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They probably could have left the description as "this spirit is a cat"  Ah poo poo I need this
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Jul 22, 2022 04:40
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I might end up pnping those new spirits.
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Jul 22, 2022 05:03
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I Like how they made the invaders look cute and family friendly on the Box Art.
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Jul 22, 2022 12:16
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Does anyone have any thoughts on seal team flix?
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Jul 25, 2022 01:05
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It's been on my get list for a while, I played it briefly and thought it was cool. I do have a soft spot for dexterity games.
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Jul 25, 2022 05:49
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A word about Bacon Bandits -- here's something else kind of amusing. Background: I have found that most problems with AI can be solved simply by applying more AI. In this case, to get an art-generating AI to more accurately and reliably create box art for my nonexistent games, just get another AI to describe the box art for me so I have to do neither of those things and can just sit sipping a margarita. But amusingly you get mild misunderstandings, and when things go mildly wrong the results are frequently hilarious. (Exploiting and applying this is of course the entire point of my project) Anyway, in this case the AI slightly misunderstood the nature of the title "Bacon Bandits". It knows the game is about stealing bacon, but it has also (mis)understood that Bacon Bandits means the bandits themselves are bacon, performing banditry in the form of stealing bacon.* Bacon Bandits! So here's the AI's pitch as a result: The game's box art shows a group of anthropomorphic bacon strips stealing bacon from a grocery store. The bacon strips would be dressed in bandit gear, such as masks and bandanas. There would be a getaway car in the background with an entire side of bacon driving. The game's title would be written in a cartoonish font.  * A quirk of English is that nouns modify other nouns but not in entirely consistent ways. e.g. "elf sword" vs "sword elf"
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Jul 25, 2022 07:35
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I think the misunderstanding here is yours, all hail the new AI overlords
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Jul 25, 2022 07:49
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My group just finished our pre-pandemic Clank Legacy game. It's very good assuming you like Clank. If you don't like Clank, it won't change your mind. For me, I do like Clank pretty well; I don't love too many deckbuilders + junk like Thunderstone, but Clank's map is better integrated than many other deckbuilding gimmicks in my opinion. For the legacy portion, I felt the added complications were all pretty fun. We ended up being semi-coop for a lot of it because we wanted to accomplish goals but we also wanted to get the most points. It's humorous too; I've never watched any of the Acquisitions Incorporated actual play stuff, but the juxtaposition of fantasy thievery and paperwork is a good one. It has a narrative, it doesn't rely on the twists and turns as much as the Pandemic Legacies do. This also means that the individual games are more samey but also I could imagine playing through the entire campaign again because it's more about the choices etc. (Minor legacy game gimmick spoiler for Clank Legacy and the Pandemic Legacy Series) My one mechanical complaint is that you occasionally have to add stickers to cards in your deck. That part is actually fine, when it is covering the main body of the text box, which is primarily what you see in the Pandemic Games. In Clank Legacy, some will change the skill cost or point gain, which reside in the upper and lower right corners. The stickers stick out over the edge if they're lined up with the original art, and didn't want to remain curled around the edge. They need to be trimmed off with scissors eventually. This is mildly annoying if you're trying to truly randomize by shuffling because of that tactile issue. I wish the sticker was graphically designed to sit entirely on the front of the card without that spillover and be lined up. It might not bother you, but it was just a little annoying, probably exacerbated by the game sitting unplayed for over a year. If you like Clank, I'd definitely recommend it. On the other hand, if you don't like Clank but like legacy games, I don't imagine the legacy aspects will keep you coming back.
