Ruling the Board: SSHS February Board Game Bonanza: Final Thoughts

The day started off pretty well with an hour on the treadmill and a foot-long tuna sub.  Once I arrived at SSHS, there were already a couple of games going and it didn't take long before a couple ended and those of us that were standing around were able to jump in and play.

I used this time wisely to raid the walls and purchase a number of games and supplements due to the moving sale.

We started a game of Glen More and after figuring it out for a few turns and realizing some of the major things we were doing wrong, we started over and played through.  It was a fun game that I was able to pull out a victory in during the final scoring.

After this, the group stayed together and we played a quick game of Castle Panic as we waited for the other groups to break finish up their games.  We won pretty easily.

After this, the other games finished and I along with two others in my current group joined Jack for another couple games.  First was the best game of the day, Tokaido, that was allot of fun and really well themed.

We finished up with another game with Jack, Home Stretch.  This was the most fun game of the day as we cheered our horses on throughout.

In the end, I was able to get in four games played, three bought along with an expansion, and 2 supplements.

It was a really fun day.  I thought about just hanging around the house and was really glad that I kicked myself out and headed over there.

Many people got some great deals that day and we bought out most of the board and card game stock that day.

They even opened up the miniature sales online and one guy bought $4,000 worth of miniatures for $2,000.  That’s allot of miniatures.

Here’s hoping that the new location with have at least as much space if not more as at one point we had four board games and one war game going at the same time and the gaming space got a bit cramped.  I love that it was that busy though as it really shows how the industry is thriving right now.

I’m already looking to their March Board Gaming Bonanza and wondering if the store will still be called Silver Springs Hobby Shop with it now moving to Port Washington Road.

Ruling the Board: SSHS February Board Game Bonanza: Home Stretch

If I was nervous about Tokaido, I was downright worried about Home Stretch.  Could a game about horse racing really be any good?

Well, the short answer is yes, good and very fun.

In the game, you are horse owners/gamblers.  You first do a pick one and pass to draw three horses that you own, you then bet and run a race, then pick and pass for two more horses, and then bet and race three more times for the end.

So, the race comprises of horses 2-12 (all combinations of 2d6).  Each player rolls the dice and chooses to move that horse 1 or 2 spaces of the 10 the track is comprised of.  If they chose 1, they can roll again and that horse must go 2 spaces.  Also, some horses are handicapped so their first roll they do not move, and others get a 2, 4, or 6 space bump when they are first rolled.  These usually go to the harder to roll numbers, but not always.

So, once you see the handicaps, players be from leader to last only placing chips of their rank in any given spot.  The bets are for winner, place, or show for each horse.  If your bet wins, you count up the number you bet times the number on the betting square and move that number of spaces, also, for each race the horse owners for first, second, and third split the winnings as listed on the card used for the race.  The player with the most points at the end of the four races wins.

It may seem like allot of rules, but in actuality, there aren't that many and the setup and rules teaching are pretty fast.

In our game, Bob started out with a commanding lead after the first race.  This allowed him to pay more in the 2^nd owner phase, but after having a couple bad races in a row he was lagging back.  I took the lead after two and three races.  In the final race it was a two owner race with Jack coming up strong late and John betting the house on one chance to come back.  In the end, Bob and I tied for the win.

Final Scores:

Me – 151

Bob – 151

Jack – 145

Dan – 131

Justine – 120

John - 54

Final Thoughts:

This was the most fun game of the day.  People really got into the racing around the track and pulling for their horses, both the ones they bet for and the ones they owned.

I would have never thought I would enjoy this game so much or that I could think about playing it with other crowds and them enjoying it as well, but the game play is really simple and fun and I could see it being played anywhere.

I was very pleasantly surprised with Home Stretch.

Ruling the Board: SSHS February Board Game Bonanza: Tokaido

In Tokaido, players take on the roles of travelers in Japan making their way from one city to the next.  Players don’t have much money, though, and must choose to use it wisely between giving money to the temple, buying souvenirs, enjoying the scenery, visiting the hot springs, partaking in encounters, and eating food at the inns.

The game goes in a furthest back order with each stop having a limited number of people who can stop there.  So, figuring out where you want to go and getting there can be a chore or impossible determined by who else wants to get there and who goes first.

You really have to be careful with your money and use it to the best of your ability to have a chance to win.  Sometimes this will mean using it to focus on a couple of types and others on spreading it out effectively among many types.

My traveler was Chuubie who got a free encounter card at every inn.  This actually worked out really well for me although it only activated at inns.  I decided to go for the four piece scenery of the 3, 4, and 5, and spread around between all types of actions.

