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Kruller posted:I have a few questions. TtA reprint is due very soon, wait for that. Nations is OK, but it's really not the best of designs, it's really, really prone to death spiralling.
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Jul 15, 2015 22:46
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Kruller posted:I have a few questions. Mage Knight has a ton of things going on at once. I really recommend you at least set it up and play a couple of rounds before you teach it. The walkthrough, though, does a pretty good job of showing you the basics. So it wouldn't be a total disaster if you all went into it blind. Just expect it to take at least 4 or 5 hours. The only things I'd suggest beyond the walkthrough are: 1. Try to do something each turn, be it fight something, land on a crystal mine, whatever. 2. Don't be afraid of taking the occasional wound. 3. Units are your best friend!
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Jul 15, 2015 22:47
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Kruller posted:I'm also looking at picking up Nations since Through the Ages is apparently impossible to find but seems to be due for a reprint around Essen. I have played neither, but I love civ style games. Will Nations be a good way to build up to TtA when it is reprinted? I prefer Patchistory to TTA personally (I like the bidding mechanic for "expansion"), but I've only played a handful of both games, so some of their respective design flaws may not be quite as apparent to me yet.
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Jul 15, 2015 23:06
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Patchistory shares a major issue with nations for me, that of the high potential for death-spiralling. TtA is too long, but it's carefully balanced to ensure that everyone has at least a chance of getting access to all the resources they need. Patchistory, it's entirely possible for one player to go without enough actions to do anything useful for most of the game if you get unlucky. SImilarly, Nations and food/stability. I really like both the bidding and the patching in Patchistory, though. I hope the TtA new edition will cut the time down a bit because I miss playing it.
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Jul 15, 2015 23:19
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thespaceinvader posted:Patchistory shares a major issue with nations for me, that of the high potential for death-spiralling. TtA is too long, but it's carefully balanced to ensure that everyone has at least a chance of getting access to all the resources they need. Patchistory, it's entirely possible for one player to go without enough actions to do anything useful for most of the game if you get unlucky. SImilarly, Nations and food/stability. I don't really see how TTA gives everyone a chance of getting access to the resources they need, since that is definitely not what happened in my games of TTA. People were consistently assed out of at least one aspect of their economy, whether it's food or production or military, doubly so since TTA uses a much maligned market row mechanic for its development. Patchistory uses a bidding mechanic for its development, so everyone has access the same tiles at once, instead of someone pulling a Yugioh and topdecking exactly the card they need. While it may be bad luck that you ran out of money when a tile you really needed came up, it's more or less your own fault for bankrupting yourself. I also never felt much of a death spiral, since you can see all offensive actions coming, except in late game with a high transportation build, at which point you should really have been expecting the attack. That person bidding on Stealth Bombers isn't doing it for the ability to move their dudes, for instance. The weakest point of Patchistory is the "objective" system that you "vote" for, which is just kinda poorly implemented and lacks any sort of intrigue. It basically means Votes = points since you always know what your own objectives are and can vote for them, and there's no real reason to split up the vote, so...eh. It's more dull than bad, though.
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Jul 15, 2015 23:32
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Kruller posted:I'm also looking at picking up Nations since Through the Ages is apparently impossible to find but seems to be due for a reprint around Essen. I have played neither, but I love civ style games. Will Nations be a good way to build up to TtA when it is reprinted? My FLGS has a copy of TtA that has been sitting there for years. Nations is poo poo.
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Jul 15, 2015 23:35
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I also played Evolution for the first time last night. I'm not sure how I feel about it. There seems to be a gang-up-on-the-loser problem. One of the players simply couldn't get any good defenses on his critters and kept getting munched on by other carnivores while the winner sat comfortably with a climber with warning call protecting his other species. It didn't help that the only Intelligence cards that showed up were discarded by another herbivore (he couldn't get any Carnivore cards). It wasn't really bad, I just don't see myself ever asking to play it again.
