About that. I've watched several walkthroughs of Terra Mystica, and while I could put this off on my wife not being a gamer, the honest truth is that that game scares the hell out of me.
You're definitely entitled to feel how you feel, but it's honestly incredibly easy to play. The strategy is deep, and I couldn't claim to have a handle on much of it yet, but it's really no worse for complexity than some of the other civ-building suggestions.
Did you happen to play with the Giants in Terra Mystica? We can't get a handle on them. Their racial ability seems like nothing but a handicap. The most common tactic I've seen with them is the fortress rush but they still seem to lag behind other races.
We haven't, although they do make me quite curious. The Fortress seems like the natural path to take, but maybe it's a red herring of sorts? If you think about it, it's only 5 terraforms at best across the game, which I guess makes it like the Nomad's bonus, except with the 2-spades conundrum in the meantime.
I think I'd be interested to try and see if I could get the priest bonus in the first turn, and then if the giants start with 7 power in bowl 2, burn off 3 of it to take a priest for your first action. Upgrade your spades twice and then try to go from there. Your second turn would probably still be slow, and it might depend on how the round bonuses are laid out, but it seems much more effective to immediately have your terraforming sorted out rather than 1 for free next turn.
With respect to the LCGs, don't bother buying two copies. Seriously. Everyone I know who complains about needing two copies are hyper competitive tournament wannabe players. No offense to anyone here. I mean, if you are the sort to obsess over deck consistency, and you can't be happy if you don't have the maximum allowed number of copies of every card, then I guess buy however many core sets you want. But if you don't even know what those things mean, seriously, who cares. I've never bought 2 core sets, and I've had a blast with every LCG I've played. Plus, if you stay on top of the booster cycles, they do include max copies of everything. So by the time you are a complete cycle through the game, you'll be set. I'd much rather buy a core set and then a complete cycle than 2 core sets.
This isn't true with Netrunner. It's not about being hyper-competitive, so much as the volume of cards that are 2-ofs which you definitely want 3 of, and that many of the 1-off cards *really* want a 2nd copy (all the runner consoles, a bunch of resources, some heavy hitters like San-San and Corporate Troubleshooter).
Consistency is huge. Game of Thrones core has a fair number of cards you want at least 2-of (nearly everything in core is 1-of) and overall plays better, especially if you are putting together decks for multiple houses at the same time.
Star Wars plays a lot better with 2-of, but after a couple of expansion cycles maybe one copy of core will be fine.
I don't have personal experience with any of the others.
I'm not super competitive, but I do like seeing my decks do what I want them to do. So if I build a Yoda deck, it damn sure needs to put a Yoda into play at some point. There's just no way to do that with only one core set.
They tried to bury us. They didn't know that we were seeds.2018 Midterms. Get your shit together.
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ArcticLancerBest served chilled.Registered Userregular
To further clarify on Netrunner, it's that you really can't have 2 players make their own decks with 1 core set. It's just missing too many crucial cards in multiples. With 2 core sets, at least each player could have 2 copies of Melange Mining Corp, for example. It's a card that's almost ubiquitos as a 3-of in Corp decks because it's too good not to be. But you only get 2 of them. So unless you want to be switching out cards between every game, it's way too much hassle. As well, playing with the core's 'pre-made decks' is a joke and horribly unbalanced.
Ideally, you'll get a core, your friend will get a core, and then the two of you can split a 3rd so everyone has 3 of everything meaningful, and you can split up the 1-ofs based on what each of you wants to play. I know this isn't quite the situation with your girlfriend, but in that case 2 cores is definitely enough to be reasonable.
Personally, while I might *own* two Netrunner cores, I only ever deck-build with one. My second copy's my demo/"playing with someone new so we're just using starter decks and I don't want to have to tear apart my built decks every game" copy.
COME FORTH, AMATERASU! - Switch Friend Code SW-5465-2458-5696 - Twitch
Personally, while I might *own* two Netrunner cores, I only ever deck-build with one. My second copy's my demo/"playing with someone new so we're just using starter decks and I don't want to have to tear apart my built decks every game" copy.
My second copy was "I need a third Melange and second Corporate Troubleshooter for this tournament why must I buy the whole set ffffff..."
To be fair, all the one-offs I did need a second of in the end.
Plus when people are low enough to play as Noise I now have a huge number of spare credit counters I can pelt them with.
Tayrun on
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ObiFettUse the ForceAs You WishRegistered Userregular
edited May 2013
Got to play my first actual game of Mage Knight last night. All I had done previously were solo sessions where I was mainly just learning the rules.
We had 3 players and played First Reconnaissance, which is basically the training mission. I played as Elf guy, my wife played as the Fire Witch, and my brother in law played as the Gold and Black Knight dude. I started off going left and rushed to recruit a unit as did my wife. My bro in law went and fought an Orc. After some exploring, my wife and bro in law ended up on the far right side of the map with me by myself in the left. This left me able to take all the fame I could by myself and plan out without having to worry about someone messing up my plans. I ended up winning as a result, hitting level 5 and owning an artifact, a keep, and a mage tower.
The first mission is great for teaching. You only need to explain the basics at first (deck, movement, playing abilities, etc). Then it reveals one new thing about the game for every new tile you explore. So its easy to digest as you go. The most frequent comment of the night from the two new players were "Wow, we can do that, too?!" Every new thing the game threw at them just widened the possibilities of what they could do on their turn. I can't get over how awesome the dual-power abilities are and the amount of choices it gives the player. Everyone pulled off some ingenious turns as a result. And those ingenious turns are awesome because everyone got a sense of accomplishment from what they were able to do during the game, regardless of winning or losing.
