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Codeacious posted:I'm not sure what it's offering to get so much attention. Just a ton of kickstarter bloat including ugly minis and battery powered components that make stupid sounds. The reviews I've seen don't make it seem like the actual game is any better.
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Feb 2, 2021 00:39
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Lichtenstein posted:
I disagree; it’s much more cost-effective to buy the new player packs, at least one per person over two that will be playing, ideally one each. With that, you are limited more by scenarios than card choice. So get the boxed expansions and corresponding mythos packs. A second core only comes useful around the time you are looking at the return-to boxes and novels. https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2020/3/24/your-investigation-begins/
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Feb 2, 2021 00:42
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Bottom Liner posted:Just a ton of kickstarter bloat including ugly minis and battery powered components that make stupid sounds. The reviews I've seen don't make it seem like the actual game is any better. Oh wow, I didn't know about the powered stuff. I can't imagine buying batteries for a boardgame! It feels like there hasn't been much compelling stuff to buy in the boardgame world recently. I'm still picking up my Marvel Champions packs, but that's about it.
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Feb 2, 2021 00:59
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Codeacious posted:Oh wow, I didn't know about the powered stuff. I can't imagine buying batteries for a boardgame! Heard good stuff about Polynesia if you're talking euros, but the most hype I've seen lately are a lot of 18xx kickstarters. Right now the spotlight is on 60, but soon 89, 41, and the GMT releases.
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Feb 2, 2021 01:55
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Bottom Liner posted:Just a ton of kickstarter bloat including ugly minis and battery powered components that make stupid sounds. The reviews I've seen don't make it seem like the actual game is any better. Nah. That's a take on Dwellings of Eldervale (the terribly-titled game which I'll reference in case nobody knows what I'm quoting about) and all but I'll offer mine with a little more detail, since I actually own and have played it. Yes, it's KS-bloat. Yes, the noise bases are incredibly dumb (and charming as a result). The minis are fine - average, I'd say, but not ugly by any means. But the game is actually a pretty interesting Frankenstein's monster of tableau building worker placement vs. Meeples on a Map area control/action selection where you're placing meeples on a map to a) take that location's action, b) potentially establish the said dwellings on that area for end-game VP and also added assistance in combat and c) to set up access to future action spots. Some of the location actions allow you to purchase cards into your tableau. Your workers (and other special troop/workers) also serve a role in combat for pushing people out of spaces. However, you also have the option to recall all of your workers from the map to then place them onto action spaces on your tableau. This is somewhat important as if you've gotten your workers killed in combat, you're not likely to be able to use them to fire off actions in your tableau (unless you're a faction who can specifically use dead people for such things). So there's some real risk-reward in playing wargames with your meeples and a tug-of-war between building your tableau on the map but then knowing when to pull off the map to actually use it. There's some Euro tracks nonsense and asymmetrical factions with dice for the Ameritrash players and for many people, the combination will be easily dismissed with a sniff of disdain not unlike the one I'm quoting. And hey, for their tastes, they're right. But it works for me and is also a solid solo experience, making it better than just trying to build another high score on Farm Simulator X in many of my other, dryer traditional Euro games.
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Feb 2, 2021 02:35
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If you are in need of a way to play some Euro games solo, I'd recommend https://myautoma.github.io/
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Feb 2, 2021 02:37
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Codeacious posted:Oh wow, I didn't know about the powered stuff. I can't imagine buying batteries for a boardgame! You can easily buy the non-deluxe game without the bases. If you do get the big dumb RAWR bases, they all come with batteries included and the replacement batteries are sold on the cheap for things like electric candles. You can restock in a couple of years off of Amazon if non-functional bases will really bug the crap out of you.
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Feb 2, 2021 02:38
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What's the best setup for a four (maybe five) person Root game for a bunch of first-timers? Would it be best to just run the base game without any of the expansion factions?
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Feb 2, 2021 05:44
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Base with otters instead of vagabond. While teaching be sure to explain that the otters card market (and other services but less so) is a huge boost to everyone because if the other players ignore them the otter player will have a pretty dull game.
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Feb 2, 2021 06:06
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Irisize posted:What's the best setup for a four (maybe five) person Root game for a bunch of first-timers? Would it be best to just run the base game without any of the expansion factions? For four there is an optional hand-holding play/walkthrough of two rounds that leads into a full game; it's included in the base and will teach you everything you need to know about your faction in those two rounds. I'd recommend that for your first time.
