Board Games

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by Carman Bulldog

7th Continent is in the middle of a massive Kickstarter right now and reviews on BGG are extremely positive. Taking the plunge on everything would be pretty expensive. Has anyone played this yet?

Definitely looks interesting, but apparently you can only buy the game through Kickstarter-it won't be offered via retail, so I certainly can't afford it

[ShaneTheMaster]

Originally Posted by Carman Bulldog

7th Continent is in the middle of a massive Kickstarter right now and reviews on BGG are extremely positive. Taking the plunge on everything would be pretty expensive. Has anyone played this yet?

I don't do kickstarter that often, but I backed this one. I love exploration type games.

[Thomkal]

Game Night crew tackle 7th Continent:

7th Continent - GameNight! Se5 Ep16 - YouTube

[Autumn]

We've been playing Clank! the past week a few times. Got it for my son, but the whole family is enjoying it. It combines a deck building game, a la Dominion, with a board game race into a dungeon and back. I highly recommend it if that sounds intriguing to you.

Clank! on Boardgamegeek

[Honolulu_Blue]

My and a couple of friends played the Arkham Living Card Game over the weekend.

It was a lot of fun.

We did well in the first scenario, but were completely DESTROY in the "Midnight Masks" scenario. It seemed ridiculously hard.

Anyone have any tips or suggestions for that one?

[AnalBumCover]

Originally Posted by Autumn

We've been playing Clank! the past week a few times. Got it for my son, but the whole family is enjoying it. It combines a deck building game, a la Dominion, with a board game race into a dungeon and back. I highly recommend it if that sounds intriguing to you.

I picked this up with the expansion on the cheap in a local transaction. I hope to take it out soon.

And this weekend I'm gonna meet up with a guy to pick up Lords of Waterdeep and its expansion. Can't wait to get these on the table.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by AnalBumCover

I picked this up with the expansion on the cheap in a local transaction. I hope to take it out soon.

And this weekend I'm gonna meet up with a guy to pick up Lords of Waterdeep and its expansion. Can't wait to get these on the table.

Lords of Waterdeep and its expansion are fantastic. A really great game.

[AnalBumCover]

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

My and a couple of friends played the Arkham Living Card Game over the weekend.

It was a lot of fun.

We did well in the first scenario, but were completely DESTROY in the "Midnight Masks" scenario. It seemed ridiculously hard.

Anyone have any tips or suggestions for that one?

I'm really loving this game. I hardly win, if at all, but I'm just playing the campaigns the first time through with the standard decks provided in the rulebook and just upgrading cards as I advance, and with freshly opened expansion and mythos packs.

What I like about this game is that, win or lose, you can advance through the scenarios and continue on with the story. I plan on continuing this way until (1) I run out of currently printed scenarios or (2) all my characters die off.

Only then I will go back and replay the campaigns from the beginning with better built decks, using all the available player cards at my disposal. At least by then, I'll have forgotten the early storylines, and they will seem new in my mind.

Sorry, I don't have tips for you on "Midnight Masks" scenario. If I remember, that one got me good as well.

[AnalBumCover]

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

Lords of Waterdeep and its expansion are fantastic. A really great game.

Should I start with just the base game a few times before throwing in the expansion, or can I just dive right into both right away?

[Vince, Pt. II]

You can probably jump into the expansion right away if you want, but I would recommend at least one playthrough of the vanilla version.

Edit: the corruption (I think, been a while since I've played) mechanic from the expansion is the one that I think will take some getting used to, so knowing how the base game works first will help.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by AnalBumCover

Should I start with just the base game a few times before throwing in the expansion, or can I just dive right into both right away?

Originally Posted by Vince, Pt. II

You can probably jump into the expansion right away if you want, but I would recommend at least one playthrough of the vanilla version.

Edit: the corruption (I think, been a while since I've played) mechanic from the expansion is the one that I think will take some getting used to, so knowing how the base game works first will help.

Either one, really. The corruption part is the biggest new mechanic that the expansion throws at you. It's a little confusing, but not too bad. The expansion fits pretty seamlessly into the base game.

[tarcone]

A couple stores are participating in a 24 hour gaming marathon. 10 am today until 10 am tomorrow.

Anyone in the St Louis the stores are Yeti Gaming on Watson and The Den which is down town.

Not sure if I can do it or not, but Im going to try.

[MIJB#19]

Went to the biggest annual board game fair in the Netherlands.
I managed to keep my pocket closed. No dime spent. Pretty much. Kind of. Almost.

Well... I couldn't resist from buying the brand new Pandemic Legacy Season 2.

[bob]

Does anyone have any thoughts on Charterstone?

[Vince, Pt. II]

I've pre-ordered it and am very excited for it, but that's about the extent of it.

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by bob

Does anyone have any thoughts on Charterstone?

