Board Game Thread 4e: The Call of Catan

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

Gilgameshback: May 18, 2010

Interesting discussion about a forthcoming game about the Golem of Prague and how it represents the history of Judaism:

https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/2522156/cultural-misrepresentation

I'm surprised to see relatively little overt chuddery.

# ? Nov 3, 2020 21:46

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# ? Jun 4, 2024 15:00

Bruceski: Aug 21, 2007; The tools of a hero mean nothing without a solid core.

Gilgameshback posted:

Interesting discussion about a forthcoming game about the Golem of Prague and how it represents the history of Judaism:

https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/2522156/cultural-misrepresentation

I'm surprised to see relatively little overt chuddery.

I think the only gripe I have of the OP is with "He was (and you play as) a kabbalist - a very advanced scholar of Jewish law, philosophy and ethics" and that's just because the relationship between Judaism and Kabbalah is complex. Kabbalah is a form of mysticism that kinda exists alongside Judaism, I liken it to Alchemy in that at the base level there's some simple stuff that blends into the adjacent culture (such as 18 being a significant number similar to the Four Elements in Alchemy, or the idea of making a Golem from clay by inscribing the Word (truth) as a mirror to man's requiring learning to truly live, that stuff's just part of the Ashkenazic cultural knowledge) but if you go down the rabbit hole it leads to some really weird stuff.

There have been learned Rabbis who have been very deep into Kabbalah or not at all, some who used its form of numerology and wordplay to add a poetry to their interpretations of the Torah, but it's not an advanced form of being a scholar. You don't "level up" into Kabbalah if you study the Torah hard enough.

As far as fixing the issues, it doesn't seem like it would take much to lean into the theme a bit more. The synagogue as a community center where people meet for jobs and such is a fine idea (my hometown's was officially called the [town] Jewish Center rather than synagogue) but the names of the actions could be tweaked. For example change "Spells" to "research" or "learning" and it becomes less generic and more evocative of how those abilities are being obtained. By the end of the thread it's come up that those names are just generic placeholders so I think it's not much of an issue, just a good example that if you try to use a theme for a game but mix it with generic fantasy terms it's going to sound jarring to the folks you're (assumedly) trying to attract.

Also apparently they got the Hebrew backwards on the box art until folks pointed it out, so that'll lead to some concern right away but it's also the sort of formatting error I can see happening from a copy/paste or the like.

# ? Nov 4, 2020 00:40

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

Getting hebrew properly typeset is goddamn infuriating, in my experience.

# ? Nov 4, 2020 00:57

Elysium: Aug 21, 2003; It is by will alone I set my mind in motion.

Finally got to check the new BGG homepage on a computer instead of a phone (where I just always assume developers have completely hamstrung the design on purpose because that's just what you do!). Wow it blows. Yeah, it was loving ugly before, but it was just "hey, here's everything you could possibly want to look at, go to town." Now it's just "Here's some giant thumbnails. Scroll around forever and you might find something."

(yes I know you just had this discussion a page or so back)

Elysium fucked around with this message at 16:27 on Nov 4, 2020

# ? Nov 4, 2020 16:24

Mayveena: Dec 27, 2006; People keep vandalizing my ID photo; I've lodged a complaint with HR

Elysium posted:

Finally got to check the new BGG homepage on a computer instead of a phone (where I just always assume developers have completely hamstrung the design on purpose because that's just what you do!). Wow it blows. Yeah, it was loving ugly before, but it was just "hey, here's everything you could possibly want to look at, go to town." Now it's just "Here's some giant thumbnails. Scroll around forever and you might find something."

(yes I know you just had this discussion a page or so back)

It's the trend in websites nowadays and apparently what they wanted was to attract new users. Most of my non board game friends absolutely hated the old site.

# ? Nov 4, 2020 16:37

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

I just hope they let you rearrange and remove components of the exploration version so you don't have to scroll down forever. It looks great and modern but it does look like a clickbait content farm now due to the sheer mass of info present on the home page.

# ? Nov 4, 2020 16:53

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

I very, very rarely use the site beyond specific game's pages and forums and my notifications, none of which are affected by the change.

