The are two categories of games that get shelved almost immediately when our numbers dwindle to 3 players: Multiplayer conflict games and negotiation games. With Bharmer joining us in recent weeks, we've had a chance to fix that and play a couple of sessions of Warrior Knights. This week Shemp once again took advantage of the foursome and selected I'm the Boss! and Santiago.
I'm the Boss!
Shemp purchased a shrink wrapped copy of I'm the Boss earlier this year but we haven't been able to get it to the table until today. I was curious if the game would be as much fun the second time around and I'm happy to say that it was. The game started with a bang as Bharmer and I made a deal before he had even selected the starting space (technically illegal, I now know). He placed the marker on a deal that needed exactly our two investors and he proclaimed that the deal was done before anyone could react. It was fun, and it set the tone for the next few deals, but it became somewhat boring after a while. We then made a house rule (or began respecting the game rules, possibly) and mandated that all cards needed to be on the table before the Boss could claim that a deal was done. The game then turned into the "flurry of cards and yelling" kind of bargaining we all remembered and it became fun again. I was particularly proud of landing a deal where I had no cards to contribute (the deal required two investors and I had neither, I offered one share to Shemp and Bharmer for their contribution and it was accepted). Good times.
We played two games, with Kozure sneakily pulling a win in the first game (seriously, no one thought he had that much money) and then me winning the second (but with Kozure once again coming a close second though no one saw it coming).
Santiago
We finished off the evening with Santiago. The highlight of the game was the turn where Bharmer was the overseer and there was little incentive for anyone to bribe him for anything in particular (there were open canals already). He was offered "a punch in the face", "yo ass" and something about his mother. We are normally a respectable group, but apparently we slipped a little there.
In the end, he had the last laugh because he won the game!
Showing posts with label Santiago. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Santiago. Show all posts
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Goin' Old Skool (El Grande, Tigris and Euphrates, Santiago)
Ah, El Grande. I missed you.
I was thinking the other day that it would be interesting to look up when was the last time I had played a few of the games that I claim are my "favorites". The result was disappointing.
El Grande, probably my favorite game, hadn't been played in nearly a year and a half!
Last week, I brought it along in the hopes that there would be time at the end of the evening, but no dice. Lucky for me, Shemp picked it this week along with Tigris and Euphrates and Santiago.
El Grande
Roughly 4 rounds into the game, Luch was far in the lead, Shemp was in second and Kozure and I were trailing. Luch made an offhanded remark that he was not in the mood to choose intrigue, and simultaneously mentioned that he normally loses at the game. It was a Seinfeld-ian moment, because we all kind of realized he was probably in the lead because he was playing the opposite of the way he normally does (there was a time when Luch was referred to as Hapi on this blog. This was a reference to the fact that He Always Picks Intrigue). Anyway, after the realization, he started choosing Intrigue more, and promptly lost the lead he had.
Shemp leapt into the lead. He managed a couple of very nice point grabs with single caballeros (the efficient, german one, no doubt). I was making a comeback, partly due to the backlash Shemp was receiving for being in first place... but would it be enough?
It was. The last scoring round was unpredictable, but when the dust settled red (me) was in the lead.
Tigris and Euphrates
T&E is my second most played game if you count BGG online games, but my actual face to face games have been few and far between. I love the game, but the analysis paralysis it brings to the table makes it well suited to turn based computer play. Face to face, and with two players much less familiar with the game than Shemp and I, the game played out quite differently. I suppose you could say that with the pressure of time, the game developed less optimally than it typically does online. I developed a long skinny kingdom in the north that I *never* would have built normally. I paid for it, too, because Shemp started disaster tiling in strategic locations to swing vast parts of my kingdom to his control. Kozure had retreated to a corner of the board where he was benefiting from a monument. Luch was the swing in the three way battle going on in the center of the board. Although I had a large presence on the board, my score was weak in blue. When the score was tallied, Shemp was the obvious winner and I was tied for last.
We finished with Santiago. Although we had difficulty remembering to distribute the new money every round, in general the game went smoothly. A large crop of green beans allowed me to win the game. Since Santiago is a difficult game to talk about, I won't really try. Fun, though.
I had a great time playing these older titles. There are certainly some lessons in recent game design that seem to have come in vogue after the release of El Grande and T&E.. notably variable turn order mechanics and downtime minimizing. These aren't things that bother me if the game is engrossing enough, as these ones are for me, but Kozure was visibly "antsy" throughout much of the evening.
Sorry, Kozure. I'll be picking El Grande again in the near future!
I was thinking the other day that it would be interesting to look up when was the last time I had played a few of the games that I claim are my "favorites". The result was disappointing.
El Grande, probably my favorite game, hadn't been played in nearly a year and a half!
Last week, I brought it along in the hopes that there would be time at the end of the evening, but no dice. Lucky for me, Shemp picked it this week along with Tigris and Euphrates and Santiago.
El Grande
Roughly 4 rounds into the game, Luch was far in the lead, Shemp was in second and Kozure and I were trailing. Luch made an offhanded remark that he was not in the mood to choose intrigue, and simultaneously mentioned that he normally loses at the game. It was a Seinfeld-ian moment, because we all kind of realized he was probably in the lead because he was playing the opposite of the way he normally does (there was a time when Luch was referred to as Hapi on this blog. This was a reference to the fact that He Always Picks Intrigue). Anyway, after the realization, he started choosing Intrigue more, and promptly lost the lead he had.
Shemp leapt into the lead. He managed a couple of very nice point grabs with single caballeros (the efficient, german one, no doubt). I was making a comeback, partly due to the backlash Shemp was receiving for being in first place... but would it be enough?
It was. The last scoring round was unpredictable, but when the dust settled red (me) was in the lead.