It's got some coverage on the Dice Tower You Tube channel-might want to check that out. BGG too of course. It's certainly intriguing-not many competitive legacy board games out there right now I don't think. I wonder how fair and balanced it will be once the legacy effects start, and one player has a large advantage/lead. Interested to see the solo rules too-would not seem to be a good fit in a competitive legacy environment.

[Vince, Pt. II]

The one review bit that I have read and am leery of is that multiple reviews mention there is very little in the way of a catch-up mechanism and that winning provides bonuses that exacerbate the problem by widening the gap.

Most of what I have read claims the game is still pretty great once the campaign is over, and that is a solid point in its favor in my eyes.

[tarcone]

My 24 hours of gaming was real fun. I played a lot of dungeon crawl type games.

But the one that stood out was the Clans of Caledonia. It is a worker placement, Area control, economic type game.

It was really fun. Not difficult to learn. Lots of strategy and ways to win. Special powers for each clan also make it really cool.

It is just released to KSer backers. I havent seen it for retail yet. But I will look into buying this one.

[tarcone]

Twilight Imperium 4 is now in Stock. Hoping to get my copy by Monday.

Real excited by this one.

[nilodor]

Anyone played through Pandemic Legacy? We just started a play through on the weekend with some good friends and it has been quite the ride so far. We're only through the first couple of months but both games came down to the wire. The legacy bits really add a new dimension to the game and having semi-permanent characters really adds to the drama.

My only criticism so far is that you have to be really careful reading and re-reading cards from the legacy deck to make sure you haven't missed something. If something doesn't make sense it's probably because you missed opening a box or something, so be careful when playing though. There are a couple of good threads to check at board game geeks to make sure you've opened and modified everything you need to.

[Honolulu_Blue]

This is very exciting for me:

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/e...-the-alliance/

This game always looked great, but I never liked the 4 rebel players vs. 1 Empire player dynamic. I’ve played some games like that and never had fun.

With this app making the game fully co-operative, I am so in. The second edition of Mansions of Madness made this same switch and it’s been great.

So, for the folks who have played Imperial Assualt, are any of the expansions better than others?

[tarcone]

Got TI4 today. 12 pounds of goodness

[tarcone]

Played Star Trek: Fleet Captains. Wow, what a great game. Very cool mechanics and dripping with theme.

Really like this game.

[AnalBumCover]

Whoa, I just went from just having the base Arkham Horror Board Game, to getting all the expansions within a short period of time. My most recent purchases were getting 2 big box and 2 small box expansions off of a local guy from FB and then finding a sealed big box off the clearance shelf at my FGLS to round out my collection.

After taking inventory of the used boxes, I'm only missing 1 monster token, of which there should be 3 copies, so I'm not really going to sweat that.

I sure hope the wife doesn't mind my taking over the dining room table for a few days!

[Thomkal]

I'm sure you don't mind the wife getting the games in the divorce settlement

[NobodyHere]

Could the potential government crackdown of lootboxes in video games have any implications for the card game world?

It wouldn't be such a stretch to imagine any CCG where you buy packs of random cards in hopes of getting some rare card to be considered gambling.

[Vince, Pt. II]

Originally Posted by bob

Does anyone have any thoughts on Charterstone?

I will tentatively be getting this to the table for our first session this weekend, and will provide as non-spoilery a review as I can here.

We will have 6 players, and while four of them are still somewhat new to complex euro-games, all have been playing board games of some sort for decades.

[Fidatelo]

Originally Posted by NobodyHere

Could the potential government crackdown of lootboxes in video games have any implications for the card game world?

It wouldn't be such a stretch to imagine any CCG where you buy packs of random cards in hopes of getting some rare card to be considered gambling.

That's a good question, and extends beyond CCG's and into all of these little toys that come in 'blind boxes' (as my kids call them), lego minifigs, etc.

[bob]

Originally Posted by Vince, Pt. II

I will tentatively be getting this to the table for our first session this weekend, and will provide as non-spoilery a review as I can here.

We will have 6 players, and while four of them are still somewhat new to complex euro-games, all have been playing board games of some sort for decades.

Did you get a chance to play? If so, how'd it go?

[Vince, Pt. II]

Everyone got sick (I'm still fighting it), so we had to cancel. Hopefully next week sometime!

[tarcone]

I got no games for Christmas.. Didnt ask for any. I bought TI4. So that was gift enough.
I did buy my best friend D-Day at Omaha Beach. The Butterield solo. My buddy is going through some serious medical issues and living with his Mom in a small town in Iowa. He is going to the U of Iowa hospitas and clinics. He was a gamin buddy a long time ago and hasnt played much the last 30 years. He loves history. ANd This game will be better than sitting on his Xbox all the time.

Anyone else get anything?

