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Zylen posted:Now I'm a huge fan of Vlaada Chvatil, already owning Space Alert and Galaxy Trucker, so I'm pretty excited for the new arrivals. However I was wondering if there are any tips or things I need know before the boyfriend and I dive in - most likely with regards to Mage Knight? Oh, and definitely get a solo play in before you try to teach it to someone else.
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Feb 5, 2015 16:39
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Poison Mushroom posted:Mage Knight is really difficult to learn until all the rules 'click'. I've heard varying reports about either solo play or playthrough videos for learning it, rather than just the rules. Whatever works better for your learning style. I've tried reading through the first playthrough manual a few times, but eventually feel overwhelmed and put it down. It might be easier if I just set it up and played along, but... yes, it does seem difficult from afar.
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Feb 5, 2015 17:00
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Early Vlaada rulebooks are notoriously bad.
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Feb 5, 2015 17:02
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fozzy fosbourne posted:CGE tweeted that Alchemists and Tash-Kalar should be off the boat soon, but that was a few weeks ago. I think I read somewhere that their crate has been stuck in customs for a month I've been playing it with my cousin on BGA and it's just sent my impatience into overdrive. Can't wait to play the actual physical game.
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Feb 5, 2015 17:07
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StashAugustine posted:
FTFY
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Feb 5, 2015 17:08
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SolitarySolidarity posted:The Merchants & Marauders expansion looks pretty cool. Some of the elements remind me of Sid Meier's Pirates! I'm a bit late, but I'll also weigh in that my gaming group and I like it a lot and it definitely nails its theme. There's some balance issues, but they've never really hurt our experience with the game. I will say we heard from here, or saw on an official FAQ or something, to make Port Actions have to be the last thing you do in a turn, and we implemented that right away. It will speed the game up and create less downtime between turns. Fake Edit: Here's the Official FAQ and I don't see the rule on there, but I couldn swear we got it from somewhere and didn't make it up ourselves. http://zmangames.com/rulebooks/Merchants_And_Marauders_FAQ.pdf
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Feb 5, 2015 17:09
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I just finished a solo game of Mage Knight, and I got owned by Volkare. Don't play while tired, you will suck. Anyway, for your first game, you should read through the walkthrough while looking at everything and setting it up. Then you should probably find a video explaining everything, because you missed half the rules. Then you should play the intro game solo with the rulebook at your side because you will have missed something. Then evaluate why you felt nowhere near ready to take on three dudes at a time. Then try again, this time a full solo game, again with the rules, because there's a few you have forgotten. Notice that you did way better, but still had trouble with the cities. Now, at this point, you should be ready for a multiplayer game, but keep the rules handy, because seriously, there's a lot of them. It's not as bad as I make it out though, most of it makes sense in lots of ways, it's just hard to remember. Maybe read through this thread too:http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3667901 I guess videotaping your first plays and checking how many rules you missed/hosed up is an option for the hardcore gamer Oh, and fire block works against ice attacks and vice versa.
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Feb 5, 2015 17:18
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Sinlaeshel posted:I've tried reading through the first playthrough manual a few times, but eventually feel overwhelmed and put it down. It might be easier if I just set it up and played along, but... yes, it does seem difficult from afar. I watched every video I could find on how to play. Rahdo, Ricky Royal, etc. Honestly after watching them I had a pretty good first play (solo), a really good second one (solo), and taught my brother for my third play. I never really felt super overwhelmed after the videos though. Highly recommend watching them.
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Feb 5, 2015 17:27
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I just packed up and noticed that the Mage Knight box says 1-4 hours as play time. One hour may be possible if you are two players who are incredibly fast, know the game seriously well, are lucky and have picked a blitz scenario. Expect at least 3 hours for a learning game with all new players. At least.
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Feb 5, 2015 17:33
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Madmarker posted:FTFY Yet hes also getting the one game that makes that false
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Feb 5, 2015 17:42
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EnjoiThePureTrip posted:I'm a bit late, but I'll also weigh in that my gaming group and I like it a lot and it definitely nails its theme. There's some balance issues, but they've never really hurt our experience with the game. That's a good idea. One of the most common complaints for this game seems to be the downtime so that would certainly help it. Thanks.
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Feb 5, 2015 17:44
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I'm the type of person who often can't pay attention to a lecture on programming unless I've started experimenting with the topic myself, in actual code. After I've gained that initial understanding of the idea through experimentation and implementation, I can follow the lecture. Really good lectures sometimes get past this. So for games like Mage Knight, I do better if just throw that beast on the table and struggle through the first turn before reading the rest of the book or watching any video tutorials. The same held true for LotR LCG; I tried Watch it Played and Rahdo and would zone out, but once I just tried to slowly work my way through the first scenario it clicked.