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Jul 15, 2015 23:45
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GrandpaPants posted:I don't really see how TTA gives everyone a chance of getting access to the resources they need, since that is definitely not what happened in my games of TTA. People were consistently assed out of at least one aspect of their economy, whether it's food or production or military, doubly so since TTA uses a much maligned market row mechanic for its development. Patchistory uses a bidding mechanic for its development, so everyone has access the same tiles at once, instead of someone pulling a Yugioh and topdecking exactly the card they need. While it may be bad luck that you ran out of money when a tile you really needed came up, it's more or less your own fault for bankrupting yourself. I also never felt much of a death spiral, since you can see all offensive actions coming, except in late game with a high transportation build, at which point you should really have been expecting the attack. That person bidding on Stealth Bombers isn't doing it for the ability to move their dudes, for instance. TtA has a more-or-less balanced set of cards that's being used and all of them will come out barring a couple of age A ones which aren't vital. One of the big skills in the game is knowing which cards to pick when, and how to account for the things you missed out on, and it usually has multiple routes to a given thing. It's possible to get hosed over, but it will usually cost your opponents to do so - there's not enough iron to go around, but getting both iron and coal is not amazingly good value because of the cost of upgrading, so it's usually possible to get one or the other, or make up the difference with wwonders or leaders or yellow cards. As oppposed to Patchistory where there's a decent chance that the player who gets a bit behind is just... never able to get a third action, or any money income together. Ever, no matter how well he tries to play. The last couple of games I've played, I've just been completely shut out of auctions and forced to take the worst thing on the board (and in one game, twice been forced to toss a card completely that I couldn't patch) because I was irretrievably behind on money, and I couldn't earn much money because I had no money. Similarly, the fact that Nations has SO many cards and you see only a small proportion of them each game makes it a strong possibility that you just... won't get some crucial resource available. In TtA, you know it's coming, you just have to fight for it, in Nations and Patchistory you can't even guarantee it's coming. It's difficult to say it's someone's fault for bankrupting himself or not having enough actions if they literally never see a money or action tile that it's possible for them to win a bid on. TtA is definitely not perfect, I'd never say otherwise. But in design terms, it's definitely better, and I have high hopes for the new edition being better still - Vlaada's come on a long way since TtA first came out...
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Jul 15, 2015 23:49
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Anyone know of an easy way (other than going there) to get coins from the Bahamas? I'd kinda like to upgrade my Archipelago coins and buying specific metal board game coins is really expensive. But the 1 and 5 cent coins of the Bahamas would work pretty well for me and it's 1 and 5 cents each... Or close. The 5 cent coins even have pineapples on them, just like the exotic fruit. So, yeah. Options?
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Jul 16, 2015 00:03
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QnoisX posted:Anyone know of an easy way (other than going there) to get coins from the Bahamas? I'd kinda like to upgrade my Archipelago coins and buying specific metal board game coins is really expensive. But the 1 and 5 cent coins of the Bahamas would work pretty well for me and it's 1 and 5 cents each... Or close. The 5 cent coins even have pineapples on them, just like the exotic fruit. So, yeah. Options? Go to a flea market, there's always a coin guy there selling foreign coins and stuff. Baring that, you might be able to get some from a bank if you ask nicely.
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Jul 16, 2015 00:18
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http://www.ebay.com/itm/BAHAMAS-50-1-CENT-2009-STARFISH-COINS-/121700672555?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1c55ece42b
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Jul 16, 2015 00:24
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Rutibex posted:Go to a flea market, there's always a coin guy there selling foreign coins and stuff. Baring that, you might be able to get some from a bank if you ask nicely. Yeah, there's 1st Monday here, but that's not till...well the first Monday of the month and I'll be at Gencon for the next one. Doubt our bank would have any, but I can check. Foehammer posted:http://www.ebay.com/itm/BAHAMAS-50-1-CENT-2009-STARFISH-COINS-/121700672555?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1c55ece42b Ebay, duh! Thanks!
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Jul 16, 2015 00:26
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What games would you guys recommend for a group of about 10 players? I was thinking Masquerade and Two Rooms and a Boom.