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Jul 25, 2022 10:01
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So Goblinko is running a sale for their games right now. Has anyone played Dungeon Degenerates? I know Dungeon Breakout is far too simple, Love Letter has more depth than it, Munchkin has more depth than it, etc, but I've always liked the art. Someone mentioned somewhere you're just paying for the art, since it's literally Eldritch Horror with a new coat of paint. Anyone here concur? Have you played it? Is he wrong? (I have not played Eldritch Horror)
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Jul 25, 2022 15:21
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dungeon degenerates is great. i saw the email and im debating buying the minis and the mean streets expansion rn. idk if it’s just eldritch horror but i’ve definitely enjoyed the handful of times ive been able to play it, and the art and theme is sick as hell so idk why you wouldn’t want to buy it just for that anyway
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Jul 25, 2022 17:01
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I present to you: Horseless Carriage By Splotter https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/2897286/splotter-playtest-session Looks neat. I'm most interested in what they mean by creating your own factory. That looks like where their signature logistics gameplay will be incorporated, but it's hard to tell what's going on with the prototype pieces. I preordered the game back when they made that available since I love Bus, Indonesia, Great Zimbabwe, and FCM. I hope the game has better components than their Indonesia reprint. Megasabin fucked around with this message at 21:52 on Jul 25, 2022 |
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Jul 25, 2022 19:56
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Dungeon Degenerates shares a lot of DNA with Eldritch Horror but it's also, imo, got far more engaging combat and a campaign/scenario system with a surprising amount of depth for a game that's otherwise pretty beer and pretzels. It also is one of my favorite visual presentations in my entire collection. Totally worthwhile grab, even for just a handful of plays so far.
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Jul 25, 2022 20:13
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Megasabin posted:I present to you: Horseless Carriage By Splotter https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/2897286/splotter-playtest-session "One problem to solve still: the box is too full, even if it is substantially bigger than the Antiquity box... (this is the box after unpunching & playing...)" Mother of God. It also looks bonkers. A little apprehensive about this one.
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Jul 25, 2022 21:21
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I'm probably late to the party, but we got one of these Chromacast bags for $20 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00IRMHGQ4 (up to $30 now). Apparently it's meant to haul around some sort of drum, but it's the perfect size for a long board game weekend and way easier to manage than the IKEA bag we'd been using previously.
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Jul 25, 2022 23:03
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I've been on a real EXIT kick with my spouse. We started with The Secret Lab, then grabbed Gate Between Worlds, Mysterious Museum, and The Pharoah's Tomb, with Abandoned Cabin in shrink still waiting for an upcoming camping trip. Weirdly, the Pharoah's Tomb is the most difficult one we did, and we got it in juuuuust over an hour without any clues - by far our best performance. The Mysterious Museum on the other hand was listed as extremely easy and we got hung up in weird ways in a couple of places. (Spoilers for EXIT: The Mysterious Museum: )The first thing that stumped us was ironically the first or second thing in the booklet, where you have the "to infinity and beyond" card and the answer involves folding it. We spent so long examining the room itself and there were just no freaking clues really anywhere on that two-page spread, it stopped us pretty dead for a bit. The second thing that really got us was finding the "ad copy". I even looked directly at it a couple times but obviously didn't read past the first couple of words, we were trying to find color sequences in things like the promotional cards and stuff. Overall an awesome series so far, we haven't hit any really garbage ones yet at least and a couple of them really stood out. Pharoah's Tomb was fantastic.
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Jul 26, 2022 06:22
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Megasabin posted:Looks neat. I'm most interested in what they mean by creating your own factory. That looks like where their signature logistics gameplay will be incorporated, but it's hard to tell what's going on with the prototype pieces. If I'm not wrong, those are the actual pieces and not prototype pieces.