[Fidatelo]

I didn't receive any board games for Christmas, but I still have my birthday coming up later this week so I've got a second shot.

I did use our traditional 'Pajama Day' today to get some solo gaming in. I played a couple scenarios of the Dunwich Legacy campaign in the Arkham Horror LCG, finishing up that campaign for the second time (this time with Jim Culver). Unfortunately another loss. Between the base campaign and Dunwich I think I'm about 1-9 now. Not sure what I'm doing wrong exactly, quite often it just seems like a short string of bad luck (like 2-3 horrible pulls from the chaos bag in a row, or 2-3 straight encounter cards that are absolutely devastating for my situation) absolutely sinks many of the scenarios. Sort of discouraging, but ultimately the game is so good that I know I'll be right back at it with some other hapless investigator soon.

I also attempted to play Descent for the first time, using the Road to Legend app on my phone. It was... not great. It seems like it could maybe be fun in a group but even with the app I'm not sure it's the solo game for me. Especially when I have so many other options available to me. I might try to sell it I think.

[AnalBumCover]

I received By Order of the Queen for Christmas. And I bought myself Marvel Legendary: Homecoming on sale from CSI.

During our family Christmas party, we played a Harry Potter skinned version of Secret Hitler called Secret Voldemort. Despite some early difficulty trying to explain the rules to my family, it turned out to be a really fun game. We also played a game of Hanabi.

Originally Posted by Fidatelo

I did use our traditional 'Pajama Day' today to get some solo gaming in. I played a couple scenarios of the Dunwich Legacy campaign in the Arkham Horror LCG, finishing up that campaign for the second time (this time with Jim Culver). Unfortunately another loss. Between the base campaign and Dunwich I think I'm about 1-9 now. Not sure what I'm doing wrong exactly, quite often it just seems like a short string of bad luck (like 2-3 horrible pulls from the chaos bag in a row, or 2-3 straight encounter cards that are absolutely devastating for my situation) absolutely sinks many of the scenarios. Sort of discouraging, but ultimately the game is so good that I know I'll be right back at it with some other hapless investigator soon.

I've got a 1-6 record in my games between base and Dunwich, finally winning my most recent scenario - Essex County Express. But I agree. Win or lose, I look forward to the next scenario.

[Vince, Pt. II]

I got Twilight Imperium 4th Edition, Shadows over Camelot, Risk: Game of Thrones Edition, and Gaia Project. I am most intrigued by Gaia Project, which is essentially Terra Mystica 2.0 set in space.

I have a bit of a backlog on board games that I haven't gotten to yet, so it might be a while until I get any of them to the table. Jenn and I will probably get a 2-player play of Gaia Project in soon because we both really enjoy Terra Mystica, but getting a group together to play these may have to wait at least a few weeks.

[Fidatelo]

Originally Posted by AnalBumCover

I've got a 1-6 record in my games between base and Dunwich, finally winning my most recent scenario - Essex County Express. But I agree. Win or lose, I look forward to the next scenario.

My 1-9 was actually a reference to the full campaign, not each scenario. I've kept all my campaign logs so I can probably whip up a quick total scenario score tonight or tomorrow. But it's probably a similar percentage, just multiplied by 4 or 5. Good to hear that I'm not alone in struggling with this game, or still enjoying coming back for more

[Buccaneer]

I just started in on the digital version of the highly rated board game Through the Ages. There is an awful to this game but in my opinion, it has by far the best tutorial I have ever seen in an iOS game. It was engaging, humorous and builds up slowly by ignoring certain elements for later for later rounds.

[QuikSand]

Originally Posted by Buccaneer

I just started in on the digital version of the highly rated board game Through the Ages. There is an awful to this game but in my opinion, it has by far the best tutorial I have ever seen in an iOS game. It was engaging, humorous and builds up slowly by ignoring certain elements for later for later rounds.

Thanks, checking it out now. Have some i$ to burn, could be a fit.

[Vince, Pt. II]

Totally agree on the digital version - possibly the best tutorial I've seen in ANY game. Great game, too.

[Vince, Pt. II]

Dola: got our first few plays of Charterstone in tonight. We might get another round in after dinner, but I'll write up my thoughts tonight or tomorrow. Initial thoughts:

• I love the game.
• Very high production values - the components are nice, the artwork is impressive, and the stickers and such are easy to remove and apply to the board.
• The game thus far isn't super deep or strategic; if you are turned off by lightweight games, this may not be for you.

[Buccaneer]

Even though I butchered my post, I’m glad you both understood what I was saying. I’ll be going through the phenomenal tutorial again, not only because I need to better understand a few things (like corruption and events), but also because it was so much fun.

[Vince, Pt. II]

Ok, more detailed Charterstone thoughts! I will try to stay spoiler-free, but I will be going over some game mechanics that aren't explicitly explained until you start playing the game and opening things up, so for that reason I'm going to spoiler the post after a while.

