What BOARD GAME(s) have you been playing?

They don't really still have those do they?

Black Barney wrote: They don't really still have those do they?

What? Barnes and Nobles? Bookstores? Not in my neck of the woods anyhoo - they closed all the chain bookstores in Eugene. Thanks AMAZON!....Now I don;t have a place to go look at all the books and decide which ones I want to buy online.

For reasons unknown, I just drank like four shots of apple pie whiskey.

Now I'm going to go set up a solo game of Cave Evil.

That right there is the October challenge -- get polluted, play a boardgame and report back. What Board Games Have You Been Playing Drunk?

Terra Mystica is the most annoying game in the world. Only had two beers, so not drunk. Went in trying to care, got annoyed at how pointless it all was. Ended up taking the pass action the last half of the game. Will never play again.

Also played Edel, Stein & Reich which is a nice bartering game from the era when euros didn't suck. Thus concludes game night. Not sure how long it will take the Terra Mystica stink to wash off...

There was a thread recently about Last Night On Earth but I did get to play that for the first time in a few years the other night. It was a good time. It's not the best game and the zombie player played like shit which made it too easy but it still provides a story. It at least makes me care what happens to my character in the game...

I support all Terra Mystica related hatred. Thats one of those barometer games where if I meet someone and they like that game, I should just probably game with someone else.

boothwah wrote:

Black Barney wrote: They don't really still have those do they?

What? Barnes and Nobles? Bookstores? Not in my neck of the woods anyhoo - they closed all the chain bookstores in Eugene. Thanks AMAZON!....Now I don;t have a place to go look at all the books and decide which ones I want to buy online.

It's not red dot sale season in Utah at Barnes and Noble. I did buy a clearance copy of Mark Halprin's The Winter's Tale for six bucks. It is one fat paperback. For a while I had him confused with Mark Helprin, the neocon columnist, but now that I know they're two different people I've gone back to reading him. Ugh, I think they are the same person. It's still a great book though.
edit #3: He's not Mark Halperin. He's an intellectual conservative. I can handle that.

Michael Barnes wrote: For reasons unknown, I just drank like four shots of apple pie whiskey.

Now I'm going to go set up a solo game of Cave Evil.

I make that twice a year or so, 12 quarts. My mom, the ultracomservative, ultrapious Catholic gave me the recipe, and its ridiculously good.

Played Flick 'em Up thanks to Mr. Look. The kids enjoyed it.

Frohike wrote: The fuck is Wiz-War doing in there?

Edit: all of the other discernible stuff... yup.

I'm not that crazy about Wiz-War, and the person I'm most likely to play it with already has it.

Got my Coup: Revolution G54 this week and played it quite a bit on Tuesday. It's an overhaul of Coup with 25 different roles in the game (and no Foreign Aid action), and each time you pick one of five Finance cards, one of 5 Communications cards, one of five Force cards, and then 2 out of 10 Special Interest cards. There are definitely some crazy cards in that last group, like the diplomatic ones which make it so you can't be targeted, either by everyone, or one select player, or the ones that let you get a benefit when you lose a card. Some of the finance cards (essentially Duke replacements) are pretty interesting and interactive, but the Communications cards (ambassador replacements) are so similar that they hardly seem to add anything new. The Force cards (like the Assassin but generally more expensive since there's no Contessa) are pretty cool, especially the General which attacks everyone who isn't a General. I've lost pretty hard most of my games- I got really used to the old version and judging the strength of my hand and when to call people's bluff. Each game now is some strange new contraption that I don't fully grasp yet. I'm gonna keep trying it out. Either it's going to create an insane amount of longevity for the game system, or I'm going to head back to the original game which comes in a much smaller box.

I want that fucking game SO BAD, James. So bad.

A friend of mine is liking Chicago Express so much he bought a copy to play on his own. Now I'm eyeing German Railways or other Winsome games for when the game burns out

This Week in Descent 2nd Ed.

I have a love/hate relationship with this game. Every week before game night I dread playing yet more Descent, but as soon as the first mission starts I'm into it and I enjoy myself. I don't know what's going on.

Last night's first mission was some goofy thing where there were 4 statues on the map that we had to heal and protect. Two of them revealed an entrance and an exit on an otherwise-inaccessible, plus-shaped alcove in the center of the map, and the other two had other abilities (extra defense within 3 spaces and a free ranged attack against a monster in LOS at the end of the OL's turn, respectively) and they were the two that needed to survive. We cleared the map in short order - he just had 2 giants and 2 giant spiders - meaning that his lieutenant, the spider woman, was stuck in the alcove. The way the adventure is written it implies she's stuck there but the OL decided that was bullshit and brought her out. It didn't matter. We beat her down and called it when it was clear we were going to win.

