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[Vinci]

That is kind of my problem. The game just *screams* YOU ARE A NERD. Which makes it hard to get my casual friends to play it, and my friends who are into board games would rather play brain burners like the above mentioned Martin Wallace migrane of joy in a box. I think I would have had better luck with Vinci actually.

Yeah, I'm more of a middle-of-the-road kind of guy. I'm a bit more brain-burnery than the rest of my group, but I cannot fathom how some people play these insanely long tactical games for a whole day without just feeling miserable several hours in. I'm fond of strategy titles and the like, but I'd rather have some good, proper tension and then get the fuck away from it. :lol

 

[AstroLad]

Yeah, I'm more of a middle-of-the-road kind of guy. I'm a bit more brain-burnery than the rest of my group, but I cannot fathom how some people play these insanely long tactical games for a whole day without just feeling miserable several hours in. I'm fond of strategy titles and the like, but I'd rather have some good, proper tension and then get the fuck away from it. :lol

6+ hours of nonstop thrills!

 

[BattleMonkey]

Yeah, I'm more of a middle-of-the-road kind of guy. I'm a bit more brain-burnery than the rest of my group, but I cannot fathom how some people play these insanely long tactical games for a whole day without just feeling miserable several hours in. I'm fond of strategy titles and the like, but I'd rather have some good, proper tension and then get the fuck away from it. :lol

As long as you play with good friends, it's all good fun for hours usually. With random casual gaming people, I can see it being an issue to play some longer games, but with some good buds it can be hours of just fun and not really sitting their staring at a board for hours.

Theres also a difference between long and COMPLICATED games with tons of rule looking up, and long games that are easy to play.

 

[Vinci]

6+ hours of nonstop thrills!

Yes, I'm sure those particular 38 years were just fun as hell. :lol

As long as you play with good friends, it's all good fun for hours usually. With random casual gaming people, I can see it being an issue to play some longer games, but with some good buds it can be hours of just fun and not really sitting their staring at a board for hours.

Oh, I'm not saying it's impossible, per se. Just that I don't think I could see myself doing it. I think I'm too naturally hyper to do that - it would start feeling like I was working a jigsaw, which I detest.

 

[StoOgE]

I try and limit my games to around 4 hours max, and I only have a few of those.

Most of my games are played in 2-3 hours time. Le Havre is probably my longest game, but it doesn't feel that bad.

I like to play a couple of "filler" games to start the evening and then one longer one.

Martin Wallace games don't typically take more than 2-3 hours, but they are as heavy as heavy can be. It's funny how my two favorite desingers are Wallace and Knizia since one is known for really fiddly games that are overly complex and the other is known for really streamlined games with novel scoring mechanics.

Maybe because they both love auctions?

Speaking of, my 2 math trade games should be in tommorow.. Tempus (Martin Wallace) and Through the Desert (Knizia). Looking forward to both.

Also, I recently played High Society. Amazing little filler game. Played Money! too. Not sure how I feel about it yet, but I think I liked it. Incan Gold (Diamant auf Europe) is a fun little filler as well. I put all of them on basically that "For Sale" plane of existance.. fun little games that would wear out their welcome quickly if they were played more than 1-2 times a month.

 

[Merino]

As an ex 40k player 6+ hour games don't scare me at all. Especially if they don't have such an insane amount of dice, rules and modifiers.

 

[AstroLad]

I don't think it's a matter of being scared or intimidated so much as just uninterested. Many don't game with people who are willing to plunge that much time into a single game. And that's actually a driving force behind eurogaming vs. say minigaming/RPGs/wargaming is the idea that you can play something that appeals to people of all types and experience levels, including in theme, mechanics, playtime, etc. I don't intrinsically hate the idea -- we had an awesome 7-hour game of Arkham Horror over the holidays -- but there's no way a 6-hour game would ever fly with my regular group. That said I'm glad there are companies out there willing to fill that niche and I'm almost always at least morbidly curious about non-RPG/wargame/mini games that have long playtimes.