Tigris and Euphrates
T&E is my second most played game if you count BGG online games, but my actual face to face games have been few and far between. I love the game, but the analysis paralysis it brings to the table makes it well suited to turn based computer play. Face to face, and with two players much less familiar with the game than Shemp and I, the game played out quite differently. I suppose you could say that with the pressure of time, the game developed less optimally than it typically does online. I developed a long skinny kingdom in the north that I *never* would have built normally. I paid for it, too, because Shemp started disaster tiling in strategic locations to swing vast parts of my kingdom to his control. Kozure had retreated to a corner of the board where he was benefiting from a monument. Luch was the swing in the three way battle going on in the center of the board. Although I had a large presence on the board, my score was weak in blue. When the score was tallied, Shemp was the obvious winner and I was tied for last.
We finished with Santiago. Although we had difficulty remembering to distribute the new money every round, in general the game went smoothly. A large crop of green beans allowed me to win the game. Since Santiago is a difficult game to talk about, I won't really try. Fun, though.
I had a great time playing these older titles. There are certainly some lessons in recent game design that seem to have come in vogue after the release of El Grande and T&E.. notably variable turn order mechanics and downtime minimizing. These aren't things that bother me if the game is engrossing enough, as these ones are for me, but Kozure was visibly "antsy" throughout much of the evening.
Sorry, Kozure. I'll be picking El Grande again in the near future!
Sunday, January 07, 2007
Twice as nice (Santiago, Mission: Red Planet)
Two games played this week, each of which I had played once before (though the rest of the group hadn't yet played Mission: Red Planet).
Tili, Shemp, Bharmer, Luch and I played Mission: Red Planet first. The rules were easily explained, and the game began. When I played this on new year's eve, I enjoyed it but predicted it would get better on subsequent playing and I'm happy to say that this is the case.
In my first playing, my concerns about the game were that I felt that there was too many roles, that it was annoying to relate the destinations of the ships to the regions of Mars and, ultimately, the chaos was a little over the top. Surprisingly, in my second playing most of these resolved themselves.
Despite the fact that I still feel 9 roles is an awkward number, I was surprised at how quickly I internalized them all this game. I normally knew which role I wanted ahead of time, so the multitude of options didn't really slow me down. I suppose that it still would have been better, from a game design standpoint, to include the full 11 roles (to allow a player to try to go the distance without resorting to the prospector) or drop the number to 5-6 (to simplify the choices)... but it doesn't bother me much already.
The destinations on the ships were very frustrating in my first game. Getting a handle on what I was trying to do involved too many steps for what was supposed to be a fun, fast game (correlate the destinations of the ships available to the regions of mars they are going to/ see how many astronauts are already in those regions, and how many are on their way/ decide on the destinations you are interested in/ see if those ships are full or if they risk filling up before you get to to play / figure out which role to play based on how quickly you need to get them on the ships and which power you want to use). Again, despite the fact that the process doesn't really get any simpler on subsequent play I was surprised at how much easier it all was this game. I think the key is that the regions names started becoming familiar, so I didn't have to do as much cross referencing for every step. Combined with my newfound familiarity with the roles, things were becoming far more manageable!
Finally, with my increased comfort level with the mechanics the chaos seemed to drop dramatically. On one hand, no one is going to confuse this with Princes of Florence... there is definitely a healthy dose of randomness and chaos in the game. On the other, I honestly felt like I was in control of my destiny for most of the game. In other words, I had a plan and I was able to pursue it, though other players were also able to do their best to mess with it.
My initial mission card was to have the most total astronauts in the central regions of the planet. With that goal in mind, I was disappointed that none of the initial crop of ships led to any of them! I played the travel agent in the hopes of getting my numbers up on the planet (I could always move them around later with the explorer). Alas! 3 players chose the secret agent and launched ships prematurely, leaving me with no options to place astronauts. Only one round in, and I had already been outplayed. On my second round, there still were no ships to the center so I went with the scientists in the hopes of getting a second bonus card. Instead, I picked a discovery card, but it was a good one: at the end game, the region with the card produces 5 goods instead of 3. I placed the card in Sirtis Major, a region I could get to that round and loaded the ship.
Over the course of the game, I fought over majorities in just 3 regions (two in the center and Sirtis Major). Every round, even if I couldn't do EXACTLY what I wanted (no ships going where I needed them, etc) I felt there was always something useful to do and some way to reach my long term objectives... a sharp contrast to my first game. In the end, I succesfully met the criteria in my bonus card by beating Tili in the center, kept control of Sirtis Major from Luch and managed a win by a large margin (not surprising considering how much of an advantage I was drawing from having experience with the system). I enjoyed it quite a bit, and I am impressed at how much the game system seemed improved for me over the first play. I'll have to choose this one again soon in order to allow others the same advantage. I am also looking forward to further plays because a few possible future strategies crossed my mind that I'd like to try!
Our second and last game was Santiago (Kozure joined us and Tili bowed out). This game of crop speculating was well received last time and it held up well. Things were looking up for me in the beginning, as I had successfully planted and dominated a large red pepper crop. Unfortunately, I took a gamble at one point and placed my 1 free irrigation marker at the edge of the field hoping to encourage anyone who would choose red pepper in next round to place there. NO red peppers were turned up, and so all the players closed off my field with different crop types. Meanwhile, Bharmer established an even larger green bean field, Luch had a potato thing going, Shemp was banana master and Kozure had interests spread out everywhere. Bharmer's combination of giant bean field and smaller crops elswhere gave him the game.
Although could be boiled down to a rather dry, mathematical game, I quite like it. I enjoy the simplicity of the system, I like how the auction relates to the tile placement and the overseer role going to the lowest bidder adds a nice twist to keep things interesting. It has many of the hallmarks of a good german game (short playing time, simple rules, clever mechanics, abstract, auction+tile laying, small board+wooden bits). For this reason, I would think this is a good choice as a follow up to Carcassonne or Settlers of Catan for anyone wanting to introduce themselves or others to German gaming.
