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Zaphod42
Sep 13, 2012

If there's anything more important than my ego around, I want it caught and shot now.

Rutibex posted:

Yeah it's the same IP, so you're good if the Mage Knight universe is your thing, I guess. The game itself is pretty generic fantasy, I couldn't tell you what is distinctively "Mage Knight" about it beyond the flavor text in the rules book.

Yeah MK had no real unique flavor. Or their flavor was "everything and the kitchen sink".

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Lichtenstein
May 31, 2012

It'll make sense, eventually.
Roll to hit is fine. There is a lot of knee-jerk reaction against it here, with people conditioned to fear and loath the mechanic by myriads of Risk clones and zombie games, but really it's the context around it that's lacking.

A lot of wargames use that mechanic, or a very slightly dressed up version of it (like, the "bucket of dice" mechanic is nothing other than a firepower table resolution, but simplified/streamlined) and many of them are awesome games made none the worse for the dice rolling. The reasons this is acceptable is twofold:

A) In contrast to mainstream designer games, quality of gameplay is not the only primary consideration, as the historical simulation value is oftentimes deemed just as important.

B) They give meaningful ways of manipulating the dice, and in fact this is the point of a big part of tactics in these games.

To begin with, I'd say concentration of force, and perhaps managing reinforcements, is not enough to sustain meaningful depth (it is a baseline, just as "push your luck" and "double-blind choice" mechanics can be fun in a proper context but grow old really fast when they're all there is to a game). Now, wargames usually patch this up with meaningful maneuver, which includes both careful terrain considerations and the units themselves shaping the battlefield in a meaningful way, blocking and channeling routes, logistics and command constraining ability to pursue optimal choices...

For example, in Blood Bowl the units are the terrain, shaping the field with their soft zones of control and various abilities. All seasoned 'bowl players will tell you that despite (or perhaps owing to) all the rampant die-rolling, the game is all about careful positioning. (A lot of other people will tell you it is a bad dicerolling game, but they're dumb and have bad opinions. Blood Bowl certainly shows its age and could use some streamlining to bring it to a more modern age, but the design philosophy behind it is sound and goes beyond the simplified popular internet argument of "it's really about not throwing dice whenever you can").

In the case of many mainstream boardgames with a hit to roll mechanic, the real issue behind the roll-to-hit is that the context behind it really sucks. They often offer little choice beyond concentrating your resources vs spreading out/conserving them, or utilize the die due to lack of ideas on how to implement granular advantages other than +1 to roll. I strongly suspect this is like 40% reason behind inclusion of dice-based combat in CitoW (the other 40% being wooing ameritrashers, and some 20% left I'm frankly not sure about).

Let's take the example of often bitched-at Eclipse: an elegant eurogame mirred by its tedious, random, roll-to-hit combat. Take note that the game is filled to the brim with randomness (exploration, tech offer, combat vps...), but the dice rolling is the only part of the randomness that is really bitched about. Goons talking "waah waah dice, bullshit randomness" and thinking up ways to "fix" the problem with introduction of an odds-based CRT have fundamentally misunderstood the underlying issue.

If we look at the Eclipse combat from a wargame perspective, it greatly simplifies the maneuver aspect by discarding terrain consideration (other than the available wormholes and enemy position), de facto reducing it to an exercise in force concentration - which, as I've mentioned before - is just not enough to sustain interest. What replaces it is the preparation beforehand, in the form of equipping the ships with new tech. Which makes sense in the space context and is an overall sound decision. The thing is, it is the tech system that sucks, not the dice.

The tiles simply do not offer enough meaningful choice to turn into a minigame of its own, rather simply sustaining a form of a technological arms race. Your only choices are the trade-off between tanking and offense, and perhaps the ability to take missles and aim for an alpha strike fleet. With little choice in terms of interesting defensive options, most everyone ends up spamming -1 modifiers (they were called shields I think) in a sort of mutually assured boredom where each and every battle does indeed turn into a dumb exercise of hoping for sixes, whichever way you've build your fleet.

