Say goodbye, 2016!

This is going to be the first of two posts here in the transition int the new year.  My focus in the first is to wrap up the events of the old year, top it off with a bow, and then set the whole thing on fire.

PAX Wrap-up

Since my last post the major event for me was PAX AUS.  The Penny Arcade Exposition Down Under.

I have never been in a position to attend conventions regularly, mostly due to financial reasons.  So when the opportunity came up to attend a major gaming convention in what is for the moment my home town, I go all in.

When you read advice articles on attending these conventions, there are certain common threads.  Point 1, plan ahead.  Look at the schedule well ahead of time and identify the events that to do not want to miss.  In the modern era, smartphones make this moderately easier.  PAX even has its own app for this purpose.  I only say moderately easier because when it comes down to it, you still have to be aware of the time, and when one is gaming that is often difficult.
Point 2, buy your con merchandise early.  Many people have an aversion for standing in long lines.  When you first approach the merch booth and see the hundreds of people waiting to check out, your first inclination is to come back later in the convention.  Bad idea.  You must fight instincts and wait in the line, unless you are not picky in the least, or wear an abnormally small t-shirt size.  For big people like me, 3x and 4x t-shirts are the first things to run out and since restocking my wardrobe iwas part of the point of coming, in the queue I wait.
Point 3, be patient.  Other than the merch booth, patience is critical. Day one of the convention is generally for scouting.  Fine the booths that have the long lines and mark those to hit first on day two and three.

The Panel Discussions
There were a lot of interesting sounding ones but I skipped most in lieu of game playing.  There were a couple I did attend.
How Geekery Saved My Life and Made Me Who I Am:  This was a semi interesting discussion amongst people (primarily from the video game industry) who used gaming and game design to turn their apparently uninteresting lives around into a fulfilling career.  To topic sounded interesting to me simply because I had a similar experience in college.  It was gaming, and all of the wonderfully strange people that came with it that made my college experience great.
Geekological Diversity, Tabletop Edition:  Diversity in gaming is a big deal at these conventions, much as it is within other media industries.  The panel in this case started with stories of how gaming was for them difficult due to the lack of inclusiveness in their local communities and how they eventually broke through and reached fulfillment in the gaming industry.  One of the other main points that was made was that board/rpg games themselves are sorely lacking in gender and cultural diversity.  Much was said about board games that feature no female figures anywhere in the artwork, and RPGs that thrive on "tired old tropes" and cultural references.  While I am certainly on board with the idea that diversity is important, I questioned the panel what they considered the end goal to be.  Was the goal full diverse representation within the art and themes within the games themselves, or is the goal a community that is itself fully inclusive and welcoming to anyone that wants to play?  In practice I did not really get a straight answer out of anyone on the panel.  They seemed to be more focused on the former, being primarily a gaming industry problem.  I feel that the latter is the more appropriate goal.  As long as anyone who wants to play games can, and they enjoy the experience, the rest is secondary.  Not unimportant, but secondary.

Games Played:

The Good, The Bad, The Munchkin - Muchkin tournament. I lost in a close game.  Did get a free card out of the deal.  WHEE!
Sushi Go - Casual game that I tripped over in the food court with friends made in the entrance queue. This is one of the best filler card games that Gamewright has released in recent memory.  I will likely have to add this to my wish list.
Quaddle - This is a fascinating little indie game that I got to play with the designer.  It is an abstract game, looking like a strange combination of Othello and Tetris.  I have not been that into abstracts lately, but this one was a lot of fun.
RoboRally - Played a LOT of this.  Mostly in one long tournament.  I lost the tournament on points, but had the high number of robot kills, so I came out of the experience with a rare PAX Challenge Coin.
Magic: the Gathering (TT and iPad version) - Even though I have been out of the loop of Magic for a long time, I can't let the game go completely, especially when they have free stuff.  All I had to do was pretend to be a newbie and I got a free deck of cards.
Scythe - This one is always a blast.  In this case I tripped over a group that needed a teacher.  I was happy to do so and fun was had by all.
Catan - another couple tournaments.  Lost every time.  I don't play this game nearly enough to be able to win consistently.
Carcassonne - another tournament. Came closer to winning, but again lost to the experts.
Between Two Cities - taught this one too.  Even though this does not feel to me like a filler game, the short game play serves that purpose.

Final War CCG - Because of my experience with Magic, I am always hesitant to even try another CCG.  This one looked a little interesting because it was advertised as a more tactical game, and they were giving away free stuff.

So finally, the haul.

I did not walk away with nearly as much as some, and certainly not as much as I could have.  I did manage to exercise a measure of restraint.

Merch:
2 PAX AUS 2016 T-shirts (the aforementioned wardrobe replenishment)
PAX 2015 Pin (grab bag)
2 PAX AUS Neoprene Playmats
PAX AUS Slap Bracelet
PAX AUS Water Bottle
Magic: The Gathering Water bottle with LEDs (free from demo tasks)
PAX AUS 2016 Patch
PAX 2016 Challenge Coin

Games:
Red Dragon Inn Allies: Keep and Nitrel - Filling out the RDI collection
Dominion: Seaside - picked this up off of the clearance shelf
Magnum Opus - Very interesting deck builder.
Final War CCG  - I caved.  It made a difference that they spent the entire convention throwing free booster backs at me.

Final (non PAX) Notes on 2016

In many ways, this past year sucked mightily.  In other ways it was really a very good year.  The year started with a gaming goal with which circumstances interfered (reference year suckage).  Even though that goal fell apart, there was a lot of games and a lot of good gaming in the past year.  My job is stable and remains interesting.  The family adventure in Australia continues to be fun and interesting, and yet we are all looking forward to the time when we return to be closer to friends and family.  While there are those lost in the past year that we will dearly miss, those that remain have our health and each other. And as long as we can sit down and play a game together, that is something to be thankful for.

Other games acquired recently:

Evolution: Climate  - Conversion Kit & Promo Pack III
Vinhos Deluxe Edition
Xibalba
The Oregon Trail Card Game
Tiny Epic Western
Red Dragon Inn: 3
Red Dragon Inn Allies: Halden, Zariah, Pooky, Erin, Wrench
Lords of Waterdeep
Speedy Recall
Qwixx
Gubs

Time.... and Games

The trouble with time

The primary problem with time is that it has this nasty tendency to flow in just one direction, and yet it is by our feeble attempts to learn and grow that we continuously try to dig up that which is past.  Note that when I say feeble, I only mean inefficient rather than unnecessary.

Since the dawn of human culture it has been the goal of every individual and societal construct to try and replicate in culture what life has done with biological evolution.  Unfortunately for human culture, its system of memory is not quite so perfect as is DNA.  There is the side benefit of creating infinite variety, that being the fodder of evolutionary progress, but the downside is that some memory can then get lost unexpectedly and quickly.

Our only salvation from this as individuals is to create as many connections with the people around us as possible, and then to waste no time in learning everything that we can.

Which brings me to the secondary problem with time.  It is limited.  We commonly say that there are not enough hours in the day to do everything.  Choices must be made.

It is always a sad event when a loved one is taken from us, especially when it is seemingly before their due time.  The focus can be very different depending on the age and the relationship to the departed.  With the young, the focus is often on future events and development that will no longer take place.  With the old, the focus is on decisions of the past that you might have done differently, opportunities that might have been taken, but were not because one thought that there was still time.  When the departed is someone you have known lifelong, you relish the memories that you shared.  But when you lose someone that you cherish, but have known all too briefly, the loss is different and far more prone to creating that irksome thing called regret.

