21st February 2023

Tuesday evening again! We're with the Woking Gaming Club at The Sovereigns again for some more gaming goodness.

​Durian: The durian is the edible fruit of several tree species belonging to the genus Durio*.
​
Durian is also game about a very, very angry gorilla who runs a jungle fruit shop​, worse than that - he's your boss in this push your luck card game about managing inventory and stock.

*According to Wikipedia

What's in a game?

• ​​Cards: All the cards in Durian are unusually rectangular and come in 2 types.
  Fruit cards: Fruit cards are divided into 2 halves, on each card one half always displays 1 fruit and the other 2-3 of the game's 4 types of fruit - bananas, grapes, strawberries and of course durians.
  

Being exceptionally long, the cards feel a little flimsy but unless they are treated badly, it shouldn't be an issue.
The order board tile and point tokens are made of suitability sturdy card, while the card holders are wooden and I always approve of wooden components.
The bell works well enough but feels a little delicate but again, unless you treat it badly, it shouldn't be a problem and while it's a unnecessary component it's a welcome addition. I've never been one to resist gimmicks!

There's a small amount artwork utilised for the siblings and the different fruits which is quite stylised and cartoonish.
It all looks good enough, the gorillas look a little abstract but the fruits look suitably distinct from each other both in colour and shape

Nearly all of the small amount of iconography used in Durian is straightforward. The 4 fruits are easily understood and differentiated from each other.
The 3 sibling cards all have their own unique icons, which despite being fairy obvious will likely have players reaching for the rule book since they appear so infrequently during the game, which - as explained below is not necessarily a good thing.

How's it play?
​Setup

• Point tokens: Put the point tokens into a single stack or row, starting with the '1' at the top/front and increasing sequentially to the '7' at the bottom/end.
• Card holders: Give each player a card holder.
• Order board: Place the order board into the central playing area.
• Player cards: Shuffle all the cards into a face-down deck.
• First Player: Determine a starting player.

​On to play
Durian is a bit of a curious beast where players are looking to see if the game has 'gone bust' using 'imperfect knowledge'.
The game uses a traditional turn order with the active player taking their turn before play progresses to the player on their left.

Before discussing the rules, it's worth stating that the deck of cards serve both as shop inventory and customer orders. Additionally, the gorilla sibling cards have different functions depending on whether they appear in the inventory or order.

• Take inventory: Deal 1 card to each player, players should not look at their card. Instead they should place it into their card holder with the front of the card facing the other players. Thus, players should not know what is on their own card.
• Take order: The active player now takes a card from the deck and flips it face-up, then they have to add it to the order board.
  The card must be lined up beneath the order board so that 1 half is beneath the 'X' and the other beneath '✓'. The active player chooses which side of the card goes where.
  The side under the '✓' is the side for customer orders, while the other side is disregarded.
  ​Gorilla card: If a gorilla card is drawn, the active player may use it to turn a previously drawn card 180'.
• ​Check order: Next, the active player must decide if they want to call the angry manager or not.
  Put simply; the active player needs to look at the other players' cards and decide whether they think the order has gone bust or not. That is, whether the there's more fruit in in the order than the inventory (Or not.).
• To call or not to call: The active player is now faced with a decision.
  • Not call: If the active player thinks there's enough fruit in the inventory to meet the orders, then they should pass and play should progress to the next player who then has to take the next order card as explained above
  • Call: However, if the active player thinks there's not enough fruit in the inventory, then they should ring the bell and...
• Call the manager: When the bell is rung, the angry manager cometh...
  The angry manager has to get angry at someone, the question is... who?
  At this point, all inventory cards should be revealed to all players and compared to the order. If any player had a gorilla sibling card as a inventory card, it takes effect now and can change what is found in the inventory. The infinite banana gorilla card means that the inventory has infinite gorillas for example and so on.
  • Not bust: If there's enough fruit in the inventory to fulfil the order then there's no problem and angry manager will get angry at the player who rung the bell for no reason.
    "Why did you disturb me for nothing," the angry gorilla will no doubt yell.
  • Bust: If there's not enough fruit in the inventory to meet the order, then the angry manager will get angry at the previous player!
    "Why didn't you call me," the angry manager will undoubtedly shout.
• Take token: Whoever was the target of the manager's ire must take a point token and place it their personal area.
  When doing so, the player always takes the lowest value token, obviously starting with the '1'.
  This means that the angry manager gets more and more angry the more you call them out!
  • New round: Regardless of who the angry manager got angry with, a new round must begin. Take all the cards and shuffle them into a new face-down deck.
  • First Player: The first player will be whoever is to the left of the player that the angry manager got angry with!

Endgame
The game ends when a player has acquired 7 or more points worth of point tokens. This could from the final 7 point token or a combination of lower valaue point tokens.

Points are tallied, lowest score wins.

Overall
Thematically, Durian could have been almost anything and gorillas running a fruit shop is as good as any, so why not, it suits the game's light nature.

Mechanically. there are a couple of interesting things going on.
Firstly, the way the game employs 'imperfect knowledge' is pretty good. Players will spend their time watching the behaviour of other players, seeing how they play the cards they draw and trying to deduct what is on their own card.
For example: if another players decides to play a card which adds bananas to the order and you can see no bananas on anyone else's inventory cards, then it's generally safe to assume that you're the one with bananas on their inventory card!
Of course, the gorilla cards can occasionally appear in the inventory and throw a spanner into the works. In the above example, the infinite bananas card could change everything.
There's a weird drawback to the rules here though; since the gorilla cards appear fairly infrequently in the inventory. Players won't remember their rules and will ask to look at the rules - it's a clear tell that a gorilla card has been thrown into the mix.

Gorilla cards can also have a big impact on orders. Allowing an order card to be changed round can cause the order to 'go bust' or vice versa.
I will add that the rules feel a little counterintuitive here. In most games, going bust is a bad thing but in Durian it can be a good thing. Ringing the bell at the right time both prevents you getting points and also inflicts them on other players. 