Now, take a look at the Hornet/Phantom Leader games from Dan Verssen Games. 90% of the gameplay is the exact same poo poo: carefully outfitting your vehicles with different guns and rolling to hit with with the most basic maneuvering aspect around it. However, these games loving rock and nobody minds the roll to hit thing. Why? Because the gear is actually interesting and offers meaningful decisions to make. The weapons are optimal for various targets, various distances, have different ammo considerations, availability, etc. All there is similar is the first strike missles which provide a sort-of initiative and sort-of limited ammo.

If I were to "fix" Eclipse's combat this is the way I'd do it: expand the tech beyond the plain +modifier -modifier. By single act of turning the three combat rounds (it was three combat tops, rather than "when everyone falls asleep or retreats, right"?) into the phases of fleets moving from contact to closer range, we'd greatly expand the design space at hand. Maybe we can have a one-shot weapon that gets better the later you activate it. Maybe a weapon that fires really fast, but only jams enemy systems, making sure they won't strike back, rather than damaging them permanently. Maybe some weapons are just universal. Maybe some ships' defensive capabilities relate to GTFO combat after dumping their long-range payloads, while others cloak, allowing to get comfortably close. Maybe you could board ships to get free pieces after the combat ends. Maybe there is terrain in space, with asteroid-filled hexes allowing fighters to hide from big ships without escorts. Maybe there are nebulas that gently caress with some otherwise useful techs. Maybe...

There is a lot that could be done to make Eclipse's combat more interesting without straying away from roll-to-hit combat resolution, nor nedlessly extend the time it takes.



gently caress all you Go autists, roll to hit is fine *drops mike*

Lichtenstein fucked around with this message at 23:11 on Jul 7, 2015

Countblanc
Apr 20, 2005

Help a hero out!
The historical simulation value of just being bad at something sometimes

AMooseDoesStuff
Dec 20, 2012

Lichtenstein posted:

Roll to hit is fine. There is a lot of knee-jerk reaction against it here, with people conditioned to fear and loath the mechanic by myriads of Risk clones and zombie games, but really it's the context around it that's lacking.

A lot of wargames use that mechanic, or a very slightly dressed up version of it (like, the "bucket of dice" mechanic is nothing other than a firepower table resolution, but simplified/streamlined) and many of them are awesome games made none the worse for the dice rolling. The reasons this is acceptable is twofold:

A) In contrast to mainstream designer games, quality of gameplay is not the only primary consideration, as the historical simulation value is oftentimes deemed just as important.

B) They give meaningful ways of manipulating the dice, and in fact this is the point of a big part of tactics in these games.

To begin with, I'd say concentration of force, and perhaps managing reinforcements, is not enough to sustain meaningful depth (it is a baseline, just as "push your luck" and "double-blind choice" mechanics can be fun in a proper context but grow old really fast when they're all there is to a game). Now, wargames usually patch this up with meaningful maneuver, which includes both careful terrain considerations and the units themselves shaping the battlefield in a meaningful way, blocking and channeling routes, logistics and command constraining ability to pursue optimal choices...

For example, in Blood Bowl the units are the terrain, shaping the field with their soft zones of control and various abilities. All seasoned 'bowl players will tell you that despite (or perhaps owing to) all the rampant die-rolling, the game is all about careful positioning. (A lot of other people will tell you it is a bad dicerolling game, but they're dumb and have bad opinions. Blood Bowl certainly shows its age and could use some streamlining to bring it to a more modern age, but the design philosophy behind it is sound and goes beyond the simplified popular internet argument of "it's really about not throwing dice whenever you can").

In the case of many mainstream boardgames with a hit to roll mechanic, the real issue behind the roll-to-hit is that the context behind it really sucks. They often offer little choice beyond concentrating your resources vs spreading out/conserving them, or utilize the die due to lack of ideas on how to implement granular advantages other than +1 to roll. I strongly suspect this is like 40% reason behind inclusion of dice-based combat in CitoW (the other 40% being wooing ameritrashers, and some 20% left I'm frankly not sure about).