I was able to take the lead about 1/3^rd of the way in and keep it through until the end of the final scoring.  It killed me not to be able to purchase food and get 6 points at the final end.

Final Score:

John – 72

Jack – 71

Me – 71

Justine – 63

Dan – 46

Final Thoughts:

This game came out of nowhere for me and blew me away.  I had never heard of it before and was a bit hesitant to step in for it, but I had wanted to play with Jack after meeting him at two previous events and not getting to play with him.

The theme in the game was really cool and the game won me over about two rounds in as I was buying souvenirs and then food at the inn along my trip.

This game is allot of fun with allot of options.  It took my brain a bit to get used to the order going from the furthest back to the first up and recognizing that certain options would only be available on the current turn as someone would be there the next turn and I would have to jump ahead of them.

I look forward to being able to play this one again in the future.

Ruling the Board: SSHS February Board Game Bonanza: Castle Panic

Next up was Castle Panic, one of the games I have played the most.  Due to it’s quick setup and rules, it is a great game to fill time between games.

In this game with the same players in Glen More we were able to very quickly move through the monsters and achieve victory.  At the finish, 2 walls and 4 turrets remained standing.  We did a really good job of working together and coming up with optimal strategies.  A couple of times we got in trouble with monster pulls, but mostly things were under control.  We even had the board fully wiped with six tokens left to draw.  

These came out all at once and we mowed them down.

So, we left victorious and the hero points were as follows.

Me – 17

Justine – 13

Dan – 13

Other Dan – 10

Ruling the Board: SSHS February Board Game Bonanza: Glen More

In Glen More, players build their city somewhat like Alhombra, but instead of buying buildings with money from the board, you use resources that your tiles create when activated.  You can also activate them for other functions such as changing unrefined goods into refined goods and changing unrefined goods into victory points.

There are also castles and lochs that can be built, people to change into chieftans, and determinations to be made on how to place your tiles and how many to use.

One neat mechanic here that almost cost me dearly in the end is that all players with more tiles that the player with the least has to give back victory points equal to three times the number of tiles over they are.

This balances out players that gobble up all of the tiles for VP’s as they play for those who are going for slower end game pieces.

I was a tile gobbler and did so through most of the game while amassing allot of VP’s.  Once the game ended, though, I knew I was in trouble.  I needed to finish high in most of the categories so I could pay for my extra tiles and have a shot.  In the end, I was able to get a few major bonuses at the end from other players not gaining any of those types and came out on top.

Final Score:

Me – 44

Justine – 37

Dan – 35

Other Dan – 28

Final Thoughts:

This was a decent game that didn't seem too deep, but that a player could really get into if they wanted too.  There were some cool mechanics that I haven’t seen before and the big/little movement and use it or lose it tiles made things interesting.

We got so lost after three turns the first time that we had to treat it as a tutorial and start from scratch.  We were playing some things pretty wrong, so that was good and everyone was laid back enough to be OK with it.

Even though this one wasn't my favorite, I would still play it again were it to hit the board.

Ruling the Board: Shaw Gaming 2/2/13: Wrap-Up

A great night of food and game started as it usually does with some appetizers, drinks, and cocktails in the kitchen.  While people finished up, we sat up Castle Panic and sat down for a nice start to the evening.  Dani and Simo showed up just in time to be dealt in, which really worked out well.

After this, we moved on to Dixit, which everyone seemed to really enjoy.  Next came the building and cooking of the pizza’s followed by a fun game of Elder Sign.

After this we tried out but did not finish Citadels and Muchkin before finishing the evening with another game of Dixit.  We ended up getting in about 7 hours or so of gaming and everyone seemed to have a really good time.  We had so good of a time that we are talking about a regularly scheduled bat show… gaming night.  I was glad that Simo and Dani were able to enjoy themselves as much as they seemed to since it was their first time.

I think we have gained another couple of gaming addicts in the Shaw’s as well.

Ruling the Board: Shaw Gaming 2/2/13: Dixit (2)

So as not to leave disappointed, with a bad taste in our mouths, we went back to a fun game from earlier in the night, Dixit.

This time, people understood a bit better how to phrase things and we were able to burn through the game with a much closer finish in the end.

Paul once again ended up on top, but it was a three bunny race at the end.

This was a great pallet cleanser after not finishing two straight games to remind us of how much fun we had throughout.

Thank you Dixit for coming through for us twice on this night.

