Dr. Fischer's Game Night

The Game of Thrones, The Boardgame

2011-12-10T18:16:00.000-08:00

Some time ago I discovered George r.r. Martin in connection with his novel The Armageddon Rag. The book was considered an out-of-print secret gem and sounded exotic and mysterious. I eventually tracked the book down and over time read most of Martin's work. He's been a prolific writer with a lot of talent but little visibility until quite recently. Now, of course, his Game of Thrones series has received lots of exposure through its presence on HBO and the franchise has generated a number of games.

Which is to say what a fiction-forward person I am, Heh.

I actually find the Game of Thrones series to be self indulgently lengthy and the body count amongst the main characters eventually makes you distance yourself from any emotional investment in the story. Further, it seems like each critical event in the book is accompanied by one or more characters displaying jarring intervals of carelessness or stupidity which allow hugely telegraphed traps and treacheries to take away yet another likable character.

Back to the games. I got a chance to play the Game of Thrones boardgame several times recently and it's a lot of fun, perhaps even more fun for someone who dislikes the books. In the game you take the roles of one of the warring factions in the game world. Your job is to conquer a good portion of the island of Westeros and prevent your opponents from doing the same. Much of the game mechanic is similar to Risk- you move tokens representing armies around the board and, generally speaking, larger armies defeat smaller ones and take territory. Like Risk, the GoT boardgame features some diplomacy as you try and convince your neighbor to leave you alone or expand in some other direction and eventually some backs are going to get stabbed when these little deals go awry.

The GoT boardgame expands on Risk in a few ways. Players have combat cards that add to their fighting strength. Some cards are better than others but you need to use them all before using any given card again. Thus, you have to decide whether to use a great card or wait for a more important battle later, and your opponent is doing the same. Further, there are several decks of event cards that impose random restrictions or cause game events to take place. The cards don't unbalance the game once you know what they can do- you simply accept a bit of chaos into your plans and sometimes even hope for it.

I enjoyed the GoT boardgame immensely. The combination of diplomacy, strategy, and luck is well balanced. Each faction has some strengths and interesting playing qualities. If you like the books then it's exciting to pretend to be one of the Starks or Lannisters. If you dislike the books it's equally fun, I'm not sure why. Maybe because it's fun to poke at such a serious and humorless series.

The only possible drawback to the game is that once you start falling behind I don't think there's much of a chance to catch up or have a huge effect on the game. The players may pile on the leader and a new leader will emerge but it's unlikely to be a player who's lost a lot to start with. If you're going to play GoT then you have to be OK with the possibility that you'll spend an hour or two losing, or at least definitely not winning. For some people that can be demoralizing, myself for example.

I think the Game of Thrones boardgame is a great choice for people looking for a longer game with lots of players that combines military strategy and diplomacy. Basically, if you want to move on from Risk this is a great choice.

Star Trek Deck Building Game- not a big hit

2011-11-26T16:54:00.000-08:00

In the years following the release of Dominion I've been on the lookout for a deck building game that was a well crafted and also carried more of a compelling theme. Up to now I've been pretty unimpressed by what's on the market. When the Star Trek Deckbuilding game was released I thought this could be the game to purchase. I got a chance to play it recently and I walked away happy to not own it.

In the Star Trek Deckbuilding Game you start the game with a small starship and a few crew members. Over time you can add functions to your ship, add crew, and eventually replace your ship with a more powerful model. The game has several scenarios- we played a cooperative one in which we had to defeat the Borg. Most of the game mechanics were familiar enough and we started play quickly. I'm going to skip the mechanical details and just move to my impressions.

My chief concern with the game is that I never felt like I was able to steer how my deck was developing. Players have a good assortment of cards to choose from but the abilities of the cards are often so specific as to make them of limited use when they crop up again in the game. Further, the game "currency" ran out midway through our game and on about one third of our turns we found we couldn't buy any cards even if we wanted to. That felt very odd.

The designers certainly tried to add theme to the game. Players can "explore," they can upgrade their ship's crew or engage in space battles. Sadly, little of this is easily directed so it all feels a bit random. I never felt like I was choosing whether to have an "exploring" deck or a "combat" deck. Each turn just seemed to be "well, what can I afford?"

The entire experience reminded me of Ascension. Both games feature "factions" and in both cases cards within a faction will help other cards of the same faction. And in both games I rarely was able to string together useful combinations of cards or use faction abilities in synchronicity.

I was pretty disappointed with the Star Trek Deckbuilding game. I had hoped for a good combination of theme and gameplay and this game does not deliver. Unlike Fleet Captains I can't even imagine Trek fans enjoying this game simply for it's Trekishness. I suppose the one perk to this game is that it makes me want to try Fleet Captains again.

Twilight Imperium- At Last!

2011-11-07T16:59:00.000-08:00

No matter what sort of store you like to shop in there are basically cheap items, typical items, and then a few over-the-top and absurdly expensive items. You may buy a six pack of Sam Adams every week and always glance musingly at the $100 bottle of champagne, for example. I've been shopping at gaming store now for thirty years or so and there have always been certain games that fall into the same category. Games so large and expensive that they are only purchased by the elite gamer, the ultra hard core gamer. For me the epitome of that sort of game has been Twilight Imperium. The cover art is superb. The box is gigantic, it seems to weigh fifty pounds. I never met a person who had purchased it or played it or even looked in the box. At the same time it's in its third edition, so Someone must be playing it. Well this weekend that someone was me.

Joking aside, Twilight Imperium (TI) is a game well known for its complexity, number of components and playing time. I got a chance to play it at Vermont's Carnage gaming convention. Suffice it to say that TI actually surpasses its hype. It's a terrific monster of a game. I don't think I could easily describe the game mechanic in any detail. In brief, players manage an alien civilization that is part of a huge galactic organization. They take turns making decisions regarding their race and accumulating victory points for various achievements. The player with the most points wins the game.

The beauty of TI is that there are dozens of ways to rack up victory points, including exploring space, fighting and conquering, trade, technological development, and politics. This game is about as open ended as any boardgame I have ever played. It's a trade boardgame, it's a miniatures space battle game, it's an exploring game and a civilization development game. Each player can direct their race in the way they see fit and play by the style that suits them best. I don't think I can imagine another boardgame with that degree of flexibility- ironically Race for the Galaxy comes close.

That being said, one could imagine that the price you pay for that design is insane complexity but the rules for TI are, well, not insanely complex at least. It's not well suited for rank beginners but people comfortable with boardgames can be playing comfortably fairly quickly. At our recent game I started play sleep deprived and sick and still picked up on play within about a turn.

Finally, everything about this game screams quality of design. The art is fantastic. The alien races are well conceived. The rules and "color" writing is top notch. After three editions the publishers have ironed out this game and produced a fabulous product well worth the price.

The only caveat to TI is really the playing time required. I suspect a full game is a ten hour affair. Certainly not a dull ten hours but ten hours nonetheless. This is not going to be played every month unless you have a certain lifestyle not featuring, say, work and children.

I would whole heartedly recommend Twilight Imperium for gamers who enjoy science fiction and have some time to play. The rules could be managed by interested teens and the victory options allow all sorts of playing styles to lead to success. Truly an epic and amazing game!

Star Trek Fleet Captains- Pricey Nostalgia

2011-11-06T13:34:00.000-08:00

I was a Star Trek fan growing up and suffered at the time from feeling like only myself and twenty other people knew how great Trek was. I would search through issues of The Monster Times or Creepy magazine for any mention of the show and once made it in to the Federation Trading Post in Manhattan- the first store dedicated to Trek and one that would fit into my living room today. So let me tell you- Kids These Days just don't know how good they have it. You can barely throw a stone in a game store now and not hit a Trek related product. But how many of these products are worth a look?

Star Trek Fleet Captains (FC) is a new game from Wizkids. I got a chance to give it a go a week ago. In the game the players control Klingon or Federation ships and cruise the galaxy having Trek-esque adventures. For example, you might have to prevent a civil war, add a new race to your stellar empire, or test a new warp drive. Success gets you victory points. You will also have a set of ongoing missions which can be finished at any time during the game for extra victory points. Some missions are combat oriented while others involve exploring a certain number of areas or some other peaceful task. Players can attack other player's ships and that may fulfill a victory condition or simply prevent your opponent from completing one of theirs. The winner player or team is the first to accumulate a set number of victory points.

On the positive side the game manages to include missions and characters from all the Trek series' very well. It's almost like you're playing out lost episodes that were never broadcast but could have been. I think the writers really grasped what makes a Trek adventure and that comes through beautifully in the game.

On the negative side I found the degree of luck in the game to be a bit much. Unless you spend valuable time "scanning" before moving you stand some risk of driving into a black hole while adventuring and losing a ship. Many of the encounters are also so difficult as to be close to impossible and may result in the loss or crippling of one of your ships. Finally, players may have special cards in their hand which can drastically alter an encounter which you may have spent some time in setting up.

This last issues touches on the heart of the problem with FC. The game has miniature spaceships and there are space battles but it's really not a miniatures game. I wouldn't tolerate a minis game with the amount of randomness that FC has. On the other hand, boardgames like Talisman and even Race for the Galaxy have a good amount of chance and are still lots of fun. One approach to FC is to keep on repeating "Not a minis game" to yourself as you play and instead see it as Talisman version of Star Trek.

That being said, the game is quite expensive because it does include lots of plastic miniatures and a modular space playing board. You end up spending a good amount on minis for this non-minis game. And, as with Talisman, you have to decide if you can tolerate lots of chance in a game. The rules could be a bit less ambiguous as well and players may have to make some on the spot decisions regarding gameplay.

Star Trek Fleet Captains has some good things going for it. It's terrific fun as a Trek simulation and fans will recognize the affection and care that went into it's design. The rules are simple and the game is playable by new gamers and teens alike. At the same time it's expensive and minis gamers may want to consider one of the many alternate Trek miniatures games available. I think a player who doesn't love the show will find it a pleasant diversion but this game is clearly aimed towards the fan.

Quarriors- Rolling Dice is Fun

2011-10-26T20:05:00.000-07:00

I recently tried to pick up some games that might be fun to play with my wife and potentially other friends who are not intense games. One game I thought to try is Quarriors.

Quarriors is a new game published by WizKids and it came with a lot of positive and negative buzz. I picked it up because it looked light and simple and a good choice for a two player game with the wife. Quarriors is a "deck building" game. Instead of building a deck of cards you play with dice. Players start with a small selection of dice and each turn they draw six randomly from bag and roll them. At first the dice simply give you game money with which you can "buy" a fantasy creature of some sort- a dragon, or wizard, or warrior for example. Once you buy a "dragon" you place a dragon die in you bag and it becomes part of your supply. As you can imagine as you add dragons, oozes, and witch dice to your bag you increase your chances of rolling those dice when you draw your random six. If you draw a dragon die and roll well you can then "summon" a dragon to fight for you. If your dragon survives a round of combat you score points and the first person to score a set number of points wins.

The idea behind deck building games is that you add cards or dice to your supply that you think will be helpful in later turns. Then other players add things in their turns that might counter your choices or they might just follow their own strategies. Deck building games are great for people who like to shape their own strategies and fine tune their games. They can have huge replay value and prompt lots of deep strategy.

Quarriors uses dice instead of cards and that is the source of its great strength and its great weakness. Rolling dice is fun. In Quarriors you get to roll lots of them! Further, it's exciting to roll and hope to get lucky and summon powerful creatures. At the same time, it's frustrating to roll your dragon dice and not actually get any dragons because of bad luck. Serious deck building players dislike Quarriors because of the luck factor. The truth is that Quarriors is not a serious game and probably shouldn't be approached in the same spirit as one approaches, say, Dominion. Quarriors is fast, light, and not very strategic.

We've played Quarriors a few times now. My wife picked up on it in no time and she had a good time playing. I think we've had better times playing different games but probably each of those took twice as long to learn. So for now I think of Quarriors as a great introduction game for young players, as a good game for casual players or as a filler for experienced players. It's fast and colorful and not un-fun, but not the next big thing.

Blood Bowl Team Manager- Sports Fun!

2011-10-26T19:45:00.000-07:00

Blood Bowl Team Manager is a game I've been looking at wistfully for a while now. Blood Bowl is a game in which fantasy creatures play a version of football against each other. I always thought it sounded like a lot of fun and also appealingly silly, as it features all manner of fierce monsters dressed up in pads and throwing a ball around in a medieval stadium. I never got the chance to play Blood Bowl but when the boardgame came on the market it sounded like a chance to get a taste of the experience without painting the miniatures and finding other players.

I got my first chance to play Team Manager tonight and this is one fun, simple game. Each player has a team of elves, dwarves, orcs, or what-not and has to help the team win a series of football games. The player's team's race may give it certain advantages- for example, orcs are great at tackling while elves are very speedy. In each game round there are a number of Blood Bowl games being played. Players can choose which games their teams will compete in and then take turns adding their players into the games. The winning team in a given game may get additional fans, special additional players, or some special bonus ability which can be used in future games. After five rounds of play the team with the most fans wins the game.

The strategy of Team Manager stems from deciding which game has the best rewards associated with it and then allocating your players well. Orc players may look for chances to tackle weaker opponents, elf players may wait till some crucial moment and then unleash their towering tree-man. You may decide to add star players to your team or try and pump it up with bonus powers an special abilities. The decision making is deep enough to be interesting but not intimidating.

The essence of Team Manager is that it's simple and, at heart, silly. The cover suggests some brutal and aggressive sports game but in reality it's quite goofy. This game features giant rats playing football. It features giant walking tree men playing football. This is not a serious game. The rules are brief and easy to learn. There is a decent amount of luck and while careful players will do well there is plenty of room for a casual player to walk away feeling satisfied. Probably my only complaint about the game is that the cover art could have been a little sillier.

That aside, this is a good fun game with lots of replay value. I'll be introducing it to my non-gaming friends and I think it'll be a hit. Certainly it's appropriate for teens and up and would be a fun family game as well.

The Tragedy of Warhammer 40K

2011-07-28T19:25:00.000-07:00

I recently bought a lot of miniatures for the Warhammer 40,000 game through Craigslist. A man was selling his son's collection because his son had stopped playing the game. I sent them through eBay and did alright but walked away with the sense that Warhammer 40K is just a tragic game.

For one, I can't count how many times I've purchased from parents who got their kids piles of 40K miniatures and watched as the child lost interest and moved on. In my hobby of historical and fantasy miniatures you Never give away your minis. You play Basic Dungeons and Dragons and WRG at age 14 and then thirty years later you've played Warhammer Ancient Battles, Hail Caesar, Songs of Blades and Heroes and, well, Dungeons and Dragons with the exact same figures. As my friend William once said, "Games come and go but minis are forever." But pity the poor 40K army, it seems to have a lifespan of a few years at best.

Then what's worse is that the value of the pieces drops by about 70% the moment you open the box. It's astounding how little you can get for a miniature that retails for $60 on the shelf. I might expect as little as 10$ for some items. There's something just sad about a $45 Dreadnaught that sells for less than the price of a plate of Pad Thai. Poor thing!

I know many older Warhammer 40K players so this is not meant to be a universal, but this game just seems designed to be purchased by hopeful dads for their sons to play and then forget a few years later, and then for the sad neglected army to be sold cut rate online. Harumph! My son is going to inherit a thousand lovingly preserved lead soldiers and if he has a mind to (time will tell) he'll be able to put them on the field of battle and rack up more battle honours. And if he has better things to do, as crazy as that sounds, the troops will have a lively time playing on someone else's table, not languishing in the dusty corner of eBay.

Railways of the World- Rail Fun

2011-07-28T19:00:00.000-07:00

Since moving to rural New Hampshire I've become more aware of railways. This is in part because this area has many scenic rail bridges and lines, and in part because a freight train goes through our back yard every night at 2 AM. So the Train Game which seemed quite esoteric in suburban Boston is much more a part of our lives.

This week I played Railways of the World. This is quite a sizable game and allows you to build and manage a rail line. Railways is different from Ticket to Ride in that it actually simulates a railway business, as opposed to Ticket which is a sort of 3 dimensional Gin Rummy. I personally find Ticket to be terrific fun, so how was a more realistic simulation? Happily it was a great game as well. In Railways you take out loans and then use the money to lengthen rail lines or improve your trains. You can then deliver freight to various cities and make money. Upgraded trains can travel along longer rail routes and players make more money with progressively longer distance deliveries. The game becomes a balancing act between making sure to borrow enough to build your line effectively and not borrowing so much that your debt cripples you for the rest of the game. There are some other elements at play to make each game slightly different but that's the basic premise.

Railways of the World is a fun challenge. You have to manage your funds, make a long term plan, and pay attention to where freight and markets are located. None of the game elements are terribly complicated but an organized player with a vision is going to do well. The map is very pretty and it's quite satisfying to create your rail empire and watch it in action. The game moves quickly and there is minimal waiting time between players.

One caveat I found with the game is that it does take 90-120 minutes to play and once you fall behind it may be difficult or impossible to catch up. I'm sure a skilled player could do it but family members and younger folks may find this frustrating. I think this makes Railways best suited for people who are present to spend time together and also play a game, rather than people who are there to play and win and only by coincidence talk and socialize. This game has a potential to be frustrating if you're a bad or impatient loser.

As with many contemporary games there is also the question of whether this is actually fun. For whatever reason I thought it was fun to manage a rail empire while I found managing a power station empire left me cold. Still, it's worth considering whether this train game is right for Your family. Unlike Ticket, Railways is pretty clearly a rail simulation. For the right people it's a great deal of fun and a nice looking game.

Magazine Followup- Wargames, Soldiers, et al

2011-07-26T17:05:00.000-07:00

A few months ago I listened to an interview with the editors of Wargames, Soldiers and Strategy (WSS). They explained that their business plan was to produce a magazine that catered to the historical gamer, but primarily in the aspect of gaming. Thus, rather that presenting extensive historical background the magazine would get right to the play itself. At that time I had read the first of the new issues and found it decent but not remarkable.

With the second of the new series WSS has become a very exciting magazine that delivers exactly what it promised. This month's issues has so many good qualities I don't even know where to start. For starters, WSS has developed a distinctive editorial voice. In the majority of articles I feel like I'm chatting with an upbeat enthusiastic chap (heh) who loves gaming in the same way I do- a bloke (and yes, I'm loving the British terms) who likes a fun, friendly game where the object is a relaxed afternoon with friends rather than a cutthroat tournament battle ending in in an argument over obscure rules. The writers in WSS seem like people you'd want to hang out with.

Further, the theme of WSS is clearly that all miniatures gaming is fun and who wouldn't want to know about more periods, styles of gaming, scenarios, and hobby techniques? This month featured pieces about a pirate battle, a series of battles in the English Civil War, and a playtest of ancient battle rules. I'm left wanting to play pirates, ECW, and ancients! There's a review of a set of rules for a fantasy pirates campaign and news regarding new plastic War of the Roses figures. Well, I always did want a WotR army and fantasy pirates- sign me up!

Finally, WSS features a great selection of photos that are taken from personal collections of actual players. Many of the miniatures are of showcase quality but some are simply well done- well done enough to be inspiring in that I could do a similar job. Once again WSS is getting me excited about the hobby.

Now in reality I'm studying for a medical exam and will not be painting up pirates, pikemen, or men at arms anytime soon. Still, WSS is proving a very enjoyable magazine. I'm looking forward to the upcoming issues.

Commands and Colors Followup

2011-07-16T18:59:00.000-07:00

I picked up a copy of Commands and Colors: Ancients a few years ago and maybe played it once. It was too much of a board game for the wargaming crowd and too much of a war game for the boardgamers. I recently unpacked it and gave it a run at Triple Play in NH for an ostensible miniature gaming night at which I had forgotten any actual miniatures.

In a game of C&C you move tiles around a board. Each group of tiles represents a party of soldiers- cavalry, bowmen, swordsmen, etc. The players have miniature battle on the board and the game supplies a variety of sample scenarios from history to play out.

C&C has several qualities that are really just charming. For one, it's fairly simple. I taught the rules in maybe fifteen minutes and we played with a minimum of time spent glancing back in the book for clarification. Further, it's fairly exciting. The players have a hand of random cards that determine what sort of orders they can give their troops. You may not have exactly the card you want and find yourself struggling to make the best of what fate has handed you. I don't like that mechanism for a game set in modern times but it's pretty fitting for an ancient battle.

Finally, as the above suggests, the game plays out fairly realistically. Even if you don't know the rules you can do well just by using good tactics. Or, if you do know the rules, you can learn good tactics by remembering what works best. I think it's rare to find a historical miniatures game that's both simple and realistic.

Of course, this isn't a miniatures game, it's a board game with wooden tiles. Except that industrious players could replace the tiles with miniature soldiers and the board with a hex marked cloth and voila! Miniatures game!

I would once again recommend Commands and Colors for anyone interested in ancient warfare. I think it's especially well suited for beginners and happily enough is also a challenge and pleasure for experienced gamers.

Megawatts- More Cerebral Eurofun

2011-07-04T13:59:00.000-07:00

I got lucky and ended up settling near Triple Play Games in New Hampshire. Each week Triple Play hosts a board game night and I've been able to play oodles of new games. The plus side of this is getting to play weird but fun games like Chaos in the Old World. The downside is noticing a trend in some games towards clever rules that are increasingly disconnected from actual visceral fun.

Megawatts is part of the Power Grid line of games. In these games the players compete improve and enlarge their power plants and to provide power to more and more cities. Megawatts is set in Eastern Canada and allows you to serve Quebec, Montreal, and nearby areas. Other versions of the game cover other regions of the world, in a fashion similar to the Ticket to Ride line.

Play in Megawatts has several phases. Players bid on a random selection of power plants. Next the players buy resources which activate the plants and then claim areas of the board to serve. Each area that is successfully powered earns you money with which to buy better power plants, more resources, and serve more regions. The game combines a bidding mechanic which is fun enough with some basic math as you try and make sure you have enough money to purchase resources and expand your services.

