Octopus Overlords

I would say with Tommy20 and myself, Memoir '44 hits the tabletop more often than Battlelore. We'll usually break those games out when our other gaming partner can't show up, since they are set for only 2 players.

I really enjoy both games equally, although we really haven't gotten too in-depth with the Battlelore rules, especially with the use of commanders and setting up your command staff based on points. I don't think we've ever done that. I have almost everything released for Battlelore, with the exception of the last two army packs released by FFG. At some point I would like to try a few games using Call to Arms, and see how that works out.

I think we may play Memoir '44 more than Battlelore because we have a lot of fantasy-based games that we all agree to play, and Memoir '44 is about the only WWII themed game that I'm at all interested in playing. And since Tommy is a WWII nut, this gives him a chance to play with his tanks and I have a good time with it as well.

(BTW, has anyone picked up the re-release of Battle Cry? I really enjoy that game as well, but we never break it out anymore. But if you enjoy Battlelore or Memoir, you really should give it a try.)

Memoir is definitely my favorite, but I enjoy all of the C&C games. In fact, I just ordered a Hotz game mat with a C&C hexmap printed on it, for playing big games of Battle Cry & Memoir with my 6yo.

Newly posted video on Mansions of Madness. Seems really cool.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZ5mZStU5zI" target="_blank

Man, I hope I can scrape together the money for that when it comes out.

My preorder will be here in time for Octocon so I'll bring my copy with me.

Jow wrote:Newly posted video on Mansions of Madness. Seems really cool.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZ5mZStU5zI" target="_blank

Boardgame porn!

Looking way cool. This could be a problem.

Cthulhu?

Mansions of Madness looks too cool. Purchasing, for sure.

I finally bought Pandemic this weekend after my brother-in-law (and everybody else ever) raved about it. My wife and I sat down to play one intro game on Monday after work and ended up playing 4 games back-to-back. Our first game seemed like it was going really well--granted, we only had 4 epidemic cards in there. We got up to, literally, one turn away from victory. I had the five cards I needed in my hand, I was on a research station. We just needed to get through my wife's turn. I said to myself "I thought this game was supposed to be hard." And of course, she pulled the last epidemic card, chain-reaction outbreaks spiraled out of control, and we were toast. Took us three more games to get a well-earned victory. I'm really looking forward to playing this one some more!

How's On the Brink? Our regular group of friends is 5 people, so I like that it allows for five players. Does it muddy things or is it an improvement over the base game?

On the Brink is a no brainer if you really like Pandemic. It adds some great new roles, a bio terrorist game variant (which I REALLY need to play one of these days as it looks like a lot of fun), a mutating virus challenge and virulent strain option, as well as the Legendary difficulty level when you finally become masters of the game.

Pandemic is one of those games I consider a must have when it comes to board gaming.

Two Sheds wrote:How's On the Brink? Our regular group of friends is 5 people, so I like that it allows for five players. Does it muddy things or is it an improvement over the base game?

On the Brink is great value for money if you enjoy the base game -- it's basically several different expansions for the price of one. It also includes some handy petri dishes and stickers for virus storage:

coopasonic wrote:

Jow wrote:Newly posted video on Mansions of Madness. Seems really cool.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZ5mZStU5zI" target="_blank

Boardgame porn!

wow, i just checked the shipping date on my pre-order (still late march) and noticed that the price has gone up from the 50.37 I was charged when I put in my order to 79.99 now.

hepcat wrote:

coopasonic wrote:

Jow wrote:Newly posted video on Mansions of Madness. Seems really cool.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZ5mZStU5zI" target="_blank

Boardgame porn!

wow, i just checked the shipping date on my pre-order (still late march) and noticed that the price has gone up from the 50.37 I was charged when I put in my order to 79.99 now.

I'm seeing the price all over the place on the Intraweb. BGG has a link to place selling for $49.95 preoder through CLS games (whoever they are)

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/ ... of-madness" target="_blank

The recommended retails price was $79.95 a couple of days ago.

http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_ ... 136&esem=2" target="_blank

If it gives as much game as Descent does only the games have a nice random element to them then $80 is worth it and I'll likely get it on impulse.

Though I'm tempted to preorder right now for the $49.95 (+$13.95 for shipping)

It may be time to look because I

WANT

Edit:

It may be time for a huge purchase at Funagain to get free shipping on this as a preorder.

