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19 Sep 2016 23:24 #234585 by SuperflyPete
I finally got in a game of Armada. It's slower and more plodding than I remember but still good shit.

I had a Rebel Home One, Whale, Nebulon, and 3 X Wings. Daughter had 2x Victory 2's, Gladiator, Raider, and 2 Ties. All vanilla.

We agreed the first player to get a capital kill wins. I got a huge broadside shot with a badly damaged Home One and imploded a Victory.

Good stuff.
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20 Sep 2016 09:02 #234594 by charlest

trif wrote:

dontbecruel wrote: So is Dragon & Flagon basically a descendant of the old AH Gunslinger?


I was wondering if it was based on Yaquinto's Swashbuckler, which I always thought could do with programmed card movement (instead of writing your moves down on an order sheet.)

And in the two hours it took me to post this I've found CharlesST has already answered.


Yes, I've seen Geoff talk about it a few times both in audio format and writing. I think it references Swashbuckler in the manual too maybe.

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20 Sep 2016 09:48 #234603 by RobertB
Swashbuckler looks like it would have been a lot of fun back in the day. My brother and I played the shit out of AH's Gladiator, which had a similar move/combat system to Swashbuckler. Write your move, execute your move, roll dice and add/subtract modifiers.

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20 Sep 2016 09:56 #234604 by engelstein

charlest wrote:

trif wrote:

dontbecruel wrote: So is Dragon & Flagon basically a descendant of the old AH Gunslinger?


I was wondering if it was based on Yaquinto's Swashbuckler, which I always thought could do with programmed card movement (instead of writing your moves down on an order sheet.)

And in the two hours it took me to post this I've found CharlesST has already answered.


Yes, I've seen Geoff talk about it a few times both in audio format and writing. I think it references Swashbuckler in the manual too maybe.


D&F actually started out as an effort to 'refurbish' Swashbuckler using modern design techniques. I am a huge fan of the original game, and we still bring it out and play it. I actually have two copies of it, and a stack of photocopied order sheets ready to go at a moment's notice.

Although - those who have played it know what I'm talking about - Swashbuckler is steeped in the excesses of late 70's game design. Charts, tables, modifiers, exceptions, etc, etc.

My plan was to get it to a reasonable state and then reach out to the designers to do a sanctioned second edition.

But as we iterated the design we got further and further afield from Swashbuckler and the way that it works. So much so, that it really has become its own animal, and very different mechanically. And as such, we feel very comfortable releasing it as a new game.

So it is a spiritual successor to Swashbuckler, and if you like that game I think you'll like this one. We included a note similar to this one in the rules with an acknowledgement to Thomas O'Neill and S. Craig Taylor, the Swashbuckler designers, for the inspiration.
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20 Sep 2016 10:24 #234606 by Msample
Never played Swashbuckler, but did a brief playing of Gunslinger once which as alluded to above, was a wretched excess of kitchen sink design - where the game took exponentially longer than the events it depicts in real life. A classic story is a friend of mine who was playing and decided he didn't like it and wanted out. So he decided he'd shoot himself. Of course, the amount of time it took to reload, cock, aim etc took many many turns. When it finally came time to resolve his act of Old West hari kari....he rolled a misfire.

--
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20 Sep 2016 11:37 #234614 by RobertB
Back when I played a lot of Gunslinger, it wasn't the gameplay that was the PITA, it was the setup. Dig through the charts to find the weapon characteristics (you usually had two weapons, and sometimes three) and put them on the sheet. Dig through the charts to do this for the players. Dig through the player cards to put together the player combat deck.

Once you got used to the system though, it'd move pretty quick and be pretty deadly. Once someone got hit, at best they'd be dealing with a ton of stun factors, so they'd be wobbling helplessly in the street while the other guy would aim and finish them off.

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20 Sep 2016 20:03 #234641 by trif

engelstein wrote:
So it is a spiritual successor to Swashbuckler, and if you like that game I think you'll like this one. We included a note similar to this one in the rules with an acknowledgement to Thomas O'Neill and S. Craig Taylor, the Swashbuckler designers, for the inspiration.


Sir, you have a sale!

:Loved Swashbuckler in it's day but released it into the wild through a maths trade (maths is Australian for math) as I thought there was too much paperwork for today's players.

