New Releases For Next Week 29/2/16

netrunner, news

So it's that time of week again when the local branch of the Asmodee collective Esdevium come down from upon high and tell us what we are being allowed to buy next week from them.

First up is a game Tom Vassel of Dice Tower fame is singing the praises of…

Next up is a reprint of the game I haven't got to the table yet Dead of Winter.

Remember last week they released a Super Mario Playmat? Well this week we are getting Super Mario deck boxes. They look bloody amazing.

Finally the biggy of next week for me is…

Some Netrunner fans have this already because they paid the excessive postage wanted by FFG to ship it. Now it is the time for those of us who were prepared to wait for it to arrive in the UK to get our copies.

I think from one or two posts I've seen the supply is limited, and some shops aren't getting their full orders. So I think I'm going to be one lucky person when I get my pre-order.

So I'm looking forward to next week…

 

So near but so far

Fenland Gamers, game night, play test

Last night saw Jonathan and I patrol once more the Streets of Commonville.

It was going to be a weird play session, there had been some “requests” made to Jonathan from some of the small but elite folks that had viewed the previous play through.

Once more we were filming the play through, but we had a wishlist of things to cover.

The first twenty minutes or so of filming was spent explaining various elements of the game. We then started a two player game.

I thought for the sake of this recording we would be taking a couple of turns and then “fast forwarding” the game state to show various in game situations.

However we were opening the board up fairly fast. A lot faster than our other two player game together.

I was soon able to level up to Captain, giving me five dice and an intuition (alter a dice to a value I need), plus my starting donut. It wasn't long before we were also able to get Jonathan up to the same rank, with similar additional powers.

But the clock was ticking. We hadn't revealed all the evidence, but we had done enough to get down to one suspect (shockingly not Dr Kinky this time), give that suspect a weapon and a set of handcuffs.

With the clock dangerously low, we had one turn to get myself to join Jonathan (who arrived the previous turn) and the suspect and defeat the suspect.

I needed three dice to get me to the suspects tile. Then we needed to score between us forty five points with our remaining dice. We totalled up our points, we had forty four points. Short by one! One lousy point!

The game had beat us. But that was the closest game we'd played. Amazingly close. Great fun.

So some editing for me, then the “directors commentary” to record and then edit back into the video, before putting up for viewing. How I ended up doing more work I don't know. All I know at the moment with the size font that will be needed in the rules book for my name in the thanks, the page will have to be a gatefold!

Tokaido Collectors Accessory Pack

expansions, first look, new arrivals

So today (and I'm jumping the gun here, because I normally talk about new arrivals on Saturdays) the Tokaido Collectors Accessory Pack arrived.

After opening the box up my initial excitement was damped by disappointment to see that one of the figures was broken. I've emailed the publisher via their website for a replacement. Time to see how their customer support matches up against the likes of AEG and Portal Games.

So in the box you get sixteen unpainted plastic figures representing the characters in both the base game and the Crossroads expansion. Sadly there is not a figure for the Eriku promo character.

Also in the box is a nice cloth bag for storing the coins that also come in the box. Plus a CD of Japanese inspired music to play in the background while playing the game is also included.

Naturally if we have a cloth bag, we also have to have something to put in it. That something is fifty metal coins. These are lovely, have a nice feel and weight to them.

You also get five replacement score tracker tokens in the shape of coloured packages. Plus a coloured base cover for the figure you are playing with, and finally a “second” (assuming you have the Crossroads expansion) dice.

As a pimp my game kit, this is a really nice little kit. Despite a model being broken, the models are really detailed, and look great. And I can't wait to get Tokaido to the table using these new components.

If you love Tokaido this is a must buy.

 

Patchwork hits iOS

apps, first look, news

Who would of thought I would be getting excited over a game about making a patchwork quilt?

Yesterday an app version of the 2014 two player game hit both the iOS App Store and that other lesser one.

I hadn't played the original physical game, but one of my regular Star Realms opponents has, and put up on Instagram that they had just downloaded the app and was asking for people to play against. So I thought why not? The app once I found it on the App Store was only $2.99, so a bargain.

Once downloaded, I went through the tutorial and was instantly hooked. I love the Tetris feel of the placement of the tiles that represent the quilt patches. Then there is the timeline, and the currency being buttons. Love those touches. And the button currency very thematic.

Each patch has a cost both in buttons and time it will advance your counter on the timeline. Certain points on the time line when you cross them will generate more buttons for you to spend, and there are single square patches that if you reach first can be used to plug that odd gap on your quilt.

Love, love, love it.