Odd...FunAgain indicates it should ship for free...but when I go through the checkout they're charging me $11 to ship it.

EDIT $50 in stock and $150 out of stock or pre-order? Highly dubious.

Smoove_B wrote:EDIT $50 in stock and $150 out of stock or pre-order? Highly dubious.

That's why I said a huge order.

LordMortis wrote:

Smoove_B wrote:EDIT $50 in stock and $150 out of stock or pre-order? Highly dubious.

That's why I said a huge order.

$150 is nothing for a boardgame order. Let me know if you need any tips. I survived my wife noticing a much larger order.

How's the fridge running?

Just use CoolStuff Inc. They ship free on orders over $100. If I decide I can afford it, I'll probably be getting Mansions, the new D&D game, and some other small one.

I just remembered an email I received from funagain announcing that they're keeping the free shipping on orders 50 dollars or more open until the end of february.

go get 'em, boys.

hepcat wrote:I just remembered an email I received from funagain announcing that they're keeping the free shipping on orders 50 dollars or more open until the end of february.

go get 'em, boys.

Doesn't work on pre-orders but the $150 does.

Right now I'm thinking:

1Robber Knights
1Airships
1Thebes
1Citadels
1Incan Gold
1Mansions Of Madness

Total: $136.97

= free close to free shipping though I'm not sure I want all of these games.

I'm going to go to thinking and researching mode when I get home.

Thebes is awesome.

hep, you are the man. Thanks for the headsup. A friend of mine is considering picking up the new Summoner Wars factions and I'm thinking of grabbing some shiznit myself.

Jow wrote:hep, you are the man. Thanks for the headsup. A friend of mine is considering picking up the new Summoner Wars factions and I'm thinking of grabbing some shiznit myself.

my local gamestore has been dropping the ball lately. I ordered the reinforcement packs for summoner wars twice now and both times they forgot to put in the order. i may have to break down and order them online.

theohall wrote: Currenlty leaning towards DungeonQuest.

Well, what was your choice? Impressions? I've got some birthday money to burn and I was looking at DungeonQuest, mostly because it can be played solo. I also had my eye on the Tailsman remake, but wasn't feeling totally sold on that either. DungeonQuest looked very much it would play similar to a roguelike PC game - which I think is hilarious. I read the reviews posted here back in September but I was curious of what you thought.

Smoove_B wrote:

theohall wrote: Currenlty leaning towards DungeonQuest.

Well, what was your choice? Impressions? I've got some birthday money to burn and I was looking at DungeonQuest, mostly because it can be played solo. I also had my eye on the Tailsman remake, but wasn't feeling totally sold on that either. DungeonQuest looked very much it would play similar to a roguelike PC game - which I think is hilarious. I read the reviews posted here back in September but I was curious of what you thought.

Get it! Get it! DungeonQuest is all kinds of awesome. It does play as a Roguelike game. The premise, as you know, is that you have up to four adventurers trying to get in, get treasure from a dragon's horde, and get the hell out. But the encounters in route are old-school crazy. There is literally an encounter card (with multiple copies in the deck!) which has the following effect: "Make an armor roll. If you fail, you die." No roll for damage, nothing - you straight up die. You could literally fail one roll on your first encounter and die, game over.

It is crazy hilarious. My buddies and I played it twice - each time out of the four of us, only one made it out alive, and it could easily have been zero both times.

DQ is perfect filler, particularly if you can leave it out while playing another game and come back. Games can take 15 minutes or more like 45 minutes, it just depends on the luck of the draw. It is fairly hilarious but don't expect any real strategy to it.

My wife pre-ordered Mansions of Madness for me in October because it was slated for Christmas. Coolstuff should still have the order and be ready to send it once it hits. All signs point to early March at the moment. That video made me feel extremely excited for the game - it looks like the closest thing to Cthulhu RPG that you can get without hours and hours of play and 3-4 people.

I might just pre-order the upcoming Wizards of the Coast "mystery" Ameritrash game Conquest of Nerath that is coming out in late June. The price, ATM is $50 and I know it will jump up like Wrath of Ashardalon and Mansions of Madness did. Unfortunately, there are very few details regarding the game at the moment, so it is hard to tell if a pre-order is worth it.

