Category Archives: Fenland Gamers

Fenland Gamers

Wacky Races

Fenland Gamers, formula d, game night
It was the end of the month. Which meant it was time for the second race in our inaugural Formula D League. In our first race Katie ran away with the victory, while Jonathan did not finish.
In a cunning plan, which I'm sure he'd been plotting since his going out in flames in the first race, Jonathan suggested a “handicapping” for starting order. Which saw Jonathan in pole position, Jo in second, myself in third, and Katie in last place. Basically the reverse order of the results from the previous race.
So even with the head start and an initial lead where it looked like Katie was getting a strong hold on last place, and a little smack talk from me. Somehow and I'm still not sure how even as I write this, Katie was in the lead, and pulling away. I think we lost it on the corners.
As Katie casually raced around the track admiring the sights and sounds of Singapore, Jonathan and I had a little tussle for second and third place, which in the end he ended up winning comfortably. Finally limping across the finish line and taking home the “Driving Miss Daisy” cup for last place was Jo.
That's back to back victories for Katie, a first time finish for Jonathan. I don't think anyone is going to touch Katie for taking the honours of champion at the end of our next race, however there's everything to play for, for the other podium places for the rest of us.

We ended the evening by introducing Katie to Bohemian Villages. Jonathan and I really should stop trying to play the “meta” game and using Jedi mind tricks on others to try and get a tactical advantage, and concentrate on playing. Katie kicked our butts at this game, some would argue beginners luck. But not I. Getting a massive score of sixty three is not luck.

Before our racing started Jonathan and myself had met up a little early to play a game or two as warm up. So we played Nations the Dice Game.

Our first game saw a couple of miss plays, like scoring only one point for being in front in books instead of two. The other more crucial was missing out the fourth age/round. DOH!

Neither of us got much of an engine going, mainly because there were very few tiles coming out to buy that gave us extra dice.

I sneaked the win. Despite the misplays, Jonathan liked the game enough to give it a second play. This time we played it correctly, and with more tiles coming out that gave more dice, engines kicked in, and more options of what to do became available.

Jonathan liked the game, and made the comment I think everyone makes after playing it, I know I have, it's over way too quickly. You just want it to go on for another round or two.

A great evening gaming once again.

Want to try Streets of Commonville?

Fenland Gamers, news, Uncategorized


If you are at the UK Games Expo this weekend one of the designers of Streets of Commonville will be doing demos of the game. 

This is an ideal time to grab Jonathan and get a look at this great little co-op game. In fact I’m hoping complete strangers stop him and say “hey aren’t you…” 

I’m loving the box he’s had done for the game.

Here’s wishing Jonathan a successful expo.

Sunday afternoon gaming

Fenland Gamers, game night
Yesterday I got invited to join Jonathan and his dad for an afternoons gaming. Upon arrival I got greeted by a puppy called Bonnie. Who was very bouncy and friendly. My ones will being giving me that betrayed look when I get home when they smell Bonnie on me.
Our afternoons gaming started off with the teaching Batman Love Letter to Jonathan's dad. For which he cashed in his beginners luck chip to win!
We followed up with a game of Brew Crafters: The Travel Card Game. A game I hadn't played before, but has been in my collection in the pile of shame for a long time.
So I was very glad to have this opportunity to play the game.
I enjoyed the game. The dual use of cards, either as a resource to complete recipes, or for its ability, is pretty cool. Which means you have to make a decision whether to use the card to complete a recipe and get points that way, or play the card for its ability and build up an engine that might get you more points when you complete a recipe, or get a free card after completing a recipe, or bonus points at the end of the game. It gives that brew crafting experience without having to go through the full on brew crafters game. It's a pretty quick to play game, I think it was about thirty mins most.
Yeah this is a nice light filler card game, which Jonathan's Dad won, leaving Jonathan and myself last with equal points.
We followed up with another first, this time for all of us, by breaking out one of the 18p (plus postage) games Jonathan got from Amazon US when they accidently priced up a load of games incorrectly, The Struggle for Catan. Which is Catan the card game basically, or Catan light.
Ok I liked this one too. I love that this gives that Catan feeling in a filler game. There are some nice touches in the game, like the destiny card which decides the direction that cards are “stolen from” if all of a card type such as roads, knights are taken. The city cards having different affects on the game such having players discard down to seven cards is nice. Plus there is a city expansion card that gives an on going ability such as protecting a road from being stolen.
I romped home with the win. I can see this game being added to the collection.
Next up Ladybug Lunch hit the table to refresh Jonathan's dad on the rules, because he was going to be teaching it soon on a trip. Three adults playing this game meant the game took on a surprise cut throat tone. Once again the spoils of victory went to Jonathan's Dad.
Our last game of the afternoon was Bohemian Villages. This was my fifth play of the game this month. I love this game. It's just a shame the game is not widely known. From my understanding there is no US distributor, which means none of those big video bloggers over that side have covered the game yet. Which means hardly anyone knows this game exists. If Stephen Buonocore of Stronghold Games was faster off the mark he'd be signing this game up before anyone else gets it. The game is bi-lingual (English/German), so technically doesn't need any work done on it, just needs getting out there.
I managed to beat Jonathan by a point, but his Dad once more walked away with the victory once again.
Finally thanks to Jonathan one of those rare photos of me playing a game. In this case Ladybug Lunch.

