What BOARD GAME(s) have you been playing?

I went out to Titan Games in Duluth on Saturday, because they're a nice bunch there. I finished up half a game of Splendor for someone, then three of us dug into Falling Sky. It was a good five+ hours of game, including some interruptions, but the time passed well for me. I was struggling to make anything work as the Aedui, not helped when the Romans came and wiped out two of my allies in the south. The Averni player was unable to kill off any legions until he realized late in the game that Devastate would serve him much better than trying to battle. When we added up the "closest to victory" scores, Averni won, and I was one point behind in the end.

After that, I left for the tavern, which is my usual Saturday group. Four of us played Shadowrun: Crossfire; by now I think all of us knew the game and we had a pretty straightforward time of it. I went Staggered as usual, being the squishy Elf Mage, but that was tying up two obstacles who weren't hitting the other players so it worked out. Max Crossfire level was three which is kind of "on-par" for a good game through the three scenes you have to complete.

The last game of the night was The Others in which I faced two players running two heroes each. We did the basic mission again, but one player got frustrated when trying to clear monsters from locations they needed to do a cleanse action on, because I'd use my reaction to move monsters back onto the space. It's a tit-for-tat system but I think they should have chosen the other path (the heroes can choose between two tasks). They were doing well at killing stuff, so should have focused on that mission instead. They did kill the avatar pretty easily, but ran out of heroes.

I got to do a little gaming over the holiday weekend.

Cockroach Poker - this time with two of my brothers and my wife. We played enough games so that everyone got to lose one.

I then forced them to play a game of Sheriff of Nottingham. On the strength of that one play, I'd say 'okay, not great'. I'm not sure if the family gamers will play it again, because it turns out the sisters-in-law dislike bluffing games.

Then yesterday I gamed with the coworkers. I roped them into learning and playing Evolution. I like the game, but I'm not sure if I could get the coworkers to play again.

After that one we played Machi Koro. The dice were unkind and/or my brain was done for the day, and I came in dead last.

Finally did the Minnesota meetup for A Game of Thrones, plus Dune. Players included F:ATties wadenels, delobius, and edulis, for a total of five players.

A Game of Thrones: I got Pyke, and somehow I got the usual center board squeeze reserved for the Lannisters, who came out swinging at me on turn one. Then the Starks came at me from the north. Although I generally fought well in 14 battles, there were a couple of key losses that cost me dearly. I spent the last few turns of the game clinging to my home and the surrounding bay, though I did manage to hang on to Riverrun for most of the game. Baratheon won on turn nine, taking advantage of Lannisters weakened by ongoing battles with Pyke.

Dune: Wade and I had played some Dune in the distant past, but nobody else at the table had played at all. So some rookie mistakes were made, including my suggestion to just randomly draw factions instead of leaving the Ben Gesserit out. So I got to play Harkonnen in a game without Atreides. I vaguely remembered that Harkonnen was a good threat for an early win but would struggle in a longer game, so I played aggressively. By the end of turn one, I had both of the ornithopter strongholds. On turn two, I shipped a big attack force onto a third stronghold. The other players scrambled to stop me, but I managed to win all three fights that round, thanks to poison and treachery.

Played a couple of games of Xia over the past couple of weeks and it was an instant hit with the kids (age range 8-13). I'm enjoying it too, but I think it needs a few more tiles to prevent the map from becoming completely explored quite so soon. After reading the rules for the upcoming expansion I think I may just incorporate some of the game fixes into the base system, particularly the market adjustment.

Also got in my first game of Heroscape, four-player, using the Rise of the Valkyrie set. It ran a bit long, and my son was getting frustrated with a low dice roll curse on his team until the full drama of the odds finally happened and a couple of under-dog vikings took down my seemingly invincible dragon (Mighty Charos). I predict large tubs of plastic taking up space in various closets in the future.

I enjoy how both of these games lend themselves to cool narrative moments without intra-diegetic fluff. Funny and/or remarkable stuff just happens and the evocativeness of the game environment lets the players make their own micro-stories/memories. Speaking of which, I need to pick up Zimby Mojo soon. It's also refreshing to play games where the miniatures actually mean something, and in the case of Heroscape, actually have physical relevance to the game mechanisms (line of sight, movement clearance, etc.)

Played some Splendor with my wife & son and I lost badly. I've only played it a couple of times and don't really enjoy it all that much but the other two play it regularly.

Also started a game of Pixel Tactics and brushed up on my "reading upside down" skills. We'll finish that one tonight and probably start up another Heroscape game.

Michael Barnes wrote: even taking Croissant in the end.

What happened to the worlds of Biscuit, Scone, and Crumpet?

I don't know but there was squid for lunch.

So I just got the Band of Brothers: Texas Arrows kickstarter (just the expansion, no $$$), and finished organizing everything. I was catching up with the latest season of Game of Thrones (which may very well be my favorite season), so I set up a small, 2-maps, scenario. Before I knew it, I had finished wiping out unfortunate second line German troops with my US paratrooper off a village..

Finally set up a time to get a first play of Star Wars Rebellion in. Set everything up...realized that somehow I don't have the Action cards. Like, both decks are totally gone. I've got everything else. No idea why I wouldn't have them. I'd bagged the game up last week, so I guess it's possible I lost them. Kind of unlikely though, because when I bag games, I usually just throw all the cards of the same size in one bag. I can't imagine why I would have separated one kind of card in particular, since I hadn't even read the rules yet. Hopefully FFG's willing to send replacements.

We wound up just making do with pulling a random leader each recruitment turn. I did miss having the special abilities though.

Chaz wrote: Finally set up a time to get a first play of Star Wars Rebellion in. Set everything up...realized that somehow I don't have the Action cards. Like, both decks are totally gone.