Digidiced the developer of the app have done an amazing job. I've installed the game on my 6S, and it's usable on the smallish screen, the buttons are on the tad small side.

The game looks amazing, plus the in-app purchases are just themes for the game, so if you want to change the appearance you can. But I love the default look.

Now I wish other app devs would learn from these guys, because the app comes with asynchronous online play straight out of the box. Too many boardgame apps are being released these days without this feature, with the promise of it coming in a future release. The bread today, jam tomorrow deal. It's one of the reasons I took so long getting the Splendor app, it still doesn't have the online play. But a 99c sale over Christmas saw me cave in. Digidiced have just hit it out of the ball park here, and deserve a big hearty pat on the back for this.

So there you have it, a great two player game on iOS, well worth getting. And you can guess what will be added to my game collection soon.

 

An RPG Bargain

news

Those Humble Bundle folks have done a massive and I mean massive bargain for those that want to try the Pathfinder RPG, or even just want to dip their toes into the dark murky waters of role playing. For about $16 you get $350 worth of Pathfinder goodness in digital form.

Not only is there a great deal on the table, there is also a series of videos about how to play the Pathfinder RPG! The link can be found on the Humble Bundle page.

For $25 plus shipping costs you can also get the beginners box in physical form!

This really is a steal. If you have been tempted to part with your money for this to good to be true deal, click HERE.

Yes I have got this. I'm not mad!

 

How many servers?

chatteris warlords, game night, netrunner

Last night was the weekly Chatteris Warlords meet. Or as I like to call it my weekly Netrunner fix.

The evening started off with a four player game of 7 Wonders. This would technically be my second play of the game ever, despite getting the game straight after my first play. So naturally I was asking questions to refresh my poor memory.

So despite my lack of experience in playing the card drafting game 7 Wonders I think coming second was rather good.

Then it was time to do some running against the corps. It was Darren v Ben. Our first game was my NEH deck verses Ben's Noise.

Ben was scoring agendas and soon hit six agenda points. During that time I was landing tags with my ice rather easily. Which made landing my drawn Scorched Earth easy. I needed to find my other Scorched Earth, Traffic Accident, find and score my Private Security Force, or hope Ben hit a snare.

As you can see I created a few servers trying to find a card that would allow me to finish off the runner. While I was doing this I was reminded of Timmy Wong and his server spawning at last years Worlds. There were four agendas hidden amongst them. But I had given up on the scoring agendas route to victory. I was going for the murder, there were plenty of tags landed, Ben still was within easy reach of that goal.

It really was a race, Ben to score that final agenda, and myself finding that damage to kill him. Sadly it was a race I was to loose. A great enjoyable game. I learnt a lot about my deck in this game.

Second game was my Noise against Ben's Personal Evolution.

Within three turns I had Pancakes/Wyldside installed. I'd got Same Old Thing down, plus Aesop's. My rig was building up nicely. Datasucker was out and building up with virus counters, thanks to an unprotected archives. My bookmarks and Streetpeddlers were doing there jobs of storing cards for me. Inject was getting cards in hand and getting me cash.

I quickly scored some agendas, Ben scored one back. I needed one agenda to win. Ben built a scoring server three ice deep. He hid a possible agenda behind it, and advanced it twice. It was run now or, well there was no other pressure at this point.

I had David install, Faust, and trashed my installed DDOS. All of sudden the ice wall was thinner, and I was ready to run hard on the server. So unable to rez the first bit of ice, the second was my first encounter. It was rez'd Faust ate it up. The third and final piece of ice had a strength of five. David territory. David ripped that ice to pieces. I was through. Had I been duped? Was this a trap?

Nope, it was my winning agenda. The evening ended up even.

How do you follow that sort of exciting game play? With a game of Catan of course.

I'm not going to bore you (well more than I already have). But Ben totally ruled this game, and got the win easily.

A great evening gaming.

Pandemic Legacy April

Fenland Gamers, game night, pandemic legacy season 1

Aren't you tired of reading this first bit yet? Obviously not… The following post may or may not (OK most definitely does this week) contain spoilers for the game Pandemic Legacy. If you don't want to read the spoilers and keep the surprises for when you play, then this most certainly isn't the post for you. If that is the case see you in the next post.

Still here?

Ok let's talk April…

After being victorious last week the funding organisation rewarded us for our success by cutting our funding!

After reading our mission brief, which was the same as March's we chose our four funded events we would be playing with.

We had lost our previous starting bonus of being able to place a starting quarantine marker anywhere on the board. But we gained being able to place a garrison anywhere on the board instead. So Shanghai became our first garrison of the game, deep in COdA-403c country, with a character upgrade done to Matts character Zardoz once at the garrison he can chuck out quarantine tokens to the connected cities.