The second mission was fun: the spider woman was going to perform a ritual to transform into her spider queen form and escape and we had to stop her. One of the fun wrinkles in the design was that there were four different colors of objective markers placed on the map, 2 of each color. The OL started out with a pile of 4 other objective markers, one of each color, to blindly randomize which of the ones on the map are active. So on the first turn he'd look at the token - not having to reveal the color until it's activated - and if a hero moved into a space adjacent to a matching one on the map the OL can place a spider on the token, simulating a spider dropping from the ceiling. Each successive turn another color activates and is added to the ones already active such that there are 2 colors active on turn 2, 3 on turn 3, etc. After the fourth turn it resets and starts over with one on the next turn. You can game it a little by already being next to a marker before moving onto it to prevent a spider from dropping, but most of the mission we had to deal with that asshole red spider that costs you a fatigue to move away from.

So the spider woman lieutenant had to go to a spot, start the ritual and complete it to transform into the giant ugly spider queen, then she had to leave the map. The OL also started out with 2 white and 1 red half-dragon guys (hybrids) and the red one's flame breath made him a priority target. On my Beastmaster's first activation the OL played "No Rest for the Wicked" = Any time a hero uses fatigue to add movement points the OL may move any of his figures one space for each fatigue spent. The first room had water (takes 2 movement points per square to enter), but I had a plan so I fatigue moved into and out of the water anyway. The OL played into my hands and used the card's ability to move the red hybrid closer such that I was able to get adjacent with one action left. Then I used my second action to use the Flash Powder I acquired last mission (As an action, test Awareness [Awareness = 4 for my Beastmaster] while adjacent to an enemy. If passed, the enemy is Stunned and you may move up to your Speed.). I passed, he was stunned, and I moved into a corner to mess up the spacing for his flame breath attack.

Our party ended up taking a flame breath attack a couple turns later but my gambit delayed him enough that we were able to kill the red hybrid before he could attack with it again. Thankfully, the hybrids don't respawn in this mission so after dealing with the white hybrids the OL kept delaying us with giant spiders - and the occasional spider drop - as we tried to make our way over to the lieutenant to kill her because, at this point, there was no way we'd get there in time to stop the transformation ritual. We got over there and my beastmaster, my wolf, the rune mage and the apothecarian formed a line to block the spider queen from escaping into the adjacent room where the exit was located. She has an action that, if you don't pass an attribute test, causes anyone within range (range 3, I think) to be cursed. Then when she attacks on her second action she can perform a Pincer Attack on two adjacent enemies and add a yellow die for each target that's cursed.

On her first turn activation she cursed all of us and wounded the hell out of me and killed my wolf. We put a couple of wounds on her and she hit us hard on her next turn as well. My wolf survived, though, so on my next activation instead of resummoning my wolf, I used that action to use my Flash Powder to stun the Queen so she could either curse us or attack on her next activation, but not both. We had to break formation when I resummoned the wolf but even though there was a one space hole the OL elected not to try for it and instead elected to try and slug it out. It was working, too, until the apothecarian and the rune mage started laying on the status effects. The apothecarian used her blowgun to poison the queen before equipping her knife that automatically does +2 damage against poisoned targets. The rune mage used the run that can cause a target to burn (+1 damage at the end of the turn unless you spend an action to put yourself out), so at the end the Queen was automatically taking 2 damage per turn. The apothecarian had a really good turn and dealt 11(!) damage in one round and my beastmaster and wolf finished off the Queen. It was too bad the OL didn't try to escape with her since, for the remainder of the campaign, he could have used the transformed version of the lieutenant anytime she was called for in a scenario.

That mission was a one-shot so afterward we went to the shop and used a travel event card our rune mage had been hoarding to add 4 treasure cards to the lineup since this was our first shopping trip for Act II gear. We bought better armor (Armor = 1 gray die and suffer a fatigue to add 1 brown die to your armor) and an ax for me. The ax, while not having the reach of my Halberd, rolls 2 red and 1 blue die, where 1 surge = +1 Damage and 2 surges = +5 Damage. I thought it would pair well with my green die-granting wolf, as well as my upgraded armor. I also used my 2 xp to buy the upgrade that gives my wolf a gray defense die and allows it, before it's activated, to attack with a 2 green and 2 red die attack before immediately dying. The way I read it, I could then immediately resummon it and I predict that next week there will be some rules lawyer arguments from the OL about why it's OP and bullshit. There wasn't anything good for the apothecarian and rune mage in the shop so, going forward, the goal is to get them kitted out with Act II weapons and items.

