PGWJ, April Fool's Week edition

This week was a PlayGamesWithJosh session that I think is worthy of a brief report...

We had our usual core of 3 players. Myself, "Uncle" Max, and "KatⒶstrophe" Kevin.

Good Recruiter Kevin almost got us another 4th (like he did last week) but unfortunately she bailed.

Nonetheless, we got some serious gaming done with 3 people.

It started with 2 rounds of 7 Wonders, which was originally a way to pass time until the 4th arrived.

The jury is still out on Leaders, and we didn't use them for either game.

The games passed quickly.. the first game ended in a tie which I won on money, and I somehow managed to win the second game as well. This is also notably the first time I've ever seen Max end a game with a negative (or even low) Military score.

Next. thanks to the first episode of Wil Wheaton's new TableTop web-series, we got out my gigantic box of boxes of Small World.

(I should post a picture of that ridiculously over-organized setup)

I have all the expansion stuff of SW from before Underground came out. Again, coincidentally, we played without the Leaders expansion for a game, and we also didn't use the Tales & Legends "Event Deck" (which I have never used).

I don't remember the entire progression of race/power combos, but one notable appearance was Kevin's Seafaring Priestesses, with the power to build a literally indestructible (until you go into decline with your second race) tower in decline. One of my favorite combos, but it turns you into a big target. The tower ended up with only a value of 3, after planned attacks against it.

In the end, Max won by a single coin.

And cleanup was a breeze! Thanks, Really Useful Boxes!

Finally, we played Power Grid.

We used the Korea map, which I had bought but never tried before (and no, Matt, we didn't use your house rules on this; we used the rules as printed).

The 2 markets really made it interesting, especially after I made a relatively early nuclear plant grab.

Somehow, despite my constant math errors (which all got corrected), I managed to pull a win out..

Also minorly notable: We were somehow missing the entirety of the coal cubes, so we used blue houses instead. Luckily, I was able to find them in the back seat of my car in a hidden Really Useful Box (transportation incident from last time I brought the game somewhere).

Next week, despite dietary restrictions, I think we might have an even better turnout. Can't wait!

Rex: Final Days of an Empire, first day

Yes, I bought Rex.. and yes, despite the universe trying to intervene, we got to play it once.

But with only 3 players.

Even with 3 players, it is a great game with lots of subtlety.

The Jol-Nar vs. the Lazax vs. the Sol Federation abilities combine nicely with their strengths and weaknesses.

As the Jol-Nar, my only issue is that my memory isn't perfect. FFG changed the original Dune rules so it is now illegal to write things down, so I had to remember where all the cards went in the Bidding Phase. With 3 players it was sort of easy to manage, but with 6 I can imagine the Jol-Nar are going to have some trouble keeping track.

The Sol Federation won (with the normal victory conditions) and the game took maybe 2 and a half hours, including interruptions and rule questions..

Unfortunately we didn't get to see any of the alliance mechanics, but hopefully we will be able to have a bigger game -- MAYBE even six players?! -- next week or some time in April.

But yes, the game has many aspects I enjoy in "gamer games". Unique powers, territory control, interesting combat mechanic, even aspects that feel like Risk Legacy without the permanent changes. (although that's a whole separate thread to think about..)

Highly recommended so far.

A rating of GRRRRRRR on the arbitrary rating scale :)

Go Go Gadget ... what?

Another little diversion from the gaming-related talk, but sort of on-topic.

Talk about First World Problems!

I've sold off most of my VTES collection, and I have made enough money that I want to reward myself with a gadget of some sort.

Edit: Please think of this more like a "fantasy rant" than a real shopping list... I'm not sure whether I'm actually going to buy something "big" or not...

I was originally thinking about replacing our Home Theater In A Box with a proper receiver and speakers, but after doing a fair amount of research, it seems like it's still too much cost and setup hassle for the amount of improvement it would give our little living room.

I'm not incredibly interested in a tablet right now; my ipad2 and my Galaxy Nexus (call it a 4-inch tablet with phone capabilities) exactly fill that niche for me.

It's all the rage right now, but a wifi ipad3 or full-sized Android tablet wouldn't add much.

And although I'm vaguely interested in a 4G-enabled tablet (whether Apple or Android or other), the data plan would exceed my new "buffer" of money within a few months. And then I'd be 'stuck' with it as a new long-term expense.