Megawatts is fun. It's fun to bid well and plan your power empire. But I'm not sure it's any More fun than successfully saving and paying your real life taxes, or more fun than budgeting for your week and successfully having money left over for more games. So yes, there is the thrill of successfully completing a task, but is that task really entertaining per se? The success of the Power Grid line suggests that enough people find it plenty fun indeed but I'm feeling a certain failure in visceral enjoyment.

I think Megawatts is probably a great group game for people who enjoy an intellectual challenge. It is well designed and seems balanced. But creating the best power delivery structure seems to me to be even less thrilling than Airlines:Europe. In summary- a great system design but for me- lacking in narrative strength.

Dystopian Wars- Lovely Incoherent Fun

2011-07-03T18:31:00.000-07:00

Some time ago Spartan Games out of the UK released Uncharted Seas, a fantasy naval combat game. I enjoyed Uncharted Seas- it was simple and fun. It did suffer from being set in a vaguely defined fantasy world that didn't provide enough gripping backstory to really pull you in. That, combined with pleasant but not incredible miniatures, left Uncharted Seas on the "yeah I should play that again some time..." table. Recently Spartan Games released Dystopian Wars, a semi-modern naval combat game. How does it fare in comparison?

Dystopian Wars (DW) is set in the early 20th century in some alternate "steam punk" universe. There are ships and planes but also giant robots, energy weapons, personal jetpacks, and super scientists living in a buried utopia in Antarctica. The backstory is completely jumbled and appears to be written by a committee of manatees holding science textbooks and atlases from the 1920s. It's improbable and not in the good way.

That being said, the game play is surprisingly... realistic. In a game of DW you marshal a force of tanks, blimps, ships and what-not and battle another player. In our trial games we used ships, dirigibles, and aircraft. The rules are simple and involve taking turns moving squadrons of vehicles and then firing. I hadn't read the rules carefully and so just tried to play as though I was commanding Napoleonic ships and Great War aircraft. The result was historically appropriate! DW rewards players who use careful formations and manage air and sea assets realistically. Granted there were few (well, zero, really) battles combining sail and torpedo bombers But if there had been then DW would simulate those encounters pretty closely. I think its a good sign when you can score well in a game not through knowing every small rule but rather by playing historically.

Further, Spartan Games has really stepped up their game in the miniatures department. The figures for DW and well crafted and designed, look good, and paint up well. These miniatures will look good when beginners paint them and they'll look great when good painters get at them. And at $50 or so for a usable force they're priced pretty well in the world of miniatures gaming.

I'm looking forward to playing more Dystopian Wars. While the backstory is loopy the product is affordable, of great quality, and fun to play.

Airlines: Europe- Great Family Game

2011-06-23T19:45:00.000-07:00

If Chaos in the Old World touches one end of the gaming spectrum then Airlines Europe certainly hits the other. This is a very family friendly game designed by the fellow who brought us Ticket to Ride.

In Airlines Europe the players invest in airlines and then try and make their stocks as valuable as possible. The game has two mechanics. The first involves a board which resembles the Ticket to Ride boards. Players pay game money to add cities to a given airline's network. Each time an airline gets a new city it's value on the stock market increases. There are some simple rules governing adding new cities to an airline that result in some tough gaming decisions but the key here is that the rules are simple.

The second game mechanic in Airlines involves purchasing stocks. Players may opt in their turns to "buy stock" in an airline. You have a random selection of stocks to purchase so you may or may not be able to get the stock you want on the turn you want it. If you have the most stock in a given airline the you can score points and the player with the most points wins.

The game play end up with players trying to pump up the values of certain airlines and then desperately trying to buy that airline's stocks. Of course, once the players see an airline's value going up they will All try to buy that stock. What results is a very interactive game that rewards a player who can pay attention, make the most of the stock they can get, and make the most of the resources they have at hand.

Airlines has a lot going for it. It is very, very far from the group solitaire type of game- players really need to watch what their opponents are doing and buying. I liked the fact that you can slow down an opponent but never really demolish them. Thus, the game is competitive but not viciously so. Finally, it's surprisingly exciting for a game based on airline stocks.

That does touch on Airline's weakness. Unlike Chaos in the Old World, which is about a very dramatic process, Airlines is a little dry. As a gamer I enjoy it but I suspect that a typical 17 year old boy will gravitate to Chaos. Saying that this is the most exciting game of airline stocks I've ever played pretty much says it all- I would absolutely play it again and even buy it to play with genteel friends, but Airlines is a game for gamers.

In summary, I really enjoyed this game. I reminded me of Ticket to Ride (for good reason) and it shares Ticket's strengths and weaknesses. It's a great family or group game as long as the players have the interest.

Chaos in the Old World, Fun, but for Whom?

2011-06-23T19:41:00.000-07:00

Do you sometimes wonder what it would be like to be an evil god of Chaos and compete with other evils gods to see who can destroy the world first? Well if you you then you probably wouldn't admit to it! But others have been pondering the question because Fantasy Flight Games' Chaos in the Old World allows you to find out.

The dilemma I face with Chaos is that the setting and background is pretty lurid. This is certainly not a game for young children and for same families it may be inappropriate for any aged player. I think the reason I find the game acceptable is that the story is so completely over-the-top that it becomes hard to take seriously. I find video games like Modern Warfare troubling because they seem to blur the line between fantasy and reality. Chaos falls more into the category of a Conan novel- taken literally it's quite inappropriate but something about the presentation just seems less troubling.

That being said, the game is set in the Warhammer universe's Old World. The players compete to corrupt and ruin areas using magical powers specific to whichever Chaos demon they are playing. They may fail as a group and the Old World survives to fight another day. Or they may succeed and one player will score the most points and win the game.

Given the lurid and colorful nature of this game one might wonder why it's worth mentioning. For one, it's a very well balanced and designed game. Each demon has special powers that make it very different in play. The players have many opportunities to oppose their competition and the game rewards people who pay attention rather than playing "group solitaire" as some modern games can run to. I enjoyed tthe game's narrative nature- you get the sense of an epic struggle sweeping across continents and lands. And finally, there are enough random events to ensure lots of replay value.

Secondly, Chaos is in the end a fun game to play. Many games have well designed rules. Chaos offers you an experience that is horrifying in reality but oddly entertaining on a game board. I would feel uncomfortable playing Pandemic (a game about global illness) and yet playing Nurgle, Demon God of Plague, was a hoot.

Chaos in the Old World is clearly not for everyone. I think it's a great choice for people who have already gamed in the Warhammer world. I think it's a fun game for older teens and adults who can separate game from reality and who don't find the game concepts deal breakers. So for that population this is a game well worth checking out.

Magazines! Wargames, Soldiers, and Strategy

2011-06-12T05:48:00.000-07:00

I've found that there's as much or more gaming up here in rural New Hampshire than there was in the center of Boston. That's been a nice surprise but at the time of our move I thought I'd be completely out of the loop here in the big woods. For that reason I got some magazine subscriptions in order to keep in touch. They haven't been needed as a lone lifeline to civilization but they have been fun and worth mentioning.

The first magazine I picked up was Wargames, Soldiers, and Strategy (WSS). WSS has a complex history- it was originally a Spanish magazine which was imported to the United Kingdom and translated into English. British wargamers enjoyed the magazine but not enough to keep it in print and the Spanish publishers let it go. Dutch publishers then purchased the rights to the title and it returned to the shelves this year. I heard about it over the grapevine and it seemed like an interesting title to try.

WSS looks pretty promising one issue in. The editor's goal is to provide a magazine very much dedicated to gaming and the hobby behind it. As a result they feature columns by famous game designers Rick Priestley and Richard Clarke, very useful pieces on painting techniques and terrain construction, and a variety of gamine and campaign suggestions. The quality of the material is top notch and the photographs are stunning.

On a positive note WSS acts as a great source of inspiration for gamers. The technical articles were handy and the gaming material did it's job- it made me think, "wow, that could be a fun time period to try out." I hate buying a magazine and finding it packed full of advertising and WSS certainly delivers a good ratio of content to fluff.

I would like to see WSS develop more of an editorial voice. Issue 54 is good but a little generic. I like a magazine with it's own identity and "feel" to it. I'm hoping that future issues will begin to present material in a fashion that says "sure you can find reviews and articles online but you can only find them written in this appealing way here at WSS." I think the magazine has that potential and certainly with the high powered columnists they have on board I have every reason to be hopeful.

In summary, Wargames, Soldiers and Strategy is a gorgeous wargaming magazine that delivers a lot of inspiration and content for the dollar. I'm looking forward to the next issue. I got my subscription through On Military Matters.

Thunderstone Revisited

2011-06-01T13:28:00.000-07:00

My wife and I sat down to give Thunderstone another try last weekend. Imagine my dismay when I discovered that I had been playing it wrong. The details would only make me look like a fool but after playing the game Correctly my take on it changes quite a bit.

The game (when played by someone who reads the rules) turns out to be quite challenging and exciting. There's a good bit of thought involved in deciding which cards to buy and which to discard in order to take on monsters that are (roughly) three times more fierce that we had believed. So that being said my ambivalence has shifted into a keen interest in playing the game again.

Coming up- more game news and more attempts to read all the rules and not every other sentence like when I read Tommyknockers. Which didn't seem to suffer from a 50% edit.

Board Game Arena - Internet option

2011-06-01T13:13:00.000-07:00

You would imagine that the internet and board games would be a natural match but the options for modern gaming online are actually surprisingly few and far between. I suspect some of this is related to licensing and some of it may reflect the fact that it's hard to make money offering online gaming. Online gamers want to play Call of Duty and board gamers just aren't a big enough demographic to prompt investment in subscription-based services. As a result most online gaming servers I've encountered are amateur productions that usually collapse once they generate enough traffic to stress their capacities.

One happy exception to this is Board Game Arena. This is a French based service which offers several popular games online. You can find Dominion, Race for the Galaxy, Puerto Rico, and several others.

I enjoy Board Game Arena. The controls are simple and the system runs smoothly. The players are distributed across the globe so you get a chance to embarrass yourself trying to resurrect high school German or use medical Spanish in a gaming setting. The service is free and offers upgrades at a small fee. Most importantly, it is still running after months of use. Check it out!

The World of Tomorrow- edited!

2011-05-31T20:13:00.000-07:00

I've had some trouble finding a steady supply of cassingles lately and thought it might be time to upgrade my Walkman to something a bit more convenient. I was very surprised to discover that Apple computers was still in business and sells a Walkman-like device!

Older readers may remember Apple from back in the 1980's. They had a popular advertising on TV and flourished briefly before being swamped by Windows. I had always assumed they had just gone out of business but it seems as though they have struggled onwards by manufacturing music players! I picked up one of these "I-Pods" and fooled around with it a few weekends ago.

I was excited to find that not only can I play my Taylor Dayne and Howard Jones songs but I can also listen to internet broadcasts called Podcasts (which is probably why Apple called their product an I-Pod, kind of riding on the coat-tails...). For gaming purposes I've hit upon Meeples and Miniatures. While most gamers are probably aware of this podcast it's worth mentioning just in case.

Meeples and Miniatures is a series of gaming related podcasts produced by a British fellow named Neil Shuck. He reviews games, talks about his gaming experiences, and discusses the state of the gaming hobby. On occasion he has interviews or guests on the show. Put briefly the podcast is a great source of information regarding the hobby. But there's more to love.

For one, the show is a great chance to listen to British men call each other mates and chaps. I think gaming shines as a social activity and it shines the brightest when it's done with mates and good chaps. The American "dude" just doesn't compare.

Secondly the show is a great source of affirmation. Feeling silly about your insanely huge game or miniature collection? You will feel like a frugal miser when you hear about Neil and his friend's collections- thanks Neil!

Finally, many of the episodes are thought provoking or even heartbreaking. In one episode the two men talk about their inspirations for gaming. They both relate how their dad's built them gaming terrain and equipment by hand. Then they describe specific pieces- certain model planes or a model airfield. Now as a parent you wonder if the things you do for your kids make any impact. How moving to hear how in these men's lives their father's handicrafts remain treasured some fifty years later! Then the bomb drops- editor Henry Hyde's father died when he was eleven. While his father never got a chance to give a speech at his wedding or share a beer on some summer evening, his love will be forever manifest in the things he made for his young son as he shared his bobby! Man, I tear up just thinking about that. Folks- the pastime we enjoy is absolutely a family hobby and whether we're playing boardgames or crafting miniatures or both we can and should involve the kids and share our interests.

That last came from the View From the Veranda episode number three. Look for it and then range through the other episodes for more interesting conversations, news, and gossip.

Huzzah! Shopping Wrapup

2011-05-22T18:00:00.000-07:00

Rural New Hampshire has a lot more miniatures gaming resources than you might expect but"lots more" than zero leaves me needing hobby supplies. Huzzah! was a chance to pack up the wagon with furs and head on over the the big city and trade them for some much needed gear.

One thing I noticed at the event was a string of big expensive rule books that actually contain fairly simple systems accompanied by many pages of pretty pictures and chatty text. I picked up a copy of Rick Priestly's Hail Ceasar as one example. The system is an evolution of his Warmaster rules (available free on the interweb btw) and I'm excited to play it but it's quite a switch from Flames of War or Warhammer 40K, both of which are quite rules-dense (and suspiciously similar in a hillbilly-esque fashion as well). Priestly's Black Powder is similar and you might say the same about recent purchases Lasalle and Rank and File. Still, I'm happy to play good rules if they're simple so we shall see how Hail Ceasar fares.

I also jumped further onto the plastics bandwagon with sets of Vikings from Wargames Factory and Gripping Beast. Part way into assembling both sets I'm very happy with how they're coming together. Gripping Beast does great work so that was no surprise. I never felt the love towards Wargames Factory that seemed to grip so many in the hobby and many of their other products did not seem exactly top notch. That being said their Viking bondi are nicely sculpted and are assembling very well. Plastic figures don't carry the satisfying heft that metals do but the price is so very very right. For purposes of throwing together a fast dark ages opfor group to take on my Scots these are just ideal.

Finally I managed to spend so much money on raffle tickets in a wasted attempt to win Command and Colors Napoleonics that I really could have just purchased the game outright. I can't imagine this will sway me from my belief that raffles and scratch-offs are great investments but it does keep my from putting my lovely 10mm Napoleonic miniatures onto the tabletop anytime soon. I'll get you next year Red Baron! And maybe just shell out for the da%$ game this summer. The system is getting great reviews and I think it sounds perfect for miniatures.

Huzzah Wrapup

2011-05-22T17:28:00.000-07:00

So the big wargames convention in Maine has come and gone. I have to say that this year's Huzzah! was just as much fun as last year's. Here are a few thoughts in hindsight.

For one, Huzzah! is a great example of how the tenor of an event relies on the people who are in charge. The Maine wargamers are a friendly and efficient bunch and that spirit really permeated the con at all levels. Certainly a good lesson that carries into all aspects of our lives.

In terms of games themselves the event was a good opportunity to try some new systems. I played my second game of Fields of Glory (FoG). FoG is blessed with a fabulous looking rulebook and cursed with forbidding and impenetrable appearing pages of charts. It was a real pleasure to discover how fast moving and intuitive the game turns out to be. At the same time it makes one wish for a better presentation somehow as the FoG rulebook's appearance completely blocked our club from ever trying it.

I also had a chance to play a game of Aerodrome. This is a First World War aircraft game and it was just fabulous. I found it simple, quick to learn, but full of potential in terms of actually mastering the play. The team that demonstrated the system has some gorgeous model planes and beautiful wooden control panels that added up to make it a great event. Here's a photo of my plane and control panel, and my medal for shooting down an enemy!

I did find that some of the con's games suffered from being spectacular in theory and just terrible as actual convention events. In a club setting you can relax, chat, drink a beer (or soda!) and potentially spend 6 hours playing a single game with no trouble. In fact, that sort of afternoon is pretty ideal. In a convention setting, however, you really need a game with rules that can be learned in ten minutes and game turns with a scant minimum of player downtime. I do wish that con game masters would consider those factors when deciding which rule sets to use. I feel like a complete heel when I sign up for a game and then start to drift off and look bored when ten minutes pass between moves. Or when the game master is explaining the historical significance of each tree on the map and I start looking around for some sort of way out. I appreciate that level of knowledge and complex games have their role but at a con I want to get started fast and then keep the action going.

None of that is to detract from the overall awesomeness of the event. I would so recommend Huzzah! to any interested gamer in the Northeast, even over bigger events like Historicon. The event is well produced, the games are high quality, and Portland Maine is just a terrific city. I'll be looking forward to next year's event, at which I am hopefully going to be running a game or two myself...

Thunderstone- Dominion in the Dungeon

2011-05-06T20:23:00.000-07:00

I enjoyed Race for the Galaxy so much that I've spent the last few years trying to find a game that would be its equal in fun and satisfaction. Since Race features cards I've probably unwisely assumed that another card game is the direction to look into and that's taken me through Magic, Dominion, GoSu, and quite a few others. Toy City in Keene had a discounted copy of Thunderstone and since it featured cards I knew that at last I'd located the successor to Race!

Well I was wrong but Thunderstone has some nice qualities and is a decent choice for a family game so let's talk about it. Thunderstone is a deck constructing game. Players start with a few cards and then add new cards to their deck. The desk is repeatedly shuffled and hands are dealt so that the cards you purchase in the last turn may come up to help you in the next turn. Over the course of the game you "construct" a deck of cards and hopefully choose to add cards that will be useful later in the game.

Thunderstone has a fantasy theme and features a "village" location and a "dungeon." Some of the cards you can buy represent items like magic swords or spells. Others represent "heroes" like dwarves or amazons. Over the course of the game you can use hero cards in your hand to kill monsters in the dungeon. You might use a magic sword card to make your hero more powerful or use a torch card to help light their way. Each monster earns you victory points and also has a cash value that can be used to buy more gear.

Thunderstone has enough role playing elements that you might think of it as a role playing game. In reality the winner is the person who can most efficiently slay zillions of monsters and manage their deck well. The challenge isn't necessarily that the creatures are very tough. The challenge is to do the job quickly and make sure your deck remains useful.

I found Thunderstone to be fun but not outstanding. I expect a bit more complexity in my card and deck games and Thunderstone is somehow disappointing. One way to win? I'm spoiled by Dominion and Race for the Galaxy which both seem to feature a multitude of winning strategies. I'm also not struck by a huge variety of action combinations, again a result of being spoiled by other games. On the positive side it is easy to learn and relatively inexpensive, and I've been told that the expansions add some challenge and variety. I'm glad I got my copy on sale and I see this as a game that's appealing without being brilliant. And if you're addicted to deck building games it's certainly worth a look.

Survive- It's fun to Survive...

2011-05-06T20:02:00.000-07:00

Triple Play Games in New Hampshire keeps the game nights coming and after a bit of a dry spell we have a game that's really pretty appropriate for almost all ages. In the game of Survive you try and get your play people off a sinking island and across the ocean to safety. The game is fast, simple and fun.

A game of Survive starts with the construction of an island out of several dozen hexagonal pieces. At the center of the island are grouped pieces depicting mountains, then comes a ring of forest pieces, and then beach pieces. The players then place tiny wooden tokens on each island hex representing their poor subjects who have to now escape from the sinking island.

Each player takes a turn removing one hex piece, starting with the beach tiles and moving in. Under each tile is printed some sort of game effect. A shark, whale, or sea creature may appear, a whirlpool may suck everyone in the vicinity down, or the player may get some special ability to use later in the game. The player then has a chance to move their people a limited distance across the island or into the ocean around it. Finally, a sea creature is picked randomly and the player gets to move it.

Over the course of the game the players try to move their people across the ocean while avoiding sharks and whales headed their way. Simultaneously they try and direct the various creatures Towards other player's tokens. Some tiles give you special movement abilities and some allow you to place sea creatures on the board. Finally, you can move one type of creature at the end of you turn but the specific type is picked randomly.

In practice Survive is a pretty light game. You have little chance of picking which sea monster you're going to be able to move so you can't work with any long term strategy. Instead the game devolves into a frantic race across the waters while sea creatures zip hither and yonder knocking over boats and devouring swimmers. In this sense it's a bit random but still fun. A single player may end up with a crushing victory or defeat but it would be as much from luck as skill and thus Survive works well as a game for younger players. There is some thought to the game, and that makes it fun for older folks as well. The game itself is very colorful and the wooden pieces are lots of fun to play with.

I don't see Survive as a game for the ages but I think it fits a nice niche as a filler game for experienced players and a good family game when younger kids are involved. I might think of it as a good choice to bring on vacation.

The Battlestar Galactica Boardgame, well....

2011-04-24T11:40:00.000-07:00

On my first visit to Triple Play Games boardgame night a friendly gang of guys invited me to play the Battlestar Galactica boardgame (BGB). It's been a while since I've met a new group of players as fun as this one but the game did not totally grab me.

The BGB is a cooperative game. The theme is that the humans are trying to escape their enemies the Cylons and in the process have to survive various "crises." The crises spawn from a deck of cards and require the players to work together and donate cards from their hands to avert riots, water shortages, and sabotage. Players accumulate cards that help deal with crises and may also have special powers based on which Galactica character they are playing. For example, the Lee Adama character has special piloting skills. If you fail to avert a crisis the ship loses supplies, fuel, or human population.

The twist in the BGB is that several players are secretly enemy Cylons. Their goal is to sabotage the human's efforts and destroy the Galactica. Thus, they may play harmful cards during a crisis or try and convince the players that one of Them is an enemy Cylon. The game rules allow for secret play and since the players know that there are in fact Cylon players once harmful cards appear in play the paranoia starts to mount. Characters can be executed or thrown in the brig so there is the potential for the body count to start to rise and if humans are executed by mistake the game can take a turn for the worse, at least from the human player's point of view.

Experienced gamers will recognize quite a bit of Shadows Over Camelot in BGB. That's not necessarily a bad thing since games featuring paranoia can be very exciting. In fact, the players relate that in one game there were No Cylon players (by accident) and despite that it was a hugely exciting game simply because of the mounting atmosphere of suspicion and fear. I'm sure there's some political commentary lurking in that scene! So if suspenseful gaming is appealing then the BGB has a lot to offer.

