What BOARD GAME(s) have you been playing?

The success of Quartermaster General in your group will likely depend on what they "normally" play. My local group loves games like Struggle of Empires that are long, involved, alliance driven, and freeform. They tried QG and it fell completely flat. (I.e., it succumbed to "Uh, that's it?" syndrome. It lasted two plays, then disappeared.) To them, it felt like seven steps backwards in conflict game design - steps that they weren't interested in taking.

QG is the lightest, beer-and-pretzelest wargame ever designed. It's as stripped down as a wargame can get. If that's what you want, it might be worth your time. I think there's even an expansion coming out?

www.kickstarter.com/projects/1459282182/...er-general-expansion

Edit: Also, as stated somewhere above, Quartermaster General doesn't have dice. In my group, a diceless wargame is a sin against God. That alone is enough to earn QG a massive shrug, and is the primary reason why Napoleon's Triumph doesn't get played - ever - even though I'm a huge fan.

Sevej wrote:

Legomancer wrote:

Sevej wrote: I found Imperial Settlers a little bit too dependent on the table meta. How's The New Era in this regard?

What do you mean by "dependent on the table meta"?

It means players have to watch other player's tableau all the time to keep the balance in check. Often, raids happen against the wrong player or, worse, not at all.

What's interesting, and I could possibly be misinterpeting the gameplay is that in TNE attacking another player's location is not a great move. In TNE each location that scores VPs puts them on the location, and once it's been scored three times, it's "done". At that point you probably want to build over it. Building over locations is also not so easy, as there are icons on the cards that need to match. when you attack a player's location and succeed, you get some stuff, they get some other stuff (usually a lesser version of what you got) and they flip the location over as rubble. However, rubble is SUPER easy to build on -- all you need to do is pay a brick, and no icon-matching -- and doing so gives you a VP. So when you kill someone's location you get some stuff, and maybe get rid of something you hated, but they get stuff, an easy-rebuild, and a VP. And in some cases they may have waned to rebuild over it anyway. So you only do that if you REALLY need those goods or if you just can't stand that location.

In IS, razing an opponent's location is, in my opinion, more hurtful. They only get a wood, and they get a foundation, but very often that location was still quite necessary. Also, in IS you are usually going to get resources out of it which can be used to build more locations, whereas in TNE, you need different things from what you usually get by razing to build locations.

Sorry if this is opaque, but hopefully it illustrates that the two games have very different angles to them. Although IS seems lighter and fluffier it is, to me, more brutal and facepunching than TNE. You most definitely need to direct razes at the proper targets and know what those targets are, and razes come much more often. It can reward brute force a lot more than TNE. This is why for me, both games are welcome on my shelves (for now) as they do different things, but I still prefer TNE both for its theme and for its different play atmosphere.

Another play last night of Merchant of Venus. Goddamn I love that game, even though I suck big fat hairy melf pelts at it. I have the FFG version, which I like, and we played the "Classic" rules. Still haven't cracked open their modified ones.

Also another 2p round of Temporum, which I'm still surprised I like. I''d love to see it with four or five and everything going nuts each round.

Legomancer wrote: Another play last night of Merchant of Venus. Goddamn I love that game, even though I suck big fat hairy melf pelts at it. I have the FFG version, which I like, and we played the "Classic" rules. Still haven't cracked open their modified ones.

I've been leery of using the modified rules, frankly. I don't want to ruin what is a fun romp, and if the modified rules don't REALLY make that even MORE fun, it's time I'll never get back. The reprint for me is good enough. If I'm wrong about this, would someone care to correct me? I promise to take no offense.

Finally tried out Star Wars: Armada. My buddy picked it up and brought it over. It is certainly pretty, I played the imperials and enjoyed looking at the Star Destroyer.

We played two games- I won the first and then flew my Star destroyer off the board on turn 6 of the 2nd game.

Things I liked:

The way squadrons worked. I liked the engagement rules and the freedom of movement the had. Felt like swarms of fighters
The dice colors and ranges and how they worked
planning orders in advance. Although I need to work on that- proved by flying off board.

Things that might grow on me/ need work
the tokens as defense (I liked them it is just going to take some gettign used to)
The 6 turn cap. Felt like the game was just getting going and it was over.
The wonky maneuver thing.

We did a bit of squad building the second game, but it was obvious we needed more ships and cards to make that work. I think the game will be fun to play once in awhile, but it will not take the place of xwing.

Does anyone have experience playing Mice and Mystics with more than 4 players? The rules cap the game at 4 players but the game includes 6 heroes and I'm curious as to how balance would be affected. Any thoughts? I figure the simplest thing would be to add 1 or 2 more minions to the encounters if things seem to be go too easy. Has anyone tried the game with more that 4 players or have any reasons as to why this might be a bad idea?

