Not sure how this is meant to be read 
1 Like
True! I love it enough to keep it. The plastic bits was fun to everyone on the table. You can gauge what size of temple piece you want but the colour is random, which is good enough to run a quick probability calculation.
Tempo ramps up fast and itās fun
We played some Second Chance over Zoom, which works really well with a webcam. Very relaxing little game and easy for anyone to join in with. I love the randomness of what card you get as your āsecond chanceā where youāre still in or kicked out on a random card flip if you canāt go.
1 Like
During our vacation I made another attempt to get my partner to play Railroad Ink Challenge and after I got the second goal before him, he almost quit in frustration. Since then I discovered there is an app and have played a whole bunch of games. I am lazy and the app is good. I adore Challenge.
So we switche to coop and played the new The Crew:Deep Sea in two player mode. We finished the first 20 of 32 missions over several days. The game is basically the same except for the contract cards they now have a difficulty and you draw as many as the mission requires for difficulty. So lets say mission says difficulty 9, you draw a 2, 1,3,2 so you need another 1ā¦ the contracts are really more varied than before. Like āI take the first and last trickā or āI will take zero green cardsā or āI will take the yellow 8 and red 5ā ā¦ there are a few communication variants mostly making communication more difficult. Personally, I enoyed this even more than the original. 2 player mode is really easy though. The simulated third player gets seven cards that are face down and another seven face up on top of those and whoever is the āMopsā aka the Captain gets to play the cards for the simulacrum. Despite this being rather easy there were a few really tricky missions like the one where the Captain has to take the contract with the highest difficulty. If you draw a 4 contract it can be quite the challenge when there is no choice.
We also played more Splendor on BGA.
We tried a couple new to us games on BGA as well: Martian Dice (better than Zombie Dice), Tzolkāin (we liked it but wonāt buy it).
I convinced my partner to play my German copy of Hardback. He lost to my final 17 or so point word: āNischeā Surprisingly, language switching wasnāt that hard for me. I do feel English is easier though possibly because it is not my native language. Weird, I know.
We played a round of Dale of Merchants. Interesting concept but I am glad I only bought one of the cheap small packs to test it. Itās a deck builder with different suits you can combine for each game and the goal is to buy cards to then place in your market stall. The deconstruction is strong in this one but it also feels a little lame compared to deck builders like Hardback with intricate bonusses and combos or Star Realms which is just so fast or the new big ones like Dune or Arnak. I guess I have too many games in the same niche and I seem to prefer when the deconstruction is a choice.
I lost enough games of Tash Kalar that I gave up on playing it on BGA for now. My friend is just so much better than I am even the flares cannot save me, I was glad when I only lost by 3 points in the last game. Though I have a feeling I might eventually learn something it is a bit frustrating and so now we are playing Beyond the Sun. In his first game he is struggling with resource balancing and also the area control vs tech tree balancing but I suspect heāll catch on quick. I think I would do better if we played TK on a real table. This game reminded me how much I rely on reading people and table talk to gauge where a game is headed. In any case it made me happy to get back to a game I enoyed in the past and play a few games.
6 Likes
Well this is a pleasant surprise!
The idea was Iād chip away at a learning game while my daughter plays in her little cage, but so far that hasnāt happened (big surprise). Still, weāve got a heatwave this weekend, so this is a heck of a revelation. Cool beers, breeze and all dem bones.
[EDIT] I completed my first run already. 
Ran up against a golem on the second (scripted) encounter and basically tanked my dice pool immediately against its power. I thought I was trapped right out of the gates (mostly an expectation running a single gearloc like this), but I wish I wasnāt so hasty in resetting; I forgot the town archers would have chipped the thing out (well before I succumbed)! Pitfalls of hitting a wall that early, I suppose. Half a second more thought (I racked my brain to ensure it wasnāt a rules miss) would have reminded me of the encounter perk.
Oh well, off to start anew!!
9 Likes
Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion , finally we reached the last mission! And it was a fairly comfortable win for us. The last boss seemed impossible, but we just threw everything at him. Would have been over even sooner, but one of my big attacks wiffed.
Kitchen Rush , first play. Basically a worker placement set in a restaurant. But each of your workers is an hourglass, which has to run out before you can move it to another place. Youāll accept patrons into the restaurant, take their orders, fill the orders with food from the storage rooms, maybe add some spice from the greenhouse, and then cook for the required amount of time. The first scenario (of eight) is pretty easy, each of you has to fulfil two orders within the time limit. The board is made up of eight interlocked, double sided tiles. You start on the A side, and then, as new rooms and actions are enabled, you turn the tiles to their B side. Scenario two introduces spices, and scenario three has dirty dishes that must be cleaned before use. All pretty easy, we didnāt have any major problems, thereās enough action spaces for everyone it seems. Good fun, if a little easy. I expect things to get harder as we go.