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Jul 26, 2022 09:55
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Rockman Reserve posted:I've been on a real EXIT kick with my spouse. We started with The Secret Lab, then grabbed Gate Between Worlds, Mysterious Museum, and The Pharoah's Tomb, with Abandoned Cabin in shrink still waiting for an upcoming camping trip. The things I hate the most in the Exit (and to a lesser extent, Unlock) games are when you have to look at something and interpret a number out of it. In Exit this often occurs after folding something, then looking at it at a specific angle. Whenever I realize I need to do it, I just groan and consider looking it up. Sometimes it's not an issue, sometimes me and my gf are spinning the thing around over and over again trying to see what the developers expect us to see. Speaking of, we finished Unlock: Legendary Adventures, by completing the Sherlock Holmes adventure. Overall, we liked it. Some inventive puzzles and scenarios, though one part of the first adventure requires folding something - not destructively, but in a way that is noticeable if someone else were to pick up the game. The Sherlock adventure was tough as poo poo though, especially at the beginning. Normally, I think we could've done it, but we didn't realize how much the game expected us to intuit from the clues - as a Sherlock game, this obviously makes sense, but as an Unlock game, it's irregular. For example: one of the first clues you're given is a corpse with some residue on it. The residue is a mixture of chalk dust and, uh medicine I think. We correctly interpreted it as this guy being a doctor, makes sense, but what we didn't conclude is that it means he was a teaching doctor, which meant that out of the five or six hospitals on the large map given, we were supposed to go to the University Hospital. I mean, in retrospect, yeah that makes total sense, but deduction is not typically something the series has asked of players, instead requiring logical connections based on information presented entirely upon the cards given. Like, what if someone didn't realize know what a teaching hospital was, or something like that? Anyway, it's not bad, and once it occurred to us that this adventure was different in this way, we did a lot better and enjoyed it more. Oh, except for some number-finding stuff which didn't feel like it should've passed playtesting.
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Jul 26, 2022 14:10
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In an effort to make it a little easier to get some games with long or annoying setups to the table, I decided to start looking into functional inserts for some of the games I want to play more. I decided to go with Star Wars: Rebellion first as each faction having a bunch of different pieces to be sorted is a pain for both setup and teardown, even though I have each unit type individually bagged. There are a bunch of pre-made fancy inserts around, but I wanted to give crafting one from foamcore a try. I followed a guide I found online and after probably way too many hours over the last week I learned that I am not great at cutting straight down, so all of my pieces are a bit wonky.  It looks no where near as fancy as the guide, but it should be really nice to just pull out a tray for the rebels and a tray for the empire and have it about ready to go with no sorting or un-bagging. Overall it was not a terrible experience. The cost for materials + my time + the results means I'll probably just purchase ones in the future rather than make my own, but this was a bit of an experiment in whether I would enjoy this type of crafting at all.
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Jul 26, 2022 16:47
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alkanphel posted:If I'm not wrong, those are the actual pieces and not prototype pieces. splotter.txt
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Jul 26, 2022 17:28
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Such mixed feelings on Return to Dark Tower now being available to buy again. On the one hand, it's over-produced generic fantasy tripe where the flavor text is graham cracker at best. I played it at a friend's house once and thought, "There's not a whole lot of actual game here. This is basically Pandemic: Dark Tower." ...and yet, there's a weird allure to the all of that over-produced fantasy tripe. I sort of love the Tower and the App, even as I recognize that a better game might exist without them. Yet, not a better game I would be thinking as hard about buying as I am this one now that it's back on Backerkit. Owners or non-owners, feel free to course-correct me before I make a decision I'll regret -- I'm just not sure whether backing or not backing is that decision. ;-)
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Jul 26, 2022 17:38
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I'm watching some of No Rolls Barred's Blood on the Clocktower runs and they are pretty good. Not something I'd want to play myself but they are fascinating to watch. Are the three bluff roles the demon is given by the storyteller just roles that are guaranteed to not be taken by a player already? Possibly roles that the storyteller might think will stir things up? The demon and minions can ignore them and claim whatever roles they think they can get away with?
