Things change. It’s the only thing that we can count on in life. Well that and the other two, death and taxes as the saying goes.
Things are going to change on the work front once again. For the better? Who knows?
In the meantime I have nine days off.
The plan is to go visit Nathan for a couple of days.
Obviously I’m taking the LoTR lcg and the Fellowship of the Ring saga.
But alongside that I’m taking some dice games with me to play as research. In that pile are Seasons, Viva Java the dice game, High Score, Yahtzee, Farkle, the Knizia books, Age of War, Hellboy the dice game, and hopefully Strike! (if it arrives in time).
I’m really looking forward to seeing Nathan and playing games with him. It’s been way too long since my last visit.
I just want to take a break from my Top 100 games of all time posts to wish all my regular readers, less frequent ones, and those that somehow stumbled upon this blog by mistake, a very merry Christmas.
I hope you have a great day with loved ones and friends.
It’s been another hectic week and it’s just going to get busier as we enter the run in to Christmas.
At work it’s basically all hands to the pump.
So December is looking like a bad month for getting games to the table.
Dune Imperium Uprising has arrived. Sadly it looks like everyone interested or possibly interested in playing it are recovering from a bout of sickness and diarrhea hitting their household.
The D-Day Dice Kickstarter has been a surprise arrival. No warning it was fulfilling, just an email from the Royal Mail saying a package was coming.
I have a new book to read. It’s all about cheating in video games. It’s an academic text and I’m looking forward to looking at the research and its conclusions.
I have the flooring to do. But I have the shelves in the living room up.
Yes not the expensive IKEA Kallax that are very very popular in the board gaming community. But budgets define the options and choices we can make. These were within my budget.
After starting to fill these two units it was apparent they wouldn’t be enough. I would need more.
The problem is and has been space to put them up.
To get these in my two seater settee had to go.
I had a suitable spot for two more to go in the dining room once the table there went.
However before I cleared that and put the plan into action there was something big happening to the house.
My landlord was having a new front door and windows put in. The “old” ones were most likely the original ones (making them about 100 years old!)
Existing units in living roomNew units in back room
All that window stuff happened whilst I was off on the union rep training last week.
So Saturday saw me getting the table cleared. I then put the two new units together configured so the lowest shelf was above Loki cocking leg height!
I’m now starting to fill the new space.
It’s going to be very close to whether this will be enough additional space to hold the rest of my game collection.
In the meantime I have a new dvd project to watch at some point that has just popped through the door in the last week.
New dvd project
Yes I’m a fan of Planet of the Apes franchise. I can even find nice stuff to say about the Tim Burton remake! But before I go off about all this and what they mean to me I’ll stop. All that sort of stuff needs saving for when I do a post about this viewing project.
Despite having a space issue for storing board games. It doesn’t stop the odd new arrival or pre-ordering stuff. In this case I’m expecting Dune Imperium Uprising at some point soon. It’s out now in the States I believe, and pre-orders from Dire Wolf have been sent out. I’m just waiting for it to arrival with retailers in the UK so my pre-order can be sent.
I’m waiting for Amazon to send me the latest book by Scott Rogers. This one is on board game design. Can’t wait to read it. Plus I have a book on cheating in video games on the way. For reason both won’t be here until next week. Very unusually slow for Amazon.
Catch you in the next post.
UPDATE: I did get some fantastic news late last night from the eldest of my sons (well I still look on them as that, even though there may not be a biological link). It nearly bought me to tears.
Long time readers of my ramblings will remember one of my big regrets in life is my relationship or lack of it with the eldest two boys.
So it meant a lot to me that he shared the news with me. I wouldn’t have blamed him if he hadn’t and I’d found out via Nathan. It would have hurt. But I wouldn’t have held any ill feelings.
I’m not going to say exactly what the news is because I’m not sure it’s my place to do so.
Been away on a union rep training course last couple of days. Which has been fun and informative.
Even been put up for a couple of nights in a Premier Inn.
I’m not sure the price difference between this chain and Travelodge is warranted. I see hardly any difference in the quality of the rooms.
I will grade the breakfast here as a 6 out of 10. Let down massively by the lack of fried bread and having hash browns.