Charterstone is a legacy game for 1-6 players, which for those of you who aren't familiar with the term means you play the game repeatedly and as you play through you modify the game - writing on the board, writing on some components, placing stickers on the board, placing stickers in the rule book, and opening/unlocking new pieces, rules, and mechanics to the game as you go. The game evolves over the course of the playthrough, and you are strongly recommended to play with the same gaming group each time you fire it up, both for continuity and for ease of explanation.

The game is designed to work with any player count and has rules specifically put into place so that games with fewer human players do not feel "empty" or as if they are missing anything. There are also Automa rules that will insert an "AI" into your game to make it feel like a fuller game if you would like; they recommend your first game be played without any Automa (unless you are playing solo), then to decide at that point whether or not to add the Automa. We did not use any Automa players in our playthrough, so I cannot speak to it in any way, shape, or form.

The game is a worker placement game whose most similar comparison I can draw is probably Lords of Waterdeep - throughout the game you are building up the city by creating new buildings which serve as spaces workers can be placed. That being said, there are plenty of notable differences right off the bat. The largest change (which doesn't spoil anything, because you need to know this to play your first game) is that this is not your "typical" worker placement game - you are allowed to place your workers on already occupied spaces. If you do, you "bump" the worker occupying that space back to your opponent's possession. Which is a big deal, because on your turn you do one of two things: place a worker or retrieve all your workers. If an opponent is nice enough to bump your workers back to you, you can spend your turn being more efficient and grabbing additional resources or playing additional actions. If not, you have to spend an entire turn simply retrieving your workers...which after a while of playing starts to feel like a huge bummer.

The main conceit of the game is that you are representatives of the "Forever King" making an effort to expand the kingdom. 6 citizens have been chosen to represent his interests and develop a new village outside the main kingdom. The players play the role of these 6 citizens, and throughout the course of the game players will collect money and resources, using them to develop buildings in the new village and/or sending the resources back to the main kingdom directly for victory points, prestige, or other agendas.

Our gaming group had 5 players, did not play with any of the Automa players, and we got through 3 of the 12 plays of the campaign. The rules are pretty straightforward, and we had minimal questions as we opened things up and tried new things. We played two rules incorrectly and would not have known that we did so except for I found explanations for them in the FAQ while looking up completely different things. Both misplays were minimal, did not affect any player adversely, and were not in any way a negative for our group.

The game does a great job of pointing you in a direction that will progress the campaign, specifically mentioning that certain actions are necessary to move things along. Whenever you need to do that "moving along" you are directed to "The Index," a nicely constructed box with a magnetic lid that has HUNDREDS of cards in it. These cards are a combination of new rules for the game, new items to be used as reference for what things do, and new components to be used in the game. The directions here are also straightforward, telling you not only what to do, but also when and how to do it. When rules are modified, new additions are highlighted with hard-to-miss call-outs so that even though most of the rules in a section stay the same, it's easy to see what is new or different.

The game is very "friendly" - there is very little in the way of antagonism or "gotcha" to the game. It is definitely a competitive game, but:

• The worker placement aspect is not exclusive, so you can always place your character where someone else already is.
• There is very little breaking of ties in this game. If two players both meet a criteria within the game, they typically share the same exact reward.
• Ditto for a tied score at the end of one of the 12 individual games - both (or more if there's more than two tied) players get credit for winning the game.
• Resources are finite (that is, if the "bank" runs out of coins, there are no more coins to be had), but so far through three games this has only been an issue exactly one time.

This isn't an issue for our group in the least, but I can easily see this being a turn off to some people.

The game has an interesting pacing mechanism: each individual game ends when the progress marker is moved to the end of the progress track. Where the marker starts on the track depends upon how many people are playing (and probably some other factors that our group doesn't know about yet, because even the 6 player space has empty spaces behind where it is supposed to start), but the marker itself only moves upon certain conditions which are all player motivated:

1. A building is constructed.
2. A crate is opened.
3. A player scores an objective.
4. A player who has run out of influence tokens begins their turn.

Because of this, the players have a pretty big impact on how long each individual game runs. While it is very difficult for a single player to have a large impact on the speed of the game (the maximum spaces you can move the progress marker in one turn is two, and that's only once you've spent all your influence...which takes a while), if more than one player is pushing to move the token, a game can definitely finish much faster than it normally would. Thus far, I have disappointingly not seen much of a use for this type of tactic, but I do like that it is an option (and we're only a quarter way through the game thus far). For a point of reference, the progress token needs to make 21 moves for a 5 player game.

