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nordichammer posted:To be fair, having beaten Legacy 1 and Gloomhaven main campaign, I find it difficult to see how a campaign setting in a board game could be implemented in such a way that I enjoy. Even with Gloomhaven, I maintain that the campaign elements are the worst part of the game. I'll say that my best memories of Seasons 1 and 2 are decisions we agonized over and risks we took. Looking back I couldn't actually tell you many particulars about those stories. We played around half of Jaws of the Lion and had a great time, but one of the first things we declared dumb and boring was the event deck. I think we made the "right" decision on the first one we tried, flipped a whammy (something like, shuffle a permanent miss card into your combat deck) and were like, "nah, we're not doing that," and never bothered with it again.
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Oct 23, 2020 15:59
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I dunno if it's the case in Jaws but in GH there are a bunch of good rewards (most importantly: scenarios) scattered through the event decks and skipping them entirely would mean missing out on fun things. The event decks aren't great by themselves though.
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Oct 23, 2020 16:02
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How's Arkham LCG with 4? Is it even playable with 4? I know I'd have to buy multiple core boxes.
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Oct 23, 2020 16:08
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Huxley posted:We played around half of Jaws of the Lion and had a great time, but one of the first things we declared dumb and boring was the event deck. I think we made the "right" decision on the first one we tried, flipped a whammy (something like, shuffle a permanent miss card into your combat deck) and were like, "nah, we're not doing that," and never bothered with it again. Wow, that sounds pretty goddamn awful. One of the things my group found when playing Jaws of the Lion was the tone of the writing was pretty bad. Like, "Why do we have to share a head with this rear end in a top hat" bad. Game plays well, though, and just being able to whack a book on the table lessens the setup and teardown time considerably.
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Oct 23, 2020 16:10
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Honestly the campaign elements of Gloomhaven were the only reason it had legs for us  The tactical combat is fine but not that compelling, and relies heavily on the novelty factor to keep it interesting across repeated plays. Maybe it would have benefitted from stripping down the campaign to bare minimum. Gloomhaven tries to keep everything scaleable so it can accommodate all sizes of all parties of all characters at all levels at all points of progression, and it's impressive how well it works but there are still scaling and balance issues. If they could say "ok, this scenario is played with a party that has these options, and no others" they could make a much tighter game.
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Oct 23, 2020 16:18
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armorer posted:How's Arkham LCG with 4? Is it even playable with 4? I know I'd have to buy multiple core boxes. It's a bit slow at 4 but not unbearable.
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Oct 23, 2020 16:21
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FFG announced the price on the app-driven coop Descent box they've been teasing. $175 And the amount of content they showed in the reveal article does not even come close to justifying that price.
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Oct 23, 2020 16:48
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The gently caress? Is it just a shitload of minis?
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Oct 23, 2020 17:14
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https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2020/10/22/descent-legends-of-the-dark/
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Oct 23, 2020 17:15
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PRADA SLUT posted:Is there anywhere I can buy Etherfields that aren't from resellers? I know they're fulfilling a Kickstarter but I just heard about this game and I'm wondering if there's somewhere I can order a copy from the publisher or a retailer or whatever So, as I expected based on the very little I've seen online, TGG Games got back to me with the extremely terse "It's kickstarter pre-order" regarding Etherfields. I asked if it is wave 1 or wave 2 but they haven't replied yet (and I expect it'll be a day or so). I may roll the dice with them. https://www.thegamesteward.com/ Also has a listing for it, but at a notably higher price. TGG Games have some connection with Awaken Realms Lite as well, so it's entirely possible that they're legit and just have a sort of business "in" that lets them get AR kickstarted stuff cheaper. I wish there was more info about them, and/or that their customer service was a bit more forthcoming.
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Oct 23, 2020 17:22
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Doctor Spaceman posted:I dunno if it's the case in Jaws but in GH there are a bunch of good rewards (most importantly: scenarios) scattered through the event decks and skipping them entirely would mean missing out on fun things. Huxley posted:We played around half of Jaws of the Lion and had a great time, but one of the first things we declared dumb and boring was the event deck. I think we made the "right" decision on the first one we tried, flipped a whammy (something like, shuffle a permanent miss card into your combat deck) and were like, "nah, we're not doing that," and never bothered with it again.