But being in the hotel reminded me I do need to book a hotel for UKGE. The Travelodge we normally frequent is not its usual £35 a night at the moment. But double that. Have they cottoned on to the fact that UKGE is on and they can exploit us poor boardgamers?
Although there has been no gaming since Friday. At least there are plans for playing games this Friday in place.
Right catch you laters now I’ve let you all know I’m ok.
It’s been a quiet week on the gaming front so far.
This weeks planned lcg/ccg/tcg game night on Tuesday fell through.
We were due to be playing Commander however the one flaw we didn’t foresee was the community centre would not be open!
Unbeknownst to any of us, having missed the change to the opening hours sign the community centre would be closed on not only a Monday but also Tuesdays now (except for the third Tuesday of the month for the open mike evening).
It’s not surprising as the business had been pretty slow on a Tuesday with them closing early. Which we were fine with.
Now we need to find either another night that works for everyone, or another Tuesday night venue.
At the moment current thinking might be every other Friday evening.
I have pre-ordered the new Dune Imperium Uprising. Which hopefully will be hitting stores this weekend. So maybe with me by the middle of next week. I’m excited to play this and see how the changes work.
The Two Towers expansion for LotR lcg was posted this morning along with the Deadpool and X-23 hero packs for Marvel Champions.
Obviously the Two Towers and Fellowship are something I want to play with Nathan. But I want to bring not only LotR but Marvel Champions to a lcg/ccg/tcg evening. I know FFG did these special scenario decks for LotR for cons like GenCon. Which were made available to the public. Sadly these are out of print and going for the usual stupid money. I know there are fan run cons for Marvel Champions where they have custom villian scenarios. These of these would be ideal for a game night but alas cost or lack of info means currently they are not an option.
Tomorrow is club night so looking forward to that. It’s looking like another low attended one. Numbers have dropped recently. I’ll be taking Apiary, Terraforming Mars the dice game, and Grail Cup.
I’ve had a stinking cold that has really taken it out of me. It’s been a real struggle going to work. I’ve definitely not been 100%, maybe 50% at best. Which has really drained me by the end of the shift. I’ve spent so much time sleeping and coughing.
The last thing I was feeling able to do was a brief play of Super Mario Bros. Wonder and Luigi’s Mansion 3 before the cold kicked in.
I’m hoping the cold clears up in the next day or two.
Something board gaming related did happen this week. as predicted Apiary did arrive, along with the latest wave of Rolling Realms promo packs. Now I have the problem of how to fit those promo realms in the Rolling Realms box. It’s currently bursting at the seams with no room to spare.
No actual gaming took place due to my taking on an extra shift at work last Tuesday. We were short staffed on a shift and I said I’d go in to help out.
But next week I’m not going to miss the Tuesday lcg/ccg/tcg session. Then I just need to survive the week before having a week’s holiday. Much needed rest and hopefully some gaming.
It’s been a day or two since my last post. As usual for these silences not much gaming wise has happened. Work is still dominating life at the moment.
Board game wise Apiary is due to start be posted out to Stonemaier Champions next week. So excited about that. It’s been a bit unusual for Stonemaier to have such a delay between the pre-order going live and the games being sent out. But as Jamey explained in this weeks Facebook Live broadcast it was tied in with Essen and having units on sale there. I think that’s sums up the thinking.
I did get the latest (as in came out in September) Marvel Champions campaign box NeXt Evolution and the two wave 7 character packs Angel and Psylocke. Plus I have the XL GameGenics playmat for the game now too.
Don’t know if I mentioned it previously but I did get in the Fellowship of the Ring Saga for Lord of the Rings lcg. That’s to play with Nathan, and potentially the lcg/ccg/tcg group at Fenland Gamers. I should see if there is a playmat for this too that is similar the Marvel Champions I just got.
I have two new video games for the Switch that just arrived. Well earlier in the week Luigi’s Mansion 3 arrived. Then yesterday Super Mario Bros. Wonder came out. So expect initial posts on those games soon.
Then finally somehow during all the work I need to get on with reorganising my home. It’s an ongoing project.