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Jul 16, 2015 00:53
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Those On My Left posted:What games would you guys recommend for a group of about 10 players? I was thinking Masquerade and Two Rooms and a Boom. if you've got an odd number panic on wall street's good, scales to 11
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Jul 16, 2015 01:02
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Oldstench posted:I also played Evolution for the first time last night. I'm not sure how I feel about it. There seems to be a gang-up-on-the-loser problem. One of the players simply couldn't get any good defenses on his critters and kept getting munched on by other carnivores while the winner sat comfortably with a climber with warning call protecting his other species. It didn't help that the only Intelligence cards that showed up were discarded by another herbivore (he couldn't get any Carnivore cards). There's only a "gang up on the loser" problem if everyone else has protected their species. A loser will be drawing fewer cards and thus have fewer species of smaller body size and population, so predator players with large populations can find themselves forced to prey on their own species to survive. The Flight expansion (and 2nd edition) is also going to weaken herbivore turtling by reducing the amount of food produced by cards. It was also pretty bad luck that in your game one player was unable to draw one of eighteen Carnivore cards and your predator players were unable to draw any of Intelligence, Climbing or Ambush. On top of which, that herbivore-only player should have been trying to combo Intelligence with cards like Long Neck, Fat Tissue and Cooperation to get stuffed to the gills with food every turn while discarding his worst cards to the Watering Hole in an attempt to get the turtle to starve.
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Jul 16, 2015 01:03
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Re:TTA, Nations, Patchistory etc I'm also eagerly awaiting the TTA reprint and looking to play Patchistory soon. I've heard good things about The Golden Ages as one of the best civ-lite games. Need to check that out when Stronghold releaeses it here
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Jul 16, 2015 02:27
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This is so funny for all the wrong reasons: https://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/2286128/star-realms?size=large Star Realms, reskinned into the Hundred Years War.
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Jul 16, 2015 05:10
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Azran posted:This is so funny for all the wrong reasons: https://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/2286128/star-realms?size=large It's silly enough that a lot of people like this game mostly because it's a deckbuilder with space lasers, but this takes thinking the theme matters to a ridiculous level.
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Jul 16, 2015 05:26
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GrandpaPants posted:I don't really see how TTA gives everyone a chance of getting access to the resources they need, since that is definitely not what happened in my games of TTA. People were consistently assed out of at least one aspect of their economy, whether it's food or production or military, doubly so since TTA uses a much maligned market row mechanic for its development. I got TTA a while ago, and played enough of it to comment on this. Here's the thing with Through The Ages. The first four on the row cost three actions to pick up. Almost literally nothing is ever worth those three actions. The next slots are two actions to take. Few cards are worth taking at two, but there are times when it's a necessary evil. Coal upgrading from Bronze on the first draws of Age 2 is as close to a no brainer as TTA gets, while Selective Breeding midway through Age 2 when you have Irrigation already is definitely not worth it. If you're not actually getting a shot at a farm/mine/science/action tech, either you're being action greedy about stuff you know you need, trying to get it for one action when you can and should afford two or someone's breaking the rules on taking duplicate techs. More likely, you need to realize you can't get everything and the point of the game is balancing that fact. You shouldn't be having up to date techs on everything every age. Trying to do so is foolishness and you'll spend so much time caretaking your economy you'll lose. If that's what other people are doing, you punish them. That's what aggressions are for. You can spend two actions to take Coal, an action to play it, and five actions upgrading your Iron mines to Coal, or you can take those eight actions and build a military to just take enough resources through aggression and colonies that it doesn't matter that you're running Bronze mines all the way into Age 4. Through The Ages does not give everyone a shot at every aspect of their development. It gives everyone a shot at some aspects of their development. There is no such thing as not getting these chances, because it's simply not possible to not have a chance at these cards. It's as simple as that. There's a limit on taking duplicate techs, and there's a limit on taking cards if you have too many in hand. There's a limit on taking multiple leaders from an age, and there's an increasing cost to taking wonders, and you can't take a new wonder if there's an old one being built. If by some act of God all of these do get taken and played then there's no time for these players to be actually developing the cards they took and they should be punished accordingly through military action. If you need to know how, that's why the yellow action cards exist. The only way someone doesn't have access to a resource they need in Through The Ages is if they willingly denied it to themselves. It's pretty brutal and unforgiving, and it's definitely not light, but it's certainly the only fair single deck market row anything I've encountered.