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Oct 23, 2020 17:54
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It's Asmodee FFG, so it's probably bad, but it def looks ambitious.
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Oct 23, 2020 17:58
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Crackbone posted:It's Asmodee FFG, so it's probably bad, but it def looks ambitious. Oh I was just posting it for the question above about whether or not it was a crapload of minis to justify their $175 asking price.
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Oct 23, 2020 18:00
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When I start up Gloomhaven or any derivatives again, here is what I'm going to do: Scrap all events. Don't do them, unlock any items for purchase in shop (with regard given to relative strength of item. And prosperity level), and start party off at level 2 or 3 with a minor gold bump and maybe prosperity bump to make early missions smoother. All classes available from the start. All locations unlocked on map with maybe a guide on what missions chain together for storyline. Scrap battle goals and award a checkmark for every completed mission. Separate tiles into Doors and Obstacles and not care about appearance of map. Skip reading intro of scenario. If a player wants to read it, they are welcome to do so. Maybe more. I like it as tactical combat scenarios. Most of the rest just gets in the way.
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Oct 23, 2020 18:05
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Mayveena posted:Anyone want to play Anno 1800 after 6pm Pacific on Tabletopia? I can teach! Although not more than three. Game is AP prone for your first time as it is Boardgames are flat, but the world is round. I want to complain to the designer about the issues with the layout. 
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Oct 23, 2020 18:14
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Huxley posted:My FLGS says it's Pandemic Legacy Season 0 day today! Not sure if that means they expect it to come in today or they expect to give it to me today, but either way we should be hilt deep in espionage this weekend. I received my order Wednesday but haven't done more than peel off the plastic. Its a heavy box. I'm tempted to save it for a long weekend.
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Oct 23, 2020 18:44
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nordichammer posted:When I start up Gloomhaven or any derivatives again, here is what I'm going to do: I get where you're going on this but some of it seems extreme. I've been finding that unlocking classes is one of the parts that gets my group the most excited, and the location chain isn't really that odious. I'm onboard with doing away with events. We've switched to a house rule where if our decision seems to block something off (i.e. "no effect, destroy this card") we just unlock it.
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Oct 23, 2020 18:59
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armorer posted:How's Arkham LCG with 4? Is it even playable with 4? I know I'd have to buy multiple core boxes. It's awesome at 4 as long as everyone is familiar with the game - having extra investigators kinda frees you up into experimenting with weirder/riskier builds. Most of the scenarios scale perfectly for the number of players but there are a few that apparently slipped through the cracks and become pretty difficult with added players (Essex County Express comes immediately to mind - ask me anything about the time one of our players - with Charon's Obol no less - got killed outright on the second or third turn with literally nothing we could have done to prevent it. Luckily that scenario is fixed pretty well in the Return To... box, because it's a neat idea and a lot of fun when it doesn't just arbitrarily dunk on you).
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Oct 23, 2020 19:08
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Unlocking Gloomhaven classes is great. The way the game lets you unlock them is really bad. Personal goals are not balanced and do not scale to player count, and their arbitrary nature can potentially force you to grind previously played scenarios if you play them as written. Considering that they gatekeep the best unlockable content of the game, they're easily the worst designed element in Gloomhaven.
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Oct 23, 2020 19:10
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food court bailiff posted:It's awesome at 4 as long as everyone is familiar with the game - having extra investigators kinda frees you up into experimenting with weirder/riskier builds. What do you end up needing to play it with 4? Two core boxes? And do you need multiple copies of the expansions as you get them as well? I'm looking for something to move on to next with a group of 4 and I think they'd be into it, I just don't know the investment required.
