Huh! I’d overlooked it, assuming it was going to be a variant on Barenpark. But hearing it’s more like “NMBR9++ with Llamas”, I’m intrigued!
And it feels like it would sit nicely on the shelf alongside Altiplano and Cuzco.
4 Likes
Lamaland shares a lot with walker hardings other game gingerbread house by the look of it.
3 Likes
With my kids getting better at playing by themselves or with each other, my energy levels in the evenings are back up a bit, so I’ve gotten some solo games to the table after my partner and kids are in bed a few times over the last week.
For What Remains Streets of Ruin – I’ve played the first two scenarios of the campaign and, so far, I’m loving this tactical skirmish game sans minis. The chit-pull system is very easy to plan and execute. The AI might be able to get some lucky pulls, but, then again, so can I. I’ve been playing as the Freemen against the AI-controlled Combine. I like being the plucky underdogs, in general, but I do look forward to starting the campaign over and playing through as the Combine with their stompy mechs. I think the only weak point in this as a solo experience is the AI movement, which, essentially, just tells the player to “do it, but try to make smart moves” and my thought is: if I knew how to make smart moves, I’d be doing that for myself!
Too Many Bones – after having this on my shelf, unplayed for so long, I decided to get it down and run it through some paces before the upcoming crowdfunding campaign begins, so I can decide how many more extraneous bones I want, assuming they offer some deep discounts. My biggest gripe about TMB is that it’s over-produced. What I’ve found in this box is, basically, a $35-40 game that I paid $120 for. So far, it’s been uneven and the “luck of the draw” along with the “luck of the dice” has meant I’ve dismally failed both with a single Gearloc (Patches) as well as with two (Patches + Boomer). Maybe the base set is too swingy? Who knows. I’ll try to get some more plays in. In my first play, I lost Days 4, 6, 7, and 8. I likely should have just given up on Day 4 because I lost out on some crucial character advancement. My second play, I just threw in the towel after getting decimated in round 1 of Day 4 by a particularly brutal encounter.
But, solo gaming will have to wait. In a rare occurrence, I shall be sharing a gaming table with a friend this evening for the first time in a couple of months. Not sure yet what we’ll be playing, but the chance to get out of my own house and play a game is certainly welcome.
7 Likes
It‘s SPIEL week and as is traditional I am playing new games. Not at SPIEL but here. So tonight we played Roll Camera.
In this game the players take on typical roles on the set of a movie Director, Star, Production Designer or Editor (there are six roles). Each has 2 special abilities. The goal to shoot 5 scenes within schedule and budget. To shoot a scene from the story board on the left you have to create the depicted pattern with the dice on the blue spaces of the set pieces in the center.
During your turn you draw a new card from the problem deck that is going to make life on set more difficult often increasing costs or blocking certain actions. Like in our case here the action slot for Production Meetings (where Idea cards can be played) is blocked.
Then you roll the six dice and place them and use them for actions. If you finish a scene it is placed in the editing room and a new scene is placed on the story board.
On the right is the quality marker. It is not enough to finish shooting a movie, it has to be good, too. Or maybe „So bad it‘s good.“ We played it on easy mode and barely made it to 5 scenes but our movie was great!
The game is mostly fun because it is thematic. The dice placement is not overly complicated, but it is just fun to see what kind of movie emerges. The board also has script cards that give you some additional scoring at the end. Ours movie was therefore titled „Beloved Clown Fighting“ But because we had neither a director nor a star (roles that can manipulate the storyboard or the script), we could only come up with a bunch of really sad scenes but as production designer I made those scenes very very beautiful and so we had a very dreamy movie about 2 sad clowns who died after drinking too much champagne… (one player gets to narrate the movie at the end)
Definitely one I want to play again because of the stories you can tell with it. As it is cooperative it makes for a very nice relaxed hour or so of play. I recommend this if you love movies and a bit of roleplaying with your dice.
10 Likes
The Crew: Mission Deep Sea - the difference is the mission deck. The objectives are more general, such as: X player must win more blues than greens. Rather than winning specific cards from the OG.
I can literally just keep one copy and have both mission decks in one box.
Hyperborea - I’ll sleep on it and talk more about it next time 
But it is literally area control with bag building, and the design works. Several paths to take.
5 Likes
A friend was back in the area after 18 months so we met for games today. We started with Clans of Caledonia which was enjoyable. I know people don’t like stuff around the contracts but I still like the plenty of this game. Just enough interaction, just enough sequencing and interesting actions plus a good small box.
