Before Diego starts his new job the stars aligned so that we both had a day off at the same time.
So naturally it was a game day.
We started off playing a two player game of Brazil Imperium.
Despite using a two player map that had a higher chance of combat there was no combat between Diego and myself.
Map setup used in Brazil Imperium
I really do like how the game board is so configurable for different player counts and if you want a higher or lower chance of combat.
This was the first time I’ve played Brazil Imperium as a two player game. And guess what? It’s still a great game as a two player game.
Obviously I’ve not played it as a solo game. However I really like it at any of the other player counts. Not many games can say that they are good at all/most player counts. They normally have a sweet spot.
I think what helps is the modular board setup that I like so much. I’m not sure I’d be saying the same if the board was a more traditional one.
That modular board makes it so that both sides are close together, a more compact board.
Next time I visit Nathan this is definitely going in the bag.
Oh and I won. So a good start to the days gaming.
Our next game was a new to me game, Tyrants of the Underdark. A game that’s been on my wish list for a while. So I was really happy to get a chance to try it.
I really liked this deckbuilder mashed with area control.
Although I would argue the theme is very weak, and could almost be anything. Having said that I really do like the art on the cards.
You chose a faction at the start, but in reality you are just choosing your playing colour. The faction name is irrelevant, there is no unique faction ability.
Factions we chose!
Player count determines how much of the board is in play. For our two player game it was just the central section. Which is one approach. Another is to have a double sided board (similar to Tapestry) with maps tailored to different player counts.
Diego won this one comfortably.
Our third game was Riverside. What more can I say about this roll and write? I like it, a lot. Plus I won this game.
Our final game of the afternoon was Super-Skill Pinball: 4-Cade.
This just didn’t jell with me at all.
The production side is great, dry erase pens, good quality player boards.
I loved the quick start rules leaflet, and rule book.
I found the ball piece annoying and smudged the markings you make on the board.
I felt the game dragged on. I thought it’d be quicker to play.
I need to try this again. But not sure I want to.
We cut the game short after I got called by another friend who had some cupcakes and curry for me to pick up.
I had a great time playing with Diego.
It was kind of him to invite me into his home, and provide a delicious lunch.
Hopefully we will get a chance to repeat this in the near future.
SPOILER ALERT TO MY ADVENTURERS! The following post contains spoilers for the up and coming campaign/session. You may want to avoid this post and join me in a future one.
Session 8 had to be cancelled at the last moment.
Luckily everyone was so understanding.
So session 8 takes place next Saturday. But due to my work rota and a 3pm to midnight shift, it is taking place earlier in the day. Which means our usual venue will not be open. Luckily Shane has said he will host session 8 at his abode.
I had been thinking of changing my Checks Sheet with more useful information.
Which I finally did today.
I changed the orientation of the page, added some more info such as death saving throws.
I like to think between this and the DM Screen I have enough information in front of me in a session to minimise having to refer to the players handbook or the DMG.
I also have, thanks to the very kind generosity of Shane I was given a copy of the Giant Book of Battle Maps.
This is the giant version of the Big Book of Battle Maps.
I do really like these battle map books. I must do as the Big Book lives in my DM bag.
Last night it was that time once again for Fenland Gamers to meet up and play some games.
I’d been lucky with my shift for the day with it finishing at 6pm. Which meant I was going straight from work to the club night. But also I wouldn’t be missing the evening of gaming.
Club night would mark the start of four days off. I couldn’t think of a better way to kick off the much needed r&r.
This was another really well attended evening with seventeen folks turning up. Which included four new faces.
Charlene and myself played Tapestry with three of them.
This wasn’t my copy of the game so we were playing with only the Arts and Architecture expansion. The cards were also unsleeved. Oh the horror of naked cards!
My Leaders were conquering artists. Sadly I got my butt handed to me, the sixty point victory point starting position for The Chosen was too much. But I did get my personal best five player score!
Our second game of the evening was the WotC “filler” card game Dungeon Mayhem.
This is a really fun card game. It’s quick and easy to play.
However it does have one “mechanic“ in it that I really dislike. That may not be a strong enough description but it’ll do for now.
That “mechanic” is the physical activity. For example I had a card in my deck that required players to perform a little dance. Charlene had one that required players to give her praise.
Why? It’s not fun!
But despite that major drawback it is a fun game. And even with players getting knocked out they are still semi involved in the game play.
This will have to join the rotation of games going into the game bag for club nights.
With the game of Dungeon Mayhem I completed one of my gaming challenges for the year.
Yep I’ve played forty new to me games this year so far.
I still find it hard to believe that I’ve played that many new to me games.
As it stands at the moment approximately two thirds of the games I’ve played this year have been new to me.
With roughly forty five percent of those new to me games being games owned by others.