Green Lantern wrote: Does anyone have experience playing Mice and Mystics with more than 4 players? The rules cap the game at 4 players but the game includes 6 heroes and I'm curious as to how balance would be affected. Any thoughts? I figure the simplest thing would be to add 1 or 2 more minions to the encounters if things seem to be go too easy. Has anyone tried the game with more that 4 players or have any reasons as to why this might be a bad idea?

You could do it; I'm not sure how the balance would play out. We've played with one extra hero a few times and the extra hero did make it easier. We were able to do a lot more searching (and upgrading) since the hero-to-enemy ratio skewed more to the heroes' favor. Going from four to six means you essentially get two extra hero activations for free between enemy activations, and 50% more hero turns is a lot. If I were to try it I'd math out the number of minions based on how they compare to the number of heroes and increase them accordingly. For example if you place 3 roaches with 4 heroes I'd try placing 5 with 6 heroes. If you place 6 rats with 4 heroes I'd try placing 8 with 6 heroes. Etc. It would probably take some trial and error to get the scaling right. For the boss minions you can't really do this, so maybe when Captian Vurst comes out give him two rat henchmen or something thematic like that. I wouldn't think you'd have to change anything with how cheese is generated during battles.

First day of a local weekend con is in the books. It's a fundraiser for an American Cancer Society Relay for Life team so I always try to go and support it. Today I decided to be awesome and run all Nate Hayden games, so I taught and played San Quentin Kings, Cave Evil, Psycho Raiders, and Mushroom Eaters. It was glorious. Not sure much more needs to be said.

Tomorrow is wargame day, so I have a game of Successors scheduled and a full game of Memoir 44 Overlord - or the best party game to play at a con. Going to be a good weekend...

Wargame buddy came over for a rainy saturday. Usually its Combat Commander, but he wanted to play some x-wing.

played three games, with various sets of ships. last game was a IG88B&C vs 8 Tie Fighters. I figured the IGs would have no problem with the TIEs, but they managed to take out 88B with only the loss of three ships. Unfortunately, C didn't have an EPT that really helped offense (had outmaneuver) nor did it have Fire Control system. Advanced sensors worked really well, with a boost/evade prior to K-Turn, but the IG needed something to make up for poor rolling. so really it was 1 three attack vs 3 defense, vs 5 2 attacks vs 3 defense. so many missed shots, and 88C ends up dieing by running into an asteroid (barely!) rolling a crit and drawing a direct hit.

Firefly w/Blue Sun. the story where all the contact decks are depleted, and the game ends when 4 of 7 decks are are used up. I really enjoyed it, very fast and forced us to take risky jobs...simply because there weren't many jobs. He ended up making over 6k in bounties just churning supply planet cards, while I was able to make bank selling contraband to Patience (had the blue sun captain that makes more money for selling goods to contacts). probably 90 minute game for two players.

Sunday, after church some lighter games.
King of Tokyo - always fun. Wife won by killing three other players, using Urbavore and Poison Spit from Tokyo.
Smash Up - made a mistake in playing with 6 players.
Shadow Hunters - Machine Gun, Chainsaw, Handgun Valkyrie massacred three characters on the same turn to win it!

Played some games with the venerable Pete Ruth this weekend...

Pompeii - this game is pretty cool, despite some Euro-nonsense movement rules. You get to burn other players' dudes in lava, so that's a plus. Very much like a Euro Survive!.

Escape from Zombie City - I never played the original Escape but Pete likes it pretty well. This one... based on 1 play I'd have to say I won't have a second play. No thanks.

I've had Claustrophobia for years and finally got it to the table. We both really enjoyed playing both sides. Got through two scenarios and my only concern is that each one feels a bit puzzley. Great feel though and eager for more. Love the quirkiness of the world.

Finally gave Mage Knight an extended solo run. What a great puzzley epic game. My third game was ridiculous, I just steamrolled everything, wound up with 3 artifacts in my deck, and conquered the last city a full round before I needed to. It's a lot of fun figuring out the puzzle of each turn. Between deck building, skills, and new follower slots, character growth is really well handled. Most of all I think I really enjoy feeling fully engrossed in each turn.

After that my copy of Fallen arrived and I'm about to finish up my second solo game. I'm a sucker for anything choose-your-own related (I have quite a few gamebooks both in physical and digital form) so naturally I had to try this. And I'm still figuring out my reactions. Although it plays fine solo playing both sides, there aren't any surprises and I think that's a big loss. The way challenges and monsters work is pretty neat. The writing is OK...somewhat stock fantasy situations but it is fairly evocative. And the one end boss battle I've played is cool. It's not really pulling at me the way Claustrophobia or Mage Knight have though.

