Has anybody here played with the mobile companion app for Apocrypha? Apparently it adds daily game mods called Temporal Mutations. Example:
I think it was me on this forum, but I stole that off of seeing others do it on Youtube. And yes, with a nice velvety token bag and those clackity tokens…man. It makes a world of difference, even though it’s hard to describe why.
:D
I do fully grok the criticism of app driven games…but I do like them. Perhaps more for the possible potential of them, but I like them.
So here’s a question. Tom, you mentioned the 2nd edition PACG rules. And Andon has mentioned that he prefers them, and I think it’s further maturation of the system as a good reason why.
Is Paizo going to continue to support these 2nd edition rules? The green box “Core set” I mean? Or was the intent to make this ruleset and then just try to shoehorn the older PACG cardsets in?
I will take this bait. I haven’t played enough solitaire games to make a top ten, so here are five.
1. Eldritch Horror. For the sames reasons cited by other people above; it is a feast of shoggoth-punching ridiculousness that goes down easy.
2. Comancheria. I found this game incredibly evocative, using its systems to keep me wrapped up in the back-and-forth history of my Comanche empire.
3. Nemo’s War. I am a sucker for good flavor text on cards.
4. Spirit Island. Provides a great sense of pushing back against an inexorable horde of invaders.
5. Darkest Night 2nd edition. Not Endless Night.
And a couple of others that I really like, but haven’t played enough to put them on a list: Champions of Hara, Atlantis Rising.
D’oh!
I was gonna let this slide, but then Tom repeated it!
I am so struggling with this affliction. I have manuals all over my house and then make a decision to round them all up and put them in the proper boxes, but never do. Then, I end up reading the rules on my ipad from BGG, which at times has updated or revised rules anyhow so maybe it’s not all bad.
Heh. Probably due to my dumbness! Gah. It’s literally sitting on a shelf about 12 feet from my desk, too.
Cool, thanks!
I guess I didn’t realize how much stuff they put in the first two boxes.
Hmm. I would like to know more.
I have been forever haunted by my days working in libraries when you learn that if someone mis-shelves a book, it is gone forever. No one will ever find it, it will never return to its correct place, and it might as well not even exist. It is in an organizational black hole from which it will never escape. That’s my fear with boardgame manuals. Did I put my copy of the Darkess/Endless Night rules book in, say, the box for some other Victory Point game, or maybe in something old like Agricola or Battlestar Galactica? Is it in with some boardgame I’ll never play again, buried at the bottom of a stack of games I’ll never even open?
The new Pathfinder boxes aren’t even that big!
-Tom
You’re 0 for 3 on my top 3 games of all time, then. I think Tainted Grail is a masterclass in everything you mention…well, except maybe execution, which was mildly wobbly in a couple places. Still great, though.
Though I like things like Champions of Hara and Apocrypha and PACG a lot too.
Would love to join in, and I even have lots of the games you’re all talking about. But it’s weird, the ones I have are called “co-op games” and they become fun when you add friends! :P
Anyway, I like the actual solitaire game Friday, by Friedemann Friese. And, it’s got one of those automated opponents, but I think I remember enjoying Imperial Settlers for one, though it’s been awhile. Finally, the Consulting Detective games (and offspring) are totally dandy played solo… except that I suck at actually piecing things together on my own. I really need other brains to bounce off of.
Since I’m kind of on the topic, I’m curious if anyone else has the problem of screwing up rules and losing track of turn order much more often when playing games solo? Like, cripplingly often. I’m way more likely to forget bonuses or minor rules–or blaze through a phase and totally miss a critical step–if my brain is not being attentive to other players and their turns or circumstances. Am I weird?
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This is why I haven’t tried to post a list. I’ve played exactly two solitaire games, Nemo’s War and Dawn of the Zeds. And I’ve only played each once. (7th Continent probably qualifies, but its support of coop is slightly less technical than Dawn of the Zeds or Nemo’s War, where it appears to exist entirely to let them put a higher player count on the box). All this other stuff is coop, and I’ve mostly played it coop.
This is why I don’t agree with the premise that complex games get more so the more people you play with. For me, the more that’s going on, the more helpful it is to have other brains tracking it as well. I don’t make more mistakes solo…I just don’t have anyone there to catch them, and I do in coop.
Yeah, that’s definitely a big factor for me, too (I probably make innocent mistakes in games slightly more often than most). Glad I’m not the only one!
Oh, holy hell. I ordered last friday and just got word my copy of Apocrypha won’t arrive till July 7.
🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
Atlantis Rising is pretty straightforward: worker placement on an island that’s crumbling into the sea, and the most efficient action spaces are in the areas that are most likely to collapse. You’re gathering resources that will let you build new, more powerful action spaces, and eventually the portal that will let you escape the island before it sinks entirely.
Like many solitaire/co-op games, it’s a race to achieve the win condition before the virus/necromancer/colonizers/etc overwhelm your world. I think that many people who play a lot of board games would find it too light, but I am a simple man with simple tastes.
I’d say it’s part of the appeal. You have to really know a game inside and out, and you have to concentrate on it, and you have to be willing to stop and look stuff up, and even keep notes. It’s an exercise in focus, very nearly meditation, a way to really dive into a game design.
Part of why it’s so different from multiplayer (and co-op) is that you’re not also including the social element of hanging out with your friends. It’s just you, the components, and the game design. When I play a boardgame with friends, it’s me, the components, the game design, my friends, our social dynamic, our unique interactions, how some of the players are slower than others, how some are really good and I need to be on guard particularly against them, how some players won’t really pay attention to the rules, how are more or less invested. There’s a lot more going on than just the game, and that’s the point, in a way. There’s a lot more complexity and interactive breadth in a non-solitaire game, but a lot more focus in a solitaire game. I love both elements of the hobby, but they offer very different kinds of experiences.
But, yes, it’s easy to forget rules. You have to work harder to know and track a solitaire game, definitely. I also tend to incorporate little interface “mods” when I play solitaire because when I look up a rule or concentrate on a decision, it’s nice to let go of remembering certain things. For instance, I keep a little marker to show whose turn it is, and I move the marker between player boards when it’s some between-turn stage. Or I’ll have a set of cubes to remind myself how many actions a character has left. That sort of thing.
-Tom
Not at all weird. I’ll throw in my own two cents and say that I certainly do blunder rules and overlook important things. What helps is being in a distraction free environment, and that’s what I essentially find so meditative about solo board gaming. A quiet environment, I can generally talk aloud to myself and get lost in my own thoughts as I keep track of various pieces, rules, exceptions and the like. I’ve found that when I do stuff up, it is easier and just more enjoyable to move on and recognise the problem for what it was, as something to be more mindful of in future. I find the difficulty in solo/co-op games to be hard enough as it is, so any small comprimise here or there helps.