I haven’t played this one enough, but it is daunting when the Soviet player gets the ability to return the “recruit army” card back to their hand.
Any other QMG titles you’ve tried?
2 Likes
Sunrise Lane - Cute filler from Knizia. Reimplementation of a game called Rondo. This one looks more appealing. Nothing serious, but I’m not sure if I can kick out an incumbent in my shelf for this game.
Fractured Sky - prior notes above confirmed. Easily won by forgoing the deduction step and just spend money on peek at where the scoring regions are. Terrible.
Ride the Rails + France map - man. I forgot how deep this game is. Strategic choice on how players develop the map and which players you wanna help when transporting passengers. From Capstone’s Iron Rails series, this is easily the best title in the series. Though, I am still waiting for Age of Rails
Santiago - negotiation, bribery, and shared incentives. Classic game.
Fun Facts - a question is ask: e.g. “how well dressed are you?”. Put a number, and in this case, a percentage. One by one, each player place their placard in ascending order. It’s a coop game, so you want a perfect arrangement. It’s a nice “icebreaker” type of game. Nothing spectacular though, compare to other party games
Ship Shape: IT’s a Smuggler’s Bounty - blind bidding game where you fill up your grid. Good fun, but it’s alright
5 Likes
icebreaker… yes exactly. i don’t play enough with people I don’t know well. so sold on. Just One and So Clover are the only ones worth keeping from that series.
4 Likes
No, 6 is a awkward number for me so i jumped at the chance to get this for £25. I really like a lot about it but I don’t think we’ve ever managed to combine a strong Germany with a strong Japan
I’m not a fan WW2 games in general so would happily look at another
1 Like
Man, don’t say this. I’ve come so close to buying Ride the Rails so many times
5 Likes
There’s the Cold War at 3 player. The Peloponnesian War at 4. And WW1 at 5. I really like the WW1 game (QMG 1914) Germany can go either west or east. Russia has 3 Central Power neighbours to choose. France/Italy have to juggle Germany and Austria-Hungary. And so on and so on. Not sure if our wavelengths will match with this though.
I found it good at 4 and 2 players. The former have a single player controlling the Central Powers.
3 Likes
Is it harder or easier than landing an actual plane? 
2 Likes
I had my first games of my newest purchases this week, getting through two games each of Arcadia Quest and New Frontiers.
Arcadia Quest was good fun solo, taking a random team of Diva, Johan and Maya through the District of Hammers and Brightsun Arena scenarios. The first game went pretty easily, but the second was much more tricky - largely due to far worse dice rolls on my behalf - but it is very moreish and I’m looking forward to completing the first campaign then trying again with another team, and in time getting it played with others - possibly my brother when he comes to visit in a couple of months. I find it far more managable than other mini-squad/dungeon-crawler games, and have the Beyond the Grave expansion on order already.
New Frontiers (from the Race for the Galaxy line) was also pretty good, and growing more on me. I tried two games as a solo two-hander and while I’m still working out good strategies and combinations, I love its theme and gameplay already so it’s likely to become my favourite space exploration tableau/engine builder. I have ordered the Starry Rift expansion with the solo rules to try later in the spring.
8 Likes
Continuing the theme, last night I played a six player game of Dune.
Majel Barrett Voice
Please specify by registry number.
- Dune. D-U-N-E. No bloody “Imperium,” “Arrakis,” or “Rex.”
Anyway. This was my first time playin’ the original for at least a decade, and I decided to pull out all the new shiny expansions. Everyone was dealt 2 factions and picked one: The final lineup was Harkonnen (Scott), Emperor (Eric), Fremen (Paul… nominative determinism at its finest), Tleilaxu (Terry), Ecaz (Justin), and CHOAM (me).
We used the Advanced Rules, but only the Exploration Token optional rules (No leaders, Strongholds, Homeworlds, or Nexus deck).
The early game saw me dropping a few troops onto the vacant Arakeen, only to have the Emperor kick me out. The Harkonnen took Sietch Tabr from the Fremen, and the Ecaz started popping Ambassadors around the map. The second turn a new Stronghold appeared in the deep desert, which the Fremen snagged, and the Ecaz used Weather Control to wipe several Spice stocks and a handful of Fremen off the map. The Tleilaxu reveal a Face Dancer from an Imperial invasion of Carthage, taking the city.