# ? Nov 4, 2020 16:56

nordichammer: Oct 11, 2013

silvergoose posted:

I very, very rarely use the site beyond specific game's pages and forums and my notifications, none of which are affected by the change.

True fax.

I would like for the hotness to have kickstarter stuff separated since they now have separate wheels. Otherwise wur Sera sera

# ? Nov 4, 2020 17:03

Back Alley Borks: Oct 22, 2017; Awoo.

I've used BGG to find games by tags when I was figuring out boardgames in general a few years ago. The redesign reeks of "modern web principles" with how it's wasting a lot of page space, but whatever.

# ? Nov 4, 2020 17:52

manero: Jan 30, 2006

Codeacious posted:

I've used BGG to find games by tags when I was figuring out boardgames in general a few years ago. The redesign reeks of "modern web principles" with how it's wasting a lot of page space, but whatever.

The old homepage was pretty bad, but there were some useful things like the list of games recently viewed that was always open on the side. Now it's closed and you have to expand the menu to see it...

I guess maybe the closest thing is https://boardgamegeek.com/dashboard when you're logged in?

I tended to stay out of the forums on BGG anyway, but it was good for knowing about upcoming releases or reprints

E: Also, if you use DuckDuckGo, you can use

code:

!bgg <game>

to hop to that game's page pretty quick

# ? Nov 4, 2020 19:02

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

manero posted:

I guess maybe the closest thing is https://boardgamegeek.com/dashboard when you're logged in?

Dashboard was the old homepage.

# ? Nov 4, 2020 19:36

manero: Jan 30, 2006

Jedit posted:

Dashboard was the old homepage.

Yup. Oh well

# ? Nov 4, 2020 19:42

Morpheus: Apr 18, 2008; My favourite little monsters

I've played a couple TTS games, Ruins of Arnak, Anno 1800, and Bonfire.

Didn't like Ruins. The theme and idea of the game is kinda fun, but the fact that the game has not one but two market rows to deal with meant I'd routinely get a card, then watch as my opponent got an objectively better one that showed up immediately after. I mean, quite literally, there's a card that's 'Explore a level 1 location' and one that's 'Explore a level 2 location'. Absolutely no reason to get the first one if given the option. The deck-building mechanics while not using up your entire hand in a turn made for some good brain scratching, but constraining it to 5 rounds total means I think I saw the cards I bought like once, maybe twice, which was really weird. Anyway, not really something I'd play again, maybe if it was 4 player I'd have more fun with it.

Anno 1800 made me want to play the Anno series again. I don't think it was particularly balanced well for 2 people - with 3 or 4, the buildings used to get resources will run out, forcing trade between people as you focus on certain areas, but with 2 that scarcity never became a problem, so it was more of a 'well I'm probably going to need this more than once so I guess I'll spend a turn on getting this building', rather than the race to a resource that it could've been. Still, the production chaining was a fun mechanic, though I preferred somewhat how it worked in Founders of Gloomhaven, but the game has the same problem as Ruins of Arnak, where you draw certain cards that are straight-up better than others. When we played, I drew two cards that let me take level 3 citizens. My friend drew four cards that let him take level 4 citizens. The amount of resources and turns required for me to attain that same level of citizenry was far beyond my ability, and hobbled me for the rest of the game, including the scoring phase, and really frustrated me every time he drew another one of the cards.

Bonfire was good. A little overwhelming to start, but the game was laid out in a logical way that made the rules explanation fairly quick and simple. Get actions, perform actions, get stuff, achieve goals, standard Feld. All in all, I quite liked it, though there was just one mechanic too many - you need to get tasks, complete tasks to turn them into bonfires, make paths to said bonfires, find guardians, make guardians walk the paths, then make portals that connect the bonfires to the paths so that guardians can traverse them, and that last portal mechanism seemed needless, just one unnecessary step. To do so requires spinning a central bonfire to find the right portal that matches symbols on your board (in the right order), and my friend and I barely engaged with the mechanic at all. It's possible it would happen more in a 3-4 player game, I suppose.

# ? Nov 4, 2020 19:57

Jcam: Jan 4, 2009; Yourhead

Anyone willing to give some Twilight Imperium tips/tricks for a table with all new players to the game? Eventually I'll be hosting a five or six player game, and despite watching a fartload of How-To-Play videos I still know it's going to be a nightmare despite being fun.

