What are you playing?

[Campfire_Burning]

Played a bit of solo Thunderstone last night, and finally had the the Chalice set of heroes come up. Torches, halbards, fireballs and goodberries were the order of the day. Fantastic game.

Oh, and I trounced the dungeon.

[moosegrinder]

They keep adding single player variants to the expansions, grab the instructions if you haven't already.

Me and the missus played some Thunderstone: Dragonspire, tried to learn Infernal Contraption and then some Carcasonne.

Dragonspire: the cards are fucking mental. The Veteran has an extra level to upgrade to, and the Stoneguard are proper chicken oriental. The combo's you can do with the cards in the set are pretty fucking sweet and Dominion like. I feel a very positive review coming on.

Infernal Contraption: I need to look up some expanded rules, it's a little bit vague in places. Mainly the bit about power supplies.

Carcasonne: proper, PROPER farm strategy fuckery. I got lots of little cities and bumped up to 24. She then proceeded to be utterly spawny and finish a city for...24 points. Fuck sake. Anyway I won in the end by a whisker of 5 points. Marvelous

[jonnyalpha]

Moosie, where were you confused about power supplies in Infernal Contraption?

[moosegrinder]

It was also the upgrades. The blue and rust coloured cards have to be attached to a power source, right? And the blue and rust coloured cards can be attached to the main line, but unless there's a power source directly attached then they're effectively useless, right?

Also, if there's an upgrade on the bottom of a blue bordered card, does the blue bordered card get the enhanced effect, because the cards resolve top to bottom, so technically a double effect upgrade has no effect at all, right?

[jonnyalpha]

Yep blue and rust ones need powering. You need far more power cores in your machine than you'd initially think and this caught us out in our first game.

If an upgrade is attached to a contraption then according to the rules it doesn't actually activate but modifies the performance of the contraption so it doesn't resolve seperately but you apply it's effect when you resolve the blue contraption card. So it takes effect even when it's on the bottom of the card.

[jonnyalpha]

Last page of the rules it says " each time a contraption effect is resolved apply all effects of any upgrades that are attached in any direction"

if you had a powered contraption on the end of the line you could have three upgrades attached to it and really cause some mayhem.

[Campfire_Burning]

Thanks to Michael's recent clear-out I've finally boarded the Summoner Wars train.

It's lovely, isn't it? Quick and clean with bags of character - I can see why it's such a huge hit. The theming in particular is wonderful. I love how the priestly Vanguard deck has a lot of healing stuff in it, while the undead Fallen Kingdom deck is all about bringing warriors back to life and infecting your opponents with diseases.

[moosegrinder]

Cheers Johnny, that makes sense.

I've not played with the Vanguard and undead ones yet, they're still sealed. The Tundra Orcs are fun because they effectively have 5 walls to spawn from.

[michael]

Wooo deliveries!

Got Glory to Rome and RoboRally in the last BGG Maths trade, both are now sitting on the pile to play. I also have a copy of the Summoner Wars Master Set on the way!

[Mogster]

I couldn't get to sleep last night, so I ended up playing an online game of Carcassonne against a complete stranger at 2am. It was a brilliant game too, with both of us clearly being complete bastards when it comes to stealing and ruining cities. I did slip up a couple of times when I forgot what colour I was playing though, which must have confused my opponent a little. It was late.

In the end I lost by a single point, maintaining my record of zero wins at the game against a human opponent.

[jonnyalpha]

Wooo deliveries!

Got Glory to Rome and RoboRally in the last BGG Maths trade, both are now sitting on the pile to play. I also have a copy of the Summoner Wars Master Set on the way!

I Glory to Rome although it's a bitch to learn and teach I'm afraid. Make sure you really understand how the cards move through the game before you sit down to teach others or it just gets really confusing. Once you've got it sussed it's a great game.

[michael]

I've heard there's a few videos online that will help. It's the worst packaged game I've ever seen though! Definitely one to transfer into a proper box.

[moosegrinder]

Finally got round to playing with the 2 faction decks I got her for Christmas, Vanguard and Fallen Kingdom. The Fallen Kingdom deck is so hideously janky it's not even funny. Add to that I can't strategize for shit and you have her steamrollering her way to victory.

[moosegrinder]

Finally got round to playing with the 2 faction decks I got her for Christmas, Vanguard and Fallen Kingdom. The Fallen Kingdom deck is so hideously janky it's not even funny. Add to that I can't strategize for shit and you have her steamrollering her way to victory.

[therearerules]

Played Bang! Yesterday, the almost in-laws were around, and luckily they're into their games too.

6 players. Only played it once (otherwise yet more monopoly deal), but I was an outlaw and we won. Normally we have to play nicely, but I just murdered the renegade and another outlaw by my second go, then threw the dynamite down. That took out the deputy and so the Sherrif was simple. Still a game I really like, even if it's incredibly easy to die and then sit there for 20 minutes. It scales up to lots of players as well.

[moosegrinder]

I love the packaging on that. Never heard of it though.

Me and donk played Thunderstone Dragonspire again and it was heavy going, if I'm honest. We had a crap randomisation meaning we only had 2 weapons and 3 cards with light, one of which was a hero. The decks were padded out with shite and I couldn't draw anything useful for toffee so, naturally, Jonny won. He might be able to give a slightly better appraisal as my brain is tired.

[strawdonkey]

I bought all the money

I bought all the heroes with the money

I killed all the monsters with the heroes that I bought with the money

I won the game with all the points from the monsters that I killed with the heroes that I bought with the money

That seems to be the way most of the games go at the moment. I'm still really enjoying it but when you see that you only have two weapons available and one of the monsters in the opening dungeon says 'Cannot be damaged by heroes without a weapon' racing to stockpile those weapons becomes a pretty high priority.