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Feb 5, 2015 18:00
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Big McHuge posted:It seems like being a pirate was incredibly rough as you get locked out of things pretty quickly. Has that been your experience or was I (probably) playing it incorrectly? Being a pirate is risky and you may end up with a severely damaged sloop and no money to repair it after your first merchant raid. Keep in mind that going to the nearest port and retiring your captain is an option. Once you get the first couple successful merchant raids under your belt you'll find it easier going, particularly if you get one of the key ship upgrades for a pirate (reinforced hull or extra cannon). New players also shy away from PvP combat. If you aren't willing, as a pirate, to take a risk and attack a merchant's flute with it's hold full of cargo and gold then you're letting the merchants win. No guts no glory!
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Feb 5, 2015 18:34
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We found Merchants and Mauraders to be really sluggish. Took way too long to do anything and it wasn't much fun being a pirate. And why else would you want to play the game other to be a pirate? Thought Francis Drake was much better on all counts.
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Feb 5, 2015 19:34
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Zylen posted:I'm on a bit of a board game bender at the moment, having bought Netrunner at the beginning of January, Doomtown last weekend and both Tash Kalar and Mage Knight should be arriving tomorrow. Mage Knight has a lot of moving parts I suggest watching someone play though a game on youtube before even attempting the solo tutorial. Also you should go ahead and order the Lost Legion expansion now because you will as soon as you finish your first game anyway 
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Feb 5, 2015 20:21
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It's horses for courses when learning new games I think. But Mage Knight has quite a few fiddly buts so personally I found watching a walkthrough very helpful, though I normally don't bother. The Ricky Royal walkthroughs are fantastic for Mage Knight. There is one for the beginners scenario, a full conquest one, and a Volkare one. Before your first game I would recommend watching the beginners scenario walkthrough
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Feb 5, 2015 21:37
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disperse posted:Magic Realm? Yes, this is the correct response to any proposal involving Magic Realm.
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Feb 5, 2015 21:50
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Some people really would rather have their first experience be with the rulebook. Some people would really rather have their first experience be with a video. I'm in the former group, and will use videos after reading sometimes, especially before teaching the game. If you already know how you like to learn this stuff, ignore people who are telling you that you really need to do it the reverse way for Mage Knight, because they're full of poo poo.
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Feb 5, 2015 21:51
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Crackbone posted:Yes, this is the correct response to any proposal involving Magic Realm. Let me guess: you rolled a 'Disgust' result on the 'Curses' table after rolling a 'Curse' result on the 'Read Runes' table trying to learn the rules? 
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Feb 5, 2015 22:09
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StashAugustine posted:Early Vlaada rulebooks are notoriously bad. "Early" meaning everything before Tash-Kalar
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Feb 5, 2015 23:15
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homullus posted:Some people really would rather have their first experience be with the rulebook. Some people would really rather have their first experience be with a video. I'm in the former group, and will use videos after reading sometimes, especially before teaching the game. If you already know how you like to learn this stuff, ignore people who are telling you that you really need to do it the reverse way for Mage Knight, because they're full of poo poo. Yeah, different people learn differently (just like different people find different things enjoyable) and if you know what works for you, stick with that. Mage Knight isn't SO DIFFERENT that you should ditch your preferred method of learning right off the bat just for it or something. Sure it's more complex than most (and not as complex as some) but it's still just a board game much like any other. Personally I have never had any trouble with reading some text and doing & remembering what it says. But like I said, not everyone learns the same. I mean, I have no patience whatsoever for videos. I might as well watch paint dry.  Play -> Intro animation (fast forward) "Hi! I'm <name> and welcome to-" (fast forward) "-ooking at today, now we really-" (fast forward) "-kay! So in the box we ha-"  Just kidding, I never make it that far into a video. Not being able to read at my own pace (which is pretty fast) and not being able to flip forward or back instantly to what I want just sets my teeth on edge.
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Feb 5, 2015 23:55
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Fungah! posted:"Early" meaning everything before Tash-Kalar Hey, Space Alert's was quite good. And despite people saying Dungeon Lords's manual was bad, I thought the single sheet rules summary at the back was enough if I needed to reference something.
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Feb 6, 2015 03:32
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The Star Trek Deck Builder is a thing. A terrible, terrible thing.
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Feb 6, 2015 05:23
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IS 50 plus shipping a good price for the 1st edition of Yomi? I'm debating pulling the trigger on it.