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Feb 2, 2021 06:10
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Bottom Liner posted:Base with otters instead of vagabond. While teaching be sure to explain that the otters card market (and other services but less so) is a huge boost to everyone because if the other players ignore them the otter player will have a pretty dull game. I'd go the other way and play base factions + Corvids or Moles. The Beavers are really good and fun but it's hard to explain the value of cards until you've played a game or 2 I think which can lead to people just not interacting with his market.
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Feb 2, 2021 09:38
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Bottom Liner posted:Base with otters instead of vagabond. While teaching be sure to explain that the otters card market (and other services but less so) is a huge boost to everyone because if the other players ignore them the otter player will have a pretty dull game. So far in all my games with otters barely anyone was using the card market, but any game with eyre they can lean hard on mercenaries to spread and fulfill decrees. WA will likely never buy anything since they have the most limited meeple pool, unless the otter player makes it a point to spend their investment as soon as possible.
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Feb 2, 2021 11:25
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The BGG Black History Month highlights in the front page are really cool
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Feb 2, 2021 18:26
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nordichammer posted:The BGG Black History Month highlights in the front page are really cool First time I've ever actually wanted to look at the new front page, and I'm excited to!
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Feb 2, 2021 18:34
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nordichammer posted:The BGG Black History Month highlights in the front page are really cool Yeah I really like Jeremy!!!
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Feb 2, 2021 19:48
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Spirit Island Promo Pack 2 is in stock at the Greater Than Games website, for anyone looking to pick it up.
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Feb 2, 2021 22:52
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My fellow goons, I need a recommendation: a two-player cooperative game that's not in the Pandemic family and isn't Arkham Horror. I'm looking for something relatively casual and lightweight to play with my wife. Suggestions?
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Feb 3, 2021 06:24
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Shipwreck Arcana or Menara
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Feb 3, 2021 06:27
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Admiralty Flag posted:My fellow goons, I need a recommendation: a two-player cooperative game that's not in the Pandemic family and isn't Arkham Horror. I'm looking for something relatively casual and lightweight to play with my wife. Suggestions? Codenames Duet (2p word game), Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective (story-based mystery), Fox in the Forest Duet (2p coop trick taking).
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Feb 3, 2021 06:30
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I also really enjoy Fog of Love, though whether or not it's 'cooperative' is up for debate. More like a cowritten narrative experience. Two people play the two main characters in a romantic dramedy, being sweet and/or terrible to each other. It's also the easiest "complex" game to teach I've ever seen, since it's specifically set up so that it teaches you how to play on your first go through, with little rules cards coming out of the decks at the right time. It's loving brilliant. Edit: The theme makes it an easy sell to couples and romantic partners who like the genre/want a 'date night' board game. But, for the love of God, do not play as yourselves, and don't project too hard onto the characters. That will very quickly turn Fog of Love into the Newlywed Game and that is not a road you want to go down. Edit 2: Aeon's End is a cooperative deckbuilder about being space wizards trying to protect the last human city from horrible monsters, but it's a bit crunchier and also has a terrible quarterbacking problem, so that might not be great if your wife isn't already a gamer. girl dick energy fucked around with this message at 07:16 on Feb 3, 2021 |
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Feb 3, 2021 07:06
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Admiralty Flag posted:My fellow goons, I need a recommendation: a two-player cooperative game that's not in the Pandemic family and isn't Arkham Horror. I'm looking for something relatively casual and lightweight to play with my wife. Suggestions? I recently played Paleo, which is a nice co-op boardgame where you have to survive as a cavemen tribe. The rules are pretty easy to understand and there's ways of making the game easier or harder.
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Feb 3, 2021 09:18
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Admiralty Flag posted:My fellow goons, I need a recommendation: a two-player cooperative game that's not in the Pandemic family and isn't Arkham Horror. I'm looking for something relatively casual and lightweight to play with my wife. Suggestions? Forbidden Desert
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Feb 3, 2021 09:18
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Admiralty Flag posted:My fellow goons, I need a recommendation: a two-player cooperative game that's not in the Pandemic family and isn't Arkham Horror. I'm looking for something relatively casual and lightweight to play with my wife. Suggestions? If it's for playing with your wife, ... and then we held hands is my go-to suggestion. I gave it to a friend as a wedding present; they took it with them on honeymoon.
