Cylons Wear Hats... Mostly

The game of the week, chosen by Pablo "No Nickname" H., was Battlestar Galactica (no expansion).

I like BSG. It has a certain feel - a combination of gritty, "let's make the hard decisions" resource management and paranoia that you don't quite get from any other game. Shadows Over Camelot wasn't bad, but got a little tiresome, and Panic Station had too many thematic problems for me to enjoy. I haven't played "The Resistance", the other candidate for the tinfoil hat prize for paranoia in gaming, but I suspect that it would be less engaging without the opportunity to push little models of Vipers around and making pyew-pyew-pyew noises while blowing up Cylon Raiders.

Well, what to say about this session except it featured a undeserved brigging of Shemp (as Apollo), the destruction of Caprica One by terrorists, an early suspicion and subsequent brigging of Bharmer (as Chief Tyrol) and a Academy Award (tm)-worthy performance by Pablo (as trouble-maker President Zarek), who turned out to be the second, very deep cover Cylon operative, unsuspected by anyone until the very end. It also featured one of the highest Raider kill counts by a single pilot (Easy's Starbuck) I've seen in the game -- somewhere upwards of 20+ --  and a very above moral reproach but ultimately futile tenure as Admiral by me as Karl Agathon.

The suspicion thrown on Shemp's behaviour by an early (and, if I recall correctly, misread) play led to him being brigged at a fairly critical time. With him being unable to get out without the firm support of the other human players, it was difficult, and then when it became apparent that Pablo was the other cylon, we couldn't brig him because the Admiral's quarters were damaged - and Tyrol had already "gone cylon", so repair cards were few.

It was an interesting dynamic. We had Bharmer pegged as a cylon early (and brigged early), but in the mid-game, none of the humans were sure who the cylon was until certain potentially Cylon-game-winning strategies were ignored both by me and Shemp, at which time it was difficult to get him out. By the time we recovered, resources were in the low reds, and there was no escaping.

We fell to a morale loss at distance 6. To my credit as the admiral, we had only lost one civilian ship to enemy fire and Galactica was never in serious danger from Cylon ship-based attacks. No, we lost this one because we couldn't identify and brig the second cylon, and Pablo's machinations caused us to lose several key morale-based crises. We were high on population, mid-range on fuel, low on food and critical on morale when we lost. I was generally happy with my performance as admiral, less so with my ability to figure out who the cylon was and act on it decisively.

The difficulty of this game varies dramatically depending on whether there are zero, one or two cylons from the initial loyalty deal to the sleeper phase, and in this case, there were two right from the start, making it the most difficult it can be in a five-player game.

This game may not be the most balanced and it is a little long; but for the dramatic experience it's one of the better ones.

Also, Cylons wear hats. It's a fact.

Shemp's Spoardic Challenge #2

What is the least impressive ending to the following:

"Hundreds of ..."

Please note we are not looking for anything necessarily negative or disgusting. The goal is to elicit an unenthusiastic "huh" from someone hearing the completed phrase.

That's a "huh", not an "ew."

The instigating phrase last night was: "Hundreds of ... baggies." Deflating, but is it the deflatingest? Only you can tell us!

[PS Challenge #1 is in buried in the post below; please go there to give us you Nerdliest Possible Board Game Title. ]

Five years, man. Also, five weeks.

All right, this is really rough, but at least a record of what got played in Early Fall 2012. Maybe I'll fill in a bit later, or someone else will in the comments.

This week I selected Traders of Genoa for our game, since, as I repeatedly stated, "It's been FIVE YEARS!"

Well, it wasn't five. It was four, so mea culpa on that. Still, a long time to go between plays.

PREVIOUSLY : Last week was 2 rounds of Smash-Ups, one w/ 3 players + 1 w/ 4. Also, Bios Megafauna.and For Sale!

PREVIOUSLIER : Game of Thrones Storm of Swords, yo. My wife thinks Storm of Swords is the nerdliest boardgame title possible. Feel free to suggest nerdlier possible titles in the comments.

EVEN PREVIOUSLIER : Roma, followed by Lord$ of Vega$, and I think a 3 of Vikings

PREVIOUSLIEST UNDER CONSIDERATION IN THIS ENTRY : Battlestar Galactica!

Summertime Rolls

WARNING THIS IS A BUNCH OF WORDS BARFED ON THE BLOG AND IT MIGHT BE EDITED LATER I'M NOT PLANNING ON MAKING ANYONE'S COMMENTS LOOK SILLY THOUGH EDITING BUT IT COULD HAPPEN Y'KNOW? ANYWAY HERE GOES:

You know, at the end of every summer I think: "The board game playing group just doesn't work very well in the summer. Maybe we should take the summer off, and just start again in September..." And this is when you, dear reader, look at our last post, see it was in May, and think: "They took the summer off."

But we did not! Though things have been fairly haphazard. I'll attempt to recap what I can recall now.

LAST week, 'twas Easy and I and special guest Aussie Tim, in from Australia. We tried to keep things light + easy for our semin00b, and went with Galaxy Trucker, Kingdom Builder, and a new, Africana. [In retrospect, Easy, how did we not think to select King of Tokyo? We should have selected King of Tokyo!]