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Jul 16, 2015 07:11
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Argent: Jebus.
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Jul 16, 2015 07:14
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Malloreon posted:Argent: Jebus. I wouldn't say it's that good.
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Jul 16, 2015 07:25
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Trasson posted:The only way someone doesn't have access to a resource they need in Through The Ages is if they willingly denied it to themselves. It's pretty brutal and unforgiving, and it's definitely not light, but it's certainly the only fair single deck market row anything I've encountered. Pax Porfiriana feels reasonable in a "nothing is fair at all so it's ok" way. You're lucky to hold on to any development at all for very long in that game though. I agree with you otherwise, I've seen people do well in TTA with almost no tech upgrades at all, letting the other 3 players compete over them and just picking up the yellow cards nobody else has enough actions left to bother with.
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Jul 16, 2015 07:39
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Trasson posted:
There's actually one important resource you can be denied by sheer random chance: You can fail to draw the formation and/or aggression cards you need. I'm pretty sure this is by design; the military path is supposed to be high risk, high reward.
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Jul 16, 2015 07:45
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Tendales posted:There's actually one important resource you can be denied by sheer random chance: You can fail to draw the formation and/or aggression cards you need. I'm pretty sure this is by design; the military path is supposed to be high risk, high reward. They're changing how this works in 2nd Ed, I think Vlaada's said he wants to keep military really important to the game but make it slightly less subject to chance. All I've seen so far is there's sort of a draft market for formation cards as well, not sure how it works.
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Jul 16, 2015 07:57
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Tendales posted:There's actually one important resource you can be denied by sheer random chance: You can fail to draw the formation and/or aggression cards you need. I'm pretty sure this is by design; the military path is supposed to be high risk, high reward. Yeah, but those aren't a resource, per se. Oh, you can need them, don't mistake me, but between colonies, aggressions, and wars, it's very unlikely military development will be wasted. Even if you don't draw any, an opponent getting them is forced to either cede colonies/combats to you or simply not utilize their political action, in which case your military has bought you a valuable advantage. I'll admit there's the one in whatever large number chance that literally no one draws any colonies, aggressions, or wars and thus no one's military can go to use for a full game but that's so vanishingly unlikely as to not matter. This is actually the problem. Military is high risk high reward, as you said, but only in so far as your own power is concerned. You might not draw the perfect Tactics card or the aggressions you need, but simply having a standing army does so much work as to be a powerful default option in TTA. I'm hoping the second edition addresses this in some way, as between that and the action economy for military the game's a little too slanted towards military power, especially in 1v1.
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Jul 16, 2015 08:13
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Kruller posted:I'll be teaching Mage Knight as a completely new player myself. I've read the walkthrough a few times, but are there any sticking points for the initial scenario that people get hung up on? With Mage Knight all I've done is teach it to people, I'm yet to actually play a normal game. It's been five times now so I think I'm okay at getting it understood! It's a good idea to play it yourself as someone else said. The combat rules (well, the wound rules) are a little illogical and it's good to actually do them so you can get a better feel for it.
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Jul 16, 2015 08:40
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The back of the rulebook does an okay job of summarizing all of the important poo poo. But in case you're wanting something a little more in depth there is always Ricky Royal https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_zW9zDxeYU&list=PLB7C824980F797C4A He's also got a series of a solo conquest game if you were wanting to see how the game actually plays out.
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Jul 16, 2015 09:06
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Kruller posted:I have a few questions. Take your time, mention the importance of getting some form of movement skill or cards. I like pointing out the thematic reasoning behind each rule, gives people a better hook. "Now if you attack the monastery, your units won't join you because they are like 'dude, wtf?!'", etc. The thing that causes most confusion for people is Ice and Fire damage, block and resistance. Not to mention the extremely gamey concept of Cold Fire damage. It might make sense that ice resistance stops ice, and ice block stops fire. But it is just too confusing for people already swallowing a lot of rules.
