Right now the German expansion for Furnace (Furnace:Interbellum) is crowdfunding and I still haven’t played the base game… so how is the game about a year or two later? Anyone played it recently? What games would you compare it to and is it better or worse than those?
I have not played it recently but it did survive my purge so it has something.
It’s a funny little engine game where you can make cool moves - I guess it’s a bit like oh my goods but a lot simpler. It does have a neatly brisk auction bit as well which has this nice “everyone is a winner” feel because losing gets you stuff.
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Oh my. I’ve been meaning to report on this.
Got, played, and loved Furnace. The most direct comparison would be Res Arcana, which is great because in the past I had struggled to find a replacement for RA.
Using that as a launching point, Res Arcana has better cards. Playing on a small set of mechanics and iconography, Res Arcana manages to get huge, true diversity of cards (just like RFTG, go figure) that let’s you make a different engine each game. Furnace, by comparison, has a deck that feels same-y even though every card is unique. They are just variations of the same principles.
That said, the AUCTION. I can’t think of anything that makes such a tight, interesting auction on such a slim set of rules and constraints. You’re trying to win or lose each auction, so it’s not just “I’m winning” or “I’m not.” EVERY placement holds you. And the simple four discs and constraints on placement make a worker-placement-y puzzle where you’re really trying to dial in what everyone else wants and what order to do things and how big to go or not go. This half of the game blew me out of the water.
Very good.
Res Arcana is probably the better game, clinically speaking. Just the deck is so intelligently made. But I like Furnace better due to the auction and player interaction.
5 Likes
Battle of the racingbbetting games now…
Long Shot: The Dice Game vs Camel Up vs Winner’s Circle vs Downforce
I’ve played two of these and was disappointed with one.
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I have played Camel Up and Downforce, once each. I enjoyed both games. Camel Cup seemed more chaotic, but we also had 4 players for that, compared to 2 for Downforce. I think more players would add to the fun.
I’ve played a lot of Downforce with different player counts. I think you really need at least 3 for the best experience. With the expansion tracks it really sings and creates some very fun conflict and decisions when you’re determining where you want to focus your bets or pivoting from an early bet that is absolutely off the table. Long Shot has only been played a couple of times at 1 or 2, but it’s been a lot of fun. I don’t think we’ve played enough to have a lot of insight into it. Just been fun to talk trash, wince when the roll doesn’t go in your favor, or get that thrill when the decisions you’ve made on your board create a great comeback for a horse out of nowhere.
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I really like Camel Up, although I’ve not played it in a while. We’ve not played it in a trash talking setting either which I think would add to the game. Especially with the Super Cup expansion there is quite a lot to it which I think takes it out of the party game with non gamers sphere.
I have yet to play Longshot. Have high hopes for it but I also think the rules might be a bit fiddly for a light game.
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I rather liked Longshot the Dice Game. Simple enough to explain quickly and play, but with enough depth to reward different strategies.
My partner enjoyed eXplorers more, so I ended up trading away my copy of LStDG for that one, so I doubt my experience is universal, but I did enjoy it.
I’ve played Camel Up (too random for my tastes, but silly, simple fun) and Downforce (I liked it, but it was a long time ago so my tastes were very different). I wouldn’t say any were bad at the time I played them.
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Thanks everyone, I think I need to check out Camel Up, I’m looking for a single light racing themed speculation game. Winner’s Circle is fun but may go on a bit too long for what it is, CC may win simply as supports the larger player count.
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I need to play Winners Circle but Camel Cup is the game out of those where we are laughing out loud.
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Has anyone got any experience of Captains of the Gulf? Being a Spielworxx game there’s obviously wasn’t a massive print run, but there is barely any discussion about it on BGG (one positive text review in english). SUSD did talk about it a few years ago and seemed to like the gameplay but complained about board, aid and manual.
It’s not top of my wish list but I have kept thinking about it over the last 3 years. From what I know I’m not convinced it’s something I need, but I do feel I need to play it to sate my earworm and think that probably involves hunting down a copy at some point.
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Anyone want to talk to me about 7 Wonders expansions? I got the 2nd ed for an absolute song recently and am thinking about expansions. Every one feels like it has it’s merits and some guidance on how each one changes the feel of the game would be useful.