I was not blown away by the game, however. The crises change in each turn and I never got the sense that my character was improving or that we as a team were building anything lasting. You deal with a crisis with your cards and then boom- off to the next. In contract I prefer games like Talismen or Arkham Horror in which your character can accumulate useful gear, or games like Race for the Galaxy in which you create something that then can help you in later turns. Further, the BGB is really fun only if the players are willing to let themselves go with the paranoia and fear. The Cylon player has limited effect by themselves and if the humans fail to go on an execution and imprisonment spree there's a limit to what the Cylon can accomplish.

Finally, just as with the television series, I can't completely enjoy a game that features executions, show trials, and psychological torment. Yes it's all very gritty but I think I'm too old for that much grit.

That being said, a fan of the series or someone who enjoys what the game has to offer will probably love the BGB. It's not a bad game at all, but it hasn't risen to the top of my list as a game for a wide population of players.

Huzzah! Best Con Ever!

2011-04-24T11:32:00.000-07:00

Just as the Druids used to gather in sacred groves to practice their mysteries, gamers love to gather in Holiday Inns and convention centers to practice theirs. Conventions can be a great chance to meet people and play new games, or they can be depressing forays into the worst antisocial behaviours a big gang of beardy home brewing men can come up with. Huzzah! is a convention in Maine which embodies all the best of gaming cons and blessedly little of the worst.

Huzzah! was first held last year in Portland Maine and was a huge success. The games were generally spectacular, both visually and in fun of play. The people were cool and friendly. The setting was spouse friendly. The whole experience was just terrific. This year's event is taking place on May 13th in Portland and I would highly recommend it to anyone in the region with an interest in miniatures gaming. I would even suggest that a weekend at Huzzah! gives you more quality gaming than, say, Historicon, and at a much lower price.

Take a look at the event webpage and see if anything grabs your interest. I loved my experience last year and I'm already set for this year's fun!

Settled!

2011-04-24T11:25:00.000-07:00

So I'm settled in a nice new house in New Hampshire. My hobby room is a pile of boxes which are too intimidating to even try to consider opening. We're learning all the exciting features of living in a 250 year old house. And there are twice as many Indian restaurants in rural New Hampshire than you would expect, since zero multiplied by any number remains zero.

That being said this area has a thriving and friendly gaming scene. West Lebanon hosts Triple Play Games which features a great board game selection and a very lively game night on Wednesdays. Newport has the Dragon Maze, a game store based in two brother's living room, that is small but fun and friendly. I suspect there is more gaming to be discovered and since unpacking is so depressing I'm set to find it!

Dungeons and Dragons Saves a Marriage

2011-03-31T17:23:00.000-07:00

As my family moves from Massachusetts to New Hampshire I've spent some time thinking about the last few years. I made some good friends, met some adorable patients, and my wife and I had a daughter. All those things are so important but this is a gaming blog so...

One of my fondest memories turned out to be playing D&D with my wife and friends. Especially striking was our last game in Massachusetts in which she and I were confronted by a giant evil fungus monster. Very scary at the moment believe me. She and I both had the same idea about how to defeat it and shouted it out simultaneously. There were some laughs but I thought about it a bit afterwards.

I'm sad to say that married couples may have few chances to work together on fun challenges. We certainly work together to change diapers and brush our kid's teeth but I don't find those challenges very exhilarating or uplifting. Yet in this last year of couple's D&D we've solved riddles, defeated trolls, and at one point blew up a dragon. I believe that our gaming has been a great source of fun but in addition I think it's reinforced our sense that we are a team and can work together and have fun.

Granted we could probably achieve the same thing by building a treehouse or playing softball so D&D is not necessarily unique in this capacity. Of note, though, the cooperative nature of role playing is a bit different from, say, Monopoly. Further, you finish the game with an exciting story to remember. I believe playing has really brought us together. It's been an interesting discovery and something that I plan on exploring with my kids as they get older. For some couples and families the role playing experience my really reinforce those vital bonds.

Black Powder - Old School Gaming

2011-03-31T16:57:00.000-07:00

My Boston wargaming group recently ran a demonstration game of Black Powder. This is a set of rules designed for battles with miniature soldiers from the era of "black powder," the American War of Independance, War Between the States, or Napoleonic period. The game was marked with quite a bit of grumping but in the end I believe the rules have some qualities that are ideal for younger players.

The Black Powder rules were designed by some of the world's best game designers. Serious wargamers had high expectations for Black Powder to rock the gaming world. They probably should have read the book's forward which states that these rules are designed to allow players to put lots of toy soldiers on a table and play a quick simple game.

Our demonstration game bore this out. Black Powder ignores a multitude of details which experienced wargamers expect. Instead, a game involves laying out as many miniature soldiers as you can on a nicely decorated table and then speedily zipping them around until the battle is over. I found the game to have a very charming quality. It's a hardcover version of game rules designed by clever ten year olds who own 300 green plastic soldiers and want to have a battle.

Specifically, I'd recommend Black Powder for anyone with lots of soldiers who is looking for a simple fast game. That would include a parent who wishes to introduce their kids to miniature games. I might consider combining these rules with the Walkerloo figures or the 54 mm figures available through outlets like the Hobby Bunker. Alternately, I think Black Powder is terrific for experienced gamers with lots of figures. It is not, however, a complex or detailed game and I would look elsewhere if that's your desire.

I'm So Unwise

2011-02-16T18:51:00.000-08:00

My group is running a campaign of Dungeons and Dragons featuring first level characters. As some readers may already know, first level characters are quite frail and no first level character is more so than the magic user. A first level magic user can cast a single spell, can't use any serious weapons, and can be killed by a thrown potato. Playing such a character can be insanely frustrating unless you just love, love, love to roleplay and the other players join in the fun.

As an aside, if that's the case then a first level magic user is a hoot and a holler to play!

A friend has been playing the magic user in our campaign and over the last few games was showing signs of boredom and frustration with his character. The GM asked my advice. He was planning on giving the player a wand that fired magical bolts. Was that a good idea? "Oh no," I replied," that's not very creative. Give him a deck of cards that summon tame wild animals to do his bidding. That's much more open ended and interesting."

After some discussion regarding open ended, tool oriented magic items, the GM thanked me and went to work. That night he gave the magic user two Wands of Magic Missiles. The magic user tied them together to make a magical sawed off shotgun and proceeded to have the time of his life blasting away like a hillbilly on Red Bull. I'd never seen him so happy. So much for creative, open ended items!

GM's Challenge Afterthoughts

2011-02-16T18:27:00.001-08:00

A while back I convinced a group of friends to take off a whole Saturday for a set of GM's Challenge Dungeons and Dragons games. The idea was to hand the GMs a random selection of story elements and then run three back-to-back games. The GMs would have to feature the story elements and also segue from the previous game into their own seamlessly.

There were a few things I found appealing about the idea. One was to be thrown the challenge of making a fun adventure that featured elements someone else picked out- including bizarre or silly things like Lurkers Above or the Flumf. I also liked the idea of having to deal with whatever cliffhanger ending the last GM left you with and link your adventure in smoothly. In essence I was aiming almost for Comedy at the Improv, Dungeons and Dragons style.

Of course, eighty percent of live improv comedy is actually pretty horrible and our first GM's challenge left lots of room for improvement. I don't think any of us really considered how to segue from one adventure to our own and so the transitions were not quite as clever as they could have been. Further, I think the idea of an adventure based on an outrageous Dungeons and Dragons creature may be immediately funnier to me than to the other GMs.

In hindsight I think the GMs challenge was a good idea that deserves a second try. I think the other GMs really needed to have the monster theme spelled out- for example, not merely to have a Roper appear, but to base the whole adventure on the city of the Ropers. Returning a lost Roper baby to its worried parents. Or thwarting an evil Roper wizard who seeks to enslave a beautiful Roper princess. It's completely silly but that's the challenge- how much mileage can you get from this absurd monster? It could be wildly creative. But again, for every hilarious improv act you see there are a dozen that just flail and it may take a bit of practice to bring the GMs to the level of Reno 911 or Upright Citizen's Brigade.

Quiet Month

2011-02-02T12:33:00.000-08:00

My family and I are getting ready to move! I hate moving (or change of any sort) but it will be for the better in the long run. In the short run, however, it's going to be a little quiet here at Gamenight. I have to figure out how to pack eleventy zillion painted minis, all the games, and of course furniture and our possessions. I have to convince my wife that our 36 inch 1996 Zenith television, the opposite of flat screen since it is actually deeper than it is wide, will someday be a collectors item and should be moved with us. I also have to convince her that paperback science fiction books are better than kreugerrands as investment items and if even one was thrown out it would be a tragedy. Yes indeed, busy days ahead.

Seven Wonders- Great Group Fun

2011-01-17T12:13:00.000-08:00

I fall prey to hyped up games more often than I should. I have several AT-43 armies, a copy of Dungeon Lords, and two fleets for Uncharted Seas. So I wasted no time in starting off the new year with a copy of Seven Wonders. This game has been gathering some good buzz and I needed a group game that could accommodate seven players and move along at a quick pace. Happily enough Seven Wonders earns the hype and has been a big hit.

Seven Wonders is a game about building up your civilization better than your opponents build up theirs. Your civilization could include a "wonder" but might also feature trade routes, civic buildings, scientific discoveries, or powerful guilds. The game mechanics of Seven Wonders are twofold. Firstly, each player gets a handful of cards. The players simultaneously play one of the cards and pass the rest to the left. Then you resolve whatever effect the played cards have and repeat the cycle. Eventually there are no more cards to pass and one of three "ages" has come to an end.

The second game mechanic of Seven Wonders involves the cards themselves. A card may represent a civic building, army barracks, a scientific advancement, or a source of resources such as "clay pit." Some cards may be placed for free. Some require you to have already placed certain cards- for example, some buildings require the "clay pit" card to already be in play to simulate having the bricks needed to build. Over the course of an age you may choose to play some resource cards and then later on "build" with the resources and have a "temple" or "library." Overall this is a pretty simple process and the cards are easy to read and understand.

Finally, at the end of three cycles of card play the players are scored for their achievements. In general it pays to have a lot of something so the player with lots of buildings or lots of scientific achievements is going to do well. The scoring process takes one practice game to really grasp but is basically simple.

Seven Wonders has several great qualities. For one, it's fast and there's little downtime spent waiting for other players. You can influence other players to some extent but there's no way to really harm or disadvantage your opponents. I think that's a big plus for families as well as sensitive adults who find cut-throat play dreary. I like building civilizations and Seven Wonders rewards someone who has an imagined goal for theirs. It's fun to say "I would love a civilization based on trade routes and guilds" and that's a winning strategy. Your friend might say, "nope, for me it's libraries, laboratories, and universities," and that could win too. The only option that seems weak is the military one, which is fine with me.

The only real caveats to Seven Wonders are that you do have little effect on other players during the game and it is a bit of a light game. I think there's plenty of replay value but I don't know if it is quite as deep as Race for the Galaxy or Catan. Not a terrible flaw but it should be noted.

Caveats aside, Seven Wonders is highly recommended for groups and families. It's fast, fun, and unlikely to lead to hurt feelings or grumpy, aggressive play.

Buck Rogers- edit edit edit

2010-12-29T08:47:00.000-08:00

Left with some free time and being pretty burned out on building train tracks I thought it was about time to introduce my son to Buck Rogers in the 25th Century. I have a compilation of much of the early strip and thought that this would be a good place to start. Ten minutes in I found I was editing the material furiously and in some cases just skipping panels entirely. What a disappointment!

I have nothing but respect for the authors of Buck Rogers but there's no escaping the fact that this is one racist and violent comic strip! Asians are big targets in the early material and once the Second World War starts things take a turn for the worse, if that could be believed. There's also rather a lot of shooting as well as some stabbing, torturing, and pushing into pools of acid. Edit, edit, edit... I left that little experiment with a few lessons learned.

One is that kids love adventure stories. The highly abridged adventures of Buddy Deering and Alura prompted hours of dressing up and imaginative play as the kids dodged patrols of Tiger Men and sword-fought across the mysterious jungles of Venus (and yes, nerds know the Tiger Men are on Mars but I was mixing it up.) So that was fun.

Secondly, the material reminds us that life in the old days was probably pretty nice as long as you were a member of a specific racial group. That group might vary depending on what country you were in but being in the "out" gang was going to be rough. Our country has problems to be sure but at least we are about a million times less racist than we were.

Finally, I left my experience wondering about how much this material affects us as children. I loved Buck Rogers as a child but I didn't develop horrifying racial stereotypes. As a pediatrician I believe more and more that consistent family values are the most powerful formative forces in a child's life. My parents were not racist and eighteen years of exposure to that handily swamped the unseemly bits from Buck Rogers, John Carter, and other terrific but dated material. It's a relief for me to know that as long as my family follows a certain pattern of behaviour our kids are likely to enjoy older films, comics, and books without picking up the worst habits of our ancestors.

Ticket to Ride Nordic Countries- Rocks!

2010-12-28T10:34:00.000-08:00

My love affair with Ticket to Ride: Europe continues unabated but the game is not perfectly suited for two players. For that reason I dropped a few hints that Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries (TRN) would be pretty welcome below this year's Christmas tree. My wife came through and we got to unwrap and play this new iteration of a great game system.
TRN is fairly similar to it's predecessors in terms of rules. Players trade in cards to lay down train tracks between cities. You score points based on how many lines you can create and whether you connect certain randomly determined locations. TRN has a few twists. For one, it's designed for two and three players. What's more, there are far fewer destinations and fewer tracks with which to connect them. We found this led to a more cut-throat style of play as every line you create can seriously inconvenience your opponent. In a game of Flames of War a cut-throat game leads to fights and broken friendships. In TRN a cut-throat game leads to laughter and plans for a rematch.

TRN also presents you with a landscape that may be completely novel. I'm sure I should know where Narvik and Trondheim are but I am an ugly American and barely know how to locate Salem, NH. Navigating the cities of the North is in the end a great time and feels exotic and intriguing. Narvik could be a European version of Mineola, NY but I chose to believe it's a snowy fairy wonderland and now I've built a railway to it.

Note: Thanks to wikipedia I've learned that it is indeed a fairy wonderland!

In summary TRN to a fabulous member of the amazing Ticket to Ride franchise. It's a great choice when you're looking for a smaller game and presents just a slightly different twist on a beloved game system. Highly, highly recommended for adults, families, and older kids!

Game Master's Challenge

2010-12-27T05:38:00.000-08:00

Businesses in Massachusetts seem to give people the week after Christmas off so we're holding our first GM's Challenge game this week. Three GM's will run an all-day adventure in three chapters. Each GM will manage one chapter and play in the other two. There are two components.

The first challenge is based on something I've wanted to do for a while. The players all look through the Monster Manual and pick out the most outrageous monster we can find. Then the GMs are assigned one of the choices randomly. The challenge is to not only have the monster appear, but have it play an integral role in the adventure. It's easy to make an adventure based on marauding Hill Giants, but can you reveal the unplumbed drama of the Water Weird? Or the badger? So far our band has picked the Ixitxachitl, Purple Worm, Rakshasa, Jackalwere, Roper, Night Hag, Lamia, Succubus, and Green Slime. We shall see who gets assigned what.

The second facet of the GM's Challenge is that it's a chain story. Each GM is assigned a story element which begins their adventure and one that ends it. The elements are deliberately vague and open to lots of interpretation. Phase one opens with "Prison Break" and ends with "Boarding a Ship." Phase two begins with "Attack From the Skies" and ends with "Royalty in Disguise." The last phase begins with "A Trap!" and ends with "Crowned by a King."

One unexpected element of the Challenge is that the GMs are going to have to be ready to deal with the preceding story's setting. Phase one may end at the docks of an island, in the center of a museum, or on a mountaintop! It's going to be fun to create a dungeon or adventure that can be seamlessly linked to a variety of physical settings!

The game is set for a few days from now and we shall see how it plays out. Also apparently it's a costume game. It's lucky I seem to have collected multiple D&D costumes. Lucky or tragic I suppose!

Holiday Gift Guide: Best Miniatures Game

2010-12-14T12:35:00.000-08:00

There are hundreds of miniatures games on the market and ever week I see the confusion this can create. Interested folks come into the Hobby Bunker, watch some games, and then look back with bewilderment at the shelves lined with gaming material. They listlessly pick at a few things and then wander off, unwilling to invest in a game that may never be played. To some extent that's good thinking because most addicted gamers and painters (ahem...) agree that they only play about 10% of what the own. So what should an interested miniatures-gamer-to-be invest in?

To be sure the answer is probably "whatever the local gamers are playing" but if you've just moved to Houlton, Maine and you are the First gamer there, I would recommend Disposable Heroes (DH) from Iron Ivan Games. DH is a skirmish game set in the Second World War. In order to play it you need about fifteen miniature figures per side and some nice terrain. We had a great game last week and some photos are arranged here. DH has a lot to recommend it. Briefly, the rules are simple, the game is easy to invest in, and there are a number of expansions that allow you to play modern combat, zombies, the battles for Poland and the Netherlands, etc. etc.

Beyond the game system itself the period has a lot of affordable choices for new gamers. You can purchase 1/72 scale figures from Revell, Italieri, and Caesar that are high quality and dirt cheap. Look to Plastic Soldier Review for examples. Bolt Action/Warlord and Artizan make terrific 28mm figures which are a little larger than 1/72. Finally, there are relatively affordable vehicles which will top off your army and a good sized force can be purchased for $50 total.

My gaming group had a terrific time with DH and several beginners ran off after playing to buy some minis for themselves. I think the game is a good choice for new players and certainly simple enough for ages ten and up. Of course, the game does deal with war and combat. Every family manages that issue differently. I personally make sure to explain to younger players the actual effect of real war, a lecture that I suspect bores them to tears but may sink in after multiple repeats or some aging on their part.

Holiday Gift Guide: Painter's Delight

2010-12-14T12:18:00.000-08:00

I paint a lot of miniature figures. Usually I use some historical information as my guide. For example, my beloved War of 1812 Battle of North Point troops were painted based on old documents and some modern paintings by Don Troiani. Sometimes, however, you have to branch out and just do our best based on your own color sense. I have no innate color sense (thus, no ties at work!) and so I need a bit of help.

That's where Annie Sloan's Color Schemes for Every Room comes in. This book has pages of color swatches arranged in pleasing combination and ordered vaguely by theme. You want to paint a fantasy galley? Try a suggestion from the Persian Palace section. Have some western showgirls to complete? Use the swatches from Neoclassical. I've fixed some horribly botched work by falling back on Ms. Sloan's suggestions. There's also a section on the color wheel, simple and complex colors, and other topics that I can't grasp but are probably quite useful.
Color Schemes for Every Room won't be as exciting to unwrap as a live ferret or a copy of Ticket to Ride Nordic Countries. It will, however, be an unbelievably useful asset to any miniature painter. Highly recommended!

Holiday Gift Guide- Budget Gaming

2010-12-03T13:41:00.000-08:00

This year's budget delight is absolutely the world of 15mm science fiction miniatures. These have been on the market for years but recent sculpts from Khurasan, Critical Mass, and others are just superb. In order to stay on budget I got a few squads from Blue Moon Miniatures. These are priced at a discount through Warweb and are of pretty high quality. The line includes a few designs that are a bit too pulp-y for my tastes but the figures I ordered were perfect.

The results speak for themselves. The painting took minutes and now I have an army of space marines and an army of Andorians. They'll be put through the paces via the Use Me rules and we'll see where we go from there. Twenty nice figures for under ten dollars!

Soldiers need vehicles to drive around in of course. I stole this idea from some other blog, it may have been Dropship Horizon , and the results were pretty satisfying. I picked up the Matchbox "Medieval Rides" pack and with some simple repaints these medieval automobiles become much less thematically contradictory! Matchbox Cars are solid and well made, they're fun to buy, and they're perfect for 15mm science fiction gaming.

Holiday Gift Guide- Best Role Playing Game

2010-12-01T13:48:00.000-08:00

I've played a lot of games this year ranging from Star Trek to Eclipse Phase. My game of the year in terms of enjoyment gained per work expended has got to be Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, the three hardcovers 1st edition. The more I play D&D the more enchanted I am by its role playing elements. I think much of the game development in rpgs since the 1970's has been in terms or developing better simulations- in other words, games that have more "realistic" qualities. D&D gives you a vaguely defined character in a vaguely defined world. The rest of the game is dependent on the enthusiasm of the players. The 1st edition is fairly difficult to make sense of right out of the box, but that's what friends and D&D contacts are for!

I have to mention the rerelease of Villains and Vigilantes. This is a superhero role playing game in which you play yourself, but with some randomly determined superpowers. The game features a simple and robust system for playing out super battles, flying, and throwing around cars and satellite dishes. I spent many an hour enjoying V&V back in the day. It's fun to have superpowers! As an aside, the powers are chosen randomly, thus this is not a game for people obsessed with every character being equal. One character is going to have super strength, one is going to be able to control squirrels. Make the best of it.

Holiday Gift Guide- Best Family Game

2010-11-30T16:24:00.000-08:00

This is the easiest recommendation I've made in a while. Ticket to Ride Europe has consistently delivered maximum fun to a huge range of gaming friends. This game is simple and appealing to look at, it's non-violent but can elicit some excitement amongst competitive players, and it appeals as much to casual gamers as to aggressive D&D Munchkin types. The game plays quickly and there's very little player downtime which is important with younger players. Ticket to Ride Europe is not new, but it is my essential family and group game of 2010.

DBA Benefit Followup

2010-11-15T12:00:00.000-08:00

The benefit tournament to support the Boston Food Bank was a great success this weekend and left me with a few thoughts. The first is that through Steve's work we managed to raise $150. In one sense that's not going to provide food for the Eastern seaboard but in another it's $150 more than they had a minute ago! I find it nice that by doing our hobby we managed to raise some money for a good cause when otherwise we might be eating pizza and talking politics. Not a bad way to spend an afternoon.

