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Kalko posted:
If you and your group have fun playing anything good on you. I just get my back up personally about games like Wingspan and Terraforming Mars because I think they're prime examples of aggressively mediocre designs that skate by primarily on Theme™ and a dose of the cult of the new (something I'm not immune to myself, to be clear). Anything that gets more people into this expensive, time consuming, and shelf warping hobby is a win as far as I'm concerned, I just wish the games that were doing it were better but I'm more than willing to admit that I'm in too deep at this point and might have trouble seeing the forest from the trees. That said, the 1889 kickstarter reissue did pull in >$200k... Valley of the Kings is excellent and one of the best deck-builders out there.
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Jan 4, 2022 17:58
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Fate Accomplice posted:Are there better games than TM? absolutely. sometimes you want to play TM and that's totally cool. That's where I'm at with it. Sometimes I even get a craving for it. Can't always be playing 18MEX or Civ... unfortunately.
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Jan 4, 2022 20:23
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For 18xxers out there, this fellow (who is also behind the fantastic 18XXC app) has created another neat app that helps in building the bank by allowing you to tell it what size you want and what chip denominations you have and want to use to build it. This is extremely useful for me because building the bank is one of the most annoying parts of setting up for me at this stage since I've got (most of) my tiles organized for my favourites. https://twitter.com/mg0rn/status/1479468680379609097
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Jan 7, 2022 17:03
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Has anyone played Cape May that can weigh in with their thoughts on it? I love the theme and idea but am scared that it is another MWE...
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Jan 14, 2022 17:14
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Seeing preorders for Horseless Carriage popping up. Does anyone know anything about this game? (How underwhelming will the components be?)
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Jan 19, 2022 16:55
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The price point is wild. Up here we're looking at $157 CDN! Which is enough to get free shipping by default from most retailers. Honestly, was just trolling with the component crack but I am curious to see what it looks like. I'll repost some information from the Geek, apologies if this was already presented earlier in the thread: quote:Horseless Carriage: You are a titan of the early auto industry. You are building cars, but no one is sure what the consumers want in their car. Do they want steering wheels? Brakes? Headlights? Every time you are playing, the wishes of the consumers, which you can somewhat influence, will be different. the market will develop in different ways. Splotter is incredible so here's hoping this isn't their first confirmed flop.
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Jan 19, 2022 21:51
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Mighty Eris posted:This post is Duck Dealer and Cannes erasure. stalin_disappearing_yezhov.jpeg I've honestly never even heard of Duck Dealer or Cannes but came to Splotter when they released FCM so I willingly abandon any hipster proto-nerd cache when it comes to the freaky deaky Dutchmen. That said, everything I've played since has been quite good so I'm assuming these games were flawed but just ahead of their time like the Dreamcast.
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Jan 19, 2022 22:37
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You can also be a dead man walking in Roads and Boats if you don't build the right thing first, which happened to my wife and me the first time we played and caused a little chuckle. And then we just restarted. I really liked it and didn't find that it took too long beyond the learning curve because the rulebook was poo poo and since I had the reprint, it was extremely frustrating trying to determine which components were appropriate for just the base game.
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Jan 20, 2022 16:36
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Jedit and other fans of Feast for Odin: are you guys privy to the rumours floating around that the Dane's expansion is going to be a stand-alone? The designer posted a vaguely confusing thing the other day and I'm trying to understand if it's a language barrier or not.
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Jan 21, 2022 18:07
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Infinitum posted:Danes is firmly in "I'll believe it when I see it" territory. That's where I've been at since it was announced. Should have everything and the legendary box by ohhh... about 2030 or so.
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Jan 21, 2022 18:43
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Late to the party but Dune: Imperium is definitely a decent WP game that is on the LIGHT side of medium. Curious if the expansion tightens things up a bit more. As it stands I enjoy the game but the market row and intrigue cards can vary so wildly that it hurts. Got to play Calico on the weekend and I really enjoyed it. It nearly blue-screened my brain with the strategy and options but can see it sitting next to Azul on the shelf. And we also got a 4P game in of 18MEX with one person totally new to this seedy underbelly of board gaming who had never heard of 18xx before he sat down. He grokked onto it faster than anyone else I've ever seen in all the times I've introduced the game, truly remarkable. Also the game is great and plays quickly. Ended by bank break before the first diesel was purchased. If we can just tighten the route-calculations we could shave an hour off the game time, easily. I also got to use the vacuum pens and it was awesome.
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Jan 24, 2022 18:19
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Maybe I have to try Targi again but Lord knows the last time we tried we both bounced off it hard. I see it recommended all the time though. Maybe we just didn't get it.