Ruling the Board: Shaw Gaming 2/2/13: Munchkin (DNF)

This was one that we decided to play without having anyone with experience first which didn't end up working out so well.  In the end, we played for an hour or so and didn't get very far.  We drew big monsters early and had to run away allot.  We weren't able to figure the game out well enough to really enjoy the goofy nature of the game.  Eventually, we were all loosing hope in the game and decided to shut it down.

Most of us agreed that we needed to learn a bit more about it and give it another shot, but at that time of the evening it was literally killing us.

Ruling the Board: Shaw Gaming 2/2/13: Citadels (DNF)

Citadels is a game where players take a role card as they go around the table that gives them a benefit for that turn.  They then use their gold to build buildings.  The first player to a set number of buildings wins.

The game started off well with themes starting to show themselves, assassinate the Architect, steal from the Bishop and the like.

We ended up getting about a third of the way through the game before we stopped. 

It seems like a fun game with a bit of strategy.

I wouldn't mind playing this one all the way through on our next play.  It just didn't work out this time.

Ruling the Board: Shaw Gaming 2/2/13: Elder Sign

This was my third playing of Elder Sign and the game is getting quicker to setup and therefore easier to bring up to play.

In our game, we were trying to keep Ithaqua from rising with the following cast of characters.

Me – Harvey Walters

Paul – Darrell Simmons

Simo – Michael McGlenn

Daniela – Monterrey Jack

Cindy – Sister Mary

Kelley – Joe Diamond

Doug – Ashcan Pete

This may have been the easiest victory that I have had so far in my three plays.  The dice were rolling well and everyone took to the strategy portion of which rooms to go after at what time really quickly so that we banged through room after room, allowing the more difficult ones to remain out.

No character died or went insane and with only a few doom tokens, we were able to shut the door on Ithaqua.

Final Thoughts:

I didn't know how well this game would play with our group who isn't too much into Lovecraft, but they all really seemed to get into the game and enjoy it.  The mechanics seemed to work really well for everyone and the dice are always a big hit due to the strategy involved and the rolling of symbols just adds a “mythos” to it.

I could see playing this one again at one of our game days, but the lack of difficulty so far makes it a bit of a beginner’s game.

Ruling the Board: Shaw Gaming 2/2/13: Zombie Dice

In a few game gatherings at the Shaw residence, Zombie Dice has quickly become the filler game of choice as everyone loves the simple and fun concept and the press your luck nature of the game.

We had seven players, but because if it’s speed we played first to 13 and it only took 3 rounds and maybe 15 minutes even will teaching 2 new people.

Simo took the lead early with 7 brains in the first round followed by Kelly and Paul with five.  In the second round, he maintained with 3 more brains for a total of 10.  I was next with 8 total with Paul and Daniela at 7.  In the third round, people expected things to end, so people were pushing it more than normal.  Simo got 4 more brains to win with 14.  Poor Doug went hungry, bringing in the big ole’ goose egg.

Final Score:

Simo – 14

Me – 8

Daniela – 7

Paul – 7

Kelly – 6

Cindy – 3

Doug – 0

Final Thoughts:

ZOMBIE EAT BRAINS!!!

This is a fun game that will take a while to get old as everyone knows what it is and enjoys it for that alone.  It is fun when you want a quick game without a lot of hassle.

Ruling the Board: Shaw Gaming 2/2/13: Dixit

Dixit is a game I had wanted to play for a while and was very glad that it made the table.  In the game, each player has 6 cards.  One player starts and says or does something in relation to their card.  All other players then play a card, face down, that others might think relates to what the person said.

They are mixed up and everyone but the giver votes on the card they think was the giver’s card.  The giver gets three points if at least one, but not all players guess their card and non if everyone or nobody guesses it.

All other players get 2 points if they choose the right card and 1 point for everyone that chose their card.

The cards are beautiful and can be thought of in tons of ways depending on the person, their mood, influences, and company at the table.  This leads to much variation on the same cards.

In our game, Paul jumped out to a small lead, while Cindy ate some grass in the back.  Once we made the turn, Paul really kicked it into gear ended up smoking us all in the end.

Final Score:

Paul – 31

Simo & Dani - 22

Stanley – 17

Kelly – 16

Doug – 14

Cindy – 14

Final Thoughts:

Once we played a round and people realized how fun it was going to be, things really picked up.  After Castle Panic opened well, Dixit seemed to hit it out of the park and people laughed allot from either phrases given or results of votes. 

Paul was on fire in this game.  He was getting his three every time as the giver and often times getting three, four, or five points when he was not the giver.  His bunny sprinted while ours loped a bit.

I had a ton of fun with this one and hope to play it allot more in the weeks and months to come.

