OO Boardgamers, what did you play this weekend?

hepcat · Post by **hepcat** » Mon May 18, 2015 11:28 am

The huge number of characters is a blessing and a curse, I will say. I know set up is a bitch for us thanks to having to toss all those tokens onto the table and start searching. I tried organizing them by age, but that ended up falling to the wayside after a few games.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Mon May 18, 2015 11:35 am

Chaosraven wrote:XCom

You bought XCom and no invitation to play came to me?

I haven't bought a game since I don't know when as gaming seems to have gone by wayside. I've really, really, really been trying to force myself out of the house to Canton Board Game League and I made my first ever Great Oak Board Game Day. I'm think I'm going to try and make that as regular as I can as well. If I can those two habitual, I'll have two Saturdays a month that I'll start playing games again. We'll see how that goes. I get pretty well wrapped up in being a hermit and blowing off house chores to make commitment of more than say, an hour or two ahead of time.

Chaosraven · Post by **Chaosraven** » Mon May 18, 2015 12:30 pm

LordMortis wrote:
Chaosraven wrote:XCom
You bought XCom and no invitation to play came to me?

Picked it up Sunday, haven't even opened it or downloaded the required App.

Chaz · Post by **Chaz** » Mon May 18, 2015 1:10 pm

I thought about doing the age thing, but aren't there only a few ages, and you'd still be sorting through a bunch to find the one you want? By number keeps everything more manageable.

The official page has printouts and instructions for a foamboard tray insert.

baelthazar · Post by **baelthazar** » Mon May 18, 2015 1:17 pm

hepcat wrote:You do realize that the game has multiple official variants, right? There's a really simple one in the basic rules that just has you pepper the playing board with tokens that act as objectives and/or rewards, instead of playing with full blown labyrinths. I suggest using that one for teaching the game.

But honestly, I never even thought the more advanced game variant was all that hard either.

Well, not for me (as a hardcore video and board gamer). But for my gaming group, who grew up with Risk and such (and who I had to make a pamphlet for to get them to understand Twilight Imperium) ideas like "op fire" are cumbersome. My wife, she still has issues with the limited stats and item combos of Arcadia Quest, so I wouldn't want to even try DoA!

hepcat · Post by **hepcat** » Mon May 18, 2015 1:20 pm

I guess I just don't see DoAII as being any harder than Arcadia Quest even. It really is a very simple game if you play without the Labyrinths.

I can understand dumping it if the silliness of the game, or the massive component amount were the issue though.

baelthazar · Post by **baelthazar** » Mon May 18, 2015 5:52 pm

hepcat wrote:I guess I just don't see DoAII as being any harder than Arcadia Quest even. It really is a very simple game if you play without the Labyrinths.

I can understand dumping it if the silliness of the game, or the massive component amount were the issue though.

Oh now! You surely can't compare a game that has 3 stats on each card and "move, then attack" as the actions you can do to a game that has multiple phases, 10+ stats on each card, op-fire, and line of sight rules that have terrain modifiers and height advantage.

I think it is a matter of familiarity. Since DoAII borrows a lot from wargame rules (the op-fire and terrain modifiers), people who play wargames will find it automatically familiar. My wife... well she would look at that terrain modifier image and just say "nope!"

Of course, you are a huge Ignacy Trzewiczek and Vlaada Chvátil fan, so complicated and rules heavy games are sort of your wheelhouse!

On the flip side of rules heavy and complicated, I played another round of Hyperborea. Why are you people not playing this! It feels like an empire-building game but takes about 1/3rd the time. I very much enjoy each time we sit down to play it!

hepcat · Post by **hepcat** » Tue May 19, 2015 9:50 am

Sorry, didn't mean to come on strong. I just really love DoAII and hate to see someone give up on it without giving it a try.

baelthazar · Post by **baelthazar** » Tue May 19, 2015 9:40 pm

hepcat wrote:Sorry, didn't mean to come on strong. I just really love DoAII and hate to see someone give up on it without giving it a try.

I'm just busting your chops a little. But you did have me wrong - I absolutely LOVE the idea, ruleset, and components of DoAII (in fact, I sadly looked it all over before listing it). The only problem is - I can't play it solo and I don't have friends who would/could learn it!

