The unofficial London QT3 Boardgame Group has enjoyed several game days recently. Time to report! If you would like to join us, we game on weekends near Canada Water. Newcomers welcome, PM me! :-)
Hardback - rarely has a game appealed to me less based on what I was told and read about it on BGG. Oh, like Scrabble, but with some extra complexity? Bone dry theme? Some light touch deck building elements. I didn’t expect to hate it, but I did expect to be thoroughly nonplussed.
In reality? Loved it. It has this magical feature that every precious morsel of “downtime” between turns is actually your desperately needed thinking thinking time. The sense of joy when spelling out a word is tremendous. The deck build aspect is light but adds welcome depth and choices. Pushing your luck with ink and eraser is suitably risky and reward-y.
The ability to solicit word suggestions without penalty to yourself other than a reward to anyone whose suggestion you take up felt like a genius piece of design. I invited suggestions several times and it kept the game moving quickly. Sure, I did not win, but I also did not care! Fun to play, fun to compete, winning entirely optional.
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/223750/hardback
Not Alone Oh what a tremendous little gem. Very quick to set up and learn to play and tear down. Our group rarely play a game twice within the space of months, never mind a single session. That we played this twice in a row makes it something like one in a hundred special.
Amazing. It is a game where for the human players not talking at all might be their most effective tactic but both plays, with different players as the Entity, had us babbling with excitement, dismay and elation all the way to the end.
In both games our Entity successfully hunted the humans which may be the more likely outcome. It did not seem to matter to the enjoyment and both games delivered palpable tension and just enough hope until the dear end.
Paper Tales Take the deck drafting and fight your neighbours elements of 7 Wonders and make a lighter, quicker, combat focused game out it and you have Paper Tales. Another extremely quick setup, learn to play, play and tear down game.
I actually own this one but goofed badly. I went to prepare drinks whilst the rules were being recapped thinking sure, yeah, I know how to play. I then proceeded to be utterly befuddled by how the other gamers performed so much better than I did.
Even when I got out a Dragon, a very strong card, it was vanquished. Game of Thrones tells me that should not be true. Taking note, read the damn play turn card that is literally right in front of you! I played “hard mode” by mistake by failing to ever take the default 2 gold per turn income.
Avoid my mistake, buy this game, draw your 2 gold, enjoy! :-P