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Oct 23, 2020 19:10
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armorer posted:What do you end up needing to play it with 4? Two core boxes? And do you need multiple copies of the expansions as you get them as well? I'm looking for something to move on to next with a group of 4 and I think they'd be into it, I just don't know the investment required. With 2 core sets, your customization options may be a bit limited it you play overlapping classes, but it'll be playable (and fine if you each play a specific class, with no significant multi-classing). Some would recommend 3-4 core sets instead. Another option instead of a 3rd/4th core set would be the investigator starter packs, which each give you many more player cards for each class. The more expansions you get, the less important the need for the extra core sets is, since they'll help increase your player card pool. But yes, 2 core sets minimum. Investment-wise, it is quite an expensive game. Each campaign (deluxe expansion + 6 mythos packs) costs as much as Gloomhaven.
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Oct 23, 2020 19:16
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It's kind of a running joke even in the Gloomhaven thread that basically we hate everything about it other than the combat but the combat is leagues ahead of anything else in the genre (although I've been meaning to try Street Masters, which some say scratches the same itch)
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Oct 23, 2020 19:19
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I have a soft spot for Descent in spite of markedly better games existing in a mechanical sense, and Legends in the Dark does absolutely nothing for me. They clearly want to be Gloomhaven really, really badly but it all just looks incredibly flat. One of Descent's charms was that it was fairly lightweight candy-coated trash, and this just looks like they're gonna go halfway and have something that's both thematically and aesthetically flat as well as mechanically underwhelming. I probably would have been suckered into it at literally half the price, but $175? Come the gently caress on.
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Oct 23, 2020 19:24
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Llyranor posted:You need a minimum of 2 core sets. You only need 1 of each expansion/mythos packs. Okay, I can stomach that in the grand scheme of things. For the number of hours that these sorts of games provide, I think the return on investment is well worth it. Thanks!
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Oct 23, 2020 19:48
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armorer posted:Oh I was just posting it for the question above about whether or not it was a crapload of minis to justify their $175 asking price. Not remotely. It has something like fifty little dudes. For comparison, CMON games tend to run $1/mini with some huge stuff thrown in. Even Games Workshop WH Quest games offer a better minis:dollars ratio. Let the mind recoil in horror from that idea. This looks incomprehensibly poorly thought out. It's also ferociously ugly. I was one hundred percent on board with this but the reveal is basically an ad for gloomhaven. Ohthehugemanatee fucked around with this message at 21:12 on Oct 23, 2020 |
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Oct 23, 2020 21:10
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armorer posted:Okay, I can stomach that in the grand scheme of things. For the number of hours that these sorts of games provide, I think the return on investment is well worth it. Thanks! Not going to lie, it does add up - but it's one of my favorite games to just pick a campaign and play through over the course of a weekend with a new investigator. Honestly, now that COVID has killed off my gaming group for the foreseeable future, I've been playing it a lot solo and it's a fantastic game for that. I usually play two investigators on my own and it's a blast. If I'm replaying a scenario I've done before, I also try to make whatever choices the investigators I've chosen probably would, because I'm a huge dork. Sure, right, Silas goes all violent and loud at the drop of a hat, why wouldn't he?
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Oct 23, 2020 23:15
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Almost all of my Gloomhaven house-rules are about tweaking campaign progression. Frosthaven at least looks to be experimenting with some improvements there.nordichammer posted:Scrap battle goals and award a checkmark for every completed mission. I don't really like this one because battle-goals add variability, an extra risk / reward component and add in some interesting tactical choices. The fact that battlegoals become largely irrelevant to mid / high level characters is a huge problem though.
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Oct 23, 2020 23:22
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You could just make it so battle goals also give a reward of gold or other resources. "If you complete this battle goal, apply a +1 enchantment on any viable level 1 or level x card".
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Oct 23, 2020 23:28
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yeah you actually want to keep battlegoals in order to keep people from having perfect information about other players and their objectives. It keeps the other players a little bit unpredictable. Some tables I've seen will just wind up admitting what goal they have, which is a shame, but I think it's better even then to have the objective rather than to excise them entirely. I think that the side objectives actually could/should be a little more mean, to be honest. Things like "loot more gold than any other player" instead of "loot x gold." or "At least one other player fails their battle goal." It's not a perfectly system - I'm hoping that the need to loot specific types of loot from specific enemies in Frosthaven keeps the party interaction a little bit more dynamic than what we have currently - but it's better than nothing.