Let's take the example of often bitched-at Eclipse: an elegant eurogame mirred by its tedious, random, roll-to-hit combat. Take note that the game is filled to the brim with randomness (exploration, tech offer, combat vps...), but the dice rolling is the only part of the randomness that is really bitched about. Goons talking "waah waah dice, bullshit randomness" and thinking up ways to "fix" the problem with introduction of an odds-based CRT have fundamentally misunderstood the underlying issue.

If we look at the Eclipse combat from a wargame perspective, it greatly simplifies the maneuver aspect by discarding terrain consideration (other than the available wormholes and enemy position), de facto reducing it to an exercise in force concentration - which, as I've mentioned before - is just not enough to sustain interest. What replaces it is the preparation beforehand, in the form of equipping the ships with new tech. Which makes sense in the space context and is an overall sound decision. The thing is, it is the tech system that sucks, not the dice.

The tiles simply do not offer enough meaningful choice to turn into a minigame of its own, rather simply sustaining a form of a technological arms race. Your only choices are the trade-off between tanking and offense, and perhaps the ability to take missles and aim for an alpha strike fleet. With little choice in terms of interesting defensive options, most everyone ends up spamming -1 modifiers (they were called shields I think) in a sort of mutually assured boredom where each and every battle does indeed turn into a dumb exercise of hoping for sixes, whichever way you've build your fleet.

Now, take a look at the Hornet/Phantom Leader games from Dan Verssen Games. 90% of the gameplay is the exact same poo poo: carefully outfitting your vehicles with different guns and rolling to hit with with the most basic maneuvering aspect around it. However, these games loving rock and nobody minds the roll to hit thing. Why? Because the gear is actually interesting and offers meaningful decisions to make. The weapons are optimal for various targets, various distances, have different ammo considerations, availability, etc. All there is similar is the first strike missles which provide a sort-of initiative and sort-of limited ammo.

If I were to "fix" Eclipse's combat this is the way I'd do it: expand the tech beyond the plain +modifier -modifier. By single act of turning the three combat rounds (it was three combat tops, rather than "when everyone falls asleep or retreats, right"?) into the phases of fleets moving from contact to closer range, we'd greatly expand the design space at hand. Maybe we can have a one-shot weapon that gets better the later you activate it. Maybe a weapon that fires really fast, but only jams enemy systems, making sure they won't strike back, rather than damaging them permanently. Maybe some weapons are just universal. Maybe some ships' defensive capabilities relate to GTFO combat after dumping their long-range payloads, while others cloak, allowing to get comfortably close. Maybe you could board ships to get free pieces after the combat ends. Maybe there is terrain in space, with asteroid-filled hexes allowing fighters to hide from big ships without escorts. Maybe there are nebulas that gently caress with some otherwise useful techs. Maybe...

There is a lot that could be done to make Eclipse's combat more interesting without straying away from roll-to-hit combat resolution, nor nedlessly extend the time it takes.



gently caress all you Go autists, roll to hit is fine *drops mike*

I too hate people with disabilities.

GreenBuckanneer
Sep 15, 2007

MikeCrotch posted:

Ugh, it's happening again. I'm...i'm getting the urge to break out and play Android.

Someone talk me down from the ledge.

Come join me on the dark side, I have the base set and some expansion packs but no one to play corporation so I can hack their servers :twisted:

Also: would anyone be able to answer questions about pathfinder card mechanics for me here?

Tekopo posted:

The reason why I play boardgames is because I can invite people over and be social and still play interesting, involving games :shrug:

Same.

GrandpaPants
Feb 13, 2006


Free to roam the heavens in man's noble quest to investigate the weirdness of the universe!

GreenBuckanneer posted:

Come join me on the dark side, I have the base set and some expansion packs but no one to play corporation so I can hack their servers :twisted:

That's not Android. That's Android: Netrunner.

Everyone should play Android at least once. Number one game that should have been so much more than it actually was.

Zaphod42
Sep 13, 2012

If there's anything more important than my ego around, I want it caught and shot now.

Lichtenstein posted:

gently caress all you Go autists, roll to hit is fine *drops mike*

I'm totally with most of your arguments; most people arguing against dice are really arguing against games that are too simple otherwise and try to use dice as a crutch in place of strategic choice or depth. Dice should be the excitement cherry on top, they can't be the main course.