Or maybe I just don't have friends...

TheMix · Post by **TheMix** » Tue May 19, 2015 9:51 pm

Scan/import it into Tabletop Simulator. Then get hep to play with you.

hepcat · Post by **hepcat** » Wed May 20, 2015 9:21 am

I thought I saw it on TS. I'll have to check again tonight.

Chaz · Post by **Chaz** » Wed May 20, 2015 10:20 am

I took a look this morning, and Duel of Ages 1 is on, but not 2.

There are one or two DoAII modules on Vassal though.

hepcat · Post by **hepcat** » Wed May 20, 2015 12:38 pm

Oooh...

Chaz · Post by **Chaz** » Wed May 27, 2015 10:40 am

When was the last time we've had a game with an actual street date. I've got a game order that included Specter Ops, which was a preorder. The site has shown copies of it in stock for a day or two, and the order has a tracking number, but it's apparently on hold to ship out until today, which is the actual release date.

I wouldn't mind so much except that there hasn't really been any official communication that the street date existed until this week. If you're going to have an enforced release date, wouldn't you want to let people know? The publisher's site hasn't said anything about it, and hasn't responded to questions about the release date in their own forums. Kind of weird.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Wed May 27, 2015 10:48 am

Colby posted this on the geek on 5/8, so some of us have known for almost 3 weeks.

We didn't have a street date until now because we didn't know when we could get it all the way out. The game had to be held for some additional testing to meet European standards. With more growth comes more scrutiny and we are still learning and adapting. So those who felt like this one was taking longer we're right it did get held up. It has now been cleared and has received a street date of May 27th and is moving down through distribution.

We didn't release any info as we didn't have solid info. Announcing that it was delayed indefinitely sounds far more drastic than it actually was as the whole time it was held up I kept believing it was only a few more days. Announcing that it needed more testing would make it sound like something was wrong with it when there wasn't. On top of that we havent generally announced a street date in the past. It's usually just 'in stores soon' and then it actually makes it out to stores before anyone gets TOO antsy.

Beyond all of this we are moving 5 families and a business across the country so our attention is being pulled a hundred different ways.

I hope this clears up any questions and any insults.

Chaz · Post by **Chaz** » Wed May 27, 2015 10:54 am

Ah. I think I heard that date of the 27th floating around, but didn't realize that he meant it was an enforced street date. Usually those dates are really "this is when we expect it to start showing up in stores."

Still kind of bugs me that the only official word is some forum thread on BGG instead of anything on the actual Plaid Hat site. I don't like BGG at all, so I hate having to troll through there looking for official announcements buried in forum threads.

baelthazar · Post by **baelthazar** » Wed May 27, 2015 11:03 am

Doesn't Colby have a reputation for being a little... acerbic? I know there has been past trouble between Plaid Hat and fans over a few things. I do wonder what "testing to meet European standards" means - does he mean gameplay or chemical testing on the inks or plastics?

A lot of buzz on Forbidden Stars in the last few days, so I expect a release is getting close. Apparently The Dice Tower released a fairly lackluster "gameplay video" that had several rules errors and dulled some enthusiasm, but I am still confident this one will be fun. Ah BGG, the place for arguments about minutia and spurious speculation!

Which reminds me, I really need to get back to doing review videos...

Has anyone played Imperial Settlers? I was thinking about getting it for a nice 2-player quick game but decided to go with Roll for the Galaxy instead. I still might pick it up, if the buzz here is good.

Zarathud · Post by **Zarathud** » Wed May 27, 2015 11:14 am

2 player? Get Roll. Settlers may be better with 3-4. I am a big fan of Race for the Galaxy and once beat Tom Lehmann at Origins. Drawing and playing Alien cards the entire game helped.

Chaz · Post by **Chaz** » Wed May 27, 2015 11:59 am

I think Forbidden Stars is listed as On The Boat on FFG's site, so probably soon. I may ask my wife to pick it up for me for my birthday or something. I definitely want it, but the price means I can't just impulse buy it.

hepcat · Post by **hepcat** » Wed May 27, 2015 1:46 pm

Zarathud wrote: I am a big fan of Race for the Galaxy and once beat Tom Lehmann at Origins.