Ruling the Board: Shaw Gaming 2/2/13: Castle Panic

We got the gang together once again at the Shaw abode for a night of gaming.  Paul, Doug, and I joined Cindy and Kelly and new comers for gaming Simo and Daniela for some fun games and good food.

The first game up was Castle Panic.  I had played it once before and had a decent idea of how everything worked, so the setup was quick and easy and it didn't take long for everyone to get into the game.

We started off well, beating down the monsters, but things turned bad for us around the middle of the game.  

We hit some bad tiles and before we knew it, a troll was storming the castles.  We drew in the hopes of getting to one of the couple of cards that could save us before he wiped us out, but after reshuffling the deck, the cards did not come.

After looking through, the first card to help us was nearly halfway through the deck, we weren’t even close.

This was my first defeat in a game that usually plays pretty easy, but it goes to show that if you let the wrong creature slip in, it can route you in the end.

Final Thoughts:

This was a fun game that just didn't end very well for us.  It was fun and a good way to start the night off by getting everyone involved and having fun.

Ruling the Board: Unterspielstadt 1/28/13: Outpost

After a quick game of Crokinole, I went directly into a much longer game, Outpost. 

In the game, you auction off cards while you build resource manufacturers to get more funds to win more auctions.  This game was a bit more complicated than the norm and I really didn’t start fully getting the hang of it until about half way through.  By this point, I was hopelessly lost, but kept fighting the good fight.

I had gone for slow and steady throughout the game which had me in the lead for a stretch in the middle, but as the game transitioned to phase three cards, Colleen ran away with things.

I was able to do just enough late to take 2^nd place, but we were all well behind.

Final Score:

Colleen – 92

Me – 58

Eric – 58

Matt – 52

Doug – 46

Final Thoughts:

This was an interesting game with a few interweaving pieces of strategy that makes for a unique experience.  You have to decide what types of cards you want to buy and how far you will go to buy them, you also have to determine how many of the entry type factories you are going to build and when you will use your workers for them on other positions and close the factory.

You also have to manage your resources to buy what you need when you need it without wasting turns.

This was a game with a deep strategy, but not too difficult mechanic so that it isn’t too hard to start playing, but it would take a decent bit of thought to really get good at it and build a winning strategy.

I enjoyed this one and although I wouldn't want to play it all the time, I would be willing to give it another play in the near future.

Ruling the Board: Unterspielstadt 1/28/13: Crokinole

My second attempt at Crokinole did not start off nearly as well as the previous did.  Eric took the quick lead and built up a lead of something like 45-0.  I couldn’t get my shots to go where I wanted them and couldn’t get my speed down for shots at the inner ring.

Then, I made a couple of lucky shots where I sprays multiple discs of his from the board with one of mine and quickly fought my way back.

Once I took the lead, it only took a couple more rounds to finish it.  The end score was somewhere around 115-75.

I’m 2-0 so far in Crokinole, maybe I have found my game.

Ruling the Board: MWGC 1/18/13 and 1/19/13: Wrap-Up

After starting to get more and more interested in board games in the previous couple of months, the timing was perfect for a local min-convention to get me more exposure to the games, people, and possibilities.

I was able to get out of work early due to having worked some extra time over the last couple of weeks and walked home.  I grabbed some lunch then a few items and headed out on foot to The Hyatt.

I knew I was in the right place when I saw the LARPers out front smoking in their strange attire.

I made my way up to the convention area, checked in, and walked around.  I strolled through the vendor area, checked out the gaming and light LARP fighting in the atrium, and poked around in the gaming room.

After a short time, I found the table for my first game and sat down to play Elder Sign.  This was my most anticipated game of the convention and it was fun.  The best part, though was meeting Sam and Ana from Illinois.  Sam was more of a heavy historical gamer normally and Ana seemed to be more of an open for anything gamer (although Sam seemed to be pretty open to play a variety of things as well).  I also found in Ana a smoking buddy for a day and a half.  Her multicolored hair was pretty awesome as well.

So, after the first game, with some time to spare, we played a card game they brought, Evil Baby Orphanage, which ended up being one of the more comical and fun games I played over the two days.

After this, we had to part ways as I needed to grab a bite to eat before heading over to my final game of the day, Tales of the Arabian Nights.

The game ended up being a little bit of a letdown for me, but the players were fun to game with and overall, the day was pretty awesome.

I made my way over to the vendor area and grabbed Dixit and Dixit: Odyssey before grabbing a bus back to my apartment.

Day 2

Saturday started really well.  I got more sleep than I expected and was up and moving quickly.  I managed to stop by the grocery store as I walked to the convention and grabbed some fruit to snack on during the day.

