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Tekopo posted:Ark Nova: "Animals on Mars". I think this is probably the weakest of the trio though, and the moving parts of it aren't as interesting as either Underwater Cities or even Terraforming Mars. Although it attempts to foster competition, most of it is focused on being the first to score a specific card. The only other competition is picking stuff up before your opponent. I kinda liked making my own little zoo and placing animals there, but picking up (mostly randomly) cards from a huge deck, that you might not even completely go through in any given game, really unbalances the game for me and means that getting the right thing is not a matter of skill most of the time, but just luck. I enjoyed some of the moving parts of the game but overall the decided randomness of the game makes it even worse than TfM IMO. This is from a few pages back now but I'm glad you posted this because I've played Ark Nova twice and I didn't like it at all, and all the other opinions on it seem to be very positive. I felt like I was going crazy. I'm always suspicious of single-deck games anyway, but this one where you only get to see a few cards at a time and the individual cards can be very impactful was particularly bad, it felt like I had very little control over what happened and basically no ability to form a strategy, all I could do was play the best card in my hand and hope I drew other cards that went with it. At least the theme is nice.
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May 24, 2023 00:39
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Ark Nova is excellent! I consider only seeing half the deck a bonus but then again as I've said in the past I enjoy TfM too.
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May 24, 2023 00:56
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I enjoyed my learning game of Ark Nova but decided my long-term opinion of the game rested on players feeling like they could see enough cards over the course of a game to meaningfully piece together a strategy.
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May 24, 2023 01:10
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I agree with the idea of houseruling any big unseeded deck game like Ark and TfM to universally double the number of card draws and discarding the leftover.
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May 24, 2023 01:19
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Most of the engine cards in Ark Nova are nice enough to give you a little something for all the stuff you've placed down that they would have given you a bigger bonus for placing after them, so it's not a total loss to draw, like, an expert on Europe when your zoo's full of Europe already.
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May 24, 2023 01:47
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I wonder whether a rule like Dune Imperium where every player can wipe/reset the market offer once per game would work. I only got halfway through my first ark nova game so maybe it has a rule like that already.
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May 24, 2023 03:41
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tbh I think it's only right that Tim Quackalope gets a forums account to come into this very thread and explain his actions and also why he claims to be a "board game" reviewer but his scraggly beard screams "simping for warhammer"
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May 24, 2023 04:32
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Edit: NM. Didn't read properly.
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May 24, 2023 08:28
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Ark Nova is an engine builder where you have to go into it assuming all the parts you're going to pull are going to be horseshit; and you need to constantly pivot what direction you go in. So you need to aim for Semi Working Jalopy - NOT - My Perfect Engine Like yeah if you luck out and pull a couple of perfect cards, more power to you, but the jalopy engine can work just as well.
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May 24, 2023 09:03
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I just dislike situations where I can't meaningfully compete with my opponents along with having a semi-solitaire game. I also feel like the game can be crippling if you just don't draw exactly what you need, although this might be an issue more with playing the two player version. For example, there was a "Predator" scoring card, and I was stuck on it because I think I had 4 out of 5 (iirc) predator symbols that I needed to score it (the first two slots had already been taken, one by a player, one by the 2P rules), and I kept trying to draw just one extra predator in order to score it. In the end, I was unable to. I tried to pivot by using what I had in my hand, but that's a huge chunk of points that were out of my control simply because I didn't draw well or nothing popped up in the market row (or got sniped before I could get it).
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May 24, 2023 09:31
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Infinitum posted:
The whole problem of giant unseeded decks in engine building games is that by definition bad draws can't work just as well. I agree it's about making do with what you have and playing the board for bonuses more than trying to build towards a specific strategy with cards, but that won't overcome someone getting lucky draws that play into what they already have vs someone getting junk.
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May 24, 2023 09:43
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Left some party games for my niece for her prom afterparty/sleepover and was told several of her friends went and ordered a few copies of Ice cool/Happy Salmon/Monikers(the bed sheet ghost round I'm told killed)/ONUW for themselves. Though no one was brave enough/knowledgeable to pay to import Diamante. Queue me nodding "Good" like Emperor Palpatine at the news; the next generation is secured for our cursed hobby. Now onto business, Cool stuff had the base version of Beast on sale recently but I chickened out. Has anyone had a chance to play it and whether it's a worthy replacement for my Fury of Dracula and Whitehall Mystery, seems like a middle ground between the two?
