If you like shifting alliances try Junta!
We had the second session of our Gloomhaven campaign, and it keeps improving. We did scenario 3 and 8 yesterday. We’ve had some, err, luck, in drawing road and city events that fit and reinforced the story of where we were heading and what we were planning on doing.
Since we’re still quite new to the game we’re making some mistakes, and it has been close to failure on a couple of the scenarios. We’re level 2 now, and the perks and new cards really work for customizing the characters and focusing the builds.
I picked up Smash Up a month or so back. It seemed pretty gimmicky—ninjas! robots! dinosaurs!—but I figured I’d give it a shot, gimmick or not.
Only just got around to playing it. Boy, it is an inexact game. It’s taking the approach of something like Magic the Gathering—simple rules systems made complicated by the cards that override them—and throwing out all the precision in describing those systems. There was a lot of ambiguity we had to interpret on the fly, and this was only the base game with one expansion.
Still, with the right two or three people I can see the appeal of the gimmick. As long as no one’s taking things too seriously or personally, the absurdity of the game is kind of fun, and some of the factions are pretty funny.
Good news, Forbidden Island arrived!
I’ll add it to my growing collection. Thanks all for your guidance so far!
BG collection by Sam Posten III, on Flickr
Left side is new stuff, right side are christmas gifts from family, kickstarter rewards, and redditgifts exchanges.
Gloomhaven has landed…almost sent my back out picking up the box.
OGRE deluxe was the enemy of my back. Needed my luggage dolly to move it around. Alas, I sold it when we downsized to an apartment (my back is happy about it along with my wife not having to look at the big box anymore)
Same. And…same. Sheesh, what a hefty box!
Hmmm…I was getting a bit worried about the lack of news about my gloomhaven arrival…
So I checked Amazon, which is where I buy pretty nuchal all my boardgames.
Apparently I never ordered the game…😕😮
It isn’t available from retailers yet. You would have to either have backed the Kickstarter or preordered from someplace that actually does boardgame preorders, which Amazon doesn’t really.
Iirc Amazon allows you to order it (goes through a reseller) and pay for it.
I’ll check my credit and debit cards etc because I was so sure I’d ordered it.
Apologies if this has already been linked, but here’s a pretty good gift guide:
Christian (my oldest son) and I finally played our first game of War of the Ring. We played the base game, no expansions (other than the Treebeard expansion and using the Aragorn - Heir of Isildur & Gandalf the White figures from Lords of Middle Earth).
I was the Shadow, he was the Free Peoples. I was curious at how he would do because I think this is probably the most complex game we have played yet, especially as a competitive game.
The game was a huge success! Not only did he really enjoy it (he wants to play it again as soon as possible), but he nearly won by destroying the ring! He was only one step away from the Crack of Doom when I was able to finally conquer the Woodland Realm. After a couple of turns, he really began to play smart, taking to the card play in actions AND combat. I did help him a little bit here and there with showing him options (like turning Gandalf into Gandalf the White, getting Treebeard into play, which by the way nearly ended Saruman early in the game, and getting Strider to become Aragorn, and other little things here and there…just showing him some of his options with his dice.)
There was a few times when I pulled my punches a bit. I could have attacked Minas Tirith sooner, for example. Instead, I held off a bit, allowing him to crown Aragorn in Minas Tirith. He still probably would have been able to crown him, it just would have taken an extra turn or so to get to one of the other spots. But, all in all, he did a very good job, especially with it being his first game.
The Shadow ended up conquering (for the military win):
Palargir, Dol Amroth, Dale, Minas Tirith, Helm’s Deep, and then the Woodland Realm.
Legolas & Merry died in the defense of Helm’s Deep. The first casualty to fall to the Ring was Boromir, in Hollin. He then soon after, he separated Gandalf & Pippin, getting them to Fangorn Forest, then turning Gandalf the Grey into Gandalf the White, and bringing in Treebeard (and came very close to eliminating Saruman from the story with back to back Ents Awake cards). He got the Fellowship to Lorien and rested a couple of turns before setting the Fellowship back out to continue the quest. He then, soon after, separated Strider & Gimli, heading to Minas Tirith to crown Strider as Aragorn, then sent Aragorn & Gimli to Edoras to help Rohan (even though his strategy there didn’t follow through and just left an army in Edoras with Aragorn, a few Elites and a Leader. This was probably the mistake that cost him the game, as he probably should have set out to Helm’s Deep to relieve the siege there). He did separate Legolas & Merry, though, sending them to Helm’s Deep before the siege actually began (I was waiting for more troops to arrive, as the Ents Awake cards and the battle at the Fords of Isen took a lot out of the Isengard army). It was in the siege of Helm’s Deep that Legolas & Merry died (so sad, too bad). They caused me a lot of grief though, as ther leader re-rolls and Legolas’ combat strength was tough to overcome.
The first strike from the Shadow was a huge Southron & Easterling army sweeping southern Gondor, taking both Palargir and then Dol Amroth, before heading around the mountains to join the weakened Isengard Army to set siege at Helm’s Deep. Meanwhile, far to the north, another S&E army, led by a Nazgul, took Dale, then prepared to assault the Woodland Realm. Sometime during this, the Witchking came into play, bolstering the soon attack on Minas Tirith. Once Aragorn was crowned, though, I decided to play “The Witchking Returns”, sending him to Angmar to begin a possible attack through the Shire, Grey Havens and Erin Luid, but Tom Bombadil’s protection stopped any assault from actually happening. So, the Witchking and 3 other Nazgul were sent back to Minas Tirith to begin the attack there, while other Nazgul were sent to the other areas of Middle Earth to help lead attacks and sieges. The army in Dol Gulder joined up with the army from Moria (and ultimately the Witchking, also) and was in place to assault Lorien.
Minas Tirith fell, then finally Helm’s Deep, followed up with the final conquest of The Woodland Realm, giving the Shadow the military win. It was interesting watching the game unfold, as there was 3 or 4 sieges all taking place at the same time, with other armies in place to begin new attacks.
Christian said there was a lot of tension as his side kept losing battles and strongholds, but the fellowship was so close. There was one play that greatly helped me, though, and probably really helped me win. He had 2 Will of the West dice, and probably would have moved the Fellowship to the final step to win (assuming he would have survived corruption), but I played a card that discarded his unused Will of the West dice results, basically stopping the Fellowship from moving.
Was just an awesome game…so glad he liked it.
Lord of the Rings LCG is getting a digital version.
I eagerly await details of whatever eminently reasonable business model it will feature. :)
-Tom
Magic had a great version of the game I loved playing with others. I kept thinking they just need to tweak it a little bit, open up to deck building, like deck building and it will be great. Then they went F2P, started nickle and diming, and made a crappier version each year. I want to be hopeful, not sure I will get there.
You know, we played Junta a few years ago, almost 30 years after we played it last, and it didn’t hold up for us. And we loved it in 1987.
Even after everyone talking about how big and heavy the Gloomhaven box was, I was still surprised. The only game I have that even comes close is Clockwork Wars.
Agreed…sigh
Maybe it’s time to throw in the towel and stop being a gamer. I’ve heard gardening is pretty popular as a hobby, maybe I should try that.
I’ve got some bad news for you, re: global warming.
Got my copy of Fallout today - punched and assembled and ready to go for tomorrow! War may never change but this map sure will!
The character cards are awesome and clever but holy hell what a pita to put together.