Board Game Thread 4e: The Call of Catan

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > Board Game Thread 4e: The Call of Catan

canyoneer: Sep 13, 2005; I only have canyoneyes for you

Morpheus posted:

I enjoy whenever SVWAG discusses being the 'rules explainer' and the issues that come along with that role. As the person who is almost thrust into that role, I'm always struggling to find the best ways for communicating, referencing, and using information to make the best experience for people I'm with.

I imagine that most people here can relate.

I am a Good Gaming Partner because I always read through the (online, if available) rulebook before we meet to play if I'm going be playing something new.

When I'm the Rules Explainer, especially on games I don't have a lot of experience with, I try to look up rules videos online or if someone on BGG made player aids. Seeing other people explain the rules sometimes opens up good approaches or ideas for explaining them, even if you already know the rules pretty well.

# ? Jul 24, 2019 22:12

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# ? Jun 5, 2024 11:47

girl dick energy: Sep 30, 2009; You think you have the wherewithal to figure out my puzzle vagina?

Jedit posted:

FTFY

I see your terrible game opinions extend beyond just tabletop. Did you somehow manage to misread DST's rulebook, too?

# ? Jul 24, 2019 22:25

Shadow225: Jan 2, 2007

all games are bad op

# ? Jul 24, 2019 22:29

silvergoose: Mar 18, 2006; IT IS SAID THE TEARS OF THE BWEENIX CAN HEAL ALL WOUNDS

Magnetic North posted:

Oh god, I missed last year, and this is so close, am I really going to miss it again just because I am goony and awkward? But none of my friends like Galaxy Trucker, the bastards.

Speaking of awkward, I played Terraforming Mars for the first time yesterday. I can definitely see the appeal. The way you increase your production and it gets expend as different currencies for different things is pretty satisfying and finding card combos is fun. However, even when drafting, you are super beholden to the deck and what you draw, and the ones that are flat useless early or late are a drag. Also, holy gently caress this game is like 3 hours long. It has no business being that long.

Also, the fact that they have the Capital icon on Noctis City is stupid confusing and should have not gotten out of the factory that way.

You'd be welcome!

# ? Jul 24, 2019 22:31

Merauder: Apr 17, 2003; The North Remembers.

canyoneer posted:

When I'm the Rules Explainer, especially on games I don't have a lot of experience with, I try to look up rules videos online or if someone on BGG made player aids. Seeing other people explain the rules sometimes opens up good approaches or ideas for explaining them, even if you already know the rules pretty well.

Yep, all of this.

I'm 100% the rules guy for my group, partially by proxy of being the guy with the big collection and semi-regular new game influx, and partially because I don't have a lot of faith in other people putting the work in to learn a new game well enough to teach it. Stuff like the above (watching videos, referencing player aids) is part of it for me, as well as just simply setting up the game in advance, walking through some turns on my own, really digging into things and smoothing out any bumps I encounter in the rules as written by checking BGG for related questions, etc. It takes some effort to fill that role well, and I commend people who take the time to do it well.

# ? Jul 24, 2019 22:31

Jedit: Dec 10, 2011; Proudly supporting vanilla legends 1994-2014

PMush Perfect posted:

I see your terrible game opinions extend beyond just tabletop. Did you somehow manage to misread DST's rulebook, too?

Nah, it just bored the tits off me. And that was playing with friends; how anyone played the original game solo is beyond me.

# ? Jul 24, 2019 22:51

FulsomFrank: Sep 11, 2005; Hard on for love

Merauder posted:

Yep, all of this.

I'm 100% the rules guy for my group, partially by proxy of being the guy with the big collection and semi-regular new game influx, and partially because I don't have a lot of faith in other people putting the work in to learn a new game well enough to teach it. Stuff like the above (watching videos, referencing player aids) is part of it for me, as well as just simply setting up the game in advance, walking through some turns on my own, really digging into things and smoothing out any bumps I encounter in the rules as written by checking BGG for related questions, etc. It takes some effort to fill that role well, and I commend people who take the time to do it well.

For big games or deeper ones I email people and send them info to read up on an overview. For Here I Stand I sent everyone's faction what they do and what they should be doing. It was still a nightmare but people want to play again especially the Habsburgs player(!). I've had a couple of times when I showed up at someone's place for game night to try a new game and the host literally tossed the rulebook at me and said figure it out. The nerve!