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Feb 3, 2021 09:45
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Oh my god, Whistle Stop is a neat game, but they made some component decisions in that game that boggle my mind. Bezier Games seems to have taken an activist position that people need to understand the plight of the colorblind. To that end, they've chosen player colors that are indistinguishable when placed in a stack. Finally I can empathize with my brothers! The player colors do not come anywhere close to matching the player boards. This is brilliant, obviously. They expect you to shuffle a massive stack of hex tiles and lay them face down to draw from, instead of just including a pouch. There are gold nugget tokens, which have a secret random point value. You are expected to lay all of these face down during set up, instead of, again, just including a pouch. The game lasts for a set number of rounds, and every round the players receive an allotment of resources. All but one round, these resources amount to two coal tokens, which are sort of a lumpy triangle. The designers expect you to place these tokens along every single space of the round track. and hand them out when each round starts. In a five player game(and that's a lie the box cover told us), that's ten lumpy triangles that you're supposed to place in a stack in a spot only slightly larger than one of these lumpy triangles. Triangles do not stack well, and I doubt the lumps help. It's incredibly fiddly and ultimately useless, because you don't wind up using more and more coal as the game goes on. You're not likely to ever have more than five or six coal at a time, since you can't spend more than 4 in a round anyway. So instead we got a bobbin out of the sewing kit, moved it along the round tracker, and just let people grab coal from the discard piles next to them because obviously that's what you'd do. It's bizarrely wasteful to have one hundred coal tokens in this game. Still, very enjoyable game in itself, can't wait to try the expansion. PMush Perfect posted:Edit 2: Aeon's End is a cooperative deckbuilder about being space wizards trying to protect the last human city from horrible monsters, but it's a bit crunchier and also has a terrible quarterbacking problem, so that might not be great if
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Feb 3, 2021 10:21
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'Only assholes quarterback' is a dangerous assumption to make, especially with more complicated cooperative games that you're teaching to someone else. Even idle suggestions can have a lot of implicit power when the people you're playing with are painfully aware that you're better at the game than them.
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Feb 3, 2021 10:51
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It's also about the group. Behavior that would be quarterbacking in one group wouldn't be in another group. As long as the correct solution is fuzzy enough then you've got plenty of scope for different amounts of advice being appreciated depending on the people involved. I think most of the time quarterbacking is a problem of failing to read the group rather than the behavior being universally bad.
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Feb 3, 2021 11:43
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Quarterbacking is just a thing that happens when group members are unequally vocal, I hesitate to cast aspersions on the people involved. It's just something to be aware of when picking games. Edit: The most vocal person in my group is also known for being wrong about everything, so he actually inspired others to refute him and it worked out. PerniciousKnid fucked around with this message at 15:16 on Feb 3, 2021 |
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Feb 3, 2021 15:13
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Admiralty Flag posted:My fellow goons, I need a recommendation: a two-player cooperative game that's not in the Pandemic family and isn't Arkham Horror. I'm looking for something relatively casual and lightweight to play with my wife. Suggestions?
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Feb 3, 2021 15:38
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PMush Perfect posted:I also really enjoy Fog of Love, though whether or not it's 'cooperative' is up for debate. More like a cowritten narrative experience. Two people play the two main characters in a romantic dramedy, being sweet and/or terrible to each other. It's also the easiest "complex" game to teach I've ever seen, since it's specifically set up so that it teaches you how to play on your first go through, with little rules cards coming out of the decks at the right time. It's loving brilliant. Seconding Fog of Love. It's not traditional co-op, but you'll feel like you're playing together instead of against each other. Frugal Tip: The Male/Male or Female/Female versions often go on sale for large discounts. But the only difference between those and the Female/Male cover is the cover. The actual game inside is identical no matter which cover you buy.
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Feb 3, 2021 15:42
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I've never experienced any sort of quarterbacking in our 4p Aeon's End sessions. There's group strategy discussions, but each player is trusted to manage their own deck. For light coops, I heartily recommend Quirky Circuits.