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May 24, 2023 10:24
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I haven't played Beast but I've been learning it so I can take it to a meetup. It's definitely in a different niche to Whitehall/Whitechapel, since the hidden movement is often not that hidden and the drafting and cardplay is also pretty significant.
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May 24, 2023 11:44
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Tekopo posted:I just dislike situations where I can't meaningfully compete with my opponents along with having a semi-solitaire game. I also feel like the game can be crippling if you just don't draw exactly what you need, although this might be an issue more with playing the two player version. For example, there was a "Predator" scoring card, and I was stuck on it because I think I had 4 out of 5 (iirc) predator symbols that I needed to score it (the first two slots had already been taken, one by a player, one by the 2P rules), and I kept trying to draw just one extra predator in order to score it. In the end, I was unable to. I tried to pivot by using what I had in my hand, but that's a huge chunk of points that were out of my control simply because I didn't draw well or nothing popped up in the market row (or got sniped before I could get it). I had a similar situation, where early on the game i had the choice to score a card for either 2 predator or 2 Europe animals, and i went for Europe because I had something down which rewarded me for playing predators, I figured I'd prioritise those and try to score a higher level on the predator card. Then over the course of the rest of the game i draw 1 predator card and several Europe cards, so i couldn't score the high level of predators because I didn't have enough animals, and couldn't score the high level of Europe because I'd already locked myself out by scoring the first level. What seemed to be a fairly arbitrary decision early on cost me a bunch of points at the end in a way that I don't think was really possible to foresee.
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May 24, 2023 12:02
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My Kickstarter of Beast recently came in and I got three games in. I haven't played the previously mentioned hidden movements, so I cannot really compare this game to those! Like Doctor Spaceman mentioned, it's not as hidden due to the fact the beast leaves trail markers when moving through the hunters or settlers. On top of that, certain beast abilities allow you to manipulate tiles or entities around you without revealing your beast, which means the hunters still know where you are, even though you haven't revealed yourself. On top of that, beasts have a prefered terrain type, so you generally know which tiles they're aiming for to strike. The beast plays movement cards face down whenever they move, so the hunters generally have an idea how many steps away the beast is from their last seen location. Mind you, some of those movement cards are "no movement" cards, which allows for some mind games. The hunters have a few cards that allow them to see the last movement card, which might just be that final bit of information they need to deduce the location of the beast. The draft is very important, as each card has a top and bottom action, one for the hunter and one for the beast. So besides drafting to get good cards, you're also drafting to prevent the other faction getting cards that could help them. Likewise as the hunters, you also gotta make sure you don't hoard all the movement cards for yourself, because that means your fellow hunters might get stuck in a location. Of the three games I played, I played as the beast once in a 4P game and as the beast and a hunter in 3P games. I won as the beast and hunter in the 3P games. The 4P game was our first game and I made some mistakes with the draft, leaving me with very little movement cards, forcing me to discard other cards to get some movement in. This resulted in the hunters inflicting a lot of damage on me during the first turn. The second time I played as a beast, I went with a different one and leaned more into their abilities and it all depended on my final action panning out. Had I failed there, the hunters would've been able to kill me. I liked how tight that game was! The final game where I played as one of the hunters, the beast wasn't really properly using their summons. Nevertheless, they started picking up steam during the final round of the game, but thanks to the synergy between the trapper and scout hunters, we were able to bag the beast before they could secure the final kill that would grant them victory. Things I like about the game: The variety of beasts and hunters keep the game fresh. They all start out with some basic unique abilities but as the game progress, start unlocking their powers which can shift the tide. It's great how the play board itself has a turn summary for the players. The blinged kickstarter edition I got has acrylic standees which I like a lot more than miniatures for board games I've realized. It saves on costs and space while still looking fancy. Once people got a full grasp of the rules, the games have been pretty tight! I think it helps there's a timer for the beast. They have to secure the victory in 3 or 4 rounds, depending on the player count, or else they lose the game. This prevents a lot of turtling and keeps the games from stalling. Things that could use some work: As great as the turn summary is on the board, it could use a tiny bit more important information. Specifically when trail marks are placed and to what piles cards are discarded. Depending on what card you discard, they go to a different pile and certain cards allow you to pick cards from certain discard piles. There was some confusion there among my fellow players and I had to keep reminding them where to discard cards. To be fair, we were a few beers deep at this point. I feel the game works best at 3P, as the draft has more impact for all the players in my opinion. But I'll have to play more games at 4P to form a proper opinion on this. Overall I'm quite happy with the game and I see myself playing this quite a lot with my various board game groups. One thing I enjoyed as well is how we discussed our games afterwards, actions that could've gone better, the mentality behind actions and forming strategies. Autodrop Monteur fucked around with this message at 12:29 on May 24, 2023 |
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May 24, 2023 12:27
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I've warmed to Ark Nova a lot more after playing it a lot on BGA async. Removing the housekeeping and being able to spend ages counting out turns makes it a more pleasing experience.
