The New Board Game Thread (Newcomer Friendly)
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XiaNaphryz
LATIN, MATRIPEDICABUS, DO YOU SPEAK IT
Yeah, the Resistance basically combines the BSG game mechanic of people turning in cards to see if they succeed in a mission (granted, a very simplified version of it) into the Werewolf game framework. I think my group's going to dig it.StoOgE said:
Still wasting moves countering someone who's targeting you while everyone else can be on their merry way. Why Dominion lacks targeted attacks and Citadels for every other card has role-specific rather than player-specific attacks. I honestly think it's just a flaw in the game that's fixed by the expansion. Warlord is just a silly card -- Diplomat is a much better implementation.
So, I bought Beyond Balderdash about 20 minutes ago at Savers.
I really am turning into a monster, but so far have managed to buy like 6 games for 20 dollars total.
I'm selling one for at least 60 bucks, math trading 2 away for stuff I actually want to own and keeping several that I've always sort of wanted to try. Depending how the math trades work out, this could be a really killer deal.
I can't stress how awesome thrift stores are as long as you
1) realize you could spend 3-4 bucks and be missing game-breaking pieces.
2) realize you aren't going to find Space Hulk just sitting there (though, I did find a game worth 100 bucks). As long as you realize it is going to lean more casual games it's an awesome way to pad your collection.
Also, I think the people at Savers are getting tired of me prying open boxes to check for bits. Today's round of games had the packaging tape encircling the boxes. :lol
I really am turning into a monster, but so far have managed to buy like 6 games for 20 dollars total.
I'm selling one for at least 60 bucks, math trading 2 away for stuff I actually want to own and keeping several that I've always sort of wanted to try. Depending how the math trades work out, this could be a really killer deal.
I can't stress how awesome thrift stores are as long as you
1) realize you could spend 3-4 bucks and be missing game-breaking pieces.
2) realize you aren't going to find Space Hulk just sitting there (though, I did find a game worth 100 bucks). As long as you realize it is going to lean more casual games it's an awesome way to pad your collection.
Also, I think the people at Savers are getting tired of me prying open boxes to check for bits. Today's round of games had the packaging tape encircling the boxes. :lol
AstroLad said:
Yeah, I can see your point. Although, someone has to really have it in for you to spend all of their money constantly attacking you. I actually like it because it prevents a run-away leader and almost forces you to sit back in the back of the pack a bit and make a push right at the end.
I don't know, I take Citadels about as seriously as I take Bang! or some other party-centric game so it doesn't bother me. It masquerades as something deeper, but I consider it just a fun way to drink and fuck your friends over.
I can vouch for The Resistance for 5 or 6. I haven't had a chance to play it with more than that though.
We first played it just using playing cards to assign roles and had a great time with it. You should be able to figure out the rules from what is posted on BGG. One of the videos does a pretty good job explaining it.
I just received the published version last week and had a chance to play that with my group. The "Plot Thickens" expansion adds whole new layers of potential lies, but most importantly changes up the pace of the game, which can start to feel very similar from game to game with out them.
I am notoriously bad at being the traitor in games, but the last game of the Resistance we played I was finally able to fool everyone. One of my friends was really trying to deduce who was playing what role, and when a "failed mission" card came up with people he thought were trustworthy (me being one of them), he looked physically upset and confused.
It's a great group game that keeps everyone involved, even if they aren't selected for the missions. It's especially great with a group that knows each other well and you really start to pick up whether someone is acting differently than normal. I can highly recommend it. Plus, the fact that you can try it out using a normal deck of cards doesn't hurt.
We first played it just using playing cards to assign roles and had a great time with it. You should be able to figure out the rules from what is posted on BGG. One of the videos does a pretty good job explaining it.
I just received the published version last week and had a chance to play that with my group. The "Plot Thickens" expansion adds whole new layers of potential lies, but most importantly changes up the pace of the game, which can start to feel very similar from game to game with out them.
I am notoriously bad at being the traitor in games, but the last game of the Resistance we played I was finally able to fool everyone. One of my friends was really trying to deduce who was playing what role, and when a "failed mission" card came up with people he thought were trustworthy (me being one of them), he looked physically upset and confused.