And I learned something this game that I had been playing wrong (I think this will be a frequent experience between me and this game for a while). I thought that ranged and siege attacks could only be used during the ranged attack part of battles. Turns out I can also use them during my normal attack after blocking and assigning damage. We didn't figure that out till the game was over, but I can see that making many battles actually winnable in the future.
Such a great game. I can tell we are going to get many plays out of it.
Also, I'm like this close to creating an excel sheet and scanning the tiles into my computer to run a forum game of it.
Got to play my first actual game of Mage Knight last night. All I had done previously were solo sessions where I was mainly just learning the rules.
We had 3 players and played First Reconnaissance, which is basically the training mission. I played as Elf guy, my wife played as the Fire Witch, and my brother in law played as the Gold and Black Knight dude. I started off going left and rushed to recruit a unit as did my wife. My bro in law went and fought an Orc. After some exploring, my wife and bro in law ended up on the far right side of the map with me by myself in the left. This left me able to take all the fame I could by myself and plan out without having to worry about someone messing up my plans. I ended up winning as a result, hitting level 5 and owning an artifact, a keep, and a mage tower.
The first mission is great for teaching. You only need to explain the basics at first (deck, movement, playing abilities, etc). Then it reveals one new thing about the game for every new tile you explore. So its easy to digest as you go. The most frequent comment of the night from the two new players were "Wow, we can do that, too?!" Every new thing the game threw at them just widened the possibilities of what they could do on their turn. I can't get over how awesome the dual-power abilities are and the amount of choices it gives the player. Everyone pulled off some ingenious turns as a result. And those ingenious turns are awesome because everyone got a sense of accomplishment from what they were able to do during the game, regardless of winning or losing.
And I learned something this game that I had been playing wrong (I think this will be a frequent experience between me and this game for a while). I thought that ranged and siege attacks could only be used during the ranged attack part of battles. Turns out I can also use them during my normal attack after blocking and assigning damage. We didn't figure that out till the game was over, but I can see that making many battles actually winnable in the future.
Such a great game. I can tell we are going to get many plays out of it.
Also, I'm like this close to creating an excel sheet and scanning the tiles into my computer to run a forum game of it.
Just finished off my Star Wars LCG binders. All the cards sleeved, then both copies of each card slotted into the pockets with Objective Sets going across the 6 pockets of 2 pages, and separated by faction.
Makes looking at cards, and deck building super easy, as you can pull out what you want and be ready to go.
When I mentioned it to people, they seemed to think I was crazy keeping all the cards sleeved, but for Star Wars, I think its worth it, since its so simple to toss together a different deck between games, and having to resleeve would be a pain in the ass.
Origin for Dragon Age: Inquisition Shenanigans: Inksplat776
We haven't, although they do make me quite curious. The Fortress seems like the natural path to take, but maybe it's a red herring of sorts? If you think about it, it's only 5 terraforms at best across the game, which I guess makes it like the Nomad's bonus, except with the 2-spades conundrum in the meantime.
I think I'd be interested to try and see if I could get the priest bonus in the first turn, and then if the giants start with 7 power in bowl 2, burn off 3 of it to take a priest for your first action. Upgrade your spades twice and then try to go from there. Your second turn would probably still be slow, and it might depend on how the round bonuses are laid out, but it seems much more effective to immediately have your terraforming sorted out rather than 1 for free next turn.
But hey, maybe it's a terrible idea.
Here's the thing we ran into with them:
Up front, their ability is a straight up handicap. Having your 1 spade terraform tiles turn into 2 spades is a much bigger limitation than your 3 spades turning into 2 spades is a bonus.
So you figure "oh, I'll get the fort and get the 2 free spades action". But that's what races like Nomads already get in addition to having 1 spade options. Yeah the giant fort gives some power too, but it didn't make up for being beat to the terraform race early.
And what devalues their fort ability is that fact that the victory points that come with spade upgrades make everyone want to get them regardless, and upgrading those devalues the fort bonus.
Basically the people who got them came to the consensus that all their "advantages" go entirely towards overcoming their handicap, while other races get an advantage right off the bat with no handicap (other than 3 spade tiles which can be worked around easily enough).
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ArcticLancerBest served chilled.Registered Userregular
Off-hand, I couldn't really contest that. My thought would be that the giants are really meant to get in your neighbor's face more than anything ... Terraform their prime options so they're only left with poor ones as well. But yes, I know you can only cover so much ground.
The alternative, of course, would just be to play the Chaos Magicians, because those guys are ludicrous ...
Well, going over LCGs with the gf turned into another girl coming over as well for boardgames instead. I guess they really enjoyed the one game of Catan we played last Thursday, because we played three games of Catan in a row last night. One regular game and two tournament ones. I was pretty good to call it an evening after the first one (I wanted to still get some detailed LCG talk in!) but they were hooked and asked for one more, so I taught them the tournament rules so it would go faster. And then they complained it was too fast and wanted to play another tournament one. I got home at around 12:30.
Catan once again proves itself as one of the best games to get people into this hobby. Neither of these girls had played non-Monopoly boardgames before and now they are both hooked, talking about future boardgame nights and whatnot. Which is great, but means I desperately need to expand my local collection past Catan and Citadels (I also have A Few Acres but that is 1v1) lest I lose my mind. Why can't I just teleport my collection from the states to Japan?
So I've been playing around with Vassal and Eclipse and was curious if there are 5 other folks out there willing to play some Eclipse as a Play-By-Email style using VASSAL? I was checking out the Pbp game, and I don't think I have it in me time-wise to host something like that, but if we all just passing around a log file, I think it could be fun. Let me know if ya interested and I'll try to set something up!