My only complaints about the game are that a player can get paralysed considering tile choice and placement since everything is open information, and it can slow things a little (I'm guilty of this). I do like the fundamentals of the mathematics, though. If I add a tile to a crop, I'm giving other players a point for every token they have in the field, while I gain 1 or 2 times the size of the field. It's a good thing that the order of future crops is unknown and that the overseer is ultimately in control of the flow of water, as this forces players to speculate on the future and take chances. I suppose it's probably possible to accurately analyse the worth of every move in the last few rounds, which could also make the game drag, but thankfully our group didn't really play that way.
Ultimately, this is a very fun game. Thanks to Shemp for buying it!
Tili, Shemp, Bharmer, Luch and I played Mission: Red Planet first. The rules were easily explained, and the game began. When I played this on new year's eve, I enjoyed it but predicted it would get better on subsequent playing and I'm happy to say that this is the case.
In my first playing, my concerns about the game were that I felt that there was too many roles, that it was annoying to relate the destinations of the ships to the regions of Mars and, ultimately, the chaos was a little over the top. Surprisingly, in my second playing most of these resolved themselves.
Despite the fact that I still feel 9 roles is an awkward number, I was surprised at how quickly I internalized them all this game. I normally knew which role I wanted ahead of time, so the multitude of options didn't really slow me down. I suppose that it still would have been better, from a game design standpoint, to include the full 11 roles (to allow a player to try to go the distance without resorting to the prospector) or drop the number to 5-6 (to simplify the choices)... but it doesn't bother me much already.
The destinations on the ships were very frustrating in my first game. Getting a handle on what I was trying to do involved too many steps for what was supposed to be a fun, fast game (correlate the destinations of the ships available to the regions of mars they are going to/ see how many astronauts are already in those regions, and how many are on their way/ decide on the destinations you are interested in/ see if those ships are full or if they risk filling up before you get to to play / figure out which role to play based on how quickly you need to get them on the ships and which power you want to use). Again, despite the fact that the process doesn't really get any simpler on subsequent play I was surprised at how much easier it all was this game. I think the key is that the regions names started becoming familiar, so I didn't have to do as much cross referencing for every step. Combined with my newfound familiarity with the roles, things were becoming far more manageable!
Finally, with my increased comfort level with the mechanics the chaos seemed to drop dramatically. On one hand, no one is going to confuse this with Princes of Florence... there is definitely a healthy dose of randomness and chaos in the game. On the other, I honestly felt like I was in control of my destiny for most of the game. In other words, I had a plan and I was able to pursue it, though other players were also able to do their best to mess with it.
My initial mission card was to have the most total astronauts in the central regions of the planet. With that goal in mind, I was disappointed that none of the initial crop of ships led to any of them! I played the travel agent in the hopes of getting my numbers up on the planet (I could always move them around later with the explorer). Alas! 3 players chose the secret agent and launched ships prematurely, leaving me with no options to place astronauts. Only one round in, and I had already been outplayed. On my second round, there still were no ships to the center so I went with the scientists in the hopes of getting a second bonus card. Instead, I picked a discovery card, but it was a good one: at the end game, the region with the card produces 5 goods instead of 3. I placed the card in Sirtis Major, a region I could get to that round and loaded the ship.
Over the course of the game, I fought over majorities in just 3 regions (two in the center and Sirtis Major). Every round, even if I couldn't do EXACTLY what I wanted (no ships going where I needed them, etc) I felt there was always something useful to do and some way to reach my long term objectives... a sharp contrast to my first game. In the end, I succesfully met the criteria in my bonus card by beating Tili in the center, kept control of Sirtis Major from Luch and managed a win by a large margin (not surprising considering how much of an advantage I was drawing from having experience with the system). I enjoyed it quite a bit, and I am impressed at how much the game system seemed improved for me over the first play. I'll have to choose this one again soon in order to allow others the same advantage. I am also looking forward to further plays because a few possible future strategies crossed my mind that I'd like to try!
Our second and last game was Santiago (Kozure joined us and Tili bowed out). This game of crop speculating was well received last time and it held up well. Things were looking up for me in the beginning, as I had successfully planted and dominated a large red pepper crop. Unfortunately, I took a gamble at one point and placed my 1 free irrigation marker at the edge of the field hoping to encourage anyone who would choose red pepper in next round to place there. NO red peppers were turned up, and so all the players closed off my field with different crop types. Meanwhile, Bharmer established an even larger green bean field, Luch had a potato thing going, Shemp was banana master and Kozure had interests spread out everywhere. Bharmer's combination of giant bean field and smaller crops elswhere gave him the game.
Although could be boiled down to a rather dry, mathematical game, I quite like it. I enjoy the simplicity of the system, I like how the auction relates to the tile placement and the overseer role going to the lowest bidder adds a nice twist to keep things interesting. It has many of the hallmarks of a good german game (short playing time, simple rules, clever mechanics, abstract, auction+tile laying, small board+wooden bits). For this reason, I would think this is a good choice as a follow up to Carcassonne or Settlers of Catan for anyone wanting to introduce themselves or others to German gaming.
My only complaints about the game are that a player can get paralysed considering tile choice and placement since everything is open information, and it can slow things a little (I'm guilty of this). I do like the fundamentals of the mathematics, though. If I add a tile to a crop, I'm giving other players a point for every token they have in the field, while I gain 1 or 2 times the size of the field. It's a good thing that the order of future crops is unknown and that the overseer is ultimately in control of the flow of water, as this forces players to speculate on the future and take chances. I suppose it's probably possible to accurately analyse the worth of every move in the last few rounds, which could also make the game drag, but thankfully our group didn't really play that way.
Ultimately, this is a very fun game. Thanks to Shemp for buying it!
Thursday, March 30, 2006
I Build, I Bleed, I Barter (Carcassonne - The City, Jyhad CCG and Santiago)
Well, it finally happened. The strike which was keeping my wife off course for nearly a month has finally ended. Good news for her, but bad news for gaming! The month off from WAGS I spoke of earlier will finally happen.