Mysterium Park X 2, first play. This is a streamlined version of Mysterium, set in a circus. I love Mysterium, but the setup is a bit of a pain. Park makes it all a lot simpler. Thereās a nine by nine grid which you fill with people cards, and then (once everyone has identified people) location cards. No object cards from the full game. There are three rounds ā identify the person, then the location, and then work out (hopefully) the final solution. You have six turns to complete rounds one and two. And everyone has to complete them, you canāt move ahead the way you could in Mysterium. The ghost chooses a plot card for each round, which shows the grid and each player colour, thus identifying each players card. The ghost has a deck of vision cards that they choose to give each player, hopefully guiding them to the correct card on the grid. The ghost needs to examine the grid cards in close detail, which could aid the other players. We ended up taking a picture (while the other players looked away). We played 3p, so only two pictures were required. Itās the same deal as the full game, the job of being the ghost is a thankless task. You canāt find the perfect card, so you just have to choose the best from your hand and hope itās enough. We failed, but it was such a quick game that we tried again, and also failed. Listening to the players talking and discussing clues can be a bit annoying (in a good way!), as they look at the wrong details or misinterpret the card (āmy clue card is blue, so he must mean this cardā). Good fun, and we probably finished a game in the time it would have taken to setup the original.
Gorus Maximus , first play. This is a fairly straighforward trick taking game. Each of your cards are gladiators, with a rank (value) and a school (suit). As is standard in trick taking games, there is an initial suit lead (the first card played), plus a trump suit, which can change even within the same trick. You have to follow suit, except you can play a card of the same value as the one just played, which changes the trump suit. Thereās a card with the suits on it, and you can move a clip around so you donāt have to remember what it is. Each card can have a crowd favour value (which can be negative). After a round in which you play ten cards, you then total your crowd favours, and the highest gets a crowd support token. Win three support tokens, and you win the game. It was fun, itās pretty quick playing. You can get a bit screwed over. The eight card has a crowd favour of negative four, so obviously you tried to dump those on the winner of a trick. I ended up with three of them in one round, which pretty much torpedoed my chances. Still ā enjoyed it, and the artwork is cartoonishly violent, which I loved.
Hats , first play. A simple enough game (or so we thoughtā¦). You are competing to see who has the best hats (obviously). You get a hand of nine cards, which show some pretty spiffy hats, with values from one through six, in seven different colours. The board shows spaces marked from one to six, which is then filled with random cards. On your turn you have two possible actions. You can exchange a card from your hand with one on the board ā but it has to be either the same colour, or a higher number. The exchanged card is played in front of you. Your second option is to play any card face down, which will give you one point at the end of the game. Obviously youād like to do a bit better than one point. The game ends when you are down to your last card ā this is your favourite hat. Scoring is done for the cards youāve played, and then for your favourite hat. Each card in your tableau is worth whatever position it is on the board ā from one through six. if itās not on the board ā no points. So, if red ended up in position four, and you have three red cards, youāll score twelve. Also, if any colour has more than one position, only the lowest one counts. Your favourite hat scores a total of the card values of that colour, minus the value of the favourite itself. So, if your favourite was a red six, and you had red cards two and three, your total is five, minus the six, so negative one (not so good). Thereās also a very realistic cookie token, which goes to the player with the most different coloured cards in their tableau, and itās worth five points at the end of the game. Didnāt help me, I held onto it all game and still lost by eight points (winner picked up a cool fifteen points in one colour). For a fairly simple game, it took us a little while to get our heads around it (might not have been a good choice to play late in the day). Looking forward to more plays.
5 Likes
Itās very pretty, ummmmmā¦what game is it?
I love doing it, though, especially with people who donāt know me. (In full-size Mysterium, which I still enjoy.)
I do wonder whether as ghost I might just set up the answer cards with pawns next to them, photograph them, and then shuffle with the dummies, as an alternative to using the screenā¦
1 Like
Just finished a first game of Lost Ruins of Arnak on BGA with my partner.
