The Cards of AGES

ages, tabletop

In a recent post I mentioned that Luke and I had played AGES, a game I really liked. In summary AGES is a deck building game where the aim is to accumulate the most points. How do you do this? By purchasing some of histories most famous and infamous people, places, events, relics and weapons.

So in this post I'm going to look at the cards that make up the game. In the rest of the post I'll be looking at the front of the cards. Which is the side of the card we are really interested in. However I do love the back of the cards. Which is why I've included the photo below of it. In my opinion it is one of the cooler looking backs out there in a game.

Within AGES there are different types of card that unsurprisingly have different uses within the game. So let's look at our first card from the game.

Icon Cards

Icon cards are used to activate the abilities of a card. There are four icon cards representing Art, Good, Evil and Science. I really do like the look of these four cards, they are clean, simple and represent their type really well.

Some cards will require just a single type of icon card (below left), while others will require a combination of different icon cards (below right) to activate the abilities. As long as you have the correct number and type(s) of icon cards indicated in your play area you can then use that cards abilities.

You get an icon card of your choice at the start of your turn. Which then remains in front of you in your play area for the rest of the game.

Gold Cards

So you need to be able to purchase cards from the trade row or eventually the Elite row. Especially in the early game the main way you will be doing this is with the gold cards. Once you have purchased some cards you will be using the gold value of the cards bought plus your gold cards to buy more cards.

  1. Cost of card
  2. Value of card
  3. Title
  4. Type of card
  5. Flavour text

There are three different value gold cards within the game. A single gold coin (below left), two gold coins (below centre) and a gold bar (below right).

Luckily at the start of the game you receive eight of the single gold coin cards. If you want to buy a gold card while playing you can either buy one of the twenty, two gold coin cards that the game has or if they appear in the trade row one of the four gold bars.

The gold cards are probably my least favourite cards in the game. I just don't find them as attractive as the other card designs.

Other Cards

Having looked at the icons and the gold cards lets now look at the other cards, which can be broken down into five categories, characters, locations, events, relics and weapons. These five categories all share a common layout which is shown below.

  1. Cost of the card
  2. Icons needed to use the ability of the card
  3. The cards ability
  4. Value of card when used as gold
  5. Name of the card
  6. Type of card
  7. Art work!
  8. Flavour text

Character Cards

There are three types of character cards in AGES, Elite Characters (below left), Jesters (below middle) and Characters (below right).

Elite Characters

Elite characters are so special they have their own deck! Not only are they special they also happen to be the most expensive cards in the game.
So why are Elite characters special? In AGES after you have taken an icon card, there is an Elite phase that kicks in once one or more of the starting Elite characters have been bought. Each Elite character that is not a starting Elite character has a special ability that has to be used during the Elite phase of your turn. This is the red/white text in the ability area of the card, an example is shown below, and is only valid if the card hasn't been purchased and is in the Elite card trade row.

The white text in the ability part of the card is what the Elite character does when you play that card from your hand.

There are four special Elite cards that are the starting Elite cards, which are identified with the words Starting Elite (see below). These four cards form the starting Elite character trade row.

You will notice that the starting Elite card mentions the rapport ability. This means that the cost of that Elite card is reduced by one for each matching icon you have on the table in front of you. However there is a limit to this cost reduction. You can not reduce the cost of an Elite card by more than the number of icons required to activate its ability. Although not mentioned on the other Elite cards, all Elite cards have the rapport ability.
Finally when the Elite character deck becomes empty that signals the end of the game.

Jesters

When you start a game along with the eight single gold cards you also get two Jester cards. Jester cards act as temporary generic icon cards within AGES. This means that when you play a Jester card you place it with the icon type you want to use it as. However unlike icon cards which remain on the table in front of you through out the game, at the end of your turn Jester cards get placed in your discard pile.

Characters

Character cards form part of the main deck and are purchased from the trade row.

Location Cards

Location cards when played are the only cards other than icons that will remain on the table in front of you.