This brings me to the mechanics for scoring. Escalating points works very well here and mostly keeps the stakes high until the game end.
​Mathematically, a game will last at least 3 rounds. If a single player gets 1+2+4 (or some other combination.) that will end the game.
Since, as the game progresses the points given out will increase, it's entirely possible that if a game gets to 7 rounds, a player who was on '0' points may get '7' points, end the game and come last! This is especially so in games with a higher player count (Durian plays up to 7.).
Because the scoring is about giving other players what are essentially negative points, usually at this point I'd criticise Durian for being well... negative but since the game is quick playing and light-hearted I don't feel an issue here.

Durian is a mechanically lightweight game with for the most part only a single decision to make - ring the bell or not.
Where it's depth comes from is in how to get to that decision. Players cannot afford to not pay attention during their opponents' turns, gleaning information from what moves they are making is vital to the decisions a player needs to make when it's their turn.
This is one of those games that's as much about playing the players as playing the game.

I found Durian an enjoyable game with a sometimes agonising central decision to make and this is good thing as it makes that decision meaningful, which is what I look for in a game.
Durian is a bit of party game that also works as a filler. It's style and humorous theme fits it's quick unpredictable gameplay well. It's not a game to take too seriously.
If this is what you're looking for, give Durian a try.

12th February

It's a Sunday afternoon and we're at The Dice Tower in Basingstoke For Ares' birthday party.

So finally... Cards Against Humanity: the blog post.

Cards Against Humanity has garnered a reputation for being wry, almost satirical humour and capacity to be outrageous.  So is this game offensive and by offensive, I mean does it offend my sensibilities regarding well balanced and sharply honed gameplay... well read on.

How's it play?

• Black cards: Shuffle the black cards into a face-down deck.
• White cards: Shuffle the white cards into several face-down decks.
  Deal 10 white cards to each player.
• First player: Determine a starting player

​On to play
The objective in Cards Against Humanity is to earn 'Awesome Points' which are just victory points (VPs). This is done by answering the questions on the black cards in the most entertaining way, which can be funny, outrageous, offensive and probably even worse!
Each player's turn consists of 4 phases.

• Black card: The active player draws a black and reads it out to all the other players.
• White cards: All players who are not the active player, i.e., all the other players now choose a white card to 'fill-in-the-blank on the black card.
  Players can choose any white card they desire but generally, they'll want to choose something entertaining.
  Once players have chosen a card, they should hand it over to the active player face-down.
• Choose: Once the active player has collected all the white cards, they should read the text on the black card while using the text on each white card to fill in the blank(s) on the black card. This needs to be done for each white card (Or sets of white cards in the case of multiple blanks.). Thus with 4 other players, it will need to be done 4 times. The active player should probably also do this aloud for maximum effect.
  Once the active player has read all the white cards, they pick one that they like the most according to whatever criteria they choose, it could be funny or offense or a mix of the two and so on.
  Once the active player has declared their favourite card, whoever played it should make themselves known and they earn a VP. Usually this is tracked by giving them the black card.
  All played white cards are discard out of play.
• End of turn: All players draw back up to 10 white cards and play progresses to the player on the left who becomes the new active player and begins their turn by drawing a new black card.

Endgame
I always thought that Cards Against Humanity concluded after the 10th black card was won but after skimming the rules, this doesn't seem to be the case and there are several different ways the game could end.
Regardless of this, whenever the game reaches whatever its game ending criteria is, the game ends and Awesome Points are calculated 

Points are tallied, highest score wins.

Overall
First of all I'll say; it's sort of pointless to blog about Cards Against Humanity and discuss mechanics or strategies or theme in the way I would normally and that's because it's the epitome of a party game, albeit a very much adult themed one.
That means it's loud and raucously humorous, easy to learn and easy to play. No one really cares about VPs or who wins and yes, it's also potentially offensive. Suffice to say that if you're thin-skinned or easily offended, Cards Against Humanity is probably not for you.

The real question is: Is it fun?
I'm going to say, yes and sometimes very much so. Obviously, much of the game's pleasure derives from the kind of people playing it​. I imagine it's a game that gets a lot of play by drunk participants - there's a good reason why the cards are fairly sturdy. If you're concerned about anything other than basically cracking jokes, probably best to look elsewhere.

Personally, I thoroughly enjoy the challenge of trying to craft the most outrageous answers and listening to other players' answers. I also think most people playing it understand it's just humour doing what humour does very well, which is bringing up stuff that would never be broached in conversation otherwise.

There is a caveat here though: Which is Cards Against Humanity can definitely outstay its welcome.
Initially, we played several times with the 10 black card limit and when that was reached, someone would invariably say: 'Why don't we play through all the black cards.'
The first time was: 'Yeah, cool'.
The second time: 'Oh Okay.'
The third time: I had to stifle an inward groan.

So if you want a shockingly funny and outrageous party game, Cards Against Humanity would be a good choice.
Just play it short intense bursts.

28th January 2023

Wogglecon 6, a day of gaming at the Bisley Scout Hall continues and the next game of the day is Skulk Hollow.

I didn't know that it turns out that little anthropomorphic fox dudes and giant stone creatures seem to really hate each: Which is what Skulk Hollow is all about in this asymmetrical strategy game!

What's in a game?
Skulk Hollow is a 2-player game where one player takes on the role of a 'Foxen' hero who leads a band of Foxen warriors against a lone guardian who is a literal colossal stony force of nature.
​Each player has their own unique decks, components and gameplay.

• Board: Skulk Hollow uses a modestly sized square board which is divided into a 3x3 grid. Unusually, during play the board is rotated 45' diamond configuration, this all the spaces are actually diamond shaped.
  Each of the 9 grid spaces sort of have their own visual theme. Additionally, 2 opposing corners are the 'start spaces'.

