Scenario 16 from Jaws of the Lion. This was fantastic, two of us dead, I had 1 HP and 2 cards left even in my beast of a mech suit. My youngest and I slapped some Rat Monstrosities around in the final turn to win by the closest of margins. This was the elation I’d been looking for. Loved it. More tomorrow
Carcassonne tonight via zoom. River, abbotts, inn and cathedrals. I got a 54 point city which won the game. I like this game because I expect to be rubbish at it and I’m generally not too bad.
Yeah. This is my default Carc set up.
A couple more sessions of Kingdom Death: Monster have put us around the end of Lantern Year 5. We were initially scared of the Nemesis: Butcher fight, but not only did we divest him of AI cards in fairly short order, but I actually managed to crit his one crittable location and secure a pretty awesome Fighting Art out of it, not to mention super-charging that guy into Axe Specializing. He didn’t hurt us much, although he did trigger disorders in two of our survivors, one Immortal (honestly pretty positive with as much insanity as he has, although it’s not without downsides) and one with Absent Seizures (making her forget fighting arts if brain traumaed, which would suck if she had any, or we were getting regularly traumaed). After similarly rocking a Screaming Antelope, and with our axe guy now rocking blood paint to dual wield (not dual axes yet, but oh they are coming), we’re tentatively contemplating a Level 2 monster. But probably at least one more hunt first. Oh, also we had a savior born, and our Twilight Sworder is getting away with murder. Sigh. We did cheat a little, in that the first two times I rolled for the intimacy event I rolled a 1 (which we honored) and then double ones (after we got our Life principle), which we did not honor. And after rolling a 3 literally every time we had the Gorm Climate event for three years in a row we finally said “fuck you, reroll” on the fourth year and 3. But honestly.
Tonight was another session of our ongoing Mage Knight Volkare’s Return. This time we finally revealed the City tile, and originally I thought I’d wait for one of my compatriots (or more) to make it down as well. Then I checked my units, and my hand, and reconsidered. I wasn’t loaded with combat cards, but… I used a bunch of crystals, all three of my units and Disintegrate. the Gunners got Disintegrated. I used my Freezers to lock the other City Defender in ice, stopping their attack and knocking them down to 4 armor. My Ice Mages Ice Siege-attacked the werewolves, taking them out before melee combat. I blocked the Vampires and used my own Gunners to finish them off, and then Improvisationally stabbed the frozen defender. Four powerful, dead monsters, no damage to me. 24 fame and 2 levels. God that felt good. Now I’m just picking off a few straggling nearby things while waiting for Volkare to get here (which levelled me to 9 and got me an artifact, for what little that artifact proved to be worth) and looking to recruit a Heroes unit and maybe buy an Advanced Action or two while the others head my way.
It’s those little dice roll fudges that I can’t abide in KD:M. Add them all up, and it makes my achievements feel worthless, don’t do them, and you risk having to do it all over again, right from the start, which is where the interesting tension comes from, but don’t do them, and get sufficiently unlucky with deaths-in-childbirth, for example, and you have to start again from scratch, and that gets boring fast.
I love the epic fights in Mage Knight, and coming up with a narrative for them.
Finished up our Imperial Assault mission tonight. We won, though my hero got wounded on the last enemy action. Actually got to use Verena’s Close Quarters ability, which has been rare since the first or second mission, and we all got some good hits in on the targets. Setting things back up, since we decided to break when we were playing on Sunday, was easy, with some pictures of the board and the character cards to show damage and strain. Probably play the last mission on the campaign over the Thanksgiving holiday.
Pretty much mine too although I do sometimes use Princess and Dragon
I’ve been playing solo games of Village Green, a recent arrival. It’s a little tableau-building game. With more players, interaction would only be via the shared market of face-up cards, which would churn faster, and possibly deny you a card you really wanted. You’re trying to draw and play the best Green cards in a 3x3 grid, while also drawing and playing the 6 cards which will define what “best” actually means on a per-column and per-row basis, with the added complication that each Green card must be ‘compatible’ with every Green card adjacent to it. So it’s an optimisation puzzle where you’re trying to make the best of the random draw, plan ahead where you can, and then hope for the best. I like the theme, and it’s an ok way to pass a few minutes (it’s nice and quick), but I’m not sure I’d pick this for a multi-player game.