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Jan 24, 2022 22:00
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It's so interesting seeing Crokinole chat from people outside of Canada/Southern Ontario because every house has probably has an old board somewhere. I grew up playing on the one my grandparents had and just enjoyed flicking the wooden discs around and now it's behind the couch at the cottage. I actually got to chat with Tracey a couple of weeks ago and he mentioned that when SU&SD did their video his business just rocketed by 3 or 4x. It really blows my mind that the game has sort of exploded all over the world to the extent that people are hyped for fresh runs. My wife's family are sharks and I do not love the game but will politely be the fourth and act as an anchor for the poor bastard I'm partnered with.
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Jan 25, 2022 19:28
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Junk Art is tons of fun. Men at Work is brutally difficult (but still fun). Not sure if Rhino Hero falls into this category but it's really cute and kids would love it. I've got Meeple Circus but haven't played it yet.
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Jan 25, 2022 22:03
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Infinitum posted:Shout out to Gameology, a very good store here in Australia, for hosting the shittiest Australia Day flash sale The sales up here have been pretty lame lately. I always get a chuckle when one of the big dogs in the GTA area, 401 Games, does a sale on like Canada Day or Labour Day and WHOA 6% OFF GAMES, INCREDIBLE. Better than a kick in the pants sure, but just barrel scraping. BGB has been weak lately too, I stayed up until midnight to get first crack at their boxing day sale and it was... not good. I did get my copy of 1848 though and is it me or are the tiles in it extra large? Looking forward to laying track through the outback and avoiding kangaroos, cheers mate.
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Jan 26, 2022 15:59
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The Dune Imperium expansion is out, can anyone vouch for it or chime in with their thoughts? The price is hilarious though, about ~80% of the base game's cost.
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Feb 1, 2022 16:45
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Radioactive Toy posted:This was just such a funky and obtuse way of making this distinction. Note that this was prior to the announcement. Truly, how could there be any confusion. Plain as day don't you see.
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Feb 2, 2022 20:37
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CitizenKeen posted:It was just brought to my attention that 5x5s don't fit through a lot of doorways and now I'm frustrated. If you're remotely inclined you can make some shelves really, really easily yourself if you've got the tools (drill, saw of some time) or know someone you can borrow them from. A few boards and screws and sandpaper/sander and some paint or whatever and you're golden. Get some braces/brackets if you're like me and have an ancient house that's not remotely level. If you want to be even thriftier swing by a Habitat for Humanity store or thrift shop and you might find some high quality shelves that you can disassemble and reassemble really easily, although this might rely on having a truck or van.
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Feb 3, 2022 02:05
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homullus posted:Everyone I've met with AP did not have mental health issues (that I knew of) and were not choosing to be that way at the table. One friend did choose to work on it, but it was a several-years-long struggle to mitigate it. I am not defending it; it sucks the life out of some game nights, and you're not obligated to play games with people when doing so isn't fun. Anecdotally, though, people with AP are often aware they have it, aware people don't like it, and still can't act differently. I am known for having some turns in Feast for Odin take longer than they should. My name is FulsomFrank and I am an APer.
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Feb 4, 2022 17:25
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Eraflure posted:If I feel I can't win anymore, I just play the last few rounds on autopilot and do whatever would give me the best chance to win the game, no matter how impossible it is. My friends know this is how I operate, so no hard feelings and no accusation of kingmaking. I think what you're describing is similar to what I try to do which is basically going into "AI mode" and playing as if I was just a dispassionate bot or something in a computer game that's already lost but still playing its heart out according to the rules and programming. That said, I've seen people go full on torpedo mode on top of the "gently caress it" attitude and just doing stupid wacky, game ending behaviour. None of this bugs me that much unless it's in a huge/long game and they're just being an rear end in a top hat.
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Feb 4, 2022 22:24
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Aramoro posted:I had a look at competitive GWT games, and people post big old match reports etc. But one things jumped out in the report on one of the finals. In the final of a 60 man tournament there were 10 play errors, like straight up mistakes like taking $2 instead of $1 for an Aux action etc. Which makes me think people are very keen, but not very good at GWT. That amount of mistakes shocks me when you're describing a competitive level. You'd think everyone would be keeping an eye on everyone else. GWT is a bit complicated but nothing that insane. I also really like the game, it's cozy. And yes, the expansion really helps but it's very expensive at MSRP so unless you're a fiend for the game hold off until a sale. In other news, I got Santa Monica to the table on the weekend and we really liked it. Very simple but surprisingly deep tableau builder. Handles the market row problem nicely with it being double layered and similar to Valley of the Kings, you know what you're going to give your opponents when you take the bottom card so play carefully. The art and theme is gorgeous and it really does take you on a sunny trip to the boardwalk and beach. The box is hilariously large for what's inside it though, makes me wonder why they didn't at least attempt to switch to a smaller one rather than use their default dimensions but what do I know. FulsomFrank fucked around with this message at 18:30 on Feb 7, 2022 |
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Feb 7, 2022 18:28
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So is the consensus then that Ark Nova is a Good Game and worth adding to my definitely not already crowded collection?