• Green wound tokens: These wooden tokens are used to track damage on the guard board.​
  ​

The component quality in Skulk is excellent.
The tokens and meeples all feel solid and look great. Obviously the massive guardian meeple is the notable standout component, yes, perhaps you could call it a gimmick but it fits thematically.
The use of card boxes is a nice touch of presentation.

The art is equally high quality. Skulk Hollow uses a coloured line illustration somewhat cartoonish style that's colourful, bright, detailed and suits the games slight whimsical (At least as whimsical as 2 factions battling each other can get!) nature.
I've found that anthropomorphic art can be divisive as a style but I think the anthropomorphic character art on card looks pretty good regardless of what your stance is.
The game board also looks great and I like how compact it is.

With regards to iconography, Skulk Hollow uses fair amount but it all seems pretty self-explanatory. Icons for movement are easily understood, as are the icons for actions such melee, leap, etc.
I don't imagine players having any problem understanding the game.

How's it play?
Setup

• Roles: First determine who will play the Foxten hero and guardian.
• Board: Put out the game board, as stated earlier, it should positioned in a 'diamond' orientation.
• Guardian player: The guardian chooses a guardian card box of their choice, then they take the relevant guardian player mat and guardian board.
  The player mat will tell the player how to set up for the game.
  Finally the guardian player takes their action deck and shuffles it into a face-down deck and draws cards to their hand limit - which is determined by the guardian player mat.
• Foxen player: This player now chooses one of the Foxen Leaders takes the Foxen player mat.
  ​The Foxen leader and Sentinel cards are immediately put into play and their respective meeples should be placed on their starting spaces.
  Then all the hero unit cards and order cards should be shuffled into a face-down deck, the Foxen player should then draws up to their hand limit - as determined by their Foxen hero mat.

On to play
Being a 2-player game, Skulk Hollow uses a very traditional turn order with one player completing their turn before play moves over to their opponent and continues alternating between them for the entirety of the game.
Additionally, the Foxen hero player always starts.

During their turn, the player will have a number of actions points (AP) available to them which is determined by which Foxen hero/guardian they chose, although typically this is 2-3 APs.

• Actions: The active player can choose from the following actions.
  • Play card: This is the most common action in Skulk Hollow and there  are a wide variety of actions that can be performed, some common to both players and some unique to each. 
    Gain power: This action is available to the Foxen hero player but only certain guardians. Functionally, it works the same for both players. The player will gain power cubes as listed on the played card. These cubes do not go directly on to either any heroes cards or guardian board, instead they go into a central 'reserve'. More on power later.
    Move: This action allows the Foxen player to move one of their units or the guardian player to move the guardian 1 space. Arrows on the card will indicate how the movement can occur.
    Play hero card: This action is only available to the Foxen hero player. If they have a hero unit card in their hand, they can spend a AP to put it into play. When the card is played, it's pertinent meeple should be placed on the board.
    Use power: This is only available to the guardian player and it allows the guardian to use the power listed on the card and as per it's description on the guardian player mat.
    Guardians have a range of powers but generally they involve dealing wounds to the Foxen heroes.
    Hero actions: Only the Foxen player can use these 3 actions for their units.
    When playing a card, the player choose from the action at the top of the card or the bottom, not both. furthermore, only heroes with a symbol matching the action can use it. Thus, a hero unit must have a boot symbol on their card to use the leap action.
    • Leap: If the hero unit is on the same space as the guardian, they can use the leap action to jump on it! This means their meeple is moved on to the guardian board. Additionally, if a hero unit is already on the guardian board, they can use the leap action to move to a different location, following one of the dotted lines.
    • Melee: A hero unit that is on the guardian board may use the melee action to inflict 1 wound on their current location
    • Missile: This action allows a hero with the missile icon to make a ranged attack on the guardian and they do not need to be on the guardian board to inflict wounds. There are some restrictions including:
      Fire: If a hero has the 'fire' tag, they can only launch a missile attack from a space on the board adjacent to the guardian's space.
      Hurl: This tag allows a hero to launch a missile attack while on the same space as the guardian on the game board.
  • Prepare: This action requires an AP and either player may perform it. It allows the player to discard a card and draw 2 new ones.
  • Spend power: This action does not actually require any APs. Instead it uses a power cube that has been allocated to either a hero or guardian.
    Each cube spent this ways grants the respective player an additional action to the unit/guardian that spend the cube. This allows them to perform an action as displayed on their respective card/board, or to move.
• End of turn: Once the active player has used all their APs, they must do the following.
  Draw cards: The player should draw cards to reach their hand limit. If their current hand is equal to or above the limit, ignore this step.
  Allocate power: If the active player had gained power cubes during this turn, they now allocate them to their units/guardian as they see fit.
  Opponent's turn: Play now progresses to the active player's opponent.

​Additional rules

• Wounds: There are some rules regarding how wounds are manged, which is slightly different for each player:
  • Hero unit: If all the heart spaces on a hero unit's card are filled, that hero is eliminated, it's meeple is removed from play and it's card is placed into the discard pile. Potentially that hero can come back into play if the discard pile is shuffled into a new deck.
  • Foxen leader: If the Foxen leader has all its heart spaces filled, it's pretty bad news for the Foxen player. However, there is something the Foxen leader can do to avoid damage, which is called...
    Banding: Basically, if there are other Foxen hero units in the same game board space as the leader, then the unit(s) take the damage instead, presumably as they throw themselves into harm's way. Thus the leader cannot be targeted when not alone.
  • Guardian: Wounds affect the guardian in 2 ways.
    Powers: On the guardian board, each power's location will have several heart spaces, if all  wound spaces on a power's location are filled, then the guardian player can no longer use that power until they somehow heal at least 1 wound.
    Full wounds: If the guardian board has all it's heart spaces filled, then it's bad news for the guardian player...
• Depleting action deck: If any time a player empties their action deck, they then simply shuffle their discard pile into a new deck.