Like all the cards you can use the cards ability if you have the correct number and type(s) of icon in front of you. However you may only use a location cards ability once per turn.

Just like Character cards Location cards form part of the main deck.

Event Cards

Event cards form part of the main deck. You will notice in the ability text the word immediate is in green. I will cover that in the Weapon card section.

Relic Cards

Relic cards are also one of the cards that make up the main deck.

Weapon Cards

Weapon cards are mainly used to defeat the other players Character cards. Can you guess which deck weapon cards are part of? Yep you guessed it the main deck.

As promised earlier in the post let's look at that green coloured word immediate in the ability text. Why is it green? What does it mean?

When you see that green immediate in the ability text it means you can play that card at any time. How cool is that? This allows you to play a card in response to another being played. For instance your opponent plays a character card, before they activate that characters abilities you are allowed to play any cards you have that have the immediate ability. So if you had the above weapon card in your hand you could play that card and defeat the just played character before the opponent can activate its abilities.

So I hope this look at the cards in AGES has been of interest. In the next post on the game I'll look at setting the game up. Which will be a shorter post. I can hear the sighs of relief now.

 

 

Game of Thrones Done For Another Year

tabletop

 

Last night saw the final episode of the current series of Game of Thrones (GoT). Which means a year to wait until it returns to our screens again. Naturally that wait is eased with the next season of The Walking Dead before it.

But what to do during the coming years wait for a GoT fan?

Obviously there is the option to rewatch the five seasons again, or re-read the books. However there are other options for the boardgame enthusiast.

FFG, the company behind some of my favourite games such as Android:Netrunner, X-Wing and Imperial Assault, have one or two options.

The first game from FFG to look at is A Game of Thrones The Board Game Second Edition. The game is for three to six players, plays apparently between two and four hours, and has a couple of expansions that you can buy to expand the game. From what I have seen of the game online I like what I see, and very interested in the game. The draw back for me is how often would I get to play the game? I think I could get enough players together but I'm not sure they would want to play a game of this duration.

Next up from FFG is their living card game (LCG) A Game of Thrones The Card Game. This LCG plays 2-4 players and the estimated game duration is one to two hours. From what I have seen online this is meant to be easier to get into than the boardgame, plays quicker, but… Is it for me? I already play a LCG but not as often as I like due to lack of players in the area. It's this fact that makes me less inclined to go for another LCG at the moment.

FFG also do the following GoT games Game of Thrones Westeros Intrigue and Battles of Westeros. I know nothing about these two games. However it appears that Battles of Westeros is based on Battlelore. I've not played Battlelore but it is literally top of my want list of games. So I'm going to spend a bit of time researching this version of the game.

There is also I think an RPG based on Game of Thrones but I'm not sure if that is even possible to purchase these days.

It will come as no surprise that there is a GoT Monopoly. However if that game floats your boat it maybe an option. However Monopoly isn't my cup of tea so not an option for this GoT fan.

However there is (if not out already) a GoT version of Risk coming. Which will have two maps to play with. I've not to my shame played Risk, but this does look like a possible option also.

So for this GoT Fan the top three of the options for me to consider are Battles of Westeros, GoT The Boardgame and GoT Risk. So don't be surprised to find one of those three in my collection soon.

As a final thought I might be tempted by the TellTale games GoT videogame. I really enjoyed their Walking Dead game, so more of the same but with GoT no brainer.

 

 

Sunday Gaming

ages, krosmaster arena, star realms, tabletop

What is it about Krosmaster Arena? Luke and I played our first full rules game today, and once more I lost. We used the Enchantment map, and the draft rules for selecting our characters.

I lasted longer than last time but his ranged attack just kept picking me off at distance, I wasn't able to get close enough to do much damage. Or when I did hit Luke healed that character. Something will click and my tactics will prevail.

But even so having such a poor track record with this game I still really enjoy playing it. That for me is the important part of playing. Winning is nice, but having a fun time is more important. Or to put it another way I enjoy the journey more than destination.