It was pretty quick and I would definitely play again, though with the shortish actions I would prefer live over turn-based. I have already asked some friends to also try it out, it might be a game they would buy 
My partner did not enjoy the TM-style action-stringing which I knew was very likely to happen. Especially in the last two rounds when you really need to hang on to your momentum he passed a couple of actions before me and that is frustrating. This being a first game we had very little idea how to go about gaining enough resources to do what we wanted and just 5 rounds puts a lot of pressure on make optimal choices from a very wide range of options (with 2 players worker spots werenāt really tight ever). I went for a card drawing strategy which only worked out while my deck was small enough to get through most of it in one turn. Is it just us or is it really hard to both explore AND research? We barely got to the level where we upgraded both our assistants and discovered 1 level 2 site each. That was it. Game ended 61/52 for me.
I now see the comparison to TM but what connects Arnak and Terra Mystica is the element of the latter that led to my partner refusing to play it any more.
I think the more rigid turn structure of Dune Imperium suits both of us more and the 10 rounds give us more time to find our strategy. Add to that the way more thematic game play and the way the decision space unfolds in a narrower band of choices that seem to matter more individually and Dune is the better choice for us. Nevertheless, I want to repeat that I think Arnak is a really good game and I had fun playing it and hope to get to play again. Itās easy enough to teach and decently quick to play. (Except for round 5 when optimization becomes a necessity bordering on AP)
2 Likes
Thank you for writing that. Iād seen this in my FLGS but knew nothing about it, and hadnāt been inspired to follow up; but that explanation sounded really great, so I ended up just grabbing it the next time I was there. The game comes as a regular ādeck of cardsā box, but has somewhat confusingly been printed here in two different box styles, which makes it seem like they might vary in some way; but I understand the cards and art is identical in both ā itās purely down to which box art you prefer.
The custom deck is very nice, with every single card having a unique character illustration, and good card quality (BGG forum says āblack core german casino quality linenā), but you can absolutely play this with any standard 52-card-plus-2-jokers deck of cards (or of course, conversely, use the custom deck to play any other standard deck card game). New Zealanders will also get a kick out of the #5 character of each suit : ) (The designers and artist are all Kiwis).
My sole complaint about the production is that the text in the little playing-card-sized manual/booklet is really small and yet the blank margins on each page are relatively largeā¦ so even without increasing the page count, they could have increased the text size and made things easier for us folks with poor eyesight. Thereās not too much to learn at least, and you can print out a larger set of rules if you need to, so itās only a temporary issue if it affects you; but I do still think they dropped the ball in this one area. A single extra sheet in the booklet (increasing the page count from 10 to 14), or any other format allowing significantly bigger text, would have been much appreciated.
I played the game solo several times today, and have really enjoyed it. I lost my first two games (I didnāt even reach the kings the first time, which made it seem very daunting), but Iāve managed three wins since then; albeit only at the lowest success-level each time (using both jokers ā I really thought I was going to get away with one joker in my last game, but found I had two kings left to face when Iād thought I had only one : )
Assuming you have a standard deck of cards at hand, I thoroughly recommend trying this game; I think itās a really neat design which constantly presents you with little dilemmas and tricky decisions.
Theyāve even managed to make all of the suits thematic. Hearts represent injured heroes being healed so that they will be available to hire again later; Diamonds represent payment for hiring heroes from the tavern to join the fight; Clubs represent extra damage; and Spades could look a bit like a shield if you squint rightā¦? The card art reflects this as well ā every Spade character is depicted with shields or extra armour; Club characters have clubs or other bludgeoning weapons; Heart characters are holding healing potions; and Diamond characters areā¦ erā¦ wielding fire?! (Maybe āappear to be wealthyā didnāt look as good. Or perhaps it was fire all along, and instead of hiring heroes itās actually a torches (and pitchforks) approach to recruiting from the tavern.)
āThe player who has most recently committed regicide goes firstā is also the funniest start-player rule Iāve seen in ages : )
From the looks of things, its Kickstarter campaign is still a good resource, but it only provides the rules for 2-4 players. The changes for solo play are that you have a hand limit of 8 cards, and jokers are used completely differently: instead of nullifying the suit of an enemy (there is no way to do that when playing solo), they are simply a two-time resource which you can use before attacking or taking damage, which causes you to discard your hand and draw a new hand of eight cards. You donāt actually need joker cards as such ā just to keep count of whether you did this action 0, 1, or 2 times (for gold, silver, or bronze victory respectively, if you win).
Edit:
Official description of solo rules differences to the regular game
Set up the game as per usual but place the two Jesters to the side. You play with a single hand limited to 8 cards. Play as normal, playing each turn one after the other. However a Jester can be flipped to activate the following power: āDiscard your hand and refill to 8 cards - this does not count as drawing for the purpose of enemy diamond immunity.ā Since you have two Jesters this can be done twice per game. Flipping the Jesters in this way does not cancel immunity. You are allowed to use the Jester power a) at the start of step 1 before you play a card or b) at the start of step 4 before you have to take damage. Winning the game after using both Jesters achieves you a Bronze Victory. Winning after flipping only 1 Jester is called a Silver Victory and winning the game while having both Jesters untouched grants you the ever-elusive Gold Victory!