Going into the dungeon in search of early points seems like a bad idea when your opponent gets to spend 15 money a turn, as they'll quickly overtake you.

Trying to play as a spellcaster isn't really amazing either as when you purchase a spell, it doesn't grant you money when you draw it from your deck like a weapon does.

Plenty of stuff that dicks with your opponent now though. Moose really loved discarding cards.

[moosegrinder]

It still took us the best part of a fucking hour to kill something to any effective degree instead of just cycling them to the bottom of the deck. At least the setting meant we could rebuy shit.

[Campfire_Burning]

I've only played Thunderstone in single player but I find as the game goes on money becomes much less of a priority. But then, any monsters you can't defeat with your current deck move out of the dungeon, so you really have to concern yourself with mopping up what you can.

This 'intelligent' randomizer's supposed to generate a fun game every time, so you needn't worry about not having light sources when you're fighting monsters with light penalties, and the like.

http://asmor.com/scripts/tsrand/

In other Thunderstone news, my promo set arrived this morning. Attached was a note saying there'd be some new promo cards out in March or April. P&P won't be free for these so it probably won't be worth having them delivered from overseas, but if you're at a convention or you have a decent local game shop it might me worth keeping an eye out for them in the near future.

[Joyrex-J9]

I braved London On Board again last night. Had a much better time, I can't quite put my finger on why, as the place was really no different. I suppose my expectations were different, it was a little quieter, I got there earlier, and did manage to play one of my games, these probably all helped.

Chatted to the main organiser, Paul, who was stacking up a massive pile of unopened games. Turns out he sells boardgames, turns out he runs boardgameguru.co.uk, and he gives a discount to anyone buying games with cash at the meet This could be very dangerous!!

Also got chatting to a guy that had heard of both michael and campfieburning, and was talking about how he liked the Little Metal Dog show and site. He had also heard of rllmuk so I think he used to be a member way back, or a lurker. :waves:

But it's a small world!

Oh yeah what did I play?

- Finally had a proper full game of Thunderstone (with the rllmuk guy), the lack of interaction didn't bother me as much as when I tried it before. Game ended in a draw. Still dunno if I like it enough to justify the expansions. Need to play a couple more games I think.

- Played Wasabi. It was shite. Lets never speak of it again

- Had a game of Alhambra another classic euro I've never played. I really liked this, subtle without being too simple, lots of little tactics I spotted. I liked the theme too. Oh and I managed a convincing win!

Definitely going to continue going, seems daft not to when it 30 seconds walk from my office!

Sorry for the long waffley post, yeah get a blog!

[moosegrinder]

Nah man, I'm well pleased you've found a play group and have got over the awkward hump. But enough about your missus LOLOLOLOLOLOL (I don't mean it, don't tell her ) but yeah, very happy for you dude.

[michael]

Nice one, man. It can be really difficult making the leap and actually showing up. The fact you went back after a pretty rubbish first time is great - fair play!

[Campfire_Burning]

Also got chatting to a guy that had heard of both michael and campfieburning, and was talking about how he liked the Little Metal Dog show and site. He had also heard of rllmuk so I think he used to be a member way back, or a lurker. :waves:

But it's a small world!

Looking at the London On Board site and the attendees for last night's meeting I deduce that the guy in question was none other than Ravening Harlot, who used to be known as Ravening Wh0re before Microsoft came along and kicked over his sandcastle.

Unless there was another forumite present. Dear God, they're everywhere!

[jonnyalpha]

And Joyrex is liking Euros even more!

You realise this also means you'll never have to pay postage on any games from Boardgameguru? A discount and no postage costs sounds very dangerous indeed.

I would be worried.

[Joyrex-J9]

And Joyrex is liking Euros even more!

You realise this also means you'll never have to pay postage on any games from Boardgameguru? A discount and no postage costs sounds very dangerous indeed.

I would be worried.

Yes it's possibly deadly, I nearly impulse bought Thunderstone: Dragonspire on the spot.

My new found interest in Euros is also deadly I've bought two since I've been going to the meets! I'm conscious my collection is very ameritrash heavy, and given euro games are usually in the £12-£25 range I thought I'd treat myself

[moosegrinder]

You wouldn't regret buying Dragonspire. Aside from it's seemingly bonkers mob set it's massive amounts of fun.

[Joyrex-J9]

I desperately need a decent storage solution & dividers for the game, it was such a pain setting it up last night. And I gave up putting it away properly so it's a jumbled mess now.

Is it worth getting Dragonspire for that aspect alone?

[moosegrinder]

Wrath Of The Elements does it too, and it's prolly cheaper and just as good. The thing I've got with the Dragonspire box is that it's gone back to the previous ridged bottom which is a pain in the bollocks.

Actually, I think Wrath has all the dividers for the original set and Dragonspire doesn't. Go for Wrath, it makes it so much easier.

[Nathan Wind]

Castle Ravenloft arrived today so I'll soon be playing that! The figures are luuuuuuuurvely. In fact, it seems to be a high quality set all-round. The board pieces are almost comparable to those of the Space Hulk re-boot in terms of their build.

[Joyrex-J9]

Wrath Of The Elements does it too, and it's prolly cheaper and just as good. The thing I've got with the Dragonspire box is that it's gone back to the previous ridged bottom which is a pain in the bollocks.

Actually, I think Wrath has all the dividers for the original set and Dragonspire doesn't. Go for Wrath, it makes it so much easier.

Not sure that's the case; I watched this components overview for Dragonspire

and I'm sure he fits every expansion in the box all with dividers. But I'll do a bit of research.

Hang on - if you've got a copy would you mind checking? If the dividers are there for the original set (e.g. Fireball or Goodberry) it's all good