What BOARD GAME(s) have you been playing?

^with respect to those games, my buddy beat me for the first time in the 20 times or so we've played it last night, he always plays USSR. Playing the digital edition a bunch against the computer really helped his skill and card knowledge, I could tell.

Anyway, game 1 was a typical quick and dirty USSR win on turn 4. He pried me out of Asia and managed a deft play in Europe to neutralize my advantage there and then rolled me. So quick, in fact, that we got to set up and played another where I did one of those slow, choking arm wrestling matches that TS is so famous for. It went to final scoring but it was ultimately an easy win. It was nice to have him beat me for real as it put some heart into him.

I'm thinking maybe of trying some of the optionals in the CE... I'd really like to try to the optional Turn 0 start.

What's the turn zero start ?! Sounds cool

It's a light dice rolling and bluffing minigame to start the game that varies the board start a bit.

Read the rules and played the first scenario of Ghost Panzer by Jim Krone (Talon, Space Empires, etc) solo. It's pretty cool but it's one of those brutal starts where you don't know the modifiers so a 30-40 minute intro scenario starts dragging because you have to look up the +/- modifiers for EVERY shot.

I do like that the game fundamentally works on morale checks for all actions which are eroded by suppression. Units starts with 10 so they automatically act as you want them to but as you go farther into the game and units come under fire they stop doing what you have planned for them. The penalty for moving infantry in the open is absolutely staggering so you have to make sure that your opponent fails their morale checks by putting fire on them. It's a really unique way to come at the genre from. Most deaths happen in close combat.

Gary Sax wrote: Read the rules and played the first scenario of Ghost Panzer by Jim Krone (Talon, Space Empires, etc) solo. It's pretty cool but it's one of those brutal starts where you don't know the modifiers so a 30-40 minute intro scenario starts dragging because you have to look up the +/- modifiers for EVERY shot.

I do like that the game fundamentally works on morale checks for all actions which are eroded by suppression. Units starts with 10 so they automatically act as you want them to but as you go farther into the game and units come under fire they stop doing what you have planned for them. The penalty for moving infantry in the open is absolutely staggering so you have to make sure that your opponent fails their morale checks by putting fire on them. It's a really unique way to come at the genre from. Most deaths happen in close combat.

The infantry mods are pretty easy... there are only some you will frequently use especially in the intro scenario (1/2 for buildings, 1 for concealment, 3 for adjacent, -4 when target is moving in open space). Tanks mods are much more confusing, and also that you gain bonus twice for adjacency during OpFire (once the normal mod, the other bringing your proficiency fire closer to your actual firepower) may cause some confusion.

edulis wrote: but it also got me thinking about gaming in middle and high school, when we did not have the internet videos and forums to help learn the rules. If we did not understand a rule we just made shit up or if we misplayed a rule it would stick and not be discovered for years later, since typical one person read the rules and explained the game.

We would argue and end up calling the GW phone trolls who were aptly named when it came to their interest and/or understanding of the rules.

I maintain to this day that "start of turn" effects trigger before "start of first phase" effects. We settled that one (against me) with a die roll.

Had a really good five player Shadows of Brimstone adventure on Friday night- light on combat, more of a push-your-luck and spatial puzzle game. I might post more in another topic.

Saturday was crowded at the tavern- 42 people attended the group over the 10 hours to the point where it was difficult for some to find a booth. A good problem to have, for sure. For the first game three of us played Isle of Skye in which one of the other players proved to be a real shark, with a (to me) monster score of 130 points, which is like double what I've usually seen. That made up for the total shut-out drubbing he got in Sons of Anarchy last week. I think the other two of us were just not paying attention to his mighty lake strategy.

Next was La Granja with the same group, and while it can be kind of tricky to explain, the others seemed to get it, and we had a good old time breeding pigs. The market was brutal, with stall-bombing every turn, leaving only two stalls standing in the final round. I managed to make my income/delivery boosting strategy work for a fairly modest win. This is still my favourite Euro perhaps because it covers all the best beats, like one of those "Stars on 45" remix singles.

That was enough gentle grassland related gaming for one evening, and the scene switched to the zombie-infested urban ruins of Zombicide: Prison Outbreak which is becoming my favourite of all the sets. In this mission we had to get the concrete saw, cut our way into the prison, and then clean house. We had zombie dogs added in along with the regular and berserker zombies. These missions usually all include some door/gate rotating/switching making a fun puzzle out of how to herd zombies in certain ways. The berserkers stop us from cheesing large groups with ranged attacks. All of which adds up to a much more interesting and engaging game than the bland, generic (literally) grey tedium of Season 1 or Black Plague.

We were ruminating on playing someone's copy of Discworld: Ankh Morpork, while I ruminated regretting selling it on for $20 shortly before they announced it will never, ever exist again. I mentioned that as much as I like it, I'd rather play Chaos in the Old World (which I think is why I sold it anyway), and everyone agreed to play that. We played with the expansion decks again (four players this time without the Horned Rat) and I played Khorne, which I don't remember if I ever did before. The game came down to points on the fifth turn. Four regions were primed to ruin in the turn, and if I could have killed enough cultists in one of the first three, I could have snatched victory with my strong setup in the fourth. Alas, I didn't reap enough blood for the blood god, and was edged out by Tzeench 58-52. I love this game, maybe even more so with the alternative decks. I'm more than half-tempted to sell on Blood Rage, though it's like the Diet-Coke version that I can get to play with more people.