Slightly spoilerish explanation of how solo and multiplayer modes compare
In 4 players each player has 5 card max and takes a hit at the end of their turn, like every player does. However each individual player has to receive every fourth hit. In solo, you are bumped up from 5 to 8 cards, but you have to take every hit every turn! What you may be missing if you havenāt had a chance to play it yet is that seeing all 8 cards and knowing that youāll go again next is a HUGE advantage that you donāt have in 4 player. If 4 player was open-handed full co-op you would win every time. Itās the informational asymmetry that makes difficult to play the perfect cards. In solo you have all the information at your literal fingertips so itās way easier to play really efficiently with lots of exact kills.
Both collapsed comments are from Solo rules | Regicide on BGG.
2 Likes
Too Many Bones, and I have to say, I think itās ugly as sin. Beautiful in some ways, but I find the artwork mildly horrifying, although itās not precisely correct to say I hate it.
I just packed up my little outdoor game after dying on my first (and onlyāreached him by the final round) attempt at the scenarioās Tyrant, Drellen. This was a bad matchup for me, as the encounter was rife with enough poison to overcome my once-per-round heal innate ability, and the boss himself was immune to my toxins (a good portion of my damage output). I was able to clear his minions, which meant he was now open to being damaged, but I just did not have enough bones, let alone too many, to overcome that chip damage. The game ended with Drellen vulnerable, but at full health. Sadly I never got to complete his special encounter, which presumably would have helped out.
Itās outrageous how much Iām in love with this game. I have spent a not-inconsiderable amount of time and money on grand adventure games, and every last one of them has fallen flat for one reason or another, to the point where I had basically given up on them. I guess I should have been playing this for the last 4 years.
7 Likes
Rallyman for ISGOYTRA:
I suspect that āclassicā Rallyman competition will end once new Dirt comes out and scratches the same itch, but Iāll keep it running as long as significant numbers of people are prepared to participateā¦
A recent realisation (probably obvious to many of you): the two big things I enjoy about boardgames are the socialising and the physical bits. With no physical bits (e.g. online) I want to be more chatty; with no socialising (e.g. a solo game) I want to play it with proper components rather than on the computer.
8 Likes
I know where I can get a copy and at some point Iām gonna do it. Such an unusual little production Iād almost want it just for the curiosity, but we both know thereās a firecracker of a game in there.
1 Like
This mirrors my sentiments in some ways. I have a friend whoās mainly on games for the story and experience. Almost everything he bought round to play I didnāt enjoy which was leading me to conclude I donāt like those games. Too Many Bones stopped me thinking that, it just made me realise I have no interest in Fantasy Flight games and I want a narrative game to have game play to it. As a consequence I have spent soooo much money on TMB
3 Likes
Played a Knizia called Callisto. it has very strong similarities with Blokus. If you have played the latter, youāll feel at home with the former. But I think I very much prefer Blokus. Will probably just give it to charity.
Played some lesser known Z-Man Deluxe Card Gamesā¢.
Black Spy - Hearts but with a twist. Itās good. Itās pulling you between winning black cards (giving positive pts) and avoiding on taking non-black 7ās (giving negative pts). I donāt want to keep it though.
Sky Tango - boring.
Chimera - a climbing game like Tichu, Haggis, etc, and itās pretty good. Much more interesting than I thought. Not sure if I prefer this or Haggis as my 3 player ātrad card gameā.
4 Likes
I am a sucker for every Hearts variant AND film noir themes!
4 Likes
This morning, my wife and I played a game of Arboretum, which we have not played in a while. She won, 26 - 22, as I did not manage to shut her out of scoring any of her paths, but she stopped my cherry blossoms from scoring.
6 Likes
Aw, I like Sky Tango. Itās a small, attractive card game, and the gameplay is simple but slightly unusual and decidedly interactive. It definitely fills a niche for me.
2 Likes
Played a few games yesterday afternoon.
-
a very close game of Inis two of us took a pretender tokens on the same turn, but a sneaky play of a hidden deed broke the tie.
-
Roam with the crystals expansion. Iām usually fairly good at spatial puzzles, but for some reason Iām consistently terrible at this one.
The art is delightful though. -
Second play of New York Zoo. I think this one might be a dudā¦ Both times weāve played Iāve found myself wishing we played BƤrenpark instead.
7 Likes