Some time ago I made a choice to take my family on an adventure.  This choice was not made unilaterally and to most observers I believe the experience has been, for the most part, valuable for all involved.  That said, these experiences have come at the cost of time that could have been spent with others.  The math at the time dictated that odds were good that we would still have learning opportunities with those we were leaving behind.  Sadly, in some cases, this was not to be.

In many ways I will regret taking my family away for these two years.  Whatever benefits of experience or future financial stability are difficult to weigh against time that could have been spent learning from a brother, a brother in law, an uncle, a father, a father-in-law, a grandfather.  The opportunities for an efficient transfer of memory are now gone.  Now all we can do is reconstruct what we can from the other connections that were left behind.

The very fact that there were connections left behind is why we cannot allow regret to take hold.  For regret just gets in the way of that reconstruction process.  Regret takes up time that should, going forward, be spent creating new memories and experiences.  While it is true that some memory and experience is gone, it does not mean that I cannot honor that memory by doing what I can to continue learning and move forward.

Thus in memory of James and Ron I will tinker, repair and build. I will learn to hunt and fish, or barring that, value, care for, and experience the wild places.  Most importantly, I will value the time that I get to spend with the family and friends that remain, doing my best to make that transfer of memory from one generation to the next just that little bit more complete.

Games I have been playing:

The one possible practical upshot to having spent the last couple weeks living by myself is that I have been able to get a lot of board game meet ups in. Whereas normally I would not feel like I can go out and play 2-3 times per week, you can do these things when you are on your own.  So here are some things that I have been playing of late.

Vast: The Crystal Caverns - This is a fantastic game to play, but a devil to teach.  Because the gameplay is completely asymmetric, there is no possible way to explain the game rules and mechanics to a whole group at once.  Every player has different rules and different goals.  Your best bet is to get the group together, hand out the rules sheets, and then just let everyone read for 20-30 minutes, answering the occasion question when it comes up.  I think this game will get the most enjoyment when there is a solid group of 4-5 people that know all of the rules for all of the roles, and it can be treated as a self contained RPG dungeon crawler.

Dreary Hamlet - Sometimes you need to play a game incorrectly once before you really get to appreciate the correct flow of the game design.  This was one of those cases.  The first time I got this monster hunter survival game out at a meet up, we missed a critical rule and the result was lopsided and not all that fun.  The next time was much better, with a much closer result.  The other lesson learned is that I probably did not need to get the extra set of coins with this Kickstarter.  I am sure they will get used, but in retrospect, they are not that great.  As for the game itself, the artwork is stunning, and the variability of the monsters and spells makes for good replay value.  Even for players that seem to incur the wrath of the dice gods, there is still enjoyment to be had, as the first to die off is not out of the game, they then get the satisfaction of screwing with the other players from the grave, at least until they join them.

Scythe - As expected, this has gotten a lot of play time at the local meetups.  Only once have I presented this game and not had a full table of willing players.  As such I believe I can make some judgements based on experience.  First, the artwork is beyond compare.  I have a lot of pretty games in my collection and this one is up there with the best of them.  Second, any of the faction/player board combinations that I have tried all seem equally balanced and fun to play.  While some of the mech abilities seem a bit lame (mostly the ones that alter combat power), I am sure that there will be a situation where that little alteration will prove critical.  Part of the problem here is that I o tend to avoid combat, and that has gotten me into trouble on a couple occasions.  More than once I have made the mistake of believing that other players are as averse to combat as I am.  Those games I usually lost badly.  But I learn from these lessons.  Games that give you an opportunity to learn and improve strategy for the next time are valuable indeed.  This is certainly one of the best.

North Sea Saga: Shipwrights of the North Sea - The first install meant of the North Sea Saga is a fun little set collection, resource management game, where the goal is be the first to build your fleet of four ships, with the captain who built the best fleet the winner.  I would generally consider this to be a filler type game, and probably won’t play it a whole lot out of the context of the other two in the series.  but in that context it is a beautiful thematic set-up for the next two games.

North Sea Saga: Raiders of the North Sea - This is a wonderful worker placement game with one of the simplest worker mechanics I have ever seen.  On every turn you place a worker, and pick up a worker.  That is pretty much it.  If you can handle that, you can play this game.  The depth of strategy comes from the planning of the raids and the timing of collecting the necessary resources and crew for those raids.  Delay too long, and attractive raids will be taken out from under your nose.  Move too quickly, and you will lose out of precious points.  Ultimately it does come down to how well you can manage the timing of resource collection versus spending those resources.  The variability of the crew cards does give enough of a random element to give replay value, but you do also have to know how to effectively use those cards.  Spend too much time going down a fruitless path to your own peril.

North Sea Saga: Explorers of the North Sea - The most recent installment I have described as Catan-ish game of area control and planning.  As the players build out the board, opportunities to score are exposed and strategies begin to form.  As the game goes on, there is just as much import given to deciding what things can be accomplished, and what things should be left behind.  Whether your strategy relies on collecting livestock, building outposts, conquering settlements, or destroying ships, you have to pay attention to them all or wish one of your opponents running the table.

Simurgh: Call of the Dragonlord - I am still not quite sure what to think about this game.  My first problem is that I need to formulate a better way of teaching to new people.  As pretty as the board is, it is just busy and unclear enough that it can be a chore for new people to decipher.  The other thing I need to straighten out is the setup.  A better storage solution would help.  one of the reasons that setup takes so long is that sorting time with the various tiles.  If these were organized better, and if I took the time to sort them back out after each game, that would be easier and faster.  It is the classic deckbuilder problem.  You have items that need to be sorted for setup, but naturally get randomized during the game.  Regardless, I still think the game is different enough from the other worker placement games in my collection that warrants Simurgh the requisite effort.

Token Trilogy and new coins - Darn you Stonemaier Games!  Why do you keep coming up with products that I must throw money at?  The latest edition of their upgraded components finally arrived, along with the extra set of Viticulture and Scythe coins that I ordered.  The next thing I need to do is print off the list of games for which these tokens can be used, though I already have ideas.  I routinely use the upgrades for Simurgh, and am pretty sure I can make use of them in the North Sea games.  My only irritation with this batch is that each box has six compartments, but usually more than six kinds of tokens.  Grr.  storage irregularities.  So now I either have to keep them in the ziplock bags, or have wells that are mixed up.  Or I can face my old gaming storage enemy: foam core.

On Caving and the Excitement that it Can Bring

This is a post that is a long time coming.  There have been many new gaming developments in the household and I really should have given each one its own post.

Thankfully gaming has produced the most interesting things to post about.  The Australian Federal election was completed with no substantive changes in government, which means that the general level of tension in the workplace is greatly reduced.  It also means that the "caretaker period" is over so now everyone can get back to business as usual.  Ahh, the joys of working for what is essentially a government agency.

Now on the subject of caving.  This is intended in both a figurative and a virtual-literal sense.  There is one video game obsession that I have successfully kept out of the far family house and (for the most part) out of the family conversation.  My children were, of course, aware of it through the influence of various family and friends but since we had consistently refused to get the game ourselves, the kids knew better than to press the point.