However roll to hit can still really bog down a game and slow it down. If for nothing else that alone means you gotta really make sure its adding something to the game and not just there because board games should have dice or whatever.

GrandpaPants posted:

That's not Android. That's Android: Netrunner.

Everyone should play Android at least once. Number one game that should have been so much more than it actually was.

If anything its just Netrunner, yeah. The Android: prefix was just slapped on there recently to help push their IP.

I kinda want Fantasy Flight to just re-package everybody else's games for them, they seem to do a pretty drat good job cleaning poo poo up and making it really polished all around.

Although maybe its not fair to compare recent releases with stuff from the 70s :cheeky:

Zaphod42 fucked around with this message at 23:19 on Jul 7, 2015

The End
Apr 16, 2007

You're welcome.
I think the reason why roll to hit feels on the nose with Eclipse is that given the cost of ships and the low unit count, taking losses is very damaging and feels arbitrary. It's fine in games with high unit counts because the rolls at least feel like they even out, and even some bad combat results can't negate good board position (and it's a fast way to resolve combat). When it's the pivotal fleet battle to decide the winner of the game in Round 9, and it comes down to whoever rolls a 6 first, with the loser being totally hosed and the winner taking all, it doesn't generally feel satisfying.

To me, I think it's a workable solution to prevent the game's length from bloating out. As one of the 'autists' who talked about workshopping a CRT for the game, I've made little progress because I'm trying to account for the role initiative plays in the battles, so for now, the dice still hold sway.

Mayveena
Dec 27, 2006

People keep vandalizing my ID photo; I've lodged a complaint with HR
A couple of things on house rules:

I will only play games where hidden track able information is public knowledge. There are a couple of exceptions and card games aren't included. Some games like Hawaii become AP central like that, so I don't play those, but most games where the designer wants to hide information play just fine with that information.

Also some people want to play Advanced Civ without the calamities as a house rule. You can play the game that way, but since the board isn't balanced, whoever gets a lead will keep it for the entire six hour plus of game play.

And I think that's my issue with playing games with truly game changing house rules. A lot of people don't take the time to seriously consider why the rule is the way it is, how changing the rule(s) will actually affect the game play, and what impact the change will have on the experience.

Mayveena fucked around with this message at 23:45 on Jul 7, 2015

GrandpaPants
Feb 13, 2006


Free to roam the heavens in man's noble quest to investigate the weirdness of the universe!

Zaphod42 posted:

If anything its just Netrunner, yeah. The Android: prefix was just slapped on there recently to help push their IP.

You've been incredibly wrong on a number of things today and for some reason, you don't seem to be willing to give that up just yet, but it's not "just" Netrunner. They made a number of substantial rules changes, including adding factions/identities and implementing a card limit. I'm not familiar enough with the original Netrunner to say much more, but FFG has made it their own.

Zaphod42
Sep 13, 2012

If there's anything more important than my ego around, I want it caught and shot now.

GrandpaPants posted:

You've been incredibly wrong on a number of things today and for some reason, you don't seem to be willing to give that up just yet, but it's not "just" Netrunner. They made a number of substantial rules changes, including adding factions/identities and implementing a card limit. I'm not familiar enough with the original Netrunner to say much more, but FFG has made it their own.

You are completely misunderstanding what I meant. What I was saying was the name was just "Netrunner". There was a Netruner before Android. The game is "netrunner" first and "android: netrunner" second and "android" is just straight inaccurate.

I in no way meant to imply that fantasy flight lifted the game wholesale from WOTC. In fact you'll see my post is actually praising the job they did cleaning the game up. :v:

Slow down and re-read what I said without trying to be superior.

GreenBuckanneer
Sep 15, 2007

No one calls it Android: Netrunner though, just Netrunner. I never even heard of Android itself until a week or two ago when I was browsing the FF website.

On that note: I kind of want to get X-Wing :ohdear:

Zaphod42
Sep 13, 2012

If there's anything more important than my ego around, I want it caught and shot now.

