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fozzy fosbourne posted:
We talked about music for a while in some geeklist. He's a cool dude.
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Aug 26, 2015 05:50
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Tuesday board game night trip report, this time it was Dark Moon. I can only speak for myself but I enjoyed it and everyone else seemed to enjoy it as well. We got to play three games in about 3 hours 30, which is more or less exactly what the box advertises. Maybe it's because I never played BSG and so have no frame of reference but I didn't find it particularly deficient in what it set out to do, nor did the people there who have played BSG who all seemed to find the enjoyable and brisk-paced. First game was with six players, I was uninfected. This was a general "teaching how poo poo works" sort of thing but it still proceeded smoothly. One of the infected (a dude who's come in before and vastly overvalues his ability to read people and/or bluff people out at deductive games) got called out as a very unsubtle infected pretty quickly, which he was, but a series of bad malfunctions (plus the presence of another infected still hidden) brought the game to a quick and deadly win for the infected as the last outpost module failed and we all died. I don't think I actually got an active turn that game and yet I don't feel like I was unjustly robbed, for one thing because I was still participating on other peoples' turns and for another because it ended soon enough that I wasn't stuck waiting for things to be over. Second game was with five, I was uninfected, and this one went the distance. Both infected remained hidden most of the game due to not having any obviously suspicious tells and things were proceeding almost too smoothly, it turns out that they were both unaware that revealing as infected gave them a new set of special actions to choose from and so they were unsure about doing it. That one's on me...I had opted to wait and tell infected players about the new set of options as soon as someone revealed so as not to deluge people with information overload (I did emphasize that revealing would let them start breaking things but I guess I wasn't clear enough). That said the game still came down to a nailbiter with one cube left on the final event and one final person rolling to either complete the task and win the game or fail it and we'd all probably die when something failed or the now-revealed infected got a go. Third game was with seven players and now that we all had a grasp on things (including correcting a couple errors of mine, turns out you can submit multiple dice at a go to malfunction tasks, whoops) it was on for real. Accusations were hurled, people were quarantined who turned out to be infected, people were quarantined who weren't infected, I actually was one of the infected and I revealed causing mayhem and destruction, someone I was sure was infected turned out not to be. A rough malfunction task loaded the outpost module board up to 5 of 6 damaged sections and the uninfected were doing quite well despite that, being only two successful tasks from victory (one on the third task and one on the final, a preemptive cube having been placed there earlier due to Tactical Prep). Unfortunately a dangerous event had called upon people to push their luck to succeed including the acting commander, and when I used my "Challenge Commander" ability it caused the outpost to overload and blow up, leading to an infected victory. So how do I feel about it? On the whole I'd say it's going to be a purchase worth its money for me and the local game group. Normally I'm not a huge fan of games where things come down to the turn of a die but there's enough risk mitigation stuff going on that it's effectively a game of maneuvering people down the path of least disaster (unless you're an infected of course) and it never felt like you might as well just flip a coin. The dice screens are kind of awkward to use to be honest, they're short, lean backwards at an angle, and aren't really big enough to camouflage your dice without you really rolling them right up against the backside of it. It's a new game and so we're all learning how things go, so I expect that while we didn't see very many people issuing order and lone wolfing it these three games that the value of such will become more apparent on successive plays...giving an order to someone trustworthy with a fat dice pool to double repair some stuff seems like it could be a clutch play for uninfected under pressure, while a successful Lone Wolf action a time or two could have won the uninfected that third game. I will say the briskness was also something in its favor. There's a lot to be said for a game that ends. Munchkin drags for ages, even BSG which is generally regarded as a Good Game can be a multi-hour long affair. I love Argent but whenever it comes to the table I know that it's going to be an evening of "one game of Argent, plus some light stuff to cool down after." Here we did three games back to back with nobody feeling burned out or bored, there was a good dose of tension and poo poo to laugh about (like a revealed infected pushing his luck when negatively contributing to a malfunction task and inadvertently rolling a +4, pushing it over the top), and I've already mentioned that I love the "Alien by way of Outland" aesthetic it's got going on, CRT monitors and dot matrix printers all day erry day. So yeah, the mark of a good game in my book is "do I want to play this again, and do other people actually want to play it with me?" and for Dark Moon the answer is yes on both counts.