The second thought is that DBA is really a pretty fun game with a lot of depth. DBA (De Bellis Antiquitatis) is the creation of a group of game designers led by Phil Barker, another member of the spookily smart Barker clan (see Professor M.A.R. Barker for more Barker madness). In a game of DBA you control an army of twelve units in a tabletop battle. DBA features a very abstracted game mechanic. Barker's team felt that men with spears would behave the same in 400 BC as they would in 1200 CE. Likewise, they felt that "spears" and "knights" would have certain consistent behaviors and strengths throughout history. "Knights" are always prone to charge, "bows" are always a threat to mounted troops, etc. etc. DBA summarizes all pre-gunpowder warfare into contests between certain archetypes and provides simple rules for resolving the battles. Luck plays a role but certain units will always do better or worse against certain other units.

This results in a fast and realistic battle that usually reflects historical reality. Knights charge at every opportunity, Greek hoplites shove back and forth until one side collapses from fatigue. And barbarian warbands charge in to impact legionnaires either to sweep them away or self destruct. The armies always include exactly twelve units of troops so clearly you're not simulating a historical event. Despite the abstraction, however, DBA seems surprisingly realistic.

DBA has a lot to recommend it as a beginner's game. The armies are easy to assemble and twelve units can be purchased for maybe $20. The rules are quick and straightforward. And the game plays quickly on a two by two foot area. It's a great way to begin a miniatures gaming hobby.

DBA does have a downside. Phil Barker is so very very very clever that his rulebook is almost impossible to make sense of. He has expressed that any intelligent schoolchild should be able to read it. I would make the counterclaim that an intelligent pediatrician found it dense. That being said the DBA community has produced the Unofficial Guide to DBA to help the slower schoolchildren and pediatricians struggle through. Beginners can also turn to Fanaticus for more inspiration and information. Interested folks can find the rules through eBay.

Gosu- the Wife Likes It!

2010-11-10T12:32:00.000-08:00

I try and avoid getting caught up in the buzz that precedes some games. Sometimes I succeed, sometimes I fail (as witnessed by the unplayed copy of Dungeon Lords in the hallway). When Gosu was released I struggled to be good and failed miserably. Fortunately Gosu has turned out to be a fun little game that probably deserves the hype.

Gosu stands for "goblin supremacy". The backstory is that several clans of goblins are battling and only one army will be supreme. More on the theme later. In a game of Gosu you lay out cards in rows. Each card has an illustration of some sort of goblin on it and each card has some effect- maybe an immediate effect, maybe something that can be triggered later. Each goblin card has a points value and the winner of a battle is the person with the most points of goblins in front of them at the end of a round. If you win a battle you get a victory chip and the first person with three chips wins the game.

Gosu turns out to be very exciting and challenging in play, even as it sounds deadly dull in text. Each goblin card has some effect on the game. One challenge is to play a card when it is most useful and to save it when it's not. Card abilities can be activated but you have limited activations in each round so you have to be careful to not waste them. Finally, some cards are useful right away and then waste space. You can exchange a goblin in a row with one from your hand at a price. Thus, a final challenge is modifying your rows of goblins to suit how the game is developing.

Gosu is a very lively game. Players can destroy or exchange goblin cards. Some goblin powers benefit a player with fewer victory chips thus keeping every player within reach of victory. I imagined my rows of goblins as being fairly static once placed but in play you're constantly adjusting or remodeling to suit circumstances. Goblin powers can also create sequences of effects and triggering off some elaborate chain of events is pretty satisfying.

If there's one criticism to Gosu it's that it has little to do with goblins. The cards could just as easily have illustrations of French nobility, factories, or DNA components. I enjoyed Race for the Galaxy because it seemed less abstract (to me, others feel otherwise). It would be a mistake to see Gosu as a fighting or war game, it's really a management game with goblin illustrations.

I was very happy with Gosu and so was my poor, tolerant wife! She enjoys systematic, logical games and liked the idea of managing a big hoard of goblins. I'm sure that's no commentary on our children but it does suggest that this game has decent crossover potential for teens and younger players. I think it certainly has good replay value and I believe there are a flood of expansions planned. I would recommend it and advise beginners that a real sense of the game play may only come after a test game.

Use Me- Science Fiction Skirmish Gaming

2010-11-04T18:22:00.000-07:00

There are times when a player wants to set up ten to twenty miniature soldiers on a table and have them blaze away at each other in a quick game. Using small numbers of figures is called skirmish gaming, as opposed to using hundreds of miniatures over a six hour span. Owing to the explosion of great 15mm minis available I thought it might be fun to find a simple skirmish rule system and have some games.

As it's going to be "cheap gaming month" for a while here at Game Night I looked for something affordable and easy to learn. I was happy to discover Use Me for sale at 15mm.co.uk and a week later received a package from another continent with my game rules in it. For three and a half pounds (anywhere from fifty cents to forty dollars depending on the mysterious world of currency) I had already had my money's worth in terms of excitement- a package from across the ocean!

The British do have a lively sense of humor and "Use Me" is an acronym for Ultra Simple something something etc etc so it's quite a family appropriate game. The book itself is the size of your hand and is simple engaging and readable. The summary for miniature gaming beginners is that this booklet gives you simple but realistic rules for playing out small battles on the tabletop between science fiction forces. Those Star Wars plastic miniatures sitting in the sandbox? Playmobil figures? Plastic astronauts and martians? All fair game. There are rules for vehicles and artillery as well. You need ten or more figures, some plastic trees or houses, and maybe some tanks or saucers and you're ready to go.

For the folks interested in the specifics Use Me borrows some nice elements from AT-43 and Iron Ivan's Disposable Heroes line. Troops are rated by training and better trained units will act first. Firing between squads is slightly abstracted to speed up play and there is a simple d6 roll to hit and to penetrate armor, both with a few modifiers. Use Me has no defensive fire or morale rules. I miss those aspects but then again, this is intended as simple and fast. The booklet includes points values for various troop and vehicle types allowing you to brew up your own forces and balance them.

I'm very happy with Use Me. It's simple but not overly so, it's very inviting in that after you read the game you're enthused to play, something that I didn't experience with, say, Warhammer 40K. There are a wealth of 15mm science fiction figures available now and this is a great way to put them to use. Of course, the system is appropriate for bigger minis as well. In summary this is a very affordable set of rules that delivers a lot of fun for the buck. Plus, it's a great way to get younger beginners involved in a fun hobby.

Coming up- my Blue Moon 15mm miniatures arrive, I swallow my pride and paint up some 1/72 scale plastic figures, and then we mix them together with some Hot Wheels I picked up in the bargain bin!

Battle Against Hunger DBA Event

2010-11-03T12:10:00.000-07:00

The fellows at Hobby Bunker (but actually mainly one very nice guy named Steve) are hosting a benefit tournament to support the Boston Food Bank. It's called Bellum Obviam Ieiunium, which I am told means War Against Hunger but could just as easily mean War Against Lemurs, so if it does my apologies in advance to lemur advocates. The BAI event will feature several rounds of a medieval miniatures game called De Bellis Antiquitatis, or DBA.

DBA is a classic and extremely successful miniatures game. It lets you play out tabletop battles with miniature lead soldiers quickly and fairly realistically. I think it's one of the few miniatures games that's played across the globe fairly consistently. Whether you go to Athens or Albuquerque you can probably get a DBA game going.

I would certainly recommend that readers in the area with DBA armies stop by and join in. Interested folks who would like to see a simple and elegant (and inexpensive!) miniatures game in action should consider popping by as well.

Crazy or No?

2010-11-03T12:02:00.000-07:00

This weekend a group of friends are going to a luxury villa on Martha's Vineyard to play non-stop Dungeons and Dragons. I'm not going largely because their style of play drives me batty.

For some time now I've tried to convince myself that a weekend in Yankee heaven playing D&D is a lot more fun that doing dishes and looking for work. That being quite true I still can't get excited about playing if it's in a way I don't like. Gamers chime in- will you turn down a game or event on grounds of style?

Pandemonium Iron GM Contest

2010-10-21T16:53:00.000-07:00

Pandemonium Books in Central Square is having a contest next month that sounds just amazing. Game masters are being challenged to run a game with the system of their choice that includes one of several key elements:
21
Wall(s)
“Future Legend” by David Bowie
Mars
A chest or steamer trunk
Leonardo da Vinci
Boston
Spiders

GMs will be judged on how fun their game is, how original it is, and whether the element was really crucial to the story or just window dressing.

I like playing rpgs simply for the fun of it but there is something to be said for a challenge. A few weeks ago I suggested to my group that we do the "lame monster challenge," in which you have to run a game which features as its central foundation one of the Monster Manual's worst monsters. I was planning a gripping yarn featuring the nation of the piercers.

Anyway, the Iron GM contest sounds like great fun. Local gamers should consider it and folks outside of Boston- take inspiration!

Cheap Game Month Continues- Fairy Tale

2010-09-24T13:13:00.000-07:00

My copy of Fairy Tale arrived yesterday and happily it has been a big hit. Fairy Tale is a small card game that has won high marks online for its speed and ease of play. After hitting my friends and family with Eclipse Phase and Malifaux I thought it was about time to step it down a notch. Happily the result has been many quick, fun games.

In Fairy Tale each player is trying to play a set of cards which win her the most points. Each card has a points value on it. Some cards give you a bonus if you have played certain Other cards. The "bard" gives you a bonus for each "Elven Warrior" you have also played. Finally, some cards give a big bonus if you have fulfilled some requirement- playing three dragons And three fairies for example.

A game Fairy Tale has two steps. In the first the players get a hand of five cards. They choose one that they want and pass the rest to the person on their right. Then they choose again from the four just passed from the person on their left, pass the rest to their right, and so on. In this way you end up with a hand of five cards which you have had some role in picking. This is called "drafting."

In the second step of Fairy Tale each player picks a card from their hand and flips it up simultaneously. That card now lays in front of you and is worth points. Over the course of the game you'll run through four drafts and have a total of twelve cards in front of you. You add the points from your twelve and come up with a grand total.

The fun of Fairy Tale comes from several factors. For one, drafting is fun. You have some control over your hand and can try and accumulate certain cards that suit your plans. Your control isn't perfect but chances are you'll have a hand that you're at least content with. Secondly, some cards allow you to affect your opponent's cards. You can sabotage their hands and wreak some mild havok with their plans. Players may also find themselves competing to collect the same sorts of cards and then one or both may have to think quick and change their plans.

Mainly, we enjoyed Fairy Tale because it was a very speedy and simple card collecting game. There is enough card interaction to create a variety of scoring strategies but not enough to cause competitive spouses to freeze and spend the next ten minutes trying to assemble the ultimate killer hand. Fairy Tale really strikes the perfect balance between ease of play and strategy. Anyone who can perform simple math can play this game so it's a good choice for older kids and families as well. Players can influence each other to a slight degree but I don't think there is potential to really demolish anyone- another positive quality for family play.

I was personally very happy with Fairy Tale. It's a good filler, a bit deeper than Court of the Medici but still quick and simple.

Thoughts on Dungeons and Dragons

2010-09-12T14:52:00.000-07:00

I was recently reading a discussion on the Victoria, BC gaming forums regarding Dungeons and Dragons. A person had posted and asked the group if there was an interest in an old school D&D game. The response from Malcolm McCallum included the following:

"As much as I found myself personally dissatisfied with the miniatures focus of D&D from 3 on, a number of us disgruntled grognards tried to go back to 'old school'. It was unasatisfying. :/

DM: Six Orcs round the corner. They appear violent and bloodthirsty. What do you do?
Elf: I fire my bow.
DM: Roll to hit
Elf: 17!
DM: Roll damage
Elf: 4!
DM: The Orc falls. Fighter, what do you do?
Fighter: I swing my sword.
DM: Roll to hit:
Fighter: 5
DM: you miss. Wizard?
Wizard: I throw a dart. I roll a 12.
DM: You miss. The orcs swing. Three points of damage to the wizard. You're dead.
Thief: I loot his body. His next character will want the gear.
etc..."

What a great commentary on D&D! As they say, it's funny because it's true. Malcolm very accurately points out that combat in D&D can be insanely dull. That's fine. D&D is a role playing game.

This seems obvious but adult players sometime describe some frustration with D&D and when you ask for details they almost always involve the very mediocre combat system. It's both simplistic and time consuming if you can imagine that. But there's a message there- keep your combats limited and infrequent. If you want to play skirmish fantasy combat then play Mordheim or Warlord or Warhammer.

The beauty of first edition D&D is it's simplicity of character generation and lack of skills and abilities. Does your character need to sail a ship? Come up with a compelling reason why she should be able to. Does your character need to identify poison ivy in the woods? Explain to the DM why he can. That's what role playing is all about- creating that character through story rather than relying on a "sailing" skill. The lack of defined skills, abilities, and feats makes combat a bore but is a huge role playing bonus.

Anyway, thanks to Malcolm in Victoria for putting into words what our group has been experiencing recently. They don't call it a role playing game for nothing.

Cheap Gaming Month! Court of the Medici

2010-09-10T16:28:00.000-07:00

Recent events being what they are we'll be concentrating on cheap games for a while. Specifically let's look at some inexpensive and fast games, which are not a bad thing when playing with kids or when foisting another set of rules on the long suffering spouse.

Court of the Medici (CoM) got good reviews at Boardgamegeek and for less than $20 it seemed well worth a look. The product itself is very attractive. CoM is a card game and each card features a painting of a noble or personality from renaissance Italy. The paintings are really superb, something I suspect the artists are well aware of as they sign only their first names a la' "Brad" and "Angelina." So if "Raphael" and "Titian" feel entitled to first name celebrity then more power to them.

Each player in CoM has a deck of cards featuring a noble on each card. Each card also has a number value ranging from one to ten. In a given turn you place a card from your hand upon the table. If you place it on top of another card you have made an "alliance." When you make an alliance you may then eliminate a different pile of cards which have the same total number value. For example, stack a Painter (value 3) on top of a Poet (value 4) and you can eliminate any card or cards whose value adds up to 7. The goal of the game is to eliminate your opponents core group of cards and be left with the higher total of survivors on the board. The twist is that you can stack your cards on your opponent's cards and you may eliminate any stack on the table.

Our playtests revealed a number of positive things about CoM. For one, this is a fast game. Fast as in ten minutes of play. I reminisce about games of Civilization lasting eight hours but that was back in the age of dinosaurs and now a ten minute game sounds pretty fine. We also discovered that there is quite a lot of strategy occurring in those ten minutes. A player must create a cache of survivors as well as knock off the opponent to win. You can stack one of your cards on your opponent's and see if they'll eliminate both. We tried a game in which one player simply tried to eliminate the other as quickly as possible- that was a failure. A winning strategy has some bluffing, some sacrifice, and some luck as well. This was certainly a game that declared it's good qualities only with play.

Finally, the play of the game suits the theme. When you stack your card on an opponent's card you Have made an "alliance" of sorts. And in the next turn you may have to ruthlessly eliminate a stack that includes some of your own cards. Just like life in the courts of the Medici! The whole thing has a pleasingly sneaky and conspiratorial quality to it.

CoM doesn't have the level of awesomeness that Ticket to Ride does, but it also costs one fifth as much and can be played in one fifth the time. There's some basic math skills that are required but it's simple enough for young children. The game looks fabulous and has a certain cut throat quality that does evoke the era of the Medici. As our first cheap game of the month, this was a great success.

Happy Birthday H.P. Lovecraft

2010-08-20T17:12:00.000-07:00

Here at Gamenight events have occurred which have occupied about 90% of my free time and thus the posting has been slow. If by slow one means non existent. Nevertheless the tireless author at Grognardia reminded me that today is H.P. Lovecraft's birthday and that really needs to be observed.

I discovered H.P. Lovecraft (HPL) in high school and still find his work exciting today. His work is technically superb and manages to be both influential and unique. People can produce material which is inspired by HPL, but I have yet to read or view anything which surpasses him. I think the best you can say is that "yes, Dagon was a film almost as good as one HPL would have made." Not to knock Dagon, btw.

Beyond HPL's artistry is the appeal of his personal life. This was a man with a generous list of foibles, challenges, and flaws. He brought some tough issues with him and life added a fair number to the mix. Despite this you get the feeling from his letters that he never stopped trying- whether that was trying to write a better story, trying to support his family, or trying to make connections with the people around him. What an inspiration!

Today there are role playing games, films, books, comics and television shows which are derived from the works of H.P. Lovecraft. It's safe to say that he has touched millions of people and I suspect that his legacy has a ways to go before it disappears into history. A nice tribute to the genius of a struggling writer from Rhode Island. Happy birthday H.P. Lovecraft!

Ticket to Ride Update

2010-07-16T06:09:00.000-07:00

I've been studying for an exam lately and that's left less time for board gaming. Ironically it's remained easy to whip off sessions of Dungeons and Dragons which may say something about the ease of running D&D after some thirty years of play. Last night I did my study session early and dragged Steve over so we could do a quick boardgaming session and have something to write about other than old school role playing.

Ticket to Ride is a new classic boardgame which has sold millions of copies and spawned a good number of expansions and sequels. I picked up Ticket to Ride: Europe (TRE) recently and last night we unwrapped it and gave it a try. TRE is now my favorite family boardgame and I'm looking forward to my next chance to play.

The rules of TRE are simple enough. You have a board with a map of Europe on it and several cities marked. Between the cities are train routes marked in a color- blue, white, green, etc. The players also have cards in their hand. Each card has a train car of a certain color- blue, white, green, etc. In your turn you can claim a train route by placing a number of cards down of the right color. If a route has three red spaces you need to place three red cards. You win points based on how long the route is.

In a player's turn you may claim a route, draw more train cards in the hopes of accumulating more red cards or blue cards or so on, or draw a bonus card which will give you extra points for connecting certain cities. The bonus card is a mystery, you hope the bonus is for cities you can easily connect but it may not be. There are a few more rules specifics but that's the main of it.

Our trial game moved quickly and we had very few rules issues. On our turn we would usually agonize about whether to grab some cards and hope to complete a long route Next turn, or just complete a short route this turn for some quick points. One thing we noticed is that there was very little down time between turns. This is not a game where four players will sit in boredom waiting for the fifth to complete some lengthy activity. As board games go it was really pretty dynamic and exciting.

We also realized that the short and concise rules still allowed a great deal of strategy. You may wish to accumulate huge numbers of cards before building routes, or to just build often. You may try and get bonus points for building specific routes. There seemed to be many ways to approach the game and people who want to play a "deeper" game will not be bored.

TRE was a very pleasant surprise. I think it's a terrific game for younger players and has huge potential for older ones. I liked the speed of play, the colorful board, and the simple rules. This game really does deserve the reputation it's acquired.

I got my copy at Henry Bear's Park but TRE is widely available.

Villains and Vigilantes - Back in Print!

2010-07-13T13:46:00.000-07:00

My most successful and long lasting role playing campaign was played using the Villain and Vigilantes (V&V) rule system. V&V is intimately associated with old friends, favorite characters, and special times in my life. High school afternoons in a friend's basement, rolling up characters with a girl I had a crush on, late nights in college and convoluted storylines and plots which actually tied up at the end. In addition I think it's a terrific game system and ideal for old pro's as well as families and younger players. I am happy to say that Villains and Vigilantes is back in print and ready to entertain a whole new generation of players.

In a game of V&V the players take on the roles of - themselves! With superpowers. Play begins with everyone deciding just how strong, smart, good looking and intelligent they are on a scale on one to eighteen. This requires a bit of give and take as one can imagine. We were able to accept that we were all about average and left things at that. You then allocate super powers by rolling for them randomly on tables. Finally you fill in details regarding each character's powers and you're ready to fight menaces in your own neighborhood, college, or what-not.

V&V is a very old school game in that some people are going to get fewer powers and some powers are just lame. Players who expect to be smashing icebergs and deflecting bullets may be dismayed to get the power of "Enhanced Vision." Players can get several powers but there will absolutely be some with better or more than others. Prospective game masters and parents introducing the game will need to be aware of this factor and plan ahead. I might recommend DC Comics Legion of Superheroes Archives Volume 1 as a great source of adventure featuring characters with less that godlike powers.

V&V offers several terrific features. It has a very simple system for deciding how far you can throw a given object and what sort of damage it does when it strikes home. Everything from satellite dishes to mailboxes is a potential weapon or tool. Fans of superhero comics and movies will recognize the fun to be had in a shopping mall, construction site, or Rose Bowl Parade. This does require a game master to occasionally think in terms of set pieces- areas that are ideal for action packed battles and that are littered with appropriate props. For example, "the street" is a poor set piece. The local airport, with several small planes, a fuel tanker, several towers and piles of luggage, is a great set piece.

The trick of using the real world as the game setting and having players act out themselves is also a great source of fun. It doesn't rule out hidden fortresses below the middle school or alien invaders landing at the local Dunkin' Donuts, but it does ground the game nicely. It also helps the game master who has trouble describing things, since local landmarks are easy to envision.

Finally, the rule system is robust and simple. It is an old school system and will not cover every possible detail your players raise. It may not simulate every superhero encounter perfectly. On the other hand, the rule systems I have encountered that do those things also seem dreary and unreadable. Villains and Vigilantes is neither- it's accessible and fun. I highly recommend it to anyone with an interest in superhero role playing. Check it out at it's Lulu storefront.

Al Qadim - Arabian Role Playing Part 2

2010-07-07T10:24:00.000-07:00

I spent some time last night trying to reconcile my affection for the Al Qadim setting with my mixed review of Arabian Adventures. In part I feel like AA delivered just the right amount of background to get me launched and just the right number of special rules required to simulate the region. I also recalled one of the first exposures I had had with Al Qadim, the free sourcebooks available from Wizards of the Coast.

Some time ago I downloaded these books and flipped through them. There's a lot of material to get through, one of the hallmarks of Al Qadim seems to be profuse background material. I stumbled across a mini adventure set at the Burning Pool of Natifa. The pool is an oasis inhabited by a ghost named Natifa.

"Near the southern edge of the pool stands a stone oven, along with a collection of gleaming copper pots, pans, kettles, forks, knives, and plates.

