Category Archives: game night

game night

Got to catch ‘em all

Fenland Gamers, game night

Another club night.

I took Splendor Pokémon and Tonga Bonga with me.

We split into a group of four (playing Power Grid), and a group of three (Dave, Colin, and myself).

We started off playing Splendor Pokémon on our table.

Whilst we set up a man came over asking what we were playing, and made a derogatory comment about being too old for Pokémon. And when we were asked if we played Monopoly I didn’t reply but Dave and Colin pointed out what a poor game it was. Shooting this man down. His partner came over and said their son collected Pokémon cards. The implication clear. It was obvious they thought grown men shouldn’t be playing “kids games”. I didn’t really interact with them. I thought it best not to. If they wanted to be ignorant and try and make us feel bad about playing games. They didn’t deserve my time.

A little known fact about the Splendor family of games (classic, Marvel, and now Pokémon) I’ve never won a game! If I include the two player Splendor Duel I have won a single game.

Despite having such a bad run with the game I really enjoy playing it.

Yes I no longer own the classic version. I didn’t see much point keeping it after getting the Marvel edition. I preferred what the Marvel edition added.

Splendor Pokémon is an import from Korea with no official english version of the rules. I had to rely on translated rules from the bgg website.

If you know how to play Splendor then you know a good 90% of the games rules.

You can only purchase the rare and legendary cards (which also can’t be reserved) if you have a master ball. So at some point you have to reserve a card on your turn to get the master ball to enable you to buy one of the face up or legendary cards.

You can also on your turn evolve your captured Pokémon (if the evolution is available). I like this a lot. The old card is replaced with the new evolved Pokémon. With the old card going face down under your trainer.

I like this version of Splendor and the little tweaks it added.

Dave won.

We followed up with a game of Tonga Bonga.

I do like this game. It’s very clever and deeper than you initially think.

But this time we never got to complete the game. We were in the closing round or two, when Colin had an emergency call that required him to leave immediately.

Dave and I called it an evening at this point leaving the other table playing Power Grid. The decision had been made easier with the fact I had no two player games with me.

Another fun club night despite the interaction with the “public”.

Gladiators in an arena

Fenland Gamers, game night

Last night was the fortnightly club night.

I took a bag of games on the lighter side. Amongst them was the recently arrived English edition of Strike! from the US Amazon store. This was a replacement for the european language version I had and was unable to find at home.

It’s the usual story for me. I’m unable to find something. Spend ages looking for it. Then over the following days the thought about it just naws away in my mind. Forcing me to keep looking at the oddest moments. Eventually to stop this driving me mad I have to order a replacement.

Then after the replacement item has been dispatched and can’t be sent back. Magically the missing item turns up in precisely where I’d been looking for it. This is how I’ve ended up with three copies of Knizia’s dice games book.

It was as I was leaving last night that the european version of Strike! turned up.

So now I have two copies. Not a total disaster. I could run a mini Strike! tournament at a future club night.

With only five of us able to make it. Or to put it another way. Only five of us with no social life outside playing games for this time of year could make it.

Yes the whole American Halloween fixation and traditional fireworks means a lot of folks have social commitments this time of year. So having five of us able to make it was a miracle in itself.

We started off playing Castle Combo. A frustrating experience at times. Some of which I’m sure was expert level trolling. Some of which was just annoying analysis paralysis. But still it’s a fun game. Despite Dave’s coin strategy, Marcin won with having a lot of keys.

Our next game saw Strike! getting to the table for the first time.

Strike! has been a thing for the Rolling Dice Taking Names guys for a few years now. Marty and Tony are split on their opinion on it. Is it dice in a bowl or gladiators in an arena? So to decide who is right they hold a yearly contest with listeners of the podcast split into two teams representing the opposing viewpoints at Gen-Con. The winning team means Strike! has to be referred to the opinion they represent for the year.

The reason I wanted to own and play it was as part of the research for my game idea. That is on the back boiler but not forgotten.