Gah, the more I read about Tzolk'in, the more it seems like a glorified spreadsheet. I understand that many euros are like this, but many lately seem to have transcended this. Really thinking about cancelling my order and getting a copy of Keyflower instead...
So today I celebrated Memorial Day by playing Combat Commander: Europe and Down in Flames: Guns Blazing. We also threw in San Juan and Catacombs because my gaming buddy had never played them before.
I'm still just not sure how I feel about Combat Commander. It intrigues me. It's a fascinating game design. I really enjoy how it feels to push bits around, form fire groups, and manage your hand. I even enjoy the flavor the events give the game.
But wow is it brutal to be on the wrong end of Combat Commander. It could be because we are still learning our way around the tactical system. But so often when we are losing, it's just a case "What the fuck am I supposed to do here?!" Case in point, I was playing Germans on the attack, my buddy was playing Russians on the defense. It was scenario 3. I had a shit ton of weapons and rifle squads. He had militia and bullshit and 2 weak ass weapons. He also had a bunch of barbed wire, and the defender actions are nice. But even so, I ended up pretty effortlessly annihilating my way across the board with a heavy machine gun. He just had no way to close in on me, and we figured his only hope was to slow me down so much, he still was winning on points at the end of the 7th turn, if it doesn't go into sudden death!!! We made it to turn 4 in 3 hours. I think there was 1 time event, he decked twice, and I decked once. Making to the end based on time alone would have been a 6 or 7 hour game, assuming more time events didn't make it out.
I think the final thoughts on that session of Combat Commander is that we were both bewildered. I didn't feel good winning, because it seemed like I was handed it on a silver platter by the game. He didn't feel good losing, because he didn't learn a damn thing from it.
To cleanse the pallet we played a nice silly game of Catacombs. Every now and again he'd start to AP on me, or ask if something was allowed, or if something counted or not, and I'd just say "It's not that kinda game. Just do it!" We had a great time.
Finally got my copy of Risk Legacy to the table today, with my intended crew of 4. We played two games, and already I can see the board taking its shape. Very neat. I hope we can get some routine playtimes scheduled, to see how it evolves. We have not yet opened any packets, and I remain unspoiled and intend to stay that way.
The games took longer than I had been led to believe they would. I had understood that early games would likely be in the 45 minute range, but this was more like 2 hours each. I don't know if I heard wrong, or if something about our play style is making it longer.
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ObiFettUse the ForceAs You WishRegistered Userregular
Sounds like you guys are turtling up a bit more. Or maybe you forgot that everyone gets a free victory star if you haven't already won a game?
We definitely all started with the correct 2 stars (cardboard + HQ). There were a lot of failed attack rolls, maybe, and people seemed to be cashing in cards for armies rather than saving them up to buy stars. I guess we'll see if it's a pattern or was a fluke after a couple more games.
Ah Risk Legacy, such an interesting game with such botched execution.
I'd really love to see a more seasoned developer try to tackle some of the ideas presented in that game.
Risk Legacy spoilers, don't read unless you've opened all the stuff:
For realsies
My group burned out on the game on something like the 12th play, we never finished the world. Our board developed in such a way that pretty much drafting aliens or mutants meant you were basically guaranteed to win the game, aliens more so, but mutants could still get luck with their free VP event cards. No one really felt up risking their shot at winning the whole thing on getting first pick of the factions (not to mention that playing a game that is decided at faction selection is pretty boring). Every other race was saddled down under some horrific faction penalties and we didn't have missions yet or whatever the things that let you get extra stars for fulfilling objectives are called. But the aliens had awesome powers, and no negative power, and a mission. So, they won every game since they showed up.
Inquisitor on
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ObiFettUse the ForceAs You WishRegistered Userregular
Ah Risk Legacy, such an interesting game with such botched execution.
I'd really love to see a more seasoned developer try to tackle some of the ideas presented in that game.
Risk Legacy spoilers, don't read unless you've opened all the stuff:
For realsies
My group burned out on the game on something like the 12th play, we never finished the world. Our board developed in such a way that pretty much drafting aliens or mutants meant you were basically guaranteed to win the game, aliens more so, but mutants could still get luck with their free VP event cards. No one really felt up risking their shot at winning the whole thing on getting first pick of the factions (not to mention that playing a game that is decided at faction selection is pretty boring). Every other race was saddled down under some horrific faction penalties and we didn't have missions yet or whatever the things that let you get extra stars for fulfilling objectives are called. But the aliens had awesome powers, and no negative power, and a mission. So, they won every game since they showed up.
Why didn't your group just gang up on whoever picked aliens? That's what my group did whenever someone picked what we perceived to be an OP faction. We would just gang up on them and pound them into submission from multiple directions and then when they were basically toast, we worried about each other.
Ah Risk Legacy, such an interesting game with such botched execution.
I'd really love to see a more seasoned developer try to tackle some of the ideas presented in that game.
Risk Legacy spoilers, don't read unless you've opened all the stuff:
For realsies
My group burned out on the game on something like the 12th play, we never finished the world. Our board developed in such a way that pretty much drafting aliens or mutants meant you were basically guaranteed to win the game, aliens more so, but mutants could still get luck with their free VP event cards. No one really felt up risking their shot at winning the whole thing on getting first pick of the factions (not to mention that playing a game that is decided at faction selection is pretty boring). Every other race was saddled down under some horrific faction penalties and we didn't have missions yet or whatever the things that let you get extra stars for fulfilling objectives are called. But the aliens had awesome powers, and no negative power, and a mission. So, they won every game since they showed up.
