|
Played a couple of games of Obscurio last night and I would recommend. It's very similar mechanics-wise to Mysterium, you are wizards trying to help a grimoire escape a library. The grimoire gives you clues based on pictures to guide you to 1 of 6 exit tiles. The wizards vote on where they think the exit is and if anyone is right you progress through the library, get it right 6 times and you win. Get it wrong and you lose cohesion, basically every wrong guess loses you a life. There are a couple of twists to the format, 1 is trap tokens. They limit what clues the grimoire can give or change how the wizards pick the exit etc, the longer you take to decide on an answer means more traps in the next room. The other one is there is a traitor, someone who is trying to trap the grimoire and stop everyone from escaping. They do this by getting involved in the wizards voting etc but additionally once they've seen the grimoire's clues they get to add up to 2 exit tiles of their choice to the 6 exits, hopefully to confuse the wizards. The traps are a nice touch and work well, the traitor mechanic is fun and really works in the game I think. Overall it's a shorter game than Mysterium, you can easily play a game in under an hour, more like 40 mins. Couple of downsides there is a 'close your eyes' section where the Traitor picks their exit tiles which you have to all do very rigorously and try not to make any noise. Second one is the Traitor can be eliminated from the game effectively. Once everyone loses enough cohesion democracy kicks in and you start accusing people of being the traitor, if everyone votes for the right person then they get exposed and remove their wizard from the board, so all they can do now is the adding exit tiles part. I don't like player elimination but in this case it was fine really, the game is short and the traitor can still win. In fact they've got a good shot at winning if you're at the point where you're making accusations. Overall it's a shorter, more 'gamery' version of Mysterium and as such really good game. Also the components are great. Aramoro fucked around with this message at 10:40 on Nov 25, 2019 |
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 10:27
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 24, 2024 22:24 |
|
|
Aramoro posted:That can cause it to do really weird things, like the Age of Empires AI that would intentionally crash the game because that was not a 'lose' for it. Maybe they're not so different from us after all.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 10:41
|
|
|
Aramoro posted:Played a couple of games of Obscurio last night and I would recommend. It's very similar mechanics-wise to Mysterium, you are wizards trying to help a grimoire escape a library. The grimoire gives you clues based on pictures to guide you to 1 of 6 exit tiles. The wizards vote on where they think the exit is and if anyone is right you progress through the library, get it right 6 times and you win. Get it wrong and you lose cohesion, basically every wrong guess loses you a life. There are a couple of twists to the format, 1 is trap tokens. They limit what clues the grimoire can give or change how the wizards pick the exit etc, the longer you take to decide on an answer means more traps in the next room. The other one is there is a traitor, someone who is trying to trap the grimoire and stop everyone from escaping. They do this by getting involved in the wizards voting etc but additionally once they've seen the grimoire's clues they get to add up to 2 exit tiles of their choice to the 6 exits, hopefully to confuse the wizards. Mysterium plays in under 45 minutes as well, so I'm not sure what your criticism is. I looked at Obscurio and thought "oh, it's just Mysterium with a bolted on traitor mechanic and player elimination".
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 11:21
|
|
|
Jedit posted:Mysterium plays in under 45 minutes as well, so I'm not sure what your criticism is. I looked at Obscurio and thought "oh, it's just Mysterium with a bolted on traitor mechanic and player elimination". We always find that playing 6-7 players Mysterium takes longer than that. In Obscurio everyone is solving the same puzzle rather than your own personal ones so there's a bit more interaction and the game just clips along a bit faster in general. Also you don't have that weird endgame part that Mysterium has. With rules explanation, setup and pizza arriving we did 2 games in under 2 hours which makes it a short game in my book, there's less setup than in Mysterium. Now I love Mysterium, but I think Obscurio might be a bit better. I think you could even play it without the traitor and it would work? Aramoro fucked around with this message at 11:40 on Nov 25, 2019 |
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 11:35
|
|
|
I played Belratti and Werewords, both are solid party games. As much as it sucks that bezier ripped off insider, their version of the game works better because it's more developed.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 11:54
|
|
|
discount cathouse posted:I played Belratti and Werewords, both are solid party games. As much as it sucks that bezier ripped off insider, their version of the game works better because it's more developed. Normally I always try to champion the better version of a game, but I just can't abide Bezier's behavior here. Not just the rip-off (which is annoying but it happens, rules can't be protected for fairly good reason), but the implied licensing shakedown of "wouldn't it be a shame if someone printed a competitor, now lets talk about an agreement". If they'd never reached out, it would be basically no problem. Like, what would happen if Stronghold or some other American publisher negotiated but eventually failed to license some game from a European publisher and printed a clone of it in America?