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Jul 26, 2022 17:48
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bagrada posted:I'm watching some of No Rolls Barred's Blood on the Clocktower runs and they are pretty good. Not something I'd want to play myself but they are fascinating to watch. Are the three bluff roles the demon is given by the storyteller just roles that are guaranteed to not be taken by a player already? Possibly roles that the storyteller might think will stir things up? The demon and minions can ignore them and claim whatever roles they think they can get away with? This is all correct. The demon is given three roles that aren't in play, so if they claim to be one of them, there won't be a conflict with the good players. The minions don't get that luxury, but their survival isn't as important. Generally the storyteller will include at least one role that provides information, so that the evil players can sow some distrust.
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Jul 26, 2022 17:54
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Phelddagrif posted:This is all correct. The demon is given three roles that aren't in play, so if they claim to be one of them, there won't be a conflict with the good players. The minions don't get that luxury, but their survival isn't as important. Generally the storyteller will include at least one role that provides information, so that the evil players can sow some distrust. Generally, the demon would also communicate the bluffs to the minions as needed. The storyteller can also then use the demon bluffs as things come up, too. Last week, I played a game as an imp and stupidly just no-scoped a ravenkeeper. Luckily, my poisoner also targeted the ravenkeeper, so he saw me as one of my bluffs.
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Jul 26, 2022 17:59
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Memnaelar posted:Such mixed feelings on Return to Dark Tower now being available to buy again. I just ordered the base game, on the fence about the expansions. I know it looks generic as all hell but man, the tower gimmick got me. I know it will hit my table plenty of times (we have had a lot of mileage out of Talisman, after all). Has anyone got experience using the app on a phone? All other app games I have (Descent 2e and Legends, Imperial Assault, Mansions of Madness and Gloomhaven) we play using a mini pc and a monitor, which doesn't appear to be an option here. I'd rather not buy a tablet that I would literally only use for this one game.
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Jul 26, 2022 18:17
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Quote-Unquote posted:I just ordered the base game, on the fence about the expansions. I know it looks generic as all hell but man, the tower gimmick got me. I know it will hit my table plenty of times (we have had a lot of mileage out of Talisman, after all). I played at my friend's house on a fairly large smartphone (like larger Android/Note-size) and it worked just fine.
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Jul 26, 2022 18:21
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Quote-Unquote posted:I just ordered the base game, on the fence about the expansions. I know it looks generic as all hell but man, the tower gimmick got me. I know it will hit my table plenty of times (we have had a lot of mileage out of Talisman, after all). We played on my normal-sized phone. Not ideal - it meant passing the phone around, and only one person can really see the fight or whatever - but it was fine. The app doesn't have, like, a bunch of status information that everyone needs to see at once. We didn't have any persistent tech/rules issues. It is not a great game - and a few of our games ended with pretty wet farts - but the novelty got us through 5 or 6 games before we sold. I'd be hesitant to buy it on a "I'm going to get $130 worth of plays out of this" basis, but definitely worth trying.
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Jul 26, 2022 19:47
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Have played a few new games last week that have been spending a couple weeks on the shelf waiting to see table time' CloudAge, Lost Ruins of Arnak, Cosmic Encounter, Viscounts of the West Kingdom, and Khora: Rise of an Empire. I am not articulate enough to write a great big interesting review but happy to give my thoughts on each of 'em.    CloudAge - we went in to this one a little apprehensive. Despite hearing good things about it, our experience with other Pfister games was mixed. I had enjoyed Great Western Trail and Maracaibo but my wife had found both quite boring on her plays and this contributed to why this had held space on the shelf for so long. Despite this, the game was a heap of fun. Very easy to grasp phases, and very little downtime with minor actions to perform on each other player's turns. Ship upgrades are simple linear +1s, but the map exploration and interactions are fast and fun and the theme of exploration of cities makes the "randomness" of rewards feel mitigatable to a degree that nothing feels too punishing or unrewarding. We got in two games - one with the opening scenario that leaves out the most complex aspect of the rules (growth) and the second with that added on. We did not yet start the "legacy" campaign, but after both of these plays being big hits we'll definitely be looking forward to this one being tabled more often.  *Not my image as I forgot to photograph this one*Lost Ruins of Arnak - I played this with a fully new table of players, none of my usual group, with two of us playing first time and two of us being quite experienced with the game. The outcome was expectedly lopsided, with us new two players being properly trounced. About halfway through I managed to grok that my method of deckbuilding was not ideal. This is a game where a super slim deck seems to be most effective (as is the case with most deckbuilders) but to the point where options are somewhat heavily limited to having less "cool" things to do lest you be giving up the META. Despite this, I enjoyed the loop, and by the end I was finding some cool combos that felt rewarding to squeeze the most action economy out of a single turn of just two workers. This is definitely one I want to replay and gain some system mastery over - I came out of the game already thinking about what I would improve on my next play. The other players were keen to add the leaders expansion next time but I am hesistant to lump more things in there until I have a good grasp of how to perform "well" in the base game.  Cosmic Encounter - I got this at the start of the month for my birthday and I don't have a lot to say except "how did I sleep on this for so long". It really lives up to the name it has gained for itself amongst nearly every reviewer I have watched, and it was a hit for all of our players resulting in a number of back to back plays and even plays on subsequent day. We did play it wrong the first time, using EVERY single flare in the flare deck which, while it did technically make things incredibly "wtf" and wild it was a whole hecking ball of fun. Definitely an accidental "alternate game mode" that we might revisit later! Also, Filch was funny for the first time, but we are definitely going to remove that version of it for future plays.  Viscounts of the West Kingdom - This is one of my favourites for all of July. We received our West Kingdom pledge late last month and had been working through Architects - Paladins (which we'd played online before) and now capped it off with Viscounts. Garphill is one of my favourite publishers/designers and this is yet another hit for us. Compared to other Rondel games that were complete misses for us (Merchants of the Dark Road, Great Western Trail) this one felt really really good to play. This game was between me and my 12yrold son who has been doing the full set of West Kingdom games and while this one he definitely didn't enjoy as much as Architects because there was less for him to do to directly impact me, this one felt pretty tight despite us both taking drastically different routes to victory. The castle worker placement was a fun wee mini game with workers "popcorning" (coined by him) and getting mass rewards in a big satisfying chain reaction. Definitely a keeper, and we look forward to getting sick of the base game before the last piece of the kickstarter arriving (Viscounts expansion)   *Also not my images*Khora: Rise of an Empire - This is an interesing one. We got it cheap and didn't have much expectations going in but it was enjoyable. Some of the faction powers seemed considerably more powerful than others, but overall the game felt pretty close with the exception of one person who focused on military might from the start. They fell extremely far behind everyone else who had gone for either a mixed approach or a focus solely on the economy tree. It was me, I went military and got mashed. Post game we were talking it over and it seems like military relies too heavily on having economy that the game requires players to take a mixed approach until they're ready to "switch" over to going military or cultural and the winner being the one who judged the switch the best. All in all it's a pretty easy to learn track-goes-up game with minimal overhead and a reasonable playtime. Likely to stay for a few more plays at least to see if we continue to enjoy it but nothing special here.
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Jul 26, 2022 21:41
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Memnaelar posted:Such mixed feelings on Return to Dark Tower now being available to buy again. Well, as a lover of pandemic, I'll just point out that that doesn't sound like a bad thing to me.  I have only one game in on Return to Dark Tower, but it was fun and I'm looking forward to the next play. It is a friends game, so I did think long and hard about picking it up. I couldn't justify it given it already exists in my friend group and I'm at pretty much max capacity on board games, anything new needs to see the exit of something else. If not for capacity issues I'd have grabbed it though.
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Jul 26, 2022 23:28
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Memnaelar posted:Such mixed feelings on Return to Dark Tower now being available to buy again. Did you play with the expansion or just the base game? I would admit that the base game is a little thin, but felt like expansion added some much needed meat. And this new expansion looks the same, adding even more density to the board.