 

[BattleMonkey]

A game of 40k should run no longer than 2 hours anyways. A 6 hour tourny will usually get you in 3 matches in standard formats.

Lot of board games I play last far longer than a 40k match.

 

[Vinci]

I don't think it's a matter of being scared or intimidated so much as just uninterested. Many don't game with people who are willing to plunge that much time into a single game. And that's actually a driving force behind eurogaming vs. say minigaming/RPGs/wargaming is the idea that you can play something that appeals to people of all types and experience levels, including in theme, mechanics, playtime, etc. I don't intrinsically hate the idea -- we had an awesome 7-hour game of Arkham Horror over the holidays -- but there's no way a 6-hour game would ever fly with my regular group. That said I'm glad there are companies out there willing to fill that niche and I'm almost always at least morbidly curious about non-RPG/wargame/mini games that have long playtimes.

Exactly. I just know myself well enough to know that I would likely never enjoy something that extensive time-wise. I would always be thinking about how many really fun, diverse gaming experiences I could have had in the same amount of time if I hadn't played the epic one.

I'd love to one day try out Arkham Horror with the right group of people, but I still doubt I'd have the patience to do it often.

 

[Zalasta]

Everyone ought to play an 18xx game once.

 

[Neverfade]

Everyone ought to play an 18xx game once.

No!

 

[Neverfade]

I know that is the one thing that bugs me actually is the lack of painting. I think they will just leave them unpainted though to keep costs down. *grumble grumble cheapass gamers*

Much to the delight of neverfade I'm thinking of getting BSG in my next CSI order. The one thing that has kept me away all this time has been the fact that it seems to require 5 and we usually have 4, so I'll probably have to recruit someone else for our gaming group because from the reviews the dropoff in quality does seem pretty substantial based on player #. It helps that I'm on a co-op and check-making kick thanks to my big AH revival over the holidays.

RE: BSG

Yeeeeeeahhh! I'm happy to report that Exodus rules remove the sympathizer and thus make 4 and 6 player games viable again! Although Ill still prefer 5 to 4 simply because that's more chances to seed the doubt.

 

[Seth C]

That is kind of my problem. The game just *screams* YOU ARE A NERD. Which makes it hard to get my casual friends to play it, and my friends who are into board games would rather play brain burners like the above mentioned Martin Wallace migrane of joy in a box. I think I would have had better luck with Vinci actually.

That's interesting. My family actually took an interest in it because the design wasn't overly serious. Basically it seemed like fantasy-comedy, which it is. Had it looked like Dungeons and Dragons, then they would have lost interest.

 

[AstroLad]

imo you can only truly enjoy the game if you find the idea Mounted Ratmen funny on numerous levels.

(which I do but I digress)

 

[Mashing]

I don't think it's a matter of being scared or intimidated so much as just uninterested. Many don't game with people who are willing to plunge that much time into a single game. And that's actually a driving force behind eurogaming vs. say minigaming/RPGs/wargaming is the idea that you can play something that appeals to people of all types and experience levels, including in theme, mechanics, playtime, etc. I don't intrinsically hate the idea -- we had an awesome 7-hour game of Arkham Horror over the holidays -- but there's no way a 6-hour game would ever fly with my regular group. That said I'm glad there are companies out there willing to fill that niche and I'm almost always at least morbidly curious about non-RPG/wargame/mini games that have long playtimes.

I'm running into a problem trying to find people who like AT style gaming. None of the groups I've been too have really broken out any AT style games (unless you considers Defenders of the Realm as one) yet. So far my small collection is a mix of both euro and AT style, but like longer more epic games. So far I haven't gotten that kind of experience with a eurogame yet (but I'm still just a newbie to the scene).

 

[AstroLad]

Agricola and Le Havre can be pretty epic in the sense that you start out with almost nothing and end up with something 10x more complex than what you started with, and also just in the sense that those games are pretty tense 2-4-hour affairs. Now that might not be a clear narrative per se but it's not too hard to fill in the blanks if that's what you're into. I'm sure there are many others, but those are two that are fairly accessible and personal favorites.