# ? Nov 4, 2020 20:36

rydiafan: Mar 17, 2009

Is a victory point game, not a war game. So you need to treat it more like Cataan than Risk. Everything you do should be something that will get you points; don't fight for the sake of fighting. On the flip side, don't hold grudges for aggression that was made in the interest of achieving an objective. In fact, make deals to enable mutual exchanges of aggression, e.g. "Let me conquer this random planet from you and I'll leave a capital ship behind for you to kill next turn."

# ? Nov 4, 2020 20:51

Afriscipio: Jun 3, 2013

Jcam posted:

Anyone willing to give some Twilight Imperium tips/tricks for a table with all new players to the game? Eventually I'll be hosting a five or six player game, and despite watching a fartload of How-To-Play videos I still know it's going to be a nightmare despite being fun.

I've hosted a few games of TI with new players, and this is what I recommend.

Pre-build a map for the first game. Map drafting is a whole other metagame that newbies don't need to know and delays the game start.
Don't let players pick Winnu, Muatt, Arborec, Nekro or Saar for their first game. These factions are either weak or break too many rules.
Sol, Barony, L1Z1X, Naalu, Yin, Xxcha and perhaps the University are probably the most beginner-friendly factions.
Each individual system of TI is fairly simple, the complexity comes from the sheer number of them.
There's a lot of frontloaded information needed to play TI, so perhaps mitigate that with a learning first round, where people can take back their moves.
Emphasize that the game is not space Risk. You win by achieving objectives, not by having the most plastic.
Explain that keeping your home system is important to scoring objectives.
For your first round of strategy picks, don't try to game it too much. Explain each when they come up.
Explain the action, strategy and fleet tokens. They are what allow you affect anything on the map. If you're playing with a bunch of newbies, don't worry too much about optimization, just tell folks to keep a few tokens in each category at the beginning of each round.
Make sure everyone understands system activation. It's the heart of the tactical phase and can cause confusion. The golden rule is you can't move anything out of an activated system.
Explain combat when it occurs.
Don't explain the agenda phase until it happens. It's not relevant for the first one or two rounds.

The RTFM 32-minute tutorial is probably the best "before-you-play" video. Try and get your players to watch that at least.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_u2xEap5hBM

# ? Nov 4, 2020 21:01

Mayveena: Dec 27, 2006; People keep vandalizing my ID photo; I've lodged a complaint with HR

Morpheus posted:

I've played a couple TTS games, Ruins of Arnak, Anno 1800, and Bonfire.

Didn't like Ruins. The theme and idea of the game is kinda fun, but the fact that the game has not one but two market rows to deal with meant I'd routinely get a card, then watch as my opponent got an objectively better one that showed up immediately after. I mean, quite literally, there's a card that's 'Explore a level 1 location' and one that's 'Explore a level 2 location'. Absolutely no reason to get the first one if given the option. The deck-building mechanics while not using up your entire hand in a turn made for some good brain scratching, but constraining it to 5 rounds total means I think I saw the cards I bought like once, maybe twice, which was really weird. Anyway, not really something I'd play again, maybe if it was 4 player I'd have more fun with it.

Anno 1800 made me want to play the Anno series again. I don't think it was particularly balanced well for 2 people - with 3 or 4, the buildings used to get resources will run out, forcing trade between people as you focus on certain areas, but with 2 that scarcity never became a problem, so it was more of a 'well I'm probably going to need this more than once so I guess I'll spend a turn on getting this building', rather than the race to a resource that it could've been. Still, the production chaining was a fun mechanic, though I preferred somewhat how it worked in Founders of Gloomhaven, but the game has the same problem as Ruins of Arnak, where you draw certain cards that are straight-up better than others. When we played, I drew two cards that let me take level 3 citizens. My friend drew four cards that let him take level 4 citizens. The amount of resources and turns required for me to attain that same level of citizenry was far beyond my ability, and hobbled me for the rest of the game, including the scoring phase, and really frustrated me every time he drew another one of the cards.