I could also get a new laptop (or wait for a Windows 8 tablet/desktop hybrid device thing); my primary 'Windows PC' these days is a good-enough-for-browsing-and-email netbook/laptop hybrid. But see the "gaming PC" comment below, and we've got no shortage of 'computers' in the house.

Another idea is more of an "un-gadget"; I've seriously considered adding a "free phone with no data plan" to our family plan, to assure that no matter how much I mess with my primary 'phone' (currently the Galaxy Nexus), I can still make and receive calls. That would still add a minimum of $9.99 a month, though, and I honestly don't make and receive regular phone calls very often at all. Also, if I chose this option, I think I'd wait to see what Verizon says about their shared data plans. If I could get a "free" Android phone and still not have to pay more for data, at least it would be able to sync contacts.

Instead of a gadget, I could buy more boardgames. There are certainly a few on my list that I wouldn't mind owning. But I still have to catch up with playing the ones I've already got :)

Same goes with videogames, really; I haven't turned on the PS3 or Wii in weeks, never mind my supposed "Gaming PC" which I updated a couple years ago and has mostly been doing nothing since then... Of course I could get something new and video-gamey and use it as motivation to get back to digital gaming, but there's also the fact that most new video games just don't interest me, and I suck at online twitch-factor games :)

A truly "unthinkable!" idea is to -- gasp -- save the money instead of searching out for something to buy just because it's shiny. And save it for guilt-free small purchases here and there, or for the next big thing I haven't discovered yet. But seriously, I would like to buy myself something symbolic for crossing this threshhold, even something tiny.

All that being said, your thoughts?

Rex: Final Days of an Empire

How did I miss this?

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/104363/rex-final-days-of-an-empire

This is FFG's remake of the classic Dune game.

I remember playing Dune once in college and really enjoying it, although I couldn't tell you anything about what the mechanics were :)

But it's definitely on my radar..

Oh, the Horror!

OK, I guess I lied about that Risk Legacy update. I will eventually write a big thing about that, but not yet.

So.. I'm in the process of selling a bunch of VTES cards, but that isn't important. What is important is that as payment for some of the cards, someone gave me a copy of Arkham Horror.

Now, of course I had heard of this game before. But I wasn't interested in it. While I do like Pandemic, the "pure co-op" aspect of Arkham was a turn-off. I'm a BSG fan, I like a game with a traitor. And without ever playing Arkham, I assumed that the game would fall flat without a "bad guy" player representing the Elder Gods.

But hey, a new game is a new game, so I gave it a shot.

We were 3 investigators: Ashcan Pete the Drifter (me), Darrell Simmons the Photographer (Max), and Bob Jenkins the Salesman (Mike).

Our adversary was Azathoth, which means that I wasn't going to get a chance to see the "end battle" no matter what.

Ashcan Pete somehow ended up being the Mage of the group. They were dumping spells on me, and I was collecting Clues preparing to close some gates.

I felt like I was actually making a difference, and knew what was going on, which is rare when I'm the newbie to a game. :)

The game ended up being pretty fun and it made for a cool story.

Monsters started popping up all over the place, and the atmosphere was tense. No real need for a traitor.

In the end, 7 gates opened, Azathoth awakened, and the game instantly ended.

I'm willing to try again...

Now I just have to resist the Completist Urge to buy an expansion or two or seven.. :)

Risk Legacy "teaser" update...

We played Risk Legacy, twice, last night at PGWJ.

I want to write a big report about it, with pictures, and blatant spoilage... and I'll try to do it soon.

Earth #6730 definitely changed significantly last night, and we will see the full extent of the changes soon...

TempleCon 2012

I'm back from TempleCon 2012, and it was yet another successful and fun year at the Con.

I should have prepped this blog post while I was there, but I'll try to remember what happened...

I arrived Friday evening, earlier than I expected.

I hadn't been planning to play the Friday VTES tournament, but after finding my way down the secret elevator to where the VTES room was, I noticed that the group was small, and I didn't really know what else was going on, so I sat down with my Chaundice deck (unmodified and un-looked-at for a year) and played 2 rounds.

It didn't get me anywhere in the tourney, but I didn't expect it to. I had some fun playing VTES for the first time in awhile, and that was OK.

Afterwards, we played some other games -- I think this was when we got a game or 2 of 7 Wonders in. Great fun.

I still had very little clue where I was going to sleep -- next year I will spring for a room and beg for roommates instead of the other way around -- but thankfully I got a sofa in a fellow player's room to crash on for a few hours, and then got up, my usual early self.