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Feb 6, 2015 07:59
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Shadow225 posted:IS 50 plus shipping a good price for the 1st edition of Yomi? I'm debating pulling the trigger on it. That's, like, an insanely good price - Before it went out of print it was $100. Granted that came with some super high quality playmats, but I'm assuming you're getting those too, and even if not I'd say so yeah.
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Feb 6, 2015 08:00
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I have only played Battlestar Galactica twice, but last night we may have had the best game we will ever play. It was a 3 player game where the only Cylon player recieved his Loyalty card during the Sleeper Agent phase, he managed to stay hidden only shortly as most of our recources were already around the halfway mark. He saw his chance and revealed himself making me discard down to 1 card. What followed was about 60 minutes of epic gameplay in which he managed to get all resources down to 1 or 2, damaged Galactica on 4 locations and was a giant pain in the arse. It all ended on my turn, we managed to get the jump track up to a point where we could jump but might loose population. We only had 1 population left but there was no way we could make it through another Crisis step so we rolled the dice, the other human player played a Strategic Planning card so it was a 50/50 chance right there. We rolled and  Normally I'd hate to have to end the game with a roll of a die but somehow it felt so good after surviving several rounds of brutal attacks and crisis cards.
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Feb 6, 2015 10:31
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Had a good session at my weekly gaming meet. Started off with Port Royal. I quite like this game, while there isn't really much in the way of strategy to it, it plays quickly and is quite easy. I don't really have much to say about it other than it's a nice game. I'm going aboard for a holiday in May so I will consider getting it for then, I don't have many small games but my family and I will need some entertainment to wile away the Kefalonian nights. Power Grid was next, another one of those "classics" that I haven't yet played.While I did enjoy it a lot, I'm glad I didn't take the plunge and buy it. It's a bit too number-crunchy for the people I regularly play with. I did like the mechanics of the game and that delicate balance you have to try and maintain between having power stations and cities. More cities only give you money if you can power them, but on the flip-side you don't want to have excess power generation because it wastes resources. The nuclear physicist in me went for nuclear power early which I topped up with renewables and for the whole game I had very little (usually none at all) competition for uranium. My city expansion slowed in the mid-game as I'd got to the cheap cities and hit a financial wall I had to overcome before I could expand any further. Would definiately play again though. I loved the artwork on the box cover but I didn't feel like it carried over the board itself, the rather small cities with those massive grey pipes connecting them is pretty ugly to be honest. I think there's probably better ways the cities and connections can be represented that aren't quite so drab. And why big, leaking pipes? Surely it should be electrical pylons. Finished off the night with Hollywood, a drafting style game much like 7 Wonders where you make movies instead of civilisations. Every movie has to have at least a Script, a Director and a Actor/Actress, and you can add on extra film crew for more benefits and points. What gets you the big points though is matching the symbols across your cards. If your script is a horror movie for example, you'd do best getting a director and actors who also have those symbols (i.e. they specialise in horror movies). Number of symbols (that match your script) squared is the points you get so they can ramp up quickly. If you get a "gently caress this gay hand" round there are "Worthless Scripts" and "Stand-in Directors" you can take at any time from the middle. These will allow you to make a movie if luck of the draw denies you a script or director, but they also come without symbols so they're more a consolation prize than anything. The whole game would be multiplayer solitaire except for one card. The loving Agent. Once the draft is over you can play your Agent if you have one, name another player and announce you're taking one of their Directors, Actors or Actresses. This can really gently caress you up and honestly it can leave you feeling bitter because, unless you have spare directors and actors in your hand, there's nothing you can do to stop it. In the first round I had a movie that would have scored me a pretty meaty 36 points. An Agent is played, and that player takes my only Actress. I lose one of my matching symbols, lose the "leading couple" bonus (4 extra points for having an Actor/Actress combo) and two of my backstage crew's bonuses also become usless. I ended up getting about 15 points for it. There's a couple of other mechanics but that's the gist of it. I would play again, and it's tempting to add it to my wishlist but as far as I know it's had a very limited release. Plus it's one of those Kickstarted games that comes with a lot of nice extras, but only if you ordered it from Kickstarter of course.
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Feb 6, 2015 12:51
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Got to break out my kickstarter copy of Dungeon Lords today. It's really good.
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Feb 6, 2015 13:33
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Jabor posted:Got to break out my kickstarter copy of Dungeon Lords today.  drat you US customs.
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Feb 6, 2015 13:55
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Sloober posted:
People in Australia already have their copies. What the hell.