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Aug 26, 2015 08:41
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I played a 6 player game of Fortune and Glory last night. I obviously do not love myself. When one of the players said it was a wee step up from Talisman I should have ran. So much random monkey cheese. Luckily I got to wash the taste out with four games of Codenames.
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Aug 26, 2015 12:27
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What's the consensus on Suburbia vs Castles of Mad King Ludwig? I've played Suburbia once and had a good time. I think I like the idea of the nice orderly hexes over the wacky looking castles - but it seems most reviewers seem to prefer Castles. Most likely going to be playing 2 player mostly.
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Aug 26, 2015 14:10
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Theme and visual design of Suburbia is better (though the theme of both is real janky), gameplay of Ludwig is definitely better. Suburbia expansion might help a bit though.
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Aug 26, 2015 14:48
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I haven't played Suburbia but I picked up Castles based on lots of positive feedback. I guess it's a pretty nice, light tile placement game but I don't find it all the compelling, especially at 2 player. The most interesting decisions you'll make are seeing what your opponent is going for and trying to price tiles appropriately, the rest of the game is pretty straight forward. Maybe it's just not my style but I think it's just alright, there are better light 2 player tile-placement games out there like Patchwork for example.
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Aug 26, 2015 15:17
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Heisenberg1276 posted:What's the consensus on Suburbia vs Castles of Mad King Ludwig? I don't know about a consensus but I have played both and I prefer Castles. Castles' way of handling objectives and scoring feels more "fair" than Suburbia's. Both games have public objectives and secret objectives. Suburbia draws both from the same deck. They are all-or-nothing and worth a significant portion of your score. If you have bad luck with the tiles you need (maybe those tiles came out at inopportune times, or weren't in the deck at all) you can end up way behind. If you are behind on the points track and you know you've blown your one hidden objective, there's not much hope that you can come back and win. Suburbia also has weird counter-intuitive objectives to have the least of something, which seem awkward to compete for and balance around. Castles, on the other hand, has separate decks for public and hidden objectives. Points from public objectives are split in case of a tie and you can still get a lesser award for second or third place. New hidden objectives can be drawn during the game, so if yours aren't panning out you can work to draw new ones. This also means that you can also earn a lot of points from hidden objectives at the end of the game, so being behind on the points track doesn't feel so discouraging. Suburbia also allows you to deny tiles to your opponents by scrapping them on your turn, sometimes even by paying money to do so. Castles has you deny tiles by making them too expensive for your opponent. I feel like Castles is a bit less "gently caress you" in that regard. On the other hand, Suburbia's mechanic of balancing income against population growth adds a layer of strategy that Castles doesn't have. I think the way you arrange your tiles in Suburbia also has more impact than with Castles. Placement requires you to plan out your suburb and think ahead, where as Castles usually has an obvious choice to score points. Much of the meat in Castles comes instead from the "master builder" mechanic, which I quite like. Suburbia might also feel like it plays faster, though, because the master builder can bog down players with decisions on their turn. I've also seen people discuss how Suburbia has too much to keep track of, and how Castles is worse about screwing players over with bad tile distribution. I don't think either one is true. Keeping track of numbers in Suburbia isn't that bad, and both Suburbia and Castles can screw you with tiles in different ways. They are both similar and both good. Disclaimer: I have only played Suburbia with 3 or 4 players. Medium Style fucked around with this message at 16:44 on Aug 26, 2015 |
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Aug 26, 2015 15:35
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What is the thread opinion on Blue Moon? We've played a ton of Magic in our day so a head-to-head card dueler seems nice, but it's got a pretty mixed reputation. Plus you can't search the thread history because all it returns is people using "once in a blue moon" in reference to other things.
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Aug 26, 2015 15:56
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Heisenberg1276 posted:What's the consensus on Suburbia vs Castles of Mad King Ludwig? I prefer Castles over Suburbia, but it's true that they fill a similar niche in a collection. Castles has an advantage of being absolutely silly in terms of castle design, which can be very memorable. Plus the master builder mechanic adds a bit more dynamic between players.
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Aug 26, 2015 16:06
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I think for 2 players Suburbia is vastly superior.