Additionally, certain spaces on the progress track trigger one of two "events" - Income and Prestige. Income is not initially a part of the experience, and the game tells you to ignore it until it is explained later. Prestige is a separate track on the game board and has a direct impact on victory point totals in each individual game. The Prestige spaces on the Progress Track are reserved solely for the player who caused the progress marker to advance to them, so there is a bit of gamesmanship as to when you want to advance the progress marker. There are not very many actions which cause you to gain Prestige, so these spaces on the Progress Track can be hard fought.

So the driving force of this game is putting buildings on the board, opening crates, and scoring objectives. Each of these actions provides the player performing them 5 victory points (which is a somewhat significant amount - our winning point totals in the three games today were 38, 42, and 60), and not only does this literally move the game forward on the progress track, but opening crates is the only way to unlock new stuff from The Index. Buildings come in the form of cards that have stickers on them. Once you build a building, you take the sticker off the card and place it on one of the open spots in your Charter (the section of the board reserved for your character to build on). This will create a worker placement slot that anyone in the game can use on future turns (you can only build within your own Charter, but your workers can use any building on the board). This also leaves you with an empty building card in your possession, but that doesn't mean that it is useless - crates cannot be opened until their building has been built, and opening crates is the primary mechanic for getting new stuff into the game. The game itself recommends that you do this at your own pace - there are over 100 buildings in the game to be built, and almost every single one of them has a crate on it. This means that you will be opening things constantly. I believe we ended up opening 8 crates in our first playthrough alone.

That's about as far as I can go without spoiling things, so the rest of this will go under the tags. Note: if you like discovery and are planning on playing the game, I would highly recommend avoiding this spoiler tag.

Spoiler

On Opening Crates
So far for us, every single crate we have opened has at the very least provided the opening player with a card or two that they get to keep to use later on during the current game. Most crates also provide cards that get put into the supply, a location where any player can purchase available cards by utilizing a specific worker placement spot. Finally, some crates unlock completely new mechanics in the game. As an example, one of our crates tonight unlocked "Minions." Minions are additional workers that you can purchase to be used as additional actions on subsequent turns, though they have fairly strict restrictions: they can only be placed on empty spaces (e.g. no workers or minions can already be there), they can only be placed within your own charter, and they are not bumped back to your possession if someone else uses that action space. There are several types of Minions (in our game, the crate that unlocked Minions gave us Robots), and each type is hidden in different crates. But the first time we unlocked a Minion crate, we were provided with a new rule that went into the rule book describing how Minions are used. After that, we were told to read the cards from The Index that pertained specifically to Robots. The second time we unlocked a Minion crate (Golems), we were told to read the same cards from The Index that the Robots crate already had us open about the Minion rules, so we just skipped those cards and read the cards that were Golem specific.

Of the major mechanics we have opened up now (two big ones), it appears that each of the six characters has their own specific crate that will open up different flavors of the mechanic tailored slightly to their own style. This means that you have six different crates pointing to that first rules card about the mechanic. The Index, in an effort not to spoil things for people who haven't opened anything yet, only refers to this rules card by its index number (36 for minions...I've tried to find it three times now). It's a minor gripe, but flipping through the index to find card 36 when you removed it a long time ago can get slightly annoying. The Index is in numerical order, so it's really not a big deal...just annoying. I actually wonder if something like a companion app would be useful for this - you tell it what crate you're opening, and it can tell you where to go and whether or not this is a crate referring to some major mechanic your group has already opened. Obviously you need the physical media for the mechanical things, but the app would help by not even asking you to look for card 36 if you've already removed it from the index. The more I type about this, the more I love the idea.

On Scoring Objectives
Anyway, moving on. Like many games, there are objectives. In the beginning, there are three random objective cards drawn from an objective card deck that can be scored by anyone in the game. Each player can only score each objective once, but scoring an objective does not lock anyone else out from scoring the same objective. One of the early crate unlocks adds additional objective cards to the deck, but also provides a building that allows you to draw an objective card from the deck that you can keep hidden. You still need to build this building before you can use it, and our group has not found much use for this particular building yet.

Since scoring objectives not only gives you points but advances the Progress Marker, I personally have been trying to game this so that I will wait to score one until it will move the Progress Marker to a reputation gain spot so I can get multiple things done at once; this is more difficult than it seems, because you not only have to A. meet the objective, but B. have a worker capable of using the action space to score an objective available and C. need that progress marker to stay one step shy of the reputation gain spot until it comes back around to your turn. This makes for a fun strategic twist in a game that is generally light on strategy.

On Game End, Scoring, and Rewards for Winning and Losing
Once you finish your first game, you tally up the scores to see who won. Then you run through the game end routine, which involves rewards for the victor(s) (remember, if two or more players tie for the win, they ALL win) and also rewards for the losers. At the end of the first game, the players get to name each of the six Charters. In what I thought was a fun twist, the losers choose their own names, and then they get to collaborate to choose the name of the winner's charter because "the winner should remain humble." This is how I was named the leader of "The Projects." That being said, I did get to credit myself for the victory in game one - and on the box itself it lets you know that each victory will be worth 7-9 points in the end of campaign scoring.