# ? Jul 25, 2019 14:03

Ravendas: Sep 29, 2001

Western Empires, which is half of the new version of Mega Civ, goes on sale for preorders tomorrow.

https://www.westernempires.com/

100euros gets you the game, and this is the only way to get it.

First 1,000 orders gets a free 9 piece plastic wonders expansion, later on sold for 15euros.

Eastern Empires probably gets released next year, and then the two games can combine for a 10-18 player game. Each individual half can play 5-9p. It's a pretty nice setup, in that two people can split a Mega Civ purchase, but still have a completely playable copy at half the player count on their own.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 14:27

Megasabin: Sep 9, 2003; I get half!!

What exactly is the gameplay of Megaciv? I see it talked about in this thread from time to time. It sort of seems like Diplomacy with some additional mechanics added on like trading? Other than the player count, what makes it different from other Diplomacy+ games like Game of Thrones & Dune?

# ? Jul 25, 2019 14:57

FulsomFrank: Sep 11, 2005; Hard on for love

Ravendas posted:

Western Empires, which is half of the new version of Mega Civ, goes on sale for preorders tomorrow.

https://www.westernempires.com/

100euros gets you the game, and this is the only way to get it.

First 1,000 orders gets a free 9 piece plastic wonders expansion, later on sold for 15euros.

Eastern Empires probably gets released next year, and then the two games can combine for a 10-18 player game. Each individual half can play 5-9p. It's a pretty nice setup, in that two people can split a Mega Civ purchase, but still have a completely playable copy at half the player count on their own.

This is... interesting. I'm concerned about balance but I want to read about what they do. If they're going to sell all 18 buildings for 15 euros I'll bite but but 9 sounds rough.

Megasabin posted:

What exactly is the gameplay of Megaciv? I see it talked about in this thread from time to time. It sort of seems like Diplomacy with some additional mechanics added on like trading? Other than the player count, what makes it different from other Diplomacy+ games like Game of Thrones & Dune?

I'd say there's not many similarities to Diplomacy. It's a game where every turn you turn chits into more chits, push chits around on the board to spread out and eventually have chits to push them together to make cities, the amount of which determines the cards you get to draw for resources, some of which might be disasters. Then you get to trade (nearly) everything with other people except you can't be 100% sure about what you're getting. Then you cash in your cards (the more you have of the same type the more valuable they are) and buy technologies with them.

Rinse and repeat.

The game is so much goddam fun, I think it might be my favourite. It's long but we've played 6 person games of veterans that only took about four or five hours. Don't buy it unless you know you've got people you can round up for it though.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 15:15

Ravendas: Sep 29, 2001

FulsomFrank posted:

This is... interesting. I'm concerned about balance but I want to read about what they do. If they're going to sell all 18 buildings for 15 euros I'll bite but but 9 sounds rough.

I'd say there's not many similarities to Diplomacy. It's a game where every turn you turn chits into more chits, push chits around on the board to spread out and eventually have chits to push them together to make cities, the amount of which determines the cards you get to draw for resources, some of which might be disasters. Then you get to trade (nearly) everything with other people except you can't be 100% sure about what you're getting. Then you cash in your cards (the more you have of the same type the more valuable they are) and buy technologies with them.

Rinse and repeat.

The game is so much goddam fun, I think it might be my favourite. It's long but we've played 6 person games of veterans that only took about four or five hours. Don't buy it unless you know you've got people you can round up for it though.

9 buildings for 15euros, since the other 9 don't exist yet. But, it's free if you're one of the first thousand to order, which should happen if you order it tomorrow when it goes up for preorder.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 15:30

al-azad: May 28, 2009

I haven't really dived deep into any version of Civilization but Mare Nostrum: Empires covers a lot of what I liked about it and I highly recommend that, not just as an alternative but as a good heavier 4X game with a laser focus.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 16:03

FulsomFrank: Sep 11, 2005; Hard on for love

Ravendas posted:

9 buildings for 15euros, since the other 9 don't exist yet. But, it's free if you're one of the first thousand to order, which should happen if you order it tomorrow when it goes up for preorder.

Yeah I meant more if/when they do the East and I imagine they do the same thing for it I'd be more likely to try these out but seeing as how I've already got Mega Civ there's not much reason beyond some cosmetic changes and the monuments to make me slap down cash for it, despite being really curious.

al-azad posted:

I haven't really dived deep into any version of Civilization but Mare Nostrum: Empires covers a lot of what I liked about it and I highly recommend that, not just as an alternative but as a good heavier 4X game with a laser focus.