Got addicted very quickly to Twice as Clever on the app. I am very, very bad.
It’s a Yatzhee style roll and write, but different coloured dice are used in different areas of the pad. There are special powers and bonuses to be had when you do certain things.
The rules bit of the app doesn’t seem to work and we couldn’t find instructions either, but the rules were easily found on BGG.
My pre-order of Aeon’s End: Outcasts got here last night, and I just finished the built-in four-game campaign, playing solo with a single mage. As expected, it’s good! The Nameless are all neat and inventive (if a little more space-hogging), and I continue to be impressed with the variety of player cards that keep coming out. The differences aren’t tremendous, but I haven’t yet found a card that’s exactly like another one, which is cool with such a simple design space. My only real gripes, honestly, comes from the marketing and the story. I’m going to write more about the complaints than the positives, but that’s mostly because the good parts of this expansion aren’t surprising; it’s more Aeon’s End, the enemies are still great, but the game isn’t suddenly a dice-chucker.
This isn’t a new thing, but all of the Aeon’s End core boxes are meant to be standalone, which means they come with all the dials, cards, and cardboard you need to just play the game. That’s great in theory, but I can’t really imagine recommending these later boxes to a person new to Aeon’s End, because the original game is still in print as is plenty of fun. So, I’m effectively spending 10-20 extra dollars for components that will immediately get trashed, which is both annoying and wasteful. At the very least, I wish fewer of these big-box expansions were standalone, so I wouldn’t feel as economically and ecologically terrible about buying them.
Now, the story. The story here is actually better than the previous games, probably the best it’s ever been, but it handles two characters kind of weirdly for me. MINOR SPOILERS Two of the mages you start with are linked together by some kind of aether bond, and it’s very clear that this is more than just a professional bond. Both mages are also female, and the game kind of tries to have its cake and eat it too regarding that fact. On the one hand, their relationship is made so painstakingly clear that it feels incredibly hamfisted; for example, both characters’ backstories are the other person describing their personality and how they are happy to be spending their lives with each other, which is less of a backstory and more of a wedding vow. It feels like the game thinks it’s being edgy with this relationship, which then makes the parts where it doesn’t commit feel all the more off. As the most egregious example, after the climactic battle, one of the mages runs to the other, embraces them tightly, and then… kisses them on the forehead? Maybe a lot of couples passionately kiss each other on the forehead, but in my head that scene doesn’t really feel right for any pair of people, whether friends or romantic partners. It’s obviously not a big deal, and it’s certainly better than no representation at all, but it all feels a little… forced. Like the game wanted open-minded people to know “these two are a couple”, but wanted more ignorant and hateful people to be able to pretend they’re just business partners.
Anyways, sorry for the rant! It’s a rock-solid expansion with tons of content, and I officially have most of everything Aeon’s End has to offer (I’m missing War Eternal and some of the small-box expansions). It’s no Marvel Champions, but I still like it enough that I’ll probably back the inevitable next Kickstarter. I’m sure one day I’ll post a single-paragraph post here, but today ain’t that day. 
So, we just completed Jaws of the Lion!!
Bit of a swizz at the end because there are 25 scenarios, but 18 was the final one it seems. The rest are side quests.
The hardest part was getting out of the first room. The final boss had 80 health at level 3, but my eldest smashed the door down, threw an axe in his face and took 12 damage before he’d had a chance to blink. We’d saved up our most powerful cards and pounded him for 3 turns and won at a canter.
On reflection, we’ve had 16, 90-120 minutes family games for a £50 box which also has us desperate to play the big box. If I played every game that much I’d be very happy.