Look forward to playing it.
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20 Sep 2016 23:39 #234646 by hotseatgames
Got some two player games in tonight.
Zimby Mojo - my first time with 2 players. It did not outstay its welcome and I managed a win. It was fun and my opponent liked it a lot. It was his first time.
WWE Superstar Showdown - Big Show put the hurt on John Cena through most of the match, but Cena pulled out a win. I was not John Cena.
Theseus - first time in a while... I played the Hunters, vs. the Bots. I won by 4 points, I think. I think perhaps that the Hunters are too focused on movement. I ended up with tons of ways to move guys around the board, which I only partially found useful.
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21 Sep 2016 08:28 #234653 by Legomancer
Played some oldies last night. First up was Samurai, the game I use as the defining example of games "everyone loves, many people own, and nobody plays". It had been the first time I played in 10 years, not counting iOS games. Remember when games just tried to do one thing well instead of doing a dozen shitty things? I even managed to comprehend the weirdo Knizia scoring rules enough to bang out a win.

Then Primordial Soup, which was a lot more simple than I remembered. It's a neat idea hampered by the fact that there are gene combos that are just straight up better than other ones, and no real way to catch up to a leader. I'd love to see someone take the idea and make something a little more balanced out of it.

Finally a 3 player free-for-all of Star Realms. I backed the wrong horse two years ago, feeling that Valley of the Kings was the better small deckbuilder, and ditching my copy of SR in favor of it. I still feel that way, but the world has passed me by. I don't dislike SR, but felt that the base set was filled with fairly obvious decisions and could be played pretty much on autopilot. I played several times on iOS and never felt like I had to pay too much attention. I haven't kept up with it, and I probably should have. There were some expansion cards in this set, but I don't know which ones. Anyway, it was fun, and one player not noticing he could straight up kill me instead of two of my bases gave me the win, as I then played two outposts and knocked everyone else out.
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21 Sep 2016 08:52 #234656 by san il defanso

Legomancer wrote: Played some oldies last night. First up was Samurai, the game I use as the defining example of games "everyone loves, many people own, and nobody plays". It had been the first time I played in 10 years, not counting iOS games. Remember when games just tried to do one thing well instead of doing a dozen shitty things? I even managed to comprehend the weirdo Knizia scoring rules enough to bang out a win.


I scored a copy of Samurai in a math trade about six months ago, and I've been pleasantly surprised at how well-received it has been in my group. I originally played it like eight years ago when it was still in print from Rio Grande, and I remember being underwhelmed. But since then I've gotten a little more euro in my tastes, or at least more German. Samurai is also helped by the fact that it has some laser focus, is over quickly, and handles all of its player counts well. Tigris & Euphrates and Ra are my favorite Knizia games, but Samurai would be in my top five, along with stuff like Beowulf and Lord of the Rings.

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22 Sep 2016 01:23 #234757 by dave
Samurai and Ursuppe are both in my top 10 (as confirmed by my ancient BGG profile). I have played Samurai fairly recently, winning easily, with one overly conservative misplay from pulling of the coup of getting two majorities in a four-player game (which usually require some newbs, which we had). It's been forever since I played Ursuppe, but, IIRC, it's a game that's centered very much around combo counters and aggressively dealing with perceived leaders (i.e., the best kind of game).

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22 Sep 2016 11:00 - 22 Sep 2016 11:08 #234772 by Jexik
I had a chance to get away for an afternoon on Saturday and play in a relatively informal 10-person X-Wing tournament. I was running two Tie Interceptors (Carnor Jax w/ Veteran Instincts, Soontir Fel with Push the Limit, both with Autothrusters + Stealth Device), and the Inquisitor with Push the Limit, the title,* and Cluster Missiles (I want to stay far away, but if you come into range 1-2, pop-pop!)

My first round I felt like a big jerk because i lost zero ships and destroyed all of his stuff. I think he had a K-wing loaded with bombs, and Horton Salm (Y-wing) also loaded with stuff. I was mostly able to get my Autothrusters to trigger and not get hit at all really. It reminded me of the times back in my Heroscape days where I'd lose a close game in the first round of Swiss to the guy who went on to win the tournament, and then you get paired with some unlucky guy who also started 0-1.