Why didn't your group just gang up on whoever picked aliens? That's what my group did whenever someone picked what we perceived to be an OP faction. We would just gang up on them and pound them into submission from multiple directions and then when they were basically toast, we worried about each other.
Because the OP factions were OP enough that if they turtled smart (limiting the number of players that can realistically engage them at once) they could win even with people ganging up on them. Also if you over commit to trying to hurt an OP faction another player is just going to come in and sweep your board for the win.
Inquisitor on
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ObiFettUse the ForceAs You WishRegistered Userregular
Ah Risk Legacy, such an interesting game with such botched execution.
I'd really love to see a more seasoned developer try to tackle some of the ideas presented in that game.
Risk Legacy spoilers, don't read unless you've opened all the stuff:
For realsies
My group burned out on the game on something like the 12th play, we never finished the world. Our board developed in such a way that pretty much drafting aliens or mutants meant you were basically guaranteed to win the game, aliens more so, but mutants could still get luck with their free VP event cards. No one really felt up risking their shot at winning the whole thing on getting first pick of the factions (not to mention that playing a game that is decided at faction selection is pretty boring). Every other race was saddled down under some horrific faction penalties and we didn't have missions yet or whatever the things that let you get extra stars for fulfilling objectives are called. But the aliens had awesome powers, and no negative power, and a mission. So, they won every game since they showed up.
Why didn't your group just gang up on whoever picked aliens? That's what my group did whenever someone picked what we perceived to be an OP faction. We would just gang up on them and pound them into submission from multiple directions and then when they were basically toast, we worried about each other.
Because the OP factions were OP enough that if they turtled smart (limiting the number of players that can realistically engage them at once) they could win even with people ganging up on them. Also if you over commit to trying to hurt an OP faction another player is just going to come in and sweep your board for the win.
So...
Aliens weren't a guaranteed win if the people you played with were more diplomatic and better at choosing starting positions to keep the OP faction from getting a prime turtle spot?
:P
Just saying that the game tells you stuff is going to get unbalanced. Its the job of the players to either prevent the unbalancing from happening or if unable to prevent the unbalancing, to change playstyle to balance the unbalancing. After all, your playgroup's choices are what created the unbalanced situation anyways. You don't get to create a unique situation and then complain about the balancing of said unique situation, especially when there are ways to play around it.
Ah Risk Legacy, such an interesting game with such botched execution.
I'd really love to see a more seasoned developer try to tackle some of the ideas presented in that game.
Risk Legacy spoilers, don't read unless you've opened all the stuff:
For realsies
My group burned out on the game on something like the 12th play, we never finished the world. Our board developed in such a way that pretty much drafting aliens or mutants meant you were basically guaranteed to win the game, aliens more so, but mutants could still get luck with their free VP event cards. No one really felt up risking their shot at winning the whole thing on getting first pick of the factions (not to mention that playing a game that is decided at faction selection is pretty boring). Every other race was saddled down under some horrific faction penalties and we didn't have missions yet or whatever the things that let you get extra stars for fulfilling objectives are called. But the aliens had awesome powers, and no negative power, and a mission. So, they won every game since they showed up.
Why didn't your group just gang up on whoever picked aliens? That's what my group did whenever someone picked what we perceived to be an OP faction. We would just gang up on them and pound them into submission from multiple directions and then when they were basically toast, we worried about each other.
Because the OP factions were OP enough that if they turtled smart (limiting the number of players that can realistically engage them at once) they could win even with people ganging up on them. Also if you over commit to trying to hurt an OP faction another player is just going to come in and sweep your board for the win.
So...
Aliens weren't a guaranteed win if the people you played with were more diplomatic and better at choosing starting positions to keep the OP faction from getting a prime turtle spot?
:P
Just saying that the game tells you stuff is going to get unbalanced. Its the job of the players to either prevent the unbalancing from happening or if unable to prevent the unbalancing, to change playstyle to balance the unbalancing. After all, your playgroup's choices are what created the unbalanced situation anyways. You don't get to create a unique situation and then complain about the balancing of said unique situation, especially when there are ways to play around it.
I feel like that's an unfair criticism to lobby, when the effects of the game are permanent. Sure, he knows those things now, but not as he was getting into the situation. Sadly, since Risk Legacy has such permanence between plays, what's done is done. Any other game, I think what you are saying would be 100% valid. I think Risk Legacy is the only game where it isn't.
Yes, also, I was only one of several players making decisions.
I voiced very loud and clear opposition to some of the decisions people were making, but it was their decision in the end.
Legacy spoilers:
They were basically either a guaranteed win or a guaranteed loss for whoever decided to take one for the team and take the aliens down with them, but its a game with only one winner. Also you basically can't take some turtle spots from some players based on city placement and other things.
I have to admit the tone you are taking in this conversation is very patronizing and I am quickly losing interesting in continuing it.
ObiFett is restating what is literally in the rulebook - that if you allow OP things to happen, they will happen, and sometimes the only way to balance them out is to work together against the OP.
ObiFett is restating what is literally in the rulebook - that if you allow OP things to happen, they will happen, and sometimes the only way to balance them out is to work together against the OP.
The OP thing that we "allowed to happen" was opening the alien faction box.
Oh what fools we were to allow that to transpire! What utter fools we were to dare to open that box! We should have known! What terrors lurked within that satanic box.
Okay, yeah, seriously think I am done with this because at this point all I can respond with is sass and that's never a productive conversation.
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ObiFettUse the ForceAs You WishRegistered Userregular
Ah Risk Legacy, such an interesting game with such botched execution.
I'd really love to see a more seasoned developer try to tackle some of the ideas presented in that game.