I’d massively recommend JOTL if you’ve not played the main game. We’ve hammered through ours because the 4 of us have been talking about it when we’ve not been playing it (that and I wanted to complete it before the boys get Imperial Assault for Xmas).
I should also say that the first 4 scenarios teach the game (and I assume base GH and Frosthaven brilliantly, I think it’s worth it just for those if you’re planning on playing a big box as well).
Just finished my first game of Thunderbolt Apache Leader. Took a while, but it was the first time through, and things were definitely going a lot faster by the end.
ETA: longer writeup on the blog.
Played a 2 player short Brass Birmingham this afternoon.
My partner seemed to have a lot of fun during the play and he played really well, no AP which is interesting because this game has some complex decisions to be made. There was only one turn where I had to let him know if he waited to use his beer that I would definitely use it the next turn.
However, he had not heard–despite me mentioning it multiple times–that level 2 buildings would give twice their VP in the short game and so he lost and so I’ll need to wait until I get to play this again.
Tonight, we had a TTS session with friends. Played 1 round of Skull which was fun. I’ve never played before. So one player quickly lost 3 of his discs. So when the round got back to him, he would have to pass or challenge and then subsequent players cannot place more discs, right? Which kind of forces the game to an end but also makes the final rounds a bit… weird?
Then we played Quantum with 4 players. I had tested the game in the afternoon with my partner but other than the few turns earlier, I had not played before. Neither had any of the others but it was an easy teach which is always a plus. I had expected a neat dice puzzle with the occasional attack when someone was being an obstacle. Which is the way I would have played… but it was not to be.
One player started out very aggressive. He had determined for himself that dominance was the best way to win. So, he started killing off my ships. Not once or twice but turn after turn. Then another player started to try the same thing with me. I am not usually a sore loser but it was a true downer to get beat down for three turns in a row by two different people before I somehow managed to rally…
Gaining cubes from dominance is what then allowed me and the original aggressor to pull away somehow from the others. Either that one cube damaged their morale so badly they gave up or it was a true game advantage, I couldn’t tell. And after that it still took several rounds to battle it out while the others watched more or less. I know my partner checked out completely… I ended up winning but it was one of the least enjoyable wins I’ve had in a while. I beat down my remaining opponent twice as he tried to place a final cube and then got lucky with a reconfiguration roll (well, I had a 50 percent chance to get the right number so luck was somewhat mitigated).
I am sure that at least two of the players do not want to play this again. I know my partner won’t. Possibly, the guy who liked the fighting might want to play again… my verdict: This is definitely not the game I expected. I can play it and win it but if this is 90% a dice-rolling fighty game, I have others that I like better. The dice puzzle I was looking for just vanished in the onslaught. I like my victories quiet and surprising not through application of brute force because that is what it felt like at the end.
It’s been a while since I saw the SUSD review and I have no memory if they mentioned how aggressive this plays. Probably. So I guess I need to vet games even better before bringing them to my gaming friends.
TL;DR: we played Quantum and couldn’t take how aggressive it was.
We just finished a knock-down, drag-out fight with a level 1 King’s Man in Kingdom Death: Monster. A couple Lantern Years early because we had a bunch of people and rolled like shit on the LY 6 event and didn’t want to lose a big pile of them. This may have been a mistake. We did win (to my surprise), partly through using our Blue savior, but we lost our most experienced hunter in the process, our savior got the King’s Curse, and we didn’t twig to the King’s Step event mechanic for most of the fight. And now the scheduled fight will be a level 2, I believe? So, yeah. It’s kind of exemplary of both the good and bad of KD:M. On the one hand, it’s a challenging fight with a bunch of interesting mechanics, and the King’s Man and Curse are creepy and visceral. On the other hand, it’s a fucking slog full of getting fucked over by poor dice rolls.
Had our usual gaming couple over for lunch and gaming, with a brief break for going to a small shopping center where they were giving out little baggies to kids for trick or treating. Our FLGS was one of the stores, so along with some candy, our kiddo got a d20. I approve!