Second round I was up against a talkative and friendly kid... (I don't know, somewhere in the 17-21 year old range I think) who was running a Z-95 loaded with a homing missile, the K-wing that can choose to heal itself, and a B-wing with some really scary torpedoes. All of his guys were placed first, and I heard that his first round went to time, so I wanted to kill something ASAP. So I chose the Z-95 to focus fire before it launched its missile and to get some points on the board. I succeeded at that. HIs B-wing started coming in from the side, and they got my Inquisitor down to just 1 hull left with 15 minutes to go. In something of a jerk move, my Inquisitor just made a bee line for the other side of the board, far from the B-wing's firing arc and far enough from the K-wing that its TLTs would never reach it. I didn't want to lose 17 pts dead to 34 or whatever. As it turned out I was able to blow up his K-wing with some lucky attack rolls- during the final round Carnor Jax got 3x Crit and 1 hit at range 1! So what felt like a nail-biter ended up being pretty decisive.

In the third round, I came up against a guy running 3 T-70s all with the integrated astromech and crack shot. His Poe had something that let him recover a shield at the end of combat if he spends a focus token- Carnor Jax's ability was relevant there once since it prevents spending a focus when at range 1! He also had the guy who could do white Talon Rolls- what a cool ability! But much like playing against a Tie Defender, it can make that ships' position somewhat predictable.

What really killed the game was when I did this:

https://twitter.com/PlaidHatJames/status/778970272825118722

I landed so barely on the asteroid... blah. I could have barrel roll + boosted out of arc of all 3, or unleashed my cluster missiles to blow one up, but instead I blew up!

Later on, Carnor Jax had a 3 on 2 with 1 hull left (and the astromech gone on a no-Focus) Poe, and I got 2 blanks and a hit, unable to spend my own focus. And he got one evade. Then Poe killed my Soontir.

I ended up not destroying anything that round, but it still felt close. I had a lot more fun in that last game than in either of my wins. Doing all of the movement shenanigans is pretty fun regardless though.

Not that I actually want to get into it since I've already got some X-Wing stuff, but why is Armada "better?" What I like is the maneuvering and mind game aspect the most. Is that still present there?

*One weird thing I started doing with the Inquisitor in this game was to choose to do my Target Lock first, which would let me check range. Then I could decide if I wanted to try to boost or barrel roll out of range of someone with PTL afterwards.
Last edit: 22 Sep 2016 11:08 by Jexik.
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22 Sep 2016 11:07 - 22 Sep 2016 11:08 #234773 by Gary Sax
Armada's appeal is looking into the future several turns and trying to figure out what you'll need order wise and the defense tokens provide a lot more certainty than defense in x-wing. Also, it has a pretty integral two types at subgame (fighters/bomber squads vs. capital ships) that works really well.

From what you say you like Id stick with x-wing.
Last edit: 22 Sep 2016 11:08 by Gary Sax.

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22 Sep 2016 16:04 #234795 by southernman
Been getting into one of my latest Math Trade arrivals, Eldritch Horror. Yeah - I'm probably a few years behind everyone else but since I already had Arkham Horror at the time and a load of other games I wasn't really interested then but now I have it I've bought a couple of small expansions (for more shit) and have even been able to play it a couple of times with my euro group. Quite a different game, very constrained (compared to Arkham) by movement and having to do tests to do most things (get gear, get the few clues, close gates) rather than just survive monster floods and race through gates - so much that we haven't adapted to doing the mysteries or clearing the game-ending Rumour mythos cards and lost badly both times. Getting it out again with my small AT group this weekend so hope to do better. Pretty fun adventure game, even most of my euro group enjoyed the fun of it rather than the thinky euros they normally play (and I usually can't stand).
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22 Sep 2016 16:12 #234796 by mads b.
I like Eldritch Horror a lot and especially the condition cards are a stroke of genius. But I hate that losing the game can take so long. Or rather, it seems to me like if you aren't close to winning when the GOO awakens, you will probably lose, but you still have to slug throug a lot of extra game to do so. In Arkham, you'd at least get to have the final battle which was a short and somewhat climactic ending.
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