Boardgaming in 2018!

Oh one more upside I forgot to mention: this game works really well at 2 and 3 players. I haven’t tried 4 yet, but it seems like people like it at that count online. I think Dudes on a Map games often have problems scaling (like Blood Rage is probably my favorite, but I tend to avoid it at all player counts other than 4).

Just wanted to follow up and say I had a blast at the con as well and was happy to meet @geewhiz and play games with him. QT3 is a great community and it’s fun to meet people in person.

Aw man, now it looks like I need to get Lords of Hellas. This forum needs an unlike button.

-Tom

Tom’s not kidding. I’m getting in the car to go buy Lords of Hellas right now almost literally as I type this. On the other hand, I’ve played 4 games of Blood Rage since I bought it 2 days ago so these recommendations aren’t a complete disaster other than financially.

Speaking of buying new games, does anyone have any experience with Dungeon Degenerates? I like the theme and general presentation, and there’s a 2nd printing Kickstarter going right now…

If R Crumb did the artwork for a dungeon crawl?

I just cannot get past that artwork, the same was @Brooski can’t get past little anime kids in his World War II tank games. It’s like the designer and artist aren’t taking their elf wizards and orc shamans seriously.

-Tom

I wish there was an R Crumb dungeon crawl. I wish the artwork in this was as good as R Crumb. It’s got a fighting outhouse.

Well, to be fair, they are “escaped-criminal adventurers,” and R. Crumb was kind of a depraved guy, so it at least fits the general theme.

Btw, 8.8 on BGG? That’s like an 11 on IGN.

Yeah, 7.8 is about the maximum you get on all but maybe 1-2 games a year.

The art is the selling point there for me. I tend towards suspicion of new fantasy adventuring boardgames as there are a lot of them and strong mechanics tend to take a back seat to things like minis and giant handfuls of dice. (I do certainly have several I think are quite good, but the question every time is - do I really need more?)

Played Near and Far for the second time today, this time beginning a campaign and rolling in the Amber Mines expansion, including the optional cooperative mode. (As I tend to prefer coop.) Campaign adds a few interesting features, including experience for doing quest encounters (that can be spent on talents that carry over between maps, although they rarely have any more impact than a decent artifact or the like), sidequests (which trigger in place of a location’s quest encounter if you’ve gained access to them), and keywords (which…I don’t actually know? I think they probably affect encounters on later maps). The Amber Mines adds the titular Amber Mines in place of the regular mines (you lay out the mines via randomized cards and can move and camp there similar to the adventure map but with no quests and less danger or reward), as well as replacement tiles for the Mystic Hut and General Store (making both quite useful and introducing an optional Magic system where you move on a magic track and can unlock spells that you recharge at the Hut , get a score bonus for being the highest magic, and potentially can place a camp token at the end), new adventurers (some quite handy), a new threat deck, new artifacts and treasures, two scenarios you can run in place of the encounters on two particular base game maps, and of course the coop mode.

I was a bit dubious about the latter because it’s a bit tricky to make the same mechanics work for two typically very different styles of play, but it turned out to work pretty well in this case. Coop mode actually changes very little - there are slightly more quest tokens on the board, you draw random hands of artifacts instead of drafting, you don’t compete to use town spaces, you can trade most things (but not artifacts), and instead of competing for the high score, you are advancing a timer track, which advances the total score you need to be victorious. Finally, there are bosses associated with a final map in the campaign that you now must regularly defeat each map simply to be eligible to win. Other than that, all the same mechanics apply and you layer coop on any of the game’s other modes and optional modules. Since Near and Far is a fairly gently competitive game in any case, it simply switches from maximizing your own score and racing to goodies ahead of your competitors to doing some light planning around maximimizing total score and occasionally swapping a resource or two. Oh, and stacking one or two of you with a bunch of sword icons so someone can win a 10-14 Combat check reliably and mow down the bosses. It really ends up feeling like a toggle for personal preference rather than one mode being radically different or better than another. And I prefer cooperating with my friends, so I’m glad to see it included.

We won, not least because I managed to buy 4 advanced artifacts and 6 regular ones for a whopping 60 points right there.

Same here. Just opening it now. I should stop coming to this thread…I literally have NO open space on my book shelves, and I’m really excited to get this one to the table now asap…curse you GT3!

You are such a jerkwad.

Hellas%20en%20route

-Tom

Oh geez! I hope you all like Lords of Hellas and I didn’t oversell it. I’m curious what you all end up thinking of it!

After the lame fizzle of The Thing: Infection at Outpost 31, we had the long wait for Who Goes There? based on the original book. With high hopes that this would finally be the game that truly captures the bleak, gritty feel of OH MY GOD ARE YOU SERIOUS WITH THAT ART?

This has to be a joke. This has to be some late April Fools prank. No…no no no NO! I refuse to believe this is the actual art of the final product.

https://boardgamegeek.com/image/3660268/who-goes-there

Oh my.

Do not want.

Played Terra Mystica last night. Probably the heaviest game I’ve tried since joining the hobby 9 months ago. Placed 2nd I’d 3. They tell me it’s better with 5-6 players but I liked it. Not in a rush to go buy tho.

I’m sure there are some Terra Mystica fans who would disagree strongly – and one in particular on this forum! – but I would say that Terra Mystica is obsoleted by Gaia Project, it’s sci-fi follow-up. If you get another chance to play Terra Mystica, hold out for Gaia Project!

-Tom

Shut Up and Sit Down did not think that highly of the value offered by the combined games:

Ah, Shut Up & Sit Down. The very best presentation of any board game review vlog…and the very worst of final opinions.

With Tom Vassal’s reviews I skip the explanation and go right to the final thoughts. It’s the opposite with SU&SD. They can usually do a good job of giving you a feel for a game, but their final opinions are as close to the subjective opposite of correct that you can get when it comes to board game tastes.

A few off the top of my head:

  • That anyone should even consider spending money on Seafall.
  • That Eldritch Horror is a bunch of pointless randomness that relies 100% on theme.
  • That Gaia Project is markedly inferior to Terra Mystica.
  • That Scythe is a waste of time and you should play Cosmic Encounter instead (wtf?).
  • That Blood Rage is a waste of time and you should play Battlelore instead (WTF???)

Tom Vasel. I haven’t watched much SU&SD, but I’m not sure I find The Dice Tower’s opinions very helpful…