GreenBuckanneer posted:

No one calls it Android: Netrunner though, just Netrunner. I never even heard of Android itself until a week or two ago when I was browsing the FF website.

On that note: I kind of want to get X-Wing :ohdear:

Yeah I've heard tons of good things about X-Wing, RPS had a glowing writeup about it. Been thinking about it but haven't caved yet, concerned it may not appeal to my friends as much.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
The thing about X-Wing is that while a luck element absolutely exists there's a lot of stuff to the game that involves making decisions which have an influence on the luck based parts (do I target lock or focus, which upgrades should I take, etc). It's true that there are moments where the dice just gently caress someone, but the whole game doesn't just hinge on a matter of random chance.

Merauder
Apr 17, 2003

The North Remembers.
X-Wing is amazing and you should buy it. There's a dedicated thread about it too, if you care to dig into it more. http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3657860

Rumda
Nov 4, 2009

Moth Lesbian Comrade
Played game of thrones tonight with the dance with dragons expansion. I was Tyrell so I was a target pretty much the entire game so I decided to hell with it and went hyper aggressive ended cycling my cards 3 times the game ended on the final round with me controlling 4 castles all three tokens and finishing third. Greyjoy won with stark just behind and the rest 2 castles behind me.

Bubble-T
Dec 26, 2004

You know, I've got a funny feeling I've seen this all before.
I'm a bit late to the open vs closed rules discussion but I believe the most important aspect of that dichotomy is not about the player experience but what it does for designers. Board game designers are really forced to consider how clean and elegant their rules are because they don't have a computer making sure everything is played correctly, and they tend not to take shortcuts or design things obtusely in the way video game designers do just because there's no reason for them not to.

I think my favourite example of this is that League of Legends awards players fractional gold income on minion kills right from the start of the game. You won't notice unless you kill two minions simultaneously and see "31 gold" pop up because the interface hides it. Video games are just full of this sort of nonsense because designers are generally free to pile exception upon equation upon rule upon exception without someone telling them how insane the whole thing is. Even designers who ostensibly care about this sort of thing fall in to the trap of thinking their rules are elegant just because someone can pick up the game and play immediately - I had a disagreement with the designer of Auro a while back because he actually thinks his game is a shining example of elegant rules even though the spell interactions are full of exceptions that aren't covered anywhere in the tutorial or manual.

Zaphod42 posted:

Ignoring the "it is really obvious that you know little" :rolleyes: The reason for picking chess is because...

I think part of Tekopo's point was that Chess is literally the culmination of 1000 years of house rules. It's pretty much the worst possible counterpoint you could have picked.

Poopy Palpy posted:

I basically checked out with Summoner Wars when I learned that a cool thing to do was have your own guys kill each other. If your mechanics encourage that, they aren't very good mechanics for a war game.

Works fine in Tash-Kalar :colbert:

Tash-Kalar's resource system is so much more interesting for cards + dudes play than traditional mana.

silvergoose posted:

I would argue that some board games, with electronic components, do have parts that are not understood by players. Space alert, for example, the soundtrack is not defined in the rules, and players don't know what rules given how many threats appear when, etc (being able to look this up or find out the framework for the app does not change the fact that most players will play the game in this situation).

So it's not even that strict a difference the other way, too.

Mission scripts are included in the box though, so I'd argue that the specifics of the soundtrack are included in the rules.

Rusty Kettle
Apr 10, 2005
Ultima! Ahmmm-bing!
I agree with the mega post on roll to hit.

The reason I am fine with Spector Ops' roll to hit mechanic is that your chances of a hit improve with how close you are to the spy. Thus, the chances improve with good play on the hunters part. If the dice hate you, the game can be ruined unjustly. But ultimately how many times you roll and the chance of success is determined by how effectively you utilize the tools at your disposal, how many mistakes the spy makes, how predictable the spy is, and all the good stuff in the game.

