Curse Of The Collector or Just Play Da Fuckin Game

Curse that damn gene !

I've just been arranging the yungsta's birthday present - xbox360 with Halo3, and around the same time someone posted on T.O.S about Halo Actionclix boosters being dumped at a cut price store .... so I just had to go and have a look [shoot me] and came back with ten - oh well, if we don't play it much they can sit with all my SW Minis and LotR Combat Hex minis.

Michael Barnes wrote:

I'm usually on the "Yes, Expansions" bandwagon but lately I've kind of cooled on that...I think FFG is kind of to blame, although I definitely don't fault them for extending the value of their properties.

...I'm realizing that I'm not too big on expansions that just add a bunch of cards or new monsters. I like add-on mechanics, the ability to increase player numbers, pick-and-mix additions, and expansions that literally expand how the game is played. I don't want more of the same- ARKHAM HORROR, I'm looking at you.

Great points. Those are exactly the kinds of things that I want and expect from expansions: more players, add-on mechanics, pick-and-mix elements, and game-changing additions.

We play enough Arkham Horror that all of the expansions have been welcome for adding to the replay value, but for those who play less often, I would only recommend the big box expansion, Dunwich and Kingsport. Each new Great Old One is like a new scenario for the game, and more character options are definitely welcome. More importantly, Dunwich greatly improved the sanity and health loss rules by offering more permanent harm that otherwise sped up the gameplay. And Kingsport replaced the tedious endgame dicefest with a more thematic and entertaining final battle.

The only other game where I've been a real sucker for expansion is Zombies!!!, because the base game is such a tantalizing glimpse of what could have been the greatest zombie board game of all time. The first few expansions only offered more cards and map tiles. The School's Out expansion included an interesting new element, the Guts trait, which determines hand size. The Six Feet Under expansion speeds up the game considerably with two new movement options (subways and sewer tunnels), making it more valuable than all the other supplements put together. And the new base game Humans!!! offers the possibility of players playing either humans or zombies.

Michael Barnes wrote:

Even though ROAD TO LEGEND was conceptually great, did it really add to my DESCENT experience? No! I don't play the game any more than I used to.

Wow, weren't you claiming it was the greatest thing since sliced cheese when it came out? Does your opinion of meals change as much as your opinion on games? Your poor wife!

Anyway I'm not a 'collector' as much as a 'completist'. For some reason I love having sets of things. I'd rather have nothing then just partial bits of something. With MOTU I was collecting the new line, then when that finished they brought out the statues. Didn't get any of those so I don't feel like I'm missing anything. But if I had a few I'd want to get them all.
It's the same with everything else for me - I wont watch just an episode or 2 of a show, if I decide to watch Buffy for example then I simply have to watch it from episode one. Even video games, I got Final Fantasy 3 on DS and decided to track down the 1 & 2 gameboy advance cartrage so I could play those first. If I got an Xbox 360 I'd hunt down halo 2 before playing 3 (already played 1). I never watch a sequel to a movie I havn't seen the original of.

I like having everything for a game. It's one of the reasons I never got into Magic or other CCGs - it kills the completest in me. It's odd. So when limited ed expansion stuff comes out I must admit I hate it. It has less to do with feeling special and more to do with just knowing every nook and cranny in a game / story / whatever.

As far as expansion stuff goes, depends on the game. Some games I like new mechanics, some games I like just getting more of the same. Some games I don't think need expansions.

Well, it _is_ a great expansion, and it'll probably get Expansion of the Year at Gameshark. Really, the problem is with me more than the game...my group just doesn't play DESCENT enough to really get anything out of it and that has altered my overall opinion of it. I don't think it makes playing the game any easier, shorter, or better for us but I still think that reframing the dungeon part in the context of an epic adventure is genius. And the mechanics that it uses to that end are genius. But we're not playing it any more than we did before, and when we do we never get that "full quest" feel and we still haven't completed any of the four campaigns I've been in on. Now, if I was in a group that was solid DESCENT players and that was sort of a main game...then yeah, I'd think it'd probably have a lot more to offer. So in the end, it's more that I think it was geared toward the hardcore players than folks like me who play a lot of different games and something like DESCENT ocassionally.

I _hate_ that feeling in CCGs where you feel like you don't have everything...that's such a powerful psychology at work there.

Mr Skeletor wrote:

Anyway I'm not a 'collector' as much as a 'completist'. For some reason I love having sets of things. I'd rather have nothing then just partial bits of something. With MOTU I was collecting the new line, then when that finished they brought out the statues. Didn't get any of those so I don't feel like I'm missing anything. But if I had a few I'd want to get them all.
It's the same with everything else for me - I wont watch just an episode or 2 of a show, if I decide to watch Buffy for example then I simply have to watch it from episode one. I never watch a sequel to a movie I havn't seen the original of.

I like having everything for a game. It's one of the reasons I never got into Magic or other CCGs - it kills the completest in me. It's odd. So when limited ed expansion stuff comes out I must admit I hate it. It has less to do with feeling special and more to do with just knowing every nook and cranny in a game / story / whatever.

Man, you just nailed exactly my feelings about having the collector/completist gene.

I think you complete me.

Road to Legend doesn't make the game any shorter?

Gary Sax wrote:

Road to Legend doesn't make the game any shorter?

I hear that it's a very long road.

Well, here's the deal. It can make individual sessions shorter and it's easier to pack up and "save" the game. However, it still takes forever to get unpacked, set up, and playing so you're _still_ looking at a 3 hour minimum session.