A great afternoons gaming, a big thank you to Jonathan and his Dad for inviting me along.

Our First Friday Evening Gaming

Fenland Gamers, game night

Last night saw the first weekly Friday Evening Gaming meetup of the Fenland Gamers at the Angel Inn in Wisbech.

The evening of gaming was scheduled to kick off at 5pm, Debbie rushing from work arrived just after. So while we waited to see if others would turn up we played King of Tokyo.

Debbie kicked my butt royally at the game. She won the first game with a points victory. Our second game we drew because I bought and played a card that did three damage to both of us, and killed both of us. Why would I do that? I knew I wouldn't survive to my next go. Debbie was doing an extra point of damage each attack because of a card she had bought. Two claws plus that extra damage would have finished me. So I settled for a draw. Our third and final game saw it going the way of the first game with me losing again.

Jonathan and his daughter turned up just as we were deciding what next to play. So we asked Jonathan's daughter to choose our next game to play. And she choose well, we were going to be playing Codenames.

The teams were boys against girls. We played two games, swapping over the roles between guesser and clue giver between games. Jonathan and I won both games. But it was great fun. You have to be able to put yourself into the head of the other person whether you are guessing or giving the clue. I was just grateful that Jonathan's comicbook knowledge and inparticular Spider-Man was good enough to get one of my clues.

Next up we played <spoiler alert> my game of the month, and a big favourite of Jonathan's as well, Bohemian Villages. Jonathan's daughter hadn't played before so we ran through the rules at the start. This is such a fun game. It's fun to watch some-one miss taking their income at the start of their turn, roll the dice and then realise what they have just done. Points lost. Then you do exactly the same on your own turn because you also got distracted or forgot. Debbie and I drew for last place, while Jonathan took first place.

Our last game of the evening was Ladybugs Lunch but hey it really should be called Ladybirds Lunch. This is Americanisation gone too far. I'd never played this game before but everyone else had. Luckily fifty percent of the design team was there to teach me! This was a game that Jonathan co-designed. You control a ladybird who has to clear the bugs off your flower. It's a “kids” game, no that's not fair, I'd call it a family game. A fun little family game. Thanks to Jonathan's shuffling (which his daughter loved) on my first turn I was in a good position to win on my second turn. Then Debbie and the others picked on me to stop that happening. A few turns later Debbie took the victory.

So our first Friday Evening gaming was a fun time. A good start, now to grow the numbers.

Pandemic Legacy October Revisited

Fenland Gamers, game night, pandemic, pandemic legacy season 1

Monday four bruised and battered adventurers once more tackled the month of October after managing to somehow get themselves back up off the ground from their last kicking by the game.

Joe the soldier had been dumped from the team, his inability to find a cure was not helpful. So parachuted in to take his place was Typhoid Mary the immunologist.

The easy objective of destroying two military bases was easily achieved, one of them was also a starting military base.

Between Mat and myself we had found two cures. The third was on its way. We had even built a vaccine building and had started making vaccine and using it to get rid of the faded.

Our third and final cure was in sight. In fact we were a couple of moves away from getting a much needed win.

That's when the game decided it had had enough playing with us, and it was time to put its meal out of its misery.