After Misty Mountain , Liam and I moved on to Combat Commander: Mediterranean , playing the scenarios we'd missed on the Allied Minors-driven burn we made through the list our first time.

Scenario #13: Tussle at Maleme
Against the 3 ANZAC squads set up in the centre by Liam, I set my Parachutists up on the left- Lauerbach's platoon of 3 covering against reinforcements, and centre- von Karsties' platoon 3 on the heights above Liam's deployment. My first mistake: I should've had 4 squads with von Karsties, aggressively setup so as to maximise early firepower.

Instead, attempts to break his mortar crews proving futile, my firegroup was soon labouring under smoke. I got a hidden IG18 which I soon pushed atop the hill to fire down at Liam's troops. I got a hidden medium mortar which I posted on the left with Lauerbach. Von Karsties' firegroup wasn't ideally posiitoned so Liam was able freely to advance a platoon of ANZACs into my right, quickly exiting most of them for a big VP swing. Lauerbach meantime had gone down in melee, for another big VP swing. I was too far behind to wait for time trigger VPs: I had to counter attack!

Von Karsties' 1 Ambush was met by 3 on the ANZACs' part and my counter attack ground to a halt no sooner than it had got off the ground. I was soundly beaten.

Scenario #15: Armata Romana
My right flank light platoon drew the fire of Liam's firebase before my big heavy central platoon popped smoke into the building in front of them and assembled up to advance in for melee next turn. Liam's centre was stricken! But- perhaps distracted by an exit VP dash, I failed to push the position either in the centre or on the left, where I had another strong platoon with a good assortment of weapons, before Liam got a command 2 hidden sergeant. The sergeant enabled Liam to reorganise his firebase around a strong melee stack w/MMG. My centre and left were paralysed in the face of this FP, even as Liam's firegroup manoeuvred into position for the killing blows against my command 2 sergeant's central MMG stack. I tried a desperate charge with reinforcement and remnants on my right through that, now relocated, MMG melee stack's line of fire to surround a lone unit for melee assault for SL victory- they were mostly broken and the attack failed, but I did get another unit in, only to lose.

A game that was closer than the final score might've made it look.

Scenario #20: A March in December
Drawing the Russians, Liam set his squads up strung out along the forest road as required. I went with the core of setup C as shown set up in the picture below:



- the full 8 squads in command radius of Captain Antonile, within his command 2- there were 6 molotovs with that group. Another 3 squads went down in the left-hand corner with Sergeant Rovena, while the rest were allocated to Lieutenant Pani in the left centre above the forest road to maximise the rout trap.

I didn't draw a Fire card at the start so my first turn consisted of discards- a Fire card! But Liam pre-empted it, advancing into 2 melees- one over-stacked melee to eliminate Antonile and his squad, and another the result of which escapes me. I counter attacked with my own over-stacked melee to eliminate Sergeant Kovalev with his threatening 2 command. Meanwhile, in the bottom left, Rovena's platoon broke Corporal Gordov's platoon with fire and melee combined.

Liam was 1 unit off his SL at this point and I pressed his stragglers hard with both Pani and Rovena's men, but he was able to regroup his force with the help of Private Gelon, who arrived in the nick of time to shore up Liam's position (Liam almost didn't take Gelon, until he noticed he had 2 Move cards in 1 hand- 1 each for Gelon and Corporal Krylov and their squads. This got them out from under my melee stack, and they regrouped to the centre. I tried to squeeze the noose to finish the SL victory, but realised that it was too risky given the balance of the VP, so I pulled back to let the Russians come on to me. They never got moving and I won on 10+VP at the first time trigger.

Scenario #21: Saint Agatha
Drawing the Italians, Liam set up a big firegroup of 5 squads with Sergeant Ottolini, his 2 command and the Italian MMG sitting on and around the central clifftop. A platoon of 3 squads went on the brow of the level 1 hill on the map's centre right. Against this I decided to bite the bullet and set up a 5-squad firegroup with Sergeant Buehler's 2 command, the HMG and an MMG, for an overall 15FP against Ottolini and his squad's 11ML- good odds for leader attrition .