I think there's probably some variant possible where you could just play a single floor dungeon or something using the setup cards...but still, setup and breakdown is pretty extensive.

Michael Barnes wrote:

Well, here's the deal. It can make individual sessions shorter and it's easier to pack up and "save" the game. However, it still takes forever to get unpacked, set up, and playing so you're _still_ looking at a 3 hour minimum session.

Instead I could spend that time playing Dominion 8 times and still have time to put my Jamies on before being tucked into bed.

Ooooh...who are these Jamies? Are they cute?

Octavian wrote:

Ooooh...who are these Jamies? Are they cute?

Stephen Avery wrote:

I game with several hard core collectors and the lure of getting something because it is rare, different, or just plain weird is always there. [...] Besides I always hear "Yeah, I wish I still had that- what was I thinking..."

Steve"packrat"Avery

Having a few weird games in your "collection" isn't bad, but when people try to collect all decks ever published for Agricola I really think that is a pretty embarrassing addiction.

mikoyan wrote:

With all these people buying action figures, hermetically sealing them and packing them away, there wont be the same amount of value to a mint figure.

IIRC Toy Story 2 raised this moral question. I guess they came to the point were it is fine if you don't play with the toys, but then you'd have to give them to a museum or something.

TheDukester wrote:

If Agricola ever had a Blue Oyster Cult deck, I might actually play the damn game.

Until then: pass.

Don't wish too hard for it. I guess when "Scribidinus" (one of the old folks on BGG) is touched by the greatness that is Agricola, he will be urged to create a BÖC expansion.

Shellhead wrote:

Besides the comic collection, I have 80+ boardgames, several CCG collections, 150 music CDs, and several bookcases worth of books. I just can't quite bring myself to get rid of the several CCGs that I rarely play anymore, the 40 boardgames that I rarely play, or the books that I read maybe once a decade. For now, I justify all this stuff because it's a bad time to sell things, and all of this stuff represents long hours of free potential entertainment so I can cut back on spending.

That's a problem I have, too. It's very hard for me to get rid of things. It's not that bad that I keep my counter frames, etc., but for example a lot of toys from my childhood are stuffed in my parent's attic, simply because as a kid I didn't want to give them away and now I'm just too lazy to do it.

Books, I think, are another issue. It's common sense to keep books and put them on a shelf. There are also quite a few books I read two times. An average human forgets a lot of stuff written in a book.

Michael Barnes wrote:

I know at least two "super collectors"...yes, Branham is one of them.

Branham is fine. He collects with style.

Juniper wrote:

I'm going through a purge cycle right now. Ditching good games that I just haven't been playing. It's liberating. I'm thinking about doing the same thing to my CD collection, now.

It's the small expansions that I most regret buying. I'll probably never get around to using all those Blue Moon decks, but they don't have enough value to justify the time required to sell them.

I also want to sell a few games now. Simply because I got to many. I also won't ever again buy an expansion before I played the base game.

ubarose wrote:

There's some interesting research out there on the "collectors gene." The most interesting thing I've read was the theory that it was the primitive human gathering instinct run a muck in an environment of plenty, and that by creating artificial scarcity (limited edition, planned "retirements" ) manufacturers can further trigger the irrational impulse to "gather" and hoard items.

It's amazing really how much of human behavior can be explained by tracing it back to the stone age. Well, we're only civilized since a few hundred years.

I come to realize that I don't like collectors.

DVD collectors are nerds who think having seen this and that movie makes you cool. I've frequently gone to the cinema not a too long time ago, too, but had to stop out of financial and local restrictions (I moved to a town which only has one cinema showing the major movies). Now I only watch maybe one movie every other month I really want to see. It's amazing how I much more appreciate having seen this one film.

Music collectors are strange, too. I like music, but listening to an endless loop of randomly selected songs out of a huge collection drives me mad. I usually buy (yeah really) one album every other month and then listen to it a lot. When I grow tired of it I listen to the other stuff I own.

I think we are really manipulated by the industries to buy a lot of stuff. Not just board games. People who already own a mobile phone buy a new one, because it looks better or has this and that extra feature. The same holds true for every other luxury product, only that I understood this the exposure to board games. The market is fed, maybe every five years something truly revolutionary comes out. I guess it's better to train yourself in renunciation, before it will be forced upon you. (And with the current change in economy and politics it will, if not now, then in 50 years.)

What does it mean exactly to "collect"? Does it mean you buy a lot of games just to have them? As in, you don't even want to play all of them, just own them. Or, do you want to have complete sets of things, like Arkham Horror and all of the expansions?

mheagerty wrote:

What does it mean exactly to "collect"? Does it mean you buy a lot of games just to have them? As in, you don't even want to play all of them, just own them. Or, do you want to have complete sets of things, like Arkham Horror and all of the expansions?

These seem to be different traits, although a gamer may possess both. I like the use of the term collector to describe the gamer with the large game collection and the use of the term completist to describe gamers like me who simply must have every expansion or somehow the game "just isn't complete".

I didn't appreciate the difference until Mr Skeletor used the term "completist" earlier on in the thread.

I'm not actually sure I'm a collector by the common definition.

I don't need to have everything, but I just buy a lot of games...and things.

So, I'm borderline psychotically impulsive. But I have had 38 years to acquire that mass of games. (I got my first game at 3. I still have it. I had a hundred games or so games as a child. Most of the people in Dad's family had a couple of dozen or more. Dad STILL has a wall of 50-60.)

The only thing I probably HAVE to acquire everything at the moment is that Descent game. Mostly because of the labor I've put into the set. Tomb of Ice probably just means some figure painting.