Bottom Liner fucked around with this message at 19:20 on Nov 26, 2015 |
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Aug 26, 2015 16:26
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I think both games can easily coexist, the only real similarity is "putting tiles next to other tiles". I still like Suburbia better, especially with 2 players. With more than 2, the market changes a bit too much between turns so you don't get to plan as much.
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Aug 26, 2015 16:31
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GrandpaPants posted:Most BGG users are actually pretty loving dickish. They seem like the type of people who are inviting at first, until someone disagrees with them and then they write essays about how they are and always will be in the right. It's a really lovely and toxic community, and I was glad to see people here cancel their orders. Sorry to say it, but this kind of applies (generally, not in each specific instance) to gamers, not just BGG users. Or put another way, how often do you see your neighbors, who are into crochet and club league soccer, get into rampaging snotty arguments about whether something is "fun" and whether "fun" has any meaning, and whether a particular crochet pattern really is a legitimate thing to do, or whether they are an absolute idiot for liking that pattern, etc. Because I see it all the time with gamers, and not just BGG users. Megaman's Jockstrap posted:ahahahahah really? I had no idea this was a thing. What woman would agree to that? Yes, the best part about it is when they then try to defend it with, "What, it's just a picture with a woman in it. You wouldn't object if it was a guy, right? You're a misogynist," types of logic. loving trying to pretend that they were doing the opposite of what they were actually doing. SlyFrog fucked around with this message at 16:40 on Aug 26, 2015 |
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Aug 26, 2015 16:36
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SlyFrog posted:Sorry to say it, but this kind of applies (generally, not in each specific instance) to gamers, not just BGG users. The difference you are seeing is the difference between people discussing something in person versus discussing it online. Not the difference between soccer (or whatever) fans and gamers.
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Aug 26, 2015 16:40
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I agree. It's not restricted to BGG people. It's not restricted to gamers. Everyone does it if they care enough about something to discuss it online at length with complete strangers.
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Aug 26, 2015 16:44
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I'll put my vote to Castles, if only because there are less interactions that you have to keep track of. That is, the only "universal" tiles are the dungeon tiles, which tend to group up together anyway. The rest of the rooms just care about their neighboring rooms. Being the auction master is also really loving fun and a much better mechanic than a standard market row.
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Aug 26, 2015 16:45
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Huxley posted:What is the thread opinion on Blue Moon? We've played a ton of Magic in our day so a head-to-head card dueler seems nice, but it's got a pretty mixed reputation. I actually looked at blue moon as a game for the spouse and me and decided not to get it because it just looked like i was playing an elaborate game of war.
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Aug 26, 2015 16:45
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Chomp8645 posted:The difference you are seeing is the difference between people discussing something in person versus discussing it online. Not the difference between soccer (or whatever) fans and gamers. It's not like it is a proveable thing, but I am comfortable in my belief that gamers in general (again, it does not apply to every gamer, or every group of gamers) tend to be more cantankerous and contrarian than typical normal people. The next thing you know, you'll be telling me that people in crochet circles also have a good chance of having members who don't know how to shower or stop talking about their loving half-elf fighter for 30 minutes straight. 
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Aug 26, 2015 16:53
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SlyFrog posted:The next thing you know, you'll be telling me that people in crochet circles also have a good chance of having members who don't know how to shower or stop talking about their loving half-elf fighter for 30 minutes straight. Are you suggesting that gamers are the only ones who don't always groom well or have inane conversations? Because lol
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Aug 26, 2015 16:57
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Chomp8645 posted:Are you suggesting that gamers are the only ones who don't always groom well or have inane conversations? Yes, that's exactly what I said. The only ones. Thank you. I feel it, flowing from you. So good.
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Aug 26, 2015 16:58
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Like I promise you, somewhere there is a crochet group meeting right now that has at least one person who looks like they came straight out of a People of Walmart photo and has been babbling for 30 minutes about the Obama's Benghazi cover up.