AGES aka Arts Good Evil Science

I really do feel honoured that I have an opportunity to play a preview of a game that is I believe going to be hitting kickstarter soon. Now for the record I have paid for the game, so now that I have made that clear you should be able to judge whether you think my opinions are valid or not.

One of my favourite genre of games are the deck building ones, such as Marvel Legendary, Android:Netrunner and Star Realms. So I was excited to get a chance to play AGES. I'm going to start covering the game in more depth in other posts. However I do like the game a lot and I like how it has combined elements from other games into a very enjoyable experience. And I'm not just saying that because I won against Luke either.

Sunday Casual Tournament 8

Yep the 8th Star Realms Sunday Casual Tournament started and for the second time only I have made it to round two! Sadly this second time hasn't been through defeating an opponent on the battle field. Nope no fallen opponent to lord it over with my superior playing skills or as usual in my case dumb luck. This time I've been denied the taste of glory, or as is more the case spared the bitter taste of defeat and been given a buy to the next round.

Which is rather lucky for you dear reader because it spares you yet another blog post of an epic crash and burn. Well until it happens in my round two match up.

In the meantime thanks to the Origins coverage by The Dice Tower I now know I have to buy the new Gambit expansion for Star Realms when it comes out in September/October time. This expansion has all new gambit cards to play with. So an even bigger pool of cards to draw from when playing with gambits.

So assuming it does get released round then knowing how long it takes to get over to the UK we will be lucky to see it before Christmas.

Which would mean it arrives around the same time as the Colony Wars “expansion” for Star Realms is released. This is 120 new cards that plays separately from the original game, or can be combined with original game to play four players.

 

Cord Cutter

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I'm a cord cutter as I believe the term is in the U.S. Of A. Where across the pond in means dropping the cable subscription over here it means I've stopped paying for Sky and I don't have Virgin or BT. In fact I don't have get the UK terrestrial channels either. Mind you I had given up on ITV and Channel 4 and 5 years ago, and hardly watched the BBC (usually only tuning in for Doctor Who and Sherlock).
Even with Sky it was mainly used as background noise. Most of my viewing was and still is streaming from the likes of Netflix, Amazon Prime and getting all the latest episodes of shows I like from the U.S. weeks if not months ahead of the UK. So even Sky was irrelevant to me.
So when my Sky box gave up the ghost I saw no point in continuing paying them money for Malcolm in the Middle, Modern Family and Simpsons reruns. When I cancelled Sky did their damnedest to stop me leaving, and I still got letters and phone calls trying to woe me back.
Still the money I saved from Sky paid for an Apple TV, which for me an Apple Fanboy was a no brainer. With AirPlay I can watch my shows from the U.S. or Amazon Prime (although I also have a Fire Stick now also due to a nice little pre-order offer from Amazon for Prime members). I can watch Netflix, Sky News and YouTube on the Apple TV.
YouTube now makes a much bigger chunk of the content I watch now. Well being able to view on a large screen does make a big difference.
Now my YouTube subscription list is of actual use. There are some great shows on YouTube around my interested of gaming (video and board). They vary in production values naturally. Some are good enough that they could easily be on a regular channel.
I wasn't able (and not likely to be able) to get to Origins last week. However thanks to one or two of the channels I subscribe to I've been able to see game previews and interviews from the show. This coming week E3 happens and there will be loads of content from there. Then not long after there will be coverage of GenCon and Dice Tower Con.
Already I have even more games on my radar now. Like Tides of Time, Nations the Dice Game, Cthulhu's Vault, Ninja Camp, Extra Extra, City of Gears, Epic (backed on Kickstarter), Council of Verona tabletop edition, and Tiny Epic Galaxies (backed on Kickstarter). Ok I've also added Imperial Settlers too after seeing the expansion preview.
It's also nice to see game play videos. I can watch live streams of National or World tournaments of games I play, or the video afterwards. These are great not only in helping to improve your own game play, but if you are looking at getting a game they are also good at giving you a feel for the game.
Then finally there are the reviews and how to play video, which I find helpful in learning a game and making my mind up if a game is for me.
It's great I have what can be best described as my own personalised channel of content that I'm interested in. Maybe I'm late to the party and more hip and trendy younger readers will have been doing this for years. However I hate watching TV on a small screen like an iPad or laptop when I have a large screen in my living room. So I've never been a big fan of watching stuff on those devices. The Apple TV has made it feasible for me to cut the cord, watch programs that I want, when I want and not be dependent on some-one else making those decisions for me.
 