We had a blast playing Strike! In the end we played five games of it. There was laughing, banter, incredible dice rolls. For such a “simple” game of just throwing dice into a bowl it was so much fun and addictive.

Our final game of the evening was Sushi Go which saw Anthony win this card drafting, set collection game.

Another fun club night.

A Couple of Gaming Sessions

Fenland Gamers, Game day, game night

Friday evening was once again club night.

For me it was a light evening of gaming with my friend Jonathan.

That’s right Jonathan had made it to club night, and it was great to be able to game with him. It’s just a shame that Diego was on the other table. Then it would have been like the old club days.

We started off on our table with a game of Castle Combo.

Apparently this game had been getting a bit of buzz which had completely passed me by.

I quite liked this card driven tableau building game.

You are building this 3×3 grid, so in total you are getting nine turns before the game ends. So in that time you are trying to purchase cards that generate you money (to buy further cards), get keys, and meeting end game scoring conditions.

The symbol reference card is handy and very much needed through out the game as you learn the iconography.

It’s fun, accessible, fairly quick. And probably why I ordered a copy this morning. At £17 plus postage not that expensive either.

Our follow up game was Big Shot. My copy had arrived that morning. It was an odd experience with Martin our third player not taking out any loans, not winning a single bid, and finishing with the original money token he started with.

We finished off our evening with a game of Sushi Go. What more can I say about this fun drafting game? It’s a great filler game.

Sadly it was a clean sweep of victories for Jonathan. But great to share the evening gaming with him.

Sadly our Saturday afternoon plan of playing Cosmic Encounter was a three player game.

I used the Cosmic combo cards to select the alien races we would use for this session. After scanning through the 34 cards I settled on the quick-start set up.

I do like these Cosmic combo cards. They are a great way for 3-5 players to choose alien races around a theme such as trade or really aggressive. Shame FFG didn’t make these available as a separate print on demand deck for existing owners of the game.

We also used the tech cards (and associated rules), flare cards (played wrong btw) plus the reward deck.

Three players was fun, but a very different experience to our first game.

I liked the tech cards, and will probably include these in future plays. They give an additional choice to make if you win an encounter as the aggressor. Do you initiate a second encounter or draw new tech cards to gain new tech?

Charlene managed to beat Anthony and myself.

Our afternoon of gaming was finished with a game of Big Shot. Yes it’s fastly becoming a favourite filler game. Quick to teach and play. I managed to win this one.

A great afternoon of gaming with plans starting to get TI4 to the table.

Fallout the board game

Fenland Gamers, game night

Last night was the fortnightly club night.

Still numbers are not back up to the heady heights that we were seeing earlier in the year. Marcin even commented so when he arrived.

That being said the seven of us that were there had a good time playing games.

We split into two tables. Four on one table playing Azul, and Camel Up. Whilst Marcin, Dave, and myself were on the other table playing Fallout the board game.

I’ve owned this game for a few years now, and it’s sat there on my pile of shame ever since.

It was only recently that I purchased the official play mat, plus the second expansion Atomic Bonds. This second expansion makes the game co-operative. Something I’m not keen to include. But you never know. It was a completeness purchase.

However the first expansion New California remains elusive. Mainly because the English version is out of print (you can pick up a German version very easily).

I think what has made the situation for New California even worse, and also driven demand for the base game is the popularity of the Amazon tv series.

I have played the modern third person version Fallout 3 back in about 2010 on my 360. I didn’t complete the game, or even get close. But I did enjoy the experience. I even went back and played a little of the original turn based rpg Fallout on a pc.

Obviously I enjoyed the recent Amazon tv series based on the Fallout games. Unlike a major trend over the years of adapting video games badly to the silver screen, Amazon actually did a decent job.

Last night we played Marcin’s copy of the game that had the New California expansion mixed in.