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 12:03
|
|
|
Realistically, how long would a 6 new players game of Dune would take? I can probably get the players to watch a video of the rules beforehand, but let's add rules explanation just to be sure. We play Root regularly, so I'm not afraid of moderate complexity, sandbagging or unique factions.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 13:03
|
|
|
Fat Samurai posted:Realistically, how long would a 6 new players game of Dune would take? I can probably get the players to watch a video of the rules beforehand, but let's add rules explanation just to be sure. We play Root regularly, so I'm not afraid of moderate complexity, sandbagging or unique factions. Played a full ten turns with six, and 4 new. We played at a decent pace and wrapped up in 4.5 hours.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 13:14
|
|
|
Triskelli posted:Played a full ten turns with six, and 4 new. We played at a decent pace and wrapped up in 4.5 hours. Ouch. Did that include rules explanation? Simple or complex rules?
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 13:31
|
|
|
Fat Samurai posted:Ouch. Did that include rules explanation? Simple or complex rules? That is with advanced rules and a rules explanation. That’s also with the full 10 turns though, if someone claims a stronghold victory then it’s shorter!
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 13:53
|
|
|
Fat Samurai posted:Realistically, how long would a 6 new players game of Dune would take? I can probably get the players to watch a video of the rules beforehand, but let's add rules explanation just to be sure. We play Root regularly, so I'm not afraid of moderate complexity, sandbagging or unique factions. We did basic with full player count and it took us maybe six hours. That said we took some breaks here and there for food and sanity.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 15:40
|
|
|
Our 5-turn win with 4p was only like 90 minutes. Basic rules, included rules explanation. Seems like about 20 minutes per turn with a full 6p is reasonable for a first game.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 17:05
|
|
|
FulsomFrank posted:We did basic with full player count and it took us maybe six hours. That said we took some breaks here and there for food and sanity. Yeah, it took us 5 hours including teaching, but without a real lunch break as we were all snacking constantly. (On Sandworm cake mostly). In fairness though there was more than normal amounts of table talk, and we finished on turn 6 because of a couple of missteps. (I accidentally shut down one player WAY too hard by winning two combats that I didn't plan to, and the Fremen player decided that the crucial 'bid for the win' turn was the turn he would go and grab some random spice instead of defending his Seitches). Oh, so, side note, like, I'm obviously totally fine with chatter like that because it's a social event, the game is entirely secondary to friends having fun together, and we're all there for hours. Sometimes it slows the game down and it can be a bit irritating if people miss what's going on because of it, and you have to 'help them out' with info they should have known if they were paying attention (because, Atreides missed that someone lost a combat and so lost some item for example, and if they can't be trusted with info you're buying it makes the game worse, etc) but like, whatever, it's only mildly irritating and not a problem and I fully acknowledge that it's only irritating to the minority of us that are more 'gamey', and even then only because I'm super into the game, which is arguably the less healthy stance, but as long as everyone's respectful of what is fun for each other, whatever, it's all gravy. BUT! I found it kinda rude that they spent a good hour or so totally out of flow, missing stuff, not paying attention, because they were planning a board game holiday? Like, wtf, we're PLAYING board games NOW, you can organise it some other time? And, I'm GOING on that holiday, so it totally pertains to me, but, I mean... Am I the rear end in a top hat here for curtailing it? I guess for other people it felt like, we're doing this one thing for the best part of half a day, you can't be expected to focus on that the whole time, and planning the next meetup is exciting, but of all the things to MISS what's going on in the game for, it just seemed so dismissive of the night that I'D set up? I actually found it more annoying in retrospect than I think I let on at the time. Obviously the real answer is to talk to the people involved. I think really this is just me venting and I'm entirely over it, and actually, all of this has just reminded me how much I loving love playing Dune so I AM going to talk to them but it's going to be to set up another Dune session with them. Maybe I'll set it up while we're round theirs playing Twilight Imperium.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 17:35
|
|
|