Next we played Anansi. As trick taking games go this is excellent. The bidding in the game and the rewards really gives you engagement and a way to play with more hands than usual for trick takers. This one is particularly recommended.
Lastly we tried some more Quarriors. Not all the games of this are good but enough are for it to be worth a shot every so often. Swingy, interesting fun.
8 Likes
Had a well-populated game night. First we tried Deception: Murder in Hong Kong for the first time. I’m not sure how it’s supposed to go, but the investigators won 4 out of 5 games, often on the very first guess. The only time the murderer won was when they chose their only poison-y weapon when I had 3 literal poisons in front of me and another player had 2, so we were getting the brunt of the accusations. Even then it came down to a 50/50 on them. Seemed way too weighted towards the investigators.
Then we played Knit Wit which is always a favorite. Is a violet stinky? Is dank weed purple? How modern are water slides really?
4 Likes
I’ve played Deception (checks BGG) 26 times and while I haven’t kept track of murderer wins I feel it happens about half the time. Not sure what I’d say are good tactics, though.
4 Likes
My wife and I played Splendor: Marvel tonight. I thought I was doomed when she hit 13 points to my 6, but a couple of turns later and I was at 15 to her 14. Since she is younger, she went first, per the rules, and while she gotna 2 point card to end the game, I was also able to get a 2 point card to get the win.
Afterward, however, we realized she had misunderstood my rules explanation regarding the level 3 cards and the time stone they provide. I told her she could only have one stone, but she took that to mean only have one level 3 card, so she has been playing at a bit of a disadvantage in our games.
Next time, it’ll get played to its fullest!
3 Likes
Just played Beyond the Sun. I was sooooo shit. Went for colonization galore but neglected the tech tracks.
It’s ridiculously big on the table, but I still really enjoy this. Despite the set up and tear down and manual scoring it is better irl than on BGA (and I really like it on there).
Why it doesn’t have a score pad is beyond me.
7 Likes
So just had a weeks holiday with my partner and their family (6 adults in total).
I normally (always) bring a pile of games. They don’t play games unless it’s me making them do it but all seem to enjoy a game on holiday.
I took:
6Nimmt - this is a great game. So quick and cruel although there is a strong element of luck. To me that’s part of the fun.
Wavelength - this went down very well although some of the cards are quite similar - nice person and good person can easily be conflated and when they end up on consecutive cards a bit of a mulligan was required. All in all a great conversational party game.
Lords of Vegas - first games at 5&6 players but didn’t use the up expansion (the rules were causing head scratching enough). I can see that at this higher counts (particularly 6) the action options get restricted which the up expansion would solve.
All in all a good holiday!
8 Likes
I love the Adventure System games. I’ve got the full collection, and they come out to the table regularly. For single adventures, both Ravenloft and Wrath of Ashardalon are great. They figured out a solid campaign system with Tomb of Annihilation and Dungeon of the Mad Mage. The middle ones exhibit some growing pains.
3 Likes
Played Betrayal at Baldur’s Gate and Bargain Quest yesterday. Both firmly ok, I think. We played Bargain Quest with 6, so it was a little bit slow. I’d like to try it at a lower player count.
2 Likes
Weird. But I see @raged_norm already provided the link to the one on BGG.
My important contribution to the thread thus being. Same. It is such a good implentation on BGA and I love it there but put it on the table it shines even more despite not being all that pretty. Imagine Ian O‘Toole having to paint a tech tree or planets by Beth Sobel? I hope my SPIEL day tomorrow will have someone asking to play that (I have 6-7 people coming over for games).
5 Likes
Wrath of Ashardalon is a possible purchase within the next few months once I see how much game time I have, as may be the new Ghost of Saltmarsh expansion as those map tiles look great.
2 Likes
I forgot I ordered this and it has been ready for me to pick up at the FLGS for a week and would have sat there until I got one of the games out if you hadn’t just reminded me! Hooray for @gmwhite999!
6 Likes
Oh, this sounds great – an expansion you can use with any of those games?!
Ghosts of Saltmarsh is an expansion for any standalone title in the Dungeons & Dragons Adventure System board game series, and it features new adventures, map tiles, monsters, traps, and spells. To use this expansion, select your favorite heroes from one of the existing games, then dive into this new campaign!
It pulls monster minis from all 6 previous games, so if you don’t have one, you need to use supplied tokens.
3 Likes
Just picked it up. I suspect it works more smoothly with the newer 3 or 4, but modifying the OG ruleset wouldn’t take much work. I’ll report on it soon!
2 Likes
This also sounds like quite a thing:
3 Likes