Africana had the feel of a slightly trickier Ticket to Ride, with a set collection aspect to scoring overlaid on the route completion mechanic. On the lighter side of things, but well done and quite fun. The end certainly came unexpectedly, and Easy won by a fair chunk, which wasn't how I thought the game was going, so there is some surprise there, also. [For the record, Easy swept that week, the third week in Aug]

Moving backwards, in the 2nd week of August, we played a 3 player round of *** some fantasy themed block game that Kozure owns, which comes in VHS style boxes *** Wizard Kings, which we adjourned w/ Easy in the clear lead. At the moment I don't have any clear thoughts on the game, as could be guessed by my earlier inability to remember it's name. I suppose I think it's a playable [meaning adequately non fiddly] fantasy wargamelite. And was fine, but kind of unmemorable.

Before that, Easy and I had a 2 player game of Vikings, the advanced version. [ The rules call this the "Progress Version", which nomenclature we spent a little time making fun of. ] The advanced version really does make decision making within the game much more difficult, particularly in the areas of resource management. Uncertainty is also upped through the special tiles won by buying the most expensive combo available. I like this version a lot, and managed to jump out to an early lead and hold on, thanks to picking up the tile that grants a bonus for nobles early on.

Further back, the 1st week of August, I wasn't there, and don't know what happened in Toronto. I did see this:

HM NOW JULY.

Fourth week of July, Last Will, along w/ MARIA. As Austria I pursued a bad strategy, and paid for it. Both other powers were in a victory position, tho I don't remember which technically took the game. I'm glad Last Will got another try, but don't think I'll be selecting it again. It's in the no man's land for me, too long and fiddly to be filler, not quite thinky enough or fun enough to be a main course.

Third week of July, BIOS MEGAFAUNA + Wildlife. A C&P: Megafauna, I knowingly took a risk and it failed due to randomness, throwing me into a spiral of larger risks, each of which failed. I'm OK w/ that, intellectually. Tho it stunk as an experience.

Wildlife, I played suboptimally, and would like another chance. Plus, it's fun and we hadn't played it in five years or somesuch.

Second week of July, I was absent, and am unsure of what happened. I DID hear that Bharmer has an impressive beard; the question remains, is it silky? I hope it's silky.

First week of July there was NO WAGS. NONE.

JUNE

Last week of June, I flaked, and Easy + Bharmer did something, I think?

Third week of June was RISK: LEGACY + Beowulf. I like the Risk Legacy. I need to get it on the table, w/ 4 or 5 players. I am kind of obsessed. In game three on our Earth, Easy in North America was targeted by the other 3 players, with Kozure attacking thru Alaska, Pablo thru Central America, and me through Greenland. I ended up winning by capturing the Easylander's HQ, which Kozure then fell JUST short of taking from me. Seeing that he was on the verge of trading in cards for a red star, I took a chance on launching 2 fronts from Europe, and took both remaining HQ's for the victory. Which means we got to open the "sign the board twice" packet, which is was pretty exciting.

Beowulf is always fun. Swedish betrayal, y'all. HM. Next RISK city is being put in Scandinavia and being named Betrayal. Book it. Unless it's something else of course.

Second week of June was three players, I was there, it happened. I don't know what happened. I am old. :(

First week of June we played 1812! I remember that week! Good game, really enjoyed it, and I'm not a wargame guy so much. Or I haven't been. Maybe en route to becoming one?

MAY

Last week of May, we played Luna, Innovation, and Kingdom Builder. I don't need to talk about Kingdom Builder, I am mostly indifferent towards Innovation, and I thought Luna was another middling Euro, but with neatish mechanics. Would play again.

Week before that, Civilization, with Kozure, Shemp, Pablo [does he have a nom de blog?] An email fragment: Went well, by which I mean: Miltary Victory by ME as the Germans. Kozure's Russia was, erm, less successful. Pablo enjoyed a learning game as the Americans, mainly getting the hang of the mechanics. Had an error in that the Wonders came out in random order, rather than sorted by era. Will look fwd to trying 4 players.

Week before that, was Eclipse, I was absent, there was a guest teaching the game - JOTORA?

Week before that, was Civilization and Last Will, with 3. AND that's as caughtupish as I can get us.

...post peters out here. Contributers who wish to expand in comments would be welcome. MOST WELCOME. -LONG ABSENT FROM BLOGGING SHEMP

MAGE KNIGHT! (Mage Knight x1)

MAGE KNIGHT IS LONG!

MAGE KNIGHT IS FIDDLY!

MAGE KNIGHT IS WELL DESIGNED!

MAGE KNIGHT HAS DOWNTIME!

MAGE KNIGHT OCCASIONALLY INVOLVES BURNING MONASTERIES!

(I occasionally daydream they are the ones from Ora et Labora or Murder in the Abbey)

MAGE KNIGHT IS CONTROVERSIAL AT BGG!

MAGE KNIGHT REQUIRES CAREFUL PLANNING!

MAGE KNIGHT HAS A BIT OF A RUNAWAY LEADER ISSUE!

MAGE KNIGHT HAS DETERMINISTIC COMBAT! 

MAGE KNIGHT IS HYPERBOLIC!

MAGE KNIGHT WAS WON BY AGENT EASY!

MAGE KNIGHT DEMANDS YOUR ATTENTION!!!

YAAAHAAHAHHAAGGGGGHHH!!!

*hack*

*slash*

(in a very calculated way)

My Personal Holy Grail... Found at Last? (Bios: Megafauna x2)

Professor Henry Jones: Elsa never really believed in the grail. She thought she'd found a prize.
Indiana Jones: And what did you find, Dad?
Professor Henry Jones: Me? Illumination. 

- Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

 

Reflections on Perfection

So, a few years back (edit: Holy Schnikes! It was EIGHT years ago. Time flies.) I wrote this blog entry on the idea of the perfect (Euro) game:

The Perfect Game

For those who can't be bothered to follow the link, in it I expounded on the elements that, to me, made up the perfect (Euro-style) game. Note: I love wargames as well, but the "perfect" wargame and the perfect Euro-style/designer game would be quite different, so in this entry, whenever I type "perfect game", substitute mentally "perfect Euro/designer game".