The "lite" concept and the fact that it can be played relatively quickly is a huge draw. For a once a month or so game night, there really is tremendous value in games that don't take 15 minutes to explain and 90 minutes to play.

And yes, after watching that video about Mansions of Madness, all I could think of was that it seemed like the closest thing to playing a Cthulhu RPG that I've seen. That alone makes me want to play.

I think I'm looking forward to painting those Mountains of Madness miniatures more than playing the game itself.

DungeonQuest is in my hands -- thanks Amazon Prime. My immediate impression upon opening the box and looking at all the tiles and cards is that the game was designed for much smaller people.

I ordered the D&D Wrath of Ashardalon and some miniatures which should arrive late next week. I love the theme of Castle Ravenloft and how it plays like D&D on a board. But it appears like they've worked on some of the criticisms about having too few items in the treasure deck and it'll be interesting to see what else they've improved.

Zarathud wrote:I ordered the D&D Wrath of Ashardalon and some miniatures which should arrive late next week. I love the theme of Castle Ravenloft and how it plays like D&D on a board. But it appears like they've worked on some of the criticisms about having too few items in the treasure deck and it'll be interesting to see what else they've improved.

They also mentioned that they worked in some "friendly" encounters. They had a few copies out at D&D Experience two weeks ago, but unfortunately my schedule was so full I didn't have a chance to get to play around with it.

Yeah, they added some "protect the villagers" cards which is nice. They also seem to have beefed up the game with certain special "chambers" that actually have a gameplay effect (rather than just being pretty). By all accounts, WoA looks to be a tad more refined that CR. I hope they do release a way to "update" CR with some of the improvements.

I expect the fan-made adventures will soon be mixing both games. Since it's Wizards of the Coast, I expect they'll expand the games in whatever way will maximize their profits.

I set the WayBack Machine and have been playing Tunnels and Trolls solo dungeons at work all weekend...

Chaosraven wrote:I set the WayBack Machine and have been playing Tunnels and Trolls solo dungeons at work all weekend...

ah, my first rpg. i remember how up in arms folks were at the time because the elves were tall.

Sewers of Oblivion was my favorite.

hepcat wrote:

Chaosraven wrote:I set the WayBack Machine and have been playing Tunnels and Trolls solo dungeons at work all weekend...

ah, my first rpg. i remember how up in arms folks were at the time because the elves were tall.

Sewers of Oblivion was my favorite.

Oh That Healing Feeling!

What's so funny is I had quite forgotten how brutal some of these were... I lost five guys at the entrance of #4 Naked Doom before lucky number Six got away from the archers. He was of course utterly disintegrated by a HellBomb Burst leading a team of heroes in #7 Overkill. Hee hee hee. Luckily I have both an excess of free time and scratch paper at work.

Another gaming weekend!

We played:

Empire Builder: Old school rail game. It's fun, but I wouldn't want to play it too much. The beginning is achingly slow, and the end comes too fast.

Pandemic: Showed my friends how to play, what a great theme for a game. In the intro game, we ran out of player cards on my turn, had 7 Outbreaks, *and* had 6 cities with 3 disease cubes. Holy crap was that close.

Dominion: Great fun with this one. I need to lay off a bit, methinks. I've been playing a lot lately.

Chaos in the Old World: YAY! I finally got to break this out Saturday night. I've had the game since it came out, and had played it exactly once. I played Slaanesh. Man, he has some tough followers. Khorne did his thing, mainly avoiding me since I had 2 Defense Seductresses early. He pounded on Nurgle in Brettonia, but we lost when he needed to kill 2 Nurgle Cultists there in the turn the region was ruined, and he rolled all 1s and 2s on all 5 dice. The huge 13 points Nurgle received was enough to shoot him up the VP chart to a easy win. Next time, we'll do better. Unfortunately, our 4th reliable player is going away for a year...

A great weekend!

Spent tonight unboxing Wrath of Ashardalon and the Cosmic Conflict expansion for Cosmic Encounter (now with 7 players!). I won't get to play Wrath until Tuesday.

Played a game of Castle Panic with my family last night. We got utterly destroyed. It was not pretty.

After that I played a 2.5 hour game of D&D using the new Virtual Tabletop software. It was a lot of fun. Still in beta, and the bugs and warts are obvious, but it really has a good feel of playing tabletop D&D remotely.