Then my wife set my elder son a goal at school.  The exact nature of the goal is unimportant.  What matters is the stated reward.  She said that if the goal were to be achieved, that she would talk to me about installing Minecraft.  Initially the thought was to put the mobile version on the iPad.  This is where I stepped in.  I said that if I were going to open that door, then we were going to install the full PC version and do it right.

Of course once I made that statement there was no going back.  The walls holding back the Minecraft tide had caved in and the rest was inevitable.

On the plus side, it has stalled the otherwise constant talk amongst my children about Power Rangers.

Predictably enough the person who has probably spent the most time in Minecraft in the last couple months is me.  I have justified the effort as my parental duty to preview everything my children are going to be looking at.  Secondarily I wanted to see what all of the fuss was about and that I could not only Minecraft with the best, but also that I could do it the hard way.  Unlike my kids, I went straight to Survival Mode and have built my little world exclusively there.  I have a multi-room castle, a "Mage Tower" with ten levels above ground and ten levels below ground with the bottom level holding a portal to the Nether (the Minecraft version of Hell for the uninitiated).  I have spent (what seemed like) endless hours wandering around in virtual caves looking to get all of those rare precious resources that my kids just fling about since they don't want to get out of creative mode and actually work for anything.

See?  You can be a bitter curmudgeon in a virtual world too.

Now for board games.  There have been a few new arrivals recently from Kickstarter projects.

Castle Panic: The Dark Titan - This expansion to the Castle Panic game was a gift from my wife.  It with the base game made it to the table in relatively short order, with myself, my wife, and elder son playing.  The intent behind this expansion was to add some more contact and some ore challenge to the regular game.  Well, it did that.  The Dark Titan kicked our collective asses in grand fashion.  When we looked back at the details of how the game went, there might have been an outside chance at the end of pulling out a win, but we spent so much time teetering on the brink if disaster that any number of bad rolls could have done us in.  In reality, we never had a chance.  Still, fun had by all.

Ultra Coins - This was a project that I backed largely because I thought the artwork looked pretty and the game concept looked simple and portable.  I have always liked the idea that you can be sitting at a table in a restaurant or bar, pull a game out of your pocket, and use it to engage socially with friends or complete strangers at a moments notice.  Unfortunately this game is not going to fit that bill.  The artwork is very nice, but much darker than I was expecting, such that in order to appreciate it the ambient environment will need to be brightly lit.  Secondarily, the coins are heavy.  There is a lot of metal so that alone would discourage anyone from casually caring the game in a pocket.  The game itself does look interesting, so I will need to get it on the table a few times at home before I pass final judgement.

Scythe - Anyone who has not been hiding under the proverbial rocks in the gaming world knows about this game.  As one reviewer put it, there is no other single title that has received more hype in the last year than did this game.  After several plays, I can confidently say that it deserves every last bit of it and more.  Scythe is a resource management, action selection, area control, mechanized combat, economic engine game with a board so massive that it required a table extension.  The players all control factions that are trying to enter influence and gain power in a post-war no man's land in an alternate history 1920's-ish post WWI setting.  The background is all depicted by the fantastic artwork of Jakub Rozalski.  (click here to see more of his art) Throughout the game you are exploring the board with your main character engaging in interesting encounters and doing your best to manage your popularity with the local populace.  This is critical as your final popularity score determines how many coins (points) the fruits of your labor are worth.  Two player games can be nice relaxed affairs, where you can make the game all about developing an economic engine and avoiding direct confrontation altogether.  Five player games can do the same, but and also show brief periods of an all out brawl.  This is not a war game.  Combat is a tool to an end, and an expensive one at that. Thank you, Jamey Stegmaier and the rest of the team at Stonemaier Games for the delivery of another fantastic title.

Simurgh and Simurgh: Call of the Dragonlord - I waffled on this game quite a bit during the Kickstarter campaign.  The artwork was very pretty featuring lots of dragons and it was presented as a worker placement game, one of my favorite game mechanics.  But almost for that reason alone I was close to not backing the project.  Many of my favorite games feature that mechanic and I was asking myself if it would be different enough to justify the cost and the shelf space.  Also, I was not really sold on the look of the components.  I have to say that in that sense I have been wholly spoiled by the consistent quality of production of Stonemaier Games (reference gushing in previous paragraph).  What ultimately tipped the balance was my wife.  She thought it looked pretty and interesting and gave the go-ahead to back the project.  With the marital permission granted, the money was spent.
Now that the game has arrived and the initial play completed, I cannot say that I am disappointed.  I am not raving either, but when you show up a week or two after one of the most anticipated games of the year, that is a hard act to follow.  As I said, this is a worker placement game where your ultimate goal is power, indicated by power points.  You gain power points though various methods, but mostly though action spaces on the board.  Your workers in this game consist of spearmint and dragon riders.  There are some spaces that can only be occupied by the dragon riders, so care must be taken to manage their efficient placement.  In addition you have one or more dragons at your disposal that have their own special and unique abilities to assist you during the game.  What makes this worker placement game unique is that most of the most useful and productive worker action spaces are transient. These action space tiles are placed by the players from a selection in their hand.  The spaces presented are now available for all to use.  However, if that tile is ever unoccupied, or holds too many workers, the tile and its actions are retired, so the players need to take great care if they want to keep access to a particularly useful action space.   This transient nature of resource production capability is both extremely interesting and rather annoying.  It makes planning long term strategies nearly impossible.  Then again, being flexible in your play strategy is often a winning trait in these type of games.
The Call of the Dragonlord expansion is not just one expansion, but a collection of modular content expansions which can be added or removed in virtually any combination.  Some of the content offers just more cards and tiles with no fundamental new rules or mechanics.  Others change the game in fundamental ways.  I really like this approach, being similar to what was done with the Tuscany expansion to Viticulture (one of the aforementioned favorite worker placement games).

Other Games I have been playing lately:  The Agents (with various expansion material), Compounded (also with expansion), Exploding Kittens, Empires of Zidal, Carcassonne, Guillotine, Museé, Arctic Scavengers, Zombie Dice.

The final cave that I have to report has to do with storage.  If you spend any time at all on the board game groups in Facebook and Google+ you have seen and endless parade of "shelfies" where people post pictures of their game collections.  Many of these collections are displayed on what has become the gold standard in board game storage, the Ikea Kallax shelf.  These come in various sizes and configurations, but they all have the distinct feature of shelves that are roughly 33cm square.  This just happens to be the perfect dimensions to store most modern hobby board games.  Fantasy Flight Games in particular have a square box that they use for most of their games and that fits particularly well on the Kallax.
Despite the size of my collection, both my wife and I resisted getting one of these for a long time.  There are several reasons for this.  First, nether of us really care for Ikea furniture.  Second, for most of the life of the collection, we could not really afford it, either in money or in space.  Finally, I am a pack rat.  I can't remember the last time that I actually paid retail prices for shelving other than garage utility shelving, and even then I tended to go cheap.
Well, having been in Australia living in a relatively small apartment for over a year now, my wife wanted some of her closet space back and she suggested getting some shelves for the games.  Collectively we decided that as long as we were going to spend money on something like this, we might as well go big.  So we did.

One 5x5 Kallax later, and we both came to the realization that this was not likely to be our last, given the proportion of the game collection that remains in storage stateside. Fortunately, Ikea has not shown a tendency to retire their standard models for long periods of time.