Turn 3 we get our first Nexus, and almost immediately the Fremen ally with the Tleilaxu and the Ecaz and Harkonnen join forces. The Harkonnen/Ecaz recapture Carthage and strike at Arrakeen, taking it as well, poising them for victory (the Ecaz have an optional win condition where if they hold 3 Strongholds with their ally then they both win, and they managed to do that with some clever maneuvering). Thankfully, the Emperor holds fast at Arrakeen.
Turn 4 and I boot the Emperor out of Arrakeen, and the Tleilaxu send another wave of troops into the jaws of obliteration. The Tleilaxu economy lags behind everyone because they earn their spice right after the Bidding, and so they rarely had the spice for weapons or defenses, and as a result many of their leaders end up in the tanks. Regardless, the Emperor manages to take the new Stronghold from the Fremen, and the Ecaz and Harkonnen shore up their defenses and take Sietch Tuek from the Fremen.
Turn 5, and everyone makes a play for the finish line. I hold Arrakeen, and so send a force from there to attack Cathage and land troops in the “other” Sietch (I forget the name). The Harkonnen/Ecaz just need to hold Carthage and Tabr while they attack the new Sietch from the Exploration Token. The Emperor holds the new Sietch and launches an attack on Tuek and Arrakeen. And the Fremen/Tleilaxu attack Tabr, hold the “other” sietch, and attack one other Fortress. Basically, I could get 3, the Ecaz/Harkonnen could get the 3 they need, the Emperor could get the 3 he needs, and the Fremen/Tleilaxu could get the 4 they need.
Sadly, I win my fights (getting me the 3 I need), but then the Harkonnen win their fights and then the Emperor wins his fights, and the Fremen/Tleilaxu lose theirs. The dust settles, and the Emperor Shaddam IV stands victorious!
Complaints: Why are the Ecaz and Tleilaxu both almost identical shades of Purple? Silly. An entire colour palette of choices and they pick the same 5 colours over and over (black, yellow, purple, blue, orange, reddish-orange, yellowish-orange, purple, blue-green, grey, grey-blue, and green).
Great game. Can’t wait to include some of the optional rules next time! I’m thinking… Nexus deck?
12 Likes
Last night at Thirsty Meeples in Oxford:
Forest Shuffle again, and even though I came last this is looking like a game I will probably buy (once it’s a bit cheaper, and indeed more widely stocked). I got some decent animal bonuses, but scored almost nothing on trees, which didn’t help matters at all.
Then on to Artifacts, Inc., a dice-worker-placement game which felt as though it should have been more fun than it was. You roll the dice and place them on cards to collect artifacts, buy or upgrade cards, get more dice, and sell artifacts to museums. Also you can go diving for a separate set of artifacts.
It’s very much a traditional view of archaeology in which these things are just lying around with nobody to care if you take them off to a museum on the other side of the world—surprising in a game from 2014, more so in a game from Ryan Laukat. More seriously, there are lots of cards on offer, but you’ll only get to play with a few of them in a game, given how tight the money tends to be.
It’s all right I suppose, but even though I like the period I didn’t feel anything pulling me to play it again, (And I have Steampunk Rally, which is also a dice-worker-placement game and which I’ve generally enjoyed rather more.)
Lastly, a change from our usual Timeline, Cardline: Animals (published in the same year, by the same designer, in the same physical format, but it doesn’t seem to have been as successful, perhaps because one can’t combine multiple sets). The only difference from Timeline, in fact, is that there are three parameters on the card, in this case size, weight, and lifespan, and one chooses one of them for each game.
We were moderately competent at the weight game, but very poor at lifespan. The main thing I took away from this is that if I still had a pack of Top Trumps I could use them to play under these rules and have a much more enjoyable game.
But not enough actually to buy a pack of Top Trumps.
10 Likes
Yesterday,
- I set up Nukleum for about 40 minutes
- I learned Nukleum for at least another 40 minutes
- I played a solo of Nukleum for… I didn’t look at the time anymore but it probably took 2 hours.
It’s just a bit of a table hog but I knew that.
Anyway I started after lunch and finished after dinner
And then a friend came by and I had to clean up quickly so we could play something else:
I am happy to report that the overall the learning process, the solo mode and the playing went well.
By various people I’ve been told various “oh Nukleum is a mix of this and that game”… let’s see:
- Brass Birmingham: absolutely. You build routes between cities and build buildings in cities. Check. There is not really a tech tree but the weird “experiment” component but that’s different. And you don’t transport beer but Uranium but well in German I’d say both will cause you to be “verstrahlt” if you have too much of it. Something something economy and industrial theme: yes.