If you are talking traditional gateway euros or abstracts then yeah they generally don't strive for that "epic" feeling. Pure AT gaming is really tough to get people into unless they are pre-existing nerds of some sort such that they can identify with either the gameplay or the themes. I generally find slightly more success with themes outside of fantasy/sci-fi, games like Arkham Horror and Tales of the Arabian Nights (not really pure AT since it's so story based, but a huge emphasis on narrative).

 

[Steve Youngblood]

That's interesting. My family actually took an interest in it because the design wasn't overly serious. Basically it seemed like fantasy-comedy, which it is. Had it looked like Dungeons and Dragons, then they would have lost interest.

I tried to play Small World once and it didn't go over well at all. That was partially my fault, partially the players (i.e. just not the right group for the game), and partially what I think could be problems with the mechanics. I say partially my fault because, even though I had read the rules and had a pretty decent idea of the basics, I didn't know enough to really be able to explain the point of the game very well. I say partly the fault of some of the players because a couple of the people playing tend to be guilty of quick, knee jerk reactions with little patience for learning the games -- meaning that the game has about 15 minutes or so to dazzle them or it's written off as boring. Lastly, I don't know if the mechanics really "clicked" with me (granted, we probably didn't get through half of a game). I could see that there was strategy to it, but it appeared to me to be kind of a toss up as to whether or not this "do as much as you can with one race and then get out there and do it all over again with another" territory control mechanic would actually be fun for the ten or so turns it would last, let alone subsequent playthroughs.

 

[Yaweee]

My (near-)full Dominion set came yesterday. Amazon put their Big Box and Seaside side-by-side in this huge three-foot box. Took out the plastic holder, cut on the larger cardboard shipping box in to divides, then folded and taped those to make bins for the cards in the Big Box. I'll take a picture of it once I get all the tabs inserted tonight.

Glad to see that the price for what I paid already went up ~30 dollars!


Smallworld has been a huge hit at my work's game night. The biggest problems with the game are:

- Too nerdy. Not a good gateway game at all.
- Good strategy is too hard to decipher. Like Ticket to Ride, first time players could end up with ~20% of the winner's point total.

 

[Artadius]

Yeah, stay away from Descent if you dislike long games. Vanilla games can last 3-4 hours easily (if not more). If you do campaign (like Road to Legend expansion), be ready. I think we had put in five four hour sessions and we weren't a third of the way through the campaign yet.

BSG from the Math Trade should be arriving today. Will try and debut with with Betrayal at House on the Hill a week from Saturday for our next game night... but we'll see. Both of those by themselves is already a long night I bet for first times on each. Might be new rule overload.

 

[Steve Youngblood]

- Good strategy is too hard to decipher. Like Ticket to Ride, first time players could end up with ~20% of the winner's point total.

Yeah, the design choices set the way for this. One issue is the hidden scoring. If you're not paying attention to what the other players are doing, it would be easy to not notice that you're way behind because you can't simply look at the board on any given turn to determine how you're doing. Another is that, though they are a also a big draw for the game's wacky humor, if you're new it's probably going to be pretty difficult to arrive at what you're supposed to be doing (when should I put a race into decline, what should I choose as my next race) as there's just a ton of combinations out there given the race abilities and special power tokens.

 

[Chorazin]

Mwahaha, a new convert!

Not just me, but the other two guys who played! I'm super glad I picked up the Seaside expansion on the cheap for use down the road!

 

[Merino]

A game of 40k should run no longer than 2 hours anyways. A 6 hour tourny will usually get you in 3 matches in standard formats.

Lot of board games I play last far longer than a 40k match.

Yeah we used to plunge way to many points in units in there I agree on that. My memory on that game though is that it always took forever.
And I think I'm generally a rather slow gamer anyway. Most my games top out far over the average playing time. Luckily neither my girlfriend or most of my friends mind it much but it does mean we don't get to play many games in one session that often.