It's a great group game that keeps everyone involved, even if they aren't selected for the missions. It's especially great with a group that knows each other well and you really start to pick up whether someone is acting differently than normal. I can highly recommend it. Plus, the fact that you can try it out using a normal deck of cards doesn't hurt.
Yeah, I really do want Resistance pretty bad.
I'm hoping it is at BGG-con. 20 dollars = instabuy.
Plus, it should make for good party-fodder as well. I'm starting to figure out games with good player interaction and shitty mechanics/balance go over better with some groups than well balanced games with limited interaction.
My love of economic engine games doesn't go over well with everyone :lol
I'm hoping it is at BGG-con. 20 dollars = instabuy.
Plus, it should make for good party-fodder as well. I'm starting to figure out games with good player interaction and shitty mechanics/balance go over better with some groups than well balanced games with limited interaction.
My love of economic engine games doesn't go over well with everyone :lol
platypotamus
Member
StoOgE said:
Le Havre isn't toooooo under the radar. It's another Uwe Rosenburg harvest game like Agricola. Not quite as good in some ways, but I love it.
Freakinchair said:
Looks like the actual big games were covered, but I've also had some good luck with taking shorter small games, like Dominion, and doing a sort of rotating table maneuver between rounds. 2 groups of 4, highest 2 scores from each join together, leaving the lowest two scores from each to play together, and kind of repeat as necessary. Keeps everyone playing, and keeps from being a fully segregated evening, so most people end up at a table with most everyone by the end of the night.
StoOgE said:
Not sure how much it runs, but the Werewolves of Miller's Hollow one is kinda worth a bit extra. It includes a bunch of extra roles beyond the basic ones (hunter, witch, little girl, lovers....) that you can mix in some of each round, to have things change up. Some are kind of dumb, but some work well, and it's nice just to have a new character or two.
platypotamus
Member
Then I'd have to think about making a facebook profile again.
Dominant Species 5 player got to the table tonight. Very well put together. It's one of those games where its pretty easy to learn, but there's a ton going on, and it may take until your second game to see how placement and scoring can work to your advantage.
Example, near the end of the game I had about 35 points in last place, the leader about double with 70. With a few proper placements I came back and won with about 111, and I earned it.
The final spread was pretty close, and it was pretty cool to see how all the different scoring methods are very balanced so no one just gets shut out.
The only real complaints I have are that AP prone players are going to suck the fucking fun right out of this, and the bits are....so...bland. But Mayday will fix that soon enough.
Recommended!
Example, near the end of the game I had about 35 points in last place, the leader about double with 70. With a few proper placements I came back and won with about 111, and I earned it.
The final spread was pretty close, and it was pretty cool to see how all the different scoring methods are very balanced so no one just gets shut out.
The only real complaints I have are that AP prone players are going to suck the fucking fun right out of this, and the bits are....so...bland. But Mayday will fix that soon enough.
Recommended!
platypotamus
Member
Flynn said:
Yeah, I killed my facebook profile like 8 months back during the big privacy kerfluffle. Not this current one (or even the one before that) but an older one.
Not that I'm that hardcore about privacy online, as even the medicorest of GAF detectives can find out who I am, etc, and I make no real secret, facebook was the place I was using specifically to post the more private stuff, as I was super selective about my friends/privacy settings on there.
Now I don't have one of "those" style online presences, they're all pretty much public me. If diaspora ever launches, I was going to get up on that though.
Played all of the games I picked up with a group last night.
Dominion -- What a brilliant concept. Deckbuilding as a game. Several options for customizing built into the base product, too, and it seems well balanced. Loved it.
Game of Thrones LCG -- Awful. Not enough ways to generate victory points, so the game grinded to a halt once I gained an advantage and locked things down, with a good hour remaining in the game. We ended it early.
Pandemic -- Very cool, but difficult. We didn't come close to winning across four playthroughs on normal. It felt like shuffling the infection discard pile into the top of the infection deck and immediately having to draw infections, after an epidemic, made outbreaks unavoidable.