- Wasserkraft/Barrage: I’ve only played the latter once and barely understood what was going on. Possibly this one is referenced in the way the map is arranged and you need to electrify buildings and for that you need a connection to a power station and possibly to a uranium mine or the coal mines… so I can see a faint relationship.
- Ticket to Ride: really? Anything that builds train routes is Ticket to Ride? Well, no.
Let me try to explain a bit what is really going on here.
There is a map of cities with a bunch of building spots for buildings, mines and turbins and 5 power stations already on the board all connected by potential rail lines (no canals, no water, nowhere). You build buildings in the city, build rail lines to connect them to power stations and and then you electrify your buildings to gather victory points and win the game 
The game ends when 2 or 3 of the game end conditions have been met (someone reaching 70 points, everyone having taken 3 income turns, someone having developed all the tech for their experiment, the action tile stack being empty or both contract tiles being empty).
There is obviously a lot of Euro stuff going on here.
The most important component are the action-tiles. They usually have 2 actions on them and are color coded in 4 colors that may be the same or different on both ends (cities are also color coded). The actions on them are various main actions and various side actions in all kinds of combinations sometimes with added or reduced cost.
There are some resources:
- workers (you get more during income turns)
- money (you get more during income turns)
- uranium (you get more when you build a mine)
On a standard turn, you chose one of your action tiles and then you decide if you want to place it as a rail line or on the slots on your player board. Both have advantages. On your player board it costs nothing extra and you definitely trigger both actions. Also during income turns you only get as much income as you placed action tiles (also you need to have moved that specific income marker…)
Placing as a rail line needs a worker (to mark that you own that one conveniently), and you only get those actions that color match both ends of the line. If you place a single tile between cities that one is immediately closed and if you match both cities, voilá 2 actions. If you place on a longer line and the adjacent spot isn’t filled, you only get 1 action and only if it matches the end. If you complete a longer line, everyone on that line gets to trigger all matching actions on that line. And you get a completion bonus. On the 2 player map there are a lot of lines that are length 1 and none that are length 3. Also you need to consider that action tiles on your board are returned to you in income turns, those placed as rail lines are gone.
So now that you have placed your action tile you can execute the matching actions on it. The side actions are all kinds of “move your income marker” or “get some resources” or “get some successes” (those are important during income turns and for endgame scoring). The main actions are:
- Urbanize: Build a building in one of your networks (you can build rails anywhere but buildings need to be where you already built a rail line except at the start of a game). There are 3 types with 4 levels each: living quarters, industry & laboratories that each give a certain type of bonus when electrified. Building buildings costs money.
- Industrialize: build one of your turbines or mines in one of your networks. These cost workers. Building mines gives you access to uranium. Turbines let you get more energy out of a power station. Also each turbine gives you a little bonus action modifier.
- Pick a contract and put it in one your contract slots for an immediate bonus. Additional bonus on fulfillment (I need to look up those rules, I think one can fulfill a contract on your round…) Contracts can give VP, money, tech… they are very useful little bonusses and they weren’t hard to fulfill they are simply an incentive to move in a certain direction which you might have been wanting to anyway f.e. build 2 laboratories or electrify 4 buildings. I feel these are mostly about bonus chaining as such things should be so
- Pick up to 2 new actions from the action market–at the start you definitely don’t have enough especially if you build a rail line with one of the basic actions and suddenly you can’t play that one anymore (no worries everyone has a 1 action joker that can’t be placed as a rail line so you can at least always use that to get more actions but it is a bit like the Verlegenheitsaktion in Beyond the Sun, if you need that tile more than once during a game, it is probably not going well for you)
- Electrify–you can electrify yours or neutral buildings. Each building needs a certain amount of energy and it needs to be connected to a power station and either coal or uranium (but to use uranium the station needs to have a Nukleum on top. 1 Nukleum is placed during setup. The others as people take income turns. If you have uranium that costs nothing, coal needs to be imported expensively (and getting more expensive during the game)
That’s it I think for actions.
The devil as usual is in the details.
Buildings can only go into slots that show their respective type or on lots that show no type but usually cost extra money to build in.
Depending on where on the map your networks are finding spots for turbines and mines can be tricky…
When to take income turns (a maximum of 6) is also tricky. Try and go a little later or earlier? Push income first or take it now?
And then there is the “weird” component. There are 4 of them each with a bunch of 8 different technologies (a mix of one time and permanent bonusses with 3 different levels that are mostly obtained from contracts or electrifying laboratories). Each also comes with a specific bonus you can get after building a certain turbine from your board and a set of associated starting actions. Each player gets one. And one of the game end conditions is having all tech developed.