 

Part of the Collection

tabletop

At the weekend I think it was, a little spatte of posting a picture of your game collection on the UK Boardgame Chat group on Facebook occurred. All the folks that posted had a nice little area of shelving where they were storing their games.

Sadly I don't have that “fancy” storage area to photograph for that thread. My games are spread around the house in various “deposits”. Oh ok more like piles. A lot of my filing systems could at best described as piles of stuff. It may look like chaos and a mess to others. But amazingly I know what is in each pile. I like to call it organised chaos. The system works for me!
So for my participation to that meme of photos of your collection, I gathered together the majority of the games I have downstairs on to my “gaming table” and took the above photo. It was only after I'd posted the photo that I realised that I had forgotten one or two games like my X-Wing miniatures, Dicemasters and Perudo that were also downstairs.
I think the follow up question for that thread should be “how many of the games haven't been to the table yet?” To my great shame my “pile of shame” of unplayed games is large, not as large as my “pile of shame” of video games. But still I need to play more games!

 

My First Skirmish

imperial assault, krosmaster arena, tabletop

Thanks to Luke coming round I was able to finally get Imperial Assault to the table for a skirmish game. We used the suggested first time skirmish teams from the skirmish manual, and played the Moisture Farm map using scenerio A – “Close to Home”. I was playing the Imperial forces who had initiative, while Luke had the Rebels.

Above: Darth Vader about to show just how destructive he can be by attacking Luke and Gaarkhan (the wookie) using brutality.

I was going to go off onto some fanciful journey of self awareness inspired by the battle between the fictional father and son Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker. Comparing their relationship and portrayal to that of being a step father and my relationship to my step sons. With the battle between father and son in the game representing the struggle and conflict within the step family I was part of. Followed by some inner reflection on my regrets and failings as a step parent since the break up of our step family.

Then after this navel gazing I'd come back to the reality of playing my first skirmish game of Imperial Assault. Luke and I had to reference the rules a few times, but that was only natural for a first game. Luke made a good tactical decision of trying to take out Darth Vader first. Which he nearly pulled off. Vaders survival had hinged on one key decision. Down to two life points, Vader was nearly out for the count. One successful attack by the right character like Luke Skywalker would of finished him off. However the wrong character was activated first giving Vader a window to wipe out enough rebels to grab the win.

A couple of days later it was time to duke it out French anime style in Krosmaster Arena. What I loved about learning this game was the fact that the manual has a tutorial mode! Just like a video game the tutorial took you through playing the game gently using mini maps, and introducing new elements of game play in each of the seven tutorials. Sadly I didn't win any of the tutorial games against Luke. I'm not the tactical genius I thought I was.

Playing Krosmaster Arena really is the boardgame experience of playing Final Fantasy Tactics. Luke even made the comment while playing he wanted to play FFT later because of this game.

Apart from cost (for both games) being a possible sticking point in playing these games, they are not cheap. But then as soon as you start adding miniatures to a game the price always shoots up. Both games have gorgeous minis. I can see people being put off Krosmaster Arena by its cutesy cartoon look, especially of the chibi style characters. But don't let that put you off, there is a nice skirmish game here which can play up to four players.

There are some similarities between both games mechanically. But it's the differences that give each their unique feel. I love in Imperial Assault the turn order, and initiative swapping each turn, and being able to choose the order you activate characters. While in Krosmaster Arena I like how order of play for your team is decided by character initiative. Team building in Imperial Assault is more in-depth than Krosmaster Arena because you are also having to build a command deck.