If you even mention the word Galaxy in any context, he will bring this up.

I like love Roll for the Galaxy, but it's one of those games that you have to add a "ghost player" to get it to work with 2. Granted, it's a very simplistic one (you just roll a die to randomly get a role), but my gaming ADD kicks in whenever that happens. Imperial Settlers plays with 2 right out of the box with no changes. And it's a fantastic learning tool for the vastly more thematic (and hilarious at times) New Era.

p.s. Neither game will fit the "quick" niche though. They're not long, but even with 2 players, it's going to run about 45 minutes to an hour for a game.

Daveman · Post by **Daveman** » Wed May 27, 2015 2:33 pm

I picked up Colt Express to give it a try and played a 4 player game with the family. Our 5 year old joined without any problem either, although she was a mostly random element most of the game. It was a lot of fun. Kind of silly in a Roborally kind of way once your plans start to crumble and you get a little fuzzy on exactly what you programmed yourself to do.

Our last turn wound up with all of us in the same train car and it was a riot with people punching each other, shooting, and trying to grab the big cash briefcase that was dropped. We can't wait to play it again.

Unrelated news... the first big army expansions for Battlelore 2nd Edition are off the boat and should be shipping this week

baelthazar · Post by **baelthazar** » Wed May 27, 2015 2:43 pm

hepcat wrote:
Zarathud wrote: I am a big fan of Race for the Galaxy and once beat Tom Lehmann at Origins.
If you even mention the word Galaxy in any context, he will bring this up.

I like love Roll for the Galaxy, but it's one of those games that you have to add a "ghost player" to get it to work with 2. Granted, it's a very simplistic one (you just roll a die to randomly get a role), but my gaming ADD kicks in whenever that happens. Imperial Settlers plays with 2 right out of the box with no changes. And it's a fantastic learning tool for the vastly more thematic (and hilarious at times) New Era.

p.s. Neither game will fit the "quick" niche though. They're not long, but even with 2 players, it's going to run about 45 minutes to an hour for a game.

Between you an Zarathud, I am sold on getting both. Ah yes, the OO effect at its finest!

45 minutes is pretty quick for me. If a game goes less than 30 minutes, I always feel a little cheated.

Daveman · Post by **Daveman** » Wed May 27, 2015 3:43 pm

We play 2 player Roll quite a bit and agree 40ish minutes is a good average. My son favors rush building a lot and with a good setup and favorable tile draws a game can end notably faster.

baelthazar · Post by **baelthazar** » Wed May 27, 2015 4:08 pm

Good, I feel vindicated in the purchase. I was a little worried, because we are not crazy about "Race," but I hear that Roll augments all the strange symbols by giving text explanations.

I ordered from Cardhaus, because they are only 2 hours away from me, but I wonder if that was a mistake. So far I do not have a shipping notice and I would have thought it would be here in only a day.

hepcat · Post by **hepcat** » Wed May 27, 2015 4:16 pm

Yup, Roll includes a decent amount of text for each and every tile. You could pretty much ignore all the icons and still be able to play.

Moving beyond Roll, I played a ton of Dice Masters this weekend after I picked up a starter set for DC Dice Masters on Friday afternoon. Redwarlord was staying with me for the holiday weekend, so we sat down Friday night to a few games. When Seppe and I had played the Marvel version months ago, we found the movement of the dice throughout the game to be...well...somewhat counter intuitive. But after about 3 games that night, we realized exactly why they move the way they do. Future games were much more satisfying as we blocked, used global effects, and concentrated on the various nuances of the characters. I really dig it now. I ended up picking up 15 boosters on Sunday...and pulled a super rare catwoman card.

I hate collectible games, but this one is actually fun to play.

Zenn7 · Post by **Zenn7** » Sat May 30, 2015 10:22 pm

Monthly boardgaming day! (YAY!)

Ingenious (tile laying game). Couldn't quite pull off a win. Enjoyable for what it was, but not really my style.

Formula Racing game - there was a 6 year old so we played a couple easier games, this was a fun quickie.