An ingenious design in the game is that each Charter has its own small "chest" (looks like the box for a deck of cards) that corresponds to their stuff. It has a small zip-loc bag that holds the pieces of that color, and can easily fit all the cards that correspond to that character - you opened these at the very beginning of the first game. When you finish a game, you put all your loot into it so that the next time you open the box, it is easy to keep track of what you get to start the next game with. What it also has around the outside of the chest is the scorecard for that Charter. After each game, you will be coloring in various meters on the box that will affect what you are able to do at the beginning of each game and what you can carry over into subsequent games. At the end of game one, you get to keep ALL your stuff for game two. But you are also told in no uncertain terms that after games 2 through 12, you will definitely NOT be able to keep all your stuff. Interestingly enough, after the second (and all subsequent, it seems) game, the winner still gets credit for the victory, but ALL of the losers get to choose a resource type that they can increase their capacity for, allowing them to carry over more goods for each subsequent game. The chest has a nice meter for this capacity right on the outside, and you simply color in a bubble for the resource you want to be able to keep more of when you lose. It is a small benefit, but a nice one nonetheless; when each action garners you 1-2 resources or costs 1-4 resources to carry out, every additional resource you can start with is a very nice leg up.

The end of the first game also introduces one of my favorite concepts: glory. Although you have to have the MOST victory points to win an individual game, the total number of points you get in each game ends up being hugely important - potentially more important than actually winning the individual games. At the end of each game, you get one Star of Glory for every ten points you scored. Each of these stars is not only worth 10 points in end of campaign scoring, but they also help you earn perks at the beginning of each subsequent game. Your charter chest has nine different rows, each corresponding to a resource. Each row has from 8-10 empty stars on it, and for each Star of Glory you earn (every 10 points) you get to fill in a star. Once you've filled in all the stars on any one row, you gain that resource at the beginning of each subsequent game.

Finally, the beginning of game two introduces the last major concept that we have gotten to in our playthrough: the Guidepost. This Guidepost is a single card that sits on the corner of the game board and provides a goal to attempt to achieve during each individual game. Whoever achieves this goal (regardless of whether they win or lose) gets to reveal the hidden choice on the bottom of the Guidepost at the end of the current game. This is one of the only non-friendly things I have seen in the game thus far - there is no such thing as a tie here, as there are rules to break the tie. Once you determine who the eventual "winner" of this Guidepost objective is, they get to scratch off the bottom half of the card (like a lottery scratcher) and then they alone get to make the choice presented on the card. This choice will open a crate and will actively shape both the scoring for the current game and the way the game is played moving forward. Our first guidepost (which I believe is the same for everyone) had the goal of accumulating the most coins and resources. Our "winner" then got to choose whether or not we should value resources or coins more. Since she had more resources, she chose resources, and the result ended up moving her into a tie for first place for the game!

Making this particular mechanic more interesting, in the second Guidepost ("won" by the same person in game 3, though she unfortunately finished far behind the winner in points) she was given the option to score points for our buildings (normally reserved for the end of campaign scoring) immediately for this current game. Since her buildings were not all that valuable, she chose not to. This choice irritated the Forever King, and led us down a path of "retribution." We have yet to play game four, but I am intrigued to see how this changes our gameplay.

This particular mechanic is both my favorite and least favorite part of the entire game. I love the idea of choices affecting future game play, and I also love that these choices are not directly tied to "winning the game." I hate the idea of playing a game through to the end only to find out that the scoring rules might change literally AFTER everything is done and I might not have any way to gameplan it because it's been hidden the whole time. In that third game particularly, Jenn got to choose between whether Tony or Jennifer (different person, we have two Jennifers) would win the game. We are a pretty chill gaming group, but holy wow could this be a polarizing mechanic. Obviously if you want to protect yourself, make sure you get to decide the Guidepost. That being said, in game three the Guidepost objective was literally "score the fewest objectives." In and of itself, that's not the end of the world, but as you continue to play the game, you are developing your character and your Charter with different buildings, and your playstyle could be built around something like Scoring Objectives. At which point this Guidepost becomes at best a huge thorn in your side and at worst a complete impossibility to achieve.

/Spoiler

My thoughts after three games (25% of the campaign):

On Player Count
As someone who has played Risk: Legacy multiple times before and vehemently holds the opinion that the game absolutely NEEDS a full player complement, I was very intrigued at the idea that the game was designed to be played with any player count and that the Automa were not strictly necessary. With the Charter mechanic and the fact that the gameboard has 6 different Charters whether or not you have six live players, without the Automa players you will end up with Charters that are not actively being built on. The game has a mechanic introduced later that will slowly populate empty Charters, but I can't help but feel that games with less than 4 players would feel horribly empty for far too long if you were not using the Automa players. Even at 4 players the game may feel a little empty in the early going.