It Is A New Day. With Luck, an Awesome One

It has been entirely too long since I have posted anything at all on the interwebs, in this blog Facebook or otherwise.  To the people that look forward to my periodic ramblings, I do apologize for the absence.

That said the grand majority of you know full well the primary reason behind the lapse.  While I know that my brother-in-law did not share my obsession with board games (YACHTZEE!), he was always one to be attentive to be attentive to everyone's interests and pounced on opportunities to bring our respective families closer together.

For this I will always be grateful.

I am also grateful that I was able to be of some assistance and support in the aftermath of James's untimely passing, even if it was just the role of tech support and basement archaeologist.

As a matter of doing honor to my late brother-in-law's memory, one of my first tasks upon returning to Australia was to do something that he did all the time. Buy a cheap, broken laptop from the classifieds and fix it up.

Now what else have I been doing over the last two months?

Work has been naturally crazy, as professional services projects tend to be. I do however have to be doubly careful not to inadvertently reveal details of what I am doing and precisely why I classify it as crazy. The reason behind that is the upcoming national election down here in Australia.  While we are all fairly certain that a change in government would not cause too much chaos, nobody (myself included) wants to take that chance.

This particular set of online ramblings was, at the outset, all about goals and obsessions.  At the writing of this entry the whole Koester family is participating in one of the world's biggest obsessions, the broadcast of the Eurovision 2016 Grand Final.

Earlier today I restarted another of my long term media goals, which is to watch all of the known Doctor Who episodes.  In order.  From the beginning.  So far I have finished up to serial 10, The Dalek Invasion of Earth.  This particular episode is notable because it ends with the first departure of one of the Doctor's companions, his granddaughter Susan Foreman.  As a note of Who trivia, the ultimate fate of Susan is one of those mysteries that is never resolved by Who canon.  While the Doctor has said in recent incarnations that he is alone in the universe after the destruction/sealing of Gallifrey at the endow the Time War, the ultimate fate of one of the few Time Lords known to have not been on the home planet is as yet, unknown.

So prepare yourselves folks.  In addition to periodic reports on what games I have been playing and collecting, you are now also likely to receive regular reports on my trip through the history of Who.

Now, about those games.

Obviously my initial goal of at least one game a day for the year is a bust.  Too many days have been missed to even track.  However, my wife has informed me that (despite her resistance on some evenings) she does value the effort and does miss the time spent playing games on a regular basis.  To that end, I will attempt to restart the regular plays, with subsequent reporting in this forum. While they may not happen daily, they will happen regularly.

Some new games that have been added to the collection -

Machi Koro: Deluxe Edition  - This is a card and dice game where the ultimate goal is to finish construction of a series of city improvements.  This is done by collecting income based on dice rolls and using that income to buy more improvements.  Essentially this game is an engine builder.  The person who builds up the fastest and most reliable stream of income will usually come out as the winner.
This was a gift from friends during our unexpected trip back stateside.  While not one that was on my immediate wish list, it was one that I have played several times before at Meetups. One thing that I will say about this game is that the Deluxe Edition is the version to get.  The base game alone, with no expansions, runs out of steam after just a few plays.  The path to victory is just a little to predictable.  Once you add the expansions, things get a lot more random and decisions made get a lot more important.  I am not sure how well this will go with my eldest son though.  This may take just a little more forward thinking and planning than he is capable of at the moment.  But who knows, after a couple plays of the base game, he may surprise me.

Tiny Epic Kingdoms: Heroes Call - This is the latest of the Gamelyn Games Tiny Epic series to arrive in my Kickstarter pipeline.  This entry is an expansion and, in my opinion, a substantial improvement upon an already solid 4x game.  In particular some of the revisions to the combat system I like.  In the original game, war was a costly venture such that most players would spend the entire game avoiding it at all costs.  Now there are more, better defense options, and most importantly the option for a lost to retreat without a debilitating loss in resources.  Ultimately the expansion has offered more paths to victory, and re-balanced some of the old ones.  I look forward to getting a full 5 player game of this going.

Tiny Epic Galaxies - This one has been getting a lot of playtime at meetups lately.  One of the reasons for this is the recent confirmation that it will be featured on an episode of Season 4 of Table Top.  It is also just a solidly awesome game with a not too common mechanic.  This dice rolling, action allocation, engine builder fills a space that I have not seen done well.  So far everyone that I have taught it to has really liked it.  There is enough variability in the planet deck that every game is a very different experience.

Red Dragon Inn 5: Character Trove - This game brings to the forefront what every fantasy adventure gamer knows happens after the adventure is over.  All of the heroes (and some of the villains) gather at the local Inn and do their best to drink their compatriots under the table.  Yes, this is a drinking game. You are one to those adventurers trying to be the last one standing. You win by having everyone else either pass out, or get kicked out of the establishment for lack of funds. (Please do not ask for credit at the Red Dragon, as getting your face bashed in by the barmaids, sometimes offends.)

I am proud to say that I actually won this game in a contest on International TableTop Day.  Mind you, this was not just luck nor was it all skill.  The last contest of the night was to identify the person who was the most AWESOME!  The method of choosing the lucky gamer started out wit what amounted to a series of coin tosses.  This winnowed the field to four.  Those four then participated in a rousing game of Zombie Dice.  I played my usual conservative game as is my habit in press your luck style games and this time fortune favored the cautious.

My reward, a TableTop Trophy of Awesome Pin, a copy of Red Dragon Inn 5: Character Trove Big Box, and a set of wonderful metal coins to replace/supplement the regular coins for the Red Dragon Inn game.  These fantastic coins (as well as the trophy pin) just happened to be made by guys that I know well, as the people behind Campaign Coins (www.campaigncoins.com) are also that hosts of my regular Tuesday Meetup.

Enough drivel from me now.  I will be back soon.  I promise.

To Market, To Market and Off to the Races

I have an apology to make.

I spent so much time in the last post ranting that I neglected to make mention of the really interesting happenings.  On the advice of some friendly locals met via my son's school, we went exploring down to the St. Kilda Twilight Market.  The visit had some urgency as this was to be the final iteration of the market for the summer.

The primary target at this market (or any market as far as I am concerned) was the food stands.  As I have a tendancy to be indecisive, we just tried to get a little bit of everything.  We passed by the Spanish paella tent (wife not big into shellfish) and picked up some charcoal roasted chicken skewers as an appetizer.  Then it was off to the Argentine BBQ tent, where I ordered the mix platter consisting of chicken wings, beef ribs, mild chorizo, and a salad, all slathered in a fresh chimichurri sauce.  Moving on from that to the Nepalese tent for more grilled marinated chicken and finally stopping at the Tex-Mex tent for chicken mole and bbq pork tacos.

YUM.

The rest of the market was rather interesting as well.  It has been a while since I have seen that quantity of tye-dye, dreds, and various other hippie-isms all in one place.  I am sure that had there been a little less wind that the place would have had a more herbal aura.

All told it was another pleasant trek out into the ocean-side community that we have found ourselves in, enjoying mild temperatures, beaches with soft sand, and no waves that threaten to kill you if you aren't looking.

Fast forward a week or so and you have another major event in the sporting extravaganza that is Melbourne, the Australia Grand Prix and the beginning of the Formula 1 racing season.

