So I finally had a chance to play Voyages of Marco Polo. I expected I would love the game but after the first play I just feel meh about it. It's an ok game and I wouldn't say no to playing it but while I played nothing really felt exciting to do. Despite having these variable powers everything just felt cold, calculated and there is no such thing as a big move. I also have to say that I am not big on worker placement, but thought the variable powers and dice would mitigate that. I am sure others here will love it but I don't think it is for me.
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New Board Gaming |OT2| On Tables, Off Topic
- Thread starter Karkador
- Start date
Mentioned munchkin and got shit on so what is the opinion on this game - Arcadia Quest?
I checked into some videos and already ordered mice and mystics. This looks like fun also if not a take off on munchkin in some ways. I can fight with my friends against the monsters and I can attack them also. Looking to add a few games with cool miniatures to my collection. There was a sale on Super Dungeon Explore today on amazon and the reviews made that game look complicated as shit. This looks a lot more friendly to me and my wife for play with our daughter.
Arcadia Quest is freaking fantastic. It has PvP and PvE, but once a player has completed his mission of killing one of an opponents dudes, there isn't much of an incentive to go after that player again. It's a heck of a lot of fun, and it's a gorgeous game which helps when trying to entice the family to the table. The rules are pretty clear and easy to follow.
I'd argue that it actually brought the game down a bit. There's really no player interaction that I remember from the gameplay, and you have to score all your points after every card you play. It felt slow and meh.
If you want a game that plays like that, but has a little more interaction and is better executed, I'd say get Suburbia.
[edit: disclaimer on this one, I played AtS a long time ago when it first launched with Atripia and I absolutely loathed it. I played it 3 times to try to enjoy it, as I was a big 7W fan...and ultimately sold it. Suburbia exectues the whole thing in a much nicer, interactive manner.]
Hmm interesting counterpoints. Will have to try before I buy I guess.
On a side note, Ashes: Rise of the Phoenixborn just arrived in the mail today. Will hopefully get it to the table tomorrow.
I look forward to knowing how that is. I have a preorder for it waiting from Miniature Market (instead of getting it from Plaid Hat direct like I should've done). If I'm being honest a lot of the reason I ordered it is that it looks gorgeous, but also it has rules for drafting out of the box, so I'm super into that.
nicoga3000
Saint Nic
Almost done assembling both core sets of Shadows of Brimstone. I'm excited to play this game finally. However, I will say...The minis look cool, but the production quality of the casting? Arguably the worst I've ever dealt with. Maybe I'm just spoiled by my days of Games Workshop and Privateer Press.
Also, trying to decide what to play with my wife tomorrow. I might try Carcassonne or Forbidden Island. I would do Suburbia, but I kind of want to run the solo scenario first to make sure I understand the rules 100%.
Also, trying to decide what to play with my wife tomorrow. I might try Carcassonne or Forbidden Island. I would do Suburbia, but I kind of want to run the solo scenario first to make sure I understand the rules 100%.
I like Munchkin but I haven't seen much point of the spinoff sets. Get original deluxe, don't bother with more than that.
I snagged Ashes at GenCon this year, and I must admit I liked it quite a bit. The dice mechanic for mana made for a lot of interesting decisions, but never felt limiting. Combined with a lot of base gameplay in the core box (all 6 or 7 Phoenixborn have their own predefined decks) makes it a very appealing pick up.
Look forward to getting more games of it in!
I'm getting that on the table tomorrow night, I'm super, super stoked. I love stuff like Magic, but I just don't want to dump all that money into it. Same with LCGs. With PHG putting EVERYTHING you need to play and make tons of decks right into the box, I knew this was the one to get into.
A much better Munchkin experience in my opinion:
A light "take-that" game that speeds the process up by allowing only 1 draw and 1 play per turn. You are working towards a VP win and there is some dice to make it interesting.