Lucky for me, it was my pick.
While waiting for Kozure, four of us played Carcassonne the City (Luch, Shemp, Sonja and I). Sonja hadn't played, but she was familiar with Carc Hunters and Gatherers, so she caught on pretty quick. The abstraction of the game defies session reporting... but let's just say that Shemp showed a knack for picking the right walls to guard. He won.
With Kozure ready and willing, I broke out the Jyhad CCG (now known as "Vampire: The Eternal Struggle" CCG).
*Edit*
To those not familiar with the game, it is a collectible card game (CCG) where each player takes the role of a Methuselah (an ancient and powerful Vampire) vying for ultimate control by destroying the influence of his opponents (measured in "blood pool"). Everyone has two decks: the first holds the cast of vampires which the Methuselah will use as pawns and the second holds cards representing the various actions those vampires may take. As the game was designed for multiplayer from the ground up, a number of design decisions help to keep the game from devolving into a slugfest where the least involved player inevitably wins. First is a "Predator - Prey" mechanic which forces a player to focus most of his atention to the player on his/her left. This means that your forces must be balanced to be offensive enough towards your prey while being defensive enough towards your predator at all times. It also means that any player more than one seat away from you is potentially your ally, since the pressure they place on your predator or prey makes life easier on you. Of course, things can't get too friendly, because as players are eliminated that player who used to be 2 seats away might now be your new predator or prey! Finally, a well implemented political system allows certain referendums to take place which can effect the whole table at once (and this is one of the key places where short term alliances across a table can really pay off).
The basic turn order works as follows:
1. Untap
2. The Methuselah can play a MASTER card, if he/she has any. This represents the Methuselah taking DIRECT action in the world, rather than through a minion.
3. The Methuselah can direct his minions to take action:
A damaged vampire can hunt to replenish him/herself
It can attempt to bleed his Methuselah's Prey
It can call a political action
It can equip itself with equipment or a retainer
It can engage an ally (non-vampire minion, like a werewolf or street gang)
An "ACTION" card can be played and the vampire does what the card says
4. The Methuselah transfers up to 4 points from his/ her blood pool (the "life" total of the player) to uncontrolled vampires he has waiting to enter the game. For this reason, a player must constantly balance his/ her well being with the need to employ minions in order to survive and thrive. (side note: blood pool is extremely hard to replenish, and is also the currency for playing MASTER cards, equiping minions, etc. Since being reduced to 0 blood pool eliminates a player from the game, these expenses must be carefully considered... it's not uncommon for a player to spend a good portion of the game teetering on oblivion)
ACTION MODIFIER cards can be played by the acting player to alter the action, and REACTION cards can be played by another player to counter the action (to be specific, the player's minions are playing those cards).
ACTIONS can be blocked. Actions have an associated STEALTH rating, and if the target METHUSELAH can muster enough INTERCEPT to match they can stop the action from happening. For this reason, STEALTH and INTERCEPT are the most fundamental ACTION MODIFIERS and REACTION CARDS.
If an action is succesfully blocked, the acting vampire and the blocking vampire enter combat. Combat has it's own subsystem, but all cards played are COMBAT cards. Vampires first determine range, then exchange strikes, and then determine if the combat will go to another round. Combat doesn't necessarily end with a defeated vampire.
* end of edit to add game description *
This game holds a special place in my heart because back in university I started playing it as soon as it came out. It quickly replaced Magic as my CCG of choice (I had also played Magic CCG, Illuminati CCG, Shadowrun CCG, Star Wars CCG and Dr. Who CCG). I lived with Luch at the time and we played it pretty much every chance we had. I wound up amassing a pretty large collection of cards and making quite a number of very good decks. At the time, Kozure and Shemp also played on occasion, but never got into it as much as we did.
Now, 10 years later, the introduction of Vampire: Prince of the City rekindled my interest to make decks and play again. I still counted it as one of my favorite games, despite it's long moratorium... I was very curious to see how it would go.
The answer is: Like a lead ballon.
Jyhad is a wonderful game on many levels. The game mechanics are very good. The theme is very well integrated into the game. There is real tension. The multiplayer aspect is extremely well implemented. Sadly, there are three very big downfalls:
1) The rules, though individually clear and straightforward, are complex due to sheer volume.
2) The game features player elimination.
3) The game is pretty long.
Now, when you combine a game that has lots of rules with the inherent complexities of a CCG, you wind up with quite a beast. Each card must be read and understood. Many have a fair bit of text on them, with different results in different circumstances. Most, by their very nature, are intended to allow something not normally allowed by the rules. That's a lot to take in. Make it a 5 player game, and it gets even more complex! Me and Luch were still pretty comfortable. Kozure didn't comment much, so I don't really know, but Shemp said he wasn't quite comfortable and Sonja was obviously buried in information overload. She had never played a CCG before, and it didn't help that I let her play a commercial preconstructed deck without being terribly familiar with it... The Ravnos deck she played turned out to be heavily defensive and reliant on tricky cards to get their job done.
But like I said, there is so much to admire! The central mechanic of giving up your own life essence to influence your minions (and other such things) is brilliant. The Predator/ Prey relationship gives order to the chaos which can result from multiplayer CCGs. That being said, the political system prevents the players from ever being able to ignore the players they are not directly involved with... "My enemy's enemy is my friend" is a concept which can really be turned to your advantage in Jyhad through the various referendums which come and go. The rules and card types do a great job of building a slow tension as everyone jockeys for position while hanging on to a very slim lifeline.
Our game pitted several clan specific decks against each other. The Nosferatu (me) preyed on the Ravnos (Sonja), who preyed on The Lasombra (Kozure), who preyed on the Brujah (Shemp), who preyed on the Tremere (Luch), who preyed on me.