Risk Legacy spoilers, don't read unless you've opened all the stuff:
For realsies
My group burned out on the game on something like the 12th play, we never finished the world. Our board developed in such a way that pretty much drafting aliens or mutants meant you were basically guaranteed to win the game, aliens more so, but mutants could still get luck with their free VP event cards. No one really felt up risking their shot at winning the whole thing on getting first pick of the factions (not to mention that playing a game that is decided at faction selection is pretty boring). Every other race was saddled down under some horrific faction penalties and we didn't have missions yet or whatever the things that let you get extra stars for fulfilling objectives are called. But the aliens had awesome powers, and no negative power, and a mission. So, they won every game since they showed up.
Why didn't your group just gang up on whoever picked aliens? That's what my group did whenever someone picked what we perceived to be an OP faction. We would just gang up on them and pound them into submission from multiple directions and then when they were basically toast, we worried about each other.
Because the OP factions were OP enough that if they turtled smart (limiting the number of players that can realistically engage them at once) they could win even with people ganging up on them. Also if you over commit to trying to hurt an OP faction another player is just going to come in and sweep your board for the win.
So...
Aliens weren't a guaranteed win if the people you played with were more diplomatic and better at choosing starting positions to keep the OP faction from getting a prime turtle spot?
:P
Just saying that the game tells you stuff is going to get unbalanced. Its the job of the players to either prevent the unbalancing from happening or if unable to prevent the unbalancing, to change playstyle to balance the unbalancing. After all, your playgroup's choices are what created the unbalanced situation anyways. You don't get to create a unique situation and then complain about the balancing of said unique situation, especially when there are ways to play around it.
I feel like that's an unfair criticism to lobby, when the effects of the game are permanent. Sure, he knows those things now, but not as he was getting into the situation. Sadly, since Risk Legacy has such permanence between plays, what's done is done. Any other game, I think what you are saying would be 100% valid. I think Risk Legacy is the only game where it isn't.
I would agree if I hadn't played the game and was told by the instructions to sign the board saying I would take responsibility for all my choices in the game. And considering the untold amount of game states any game can be in around game 12, its unreasonable to think anyone can design such a game for it to be completely balanced after 4-5 people make permanent, in the moment decisions.
But that's just awesomeness of the game. You rip shit up. You permanently alter your board. It becomes unbalanced and asymmetric. Then the group has to deal with those decisions and adapt. If the group can't adapt or refuses to, then I guess they lose out. I guarantee you give me your game, Inquisitor, and my playgroup would go through 5-6 games with no single faction winning more than twice. We see something that unbalances the game, then we squash it. Knowing that if we don't, that we create a pattern where other people will exploit that unbalance the next game.
Since Risk:Legacy is a game of multiple games, to think of only the current game (completely irrespective of "mistakes" made in the past) is to lose the greater game.
Yes, also, I was only one of several players making decisions.
I voiced very loud and clear opposition to some of the decisions people were making, but it was their decision in the end.
Legacy spoilers:
They were basically either a guaranteed win or a guaranteed loss for whoever decided to take one for the team and take the aliens down with them, but its a game with only one winner. Also you basically can't take some turtle spots from some players based on city placement and other things.
I have to admit the tone you are taking in this conversation is very patronizing and I am quickly losing interesting in continuing it.
Ah Risk Legacy, such an interesting game with such botched execution.
I'd really love to see a more seasoned developer try to tackle some of the ideas presented in that game.
Risk Legacy spoilers, don't read unless you've opened all the stuff:
For realsies
My group burned out on the game on something like the 12th play, we never finished the world. Our board developed in such a way that pretty much drafting aliens or mutants meant you were basically guaranteed to win the game, aliens more so, but mutants could still get luck with their free VP event cards. No one really felt up risking their shot at winning the whole thing on getting first pick of the factions (not to mention that playing a game that is decided at faction selection is pretty boring). Every other race was saddled down under some horrific faction penalties and we didn't have missions yet or whatever the things that let you get extra stars for fulfilling objectives are called. But the aliens had awesome powers, and no negative power, and a mission. So, they won every game since they showed up.
Why didn't your group just gang up on whoever picked aliens? That's what my group did whenever someone picked what we perceived to be an OP faction. We would just gang up on them and pound them into submission from multiple directions and then when they were basically toast, we worried about each other.
Because the OP factions were OP enough that if they turtled smart (limiting the number of players that can realistically engage them at once) they could win even with people ganging up on them. Also if you over commit to trying to hurt an OP faction another player is just going to come in and sweep your board for the win.
So...
Aliens weren't a guaranteed win if the people you played with were more diplomatic and better at choosing starting positions to keep the OP faction from getting a prime turtle spot?
:P
Just saying that the game tells you stuff is going to get unbalanced. Its the job of the players to either prevent the unbalancing from happening or if unable to prevent the unbalancing, to change playstyle to balance the unbalancing. After all, your playgroup's choices are what created the unbalanced situation anyways. You don't get to create a unique situation and then complain about the balancing of said unique situation, especially when there are ways to play around it.
I feel like that's an unfair criticism to lobby, when the effects of the game are permanent. Sure, he knows those things now, but not as he was getting into the situation. Sadly, since Risk Legacy has such permanence between plays, what's done is done. Any other game, I think what you are saying would be 100% valid. I think Risk Legacy is the only game where it isn't.
I would agree if I hadn't played the game and was told by the instructions to sign the board saying I would take responsibility for all my choices in the game. And considering the untold amount of game states any game can be in around game 12, its unreasonable to think anyone can design such a game for it to be completely balanced after 4-5 people make permanent, in the moment decisions.