Then we played Pickimou? (tiles numbered from 21-36 with worms, you roll 8 dice and pull the tile that ends with your final count after all your rolling). This was for the 6 year old's benefit too. Reasonably enjoyable though we mucked up one part of the rules.

Then we moved on to Temple Escape - I'd played this once and some of the others had played 1-2 times. There 3 xpacs in there, we tried to take those out and flub our way through the first game. Monumental failure. Second time we did a little better but still failed badly. Feeling this was too brutal for us, we moved on...

Then we moved on to Caverina (?) - game with dwarfs that plays like Agricola (which was not helpful for me as I'd never played that either, the others all had, and most were somewhat familiar with these rules, but not quite 100% so a few oddities here and there). We ended up having to quite about 2/3's of the way through as the owner was leaving (he did offer to let us keep playing and just bring it back next month, but I guess it's $100 game, we didn't feel right about that idea). Was having fun but definitely needed to figure out what I was doing better from the start!

So we got in a Sentinels of the Multiverse (first time every playing this). We had to quit earlier, but 5 players against Omnitron - we had him down to 51 (out of 100) and were easily cleaning up everything he and the environment put out every round. No significant player damage. Had we kept playing, we would have wiped him easily. As 2 of us were knew, the guy setting it up picked an easier villain. Enjoyable co-op, seemed really easy to play and like it would play reasonably quick but still provide some satisfaction.

As always though, a great amount of fun overall!

Defiant · Post by **Defiant** » Sun May 31, 2015 4:16 pm

Lets see, lately I've played Castles of Mad King Ludwig which was fun as usual. I also played one of the Dominion games as well as one of the flux variants.

I played The Adventurers: The Pyramid of Horus, which isn't as good as the other game of the series (Temple of Chac). The different areas feel the same, and while the moving mummies seem cool, they're little more than sentries going back and forth. The only real fun, dynamic part of the games was the roof collapsing in, which seemed to happen disproportionately in the front of the pyramid, and fairly quickly managed to seal the pyramid (I had managed to grab a couple of the more expensive treasures, so I had started heading out when I had seen a couple of stones falling in the entrance, and managed to get out just in time, unlike my competitors). Unfortunately, the stones falling is far too random to always be effective like that. Still, it has a nice adventurer atmosphere to it. I would recommend the first game over it, though - far better designed, while still giving the same atmosphere.

I played Libertalia, which was fun. The person I thought hadn't understood the rules (as they weren't paying attention when they were explained), managed to pull into first place after the second round, but quickly fell as they were attacked by everyone. I managed to do well by getting two treasure maps (and then getting a third) when I used my spanish spy, and by combining my mutineer with the voodoo witch.

And I played witness, which was lots of fun. Shame it requires four people exactly.

MythicalMino · Post by **MythicalMino** » Tue Jun 02, 2015 10:01 pm

I have discovered the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game. That is all....

Zarathud · Post by **Zarathud** » Tue Jun 02, 2015 11:19 pm

There are two box sets of Pathfinder miniatures that will get you everyone but Lem.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 9:44 am

I played Xenoshyft Onslaught with X(9) last weekend. It's fairly straightforward and offers some interesting choices, specifically in helping other players. Deciding which damage to mitigate and which damage to go through. Deciding how to order your troops in your lane and if you should get that armor or weapon or booster. Every single creature has a special power, so it's never a straight up fight. It plays a bit longer than I would like, but I enjoyed it.

hepcat · Post by **hepcat** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 9:53 am

I just saw Xenoshyft pop up on coolstuff for order. Would you recommend it? It does look fun.

Zarathud wrote:There are two box sets of Pathfinder miniatures that will get you everyone but Lem.

I've been looking for figs for the second base set, but I have had no luck so far. PACG is my go to game on a lazy saturday afternoon when no one is around for gaming and I want to have a few beers and play something other than a video game. But I'm only about halfway through the first base set.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 10:14 am

hepcat wrote:I just saw Xenoshyft pop up on coolstuff for order. Would you recommend it? It does look fun.