Eight years after writing that entry, thirteen years after rebooting my boardgaming hobby by buying Settlers of Catan and thirty-odd years after developing a keen interest in boardgaming in the first place, I've finally found a game that satisfies (to varying degrees) every criteria I set for choosing the perfect game.

Amazingly, the game is one I hadn't expected to be more than a passing interest - a curiosity or a niche game. It just goes to show that you often find things in the last place you look (a truism - but that's another discussion).

What's the game that matches all my "perfect game" criteria?

Bios: Megafauna

Is this the perfect game for everyone? No, not at all. In fact, were I to choose criteria that to me would define the best possible game for the largest possible audience, it would be a game much different than Bios: Megafauna.

But, by the criteria I first wrote down eight years ago and on reviewing them, largely still feel right today, I've found my "Holy Grail".

Before I go too far off the deep end, I do want to caution the reader that I am a self-confessed enthusiastic dilettante. I will often get really quite enthusiastic about something, engage with it with a laser-like focus for a few weeks or months, then gradually lose interest. I don't "drop" the interest, and I seldom lose fondness for it, it's just that I'll spend less time obsessing about it.

So, I've learned to try to temper my enthusiasm for something with the need for "sober second thought". I will need to play Bios: Megafauna at least a dozen more times to better test its limits and breaking points. I'm sure, in time, some wrinkles will appear in its radiant countenance. But for the moment, I'm pretty smitten. Thus, take what I've written with a grain of salt.

To the review and the criteria I've set for the perfect game.

Evolution and Me

Bios: Megafauna is a reworking of Phil Eklund's American Megafauna, a game which I've been interested in for some time but have never found an owner or anyone interested enough in playing to actively hunt down a copy on eBay to buy.

I've always been fascinated by the arms race of evolution - the survival of the fittest and the jaw-droppingly vast time periods, geographical changes and sheer biomass involved. Why were there once Sabretooth Tigers? Why did they die out? Are wooly mammoths the ancestors of elephants (A: no, not really - their genus is extinct). What on earth is a Terror Bird? How on earth would land animals ever manage to grow to over 30 tonnes? And how does something hunt something that weighs 30 tonnes?

These sorts of questions and their answers are fascinating to me. Since re-entering the boardgaming hobby again in 1999, I've cast about for a game which captures this fascination in a playable but scientifically respectful way. By "scientifically respectful" - I mean that the game doesn't have to be bang on with the science - a simulation -, but an effort to be accurate and a sort of "if you squint it still looks right" effect is desired.

The Proto-Evolutionaries

One of the first I came across was Evo, but while cute and entertaining, hard science it ain't. Later I found WildLife, which I still quite enjoy and think is a bit of a overlooked gem - the science isn't too bad, but for game balance reasons, you can only really play it best with four or six people, which is sometimes a hard number to hit in my gaming group. For my young son, I picked up Trias, but it was also somewhat light on the science, and didn't really satisfy on a "mutate the individual creature level". I also bought Dominant Species with high hopes and, while it also is a well designed game (it also has a few faults for me) I find that it largely abstracts the finer details of evolution, the physiology of individual species and genera, which is of interest to me, and it also has some scoring/randomness issues which I find somewhat problematic.

I put American Megafauna on my wishlist before Dominant Species was in development, and even after buying and playing Dominant Species, it remained on my list. I loved High Frontier, also from Phil Eklund, and it remains one of my top five games. When I heard that Bios: Megafauna was in the pipeline, I was interested, but I didn't order a copy because I didn't think anyone in my weekly playing group would be into it. When I already had WildLife and Dominant Species, neither of which generally hits the table unless I pick it, it was hard to justify buying another evolution-based game that was based on harder science than either.

To my surprise, a fellow gaming group member, Agent Easy, bought it a few weeks ago. I knew he was mildly interested in American Megafauna, but I didn't think he was keen enough to pick it up. "Well," I thought, "here's my chance to try it. It should be good to play once."

Entering the Presence of the Grail

Agent Easy pulled out the game box. To be honest, the cover, while glossy and relatively professional looking, is a little hokey. A velociraptor holding a bow, pulling an arrow out of a quiver with its other hand, reflected in the eye of some sort of reptilian? I know it's the Sierra Madre Games logo and all, but come on.

The board is sturdy, if a little gaudy - it looks very Illustrator-drawn (if you've used Illustrator or similar DTP programs, you know what I mean) - lots of hard edges and geometrical shapes. The colours are a little garish and there's a proliferation of different typefaces (at least seven or eight, by my count) which give it a bit of a uneven appearance, as if another "pass" would've smoothed it into a more coherent-looking whole.

In play, it's actually a little mis-sized - the roadrunner DNA tracks (more on that later) are a little too big and the actual play spaces are a little too small. The board feels small, but actually there is room for everything - as long as you don't mind tiny point sizes.

Overall, it's very functional, if a little unattractive. To paraphrase a movie about a Archaelogist/Fortune Hunter who is on a quest for his own grail, "Truly this is the gameboard of a scientist."

The cards are very nice, good cardstock and quite well designed in general; they are clear, with excellent icons and illustrations. The wooden "creature" pieces (creeples?) are excellently cut and coloured, with surprisingly sharp detail. As representation of the various genotypes, they're great.