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Aug 26, 2015 17:01
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SlyFrog posted:Sorry to say it, but this kind of applies (generally, not in each specific instance) to gamers, not just BGG users. Naah, there are gear snobs and crappy people in every hobby. The sewing nerds sling mud about how computerized sewing machines are trash for babies, high end machine brand X is better than high end machine brand Y, working off of patterns is for no-talent scrubs, etc. Get into climbing or any sport with rope and you get people arguing about what is "safe enough", why Zion National Park is better than Grand Canyon National Park, blahblahblahblah
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Aug 26, 2015 17:01
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Also sports fans as a whole are a lot more crazy than gamers could ever be.
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Aug 26, 2015 17:02
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SlyFrog posted:Thank you. I feel it, flowing from you. So good. I don't know what you are trying to do but it's not interesting.
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Aug 26, 2015 17:02
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Football fans can gather in armed mobs and kill a bunch of people. Music fans might end up stalking their favourite artist. People who feel defined by the particular thing they like are the issue, toxic idiots who define themselves as gamers are just part of that bunch.
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Aug 26, 2015 17:02
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It's hobbies. I used to run 10th scale RC cars, same thing. Sports, same thing. It's just how people are I guess, but they don't have to be that way.
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Aug 26, 2015 17:27
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Tekopo posted:Also sports fans as a whole are a lot more crazy than gamers could ever be. let me introduce you to high school football parents
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Aug 26, 2015 17:31
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What's the point of even having a hobby if you can't act superior to other people in that same hobby?
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Aug 26, 2015 17:32
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Scyther posted:What's the point of even having a hobby if you can't act superior to other people in that same hobby? Except for me, of course 
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Aug 26, 2015 17:34
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canyoneer posted:Get into climbing or any sport with rope and you get people arguing about what is "safe enough", why Zion National Park is better than Grand Canyon National Park, blahblahblahblah loving Ameritrash. Your parks with their lovely tourists are inferior to Europarks in every way. Why don't you check out Parcul Naţional Domogled-Valea Cernei, you noob?
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Aug 26, 2015 18:10
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Toshimo posted:loving Ameritrash. Your parks with their lovely tourists are inferior to Europarks in every way. Why don't you check out Parcul Naţional Domogled-Valea Cernei, you noob? Yeah, but the theming in Europarks sucks
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Aug 26, 2015 18:15
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SlyFrog posted:Or put another way, how often do you see your neighbors, who are into crochet and club league soccer, get into rampaging snotty arguments about whether something is "fun" and whether "fun" has any meaning, and whether a particular crochet pattern really is a legitimate thing to do, or whether they are an absolute idiot for liking that pattern, etc.
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Aug 26, 2015 18:35
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But soccer (and hockey) fans do all the time talk crap about successful teams that play boring styles (Chelsea, LA Kings, etc).
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Aug 26, 2015 19:40
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PerniciousKnid posted:It's true, no fan ever defends their local club team's performance by saying they had fun talking to their friends in the next seat, and the weather was nice at the games they attended, and praising all the time they had to drink beer during the lulls in action. Pinkhat Red Sox fans do.
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Aug 26, 2015 19:46
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Cricket has the worst rules and could really do with Vlaada taking the helm for Cricket 2
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Aug 26, 2015 19:46
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The Supreme Court posted:Cricket has the worst rules and could really do with Vlaada taking the helm for Cricket 2 As long as there is a rule about an unwanted cricket player getting turned into food for other cricket players.
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Aug 26, 2015 19:48
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The Supreme Court posted:Cricket has the worst rules and could really do with Vlaada taking the helm for Cricket 2 Vlaada's Cricket 2 would feature an invisible ball whose presence is only revealed on video replay, at which point players realize how horribly they misjudged everything.
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Aug 26, 2015 20:04
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I would watch the poo poo out of that.
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Aug 26, 2015 20:06
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FFG's Cricket 2 would just be Cricket with space marines on the bats, Starship Troopers playing on the big screen, and all the umpires would be completely shitfaced.
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Aug 26, 2015 20:21
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At least the players would get little reference cards when the expansion comes out.
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Aug 26, 2015 20:24
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| # ? May 29, 2024 21:19 |
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Poison Mushroom posted:FFG's Cricket 2 would just be Cricket with space marines on the bats, Starship Troopers playing on the big screen, and all the umpires would be completely shitfaced. It would actually just be a licensed theme they have so get ready for Arkham Cricket or Sith Cricket
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Aug 26, 2015 20:39
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