I enjoyed playing both and want to get both to the table on a regular basis. However Luke preferred Krosmaster Arena. So much so that a regular thing has been set up to play the game. Next time it's a full game, with us drafting our teams from the limited pool of characters that I have. And yes the future does seem to see me at some point buying more figures.

 

My Noise Deck

netrunner, tabletop

Here is my Noise deck that I put together to play against Todd. As the feedback from Todd was I didn't put him under enough pressure or as I like to put it I was not aggressive enough. I just wasn't drawing viruses, which put me off running at ice. The cards I had in for economy worked really well. So I'm happier with that side of things.

My viruses/programs need to be worked on. So once Todd sees this list and what cards he has to work with he will make some suggestions on how to improve my deck.

In the meantime I want to replace Inject with something else. What I don't know, maybe use those as slots for more viruses. I know I have spare influence as well so using an out of faction card is an option.

Runner:

  • Noise

Programs:

  • Parasite
  • Clot (x2)
  • Darwin (x2)
  • Wyrm (x2)
  • Imp (x2)

Events:

  • Inside Job
  • Day Job
  • Wanton Destruction
  • Inject (x2)
  • Showing Off (x2)
  • Hacktivist Meeting (x2)
  • I've Had Worse (x2)
  • Infiltration (x2)
  • Surge (x2)
  • Deja Vu (x2)
  • Demolition Run (x2)

Resources:

  • Scrubber (x2)
  • Utopia Shard
  • Hades Shard
  • Armitage Codebusting (x2)
  • Virus Breeding Ground (x2)
  • Kati Jones
  • Human First
  • Plascrete Carapace (x2)
  • Chop Bot 3000
  • Astrolabe
  • Grimoire
  • Cyberfeeder (x2)

45 cards in total

Built from the following:

  • Core set (x2)
  • What Lies Ahead
  • Trace Amount
  • Cyber Exodus
  • A Study in Static
  • Humanity's Shadow
  • Future Proof
  • True Colors
  • First Contact
  • Up and Over
  • All That Remains
  • The Valley
  • Breaker Bay
  • Order and Chaos

 

 

My Imperial Assault Wish List

imperial assault, star wars, tabletop

I've just read a great post over on Couple vs Cardboard about 5 Things They Want In Imperial Assault.

This got me thinking what would I like to see added to this game?

First up on my list is I want character cards for the released allies like Luke, Han and Chewie so that those characters can be played in the supplied campaign instead of the characters that come in the base set. I don't just want to play with them as allies to a mission. I want to play the campaign as them.

I'd love to see a separate campaign/skirmish designer book released. One of the things I loved about the Zombicide scenario book that was released was the excellent designer advice section that gave advice on how to create your own scenarios. What makes a great campaign? How do you balance the game? What makes a great skirmish scenario? You get the idea. Add in a mini campaign and a couple of skirmish scenario s with maybe some designer notes and I think this would fly off the shelves. Imperial Assault screams making your own scenarios for it, and this would help guide people in making enjoyable ones to play.

I'd love to see an expansion that covers the conflict between the rebels and imperials on the planet Hoth. It screams tiles that cover the rebel base, and also the rebel defences. I can see the Tauntaun models now with plugin riders for Han and Luke. And how awesome would a Wampa model be?

At some point there has to be Ewoks. Toughest creatures in the Empire! Look how easily these little guys with little more than sticks and stones took on superior forces that were far better equipped and won.

What would you like to see added to Imperial Assault?

 

Tabletop Gaming the Magazine

tabletop
At the UK Games Expo a brand new tabletop gaming magazine was launched called Tabletop Gaming.

As the cover shouts out in no particular order they list 101 games that you need to play. I'm not going to comment on the list too much, these sort of things are always contentious, everyone will have some games that they think should be on the list and there will be others on the list that they think shouldn't be.

Each game has a small but reasonable bit written about it, that summarises the game nicely. But I would have liked to know why the game made the list, what made them stand out as a must play.

It's because of this list of 101 games that I feel it's unfair to really judge the magazine as a whole. The list takes up the majority of the first issue, space that I'm hoping in future issues will be taken up by other features and reviews.