I would like to reiterate that this is Formula 1 racing.  Real racing, as opposed to that anachronism pretending to be modern racing called NASCAR.

On a whim we decide to take the whole crew to the races on Saturday, knowing full well that the main event was the next day.  Besides being markedly cheaper, we also knew the crowds would be quite a bit smaller and thus the experience for all more pleasant.

In general it was indeed a pleasant experience.  We got to see a parade Ferraris, vintage race cars, and a shortened GT race that started with a five car pileup consisting almost entirely of Lamborghinis. Then we nearly had our eardrums ruptured by a race of V8 supercars (my eldest son's favorite), and then again shortly thereafter by a aerial demonstration by the RAAF.  Finally we got to the highlight of the day (for me at least) the F1 Qualifiers.  I honestly can't say that I got a lot out of the race.  I have not paid close attention to F1 in nearly 15 years, back when Michael Schumacher was the only name you really needed to know because he was the only one winning anything.

At the end if the day I was extremely grateful that the event was within short walking distance of the apartment.  It makes listening to racing from down tim dusk for four days straight worth it.

Now on to the Game play updates.  Thank God for Boardgamegeek.com for giving me a method for keeping track of plays.  Especially when I get lazy and go too long between blog posts.

Game Report Day 64 - Entropy

Now having played this game a few times, and probably more importantly with my wife having a few plays under her belt, plays of this neat little card game are starting to make more sense.  One thing I can say that is that I am not entirely certain that this should be classified as a two player game.  One of the key mechanisms in the game is the action selection mechanic, and the doublethink that comes from the very real possibility of choosing the same action as someone else, resulting in a clash where the affected players do nothing for that turn.  In a two player game. this just does not happen very often and I think it detracts from the flavor of the game.  I don't mean to say that the game is unpleasant with two players.  It is just a very different game.  And a very short one to boot.  Jury still out on this one.

Game Report Day 65 - Lift Off: Get Me Off This Planet!

I had the opportunity to participate in a playtest of some new Lift Off points in this game a few weeks ago.  For whatever reason, I never got around to getting the new material printed and ready for play.  I may yet if sufficiently motivated.  Either way, it does not change the fact that this is a fun game, and one that I think I need to introduce to my elder son.  With some help, he should be able to get the planning and resource management concepts.  We (wife and I) also got to play with some content that I had not yet used, most notably the Stargate lift off point.   This point allows for the possibility of evacuating a lot of Alieneeples at once, but only if the randomness of the stargate die is kind to you.  Needless to say, it was not kind to either of us.  I ended up winning mostly because I gave up and executed my backup plan a just a little faster.

Game Report Day 66 - Asphodel

This is another game that, as far as I am concerned, should not really be a two player game.  Since the size of the playing field itself is determined by the number of players, there is just not enough game there when you start with just two.  I really need to get this on the table at a Tuesday night Meetup.

Game Report Day 67 - Tiny Epic Galaxies

Every gamer will be able to relate multiple tales of games lost for the sole reason that "the dice hate me".  Some people have a generalized and persistent antagonistic relationship with dice.  These are people that are often nominated to GM tabletop RPGs.  Why, you ask?  Because it is fun to walk away with the dragon's treasure hoard because the GM critical fumbled six rolls in a row, that's why.

This is one of the more commonplace versions of the story.  I lost the game in spectacular fashion to my wife simply because I could not come up with dice results that were even remotely useful.  Unfortunately the game has only one set of dice, so I can't put the offending items in time-out and play with replacements.  Sometimes you have to show the dice who is boss.

Game Report Day 68 - Viticulture w/ Tuscany

Another fully booked Tuesday Meetup and, per the organizer's request, I brought another six player game.  With the previous weeks tied up with Evolution play testing, I had not brought Viticulture in a while and I figured it was due for an appearance.  The table for six filled up predictably quickly with some new and some slightly less-than-new players and a rousing game ensued.  I was more than a little worried when, due to a particular combination of cards, nearly the entire table had their full compliment of six workers at year two, putting myself and one other player at a potentially severe disadvantage.  Fortunately I was able to be unusually efficient with my actions on subsequent turns and kept within striking range of the points leaders, until the last year when I was able to end the game and win just before everyone else got their points engines to peak production.  When someone noted that I won mostly due to experience, I disagreed, pointing out that while experience may have helped a little, this was in fact the first six player game of Viticulture that I had won in quite some time.  Win or lose, fun was indeed had by all.

Game Report Day 69 - Uno

Sometimes after a busy day all players want to do something that requires nearly no brain activity.

We played UNO.  Nuf said.

Game Report Day 70 - Castle Panic

Since my wife and I were able to give our brains a break on the previous night, we both felt like we could put a little more energy into play.  But not too much.

So out comes one of the co-ops.  When both players are working towards the same goal, neither individual has to think as hard, right?

Well, perhaps we should have thought a little harder on this one, or perhaps it was another occasion where fate was just looking askance in our direction.  Needless to say what started out to be a promising game turned against us very quickly and the orc hordes destroyed our castle in spectacular fashion.

Game Report Day 71 - In a Pickle

This is one of those unfortunate games that I don't play often because I generally consider it to be a party game.  While it does play very well as a party game is technically can be played by two to similar amusing effect.  Fortunately this one had not yet been put away and was still sitting under the bedside table.  The wife suggested it mostly because she was dissatisfied with the outcome of the previous session (read she lost badly).  Unfortunately, the outcome of this session was not all that different, and in many ways probably worse.  While I think both of us had more useless cards than should ever be allowed, I had just enough to come out of it with a 5-1 win.

Game Report Day 72 - Cribbage

Despite the math and counting and probability involved with playing this game well, there is something fundamentally relaxing about playing classic card games.  This is why I firmly believe that there are some classic games that everyone should know and play.

It probably helps when I win.

Game Report Day 73 - Sleeping Queens

This is one of the vast library of Gamewright card game titles.  In this game you are presented with a field of Sleeping (face down) Queens of varying point value.  Your goal is to collect King cards to wake up a queen of your choice.  First to 5 queens or 50 points wins.  There are other mechanisms like stealing queens and sleeping potions and cards to counter both of those, but in general your goal is to run through the draw pile as fast as you can to get King to wake Queens.  It is all about draw probability.  Today probability was not in my favor and I lost in grand fashion.

Game Report Day 74 - Match the Penguins

Another day, another Gamewright card game.  This one involves more skill and a lot less luck.  The goal here is to slowly expose penguin cards.  These penguins have sever traits, shirt color, blanket color, sunglasses color, lei color, etc.  If only one trait matches, you call that trait out and pick up cards.  If two traits match, point them out and collect a card.  If all traits match collect cards.  The trick is making sure you see everything that is there.  There were a number of occasions that I was in the middle of noticing matching traits, when my wife repeatedly beat me to the fact that all traits on the cards matched.  There is probably a brain study somewhere in there that could be done.  Anyhow, because on this night my wife was significantly more observant than I, she won.

Game Report Day 75 - Pillars of the Earth, Between Two Cities

At the Tuesday Meetups, I often find myself in the position of teacher.  I do not mind this, as I used to do exactly that as a profession, and also because it allows me to get more of my games onto the table.