I think it's a little too simple/straightforward. $48 seems a bit steep to me (which is kind of funny to say since I paid $80 for it - including 2 expansions and the 5-6 player expansion pack). I'm not sure what the game would look like without all the kickstarter goodies. I think it would be pretty good for co-op fans that want something a little simpler. Though simple, it's a lot more challenging than Legendary. I'll just caveat once more that I don't know what it's like without the kickstarter stuff. I'm not a huge fan of the expansions which are just two more divisions, so ignore that, but hero cards and experimental equipment are cool and not in the game box.

Daveman · Post by **Daveman** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 5:54 pm

CSI just shipped my preorder of the two Battlelore 2nd Edition army packs! Painting incoming, then more gaming

MythicalMino · Post by **MythicalMino** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 8:28 pm

PACG was something I always had my eye on, but never pulled the trigger. I traded for it, and then quickly got the rest of the Runelords stuff, and the Skulls & Shackles base set and stuff....going to play the S&S with my wife and kids, while the Runelords will be for me solo (and friends)

Lordnine · Post by **Lordnine** » Sat Jun 06, 2015 12:01 pm

We played another game of Assassinorum: Execution Force last night. As much as I would like to say otherwise, I don’t see this one having legs in our group. It is still fun but the sameness is already setting in. That said, all the models are painted and look nice now…

MythicalMino · Post by **MythicalMino** » Sat Jun 06, 2015 8:28 pm

Wow. Finished the beginner adventure in the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game : Rise of the Runelords (Perils of the Lost Coast). Defeated Black Fang with not one turn left to spare! Just added the cards for the flirt Adventure Deck, beginning the Rise of the Runelords adventure path next.

I cannot believe how much I am enjoying this game. Tomorrow, me, my wife, and my two boys begin the Skull & Shackles game. Can't hardly wait!

TheMix · Post by **TheMix** » Sat Jun 06, 2015 11:36 pm

Tao dropped by after the Boulder get-together.

First we ran through Sentinels of the Multiverse. Gilraen joined us. Smoked the boss without breaking a sweat. Got some great cards right out of the gate. Actually took a turn or so to realize that we'd won. We were waiting for it to get difficult.

Then Tao and I tackled the first scenario in Zombicide: Rue Morgue. I'd played through the first three scenarios last weekend with my best friend. Definitely getting a better feel for the game. We won pretty easily. Got lucky on some gear cards. So far the game seems to either be really easy, or impossible. My friend and I pulled a-bombs twice on the second turn, and once on the third. We actually survived the latter. We called mulligans on the first ones. If the a-bomb pops too early, there isn't much reason to continue.

Still, it seems pretty easy to explain and play. So I'm hoping to get some more use out of it.

Defiant · Post by **Defiant** » Sun Jun 07, 2015 12:56 pm

Played Alchemist and Nations.

Alchemist is finally a logic/deduction game done right (mixed in with a worker placement design). I wont go into an explanation of the game (you can read a review for that) but it does deduction in a much more subtle and engaging way than something like Clue (it helps that there's an app to handle all the bookkeeping necessary). There are a few annoying things that mar it - randomness (of what ingredients you get and which ones you happen to test) might mean that you learn more or less, or that you might just happen to have the same ingredients you've already tested and can sell it for lots of money. I also feel like the pacing/balancing different gameplay mechanics could be better - maybe add more incentive putting theories up with incomplete information, as we were pretty much waiting until we knew what an ingredient was before making a theory on it. However, given how well this does deduction gaming, and that it's fairly unique, it's well worth it.

Nations is a civilization style game a la 7 wonders, but with more substance, and with more competition, as you're trying to race-to-the-top (or at least race to not be minimum) in several tracks (military power, stability, books). It's nicely designed and works well, but there are plenty of similar games, and given it's long length, 7 wonders is probably going to be a more popular game that'll scratch the same itch.

Daveman · Post by **Daveman** » Tue Jun 09, 2015 4:21 pm

Woo! They've just released the first big army expansions for the two factions in Battlelore 2nd Edition. There's also 3 neutral units coming that any faction can use. Now today, they've announced a whole new faction coming in two army expansions... the undead!

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/n ... re-coming/

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Sat Jun 13, 2015 8:21 pm

Other than Star Trek Catan, are there any decent Trek themed board games out there that can be played by more than two players? My kids are really starting to get into Trek, and I want to extend that into other hobbies.