Bonfire was good. A little overwhelming to start, but the game was laid out in a logical way that made the rules explanation fairly quick and simple. Get actions, perform actions, get stuff, achieve goals, standard Feld. All in all, I quite liked it, though there was just one mechanic too many - you need to get tasks, complete tasks to turn them into bonfires, make paths to said bonfires, find guardians, make guardians walk the paths, then make portals that connect the bonfires to the paths so that guardians can traverse them, and that last portal mechanism seemed needless, just one unnecessary step. To do so requires spinning a central bonfire to find the right portal that matches symbols on your board (in the right order), and my friend and I barely engaged with the mechanic at all. It's possible it would happen more in a 3-4 player game, I suppose.

With Anno you'll realize that really, you want to trade and get the other players to spend resources while you take their stuff with your single trade token. You definitely don't want to keep buying stuff when you can trade for it. And drawing a bunch of cards is a good way to lose the game. You want to empty your hand faster than your opponent and still score points. That's where the strategy is, not in getting more cards or even more better cards.

We've played Bonfire a bunch now and it's starting to feel very samey, don't know if it's really a keeper.

# ? Nov 4, 2020 21:40

Impermanent: Apr 1, 2010

the real anno 1800 game is The Colonists imo. they (the board game and the video game) feel very similar.

# ? Nov 4, 2020 21:44

Mayveena: Dec 27, 2006; People keep vandalizing my ID photo; I've lodged a complaint with HR

Impermanent posted:

the real anno 1800 game is The Colonists imo. they (the board game and the video game) feel very similar.

Kind of, but Anno 1800 the board game goes way farther than The Colonists does. The Colonists uses the Anno series base mechanic but 1800 uses more of the actual specific video game.

# ? Nov 4, 2020 21:54

FulsomFrank: Sep 11, 2005; Hard on for love

If I've already got the Colonists is there a point in getting Anno?

# ? Nov 4, 2020 22:12

zimbomonkey: Jul 15, 2008; Tattoos? On MY black quarterback?

I would like to thank everyone who told me not to panic buy King's Dilemma. it hit Amazon sometime last week and I was able to get a copy. probably saved me a good 40 or 50 bucks.

# ? Nov 4, 2020 23:43

Morpheus: Apr 18, 2008; My favourite little monsters

Mayveena posted:

With Anno you'll realize that really, you want to trade and get the other players to spend resources while you take their stuff with your single trade token. You definitely don't want to keep buying stuff when you can trade for it. And drawing a bunch of cards is a good way to lose the game. You want to empty your hand faster than your opponent and still score points. That's where the strategy is, not in getting more cards or even more better cards.

We've played Bonfire a bunch now and it's starting to feel very samey, don't know if it's really a keeper.

Yeah, for the most part we did well in not drawing too many cards, I don't remember exactly how we got new population most of the time. But the disparity of card usefulness was really off-putting.

# ? Nov 5, 2020 00:09

Mayveena: Dec 27, 2006; People keep vandalizing my ID photo; I've lodged a complaint with HR

FulsomFrank posted:

If I've already got the Colonists is there a point in getting Anno?

It's pretty different. And also faster than a full game of the Colonists. That being said your first few games will go slowly because as I mentioned people buy too many cards which slows the game down to a crawl. You won't feel as if you have the same game twice as Anno is not as tech tree intensive as the Colonists. Again on first look it appears to be tech tree intensive but a lot of it is making smart acquisitions and seeing what your opponents are buying so you can leech off of them.

# ? Nov 5, 2020 01:12

Serotoning: Sep 14, 2010; D&D: HASBARA SQUAD
HANG 'EM HIGH

We're fighting human animals and we act accordingly

Anyone have links for must-have boardgame accessories available on AliExpress? I'm looking for a decent cloth bag, for one.

# ? Nov 5, 2020 04:30

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

Pvt. Parts posted:

Anyone have links for must-have boardgame accessories available on AliExpress? I'm looking for a decent cloth bag, for one.

For carrying games?

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/327...earchweb201603_

# ? Nov 5, 2020 04:44

Serotoning: Sep 14, 2010; D&D: HASBARA SQUAD
HANG 'EM HIGH

We're fighting human animals and we act accordingly

Bottom Liner posted:

For carrying games?