Once more an epidemic outbreak broke into pandemics, and like a broken record we ran out of faded and lost the game.

Our fourth loss in a row.

Mat was given the honour of opening the box he had been eying up since the beginning. Inside that mysterious box so many have seen but few have opened, were some cards! Cards that get shuffled into the players deck that will hopefully make our next game easier!

We decide to call it a day after yet another tick in the loser column, and attempt November next time.

But wow we are potentially now two games away from the end of the game, but with the way we have been playing more likely four.

 

Pandemic Legacy September Again

Fenland Gamers, game night, pandemic, pandemic legacy season 1

Wednesday saw the gang get together after a loooong hiatus (and still no ice cream or present from the holiday Debbbbie) to try and save humanity from being wiped off the face of the earth.

After restarting our first game once we realised we had already caught the paranoid soldier! Yeah that soldier that killed off my character Mustard by revealing he was a traitor! The character who was able to remove the faded. Our main source of doing this, apart from a couple of unfunded events. It was kind of a mercy restart also the game was kicking our butt.

With our restart well under way, things were not looking good. Things were just snow balling, outbreaks of the faded going unchecked, pandemics mounting up, a team decision was made to try and salvage something from this imminent defeat. We were going to concentrate on finding the virologist. At least we would have achieved something, an objective would have been completed. But more important another step to getting a cure for the faded.

It was a close one, but we did complete our manhunt, and the second piece of the cure puzzle found, before the game smashed us in the face.

So September had got the better of us. The game has a great win ratio against our team. Jonathan is going through a love hate relationship with it. Or more accurately battered player syndrome. The game keeps beating him up but he comes back for more.

We still had time to see if we could turn the evening around and get a victory on the sheet.

October saw us having to find patient zero at ground zero as a new objective. Not being able to remove the faded is hurting us. The nearest we can get to any form of control is quarantining cities. But it's not nearly as effective as removing them. Mustard you traitorous git you are truly missed.

Once again we set up to get patient zero as a priority. A priority we achieved. We now had all three parts of the puzzle for a cure. And our earlier misplay was now corrected. The universe was now back in alignment. Sadly the infected cities with the faded weren't. They were running away unchecked. We managed to complete a second objective of destroying two military bases, and cure a disease before time ran out like the faded. We could no longer place anymore faded on the board, so an auto loss.

Defeated again. But we did achieve some things we needed to do. We now have an answer for the faded. We can deal with them now. More about this next time when we can start using it in anger.

 

Empires and Villages At Costa

coffee shop gaming, Fenland Gamers

After spotting the new mayor and his deputy supping daintily a coffee at Costa and saying hi, I had just enough time to pig out at the local Burger King, pick up my free Lego that the Daily Hate is giving away, before ending back at the Costa to meet Debbie and Jonathan for a Costa gaming session.

Before going I had debated internally whether to message Jonathan to bring Bohemian Villages, but ended up not doing so. Luckily Jonathan had bought it with him along with his 18p plus postage copy of Catan the card game.

So our first game of the afternoon was Bohemian Villages. Despite having a nice in play lead on the points front, my undoing was not completing villages to score my town halls and instead taking a negative points hit, whilst thinking I had a majority in churches that I didn't have.

Jonathan just hit it out of the park with the final scoring hitting sixty points. I made it to thirty eight points, with Debbie coming in third with a very close thirty five points. The negative points and not having the majority I thought I had cost me big time.

But still this played really well with three players. I'm still really loving this game.

Our next game was a first play for all of us, and that was Eight Minute Empire Legends. So we were learning a new game as we played it.

I thought this was going to be a lighter game. But wow was I pleasantly surprised. There is a surprisingly amount of deepness to the decisions you have to make. Deciding which card to choose, how much to pay for it, is it worth the cos?t, or do you wait hoping it will drop in cost? Do you take the card for its action to do immediately or for its ability? Or are you taking it to block a scoring opportunity for one of your opponents?

This is a nice little area control game. There are some nice touches to it. The board that you are battling over is variable and changes each game depending on the tiles you select. We played the basic game, which you would for a first time, but there are variants included such as the legend cards, the explore tokens, citadel tokens and encounter tokens. Which adds to the replayability of the game.