Castle Ravenloft -- We liked this one less the more we played it. It would be so much better if the combat was actually the main element, but it becomes secondary to the random effects of the encounter cards you have to draw most turns, which are far more dangerous. In hindsight it looks like we didn't move through the dungeon fast enough. Would have liked that mechanic reworked and more depth to the combat and leveling up and so forth.
Dominion -- What a brilliant concept. Deckbuilding as a game. Several options for customizing built into the base product, too, and it seems well balanced. Loved it.
Game of Thrones LCG -- Awful. Not enough ways to generate victory points, so the game grinded to a halt once I gained an advantage and locked things down, with a good hour remaining in the game. We ended it early.
Pandemic -- Very cool, but difficult. We didn't come close to winning across four playthroughs on normal. It felt like shuffling the infection discard pile into the top of the infection deck and immediately having to draw infections, after an epidemic, made outbreaks unavoidable.
Castle Ravenloft -- We liked this one less the more we played it. It would be so much better if the combat was actually the main element, but it becomes secondary to the random effects of the encounter cards you have to draw most turns, which are far more dangerous. In hindsight it looks like we didn't move through the dungeon fast enough. Would have liked that mechanic reworked and more depth to the combat and leveling up and so forth.
EviLore said:
On Dominion: Get Seaside or Prosperity asap! These expansions make the game so much better. I also like the base game but after 5 plays I already knew what was going to happen. These expansions rally opne up the game.
On Ravenloft: Maybe Descent is more your thing then? I have not played it but I know that the combat there is more in depth and so is the leveling.
EviLore said:
It does make them very hard to avoid if someone (medic) isn't putting out infections with regularity. You really can't afford to let cities get at more then 2 cubes on them without risking an outbreak.
I really enjoy the game, but it essentially plays out in one of two ways: 1) You manage to control the diseases well from the outset and maintain a firm control of the situation. 2) Things go poorly at some point and then spiral out of control culminating in the death of billions of people. I have yet to play a game where things started to get really out of hand and we managed to come back from the brink.
Just make sure you always play with a medic and scientist. Dispatcher doesn't hurt either. Especially on your first plays through the game. And remember, putting out potential outbreaks is always more important than anything else you might be thinking of doing on your turn.
Another pro-tip: erradicate diseases. Once you find the cure, if you can send the medic to wipe it off the board those cards that get drawn have no effect at all on the game from then on out. Means you have a better chance of drawing harmless cards out of the infection pile. And the medic gets to remove cubes from a cured disease simply by entering the city the cubes are in.. he no longer has to use an action to remove disease cubes of that color.
EviLore said:
yeah, it happens. Sometimes even if you play the perfect strategy you still lose. It's what keeps the game interesting though.
What is really fun is if you just shuffle the epidemic cards into the deck and don't space them out evenly. You can run into 2-3 epidemic cards in rapid succession which is a recipe for disaster simply because you are ensuring the same cards get drawn over and over again.
BattleMonkey
Member
Ravenloft is crap, don't know why it's gotten so much hype and such. It's simple and DnD universe, but the system sucks.
And LCG's are just CCG's without having to collect and spend tons of money. But you still need to treat it like a CCG with all the constant buying of expansions and making your decks optimized ahead of time. The LCG's do not work well as is, and if your going to play and enjoy them you have to dedicate yourself to it like you would any CCG. Only thing that changed with LCG's is that it's cheaper and easier to collect.
And LCG's are just CCG's without having to collect and spend tons of money. But you still need to treat it like a CCG with all the constant buying of expansions and making your decks optimized ahead of time. The LCG's do not work well as is, and if your going to play and enjoy them you have to dedicate yourself to it like you would any CCG. Only thing that changed with LCG's is that it's cheaper and easier to collect.
I think Pandemic can be a little too easy if you get a perfect draw of roles (or just pick them yourselves). We always go random and this sometimes totally screws us over.
Thankfully I have the random ability to draw the Dispatcher approximately every other game, so that certainly helps out a lot.
Thankfully I have the random ability to draw the Dispatcher approximately every other game, so that certainly helps out a lot.