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Feb 6, 2015 13:59
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Poopy Palpy posted:People in Australia already have their copies. What the hell. They gave CGE the wrong shipping info so it shipped a week or two late, and then US Customs decided a container full of board games was possible contraband/and/or illegal poo poo so they wanted to do a more in depth search or something, and it's been there ever since. Going on something like a month now.
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Feb 6, 2015 14:02
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Sloober posted:Going on something like a month now. Try 2 months It's been a month since they've posted an update on the KS page
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Feb 6, 2015 15:03
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Zveroboy posted:Finished off the night with Hollywood, a drafting style game much like 7 Wonders where you make movies instead of civilisations. Every movie has to have at least a Script, a Director and a Actor/Actress, and you can add on extra film crew for more benefits and points. What gets you the big points though is matching the symbols across your cards. If your script is a horror movie for example, you'd do best getting a director and actors who also have those symbols (i.e. they specialise in horror movies). Number of symbols (that match your script) squared is the points you get so they can ramp up quickly. If you get a "gently caress this gay hand" round there are "Worthless Scripts" and "Stand-in Directors" you can take at any time from the middle. These will allow you to make a movie if luck of the draw denies you a script or director, but they also come without symbols so they're more a consolation prize than anything. I'm kinda curious to try this because I have been tinkering with a very similar game, just not drafting. There really is a lack of good movie industry-related games that aren't pure trivia.
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Feb 6, 2015 15:10
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Deceptive Thinker posted:Try 2 months I'm trying to ignore it so I can be all surprised when it arrives on my doorstep finally. It's not really working 
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Feb 6, 2015 15:43
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At least we've got XCOM to pass the time until DL ships, that game is good even if you have to play with someone who can't stand time pressures and needs to continually pause on Easy mode.
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Feb 6, 2015 16:04
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Played Five Tribes, Tragedy Looper, and Spike at my first gaming night with http://www.easttennesseegamers.com/ Five Tribes is a very pretty game on the table, and the mechanic of moving around already laid meeples is an interesting one -- I definitely saw some AP among the players at our table, although I would think on repeated plays this would (hopefully) lessen. I tried to clear as many tiles as possible which didn't really work well for me (a min/max player who got all 9 unique cards crushed everyone). I don't know -- I liked it enough to play again but I probably wouldn't buy it. Tragedy Looper (which I already own, but haven't opened) felt like more of a training run than anything. The mastermind had only played once or twice before so we missed a few rules (tile movement restrictions, specifically), but he did a good job of showing how the deduction/card countering worked. I would say it took everyone until around the third day to really get a handle on how everything interacted. I liked the general feel of the aesthetics, but the cards (perhaps intentionally?) were too hard to differentiate for one of the players, and the paranoia/movement restrictions too small to see for another. Not a game I would bring to a gaming night with new folks, because you'll want to play it with a core group, but I'm excited to play some more. Spike was...decent. It puts an inordinate amount of importance on your early game strategy -- as you have three supplies which you can only deliver once (with higher values depending on the city you deliver to), and you can only pick up certain supplies in certain cities (only Coal in Boston, only Cows in Atlanta -- for example) -- and at the beginning of the game you get a card that gives an end game bonus for connecting your rails to a specific set of cities..so well you can see why your initial train placement is absolutely crucial. The gameplay is also slow (one move per term, one of which can be simply setting your train in motion in order to move on your next turn), although there are some interesting midgame decisions (specifically when to forge ahead to your high value targets, and when to make side routes and pick up quick cash). I wouldn't want to play this again if there other options, but I wouldn't push it away either if people really wanted to play it. edit: Greg was an amazing host (he literally taught us Spike while playing Oasis) and his collection was incredible Lorini, so much that he hasn't played El Grande in five years despite it being his favorite game. He promised to pull it out next time I'm there so \o/ and gently caress I hope that Cardhaus's shipping estimation of vanilla Dungeon Lords and Last Will isn't related to the shipping business -- Feb 28th is already a long time to wait 
T-Bone fucked around with this message at 17:14 on Feb 6, 2015 |
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Feb 6, 2015 16:19
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Any thoughts on Sheriff of Nottingham? I like what I see, but I wonder how it holds up over repeated plays?
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Feb 6, 2015 16:21
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Why is hidden information bad, again?
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Feb 6, 2015 16:45
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fozzy fosbourne posted:Why is hidden information bad, again? Hidden trackable information is bad because it's trackable and the designer wants to pretend like the players are stupid.
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Feb 6, 2015 16:49
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Yep. We've (friends) always played Puerto Rico and Small World with the VP face up. If someone wants to play them face down we get out the pen and paper and track it like we do in magic. That usually gets people to stop being coy.
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Feb 6, 2015 16:58
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