Octopus Overlords

Legendary Encounters? If so, the only thing that series shares with Ascension is that they're both deck builders. Other than that, night and day.

YK, get LE: Predator. We played Sunday and had a blast. I think they upped the game with even more ingenious card abilities that make you feel like you're playing through the movies. Absolutely loved it.

He may be confusing the DC Deck Building game with Legendary. I think DC and Ascension are built on the same engine.

Our Imperial Assault campaign is progressing nicely. We played two missions last night. The first mission could have gone either way right up till the end. It was a timed mission and the Rebels managed to complete their objective on their second to last activation of the final round.

The second mission was brutal for the Rebels. Early on, I managed to surround their Jedi with my Elite Royal Guards and pretty much took him out in one round. After that, the rest of the Rebels ran for the first objective. Opening the door to the data chamber summoned three pretty powerful units, which I assumed would wipe the three remaining Rebels in short order. Unfortunately, their solider character had recently upgraded to get a Blast ability, which basically does AOE damage on every hit. She rolled perfectly and since my newly summoned units were all bunched up, they got destroyed before they could even activate.

After that little setback I just did a full on death march with my two Royal Guard squads. Two by two they marched up the corridors towards the rebels, cutting down each character as they got to them. The Wookie was the only character with enough defense to really stand up to them and he decided to make a mad dash for the final objective. Unfortunately, I had saved enough deployment points to throw down a minigun in the final corridor and just obliterated him.

Fun times.

hentzau wrote:He may be confusing the DC Deck Building game with Legendary. I think DC and Ascension are built on the same engine.

Hmm - I watched a bit of the Table Top of the Legendary: Marvel game and it seemed very similar to Ascension. Are Legendary and Legendary Encounters different? For some reason, I always thought they were just themed version of the same game.

Ascension and Legendary: Marvel are extremely different deck builders. The latter is a coop first and foremost. As is the Legendary Encounter series. The only thing that Legendary shares with Ascension is the basic concept of buying cards from a small collection of 5 cards in a center "trade row" (which Star Realms/Cthulhu Realms also does), and the basic deck builder mechanic. Other than that, night and day.

Legendary Encounters l is different than the Legendary: Marvel series through the better application of theme, in my opinion. But they share the same basic mechanic. The biggest change in the LE series is that cards travel down a series of rows face down, rather than face up (which is what Legendary Marvel does); and you play a specific character.

I would say Ascension is closer to Thuderstone in terms of gameplay. The center line of cards (the "City") is more or less the Thunderstone Dungeon and the Legendary HQ area is the Thunderstone town or merchant area. In the same way that cards can affect the City, there are cards that can affect the Dungeon.

With Ascension, that line of cards just rotates new cards to be purchased - at least in the base game; I've never played through expansions. I'd also say Ascension plays much faster than both Legendary and Thunderstone. Ascension is indeed going to be more like Star Realms (or Epic - being delivered to me today, incidentally). I like Ascension it's clean and quick. Legendary is fun but I think you really need to like the theme. For Marvel my buddy isn't really all that into the comic book heroes, so the gameplay isn't nearly as compelling.

That's what is so cool about the deck builders -- if you don't like one particular game it's still possible you'll enjoy another one because it's been tweaked or adjusted.

One game of Legendary Encounters: Alien and I couldn't see myself returning to Legendary: Marvel.

Smoove_B wrote:That's what is so cool about the deck builders -- if you don't like one particular game it's still possible you'll enjoy another one because it's been tweaked or adjusted.

Nightfall! All player interaction, all the time!!1!1

I wish I'd been able to find a more receptive crowd for that one in Chicago. I liked it, but it just never clicked for most folks here.

Yeah, I'm in the same spot with Marvel Legendary. The box is huuuuge so I'm not going to run out and get the Aliens version until I can offload the Marvel one. I like the Marvel theme but it's not something I'd play solo. Nightfall broke my mind. Watching videos of Netrunner had the same result.

I did learn how to play Pokemon this summer, so I finally have that going for me.

Netrunner I can see being a brain breaker. Nightfall isn't that difficult.