A ghost named Natifa, who appears as an elderly woman with rich brown skin and shoulder-length hair as white as a chicken egg, lives on the bottom of the pool. Natifa occasionally surfaces to perch atop the fountain. When a stranger approaches, Natifa may ask him to prepare her a meal. If the stranger declines, Natifa politely but firmly asks him to leave. If she is in a playful mood, she may toss a handful of flaming arafaj in his direction.

If the stranger agrees, Natifa asks him to name the dish he intends to prepare (the more exotic the dish, the more intrigued she will be). If the dish requires special ingredients, she will fetch them. The dish must be prepared on her stone oven, using her cookware and utensils.

When the stranger completes the dish, Natifa descends from the fountain to sample it. If the food displeases her, she casts it into the pool, throwing the stranger in after it, then disappears. The stranger will have to navigate the flaming arafaj to return to shore. If Natifa enjoys the dish, she shows her appreciation by aiding the stranger, usually by offering information..."

What an awesome encounter! There's drama, a reward, supernatural mystery, and humor. This spirit seems to permeate Al Qadim and make it a very entertaining setting.

Al Qadim - Arabian Role Playing Part 1

2010-07-06T11:13:00.000-07:00

There are now four different Dungeons and Dragons campaigns going on amongst my circle of friend, one being run by someone who only started playing this year. I don't think I ever would have believed that I would someday complain about there being too many D&D games to play and yet that is now the case. Further, they're all different and all pretty exciting. I felt like it was time to try a new setting just so that my campaign could seem a little different. My wife also suggested that a game with more exploring and role playing and less hacking might be a good idea. With that in mind I picked up some copies of the main books for the Al Qadim campaign.

Al Qadim was the dungeons and dragons middle eastern setting. It was released in 1992 and saw some success before being discontinued as per the publisher's original plan. I picked up the main rulebook Arabian Adventures as well as a boxed set called Al Qadim: Land of Fate. For today's entry let's talk about Arabian Adventures.

Arabian Adventures (AA) is a well designed book. It's softcover with a fabulous illustration on the cover of a man on horseback being menaced by a djinn of some sort. This is only one of a dozen or so evocative colour illustrations the book provides. Some art in D&D is fair, some is ghastly, and the material in AA is just perfect- each one suggesting some interesting adventure that you might want to be a part of and each one really true to the original source material. Except with some dragons added. To be sure there are some black and white illustration in AA that are fair but the overall work is terrific.

Once you get past the pictures the AA book has a lot to offer. You get brief background material on the lifestyles of the people of Zakhara (the D&D middle east). This section is scanty and deliberately so but it introduces concepts such as social standing, how the citizens interact, and the roles of family and honor. I enjoyed this section and it did help to establish the game's setting.

The book follows with character generation rules based on second edition D&D. I was pretty disappointed with this section. While the rules introduce twenty character classes the majority seem either boring or potentially exciting but with boring special abilities. I think this is why I don't play second edition at all and probably my dismissal of this section is less a critique of the book and more a critique of second edition itself.

Happily the rest of the material is interesting and useful. There are lists of equipment and Arabian themed weapons. There are new rules that apply to adventures in the setting, rules regarding armour use in the heat, the "evil eye," social standing and so on. I personally love the idea of making armour too hot to wear routinely. In this setting fighters are still best for melee but they're less likely to stomp around encased in enchanted mithril plate mail. A thief with a ring of protection might be equally safe as a fighter in chain mail, although certainly less able to shrug off multiple blows. I suspect games of Al Qadim will include far more thieves, monks, and illusionists than I'm used to seeing.

The AA book winds up with new spells for an Arabian setting. Some of these are pretty weak or specialized for survival in the sands. I suspect that first level players are still going to memorize color spray or magic missile but as a magic user's spells expand they may wish to choose "wind compass" or "fire truth" (detect lies by means of the motion of a nearby flame).

I plan on using the AA material and ignoring the new classes. The cultural notes are interesting, the campaign setting is exciting, and the colour illustrations just terrific. I think we'll be doing more chats with djinn, more lock picking and swinging from ropes, and more planning before combat. I would absolutely recommend this book as a great campaign setting for D&D, and perhaps a better one than most for the kids.

Next, lets talk about the Land of Fate boxed set!

Fantasy Rules! Rules May Indeed Rule

2010-07-06T06:29:00.000-07:00

In the wake of the Splintered Light sale I went off and ordered a generous number of undead and forest animals and then spent some time wondering just what on earth I was going to do with them. Other than paint them of course. It's strange that despite the fact that there are thousands of fantasy miniatures on the market there is really only one well known game for their use, Warhammer Fantasy, and that game has some flaws. As in a lot of flaws. This is not to say that there are dozens of sets of rules for fantasy battles. It's just that each set of rules is beloved by a fairly small number of players who will complain bitterly that other players lack the sense to recognize the awesomeness of their favorite game. I set out to find a set of rules that I could champion in the same lonely fashion.

The Splintered Light sale gave me the option to build a decent sized army so I started looking for rules involving battles between larger groups of figures. After some searching through The Miniatures Page's archives I settled on the Fantasy Rules! (FR) line. The company that publishes them has several versions for sale, the Tournament and Campaign Edition (FR/TCE) seemed like the best place to start.

So far I'm pretty optimistic with FR/TCE. Each player needs an army of figures mounted on 40x40mm stands. You can build from scratch and attach about six figures to a stand. A medium sized army is twenty units or one hundred and twenty minis. For this level of play that's not excessively many although it's more than some may like. Experienced players may note that they can double up existing Warmaster or Field of Glory stands to create their fantasy army.

This brings us to the next feature of FR/TCE, which may be a perk or a flaw depending on your perspective. The rules are designed to accommodate virtually any fantasy army. Dwarves, elves, garden gnomes, flying carpets, werewolves, you name it. In one sense this is terrific news. I can paint up twelve vampires and use them to lead my already painted medieval Italian army. Note on the right, for example, that the "Greek army" has both monsters and ordinary troops. Players who already own miniatures may be halfway done with their fantasy armies and not realize it! In another sense this could lead to people playing progressively more silly armies like the pebble army or the invisible army featuring unpainted bases with nothing attached to them. I suppose every player will just have to decide how they feel about silly armies.

My preliminary readthrough of FR/TCE looks otherwise promising. The thrust of the rules seems to be that certain types of units do better against certain other types and I enjoy that style of play. There is a basic rule mechanism dealing with overall army morale and a force that takes many casualties seems like it will start to fracture and become unresponsive. I'm not finding the rulebook to be terrifically organized, better than many but not at the standards of Warhammer or Warmaster for example.

So where might this leave a reader with the same interest, or a reader who might want to introduce their child into the fun of giant battles between elves and orcs, or say between vampire "newborns" and allied werewolves and vampires? I think the rules system looks like it could be fun. I think the book could use some editing and formatting but its not impossible to decipher. I'm going to try and play a game in the next few weeks and we shall see whether Fantasy Rules! rules or not.

Splintered Light Miniatures on Sale

2010-06-30T06:35:00.001-07:00

As my vacation from blogging ends let's launch in with some exciting news. Splintered Light Miniatures (SLM) is one of my favorite companies. They're a (relatively) small operation that produces some of the most beautiful miniature figures I have seen. SLM has two lines of product. They make a 15mm line of fantasy figures which are nicely detailed and good quality. In addition they manufacture a line of 18mm forest animal figures that are just stupendous. The forest animal line is called Splintered Lands. The miniatures are beautifully proportioned, high quality, they paint up nicely and they're insanely cute.

The number of uses these little figures have are really limitless. They look great next to "Christmas village" houses, so regardless of your religion you can make pretty winter dioramas populated by well armed forest animals. The minis can be used in skirmish games such as the Song of... line from Ganesha Games. You could use them in role playing games and play Dungeons and Dragons with forest creatures instead of elves and dwarves. The sky is the limit. These minis are metal so obviously they are for the older kids. Give the younger children your plastic Perry Hussars or Walkerloo figures.

SLM will be missing Historicon this year (and that leaves my friend Kurt off the hook in terms of grabbing me some packs) and so they're putting their lines on sale. Send them an email describing which minis you want and they'll send you a PayPal invoice with 20% marked off. This is a terrific offer on some of the best miniatures in the country. Take a look and see if any grab you!

Huzzah Followup- a Rockin' Good Time

2010-05-25T11:04:00.000-07:00

Well it's a little late but I want to write a bit about my experience at Huzzah, a gaming convention in Portland, Maine that took place the weekend of April 30th.

In brief the event was just terrific. But let's hit some of the high points. Last year I drove down to Historicon in Pennsylvania for the country's largest historical gaming convention. I enjoyed about seven hours of traffic through New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. To be sure the Pennsylvania area is just breathtaking but so is Concord, MA and you don't need six hours to reach it. At the event I played in about six games and had a fair time. One game was really superb and the rest were not much better than what my club plays every week. In the end I paid for hotel and gas and food and while food in Pennsylvania is cheap and yummy it was still a bit of an expense. So stage set for Huzzah.

Portland is of course not very far from Boston. We made it in a few hours and even being stuck on the Maine Turnpike because of a burning semi is not too terrible. I walked in the main hall and was immediately struck by the incredible quality of the games being run. There were armies with hundreds of figures, huge castles and mockups of European towns. There was a fabulous depiction of Pacific islands and a model Alamo. Each game was of top quality in terms of presentation and preparation.

Two days later I left on a high note. I don't think I've ever met such a friendly group of gamers. I played a skirmish game depicting the Battle of Hampden (see photo on right) and Eric the game master regaled us with stories of this historical action that took place in Maine during the War of 1812. Not only was the action pretty exciting (ill-trained Americans try and slow down the British) but the story included the typical cast of crazy characters that makes the War of 1812 so interesting in the first place. I also got to play in a battle between Ethiopians and Italians set in 1935 and a skirmish between Germans and retreating British occurring late in the Second World War. Each game was just terrific in terms of presentation and playability. Finally, I got to run my own game, the Battle of North Point, which took place outside of Baltimore during the War of 1812 (see photos on left). I think my game was fair but the players were so good natured that a good time was had by all. Definitely another example of how fun players can make any game a success.

I'd get reservations for next year's Huzzah now if they were offered. I enjoyed a national level of gaming a few hours from home, my wife enjoyed Portland, and I met a great bunch of people. Huzzah! indeed.

Settlers of Catan- Maybe Better Never than Late

2010-05-21T09:49:00.000-07:00

The expensive and cleverly designed Eurogame has only been in existence a short while. Until recently gamers could enjoy popular games like bridge or chess or delve into the underground with miniatures games or wargames but that was it. Settlers of Catan could be considered one of the first major successes in the world of new games. It's sold over fifteen million copies and has achieved great notoriety. I picked up a copy recently and gave it a trial run.

As with many classic games the rules to Catan are simple. The board is pieced together from tiles selected randomly and arranged into an island. Each tile represents forest, fields, meadows, or some other type of terrain. Each tile is assigned a number from two to twelve. Players get two starting settlements to place on the board and the game begins.

Each player takes a turn rolling two dice. The terrain tiles corresponding to that number "produce" some commodity. Woods, for example, produce wood. Anyone with a settlement bordering that tile gets a "wood" card. After distributing cards the players can then trade cards amongst themselves and then the player whose turn it is can trade cards for some product or upgrade to their civilization. You could buy another settlement, some roads, or a some component of a civilization like a university. The player who accumulates a certain number of upgrades first is the winner.

Catan has many nice touches. Players know that they are more likely to roll an eight than a two so some territories are more likely to produce than others. A player may receive goods during any turn so there is less down time waiting for other people to finish their turns. Finally, players must trade commodities in order to win the game. As a result each turn is really a chance to interact and further your game.

That being said I hated my game experience. I have to say I was in a bad mood when we started and had no desire to cajole people into trading with me. Further, my setup left me with no chance to acquiring a vital resource and that left the other players with exactly zero incentive to ever trade it to me. I found that once I had fallen behind there was no way to catch up and the remaining time was really just dull. So in one sense this is not a game for ill tempered children who hate to lose.

Joking aside my experience does demonstrate some issues with Catan. If you don't want to trade then do not play this game. If you just want to win because of luck or great tactics then this is not your game. This is a game that demands cheery trading and interaction. Further, while I'm sure experienced players will feel otherwise, I think beginners really can fall behind and get left in the dust in Catan. Granted the game is over quickly but even so this may be an issue to consider if you have cranky children who hate losing.

On the positive side Catan is fast and simple and insanely clever in its design. I think the trading mechanic is great for people who want a trading game and probably would work very well for four players. The board has a variable setup which ensure each game will be different and the quickness of play ensures that if a player is unhappy with a given game they will be playing a different one soon enough.

In the end I'm glad I have finally tried Settlers of Catan. I think it's terrific for the right players but not for cranky folks.

Pros: simple, fast, clever design, strategic, fun

Cons: not for the cranky, irascible, or people not in the mood to trade

Beyond the Basics: a subtle game with lots of replay value

Family Pastimes Treasure Trove Discovered

2010-05-19T12:10:00.000-07:00

Family Pastimes is a notorious publisher of cheery cooperative games for children. I've reviewed their Secret Door and Max previously. Their games are characterized by simple rules and cooperative play, in addition to a very homegrown design aesthetic that takes me back to my days playing old old old school role playing games and wargames. Their games are also enjoyed by legions of fans and are nicely priced.

The main drawback to Family Pastimes games has always been finding them in the first place. I was very excited last week to discover that the Waldorf School in Lexington has a huge supply in their basement store. Now the basement store is actually pretty well hidden but the search is fun as you'll pass by workshops and kitchens and various appealing elements of the school. But once your search is over you can indulge in affordable, nurturing, cooperative games!

Perry French Dragoons - Initial Impressions

2010-05-13T05:00:00.000-07:00

Some time ago I reviewed Victrix Miniature's line of French Napoleonic foot soldiers. Recently I picked up a box of Perry Miniatures French Dragoons. Both are significant in that they are plastic miniatures as opposed to lead. Plastic miniatures are generally cheaper, easier to tote around, and most significantly, contain no lead. I was interested to see how the Perry brother's work stacked up against the nice figures from Victrix.

The box of dragoons included several sprues of pieces, some bases for the completed figures, and a painting guide. The guide was helpful without being incredibly detailed, more than sufficient for a casual hobbiest. The bases were an assortment of sizes but didn't include any for the dismounted figures. I use thicker bases anyway so that was hardly a deal breaker.

Once I started assembling the figures I was struck by how much simpler they were to construct compared to the Victrix infantry. There is some variety in how the figures can be completed, mainly in how you pose the sword-holding left hand. The horses come in two parts and their stance can vary depending on which two parts you glue together. In comparison the Victrix box included a multitude of poorly identified arm variations that really slowed down construction. The bottom line was that assembling the Perry dragoons was fast and easy.

I did have some worry that the lack of variety would lead to a homogeneous looking group. I was happy to see that once lined up the figures all had some individual character. To be sure they had less than the Victrix infantry but on a tabletop I don't think the difference would be striking. I did notice that the Perry figures seem to be modeled after healthy, slender fashion models while Victrix based their figures on thugs, roughnecks and hillbillies (see redcoats on left). Historically this seems about right and I'll probably continue to use Victrix for foot soldiers.

The Perry Dragoons story had an unexpected happy ending. After assembling the troops I left them out on the kitchen table. My three year old son found them and started examining them. In a minute the troops were lined up in neat rows and we spent the next half hour having horse races across the table. I think it was probably a welcome relief for the dragoons to take a break from harassing Richard Sharpe across the length of Spain and just race around for a bit. Mainly it was heartwarming as h#&% to play with toy soldiers together. As an addendum the figures held up to play just fine and worst case scenario was that I would have to reglue something.

I was very happy with the Perry Dragoons. They assembled easily and the box is a great value. I like the absence of lead which allows me to clutter up the house with the figures, much to the wife's delight. For gaming purposes they look terrific and for playing purposes they are a hit with three year olds. I got my box at the Hobby Bunker in Malden.

Uncharted Seas After Action Report

2010-04-26T19:07:00.000-07:00

This weekend we ran through another game of Uncharted Seas and I like this game more with each play. In summary it's quick, exciting, "realistic" enough for me and pretty affordable. I wrote a review of the game some months ago. Let's get down to the details.

I commanded a fleet of humans against Tony's "Iron Dwarves." I had painted up his fleet in a Greek inspired color scheme of white with blue accents while mine was a crazy North African melange of reds, blues, purples and yellows (thanks to Color Schemes for Every Room, Annie Sloan). I'm not awestruck by Uncharted Seas designs but the ships are big and they look terrific on the table.

I want first and sent my light frigates ahead of my main body to screen. At that moment my plans fell apart. My ships zipped across the table and within seconds were being blasted into splinters by the Dwarves. First lesson- this game moves quickly, with long ranged weapons and fast movement rates. The surviving frigates took aim at the Dwarven battleship and unleashed a great volley which bounced harmlessly. Second lesson- appropriately enough smaller ships are pretty ineffectual against giant ones.

My fleet was pretty much crippled early on but Tony moved some of his ships ahead just to see what might happen. We exchanged some gunfire and cast some spells at each other which were fairly entertaining without being completely unbalancing. Then I found some Dwarven frigates in the path of my battleships and rammed them to see how that would go. It went satisfyingly poorly for the Dwarves and we then learned that ramming and boarding actions are fast, simple, and "feel" right.

The action ended with my colorful fleet at the bottom of the ocean and my battleship and one frigate sailing away in terror while the Dwarves popped open some retsina and celebrated. Through the entire action we managed a variety of situations smoothly. We had to check rules a few times but were always able to find the answer written in a straightforward and concise fashion. We didn't find any gaping rules holes and the playtesting seems to have been effective.

Our group enjoyed Uncharted Seas. It's certainly simple but not silly or arbitrary. A functional fleet is less than $50 and the ships are fun to paint. I don't see it as a classic game for the ages but we'll be playing again and I'd certainly recommend it as a good game for beginners and experienced gamers alike.

Pros: simple, fast, fun

Cons: fair ship design, ships are made of resin and can shatter if dropped.

Beyond the Basics: expansions are planned, plus there are only a hundred other naval battle rulesets out there.

Huzzah- Wargaming in Maine

2010-04-22T05:00:00.000-07:00

Next weekend is Huzzah, a new wargaming convention being held in Portland, Maine. The schedule has a pretty good assortment of games, most aimed at older teens and adults. Many local conventions are a mix of board games, role playing, and miniatures gaming. Huzzah really concentrates on miniatures.

There are a number of reasons to consider the trip. The game selection is good and includes several that could be fun for beginners. My suggestions would include Aerodrome, Smoke on the Water, and Gangland. You'll also get to see more complex but very popular games like Flames of War being played and perhaps try them as well.

Huzzah is also fairly close by and there aren't many events like this in the area, Havoc and Northeast Wars (not Winter Wars, my bad) being the only two that come to mind. And Northeast Wars was canceled this year, which I think leads us to the next reason to attend.

This is Huzzah's first year. The group running the event has put a Lot of work into it and I think it would be great to respond. Huzzah looks very professionally organized but it is absolutely a labor of love by people with a passion for gaming. I'd encourage interested parties to get up there and show support.

Magic the Gathering - Fifteen Years Redux Part 2

2010-04-19T08:11:00.000-07:00

My gaming group enjoyed Dominion and Race for the Galaxy and I wanted to try a more traditional collectible card game. We had flirted with Legend of the Five Rings and Game of Thrones LCG. The former seemed more complex than the group were ready for (although by reputation it's a terrific game). I dropped the latter as I got through book three of the Game of Thrones novels and quit in a frenzy of frustration and irritation. That left us with Magic the Gathering (MtG) and after some research we tried a low key game variant.

The rules of MtG are fairly simple, Players have a deck of cards and draw up seven into their hand. In each turn they can play "land" cards. Each land gives the player a point of magical power which they can use to cast spells or do some other task. The cards in a player's hand also include creatures which can be summoned and a variety of spells which can help or hinder. For example, you might summon a fierce mouse for 1 point, or summon a dragon for 5 points of magic. But you might summon a mouse and then play another card which makes the mouse grow to seventy feet in height with flashing eyes and electric tentacles. Or you might cast a banishing spell and send your opponent's dragon off to limbo. All this "spell casting" is based on which cards randomly end up in your hand and can only occur if you have enough land cards in front of you to pay the cost in magical points.

Once a player has summoned and cast spells they can send their creatures off to attack other players. The opponent then has to use their own creatures to defend and little battles ensue. Any attackers that make it through inflict points of damage on the player and if the player takes twenty points of damage they are out of the game.

Our group had a terrific time with MtG. We found that early in the game the players mainly try and get some land cards on the table. This is a little slow paced and until you have the land and the resulting magical points you're not likely to be doing any great feats. In the middle of the game the players start summoning creatures and playing other useful cards. Things then speed up and by the end the players are banishing, summoning, casting enchantments and doing all sorts of interesting things. We had to refer to the rules every now and then but every question had a simple answer.

In terms of pros and cons we enjoyed the variety of cards available. Each player had a moment where they unleashed some amusing of devastating creature and many had subtle and interesting special abilities. We liked the simple rules. The beginning of the game moved slowly as we got used to the dynamic but by the end we were having some exciting battles. Some multi player games can be dull as each player takes a turn but MtG allows players to cast spells during other people's turns so there was no dreary downtime. Finally, by the end of the game we could see some strategic elements and the possibility of getting better as a player.

On the down side the game did start slowly and I think some players were frustrated that they couldn't use some of their cooler cards right away. Once we understood that you just don't expect to cast awesome spells immediately that issue was resolved. I'm not sure if you can "come back" once you start losing. On the other hand this game seems to play fast so I suspect that a loser can get back in with another game quickly enough. Finally, we all did feel the pull to immediately start shopping on EBay for rare cards. Once you realize that just by adding the hologram mythic rare special edition Chromatic Dragon to your deck you'd be unbeatable it's highly tempting to do so. We resisted the siren call.