Mare Nostrum empires is a lot of fun. The trading mechanic was fairly unique too. I would definitely enjoy another play of it but I have a feeling in my group that it would be a tough sell versus just playing Civ though.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 16:27

Chill la Chill: Jul 2, 2007; Don't lose your gay

I like mega civ because it doesn�t have a focus on warfare. In fact, warfare actually hurts only you and the target while everyone else relatively prospers. Mare Nostrum I don�t mind either even though it�s more focused on warfare. I think personally I�ve been so tired of 4+ player games with such a focus on aggression that it got old. Even games like Inis and el grande are area majority and not solely aggressive. If I wanted that there�s plenty of better wargames with limits on how much you can wage war beyond just how many units you have.

It also has bazaar like trading with toxic assets which I love.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 16:30

al-azad: May 28, 2009

Mare Nostrum is kind of cruel because it puts the two most aggressive civs side-by-side when they're supposed to act as foils to Egypt/Carthage who can straight up win on the second turn if left unchecked.

But combat is costly in that game as well. You'll probably never be in a position to hold territory so your goal is to either pillage for a quick influx of resources or to knock a culture leader down.

The leader track is probably my favorite aspect of the game. One of my top 5 board gaming moments was winning turn 1 because two new players were like "WOO! WAR GAME" and steamrolled someone resulting in me winning outright. Normally I wouldn't count a learning game as a victory but the two of them sat there mouth agape before saying in unison "alright let's try this again..."

# ? Jul 25, 2019 16:39

FulsomFrank: Sep 11, 2005; Hard on for love

al-azad posted:

Mare Nostrum is kind of cruel because it puts the two most aggressive civs side-by-side when they're supposed to act as foils to Egypt/Carthage who can straight up win on the second turn if left unchecked.

But combat is costly in that game as well. You'll probably never be in a position to hold territory so your goal is to either pillage for a quick influx of resources or to knock a culture leader down.

The leader track is probably my favorite aspect of the game. One of my top 5 board gaming moments was winning turn 1 because two new players were like "WOO! WAR GAME" and steamrolled someone resulting in me winning outright. Normally I wouldn't count a learning game as a victory but the two of them sat there mouth agape before saying in unison "alright let's try this again..."

I'd rather someone won outright turn 1 or 2 and we were able to reset and fix the mistakes than playing a full game and having a "huh that's it eh?" moment. That's another thing about Adv/Mega Civ is that you know where people stand almost entirely. And yes, this can result in you knowing you have no chance of winning but to be honest, it's usually down to about three people fighting for supremacy at the end. That doesn't mean you aren't having fun but we've had some games where someone is just completely out of it early and often and you feel bad for them. I'm still waiting for our group to take it to the next level and ruthlessly tear down the leaders rather than pussyfooting around but there are so many personalities that get sullen and pissy when they're attacked I'm not sure it'll ever happen.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 16:46

Chill la Chill: Jul 2, 2007; Don't lose your gay

We�ve had a few instances of ganging up on the leader in megaciv. It�s usually not something I like in games but in mega civ the city advance requirement is pretty easy and there�s a point where you�re just steamrolling free upgrades so you end up winning more or less via tech anyway.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 16:54

Bottom Liner: Feb 15, 2006; a specific vein of lasagna

Anyone have thoughts on Reef Encounter or Condotierre? Got both in the gencon math trade and been wanting to try them for a while.

Also got some good Oinks (Startups, Maskmen, Modern Art) and a lot of MWEs (Teotihuacan, Marco Polo, Troyes, Trajan, GWT expansion).

# ? Jul 25, 2019 16:58

KPC_Mammon: Jan 23, 2004; Ready for the fashy circle jerk

Civ was the first real boardgame that I played with my dad and I really want to get MegaCiv even if it isn't going to get to the table very often.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 17:00

cenotaph: Mar 2, 2013

GF9 Dune reprint quickstart rules are up (pdf link)

https://gf9games.com/dune/wp-content/uploads/DUNE-Quick-start-Guide.pdf

# ? Jul 25, 2019 17:00

al-azad: May 28, 2009

Bottom Liner posted:

Anyone have thoughts on Reef Encounter or Condotierre? Got both in the gencon math trade and been wanting to try them for a while.

Also got some good Oinks (Startups, Maskmen, Modern Art) and a lot of MWEs (Teotihuacan, Marco Polo, Troyes, Trajan, GWT expansion).

