Category Archives: still alive

More ramblings

D&D, D&D Grp2, Gloom Chronicles, life, the universe, and everything, Marvel Champions, rambling, RPG, session planning, still alive

Well just like politics a day in my life can be a long time, and things change.

The next session arranged for Saturday has had to be cancelled due to a union work thing that has cropped up.

However it looks like it may go ahead Monday (currently my day off!) evening instead. I’m still on lates next week, so I don’t have to worry about getting up for a damn early start the next morning.

So there is a silver lining to this cloud.

It would appear that soon (next payday) I will be jumping into the lcg from FFG, Marvel Champions.

Hence the new little icon thingy I’ve done.

I did enjoy the game when I did the “try before you buy” game with Gavin. And it is his copy with expansions I’m buying.

I also think this is a game I can play with Nathan that I’m pretty sure he will enjoy. I’m not sure I’ve played a co-op game with Nath. But I know just from the theme alone he will love it. And I’m excited that I will be able to play this with him.

Buying Marvel Champions does boot into the distance any decision I was going to make about getting into another FFG lcg The Lord of the Rings Card Game. Which does also appeal to me on theme alone.

We know I like the idea of solo gaming, and when I see a game can be played solo it does help sell the game to me. But when it comes to actual reality I very rarely play a game solo. I think I can count on one hand the games I’ve played solo. So I’ll never (ok I know never say never) play Marvel Champions solo.

Another given is in the coming months once Marvel Champions has joined my collection I will be catching up with the expansions I don’t have. It’s that whole Pokémon “got to catch ‘em all” thing.

Bugger they also have playmats for the game. And we know how I am about playmats.

I better order in a lot of sleeves. I usually go Mayday Premium with boardgames. But this technically is a card game so I may fall back to my other preferred brand Dragon Shield Matt sleeves. The ones I use for playing MtG.

Before I look for players willing to commit to playing the campaign version of Gloom, The Gloom Chronicles, I need to get the two expansions that I currently do not own.

Obviously The Gloom Chronicles uses the core game. But it also needs Unfortunate Expeditions, Unquiet Dead (need to get), Gloomier: A Night at Hemlock Hall, Unhappy Homes (need to get), and Unwelcome Guests.

It’s a twenty game campaign. It should be possible to play multiple games a session. I don’t see it being much of a commitment, three or four sessions at most.

I’m very intrigued how Gloom plays as a campaign. It’s a story based game. Well technically if players are not into the story side can be played as just a card game. I know other games like Scythe, Pandemic, etc have campaigns that are tied together by an over all story. But that’s a story written by the designer. Gloom is a different animal altogether. The storytelling is part of the game.

I definitely want to get Gloom to the table sooner than later for sure. Especially around the end of the month. I don’t do Halloween but if that isn’t the time to at least play the game once I don’t know when is.

A Rambling Wednesday Update

life, the universe, and everything, rambling, still alive

The September monthly stats will go live on the last day of the month. I suppose they could have gone live now. It’s not as if I will have played any more games before October starts.

Being one of those glass half empty doom merchants I don’t think October will be a massive month for playing games.

October starts at the weekend with a D&D session. But after that my next bit of gaming will be the following Friday with the next Fenland Gamers session.

My next day off is a Monday when our hosts are not open. Plus I’ve not had much luck getting others interested in gaming on days I’m off. So even if they were open I don’t think I’d find others to game with.

That’s the drawback of my current job with my shifting days off during the week.

So far I’ve been lucky that I can make the Friday evening sessions.

It also makes it harder to arrange things. I should know three weeks in advance what my rota is. But at the moment I know what I’m working up to the end of next week and that’s it. I’m on lates for this and next week. Which I like working.

I do have a weeks holiday next month as well. I’m hoping to visit Nathan then. So that will be quality time together gaming.

But for the next five months I do have a week off each month, as until that week off I’ve only had one days holiday this year.

