From the Depths: Blue Moon

Two-player card games occupy an interesting niche in the world...

Read more...

PILLAR GANG PILLAR GANG PILLAR GANG

God I love Blue Moon. I used to play it a ton, then not at all, then even more when I found a digital implementation a few years back. Now it's in another lull. I nearly culled it due to inactivity in our recent downsizing but I couldn't bring myself to do it, so another box took the fall. I adore this game.

Very few people seem to acknowledge that Blue Moon is secretly another Knizia auction game. Playing with that mindset helps significantly when it comes to knowing when to give points up. Fights should rarely get to the point where they're worth two dragons unless you are damn sure you're richer.

So good.

I am sure there is a good game here but for the life of me I couldn't get over the game text being written in first-person. I.e. "Draw a card" refers to your opponent, while "I draw acard" would refer to myself. After years of playing with CCG templating it was an uphill struggle. A silly complaint and entirely on me, but I couldn't get over it. I have a dozen other two-player card games that are intuitive for me to play.

The "you" and "I" format takes a moment to get used to, but I found it to be really logical after a couple games, to the point where I wondered why other games hadn't done it before.

Vysetron wrote: PILLAR GANG PILLAR GANG PILLAR GANG

I'm a big Pillar fan, too, because I was always a fan of Black discard in MTG (Let us all now rise and sing the hymn to Tourach...) I like making my opponent decide what's worth saving in their hand. But I'm also fond of Flit and Aqua for precisely opposite reasons; the former can keep slapping down The Answer and your opponent has to know that it will happen every time you retrieve it, and the latter can often set up impossible targets with Protected; active and reactive, depending on your perspective. I also love Aqua for its versatility.

This is the winning deck from the German tournament in 2008(?):
LEADER: Aqua-Alpha-Alpha (Aqua)
30 Cards / 10 Moons
INQUISITOR: Grease-Palm (X1)
+10 Cards / +15 Moons

LEADERSHIP (3)
Aqua (30): Drown Resistance (K) (Now I may discard all active cards from your Combat Area, except one Character card and any Protected cards.)
Aqua (31): Administer Water of Immortality (A) (Now I may shuffle my discard pile into my draw deck.)
Aqua (32): Chosen of Water (X2) (Now we both shuffle our hands into our draw decks, then we refresh our hands.)

CHARACTER (15)
Aqua (01): Eelena-Aqua-Prima-Alpha (A) (5/5)
Aqua (02): Giant Octopus (A) (5/0, Protected)
Aqua (03): Terrible Kraken (A) (0/5, Protected)
Aqua (04): Aaralia-Aqua-Secunda (V) (4/4)
Aqua (12): Yang (A) (2/0, The next character/booster/support card I play on this turn is treated as if it had the Free icon.)
Aqua (13): Yin (A) (0/2, The next character/booster/support card I play on this turn is treated as if it had the Free icon.)
Flit (01): Wing Commander Razorfeather (F) (4/4, Retrieve) 2 Moons
Flit (07): Tittertweet (F) (2/2, Retrieve, Your special power texts are ignored, except on Flit character cards.) 2 Moons
Hoax (14): Genathones the Blind (H) (2/2, On my turn, I may play one additional support card.) 1 Moon
Mimix (13): Wild Gazelle (M) (3/3, Pair)
Mimix (14): Wild Antelope (M) (3/3, Pair)
Mimix (15): Wild Unicorn (P) (3/3, Pair, Double Shield) 2 Moons
Terrah (02): Roomban Rockmaster (T) (3/6) 2 Moons
Terrah (12): Ferro Fos (T) (2/2, You may not play cards that have special power text.) 1 Moon
Vulca (02): Flash the Incendiary (T) (6/3) 2 Moons

INFLUENCE (4)
Infl (603): Yaggi (X2) (Hyla, 1/1)
Infl (604): Piplox (X1) (Hyla, On my turn, I may play one additional booster/support card.)
Infl (605): Hagbaad (X2) (Hyla, At the end of my turn, I may draw one additional card.)
Infl (608): Reappearance (X2) (Hyla, Now I search through my discard pile and exchange this card with any Hyla card from there.)

INTERFERENCE (4)
Inter (401): How dare you! (X2) (I may play this card when you play a Leadership phase card: your card is cancelled and discarded.) 2 Moons
Inter (402): Shame on you! (X1) (I may play this card when you play your first character card on your turn: Your card is cancelled and discarded. You must play a replacement or retreat.) 2 Moons
Inter (406): Who do you think you are? (X2) (I may play this card when you attract exactly one dragon: You do not attract the dragon.) 2 Moons
Inter (407): I saw that coming! (X1) (I may play this card when you play an Interference card: Your card is cancelled and discarded.)

SUPPORT (11)
Aqua (21): Fire Swamp (A) (2/0, Free)
Aqua (22): Perilous Marsh (A) (0/2, Free)
Aqua (23): Ravenous Razorjaw (A) (3/0, Protected)
Aqua (24): Swarming Sea Serpents (A) (0/3, Protected)
Aqua (25): Torrential Flood (A) (1/1, If I have more than one active Flood support card after the end of my turn, then you must immediately retreat.)
Aqua (26): Tidal Flood (A) (1/1, If I have more than one active Flood support card after the end of my turn, then you must immediately retreat.)
Terrah (26): Impenetrable Fog (T) (Your icons are ignored, except Stop and Protected.) 2 Moons
Terrah (28): Evil Eye (X1) (You may not play Leadership cards.) 1 Moon
Tutu (508): SnakePipe (X2) (Tutu, 3/3, Free, If I retreat, you attract one additional dragon.) 1 Moon
Vulca (24): Flickering Fires (V) (1/1, You may not play Leadership cards.) 1 Moon
Vulca (25): Heat Haze (P) (You may not play character/booster cards that have special power text.) 2 Moons

BOOSTER (3)
Aqua (16): Sudden Waterspout (A) (2/0, Free)
Aqua (17): Instant Undertow (A) (0/2, Free)
Aqua (18): Aquatic Armor (A) (0/0, Double Shield)

Total Cards: 40
Total Moons: 25

It's basically a Blue control deck with a variety of ways to respond to different threats.