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Feb 9, 2022 17:34
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jesus WEP posted:maybe it goes without saying but buying a board game off amazon is a terrible idea, you have real good odds of getting something not in your own language or - as a friend buying azul found - a cheap knockoff of the game I found a copy out of the blue of Panic on Wall St from Australia (!) with free shipping for ~$45 CDN like six years ago and it was perfect! Except that the company products/stock tiles are in Spanish. Very strange. Great game though. taser rates posted:This is a central mechanic in the 18xx genre pretty much. There are pre-defined moments at which old trains will "rust" (ie disappear) from the game, somewhat modelling the obsolescence of technology, and learning how to navigate that is one of main questions in each game. I've also seen this implemented through increasing maintenance costs as opposed to outright removal, but the same principle is there. Worth taking a look at 18xx-adjacent game Rolling Stock as well for this. How is Rolling Stock? This is the second time in a week someone has brought it up and it seems very interesting. Not a bad price from AAG either but they're selling Rolling Rock Stars so unsure if it's the same or not. We have friends coming over for dinner on Saturday and I'm tempted to see if I can trick them into playing some 18MEX or 30. I really liked 61/67 but it's just slightly on the chromey side with the mergers and distinct phases.
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Feb 10, 2022 16:50
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Jewmanji posted:Am I missing something in Pax Pamir 2E? I’ve lost 3/3 now in a two player game (no Wakhan). In both cases my opponent was threatening victory on the first dominance card, so I switched to the dominant coalition so I could at least profit a little off the dominance card. The trouble is, there’s absolutely no room for error after that. Losing even one more unsuccessful dominance check ends the game. Losing even two unsuccessful checks in a row loses the game. What am I missing here? It seems like losing the first dominance (whether successful or not) shouldn’t put you in such a deep hole. Do I just suck at this game? Just a rule check too, but are you clearing the blocks off the map after each dominance check? Are you leaving too much money for your opponent to grab off cards? Are you playing with the favoured suit properly (ie. switching suits at best time, grabbing relevant cards etc.) to maximise bonus actions off your tableau? Are you locking down regions and forcing the classic "gently caress you, pay me" bribes? Are you misreading the market-row and letting your opponent grab patriots and cards that let them throw down corresponding blocks to achieve dominance without contest? Pax Pamir is such a wild game that there's a million things that could be going on at one time. Everything is extremely fragile too for EVERYONE so it's about knocking their poo poo down and keeping yours up for just long enough to count. Lovely game but also frustrating to play with new people at higher counts because misplays are costly especially if like the last game I played, someone is just feeding the player after them with money and good cards. Impossible to climb back from.
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Feb 11, 2022 21:38
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I'm still waiting on Medeira COLLECTOR'S EDITION™ that's in production hell but beyond that I've had flawless victories with boardgame KS/crowd funding. But now I've gone done cursed it so here we go.
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Feb 16, 2022 16:21
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Ohhh I thought we were posting about kickstarters that went bad because of fulfillment or lies or Darth Vader style "altering of agreements". I've backed plenty of poo poo I wasn't thrilled with ultimately and it is not a coincidence that most of these are MWE. My latest is Arkwright the Card Game, which I didn't hate but I was less than impressed with. The production quality on it was also so-so and it's the first time I've ever cracked a KS game and been dealing with missing pieces and improperly cut boards.
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Feb 16, 2022 21:34
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Quote-Unquote posted:Bad Kickstarters, huh? Guess who backed the Divinity Original Sin board game two years ago, which has now changed beyond all recognition, including the designer being fired and slapped with an NDA, and still hasn't got any indication of ever being finished? I had no idea this was such a disaster. I actually saw the playtest version of it in person with the original designer at a local con before everything went crazy so this was way back either before the KS or right after it launched? For me a licensed KS is an immediate red flag. If you know more about what's going on I'd love to see a write-up.