The previous week one of the other Meetup regulars asked if I would be willing to teach a game of Pillars of the Earth.  As this is another of the worker placement games that I very much enjoy, I was quick to accept.  There was also the advantage of there being a library copy of the game, so I did not have to lug mine in.  The interest in this particular game for the requesting player was in that she had read and enjoyed the namesake book.  I informed her that other than recognizing some of the referenced names, knowing the book gave no advantage in the game, quickly following up with the fact that I thought it was an awesome game anyway.

The game is played in two stages.  First players bid on resources that are eventually used to generate victory points.  Then players place workers (termed master builders) on various action spaces that, through various methods, make your generation of victory points from resources more efficient.  Over the course of the six rounds, the cathedral from the book is built.  At the end, the player with the high victory point total wins.

The original requester came out on top, with me very close behind.  In typical euro fashion, it came down to the very end.  Riveting game and fun had by all.  The one thing that I will do if I am in the mood to play again on Meetup night is bring my Stonemaier treasure chest resources, just to make a pretty game that much cooler.

Game Report Day 76 - Cribbage

Same reason as before.  Sometimes you just need something relaxing, but just that tiny bit stimulating and competitive.

Game Report Day 77 - Monopoly Deal

Some time ago Hasbro game out with card game version of some of their classic mass market games. Monopoly Deal is one of those.  It is wonderfully portable, short, and in the eyes of most gamers a far superior game compared to its namesake.  The goal is roughly the same.  You are collecting sets of colored properties.  Fortunately you don't have to buy them, just draw them.  There are a health number of wild cards to help you out as well.  It is not quite so easy as that, as your opponent can, with various action cards, charge you rent and if you don't have sufficient cash on hand, you may be forced to sell property, decreasing your chances of winning.

Unfortunately for my wife, on this occasion, dude to the luck of the draw, she had no chance of winning.  I had the required three property sets before she had one.  Still a fun game.

Game Report Day 78 - Tsuro

The Game of the Path.  Most times when I play this game I follow a pretty specific strategy.  Stay out of everyone's way and stay on the edges of the play field as much as possible.  More often than not, I lose doing this, so I thought I would be a little more random and a little more aggressive.

While it may not be a good idea to kill off a strategy based on one play, the initial results were not good.  I lost even faster.

Game Report Day 79 - Khet, Eye of Horus Beam Splitter Expansion, Khet 3D Tower of Kadesh

Khet is one of my favorite two player games.  It is basically chess with lasers.  Who wouldn't like that, right?  Unfortunately this game was also the source of one of my greatest gaming regrets.  There were two expansions to the base game.  The first introduced beam splitters.  The second added a third dimension with a tower, potentially bouncing the laser up onto a secondary platform.  I had neglected to purchase this second expansion when it was in print, and in years since it has been extremely difficult to find at a reasonable price, if at all.

A few weeks ago, while browsing on Ebay, I found one.  In ages past it was still priced at more that I would have paid, but this time I just pulled the trigger.  Today it finally arrived.  As expected it takes this wonderful abstract game and makes it look even more majestic.

After the initial play with my wife, she says "you took lasers and made my brain a puddle".  She tries to say that she is not great at abstract games, but I know that there are a couple where she routinely wins.  Either way in this case my strategy was pretty clever.  Make some obvious complicated moves that were not really going to amount to much to trick her into making the win much easier.  It would have been even MORE clever if I had planned it that way..

Good games played , and one more grail ticked off the wish list.  All told, not a bad day.

On Testing, Risk, and Blame

I have not posted anything in a while, and in true human fashion I am going to make an effort to formulate some plausible excuses.  The most obvious, and probably most accurate, is that I have been lazy.  Secondarily I have been extremely busy at work of late, although even that has qualifiers.  In terms of actual things to do, work has been rather dull.  Unfortunately when certain people have less to work on, they start to spend more time looking around and analyzing their situation.  This, in a large project on a tight timetable, can be disastrous.  Managing this situation can be time consuming and mentally draining.

When people who previously were not looking start looking they find things that are suddenly critical problems that should have been addressed months ago but now are top priority with no time left to actually come up with a productive solution.  The lesson to be learned from this?  Manage you manager's time carefully.  If you let your guard down for even a moment....

Next lesson, either make very good friends with the security administrator, or when that is not possible, have an airtight alibi and several places to hide the body ready.

Final lesson for today, make sure that the people running test regimes for your project actually know what they are doing.  For example, make sure they actually know the difference between functional testing and recursion testing.  I actually had to explain to test managers today that when testing a file level backup/restore solution, testing restoration of each individual file on the hundred-or-so servers was completely unnecessary, as was testing application functionality after each file restore.

Of course all of this irritation is the product of an organization that unbelievably risk-averse and is terrified at the prospect of the finger of blame being pointed in their direction.  Ugh.  Grow up people...

Fortunately I have my home, my wife, my children, and my games to help me maintain a level of no-destructive insanity.

Game report day 53 -Trans America
I really need to get this one out more often.  Train games in general are a lot of fun.  I have never been able to determine why the genre has such a near universal appeal, and in practice is really does not matter.  This particular game has been in the gaming news of late as there is supposedly a very, very long awaited reprint in the works.  That is good because it is a fantastic little lightweight train game.  Even with just my wife and I, it is a lot of fun, although I do prefer it with more people.  Things get much crazier and hard to predict as the board geography gets more crowded.  In each round of the game, each player as five cities that they need to connect with track.  As soon as your rail network connects with another, you can build off of the now combined network.  As such deciding when you make that connection can be a very important and strategic choice.  I lost the first round, but ended up winning the game by a reasonable margin.  Fun had by all.

Game report day 54 - Settlers of Catan, Seafarers of Catan, Traders and Barbarians of Catan, Helpers of Catan, Frenemies of Catan
The Catan franchise has a special place in many gamer's hearts.  It is one of those modern classics of the modern era and for many, was the gateway game that got them started into the hobby.  While my entrance into the role of hardcore board gamer did not necessarily follow the normal path, I can say that the island of Catan did hold an important role.

The age and popularity of the game does create a few problems.  One of these is that game publishers sometimes do silly things with popular games.  Sometimes they publish new editions that sport minor changes. Sometimes they produce a library of expansions that purport to make the base game new and more exciting.  The Catan franchise has done both.  While I don't have all of the expansions, I do have quite a few.  When the Tuesday Meetup organizers announced a Catan night, I had a "wonderful" idea.  I knew that most of expansion content that I had for Catan had never made it to the table (mostly because the game does not play well at all with two).  Since I knew there would be plenty of offerings of plain vanilla Catan at the Meetup, I decided to go in a different direction.  I wanted to make the most complicated Catan setup that I could that did not suck.

Here is what I came up with.  Starting with the base game, adding in Seafarers (to get more geography and boats), then adding in the Great River from Traders and Barbarians (obstacles and more scoring options), Fishermen from Settlers and Barbarians (more resources and makes settlements on the coast not suck), Helpers of Catan (mini expansion offering limited use special abilities), and Frenemies (offering special benefits to players that are not assholes).  For the most part, the layout was random.  I did have to make a few adjustments here and there, but not much.  The other change was the use of the Event Deck rather than dice. Anyone who has played this game knows how vindictive those red and yellow D6s can be.  Using the Event cards gives a little more assurance that probability will hold sway.

The final verdict from the players?  Totally Awesome!  All had played the base game before and all found the extra content very interesting.  While it did take significantly longer to finish, everyone had an excellent time and said that they would love to play the combo again.