​Endgame
There are 3 ways the game end can be triggered.

• If the Foxen leader has all the heart spaces on their card filled, they are defeated and the guardian player immediately wins.
• If the guardian board has all it's heart spaces filled, the guardian is defeated and the Foxen heroes player immediately wins.
• Each guardian has their own unique victory condition. If that condition is met, then the guardian player immediately wins.

Overall
Skulk Hollow has asymmetrical and card driven gameplay which presents players with some challenging, meaningful choices and options.

Players will instinctively want to play cards with maximum efficiency to inflict maximum damage but sometimes because of their hand of cards, players won't be guaranteed having the card to make the move they they need and they'll be forced to adapt.
This can be a little frustrating but also makes hand management quite important, sure a player can use a strong card now but sometimes it's worth keeping hold of it for perhaps a more effective use in a later round. It should be mentioned that some of the guardians have smaller hand sizes, meaning they are trickier to play.

Of course, players will also want to watch their opponents, paying attention to which cards they play and when. - There's a bit of higher level play here about tracking opponent's actions, essentially a bit of card counting.

Otherwise it's quite tricky to describe gameplay; with 4 Foxen leaders and 4 guardians, the various combinations will at least to some extent dictate player tactics - as will the actions of opponents. Skulk Hollow feels like it's about playing the player as much as playing the game.

Finally; Skulk Hollow is a 2-player game and I'm always a bit wary of 2-player games as they can revert to a traditional 1-on-1 directly confrontational game, this is definitely the case with Skulk Hollow. While the game is not particularly chess-like, with moving pieces about a board to eliminate your opponent, it does provide something of a chess-like experience and to be honest, it's a playstyle that I'm not personally overly enamoured with. Your mileage will of course vary.

Having said all of that; I like to think that I can recognise a well crafted game when I play one and that's what I think this is.

Thematically, Skulk Hollow is quite strong.
The 'numerous weaker units vs a single giant enemy' gameplay draws inspiration from some classic older games.
While, with its climbing on to, running around and stabbing bits of a colossal monster, it's undeniable that Skulk Hollow also takes some thematic inspiration from a certain videogame and it makes for a entertaining concept to add to a board game.
It adds up to an interesting game, both visually and mechanically.

it is a mid-weight, asymmetrical game that features a lot of player interaction and conflict with moderate tactics and touch of luck. The various combinations of the 2 battling factions also provides a fair bit of replayability.
If you want a 2-player game with those elements, Skulk Hollow is worth a look.

28th January 2023

Our day of gaming with The Woking Gaming Club at Wogglecon 6 continued with Ligretto.

I don't know what Ligretto is meant to mean but it gets shouted a lot when playing this real-time, abstract card game.

It's time to begin the blog so without any further ado... LIGRETTO!

What's in a game?
There are 3 versions of Ligretto; red, green and blue. They are functionally identical except for the backs, which indicate which decks they are and which set they come from.
A single set of Ligretto is enough for 4 players, having all 3 sets means there's enough for 12 players!
​

• Cards: A set of Ligretto comes with 160 cards, which is 4 decks of 40 cards each.
  Furthermore. each 40 card deck has cards numbered 1-10 4 times, once in each of the game's 4 colours.
  Backs: Each 40 card deck has a slightly different back to differentiate it from the other decks

Well that's it for components.

The cards are the standard quality you'd expect for a modern game.

Ligretto makes great use of colour, the 4 colours are all bright, vibrant and distinctive. Otherwise, there's no illustrations and minimal art for Ligretto, just some detailing. This is by no means a bad thing. Ligretto is an abstract game, trying to fit a theme to it would just feel like shoehorning.
I do have one small criticism that is directed at the backs of the cards which could have have been more distinct from each other.

Ligretto also has no iconography other than numbers, players will have no trouble understanding the game.

How's it play?
Setup

• Decks: Give each player a deck of 40 cards, this should consist of cards numbered 1-10 in each of 4 colours. Thus each player should have all the cards with an identical back.
  Each player should shuffle their cards into a face-down deck.
  Ligretto stack: First, each player should now deal 10 cards face-up into a stack. This is their Ligretto stack.
  Row: Next, each player should deal 3 face-up cards into a row alongside their Ligretto stack.
  Hand: Players should now keep all their remaining cards (There should be 27.) in their hand.

On to play
Ligretto is played simultaneously by all players in real time which means there are no turns or any turn structure.
The purpose is to play as many cards as possible (An as quickly as possible.) before the round end is triggered, which occurs when any player's Ligretto stack is emptied. How is this done - read on.

• Start: To start a round, someone must shout "Ligretto,".
• Objective: Players are looking to play cards to create stacks of the same colour numbered sequentially from 1-10. There are of course some rules and restrictions for this.
  • The first card in a stack must always be a '1'.
  • The next card played on a stack must be the same colour and also the next number in the sequence. I.e., only a green 5 can be played on a green 4.
  • Any player may play a legal card on any stack.
  • Once a stack reaches 10, it is completed, no further cards can be played on it.
• Playing cards: There are several ways a player may play a card providing the criteria mentioned above are met.
  Row: A card may be played from a player's row. When this is done, it is immediately replaced by the top card of their Ligretto stack.
  Ligretto stack: Alternatively, a player may play the top card from their Ligretto stack.
  Hand: If a player cannot play a card from either their row or stack, they must discard 3 cards from their hand face-up into a discard pile. The 3rd card (And only the 3rd card.) they put into the discard becomes available to play.
  If that card cannot be played, then the player must continue discarding cards, 3 at a time until they get a card that can be played.
  If a player's hand of card empties, they must shuffle the discard pile into a new hand.
• Round end: As soon as the last card from any player's Ligretto stack is played, that player must shout "Ligretto stop!" and the round immediately ends.
  Points: Now points are calculated.
  Only cards played into stacks and cards remaining in all players' Ligretto stacks are used for scoring, all other cards are put aside for now.
  • Stacks: Take all the stacks, sort and separate the cards according to their backs. This will indicate how many cards each player has played. Players gain 1 victory point (VP) per card they played.
  • Ligretto stack: Now each player counts how many cards they have remaining in their personal stack. Players lose 2 VP per card they have remaining!
• Next round: All cards are returned to their respective owners.
  All players shuffle their cards then deal a Ligretto stack and row in preparation for the next round.