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Feb 17, 2022 16:38
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Played a game that I picked up on sale a while ago but never opened, Coal Baron from Kiesling and Kramer. Lads, this was good. Couldn't believe how nicely it played. Solid MWE on the lighter side but with plenty of decision space. Crux of the game is action selection on the main board with the central gimmick being that you can go where anyone else put a worker but you have to pay one more worker for the space than whatever was there previously. So things get progressively more expensive. And then in your personal mine-shaft/board you are adding more tunnels/mine carts with one of four types of coal that you need to send an adorable elevator down and grab, each stage of the process requiring action points that you again grab from a space on the main board. You're doing all this to fulfill contracts and there are three scoring rounds with progressively more and more things being scored based on the majorities like, who has fulfilled the most yellow coal contracts and contracts that require trains and so on. Obviously some more to it but this is the gist. Overall, plays super quickly, lots of fun and tough decisions to make, and you're always left with a "Oh man, if only I had just ONE MORE worker I could do this..." feeling. Really impressed and surprised it's flown below the radar because frankly it does more in a little package than most other Euros do with a fifteen minute set up and hour long rule break down.
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Feb 22, 2022 16:35
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I'd like to see them do a total reno (heh) of the game but I have a feeling it'll be cosmetic at best. It's remarkable how much people love this goddamn game and who am I to begrudge people having a good time but Lord knows my ratio on enjoying this is something like 1:5 Sloober posted:i'm mostly ambivalent about the game with the expectation that i'm going to dislike the 'haunt' 3/4 the time in the base game, my group played the legacy version which was not completely terrible, but if there's a game that would benefit from an entire main mechanic rework its definitely that one. For starters, they can toss most of the haunts into the garbage where they belong Unsure if you've tried them but the Pandemic Legacy games are tremendous (at least Season 1 and 0 are, haven't done 2). The EXIT games are great too for the most part and a nice one and done experience for reasonable price. FulsomFrank fucked around with this message at 18:01 on Feb 24, 2022 |
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Feb 24, 2022 17:18
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Is 18AL worth grabbing for $120 CAD if I can get it? I already have MEX so unsure about this.
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Mar 1, 2022 22:42
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taser rates posted:No, don't bother. Cthulhu Dreams posted:Its not very good. Its not terrible, its just fine. Thanks for the heads up. I will certainly pass. I just saw that it looks impossible to find and was curious whether it was worth it.
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Mar 2, 2022 16:20
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Captain Scandinaiva posted:A friend of mine is a Stonemaier Champion, which means 20% off in their store. I've played Wingspan (eh) and Viticulture (cool and fun). Is there anything that is a must have? No must haves by any stretch. Viticulture + Tuscany is a perfectly fine MWE. Haven't played it but Space-Biff gave a glowing review to the "new" version of Libertalia if that's something you might be into?
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Mar 4, 2022 17:20
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Good weekend of gaming. First we did a seven player game of Mega Civ western map. Two total newbies, one of which I had to dissuade from being demoralised before the game even started thanks to that dogshit video SU&SD did for Western Empires. I set up the night before and we got properly rolling by about 11:00 and called it about six hours later. I had Minoa, which is very fun to play as and not that difficult even though I screw up here and there. BUT, the only thing I agree with Quinns about and it still astounds me to this day, is how goddamn bad the graphic design on the map is in a practical sense. Playing as Minoa is an exercise in carefully stacking chits and putting them in just the right place so that you can see what's beneath them. Throw in the fact you're going to have boats that are twice the size as normal chits for almost the entire game and you've got yourself a frothy soup of frustration. You also really need someone to be on the ball with census and someone else responsible for handling the trade cards. I came in second and made plenty of mistakes. The winner was Hellas who played well but also had the luck of the Irish because he ended up drawing round after round of no calamities and even when he did get some, was able to mitigate them with the help of his previous purchases. Was very happy that everyone had a great time and the one person I was referring to earlier even sent me a message after saying how much he enjoyed the game and he'd play again any time. You love to hear it. And then the next day my wife and I sat down and played another game of Coal Baron and had another fantastic time. I blew her out of the water this game though. The game plays so quickly and simply with just enough tricky decisions and risk-management to make it exactly at the right crunch level. Very quick set up and take down too.