Don’t hold me to those percentages I’ve spitballed those figures as rough guesstimates, they may vary by a percent or two if I actually calculated them. But they are close enough.
Using the 3×3 functionality of the bgstat you can see what those forty games were below.
I’m not going to increase the challenge even with three months of the year left.
But it will be very interesting to see how many new to me games I actually do end up playing at the end of the year.
A week and a half ago I somehow ended up negotiating for a copy of Space Hulk Death Angel the card game plus two of the rare expansions.
I already had the core game, and was only really interested in the two expansions.
But unlike the others that had expressed interest in only the expansions if the seller was going to split the lot up. I reasoned buying the lot would be easier and make me a more attractive to the seller.
I guessed right.
There wasn’t much negotiating to be fair as we both were not that far off in the price we were thinking of.
So a deal was made.
With the arrival of Space Hulk Death Angel the card game and the two expansions (see photo below for which) it got me thinking about my other grail expansions.
A grail expansion or game for that matter is a game/expansion that you would love to own but for the following reason don’t. That reason is because the game/expansion is out of print, never likely to be printed again, and going for silly money on the second hand market. In other words difficult and expensive to get.
My grail expansions are the following:
My grail expansions
I could add the Tannhausen expansions possibly to the above. But at the moment I’m not sure.
If I ever get any of these grail expansions it will be by luck, and I had some spare money at that precise moment in time. I’m not actively hunting them down.
So if anyone is interested I do have a spare copy of Space Hulk Death Angel the card game for sale ;)
I think it’s time to rectify the glaring omission of mine that I pointed out in my post on the new official Stonemaier Games scoring app.
All of us at Whitespider1066 Towers (basically me, and the two attack chihuahuas Nico and Loki) would like to wish Jamey and all those that work for and with Stonemaier Games a happy tenth anniversary.
It’s no secret that I’m a Stonemaier Games fanboy.
There is banter about me being so at our club game nights from time to time.
Now I don’t own every game by Stonemaier Games. That might come as a big shock to one or two of you out there. Which means I haven’t played them all.
An even bigger shock for everyone (unless you have been reading this blog for a long long time) is I actually don’t like one of their games! But it would count as two because if I didn’t like the original then I wouldn’t like the themed version of it either (which I haven’t played).
Have you guessed which game it is?
Yep Between Two Cities. Back when we played Jonathan’s copy it just didn’t jell with us. So if I didn’t like that game then sadly when Stonemaier released Between Two Castles of Mad King Ludwig there wasn’t much chance of it finding its way into my collection.
But enough of the negative vibe this is meant to be a celebration of Stonemaier Games.
The seven games I do own I absolutely love.
Do I really need to state once again that Scythe is my all time favourite game? I absolutely love the game. I think the only thing I need to add to the game at some point in the future (when finances allow) is the metal mechs.
I’m not sure how a new top 100 games would shake out using paired comparisons but I’d be surprised if a quarter of my top twenty weren’t made up of Stonemaier games.
But what is it that attracts me to Stonemaier games?
Firstly and I don’t think anyone would dispute this, is the production values. For a few years now I would argue Stonemaier have been setting the standards others try to achieve. From the components to art, and even the rule books. They are of such a high standard.
Then game play. The games are so accessible, usually easy to pick up, but offer depth as well. Plus they usually have an interesting twist on the core game mechanic.
Considering the high production standards of the games, the rrp is amazing, and surprisingly cheaper than expected. Often before release I’ve tried estimating what the game will cost and always I’m way over.
Then there is the support of the games via expansions, accessories, and easily accessible promos. Let alone the actually very good customer service.
I’m looking forward to the next ten years and the fond memories it will bring playing my current Stonemaier games, and future ones to come.
Nathan has been in the US of A on a family holiday with his biological family the last couple of weeks.
Before he left I had asked if he ended up in a Target, if by some fluke they had one in stock, could he get me a copy of the new D&D Starter Set Dragons of Stormwreck Isle.
Until I think October, this has been a Target exclusive.
Nath got home early last week, and when we finally managed to speak yesterday he said he’d managed to get it. He’d got the stores last copy. Which was a miracle really. I’d seen elsewhere that people were going to Target only to find it had sold out.
Yeah I know not much of a getting it early. Especially by the time I get to visit him. But still.
Nath and Josh (one of his older brothers) did buy some Pokémon cards over there. Much to the chagrin of other biological members of the family. I don’t get that attitude. But I’m glad they didn’t let it put them off buying something that brings them joy. There was a bit of education for Nath from his brother as he discovered how much some Pokémon cards can be worth. Do they play the game? No. I think they just enjoy the collecting side! Which is cool.
Nath nearly bought Alien Fate of the Nostromo from Target that also came with an Ash mini. When he finds out that in the base game Ash is just a standee not a mini he’s going to regret being talked out of it.