Isgrimnur wrote:Netrunner I can see being a brain breaker. Nightfall isn't that difficult.

Nightfall is more complicated than any of the other deckbuilders mentioned here except Netrunner. Now that's not saying a whole lot as most deckbuilders are pretty damn simple, but it is still more complicated.

Smoove_B wrote:Yeah, I'm in the same spot with Marvel Legendary. The box is huuuuge so I'm not going to run out and get the Aliens version until I can offload the Marvel one.

I cannot stress enough how different the games feel. You will never feel like Legendary Encounters is just a clone of Legendary: Marvel. So buying into Legendary Encounters now won't make you feel like you're just buying the same game twice if you own Marvel.

p.s. for my money, the best deckbuilder out there is still Core Worlds. It honestly feels like a 4X game.

Marvel Legendary is light and fun. Legendary Encounters is dark and deadly. You are never hurt in Marvel. You are constantly in fear of dying in Encounters. For being the same system, it is a completely different game.

I'm definitely going to pick up LE: Predator at some point, but was hoping to beat all the Alien scenarios first. That may be a tall order considering my skill level.

I love the game though. The only deck builder I've played is the Lord of the Rings Living Card Game, and while I enjoyed it for the most part, that game is SO damn fiddly in terms of action order. Combined with having to strategize to make the best deck, it was just too stressful.

I think the best thing about the LE series is the mechanic of building the deck while you're playing instead of before you play. It offsets that "min/max" paranoia by letting you react to the current conditions, not what may happen.

One of the better changes in LE: Predator is that they push you to coordinate far more than they do in Alien. Many situations that are brought about by the cards, as well as powers granted by role cards, actually demand that you use coordinate.

...and yes, there is a card called "Sexual Tyrannosaurus".

It's more of a space issue at this point. I've already completely filled two ~6' tall cabinets with board games and associated bits. Everything I've read about the Legendary Aliens and Predator games makes them sound fantastic.

hepcat wrote:...and yes, there is a card called "Sexual Tyrannosaurus".

Dammit. Must...make...room.

YellowKing wrote:Lord of the Rings Living Card Game, and while I enjoyed it for the most part, that game is SO damn fiddly in terms of action order. Combined with having to strategize to make the best deck, it was just too stressful.

Yup. I like the art, love the theme and general feel of playing. But unless you know how to craft a deck or pick the right teams we found that beating a particular mission can be downright impossible unless you draw the right card at exactly the right time. That's not fun. It's another one I'll need to unload -- and my entire untouched set of the Shadows of Mirkwood campaign. Waaaay too fiddly for casual players.

YellowKing wrote:The only deck builder I've played is the Lord of the Rings Living Card Game, and while I enjoyed it for the most part, that game is SO damn fiddly in terms of action order. Combined with having to strategize to make the best deck, it was just too stressful.

That's a different definition of deck builder for anyone watching at home.

Deck drafting is probably the term you want to use for LotR living card game.

Forgot to report, I got in a game of Steampunk Rally on Monday. Fun, light little race game where you build out crazy racing machines using card drafting and power them using a dice rolling/worker placement mechanism.

Everyone starts with a hand of 4 cards that contains a power source, a connector, a movement source, and a boost card. Your vehicle starts with a cockpit and a second component that do different things, based on the historical inventor you are playing (I hadn't heard of about 6 of the inventors in the game, they do provide nice little biographies of them in the rulebook.) You choose one of the cards and pass the other 3 to the next person. You either place the card into your invention through legal connectors on the cards, or discard it to get cogs or power dice (three colors of dice, that represent steam, electricity or fire). After all cards are either played or discarded, you then move on to the venting phase.

During venting, you vent the dice that are currently placed on your invention by spending cogs to reduce the pips on the dice. You can only use a part of your invention if the fuel space on the card is empty.

