What BOARD GAME(s) have you been playing?

Letters is the more pure deduction game and has a tighter focus. FFG Fury is the big thematic game with abilities/equipment/etc. GW Fury is like FFG Fury but has more of an desperate adventure feel for the Hunters since Dracula's events don't fall off a track, so they could be encountering nasty stuff that's been lingering for a long time gameplay-wise. I really enjoy and am keeping all three, but there's something about the flavor of the GW Fury that probably keeps it at the top of the heap for me. Unfortunately GW Fury is also the most fragile as you really need a good Dracula player that cycles his chits enough to get his Vampires out there.

My wife REALLY likes Argent.

I took out Android: Netrunner last night, which I had traded Greenland for. I watched the FFG 20-minute explanation of the game on Youtube, and think I have the gist of it. I think Metalface13 taught me how to play the original Netrunner, but that was years ago. I hope it ends up being as fun as it's supposed to be. I remember when I played my first serious boardgame, Railroad Tycoon, and it was so alien it made my head explode. Now I need games explained to me in terms of other games so I can understand them in relation to other mechanics I've picked up. There's a third party video, but it's 45 minutes long and they don't use a good mic.

Then I played the Ark of the Covenant bible version of Carcassonne. They didn't understand the giant meeple bonus, except for the 12-year-old, who scored a huge city and crushed us like bugs. None of them will play it again because "it's boring." Older daughter said she'll play if she can do homework at the same time. I really need to look into solitaire games or learn vassal. My wife has said she'll play anything she can sit down and play that doesn't have a lot of fiddly rules. Her favorite is Rat-a-tat-cat, which we are getting tired of. She hinted she would play Battleline again.

Get yourself Silent Victory. Its forums have been rockin' and rollin' for weeks now. Solo game that plays in about two hours.

I had it preordered along with Talon and Liberty or Death until it became apparent all three would arrive at about the same day. I chickened out on this one. It turned out to be THE same day.

I look forward to picking it up used in a couple of months.

S.

I had Silent War back in 2008, but sold it off or traded it for something else that I no longer have. Silent Victory still looks pretty interesting. I'm just not sure if my aging brain has the patience to figure it out. It seems a little spreadsheet-isa. I'm regretting trading Nemo's War, thinking the deluxe version would be out soon.

Warriors of Japan just came back in stock, which is also tempting. I am in the wrong thread and will shut up now.

Played a game with our new Argent set with the painted wood bases with magnets indicating player owner and a washer glued to the mage figures indicating type. It worked way better than the bases that came with the thing, I'd recommend the setup.

And I won, for once. I locked down the 2IP spot, which was one of the only IP spots in the setup. She is beginning to see why playing without wounding presents problems---the simplest way to get the inevitable blue mages out of those types of "NEED IT NOW" spaces is to nuke them with Sorcerers. When they aren't in the game, it becomes extremely difficult to leverage them out.

Ran through the first "quest" in Descent 2nd edition by myself last night, after acquiring it in the recent math trade. I say "quest" because that first bit is really just a combat primer and is over in 20 minutes, tops. I won't be showing that to my group, otherwise this game would get a quick pass.

It's certainly streamlined compared to first edition. I don't know if that's so much for the better yet. But the monsters seem cool.

Legomancer wrote: Skipped the Sunday group this week, even though it was the first time I've been able to make it in a while. They were going to play Food Chain Magnate and Mombasa and those looked super ugh to me.

I haven't played either, but I agree with you on these. FCM physically looks ugh especially the street grid tiles. I also don't care for how people are already talking about optimum opener moves, how the game can easily take 2+ hours, the ridiculous cost of it, and how many people trying to make a profit off ridiculous cost.

Mombasa also looks physically ugh. Everything looks way too tan. The theme is also off-putting to me despite whatever is in the rule book about trying to educate people on the reality of colonialism. Why not just make up a fake location?

Played my annual game of Advanced Civilization on Saturday. I played Egypt when I got first pick. No one really messed with me for the whole game, except tons of pirates, barbarians, and the like. I made one really good round of trading to get 5 Oil early on and score Architecture for myself. (And our 5 minute timer buzzed just before I would have gotten my 6th)! From then on people were really hesitant to trade me what I wanted, and I seemed to keep drawing 2-3 calamities* which meant that I couldn't even get people to trade since I had nothing they wanted. I ended up a distant 3rd out of 6, but I had a good time. I need to learn how to get a big set of cards while still setting myself up to do something decent the next round. I think my flow ebbed a bit too much, if that makes any sense. It's still one of the best games that I don't think I'll be able to get my friends to play.

*The very first time I got to 9 cities, I drew Piracy, as well as Civil War and one other non-tradable. I didn't trade the Piracy, and then I got Civil War discarded thanks to the mercy rule.

I've also been playing Machi Koro lately. It's simple fun. It definitely changes at different player counts.