Thanks a lot for the nightmares I'll have tonight.

I'm contuining my goal of just playing the ones I own more often. So I taught a few friends Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective. I have the old Chessex version from the early 80s. We played the first scenario since I've forgotten all the details in them. We played fully cooperative and would discuss each move with each other before deciding. Took us way too long as we were inclined to follow subplots before the crimes first. Everyone had a blast though and wants to play it again. They were disappointed it only came with 10 cases. So I spent the next day finding the free cases on BGG and researching the expansions coming out for it. Mythos Tales should be arriving soon too which will scratch the same itch.

Later tonight, I'm playing Arkham Horror with a few other friends. I had found the summer league kit FFG put out around 2009 and we've been playing through that. It's a slow go as we play once every month or two, but I've been enjoying it.

I took some time off work to relax and attend Buckeye Game Fest. What I played was...

Thursday: Two games of Scythe. In the first game I had Blue/Patriotic, chased my tail by trying to do too much, and ended up third out of 4, at 80/66/56/50. The morals of that story were don't chase after too much crap, and remember your faction abilities - on a lost battle I took the defeated unit back to the start point, when as Blue I could have retreated to a lake.

The second Scythe game ended up a lot closer. I had Red/Patriotic. I got the Factory right off the bat, and took 'Pay a combat card to gain 2 popularity'. I used it to get Popularity level 3. One of the other players ended the game at 6, and final scores were 70/70/5*/4*/4*. That took us to tiebreakers, which is 'pieces on the table'. I lost in tiebreakers by one piece, 11/10. I thought I played okay, but so did the winner.

Friday: I got into a game of T'zolkin, then realized that I had forgotten pretty much every rule in the game - it had been a couple of years since I had played it last. So as an effective newbie, I played like one and finished dead last.

Afterwards, I dragged Forbidden Stars out of the club library, to at least read the rules and maybe get in a game. I ended up in a 2-player game with another newbie. We both flailed around while learning the rules, but I flailed less effectively and he won 1-0. I liked it, and maybe I'll hypnotize one of my 40K friends into buying it.

Saturday: I got Star Wars: Rebellion out of the library, and got into a game with a fellow CABS member that I've known for a while. I had Empire, and we both were generally moving the ball forward in the game without too much newbie idiocy. I managed to catch Obi-Wan on a mission while I had a card I wanted to play - 'tell me three planets with one being correct'. That told me where he was, and he knew it. He ran for it, but he didn't have a lot of choices, and ended up right next to a small task force whose job was to hunt abandoned planets, just in case. The next move, the task force stepped on his hiding place for a win. I liked Rebellion so much that I dragged out the credit card and bought a copy.

To wrap up the day, I checked out Blood Rage. Got one other player, read the rules, etc. I cashed in a bunch of quests, managed to get points by dying a lot, and ended up winning 110-ish - 90-ish. My vast 1-game experience tells me that Blood Rage needs more players. It was fun, but I could see where playing with three or four players opens up some of the card options.

Was my weekend fun? I got to try some games and I did. I know the game is about the play, not the victory, but winning a few doesn't hurt. None of the folks I met were irredeemable assholes. I'll count that as a success.

And I'm with Chaz - thanks for making me worry about my unopened game. I guess in a few minutes I'll be opening it up to check it out.

ETA: Forbidden Stars and Rebellion were my first experience with what must be FFG's Learn to Play/Reference Guide scheme. I liked it. Other designers/developers should steal that idea.

Sorry for introducing paranoia, but is it still paranoia if you're missing entire decks?

I can't remember if Rebellion's cards came with the decks in baggies or shrink wrapped. If they were shrink wrapped, it seems super unlikely that those cards were missing, and more likely I misplaced them. Still don't think I did though, cuz I've looked everywhere I would potentially have sat down with the game unpacked. And I still can't think of why I might've been wandering around with just those decks.

The Learn to Play/Guide system worked well for this one. They've gotten better at doing it. I seem to remember Forbidden Stars not doing it super well, with some important rules only showing up in one place or the other or something.

would it ease you guys' paranoia if I told you that I have your missing decks? Including the ones in shrink?

Maybe not?

Turns out I'm a moron, which is shocking to nobody. My wife found the decks of cards on the mantel above the fireplace. No idea how they got there. I blame having a newborn in the house that I can't remember shit.

Folks who watch this space know that I like hardcore euro worker placement, but not as a competitive game. Instead, I treat it more of a two person puzzle with my wife, building the individual engines is soothing so it's a nice way to do something together. We tally scores but it doesn't matter. Along those lines, we brought out Fields of Arle again and played it---definitely my favorite Uwe game because it is 2 player, resources aren't super tight, and there isn't buying additional workers, so it functions perfectly for my purpose. Glad I got rid of Agricola, as FoA is better than Agricola.

My brother's two oldest kids (13 year old nephew and 11 year old niece/goddaughter) came over last weekend for our son's 6th birthday party. Late at night when he was watching a movie with the 7 year old nephew, we played two games of Settlers of Catan (which I still usually call 'Settlers' rather than Catan). I still love it. It's just such a clean, intuitive design. A new player can get what's going on, and can often feel like they're in it because of the dice and everything. I wonder how long before we see a low-quality version of it at every Target and Wal-mart for $12-20. My niece rarely plays board games at all, but she played two back to back games of it and was in the running in each one. The following morning after we all went to the park and got donuts, we played Codenames: Pictures until I basically had to force them to go home. Pictures is solid; I'm not sure which I prefer but a number of my friends and acquaintances seem to like the new one better. We kept my fiancée and I separate for most of the games of codenames, until the last one. We almost won in two back-to-back 4-card clues. After getting 3 correct on the second clue, she hit the assassin. It was an amazing loss.