Then you race! You roll any dice that are in your power pool that you had obtained during the drafting phase, and place them on spots on your invention. Based on the spot you place it on, you either generate movement points, cogs, more dice, armor for your invention, etc. Any additional dice that you generate get rolled immediately and placed onto your invention causing more effects. Any movement points are spent immediately, and moving over certain terrain spaces can cause damage to your invention. If you go into negative points for your vehicle, you have to lose parts of your vehicle during the damage phase. Vehicle to make it furthest across the finish line is the winner.

Enjoyed this a lot on our first play. It was a 3 player race, and including learning we got in a game in about 2 hours. The creators recommend playing the game simultaneously, where everyone vents and powers and races at the same time. I can see where this would be necessary in an eight player game to keep the game from getting bogged down, but it was fun to see how the other players were able to put together "engines," so to speak, that generated the power needed to move their vehicle. I ended up losing this game by 2 spaces...it came down to Tom's last power roll and he rolled double 6's which gave him lots of movement right at the end.

Saturday was a card and dice day for Seppe and I. We had signed up for a mini Dice Masters tournament at our FLGS and showed up earlier in the day for some other gaming opportunities. To that end, we were able to play:

Epic (2 games) - The first game we played the sealed deck variant (deal 30 cards to each player and off you go). We really enjoyed it, but agreed that the draft variant (two players draw 4 cards at a time and select from those in a specific manner) was better. So that was our second game. Unfortunately, we had someone who begged to join us and who turned out to be a power player/whiner (Him: You guys are ganging up on me! Us: Then don't freakin' play a card that can potentially take out a player in one turn, for christ's sake!), when we just wanted to play casually and have fun. From now on, I'm going to be a bit more selective about who I play with with head to head games.

Anyway, the game was quite fun. Almost every card is ridiculously overpowered...but that's why it's so much fun. There's nothing like having someone throw a 20 point attack at you...only to find that you've got a card that wipes out his entire attack party that you've been hanging onto until now. While I can see that might put off some players, I really enjoyed it for the silliness factor. We had quite a few good laughs over some of the card effects. Since there are over 120 cards (with the kickstarter, that is) and they're all different, we barely saw half of them in our two games. I can't speak to its longevity as it might grow stale after the newness of the cards wears off. But for now, I give it two thumbs up. It's just too bad the rules are really, really badly written. But that's why Boardgamegeek.com is around!

Then we played the other player's game, Don't Turn Your Back. A work placement/deck builder with a horror theme. It was...okay. But I doubt I'll play it again. Simply put: you place your cards on various tracks that give you either victory points or more cards, or spaces that allow you to use the special abilities that are on the more expensive cards. At the end, whoever has the most VP (or "candles" as they call it) wins. It was a bit lighter than I'd like for a game with that much work though.

After that, I took dead last in the Dice Master tournament. But I did get a super rare card during the drafting, so...WINNAH!

I love DM. Especially the comic themed version. It fixes most of the problems I had with Quarriors (at the expense of becoming a two player game though). I love trying to figure out the best power combos for my team, while still trying to stay thematic.

Finally, we whipped out Ashes. The more I play this one, the more I like it. It's such an elegant mix of resource and hand management, while still allowing for meaningful head to head confrontation.

I wish I'd had a chance to play with the new factions I picked up for Doomtown: Reloaded. But next time, I hope.

My son picked up Quarriors for his birthday this week. I recommended it to him just based on how much I'd seen it mentioned here.

We've only had time for one play so far. It took a while to get through the rules, but once you get through that, it's a pretty easy game to play. We both enjoyed it quite a bit and will probably play a few more times tonight.

I just got Firefly from my sister for my birthday. I have played this like 3 times, and really enjoy it. We have all the expansions, and have played it with almost all of them every time.

Look forward to getting this on the table very soon in the future.

paulbaxter wrote:My son picked up Quarriors for his birthday this week. I recommended it to him just based on how much I'd seen it mentioned here.

We've only had time for one play so far. It took a while to get through the rules, but once you get through that, it's a pretty easy game to play. We both enjoyed it quite a bit and will probably play a few more times tonight.

Try Dice Masters. I know that being a CCG type of game is a huge turnoff for most people, but all you really need is a 20 dollar starter and a few boosters. If you like it, you can split a gravity feed with someone for 30 bucks or less and get most of the other cards/dice you'd need for a set.