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May 24, 2023 12:47
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Bottom Liner posted:that won't overcome someone getting lucky draws that play into what they already have vs someone getting junk. In every 4 player game, there is 1 person who wants less luck and 3 who want more.
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May 24, 2023 12:56
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Infinitum posted:Ark Nova is an engine builder where you have to go into it assuming all the parts you're going to pull are going to be horseshit; and you need to constantly pivot what direction you go in. Not to toot my own horn but I've won all of my Ark Nova games so far and I'd say it's because I never treated it as an engine builder. It's a race for points, and while setting up a rudimentary engine before the first/maybe second break is useful, it always ends up being too barebones to qualify imo. Maybe I'm just being finicky, not sure how much engine you need to build in a game to call it an engine builder but AN is definitely in the lower end. It's a very tactical game and trying to plan a zoo from turn 1 will lose you the game unless you get VERY lucky.
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May 24, 2023 13:10
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Eraflure posted:Not to toot my own horn but I've won all of my Ark Nova games so far and I'd say it's because I never treated it as an engine builder. It's a race for points, and while setting up a rudimentary engine before the first/maybe second break is useful, it always ends up being too barebones to qualify imo. I haven't played a lot but this is my experience as well, other new players seem to be a lot more focused on sponsors and hunting for matching symbols while I'm slamming down animals. There's still going to be some element of draw luck, if symbols line up right for you it's a couple free points, but there seem to be enough avenues of scoring that it's not likely to be decisive. The majority of your points and resources aren't going to care about what symbols are available.
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May 24, 2023 14:48
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Eraflure posted:Not to toot my own horn but I've won all of my Ark Nova games so far and I'd say it's because I never treated it as an engine builder. It's a race for points, and while setting up a rudimentary engine before the first/maybe second break is useful, it always ends up being too barebones to qualify imo. This has been my take on it as well. It's a game about flexibility and adapting IMO. There are too many cards to do exactly what you want to do without getting extremely lucky card draws, so you just have to maximize what's available to you on any given turn. My "math-it-out" Analysis Paralysis friends always end games like Earth, Ark Nova, Ares Expedition, either in last or with absurdly high scores, dependent entirely on how well their card draws sync.
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May 24, 2023 14:54
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My gold standard for "adapting/tactical games" is Dungeon Petz, which is entirely tactical and requires adaption while still allowing for a good degree of competition between players. You can get screwed in Dungeon Petz but there are systems to alleviate that, especially with the expansion, and it has a risk/reward formula that pushes you towards making risky plays. The same does not ring true for Ark Nova, at least for me, because you are simply trying to make the best out of the draw, come what may. Not to toot my own horn, but I win most games of Petz that I play. Even in situations where I lost a pet due to unlucky draws. Even then, I accepted and took the risk for that particular pet, which is not something that happens within Ark Nova as far as I can see. sportsgenius86 posted:My "math-it-out" Analysis Paralysis friends always end games like Earth, Ark Nova, Ares Expedition, either in last or with absurdly high scores, dependent entirely on how well their card draws sync. Even after I had my game, the person that taught it to me said that chasing points based on your initial card scorers is a trap (which I agree with) and that it's best to just play whatever you have and have no set strategy. But my point is that is that the game does not have any interesting competitive mechanisms apart from "play what you have been given, hope for the best", and some limited competition for scoring spaces/the market row.