I'm a very early riser, and that doesn't mix too well with a convention like this. In the morning it was kind of quiet, and after trekking across the street to Dunkin's, I camped out around the boardgame room until it opened.

I was invited to a game of Diplomacy... but passed. That's not exactly a pickup game :)

I sat around in the boardgame room wondering what to do. And then some guys got out the library copy of BSG and were puzzlingly looking at the components.

I couldn't resist.

Long story short, I sat down to play with these strangers; a 4 player game with some Pegasus and some Exodus components.

I was Admiral Helo, with President Baltar, Tyrol, and CAG Boomer around the table.

Interestingly, the Exodus loyalty rules left the Sympathizer card as the "extra"; Baltar was on his own as the lone Cylon (as he usually is).

He didn't even need to Reveal; Boomer was brigged, I was brigged, and Tyrol was frakked. We resigned when there wasn't much we could do.

By the time that game ended, Round 1 of the VTES Qualifier was well underway. So I got in at Round 2.

Unfortunately, my Round 2 was not really much of a round. My predator was Ben Peal, with Kevin Mergen's Una deck (40+ Freak Drives), and I basically got a chance to take 1 action all game before I got smushed.

Round 3 was a little bit better. My deck got to Do Something. But I still ended up with zero VPs (or maybe I squeezed out one, I honestly forget; will update this entry after I see Matt's report).

Somewhere during the tournament, I tried out the game "Atlantis", and I actually won. Not sure it's a game I'd pick up, but it was interesting..

And then that night, there were *two* games of BSG.

In the first (7 player!) game, I was Starbuck and became a Cylon at the sleeper phase, sitting next to Prescott as Leoben. Cally (Tony) was the other Cylon. We won due to a forced march of Centurions, one of the classics.

Prescott didn't meet his goal (he wasn't in the brig and hadn't been executed), and that actually led to a question (can you Infiltrate directly into the Brig?) which we ruled as "no" but I haven't looked up an official answer.

In the second game (5 of us), I was in a silly mood so I chose Ellen Tigh.
Once again we had a lone Cylon (Matt M, but I don't remember which character he was), but we agreed beforehand to use the house rule "if the last card in the loyalty deck is a Cylon, lose 1 of each resource", which I may continue to use.

This was a pretty brutal game and the resources dwindled down into nothing. A third Cylon victory.

At about 2am, I had a floor to sleep on in Kevin+Pete+Matt's room, and we found Kevin very drunk and awake in bed. A short conversation about the backstory of Huang, Blood Cultist (he was apparently a Subway employee who liked to play Mario Kart), and I got about 2 hours of uncomfortable floor-sleep (see my earlier comment about a hotel room for next year).

Once again I was an early riser. But Sunday, the VTES draft started at 11, so there wasn't much time to do anything between room-opening time and VTES time. I could have skipped VTES but I was feeling like hanging out with those guys.

This gave me the idea that maybe next year, I will volunteer with TempleCon as an "early morning gaming liaison", to keep the boardgame room open and running for the morning people like me.

In the actual draft -- where we got Free Cards -- we played 2 rounds with no final; the Sunday draft usually fizzles out like this.

I drafted a halfway decent Lasombra deck out of a bunch of random packs.

I was happy that, in both rounds, I got to use Paulo's ability on the first turn of the game (move 1 blood from him to an uncontrolled Lasombra when he comes out).

In the first round, a combination of Pentex Subversion and Consignment to Duat locked me down after a strong start (draftferiors make dom/obt even better!), and I died without a VP.

In the second round, my stealth-weenie predator (Ira) "allowed me" to get 1VP before he obliterated me.

Overall it was fun.

And I gave away most of my free cards, knowing full well that I'd otherwise probably just be selling them which isn't fair.

Hoping to get back to the con next year, whether I play VTES or not (I don't think I'll be building any new decks, either way ...)

BONUS FACT: Throughout several plays of 7 Wonders during the weekend, I happened to notice that one of the cards looked 'marked'. There was some sort of grey blob on the back of the card.

When I got home, I posted something on boardgamegeek about card replacing, and I got contacted directly by the North American publisher of the game. A replacement is on its way. Cool!

Also, this morning (I'm home from work for unrelated reasons), I went through my set of BSG. To my surprise, it's still complete! Not a single lost bit or card!

Anyway, see you next year at TempleCon!