Last week Diego and myself had arranged to visit Jeff to play some Vampire the Masquerade Rivals. Yesterday was the prearranged day.

I’d stopped at Asda on the way out and picked up some pastries to go with our beverages.

When it came to choosing our clans I decided I wanted to sit safely in my haven replacing the blood of my rival, so I chose Tremere. Jeff went with Brujah because he knew that clan from his learning game in the later months of last year. Diego went Gangrel. You can see who our leaders were below.

My rival was Jeff, Diego was Jeff’s, and I was Diego’s.

Multiplayer is such a different game to a two player game.

I needed Jeff to be more aggressive towards his rival Diego. But Jeff spent too much time early on taking out mortals in the street. Leaving Diego free to annoy me.

Luckily I had a ritual out that increased my havens secrecy, which bought me breathing space from Diego.

Jeff only had two vampires out. So when he did eventually start taking on Diego a window was starting to open for me. Which became wide open when Jeff attacked Diego in his haven and both the target and attacker got taken out and sent to torpor. Leaving Jeff with a solo vampire on three blood in the street.

I was able to knock out Jeff’s only remaining vampire to grab a victory by KO!

It was an opportunistic win. Next turn Jeff would have grabbed the win.

After my glorious victory in Rivals we played a game of Potion Explosion.

This has been a game I’d wanted to try since it came out a few years ago. However as far as I knew no-one I knew had a copy. But that changed last Friday when Diego bought it along and played it. So I commented at the time I’d like to try it and could he bring it along Monday.

Which brings us nicely to our time after our three player game of Rivals and a coffee and cake break.

I’m not sure how I feel about Potion Explosion.

I enjoyed the game. But did I like it? I didn’t hate or dislike it. I’d play the game again.

The game has that table presence, that wow factor, which has people not playing saying “what’s this game?”

Which is why I’m unsettled by my reaction to the game. I like it when games make you feel strongly about them even if it’s a negative reaction.

I can’t put my finger on why Potion Explosion makes me feel this way.

As you can see compared to the others my final score was not even close.

I had a great morning gaming with two amazing friends. A fantastic way to end the shortest month of the year.