Board Game Purchases

[Ink Asylum]

Looking at the expansions online, and I think I would enjoy Exodus over Pegasus. I'm reading a lot of negative things about the additions in Pegasus.

[Camel]

Finally got to play Dungeon Petz for the first time yesterday. Like pretty much any Vlaada Chvatil game (Space Alert, Galaxy Trucker, etc.), there are a billion little pieces and rules, but once you actually start playing it all comes together. If nothing else, his rulebooks are always very entertaining, and even contain a few laugh out loud moments. The basic premise of the game is that you are the owner of an imp-run pet store, where you raise monsters in the hopes of selling them to owners of dungeons. There are two major things going on in the game - sending your imps out to do things like buying cages, pets, and supplies, and then meeting the needs of your pets. They might be very aggressive, so a strong cage is a must. Maybe they will be playful, so you'll need to keep an imp ready to play with them. Sometimes they just might need to poop.

My favorite thing about Dungeon Petz was how thematic it felt. Granted, it doesn't take much for me to try to immerse myself in a theme, no matter how flimsy, but I thought the idea of taking care of little monsters, entering them into beauty pageants and eating contests, and then selling them to potential customers was really well done. Definitely looking forward to playing again now that I've got the rules down.

It's also got the best quality of worker placement games - that feeling of not having enough workers to do everything you want (Agricola is the master of this). There are ALWAYS little things to take care of, like cleaning up monster poop, getting work visas for your out of town cousins, stopping by the hospital to pick up potions or injured workers, getting one of your imps on the judging panel for the contests...lots to do, not enough imps to do it!

EDIT: Played another new game - Power Grid: First Sparks. I've never played the original Power Grid, and heard that this version is faster and less "mathy." You play as a little tribe of cavemen, building up technology which allows you to hunt animals (represented by very cool fish, bear, and mammoth meeples) and collect berries. Getting more food lets you put more cavemen out on the board, and the first player to get all their cavemen out on the board (maybe) wins. The instructions make the game seem more complicated than it actually is. Lots of fun, plays quickly, great components.

As an added bonus, my wife won, which means it will probably make it to the table more frequently!

[NotJeff]

Originally Posted by Camel

Finally got to play Dungeon Petz for the first time yesterday.

I love Dungeon Petz.

Originally Posted by Camel

EDIT: Played another new game - Power Grid: First Sparks. I've never played the original Power Grid, and heard that this version is faster and less "mathy."

They're very different games. I like both, but I LOVE Power Grid itself.

[Camel]

For my last new game of my two day snowed-in adventure, I played Glory to Rome.

I had heard lots of comparisons to Race for the Galaxy, but the games are definitely different enough that I want to keep both. Also, while Glory to Rome has a learning curve for sure, I didn't think it was anywhere near as steep as Race's (I know it's cliche to bash on the symbols used in that game, but they are just ridiculous at times).

For those who don't know, Glory to Rome is all about rebuilding Rome, piece by piece. You've got a lot of materials and workers to use, and the purpose of building things is not only to give you points to win the game, but also to allow you to break the rules in all sorts of crazy ways. I personally like that the latrine lets you discard a card, while the vomitorium lets you discard ALL of your cards. Really fun, and I'm looking forward to playing it again. I'll stick with Race for the Galaxy as a two player game, and Glory to Rome for bigger groups.

[Rune_74]

Woohoo, my expansion I kickstarted for Sentinals of the multiverse is on the way as well as Zpocalypse, oh glory days.

[PathMaster]

Top Ten Games NOT to play with an Angry Person

[Rune_74]

Well got my copy of zpocalypse and it looks and feels very well done. I have only played about a half game of it so far learning the rules but it is pretty cool.

Also they have started another kickstarter to replace your cardboard cutout stuff with actual miniatures...for things such as doors and sandbags and such...cool in my book.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/...iving-are-risi

[Camel]

Played The Resistance: Avalon today, and the addition of roles makes this game SO much better. As the assassin, I managed to correctly identify Merlin (I had a 50-50 shot) after the good guys had completed three straight quests. Freaking awesome.