I taught my girlfriend how to play RBOADTS over the weekend and it was a big hit. Does anyone here have 2 player map layouts they especially like? We will probably be playing another game during our post-thanksgiving time off
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 17:44
|
|
|
One other thing about Dune- I deeply deeply regret not taking notes as Atreides. Your Atreides player should know where the lasgun is AT ALL TIMES. FulsomFrank posted:I got so overwhelmed that I forgot to take notes a bunch of times. Something else you should do as Atreides is SELL INFO. I wish I had been more aggressive with this in my game but you should be hustling and offering to let people know what you know... for a price. The collorary is of course to never give out info for free, as this will totally undermine your ability to sell info. Triskelli fucked around with this message at 18:14 on Nov 25, 2019 |
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 18:05
|
|
|
Triskelli posted:One other thing about Dune- I deeply deeply regret not taking notes as Atreides. Your Atreides player should know where the lasgun is AT ALL TIMES. I got so overwhelmed that I forgot to take notes a bunch of times. Something else you should do as Atreides is SELL INFO. I wish I had been more aggressive with this in my game but you should be hustling and offering to let people know what you know... for a price.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 18:08
|
|
|
Grundma posted:I taught my girlfriend how to play RBOADTS over the weekend and it was a big hit. Does anyone here have 2 player map layouts they especially like? We will probably be playing another game during our post-thanksgiving time off One suggestion that I like is try playing the maps for one player count less than what you have, ie the provided solo layout for 2p. Makes things much tighter and more competitive.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 18:08
|
|
|
discount cathouse posted:I played Belratti and Werewords, both are solid party games. As much as it sucks that bezier ripped off insider, their version of the game works better because it's more developed. Is it better to have a traitor than a merlin?
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 18:27
|
|
|
Kiranamos posted:Is it better to have a traitor than a merlin? As villager, your goal in Insider is to play 20 question as badly and slow as you can - so the Insider will have to be more obvious. Giving the step of figuring out the Insider to the Werewolf fixes this problem - its in your best interest to play well.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 18:37
|
|
|
Hollandspiele activated their yearly sale; if you are gonna grab Infamous Traffic before it goes out of print now's the time to do it. Any recommendation for games they publish? I already own Meltwater and This Guilty Land.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 19:20
|
|
|
Quixotic1 posted:Hollandspiele activated their yearly sale; if you are gonna grab Infamous Traffic before it goes out of print now's the time to do it. I think For-Ex is popular. I bought it a while back and have been waiting to play it. Really looking forward to Westphalia  EDIT: Whaaaaa FulsomFrank fucked around with this message at 19:58 on Nov 25, 2019 |
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 19:37
|
|
|
FulsomFrank posted:I think For-Ex is popular. I bought it a while back and have been waiting to play it. (It's out now) https://hollandspiele.com/products/westphalia-1 $45 instead of $50 for the sale. 10% more off if you order $100+ and put in code MonsterDeal19. Also, their free game The Toledo War if you buy 2+ games. I got AIT, Meltwater and The Soo Line from last year. I'm looking at Westphalia and.... ????
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 19:42
|
|
|
How is Infamous Traffic "going out of print" when it's all print on demand? Is the publishing going somewhere else?
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 20:09
|
|
|
al-azad posted:How is Infamous Traffic "going out of print" when it's all print on demand? Is the publishing going somewhere else? It's Cole Wehrle's game and the rights are reverting.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 20:10
|
|
|
al-azad posted:How is Infamous Traffic "going out of print" when it's all print on demand? Is the publishing going somewhere else? Tom Russell and Cole Wherle had one of those friendly "who gets to pick up the dinner check" fights (but over publishing rights) and Tom Russell won (by ceding Cole's publishing rights back to him when Cole tried to renew) They are both too good for this world. Hopefully Cole has the time to organize a reprint of AIT under Wherligig's label sometime soon, but it's likely out of print for the time being.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 20:21
|
|
|
Stock up because Cole said he's not revisiting AIT for a few years.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 20:23
|
|
|
But is AIT good? The only local friends to play it complained about the die-rolling making it a luck-fest but I haven't looked more deeply into it yet.