Seeing the Light

I had read the rules earlier in the day. Having heard what a simulation American Megafauna was supposed to be, I was expecting a much heavier ruleset. Although the terminology is dense (Eklund coins his own term for genetic characteristics that help one catch prey or avoid being caught as prey - "Roadrunner DNA" - you know, like the Warner Brothers cartoon, with Wile E. Coyote always chasing the Roadrunner? Eh? Eh?) with terms like genotype, speciation, dentition, genome, biome and orogeny sprinkled throughout the rulebook, the actual mechanics, once you get past the fancy names, aren't that difficult at all. Others have describe the game turn in more detail, but simply put, you choose one of four (or six, if you're using the optional living rules additions) actions, carry out the consquences of that action, and then pass play to the next player.

The original actions are buy a card from a shared display of five (or ten, if you're using the living rules "two display" variant) which starts a new genotype or mutates one of your existing species - and then resolve an event on the card which replaces the one you bought; resize, which makes a species bigger or smaller, allowing it to develop (or lose) attributes and hunt or avoid being hunted by other creatures; acculturate a species, which gives a species advanced, primitive human-like abilities which enable it to survive more readily in wider types of environments (and also banks VPs) and expand, which allows you to add additional figures of a species to the board, or alternatively add a new species which inherits some of the genetic traits of the parent species.

The actions added in the living rules are Roadrunner action which permits a player to put two genes (the currency of the game) on one of the first cards in the display row and develop or improve a roadrunner DNA trait. This was apparently added largely as a fix for the possible start-game condition where a player might be surrounded by impassible marine biomes and consequently find it impossible to expand. The last added action is Genetic Drift a way for a player to steal genes from the player with the most genes... a sort of evolutionary rob from the rich to give to the poor scheme that I suspect Eklund added as a balancing feature to avoid a situation when someone might hoard genes and not release them back into circulation (genes are zero-sum).

I would be remiss to mention the little nuggets of scientific facts footnoted or sidenoted throughout the rules. These are catnip for me - I just can't get enough.

Struck by the Chixulub Bolide

Gameplay turned out to be fast, actually much faster than I had expected. We blew through a game, including a brief rules explanation, in just over 90 minutes. I immediately wanted to play again; everything was falling into place. We played again immediately. The second game was a little longer at 110 minutes,(people, knowing what to look for and what to avoid, took a more time to consider their moves) but just as enjoyable for me. Decisions are challenging but not paralyzing, you can directly affect other players in a competitive, predatory or somewhat parasitic way, and the theme permeates the entire game in a positive, constructive way, instead of interfering with or slowing down game play.

So, how does Bios Megafauna satisfy my Perfect Game criteria?

1. PLAYING TIME: Playable in 60-90 minutes – 120 minutes at absolute outside. The game can be finished in 90 minutes. Slightly shorter or longer games are also possible, depending on variants used (we used the two display variant) and gaming group play style. My gaming group seemed to "get it".


2. PLAYER LIMIT: Playable by 2-6 players, and scales well at all player numbers. To be fair, this game does not play with 5 or 6 players, so it doesn't quite meet this criteria completely. However it does have a solo option, and 2, 3 or 4 players seem quite playable. Call it a partial match?


3. DOWNTIME: Has low levels of downtime and low amounts of “move paralysis” – that is, the number of action options available to a player during any given turn or turn phase should be neither so numerous nor so complex as to be daunting. With some groups, the dreaded analysis paralysis (AP) might set in, but the chance of this happening compared to, say, Tikal, is much, much less. I never felt like I was "waiting" for my turn - I was always engaged in what was going on.


4. BUILDING: Involves “building” in some way – creating and improving on something, so that you end the game with something “better” than you started. For example – more money, better city, more powerful character. The game is about evolving - the most biological way of building possible. On top of building more "fit" creatures, over-specialized creatures can be wiped out by extinction events, letting you/forcing you to build another creature suited for the new reality.


5. CONFLICT: Involves “conflict” in some way – either actual fighting or economic/qualitative/quantitative competition. Survival of the fittest, baby! If your creatures can't compete, they won't thrive.
   


6. NOT TOO RANDOM: Minimizes randomness – players should never feel as though the luck of the die/draw is the only factor in success. Some have pointed to the events as causing too much randomness. I didn't experience this. Careful play and anticipation of catastrophe will reward a player who diversifies and doesn't put all of her genotypes in one basket.
   


7. SOCIAL INTERACTION: Involves enough player interaction that a social atmosphere is created, while avoiding interaction which otherwise slows down the game. There was much discussion and amusement over comparing and describing the creatures being created - long-necked elephantoid creatures with beaks and tusks, or super-speedy, horse sized raptor-creatures who could sing to each other and relied on adrenal glands for bursts of speed.


8. EASY TO TRACK: Minimizes calculation or the need for extensive record/bookkeeping – i.e. everything is at your fingertips or in front of you and does not have to be closely tracked by a complex process. Points are simple - tiles you've won from the tarpit, cards you've put in your fossil record, and creature meeples on the board.


9. SCREW YOUR NEIGHBOUR: Gives the opportunity for “screw your neighbour” tactics – a way to play to thwart the plans of others, but in a manner that is otherwise avoidable by careful play and not overly frustrating. All the time - snatching a juicy biome or buying a card at exactly the right moment was a constant feature of our games. You can even go so far as to purposefully out compete an opponent's species.


10. DOWN BUT NOT OUT: A mechanic for dealing with the possibility of being knocked out of the game – that is, if someone is in a losing position, there is a way to fight back if carefully played. There is a specific mechanic for a player whose species have all become extinct - Lazarus Player, which actually occurred. The player involved came back to win the game! The living rules also added the genetic drift rule, which seems to level the playing field. In addition, extinction catastrophes can easily take out a species which has become over-specialized, allowing other players to take over those biomes.