On the Volume of Game Modification that Happens
I'm on record as mentioning that I was not super impressed with Pandemic: Legacy because of how much you changed the game with each playthrough (I also only played one session of Pandemic: Legacy and we got through 5 games, so keep that in mind). I absolutely do not feel the same way in this game despite the fact that there is easily as much or more that you do to change the game. I think the reason for this is twofold: First, the unlocks are built into the theme of the game and thus far work pretty seamlessly with it. Everything flows well, none of the additions are jarring, and it all makes sense. Second, you are basically building this board game as you play it. The board begins with huge swaths of empty space, and over the course of the game you are building it up from nothing. I think this helps a ton with all the changes because we are not just wily-nily changing an existing world.

On Gameplay
The "bump" mechanic of being able to utilize a building/action that someone else has already used is interesting. It makes placing your workers slightly less strategic because there is no scarcity involved, but at the same time there are plenty of opportunities for you to "game" the system by predicting which actions your opponents will need to take and using those actions first to pre-emptively earn a bump from an opponent. This also makes the game have more of a "flow" as opposed to a round system, and in my opinion makes the game move more quickly - especially after the players start to get comfortable with the mechanics and have a cohesive plan.

The game (thus far) is not as strategic as I had hoped; while the game presents many differing (and legitimate) paths to victory, the depth is quite shallow and there is little you can do to get in your opponents' way. I'm not sure the added speed/flow of the game is worth the simplicity.

I want to get more plays in before I give a definitive thought on this game overall (unfortunately we have about two weeks off here as half the group is going on a cruise), but as it stands now:

• Still really enjoying it.
• Intrigued by some of the decision making that happens from game to game.
• Looking forward to seeing how the game continues to evolve.
• If you like Lords of Waterdeep, you will probably really enjoy this game.
• That being said, I cannot recommend this game to a group that is more than moderately competitive or looking for deep strategy; there is a mechanic (detailed in the spoiler) that will be revealed after a few games that makes scoring and planning for scoring challenging at best and anger inducing at worst.

[Thomkal]

wow thanks for that detailed review Vince. I've been trying to avoid spoilers and You-Tube "Let's play's", because I might conceivably play this game someday, so I appreciate you hid the spoilers. Just one question right now-do you think the game will still be as good playing solo?

[Vince, Pt. II]

You're welcome! Brevity has never been my strong suit

Without busting out the Automa it's really hard to say. I know that they have different difficulty levels for the Automa and that with the 12 game campaign you can adjust it from game to game - this includes adding and removing Automa players as well as setting their difficulty level, so you should be able to find a sweet spot as you go.

That being said, a lot of the fun in this type of game is sharing the discovery with people and seeing which direction they take it, so I would imagine it would lose a lot in a solo play even if the Automa make for solid additional players.

Addendum: I opened up the Automa rules to see what they had to say about specific things that I was curious about. All decision making is left up to the active players, even if one of the Automa would have qualified to "earn" the decision. Also, the game has a built in method for increasing or decreasing the strength of the AI from game to game based upon how it scores relative to the human players in the game. It sounds pretty solid; then again, my caveats above still apply. I do not think the game would be as enjoyable unless you had a solid contingent of human players. My very early feeling is that 4 is the sweet spot, though more human players seems like it would be better in almost every conceivable case. That is a very subjective opinion though, so your mileage may vary.

[Thomkal]

Thanks again Vince-I do find it hard to play a game solo at times because of that human interaction that so often makes a game better. But games like this one and 7th Continent certainly want to give them a try solo.

One last question-can I be your new best friend, so I can come play these games?

[Vince, Pt. II]

Originally Posted by Thomkal

Thanks again Vince-I do find it hard to play a game solo at times because of that human interaction that so often makes a game better. But games like this one and 7th Continent certainly want to give them a try solo.

One last question-can I be your new best friend, so I can come play these games?

Haha! You're always welcome over here. It's a bit of a hike for you though

[Carman Bulldog]

Cross posting from the Steam thread, but can someone explain Tabletop Simulator to me? Are most of the games played offline head-to-head, offline AI, asynchronous, etc. Also, are most of the games free from the workshop and the only games that one needs to pay for are from the "Downloadable Content"?, etc.

[Vince, Pt. II]

Unfortunately I can't help with Tabletop Simulator.

Jenn and I did get a two player game of Gaia Project in yesterday, and we were both very impressed. This is a game done by the same group that created Terra Mystica, and is essentially a re-themed version 2.0 of that game. As a heads-up, Terra Mystica is one of my favorite games of all time, so I was a little biased going in.