But that's just awesomeness of the game. You rip shit up. You permanently alter your board. It becomes unbalanced and asymmetric. Then the group has to deal with those decisions and adapt. If the group can't adapt or refuses to, then I guess they lose out. I guarantee you give me your game, Inquisitor and my playgroup would go through 5-6 games with no single faction winning more than twice. We see something that unbalances the game, then we squash it. Knowing that if we don't, that we create a pattern where other people will exploit that unbalance the next game.
Since Risk:Legacy is a game of multiple games, to think of only the current game (completely irrespective of "mistakes" made in the past) is to lose the greater game.
I think what you are describing is a text book prisoners dilemma. Your group is able to succeed in the prisoner dilemma. Inquisitor's group is not apparently. Group dynamics always vary. I think it's fair to say that Risk Legacy may have worked itself into an untenable gamestate for his group, which repeatedly fails the prisoner's dilemma. Just as you can't play certain games because one player has awful AP, or a couple who always helps one another, or other social factors.
So I've been playing around with Vassal and Eclipse and was curious if there are 5 other folks out there willing to play some Eclipse as a Play-By-Email style using VASSAL? I was checking out the Pbp game, and I don't think I have it in me time-wise to host something like that, but if we all just passing around a log file, I think it could be fun. Let me know if ya interested and I'll try to set something up!
Heck yeah.
We'd all probably mess something up with the Vassal interface, but yeah!
I'm impressed with a lot of the "balancing mechanisms" Risk Legacy came up with to try and swing things away from one thing dominating, but there have been some features that bothered me.
(non spoilers)
To start with, major cities are just too good. They are by far the best winner reward. Big advantage to whoever has the most. They choke out choice and there are just too many of them. I want to see a funny board of continent naming and nerfing Austrailia, but you're a fool to take anything but a major city. By the time you run out them and turn to more varied winner choices, the campaign is two-thirds finished.
(spoilers)
I like all the bidding system options for each game, but dislike the traits that are permanently assigned to factions. Worse, some of them are obscenely overpowered, like the one that gives +1 to both dice when attacking HQs. Even worse when it gets (permanently) applied to one of the default strongest factions like Enclave or Republic. We just opened the packet with scar weaknesses, and the faction that gets stuck with "purist" (can never hold more than 2 coin cards) is going to be virtually crippled.
These wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for the overall problem that plagues a lot of these games: taking one for the team puts you out of the running. It can be attacking the leader or permanent choices. The game would be more enjoyable for everyone if Australia was nerfed, but you want to win so you plop your major city there instead of taking one for the team and hitting it with a -1 modifier. The game would be more enjoyable if someone plopped down a mercenary scar on Australia to break it being a mutant stronghold, but placing it in a spot you're already at (on a continent that already has 2 mercenaries) is what you do if you want to win even if it will make future games more binary. The debilitating weaknesses scar could be used on the most powerful faction, but you're going to use it against your immediate neighbor because you want to win (and there's a chance the powerful faction player will draw it to further cement their dominance).
+2
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ObiFettUse the ForceAs You WishRegistered Userregular
edited May 2013
Man
First thing I did in my game was weaken Australia.
edit: although to be fair, that was the major selling point of Risk:Legacy for me. I hate hate hate the Australia strategy and have always wanted to destroy all the advantages it inherently has.
And as soon as the chance arose, we created another boundary into Australia (from Africa)
I won games, yes, and currently have the most games won among our group. I (and a couple others) actually had to negotiate with the person that placed the
Alien island that connected Africa and Australia
by agreeing to work with, in the future, with that person to place the
capitol
in a place that was favorable to those who made the deal.
And Risk:Legacy is a game I feel comfortable saying "What counts as winning?" I really do think its about the story, journey, and memories you create with that game. Obviously everyone tries to win every individual game, but I also think our group had a really good habit of thinking ahead and working to prevent anything from getting too OP. Because we all knew that if something got too powerful, there was no guarantee that anyone would get to use it. And why make something OP if there is a chance it will be used against you?
We haven't finished our board yet, sadly. Moving and stuff put us in different locations, but we did open all the packs and pockets.
So I've been playing around with Vassal and Eclipse and was curious if there are 5 other folks out there willing to play some Eclipse as a Play-By-Email style using VASSAL? I was checking out the Pbp game, and I don't think I have it in me time-wise to host something like that, but if we all just passing around a log file, I think it could be fun. Let me know if ya interested and I'll try to set something up!
Heck yeah.
We'd all probably mess something up with the Vassal interface, but yeah!
Woo! Few more! Vassal isn't too horrible for this thing. I've played a few. Not sure how we'd do combat in an email setting.
Posts
We haven't, although they do make me quite curious. The Fortress seems like the natural path to take, but maybe it's a red herring of sorts? If you think about it, it's only 5 terraforms at best across the game, which I guess makes it like the Nomad's bonus, except with the 2-spades conundrum in the meantime.
I think I'd be interested to try and see if I could get the priest bonus in the first turn, and then if the giants start with 7 power in bowl 2, burn off 3 of it to take a priest for your first action. Upgrade your spades twice and then try to go from there. Your second turn would probably still be slow, and it might depend on how the round bonuses are laid out, but it seems much more effective to immediately have your terraforming sorted out rather than 1 for free next turn.
But hey, maybe it's a terrible idea.
This isn't true with Netrunner. It's not about being hyper-competitive, so much as the volume of cards that are 2-ofs which you definitely want 3 of, and that many of the 1-off cards *really* want a 2nd copy (all the runner consoles, a bunch of resources, some heavy hitters like San-San and Corporate Troubleshooter).
Perhaps I can interest you in my meager selection of pins?