Our group had a great time with MtG. As about a million people already know this is a great group game. It's family friendly. It can be played in a low key fashion although it often may not be. If a parent thinks they can avoid the trader frenzy this would be a great game for kids and teens and a good choice for groups of adult friends as well.

Pros: simple, fun, some strategic component

Cons: risk of trading frenzy, potential to be a black hole money pit

Beyond the Basics: a new edition each year plus it's an introduction to resource management games of which there are many

Magic the Gathering - Fifteen Years Redux Part 1.

2010-04-19T06:17:00.000-07:00

When Magic the Gathering (MtG) was first released I picked up a pair of starter sets and my girlfriend and I gave them a try. I remember thinking the game was a bit slow and didn't see the appeal and that was the end of that. Some time later my gaming group had a terrific time playing Dominion and I was left wondering if it was time to give MtG another try.

Readers are possibly already aware that MtG is a collectible card game. The game is played with a deck of MtG cards. Players buy cards to put in their decks. Some cards are more rare and also more effective than others. The cards are purchased, in theory, through "booster packs" which have a random assortment sealed inside. The game has developed so that some cards are highly sought after and since the booster packs are a shot in the dark a busy world of trading and card sales has emerged. I've witnessed high school students spending hundreds of dollars for sets of valued cards. That was chilling and creepy in several ways I can assure you.

I didn't want to enter into that world of collecting and trading. My last memory of being a collector and trader was selling Giant Size X-Men #1 for $30 in high school. Suffice it to say that it's worth a trifle more today. I turned to Boardgamegeek and got some good advice about a lower key way to play. Then I went over to Arlington's Comicazi and talked to the salesman there. He was very friendly and helpful and in the end I had a plan.

MtG can be purchased in starter sets and tournament decks. Either gives you enough cards to play a game. The people at Comicazi recommended giving each player a starter set. Then each time your friends play they buy a few booster packs as well. The players empty the boosters onto a table. They then take turns picking up a card until all the new cards are gone. In theory each person has a decent chance of getting some useful material. Apparently a similar system is used in some tournaments which highlight play ability over devastatingly tuned decks. Specifically this is called "drafting."

The Comicazi people pointed out that as long as the group played each other the decks would stay roughly equal in quality. Further, your expense would be roughly ten dollars for a starter deck and then five dollars for each booster. A single person could play many games and maybe spend less than thirty dollars. Finally, since the players have some choice over the cards that they draft they could over time seek out certain cards they prefer. The end result would be a deck which was somewhat personalized but at about a tenth of the cost and bother.

In the spirit of seeking knowledge and acquiring more games for the shelves and empty spaces of the house I purchased four tournament decks of Magic the Gathering: Shards of Alara. That evening I subjected my gaming group to Magic the Gathering.

Walkerloo - A Nice Introduction to Toy Soldiers

2010-04-18T07:35:00.000-07:00

I recently got a call from a friend who asked if he could bring his son over to look at my miniature toy soldiers. In one sense I was thinking "h*%# yes!" since I think miniature gaming is a great hobby. In another sense I had some qualms since most miniatures have sharp edges, small pieces, they're time consuming to paint and of course they contain lead. The call left me wondering about the best way to introduce younger folks into the hobby of miniatures and toy soldiers.

I'm not even sure how I stumbled upon Walkerloo Toy Soldiers. These are cardboard flat soldiers patterned after several regiments that fought at Waterloo. In one gesture you eliminate lead, sharp edges, expense, and hours of painting. Now to be sure I rather like hours of painting personally but as a gift for kids this just can't be beat.

The Walkerloo website also offers several rulesets for use in playing with your soldiers, one written by another Mike Fischer! You can buy various packs of soldiers to suit your needs ranging from squadrons of cavalry all the way to a mammoth box with hundreds of foot and several dozen cavalry figures.

There is one caveat. The illustrations are generally charming and full of character. Some of the figures are depicted in the process of being shot. To death. Parents are Highly Encouraged to consider ahead of time whether this is a level of realism that is excessive. One could pull those figures from the pack if they seem to cross the line.

I love the Walkerloo figures. In general I have an affection for "flats." They're colorful, old school, and affordable. These figures are obviously a labor of love as well as a business venture and I think they're a great introduction to tactical gaming and toy soldiers.

Mutant Future- Fun and Free

2010-04-18T06:34:00.000-07:00

I first heard about Mutant Future over at Jeff Rients' highly entertaining blog. But maybe in a sense I first heard about it twenty years ago at Waterloo Games on Long Island. Gamma World was one of the first generation role playing games released by TSR in the 1970s. The rules were quite similar to Dungeons and Dragons but the setting was a distant future after an apocalyptic war. Our gaming group never tried Gamma World. It seemed poorly supported compared to Dungeons and Dragons and the cover was both evocative and creepy. The emphasis on crazy mutations and dangerous radiation also just seemed depressing.

Twenty years down the road a number of publishers have begin printing versions of old school games like Dungeons and Dragons and Runequest. Mutant Future (MF) is Goblinoid Games version of original Gamma World. Our gaming group was looking for something different last night so I ran an ad lib game and we had a terrific time. In MF your character can be a human, a mutated human, a mutated animal, an android or a mutated plant (!). To my surprise no one chose to be a mutated plant, a character class which sounds incredibly entertaining. Instead the players chose android, mutated human, and a walking, speaking, mutant goat. The players roll dice to determine their character's strength, intelligence, and so on just as in D&D. As in the original Gamma World the attributes are pretty similar to D&D. The players then rolled for a random selection of mutations. One player discovered that he could reflect attacks- for example if he was stabbed with a spear the attacker would suffer the damage. Ironically that character also had the "prey scent" mutation- he had some unique scent that attracted predators. The android player got the ability to turn into a thirty foot python at will. In addition he had photosynthetic skin but slowed down in the dark. In general the mutations are entertaining and completely unbalanced. More on that later.

In the game the characters had to track down the population of their village which had mysteriously emptied one night. They tracked the villagers across the nearby burning sands under the hot, oblong sun. Oblong? Then they came to a wall painted the color of the sky that stretched far to the left and right and up to the sky, with a door in it. Of course by this point the players suspected they were actually in a huge room of some sort, perhaps an underground habitat or generational starship. Once through the door the encountered some mutant tiger mummy women and rescued their friends from a pack of intelligent walking dogs with shotguns (thanks Jack Kirby!). In the end they met with the "old man in the cave" but none of the players watched much Twilight Zone so the reference was wasted.

MF was a great time. My players are not interested in learning new game systems and MF is basically D&D with mutant powers so all the game mechanics were familiar. I struggled to find a setting that wasn't depressing but once I hit upon Starlost meets Kamandi the adventure flowed smoothly. The rules are well written and include all the information you would need to play, and they're free!

There are some downsides to MF. The mutant powers are random and completely unbalanced. We just accepted that and I made sure each player had something amusing to do. Competitive players may have trouble either accepting weak powers or holding back from dominating the game with better powers. A sense of whimsy may be key here.

The other potential issue with MF is that it has no clear setting other than "post apocalypse." The game master (actually referred to as "Mutant Lord") will need to come up with the setting and that may require a bit of thought or just some visits to the video store to review The Road Warrior, Delicatessen, or Six String Samurai.

I would recommend MF to anyone looking for some light, simple role playing fun. It's a great product and I'm glad we gave it a try. Download your copy at the Goblinoid Games website.

Pros: Well written, fun, free game

Cons: subject matter is potentially depressing, totally unbalanced powers

When the party ends- RPG conflict

2010-04-01T06:55:00.000-07:00

I had an interesting experience recently which playing Dungeons and Dragons. The other players were mainly beginners and the party had just discovered some treasure. To make a long story short my character found several magical rings and took them all. Another player demanded that they be shared and when I decline his character drew a weapon and insisted at swordpoint. The situation was quite awkward and left many of the players wondering. How do you manage that type of conflict at the role playing table?

Even as I write this account the essential difficulty of the situation becomes clear. The players each have a character and they act out what the character is doing. So Mike Fischer isn't taking the magic rings, it's Ashraf the Illusionist. And Joe Smith isn't pulling a sword and demanding they be shared, it's Krunk the Dwarf. Some players might argue that any behaviour is acceptable if it fits what the fictional character would be prone to do. If your character is a thief then she could and likely should steal from the other members of the party. If your character has a short temper then you should act that out.

I think the role playing realism approach has some merit. I like role playing and being true to your character makes for some unpredictable and exciting games. Further, you could argue that role playing an unusual or complex personality is a real achievement in terms of your own creativity and acting skills.

In the end I decided that while you can justify inter-party conflict as role playing that doesn't make it fun for me personally. Granted it's not "against the rules," and may even be supported by the rules. Nevertheless it just wasn't fun. Specifically: it wasn't fun for me. So how does this apply to gaming in general, or anyone else in the world?

If you're assembling a gaming group or starting out games it may be a good idea to talk about what the player's goals are. You could ask whether everyone is comfortable with aggressive styles of playing, with triumphant yells or competitive comments. If you're playing with children you might take a more directive role and help them grow into good social gamers. I've encountered skilled teen players who are shunned because their aggressive style is just too irritating for the other people in the group.

The role players may want to discuss the levels of realistic violence and drama they're comfortable with. One player may feel that graphic descriptions of combat are uncomfortable. Another player may be unwilling to play in a game in which the characters can turn on one another. Or all the players may agree that the game is a free-for-all and that any level of mayhem is acceptable.

In the end I decided that whatever the arguments for or against inter-party conflict were, for my purposes it just wasn't fun. At age 45 any free time is pretty precious and there's just no point in sitting through a game that's not enjoyable. At the same time I resolved not to antagonize the other player by appearing as though I wasn't sharing. His time is just as valuable as mine of course and in the end the point of the game is to have fun as a group- otherwise you'd just be playing solitaire.

Frog Juice - With a Name Like That...

2010-04-01T06:31:00.000-07:00

As I study for the medical boards the posts are going to come less frequently but today lets drop our age range a bit and talk about another product from the reliable folks at Gamewright, Frog Juice.

This game has such an appealing title that many kids could probably be handed a collection of almost any items, be told they were components for playing Frog Juice, and they'd probably have a great time. Purists can choose to follow the rules of the game, which are happily fairly simple. The basic premise of Frog Juice is that players compete to collect cards. At the end of the game the number and type of cards you've collected earn you points.

The specific mechanisms of Frog Juice are straightforward and sneak in some basic math skills. Players have cards in their hand with number values. "Toads," for example, are number 3. There are cards laid out in front of all the players. To capture a card you have to play a card from you hand of the same value. You can also capture cards adding up to the card in your hand, so a card valued at 11 could capture a 5 and a 6. Finally you can add several cards from your hand to capture a card valued at the total. So a 4 and a 3 from you hand can capture a 7. Cynical readers may claim that this makes Frog Juice simply an adding game!

Cynics be gone because Gamewright has tossed in their customary collection of game tweaks. There are special cards that allow players to steal other player's collected cards, or allow players to grab all the cards in the center of the table, or allow players to prevent one of the above from happening. Finally you can cast a spell card and collect cards directly from other players hands. The variety of special actions and spells keeps Frog Juice sufficiently unpredictable and funny even as the players exercise their addition skills.

There's a lot to like in this game. There is some strategy, there is luck and there are some sweeping magical cards. The game's small size makes it good for car trips or quick games in some boring setting and it looks like a good vacation game to be played at grandma's house. It's got spells and witches and teaches kids to add and subtract, plus a funny name. What's not to like?

Pros: funny, educational without being prim

Cons: its a fun filler game, hard to criticize

Beyond the Basics: learn to add and the world is your oyster

Lord of the Rings - Better Late Than Never

2010-03-09T06:32:00.000-08:00

The absolute first "new" game I received was The Lord of the Rings. My nurse at my Texas office got it for me for my fortieth birthday and set off a dire chain of events that now leaves me with several shelves full of colorful games and game related gear. Strangely enough the game itself was only played once. Texas is not a very boardgame conducive state as it combines perfect weather with inexpensive food and drink and thus people are less inclined to stay inside and play. I pulled The Lord of the Rings (LoTR) out last weekend and we gave it another spin. As an aside, I'm going to assume that readers are familiar with the books and characters, otherwise there is little reason to pursue the game.

LoTR is a cooperative game. The players take on the roles of the hobbits and try and get across the perilous map of Middle Earth without being corrupted by the dark force of Sauron. The specific game mechanism is fairly straight forward. Players receive a hand of cards. The cards have one of five symbols on them: feet for travelling, a tree for hiding, crossed weapons for fighting, shaking hands for friendship, and a star which acts as a wild card. At various points in the game players are faced with challenges and have to surmount them by playing the right type of card. For example, when the nazgul appear the players must "hide" by playing cards with trees.

The challenge of the game stems from not always having the cards you need and from finding ways to pool resources and help out the other players. Some special cards may allow you to "save" another players. At other moments you may pass some valuable card to a player in trouble, or even choose to suffer some minor drawback in order to protect another player from something much worse. LoTR really plays up the idea that the players are a fellowship and must work as a group to defeat the dark lord. There is no real individual glory in this game, just a series of close calls and the feeling that without your pal to the left your goose would have been cooked a long time ago.

The cooperative quality is of course of one of LoTR's great strengths. It's terribly satisfying to help the other players and it feels great to have them help you. In this regards LoTR is a pretty ideal family game. Everyone has a chance to help someone, everyone has a chance to be seen as a rescuer. And the whole group feels great if they finish the game and succeed.

The cooperative quality is also a slight flaw to LoTR. There is absolutely a strategic quality to this game. In our group, for example, we were decimated in our first game and in the second did quite nicely, mainly because we learned by doing. At the same time LoTR is as much an experience as a game. You play to share an adventure. I like experience games just fine, Sleeping Queens in another example and it's a terrific product. Mousetrap is another game that strays into experience play. LoTR strives to present a specific story with set encounters and events and that format may be too linear for some players or some moments. We had fun but I don't see playing LoTR with the same intensity we play Race for the Galaxy or Dominion.

I would absolutely recommend Lord of the Rings as a fun family game with a cooperative angle. Our group of gaming beginners had a good time and later asked why we hadn't played it before. I think you need familiarity with the books to get the full experience and it probably works best with ages ten and up. I got my copy years ago but I suspect it's still available in stores or through eBay.

Pros: Cooperative, team building

Cons: Linear, first game could be demoralizing

Beyond the basics: expansions exist, plus you can reread the books

Uncharted Seas- Simple Naval Miniatures Game

2010-03-03T10:27:00.000-08:00

The miniatures gaming world has dozens of sets of rules for playing out battles at sea. Typically the rule sets suffer from a few common issues- they may be excessively detailed, they may be historically flawed, or they may be simply dull. Sea Krieg, for example, is an insanely detailed rule set that we found almost completely unplayable. On the other hand, Victory at Sea has historical flaws that make it mildly to very irritating to players looking for realism. One solution to this issue is to create a game set in a fantasy world and make the rules simple and fast. Spartan Games sets out to do just that with Uncharted Seas.

In a game of Uncharted Seas players lay out miniature ships on a table or felt cloth and then "sail" them around a board attempting to sink their opponents. Rather than playing Swedes against Russians the players take the sides of elves, dwarves, humans, and other fantasy beings. This allows the publishers to avoid some issues of realism and historical accuracy. It does leave the question, however, of whether Uncharted Seas is actually fun.

Happily Uncharted Seas is actually a fairly fun game. Individual ships have a set distance they can move, which in some cases is modified by wind direction or some other variable. Ships also possess various weapons which they can fire or they may just choose to ram an opponent. Different ships and races have strengths or weaknesses which differentiate them. Dwarves use steam power to move their ships and while they move slowly they can ignore the wind. Humans use sails and so they may zip along or get stuck if the wind is blowing in the wrong direction. The ships of the orcs fire best straight ahead, the dwarves like to ram, and the elves can launch dragons to make aerial attacks.

Speaking of attacks, the combat system in Uncharted Seas is simple but not overly so. Players roll dice to "hit" an enemy and if they score enough hits the attack penetrates armor and does some damage. Larger ships require more hits before they suffer damage but may be easier to hit while small ships are hard to hit but fragile.

Finally, each player in Uncharted Seas has a deck of cards which give certain special abilities or bits of good luck. You have several of these cards dealt randomly to you and they may give you a bonus attack or defense or allow better movement. Primarily the cards add a random factor to the mix and while they aren't realistic they are exciting.

Uncharted Seas is sold as a stand alone set of rules and additional fleet boxes. Each box gives you enough ship models to play a good sized game. The models are made of resin (see photo to the right) and the samples I have seen are of good quality. They do need to be painted so this game is not ready to play instantly. The models also need to be glued together- again, this is not an instant play sort of game. I was not completely blown away by the models' art design but while the sculpts are not fabulous they do paint up nicely and look good on the board.

I found Uncharted Seas to be a fun and simple naval battle game. It's not groundbreaking, it's not artistically a masterpiece, but it is a very fun and playable game that's easy to get started and has good variety. I got my fleet at the Hobby Bunker- they were selling out so call ahead if you have an interest and see if a new shipment has come in.

Pros: simple, fast, fun

Cons: models require painting

Beyond the basics: Just the entire world of naval miniature gaming...

Carson City - Western Town Building Game

2010-02-24T07:10:00.000-08:00

After my tenth round of listening to Dwight Sings Buck I thought it might be nice to review a western themed game. Happily I was able to track down Carson City, a town building game which is about to appear in a second printing.

In the game of Carson City the players compete to build and develop and area of western desert. Some players may build mines, others hotels or ranches. There are a variety of ways to score victory points and the winner is the person with the most points after four turns. The basic mechanism of play in Carson City is straightforward. In a given turn a player may claim some land, build structures or roads on land, rob another player's building, or simply try and earn money based on how many building or followers they have. A player may try any one of the above or do several. At the end of the turn victory points are added to the player's total and the next turn begins.

Carson City adds a number of twists to the gameplay. Each turn the players choose a "character" that they will be for the duration of the turn. each character gives some benefit in play. For example, the person who is the "grocer" can earn much more money for their buildings. The "settler" gets a lot of land immediately for free. Players have to decide which character is going to help them the most in a given turn.

There is also a limit on certain actions. For example, only one player can collect victory points based on the number of buildings they own per turn. Certain buildings may be present in limited supply. Whenever two players want to do the same action the fight a "duel." Duels seem to be best avoided so the result is that you may not be able to do exactly what you want in a given turn and there may be some racing to see who can build the church or collect income from property at any given time.

The concept of changing your character each turn combined with being able to earn victory points in several ways is pretty typical of contemporary gaming. There does not seem to be a single "best" way to play Carson City. You can try robbing other players, building property, having lots of followers, or just earning lots of money and then buying victory points with the cash. In one sense it makes for lots of interesting strategy and good replay value. In another sense this can be baffling and irritating for some beginners. Some players find that a lot of choices is overwhelming. If your target audience includes a lot of players of that sort then Carson City will be a huge disaster.

I think Carson City has a lot of potential to be fun. It mixes concepts form many other games in a way that verges on derivative rather than inventive but I think that just makes it a "B" game rather than a classic like Race for the Galaxy or Citadels (both of which have elements that end up in Carson City and are themselves based on earlier games). I would recommend introducing Carson City in the sense of "let's just try this and see how it goes," rather than "this is exactly how to win, now let's aim for exactly that goal." I think players will discover the game's flow through playing it and as they do they will find fun strategies and ways to score. That was how my players approached Dominion and that became a gaming stable. Hopefully your crowd will feel the same way about Carson City.

I haven't checked but I suspect you can find Carson City at Pandemonium Books in Central Square.

Pros: lots of options and surprising ways to win

Cons: potentially too many options and surprising ways to win

Beyond the Basics: Decent replay value and a good introduction to other similar games

Traveller - Old School Science Fiction RPG

2010-02-21T15:40:00.000-08:00

I was lucky enough to grow up near Waterloo Hobbies on Long Island. Waterloo was a very well stocked game store and I spent hours there swimming happily through a sea of role playing and board games. As many people know the first generation of fantasy role playing games (rpgs) was dominated by Dungeons and Dragons. Authors of the day also delved into genres like wild west, superheroes, and science fiction. The most famous science fiction rpg at that time was Traveller.

Ironically I found Traveller consistently frustrating and underwhelming throughout high school and college. The game is set in the future and there are spacecraft and a variety of planets to visit. The original books, however, give no setting whatsoever. You are in The Future, but the social structure, government, star atlas, and all other background details are absent. Further, the equipment available to you is essentially no different than what's available at the present day. Admittedly you may purchase a laser rifle but there are no phasers, blasters, light sabers, force fields or androids. I missed the color of amazing weapons and bizarre aliens that Star Trek (and later Star Wars) flaunted so shamelessly. Further, characters in Traveller were generally military veterans with a few randomly determined skills. I put down the rules for twenty years.

Last night I pulled the set back out and ran a beginner's game for some friends. Interestingly it was a good success. A lot has changed in the gaming world in twenty years. Contemporary science fiction games are tremendously colorful and dripping with exotic weapons, genetic abilities, aliens, and nanotechnology. Two examples include Dark Heresy and Eclipse Phase. Yet my players won't go near either of those games because they are so very detailed and rich in setting. Playing either requires several hours of discussion and character generation.

In comparison we were able to create characters for Traveller in thirty minutes. Then I plonked the players down in a derelict spacecraft and let them search for escape pods while being chased by mutants. The players immediately grasped the ideas at play- flickering lights, ship is lurching, and those packs of howling creatures with blue spears are probably unfriendly. As a side note I ran them through the movie Pandorum (an underrated American remake of Eden Log, an underrated French SF film). Everyone had a good time and will probably play again, at which point I'll run them through a version of A Planet Called Treason.

For purposes of the blog I mention Traveller because it has good potential as a beginner's rpg that a parent could run for teens. The rules are simple, the characters are easy to create, and you can be up and playing in no time. The downside to the game is that you have to supply your own science fiction universe but if you're creative (or, like me, just read and watch a lot of SF) then this shouldn't be a problem.