Played Vino last night, a euro from 1999. I'd played it before in 2011, my first time. Rated it a seven at the time.

Boy have my tastes changed. This is one of those no-luck-after-startup nonsense theme utterly calculable Euros. If you enjoy everyone else at the table telling you what the optimum play is and telling you that you played wrong, then you need to grab a copy of this delight.

Downgraded to a 4. A generous 4.

PSA time...Ghostbusters: Protect the Barrier is one of those hidden gems in the mass market crowd. It's a rethemed version of Ghost Fightin' Treasure Hunters, which won Kinderspiel in 2014, but it actually has 2 additional modes of play and a couple extra bits for about half the price ($20 MSRP). Played it last night and thought it was good "AT Junior" fun. Ghosts pop up in Pandemic fashion, but it's kind of a dungeon crawl with oodles of dice rolling. My wife and I loved the new Ghostbusters movie, so the theme was a big hit with us and we thought it fit the mechanics quite well. I think it would do well closing the night on our F:AT Thursdays, but if you have kids it's a no-brainer, especially if they like Ghostbusters. The four different modes of play offer a very good range of difficulty, so finding something to fit your kid's age/experience level is great and the more advanced stuff makes it more interesting for adults. Can't beat it for the price and availability.

So, a better $20 Ghostbusters game than the gazillion dollar Kickstarter one.

I just ordered it from Amazon, my kids are fascinated with GB right now but they are still just a little too young for the language/sexy stuff in the movies.

I bought it on Amazon and haven't played it yet. Looks like pan-kid-demic. Very cool. The Tom Vasel review made it seem really fun and kid-friendly, and my daughter's birthday is coming up, so this should be a good fit.

Sevej wrote: The infantry mods are pretty easy... there are only some you will frequently use especially in the intro scenario (1/2 for buildings, 1 for concealment, 3 for adjacent, -4 when target is moving in open space). Tanks mods are much more confusing, and also that you gain bonus twice for adjacency during OpFire (once the normal mod, the other bringing your proficiency fire closer to your actual firepower) may cause some confusion.

The vehicle rules made me wince when I saw them in the back, made me wish I hadn't gotten the eastern front one which is a lot of tank battles, I think? The proficient tasks modifiers table WAS very confusing, so that one got me.

Game seems cools. I like it way more than the very little I played ASL so far. Model makes more sense to me.

We had a Pain-A-Lympics this past Sunday. My original plan for the Game Day was to hit them with 1) games we’d never played before and 2) games that are wholly unpopular, for one reason or another. Lord of the Rings was an anomaly, but fell in line because of the “pain” aspect. Unfortunately, one of my players couldn’t make it due to illness, so we stuck to the games that worked best with fewer players.

The first game we played was Tom Clancy’s Politika. I was the Communists, my wife was the Church, Eddie was the Mafia, and Trish was the Reformers. It was the first time playing for Eddie and JoAnn, while Trish and I were veterans.

The game’s leader went back and forth. I took a minor lead, only to be smacked down by the Church and the Reformers. I made influence deals with the Mafia, and eventually made an alliance with them, securing our lead. The game really didn’t get going until the last two rounds, then all the Event cards came into play. I was second, and still in the alliance with the frontrunning Mafia, but I didn’t trust Eddie to hold up the alliance in the last round. So, on the last round, I switched sides and got in bed with the Reformers, who were the last to take their turn and in last place. In response, the Mafia and the Church got in bed, but it didn’t help in the end. The Commies and the Reformers eked out a joint victory.

Our next game was Lord of the Rings, which everyone except for me were newbies. We blazed through Moria easily, but then the shit hit the fan when we got to Helm’s Deep. We were overtaken by events and a lot of us were on the middle of the corruption track, with Sauron just a short distance away tempting us with cookies.

Shelob’s Lair proved to be our undoing. Multiple Events hitting us back to back to back royally screwed us (we referred to the Event Tile Bag as the Bag o’ Crap) and Frodo, albeit got us out of the Lair, didn’t have the requisite Life tokens and he fell to Sauron. My wife’s impression: “This game is just mean.” I told her that it is simply Elder Sign without the laughable pretense that you might win.

We finished out the evening playing a double of Zombie Dice, which everyone except me loves. JoAnn and Eddie won, respectfully.

Michael Barnes wrote: my kids are fascinated with GB right now but they are still just a little too young for the language/sexy stuff in the movies.

The new movie so, so close to being 100% kid safe. There's one joke early one that's likely to go over their heads, but there's one use of "shit" later on and how they defeat the baddie that causes me to give pause before saying it's ok for kids. It's also way creepier than the originals.

Rliyen wrote: We finished out the evening playing a double of Zombie Dice, which everyone except me loves. JoAnn and Eddie won, respectfully.

There's a cheap little expansion with like 3 or 5 dice..adds Santa, adds a 2x brain. Really adds to the variance.

SuperflyTNT wrote:

Rliyen wrote: We finished out the evening playing a double of Zombie Dice, which everyone except me loves. JoAnn and Eddie won, respectfully.

There's a cheap little expansion with like 3 or 5 dice..adds Santa, adds a 2x brain. Really adds to the variance.

Oh, I have it. And it was used last night. Still not enjoyable. Sad part is I used to like it.