Gaming-wise, we played Mysterium, with my wife as the ghost. One player flew right through all three stages, and her husband was only a step behind. I needed to hour six to reach the end. Good thing we were playing on easy. We ended up failing on the last vision, but at least all three of us were in agreement. We guessed again and were still wrong. My wife explained her reasonings for the cards she picked, and while they made sense, especially using a vision with jellyfish to represent poison, they had seemed to fit the other potential solution better.
After that, we talked about playing Ghost Stories, but our guests wanted to play something they had better odds of winning :D. So we played what was supposed to be a quick game of Quacks of Quedlinburg, which ended up taking a couple hours due to child interruptions. The same player that zipped through Mysterium also got a pretty good lead through the first five rounds of play, but then exploded on round six and chose money over points, which allowed the rest of us to close the gap significantly. I had a bad round, getting up to six bombs really quick, and knowing I needed to push my luck to stay competitive, ended up blowing up shortly thereafter, which pretty much ruined my shot at winning. Our other friend ended up tying with my wife in the end, but had gotten further in his last pot than she did, which is the tiebreaker, giving him the win.
Not a bad day gaming-wise.
I think this may be a big part of why I sold my copy, in the end (filtered through the usual immediate reason of “I don’t get it to the table often enough”). Very occasionally I’m in the right mood for it, and I quite like the puzzly aspect, but there are other things against it for me: the theme is very weak, and I’m not fond of the tracking through the turn of “this ship has moved, that ship has used its special power, I have two actions left”, etc.
Also it’s the sort of game where the #2 and #3 players have to jump on and drag down the #1 or #1 will get a runaway victory.
I’ve managed to get through a few solo games this week on various nights, mostly of Viticulture which were not always successfully won (or strategised!) although I did managed to score 29 victory points in 7 years in one game so was well chuffed with that. Architects of the West Kingdom got a couple of sessions too, splitting them 1-1 with the solo bots. Last night though I got to try Cyclades, albeit as a solo two-hander. I never got to finish it and obviously it’s hard to play fully as you can’t properly scheme and bid against yourself, but even an hour or so trying it to get to know the rules was great and I can see this would be fun with a few others. Tonight if I get time I might finally get to try V-Commandos, or if not then Nusfjord or perhaps an older title may get to the table, Eldritch Horror even if I start early enough.
I got that feeling at some point. The combat as it is in the box is weird:
I really didn’t see a good way to play this defensively like f.e. a battle station having the ability to fire at anyone passing by or something like that. Aggression is without question the better option and as soon as anyone starts playing that way, everyone has to follow suit quickly or they are left behind and then the game never ends.
Only played it once, a long time ago, but I seem to remember there are some tech upgrades that act as significant deterrents.
There are some mitigating cards and I do think the two guys who checked out could have played better. The aggression escalated because one person went all out on it and instead of looking for smart ways out of it we all went into retaliation mode.
We play too many multiplayer solitaire and coop games for them to be able to adapt quickly to a situation where you have to really play the other players and not just optimize better than everyone else. Interestingly, the only person who picked defensive cards was the guy who started attacking everyone else.
3 player Brass Birmingham, introducing the youngest to the industrial heartlands. Have I said before that this game is beautiful? 
He picked it up pretty quickly and we all enjoyed it. I sold a lot more stuff than I ever have before, sacrificing breweries and rail links. I also strangely got stuck in the bottom corner on my own while my wife and kid contested the West Midlands. That meant my beer needs were protected, but I spent a lot on coal, buying it from the market rather than pinching it from their mines.
I wish I could unsee the BGG forums, because there is a clear best strategy beer, rails, iron, cotton which, if one player does uncontested they are in a great spot for the win. My wife went this route and got a 30 point win. The obvious counter to BRIC is to do it as well, which, in such a tactical game makes it self balancing to an extent. However, we’re all still learning and exploring the game and it’s fun (and challenging and stressful) to play without needing to play optimally to secure the win. And even if you lose you get to look at that board for 60-90 minutes.
