A lot of Rosenberg games seem to overcome the iconography problem by having text on the cards themselves but that obviously has cost issues and also, I guess, limits on how fun/intricate the cards could be.
I looked at one card and it was not immediately obvious what it did which rang an alarm bell in my head. I’m generally not that great at complex games but having to process the four things (plus what I’ve got) while bouncing between references felt like something that would disrupt my flow too much!
mostly referring to the types of routes surrounding the card, these are mostly okay to read (note: I did not say easy to read)
often these just give you some resources
sometimes depending on number of matching routes you get some victory point tokens
3 card types
early game production cards are green those are mostly readable without almanac: the conditions are usually route types and the result is just resources
mid game buildings in brown also mostly use route types for conditions and give a mix of resources and VP, this is where I usually begin consulting the almanac
blue endgame cards is where the “fun” begins: these have fun conditions like
you get VP for every route type that has 7 or more placements on the board at the time…
if you have more ore than processed iron, you can exchange the ore for money
you get VP for the number of orthogonal railroad placements on the board
Just to show some of what is in Deck A.
I have hopes that I might learn the iconography to a point where I do not need the alamanc but it is more likely that if I play enough to do that I will not have learned the iconography but have memorized the cards (each of the 4 decks has about 60 cards, “memorizing” one of those is absolutely possible)
I think it was possibly a mistake to try and use iconography for the blue cards. The alamanc text explanations are short enough, they would fit on the cards. But the game comes with English and German variants in 1 box and the almanac allows for saving on additional card decks in another language.
A few nights ago we played a head-to-head match of The Voyages of Marco Polo, which is one of our nicest thinky ones. My wife wiped the floor with me! It was a very money-light game, and her first city was the one that gives 2x the die in money. Combined with her ability to choose her die faces instead of rolling, she had an easy 12-money spot each turn.
Meanwhile I got a city that allowed payment of camels for travel, which is really good! Except it’s kind of hard to get lots of camels without having any money, especially if you don’t have the money to travel and therefore are going second every round. As the character who got resources whenever she took certain actions, that drip feed was good enough for contracts but not for my serious cash and camelflow problems.
So I got to Beijing first, but she was ahead of me on the return trip we both took and was getting the city bonuses, and managed to put down all her posts and reach all her goal cities. I had more contracts but it wasn’t enough.
I like it. I can see why the Race comparison is there, but IMO Earth isn’t competing with it. I think it’s closer to Wingspan than Race. I like the bonus actions - you feel clever with them firing all the time.
We had a chat about the art - personally I like it but I’m a fan of wildlife photography.
It really slowed down playing in real time, which is why I think async would work better. Irl it would be easier because you could pretty much take all of your bonuses together, rather than 1 at a time.
The theme works and there seems to be lots of paths to victory which I always like. I don’t see a way to rush the endgame which would be a nice option.
I’d definitely be interested in picking it up when it’s released
Edit - it’s very slow async, lots of micro turns but at least you’re not sat waiting
Played 4 games of Spirit Island this week, all against Scotland level 4. Having read someone saying about how much level 6 adversaries skew playing I’ve dropped back to level 4 after beating all adversaries at level 6 to get to know the spirits a bit better. It’s been fun. Also we played all 4 low complexity spirits with an aspect as they’ve often been overlooked. The aspects are also quite fun, maybe not quite enough to drag them complexity up much but they do really vary the gameplay and what you’re doing with the spirit.
Yesterday there were 4 of us and that included @lalunaverde and we played Cthulhu Wars. Deamon Sultan had a really strong victory against Bubastis, Great Cthulhu and The Invasion playing on the Library at Caleano map. The Librarian didn’t put in an appearance but the custodian was good marauding around sending many a delinquent to the oubliette.
This game was again real interesting the mix of factions didn’t give much combat not helped by the newer cthulhu player failing to understand how to be aggressive with them which would have got the fighting ball rolling. There was however a ton of kidnapping of cultists and loads of monsters and acolytes getting catnapped to the moon. The map was great fun. Really interesting connections between spaces that gave a complex web of threat ranges to manage. Also the custodian and librarian interactions should grow over time so it should keep improving.
Edit
Then we finished up with 2 games of Hanabi. First one had far too much talking as we inducted a newer player to the ways. Second one we actually played by the rules until the final round when a cock up made it go rote for the last 3 plays. Still love this game!
I got really good at this game over lockdown as I played it a lot on BGA but now I’ve totally forgotten all the conventions for indicating what people have etc. Must relearn
I have steadfastly refused to learn conventions nor codify it. Some have crept in but I think that’s unavoidable. I feel that the game is fun feeling it out and trying to work out based on context and some deduction to see how each person communicates.