11. LEADER REWARDS: A mechanic to address the standard “kill the leader” situation that rewards being in the lead without making being the leader unstoppable. The leader gets a substantial share of the tar-pit. I can't immediately think of other aspects, but a method to specifically "kill the leader" seems like it would be trickier in this game.


12. VICTORY CONDITIONS: A victory condition track (victory points or score) which permits the fun of being able to see how roughly how close other players are to each other (fostering competition) while maintaining some element of surprise. Players can see how many tiles are received from the tar pit each round. Genotypes can be bought and buried in the fossil record, lending some element of surprise .


13. THEME/FEEL: Game has a strong and interesting theme that is colourful but also relates to the game mechanic without bogging down the game. Execution of the mechanics of the game and the theme should mesh well at all levels. It should “feel” right. Yes, yes, YES. In spades.
    


14. REPLAYABILITY: Game should have enough “depth” that it can be played more than once – conversely, it could be simple enough that complex strategies are possible (like chess or bridge) even given relatively simple rules. Not sure yet, but the random placement of starting biomes, the random assortment of cards, the random occurrence of events and the very variable consequences of player interaction while competing for specific biomes and configurations of biomes (which, as noted, are determined randomly) make this one look like it could have really long "legs".

Wow. Just wow. Depending on how you count, a game which hits 14 out of 14 points (13 if you dock it marks for being 1-4 players instead of 2-6). Amazing. Whereas some of the games which have come closest before had 10 or 12 points satisfied, this one has 13.

I'm really excited about playing this one again. I'm not sure if the novelty of the 108 mutation cards and 144 tiles will wear off, or if I'll tire of imagining sail-backed bipedal giraffes with disembowling claws or massive underground communities of tool-using insectivore lizards with wings.

I've played (euro) games which were more fun. I've played games which were more satisfying on an intellectual level. I've played games which felt more clever from a game-design point of view. But seldom have all of these factors come together for me so cohesively in a single game.

Taking it on Faith

There may not be any such thing as a "perfect game", but Phil Eklund has managed to make something which, for my money, is a close as anyone has gotten.

Once again, and I want to make this abundantly clear, it won't be perfect for everyone. Some people will be put off by the technical jargon. Others will find the mutation mechanic and the long strings of letters to be confusing. Still others might dislike the idea of a random event potentially smashing their carefully created empire of hyper-specialized critters into bone fragments and dust, or having their marine animals find their seas dry up around them.

Now that I've found Bios Megafauna, will I stop looking for the Perfect Game? Nope. Not by a long shot. But isn't that the beauty of unobtainable perfection?

For the moment, I'll be sitting back and enjoying this little gem. It deserves the attention.

Marcus Brody: The search for the Grail is the search for the divine in all of us. But if you want facts, Indy, I've none to give you. At my age, I'm prepared to take a few things on faith.

Boring Old Record Keeping

The record keeper blew the dust off the ledger and laid open the cracking spine. The pages waterfalled like October leaves.

Brushing a gnarled hand over the pages, he made some very boring notations in a spidery hand:

The March 1st and March 29th sessions were cancelled due to lack of attendees. The February 2nd session was also cancelled (I'm noting that in case anyone has to forensically reconstruct their play list at BGG for the year, as I had to go back and correct some notations).

On April 5th we played two sessions of 7 Wonders (victors unremembered), followed by a session of Panic Station (Agent Easy was original bug(?), David and Shemp joined them, bugs were victors.). On April 12, we played Risk Legacy (curiously, I can't remember whether Shemp or Agent East won; it was one of them - I think it was Shemp, which would make it two for two for him), Beowulf (strangely, once again, I can't remember the victor, though I think I was up there) and Jungle Speed (Kozure won).

Last week, April 19th, there was only Shemp and I. We played Dragon Dice with my son Daigoro. I don't have a lot of time for commentary on the game except to say it was actually "deeper" as a playing experience than I was expected - there's some difficult and interesting play choices to be made, and there's enough chrome to keep it interesting. Still not sure about long term replay-ability apart from the customization aspect of it, but willing to play again. We had to call it for time (Daigoro had to head to bed), but Shemp was well on his way to victory.

We finished the evening with two games of Jungle Wars - Deep Dwarves (Shemp) vs. Mountain Vargath (Me) and Sand Goblins (Shemp) vs. Jungle Elves. (Me). I won both games, more from my greater experience with the game than through any stellar play. Shemp was starting to pick up on the flow by the end.

It's been a while. again. (Flashpoint, Die Bergen Von Burgund, Scrabble Slam, Vikings x2, Roma 2 x3)

Hmm, having a hard time keeping up with the blog these days.

A few weeks ago we played Flashpoint. It was good, and would probably work well as a family or non-gamer group game due to the compelling theme. Based on the one play, which we won handily, I don't see myself suggesting it for WAGS though. Very similar to Pandemic, though without the clever mechanism that compounds the threat of disease (the infected cities discard gets added back on top of the deck).

More Bergen Von Burgund, though this time we tried the advanced boards. Still enjoying it, though unlike the others in the group I think I prefer Macao slightly. The different boards were fun, though.

This week we were supposed to be 5 but in a weird twist of fate Bearbomb, Perra and Kozure couldn't make it at the last minute! 2 player games it was.