Game report day 55 - Cribbage
After all of the complication the night before, it was refreshing to return to an older classic.  I know people for whom the evening game of cribbage is almost a ritual.  I generally don't play cribbage with these people as I tend to lose often and badly.  As with many of the ancient classics, easy to learn, takes a long time to master.

Game report day 56 - Fortress
Going from a very old card game to a brand new one.  I came across a Kickstarted recently that was pitching the development of 4-5 new card and dice game for a measly eight bucks.  Since I am generally all about new games for cheap, I was in.  A few weeks later, the pdf rules for the new games were delivered.  The first my wife and I tried was Fortress.  This one has a simple mechanic, but the strategy involved is deep.  Players first draw a hand of cards slowly contracting their Fortress.  Ideally, you have face cards in the middle protected by lower value cards on either side.  Then you attack the other player's hand with your defensive cards trying to capture some face cards.  Using cards for attack makes their defense value known, so choosing what to use is not something done lightly.  This is one that will take some more plays to really develop strategy.

Game report day 57 - Dice Wars
The next night we tried the dice game.  The rules sheet included a small playing field.  The object of Dice Wars is to knock down your opponent's live points, indicated using a D20.  This is done using D6 pawns, which are rolled.  The value rolled indicates both its power and how far it can move.  The tricky part is that the pawn MUST move its full value.  The only thing you can control is its starting point.  This forces the player to look ahead and see where his opponent's pawns are likely to be.  If you consistently land in gaps (as I did) you can knock down their life points in fairly short order.  Like the previous entry, this will take some more plays to be sure, but I think this is a keeper.

Game report day 58 - Wombat Rescue
The fifth player bits that I ordered (that I should have ordered during the Kickstarter campaign but missed - grr) arrived recently and we had convenient time where my wife and eldest son could sit down and maneuver pooping wombats.  The game went much much smoother this time, as one would expect with players that all understood and remembered the rules.  We also added in the boulder obstacles to make the field a little more interesting.  Even with the extra obstacles, everyone seemed to be able to get around the board to where they needed to go with little effort.  The winning strategy (mine, of course) seemed to be doing your best to have an unobstructed return path in the middle of the board.  The extra player abilities did not factor as highly in as I would have expected.  I think there was a memory from the first game thinking the single use powers were exhausted too early.  Anyhow, fun still had by all.

Game report day 59 - Iota
Iota is a miniature card version of an abstract that I really enjoy, Qwirkle.  Iota makes things a little more complex by giving each tile three traits (instead of two) and making each tile unique.  For the sake of sanity there are 3 wild cards as well.  Aside from that, the game plays exactly the same.  You create lines of cards, where each element in the line mush all match or all differ.  Points are scored for each line added to, and double points are scored for making sets of four.  Towards the end of the game I drew two if three wild cards and was able to use them to great effect.  I still lost, but without the lucky draws, I would have lost in spectacular fashion.

Game report day 60 - In A Pickle
Another Gamewright title I need to get out more often.  I had not played it in a while because for some reason I thought it needed at least three players, and I was sure my elder son was not quite ready.  I can safely say now that I was incorrect on both points.  The point of the game is build a chain of items that either fit inside (smaller that) or surround/contain (larger than) the neighboring item.  For example Lake->Planet->Galaxy->Universe.  When a chain of four is formed, each player can try and top the largest card with something larger yet with the last successful player claiming the pile.  First to claim 4-5 piles wins.  What is fun about this game is the bickering that can happen.  The rules clearly state that each card need only relate to its neighbor and that the idea of containment need not be physical.  It can be metaphorical.  For example, the universe can contained my a dictionary.  It is a word after all.  Lots of fun for such a simple mechanic, but then again that is usually what makes good social/party games.

Game report day 61 - Evolution: Climate with Flight Expansion
More play testing at the Tuesday Meetup. I was able to get two rounds in with two completely different groups.  This time I also made the decision to add the Flight expansion into the mix.  During the alpha round of testing, there was a great deal of discussion/complaining about the omission of Flight.  The designer's reasoning was to start simple and get the Climate pieces fleshed out a bit on their own before needing to test in combination with the complexity offered by Flight.  I can't say I agree with him, but his game, his approach.

The first game went pretty smooth.  Some of players were a little slow to pick up that flow of the rounds, but that is to be expected.  The climate hovered on the warm side, diving cold on the last round.  Had the game run one round longer there would have been a game altering mass extinction as a result.  AS it was some people had the cards to capitalize off the abundance of food better than others.  The one that had the best combos was the clear winner.

The second game was drastically different.  First of all, the climate was a much bigger and deadlier factor.  While the general discussion around the table indicated that there was agreement to push the climate cooler, a couple players secretly actively worked against that to their great benefit.  The climate track was pushed all the way to its hottest limit, killing off nearly the whole table save the ones that saw it coming and were able to prepare.  It was a brutal, lower scoring game, but also a lot of fun.  Also I managed to win a six player game, albeit by a single point.

Game report day 62 - Gin Rummy
As seems to be typical for Wednesday nights, neither my wife not I were in the mood for anything complex.  I had a deck of cards on the side table and suggested Gin Rummy.  After hearing my wife say that she did not know how to play, I settled on my choice and proceeded with filling this essential gap in my wife's grey matter. 

As with most classic card games, there are more variations than most people care to keep track of.  This is why I recommend that every serious gamer with any interest in the classics (which by the way should be all serious gamers) needs to have a copy of the Book of Hoyle.  This way you will be sure to have access to all of the "official" variations.  The one that I chose was the most basic that I could remember (both my Hoyle books are in storage).  Gin is the game of drawing cards to create a ten card hand of sets and runs.  The player that does so first lays down his hand and scores points depending on his opponent's failure to do the same.  It is the most basic of set collection games, and one that is good to come back to on occasion.  We played a few hands, not really keeping score, but having fun anyway.

Game report day 63 - Gobblet!
Let last few times I played this was with my son.  As I could not remember ever actually playing the game with my wife, I pulled it off the shelf for a quick game after an evening of playing Game Report Catch-up.  It was a close battle, with both of us nearly taking the win a few times.  I eventually worked her into a corner and pulled out the win.  For a game that is basically Tic-Tac-Toe on steroids, this is a lot of fun.

On Entropy and White Night

Entropy is a dangerous thing.  Entropy is the enemy of organization.  Entropy is the enemy of nice, pretty game shelves.  Having nice, pretty, well organized game storage is key is keeping said games in good condition for years to come.

I have always said that I have no expectation of my game collection remaining in as-new condition.  I say this of even the vintage titles that may (some day) hold some value to collectors.  That said, some of the game boxes were showing more than an acceptable level of wear and damage.  I resolved to do something about this, and that something was a re-org.

On off the unfortunate realities of my current living situation is that I do not have space for proper game shelving.  As such, most of the games occupy the hall closet, where one would normally store coats and other warm outerwear.  This is not a problem as cold does not exist in this country.  Another unfortunate reality is that my varied taste in games, along with a lack of consensus among game publishers, has produced a myriad of box sizes and dimensions.  This means that game organization and storage is something that requires careful planning, attention to detail, and years of practice playing Tetris.