Endgame
As soon as any player has scored 99 or more points at the end of a round, the game ends.

Points are tallied, highest score wins.

Overall
Speed and reflexes drive gameplay in Ligretto. The objective is pretty simple - play as many cards as possible while emptying the Ligretto stack.
Not only will players have to pay attention for opportunities to play cards, they'll also want to think ahead.
Canny players will keep a sharp eye out for stacks which are 2 numbers lower than cards they want to play so that as soon as an opponent adds a card to that stack, they can immediately add to it themselves.

As a rule, I'm wary of dexterity, reflex or reaction based games and to be honest, it's not why I like or play board games. In fact, I like board games because they generally do away with those elements.

Which brings me to Ligretto; a real-time, twitch game. This should irk me but because this is essentially a party game and not to be taken seriously, the relative simplicity of the gameplay and brisk playtime prevent it being frustrating.
Ligretto is a fun filler game and its light touch can provide some low intensity entertainment after a more demanding game. It also works as a good crossover game, it can easily be played with families and more casual players. We never played it with it's max player count of 12 but I imagine it would be a quite boisterous affair.

If you don't mind the reflex based gameplay, Ligretto provides a fun experience and something a little different. Worth a try in my opinion.

28th January 2023

Wogglecon continued with Dominion the deck building game. A game I've played a few times in the past but not since starting this blog.

Rule your kingdom in Dominion by recruiting bureaucrats, moneylenders and spies and others or creating festivals, gardens and more.

How's it play?
Setup

• Base cards:
  Treasure cards: Put out the treasure cards face-up in their 3 denominations.
  Victory cards: Next put out the victory card face-up in their separate decks, the number of cards in each deck will be determined by the player count.
  Trash card: Put the trash card into the central playing area.
• Kingdom cards: Each game of Dominion uses 10 sets of the kingdom cards.
  The rules provide a number of predetermined thematic sets of kingdom cards which can be used.
  Alternatively, the randomiser deck can be shuffled info a face-down deck and 10 cards drawn from it, these will be the 10 sets used in the game.
  Finally, players can collectively choose 10 sets to use if they wish.
  Generally 10 cards from each set are used, but the number of victory cards uses will depend on player count.
• Player cards: Each player takes 7 1 gold treasure cards and 3 1VP victory cards, shuffles them into a face down deck and draws 5 cards for their starting hand.
• First player: Determine a starting player.

On to play
Dominion uses a traditional turn order with the active player completing their turn before play moves on the player on their left.

A turn in Dominion is easy as A, B, C - quite literally too. The phases are Action, Buy and Clean up!

• Action: The player player may take 1 action, that is play an action card from their hand. Action cards have a wide variety of uses and can provide gold, more cards and so on to the active player, too many to be described here.
  It should be noted that even if the active player has 2 action cards in their hand, they still only get to perform 1 action unless the action card they play grants them 1 or more extra actions!
  Treasure cards do not count as an action so can be played as needed.
  Victory point cards cannot be played as they have no function other than to score VPs at the game end and clutter up a players hand during play.
• Buy: Once the active player has perform their action(s), they can buy 1 card from the central area using treasure cards or coins on action cards.
  Again, unless an action card that has been played grants the active player more 'buys', they can only buy 1 card.
  Any card bought, goes directly into the active player's discard pile.
• Clean up: Cards that have been played are not immediately put into the active player's discard pile instead they are considered still 'in play' even if they've been resolved until this phase occurs. 
  During this phase, the active player discards all cards played and also all cards still in hand which were not or could not be played. Then the active player draws a new hand of 5 cards.
  Next player: Play then progresses to the next player.

Additional rules: There are a couple of extra rules that need explanation.

• Reaction: Card with a 'Reaction' descriptor can be used during another player's turn. If an opponent plays an attack card, any player who has a reaction card in their hand may reveal it to counter the attack.
  Cards revealed this way are not discarded and are considered not to have been played.
• Reshuffle: If any time a player needs to draw cards but does not have enough or any cards in their deck to do so, then they draw whatever they can and shuffle their discard pile into a new draw deck and draw whatever cards they still need to draw.
  Remember, if the active player has to shuffle a new draw deck from their discard pile in the middle of their turn, any cards in play or in hand are considered still in play and not part of the discard pile.

Endgame
Play continues until one of the following 2 criteria are met.

When the pile of Province (6VP) victory cards has been emptied.
OR
Any 3 of the 10 stacks of cards in the central supply have been emptied.

In either case, when the turn of the player who triggered the endgame is over, the game immediately ends and goes to scoring.
Players then calculate their scores from all victory cards they have acquires.

Points are tallied, highest score wins.

Overall
Dominion has been around for a few years and one I've played in the past but only finally have gotten to blogging about it.

It is the deck builder game, the one that started it all and to honest, it pretty much got everything right the first time.

The only quibble I could argue is that the rules regarding only 1 action and 1 buy per turn unless other cards increase them, forcing players to track their card plays throughout their turn are little fiddly but this is minor and doesn't effect the game's quality.