My first game was Amun-Re which was a good way to start the day.  It finished pretty quickly and I was able to fit in a first time play of 7 Wonders for me, which was more of a learning experience than anything else.

Next up was one of the most fun games for me, Ra, which was a great experience.

Originally, after this was going to be Eclipse, but I backed out as it would overlap another game I had scheduled.  So, I walked a block over to Subway, ate lunch, and called back my dad who had left a message.  We talked a little NFL and a little college basketball.  This was a very good break as I got food and got away for a bit to let my head clear.

Once I returned, I had another couple of hours until my next game, so I walked around some more.  I placed some bids on the silent auction, bought some raffle tickets, bought Tentacle Bento, bought some cheap shirts in the vendor area, and walked around the atrium.

Then came my biggest surprise of the Con.  I walked in to the medieval LARP room to check it out.  I looked at some of the cool items and clothing.  As I was nearly finished walking through the clothing tent, a woman approached me and asked what period was my favorite.

I told her that I was just looking, but she told me not to worry.  Before I knew it, she and her assistant had me in all sorts of clothes.  I was then gently nudged out to the main section where a few people spent the next half an hour describing their group, what type of LARP they do, how it differs from other types, where they practice, and where they perform.

I was incredibly nervous and felt out of place at first, but the people were really nice and seemed to enjoy just letting others know what they did and that they weren’t crazy (at least not much more than the rest of us.)

After a while, I told them that I had to go as I had a game starting up soon and after a few minutes, I was out of the medieval garb and on my way back to the gaming room.

Once there, I found out that the silent auction was almost over and placed some last minute bids.  It then ended and the bid off began on all but one of the items I was bidding on in the end.  No action occurred on any of them, so the ones I bid on last I won and those I had been outbid on late, I did not rebid on and therefore lost.

I ended up with a nice little haul for not too much money.  The big win for me was the $21 Amun-Re I won.

I then made my way over to the City of Horror table and after a while of shuffling late players in and out, we started.  The game was a little tough to pick up on in the end and got a bit stand offish, which didn’t work great for our table.

After this, we went directly into Super Dungeon Explore, which did not work for our group.  It had a setup time, and ran very slowly.  We ended up playing for almost 4 hours and after the first hour to hour and a half it would have been nearly impossible for us to win, so it really dragged and got very frustrating.

It didn’t help that we finished late and I still had not eaten dinner.  So, my final game, Power Grid never got setup, which was fine with me as I needed to shut things down anyway.  I gathered my things and walked outside where the temperature had dropped and the wind was going crazy.

I walked to the bus stop, just to see the bus go by a minute before I got there.  So, I walked the half hour or so back to the apartment, ate some late diner, had a couple of drinks, and crashed.

Overall, I had allot of fun at the convention.  I think of it in three parts now, Friday, Saturday pre-lunch and Saturday post-lunch.  The first two segments were great and the third was ok.

I ended up playing a bunch of new games and a few for the 2^nd time.  I came out with a haul of new games, t-shirts, and a small bag.  I met a bunch of new people that seem to do allot of gaming.  I am very thankful to Aaron, Eric, and the others who ran games at the convention and allow me to have so much fun.

I’m looking forward to MidWinter 2014 next year and the fun I had here made me know for sure that I wanted to go to GenCon later this year.

Ruling the Board: MWGC 1/19/13: Super Dungeon Explore

In this game, players choose an adventurer from the premade characters and one chooses to be the Dungeon Master.  The players attempt to shut down all four spawn points on the board while defeating two mini bosses before a showdown with the final boss dragon.

The players and their character types are listed below:

Anna – Druid

Jesse – Barbarian

Me – Ranger

Lindsey – Paladin

Mike – Rogue

Moishe – Dungeon Master

The game started pretty well with us starting around one of the spawn points and taking it down quickly.  Meanwhile, the creatures began to build in the other areas and make their way towards us.

We ran down a narrow corridor and Lindsey got caught out.  With in the first half an hour she was dead without hitting a single creature or healing any wounds.

Our luck continued to suffer as we got the first mini-boss quickly down to 1 hit left, but were unable to finish it for a number of turns.

We got into a bad pattern of clearing trash for more and more to build up each subsequent turn.  By the time we finally killed the first mini-boss, the second was already upon us and quickly after this, the dragon spawned.

By this point, the Barbarian had been long dead with the druid following a little bit behind.  That left the Ranger and the Rogue.

When the dragon showed up, we were already almost dead and it quickly finished us off.