We played the introductory scenario Welcome to the Commonwealth with the extended map. I was playing the robot Mister Handy, Marcin played the Ghoul, and Ben was the Brotherhood Outcast.

The game was great fun.

I think it captured the theme really well through the art, miniatures, quests, and mechanics.

On your turn you get two actions. One is exploring. That allows you to flip over an adjacent unexplored tile. So you get that exploring feel, discovering new areas, revealing new threats.

The quests or encounters you can go on have some great thematic text to read out.

Combat is simple and quick. You roll three dice, hopefully getting the required bits of the body to defeat the enemy and not get any hits in return. The “AI” to move/activate enemies on the board was very simplistic. Which involved turning over an agenda card and looking at icons on the bottom of the card for what gets activated.

With the learn of the game, it took us roughly three hours to play.

Obviously I want to play some more of the game. I really did have great fun playing it.

I survived!

Fenland Gamers, game night, life, the universe, and everything, star wars, Star Wars Unlimited, still alive

It’s Saturday morning. I’ve been awake from bloody early a.m. on my day off.

The status update of my McDonald’s breakfast seems stuck on “picking up my order”.

I’m just too knackered after my seven day tour of duty at work.

I’ve come out of it feeling battered emotionally. I won’t go into details but the frustration levels have been through the roof.

So I feel I’ve earnt this lazy start to my day off.

Yesterday Mini Rails arrived from Zatu without any problems. Which has been my experience with them every time I’ve ordered from them. That will shock some. But for me my experiences have been positive.

Also through the letter box came the new Zelda game The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom. Where I think for the first time you can actually play as Princess Zelda. Another entry in my long to play list.

Last night was a “get it to the table” night for Fenland Gamers. Which saw Marcin, Anthony, and myself play Marcin’s copy of Coimbra. Which frankly I’m shocked he owns based on its theme alone! It’s not exactly post apocalyptic.

However it’s a fun game that has dice drafting, and then using those dice to do something, with the value of the die being used determining the cost of what you purchase. Plus the colour of the die comes into play in a later stage of the round.

Each round player order changes based on number crowns each player has accumulated that round.

You have a bit of engine building going on with the cards you purchase. Add in also trying to move a pawn round a map to collect bonus tiles, and racing up four influence tracks to try to have the most in each. This a lot to try and do with the three dice you draft.

It’s also only four rounds and plays very quickly.

It is a fun game.

History will record Marcin won on a technicality.

Along with Mini Rails the final cards of my two new decks arrived.

Those two incomplete decks got an outing on Tuesday just gone when Marcin and I play Star Wars Unlimited (SWU) using our Twin Suns decks. I suppose you could say that this was the SWU equivalent of the popular MtG singleton (one one copy of a card) format Highlander.

The two incomplete decks worked well. Or I should say as intended. So I have three Twin Suns decks. Marcin has two. Which means if we have a fourth player join us we can lend them a deck if they have no deck of their own.

I now need to write up these decks.

New Games To The Table

Fenland Gamers, Game day, game night

Despite me starting this epic seven days of work without a break (currently on day 4 as I write this post) I’ve managed to get some gaming in.

It was club night Friday evening with only five people able to make it along. Is this the new normal? Why has attendance slipped?

The only five player game we had was Tribes of the Wind. So I was glad to be able to get this latest addition to the collection to the table.

This is a nice game. It even played well at five players, despite one of those players being well known to suffer from analysis paralysis (ap). Even with an ap inflicted player we played the game in about an hour and three quarters.

Although on the table space we had five players was rather cramped.

Production is great, and I really like the art by Vincent Dutrait. He has also done the art for After Us, the Amun-Re 20th Anniversary Edition, Broom Service, plus many more. The three mentioned I also own, and love the art.

I love how you need to take into account the cards your neighbours are holding. It means that whilst you can plan your next turn while waiting for others to take theirs. That plan might go out the window because the cards held by a neighbour have change meaning you can’t play that card you wanted to.