Otherwise Dominion provides players pretty much everything they could want from a deck builder. 
It provides players with the classic early/late game challenge of creating their engine in the early stage and then exploiting that engine to acquire VPs in the late stage.
Players will look to optimise their card actions, maximise the efficiency of their decks and find effective combos and exploits. This is especially true in Dominion since, victory cards actively hinder player and acquiring them too early can slow a player's deck down.
​Dominion provides a number of predetermined setups that can be used but also has provision for randomising setup, which can give player some unusual, interesting and challenging setups.
It's also worth adding that there's loads of expansions for Dominion which increase its replayability and longevity.

If you like deck builders and for some reason you've not played Dominion, then you should definitely play this. Dominion is one of the best examples of it's genre. In fact, unless you actively hate deck builders, then this is one to try regardless. It's a classic for a reason.

11th December 2022

It's a Sunday evening and where logged into video chat and Board Game Arena for some gaming fun.

More space, more empires and more final frontiers. 
Cosmos: Empires is a galactically-themed tableau building where plays rush to build their cosmic empire - or least increase their empire's production - all very capitalist!

Caveat: We've only ever played this game digitally.

What's in a game?

• Cards: Cosmos: Empires uses a single deck of card.
  Each card is illustrated with some sort of space-themed vehicle or construct.
  In the top left corner of each card is the 'purchasing' cost
  Along the bottom it lists the card's 'type', 'activation number' and 'production value'.
  Some cards will also have one of various types of ability, this may well also include some text to better explain how the card works.
• Dice: The game uses 2 4-sided (d4), pyramid looking dice numbered from 1-4.
  There are also a few 8-sided (d8) dice which have no direct gameplay use but are instead used to track certain cards.
• Currency: The game uses 'credits' as its currency.

I have to say I found the illustrations to be pretty good sci-fi themed artwork and could easily see them on classic 70's sci-fi book covers. Having said that, I did also find some of the artwork was a little too busy for a card game, there were bright spots that drew the eye from important information for example and perhaps the text could have been a bit clearer.

While there are a few icons, it's not overwhelming, some information on card abilities are displayed on the cards themselves, sometimes player's will want to refer to the rules for clarification. I would not consider it a problem as Cosmos: Empires is pretty straightforward.

How's it play?
Setup

• Cards: Shuffle the cards into a face-down deck, then deal 10 face-up into a central drafting area.
• Players: Give 8 credits to each player.
• First player: Determine a starting player.

On to play
In Cosmos: Empires, players will be generating credits which will be used to buy cards from the drafting area.
These cards will have various actions that can be used to the player's benefit with the ultimate aim of increasing currency production.
When a player reaches a certain threshold of currency production, it will trigger the game end.
Cosmos: Empires mostly follows the typical turn structure with the active player performing their actions before play progresses to the player on their left. However, it is likely that 'inactive' players will have their cards activated outside of their turn.
The following occurs during the active player's turn.

• Roll dice: First the active player rolls the 2 4-sided dice and add their values together generating a number from 2-8.
  Note: It should be noted that it's possible for the active player to change the result of the dice roll during their turn. More on this below.
  • Activations: Now all players who have cards with matching activation numbers can activate those cards and produce the listed amount of credits for each activated card's production value.
• Actions: During their turn, the active play can perform any 2 actions from the following. A player may also pick an action to perform twice.
  • Shift result: The active player may use an action increase or decrease the result of the dice roll by 1. This will have the result of changing which cards are activated.
  • Build card: This is another way of saying the active player may buy a card  from the drafting area and add it to their tableau.
  • Cycle a card: The active player may spend an action to discard a card from the drafting area to the bottom of the deck and gain 2 credits.
• Card abilities: If a card has an ability, it can be activated by the active player during their turn without using an action, it's essentially 'free' to use a card ability.
  Furthermore, if the active player 'builds' a card, its ability can be immediately used.
• Next player: Once the active player has completed their 2 actions, play progress to the player on their left.

Endgame
Play continues until any one player has combined production value (Not credits.) on all the cards in their tableau of 30 or more.
At this point the endgame is triggered, the round continues until all players have had even turns.
All player then calculate their finishing combined production value.

Points are tallied, highest score wins.

Overall
Cosmos: Empires is a tableau building game that seems to me to have been designed to be a more streamlined, quicker playing, simpler, more accessible game that's a little different to other games of this type.

The strategy in Cosmos: Empires is relatively straightforward; acquire as many cards as quickly as you can, while some cards do combo off each other and getting those cards is good. It's also a goof idea to just get many cards as you can and hope dice rolls go your way.

You see; typically in tableau building games there's ​an early game element about building up the tableau then a late game element about using that tableau to work towards whatever the winning criteria.
Cosmos: Empires eschews this paradigm because it's winning criteria is about accumulating production value and all cards provide production value. It means that acquiring any cards works towards winning.
​The impact of this is that can create a sort of situation where a player will get some cards that quickly earn them a lot of production/credits which can be used to get even more cards (Especially the case when a player can build 2 cards per turn.) to get more even more production/credits in a self perpetuating cycle.
Now this might sound like a good thing and the kind of you'd want in a tableau builder?

The issue is that it can put one player into a unassailable lead where they not only constantly outproduce other players' production but consequently, they also constantly outpace the production increases of other players. A uncatchable double whammy!
This can be exacerbated by the fact that all cards activate in all players' turns. Quite often activations will end up benefitting whoever is in the lead simply by virtue of them having more cards.
Sure, players can shift the activation numbers but I found in order to not to give the leader benefits, I also had to deny them to myself. It felt very negative.

I genuinely admire any game's attempt to pare back rules, provide more elegant gameplay and quicker playtime and this is the case for Cosmos: Empires but it results in a game that feels somewhat unbalanced.
Additionally, I found Cosmos: Empires a little bland, it didn't feel like there's much variety in the mix of cards and it didn't feel particularly engaging. I'm not sure it would stand up to repeated playing

Although, having said all of that, I might not be the best target audience.
Cosmos: Empires might serve as a good entry the tableau building game type and if you want a straightforward, uncluttered, quick playing iteration of it, Cosmos: Empires might tick those boxes.