 

[Flynn]

Yeah, stay away from Descent if you dislike long games.

I recommend Prophecy (by Vlaada Chvatil -- Dungeon Lords, Galaxy Trucker, etc) for those looking for that Descent/Talisman experience with smart Euro balancing and streamlining.

Z-Man told me there would be a reprint next year.

 

[echoshifting]

Seaside is easily my favorite Dominion expansion, my wife and I got Prosperity from "Santa" and it's already her favorite. We always "draft" our ten cards and she dislikes ending up with more than one or two duration cards in the set of ten, since they really do change the game quite a bit. Intrigue is on its way, and I'm sure we'll nab up the next expansion when it comes out, too, whatever that might be, so she's relieved to see their tendency to pop up on the table thinned out a bit.

Initially we just had Dominion and Seaside; I would deal out about half the deck of potential action cards to each (this is what we use the blue-backed cards for), set aside a few randomly chosen, face down, and randomly choose two more, face up. Then we'd go back and forth until we had ten on the table. Furthermore, each player chose a card to "ban" one active card after each game - those two cards cannot re-enter the draft pool for three games.

We actually do the same thing when playing with friends, since we both have practically every card memorized, and those who play it are barely familiar with it. ;p This allows us to get the game completely set up before anyone arrives.

Because Prosperity introduces new victory/treasure card elements, though, I'm changing up the system a bit. We'll still do the draft, and each person will always have a pool of 20-25 cards to choose from, but we rotate what sets are available in each round, as follows (skipping Intrigue games, of course, till it shows up any day now):

Classic
Classic + Intrigue
Seaside
Seaside + Prosperity
Classic + Intrigue + Prosperity
Intrigue
Intrigue + Seaside
Classic + Seaside + Prosperity
Prosperity
Prosperity + Intrigue
Classic + Intrigue + Seaside
Classic + Seaside
Intrigue + Seaside + Prosperity
Intrigue + Prosperity
Classic + Prosperity
Classic + Intrigue + Seaside + Prosperity

The new victory card and gold card only appear in games using Prosperity in the draft, and they are removed if less than two Prosperity cards were selected. We've done away with the three round ban, too, since it's so much harder for a particular card to pop up several games in a row. I definitely recommend it for couples, though, if you have one or two sets instead of three or four. Great way to reduce the "omg I can't believe you picked Embargo AGAIN" grumbling...

Insanely obsessive? Wellllll yeah. But Dominion is all we play right now; this helps keep it fun, competitive, and fresh every game (we NEVER see the same 10-card layout anymore, each play environment is unique - this is what keeps us coming back to it night after night). I'm not terribly embarrassed by it.

edit: I completely forgot I have an actual question: Do any of you ever play with the Ambassador card? Is it just defense for a curse-heavy game, or something? I have never seen it played and a cursory examination makes it seem pretty lame. I've been trying to come up with some sort of decent tactical combo for this guy for months.

 

[AstroLad]

Read the BSG rules and FAQ. Kind of surprised at how straightforward the game is considering how I've seen a lot of comments about it being hard to teach to casuals/crappy manual and thus a problematic co-op experience. Probably helps that stooge taught us Shadows Over Camelot (from which BSG borrow a lot of concepts) at BGG.Con and I've been slogging through AH expansions of all types the past three weeks so maybe that's why this seemed like a relative walk in the park. And I don't even think the manual is that crappy . . . the AH manual is way crappier .

Now to find a fifth player.... (well, and get the game at some point).

edit: I completely forgot I have an actual question: Do any of you ever play with the Ambassador card? Is it just defense for a curse-heavy game, or something? I have never seen it played and a cursory examination makes it seem pretty lame. I've been trying to come up with some sort of decent tactical combo for this guy for months.

Even without Curses people use it to flood others with Coppers and the many action cards that become useless late-game. I've seen it used on isotropic in this manner. I don't use it much myself though.