Which version of Condotierre? If it's the FFG one ehhhhhhh they change some card balancing and rules I don't like. The original is decent little area control game where battles are played out in little mini-games of playing cards. Best thing I can compare it to is Maria except everyone participates in combat simultaneously.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 17:03

CaptainRightful: Jan 11, 2005

Bottom Liner posted:

Anyone have thoughts on Reef Encounter or Condotierre? Got both in the gencon math trade and been wanting to try them for a while.

Also got some good Oinks (Startups, Maskmen, Modern Art) and a lot of MWEs (Teotihuacan, Marco Polo, Troyes, Trajan, GWT expansion).

Condotierre is a pretty solid filler. It plays out much faster than it looks at first, because people will get into bidding wars and quickly drain their entire hand. There's an interesting push your luck factor--you want to sit back and watch others blow all their valuable cards so you can pick up an easy territory win, but if you wait too long, you'll be stuck with a mediocre hand while they refresh.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 17:06

Bottom Liner: Feb 15, 2006; a specific vein of lasagna

al-azad posted:

Which version of Condotierre? If it's the FFG one ehhhhhhh they change some card balancing and rules I don't like. The original is decent little area control game where battles are played out in little mini-games of playing cards. Best thing I can compare it to is Maria except everyone participates in combat simultaneously.

It's the original edition, so that's good.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 17:08

Megasabin: Sep 9, 2003; I get half!!

Bottom Liner posted:

Anyone have thoughts on Reef Encounter or Condotierre? Got both in the gencon math trade and been wanting to try them for a while.

Also got some good Oinks (Startups, Maskmen, Modern Art) and a lot of MWEs (Teotihuacan, Marco Polo, Troyes, Trajan, GWT expansion).

Wanted to like Reef Encounter, but it's just very dated. There are lot's of quirks you can identify and be like "oh this game was made before _____ concept in board game design was invented". Ultimately I was unimpressed and as a tile laying game I'd rather play T&E every single time.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 17:57

The Eyes Have It: Feb 10, 2008; Third Eye Sees All
...snookums

My preorder for Roads & Boats reprint arrived, and considerably earlier than I had expected!

# ? Jul 25, 2019 18:36

Morpheus: Apr 18, 2008; My favourite little monsters

The Eyes Have It posted:

My preorder for Roads & Boats reprint arrived, and considerably earlier than I had expected!

Make sure you have all the roads and each of the boats. That's how they getcha.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 18:38

Bottom Liner: Feb 15, 2006; a specific vein of lasagna

Make sure you have the good donkey too

# ? Jul 25, 2019 18:41

prokaryote: Apr 29, 2013

The Eyes Have It posted:

My preorder for Roads & Boats reprint arrived, and considerably earlier than I had expected!

I'm very jealous! Did you order direct from Splotter or another method?

# ? Jul 25, 2019 18:48

FulsomFrank: Sep 11, 2005; Hard on for love

The Eyes Have It posted:

My preorder for Roads & Boats reprint arrived, and considerably earlier than I had expected!

Whoa, I thought this and the FCM expansion weren't coming out for a while

# ? Jul 25, 2019 19:22

medchem: Oct 11, 2012

Is there anything new at Gen Con this year that's worth getting? Last year, I recall Root and Keyforge was the hotness, but I don't see anything like that this year. Insert bubble bursting comments here.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 19:28

The Eyes Have It: Feb 10, 2008; Third Eye Sees All
...snookums

I mashed BUY direct from Splotter, maybe should have done the FCM expansion too! :haw:

# ? Jul 25, 2019 20:28

Shadow225: Jan 2, 2007

medchem posted:

Is there anything new at Gen Con this year that's worth getting? Last year, I recall Root and Keyforge was the hotness, but I don't see anything like that this year. Insert bubble bursting comments here.

When I looked through the list, here is what I found that may vaguely interest me.

City of the Big Shoulders
Valley of the Kings: Premium Edition
Detective: City of Angels
Sinister Six
Barenpark: The Bad News Bears
Las Vegas Royale (I forget if this is going to be there or nah)

# ? Jul 25, 2019 20:42

Merauder: Apr 17, 2003; The North Remembers.