BattleMonkey
Member
Evlar said:
What? Dominion is not one of the LCG products
BattleMonkey
Member
Evlar said:
LCG's are Fantasy Flights rebranding of CCG's where it is no longer collectible. The games are still CCG in style and mechanics, but they now come prepackaged in sets instead of random packs of cards you have to collect. The mechanics, gameplay, and deck building design is still traditional CCG material.
Evlar said:
LCG = limited card game.
Think more magic: the gathering and less Dominion. The difference between a LCG and a CCG (collectible card game) is you know what cards come in the box already.. so there aren't any rare cards and you don't have to spend 200 bucks to get that ultra rare card that will really bring your deck of cards together.
Dominion is a game about building a deck on the fly out of a limited selection of cards. LCG/CCG are more about having your decks already built and then playing it out against your budy with their already constructed deck.
LCG/CCG are necessarily not naturally balanced because it is up to you to design an effecient deck for use out of the cards you have.. not the game designers job.
Blue Moon is an interesting game in that is kind of straddles that line. It's about playing a deck that is already constructed for you.. kind of like playing Magic:TG without having to construct a deck so everything winds up balanced from the get go and you don't have to worry about your opponent having a better deck of cards than you do (an issue in Magic the gathering.. sometimes your opponent has just built a better deck and there is nothing you can do about it)
It's also made by Reiner Knzia so it's better than most games because he is a god of 1v1 card games. It is also an amazingly good gateway game into the LCG/CCG for Euro players. I learned the hard way that I love the gateway, but not the games that lie beyond it.
StoOgE said:
Let's not be too hasty, as this threads resident AT apologist, I have to say I don't like GoT LCG and Castle Ravenloft looks like a total snore to me.
EvilLore, If Game of Thrones is a theme you're interested, go for the BOARD game, not the LCG, its pretty amazing.
BattleMonkey
Member
This "ameri"-trash stuff is annoying
It pretty much is dnd with everything that makes dnd interesting gutted from it. I've seen people buy it just to get the minis and tiles for use in regular dnd, tossing out the rulebook :lol
Chorazin said:
It pretty much is dnd with everything that makes dnd interesting gutted from it. I've seen people buy it just to get the minis and tiles for use in regular dnd, tossing out the rulebook :lol
BattleMonkey
Member
AstroLad said:
XiaNaphryz
LATIN, MATRIPEDICABUS, DO YOU SPEAK IT
It's the nomenclature of the hobby. Eurotrash is a common term as well you know. ;PBattleMonkey said:
BattleMonkey
Member
XiaNaphryz said:
I associate Eurotrash to things outside of board and gaming in general
XiaNaphryz
LATIN, MATRIPEDICABUS, DO YOU SPEAK IT
Then your context switching needs work.BattleMonkey said:I associate Eurotrash to things outside of board and gaming in general
Speaking of Ameritrash..
got in two games of Last Night on Earth in tonight. It's a game I've had on my wish list for a very long time but have never pulled the trigger on.
The good news: the game is light enough for my friends to easily grasp. The theme is also amazingly well done. I love Zombies, and this would be perfect for a game right before or after Walking Dead next weekend.
The bad news: There is no question left that I am a Eurogamer through and through.
FUCKING FUCK YOU DICE ROLLS.
So frustrating to plan everything perfectly in one of the scenarios.. forcing zombies out of the house, put everything into place.. everyone had extra dice rolls, all kinds of shit. and then we lost 80% of the dice rolls despite everything being stacked in our favor and lost the game because the zombies killed 3 of the humans.
Killing Zombies is hard.. Only a 14% chance of killing a zombie IF the zombie rolls a 1. For every number above 1 the chances of zombie death decreases 20%.
I enjoy the game and could see it occupying a nice area as a friendly little drinking game that no one takes seriously.. but the game has a few real problems.
1) 1 stupid player can ruin the game for the humans.
2) This leads to all of the other humans just telling the stupid one what to do. Probably not fun for the dumb person who already has to deal with going through life being stupid and all.
3) Too luck heavy, card draws make the zombies super powerful.. in one of the scenarios we played card draws for humans were next to impossible just because we had to defend the house in the middle of the board.