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All of them adds more faff but they give okay returns.
More Wonders Pack is more wonders. Best one imo. Anniversary packs adds more on their respective expansions.
Leaders is the easiest as you simply add another layer of drafting at start of game, and you play these leaders at the start of each era.
Cities is middling.
Havent played Armada enough but I like it so far.
I have been told to stay away from Babel and I did.
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I will mostly echo Lalunaverde here: More Wonders are great (although they haven’t been released for 2nd Ed yet, I don’t think… might only be an artwork/icon issue, though?), the Anniversary packs are also only 1st Ed.
Leaders is good. It adds a 3 card draft round between each of the three Ages, helps give you some direction before that Age. Nice bonus, not huge.
Cities replaces the last round Guilds (purple cards) with Cities, which appear in all three Ages. The idea was to remove the utter randomness of the guilds included in your game (“Oh look, the Science Guild! And I built zero science all game… yay…”). It’s not as good as Leaders, a bit too complicated, but okay.
Babel was weak (and I don’t think they’ve remade it yet). It gave everyone a single collective “centre” Wonder to work on, which got better as other players worked on it. So you could theoretically wait until somebody else started to snake a few more points… but what if they waited… it made the game slower with no real payoff.
I haven’t tried Armada. Looks okay. I think it lets you play with 8, as well, which… menh. 7 Wonders really shines at the 3-5 players, where you still have an impact on other players. Too many players and the draft kinda becomes meaningless.
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Basically agree.
Wonders adds new boards and just mixes things up a bit. Good if you’ve played a lot or with a lot of people and want more variety.
Leaders adds people that you draft before the regular game then play before each age. It’s most helpful in giving you a possible strategy (beyond your board) to plan for from the start.
There is a small little anniversary pack for Leaders that adds a few more, notably these are all women to help redress the imbalance in the original leaders (somewhat necessitated by the historical imbalance in the gender of those with power and prestige).
Cities is the closest to basic 7 Wonders as it just adds new cards into the normal age decks and you play an extra one each age. The new cards have a little more player interaction (some positive and some negative) and a little more complexity to them. It’s really base 7 Wonders Plus. Cities also has an anniversary pack but I don’t remember what’s special there, if anything.
Have played Babel once. It sucks. It’s overly complicated in ways that detracts from the heart of the main game. You have all these side boards that you can decide to do things with rather than playing your card normally and maybe you should or not but it doesn’t integrate at all with the rest of what you are doing. Bah.
Armada is like Babel in that it is overly complicated but unlike Babel in that it fully integrates with the heart of the main game and is awesome, in my opinion. It is complex and should not be added until everyone is comfortable with the game, but I love it. Everyone gets an extra board with four different colored boats that can move along tracks. When you play a card, you also look at the next step on the associated boat track (e.g. a green science card for the green boat), and there will be a cost. You can pay that cost in addition to the cost of the card just played to move the boat up the track. Every track provides different benefits based on its type. Armada also introduces table-wide navy combat in addition to neighboring player army combat.
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Mostly the same as those who came before me. More wonders: good. Leaders: good. Cities: maybe. Babel: definitely no. Armada: meh. Rather not. Makes a reasonably quick game unnecessarily big. I‘ve only played with it twice but ever since I have it, I am loath to get it onto the table because it‘s just too much stuff now.
3 Likes
Something to note about Cities is that it adds an element of “take-that” as you can play cards that make everyone discard coins, which sucks if you have been saving up so you can purchase materials to build something. My wife and I played it once and did not care for it. At the same time, we also played with Leaders, and liked that well enough to purchase that expansion.
I have both Babel and Armada, the former being really cheap at one point and the latter a gift, but I have not played either yet so I can’t comment on them.
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Really useful everyone, I want to keep it snappy so it might just be Leaders I go for, with Armada if a decent deal comes around.
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When Armada launched, the publisher sent a walking “boat” round the halls in Essen. It got in the way and made a lot of noise. Therefore I don’t recommend Armada. 
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Gingkopolis?
Looks like a relatively heavy, thinky filler that plays well at 2.
2 Likes