Things were shaping up well. I started out quickly with a 4 capacity vampire, who soon equipped with a set of hand claws for increased combat damage and found a handy hunting ground (through a master card I played). I then influenced a larger minion to the table… a prince no less, and got ready to start doing some damage. Meanwhile, the other clans were readying their minions. There was a brutal battle between the Brujah and the Tremere which saw the 6 Tremere vampire reduced to 0 through 2 shots by a 22 magnum loaded with manstopper rounds. I managed to tear up one of Sonja’s big hitters myself, sending it to torpor after a few rounds of “growing furies” and the like. My referendum to force all players to lose 1 blood pool for every tapped vampire was also successful… Kozure, being neither my predator or my prey, had little to lose backing my position and the motion carried. We both lost 1 and the others lost 2-3 (to those who haven’t played the game, that difference may seem low, but every point is important as it’s not uncommon to spend a good chunk of the game trying to hold on with +/- 5 blood pool left!).
Although Shemp’s deck was doing fairly well, it could not do anything to prevent the stealthy Lasombra. One turn before I was going to eliminate Sonja, Kozure took out Shemp. Since the game was going long, and some weren’t really comfortable enough with the system to enjoy it, we called it at that point. Despite the good things going on, it was clear we weren’t firing on all cylinders. I guess it was too much too soon.
I think it’s fair to say that it wasn’t a success (though for me, I can definitely say the magic is still there)
We had a quick conversation on our preferences for types of complexity afterwards. It was very interesting! As I said before, CCGs are complex by their very nature because no matter how simple the rules are you are faced with a hand of cards and each has an effect which can change the environment, nature of rules and play. That said, each game system is likely to highlight different complexities.
Let’s take Jyhad and compare it to Illuminati CCG and Shadowrun CCG (since those are the other CCGs we play on occasion)
In Jyhad, there are many rules to cover the many phases and aspects of the game. It is rules complex.
In Illuminati, there are also a fair number of rules, but they tend to be variations on a central mechanic so it’s not too hard to pick up the basics. It’s rules moderate.
Shadowrun is a little more like Jyhad. There are several phases and subsystems, with cards specific to each. Still, it's significantly simpler overall.
In Jyhad, Your individual decisions are not to overwhelming, because you tend to be limited by the situation on the table and the cards in your hand. Once you understand the rules, gameplay is pretty straightforward (and the system has very few ambiguities, which is nice). Internalizing the rules is the main challenge.
In Illuminati, a fair bit of effort is required to understand what is on the table at a given time. There are countless modifiers through the cards in your hand, the cards on the table, the current “New World Orders”, etc. To complicate things further, on most turns any other player is free to get involved. Gameplay cannot be simplified without accepting that modifiers will be missed (that's probably the point, but it feels wrong to me). Typically, after trying to determine the possible outcome of a possible move, I give up and resort to "What the hell, let's see what happens".
In Shadowrun, you neither have too much to consider, nor much difficulty determining what to do on a round. Unfortunately, instead of resulting in a better game than both the other entries it kind of feels a little bland. It's a good game, but the least engaging of the three for me.
Since I am typically willing to absorb a lot of rules so long as the game plays smoothly afterwards, Jyhad suits me fine. Illuminati, on the other hand, I typically find overwhelming (though still enjoyable). Put a different way, once you "get" the Jyhad system, there isn't much to it. I feel I can focus on my objectives, weigh my options, try to manipulate the table, etc. Picking my action is an important decision, but figuring out the outcome is simple. In Illuminati, I will always have to stop and read all the cards on the table and do the math every turn (as does anyone else who wants to get involved). It's the same issue I had with Arkham Horror... I need to draw info from too many sources at one time to figure out what's going on at any given time. There are too many rules which need to be remembered and taken into consideration AT THE SAME TIME. More often than not, something gets forgotten. Again, in Illuminati I think that's part of the point, it's a humorous game after all. In Arkham Horror, it's just a problem (IMHO).
I’ll definitely try to bring this out again, but maybe with a smaller group and strictly with the decks I made up (as they were meant to be simpler than the preconstructed ones). Hopefully the audience will still be willing!
We finished off with a game of Santiago. I angled for a big potato farm, but didn’t quite make it. For a while, I was a contender! (I blew any chance I had in the second last round by going high on a bid and still winding up third… leaving me broke and with no good plantation to show for it). Luch was looking good with a few big stakes in a few fields, but in the end it was Shemp who carried it on the strength of some good representation in many fields of varying worth. On an amusing note, Sonja was endlessly perturbed by our group’s lack of interest in bribes. We all typically shunned the money and went for the strategic move on the board… which not only makes us very different than her other gamer friends but also pretty cheap (of course, if she thinks we are cheap at Santiago, she should see us at Traders of Genoa!).
See you in a month!
Lucky for me, it was my pick.
While waiting for Kozure, four of us played Carcassonne the City (Luch, Shemp, Sonja and I). Sonja hadn't played, but she was familiar with Carc Hunters and Gatherers, so she caught on pretty quick. The abstraction of the game defies session reporting... but let's just say that Shemp showed a knack for picking the right walls to guard. He won.
With Kozure ready and willing, I broke out the Jyhad CCG (now known as "Vampire: The Eternal Struggle" CCG).
*Edit*
To those not familiar with the game, it is a collectible card game (CCG) where each player takes the role of a Methuselah (an ancient and powerful Vampire) vying for ultimate control by destroying the influence of his opponents (measured in "blood pool"). Everyone has two decks: the first holds the cast of vampires which the Methuselah will use as pawns and the second holds cards representing the various actions those vampires may take. As the game was designed for multiplayer from the ground up, a number of design decisions help to keep the game from devolving into a slugfest where the least involved player inevitably wins. First is a "Predator - Prey" mechanic which forces a player to focus most of his atention to the player on his/her left. This means that your forces must be balanced to be offensive enough towards your prey while being defensive enough towards your predator at all times. It also means that any player more than one seat away from you is potentially your ally, since the pressure they place on your predator or prey makes life easier on you. Of course, things can't get too friendly, because as players are eliminated that player who used to be 2 seats away might now be your new predator or prey! Finally, a well implemented political system allows certain referendums to take place which can effect the whole table at once (and this is one of the key places where short term alliances across a table can really pay off).