My Gen Con list:

Scythe modular board from Meeple Source (hitting stores soon, but I pre-ordered for pick up with them a while ago)
Era from Eggertspiele (it's pricey for what equates to a 3D roll & write, but I played it at Origins and really enjoyed it)
Fight Club from Mondo (2p deck-building where each player is a side of the main character's psyche; love the movie & book, sounds like a fun take on the theme)
Team 3 from Brain Games (team-based stacking where one person sees a pattern but can't talk, a second player can see their gestures but can't touch the pieces, and a third player has to follow the 2nd player's direction to construct the pattern from the 1st player with their eyes closed - super light but sounds really entertaining)
Q.E. from BoardgameTables.com (didn't back their KS, but a good friend highly recommended it)
Teotihuacan expansion
Captain Sonar expansion
Decrypto expansion

# ? Jul 25, 2019 20:56

Jedit: Dec 10, 2011; Proudly supporting vanilla legends 1994-2014

I've got Bad News Bears/Die Grizzlies Sind Los! as of today. The Grizzly Habitats are 6-space tiles worth 7-10 points, and to get one you must exchange a green tile and a bear house. If you use them then you also have to build a fifth board with an Exit Gate; this board is restricted in that it cannot be placed below another board. The Monorail is built between green areas that are exactly three spaces apart in a horizontal or vertical line; you can only build one a turn and they must go at right angles.

Apart from that you just get six new Achievements and some extra (gendered) toilets.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 20:57

OgreNoah: Nov 18, 2003

There's also the Century Golem 2nd part debuting at Gen Con.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 21:08

Merauder: Apr 17, 2003; The North Remembers.

OgreNoah posted:

There's also the Century Golem 2nd part debuting at Gen Con.

Yeah, I've got that on my list to take a look at. I own the original Golem Ed., and made my group replay it a couple weeks ago in light of them announcing the subsequent Golem titles. I'm not convinced it's something I really need the whole series of, and I didn't love Eastern Wonders on its own when I demoed it. But who knows, con hype is real.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 21:13

garthoneeye: Feb 18, 2013

FulsomFrank posted:

Whoa, I thought this and the FCM expansion weren't coming out for a while

FCM is planned for Essen I believe, but R&B was always listed as Summer.

I won�t be getting my copy until after Essen because I ordered it and FCM expansion together. :doh:

# ? Jul 25, 2019 21:16

Shadow225: Jan 2, 2007

Jedit posted:

I've got Bad News Bears/Die Grizzlies Sind Los! as of today. The Grizzly Habitats are 6-space tiles worth 7-10 points, and to get one you must exchange a green tile and a bear house. If you use them then you also have to build a fifth board with an Exit Gate; this board is restricted in that it cannot be placed below another board. The Monorail is built between green areas that are exactly three spaces apart in a horizontal or vertical line; you can only build one a turn and they must go at right angles.

Apart from that you just get six new Achievements and some extra (gendered) toilets.

How do you feel about the monorail part? My policy on modular expansions is to avoid them unless it is easy enough to include all of them. This is actually the deciding factor on if I keep Barenpark or Kingdomino, as they both occupy roughly the same space.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 21:19

The Eyes Have It: Feb 10, 2008; Third Eye Sees All
...snookums

Merauder posted:

My Gen Con list:

Scythe modular board from Meeple Source (hitting stores soon, but I pre-ordered for pick up with them a while ago)
Era from Eggertspiele (it's pricey for what equates to a 3D roll & write, but I played it at Origins and really enjoyed it)
Fight Club from Mondo (2p deck-building where each player is a side of the main character's psyche; love the movie & book, sounds like a fun take on the theme)
Team 3 from Brain Games (team-based stacking where one person sees a pattern but can't talk, a second player can see their gestures but can't touch the pieces, and a third player has to follow the 2nd player's direction to construct the pattern from the 1st player with their eyes closed - super light but sounds really entertaining)
Q.E. from BoardgameTables.com (didn't back their KS, but a good friend highly recommended it)
Teotihuacan expansion
Captain Sonar expansion
Decrypto expansion

Team3 sounds pretty cool. My opportunities for party games are limited but it's sometimes worth holding onto one just in case. I have a soft spot for games with dexterity elements.

The Eyes Have It fucked around with this message at 22:18 on Jul 25, 2019

# ? Jul 25, 2019 21:50

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# ? Jun 5, 2024 11:47

Bottom Liner: Feb 15, 2006; a specific vein of lasagna

Merauder posted:

Q.E. from BoardgameTables.com (didn't back their KS, but a good friend highly recommended it)

Oh thanks for this info, didn't know it would be available anywhere. That'll be the only new game I buy I guess.

# ? Jul 25, 2019 22:12

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > Board Game Thread 4e: The Call of Catan

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