Years ago in Ludology podcast Geoff Engelstein saying they’re kid spent time with friends learning conventions, instantly nailed a 25 score and then never played. To me those conventions are basically a way of talking that’s using the permitted actions to communicate that’s built in to the game. It’s like people counting in their head when playing the mind and playing their cards on the count. Sure you can but it’s enjoying a version of success that just allows you to avoid the game rules and therefore the fun. Often with games the restrictions are where the fun comes from. I’ve never got a score of 25 so in that metric there’s a failure. On the flip side I’ve spent something like 6 years owning and enjoying the game Hanabi.
I don’t think even playing with most of the conventions we ‘beat’ the game more than a couple of times. Someone always misunderstands which is the point I guess.
I think it depends on the nature of the implicit disclosures I think. On the one had. Saying “I have one red” or whatever could be arbiitrary code to the whole hand. However I think establishing some hierarchical logic ( a bit like one of those puzzles where a bunch of gnomes work together to work out what coloured hats they each have) is probably okay?
Of course in the case of having a pre constructed logic system probably shifts the location of the game away from the card play and more into the puzzle in advance of sitting down with the cards, as would be the case in the gnome puzzle.
Last night my husband and I finished up our last game in the Antarctica-based Arkham Horror LCG campaign. There were some frustrating moments as ever in the land of Arkham Horror, but we made it out without too many lost to death or insanity, so an overall win. My husband and I each played two characters this time. He had a fighter and a clue person. I had a general support/versatile and back up clue person who worked well and then I had what should have been a fighter, but this campaign didn’t have as much fighting as some do and my husband always had his fighter do all the available fighting first, so my fighter was mostly twiddling her thumbs and feeling useless.
I’m work from home today, which would normally mean grading and class prep, but I have very little of either of that to do right now. So my main job today is to get Arkham cleaned up in preparation for Frosthaven that is supposed to be arriving this afternoon then start unboxing that.
Unfortunately before I could get Arkham off the table this morning, the dog, who has not done anything like this in at least a year, probably longer, decided to hop up to the game table and grab a few Arkham cards off it. Two are only lightly wrinkled, but one has a big tooth hole all the way through it and is otherwise badly wrinkled. That card just so happens to be one my husband mentioned last night is one he really likes having in his deck.
Maybe. I’ve sent a message to Fantasy Flight asking them if they can help. If they say no, which is likely I suspect since they are under Asmodee now, it will probably mean buying a whole pack over. I’ve looked and can get a used copy of the one I’d need for about $10. I think I’d be willing to risk that since I’m just banking on one card being in good condition.
As expected, Fantasy Flight said no. They said if I’m outside the US, I could contact my local version of their company and maybe they could help, but there is no spare parts of any kind if I’m in the US.
That’s very nice of you. I already ordered a used copy of the pack needed to replace the most damaged card, but if that one turns out to be in poor condition, I might check back in with you. I really appreciate the offer!
Italian trick taker - I don’t know what the name is, but it is a partnership 4 player game (if played the proper way) and the ranking goes like this: 3, 2, 1, King, Knight, Lady, 7, 6, 5, 4. You score 1 pt for every 3 cards and 1 pt for the 1’s.
Pax Pamir 2 - 5 player game with 2 British, 2 Russian, and 1 Afghan. The first round was a cylinder game where we all buff up the factions and so it was hard to break the stalemate. On the 2nd round, the Russians took a beating and the other Russian-aligned player and I switched sides to the Afghans to upset the balance. The sleazy defectors were quick to impress the Emir. The latter raised an army and repelled the British out of Afghanistan. The 3rd place player left fuming.
Alas, after years of peace, the Afghan coalition broken into petty factions once more, with all players unsure who to back many switched sides. The Russians and the British have returned slowly but steadily. And another dominance check to counter the powerful pro-Afghan lords. With a weak Emir, the warlords were divided between Russian and British. I sided with the British, but my so-called “allies” aren’t happy to be in the same boat as the winning player. The same person as in our previous game found himself again on the same tough kingmaking position. He decided that he’s rather be 2nd place than last place and triggered the dominant check which gave me the win. His other reasoning is that I have a 3 pts lead against 2nd place player that he’s not confident on his position to jump from last to 1st.
Some people weren’t happy with the reasoning, but eh, you can’t please everyone.
Coup
Hanabi
Cthulhu Wars - glad to get back to this again. The new factions are a joy as expected. But I am less enamoured with the Library map. Yeah, it’s a library that has the same scale of these cosmic monsters, but I think I prefer having a map that is more like a map. But that is obviously an aesthetics thing. I thought the Custodian and Librarian are a nice mini game. I played ‘The Invasion’ faction, which is a pretty complicated faction to play.