We played Vikings, and that was fun though there seemed to be far more available money with only 2 players. Wether tried the advanced variant (which we had never played before). It adds a new series of special function tiles that you get if you take the most expensive tile in the rondel. In,our first round, we went a little crazy buying the expensive tiles to get the power tiles. Unfortunately, for several rounds afterwards we were broke and had to take the free tile all the way around. We both salvaged our positions and were able to finish the game with respectable boards, though, and both enjoyed the advanced rules quite a bit (though we opted to skip the auction variant). One thing I will say, this is truly and advanced variant. It's not just more complicated or different, as is the case with most expert variants. It's actually harder strategically. The bonus tiles can be very powerful, but you can go broke doing it. We were surprised how much more thinking power was required!

Finished up with 3 sessions of Roma. I won the last one and that might be a first.

Easy Come, Easy Go

I continue to stalk Agent Easy's math trades.

EASY COME -
Lord Of The Rings: The Card Game
Kingdom Builder
Glen More

EASY GO -
Nexus Ops
Mission: Red Planet
Container
Lock n' Load: Band of Heroes
Junta

Simple, but unintuitive (In the Year of the Dragon, Paris Connection, Kingdom Builder x4, Die Bergun von Burgund, Innovation)

Over the past two weeks, we've had a chance to play quite a few games... sme old, and some new.

Two weeks ago, Bearbomb, Kozure, Shemp, Dale and I had a chance to play In the Year of the Dragon. I was kicking myself for forgetting to bring along the expansion(s) from the Alea Treasure Chest! Regardless, this is always a fun and challenging game. I spent the first half concentrating on maintaining the lead in the turn order track and getting my "end of round" points up (courtisan, double dragon tablet). Although I am convinced there are multiple valid strategies in the game, this is the one that appeals to me and so I tend to fall back on it. You need very little money since you don't have to worry about paying for actions, and so it saves you actions accumulating wealth. This also means that I typically struggle with the offering to the emperor, but as long as I can take a turn to get to three huan it's not too painful. Although in the last third I lost the battle for turn order I did manage to conserve the lead in points for the win. One thing that seems to be essential, though, is to pick a couple of events to essentially disregard. If you are stuck with the pack always trying to build up against the event that is coming up next you will find yourself blocked out or paying.

We also played Paris Connection. There seems to be an endless variation of train themed stock manipulation games, which range the gamut from light to very heavy. It constantly surprises me that a new one can come along and still explore a new way to approach the topic. PAris Connection is a very light and fast game, which manages top play up to 6 in 30-45 minutes. There are similarities to Wabash Cannonball/ Chicago Express, but this is the more streamlined design. On a turn, you play up to 5 trains to the board or draw 1-2 trains from the supply. As the train routes develop, they touch areas that increase the worth of that colour. The trains a player has is therefore both the number of stocks a player has in a given company and the vehicle through which they can increase the value of a line. In other words, every time you play a train you are shrinking your shares in that same line. It's tricky. It leads to players dumping trains of a colour they don't want to perform well by extending the line to places that are worthless. It means that the best way to make money is for someone else to expand a line you are keeping shares in. As with many games like this, it means that you are best off trying to figure out what other players want, and investing in that, rather than trying to boost the value yourself. Anyway, as light as it is, the unusual thought process required to play the game means that I can't really see non-gamers enjoying it much. For me, I liked it.

We ended the night with two games of Kingdom Builder. This game came with a lot of hype, since it's from the designer of Dominion, but also a lot of backlash since it's pretty different. In fact, I'd say it gets most of it's flack because it's both quite simple and quite unintuitive, an unusual mix (I know I just said that about Paris Connection, I guess I mean it's unusual outside of the stock game genre).

There are a number of boards, from which 4 are selected at random, and a number of victory condition cards from which 3 are selected at random. Players take turns drawing 1 card and placing three pieces on that type of terrain. The victory condition cards say things like "units next to a mountain gain 1 VP", or "gain 1 VP for each connection between a city or special site". This means that you are trying to accomplish different things with your pieces each game, which is a simple change but it's interesting how different it makes each game feel. The biggest trick is the placement rule... the one card you play determines the terrain type you can play on, but you have to play on terrain adjacent to pieces you've already played if possible. That means that if you played earlier pieces next to many types of terrain the card you draw will largely determine what you can do. On the other hand, if you play your pieces in such a way that you are next to very few types of terrain there is a good chance that you will draw a card showing terrain you aren't adjacent to, allowing you to play ANYWHERE on the board on the correct type of terrain. In addition to that, each board comes shows a different special location (or two) that gives a player a special power if they place a token adjacent to it. The special powers allow a player to move pieces in special ways, build on water hexes, skip spaces during placement, etc. It all adds together to a very engaging, yet simple game. And boy is it fast! 30-40 minutes for 3-4 players. We've since played 2 more times and I enjoyed it just as much.

Let's start with the biggest similarity with Dominion... there is a lot of variability built into the game, but it's all defined at the time of setup. After that, there is neither randomness nor cardplay from decks of cards. I find this refreshing because these days it seems like many games are going that route (Summoner Wars, A Few Acres of Snow, Mage Knight, Kings of Tokyo, Yomi, etc). I guess a second similarity would be a complete and utter absence of theme. Even the title is beyond generic!

Anyway, that nitpick aside, I really enjoyed the game. It won't be as influential as Dominion, but I think I actually prefer it. It feels a little like advanced Through the Desert, with variable victory conditions and board. Good stuff.

Two weeks, three games (In the Shadow of the Emperor, Die Burgen Von Burgund, Power Grid: First Sparks)

Two weeks ago, we pulled out a game that has languished on the shelves for far too long: In the shadow of the Emperor. Before this, it had been 3.5 years since we last played it!

