Well, to post on something that was fun, got a few rounds of Tiny Towns in. This was a game I didn’t need to buy, but then it went on sale for $21 and the feeding frenzy kicked in.
Delightful! I went in expecting a little more from it, fearing a little less from it, and came out quietly happy somewhere in between. Made a ton of mistakes my first round; building too many little buildings before trying to put up something big, and having zero plan for the stone cards that came out. Second round I was much more prepared.
Maybe like Cascadia (which was similarly underwhelming but maybe just pleasant enough to justify itself on other footing - not sure yet) you put in the time, make a few hard but not painful decisions, and come out happy. All the art and components and colors are just…pleasant. This might be the Barenpark killer, which I also found surprisingly light, yet left me disappointed rather than happy.
We worked out a nice alternate game mode as well, more constraining than the “pick anything” base rules but not as disruptive as the pure “draw a card” mode.
We have the master builder (first player in the round) flip over a number of resource cards equal to the number of players. They get first pick, then the player to their RIGHT gets second pick, all the way until the last player gets the garbage.
Play then proceeds to the LEFT for the next master builder. (I could get into why we had the two rotations go opposite, but I won’t bore you. It’s more fun.)
This layers in an element of drafting interaction and gives the game a nice cadence between choice and constraint. It’s nice.
Hope you enjoy it, we’ve found it improves every aspect of the game significantly without it it feeling bloated. I can’t see us ever playing the game again without all the expansion modules.
Viticulture EE is the original version of Viticulture with a couple of the modules from the original version of Tuscany (Mamas and Papas and the grande worker I think). The Tuscany EE then adds the other modules - the new board, structures cards and specialist workers.
I have the essential tuscany expansion but have not managed to play. The thing is though that map with the 4 seasons looks really tasty and I definitely need to play that. Will report on it if I get to it.
Played a few games of Azul on BGA this evening. I’ve finally worked out that making lines is a good idea! It’s such a cool game.
Also took advantage of a Dire Wolf sale and got the Yellow and Yangtze app on my phone and Root on Steam.
I have physical copies of both of these but have struggled to get Y&Y played. It’s a slightly not as good version of Tigris and Euphrates, but is in print and an excellent game in its own right.
Still love Root. Steam helps with both being able to play it and the rules enforcement is really useful because we generally have to play with the rulebook open.
If anyone is interested in either game async, or UK time give me a shout.
So The Great Zimbabwe was discussed about a month past? I got Boardlandia to do a price match with Gamenerdz, then they have 10% off right now (auto in cart). $81 free shipping if you are in the states.
Splotter is always a big line item but this is likely about as good as you’ll ever do.
I’m about halfway through a learning game of Kemet, playing two-handed to come to grips with the rules. This isn’t a game to “play each side” with thanks to the cardplay shenanigans, but it’s doing the job for the task at hand. It’s incredible to me that after almost a decade and several revisions, they managed to fart out this travesty of a rulebook.
Anyway, thankfully there’s nothing wrong with the actual rules or the associated gameplay, and I’m having a fun time duking it out (between BGG threads, files and errata) and desperately trying to keep up on those sweet square victory tokens. It’s an aggressive game, which I really appreciate, particularly since things boil down to how badly you want to win a given combat versus how badly you need to survive, so smart defense is still a big consideration.
I can only guess about the cardplay, but I’m intrigued and excited by it. With no real way to simulate the blind reveal dynamic I’ve just been kind of fudging it based on the cards available, and how hard each side would be willing to fight in a given combat encounter. Hardly ideal, but at least I’m getting something more out of it than from a simple blind draw approach (which would at least provide the a-ha/oh-no moments).
I know a few folks who will want to dig into this at least a little. Hopefully I can arrange a big game soon.
FWIW, I found the PP2e bot more palatable after I read that it is supposed to stand in for not one, but effectively two AI opponents, merged into one for simplicity and speed. So it can change the game state as much as two opponents would, and sometimes boosts both of the factions you are not aligned with instead of only one. It’s taking a different tack to one vs. one bots.
We starting playing some Spoopy-themed games (mostly)
Broom Service - I am still THE Brave Forest Witch
Through the Ages - played it 4 players with 2 newbies. It can get slow with AP players, but I still like how big the decisions are.
Poison aka Friday the 13th - another Knizia card game. We have the old edition of Poison with the useless but pretty big cauldron to create potions on. They are nice and I didn’t mind them.