It’s cool that when you build a village you get to choose a village card that is duel use. You can either use it for an immediate benefit, or for its end game scoring bonus.

Each player board is unique. Well in which conditions you need to complete to be able to select one of the four unique guide cards each player has. You get up to two of these cards. They act like ongoing special abilities throughout the rest of the game.

They are also unique in the distribution of pollution on your player board.

The uniqueness is continued with the starting tiles that give differing starting resources.

The iconography is easy to pick up, as is the learning curve. As I pointed out in just under two hours we learnt and played the game.

Yeah I liked this game a lot. Sadly I didn’t win, the ap inflicted player did.

Afterwards I had to pack away and get home rather quickly. My curfew was way earlier than Cinderella’s. With work and the start of the seven days the next morning I needed to be in bed and sleeping by 9:30pm.

Sunday saw me round Ben’s as soon as work had finished. Diego and Charlene would be joining us.

I had suspected Charlene might be. So I had put Stamp Swap in the car.

After punching the cardboard Ben and I set up Stamp Swap. By which time Charlene had arrived. Not long after followed by Diego.

After going through the rules we started stamp collecting.

This is a fast game. The three rounds flew by.

I loved the drafting of the stamps in the first phase. Especially with some of the stamps being facedown unknown to anyone. The I split, you choose of the second phase. Great fun and just as tactical as the drafting. Followed by the puzzle bit of fitting the stamps in your play area. I really enjoyed how these three mechanics had been melded together.

That last phase is heavily influenced by the four goals and the final scoring goal. At the end of each round you select one of the four available goals and score it. Once selected you can’t select it in further rounds. Plus you only get to choose three out of the four.

Each player may has a unique end of round scoring card, also directing your focus of stamps to draft.

Yeah for me this is another Stonemaier hit. Who knew stamp collecting could be so much fun.

Having been robbed of a joint victory by a bs tie breaker we followed up with a game of Mini Rails.

I hadn’t played Mini Rails before. But I liked this share based game.

Each round you get to do two actions once. Build a track, take a share. Which share or track you buy/build determines your turn order for your actions next round.

It’s not a heavy game or a massive high scoring game. But it gets very tactical because the share/track you want might not get you where you want in the turn order next round. Plus the trying to manipulate the share price.

How much did I like it? Well a copy is now on its way to me. Zatu have it for under £20. A big discount. Might be due to a new version due to hit kickstarter soon (fancy meeples, and new cuter art, same game). But I’ll take the cheap option.

Our final game of the afternoon was Nokosu Dice. Love this trick taking game that utilises cards and dice. Which apparently is hard to get hold off, and if you can it’s for silly money.

Charlene just smashed this one breaking Diego’s run of wins for the afternoon.

It was a great afternoon of gaming, with great friends.

Growing trees

Fenland Gamers, game night

Last night was the fortnightly club night. For the middle of Summer having eight folks turn up was pretty good.

On the table I was on we were learning and playing a four player game of Undergrove.

This was Charlene’s deluxe kickstarter edition.

Wow! The production on this deluxe edition is phenomenal.

The wooden tile holders in the shape of trees just take a beautiful looking game with an eye catching table presence to another level.

The tiles are I think wooden, beautiful artwork, really nice feel to them. The wooden mushroom first player marker is overkill but still impressive.

There is a great learn the game mode that takes each player through their first four turns. Each unique and doing something different. Then at the end of the fourth turn it gives you advice on your next turns.

I like the flow of the game with each player taking it in turn to do one of the possible actions. Plus it is possible with the right tile(s) out on the board to combo or get more than one action on your turn.

With several goal cards to choose from each game, and a reasonable number of tiles the replayability is there.

There is a bit of decision making and tactics involved in where you start to grow your trees. Its location, location, location. You have to factor in not just the points the tile will give you but also what action the tile will allow you and anyone else with roots on it to do. It’s almost like you are building an engine in plain view of everyone.

I will say the iconography took a few rounds to get used to. But once it clicks.