The solo mode has an automated player that has a bunch of action tiles and rolls a die which one to take. And then there are rules how the bot places the action tile as a rail line or not and where they place it. There is a card deck for tie breakers on where to place what depending on which actions the bot gets to take. The bot takes a maximum of 3 income turns when they run out of actions and then it’s game over. A lot of the side actions are simply translated into VP or resources for the bot. It is definitely not an automa and the placement rules for rail lines become more and more intuitive over the course of a single game. Also the solo rules have a convenient flow chart on the back and a reminder for all actions how the bot takes them and mostly I had to consult that 1 sheet during the game. There are also challenge modes if the game against the bot might be too easy after a while.
I feel like this is easier logistics-wise than Brass B. Also easier than Barrage. It is definitely far less opaque than either of those. It is not that Nukleum lacks depth. But it is easier to see what the effects of each of your actions are. Electrifying definitely gives you the most important bonusses. But you can’t do it without having your buildings on the map and connected to power plants. Contracts help push you in a direction and the bonusses from these are also really nice.
The 2 player side of the map is quite tight and could in an actual 2 player game probably lead to some nice blocking actions if only to prevent another player to get access to a mine. You can only transport over lines that you own at least partially.
So despite it having more moving parts than Brass B at least, I think it might be easier to table this one. But my experience with Brass B / OG Brass is minimal… I just remember how hard it is to get your economy going especially in OG.
I like the action tiles and how you want to weigh which ones to use as rail lines and which to place on your board. And both are important and needed.
I need to play more of course, but I’d recommend giving it a try if you see it on a table or shelf somewhere near you–if you like the types of games I mentioned.
PS: unlike Brass B, uranium mines have owners and you cannot use someone else’s uranium to power your buildings. Sorry.
8 Likes
btw this fits Quinns dominoes prediction. too bad it’s a 2023 game.
4 Likes
Kabuto Sumo last night. After some very long games, I’m following the suggestion of always playing with the Total Mayhem content, which gives more ways to win.
Love it.
ETA: I am Reminded that I lost 4 games to 1. And I still love it!
9 Likes
Can we play the new expansion on AireCon?
3 Likes
Well, he did predict “Dominos!” for 2023 as well.
3 Likes
If you mean Sakura Slam, then no, because the KS hasn’t delivered yet (ETA was July).
2 Likes
Ah! D’oh! Total Mayhem sounds good. Never tried beyond the base game
4 Likes
Tried Pockroach Coker with my partner last night. Surprisingly fun even as a 2-player! I’d like to give it a go with more.
7 Likes
Played Pixies X2, 2 player today.
Hmm. Could go either way this. Drafting game, in 2 player four cards are revealed and you take turns to pick. Last person to get a card gets the first pick in the next pack.
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Cards are numbered 1-9 and go in the space allotted by the card. If you have the number you choose which card to tuck under to ‘validate’ the card for scoring the points as the number. If you already have two cards in a position you pretuck it in an open spot.
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Round ends when someone’s grid has all the spots filled, pretucked or not. There are three rounds.
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Points are also scored by your largest group of a single colour (there are 4 plus a wild) and number of swirls minus crosses (lower cards the to have swirls, higher cards tend to have crosses, in a brute force way to squash the average value of a position to into a 5-7 range as a guess)
Lots of interesting choices but this could be Sushi Go where every card is worth a similar point value.
Our scores were 133 vs 130 and 107 vs 142. Currently playing randoms on BGA to test a three player game and scores
4 Likes
Ticket to Ride: Poland - meh. Not much variation. It does have neighbouring regions like Switzerland map, but thats it.
Ticket to Ride: Nederlands - ah i like the bridge mechanism where you now have a currency to pay the bank when claiming a route, but if someone is already there, then you pay that player instead. Bridge coins will be an area majority scoring at end of game, so claiming routes early and fast is interesting.
Ticket to Ride: Germany - the passengers are cute, which counts for area majority scoring for each type at end of game.
Loot x2
Sushizock im Gockelwok - ah i prefer this over the OG. But eh, Im not so hot about it. Nothing can still beat Liars Dice as the fave dice chucking filler in my heart.
Liberté - Round 1, I led the Moderates to victory. In Round 2, player 5 tries to wrestle control away from me while I was courting the Royalists.
I became petty and supported the Jacobins. With 3 players bolstering them, we end up with them controlling a supermajority and overthrew our young republic.
Seas of Strife - amazing trick taker! No overwrought mechanisms on top but performs so well.
Easily in my Top New-to-Me this year
5 Likes