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Feb 3, 2021 15:48
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PMush Perfect posted:I also really enjoy Fog of Love, though whether or not it's 'cooperative' is up for debate. More like a cowritten narrative experience. Two people play the two main characters in a romantic dramedy, being sweet and/or terrible to each other. It's also the easiest "complex" game to teach I've ever seen, since it's specifically set up so that it teaches you how to play on your first go through, with little rules cards coming out of the decks at the right time. It's loving brilliant.  Personally I don't think Fog of Love is much of a game really, but the hobby would be improved if more tabletop designers took inspiration from and sought to emulate Fog of Love's choices about rules, documentation, teaching, organization, and so on.
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Feb 3, 2021 18:24
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Llyranor posted:I've never experienced any sort of quarterbacking in our 4p Aeon's End sessions. There's group strategy discussions, but each player is trusted to manage their own deck. Yeah my suggestion on Aeon's End would be less about quarterbacking and more having a house rule that you get one reshuffle/redraw of the turn order deck if it suddenly decides to have the Nemesis take four turns in a row and turbofuck you to death (edit): I should clarify that I love the hell out of Aeon's End and have most of the expansions, so I'm not just talking poo poo on it, but a bad draw of the turn order deck killing your game can be a real turn off for a new player.
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Feb 3, 2021 18:46
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Admiralty Flag posted:My fellow goons, I need a recommendation: a two-player cooperative game that's not in the Pandemic family and isn't Arkham Horror. I'm looking for something relatively casual and lightweight to play with my wife. Suggestions? My wife really likes Fox in the Forest Duet.
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Feb 3, 2021 20:10
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El Fideo posted:The game lasts for a set number of rounds, and every round the players receive an allotment of resources. All but one round, these resources amount to two coal tokens, which are sort of a lumpy triangle. The designers expect you to place these tokens along every single space of the round track. and hand them out when each round starts. In a five player game(and that's a lie the box cover told us), that's ten lumpy triangles that you're supposed to place in a stack in a spot only slightly larger than one of these lumpy triangles. Triangles do not stack well, and I doubt the lumps help. It's incredibly fiddly and ultimately useless, because you don't wind up using more and more coal as the game goes on. You're not likely to ever have more than five or six coal at a time, since you can't spend more than 4 in a round anyway. So instead we got a bobbin out of the sewing kit, moved it along the round tracker, and just let people grab coal from the discard piles next to them because obviously that's what you'd do. It's bizarrely wasteful to have one hundred coal tokens in this game. but if you use the bobbin, you can't print "OVER 100 WOODEN RESOURCE TOKENS" on every box
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Feb 3, 2021 20:45
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sportsgenius86 posted:My wife really likes Fox in the Forest Duet. I think Fox in the Forest Duet has been on our dining room table since Christmas 2019. We play it weekly, at least. Air, Land & Sea joined it this last Christmas, and I'm happy to announce I finally won a game. I should break out Schotten Totten and see if my luck still holds!
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Feb 3, 2021 21:17
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Is there anything I should know about Twilight Struggle before playing it the first time, other than reading the instructions?
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Feb 3, 2021 21:28
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Look Sir Droids posted:Is there anything I should know about Twilight Struggle before playing it the first time, other than reading the instructions?
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Feb 3, 2021 21:32
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Anyone else looking forward to Syndicate? The design is beautiful. https://pdu-games.com/syndicate
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Feb 3, 2021 21:34
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Look Sir Droids posted:Is there anything I should know about Twilight Struggle before playing it the first time, other than reading the instructions? Make sure you understand how DEFCON losses work: if DEFCON drops to 1 during your action round, regardless of whether it's an event belonging to your opponent and regardless of whether it was your opponent's decision that DEFCON went to 1, you lose. So unfriendly events that drop DEFCON or allow your opponent to take actions that could drop DEFCON are extremely dangerous when DEFCON is at 2 and letting multiple of them pile up in your hand can lead to dead man walking scenarios. The USSR player needs to be extra careful about this, as they run into DEFCON suicide cards earlier and more often.
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Feb 3, 2021 21:35
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Look Sir Droids posted:Is there anything I should know about Twilight Struggle before playing it the first time, other than reading the instructions? Know which scoring cards are present in which eras. That should dictate the majority of the game.
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Feb 3, 2021 21:36
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