But at least I know what to get him for his birthday now. And I look forward to playing this with him.
Whilst we were chatting on the phone I was telling him about new games that I’d got. Sadly we won’t be playing Twilight Inscription together unless I take a folding table with me. His circular table just isn’t large enough. So it joins a growing list of games we can’t play on our visits.
However I do have new arrivals that we can play like Brazil Imperium. With its modular board the two player setup will fit easily.
Nath did request I bring Wingspan with me on my next visit as he really likes the game. That really does make me happy.
I love that we can share a love of board games.
Obviously we have more than that in common. We are both geeks. We like the same sort of movies and tv shows. We love video games. You get the idea.
However it’s when we play board games together that I feel we are getting some deeper more meaningful quality time together.
It’s just a shame his biological family don’t want to share in that sort of time with him. I think they’d all benefit from it. I know Kate sometimes tries. She even owns Wingspan (but hasn’t got to grips with it yet).
Anyway I’m hoping to get to see Nathan real soon. Assuming my rota for next couple of weeks doesn’t change.
The drawback of my new role is that my days off each week move around. So it’s not guaranteed I am off at the weekend or even our fortnightly club meet-ups.
What this means is I am more reliant on ad-hoc gaming sessions and peoples availability mid-week than ever to get any gaming it.
Luckily Thursday evening Marcin, Charlene, and Julie were free to play a game of Brazil Imperium.
Who played who in Brazil Imperium
Once again I went with some synergy with my era cards. Once again it was paintings that was the linking factor.
Whilst the others went after resources or built as their first actions I went after a painting. Particularly as the one I grabbed allowed me to use gold cards as science tokens, followed a couple of turns later by grabbing a painting that allowed me to use wool as gold.
So for much of the early game I felt I was playing catch up to the others as I kind of started setting up a paintings engine in my early turns that would give me early access to science, and worked towards my objectives.
It felt very explosive once I did start building and expanding my empire.
Marcin was the first to complete the first era and the second. However I wasn’t far behind completing my first two era objectives.
However my early investment in the painting engine paid off and I was in a great position to complete my third era objective and trigger the end of the game.
After all the tallying was done Marcin’s more aggressive building snagged him a comprehensive victory.
Having chosen a four player map that was in the middle for the chance of conflict between players, there was no conflict. The opportunities were there. Particularly against my empire as it was fairly late compared to the others that I had my monarch out, or built up my forces for my final era objective.
Final Brazil Imperium scores
It had seemed a good idea to game Thursday evening. But as I woke up Friday morning at ten past four the next morning to get ready for work it seemed less so.
The plus point for my tired body was my shift was only five hours.
However my other brilliant idea a couple of days earlier was to arrange a session to play Twilight Imperium if it arrived in time that evening.
Luckily my optimism was well placed and Twilight Imperium did arrive whilst I was at work. So the gaming session could go ahead.
I spent a therapeutic half hour sleeving the cards in Twilight Inscription. Luckily I had just enough. But it was close. Damn close.
The rest of the afternoon before the session was spent watching YouTube rules videos for the game, reading the rules, and dozing off. Yep I was apparently tired!
For some reason I had got it in my head that Twilight Inscription played between one and four players.
But it does not.
Twilight Inscription actually plays up to eight players!
Who played which faction
Which kinda makes sense considering the game it’s meant to be based on also plays that many.
However! I don’t think I’ll ever play with more than four players just on a practical level.
This game is a space hog.
My mind boggles at the size table you’d need for that player count. There is no way everyone would see the Mecatol board and the four objective cards. However I can see this working as a remote play game if everyone playing has a copy.
On the 6ft by 2.5ft table we were on it would have been snug with a fourth player but possible.
Twilight Inscription is both a flip and write AND a roll and write. It makes great use of both. You work through the event deck that gives you resources in an expansion event or triggers a warfare or political event. Plus during the expansion event you also roll the dice to get further resources to use. I quite like this combo, it works really well here.
Let’s address the elephant in the room about Twilight Inscription. This is not a cut down version of Twilight Imperium. It really is it’s own thing set in the Twilight Imperium universe.
It does have a 4X feel, after all each of the four player boards is one of those X’s. However the only real player interaction comes in the form of the voting and warfare.
Component wise it knocks it out of the park. The dice are large chunky affairs that feel really nice to roll. But you do need big hands to roll all six at once. The chalk pens I like. You do need a cloth to clean the boards with at the end. It is a pain to use the erasers on the ends of the supplied pens. But the chalk pens don’t smudge once dry on the board. Which is really important in the game as you play the game moving between the various player boards.
Political cards we voted on
Compared to other roll and writes Twilight Imperium takes a lot of setup. You are constructing the event deck, shuffling the artifact deck, randomly selecting objectives and political cards, choosing a faction to play.