So, we managed to shut down 1 of 4 spawn points and kill one of the mini-bosses.

Final Thoughts:

This is a tough game to judge.  The one person who had run it before was a consultant for everyone in the game, where I thought it might have been better for him to play Dungeon Master.  This would have helped to cut out some of the major chunks of down time in the game.

The game lasted almost four hours, which for what we did in the game seemed way too long.  As this ran over the top of when I would normally eat dinner I could tell that I got a little testy during this time, which was not helpful.

The game seemed to go for bigger instead of better with tons of creatures spawning and special abilities that could kill many creatures at a time.  This was fun sometimes, but if your special ability didn’t hit, you were screwed.

The sub-bosses were pretty tough, but seemed about right, but the dragon seemed completely broken.  It got a ton of actions every turn that were really powerful.  I don’t know how you could ever beat it.  

Obviously you can, but it seemed in our game to be completely overpowering.

I think someone would have to talk me into playing this one again.  If the DM was experienced and could quickly move through their phase and everyone was committed to the game it could work.

However, in our game, the DM phase would take more time than everyone else’s turns combined which mad for allot of time between player turns.

Ruling the Board: MWGC 1/19/13: City of Horror

City of Horror is a game where each player has a group of three people trying to survive the zombie apocalypse.  There are a number of buildings around the board which have distinct advantages and disadvantages.

Each turn, the players move one of their characters to a different location where there is a space or to the overturned food truck if there is no space available.

Along the way, you try to have as many of your people survive.  Not only must they survive, though, you need to acquire an injection and victory points where possible in order to board the helicopter that arrives at the end of the game to carry off survivors.

My team consisted of a male police officer, male punk rocker, and female business woman.  The woman stayed in the bank most of the game, and the police officer stayed in the hospital, so it was up to the punk rocker to move around, although he was mostly in the church.

After the players move, the zombies are added based off of the card chosen and can move.  Each location has rules around zombies and when they will kill someone.  The players have special abilities and cards to try to fend off the zombies, but few of each.

In our game, one player controlled most of the game, however, his controlling of the game did not end up to his advantage in the end as he had not made many friends and a fairly sly trade of mine while he was attempting to secure a trade that he thought would win him the game, crumbled his plan in one action.

In the end, the game took its slotted 2 hours to complete and every player had at least on survivor make it to the chopper. The scores were as follows.

Anna – 9

Scott – 9

Ron – 7

Francois – 7

Me – 7

Moishe – 2

Aaron – Zombie GM

Final Thoughts:

This game was fun, but the symbols and gameplay are a little tough to pick up on.  You really need to pay attention and figure out some of the meanings to get the most out of your gameplay.

Due to the fight to stay alive mentality of the game, people can get pretty competitive.  In our game, we had one person really get into it and get angry a few times and another person pretty much check out of the game at times.

City of Horror was a fun game with different scenarios to keep it interesting.  I’d like to do a bit of reading on it and get a better understanding before playing it again.

Ruling the Board: MWGC 1/19/13: Ra

It had been a good morning of gaming and it would continue with my first playing of Ra.  In Ra, tiles are laid out one at a time on the board.  Players can choose to either to draw a tile from the bag to place on the auction block or start a round of bidding.  Each player has four bidding tokens with a number on them.  The bidding only goes around once, so they have to decide how high they are willing to go in a round from the start as it will never come back to them.

In the game, there are five or six different ways to score as determined by the tiles you take, some of these are gathering the same buildings, gathering different buildings, getting lands and a flood, along with others.

As tiles are added to the board, there are some that are red and automatically trigger bidding.   However, if nobody bids, you keep going as normal.  Once everyone has used their bidding tokens once, you count victory points for what you currently have and move on to the second half of the game.  Some cards, such as floods and straight scoring pieces are only used in one part of the game, so would be discarded here.

Everything else stays and you start the second half.  Part of the fun is that when you win a bid, you get all tiles currently on the board as well as the bidding chip from the last person to win an auction.  So, when you start the second half, you use those chips.

Once everyone has used their bidding chips in the second phase of the game or when the final red tile is drawn, the game is over and you add your second phase victory points to the first for an overall winner.

I was able to pick up on this game pretty quickly out of the blocks and did well gathering a ton of buildings.  

Overall, I thought that I did a pretty good job and finished third.  Cory, however, dominated in the end as shown below.

Cory – 57

Dan – 37

Me – 36

Leigh – 23

Eric – 23

Final Thoughts:

Much like the other early Egyptian themed game of the day, Ra was a really fun game that would be a good transitional game from party to strategy as the elements are quick to discover, while the strategy can be much deeper than you would think at a glance.  The bidding process leads to allot of fun banter around the table, which keeps the game fun and moving along.