I will comment on the features and interviews that the magazine manages to squeeze into its pages.

For me in both the features and interviews way too much space is spent describing the game itself. In the case of the features that is the majority of them. The first looks were more the style of writing that I was expecting in the features. The best example of this is the Guild Ball first look. My ideal feature tells me about the game, the ideas behind it, influences, what makes the game unique. I want a bit of the writers personality to come through.

I grew up reading the video game magazines like Crash! And Zzap64. What I liked about the reviews in these two magazines (both by the same publisher) was that you had little talking heads for each of the reviewers on each review giving their personal view of the game. You got to know what the reviewer liked and didn't. It was then possible to judge a review by the preferences of the reviewer. If that reviewer had similar tastes to yourself and they liked a game, then you knew there was a good chance you too would enjoy it.

I would like to see something like this come through in the reviews for this magazine. It is sadly missing from magazines these days, very few credit who is writing the review. Hopefully when proper reviews start appearing in the magazine they will be in the Crash,/Zzap64 style.

Another thing missing from the magazine were columnists. It would be cool to see regular columns on various aspects of gaming, such as maybe a Netrunner column, or Magic the Gathering. I'd love to see Leigh Alexander write one of these columns. Her writings in Edge were always a joy to read, and her pieces on Shut Up, Sit Down continue to be a joy to read

In this modern digital age with so much content being free and more up to date it has been a rocky time for established magazines. So for a new publication to start up they are facing an up hill struggle in a shrinking market place. However there is hardly any competition for Tabletop Gaming magazine, especially as a general gaming magazine on the newsstand, but it is the online stuff they have to compete against.

Tabletop Gaming needs to offer something that stands out from the online competition, and there are glimpses within the magazine that they are able to do that. It's early days, the first edition so it's hard to be too judgemental. I think a truer indication of the type of magazine this will be will come in the second edition.

Terminator Genisys

For the duration of the show those that purchased the magazine also got three plastic figures for the soon to be released miniatures game Terminator Genisys. I wasn't really impressed with the figures, especially that they required some assembly, and seemed really delicate. These figures were an opportunity to sell me on the upcoming game. They just didn't grab me.

There was a photo of the game in the magazine, that showed the game being played on a war torn landscape with the odd semi destroyed building, very reminiscent of a post apocalyptic future showing the aftermath of the war between man and robots. No boards or game tiles, looking more like something a war gamer would be playing with.

I already have miniature based games like X-Wing, Imperial Assault, Zombicide, and the just added Krosmaster Arena, and they are all pretty heavy on the collectable side. So despite liking the first two Terminator movies a lot (the remaining films were watchable at best) and being predisposed to wanting to play a Terminator themed game, this game is not the game for me.

Tabletop Gaming will be available from a local newsagents/supermarket magazine shelf from the 19th June.

 

 

Summer 2015 Hot List Predictions

hot list, tabletop

Below is a list of games and expansions I think will be “hot” over the Summer months. These are all being released and available (allegedly – delays do happen for whatever reason) between now and September. I'll do a new one of these types of posts then with what I think will be “hot” for the Autumn and Winter.

Naturally it will be safe to assume one or two of these will end up in my collection ^_^

  1. Star Wars Imperial Assault Twin Shadows Expansion
  2. Star Wars Imperial Assault Ally & Villians Packs: Boba Fett, C3-PO & R2-D2, Kayn Somos
  3. Five Tribes The Artisans of Naqala Expansion
  4. Ghostbusters the boardgame
  5. Legendary Encounters Predator
  6. Alien v Predator: The Hunt Begins boardgame
  7. Bang! The Dice Game: The Walking Dead
  8. Machi Koro Millionaires Row Expansion

Hopefully this have given you some ideas, maybe alerted you to something you had missed was coming out. What do you think will be hot? What are you looking forward to buying and playing over the Summer?

UPDATE 2/6/2015: How could I miss off the list Magic the Gathering the board game?! It really should be on this list as well