The basic turn order works as follows:
1. Untap
2. The Methuselah can play a MASTER card, if he/she has any. This represents the Methuselah taking DIRECT action in the world, rather than through a minion.
3. The Methuselah can direct his minions to take action:
A damaged vampire can hunt to replenish him/herself
It can attempt to bleed his Methuselah's Prey
It can call a political action
It can equip itself with equipment or a retainer
It can engage an ally (non-vampire minion, like a werewolf or street gang)
An "ACTION" card can be played and the vampire does what the card says
4. The Methuselah transfers up to 4 points from his/ her blood pool (the "life" total of the player) to uncontrolled vampires he has waiting to enter the game. For this reason, a player must constantly balance his/ her well being with the need to employ minions in order to survive and thrive. (side note: blood pool is extremely hard to replenish, and is also the currency for playing MASTER cards, equiping minions, etc. Since being reduced to 0 blood pool eliminates a player from the game, these expenses must be carefully considered... it's not uncommon for a player to spend a good portion of the game teetering on oblivion)
ACTION MODIFIER cards can be played by the acting player to alter the action, and REACTION cards can be played by another player to counter the action (to be specific, the player's minions are playing those cards).
ACTIONS can be blocked. Actions have an associated STEALTH rating, and if the target METHUSELAH can muster enough INTERCEPT to match they can stop the action from happening. For this reason, STEALTH and INTERCEPT are the most fundamental ACTION MODIFIERS and REACTION CARDS.
If an action is succesfully blocked, the acting vampire and the blocking vampire enter combat. Combat has it's own subsystem, but all cards played are COMBAT cards. Vampires first determine range, then exchange strikes, and then determine if the combat will go to another round. Combat doesn't necessarily end with a defeated vampire.
* end of edit to add game description *
This game holds a special place in my heart because back in university I started playing it as soon as it came out. It quickly replaced Magic as my CCG of choice (I had also played Magic CCG, Illuminati CCG, Shadowrun CCG, Star Wars CCG and Dr. Who CCG). I lived with Luch at the time and we played it pretty much every chance we had. I wound up amassing a pretty large collection of cards and making quite a number of very good decks. At the time, Kozure and Shemp also played on occasion, but never got into it as much as we did.
Now, 10 years later, the introduction of Vampire: Prince of the City rekindled my interest to make decks and play again. I still counted it as one of my favorite games, despite it's long moratorium... I was very curious to see how it would go.
The answer is: Like a lead ballon.
Jyhad is a wonderful game on many levels. The game mechanics are very good. The theme is very well integrated into the game. There is real tension. The multiplayer aspect is extremely well implemented. Sadly, there are three very big downfalls:
1) The rules, though individually clear and straightforward, are complex due to sheer volume.
2) The game features player elimination.
3) The game is pretty long.
Now, when you combine a game that has lots of rules with the inherent complexities of a CCG, you wind up with quite a beast. Each card must be read and understood. Many have a fair bit of text on them, with different results in different circumstances. Most, by their very nature, are intended to allow something not normally allowed by the rules. That's a lot to take in. Make it a 5 player game, and it gets even more complex! Me and Luch were still pretty comfortable. Kozure didn't comment much, so I don't really know, but Shemp said he wasn't quite comfortable and Sonja was obviously buried in information overload. She had never played a CCG before, and it didn't help that I let her play a commercial preconstructed deck without being terribly familiar with it... The Ravnos deck she played turned out to be heavily defensive and reliant on tricky cards to get their job done.
But like I said, there is so much to admire! The central mechanic of giving up your own life essence to influence your minions (and other such things) is brilliant. The Predator/ Prey relationship gives order to the chaos which can result from multiplayer CCGs. That being said, the political system prevents the players from ever being able to ignore the players they are not directly involved with... "My enemy's enemy is my friend" is a concept which can really be turned to your advantage in Jyhad through the various referendums which come and go. The rules and card types do a great job of building a slow tension as everyone jockeys for position while hanging on to a very slim lifeline.
Our game pitted several clan specific decks against each other. The Nosferatu (me) preyed on the Ravnos (Sonja), who preyed on The Lasombra (Kozure), who preyed on the Brujah (Shemp), who preyed on the Tremere (Luch), who preyed on me.
Things were shaping up well. I started out quickly with a 4 capacity vampire, who soon equipped with a set of hand claws for increased combat damage and found a handy hunting ground (through a master card I played). I then influenced a larger minion to the table… a prince no less, and got ready to start doing some damage. Meanwhile, the other clans were readying their minions. There was a brutal battle between the Brujah and the Tremere which saw the 6 Tremere vampire reduced to 0 through 2 shots by a 22 magnum loaded with manstopper rounds. I managed to tear up one of Sonja’s big hitters myself, sending it to torpor after a few rounds of “growing furies” and the like. My referendum to force all players to lose 1 blood pool for every tapped vampire was also successful… Kozure, being neither my predator or my prey, had little to lose backing my position and the motion carried. We both lost 1 and the others lost 2-3 (to those who haven’t played the game, that difference may seem low, but every point is important as it’s not uncommon to spend a good chunk of the game trying to hold on with +/- 5 blood pool left!).
Although Shemp’s deck was doing fairly well, it could not do anything to prevent the stealthy Lasombra. One turn before I was going to eliminate Sonja, Kozure took out Shemp. Since the game was going long, and some weren’t really comfortable enough with the system to enjoy it, we called it at that point. Despite the good things going on, it was clear we weren’t firing on all cylinders. I guess it was too much too soon.