Star Wars plays a lot better with 2-of, but after a couple of expansion cycles maybe one copy of core will be fine.
I don't have personal experience with any of the others.
They tried to bury us. They didn't know that we were seeds. 2018 Midterms. Get your shit together.
Ideally, you'll get a core, your friend will get a core, and then the two of you can split a 3rd so everyone has 3 of everything meaningful, and you can split up the 1-ofs based on what each of you wants to play. I know this isn't quite the situation with your girlfriend, but in that case 2 cores is definitely enough to be reasonable.
Perhaps I can interest you in my meager selection of pins?
COME FORTH, AMATERASU! - Switch Friend Code SW-5465-2458-5696 - Twitch
My second copy was "I need a third Melange and second Corporate Troubleshooter for this tournament why must I buy the whole set ffffff..."
To be fair, all the one-offs I did need a second of in the end.
Plus when people are low enough to play as Noise I now have a huge number of spare credit counters I can pelt them with.
We had 3 players and played First Reconnaissance, which is basically the training mission. I played as Elf guy, my wife played as the Fire Witch, and my brother in law played as the Gold and Black Knight dude. I started off going left and rushed to recruit a unit as did my wife. My bro in law went and fought an Orc. After some exploring, my wife and bro in law ended up on the far right side of the map with me by myself in the left. This left me able to take all the fame I could by myself and plan out without having to worry about someone messing up my plans. I ended up winning as a result, hitting level 5 and owning an artifact, a keep, and a mage tower.
The first mission is great for teaching. You only need to explain the basics at first (deck, movement, playing abilities, etc). Then it reveals one new thing about the game for every new tile you explore. So its easy to digest as you go. The most frequent comment of the night from the two new players were "Wow, we can do that, too?!" Every new thing the game threw at them just widened the possibilities of what they could do on their turn. I can't get over how awesome the dual-power abilities are and the amount of choices it gives the player. Everyone pulled off some ingenious turns as a result. And those ingenious turns are awesome because everyone got a sense of accomplishment from what they were able to do during the game, regardless of winning or losing.
And I learned something this game that I had been playing wrong (I think this will be a frequent experience between me and this game for a while). I thought that ranged and siege attacks could only be used during the ranged attack part of battles. Turns out I can also use them during my normal attack after blocking and assigning damage. We didn't figure that out till the game was over, but I can see that making many battles actually winnable in the future.
Such a great game. I can tell we are going to get many plays out of it.
Also, I'm like this close to creating an excel sheet and scanning the tiles into my computer to run a forum game of it.
Do it do it! I wanna play! Do it!
That totally gets me dibs on a spot, right?
Geth roll 5xM
That's amazing Infi and would/will get you dibs on a spot, yes.
Makes looking at cards, and deck building super easy, as you can pull out what you want and be ready to go.
When I mentioned it to people, they seemed to think I was crazy keeping all the cards sleeved, but for Star Wars, I think its worth it, since its so simple to toss together a different deck between games, and having to resleeve would be a pain in the ass.
Here's the thing we ran into with them:
Up front, their ability is a straight up handicap. Having your 1 spade terraform tiles turn into 2 spades is a much bigger limitation than your 3 spades turning into 2 spades is a bonus.
So you figure "oh, I'll get the fort and get the 2 free spades action". But that's what races like Nomads already get in addition to having 1 spade options. Yeah the giant fort gives some power too, but it didn't make up for being beat to the terraform race early.
And what devalues their fort ability is that fact that the victory points that come with spade upgrades make everyone want to get them regardless, and upgrading those devalues the fort bonus.
Basically the people who got them came to the consensus that all their "advantages" go entirely towards overcoming their handicap, while other races get an advantage right off the bat with no handicap (other than 3 spade tiles which can be worked around easily enough).
The alternative, of course, would just be to play the Chaos Magicians, because those guys are ludicrous ...
Perhaps I can interest you in my meager selection of pins?
Catan once again proves itself as one of the best games to get people into this hobby. Neither of these girls had played non-Monopoly boardgames before and now they are both hooked, talking about future boardgame nights and whatnot. Which is great, but means I desperately need to expand my local collection past Catan and Citadels (I also have A Few Acres but that is 1v1) lest I lose my mind. Why can't I just teleport my collection from the states to Japan?
Selling Board Games for Medical Bills
My board games -->http://www.boardgamegeek.com/collection/user/cpugeek13
My BGG wishlist --> http://www.boardgamegeek.com/wishlist/cpugeek13
I'm still just not sure how I feel about Combat Commander. It intrigues me. It's a fascinating game design. I really enjoy how it feels to push bits around, form fire groups, and manage your hand. I even enjoy the flavor the events give the game.
But wow is it brutal to be on the wrong end of Combat Commander. It could be because we are still learning our way around the tactical system. But so often when we are losing, it's just a case "What the fuck am I supposed to do here?!" Case in point, I was playing Germans on the attack, my buddy was playing Russians on the defense. It was scenario 3. I had a shit ton of weapons and rifle squads. He had militia and bullshit and 2 weak ass weapons. He also had a bunch of barbed wire, and the defender actions are nice. But even so, I ended up pretty effortlessly annihilating my way across the board with a heavy machine gun. He just had no way to close in on me, and we figured his only hope was to slow me down so much, he still was winning on points at the end of the 7th turn, if it doesn't go into sudden death!!! We made it to turn 4 in 3 hours. I think there was 1 time event, he decked twice, and I decked once. Making to the end based on time alone would have been a 6 or 7 hour game, assuming more time events didn't make it out.
I think the final thoughts on that session of Combat Commander is that we were both bewildered. I didn't feel good winning, because it seemed like I was handed it on a silver platter by the game. He didn't feel good losing, because he didn't learn a damn thing from it.