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Jul 27, 2022 01:13
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iceyman posted:Did you play with the expansion or just the base game? I would admit that the base game is a little thin, but felt like expansion added some much needed meat. And this new expansion looks the same, adding even more density to the board. The game is pretty challenging with four people, unless the group is hyper co-ordinated. What does the expansion add? Because I feel like more stuff, with limited turns, doesn't make sense to me. No idea how I'm going to complete Yana and Gaze Within's dungeons starting month 3 with pitifully low supplies...
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Jul 27, 2022 01:49
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TheDiceMustRoll posted:The game is pretty challenging with four people, unless the group is hyper co-ordinated. What does the expansion add? Because I feel like more stuff, with limited turns, doesn't make sense to me. No idea how I'm going to complete Yana and Gaze Within's dungeons starting month 3 with pitifully low supplies... Alliances adds power skulls which have a penalty if you move into the same space. This has the effect of constraining your movement a bit so you have to plan your route more. It also adds the guilds which gives you access to companions with special abilities. They add positive events to the game and are essentially another way to upgrade your character.
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Jul 27, 2022 02:15
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What are the best games that travel easily? If they also play easily during travel(on a plane/train/whatever) that would be great. Outside of the obvious "bring a standard deck of playing cards". Totally a valid option, but looking for at least slightly more interesting. 2 players is great but if it also could do more to make it more versatile, bonus.
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Aug 1, 2022 22:22
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King Burgundy posted:What are the best games that travel easily? If they also play easily during travel(on a plane/train/whatever) that would be great.
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Aug 1, 2022 22:43
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King Burgundy posted:What are the best games that travel easily? If they also play easily during travel(on a plane/train/whatever) that would be great. This recent article from Bitewing Games goes through a lot of good options: https://bitewinggames.com/best-travel-friendly-board-games/
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Aug 1, 2022 23:13
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fox in the forest ascension eternal without the tokens
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Aug 1, 2022 23:18
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Codenames Duet is the one that my wife and I have played the most while travelling. Maybe pushing it for on a plane, but on a train table, in a cafe etc it works great.
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Aug 1, 2022 23:18
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King Burgundy posted:What are the best games that travel easily? If they also play easily during travel(on a plane/train/whatever) that would be great. Hive Pocket or Tak (if you keep it in a cloth bag maybe?) assuming you have a table. Both are 2 player only. High Society is pretty small and is a terrific game. The Mind if you can all reach a central point. Welcome to the Dungeon would need similar proximity but is a bit more gamer-y. Seconding Codenames Duet because it's absolutely stellar. The only downside is it will be much harder to play on a plane because it really depends on sitting across from each other with a common space between. It'd be perfect for a train, though, so long as you can get one of those table seats. If you don't have a table, just your hands, you could probably play Love Letter without too much issue, except for reviewing 'discard piles', perhaps keeping them in your non-dominant hand. You might be able to play Insider if you use a phone for the timer and everyone could have an opportunity see the card without too much movement if they are the Insider.
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Aug 1, 2022 23:24
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Some great suggestions here, thanks all!
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Aug 2, 2022 00:54
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I know you said Outside of the obvious "bring a standard deck of playing cards", but Regicide is a ton of fun. Grab a deck of cards with nice artwork and the PDF for Regicide -- https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/307002/regicide Bonus: you can use the same deck for Cribbage (might need an app or some paper?) and German Whist -- https://www.pagat.com/whist/german_whist.html Ganz Schön Clever and a bunch of other Roll & Writes can reuse the same dice and a couple laminated game boards. Consider anything from Buttonshy Games. They all come in little wallets and rarely need anything else. You'd be surprised how thinky some of their games can be. My wife loves Skulls of Sedlec. I really enjoy Antinomy(you'll need ~10 of anything to use as time crystals) and Sprawlopolis.
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Aug 2, 2022 01:47
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Is there uh, any progress on anything resembling a Dungeon Keeper game outside of Dungeon Lords yet?
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Aug 2, 2022 16:48
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