I think it’s fair to say that it wasn’t a success (though for me, I can definitely say the magic is still there)
We had a quick conversation on our preferences for types of complexity afterwards. It was very interesting! As I said before, CCGs are complex by their very nature because no matter how simple the rules are you are faced with a hand of cards and each has an effect which can change the environment, nature of rules and play. That said, each game system is likely to highlight different complexities.
Let’s take Jyhad and compare it to Illuminati CCG and Shadowrun CCG (since those are the other CCGs we play on occasion)
In Jyhad, there are many rules to cover the many phases and aspects of the game. It is rules complex.
In Illuminati, there are also a fair number of rules, but they tend to be variations on a central mechanic so it’s not too hard to pick up the basics. It’s rules moderate.
Shadowrun is a little more like Jyhad. There are several phases and subsystems, with cards specific to each. Still, it's significantly simpler overall.
In Jyhad, Your individual decisions are not to overwhelming, because you tend to be limited by the situation on the table and the cards in your hand. Once you understand the rules, gameplay is pretty straightforward (and the system has very few ambiguities, which is nice). Internalizing the rules is the main challenge.
In Illuminati, a fair bit of effort is required to understand what is on the table at a given time. There are countless modifiers through the cards in your hand, the cards on the table, the current “New World Orders”, etc. To complicate things further, on most turns any other player is free to get involved. Gameplay cannot be simplified without accepting that modifiers will be missed (that's probably the point, but it feels wrong to me). Typically, after trying to determine the possible outcome of a possible move, I give up and resort to "What the hell, let's see what happens".
In Shadowrun, you neither have too much to consider, nor much difficulty determining what to do on a round. Unfortunately, instead of resulting in a better game than both the other entries it kind of feels a little bland. It's a good game, but the least engaging of the three for me.
Since I am typically willing to absorb a lot of rules so long as the game plays smoothly afterwards, Jyhad suits me fine. Illuminati, on the other hand, I typically find overwhelming (though still enjoyable). Put a different way, once you "get" the Jyhad system, there isn't much to it. I feel I can focus on my objectives, weigh my options, try to manipulate the table, etc. Picking my action is an important decision, but figuring out the outcome is simple. In Illuminati, I will always have to stop and read all the cards on the table and do the math every turn (as does anyone else who wants to get involved). It's the same issue I had with Arkham Horror... I need to draw info from too many sources at one time to figure out what's going on at any given time. There are too many rules which need to be remembered and taken into consideration AT THE SAME TIME. More often than not, something gets forgotten. Again, in Illuminati I think that's part of the point, it's a humorous game after all. In Arkham Horror, it's just a problem (IMHO).
I’ll definitely try to bring this out again, but maybe with a smaller group and strictly with the decks I made up (as they were meant to be simpler than the preconstructed ones). Hopefully the audience will still be willing!
We finished off with a game of Santiago. I angled for a big potato farm, but didn’t quite make it. For a while, I was a contender! (I blew any chance I had in the second last round by going high on a bid and still winding up third… leaving me broke and with no good plantation to show for it). Luch was looking good with a few big stakes in a few fields, but in the end it was Shemp who carried it on the strength of some good representation in many fields of varying worth. On an amusing note, Sonja was endlessly perturbed by our group’s lack of interest in bribes. We all typically shunned the money and went for the strategic move on the board… which not only makes us very different than her other gamer friends but also pretty cheap (of course, if she thinks we are cheap at Santiago, she should see us at Traders of Genoa!).
See you in a month!
Sunday, January 15, 2006
Vinci. Vinki. Winky. Bananas. (Vinci, Santiago)
Sonja joined us again, and brought 2 new (to us) games in tow... Vinci and Santiago. These are two of her favorite games, so I was quite curious to try them (For Sale!, though a very different game, was a favorite of hers which has gone over extremely well).
We started with Vinci (pronounced "Vinky" or "Winky", depending on who you ask). It means "to be conquered", and the name is fitting! The gameboard shows Europe as unamed territories defined by their major resource (mountains, fields, etc). In addition, a few other descriptors, "ports" and "mines", are identified. A series of "characteristics" are randomly drawn and layed out in pairs along the top of the board. In turn, players must choose a pair of characteristics which will define their emerging civilization and then begin to spread their influence across the board (a focus on military and farming, for ex.). Points are earned acording to the size of the civ, and for how well the civ matches up with some of the characteristics the player chose for it (a nation of farmers gets bonus points for controlling fields, for example). As the game progresses, players must decide when their civilization has reached it's zenith, and then decide to put it into "decline". This allows the player to pick a new pair of characteristics and start a new nation. The old nation continues to provide points until it is wiped of the board. This keeps going until the game ends. The whole thing is pretty abstracted, as the capacity for a nation to expand is the only thing which is described, and that is represented solely by a supply of little wooden discs. Seeing a game of Vinci is very similar to watching a number of coloured ameoba rather rapidly growing and contracting across the board.
The game was definitely interesting. Sonja, having played several times before, was much better at choosing her nation's characteristics, and cycling them for maximum VPs. She took over the center of the board and held it for quite a while. Kozure was last in turn order, and had a difficult start since the board was already pretty congested by his turn. I played my timing pretty badly, and at one point I was completely eliminated from the board! (I took solace in the fact that I was still in 3rd place, but with no source of points that was pretty short lived). Lucky for me, this is not a player elimination game... On my turn, I just selected another pair of characteristics and started a new civilization (I beleive my last one was defined by "Barbarians" and "Espionage"... an advantage in numbers and the ability to take out a large army with few soldiers). Luch got a good run out of some "Port" territories and came very close to catching up to Sonja, but ultimately Kozure had a very lucrative last turn and came in second. I was dead last.