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Jul 16, 2015 14:23
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Kruller posted:I have a few questions. I recommend actually playing through the walkthrough with it set up at your table. Maybe more than once. There are basically infinite minor sticking points with Mage Knight (when do Advanced Units come up in the offer? When can I see what monster is in that hex? Do I need to move into that hex to attack, or just move next to it? Does the dungeon monster stay there if I can't beat it? What is the difference between a mana token and a mana crystal? How do summons work? et cetera) and the more things you reinforce by autopsy, the better.
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Jul 16, 2015 14:44
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I had the opportunity to play 18OE again (for the third time!) but I saw the prospective players playing 1830 and they had to continually ask me about rule clarifications and understanding basic concepts. I've only played 18OE with experienced 18xx players and it still took 12 hours, I cannot imagine the living hell that it would be to play 18OE with a bunch of inexperienced players. Shame 
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Jul 16, 2015 14:50
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Tekopo, July 11 posted:had some newbies playing 1830 in the table next to me at the meet and they were asking me stuff constantly, holy poo poo Tekopo, July 16 posted:I had the opportunity to play 18OE again (for the third time!) but I saw the prospective players playing 1830 and they had to continually ask me about rule clarifications and understanding basic concepts. 1830 happens and Tekopo is annoyed. Loop ends.
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Jul 16, 2015 15:18
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Those were the same group, actually 
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Jul 16, 2015 15:19
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Tekopo posted:I had the opportunity to play 18OE again (for the third time!) but I saw the prospective players playing 1830 and they had to continually ask me about rule clarifications and understanding basic concepts. I've only played 18OE with experienced 18xx players and it still took 12 hours, I cannot imagine the living hell that it would be to play 18OE with a bunch of inexperienced players. Shame Isn't there a short scenario that "only" lasts ~5 hours?
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Jul 16, 2015 15:30
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Tekopo posted:I had the opportunity to play 18OE again (for the third time!) but I saw the prospective players playing 1830 and they had to continually ask me about rule clarifications and understanding basic concepts. I've only played 18OE with experienced 18xx players and it still took 12 hours, I cannot imagine the living hell that it would be to play 18OE with a bunch of inexperienced players. Shame How do people become experienced 18xx players if playing the first few games takes considerably longer than 12 hours? "Hey, let's spend the entire weekend playing this ridiculously complicated game that needs a spreadsheet to keep track of all the bits and pieces. Don't worry, once we go through this three or four times we can knock out a game in less than 12 hours. It will be fun!" I suspect some exaggeration, but even then...
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Jul 16, 2015 15:31
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How do you get experienced with wargames?
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Jul 16, 2015 15:31
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I mean, real wargames.
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Jul 16, 2015 15:32
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Played my third game of Agricola (Family) last night with another newish player and two newbies. I was a bit disappointed after seeing myself up for a 50/50 shoot at being first to family growth on round 6, but growth came out at round 7, oops. The other players hogged the start player and growth spaces so I was the last to grow, and I worried that I would be hurt in terms of both efficiency and real-life boredom. I ultimately won handily, but I don't know how much was cleverly snapping up bulk resources while others were growing, and how much was me knowing the game better. All in all, I've been enjoying Agricola more than I thought I would. It's a bit fiddly, with all that cart reloading, and it feels a bit slow and overlong, but much less so than I expected. I find it surprisingly satisfying to play, both a challenging puzzle and a sedate country slice of life.
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Jul 16, 2015 15:33
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Fat Samurai posted:How do people become experienced 18xx players if playing the first few games takes considerably longer than 12 hours? As I read it, you play a bunch of 1830, which is less than 12 hours, and when that becomes stale, predictable and short, you move on to 18OE, which is 12 hours with people who know 1830 (and other 18xx-games).
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Jul 16, 2015 15:36
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Lichtenstein posted:I mean, real wargames. You start with this. This thread is full of Finn memes. Don't go there if you're a dirty Finn. Then move on to this. And end up here. By the way, I'm very happy that all of this is going on right now in SA.
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Jul 16, 2015 15:37
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BonHair posted:As I read it, you play a bunch of 1830, which is less than 12 hours, and when that becomes stale, predictable and short, you move on to 18OE, which is 12 hours with people who know 1830 (and other 18xx-games).
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Jul 16, 2015 15:40
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