I like that the end game is achieved when every player has a certain number of cards in front of them (dependent on the number of players, in our three player game it was ten cards). So this means you have a finite number of turns to the game, a finite number of actions.

I like this game, it will be interesting to see how the variants affect the game play. Plus I have the expansion also which I haven't even looked at yet.

I'm glad this finally got to the table. I can't wait to get it back onto the table.

Another great afternoon gaming at Costa.

 

As long as a John Bonham Drum Solo

Fenland Gamers, game night

Last night was the second Wednesday of the month and so the regular monthly Fenland Gamers meetup was held at its usual location in Wisbech.

We kind of had a theme last night of gateway/casual games. With a friend of mine from Peterborough and her daughter coming along for the first time, who aren't “gamers” but more noobs having played and loved Tsuro and Love Letter in the past and definitely not into the heavier side of gaming, our selection of games played were aimed at them.

Now I should point out that just because the games played are considered to be on the lighter side, that they are still great fun games for the more hardened gamer. Two of our evenings games are from my collection so that should say how I feel about those two games.

Our evenings gaming started off with a game of Sushi Go. Is it really nearly a year since I first played this game at the UK Games Expo, and bought instantly after the demo game? Drafting and set collection, great fun colourful art work. This is a lovely little game. And nearly a year later I still love it. I think the secret with these sort of games is not to over play them otherwise you get burned out, and no longer enjoy playing them. Having a variety of games that fill the same role that you can rotate, switch around, definitely is the secret to keeping these games fresh and favourites.

Our game of Sushi Go this evening was won by Katie.

We followed Sushi Go up with Batman Fluxx. This was an epic game of Fluxx. I don't think I've played a game of Fluxx that last this long, we must have been easily forty to fifty minutes. We had loads of new rules out, they'd get reset to the basic rules, then the new rules would build up. Everyone was trying to find a way to manipulate the cards to give them the win, but not getting close. We cycled through the discard pile twice!

I ended up with the goal that needed five or more Villians out in front of players and the Bat signal. Katie had the Bat signal in front of her. I had an action that allowed me to steal it. Wait I can win this on my next go, as long as no one else has a way of getting a win.

Jonathan took his go, no win. Then it was Katie, no win. My friends daughter, no win. Finally before my turn, my friend. Her last play was discard your hand then draw that number cards you discarded. Sixteen cards discarded, sixteen new cards! Why? Why would you do that?

Right my turn…

I got cocky, I asked Jonathan to draw my cards and just place them face down because I didn't care what they were! Right play my first card and steal the Bat signal from Katie. But Jonathan decided to throw a curve ball in my plan and bring it to an early end. He interrupted my action and instead was allowed to steal from my keepers. Damn! Right new rule Play All, OK better look at my hand. Wait, I still have a card I can play to steal the Bat signal. With the Bat signal safely in front of me, time to play the new goal and get the win!!! Victory! That was very closely me falling flat on my face in an embarrassing way after me being so cocky.

But what an epic long game.

Our final game of the evening was Camel Up. This is my second time playing the game. I gather Jonathan's kids must like it, because we suspect they played it last after Jonathan found it hadn't been packed away “correctly”.

Camel Up is a beautiful looking game. The pyramid dice shaker being the obvious show stopper of the game. The eyes are just attracted to it on the board. Not the most practical of things, but a wonderful tactile bit of theatrics.

Camel Up isn't in my collection. I don't like it enough to add it. Don't get me wrong the two times I've played it now I've had fun. But Colt Express fills a similar role in my collection.

Oh for the history books Katie walked away with the honours here too.

Whilst putting together the games to take for the evening I was going to throw in Age of War. But for the love of it I couldn't find it. I'd seen it earlier in the day. But now no sign of it. I could feel that little itch that starts when I lose something starting to kick in. I'd find no rest until I found it or got a replacement.

When I got home after a great evening gaming, I found the game. It was sitting under some Lego!! Mystery solved, itch stopped. I'd be able to sleep.

 

An Alternate Game Night

Fenland Gamers, game night

Last night was the last forced break from Pandemic Legacy due to holidays in warmer climates by a team member. Wait I wonder if I can make that sound even more passive aggressive? Anyway not to waste permission slips etc the rest of our team met up to play games.

First to the table was Glass Road. This time we were going to play it correctly!