To a similar extent, Summoner wars' roll to hit mechanics are fine. Depending on the faction, you'll have all sorts of ways to get more dice, more attacks, improve your attack probability, and limit your opponent's attacks. All of this depends on a combination of hand management, resource management, resource denial, positioning, planning, and other good stuff. Furthermore, the probability of hitting is always pretty good and predictable, so getting completely screwed over by a bad roll is relatively unlikely compared to other games, in my opinion. It'll happen, but you can form a plan B. And if you absolutely hate rolling, you can build a precise Phoenix elves army and not make a single roll.

GreenBuckanneer
Sep 15, 2007

Rumda posted:

Played game of thrones tonight with the dance with dragons expansion. I was Tyrell so I was a target pretty much the entire game so I decided to hell with it and went hyper aggressive ended cycling my cards 3 times the game ended on the final round with me controlling 4 castles all three tokens and finishing third. Greyjoy won with stark just behind and the rest 2 castles behind me.

I have the original game, second edition, and I really really want to play it but the fact you need 5 other people and 2-4 hours minimum of time is more than it seems anyone wants to do.

Such a shame too because it looks just the right amount of complicated fun too.

fozzy fosbourne
Apr 21, 2010

I have the Feast of Crows expansion and keep meaning to play that with 4 and report back here on how it goes but I keep playing other good games instead so stay gooned I guess

General Battuta
Feb 7, 2011

This is how you communicate with a fellow intelligence: you hurt it, you keep on hurting it, until you can distinguish the posts from the screams.
I just sold a horror story to Tor.com (a very cool science fiction/fantasy website) about playing Arkham Horror with your ex :cthulhu:

Rutibex
Sep 9, 2001

by Fluffdaddy

General Battuta posted:

I just sold a horror story to Tor.com (a very cool science fiction/fantasy website) about playing Arkham Horror with your ex :cthulhu:

Do you do commissions? I would like a story about me and Hulk Hogan playing Talisman together, TIA

General Battuta
Feb 7, 2011

This is how you communicate with a fellow intelligence: you hurt it, you keep on hurting it, until you can distinguish the posts from the screams.

Rutibex posted:

Do you do commissions? I would like a story about me and Hulk Hogan playing Talisman together, TIA

This should be an HBO miniseries, not a piddling little tract.

The Eyes Have It
Feb 10, 2008

Third Eye Sees All
...snookums

Bubble-T posted:

[Space Alert's] mission scripts are included in the box though, so I'd argue that the specifics of the soundtrack are included in the rules.

Fun fact - actually they are not, or at least not any longer. I bought Space Alert sometime this past year and the documentation says it has mission cards but they aren't there. FAQ says "yeah we stopped including them, no one uses them"

Bubble-T
Dec 26, 2004

You know, I've got a funny feeling I've seen this all before.

Mister Sinewave posted:

Fun fact - actually they are not, or at least not any longer. I bought Space Alert sometime this past year and the documentation says it has mission cards but they aren't there. FAQ says "yeah we stopped including them, no one uses them"

Huh, interesting.

Bobby The Rookie
Jun 2, 2005

They can still be downloaded as PDF's off CGE's site, in case you have to play the game like a broken person.

The Eyes Have It
Feb 10, 2008

Third Eye Sees All
...snookums
^^^ :aslol:


I don't remember if it was an official FAQ or not come to think of it but the scoop was that it was the new normal.

StashAugustine
Mar 24, 2013

Do not trust in hope- it will betray you! Only faith and hatred sustain.

Countblanc posted:

The historical simulation value of just being bad at something sometimes

Wouldn't be a WWII game without the Italians

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
So here's my Spyfall trip report.

A board game night regular brought Spyfall this evening and based on some recommendations here I was pretty interested in playing it. It's a fairly basic hidden role concept...one player is secretly the spy and the other people want to identify them...but instead of missions and such every other person who isn't the spy receives a card that tells them the location the round is taking place in. These can be things like a Corporate Party, a Space Station, or The Crusades (it's obviously a lighthearted sort of game). In order to suss out the spy, players take turns asking one another questions ("So tell me, how are the men doing?" or "Do you remember the Captain's last orders?," stuff like that) which they have to offer answers to. The spy, obviously, doesn't know where they are but wants to play along to A). not get lynched and B). figure it out based on context clues because if they correctly guess what the location is that player wins the round and snags some bonus points. So the trick is for people hunting the spy to ask questions that fall somewhere between "too vague to let everyone else know that they're on the same side" and "too blatantly obvious that the spy figures it out."