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May 24, 2023 15:05
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Tekopo posted:Yes, this is the experience that people find unappealing, and seems to run contrary to the point that other people are raising, that card luck is not the be-all-and-end-all and that it doesn't actually matter what you draw. I haven't run into that issue yet in Ark Nova (although time will tell.) I can see where it would be possible to put all your eggs in one basket and hope the draws work out as a shoot-the-moon sort of strategy, but I'd think there would be enough competition over symbols for key conservancies that the other players probably need to let it happen. Tekopo posted:Even after I had my game, the person that taught it to me said that chasing points based on your initial card scorers is a trap (which I agree with) and that it's best to just play whatever you have and have no set strategy. But my point is that is that the game does not have any interesting competitive mechanisms apart from "play what you have been given, hope for the best", and some limited competition for scoring spaces/the market row. The action card & break track mechanics are nice touches that I think elevate Ark Nova over most other games of its ilk. There is actually a neat little tactical dimension there, but I do agree that it's buried under way too much cruft. I think those mechanics want to be in leaner game where they can be front and center.
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May 24, 2023 15:22
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Does anyone know about the expansion for Ark Nova and whether it might alleviate some of the problems people are discussing or not? I got a "dented" copy of it a while ago but haven't had time to play it yet because when you have an infant lol @ time to play bigger games.
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May 24, 2023 16:04
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FulsomFrank posted:Does anyone know about the expansion for Ark Nova and whether it might alleviate some of the problems people are discussing or not? I got a "dented" copy of it a while ago but haven't had time to play it yet because when you have an infant lol @ time to play bigger games. It's going to make the deck bigger and add an additional animal type (marine) so it will make all the issues with Ark Nova worse. There will be new zoo maps and alternate actions cards so more variety for players that like a heads down zero interaction puzzle game.
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May 24, 2023 18:40
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Ark Nova is a game I never managed to tear out of its wrapper, but happily play and enjoy on BGA async. The high amount of upkeep combined with (reportedly) poor rulebook kept it in the shrink for me.
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May 24, 2023 18:45
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Suddenly Susan posted:It's going to make the deck bigger and add an additional animal type (marine) so it will make all the issues with Ark Nova worse. There will be new zoo maps and alternate actions cards so more variety for players that like a heads down zero interaction puzzle game. It has an interesting mechanic (for adding to a deck) that when an expansion card is drawn, it kicks the oldest card in the market. So in theory, the deck should cycle at the same speed.
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May 24, 2023 18:47
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The Eyes Have It posted:Ark Nova is a game I never managed to tear out of its wrapper, but happily play and enjoy on BGA async. The high amount of upkeep combined with (reportedly) poor rulebook kept it in the shrink for me. I didn't find it had too much stuff to manage other than just taking up a large amount of table space. The main board in particular felt like it could be like half the size it is.
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May 24, 2023 19:02
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Ark Nova 2 player doesn't have a ton of interaction, and the card row doesn't cycle any faster based on player count so you see a lot less of the deck. 3 or 4 player there's a lot more competition for association actions and animals which I think makes it more interesting. I still like it a lot as a 2p game but it's definitely more solitaire-y.
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May 24, 2023 19:53
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God I fucking love Diablo 3 gold, it even paid for this shitty title
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CitizenKeen posted:It has an interesting mechanic (for adding to a deck) that when an expansion card is drawn, it kicks the oldest card in the market. So in theory, the deck should cycle at the same speed. In theory, if all of the expansion cards had the icon and if your main way of getting cards was via the market. Since neither is the case the expansion will inevitably leave the deck watered down.
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May 24, 2023 20:09
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I bounced off Ark Nova pretty hard my first and only play. I wanted the tile part to be much more engaging than it turned out to be, just another card requirement in a sea of card requirements.