Seasons isn't very CCG-ey. It is a tableau building game like Seven Wonders or Race for the Galaxy. You don't come in with a pre-built deck or anything.
Ashes is a lot like MTG with constructed decks and direct attacking the other players.
I'd only be interested if they make it more accessible and playable in less time.
Seasons, similar to 7 Wonders? Nahhhh. I can sort of see a Race to the Galaxy comparison, but it's still a little bit of a stretch.
I say it's CCG-like because you have the same building blocks of drafting 'packs' of random cards, classing them into rough categories of "early/mid/late game", and trying to make combos work - all the while managing your energies to put them into play.
So the difference is the constructed deck? I see
antiquegamer
Member
My only concern is if it's being put out by WizKids, the components will be awful. The last Mage Knight expansion is a mess and I am glad I waited before picking it up.
WizKids? Oh then it's never coming out here anyway.
Gets me hyped.
antiquegamer
Member
http://wizkidsgames.com/blog/2015/08/14/star-trek-frontiers-board-game-coming-soon-from-wizkids/
Yep, it's WizKids. I will reserve my judgement.
I have already read large parts of Homo Ludens.
This is still and interesting list to me.
Got a play in tonight with my wife.
Very interesting game. One thing that was nice, and a surprise comming from Plaid Hat, the game seems very balanced. Another nice thing is the decks are vastly different in how they play.
I was playing a deck that focused heavily on making the other player discard cards and run out of options to make sure you could get a few swings in with your low life and high attack minions, while my wifes deck was all about flooding the field with minions and using them for minionbased spells.
I really enjoy the fact that you get to choose your starting hand. It really opens up some new interesting strategic possibilites, especially when building decks.
Also the dice for mana are working nice. It seems to have fixed the, running out of stuff to do due to manastarvation, problem that can be rather a big problem in MTG.
I am also happy that the dice are only used for card play and not for resolving damage. I for one prefer this strategic game to the luckfest trash that is Mage Wars.
The game seems alot slower than MTG though, so I actually feel there is space for both games in the collection.
Will return with more thoughts after more plays. But its definately an interesting game.
EDIT: Misunderstanding on my part.
Arcadia is a tableau building card game about creating an amusement park.
Arcadia Quest I actually like a lot.
nicoga3000
Saint Nic
Played Carcassonne with my wife tonight. Skipped out on Farm scoring because that's a bit wonky (and it's not fun to have to strategize like that your first game). She beat me 100 to 70. She closed a HUGE city with like 6 shields in it and scored something like 48 points. That made it tough to catch up.
Bonus? She enjoyed it!
Bonus? She enjoyed it!
My wife likes Carcassonne too. I recently picked up Cacao at Gen Con. It's kinda similar. She likes that one a little better. One cause it's new, and two it has more options when laying a tile and end game scoring.
And here I'm completely booked to go to Worlds and haven't played in over a month :/ (work + life). Thankfully honestly NR is honestly not nearly as hard to get into/back into as it seems. Just remember you don't have to know even 10% of all cards and major strategies. Knowing that:
NBN/HB=FA (or sometimes kill with NBN)
Weyland=Kill via tag
Jinteki=Kill via traps
Shapers go for R&D (consistent and fast)
Crims go for HQ (good early slow late)
Anarchs are Archives (sort of) and most importantly slow early but good late
I ended up getting Trace Amount, Study in Static, Second Thoughts and Mala Tempora out of the deal.
Aside from the two sold out packs which are in the queue, are there any other must haves? Should I just start with the big box expansions that add the most to the factions I like?
Aside from the two sold out packs which are in the queue, are there any other must haves? Should I just start with the big box expansions that add the most to the factions I like?
Affeinvasion
Member
Anyone pick up that new VS system box? Any good? Any differences from what was released at gen con last year? I've never played the game but I'm intrigued.