Objectives we could claim
For me I did feel I was empire building, exploring the stars and battling my neighbours. So I think the theme came through.
If you don’t ever play eight players then selecting player boards randomly, and using the unique side of each board, with one of the 24 factions. Then there is an incredible amount of variety each game. With no two games being the same from a player setup side of things.
The political and objective decks are very small, and would have been nice to have more cards for these. I can see these feeling very tired very quickly. The event deck could have done with having more cards too.
I don’t really think I can give advice on how to play this after a single game and how badly I did.
I got my arsed kicked royally in this first game as the scores below show. But I still had a blast playing the game.
Final Twilight Inscription Scores
My run of “great” decisions continues today with an afternoon of D&D before doing a seven hour shift!
As part of the tenth anniversary celebrations for Stonemaier Games (which strangely for a fanboy I haven’t written about yet!) have just announced and released a free official Stonemaier Games Scoring app.
The app will initially act as a digital score pad for Wingspan, and record high scores. Other Stonemaier games will follow over time.
So how will this effect the unofficial, nothing to do with Stonemaier Games, Wingspan scoring app Wingmate?
Although technically they do the same job in other ways they differ.
Firstly Wingmate will cost you money. To score a game (other than the free to try single player scoring), use the automata, use either/both the expansions for scoring, you have to fork out hard digital cash.
As mentioned earlier in the post the Stonemaier app is completely free.
Wingmate is designed to be used during play.
At the start of a game you set up the end of round objectives either using the app to select them or draw them randomly physically and let the app know which ones you are using.
Then during the game at the end of each round you record each players score for that objective.
The official app is designed to be used at the end of the game.
It’s here that I noticed a difference in the nectar scoring.
Wingmate calculates the end game scoring on the rules where points awarded are based on majority in each habitat. Whilst the official app gives a point for each nectar collected!
When did this change? Shouldn’t the official app use the rules or give the option to chose between the two?
I don’t play using the Automata so I haven’t used that option in Wingmate. And I’m not paying £1.79 to see what it does! I’m not that dedicated.
The official app keeps a high score table, which Stonemaier plan to have so that you can see how you rank against other users of the app.
It also allows you to record scores for three other Stonemaier games (no score pad functionality) for their own respective high score tables. With the same future plans.
Currently Wingmate does not have this functionality. Will they add it? I’m not sure.
I’m not sure what the future of Wingmate is. I think the official app will meet the majority of players needs. Despite the change in nectar scoring. Whether that takes away enough in-app purchases income to justify stopping the further development of Wingmate I don’t know. Maybe it forces Wingmate to drop the in-app purchases and go completely free also. It’s going to be interesting to see what the developer decides.
I do like the end of round scoring functionality of Wingmate. I’d definitely add this to my wish list of features for the official app after sorting out the nectar scoring. Which for me is the top priority.
As a first release the official app is pretty cool.
Although I only cover iOS apps this will as soon as the Google app approval process allows be out on that other platform too.
Before I go into the rest of the post a little peak behind the curtain of running this blog.
About seven weeks ago the jetpack plugin for WordPress (the software used to run this blog) stopped working.
I had no clue why.
At the time I didn’t have the time to investigate why, so I just deactivated it.
Which meant I wasn’t getting any stats for the blog, no social media sharing etc. Basically I had no idea if anyone was reading my ramblings. Wait let me correct that. I had no idea how few people were reading my poorly put together thoughts.
About three weeks ago I finally got round to trying to sort out the issue.
It’s been a tiring bouncing between initially WordPress support, then the jetpack support and my hosting provider bluehost.
The jetpack support also involved the development team, who would ask for something to be checked, or changed on the server. That would then require me to contact the bluehost support.
There were a couple of permission issues. But finally yesterday a bluehost support person ran a repair on the WordPress database and all of a sudden the jetpack plugin was alive once more.
So long story short, something technically wasn’t working, now it is!
Just dropped through the letterbox is the latest Alien RPG cinematic expansion Heart of Darkness. The third and final part of a three part series called the Draconis Strain Saga (Chariot of the Gods, and Destroyer of Worlds being the other two parts). Although it can also be played as a stand alone cinematic adventure.
You do need either the core rulebook or the starter set rules to play.
I haven’t had a chance to play the RPG, but I’m hoping to rectify that soon. In the meantime I might just look at the three expansions as a whole and give my impression of the adventures, contents, etc.
Imminent arrivals
Finally nearly a year later Renegade will any day now be sending out the promised “We’re sorry” promo packs for the missing promo card that was meant to be sent out with orders last September or October last year.
Also due anytime now is the replacement dice for The One Ring second edition plus the hard copy of The Ruins of the Lost Realm.
Then by the end of this week the preorder of Twilight Inscription should arrive. I’m looking forward to playing this roll and write.