Yeah I liked the game (and not just because I won). I’d happily play this again. Would I add it to my collection? I’m not sure. It’d depend on how much the deluxe edition and the tree tile holders (they are a separate purchase) are. It’s the only edition of the game I’d want.

One against many, or just another Commander evening

Commander, game night, lcg/ccg/tcg game night, magic, MtG

Tuesday saw another lcg/tcg/ccg evening.

This time three of us could make it, so the plan was to have a game of Commander.

Dave was playing his Doctor Who deck. I played my Ninja deck. While Marcin played my Atraxa precon.

It really was Dave and Marcin vs me. I needed every trick in my deck to try and hold in and get to a winning position.

A position that never arrived.

Was I close? I don’t think so. I tried politicking to try and help me out. But the butt hurt Marcin still had from the weekend made that very hard.

Obviously I knew the main tactic of the Atraxa deck, and the proliferate was useful in delaying Dave getting his cards out for free using his time warp/suspend ability. I think the Doctors deck Dave was using had potential. With some suitable additions could be pretty good and fun.

That’s what I like about my ninja deck is it is a fun deck to play. Maybe not be on the receiving end of.

Marcin managed to get the win.

Next week the plan is to do a Dice Masters draft using draft packs from Tomb of Annihilation. A booster box had arrived earlier that day along with two campaign boxes. Recently Wizkids had a 50% off sale on Dice Masters stuff. So I took advantage of that sale to pick up a couple of things.

Feast or famine

Game day, game night

After what has seemed a famine when it comes to board gaming over the past few months.

It now seems like the complete opposite. I’m gorging myself on gaming.

Friday evening saw Marcin and I play a two player game of Ra. I’d recently picked up a Pharaoh edition of the game. Which is basically the thematic way to describe the deluxe edition of Ra.

The main difference as far as I’m aware between this fancy edition and the retail edition is metal coins and wooden/plastic tiles.

The production is out of this world. The Ra token is huge. The sun boat marker, epoch marker, sun dials are all wooden. The auction board and player boards are a good thickness. It’s obvious a lot of love has gone into the production of this game.

Friday evening gaming

As a two player game it worked, and was an enjoyable experience. However I need to play this at the higher player counts. I think the play experience will be completely different.

Sadly Marcin won.

For our second game of the evening we were joined by Anthony. The game was Ohanami.

I’ve been often a copy of this game ever since I hear about it in a Broken Meeple video. At the time I was unable to track down a copy. That was until about two weeks ago when I was just browsing through saved items in my Amazon basket and saw it was in stock. I clicked on the item to check my eyes weren’t deceiving me. The price was amazing. Just under £11 for this card game. I instinctively pressed buy it now.

If a purchase has not been a dice game, then it’s most likely been a trick taking or drafting game. I do seem to be into those two mechanics at the moment.

This was a great purchase.

Once more Marcin won. He was on track for a clean sweep.

Next Fuji Flush hit the table. I think I was the only one who hadn’t played it before. But I was glad I did. This purchase has been sitting in my game bag since purchasing.

The game was fun at its lowest player count. But like Ra I think Fuji Flush will be a different experience at the higher player counts. Maybe even better.

We managed to get two plays in. Marcin’s win streak was ended. With the honours being shared between Anthony and myself.

We finished off the evening (for me anyway, I left Anthony and Marcin playing some other game) with the game Haggis. I’m so glad this great trick taker is making it back to the table. Which is easier to do because it’s either a two or three player game. It’s the three player support that is enabling it to get some love.

Luckily I was able to end my evening on a win.

After that I headed home. I couldn’t be late home because I had work the next morning.

Sunday I went straight from work to game with Marcin, Anthony, and Jeff.

Our game for the afternoon was Steamwatchers.

I have to say I was pretty tired during the rules explanation and nearly fell asleep a couple of times. That was by no means an indictment of Marcin and his explaining of the rules.