The Xtortionist
Member
It's a different game than the original, but retains the same feel and some of the same mechanics. I followed the $10K tourney and community dialogue pretty closely, and most people seem to be loving it. A friend of mine also picked it up yesterday and can't get enough of it. We theorycrafted quite a bit before the game even launched, which probably says a lot. Just going by what I've seen, it looks like a very strategic and tactical game (much like original VS), just with the game's complexity focused more on combat than out-of-combat stuff. Looks to be plenty of deck variety in the box, too. I'd pick it up myself if I had a playgroup (anyone play VS in Las Vegas? lol). Old crew disbanded years ago, but I try to keep in touch. My second-hand recommendation is a "buy" if you like trading card games, which the new VS is in all but its distribution method - you get a playset of every card in the box, so you can build any deck you want right off the bat. Not bad for $50, considering that booster boxes of original VS were something like $60-80 a pop and hardly guaranteed a playset of everything even after buying a handful of them.
edit - here's a great review by Drive Thru Review that covers pretty much every aspect of the game.
antiquegamer
Member
Pick up Legendary Encounters last week and wow, I heard that it is better than Marvel version but I didn't think it would be this much better. I always feel disconnect with Legendary theme as it never seems like you are the superheroes team and feel more like a card trader. The "Coordinate" card really improve the co-op nature and I like the avatar mechanic where you feel like you are in constant danger of dying from strike card.
I hold off picking this up for so long because Legendary is not game we play all that much and all the missing cards snafu with the early run but now I wish I have gotten it sooner. My only gripe is with Legendary Encounters is still the difficulty of sacking cards you don't want anymore. May be it is part of the balance but drawing 6 cards in late game and still getting a bunch of your starter cards is really lame. The artworks is great but sometimes a little inconsistent (several artists?) I don't think I have any missing cards (that I know of anyway) so that is good and the playmat is a nice touch and I like it better than a board. Any card drafting game or card games that have extensive set up area really need to come with playmat, it make learning and teaching so much easier. The insert for the box is cheap and terrible not sure if I want to invest in Broken Token or just make a foam core one.
I hold off picking this up for so long because Legendary is not game we play all that much and all the missing cards snafu with the early run but now I wish I have gotten it sooner. My only gripe is with Legendary Encounters is still the difficulty of sacking cards you don't want anymore. May be it is part of the balance but drawing 6 cards in late game and still getting a bunch of your starter cards is really lame. The artworks is great but sometimes a little inconsistent (several artists?) I don't think I have any missing cards (that I know of anyway) so that is good and the playmat is a nice touch and I like it better than a board. Any card drafting game or card games that have extensive set up area really need to come with playmat, it make learning and teaching so much easier. The insert for the box is cheap and terrible not sure if I want to invest in Broken Token or just make a foam core one.
Someone brought Ghost Stories last night and it was my first time playing it. WIth 4 people, we barely won easy mode with a last-ditch attack on a 3-black-resistance boss.
Apparently it was the first time the game owner was officially claiming to have won the game, having lost (or possibly lost depending on rules interpretation) all previous attempts. It's hard to imagine some people finding the game too easy, adding multiple boss monsters, etc. We also had someone dead at the moment we won.
I am not a big cooperative game person in general, but the theme of this one in particular didn't do much for me. I prefer cthulhu/horror themes over all the yin-yang, tau, chi, etc. references. In terms of mechanics, having bad things constantly happen where your powers are disabled or dice are locked kind of annoys me, but I suppose that is a staple of the genre.
Apparently it was the first time the game owner was officially claiming to have won the game, having lost (or possibly lost depending on rules interpretation) all previous attempts. It's hard to imagine some people finding the game too easy, adding multiple boss monsters, etc. We also had someone dead at the moment we won.
I am not a big cooperative game person in general, but the theme of this one in particular didn't do much for me. I prefer cthulhu/horror themes over all the yin-yang, tau, chi, etc. references. In terms of mechanics, having bad things constantly happen where your powers are disabled or dice are locked kind of annoys me, but I suppose that is a staple of the genre.
nicoga3000
Saint Nic
Ghost Stories is one of my favorite games of all time. However, it is INCREDIBLY difficult. I firmly believe some board combinations are impossible to win on any difficulty, ha.