 

[BomberMouse]

That TTR expansion looks nuts, I'll buy it day 1.

EDIT: We are never going to finish those stone age games at yucata games at this rate :lol .

 

[echoshifting]

Even without Curses people use it to flood others with Coppers and the many action cards that become useless late-game. I've seen it used on isotropic in this manner. I don't use it much myself though.

Hmmm...interesting...new combos popping up in brain...

Damn this game is good ;p

 

[Unison]

I've been playing a lot of 7 Wonders the last few days, and really dig it. It's almost brainless, but at the same time the decisions that you have to make aren't ever too terribly painful, because you will end up getting something no matter what. It kind of reminds me of Le Havre (one of my absolute favorites) in that respect.

For a game that runs about 30-40 minutes, it really manages to get the ramp-up of a good city building game, and the rules are so easy to explain that it almost immediately clicks for new players. I have a mild concern that the game might be a little light strategically, but the play time makes it almost a non-issue.

This is probably the best first impression I've gotten from a new card game since Dominion. It seems as ripe for expansions too!

 

[Flynn]

I've been playing a lot of 7 Wonders the last few days, and really dig it. It's almost brainless, but at the same time the decisions that you have to make aren't ever too terribly painful, because you will end up getting something no matter what. It kind of reminds me of Le Havre (one of my absolute favorites) in that respect.

For a game that runs about 30-40 minutes, it really manages to get the ramp-up of a good city building game, and the rules are so easy to explain that it almost immediately clicks for new players. I have a mild concern that the game might be a little light strategically, but the play time makes it almost a non-issue.

This is probably the best first impression I've gotten from a new card game since Dominion. It seems as ripe for expansions too!

There's a promo 8th Wonder available from BGG.

We've been playing the game a lot and have found that there's a lot of strategy to be found from trying to read all the rest of the players' tableaus -- that helps a lot in deciding which path to chase.

 

[Yaweee]

Even without Curses people use it to flood others with Coppers and the many action cards that become useless late-game. I've seen it used on isotropic in this manner. I don't use it much myself though.

Basically that. It's most useful to dumb coppers and curses and clutter your opponents decks in 3+ player games.


The Amazon Big Box with the shitty cardboard dividers I added will likely last until expansion #10, or something. At this point, updating my collection with Intrigue + Cornucopia (upcoming small set) won't even fill it to half way. I might have to modify the Seaside box for the time being.


As for Randomization in Dominion Games, DOWNLOAD AN APP. There's quite a few on each Android Store, the Apple Store, and for PC on BGG. You can allow/disallow by set, cost, type, expansion, or even single cards, and worst comes to worst if you don't like a set of 10 you can just reshuffle for a new set.


Promo items on BGG are displaying as only $.01. Is that a typo, or is it that cheap to get giant stacks of blank Dominion cards?

 

[AstroLad]

Promo items on BGG are displaying as only $.01. Is that a typo, or is it that cheap to get giant stacks of blank Dominion cards?

They just make their money up on shipping though I forget how it works if you order multiple things.

 

[Flynn]

They just make their money up on shipping though I forget how it works if you order multiple things.

Yeah, the stuff I ordered has wound up costing $5. The Dominion promo cards are a must.

 

[Yaweee]

Yeah, the stuff I ordered has wound up costing $5. The Dominion promo cards are a must.

The Amazon Big Box came with Envoy and Black Market. I'll probably pick up Stash+Blanks (how many are in a "set"? 10 or 12?) sometime, but do they have any non-promo games? Still looking for a cheap copy of Carcassonne or Intrigue.

 

[echoshifting]

As for Randomization in Dominion Games, DOWNLOAD AN APP. There's quite a few on each Android Store, the Apple Store, and for PC on BGG. You can allow/disallow by set, cost, type, expansion, or even single cards, and worst comes to worst if you don't like a set of 10 you can just reshuffle for a new set.