Wow what a big difference that made. It's a very fast game when played correctly, thirty to forty minutes for the three of us. I do like the resource management using the two dials with the auto production of glass and bricks.

Now during last nights game I got the pond with a shark in it! Does this count as an Easter egg in the game? But I love little touches like this, Imperial Settlers has these in its art. It adds a nice like side chat during game play “oh look…”

My tactic in the game ended up being buying tiles with as high a victory point score on as possible, over ones that had a variable score based on the amount of a specific resource. Which after the final scoring saw me victorious by a single point.

Our second game of the evening was Traders of Osaka. This game was good as a two player game, but as a three player game? Wow!

It scaled nicely, it's just as much fun if not more so. Plus the game becomes more tactical, especially on the reserving cards, and buying the market. Timing is everything. Reserving cards becomes more a decision of do I want this card to advance my plans, or do I need to stop this card being taken to deny my opponents a scoring opportunity?

For example early on I was able to get the yellow ship to Edo for a payday, leaving green and red in dangerous waters and sinking. This wiped out Mat's green and red cards in front of him, he had no yellow. While doing the same to Jonathan however he was able to score two points on yellow, while I was able to score four points.

The other nice thing is that the market is changing more variable with more players, causing you to think on your feet and adjust plans.

Yeah Traders of Osaka is fast becoming a favourite.

After some chat such as how the box for Bohemian Villages could be smaller, however it's not upto the levels of Machi Koro for over sized boxes, we said our farewells.

Another great evening of gaming, and a clean sweep of wins for me!

Beverages and Gaming on a Saturday

coffee shop gaming, Fenland Gamers, game night

Yesterday a long over due Costa Gaming happened. Jonathan and I met up at the local Wisbech Costa on the Market Place to enjoy good beverages and hopefully some great games.

I had got there slightly early (had to get a birthday card for my Mum and a present, well it's kinda her birthday today), so I was looking through the games I'd bought with me. Oh why had I taken? Eight Minute Empire Legends, Traders of Osaka, Roll For It and Batman Fluxx. Traders of Osaka was out when Jonathan arrived.

So that is the game we played first. I've been wanting to get this to the table since it arrived.

It appears a simple game, on your turn you can do one of three actions, take a card for its monetary value, buy the whole market row, reserve a card.

Before playing and when explaining it the scoring of sets when a ship hits Edo sounds unnecessarily complicated using rounding up, multiplication and division. But when you start doing it, it actually isn't that much of a hassle.

There is a hidden depth and tactical decision making to the game. Having to decide when best to reserve a card, and when to take the card. Trying to manipulate the boats and when they arrive, or get stranded so they sink hopefully denying the other players of possible points.

I did like the game, it didn't disappoint. It worked really well as a two player game.

Our second game was a new arrival for Jonathan, Bohemian Villages.

 

This is a worker placement type game where your placement of your workers is controlled by the roll of four dice. You allocate those dice to generate a number, the only limitation is that you can't use a single dice to generate a number for placement. For instance if I rolled a 6, 2, 4 and a 3, I could use the 6 and 2 to make 8 and place one of my workers on farm or if I wanted a town hall I could use the 6 and 4 to give me 10, and then use the 3 and 2 to make 5 and allow me to place a worker on a tailor shop. As you can tell by that each building type is allocated to a number, for instance churches are 11. Some of these buildings give immediate scoring (which is in the form of money), others score at the end of the game (which is triggered when one player has no more workers to place), some like the inns once three other workers are in the village give reoccurring money at the start of your turn. Then you have mid game scoring that gets triggered when certain events happen.

At the end of the game the one with the most money is the winner.

Despite winning I like this game a lot. I like the rolling dice and combining them to allow you to place workers. There is a nice balance between immediate scoring, and end scoring opportunities. I like the art work. It's quick to learn. Jonathan and I did forget to claim some recurring money at the start of our turns once or twice. I think I lost about five points this way, Jonathan lost about three I think. Which brings me to the only “weak” spot of the game, and Jonathan and I both agree on this, the player aids could be improved, and made clearer about the recurring money, maybe some reminds to claim, and the wording on one or two is a little confusing.

After two great games Jonathan and I chewed the fat, righted wrongs, brainstormed before saying our farewells.

I had a great time in Costa, great games, great company. Can you ask for more?