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Mar 7, 2022 19:36
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AAAAA! Real Muenster posted:I had no idea Mega Civ was a thing, that is amazing. Having played a ton of vintage Tresham Civ, I totally agree about the province size and density. I've always wanted a game like Tresham civ with the pop growth and management + city building, straight forward combat, and buying tech.... but with a faster playtime, better map, and a less punishing calamity mechanic (so like what happened with the winner in your game not getting any calamities... hrmm, interesting correlation?). I havent found one yet, so as a hobby and creative outlet I've started making my own just for shits, and I taught myself the free photoshop, GIMP, to make the map. I'm curious what you think of the map (work in progress, please ignore the little bits of color sticking out from some of the province lines): Friend, any Civ related content is great to see and always welcome. I'm not an expert by any stretch but I think I've played enough games to get a decent understanding of what I like and don't. My skin-deep assessment of the the map you've posted is that it looks quite promising and it's interesting that you're going with that variation in agriculture because it's a similar idea to something my friend and I are working out in our own personal Civ project. My only criticism is that from the look of things a lot if not most of the territories you've got down there are hyper connected to other ones - in other words, you've got every province/territory a wobbly hex that connects to another province that is also a wobbly hex... Unsure if this is because it's a preliminary design choice or not but look at your Tresham Civ board again and note how disparate territories are with regard to how many other territories they touch as well as the relative pop caps to them. You also might want to be a little more erratic with the pop cap on the territories too. Again, look at the original boards and note the lack of congruity between the numbers. It's rare to see a giant group of 1s, 2s, 3s all in one big stretch. Not saying you can't do it but spreading them out better combined with my advice regarding the territory sizes might do wonders. That's a fun part about designing maps because you get to play around with the relative "safety" of certain places versus their utility for cities, populations, movement etc. Anyway, just what I noticed off the top of my head. No clue about what your design goals are but I'm definitely interested and have always wondered why 1829/30 spawned an entire sub-genre yet Civ was left to languish (comparatively).
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Mar 7, 2022 21:48
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Jcam posted:For the Canadian goons here, 401Games appears to have done a massive restocking. I’m seeing gems such as Pax Pamir 2e, War of the Ring 2e, and Food Chain Magnate! And like ten copies of 1830 for those who have been struggling to track down a copy because it's here one day and the next gone for like a year.
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Mar 10, 2022 16:15
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Infinitum posted:Setup for game day complete. Love a good table filler I enjoyed Nemesis but the colour scheme they used I think while thematically appropriate is really annoying to look at and I recall it being difficult to do a quick glance at the board and tell the difference between things. I will admit I played it in someone's backyard and the sun was kinda making it tough to see everything perfectly but it's something that stuck with me.
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Mar 11, 2022 17:58
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Is Ginkopolis still worth owning/playing today? I see that copies are back in stock and I was curious if's held up or is another title that has been surpassed?
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Mar 11, 2022 19:41
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Bottomliner, did you get your Ginkopolis on? I got to learn and play Teotihuacan (base game) and I have mixed thoughts. First off, the production is tremendous. I cannot believe they went with actual giant Mahjongy blocks for the temple, the meeples/resource tokens are great, and the cardboard chits are all decently thicc. Just disappointed the cocoa is so boring for some reason. Gameplay-wise I really liked the dice combo-wombo system of them getting stronger and stronger and better when used in multiples. Really neat, especially when you ASCEND your 6ers. Overall, really enjoyed it. My only criticism comes from personal experience but that I cannot understand why the Noble's space works as it does and unlike every other board, punishes you for taking the action repeatedly in the form of making the points gained for going up on the track of the dead or whatever it's called worse by a vast degree. There's even a technology that rewards you with extra VPs for building the houses but you're also gimping yourself down the line by taking advantage of this, so I just figure because it's vaguely easier to do they wanted to make it less beneficial, even though you still need multiple workers there to really get bigger points. And also it seems like locking in to "worship" at certain spots was a total waste of time. Masks are such garbage and take forever to acquire sets that make it worth while unless you are a masochist and enjoy spending spare cocoa or entire turns to free workers from their prisons. One fellow just got gold, every tech, and climbed the tracks of the red and green (I think) god tracks and ended up with like 50 more points than everyone else. Absurd.
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Mar 14, 2022 16:13
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Mayveena posted:Optimize your play Did... did you just tell me to git gud?? I'm kidding but curious what you'd advise. The fellow who taught it really likes it and would probably try to get it on the table as frequently as possible so having some guidance would be appreciated if at bare minimum to speed the game up because I think it took us 3 hours to finish and some turns felt like agony and totally disconnected.
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Mar 14, 2022 17:22
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and Mr gold player will not end up with ahead by 50 points. If you want more help I can give it as we've played this game a ton of times and it's one of our all time favorites. However if you want to learn on your own, you have a lot to go for
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Just saw someone talking about Hamlet. Looks like a cute mish-mash of Roads & Boats and Keyflower. If this was me five years ago I would have mashed that PLEDGE button but now I'm a little more cautious, especially with how expensive it looks (~$77 CAD before shipping). Does anyone have any input about it? I love city/village building games and tile layers and what little I've read about it so far seems fairly positive.
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Mar 16, 2022 19:58
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