Obviously, a substantial refresher was in order (and Bearbomb had never played). Luckily, once it gets going it's not too difficult. This is a great example of how well themed an otherwise abstract and dry game can be.

Shemp started as emperor, but after a failed coup by Kozure, I succeeded in taking over the throne. A mid-game alliance with Bearbomb allowed me to survive the next coup and after that I managed to fortify my position considerably and hold on through an all out assault by all players to take me down. Being emperor for several turns does not guarantee victory, but it sure makes it easier. There is so much to manage in this game... How to get majorities in order to be elected, but not necessarily keeping them since points are gained by being newly elected somewhere, not staying elected? How to manage and position your nobles as they age, marry and have children? It's quite a good game, and a very interesting and tight design.

It's a shame it only plays well with 4, or it might come out more often.

This week, we played 2 new (to us) games: Die Burgen Von Burgund (The Castles of Burgundy)and Power Grid: First Sparks.

I have been eyeing DBvB for quite some time now. Stephan Feld, the designer of the game, is one of my favorites right now. He consistently puts out games that are mechanically solid and fun (though they typically suffer from being thematically weak).

Well, first off, I think Feld heard to complaints about the weak theming of his previous games and set out to disprove them. Unfortunately, he did so by designing a game SO WEAK thematically, that the previous ones would shine in comparison. Luckily, the game itself is quite good.

Ostensibly, the theme is establishing the estate around your castle. In practice, it's about rolling dice and using the values rolled to either select from an available pool of tiles, place tiles on your player mat, or ship goods. There is a huge variety of tiles, each color coded according to function, and each imparting a specific benefit to the player once placed in the estate. At first, I was very worried that with so much to take in the game would be a chore to play, but as it turns out it makes logical sense and we were able to internalize most of it pretty quickly.

In addition to the selecting and placing of tiles, players are trying to generate victory points by filling colored regions on the board, and trying to do so before other players. The game then becomes a puzzle, trying to maximize combos of tile powers in order to generate the most VPs.

Players are engaged throughout as turns go very quickly. The game itself is longish, though. Our first game took 1.5 - 2hrs for three players, including rules explanation.

I was ahead for much of the early game, then Shemp jumped to the lead, and then we traded first place for most of the second half of the game. Kozure was not far behind, but trailed. Unfortunately for me, once the end game bonus points were tallied, I placed last and Shemp and Kozure tied for first, 2 points ahead of me! (Kozure won the tie breaker, fewest empty spaces).

When I think about it, the bonuses for completing regions make up a large chunk of the points but in some ways they are misleading. If every player completes the same number of regions in the same rounds, and by the end of the game roughly fill in the same number of regions, the points total will Bethesda same (regardless of who scores which regions, when). That may sound self evident, but more than most games i suspect that this is LIKELY to happen. The difference is going to be a few points here and there, generated by shipping and building combos allowing that extra region to be completed. Of course, the yellow "end game bonus" tiles might also swing things, and generate some long term strategy opportunities we haven't taken advantage of yet, so there's that.

Anyway, I very much liked it and Shemp and Kozure seemed positive as well. Feld strikes again.

Last, we played Power Grid: First Sparks. This is a game that, according to the designer, is being released to celebrate the 10 year anniversary of the Funkenshlag (the original version of what is now known as Power Grid). Power Grid is a game I enjoy, but it's kind of overlong and extremely mathy. The stated goal of this redesign was to make it shorter and less mathy... How could I not give it a try?!!

In many ways, this is still very much Power Grid despite the re-theming to the stone age. There is still a power plant market, with an available market and a futures market, but now they are called tools and feature such seminal inventions as the basket and the spear. Their purpose is not to generate money but rather food, but in gameplay terms they are analogous. Over time, the baskets get bigger, and the spears pointier, and they allow players to gather food more effectively. To spice things up, "knowledge" cards are intermixed with the tools, giving the player that selects it an advantage in the game (such as fire, speech, etc). Many of the tools are tied to a specific food source, such as bear, fish or mammoth, so it is necessary to make sure that at least one of the player's clansmen are adjacent to the related source of food. The tools are auctioned in a weird, but much faster than regular Power Grid, reverse auction.

And that takes us to the board. This is the biggest change, in my opinion. Instead of having a preset map with various cities and costs to build between them, the board is made up of modular tiles. Spaces that are adjacent to each other can be built to, and the cost only calculated based on the total number of clansmen the player wants to play that turn + the number of clansmen already on the spaces to be occupied. This simplifies the math dramatically. There are no phases to the game limiting how many clansmen can be in which space at which time, it's strictly a function of expansion becoming more expensive as the board gets more crowded. Still, the blocking tactics found in Power Grid are still available here... It can definitely be a good move to build up against someone in an effort to make expansion for them more expensive.

I liked it. The wonderful animeeples, the humorous art on the tools and the addition of "knowledge cards" make the thematic shift work. It's much more accessible and plays in approximately an hour, which is huge. I found the gameplay quite good and still satisfying despite many othe simplifications. My only misgiving is that the modular board seemed less interesting that the various Power Grid maps... I'm hoping it won't get stale because of this. Also, I don't feel like the board positions mattered as much as they should (they did, as far as blocking, but long term positioning seemed somewhat irrelevant).

Falling behind (7 wonders, Robo-rally, I'm the boss!, King of Tokyo, Diamant, El Grande, Cosmic Encounter)

I haven't been updating this regularly, but for the sake of posterity I'm going to record the games played in the last two weeks.