22nd November 2022

Tuesday is here again and that means we're with the Woking Gaming Club at The Sovereigns for a evening of gaming.

Space... is it the final frontier? I mean it's pretty large with enough room for separate civilisations to expand without impinging on each other's territory. Except in Cosmic Encounter, it's not! Players take on the roles of one of numerous alien civilisations with the purpose of invading other player's planets in this game of bidding and bluffing.

• Cards: Cosmic Encounter uses a variety of cards.
  Destiny cards: This deck is used to determine who the active player will attack.
  ​Encounter cards: By far the most numerous type of card and form the cosmic deck. As the name suggests, these are used during encounters between players. They contain cards numbered 1-to-40 as well as 'negotiate' and 'morph' cards.
  Artefact and tech cards: These are cards that can also be used during encounters and add extra effects or actions to an encounter.
  Flare cards: Flare cards are specific to each race and pertinent flare cards for the aliens in play are added to the cosmic deck. Unlike most cards, once a player has a flare card for their alien race, it is not discarded when played.
  Reinforcement cards: These can be played after the encounter cards have been revealed to alter the outcome.

The component quality is all good, the tiles and tokens are made of suitably sturdy board while cards are average.
The spaceships are plastic with a nice bit of detail and being able to stack them keeps the game area relatively clutter free.

In terms of art direction, the tiles are colourful and mostly ​space-themed with the planet tiles looking like well, planets. The hyperspace and warp tiles are appropriately cosmic looking.
Artwork is used sparingly on cards with space (SIC) given over to text instead.
For the most part, illustrations are reserved for the alien sheets and used to represent the various different alien races. This artwork is fairly good with a lot of diverse and interesting sci-fi artwork.

Cosmic Encounter has little in the way of iconography, numbers are used on encounter cards but otherwise text is used to convey information.
​Nothing here is tricky to understand

How's it play?
Setup

• ​Players:
  Alien sheet: Shuffle the flare cards into a face-down deck and deal 2 to each player.
  Each player should then take the alien sheets corresponding to the flare cards and choose one sheet for this game, players should take any tokens relevant to the sheet they have chosen.
  Home system: Give each player the planet tiles and space ships in their player colour.
  Each player should put out their planet tiles in a row, they should then stack 4 spaceships on each tile.
• Central playing area:
  ​Warp tile: Place the warp tile in the middle of the central playing area.
  Players should place their colony tokens at the '0' starting spot.
  Destiny deck: Remove cards that would refer to any unused player colours for the game and shuffle the remaining into a face-down deck.
  Cosmic deck: Add the flare cards for the chosen alien sheets to the encounter cards then shuffle them into a face-down cosmic deck.
  Starting hand: Deal 8 cards face-down to each player.
• First player: Determine the starting player.

On to play
In Cosmic Encounter players will be trying to create colonies on other players' home systems in the form of land their spaceships on those planets while also preventing their own system from being colonised.
The game employs a traditional turn order with the active player resolving their turn before the game progresses to the player on their left.
Each turn consists of 6 phases.

• Regroup: The active player may retrieve one of their spaceships from the warp (If possible.) and add it to a planet in their home system.
• Destiny: A card is drawn from the destiny deck and immediately resolved.
  Colour: If a colour card is drawn from the destiny deck, the player with that player colour will be the active player's target for their 'encounter' (Or attack really!).
  In some circumstances, the active player may target one of their own planets if it has been totally overrun by other players.
  Wild: If a wild card is drawn, then the active player must choose which player to target.
  Special: These are unique cards that have specific outcomes. If a special card is drawn, it will contain text to explain how it is resolved.
• Attack!: The active player takes the hyperspace tile and points the er... pointy end at one of the planets in the targeted system. Then they add 1-4 spaceships sourced in any combination from any of their planets to the other end, signifying how many ships they commit to the encounter.
• Alliances: Now the active player who is considered the attacker may invite any number of other players to join with them in the attack.
  ​The targeted player who is now considered the defender may also invite any number of other players to join with their defence.
  Once invites have gone out, the invited players may choose to accept or decline the invitation. If a player is invited to both sides, they must choose one side only or decline.
  Any player that accepts the invitation to form an alliance must commit 1-4 of their ships to their alliance's side by placing them on the hyperspace tile or alongside targeted planet respectively.
• Planning: During this phase both the attacker and defender choose a card and play it face-down.
• Reveal: Now both player simultaneously flip their cards face-up and calculate their values which is the card's value plus the number of spaceships committed to the encounter.
  Usually, whoever has the highest total value wins the encounter, ties go in the favour of the defender. However, there are several ways this can change. 
  Reinforcements: After cards are revealed, reinforcement cards may be played to alter scores, this can be done the attacker, defender or any of their respective allies.
  Negotiate: If either the attacker or defender has played a 'negotiate' card, they immediately lose the encounter but as compensation, they get to take cards from their opponent.
  Double negotiate: If both attacker and defender played negotiate cards, then they get 1 minute of real-time to actually negotiate an actual settlement between them!
  If they fail to reach a deal, then both players lose 3 spaceships to the warp tile.
  Morph cards: When a morph card is played, it 'adapts' to have the same value as the card played by the opposing player, essentially negating it.
  Resolution: Once all cards and special abilities have been taken into account and a winner has been determined, the results must be resolved.
  • Attacker wins: If this is the case, all the defender's ships (And those of their allies.) are placed on to the warp tile.
    All of the spaceships committed to the attack by the attacker as well as allied attacker's spaceships are placed on to the targeted planet. Each respective attacking player gets to advance their colony token 1 space on the score tracker.
    Finally, if the successful offensive was the player's first action, they get a second.
  • Defender wins: If this occurs, all of the spaceships committed to the attack by the attacker and their allies are sent to the warp tile.
    The defender's spaceships are unaffected and those committed by allies are safely returned to their planets.
    The score tracker remains unchanged but allies of the successful defender also get to recover ships from the warp tile and/or draw cards as a reward.
• Next player: Once the active player taken their available action(s), play moves on to the player on their left.