I was watching The Dice Tower Autumn Spectacular – Top 10 Horror Games last night.

It reminded me although I own them I still haven’t got Fury of Dracula nor Ghost Stories to the table. Plus The Others appeared on a couple of the lists, and now I want to get that back to the table.

The Others has the dubious distinction of putting me off ever backing or buying a CMoN game again. Or I should clarify it was the Kickstarter campaign CMoN ran for it and not the game itself (which I really enjoyed).

But one omission from the four top ten lists the Dice Tower contributors came up with for me was Gloom.

Which I have played once. But I really do need to get back to the table (especially now I have the fancy storage box, Gloomier, and Gloom Chronicles from the last Kickstarter) as I think there are others in Fenland Gamers that would also enjoy playing it.

10th October sees a World Mental Health Day.

I’m going to try and “celebrate” it with a post. I don’t know how the post will come out. That will all depend on the day I suppose.

That’s it for now. See you in the next post.

Wait what happened to the cake?

still alive

Just a very very brief life update that acts as proof of life, and paper thin excuse for not posting.

The best excuse I can come up with for not posting is just plain tiredness.

I’ve finished nights now (yesterday). Which I think I’m going to miss!

They have been fun. The night actually went really fast. But the important bit was I was working with a great bunch of folks.

Heck we even got some gaming in during our breaks!

We haven’t been playing epic games of Twilight Imperium, or even light games that take an hour to play. Basically what would be called filler games by the board gaming community has been our jam. Something that can be played in half an hour, quick to setup and teach.

So we have played Bang!, Love Letter, and Batman Fluxx (with the house rule of if no winner after half an hour the game ends). Although we did also have a multiplayer game of Star Realms where two teams played against each other.

Plus! We have been playing a lot of Star Realms against each other using the app. I can only imagine the image we gave sitting around the table in the staff room engrossed in our phones not speaking to each other. However we are actually all taking our turns in the game against each other.

I now have a couple of days off so I’m hoping to get the next post about Portal finished (it’s about half written at the moment), play some games and tell you about that. Then it’s back to work for a day before having an early weekend (again), followed by more work.

I promised short and sweet, and this has been a bit longer than planned. Laters.

Why so silent?

still alive

When you are knackered and working these later shifts time sure does fly. Can’t believe it’s been three days since I wrote about the culmination of our Rise of Fenris campaign and Jeff’s victory.

In real life the uncertain future at work is starting to take shape. I got a glimpse of it when I got my shifts for the next three weeks. To paraphrase The Animals song I’ve Gotta Get Out of This Place, and find something with the hours I need to make ends meet.

Gaming wise I’m able to do a mid week session with Gavin tomorrow. The plan is to have a two player game of Star Wars Outer Rim. Gavin wants to try the game as he owns it but never played it (I think I can relate to that – currently 56 games have that distinction in my collection). The experience will determine if he keeps it or not. So no pressure!

Then Friday sees me running the Paranoia RPG one shot [YOUR SECURITY CLEARANCE IS NOT HIGH ENOUGH FOR THE TITLE OF THIS ADVENTURE]. Looking forward to this.

I did have to move the planned Tapestry session for a third time! Hopefully this will be the final time I have to do this. Having the shifts for the next three weeks has helped on at least finding a day when I won’t be working!

Remember the saga of the Vampire the Masquerade Rivals expansion Shadows and Shrouds preorder? Well the missing half finally turned up on Monday! What’s that 10 weeks!! I’ll be using this copy of the expansion as prize support.

I’m tempted to start a coding project to write a Vampire the Masquerade Rivals deck builder app. I know Renegade have one on their website. But I’m not a fan of it. It’s functional, but because it’s a web page just feels clunky, slow, and so Web 1.0! I want something more like the MtG Decked app for deck building. At the moment it’s just an idea with the start of some class diagrams defining attributes. There are many technical problems to overcome. Maybe I’ll discuss this in more detail in a future post if I go ahead with the project.

See you in the next post.