There are 30 provided locations with some overlap in theme and concept...there's a submarine, a military base, a space station, a pirate ship, and the aforementioned Crusades, so if someone starts talking about the "Captain" or "Commander" the spy can't just go "oh it must obviously be this one," same if someone mentions swords or whatever, but if someone says "hey, remember when we made that guy walk the plank after he wouldn't hand over his stash of Spanish gold?" then you probably hosed up. It's important to note that memorization of the locations isn't necessary...when the spy goes for it, he gets an allotted time to study the list of potential locations to make the most informed decision he can.

So here's how the game went.

Round One: I get dealt the spy! Awesome. The dealer (who's the first to ask the question in a round) asks someone else "hey, so when do we get fed again?" and the other person (the game store owner who was playing with us) answers to the effect of "oh you know, rations at 6:00 A.M. and 6:00 P.M. and a share of rum in between." I pretty much immediately knew that it was the Pirate Ship. I didn't want to just immediately slam my card down (and also I mean, I dunno, for all I knew it could have been something else) so I let things play out for a bit longer...I got asked a question and faked my way through it, tossed out a fake accusation, etc...but by the time people were asking about how much longer we'd be becalmed I was like "yeah, it's the Pirate Ship." I score for the round.

Round Two: I'm not the spy, this time the location is The Crusades. We have some questions go around, one guy asking another if he can "polish his sword" brings the timer to a brief pause for laughter because we're all 12 years old, and I notice this one guy very obviously studying the inset in the rulebook and, half-jokingly, accuse him of being the spy.

And he throws a loving eye-rolling snit-fit over it, how is he supposed to try and play this game when he doesn't even have a chance to memorize all these locations, ugh this game sucks. He flips his card without anyone even having the chance to vote and he was in fact the spy. Never mind that you don't actually need to memorize all 30 locations because you're supposed to be deducing things based on context clues and you get a chance to study the drat list once you've announced that you're the spy.

My mood went from "hell yeah, time to try this new game that I've been interested in" to "I should go" so fast I got whiplash and that basically killed the game right then and there since everything was now super loving awkward and, speaking only for myself at any rate, I no longer had any desire to continue playing because as nice as it would have been for everyone else to go "okay then, you can find something else to do while the rest of us play" I knew that wasn't going to happen and I wasn't about to elevate the drama of an already offputting situation my own self for minimal gain, especially since I'm gathering this guy is friends with some of the other regulars who were playing.

So that's my Spyfall story. Based on one and a half rounds and approximately five minutes of actual gameplay time I'd say it seems pretty cool, but I'm going to reserve judgement until I've played two, maybe three full rounds first.

Kai Tave fucked around with this message at 06:39 on Jul 8, 2015

ThisIsNoZaku
Apr 22, 2013

Pew Pew Pew!

Kai Tave posted:

So here's my Spyfall trip report.

When I played it through maybe 8 rounds, we passed the insert around to whomever was asked a question so everyone could glance over it to help formulate their questions and answers. Some people developed a habit of always looked at it so it quickly stopped being a suspicious thing to do.

ThisIsNoZaku fucked around with this message at 06:45 on Jul 8, 2015

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

ThisIsNoZaku posted:

When I played it through maybe 8 rounds, we passed the insert around to whomever was asked a question so everyone could glance over it to help formulate their questions and answers. Some people developed a habit of always looked at it so it quickly stopped being a suspicious thing to do.

The guy who brought the game said he was planning on making copies of the insert so that everyone around the table could have one at hand. I'm of the opinion that I wish more game publishers would include handouts like that...I know that a lot of them do, but enough of them don't especially when it seems like a no-brainer.

That said the combination of "using context clues to figure out what sort of location it might be in broad strokes" and "getting a chance to actually peruse the insert once you've revealed yourself as the spy to further refine your deduction" should make it abundantly obvious that you don't need to memorize 30 locations to be an effective spy, especially when people are lobbing around fairly easy questions and answers. "Can I polish your sword?" Hmm, innuendo aside I wonder if there might be any swords at the location, could that possibly narrow things down? Oh, and that one dude talking about infidels taking him captive, yeah, there's no way to figure this out, better throw a sneering shitfit and rain on everyone's parade, obviously this game is impossible.