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 20:43
|
|
|
Memnaelar posted:But is AIT good? The only local friends to play it complained about the die-rolling making it a luck-fest but I haven't looked more deeply into it yet. The dice are rolled infrequently, but the main roll happen at the start of the game before any play happens and I would consider it more of a setup variance. The rolls that happen during the game can have a big impact on play, but it's something that you can influence and plan for (the player will select dice to place/reroll). I would say the more difficult aspect of AIT to balance is making sure all the players are on equivalent footing. It's sort of the Root vagabond problem where attacking a player who has a lead can be disadvantageous to your position, but if nobody does it, that player will win. It's definitely a fragile game and sometimes the dice just roll a way that it collapses and the game ends prematurely, or the economy grinds to a halt. But the victory conditions change in the former situation and it's something that players need to consider. Knowing how to take advantage of the latter situation is also part of the game. I know that can be read as "get good", but its more of "you need to play the game more than once" so everyone can start the game with an understanding of the systems and when to play tactically vs strategically. Taking actions that may halt the economy is good if you have good positioning. If you are playing with new players it probably does feel random because who is positioned correctly might be random based on people naturally trying to take different starting paths It being good or not is completely dependent on if any of the above sounds interesting to you. It's not a game for everyone
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 20:59
|
|
|
AIT is also 30 minutes long and I will make fun of a group that played it once and were like "TOO RANDUMB"
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 21:19
|
|
|
how's era of the five dynasties because I've got my peeps on that, westphalia, and a cloth map for AIT this year
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 21:23
|
|
|
I think the first time through or people who think too much would be in the 60-90 min range, but yeah it's fast when people know how to play, especially if someone runs away with points and you just concede the game to them/try to destabilize China as fast as possible
|
|
#
?
Nov 25, 2019 21:25
|
|
|
al-azad posted:Stock up because Cole said he's not revisiting AIT for a few years. quote:Cole Yesterday at 8:47 PM Yep, if you want AIT, get it now. The next version is awhile away.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2019 01:03
|
|
|
Im continuing the trend of liking games that everyone in this thread thinks is mediocre and Im having a grand time with Terraforming Mars. I feel like draft mode is vital because it spreads around the good cards, so even with the extra time drafting the things, the games tend to be shorter because statistically people are seeing better cards and making better plays that end the game in fewer generations. I dont agree that its not an engine-building game, but rather that the engines have to be very focused and the only other cards that get played are just good value by themselves. My last game, I was playing the corp that lowered energy card costs by 3, and got the card that refunded 3 for standard projects, so I just bought a shitload of energy for 5 megabucks each and used the energy to singlehandedly oxygenate (through some action cards) the entire planet before dumping my energy production into money production and then back into energy production for temperature and oceans. I ended the game with like 49 TR lol.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2019 02:22
|
|
|
Valley of the Kings Premium is on sale for $38 at CSI. Highly recommend. https://www.coolstuffinc.com/p/277258
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2019 02:22
|
|
|
Oh another way to improve TR is to draft the beginning hand prior to picking corps. It usually lets everyone form the start of a strategy
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2019 02:29
|
|
|
Control Volume posted:Oh another way to improve TR is to draft the beginning hand prior to picking corps. It usually lets everyone form the start of a strategy Yeah I thought you were meant to choose them together?
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2019 02:34
|
|
|
Bottom Liner posted:Valley of the Kings Premium is on sale for $38 at CSI. Highly recommend. That's some empty box space, they really gonna do that many expansions?
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2019 03:32
|
|
|
Quixotic1 posted:That's some empty box space, they really gonna do that many expansions? The box insert on one side is slightly too small to fit the sleeved cards properly.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2019 03:39
|
|
|
i put the whole thing in a Race for the Galaxy expansion box. Stupid big boxes.
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2019 03:42
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 24, 2024 22:24 |
|
|
Doctor Spaceman posted:Yeah I thought you were meant to choose them together? You are, Im talking about adding drafting which isnt in the rules as written. It stacks the odds that youll see cards that synergize with one of your dealt corps
|
|
#
?
Nov 26, 2019 05:44
|
|