I tried grabbing cards to create majorities on 1 or 2 colours, rather than playing cautiously and reduce the number of cards taken. Majorities on each of the 3 colour of cards, will be discarded and won’t count as penalty pts to you. Hence, why I am eager to take them. Unfortunately, I was often short on one majority so I end up taking more pts. “Git gud” as the kids say nowadays. I think I prefer this over Parade by Z-Man. But I will still eagerly play Parade . Poison or Friday the 13th is way simple and a bit more clever than the latter.
Another game of Broom Service and I am still the Brave Forest Witch. This time, my long term goal of reaching the far end of the map was a success but people intentionally screwed over my last round and lost by 4 pts. Scoundrels!! That’s what they are!
There is a significant amount of chaos, but I think you can have a good degree of information to make deductions on guessing what people might pick as their actions for that round, and also have enough control to make long term plans. I am both impressed with what I saw, and also a bit concern on how much game I get to play until I find myself in a routine of doing the same thing again and again
Rallyman and Rallyman GT to get my ISGOYTRA entries done. (It really annoys the ISGOYTRA admin if you put them in on the last day.)
Merkator which we talked about in the latest podcast – and while I’m never going to be a dry Euro fan I really appreciated the shifting puzzliness of it all.
Some more BGA tonight. Started with Beyond the Sun. I swear I’m getting even worse! I really struggle with the tempo of this game. It feels like you should be making bigger and bigger moves to finish in a crescendo, but I often find I limp over the line having achieved bugger all for 4 turns.
Had a game of Lama. This really doesn’t have much of a game to it, but is still good fun.
Finished with a first play for a while of Nidavellir. A hidden auction set collection game. The dwarf theme isn’t my bag, but there’s a lot to like in this game. I think the scoring irl would be an absolute pig, but it’s decent enough for a quick blast online.
Played Rising Sun this evening with 5. I much preferred it to playing with 3 - there was much more contention for control of the board. We also played with the Kami expansion, which changed the game quite a bit.
The owner had done a really good job with painting the minis, including adding glue “slime” to one of the monsters:
Played a game of Free Ride recently (my box says Frei Fahrt). It feels at first a lot like TransAmerica (everyone puts pieces on the board to make train routes which become available to everyone) but has a route planning aspect where you have to move a train around between spots.
The game feels extremely tight (the solo mode has a crap performance to top performance score with a score range of 225-250) so I think the game is very mathy to play it well. Also I think the game would benefit with 3+ Players. Some decisions can lead to a six point swing in 2p which feels like a lot after playing it.
So, New Frontiers. It’s the Race for the Galaxy Board Game where Lehmann finally goes full Puerto Rico.
I’d been eager for a Puerto Rico killer. The game and I have a lukewarm history, but back in 2000 when half the internet was geocities and Settlers was fresh off the BGG #1 throne, you played a lot of Puerto. It’s just what you did. I never loved it, but I remain pretty attached simply due to time spent together (and memory of the sessions and people that came with it).
New Frontiers does fix every single thing wrong with Puerto Rico, which is great. On a first play, though, I found it also failed to duplicate the things that Puerto did right, and I was left with TWO boxes on my shelf, two sides of an imperfect coin (side note: oddly, I found that Bruxelles 1897 was a much more effective Puerto Rico killer despite the complete lack of mechanical overlap. The competitive and decision space felt very similar).
When New Frontiers popped up on BGA beta out of nowhere, I started playing it pretty compulsively and each time I love it more. I’m four games in now and it’s really showing it’s nuance. No, it doesn’t have the juicy “when do I produce?” question or the tense sparring over shipping space, nor the long term planning of where to put limited “colonists” (cough, cough) to activate parts of your engine until the next Mayor phase. But it does have other areas of tension and interaction that I"m falling in love with.
Then, last night, I played it in person again with my sister-in-law. It was bland on the table. It felt like it ended too soon and plagued with too many obvious choices. I don’t know if that is an artifact of the 2-player game vs. 3 or 4, that she made it too easy on me by missing the action selection nuance, or that we were both tired at the back half of another long week?
Anyway, New Frontiers. 3-4 player asynch, I cannot get enough of it. 2 player on the table, twice disappointed. I’m going to stick with it until I can ferret out what makes it work, because when the game clicks I absolutely love it.