I had a lot of fun playing the game, but the eurogamer in me was screaming from the inside..
supposed to play Betrayal at House on the whatever next week. Looking forward to that as well.
Plus, with my birthday being this weekend I intend fully to subject my friends through nothing but economic engine and worker placement games all night Friday and Saturday
got in two games of Last Night on Earth in tonight. It's a game I've had on my wish list for a very long time but have never pulled the trigger on.
The good news: the game is light enough for my friends to easily grasp. The theme is also amazingly well done. I love Zombies, and this would be perfect for a game right before or after Walking Dead next weekend.
The bad news: There is no question left that I am a Eurogamer through and through.
FUCKING FUCK YOU DICE ROLLS.
So frustrating to plan everything perfectly in one of the scenarios.. forcing zombies out of the house, put everything into place.. everyone had extra dice rolls, all kinds of shit. and then we lost 80% of the dice rolls despite everything being stacked in our favor and lost the game because the zombies killed 3 of the humans.
Killing Zombies is hard.. Only a 14% chance of killing a zombie IF the zombie rolls a 1. For every number above 1 the chances of zombie death decreases 20%.
I enjoy the game and could see it occupying a nice area as a friendly little drinking game that no one takes seriously.. but the game has a few real problems.
1) 1 stupid player can ruin the game for the humans.
2) This leads to all of the other humans just telling the stupid one what to do. Probably not fun for the dumb person who already has to deal with going through life being stupid and all.
3) Too luck heavy, card draws make the zombies super powerful.. in one of the scenarios we played card draws for humans were next to impossible just because we had to defend the house in the middle of the board.
I had a lot of fun playing the game, but the eurogamer in me was screaming from the inside..
supposed to play Betrayal at House on the whatever next week. Looking forward to that as well.
Plus, with my birthday being this weekend I intend fully to subject my friends through nothing but economic engine and worker placement games all night Friday and Saturday
joeyjoejoeshabadoo
Member
The thing I adore about this game is all the complaints you have fit the theme perfectly. The game plays out exactly like a zombie movie. One dumb player can screw things up for the group but just like in a zombie flick there is always that one guy.StoOgE said:Speaking of Ameritrash..
got in two games of Last Night on Earth in tonight. It's a game I've had on my wish list for a very long time but have never pulled the trigger on.
The good news: the game is light enough for my friends to easily grasp. The theme is also amazingly well done. I love Zombies, and this would be perfect for a game right before or after Walking Dead next weekend.
The bad news: There is no question left that I am a Eurogamer through and through.
FUCKING FUCK YOU DICE ROLLS.
So frustrating to plan everything perfectly in one of the scenarios.. forcing zombies out of the house, put everything into place.. everyone had extra dice rolls, all kinds of shit. and then we lost 80% of the dice rolls despite everything being stacked in our favor and lost the game because the zombies killed 3 of the humans.
Killing Zombies is hard.. Only a 14% chance of killing a zombie IF the zombie rolls a 1. For every number above 1 the chances of zombie death decreases 20%.
I enjoy the game and could see it occupying a nice area as a friendly little drinking game that no one takes seriously.. but the game has a few real problems.
1) 1 stupid player can ruin the game for the humans.
2) This leads to all of the other humans just telling the stupid one what to do. Probably not fun for the dumb person who already has to deal with going through life being stupid and all.
3) Too luck heavy, card draws make the zombies super powerful.. in one of the scenarios we played card draws for humans were next to impossible just because we had to defend the house in the middle of the board.
I had a lot of fun playing the game, but the eurogamer in me was screaming from the inside..
supposed to play Betrayal at House on the whatever next week. Looking forward to that as well.
Plus, with my birthday being this weekend I intend fully to subject my friends through nothing but economic engine and worker placement games all night Friday and Saturday
You got it right, the game isn't supposed to be a deep experience. It supposed to be a super light beer and pretzel game with a fun theme.
BattleMonkey
Member
Zombie players can just be as dumb as a human player. Game can also play greatly different depending on the characters the human players end up with. The experience plays out differently pretty well each time, and the expansions add lot of great flavorful scenarios.
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