I would imagine Fallen would lose a lot solo. The anticipation of the narrative and back and forth rhythm brings an energy to the game that wouldn't be there.

Also, part of the fun from the Dungeon Lord's perspective is watching another human flail about in a story, trying to make the right choice and follow their path. Half throwing up roadblocks and half observing as you slowly drive by the car crash.

wadenels wrote:

Green Lantern wrote: Does anyone have experience playing Mice and Mystics with more than 4 players?

You could do it; I'm not sure how the balance would play out. We've played with one extra hero a few times and the extra hero did make it easier. We were able to do a lot more searching (and upgrading) since the hero-to-enemy ratio skewed more to the heroes' favor. Going from four to six means you essentially get two extra hero activations for free between enemy activations, and 50% more hero turns is a lot. If I were to try it I'd math out the number of minions based on how they compare to the number of heroes and increase them accordingly. For example if you place 3 roaches with 4 heroes I'd try placing 5 with 6 heroes. If you place 6 rats with 4 heroes I'd try placing 8 with 6 heroes. Etc. It would probably take some trial and error to get the scaling right. For the boss minions you can't really do this, so maybe when Captian Vurst comes out give him two rat henchmen or something thematic like that. I wouldn't think you'd have to change anything with how cheese is generated during battles.

Played through Mice and Mystics chapter 1 and we made it by the skin of our teeth. Since it was our first session and everyone had to learn the rules I didn't modify the number of minions in the encounters and I'm glad I didn't because by the time we made it to the courtyard we only needed 1 more cheese token to run out of time and lose the game. I've since read over the FAQ and realized I screwed up and made the game more challenging by forcing our band of mice into an extra encounter. According to the FAQ you do NOT face another encounter when exploring any tiles you have previously explored. I bungled that when we left the kitchen and went back to the tunnels, an area we had already cleared of minions.

We had 5 mice heroes and it took us about 2.5 hours to set up, learn the rules, and wrap it all up. I think everyone had fun and are looking forward to chapter 2. I'm gonna take Wadenels suggestion and bump the number of minions up as needed, feeling out how things are going during the session rather than trying to complicate things. If we are steamrolling the enemies I'll start adding in some extra baddies as needed, and if we are getting slaughtered I will use the minion numbers as printed on the encounter cards.

To sum up, I don't think adding in a 5th mouse impacted the difficulty at all as we still had a tough go. The only drawback to the extra player might have been a little added down time for the other players. We'll see how it works out in chapter 2.

I played Tragedy Looper for the first time tonight. I was one of the protagonists, not the mastermind. It was one of the coolest games I've played in awhile.

Had a wonderful gamenight last weekend, with 3 enthusiastic gamers.
What hit the table:

Welcome to the Dungeon (Iello)
This is hands down the best push-your luck game I have played so far.
I have always been a bit lukewarm on Inca's gold. I found it a bit repetitive and lacking depth.
This one adds that extra needed layer of bluff and psychology. It is a microgame, meaning it comes with a small deck, some cardboard mini tiles all packed inside a small box (a big plus for me, as I can carry it around easily), but there is alot of game in here for such a small amount of stuff, and the artwork is beautiful, regardless the fact I generally prefer realism over cartoony art like this. A must buy for anyone who likes tense games with some hidden information.

Mysterium (Portal)
Believe the hype. This is Dixit meets Cluedo meets alot of Polish weirdness.
The setting has you as part of an investiggator team visit a haunted house with one player controlling the spirit communicating with the other player through dreams.
If this description doesn't trigger your interest this game is not meant for you. It is an almost surreal experience, with alot of creativity needed from players to communicate with each other, and alot of group discussing. This makes it far more interactive than dixit.
The artwork nis truly wonderful and the theme really pulls this on another level. A game anyone should at least try ones,

One night werewolf (Bezier games)
After all the positive reports I wanted to try this variant of werewolf, especially since people assured me it played well with 4.
In all honesty, I was a bit underwhelmed. I felt it lacked the drama of regular werewolf, and I am pretty confident this game shines brighter with more than 4 players.
The role of the troublemaker and robber also made the game feel a bit more random, with less control of what is happening.
This is not a hughe problem for such a short game, but the fact you only have one night to manipulate the system, having a random element switch your role without any chance to counter this switch is a bit...well....weird and frustrating. Not a bad game by any stretch, and we had some good discussions while playing.
I liked the fact trying to convince/manipulate players is just as crucial here than in the vanilla version makes it a good alternative.