Honestly, it kills me to let the triumphant return of El Grande to the WAGS table pass without more comment, but so it goes. For the record, Shemp and I tied.

(stealth update)
Just wanted to comment on El Grande. If El Grande shows it's age at all, it's in downtime. Between turns, players are not involved in any way and this is something that more recent games have largely eliminated. Still, the gameplay remains extremely engaging for me. There's a simplicity to the process. Many of today's games,as fun as they are, appear to me to be a) variations on "cards with text that breaks rules" or "creatures with powers", or b) "games with so much going on that optimal play is not possible without AP". In the first case, the gameplay itself is usually not particularly interesting... The fun is in finding and creating combos between cards. In b) for many sessions there is no knowing whether the challenge is just doing better than the other guy at understanding the system. You're not necessarily just playing against other players, you are also just struggling to understand the games space. Many games appear interesting, but it's only an illusion because once you become familiar with what is going on and understand the good and bad moves are, you realize the choices are actually pretty obvious and it becomes dull. Anyway, in my mind El Grande is not one of those games. The interface is easy but the choices are always difficult. Great game.

In Soviet Russia Magic cards look at you!

So, you remember Magic: The Gathering, right? You've seen the cards? Have you seen the cards with googly eyes?

If you clicked that link, you have now.

2011 in review

2011 is now history. Here's what we played:

7 plays
7 Wonders

6 plays
Roma/ Roma 2: the arena

5 plays
King of Tokyo
Clans

4 plays
Dominion
Innovation

3 plays
Troyes
Tribune
Panic Station
Civilization (2010 version)
Vikings
Lords of Vegas
High Frontiers
Nightfall
Defenders of the Realm

2 plays
High Society
Maria
Power Grid
Macao
Quarriors
Frag
Go
Alien Frontiers
Ra
Dominant Species
1960: The Making of a President
Yomi
Ra: the dice game

1 play
Urban Sprawl
Last Night on Earth
Galaxy Trucker
China
TransEuropa
Duel of Ages
Android
Power Struggle
Junta: Vive El Presidente
Nexus Ops
Scrabble Slam!
Chaos in the Old World
Steam
Dungeon Twister
Dvonn
Survive!
Acquire
Dixit
Cyclades
Earth Reborn



So, that's 104 plays of 48 different games.

2011 was a lot of fun at WAGS, Perra joined us semi-regularly and Bearbomb looks like he might become a regular as well. We did spend a lot of time with just three players, though, and that has really impacted the choice of games this year. Unlike last year, I acquired quite a few games as the stream of interesting looking games (mostly on the war gaming and American style game side of things) seemed nearly endless. As is often the case with Wargames, I haven't played them much of them if at all (conflict of heroes: price of honor, Sekigahara, A few Acres of Snow), and with the American style games I find them fun but rarely great (Wrath of Ashardalon, Quarriors, Summoner Wars). This has been a really weak year for pure euros in my opinion, or maybe we've played enough that they all look too samey now. Stephan Feld seems to be one of the few designers still able to pique my interest in that field, but due to lack of availability I haven't tried any of his latest games. A few hybrid or otherwise "oddball" titles proved fun, and I think this is the direction the euros will have to go if I'm going to be interested these days (innovation, High Frontier, Nightfall, etc)

Game of the Year
Hard to pick this year. Nothing stands out as a really great, innovative strategy game... Which is the type of game I usually prefer to choose for this slot. I'm going to to pick King of Tokyo, since it does what it sets out to do about as well as it could have. It's not aiming very high, as far as that goes, but the gameplay is fun and the production is great.

I quite enjoyed Tribune, which was new to us this year, but it's actually a few years old. Troyes would likely be the top contender for strategy games, but it's not quite there as a game (not sure... Needs editing I think). Nightfall I also quite enjoyed, but the art and card design bothers me enough that it's not a contender (but that chaining mechanic is quite cool!).

Most innovative/ Interesting game of the Year
Hear I'm going to give it to Innovation. Sure, it's just a card game but it's weird in a wonderful sort of way. I like that the powers become so powerful if certain combos come out, just like Glory to Rome but the games are quite different.

Catacombs became more widely available this year, and I picked it up along with both expansions. We have had lots of fun playing this at home. This is clearly a very innovative game, meshing the dungeon crawl with crokinole... And it works! Not a game for WAGS, but If my oldest son was picking a game of the year, I'm convinced it would be this (well, Summoner Wars might give it a run for it's money I guess).

Wrath of Ashardalon, although not really a great game, is also quite innovative in how it manages to capture a fun dungeon crawl in roughly 1 hour. I doubt this category of game, the short thematic dungeon crawl, is likely to see a better entry.

Lastly, RISK Legacy appears to be a very innovative game but we haven't played it yet, so we'll have to wait until next year to see if it works in practice. Who would of thought that a game that asked you to write on the board and tear up cards would be seen as a good thing?

On an even more personal note, gaming with the kids continues to be great fun. Catacombs, Wrath of Ashardalon, Quarriors!, King of Tokyo, Summoner Wars, Fauna, Zooloretto, Jamaica, Dice Town, Agricola, etc, are all games that have seen much table time with my oldest son even if they don't always show up at WAGS. Although my second son shows much less interest, he will still occasionally play Dice Town, Jamaica or Sorry Sliders. My third appears to have more in common with the oldest. Haba games such as Animal upon Animal, Gold Donkey and Orchard get played a lot (alongside other trusty favorites, such as Chicken Cha Cha Cha, Gulo Gulo, etc, etc).

Being the father of three awesome boys is a really fantastic privilege!