Although it's really just a two player game, I think Dice Masters improves on almost every aspect of Quarriors. So much so that I sold off all my Quarriors stuff at Gencon this year.

RMC wrote:I just got Firefly from my sister for my birthday. I have played this like 3 times, and really enjoy it. We have all the expansions, and have played it with almost all of them every time.

Look forward to getting this on the table very soon in the future.

Happy Birthday!

I have almost everything for Firefly (the latest expansion is the only thing I'm missing...but I don't think it's in stores yet anyway) and really need to play it again soon. The only thing that turns me off playing it with more than two is the time it takes.

I must have been missing something with Dice Masters, I tried the Avengers vs X-Men version and it kind of left me cold. Not sure if I got the rules right. But it seems like a great game to play with my son though.

I also have a starter and some boosters of the D&D set. I should probably give that one a try too.

hepcat wrote:

paulbaxter wrote:My son picked up Quarriors for his birthday this week. I recommended it to him just based on how much I'd seen it mentioned here.

We've only had time for one play so far. It took a while to get through the rules, but once you get through that, it's a pretty easy game to play. We both enjoyed it quite a bit and will probably play a few more times tonight.

Try Dice Masters. I know that being a CCG type of game is a huge turnoff for most people, but all you really need is a 20 dollar starter and a few boosters. If you like it, you can split a gravity feed with someone for 30 bucks or less and get most of the other cards/dice you'd need for a set.

Although it's really just a two player game, I think Dice Masters improves on almost every aspect of Quarriors. So much so that I sold off all my Quarriors stuff at Gencon this year.

RMC wrote:I just got Firefly from my sister for my birthday. I have played this like 3 times, and really enjoy it. We have all the expansions, and have played it with almost all of them every time.

Look forward to getting this on the table very soon in the future.

Happy Birthday!

I have almost everything for Firefly (the latest expansion is the only thing I'm missing...but I don't think it's in stores yet anyway) and really need to play it again soon. The only thing that turns me off playing it with more than two is the time it takes.

I actually like the longer games, not sure why. I really love the Space Themed games as well. So Eclipse is one of my favorites, and we play that one fairly often. Hepcat is going to indoctrinate me into Star Trek Attack Wing when I come out to Chicago.

RMC wrote:

hepcat wrote:

paulbaxter wrote:My son picked up Quarriors for his birthday this week. I recommended it to him just based on how much I'd seen it mentioned here.

We've only had time for one play so far. It took a while to get through the rules, but once you get through that, it's a pretty easy game to play. We both enjoyed it quite a bit and will probably play a few more times tonight.

Try Dice Masters. I know that being a CCG type of game is a huge turnoff for most people, but all you really need is a 20 dollar starter and a few boosters. If you like it, you can split a gravity feed with someone for 30 bucks or less and get most of the other cards/dice you'd need for a set.

Although it's really just a two player game, I think Dice Masters improves on almost every aspect of Quarriors. So much so that I sold off all my Quarriors stuff at Gencon this year.

RMC wrote:I just got Firefly from my sister for my birthday. I have played this like 3 times, and really enjoy it. We have all the expansions, and have played it with almost all of them every time.

Look forward to getting this on the table very soon in the future.

Happy Birthday!

I have almost everything for Firefly (the latest expansion is the only thing I'm missing...but I don't think it's in stores yet anyway) and really need to play it again soon. The only thing that turns me off playing it with more than two is the time it takes.

I actually like the longer games, not sure why. I really love the Space Themed games as well. So Eclipse is one of my favorites, and we play that one fairly often. Hepcat is going to indoctrinate me into Star Trek Attack Wing when I come out to Chicago.

Xia. You need to play Xia.

hentzau wrote:I must have been missing something with Dice Masters, I tried the Avengers vs X-Men version and it kind of left me cold. Not sure if I got the rules right. But it seems like a great game to play with my son though.

I also have a starter and some boosters of the D&D set. I should probably give that one a try too.