But I did wake up. Or feel more awake after I purchased my usual beverage order and started playing.

Sunday afternoon gaming

The theme of Steamwatchers is a post apocalyptic one. This is Marcin’s favourite game theme.

There is very much a big influence from the game A Game of Thrones on Steamwatchers with the Dune combat system thrown in.

Early on both Jeff and I formed an alliance. We offered an alliance to Anthony as well. The aim was to focus on crushing Marcin. However Anthony made the error of joining forces with Marcin.

That meant Anthony had hostile forces either side of him. So Jeff and I jointly attacked Anthony from both sides, whilst Marcin just turtled. Yep Marcin threw Anthony under the bus in an attempt to build get enough points to win.

We had to cut the game short by one round due to the social club closing early. But it was a critical round.

I had planned to attack Anthony to try and grab a point off him. Like Dune Imperium a one point swing is huge. However he moved all of his forces out of my target space to attack me first. This was better than I had hoped. The base would be undefended. I didn’t bother winning the battle, my forces were sacrificed for the greater good. I couldn’t have him retreating back to the base.

My turns saw my train with troops swoop in and claim the undefended base and grab the point.

I also broke my alliance with Jeff to grab a last point by taking an undefended base with my last action.

Points were tallied and I had won.

Wow the banter, especially at the end. It was hilarious. Marcin was butt hurt, trying to deflect from his betrayal of Anthony. Remember those buses he let hit Anthony without doing anything?

It was a fun afternoon, a fun game, and great company.

Lcg/tcg/ccg night returns

ccg/tcg, game night, lcg/ccg/tcg game night, Star Wars Unlimited

Sadly neither Marcin or Diego were able to make the restart of the lcg/tcg/ccg night. But Dave was.

It’d been a long day for me. To be at work for 6am I need to get up at 4:30. Or 4:45 if I’m feeling particularly lazy. Having started at 6am, these last three days I’ve been finishing at 3pm.

After getting home just before 4pm, I had a bath and nearly fell asleep. Yeah I was that tired.

I threw the two starter sets you can get for Star Wars Unlimited (SWU) into a bag along with the two player game mat.

After pleasantries, getting refreshments, and having to apologise for the very poor quality of the starter set components (they are shocking) we chose our decks from the Spark of Rebellion starter set.

Dave went Vader, which means I played Luke.

The first game went my way. It wasn’t one sided by all means. It was a bit to and fro, with each player having moments having the upper hand.

We stayed with our respective deck choices, and played a second game.

Dave definitely had the upper hand in this game. For the majority of the game I felt I was just holding on for dear life. Delaying the inevitable.

Finally Dave managed to deliver the winning blow.

Our third game was going to be with the second starter set that goes with the latest set Shadows of the Galaxy.

Dave played the Moth Gideon deck whilst I had the Mandalorian deck.

These decks were completely new to me. I had no idea what the focus of them were. I’d avoided any talk online about them.

I had to mulligan my opening hand and the resulting six cards still left me lacking a turn one play or even a decent turn two play. My turn one action was taking the initiative token.

Yeah I was on the backfoot right from the start.

Whilst my deck continued to hate me giving me no synergy between cards I had, no combos etc. Dave’s was just delivering him the goodies to overwhelm me, remove any defences/threats I could muster. In the end he just totally destroyed me.

I know within SWU there is targeted removal of one for or another. But I would have loved a board wipe card in this game. Maybe that’ll come in future releases.

Our fourth and final game saw the tables turned. I was getting upgrades, went all Voltron on Mando once he was out (I had him hitting for eight points of damage and a final winning 9). Dave was struggling to keep up or deal with the heavily upgraded Mando.

I do really like these starter decks. They are great fun to play. Seem relatively balanced. Great design on the player mats with the helpful player aids. But as pointed out these decks are let down by poor component quality.

I’m currently (as you have seen) using these like MtG duel decks for casual play with friends.

I had a great evening playing SWU with Dave.