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/327...earchweb201603_

Sorry, I should have specified. For randomizing/pulling tiles. But any tips are welcome!

# ? Nov 5, 2020 04:49

Crackbone: May 23, 2003; Vlaada is my co-pilot.

Pvt. Parts posted:

Anyone have links for must-have boardgame accessories available on AliExpress? I'm looking for a decent cloth bag, for one.

No, because most of what Aliexpress has is a total crapshoot in terms of quality.
The boardgamegeekstore has a selection of nice themed bags, otherwise you could get something nice enough on Amazon or locally.

# ? Nov 5, 2020 04:51

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

Pvt. Parts posted:

Sorry, I should have specified. For randomizing/pulling tiles. But any tips are welcome!

I'm a big fan of pencil case zip bags for this. We use one for Carcassonne and it's perfect. ~$1 at walmart.

# ? Nov 5, 2020 05:03

Ravendas: Sep 29, 2001

Bottom Liner posted:

I'm a big fan of pencil case zip bags for this. We use one for Carcassonne and it's perfect. ~$1 at walmart.

I used to store Carc in a single sleeve of Oreos box. They fit with like 3mm of clearance, it was perfect. That was back when I'd carry games in my 'walk around the city' bag, and needed things to be small.

# ? Nov 5, 2020 14:21

rydiafan: Mar 17, 2009

Pvt. Parts posted:

Sorry, I should have specified. For randomizing/pulling tiles. But any tips are welcome!

Buy a bottle of Crown Royale.

# ? Nov 5, 2020 15:18

Rutibex: Sep 9, 2001; by Fluffdaddy

rydiafan posted:

Buy a bottle of Crown Royale.

They only come with a bag when they do the special editions now

# ? Nov 5, 2020 15:20

armorer: Aug 6, 2012; I like metal.

If you want Crown Royal bags, you can get them pretty cheap on ebay.

# ? Nov 5, 2020 15:26

Mr. Squishy: Mar 22, 2010; A country where you can always get richer.

Just get your mum to make one, OP.

# ? Nov 5, 2020 15:49

rydiafan: Mar 17, 2009

armorer posted:

If you want Crown Royal bags, you can get them pretty cheap on ebay.

I have like 30 of them I got when my grandfather died.

# ? Nov 5, 2020 19:00

nordichammer: Oct 11, 2013

Dang wish my grandfather was made of crown royal bags instead of racism

# ? Nov 5, 2020 19:06

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

After seeing people talk about cubes guy lmao in the TG gang tag thread, I'm disappointed he didn't make an appearance in Sidereal Confluence: Trading and Negotiation in the Elysian Quadrant

# ? Nov 5, 2020 21:19

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

Every race in Sidereal is in fact the Eridani behind a paper-thin mask :ssh:

# ? Nov 5, 2020 21:33

Mayveena: Dec 27, 2006; People keep vandalizing my ID photo; I've lodged a complaint with HR

So what do you folks have on order?

I have:

Beyond the Sun
Tawansituyu
Raiders of Scythia
Cloudage
Praga Caput Regni
Anno 1800
Paris
Whistle Mountain

I will order Halleratu as soon as the orders open for the US.

Looking forward to all of them!

# ? Nov 5, 2020 23:04

Countblanc: Apr 20, 2005; _{Help a hero out!}

Chill la Chill posted:

After seeing people talk about cubes guy lmao in the TG gang tag thread, I'm disappointed he didn't make an appearance in Sidereal Confluence: Trading and Negotiation in the Elysian Quadrant

they're saving them for a crossover expansion, and they'll put the Yengii in TI

# ? Nov 5, 2020 23:05

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# ? Jun 4, 2024 15:00

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

Mayveena posted:

So what do you folks have on order?

I have:

Beyond the Sun
Tawansituyu
Raiders of Scythia
Cloudage
Praga Caput Regni
Anno 1800
Paris
Whistle Mountain

I will order Halleratu as soon as the orders open for the US.

Looking forward to all of them!

Just Oath and Jagged Earth at the moment but I�m going to check out some of these.

# ? Nov 5, 2020 23:09

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

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