I really liked the original version, but until today it didn't really click. I think a big problem was that in the three or four times we had played previously, the resistance never completed a single mission -- no matter what, spies messed the whole thing up.

I've also been playing Love Letter recently. It's cheap, plays fast, is super easy to learn, and sooooo much fun. Highly recommended.

I also backed the Kickstarter for Coup today, which is also set in The Resistance's futuristic world. I'm not a huge fan of the artwork, though. I think I might pick up the original version, even though it's more expensive. There's also a French edition coming out with REALLY great artwork.

[Ink Asylum]

The original Coup is a fun, quick game, but because of how short it is and the lack of actionable intelligence to gather it's a lot more luck-based than The Resistance. More often than not you're just going to go with your gut than any deduction.

I didn't really enjoy Avalon much when I played it. Maybe it was because I was playing 10-player games that had a ton of roles which were more confusing than helpful. Although I think I've mostly come to realize that I'm not a huge fan of deception-based games. I'm just no good at them and don't have as much fun.

[Matthias]

A little late for anyone who hasn't heard of this, but I just spent far too much money on the Dwarven Forge Kickstarter. Hopefully this spurs me to actually get more D&D games going at work.

[Dualonymous]

Just wanted to point this out. If you have not played any of the previous version it is a super simple game but is very fun and works well with any size group.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/...4?ref=category

[Drayven]

We have the first Red Dragon but haven't played it yet. We did get to play Last Night on Earth a few times and that game is a lot of fun. I gotta say it really moved them up a few points when I opened the box and saw they had included a soundtrack...

[Camel]

I picked up Twilight Imperium 3 in a sale around Christmas, but haven't had a chance to play it yet (although I hopefully will soon). Since then, I've read a few reviews of Eclipse and have started wondering if I bought the wrong game. From what I have read, Eclipse is more streamlined, but TI3 provides more memorable experiences (which I suppose is inevitable since it seems like it takes many hours more to actually play).

Anyone play both and have any specific preferences?

[Scull]

Originally Posted by Camel

I picked up Twilight Imperium 3 in a sale around Christmas, but haven't had a chance to play it yet (although I hopefully will soon). Since then, I've read a few reviews of Eclipse and have started wondering if I bought the wrong game. From what I have read, Eclipse is more streamlined, but TI3 provides more memorable experiences (which I suppose is inevitable since it seems like it takes many hours more to actually play).

Anyone play both and have any specific preferences?

I've played both and prefer Eclipse. I think that TI3 is a blast, but the time investment was just too great for most of my game time. That being said Eclipse isn't that much faster. A lot more streamlined to be sure, but it is still a hefty dedication of time to play a full round. I also like the bits better in Eclipse than in TI3.

[Camel]

As usual, it was Shut Up & Sit Down that sold me on Eclipse. Some of the stories in the comments make the game sound like so much fun.

Want to splurge on absurd super-shields? Great! Problem is, they require more power than your paltry reactor can put out. But wait... look there. You realise that you can just place a second nuclear reactor tile on your biggest ship, where the armour tile was, and then replace the existing shield with your new one. Yes! At which point you look at what your friends have built, desperate to claim edges of their own. One player is wielding flotillas of tiny missile barges. Another found a monumentally deadly alien targeting computer, but is still sweating over his designs, trying to figure out where best to use it.

I've played this twice. Each time it has bred hilarious stories.

One player disappeared into the void for most of the game, avoiding confrontation, only to re-emerge in the late game with a swarming junker fleet of tiny gunboats, equipped with alien warp tech. He jumped straight into a rivals home systems, only to go splat on the windshield of their super battleships.

Another time three of us struck up an unlikely alliance against a marauding pirate player, and a teched up warlord. These two chose to go it alone, and both came within a hairs whisker of winning, except the way the rules are balanced gave our fragile alliance a win by one point.

Tense until the last dice drops.

[Rune_74]

So got my City of Iron game from kickstarter, art is gorgeous have yet to play since I had to wait and get card sleeves since the cards are bit thin and I want to protect them....good reviews on it so far. A bit different of a game.

[Wilkz07]

I got Star Wars the card game for my bday. Havent tried it yet. Think i might go to the dollar store to get protector sleeves.