Tons of Hanabi. I've gotten a perfect 25 with a couple groups in the past month. Now we're working towards 30 with the 6th color added. I got 28 with my girlfriend, and either 27 or 28 with kids at work. One kid is obsessed with getting a perfect score and will start over as soon as we discard a 5 or a 2nd of anything. If I could design a game, I'd love for it to be as simple and good as this.

Played Tragedy Looper for the first time in awhile. We ran the 9th scenario in the book, which I thought we had already done, but my girlfriend was positive that we hadn't. I think she was right, but she ended up giving too much information in the first loop- I was able to figure out some key roles which narrowed down the main plot and more for me. I kept putting Goodwill on whoever she didn't have cards on early, and eventually I was able to find out more info as well as keep people's paranoia levels down to prevent incidents. I survived the second loop. Just one more scenario to go, then on to the expansion that I bought way back at last GenCon. I think 2p might be best for this. If talking is on with a bunch of players it can really drag. I would like for someone else to Mastermind some time so we can be on the same team though.

Then I got crushed in X-WIng that same night. I was running the two named Z-95 pilots for the Scum, as well as a Kihraxs fighter and a Y-wing. She had... Kath Scarlet, a TIE Defender, and a TIE/FO fighter. I spent about 20 points on torpedoes and missiles to bring my points up to 100, and I launched 3 of them at the Defender the first time I got a chance... resulting in just one shield gone! The other got launched at the FO fighter and did one shield and one hull damage. That was about all that I did the whole game as I tried focusing on the Defender with no real results. I don't know if I even cracked his shields.

Took a half day yesterday and played in a four hour game of Forbidden Stars. I was Eldar and started off slow in terms of gaining objectives. I opted for a first turn city and starting teching up right away.

This would prove fruitful as I would swing things back in my favor as Chaos and Space Marines duked it out, while Orks made a push against me. I would beat back the Orks and cut in with Falcon Grav Tanks, closing out the game.

Chaos could have won a turn before I did but lost in a key battle against a Land Raider and Marine. Was a tense game.

Then we played Blood Rage. This would be the third game I've scored 180+ points, and second back to back. I was competing against two other veterans and one newbie.

Before the game started I was giving strategy tips to the newbie and I suggested he not ignore Quests as it's one of the things unexperienced players tend to do since they aren't sexy. I said I can't recall the last time I saw someone win ignoring quests.

The other player who has played as much as me said he didn't agree with that and said quests usually go last in the draft. I said ok and new what strategy I would employ.

I ended up accomplishing three quests in the first age and raising a clan stat with a key battle to get my Rage to 12 going into Age 2. In age 2 I accomplished three more Quests, and finished out the game in Age 3 accomplishing five more quests.

I maxed out all of my stats from questing and I also was able to get every single one of my figures out in the final age because I locked down a province and held it, not pillaging while others ran out of rage behind me. I drafted the third Age upgrade that gave me 3 points per figure on the board and ended up with the max of 10 figures.

So in the final age I scored 40-50 for quests, 30 for units on the board, and of course 60 for maxed out stats. I won one battle all game and stayed out of fights for the most part. The other veteran said I may have convinced him that questing is better than he thought.

So.... the game about vikings fighting... you won by not fighting. This is the thing I hate about DOAMs; when the best strategy involves playing like a coward.

Played a 7-player game of Cthulhu Wars last night. It was 4+ hours, and very swingy, so I don't remember specifics. I was Sleeper and after being out near the front for the first part of the game, I ended up coming in last. But it was my first play as Sleeper, so whatever. Windwalker and Black Goat ended up tying for first after huge surges in points the final round. On a side note, I hate that there is no tie breaker in this game. Happened to me a few games ago. Sharing victory is stupid.

I'm not the biggest fan of this game to begin with, but I've decided I like the larger player games even less. They are super swingy between different players and it doesn't seem like you have a lot of control over your strategy. There's enough players on the board that a few of them can just decide to hit you and nearly wipe you out with pretty much no recourse. This happened multiple times to different people, in this game and the previous one I played with 6 players. Time to convince them to put this distraction aside and go back to X-Wing.

Biggest game of Cthulhu Wars I've been in was 4 players. 7 does sound like a slog.

hotseatgames wrote: So.... the game about vikings fighting... you won by not fighting. This is the thing I hate about DOAMs; when the best strategy involves playing like a coward.

I wasn't a coward, you can't exactly hide in Blood Rage. The player with the Sea Serpent could have gone into the Fjord I had locked down and kicked my ass.

But yes, I didn't fight and won. And it felt very good and tense as several things had to coalesce for that to happen. Players could have thwarted me but they didn't.

You can win in Cyclades without winning many fights too. Doesn't change how enjoyable it is.

Same with Chaos in the Old World. I've seen plenty of games with non-Khorne races winning no fights or killing almost nothing.

I also won my last game of Cthulhu Wars as Yellow Sign without winning one fight. It was great.

4 players is perfect.

I can't see it being a slog at 8 because the turns are so fast, but it would diminish things a bit.