Like goddamn, I had such a miserable time playing Thunderstone last time that you don't even know, but at least I managed not to have a public outburst about it.

ThisIsNoZaku
Apr 22, 2013

Pew Pew Pew!

Kai Tave posted:

Like goddamn, I had such a miserable time playing Thunderstone last time that you don't even know

Hey, I've played Thunderstone, don't you tell me what I do and don't know. :colbert:.

I was surprised how much I liked Spyfall. I also have no idea why the rules suggest not using the roles in your first games- everyone I played with thought the context they provide for people to inform their questions and answers are kind of important.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib
Spyfall seems, based on my extremely limited exposure to it, like a charming sort of hidden role/deduction game, it's got amusing art and it's freeform enough that you can have some some fun with the questions and answers, and yeah, we used roles when we played because it seems like a good way to force non-spies to have to effectively frame their questions instead of always being as broadly general as they can get away with while also giving the spy something else he has to try and scramble to fake in the meantime ("I was, uh, sweeping the hallways. Because I'm the...janitor. YES WE HAVE A JANITOR OKAY?")

I would say that the potential pitfall I see with it is that while it's a game with a lot of potential for being goofy and raucous and kind of "party game" esque that it's still a deduction game and still demands a certain degree of mental focus. One of the other players was completely lost throughout the entire process because she's the sort of person to spend the entire time someone's explaining the rules engrossed in a conversation with someone else at the end of the table and then be like "I don't get how this works?" when the game actually starts. So it looks and sounds a bit like a "social lubricant" party game where the rules are just sort of a vague framework to get people talking and joking and the points don't really matter buuuut it probably doesn't work that great if half the table is checking out and not spending time thinking of good questions so that you wind up with a lot of "um, uh..." whenever it's their turn to ask something.

Tekopo
Oct 24, 2008

When you see it, you'll shit yourself.


I do think that people in this thread have always acknowledged that it isn't if dice are used or not, but how they are used. I mean, take for example Virgin Queen: this has probably one of the worst dice combat ever, with the most unsatisfying results and where tactics just go down to "have more troops". And then you add to that the fact that you have to roll dice to do ANYTHING in the game and agency in the game feels kind of lacking, almost. I do generally think that there are a lot if games where "roll X+ to hit" is similarly unsatisfying but that's just my general dislike for binary results in games: with most systems it's either something happens or nothing happens and I much prefer systems where the probability of absolutely nothing happening is low.

Tekopo fucked around with this message at 11:07 on Jul 8, 2015

TastyLemonDrops
Aug 6, 2008

you said "drop kick" fyi
Fake Artist Goes to New York does Spyfall better.

ThisIsNoZaku
Apr 22, 2013

Pew Pew Pew!

Tekopo posted:

I do think that people in this thread have always acknowledged that it isn't if Duce are used or not, but how they are used.

I've never seen a game use Mussolini right.

Kai Tave
Jul 2, 2012
Fallen Rib

ThisIsNoZaku posted:

I've never seen a game use Mussolini right.

Ticket to Ride :v:

Oldstench
Jun 29, 2007

Let's talk about where you're going.

TastyLemonDrops posted:

Fake Artist Goes to New York does Spyfall better.

girl dick energy
Sep 30, 2009

You think you have the wherewithal to figure out my puzzle vagina?

Kai Tave posted:

Ticket to Ride :v:
I assume you mean Ticket to Ride Europe. We don't really have the right spices for Mussoulini here in the states.

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silvergoose
Mar 18, 2006

IT IS SAID THE TEARS OF THE BWEENIX CAN HEAL ALL WOUNDS




By the way, the ultimate in choose-your-own-ruleset, even more than Tuscany, is the upcoming 504, which is 9 different rulesets, of which you pick three randomly (or choose them I suppose) and that forms the game you play that time.

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