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Oct 23, 2020 23:28
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On the other hand, there isn't really a choice between 'use items 2 plus your level times' and 'overkill an enemy by half their health' if I only have two items that are consumable and I'm playing an AoE character against a map of Stone Golems. I understand the intent. I just don't like the implications one way or the other. In practice, it has lead to incredibly uneven play experiences for my group.
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Oct 23, 2020 23:56
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Huxley posted:I think we made the "right" decision on the first one we tried, flipped a whammy (something like, shuffle a permanent miss card into your combat deck) and were like, "nah, we're not doing that," and never bothered with it again. Was that a curse card? Because curse cards a removed from your deck after you draw it, or you finish the scenario. They aren’t permanently stuck in your deck.
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Oct 24, 2020 00:52
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Ubik_Lives posted:Was that a curse card? Because curse cards a removed from your deck after you draw it, or you finish the scenario. They aren’t permanently stuck in your deck. I assumed they were permanent since it happened between rounds, but now that I hear you say it i get that they meant for it to just be for the next round. That's a lot less punishing, for sure.
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Oct 24, 2020 01:53
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Curses and Blesses get removed at the end of a scenario or when drawn, whichever happens first.
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Oct 24, 2020 02:01
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Semi-related to the recent discussions, what are some people's favorite campaign board games? Not necessarily legacy games, but I often enjoy the metaprogression of characters or the world over the course of many games. I would say that's one of the big reasons my Gloomhaven crew stuck with the game so well before covid, because we enjoyed the campaign aspect. Same with Pandemic Legacy Season 1, though obviously the legacy aspect makes it more of a one and done campaign.
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Oct 24, 2020 02:31
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Do people have any opinions on Nemesis? Expected it to have its own thread, I don't know much about it but my friend mentioned some new Kickstarter for a re-release of the Core game plus new expansions. I thought Gloomhaven and Arkham Horror LCG were expensive but goddamn Nemesis seems like a huge investment.
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Oct 24, 2020 05:37
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DLC Inc posted:Do people have any opinions on Nemesis? Expected it to have its own thread, I don't know much about it but my friend mentioned some new Kickstarter for a re-release of the Core game plus new expansions. Nemesis has a cool premise and the first couple plays will likely be fun, and then you realize just how shallow the game is and you are full of regrets. Except me, since I didn't actually buy the game. The game hit diminishing returns hard once you realize the characters aren't all that different, the goals are absolute poo poo, and the endgame has Talisman-esque levels of gently caress you. Despite having a GREAT time for my first 1-2 plays, it wore off amazingly quickly for me.
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Oct 24, 2020 07:41
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GrandpaPants posted:Nemesis has a cool premise and the first couple turns will likely be fun Fixed for my own experience with the game.
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Oct 24, 2020 08:35
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I've only played Nemisis on TTS but I think a big issue with it are the goals. The goals to kill a specific player just seem mean really, and not in a good fun way but in a tedious way. The personal goals all seem way way easier than the Corporate ones as well, in 3 5 players games I've played no one had kept a corporate goal. Blowing up the ship, or changing the course feel like good objectives but kill player 3? Nah. Especially when you 'are' player 3 when you have to do the fallback objective of be the only one who survives. There are other issues as well but the objectives feels the most egregious.
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Oct 24, 2020 10:48
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The typical sales pitch for Nemesis: You know how in Alien movies some of the characters make bad decisions that get them killed? The game recreates that experience. As in, if you bought the game, you made a bad decision.
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Oct 24, 2020 12:19
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Trip reports: Lost Ruins of Arnak is potentially interesting and I like the gameplay loop (combined deckbuilder/WP), but it feels very restrictive in the gaining of certain resources. With only five rounds I can see that hurting players who go later in turn order. I'd need to see more of it. The Red Cathedral is solid and I can see a lot of people here enjoying it. It uses a neat resource gathering mechanic where you're moving dice around a rondel and re-rolling them every time they get used. This adds player interaction as you can really gently caress people over by moving a die they were relying on using for something else. There's a lot of good timing going on as well; you can seize opportunities as other players open them up to score and make them lose points by getting certain jobs done faster.
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Oct 24, 2020 13:20
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