If you haven't played Terra Mystica this review won't make much sense, so here's a rundown of Terra Mystica: It is an area control game with multiple factions, each with their own special abilities, strengths, and weaknesses. My favorite thing about the game is that it is a "perfect information" game. There is 0% randomness once the game starts. The only information you do not know is the actions your opponents are going to take. There are no dice rolls, no random card draws, nothing. Not only that, but the game is extremely variable from game to game - during each of the six rounds there is a special bonus scoring tile in play that will give you bonus points for performing specific actions during that round. These are randomly selected during set up from a pool of about 10, so not only are the bonuses different from game to game, but the order in which the bonuses appear also varies. What is nice is that you can see all of these round bonuses before any player makes a move (or even before you choose your faction!), so you can design your own strategy completely around the bonuses.

The Terra Mystica theme is that of a fantasy world - some of the factions are Mermaids, Witches, Dwarves, Giants, and Chaos Mages, for example - and each faction can only live on a certain terrain type. Therefore throughout the game you are terraforming the planet to make the land suitable for your faction to build upon. This makes the struggle to find and develop land the main crux of the game; while it may be simple to change the badlands into desert that your Nomads can thrive on, it takes a lot of effort to convert that lake to a desert. Meanwhile, the Chaos Mages are trying to gobble up all the Badlands, because that's where they can survive!

One of the interesting mechanics of the game is that not only do you simply build, you then upgrade your buildings - and there is a point at which you choose one of two paths to upgrade a building. What makes this truly interesting is that upgrading buildings is cheaper if you happen to be adjacent to an opposing faction - so you don't just want to run away and hide in the corner where you won't have to fight for land, because then all your buildings will be extremely expensive.

Finally, there is a separate board that houses the "Cult Tracks," four categories (Air, Earth, Water, and Fire) where each faction has a rank, and at the end of the game gets a bonus for 1st, 2nd, or 3rd place on each of the four different tracks. These ranks tie into each round's bonus tile, and are heavily dependent upon upgrading your buildings from Trading houses to Temples.

While there is a ton more to the game, that gives you the basic gist of it.

Gaia Project has the same basic mechanics - area control, multiple factions, 0% randomness, variable round scoring tiles. The theme has changed to space, so instead of a map that has almost every single tile available to build on, now there are planets separated by wide swaths of empty space. The major changes to the game are as follows:

• Instead of a static Game Board, the game comes with 10 "Sectors" that you use to build the game board. They are all similarly shaped, so the board can be put together in a ton of different ways, changing the game significantly from game to game.
• Instead of Terra Mystica's end game scoring of simply being whichever faction covered the most land, now you set two end-game scoring bonuses out of a collection of 6 different bonuses. Like the variable board, this changes in-game strategy from game to game.
• In Terra Mystica, every faction was tied to one specific terrain type. In Gaia Project, every faction has a single planet type they can build on, but there are two types of planets that are universal: Transdim and Gaia. Any faction can build on a Gaia planet (given the proper resources) and any faction can turn a Transdim planet into a Gaia planet (given the proper research and resources).
• The biggest (and in my opinion greatest) change to the game is that the "Cult Track" has been completely re-designed to be the "Research Track." Now instead of four generic tracks that provide a single resource reward for every single one of the four tracks, there are 6 research avenues that you can explore, each of which provides mechanical improvements to your faction (such as extended range for future construction), but also can provide improved resource generation.

These are all welcome changes, but the new research design patches what I consider to be one of the weakest portions of Terra Mystica - the Cult track always felt sort of "tacked on," and while certain factions tied into the Cult track well, far too many of the factions felt like they had no reason to be a part of it. As research, it integrates perfectly with the theme, no one feels left out, and with the incremental improvements provided by advancing along the tracks it feels far more seamless than the abstract "I need to rank high to get points" aspect that the Cult track felt like in Terra Mystica. Not only that, it provides a bunch more strategic decisions throughout the course of the game!

We only have one (two player) play of the game under our belts, but we are both very impressed, and can't wait to give it more of a spin. There are some incredibly interesting faction powers that I can't wait to dive into, and I want to explore more of the technology paths.

[sachmo71]

Folks, I need to sing the praises of Master of Orion Boardgames. It’s simple, quick and really fun. Everything you need is right in front of you, there are multiple paths to win and takes 30 to 45 minutes to play. Check it out.

Fallout is fun, it there are problems. I’ll give a more detailed review later, but I’m off to play so,e Rebellion now. Maybe we can squeeze in another game of MOO!

[Pumpy Tudors]

I'm glad to see other folks here besides myself are playing board games. Keep having fun, guys!

[AnalBumCover]

What are you guys playing to pass the time until the New Year comes? I'm keeping it simple for my small non-gaming group of friends: Love Letter, Bang! The Dice Game, How to Rob a Bank, and Splendor.