I would guess that a teen who enjoys Traveller may move on to some of the games listed above, or others on the market that deliver more color and detail. That's what I did. But that doesn't downplay the accessibility and ease of play of this old school game.

You can find Traveller on eBay, or you can buy a collection of the rules from Far Future Enterprises. The Far Future collection represents the original set of rules which have been revised multiple times in the last few decades. Mongoose Publishing has the latest version. This version seemed at first glace to be more complex than it should be, without the exotic color of more modern games- thus a sort of lose-lose.

The Dungeon Alphabet - a Fun Impulse Buy

2010-02-01T18:36:00.000-08:00

In recent years we've seen a resurgence of conversation online regarding the Dungeons and Dragons "retro renaissance." This is the practice of playing original edition D&D, often in the way it was first played back in the early 1970's. In some ways the concept of the retro renaissance seems funny to me because I've always played first edition D&D. I suppose that made me both behind and ahead of the times. The other aspect of the "renaissance" that strikes me is that the historical Italian Renaissance shook the world and led the great advances in a variety of fields. In comparison the D&D Renaissance could simply be some older guys with blogs waxing nostalgic in the midst of a role playing mid life crisis.

So having established that I'm a D&D fan but not expecting Carla Bruni and Nicolas Sarkozy to join the Obamas in rolling up some characters anytime soon, let's look at a fun new product I picked up this weekend. Goodman Games recently published a hardcover book called The Dungeon Alphabet (TDA). This book contains twenty six entries related to D&D, arranged by letter of the alphabet. So, for example, "P is for Pool," and "K is for Kobold." Each entry is accompanied by a page or so of text and a table which allows you to randomly pick a certain type of pool, kobold, or what not. Some of the entries are really quite inspired- under "W is for Weird" you can roll up weird discovery number eleven:

"A cloud of glowing dust motes floats in the air in some difficult to reach place (in a high balcony, on the far side of a deep chasm, or atop a stone pillar."

Now for those readers who are not experienced in old style D&D, let's explain why that entry is so fabulous. When players encounter this they are intrigued- glowing motes, could these be related to treasure, could they be magical, could they be a trap or some portal to another location? And then the players have to decide how to examine them- climb a wall, cross the chasm, search for some hidden route. In a few sentences the dungeon master has created an exciting mystery with a challenge, some risk of hidden danger, and some hint of a cool reward. An experienced dungeon master could really ad lib the rest, just sitting here I can imagine an invisible treasure chest that glows, a will o' the wisp that lures victims into peril, a collection of gold that magically floats and allows anyone carrying it to levitate as well, the possibilities are endless and this is one of hundreds of entries.

The randomized charts are also appealing to old school players simply because random events are so very old school. A contemporary D&D adventure tells a grand story with characters, plot developments, emotional twists and complex metaplots. Old school games feature crazy magical pools, traps, baffling magical items and a sense that the world is endlessly surprising and mysterious. At their worst old school games can seem a little unreal, but at their best the excitement of discovering a mysterious fountain with a single black goldfish swimming in it and a sealed and unknown potion in its center is just terrific. A fountain! Is it magic? What's that potion? A trap? And the goldfish? Is it guarding the treasure or an innocent pet? Who wants to try drinking from the fountain? And off we go...

TDA is priced at ten dollars and this is the deal maker for me. The book is charming but it is basically a few dozen randomized tables. Ten dollars is exactly the amount that makes this a fun purchase. The book isn't designed to change anyone's life, just breath some fun and flavor into your games. I've already gotten my money's worth just from the pleasure of ready the entries and my players and going to love some of these pools, traps, doors, and "weird." I got my copy of The Dungeon Alphabet at Pandemonium Books in Central Square.

Roots of Role Playing- Eric Carle's Dragons!

2010-01-31T06:26:00.000-08:00

Some of us spend our time wondering how to introduce our children to dragons, mermaids and the like at a young age. I've been disappointed at how few books there are for younger children with what I would call decent art and appealing stories. My trips to Barnes and Noble have been busts so far and the 1st edition Dungeons and Dragons Monster Manual is less appealing to 3 year olds that you might guess.

For these reasons I was thrilled when my wife brought home Eric Carle's Dragons Dragons. The book has illustrations of a few dozen creatures and each image is accompanied by a poem. The images are fabulous. Carle has a reputation for cute children's books but his work here just slightly more mature- still approachable for children but fun for parents to look at as well. I don't have much of a taste for poetry but the majority of the pieces are light-hearted and even a little silly. And if the poem doesn't grab you the artwork certainly will.

Dragons Dragons is a fun book for any child. It's also a nice item for role playing parents who want to give their kids a glimpse of fabulous and awesome creatures that could crop up in some rpg later on.

Totalcon 2010 - Nice Boardgaming Array

2010-01-26T11:12:00.000-08:00

Families interested in board gaming could take a look at Totalcon. This is a yearly event held in Mansfield, MA, that offers a wide selection of games to try. I think the selection of boardgames this year looks particularly promising. If you have any interest at all then this is a fine chance to try a bunch of games and see which ones grab you. Note that there are special activities for younger players and that each event is classified as introductory or as requiring some experience.

Take a look at the Totalcon website for more details. The event occurs feb. 18th through 21st, 2010.

Command and Colors Ancients- Awesome!

2010-01-13T11:35:00.000-08:00

My wargame club recently began its fall project and my role is to paint the small metal soldiers that will represent the French troops. It seems that to depict these soldiers I'll have to paint several hundred tiny metal men. As I tried to swallow that task I reflected that miniature wargaming certainly has a significant built-in barrier to new players. How do you welcome interested people and then suggest that they launch into such a potentially time-consuming hobby? One answer is of course that it's fun to paint tiny metal figures! Another answer may lie in boardgames that act like miniatures games but without the ridiculous time investment. Command and Colors: Ancients (C&C) is one such example.

In a game of C&C each player is in charge of an army and their role is to sweep aside or defeat the opponent's army. Instead of a million metal men the players use wooden blocks with illustration of soldiers, horses, or elephants on their sides. A player's unit of Numidian cavalry might be depicted by three blocks with pictures of men on horseback on them, for example. The players lay out their armies on a board marked with spaces. Then in a given turn a player might move some of their units several spaces across the board, and if they're close enough to the enemy, "battle" them by rolling dice. Lucky die rolls might cause the opponent to retreat or disappear. If the attacker is unlucky the opponent may be given a chance to fight back. The turns alternate and each player gets a chance to move units, maneuver, and attack as best they can. Usually a game ends when one army has lost a good number of units.

C&C has a few rules that keep the play simple but satisfying. Both players have a hand of cards. Players in charge of historically better led armies have more cards in their hand at any time. In their turn a player chooses a card, places it before them, and follows the instructions on it. Cards usually allow you to move a certain number of troops on a certain part of the board - "Move two units in the center of the board," for example. The cards are dealt randomly so you may not have the exact card you want, rather you just have to make due. For example, you may have powerful troops on the right and have to wait a while until dealt a card allowing you to move troops on the right. The limited set of options at any time is meant to simulate the limited control generals in Classical periods had over their troops. Giving one side more cards simulates the higher quality of leadership they had in that battle.

C&C includes a dozen or so sample scenarios based on real historical battles between Rome and Carthage. Players may command spear armed infantry, bowmen, chariots or elephants. These two elements contain both the strengths and weaknesses of the game. In terms of weaknesses C&C is going to be pretty dull to anyone not interested in the battles of ancient Rome. Hard as it is to imagine, some teens and adults may not care a whit about such things, or would rather be battling space marines or sherman tanks. This game is obviously wasted on anyone disinterested in ancient battles.

In terms of strengths, then, this game is a fantastic simulation and ideal for anyone with an interest in ancient battles. In summary, C&C illustrates well a variety of factors which were crucial in these contests. We see light cavalry zipping around the board but running the risk of retreating off the map at some inopportune moment. We see the importance of maintaining a strong battle line. We see elephants running rough over formed troops but vulnerable to light infantry and slingers. Players will tend to win battles if they use their troops in their historic role- skirmishers in front, flanks protected with cavalry, archers disrupting enemy lines, and so on. New players may not know any of these things in their first game but after several plays they'll have received a crash course in ancient history.

One other drawback of note is C&S' card system. It's not unreasonable that ancient generals had some limits in their control of their own troops and one could imagine an army's wing sitting and picking their teeth rather than charging at some crucial moment. Nevertheless the card system does veer away from "simulation" and towards "game". Serious ancient battle wargamers may find it too game-y. Further, very casual or younger players may prefer a game in which they can move all their troops in each turn to their heart's content. I personally find the card system exciting and challenging but players looking for non stop charges and attacks may look elsewhere.

I would recommend Command and Colors: Ancients for anyone with an interest in gaming ancient battles. I think it's a terrific game in it's own right and a fine introduction to tactical and miniatures gaming as well. The rule book is a bit long but the basic system is simple and should be approachable to interested teens and up. I got my copy for the Holidays, you might order yours from the Hobby Bunker in Malden.

Pros: simple, fast, great historical battle game

Cons: requires interest in historical battles

Beyond the Basics: multiple expansions exist and there's plenty of room for tactical improvement

Citadels- Better Late Than Never

2010-01-10T08:31:00.000-08:00

Many years ago I discovered modern European games and went out to buy a few. Most lay unplayed on the shelf as my Texas friends preferred to hike, swim, relax in the sun, or sip margaritas in the warm evening's air. The brisk Boston weather is better suited for indoor activities and recently I unpacked Citadels to give it a spin. After several rounds of gaming I can see why this is such a popular and well reviewed game.

In a game of Citadels the players compete to see who can build up a city area fastest and best. In a given turn a player will have a hand of cards, each depicting a building or city area- "Tavern" for example, or "Palace." During a turn you may choose to get more cards for your hand or get some gold coins. You can then spend gold to build your tavern, palace or what have you. When a player builds something they put their card in front of them and return the cost in gold coins back to the bank. Finally the turn moves to the next player.

Building things has some simple dynamics. Larger building and sites cost more gold, so a tavern is cheaper to build than a palace. Players may have to wait to collect enough gold to build what they want and they may have to choose to collect more cards if the ones in their hand are unsuitable for some reason. Victory is simple as well, the first person to build eight things ends the game- the remaining players finish the round and then everyone totals up the cost in gold of all their buildings. The person with the most expensive array of buildings is the winner. There are a few details to scoring but as you can see this is a very simple game.

Citadels becomes a brilliant and satisfying game through a simple mechanic. In each turn a player chooses a "character" to be. Examples include "thief," "king," or "bishop." Each character comes with certain special abilities. For example, the thief gets to steal gold from another character. The bishop gets extra gold for each religiously themed building they own. Imagine that you've built a temple and a monastery and that this turn you really need gold in order to build some extra fabulous site. You might try and be the bishop. You collect extra gold and can build your palace. But next turn you could choose a different character in order to accomplish a different goal.

In our trial game the players found that jockeying for the choice characters was a lot of fun. Some characters can allow you to steal or interfere with other players and so in addition to giving gold and perks your choice could decide who has their building demolished or who gains or loses cards. The rules managed who can pick a character first and ensured that we all had our moments to get the special abilities we needed. The strategy of picking the right character at the right time adds huge depth to this simple game.

Citadels had a few more strengths. One is that it works well with a big group. we played with seven. Further, it's a quick moving game and you could probably finish in thirty to forty five minutes. The game is also quite inexpensive compared to some eurogames that retail for fifty or more dollars. Finally, the game is quick enough that you rarely get a staggering victory or humiliating loss, a nice touch if playing with people who hate to lose.

I would recommend Citadels to anyone looking for a simple and quick group game with the possibility of deep strategy. Children ages ten and up could probably play well and teens will grasp the deeper nuances after a few rounds.

Pros: simple, deep strategic potential, fast play

Cons: may be of little interest if the theme of building cities is uninteresting

Beyond the Basics: Insane potential for strategy and improvement, several expansions

Talisman - One Silly Good Time

2009-12-16T08:29:00.000-08:00

Last week we found ourselves in the Hobby Bunker needing a two person game. Rich stepped up and bought a copy of Talisman, 4th edition, so we could have something to play. What a great moment! I would have done the same but I had previously ordered Infinity and my impulse-buy points were all gone. Rich had played first edition back in the day and we settled down to see how to newest version held up.

Talisman is without doubt one old school game. The play takes place through moving a token around a rectangular board and seeing what happens when you land on a given space- pretty much the same as Monopoly. Each player starts the game by selecting a character. I always felt like the token in Monopoly should give you some special ability- the car should move faster or the dog could, well, that's where that plan falls apart. In Talisman your token does give you special abilities. Take the Prophetess and you can influence random events. Take the thief and you can steal from other players. Do you want to fight monsters? Then take a troll or warrior. There are more than a dozen characters to play and they have a variety of powers and advantages.

Once the players have chosen their characters they set up on the board. Each player rolls a die and may move that many spaces to the left or right. The player is likely to have to draw an adventure card on the space they land on and deal with whatever the card says. It may give the players a magical item, a faithful follower, or reveal some monster to fight. If you succeed at the challenge the card delivers you may improve your strength or spell casting ability. If you fail you may lose a "life," of which you have a finite number. After you resolve your adventure card the play moves on to the next player.

The goal of Talisman is to improve you character through these adventures until you can make your way to the center of the board and collect the Crown of Command. At this point the other players must catch the first soon or lose the game.

Rich and I enjoyed our game. I was pretty entertained as I acquired a unicorn and maiden follower for my Prophetess and then a gnome, which didn't make as much sense but was still pretty cool. Then I was turned into a toad and had to start from scratch but that was pretty entertaining as well. Through the coarse of the game we discovered hidden markets and sorcerers who would sell us armor and spells so over time we had locations we could return to to acquire more cool gear. In general we enjoyed the game's light tone and the character development that occurred as we moved along. I don't think i spent much time considering strategy, I just sat back and enjoyed the ride.

Talisman has received a bit of criticism for being very random. The adventure cards can deliver you a bag of gold or a powerful dragon. You may be forced to land on spaces that are unhelpful or even dangerous to your character. And you may struggle to get to an important space and consistently fail to roll the number required to get there. I think it's simplest to say that if a random game bugs you, just look elsewhere. If you find chance tolerable or even exciting then this is less of an issue.

Talisman is also very old school in that some of the characters may be stronger than others. It may also leave some players struggling to catch up to luckier, more powerful opponents. I think we see the same thing with games like Monopoly and Life. For this reason Talisman is absolutely not recommended for younger players who may find losing or perceived unfairness upsetting.

I enjoyed my game and I would happily play again. I see Talisman as a light and low key event rather than a competition. It absolutely has silly elements. There's a slight role playing quality in terms of watching your character develop and for me that's a bonus. The game itself is colorful and well put together. For people who are looking for an amusing way to spend some time this is a great game.

Talisman is available at most game stores, Rich got his at Hobby Bunker in Malden.

Pros: Light, cheery, full of surprises, role playing element

Cons: random nature of game means many many surprises

Beyond the Basics: You're not likely to become an "ace" Talisman player but there are some expansions to add a bit of variety

Blue Moon - Great Game but Too Blue?

2009-12-10T06:07:00.000-08:00

Blue Moon was released years ago. At the time it seemed like a small scale card game and in the days prior to marriage and babies I was looking for epic games that required hours to finish and involved lots of small sharp lead figures. Now I look for games that can be played quickly and don't have components that are messy or dangerous. The new world order, combined with a big sale at Fantasy Flight Games, promoted me to try Blue Moon.

I'm happy to say that this is a very fun game with a lot of depth and strategy to it. The gist of play is pretty simple. Each player has a deck of cards specific to a particular alien race. The basic box gives you two decks and you can buy addition decks separately. Through the game you draw cards from your deck into you hand and then play them on the table. The cards have a points value and if one player can't match or beat the points that the other player puts down they lose that round. One analogy might be the game of "War" if you had a hand of cards to choose from rather than just picking a card from the top of the deck.

Now given that I've disliked the game of War for forty years, why is Blue Moon any fun at all? The Blue Moon decks include a good number of cards with special abilities or effects. Further, each deck has some high value cards and some mediocre ones. Finally, each deck has cards with special abilities that can be played alongside your regular cards. Each deck has different special abilities so your game is going to change based on the alien race you're playing. The result is that a player has to decide when to use better cards, when to retreat before a stronger opponent's hand, and when to use the various boosters and support cards. Further, your game will vary based on which alien race you're playing.

We have played Blue Moon a number of times now and we've been struck by several good qualities. The simplicity of the rules is a real bonus. In addition the entire game may last only thirty minutes. The alien races are all very interesting and colorful and I like the idea that each one is going to play a little differently. I'm looking forward to seeing which is my favorite and developing some tricks and strategies specific to that race.

Simplicity, speed of play, and colorful components are all good things. Sadly, Blue Moon has two drawbacks. For one it may be difficult to find and you may have to order it from Fantasy Flight Games or Funagain. The second issue is a bit trickier. The artwork on the cards seems to feature very fit people wearing scraps of cloth or feathers. I'm not sure it's any more revealing than the outfits worn for beach volleyball, but do you necessarily want to buy your kids a game featuring scantily clad beach volleyball players, space aliens, or a mix of the two? The art has been a source of dismay for many parents and prospective owners of the Blue Moon game would be well advised to think about the issue before buying.

I think Blue Moon combines simplicity of play with room for strategic depth. If the game art doesn't offend then this is a great addition to the game library of older players and adults.

Pros: simple, strategic, fast, colorful art

Cons: Blue Moon has blue art

Beyond the Basics: lots of room to improve, master the various races and decks

Nice Sale at Funagain Games

2009-12-10T06:02:00.000-08:00

I do recommend buying your games locally but Oscar Wilde says that nothing suits a long list of virtues better than an occasional vice. Therefore feel entitled to head on over to Funagain.com for a really impressive holiday game sale. They're letting popular and highly respected games like Dominion, Power Grid, and Carcassonne go at insane discounts. Don't let it slip by.

Holiday Gift Guide 2009

2009-12-02T10:39:00.000-08:00

I've been musing over the various blog entries and feeling like some summary or assessment is in order. Given that both Gift Trap and Wings of War received positive reviews, is one better than the other? What's been truly exciting in 2009?

There's no difficulty in deciding the Most Exciting Game of 2009. Race for the Galaxy is overflowing with great qualities. It's simple, its components are beautiful, it has terrific replay value and you can improve your play with each game. There are two supplements that are decent values and add to the experience but you can play happily with just the basic box set. Race for the Galaxy is a beautifully designed game and has been the source of a great deal of fun across 2009.

Dominion: Intrigue (D:I) comes in as a runner up for most exciting game. D:I has an elegant set of simple rules, great replay value, and gets better with each play. I do feel that it's a little too abstract to really excite me. In Race for the Galaxy you do have a sense that you're building a galactic civilization. With D:I the play is more along the lines of "how can I combine these cards in a clever way?" On the other hand, players who love abstract games may prefer D:I for just that reason.

On the other side of the coin we see Arkham Horror. This product boasts amazing production values and is not at all abstract. You march your adventurer across a board, collect equipment, and fight monsters. My wife prefers games with stories and for this reason Arkham Horror is a favorite of hers. Arkham Horror won't take top honors because while it is fun I don't feel it's as elegant a design as Race of D:I.

In terms of Best Game for Younger Players we're faced with a bit of a dilemma. Can you make a reasonable argument for spending fifty dollars on a eurogame for young children? I have my doubts and that's why I give the nod to Gamewright's Sleeping Queens. More of an activity than a game per se, it remains fun to play and pretty to look at. Plus it delivers good times at a very reasonable price.

In terms of the younger folks I'd have to mention Max, the game in which you get tiny forest animals past a mean old cat. Max is cooperative and simple but boasts a very modest production quality. Sadly I like my games glamorous like Sleeping Queens.

Blokus is a nice game for younger players. It's priced reasonably and has good replay value. I don't see it as being quite as exciting as the Queens though, so it remains runner up.

There are certain games that are Great Games for Larger Groups. Tops on this list is Bang! This game has been a consistent crowd pleaser with every group I've introduced it to. bang! is simple, fast, fun, and involves the entire group at almost all times. Unlike many of these games it's also priced affordably.

In terms of Miniature and Tactical Games the indisputable champion is Wings of War. This game simulates air combat in World War 1 with fair realism but uses simple rules and allows quick play. In addition the miniature aircraft are just stunning. For very little money you can lay down a dogfight of a half dozen colorful aircraft on your kitchen table. Wings of War is a fabulous marriage of great production value and beautiful game design.

I was very impressed with Federation Commander, the Amarillo Design Bureau's update of the venerable Starfleet Battles rules. Federation Commander does a great job of simulating Star Trek starship combat and keeps the rules to a minimum. Still, the "minimum" at this level remains more than many players will be comfortable with and the rules could be written more clearly. This game is ideal for the older player who really, really wants to fight Klingons. Y'all know who you are.

Finally we're left with Role Playing Game of the Year. I remain disappointed that the rpg publishers seem disinclined to produce introductory level games. One exception is the admirable The Zantabulous Zorcerer of Zo. This game delivers simple rules, a fun setting, good accessibility to younger players, and accompanies it with generous background material. It's a model for what an introductory game should be like, not to mention a game that more experienced players will enjoy as well.

I found Starblazer Adventures to be another game well suited to beginners. The rules are comprehensive and the product is an awesome value in terms of the content it delivers. The fact that it exists without a clear game universe (unlike, say, the Conan, Star Wars, or Ghostbusters role playing games) may create a slight challenge for the person running the game unless they are pretty familiar with science fiction concepts. Happily, there seem to be plenty of moms and dads who know the difference between Tardis and Star Destroyer and so for them Starblazer Adventures is a good option.

The majority of these games are available in local stores like Pandemonium Books, Hit or Miss Games in Lexington, or Complete Strategist in Boston. If not immediately available they can be easily ordered. I say keep the business local, most of these store owners care deeply about the hobby and are great resources if you have further questions.