To make a long(ish) story short(er),  that is how I spent my Saturday.  The entire contents of the closet were emptied and re-stacked so as to minimize or eliminate box crushing and dishing.  With that task done, I played some games with the kids and took a short nap.  White Night was calling.

This would be the second time I had experienced this event, and I can still safely say that I don't really know how to describe it in anything resembling concise terms.  For twelve hours starting at 7:00 PM on Saturday, the entire central business district of Melbourne shuts down to everything except pedestrian traffic.  This sets up a massive canvas for the expression of various arts and music.  Several large stages have rotations or musicians and dancers, while smaller acts and street performers fill in the space between.  You can see artists actively painting, while in the next glance see an entire building facade being used as a projection screen.

Unfortunately I did not get to see white as much this year as I did the year previous. (Darn those familial responsibilities!) Even so, it was still an amazing sight and I encourage people to look it up. (Google Melbourne White Night) I am sure that pictures and video from this year's event are starting to hit the interwebs.

Game report day 44 - Spot It!

Blue Orange Games has one of those libraries that makes a successful bridge between games exclusively for kids (i.e. parents can't stand playing them) and games for adults (i.e. kids don't get them).  Spot It! is exactly what the title makes it sound like.  It is a game about spotting matching symbols on different cards.  The rulebook contains several variations that can be further modified for the ages participating, but in general, if you see it first, you win.  Pattern recognition games are something that I am typically quite good at.  On this particular evening, my wife was easily holding her own, and I am told that this is another game to add to the list of games my eldest son does not need coaching or assistance.

Game report day 45 - Evolution: Climate

I received the long awaited e-mail from North Star Games that with the beta playtest files for Climate about a week ago.  Initially, I was not going to be in any great hurry to finish the build, as I thought that the weekly Meetup had a big Catan event scheduled.  Upon closer inspection of the calendar, that Catan event was next week.  So, off to the print shop I went.  Later that evening once the build was complete, I sat down with my wife to give it a run.  The results were somewhat less than surprising.  I won the game handily, but as my wife was quick to point out, I was already far more familiar with the new game content then she was.  That and she says that I have a better sense for game combinations and their usefulness.  She is probably right.  My time spent playing Magic had to have had some benefit.  Her other complaint is that there was still not enough climate events being triggered throwing chaos and uncertainty into the game.  Personally, I like that the chaos that the climate track can deliver is manageable.  I think with a few more plays, she will come to recognize and use some of the new strategic possibilities.

Game report day 46 - Evolution: Climate

Meetup time again and this was my chance to get more full table play testing done for Evolution: Climate.  The Meetup was fully booked, so the table filled quickly.  The first game started a little slow, as it always does with new players, but soon everyone settled down in to different combinations and strategies.  Myself and another player started on similar aggressive paths early on, and predictable annihilated each other's chances of victory.  That pretty much left the winner to be the one what could successfully fly under the radar and stay out of everyone's way.  Fun was had by all.  The one complaint in that game was from the one other player that had experience with Evolution before. He did not really care for the new Climate content.  His preference was for the base game, where your only opponent was the other players.  He liked that it was basically like a biology themed poker game.  To each their own, I guess.  He still had fun and that is what is important.

The second game of the night, with the same players, kicked off very quickly and smoothly.  Everyone was ready with different strategies to try.  Some of those quickly fell flat, and others would have been interesting had the climate not intervened.  This time the climate track was a major factor in the game, initiating two, nearly three events and multiple mass extinctions.  The differing play flavors is precisely why I like this game.

Game report day 47 - Rack-O

This evening I had a request to pick something less strategic.  This is code for "I am tired and don't have the energy to think about anything".  That's okay, I can handle that.  I was tired too.  Fortunately there is not a lot of thought required to put numbers in order.  Serious fans of this classic will say that there is a lot of thought involved since you need to think about probability and arrangement and they are probably right.  It does not change the fact that Rack-O is also just fun to play and a very light, low stress filler.  We played a few hands, not really keeping score.  If memory serves, hand wins were split about 50/50.

Game report day 48 - Zombie Dice, Zombie Dice 2 Double Feature, Zombie Dice 3 School Bus

Thursday was another rough day for both of us, so another light filler came out.  As light as Zombie Dice is, I always find it interesting to see how engaged players always get.  Part of that is just the inherent nature of press-your-luck style games. This game also has enough goofy elements added to make it just that much more interesting.  For example, the expansions add the following.

• The Hero and the Bimbo - White and pink dice respectively.  They each can rescue each other.  The hero can do more damage, while the bimbo is better at running away (all legs, no brains).
• Santa Claus - The holiday feature.  In addition to his tasty brains, Santa can deliver presents, making your zombie tougher or faster.
• The Bus - There is something that I find endlessly amusing about the image of a school bus full of shogun wielding children.

I won the round, but fun had by all.

Game report day 49 - We Didn't Playtest This At All, We Didn't Playtest This Either

Are you seeing a pattern here?

Friday was pretty much like the previous two days, so in celebration I got out the single most unstructured, random game I own.  Once I played this with a group of eight friends.  It took three games just to get all the way around the table.  If you are not familiar with the franchise, this is a card game that is in all things random and crazy.  It is like Flux, only more random.  There is no way to predict how one will win or lose, and that is why, in the right setting, it can be a hell of a lot of fun.

Game report day 51 - Coo Coo The Rocking Clown, Snail's Pace Race

As I mentioned earlier, much of Saturday was spent organizing the game closet.  Once this was done, I wanted to get the kids involved.  First I got out Coo Coo.  This is another Blue Orange title that is all about dexterity and balance.  Players take turns placing pieces on Coo Coo, the Rocking Clown.  First to upset the balance and knock pieces off loses.  Played with both boys.  The younger son is starting to get enough motor control to be able to play the game reliably.  The elder son is starting to figure out that you can place pieces to almost upset the balance thus setting up the next player for defeat.

Not wanting to leave out my youngest, I got out one of the Ravensburger titles that is geared for that age.  As she is soon to be three, she does know how to take turns and roll dice.  In this particular instance, she was more inclined to just place the dice on the color she wanted to move.  No winners in Snail's Pace Race, it is all just a cooperative effort to get the colored snails to the yummy leaves.

Game report day 52 - Between Two Cities, Go Away Monster

Go away Monster has become my nearly three-year-old's standby game.  The game it simple enough.  You pull shapes out of a bag.  If it is a piece of your bedroom, you add it to your card in the appropriate spot.  If it is a monster, you shout "Go Away Monster!" and toss the piece in the box.  As tedious as this may sound to adults, the cuteness of your little girl (in a cold-induced hoarse voice) croak "Go Away Monster" is just something you don't say no to.

Having largely recovered from the work week and White Night, I wanted to get out something that required a little more thought.  Unfortunately it was still a busy day with some critical shopping errands that needed done.  Thus a faster game was called for.  Enter Between Two Cities, the latest product in the Stonemaier Games library.  In this game you are city planners using a tile drafting mechanic to create the best 4x4 city grid.  In a two player game (as we were playing), you have full control over both cities, and score the combination of the two.  With more players, you share each city with your neighbor, with both of you contributing.  Your final score is the lower scoring of the two cities.  The result of this scoring is that each player cannot afford to neglect either of his cities, forcing you to negotiate with both partners in good faith.  I won this round, but my wife declared that this needed to hit the table more often, as she wants to get better at it.

Ask and ye shall receive.