Same here. It's my favorite co-op by a good deal and I really like co-ops. Pretty much the only negative for me is that it doesn't play great as a gateway or with a dinner-party type crowd in the way Hanabi, Forbidden Island, etc. do.
nicoga3000
Saint Nic
Speaking of Forbidden Island, can someone explain what the Diver's ability is? Is it just that he can move through 2+ flooded tile as if it were 1 tile?
NuffDREW4two
Member
Enter a flooded or sunken space and continue to move through flooded/sunken spaces until you wish to end on a normal or flooded tile -- all for one movement. You can zig-zag all you like, but can't go around the outside of the board.
nicoga3000
Saint Nic
So it has to be a flooded/sunken tile to count as one action, right?
joeyjoejoeshabadoo
Member
Here's a buying guide from Reddit that is pretty good.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Netrunner/wiki/buyingguide
The big boxes are a good place to start if you just want to focus on a particular faction. Creation and Control (which might still be OOP) is the best one out of the three available. Tons of great cards that not only make Shaper stronger, but can be imported into other faction to help them out. Order and Chaos is also pretty good, I think Weyland sort of got the shaft in that pack, but Anarch got a huge boost. Honor and Profit is probably the weakest, but I'm not a Jinteki or a Criminal player.
As for data packs, if you are looking to play either Weyland or NBN look into grabbing Upstalk for the Near Earth Hub ID and Up and Over for the Weyland Blue Sun ID. I personally think they are the strongest IDs for both factions and are a must. The San San Cycle has also been very good. I am in love with my Hayley Chameleon deck that uses some key cards from that cycle. There is also Net Ready Eyes in that cycle which has made the static breakers from the core set very strong. When it comes back in stock, grab Opening Moves. Jackson Howard is an extremely strong corp card and is pretty much a necessity for all corp decks.
NuffDREW4two
Member
Yup.
Ex. From start space -> flooded/sunken -> flooded/sunken -> flooded/sunken -> flooded/sunken -> flooded/normal tile (desired end space) = one action. Throw a normal tile somewhere in the middle of the above string and it becomes two actions.
Thanks, I'm definitely leaning towards NBN so I'll check those out.
Looking at that deck you linked, is running so few Icebreakers common? I know you have self modifying code in there, but having not played since launch and not knowing the meta well yet, that looks terrifying haha.
nicoga3000
Saint Nic
Awesome thanks - the wording was a little confusing so I needed a bit of help. Going to give it a play tomorrow I think.
E: Also, I finally finished putting together EVERYTHING for Shadows of Brimstone - both core sets, first expansion, and all Gen Con Preview models. This isn't a board game. This is something else entirely.
Ecto311
Member
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1556347499/?tag=neogaf0e-20
Anyone know why that "Need for steed" expansion to munchkin is $7 - so cheap? the cover pic in the sale looks different than the normal one but are the cards the same? People have asked in the page and it was answered as "English" but I have no idea if this would fit the deluxe version of it that i have or if it will stick out with different card backs.
edit - some of the questions asked on there and searching the code from the site show that it is a monochrome version of the expansion. That would suck to know by the back of the card what it is so Ill pass on that.
Anyone know why that "Need for steed" expansion to munchkin is $7 - so cheap? the cover pic in the sale looks different than the normal one but are the cards the same? People have asked in the page and it was answered as "English" but I have no idea if this would fit the deluxe version of it that i have or if it will stick out with different card backs.
edit - some of the questions asked on there and searching the code from the site show that it is a monochrome version of the expansion. That would suck to know by the back of the card what it is so Ill pass on that.
Huh. I've always played it with only sunken spaces, this makes it much better.