Trashdome - Nexus Ops VS Neuroshima Hex

WELCOME TO TRASHDOME!

This is part of a series of bloody matches to the death. Show support for your favorite game so it will do better in the fight. You can support it by writing why you think its the better game and more importantly by betting (i.e. voting for) it. Please make it clear for when I check the bets later. You have until Friday when I tally the bets and declare the winner. I will reserve my bet for any tie-breakers.

Although you should be familiar with both games, there is no rule that says you have to have played both of them. The only rule in Trashdome is this;

Two games enter! One game leaves!

vote: Nexus Ops

Nexus Ops

Because you get cardboard hexes AND miniatures !
Seriously, the "toy factor" of Nexus Ops makes it much better.
In addition, I think that for a lighter and shorter game, symmetric forces are preferred.

I probably should vote for Nexus Ops which I enjoy a great deal but I have to say that Neuroshima Hex is an awesome game with a really interesting design. Nesus Ops feels like a bunch of other games and isn't really that different. Neuroshima Hex is a really unique game that feels like an abstract but still has heavy combat, some luck, plays quick and is really, really fun. I personally think it plays best with 2 players but 3-4 can work well if you play for points instead of hitpoints. This new edition from Z-man is awesome. It adds scenario's and a cool new board. For uniqueness in the AT world (how many AT games are mixed with abstract strategy??) alone I could vote for NH.. the fact that it is a fun game that we all enjoy just pushes it up that much further.

vote: Neuroshima Hex

Nexus Ops. It's just the right mix of fun, toy-factor and playtime in one box.

-Will

Nexus Ops. Would be perfect if they'd worked variable player powers in there. As it is, a really nice piece of work.

Plus, you can get high off smelling the figs.

I think Nexus Ops will win this contest easily, but I'm voting for Neuroshima Hex.

I really like NO. The mix of resource gathering and territory conquest, the streamlined play, work well together and I always have tons of fun playing it. However the secret objective cards are a mixed bag. WHile they remedy the problem conquest games have with game length and balance by making the conflicts less zero sum, they also feel artificial and outside the game yet in it at the same time. They dilute the experience a bit, even though all in all they are a good device that makes NO fast and streamlined.

I find Neuroshima Hex a bit more exciting and a bit more challenging. Plus its fast. My favourite kind of games involve adapting on the spot to shifting conditions, and the tile drawing in NH gives you that. There are always difficult decisions, and while there aren't dice rolls, the tile draws can be exciting. Because of the steady stream of fights in the game, falling behind sucks but it doesn't pull you out of the game. You can always go down fighting and have a decent chance at winning those fights even if you are sure to lose the game.

While some people don't like the resolution of battle and find it too abstract and puzzly, I find that the game doesn't have that problem when played face to face, as everyone at the table helps keep track of what their dudes do when. Since I only play face to face, battle resolution has always been easy (and coming from a suboptimal gamer like me that's saying something)

The best thing for me about NH is the asymmetry and fast playing time. Each army feels completely different, and this adds tons of variation (and, IMO character) to the games. The games are tight and intense and over fairly quickly.

Vote: Neuroshima Hex!

VOTE: Nexus Ops

When people begin talking about a good multiplayer AT conflict game that plays in a short amount of time---I'm amazed this doesn't come up more often. Ken is right that variable powers might have been a fun expansion for this game...but it is fun by itself. And you can get non-players up and going very quickly. Esp for people that have played Axis and Allies, this game hits the spot and is a blast. And you can play it again...it is short without seeming to play as a short game.

Vote: Nexus Ops

It's like StarCraft! (the PC game) Especially if you replace the lame resource chits with blue acrylic crystals. It's also nice and cartoony in a cool and charming way, like SNES games.

It even SMELLS like an alien world, which was a nice touch, I think.

Vote: Nexus Ops

NH is alright. Nexus Ops is a near perfect distillation of the classic dudes on a map formula, boiled down to quick hit off the pipe.

I remember getting this package from AH at Atlanta Game Factory. It was a couple of little demo pieces for some of their then-upcoming games. One of them was a little mini-A&A:D-DAY thing, kind of a tiny version of the game with pieces from it. The other was a miniature version of NEXUS OPS. I saw those day-glo pieces and thought, as any sane person would, WTF.

So we played the little demo, and I immediately thought "Hey, this is really kind of cool". It was pretty much a reduction of the A&A style DoaM game to something really tight and quick.

Then the game came out, and I adored it. I still do. I think it stands as one of the top AT designs out there, a smart way to present a lot of game into a very small package. There's some real brilliance in the design- any game that has short-term objective cards likely owes a debt of gratitude to NEXUS OPS. Plus it's got character to boot- I only wish there was an expansion and that the cardboard pieces were nicer.

But NEUROSHIMA HEX is good- it's more of a thinky, bordering-on-abstract game but it does have plenty of executive theme (remember that awesome fluff story with all the "fucks" and "shits" in the original rulebook?) and it's a really well done game for what it is. It's pretty ruthless and bloody too. I liked the game enough to import 30 copies of it from Ignacy back before Zev picked it up...at one time, I was the sole source of copies in the US. I sold both Aldie and Greg Schloesser their copies. And they even got free Michael Barnes autographs.

But it's definitely going to be NEXUS OPS. It's one of the best AT games of the modern movement.

Vote: Nexus Ops

I have to go with Nexus Ops on this one. As many others have said, it's basically all the joy of beating the crap out of your opponents' armies in any DOAM game distilled down to it's basic essence and crammed into a sixty minute game.

I don't actually much like Neuroshima Hex. It's okay, but there's far too much time spent going "right, this hits this before that attacks that but this can't kill that because that has a medic module attached to it" before every move. I can't be bothered to work it all out.

I keep reading that people refer to NO as "Neuroshima Hex lite". They're deluded.

'NH Lite' are you fucking kidding me? That's like saying "lite lite beer" or "decaf decaf coffee".

What the fuck is wrong with board gamers with this whole "lite" thing anyway? It makes me think that board gamers are these squirrely, retiring milquetoast types who whine and cry "eh, I like my games tepid and shallow, tentative seven". Jesus fucking christ, has anyone in any other medium wanted a "lite" version of a book or a record? "Oh, that movie is like 2001 Lite!" "The other day I was feeling like a simpering coward so I was listening to "Pet Sounds Lite". "I don't have the attention span for depth and scope, so I read MOBY DICK LITE instead of the real thing". God damn it, it's shit like this that makes me want to call for the destruction of thiis entire hobby.

Now I'm riled up. I couldn't really get riled up against NH, but I think this "lite" thing has done it, thanks Matt.

Michael Barnes wrote:

"I don't have the attention span for depth and scope, so I read MOBY DICK LITE instead of the real thing".

That's what audiobooks are for.