To cleanse the pallet we played a nice silly game of Catacombs. Every now and again he'd start to AP on me, or ask if something was allowed, or if something counted or not, and I'd just say "It's not that kinda game. Just do it!" We had a great time.
The games took longer than I had been led to believe they would. I had understood that early games would likely be in the 45 minute range, but this was more like 2 hours each. I don't know if I heard wrong, or if something about our play style is making it longer.
I'd really love to see a more seasoned developer try to tackle some of the ideas presented in that game.
Risk Legacy spoilers, don't read unless you've opened all the stuff:
Aliens weren't a guaranteed win if the people you played with were more diplomatic and better at choosing starting positions to keep the OP faction from getting a prime turtle spot?
:P
Just saying that the game tells you stuff is going to get unbalanced. Its the job of the players to either prevent the unbalancing from happening or if unable to prevent the unbalancing, to change playstyle to balance the unbalancing. After all, your playgroup's choices are what created the unbalanced situation anyways. You don't get to create a unique situation and then complain about the balancing of said unique situation, especially when there are ways to play around it.
I feel like that's an unfair criticism to lobby, when the effects of the game are permanent. Sure, he knows those things now, but not as he was getting into the situation. Sadly, since Risk Legacy has such permanence between plays, what's done is done. Any other game, I think what you are saying would be 100% valid. I think Risk Legacy is the only game where it isn't.
I voiced very loud and clear opposition to some of the decisions people were making, but it was their decision in the end.
Legacy spoilers:
I have to admit the tone you are taking in this conversation is very patronizing and I am quickly losing interesting in continuing it.
Rock Band DLC | GW:OttW - arrcd | WLD - Thortar
Oh what fools we were to allow that to transpire! What utter fools we were to dare to open that box! We should have known! What terrors lurked within that satanic box.
Okay, yeah, seriously think I am done with this because at this point all I can respond with is sass and that's never a productive conversation.
I would agree if I hadn't played the game and was told by the instructions to sign the board saying I would take responsibility for all my choices in the game. And considering the untold amount of game states any game can be in around game 12, its unreasonable to think anyone can design such a game for it to be completely balanced after 4-5 people make permanent, in the moment decisions.
But that's just awesomeness of the game. You rip shit up. You permanently alter your board. It becomes unbalanced and asymmetric. Then the group has to deal with those decisions and adapt. If the group can't adapt or refuses to, then I guess they lose out. I guarantee you give me your game, Inquisitor, and my playgroup would go through 5-6 games with no single faction winning more than twice. We see something that unbalances the game, then we squash it. Knowing that if we don't, that we create a pattern where other people will exploit that unbalance the next game.
Since Risk:Legacy is a game of multiple games, to think of only the current game (completely irrespective of "mistakes" made in the past) is to lose the greater game.
I'm not meaning to be patronizing. Sorry.
I'll stop talking about it.
I think what you are describing is a text book prisoners dilemma. Your group is able to succeed in the prisoner dilemma. Inquisitor's group is not apparently. Group dynamics always vary. I think it's fair to say that Risk Legacy may have worked itself into an untenable gamestate for his group, which repeatedly fails the prisoner's dilemma. Just as you can't play certain games because one player has awful AP, or a couple who always helps one another, or other social factors.
Heck yeah.
We'd all probably mess something up with the Vassal interface, but yeah!
(non spoilers)
To start with, major cities are just too good. They are by far the best winner reward. Big advantage to whoever has the most. They choke out choice and there are just too many of them. I want to see a funny board of continent naming and nerfing Austrailia, but you're a fool to take anything but a major city. By the time you run out them and turn to more varied winner choices, the campaign is two-thirds finished.
(spoilers)
These wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for the overall problem that plagues a lot of these games: taking one for the team puts you out of the running. It can be attacking the leader or permanent choices. The game would be more enjoyable for everyone if Australia was nerfed, but you want to win so you plop your major city there instead of taking one for the team and hitting it with a -1 modifier. The game would be more enjoyable if someone plopped down a mercenary scar on Australia to break it being a mutant stronghold, but placing it in a spot you're already at (on a continent that already has 2 mercenaries) is what you do if you want to win even if it will make future games more binary. The debilitating weaknesses scar could be used on the most powerful faction, but you're going to use it against your immediate neighbor because you want to win (and there's a chance the powerful faction player will draw it to further cement their dominance).
First thing I did in my game was weaken Australia.
edit: although to be fair, that was the major selling point of Risk:Legacy for me. I hate hate hate the Australia strategy and have always wanted to destroy all the advantages it inherently has.
I won games, yes, and currently have the most games won among our group. I (and a couple others) actually had to negotiate with the person that placed the
And Risk:Legacy is a game I feel comfortable saying "What counts as winning?" I really do think its about the story, journey, and memories you create with that game. Obviously everyone tries to win every individual game, but I also think our group had a really good habit of thinking ahead and working to prevent anything from getting too OP. Because we all knew that if something got too powerful, there was no guarantee that anyone would get to use it. And why make something OP if there is a chance it will be used against you?
We haven't finished our board yet, sadly. Moving and stuff put us in different locations, but we did open all the packs and pockets.
Woo! Few more! Vassal isn't too horrible for this thing. I've played a few. Not sure how we'd do combat in an email setting.
Selling Board Games for Medical Bills
That would be 100% preferable. Now will you buy me an iPad? :P
Selling Board Games for Medical Bills
Same conditions, though.
You people and your technology.
They tried to bury us. They didn't know that we were seeds. 2018 Midterms. Get your shit together.