A few of the tiles were a little tough to distinguish between in the beginning and a few of the mechanics took a little trial and error to figure out, but it only takes a couple of bidding phases to be right in there.

A good group willing to talk and laugh is a big bonus here, as are players who pay attention and keep the tile bag moving around with a good pace.  This is definitely a game that can drag needlessly if one or more people are not engaged and let the bag sit for no reason.

Luckily, we had a good group and did not have any issues, which led to me thoroughly enjoying this game, maybe more than any other that I played at the convention.

I look forward to playing this one again in the future.

Ruling the Board: MWGC 1/19/13: 7 Wonders

From what I can ascertain, one of the top 10 most played games at the moment is 7 Wonders.  It is a game that is somewhat easy to get started with, but takes a few games to really be able to start formulating a strategy and capitalizing on it.  My wonder was The Lighthouse of Alexandria.

The mechanics themselves are fairly simple, take a card and pass the rest to the left during the first phase, the right in the second, and the left again in the third.  You can generate components needed to build other things if you choose and play those cards when they come to you or you can purchase them from the player on your right or left.

You are using these to build things to give you bonuses and to build your wonders.

You are trying to collect sets of card types, win battles with those on either side, and overall gain the most victory points to win.

My strategy was really just to learn the game a bit, so I tended to choose victory point cards early on.  This was very bad as it kept me from gaining any resources to build things early on and I had to use all of my gold to buy what I needed.

I also didn’t take any fighting cards, which did not end up hurting me, but it was something I could have done to gain more in the end.  The worst though, was due to my last of buildings early on, lack of resources, and money, I found it impossible to use the better cards at the end of the game..

It was no surprise when the points were totaled at the end that I got stomped.  I knew I would be nowhere near the lead.  I did ok with fighting, had a bit of gold, finished all three of my wonders, had a decent amount of straight victory point cards, but then the bottom dropped out.

The final score was as follows:

Moishe – 58 (strong in military, wonders, civilian, and guild points)

Randy – 52 ( by far the most civilian, strong in guild and wonders, weak everywhere else, and terrible in military)

Josh – 52 (best in military, strong in gold and wonders, weak in civilian)

Nate – 42 (best in science by far, strong in guild and civilian, weak in commerce/wonders/goald, worst in military)

Matt – 36 (best in wonders and commerce, weak everywhere else)

Me – 35 (good in wonders and civilian, weak everywhere else

Final Thoughts:

This is a fun game that I think would get even better with a few more plays.  I didn’t really get most of it through the first phase and this killed me late in the game, but I still had allot of fun playing it.  I really would like to get some more experience with this one.

Ruling the Board: MWGC 1/19/13: Amun-Re

After winning my first play of this game at Unterspielstadt the previous week, it was time for a retry with one carry over player and a couple of new ones.  It was the first game of my day pretty early in the morning and was a good way to get things going.

In this game I started getting scoring cards off the bat and gained a number of them throughout the game.  So, my strategy changed from pyramids and temples to segments of the board and farmers.

I quickly discovered that this was not the best strategy, actually a fairly weak one.  I learned that farmers and segments are good, but only with a strong base of pyramids to get you a good base of scoring.

However, the scoring cards kept coming and I played it out to see how things would end up.

The answer… not very well.   It ended up being a probably average to low scoring game overall, which meant that I did not lose by as much as I probably should have.

End Results:

Moishe – 38

Chad – 37

Eric – 31

Me – 29

Final Thoughts:

In two games, I managed to come in first and last.  However, the game is much more about strategy than luck, so it appears to be pretty well balanced.  There are a few major strategies that can be used, but mostly, it will come down to the minutia of the different aspects of the strategy you use, or in my case of the first game, stumbling upon a something that works at the time.

This is a really fun game that can be learned pretty quickly, but seems like it will retain its fun and replay value for quite some time.  I’m looking forward to playing this one again.

Ruling the Board: MWGC 1/18/13: Elder Sign

The first game up for me in the convention was Elder Sign.  I had played the board version once before and had a good time.  I have played the app version a few times and really enjoyed it.  I wanted to play with a few more people, though, so I made sure to get to this event.

Azathoth was the Elder God to keep from awakening and we had a group of four lion-hearted people to keep him from doing so (Ann - Vincent Lee, Sam - Mandy Thompson, Me - Gloria Goldburg, Aaron - Monterrey Jack).

