What BOARD GAME(s) have you been playing?

ubarose wrote: I got tricked into playing Ex Libris. What a shitty shit boring shit game. I was told it was a game about a magical library. I was lied to. OMG. The pain, the horror, the boredom!

Holy shit thank you. I hated that game. Who thought it was a good idea to have a slow, dull worker placement game where you draw all the resources out of a deck of cards? I demand answers, and possibly names/addresses of those responsible.

Ex libris felt like they had a card game in development, but couldn't figure out how to finish the design so they buried it under a sub par worker placement game in an attempt to make it interesting. It's basically top decking cards: the worker placement game.

Played Fallout with my friend tonight. Finally got all of the rules right (I think). I've decided that I really like this game, but I hate the rule books and I think some enemies just really suck to fight due their difficult die rolls that are required.

Again, thanks to getting rules correct, we ended up with TONS of enemies on the board. This made it very difficult to advance the story quests, and the game went on a LONG time. It was probably 2 1/2 hours. It dragged a bit but for the most part it was fun for the duration.

We ended up tying, and the rules provide no means for tie breaking; you just both win. I expect to be getting the expansion for Christmas, so hopefully it sees the table again very soon.

hotseatgames wrote: Played Fallout with my friend tonight. Finally got all of the rules right (I think). I've decided that I really like this game, but I hate the rule books and I think some enemies just really suck to fight due their difficult die rolls that are required.

Again, thanks to getting rules correct, we ended up with TONS of enemies on the board. This made it very difficult to advance the story quests, and the game went on a LONG time. It was probably 2 1/2 hours. It dragged a bit but for the most part it was fun for the duration.

We ended up tying, and the rules provide no means for tie breaking; you just both win. I expect to be getting the expansion for Christmas, so hopefully it sees the table again very soon.

The first time I played Divinity Derby we tied. And nothing in the book about a tie breaker. Seriously, WTF.

Some more late night solo gaming with Skies Above the Reich. Been playing some of the more advanced scenarios.

Last night I hired on some auxiliary fighters to help out my innate squadron. They were flying Bf-110s which are weaker fighters but that was not to be their role. I loaded them up with bombs with the intention of dropping them into the B17 formation and loosening up their formation making it less deadly for my main attack pilots. This was an actual tactic used by the Luftwaffe. Something I didn't know before playing this game.

Anyway, I got lucky and the bombs not only dispersed two elements of the formation (An element is a group of 3 planes in the larger formation of 12 planes or more), but actually destroyed one of the bombers. Now, you don't get VP for the hand of fate helping you out like that but it does make the attack go easier.

The subsequent attack I went full on aggressive with mixed results. I did destroy three bombers, my new record for one mission, but at the cost of three dead pilots and two wounded.

The highlight was my ace pilot making a pass and doing some minimal damage but then being hit himself which caused him to collide into a bomber like a fiery comet and destroying them both. I suppose if you gotta go, that's the way to do it.

I had a friend over Saturday night and played a excellent game of Hammer of the Scots. England, as it typical took the lead early on, but Scotland managed to push hard into the South and some excellent dice rolls gave him most of the nobles for a turn. I, as England had a small foothold in the North and lucked out with a sea movement card and managed to kill Moray and take Ross in the North. Making for an odd HotS board with England holding the North and the Scots holding the South.

The game went to the end of the scenario with England winning, Wallace and Edward the 1st were both still alive. I think Scotland would have one, if my opponent was not new to the game. The whole wintering thing and the importance of retreating makes HotS a very different wargame.

Sunday, I went to a friends house with my children. We played a game of Star Wars : Armada surrounded by children ranging from crying baby to 10 year old boy really wanting to add ships to our game. This was my first large scale Armada game and despite the children chaos I liked it. He has a limited number of ships, but we are talking about trying out the campaign that FFG sold a few years ago.

hotseatgames wrote: Played Fallout with my friend tonight. Finally got all of the rules right (I think). I've decided that I really like this game, but I hate the rule books and I think some enemies just really suck to fight due their difficult die rolls that are required.

Again, thanks to getting rules correct, we ended up with TONS of enemies on the board. This made it very difficult to advance the story quests, and the game went on a LONG time. It was probably 2 1/2 hours. It dragged a bit but for the most part it was fun for the duration.

We ended up tying, and the rules provide no means for tie breaking; you just both win. I expect to be getting the expansion for Christmas, so hopefully it sees the table again very soon.