I thought that Vinci was a very good game. The twin characteristics encourage players to look at the board differently for each combination they play. The expansion mechanics are simple enough that things move quickly for a game of such "scope". "Kill the Leader" tactics dominate the second half of the game, but the fact that players start new civs whenever they want and score their points immediately ensures that the game can't help but move forward. A minor issue I have is that things are SO abstracted and simplified that I never really felt I had time to identify with any of my nations. For a game with such a compelling topic, that's a bit of a shame. Still, the game was fun, so I can't fault it too badly!
I'm pretty sure it was well liked by the group. Kozure said he preferred it to El Grande! I don't see the connection, myself (and I definitely prefer El Grande)...
Santiago was next.
This is a game where players auction for goods to plant in a field (banana plants, potato seeds, etc), and ultimately win for producing the most valuable crops. A valuable crop is defined by it's size (a continuous set of 7 banana plants is worth more than 7 plants spread out across the board). The twist is that every turn, the player who bid the LEAST is in charge of determining which plants will get watered (termed "the overseer"). Predictably, plants without water eventually dry up and die. The game, therefore, revolves around evaluating the opportunities for various crops on the board, bidding accordingly to pick the right crops at the right time, and then bribing the "overseer" enough to make sure your efforts don't go to waste.
It's a simple enough system, and the bribing aspect makes the play interesting (it provides cash to the cash poor, and keeps runaway leaders in check... unless they are very persuasive!). Nothing groundbreaking, but player interaction was good and things moved along well (and any game with a built in screwage factor is always fun). For whatever reason, I lump this game with "China"... a modest game , but one that does what it's trying to do simply, cleanly and effectively (I'm not saying they are similar games, just that I associate them in this way). Not the kind of thing that would ever be in my top 10, but I could see them getting lots of play.
Unfortunately, my game was cut short (had to leave early). I wasn't able to finish the game, but what I played seemed promising enough. The next day, I was told I managed to virtually tie Shemp despite my absence for the second half of the game! Not sure what went so horribly wrong for him, and he's not offering to tell me....
Vinci: 8
Santiago: 7.5 (though not based on a full game)
We started with Vinci (pronounced "Vinky" or "Winky", depending on who you ask). It means "to be conquered", and the name is fitting! The gameboard shows Europe as unamed territories defined by their major resource (mountains, fields, etc). In addition, a few other descriptors, "ports" and "mines", are identified. A series of "characteristics" are randomly drawn and layed out in pairs along the top of the board. In turn, players must choose a pair of characteristics which will define their emerging civilization and then begin to spread their influence across the board (a focus on military and farming, for ex.). Points are earned acording to the size of the civ, and for how well the civ matches up with some of the characteristics the player chose for it (a nation of farmers gets bonus points for controlling fields, for example). As the game progresses, players must decide when their civilization has reached it's zenith, and then decide to put it into "decline". This allows the player to pick a new pair of characteristics and start a new nation. The old nation continues to provide points until it is wiped of the board. This keeps going until the game ends. The whole thing is pretty abstracted, as the capacity for a nation to expand is the only thing which is described, and that is represented solely by a supply of little wooden discs. Seeing a game of Vinci is very similar to watching a number of coloured ameoba rather rapidly growing and contracting across the board.
The game was definitely interesting. Sonja, having played several times before, was much better at choosing her nation's characteristics, and cycling them for maximum VPs. She took over the center of the board and held it for quite a while. Kozure was last in turn order, and had a difficult start since the board was already pretty congested by his turn. I played my timing pretty badly, and at one point I was completely eliminated from the board! (I took solace in the fact that I was still in 3rd place, but with no source of points that was pretty short lived). Lucky for me, this is not a player elimination game... On my turn, I just selected another pair of characteristics and started a new civilization (I beleive my last one was defined by "Barbarians" and "Espionage"... an advantage in numbers and the ability to take out a large army with few soldiers). Luch got a good run out of some "Port" territories and came very close to catching up to Sonja, but ultimately Kozure had a very lucrative last turn and came in second. I was dead last.
I thought that Vinci was a very good game. The twin characteristics encourage players to look at the board differently for each combination they play. The expansion mechanics are simple enough that things move quickly for a game of such "scope". "Kill the Leader" tactics dominate the second half of the game, but the fact that players start new civs whenever they want and score their points immediately ensures that the game can't help but move forward. A minor issue I have is that things are SO abstracted and simplified that I never really felt I had time to identify with any of my nations. For a game with such a compelling topic, that's a bit of a shame. Still, the game was fun, so I can't fault it too badly!
I'm pretty sure it was well liked by the group. Kozure said he preferred it to El Grande! I don't see the connection, myself (and I definitely prefer El Grande)...
Santiago was next.
This is a game where players auction for goods to plant in a field (banana plants, potato seeds, etc), and ultimately win for producing the most valuable crops. A valuable crop is defined by it's size (a continuous set of 7 banana plants is worth more than 7 plants spread out across the board). The twist is that every turn, the player who bid the LEAST is in charge of determining which plants will get watered (termed "the overseer"). Predictably, plants without water eventually dry up and die. The game, therefore, revolves around evaluating the opportunities for various crops on the board, bidding accordingly to pick the right crops at the right time, and then bribing the "overseer" enough to make sure your efforts don't go to waste.
It's a simple enough system, and the bribing aspect makes the play interesting (it provides cash to the cash poor, and keeps runaway leaders in check... unless they are very persuasive!). Nothing groundbreaking, but player interaction was good and things moved along well (and any game with a built in screwage factor is always fun). For whatever reason, I lump this game with "China"... a modest game , but one that does what it's trying to do simply, cleanly and effectively (I'm not saying they are similar games, just that I associate them in this way). Not the kind of thing that would ever be in my top 10, but I could see them getting lots of play.
Unfortunately, my game was cut short (had to leave early). I wasn't able to finish the game, but what I played seemed promising enough. The next day, I was told I managed to virtually tie Shemp despite my absence for the second half of the game! Not sure what went so horribly wrong for him, and he's not offering to tell me....
Vinci: 8
Santiago: 7.5 (though not based on a full game)
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