We played a nearly perfect game.  The dice rolls were in our favor and we took the build up and knock it out approach.  So, with our first couple of rounds we gained a few trophies and elder signs, but we gained allot of items, spells, and clues.

So, once we started pushing for elder signs, they were much easier to get.  We were able do defeat a few different double elder sign cards within two rounds which built them up very quickly.  At this point, the dice started to cool off a bit, but we already had so many trophies that we were able to turn them in for the few elder signs still needed.

Overall, I was a little disappointed in the ease of defeating the game for the second time in a row.  I'm assuming that it can be much more difficult than what we have experienced so far, but I just haven't seen it yet.

Thankfully, with the great theme work in the game, the fun mechanics, and really cool dice the game remains fun in each play.  I am starting to get a little worried, though, that after a few more plays, it may start to see a decline in my rotations of it.

Ruling the Board: MWGC 1/18/13: Evil Baby Orphanage

I had a really good time playing Elder Sign with some people that I had just met during that game.  Since I had a big gap between games, we decided to fit in a fun, quick card game that they had brought along with them called Evil Baby Orphanage.

In the game, each player is running an orphanage for babies of evil individuals throughout history.  You choose new babies and gain cards that help you to keep them under control, if you want to each turn.  If not, they have special effects that will trigger.  You need to reach a certain power rating of combined babies to win.

The babies are constantly moving around from orphanage to orphanage with the play of different cards and the special features of certain babies.

In the game, Sam got out to the quick lead with a number of high power babies.  This made the rest of us gang up on him to steal his babies and move them around.  Aaron and myself began to build up our baby power as Ann was a bit behind.  However, she played a card that randomly placed all of the babies in orphanages and with some shrewd workings quickly came out on top.

It was a devious plan, which was all the better and she and her evil babies emerged victorious.

Final Thoughts:

This was a goofy fun little card game that leads to lots of laughs as new babies come out.  The icon abilities are fun, but take a little bit to get used to.

I would play this one again in a minute.  It was fun, light, and quick to play.

Ruling the Board: MWGC 1/18/13: Tales of the Arabian Nights

Tales of the Arabian Nights was my last game of the evening.  In the game, we played adventurers from the stories.  We had a goal to achieve for extra points, but the overall point of the game is to reach a certain number of story and wisdom points and make your way back to the starting city.

In our game, our goal was 16 and I chose my goal of eight of each.  We chose our adventurers and our skills.

Chad – Ma’aruf

Anna – Scheherazade

Stanley – Sinbad (seamanship, weapon use, luck)

Frank – Aladdin

Karen – Zumurruel

Aaron - Storyteller

My quest was seek knowledge and my cities were placed on the board.  We all began and quickly were put to the test.  A couple of players started out strong with a number of points in their favor, I was not one of these people.  I made my way to my first city and then quickly thereafter was ensorcelled.  This was the beginning of a theme for me on this night.

In a game where you have to deliberately move to specific places on the board and others are able to move you instead of you choosing, things become a bit difficult.

Others were dealing with their own issues such as marriage, running away after not marrying, and being imprisoned.  As a weapon user, I tried to fight allot, which did not end up being a very good strategy.  Not only could I not move my own piece, but I was also quickly wounded.  This later led to death.

I quickly discovered that death is fairly rare in the game, so I would achieve at least something in the game.

I was reset and started from scratch with Sinbad.  I was quickly then ensorcelled again.  I was then wounded and ensorcelled yet again.  I got some really bad results in my final couple turns and even though my wisdom and storytelling were skyrocketing as the others didn't see me as a threat, there was no way I was going to win.

After four hours, Anna finally had reached her goal and returned to the starting city for the victory.

Pros:

There was some fun storytelling.

“Camel Babies”

Cons:

The game took a long, long time to play, especially for what it was.

The options chosen seemed too often not make any sense with the story that then followed.

There seemed to be too many really bad effects in the game that helped to convoluted it and drag it out.

Final Thoughts:

Not a bad group, but we had some really bad rounds where the game seemed to crawl.  There were some fun things that happened like the “Camel Babies” running joke and the crawling through the hole in the grave to the pit of diamonds where the person picked up some before hitching a ride taunton style in the body of a dead beast to get out.

I’m not sure if I’d really want to play this one again.  I usually like storytelling games, but in this one, the storytelling is done by the storyteller and not the players, which negates it for the most part.  Also, the game often not making sense story-wise from chosen options and skills made them somewhat pointless.

It was a fun game that introduced me to a few people that I would be gaming with a few more times throughout the tournament, so I was glad to get to meet them and get to know them a bit.