The first time I played it, I hated it. Seppe and I were trying to play it like it was Quarriors though. But it has a few subtle differences that can make the dice movement feel less than intuitive coming from its predecessor. Redwarlord and I sat down one day and devoted an afternoon to it though and it finally clicked with us. After that, I understood why they do things like having character dice go the used pile if unblocked, but to the prep area when KO'd (it's for the sake of balance); something that bugged us the first time we played.

And the D&D Dice Master set really is fantastic. The system lends itself perfectly to the format in terms of theme. I'm trying to find a gravity feed at a decent price right now, as a matter of fact.

Oh my god, how did I not know Xia, existed? That looks very good.

Thanks for the suggestion!

I like Dice Masters...


click to hugify

RMC wrote:Oh my god, how did I not know Xia, existed? That looks very good.

And it is fantastic.

coopasonic wrote:I like Dice Masters...

Seppe and I just got our gravity feed for War of Light yesterday from coolstuff, along with the collector boxes and starter sets. I pulled a super rare Black Lantern Superman during a rainbow draft tournament on Saturday, too.

I had thought about getting the Zen boxes (which I believe you have in that photo), but the collector boxes seem to hold more for a better price. Although I do prefer the look of it all in yours.

Still waiting for my Zen bins to arrive.

We started with Quarriors as well and I think I do like the Dice Master system a bit more.

hepcat wrote: I had thought about getting the Zen boxes (which I believe you have in that photo), but the collector boxes seem to hold more for a better price. Although I do prefer the look of it all in yours.

Yeah, those are the Zen Bins. I have one Collector's box, but I like the flexibility of the Zen Bins. With more Collector's boxes I would have been ok, but I can travel a little more compactly with Zen bins. Storing everything would take about the same space.

I am trying to avoid buying more Dice Masters unless I start really playing it. It's hard to resist all those pretty dice!

RMC wrote:Oh my god, how did I not know Xia, existed? That looks very good.

Thanks for the suggestion!

I'll have my copy at OctoCon...

hepcat wrote:

hentzau wrote:I must have been missing something with Dice Masters, I tried the Avengers vs X-Men version and it kind of left me cold. Not sure if I got the rules right. But it seems like a great game to play with my son though.

I also have a starter and some boosters of the D&D set. I should probably give that one a try too.

The first time I played it, I hated it. Seppe and I were trying to play it like it was Quarriors though. But it has a few subtle differences that can make the dice movement feel less than intuitive coming from its predecessor. Redwarlord and I sat down one day and devoted an afternoon to it though and it finally clicked with us. After that, I understood why they do things like having character dice go the used pile if unblocked, but to the prep area when KO'd (it's for the sake of balance); something that bugged us the first time we played.

And the D&D Dice Master set really is fantastic. The system lends itself perfectly to the format in terms of theme. I'm trying to find a gravity feed at a decent price right now, as a matter of fact.

Some evening I need to sit down with you and have you thrash me, I mean teach me how to play.

I will also have Eclipse, Emergence Event (compared to Mage Knight in space) and X-Wing. My brother-in-law has thrown himself into squad building. My copy of Tiny Epic Galaxies arrived yesterday, too!

hentzau wrote: Some evening I need to sit down with you and have you thrash me, I mean teach me how to play.

I'll bring a collector's box or two to Octocon then.

hepcat wrote:

hentzau wrote: Some evening I need to sit down with you and have you thrash me, I mean teach me how to play.

I'll bring a collector's box or two to Octocon then.

/whimper

It does all seem counter-intuitive at first but (like hepcat said) after a couple of plays you should get the flow and see how it makes sense. The combat part works a lot like combat in Magic.

What I really like is how the card powers thematically mirror the characters they represent. For example: in the Justice League set, if Deadman is knocked out of play, you get to take one of the other dice (characters) that was knocked out and reroll it. If it comes up with a character face, you can put it in play. So Deadman does what Deadman does best: he leaps from body to body.

Of course, it really works best if you're an old comic book nerd. I can see where that wouldn't impress someone otherwise.