I really enjoy Fallout despite its wincon problems. It's a fun ride from start to finish. It's still on the go shelf though. The deck is a bit light on content and we're likely not going to go for the expansion to see if that changes.

On Saturday a pal named Brian was hosting an all-day game day and Christmas potluck. I don't get to Brian's much, so I was happy to go. I got there around 10:15am.

Brian had two friends there, Tim and Marla, who were new to board gaming in general. He was looking for something straightforward with them. I had brought Black Fleet, which seemed to fit the bill, and we jumped into that. It took longer than it should -- 2 hours -- but that's understandable with new board gamers. We had a good time, and the game was very close.

Then we were ready for something else and Tim wanted Terraforming Mars, which he had apparently played once or twice before. I balked at this, feeling that TfM isn't a game to spring on new players, but Brian was up for it and so was Marla. I suggested that we at least only play the base game but was outvoted to include Colonies, Prelude, and Venus. Other tables were into other games and I couldn't jump.

(Interlude: if you don't like Terraforming Mars, just walk right by the rest of this post because buddy, I don't want to fucking hear about it anymore.)

The game ended up taking nearly ten hours. I taught the rules, as best I could, and we were helping the new players (Time may have played before but none of that experience had apparently stuck) but things moved at a crawl. It doesn't help that Brian himself is a slow player and bought a ton of cards, so every action he had to browse though all of them again. HE also had a floater engine going on, so a lot of futzing around with that.

By 7pm the oxygen level was at 2%.

It was pretty excruciating. However, I mentioned this in a slack with my gaming pals in it (no one who was in that game) and apparently what I SHOULD have done, according to them, was get up and be an asshole and leave, or do counterproductive shit to obviously speed up the game. In other words, it was suggested that my best option was to make it clear to the host and his friends that playing a game with them was unbearable torture.

It wasn't a great time. The new players seemed to enjoy themselves, so that was something. And I did get to confirm my feelings that the Colonies expansion isn't great and I'd rather play without it and Venus.

repoman wrote: We then played the most underrated game in a long time, Civilization: A New Dawn. This game kicks ass and it's so cheap by today's standards. $23 and change? Ridiculous. To steal Josh Look's catch phrase: "Listen." If you dig 4x type civ building, you are really missing out if you don't have this one. 3 players was just as fun as 4.

I finally got to try this the other day, and I really liked it. Sadly, I don't think my group liked it as much. I think they were trying to make it more complicated than it is. Of course, it was my first game so I hadn't worked out the best way to teach it yet, so I have to take some of the responsibility for that.

Legomancer wrote:
It was pretty excruciating. However, I mentioned this in a slack with my gaming pals in it (no one who was in that game) and apparently what I SHOULD have done, according to them, was get up and be an asshole and leave, or do counterproductive shit to obviously speed up the game. In other words, it was suggested that my best option was to make it clear to the host and his friends that playing a game with them was unbearable torture.

It wasn't a great time. The new players seemed to enjoy themselves, so that was something. And I did get to confirm my feelings that the Colonies expansion isn't great and I'd rather play without it and Venus.

This kind of thing makes me worry about society -- it would be astounding to me for someone to advocate behaving like that. I think it is great that the new players liked the game -- good for you for sticking it out and providing an enjoyable experience for other people. The world could use a lot more patience and grace towards others.

If a game stopped being enjoyable 3 hours ago then you're well within your gamer rights to concede and suggest playing something else. Saying something like "this game has been dragging longer than I expected and stopped being fun a few hours ago. can we please wrap it up?" shouldn't lead to social exile.

I don't think I would have "allowed" myself to play with new players (this part is not the issue) and three expansions (this part is the issue.). I would have politely insisted we play the base game and suggested, If everyone really digs it, we can play again and add an expansion. As much as I love playing Kemet:Seth there is no way I would suggest even one player new to Kemet sit down and play with this expansion, much less two people. And I actually love teaching Kemet, it just does a disservice to the players and the game IMHO.

The only way I like TM is base game, no corporate era no draft. It's a fun game if you embrace the luckiness of the card draw and get it the hell over with in a timely fashion. I stopped playing it at game meetups etc because they want to draft everything and use all the things and play it for 3-5 hours per game which I don't think that game holds up for.

Played a game of roll for the galaxy. I'm not sure there's anything I'd change about the game, it's an almost perfect light game for me.