I'm aware of the options...that's just the way we prefer to do it. The draft adds about 15-30 min to our playtime, but it's fun.

 

[Artadius]

So I still have $50 in gift certs at Amazon and I know I want to spend that on one more (just one more!) boardgame. Help me decide!

I have it narrowed down to:

• Arkham Horror
• Agricola
• Dominion
• Power Grid
• Puerto Rico + TTR 1910 Expansion
• Pandemic On the Brink + TTR 1910 Expansion

Gah

Leaning toward Arkham Horror... I wish it would show up in my personal gold box pick list. I've got my history stacked on amazon with nothing but boardgames right now.

 

[AstroLad]

Really just depends what you are looking for. Those are all very different games. I mean you've almost got the whole spectrum there save maybe a pure abstract. I would have a hard time even ranking them in any order they are so different. Right now I am very much into Gric, AH, and even Pandemic though.

 

[echoshifting]

To play with what kind of group? Arkham is glorious with the right group, a chore with the wrong one.

 

[Artadius]

We always have three folks, sometimes up to five or six (or more if wives are interested).

Here's what we're regularly playing right now in order of what I think most of us like the most.

• Pandemic
• Forbidden Island
• Ticket to Ride
• Descent
• Munchkin

I'd say that co-op games are hit right now. Our core players are all big fantasy nuts... but descent scratches that itch well when its just the three of us. When we have larger groups, we tend to play more Pandemic / TTR / Munchkin.

We have Betrayal at House on the Hill yet to be played but everyone agrees the concept sounds extremely fun and BSG on the way which will likely be a big hit or a big miss I think heh.

Arkham Horror, like I said, is what I'm leaning towards. However, none of us are necessarily FANS of Lovecraftian mythos. Most of us are RPG nuts though (recovering WoW addicts and former Pen and Paper gamers like DnD and such so story and theme is important I think).

I think I'd prefer to not do the Pandemic/TTR expansion either since I'm still trying to build up a varied collection first before expanding existing games. But those two expansions do seem like no-brainers.

 

[AstroLad]

You definitely don't have to be a Lovecraft fan to enjoy the theme and atmosphere in AH. That said, it's superficially quite similar to Descent in that it's a long-play co-op with a solid amount of complexity. So even though the two games are totally different otherwise, there is overlap in some senses. To me you can't go wrong with either Gric or AH. Do you think your friends could handle and enjoy a heavyish euro like Gric? Or maybe the co-op aspect of AH and the fact that it is quite a novel game make it the choice.

Anyone playing Merchants & Marauders? Just read through the rules tonight and it sounds really fun. Hope to break it out on Sunday. Learned two mediumweight+ games today whoo . . . it's like being back at BGG.Con.

 

[nilbog21]

Hey guys I am looking for an intellectual boardgame that is suitable for a group of young adults. I used to love playing scategories with my parents and friends, so I was thinking about buying that again, but are there any games I should be checking out? Thx guys need some good opinions

Maybe a game where you could incorporate drinking would be a plus ^^

 

[echoshifting]

!

I read that and dove immediately for Google. :lol

No details yet

 

[Neverfade]

Anyone playing Merchants & Marauders? Just read through the rules tonight and it sounds really fun.

I enjoy it. it's better with 4 than 2. More pirating going on that way. Those are some...crazy rules though. It took a lot of trial and error to figure some stuff out.

 

[Flynn]

Hey guys I am looking for an intellectual boardgame that is suitable for a group of young adults. I used to love playing scategories with my parents and friends, so I was thinking about buying that again, but are there any games I should be checking out? Thx guys need some good opinions

Maybe a game where you could incorporate drinking would be a plus ^^

In the vein of Scattergories and word/party games check out Prolix. Otherwise, the OP is a treasure trove of great suggestions.