Which I promptly did. I just kept breaking Ottolini and his squad, and finished Ottolini himself off with a sniper while he was out of LOS of my firegroup. Then, bringing in 3 of his 4 reinforcement squads deep on my left in position for exit dashes, Liam pulled Corporal Brachette back towards the clifftop foxholes. I'd readjusted my firebase to the right so I promptly opened fire with 13FP against ML7s. I rolled a 7 for a 20 and an event, drawing Air Support, which targetted Brachette's hex, breaking the units before Liam's defence rolls. Liam conceded when Brachette died leaving him a good 10 points behind with no leaders left on the table and units scattered and vulnerable to mopping up.

SuperflyTNT wrote: I want that fucking game SO BAD, James. So bad.

Yeah, I played Coup G54 more last night.

We tried playing with 7, even though the game lists 6 as the maximum, but the kickstarter version came with 4 of each role, so 20 cards should be enough for 7. So for the first game we tried playing the 5 roles listed for the first game, with 4 of them being almost identical to the original. The only differences were that the Guerilla (Assassin) costs 4 to do and it's blocked by other Guerillas instead of the Contessa. The Politician (Captain) similarly is only blocked by itself. In general, if something can be blocked in G54, only the same card can block it. The last special interest slot was a new one called Peacekeeper, which takes one coin and puts a peacekeeping token in front of itself, which prevents people from targeting that player with anything except a coup. There's only one token, so if someone else claims Peacekeeper it moves. People were kind of so-so on it at this point, and didn't like how hard it was to call people on their bluff with 4 of each card in the pool.

For the second game we instead played with 6 roles, picking one extra from the special interest category:

Spy (Finance):Take one coin, then take another non-Spy action.
Reporter (Communications): Take one coin, then take one card from the court deck, then put one card back.
Judge (Force): Pay someone 3 money, and they lose an influence card. Other judges can block it, and they pocket the money!
Priest (SI) Take one money from everyone at the table. Unless they claim Priest. [Pretty insane with 7].
Missionary (SI): When you lose a card from anything but a Coup, you can set a card aside face down and claim that it's a Missionary. Then you get a new card to replace it. If you're called on that and it's not the Missionary, you lose your first influence card and another for losing the challenge.
Intellectual (SI): You can set aside a card when you lose one to just get 5 coins. Doesn't really do anything if it's your second card, and it has the same vulnerability as Missionary if you're called out on your first card. Unlike the Missionary, you can claim Intellectual when you get coup'd.

I'm gonna put some placeholder names in here so that the people can stay straight with who's who.

I opened with Spy and Judge, and I thought, "cool, I'll get money and then attack people." John remarked before the cards got dealt that, "Spy and Reporter seems like a pretty good first turn." I Spy'd and took income, then John went after me, doing exactly what he thought would be good, Spying, and Reporter-ing. I called him on Reporter, and he actually had it. Not thinking about the new cards, I flipped over my Spy. Doug claimed Priest, and 4 other people (including me and John) claimed priest to protect themselves so he only got 2 money. Doug didn't know who to call, so he let it all slide. Then it became a struggle over who was actually a priest and claiming it. I got called and set my Judge aside as a "Missionary," and got... I think another judge. I was in trouble for the rest of the game, really. Ramon claimed Missionary twice (and it turned out he actually had it twice). He later called someone else on Missionary thinking that mine was real, and that helped knock him out of the game. The one person who never got called on being a Priest was Doug, and it turned out he never even had it! He died to being coup'd though, and it came down to Ramon (1 card), Hannah (who was laying low the whole game and not claiming priest... and somehow had 2 cards left), and John with one card. John was the last priest left and kept taking money from both of them. Ramon got taken out on his missionary call on Hannah, but Hannah had just enough money so that she'd be at 7 the turn that Josh coup'd her, so she return coup'd him for the win. I kept waiting for someone to get Judged and to Intellectual in response to have 8 coins, but it never happened. Most people lost cards just by being challenged.

One oddity with this many players and the Missionary is that the deck gets really low, especially if people safely bluff it. We only had 1 card in the deck. I saw some people talking about it on BGG- I'm not sure what the workaround is. If I'm playing 7 again and the missionary gets pulled, I might just pull a 7th role. 7 took longer and was a bit wackier, but I still had fun.

I know that I like a game if I come back for more even after losing badly. I wanted to play more after that game but people went on to play Bohnanza. Coup is a short game that only gets richer as you play more with the same people. Aside from the initial card draw (which you can lie about) there are very few random elements in the game- it's all player driven negotiation, board evaluation, bluffing, and backstabbing. I already played Coup a ton; I can see this version lasting for a very long time. I might even sleeve it.

One card I really want to play with that I haven't had yet is the Lawyer. When someone loses their last influence, everyone who claims Lawyer splits their money!