Ghost Stories- Cooperative Supernatural Action

2009-12-01T10:10:00.000-08:00

Ghost Stories is a cooperative game based on the movie genre of Chinese ghost fighting. For much of the American public this is about as obscure as you're going to get and that's a shame because the films and the game have a lot to offer.

Readers looking for some background in this entertaining field should consider movies like Chinese Ghost Story or Mr. Vampire. In a general sense these stories usually feature a cast of exorcists who use taoism to fight and banish various supernatural beings. This may involve the use of martial arts or certain magical substances- special grains of rice, magical scrolls, or special bells play a role. The movies assume that you understand why sticky rice repels the undead or why placing a scroll on a vampire's forehead will cause it to stand frozen in place. If you choose to just accept everything you see at face value rather than wonder "what's the deal with the rice?" then these films are outrageously fun.

In the game of Ghost Stories the players take on the roles of taoist ghost fighters. Your job is to protect a village from a relentless flood of ghosts and eventually defeat their leader, Wu-Feng. Each player has their own turn. During a given turn the ghosts are first given a chance to appear on the board and then may haunt part of the village. In the second half of the turn the play may move their figure around the village and attempt to banish one or more ghosts. If the players can banish all the ghosts and their leader then they win the game. In several cases players will have to act together to succeed, sharing gear or teaming up.

Ghost Stories adds drama and strategy through a number of details. There are a wide variety of ghosts which may appear and each has some special ability. Some ghosts are easier to banish than others and some may require the players to band together or share equipment. There are four ghost fighters in the game to choose from and each has a different set of special abilities as well. Finally, the evil spirit Wu-Feng will have different abilities in each game. The game delivers good replay value through the random assortment of foes and abilities to deal with.

In addition to replay value Ghost Stories has a number of other positive qualities. Firstly- banishing ghosts is fun. Working together is fun. Working together to banish ghosts is thus especially fun. For a certain group of players working together and using kung fu and magic to banish ghosts is just crazily outrageous fun.

Multiple reviewers have also agreed that Ghost Stories is hard. So hard to win that players are better off concentrating on the fun factor of banishing as many ghosts as possible rather than winning per se. This is hard to assess- we want to win in general but if we know we're not likely to then is it just as fun to play hard and see how far you get, only to try harder next time? For a lot of players that's a good time but for the player who wants to win on the first try Ghost Stories will be a frustrating time.

Speaking of frustrating, it appears as though the rulebook has been translated through several languages. I feel pretty experienced in rules reading but these were tough. After a few read-throughs I did get the ideas and it's not like the game is very complex, it's just that the rules are poorly explained. Further, there are plenty of items ("tao dice," "Qi tokens") whose purposes are not immediately apparent from their names. Be patient, their use is actually fairly simple once explained.

The second caveat to Ghost Stories is in its choice of language. Players are told they are banishing ghosts back to hell. The ghosts themselves have fairly spooky names like "flesh devourer" or "hope killer." This may be troubling for some parents who find that type of verbiage inappropriate for their homes. As an aside, the same warning extends to the films- they have sequences that are hysterical but also some spooky or sexual scenes- please preview before having your teens watch them.

I personally liked Ghost Stories. I like cooperative games and this one really has the players working together to accomplish their goal. The genre is one I'm fond of and the game really captures the spooky and silly flavour of it. Most parents have a sense of whether their children will say "fighting Chinese ghosts and zombies using magic? Count me in!" For those families this is a great product.

Pros: cooperative, exciting, great subject matter

Cons: terrible rulebook, spooky language may not be for everyone, esoteric subject matter

Beyond the Basics: good replay value and several supplements.

Dominion: Intrigue - Quick to Learn and Fun

2009-11-10T10:20:00.000-08:00

I purchased a copy of bestselling Dominion:Intrigue (D:I) a while ago and had a chance to play it this weekend. While sales doesn't always guarantee quality my group found this to be a fun game with basically three rules. It's going to the top of my list of recommended games although to read about it doesn't do the play justice.

D:I is a sequel to the bestselling game Dominion. You don't need a copy of Dominion to play it but having one gives you more play options. Confusingly there is another sequel called Dominion:Seaside which does require a copy of Dominion to play. All the games have a similar structure. Players get ten cards and draw five randomly into their hand. Some cards may give the player money to spend, some may be "played" and cause some effect to occur. In a player's turn they may play one card in front of them and buy one card from an assortment in the center of the table. After playing and buying the player takes all cards (played, purchased, and any left in the hand) and places them in a discard pile. When you run through your original pile of ten cards you take all the cards from the discard pile, shuffle them, and start over by drawing five.

Given the relatively simple sequence of draw, play, buy, and discard what makes this game shine? The key to the Dominion series is in the cards which you purchase. In any game you have ten different types of cards to buy. these are called Kingdom Cards. Each Kingdom Card has some special power. One might give you more money to spend, one might allow you to buy another thing. Or one might let you play another card. In addition a player may buy more money cards. Once purchased these cards go into your discard pile and have to wait until the discard pile is reshuffled and dealt out. Imagine you buy Kingdom Card that gives you one extra gold coin. When that ends up in your hand later on you can play it and have more money to spend. Now imagine you use that money to buy a card that lets you buy two things instead of one. If you play that card later you could buy twice. Finally, imagine some cards allow you to play additional cards in the same turn. Suddenly you lay down a sequence from you hand which allows you to buy more stuff, play extra cards, and even draw more cards from your deck and play them as well. Discovering and playing out these sequences of cards is surprisingly fun and satisfying.

How fun and satisfying is it, really? We played with two people who were infrequent gamers. In the first few turns we purchased things fairly randomly just to see how the game would play. Ten minutes in and the turns were going fast and smooth and each of us was having a great time stringing together Kingdom Cards to create wilder and wilder combinations. With the possible exception of Bang! I don't think I've ever seen a game that people caught on to as quickly and had so much fun at.

Just to tie things up, the goal of the game is to purchase cards with victory point values. Victory point cards cost money and the cards with more points cost more to buy. In the end the players tally up their victory points cards and the person with the most points wins.

D:I is a simple game with the potential for complex strategy. Players must decide which cards to buy with the understanding that they can't choose when the card will pop up in their hand. Further, players must decide whether to spend on money cards, cards with victory points, or Kingdom Cards. You need more money to afford better Kingdom Cards. You can't win unless you buy victory point cards. There are lots of fun choices to make and strategies to try.

Another nice quality about D:I is that it's fast. Experienced players could probably finish a game in less than an hour. Of course if you finish quickly you'll want to play again. And again...

I highly recommend D:I for families with older children or teens. The rules are simple, the various cards are colorful, and the game is fast. There are a good number of Kingdom Cards in the basic set and you only use about half in any given game. This means that each game may play out differently as you combine different cards in new ways. Finally, the game has a collectible card game feel to it which may make it easier for kids who play Pokemon and Magic to grasp.

I got my copy of Dominion:Intrigue at Your Move Games in Davis Square. I've seen copies at Hobby Bunker, Pandemonium, and Hit and Miss in Lexington. This is really a classic-to-be and a great starter game.

Pros: simple, deep strategy, huge replay value

Cons: looks really confusing and dull until you play it

Beyond the Basics: awesome replay value in the single box, plus supplements!

The Adventurers - Light Exploration Game

2009-11-05T10:38:00.000-08:00

We have a very mixed opinion of buried treasure. In one hand it seems to exist purely for the purposes of being heroically unearthed and spirited away. On the other hand we expect that anyone who is even slightly too greedy in treasure hunting is going to get their due at the hands of some trap or hidden creature. The characters who finish the story basking on a beach in Aruba seem to know exactly how many rubies are appropriate to snatch from the Tomb of Mysteries. The publishers of The Adventurers work with this dynamic to create an adventure game in which players struggle to balance greed and caution. The winner of this game is the person who knows when to stop pilfering and start running.

The board for The Adventurers depicts a Mayan tomb replete with treasure chambers, winding corridors, rickety bridges and rushing rivers. The players compete to grab treasure from various parts of the tomb and then escape in one piece. Each player begins the game by choosing an adventuring identity and token. The tokens are nicely sculpted miniatures just begging for paint. Each adventurer will have some special ability that may prove helpful in the tomb- swimming for example. The players put their adventurer figures at the entrance of the temple and then take turns moving and grabbing treasure.

The play mechanics of The Adventurers are pretty simple. Each turns players roll five dice and try and roll high. For each high roll they get one "action." The definition of "high" depends on the amount of treasure you are carrying. The more treasure, the higher the roll required. Players use actions to move, decode traps, pick locks, and grab more loot. The key ability listed there is probably "move." In each turn a boulder moves along the main corridor and will eventually seal off the tomb entrance. In addition a room full of treasure also features walls which slowly close together. Through the game players will use their actions to seek out and grab treasure from various locations in the tomb. As the players merrily run amuck they must keep an eye on which exits remain viable or they run the risk getting trapped. Then they must escape over the rope bridge or through the underground stream. As before, these tasks are harder when carrying lots of goodies.

The Adventurers strikes me as a pleasing but ultimately light game. The players have the choice of different characters to play and each gives a different ability. There is some randomness to the traps and obstacles. Still, repeated plays of the game aren't likely to reveal some subtle depths of strategy. At the same time you could say the same about games like Sleeping Queens and Mousetrap. The Adventurers may be a board game which delivers the fun in terms of simply experiencing it, rather than through thought and strategy.

In that context The Adventurers has a lot to offer as a fun but light diversion. It's fun to gather treasure, it's fun to try and decide whether to risk carrying off just one more bag of gold, it's fun to see friends and family succeed or fall off rickety bridges. In games of course, not real life! One slight drawback to the game as a family event is that the illustrations are pretty sexist. The male adventurers are all sorts of humorous caricatures, the females all have skimpy outfits and gigantic, barely restrained breasts. Did we just travel back to 1975? I imagine playing this with my daughter and just grimace- which floozy would you like to play? Well, creative parents who care can come up with some creative solution.

Aside from the freakish retro sexism The Adventurers is a simple and light adventure game. Not a classic for the ages but pretty entertaining and a decent way to wile away a cold winter's day.

Pros: simple, easily grasped game dynamic

Cons: fire that illustrator!

Beyond the Basics: if they like it a lot then go buy Labyrinth Lord, Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (not 4th edition thank you) or Castles and Crusades.

I'm Friends With the Cool Kids At Last

2009-10-29T11:57:00.000-07:00

Are you curious to know what famous role playing game authors are up to? Many of them have Facebook pages! At last some purpose for this otherwise silly internet thing. Look for pages for Green Ronin Publishing, the man who brings us Grognardia, and the mastermind behind Elf Lair Games among others.

Legend of the Five Rings card game

2009-10-29T10:24:00.000-07:00

The thrilling surprise that is Race for the Galaxy led me to look into other games that feature a multitude of cards. One of those was the Game of Thrones card game. Another is the Legend of the Five Rings card game.

The Legend of the Five Rings (L5R) franchise began is the mid 1990's and has spawned both collectible card and role playing games. It is set in the fictional land of Rokugan, a fantastic land that resembles medieval Japan. Over the last decade or so the setting has evolved. Various families and groups in the land have had their fortunes rise and fall. Fictional characters have appeared and risen to power or fallen into ignominy. One of L5R's allures is that unlike Tolkien's Middle Earth or Howard's Hyborea the background world is dynamic and changeable.

The L5R card game is collectible and much of the play resembles that of other similar games. Players begin the game with a starter deck of cards. They can buy "boosters" which give them new, randomly determined cards. The basic strategy of the game revolves around which cards to include in your deck when you play.

The rules for the L5R card game are available online. I printed them and they come out to a healthy thirty seven pages. Now some of this is the result of some great illustrations and some the result of a rules glossary, but clearly L5R requires a bit of reading in advance to play. In comparison to Game of Thrones the cards have more information and rules to pay attention to. I did my reading and then dragged an innocent bystander into a few games.

Our experience in game play was positive but not riveting. Players take turns drawing cards and then placing them on the table. Certain cards can represent locations, events, or specific characters. At some point players will choose to attack their opponents with one or more characters and the opponent must then choose character cards of their own to defend with. The characters have varying degrees of deadliness on the battlefield and certain events can make battles go one way or the other. Players can accumulate "honor" points and certain powerful characters will only be playable with higher levels of honor.

In a general sense a person is either going to love or hate this sort of game. My goodhearted wife tolerated it. I enjoyed the variety and color of the cards. Oddly enough, not knowing the full mythology of the L5R universe didn't seem to diminish the enjoyment of the game. I think that may be because the characters are portrayed so very very broadly. A noble appearing general in armor is probably heroic, a sneaky looking man in a black body suit is probably a spy, and a sexy woman in a one piece body suit is probably some sort of seductive personality. In contrast the characters in the Game of Thrones game were harder to get a grip on- in the latter's case the illustrations just depicted stressed out people holding swords. You could argue that this is because Game of Thrones has more complex characterization and I'm sure that's true, but it makes the game fiction harder to grasp without reading the background information.

My wife also found the basic idea of L5R irritating- that to have a good deck you'd better be prepared to spend money on boosters. I agree that this is a troubling concept and yet buying booster packs is fun and exciting. Who knows what will be inside?! I suppose I'll have to wear my "sucker" tattoo but building a deck seems like good fun.

In summary I didn't find the L5R card game to be another Race for the Galaxy but I think for people inclined to try a collectible card game it's a good product to consider. The rules are longer than Game of Thrones and the game may be more expensive in the long run but the ease of entering into the world is a nice selling point. One key issue with either game is that a single player with a deck is not going to have much fun. I would make sure you have a local community of players or a goodhearted spouse before investing in either of these games for a child.

I got my L5R cards at Your Move Games in Davis Square and at Pandemonium Books in Central Square.

Pros: fun cards, easy to get into the world concept

Cons: potential bottomless money pit, lengthy rules

Beyond the Basics: lots of replay value but beware the Beanie Baby phenomenon, any collectible item can become tomorrow's trash in a blink of an eye.

Game of Thrones card game

2009-10-21T11:31:00.000-07:00

I've enjoyed George r. r. Martin's fiction for decades now. Some of his early work captured the mystery and magic of space travel in a way few other authors could manage. As the years have progressed his fiction has grown a bit less startling and inventive and perhaps more approachable to the general public. His fantasy series which began with A Game of Thrones is a prime example of this. I think it's quite superior to the majority of fantasy fiction these days but not quite as heady and imaginative as its predecessors. Nevertheless, Martin's early, edgy material didn't spawn a multitude of spinoffs including board, role playing, and card games. Let's talk about a recent product, the Game of Thrones Living Card Game (GoT) .

The 1990's birthed the concept of a collectible card game. This is a game in which players buy a starter pack of cards and then "booster" packs of additional cards. Each card may give you some new advantage or ability in the game setting. Some cards are quite common, others are rare and you might have to buy dozens of booster packs before coming across one. Or, of course, you could Buy a rare card from another player. Thus the issue of collectibility. And also the fantastic shadow economy that these games create in which teens and preteens throw down impressive sums for a rare card. This financial aspect has turned some people away from these games as they find the investment required to play to be off putting or perhaps just plain insane.

Fantasy Flight Games has attempted to bring new life to some older card games with the idea of a Living Card Game. They market the original games in starter and booster boxes but there is no longer a mystery regarding the pack's contents. The product is designed to suit a player or group of players who simply want to play without the trading, collecting, and selling. GoT is one of Fantasy Flight's first attempts at making the Living Card Game concept a success.

In GoT you control one of several noble families in an attempt to rule the land of Westeros. At the beginning of the game you get a deck of cards specific to your family or "house." Some cards may portray members of the family or other significant people. Some cards may depict magic items or armor. Some cards may represent locations like a fortress or events which could occur like a plague or battle. You shuffle your deck, draw seven cards randomly, sit down in a circle and you're ready to play.

The course of the game has three major phases. In one phase you "play" you cards and lay a certain number from your hand into the space before you. If a card is played it gives you some benefit. A knight may be able to fight in a battle later, a card depicting a fortress may protect you from attack, an event may give you some advantage or cause trouble for an opponent. You can play a limited number of cards so there is some strategy in deciding which to play at what time. Further, you draw cards randomly from your deck so there is no knowing what card will find its way into your hand next.

The second component of the game is challenging a opponent. You may challenge using force, intrigue, or make a political power play. As one might imagine, a knight will be more effective in force, a spy card would be helpful in intrigue, and a courtier might do well in political attacks. Again the players are confronted with some decisions to make- if you only have knights in front of you then you will be vulnerable to spies. Players who make sure to have a variety of forces in play will do better. Challenges are resolved using a simple mechanism with plenty of special rules and exceptions, all described in good detail on the cards themselves. In our playtest we found the challenge rules to go quickly and smoothly and we had several non-gamers taking part.

The last element of the game is that each turn the players choose different positions within the court of Westeros. You may choose to be tax collector, for example, and as a result you get more revenue in that turn. The game adds a nice twist by dictating that some positions cannot attack others, and that some may help others. The result of this is that if one player is a huge threat you can jockey for a position that they are prohibited from attacking. Further, players are pretty much forced to alternately cooperate and clash. I like this touch as it reinforces the idea that the fighting here isn't personal, it's all business. In one turn you may slay someone's knight and in the next defend their castle. I feel this is a nice element in a game for teens as it keeps things from becoming personal and bitter.

We enjoyed GoT for several reasons. I liked the different qualities of the families in play. One family specializes in resolute fighters and giant winter wolves. One family excels in sneakiness and intrigue. Players will have different play experiences depending on which house they play. The variety of cards within each deck was also interesting and there seemed to be a variety of ways to score points. I felt like overall GoT had good replay value.

My wife liked the sense that there was a story associated with the game. While she hadn't read the books the various characters seemed interesting and evocative. As a fan of the books I got much more from the game. Potentially someone with no experience in the fiction could be a little left in the cold by the game and that is a downside to GoT. Still, whether you know the story of Nymeria the giant wolf or not, a giant wolf is pretty cool in itself.

The play itself went smoothly and fast. We look for games we can complete relatively quickly and GoT was satisfyingly speedy. Further, the process of challenges, counter challenges, battles and escapes was pretty exciting and kept people's attention. Players do very little sitting and waiting in GoT and that's appreciated.

Finally, GoT is a Living Card Game after all. So I ran out and purchased some booster packs to see what they had to add. I found that they contained more interesting cards and were pretty well designed to offer something useful to all the houses in play. I feel a desire to get more and more boosters so I'm not sure that GoT is quite the money saver it touts itself as but I believe it's less expensive that a typical collectible card game. The booster are arranged in a groups and the grouping is a little esoteric. Look for guidance as to what to buy on the Fantasy Flight Games GoT forum.

In summary, I found a lot to like with GoT. The rules are smooth and fast moving. The box set gets you started with a satisfying set of cards. The political element and maneuvering is a nice touch. The story is interesting, especially if you know the fiction. This of course leads to the downside. If you don't know the fiction you may find the whole thing a little pointless or boring. I wouldn't get this game as a surprise for someone. I would recommend it as a game you and your teen should check out together, however, and if the teen is interested, then grab it. I got my copy at Pandemonium Books in Central Square.

Speaking of buying into game concepts that are completely foreign, we'll talk about Legend of the Five Rings next.

Pros: affordable, good game concept, fast paced, fun

Cons: relies on a somewhat obscure fiction series

Beyond the Basics: Hundreds of new cards to buy and lot of replay value here

Carnage - Gaming Event in Vermont

2009-10-09T13:08:00.001-07:00

Carnage is a gaming convention held yearly in Vermont. This year the event takes place over November 6th through 8th. The web site is strikingly hard to navigate but the events listing (called a "pre-reg book," look to the right of the main page) is impressive. The selection of games to choose from is really superb. There are some great new and old board games, some role playing games I've been looking forward to playing, and some collectible card games that would torch my wallet and yet look pretty appealing as well. Interested parties should check it out!

Castle Panic - another fun coopertive game

2009-10-08T08:13:00.000-07:00

It wasn't long ago that the only cooperative games on the market were those produced by Family Pastimes. Not to knock that outstanding publisher but it's been exciting to see the cooperative game niche really expand in recent years. Let's look at a recent product which I believe hails from my old home in Texas.

Castle Panic is a game in which the players attempt to defend their castle from advancing goblins, orcs and trolls. The board is set up with a castle in the center and rings of territory surrounding it. The farthest ring can be reached by archers. The next closest ring can be reached by knights. The absolute closest ring can be reached by swordsmen. Through the course of the game various monsters appear outside the farthest circle and then begin to advance towards the castle. The player's challenge is to activate and use their archers, knights, and swordsmen in the best fashion and prevent the monsters from reaching and destroying the castle and its walls.

The specific rules system is hardly more complex than the basic game concept. Players have a hand of cards representing archers, swordsmen, etc etc and play them during their turn. Cards may slay monsters, repair the castle, or some other useful task. In a given turn players refresh their hand and then play as many cards as they wish. In each turn a player also draws monster tokens randomly and places them in the forest around the castle. The monsters advance automatically once placed.

The game system has some variability built into it. Some monster tokens represent stronger enemies. Some cause a special event to occur such as forcing the players to discard certain cards or causing a huge boulder to appear and roll towards the castle. The variability, along with the inexorable march of the monsters towards the hapless castle, adds a good amount of drama to the game.

In the end drama is what this game is about. It's exciting to work with your friends to defend the castle and slay monsters. It's exciting to see them steadily advancing, or to suddenly draw the "Goblin King" token and find yourself awash in goblins. I have my doubts about the strategic qualities of Castle Panic, this is more just a fun, cooperative romp.

I think Castle Panic is a great game for players old enough to cooperate and play as a team, but too young for more sophisticated games. I'm not sure I see this as a great crossover game that adults can play as well. Still, as a choice for a fun evening with the kids I think Castle Panic has lots to offer.

Castle Panic is published by a smaller company. interested parties could special order it or contact the publishers, Fireside Games.

Pros: cooperative, exciting, great gripping concept

Cons: not a deep game per se, good for younger players.
Beyond the basics: pretty basic, really, but probably lots of replay value till the kids grow out of it.