 

[Chorazin]

Hey guys I am looking for an intellectual boardgame that is suitable for a group of young adults. I used to love playing scategories with my parents and friends, so I was thinking about buying that again, but are there any games I should be checking out? Thx guys need some good opinions

Maybe a game where you could incorporate drinking would be a plus ^^

Wits and Wagers might be a bit of fun, you get a trivia question like "What percent of US citizens is left handed?" and then everyone writes a number on a dry erase board and places it on a mat, and then everyone bids on who they think got the closest answer.

You could easily substitute drinks for the chips, I suppose, but you'll get blasted pretty quick. :lol

 

[joeyjoejoeshabadoo]

Promo items on BGG are displaying as only $.01. Is that a typo, or is it that cheap to get giant stacks of blank Dominion cards?

BGG charges ~$5 per item in shipping. I recently ordered one Dominion promo set and the promo 8th Wonder for 7 Wonders and it came out to $10 even.

 

[Seth C]

Yeah, the design choices set the way for this. One issue is the hidden scoring. If you're not paying attention to what the other players are doing, it would be easy to not notice that you're way behind because you can't simply look at the board on any given turn to determine how you're doing. Another is that, though they are a also a big draw for the game's wacky humor, if you're new it's probably going to be pretty difficult to arrive at what you're supposed to be doing (when should I put a race into decline, what should I choose as my next race) as there's just a ton of combinations out there given the race abilities and special power tokens.

It's definitely not a game that most people will get in to early on. I'll be honest, even I was skeptical of it right up until the end of the first game. In the end, the strategy (and fun) of it is the randomization of race/power combos and the process whereby you have to potentially pay to get the one you want (thereby increasing the values of any others). My opponent's second race to go in to decline had the Spirit power, so I immediately set out to wipe out almost all of them, knowing they could sit out there forever. Trolls were a force in decline because they still sat on troll lairs, requiring an extra unit to conquer. Near the end of the game when I was in the lead, I watched as the other player took the stout ghouls in turn 9, only to immediately send them in to decline at the end of the turn so that in round ten he could have points for two races in decline plus the active one, and get to attack with two races. It was a desperation attempt, but it made me realize how much fun the game could be.

 

[Chorazin]

Yeah, the stuff I ordered has wound up costing $5. The Dominion promo cards are a must.

I just ordered them, they look really awesome!

 

[StoOgE]

BGG charges ~$5 per item in shipping. I recently ordered one Dominion promo set and the promo 8th Wonder for 7 Wonders and it came out to $10 even.

yeah, and you don't get any discount for ordering multiple items. So if you order 6 promos you pay 30 dollars. I think that is to keep people from ordering all of the promos and hording them.

That said, the promo cards are awesome.

Black market can be a bit of a pain.. but I just use the randomizer deck as the "black market" since I use an iphone app to do my card selection.

 

[Mashing]

Oh, just saw a review for Merchant and Marauders and I think that might be my next purchase. I love that time period (and pirate stuff in general) and this game reminds SOOO much of the old Pirates! game on the NES (and to a lesser extend the newer PC version).

 

[CTLance]

Over the holidays I've played a bunch of Stone Age, Dominion (Vanilla+Seaside+Intrigue), Small World (All expansions), Forbidden Island, Settlers of Catan (Vanilla), Tobago, and an army game on a huge hex gameboard whose name I can't recall.

That army game was rather fun, if involved (we played with 6 players, each responsible for one part of the army). You draw cards with commands and combine those with a public stack to advance your army. Interesting concept, but the luck of the draw plus my miserable dice skills very nearly defeated us - until my right subcommander had a come-from-behind victory with goblin heavy cavalry that somehow just obliterated everything in its path.

I love my gaming friends. I could never hope to chew through so many games with only family and "normal" friends.


I was pleasantly surprised by Tobago and Forbidden Island. Both are on the less challenging side of things at the beginner level we were playing at, but the build quality and artwork really impressed me.

Plus those metal coins in Dominion Seaside really are a nice addition. They jingle and are shiny and metal and ooooh whazzat... *twitch*

I'm starting to take note of the materials and artwork more than the gameplay itself. This is a worrying trend.