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May 24, 2023 21:05
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Bottom Liner posted:I didn't find it had too much stuff to manage other than just taking up a large amount of table space. The main board in particular felt like it could be like half the size it is. It's extremely large, for sure, and I can't imagine why. My table isn't the biggest but having played Ark Nova with two players on it I'm pretty sure it literally can't accommodate four. The Eyes Have It posted:Ark Nova is a game I never managed to tear out of its wrapper, but happily play and enjoy on BGA async. The high amount of upkeep combined with (reportedly) poor rulebook kept it in the shrink for me. I don't think it has a particularly large amount of upkeep compared to games of similar complexity, but you're right that the rulebook is poo poo. Wallet fucked around with this message at 22:24 on May 24, 2023 |
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May 24, 2023 22:19
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There's a lot of interconnected dependencies in Ark Nova (prereqs, ongoing effects, income calculation, etc) that I'm just glad is all done for me in the digital implementation. I haven't been very interested in sprawling table hogs lately, and poorly-written rules neither.
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May 25, 2023 00:09
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Poopy Palpy posted:In theory, if all of the expansion cards had the icon and if your main way of getting cards was via the market. Since neither is the case the expansion will inevitably leave the deck watered down. There will be however new universities which let you dig for a specific kind of animal. The fish will also have effects which trigger of other fish being played, so hopefully we will get some card draw from that.
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May 25, 2023 06:07
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Selecta84 posted:The fish will also have effects which trigger of other fish being played, so hopefully we will get some card draw from that. Dripping with theme
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May 25, 2023 06:11
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What do folks here think of Too Many Bones? The flgs got a couple copies in and it seems like it could be a decent solo game but I've read some reviews saying that the rules are a mess and you end up jumping around looking up what abilities mean too much.
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May 25, 2023 16:29
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Grundma posted:What do folks here think of Too Many Bones? The flgs got a couple copies in and it seems like it could be a decent solo game but I've read some reviews saying that the rules are a mess and you end up jumping around looking up what abilities mean too much. It's a very good game and all the components are excellent quality, but it has by far the worst written rules of any game I've ever played. The rulebook is terrible and doesn't contain most of the actual rules, which are instead on various reference cards. Examples: There are important setup instructions about difficulty level which don't appear until the final page of the book before the appendix. If you play the game with the default setup, you're playing on the hardest difficulty level and you will almost certainly lose. The rules for lockpicking, which you will do very early in the game most of the time, are not in the book at all (though it does mention it briefly). This is on a separate reference card. Once you've played it a couple of times (it can also be very long) it's fine, it is just very annoying getting started for the first time.
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May 25, 2023 16:57
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Grundma posted:What do folks here think of Too Many Bones? The flgs got a couple copies in and it seems like it could be a decent solo game but I've read some reviews saying that the rules are a mess and you end up jumping around looking up what abilities mean too much. Probably in my top 5 favorite board games. I absolutely love it, each character they put out plays so differently than the other releases. Component quality is top notch, the built in storage is great. It's not perfect, Quote-Unquote points out a lot of the problems with it and didn't even mention the weird dart throwing minigame that gets way too much space on the rules sheet for something you barely ever do. On Sunday we played the Unbreakable stand alone expansion, with the two characters in the box and our third player was Polaris. edit: I haven't played solo yet, I was thinking about doing that this weekend. When I looked it up I saw people say that the actual solo rule play sucks largely because you can't have as much fun with building a specialized character, but playing two to three characters solo is fun because you can specialize each character. Having played the game a bunch multiplayer, I feel like I would not have a problem running 3 characters solo. Chainclaw fucked around with this message at 17:05 on May 25, 2023 |
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May 25, 2023 17:01
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I've had a decent amount of fun playing pure solo in both the base game and Undertow, but now that my copy of Riffle is finally showing up tomorrow I'm looking forward to getting some people over for multiplayer.
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May 25, 2023 17:24
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Thanks for the thoughts. Are there any 3rd party reference sheets worth printing out and having handy while learning if I pick it up? Im usually wary of them til I know the game in case they have errors but if the rules are as badly organized as you say I might give it a shot.
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May 25, 2023 17:25
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Anyone have thoughts on Paladins of the West Kingdom? I'm missing a more complex worker placement game in my collection, and from the reviewsd it seems pretty solid.
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May 25, 2023 17:25
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