The briefing also told us to place a reminder on the third epidemic spot. Which when reached meant turning over some more cards on the legacy deck.

Our plan was to have Matt in COdA country quarantining the cities, and making use of the garrison and his upgrade, while the rest of us fought the other outbreaks and find cures.

We got the unnamed yellow disease cured, and eradicated early. But success was quickly followed by two epidemic cards. We hit that reminder token and now had to see what was being thrown at us next.

We hit an Alert, COdA was mutating!!!! There were also a lot of tabs to open. We were in for a rough ride. New stickers were being added to the rule book to cover the faded and how they are handled. Plus new stickers to mark the board with when a city becomes faded. And then…

OMG the faded victims of COdA are amazing!!! Little translucent green figures to add to the board. As Jonathan said the game is worth getting just for these alone.

All of a sudden a game about fighting disease and curing them, has turned into a zombie game!!! Ok they don't call them zombies but the faded. But they look like little zombies. This is AWESOME!

We soon after cured and eradicated Sithite (Matt), and with the player deck dwindling fast we got found a cure for C-Thatcam-Major (Debbie).

We had won against the odds! Our first upgrade chosen was to make Shanghai a starting garrison, and we also took the new unfunded event.

Finally we had to name the unnamed yellow disease, since we eradicated it. Which was given the name of Cleggmidia.

With two funded events for May, the odds are stacking up against us of succeeding. Bring the onslaught on…

Cats out of the bag

play test

You know from the posts that the last couple of weeks have seen some playtesting of a game that Jonathan and Rebecca have been working on called Streets of Commonville.

I've been recording the play sessions for Jonathan and Rebecca to review and placing them on YouTube for them. It's the easiest way to share the video considering Rebecca is in the US of A. Unless you have the link you can't see the video. Well apart from the South Park style humour from me, and my low opinion of law enforcement, these videos weren't meant for public consumption.

Anyhow this has changed with the latest one.

Today Common Man Games (home of Police Precinct game) have shared that link for the last game play with their fans on Facebook. Here is how they spilled the beans…

“APB (episode 209): Today's headline reads…

“BACK TO THE STREETS!”

Talkin' About “The Streets Of Commonville” which is a game we have mentioned previously here (see APB #193 and others). It's being designed by a UK/USA team. We (CMG) have not yet entered the process, except to say that we are ecited to see what they come up with and to publish it if we love it and think YOU will too. We want to try to feed you-all the occasional update on this game's development. Within the past 24 hours Jonathan (one of the designers) provided me with a video of a full play-through of the game as it stands now (by all reports, it's quite developed but still being tweaked). I watched some of it and it looks fun and easy to play! I would watch the whole thing right now except that I have to prepare to ship a ton of games out the door (4 pallets headed this way). YOU can watch a bit too, enjoy!…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtYQqv9v5pQ“

Please remember this video is unedited, it's loooong… Nearly two hours in duration and shows the whole game being played.

If you do watch it please leave feedback in the comments below on this post. Jonathan is able read them and respond to them here.

Maybe this filmed playtesting is something I could offer as a service to publishers and designers for a small financial consideration. Wouldn't that be something? I can dream.

 

My Netrunner Media Fixes

chatteris warlords, netrunner

This post is aimed squarely at my fellow Netrunner players in the growing meta at Chatteris Warlords.

I thought it might be an idea to share the podcasts and YouTube stuff I listen to and watch about Netrunner.

 

First up I'll list the three podcasts I subscribe to.

This is an Australian podcast by a panel of Netrunner runner champs at various levels down under. It's usually a shortish podcast running at about half an hour. You can subscribe to it HERE.

 

 

Run, Last, Click is a UK podcast by two Netrunner players based in London. They have regular guests on the show, including interweb Boardgaming personality Quinns from Shut Up, Sit Down who is a major Netrunner addict. You can listen to Run, Last, Click HERE.

 

Terminal7 is hosted by two Canadian videogame developers who have a Netrunner addiction. They two also have from time to time Quinns on the show plus other guests. You can listen to Terminal7 HERE.

 

Finally here is the YouTube stuff. Ok there is only one YouTube channel I follow for Netrunner and here it is…

Teamworkcast does some brilliant commentated matches from various tournaments from around Europe. The commentary is very entertaining, once you've watched one or two you will get why I call some cards by nicknames such as pancakes or sexy bot. You can watch Teamworkcast HERE.
You may like this video from the recent Teamworkcast output which gives advice to a runner on playing his deck as a commentary.

So I hope this has been useful to my fellow players at the club.