There are some other situational rules and variants but this pretty much sums up the essence of what goes on in Cosmic Encounters.

Endgame
The first player to reach 5 on the score tracker wins!
Because of alliances and such, it is possible for more than one player to reach the 5 score at once. if this is the case, all those players share the victory.

Overall
​Mechanically, Cosmic Encounter is straightforward, at its core it's essentially a single blind bid auctioning game albeit one where players bid within the constraints of their limited hand of encounter cards in order to win encounters
On a basic level, a player only has to win 5 bids to win the game.

There is of course more to it than that.

It's vital that players will have to exploit the stronger cards in their hand and mitigate the risk from weaker cards. High value cards are obviously useful because they can win encounters but weak cards can also have a use.
A low value card can be used as a bluff or ruse to flush out an opponent's higher value card, potentially altering what a later outcome might be. Or, if a player think's they're going to lose, why not throw the lowest value card into the mix? 
Negotiate cards can also prove useful when a player knows they are going to lose and can be used to not only fill their hand but deplete the cards of an opponent.
Managing the luck of the draw is vital for victory.

The alien sheets can throw some real curveballs into the game and how players behave. Some of the sheets provide some really radical changes to strategies.

For example; in one game I played as the 'Spiff' who have the ability can crash land a spaceship on a planet if they are a part of an attack that loses badly.
It suddenly introduced a whole new dynamic into attacks which involved the Spiff (And I involved the Spiff with as many attacks as I could!) because defending players were now faced with the conundrum of having to worry about winning too big which might mean playing a lower value card instead and the risk of doing that meant that they might just flat out lose if I played a high value card! Choices, choices!

With 50 different alien sheets available in the base game (With more in expansions.) it means there will be a lot of variation in games and a lot of unique interactions from game-to-game. 

The rules for the destiny deck can also throw a curveball into the game.
I feel one of the primary purposes of the destiny deck is prevent a 'pick on a player' tactic and in this regard it does it well.
It also means that game has constant shifting alliances, 2 players have been allies in a previous turn but the destiny deck could quickly have one targeting the other in the next run.

This brings me to the next thing that's really strong in Cosmic Encounter; which is player interactivity.
Players will be bidding and bluffing against each other, forming temporary alliances, looking to exploit their abilities and take advantage of their unique ability and circumstances as they might arise.
I also think that the quality of the experience the game provides will in part rely on the people playing it. If players buy into the somewhat boisterous, confrontational and luck-based gameplay, then it'll be a positive, enjoyable experience. 

I will add that this game has a lot direct confrontation between players and a hefty dose of 'take that' that goes on as well.
If you find this sort of thing unappealing, it's probably a safe bet to say that you won't like this game and to be fair, sometimes I'm not in the mood for this kind of game.

Otherwise, it's hard to find fault with Cosmic Encounter, the rules are quick to learn and presents players which meaningful decisions to make whenever they attack or have to defend - which is reasonably often, they'll also be faced with whether to join alliances or not and deal with the outcome of those decisions.

Cosmic Encounters is a lot of fun to play and worth trying.

13th October 2022

It's a Thursday and we're in Aldershot for a evening of gaming entertainment.

Do you like salads? Do you like points? If so, then maybe you'll like Point Salad, a game about well... about making salads and scoring points with a literal point salad mechanic!

What's in a game?

• Cards: Point Salad uses a deck of 108 cards and that's it. OK, there's a bit more to it.
  Each card is double sided with a veggie side and a scoring side. The veggie side features 1 of 6 vegetables/colours and the other,  the scoring side has scoring criteria related to the veggies.
  Veggie side: The vegetables (Or veggies) types are:
  Cabbage/purple.
  Carrot/orange.
  Lettuce/green.
  Onion/dark red.
  Pepper/yellow.
  Tomato/red (Yes, technically, tomatoes are a fruit but I digress.).
  Scoring side: The flip side of the cards each feature a scoring criteria or manner of point scoring, of which Point Salad has a wide variety.
  The scoring criteria tend to be based on combinations of veggies. For example,  8 victory points (VPs) per 3 onions or 10 VPs for the most tomatoes or 5 VPs for each pair of carrot and lettuce and so on. Some cards will give points for certain veggies and deduct VPs for others, some may score for not having any of a certain type of veggie!
  Finally, in the corner on a scoring card it will display which veggie is on the other side.

Point Salad's cards are pretty basic, they don't seem laminated and feel a little flimsy. Although unless you treat them badly, it shouldn't be a problem.

There isn't much art to Point Salad, only the illustrations for the 6 types of veggie. These are colourful, chunky illustrations with thick line art. I like it and think it suits the game's light, breezy theme.

The game's only iconography is the 6 vegetable types. For the most part, they are clear  and distinct. EXCEPT for the onion and tomato images which not only look a little similar but both use shades of red for their associated colour. It's not a gamebreaker by any means but it definitely can be a little confusing and could have been clearer
The scoring criteria are pretty easy to understand, it uses a mixture of the icons and text to explain their individual rules.

• First player: Determine a starting player.

On to play
In Point Salad players will be drafting cards from the central selection.
They will be drafting veggies to create sets and drafting scoring cards to score those sets.
Point Salad uses the typical turn structure with the active player acting before play progresses to the player on their left.

During their turn, the active player must perform 1 of the following 2 draft actions, additionally, they may then also perform a free action.

• Draft: The active player must perform 1 of the following 2 draft actions.
  Take 1 scoring card: The active player may take 1 card from the 3 scoring decks and place it in their personal area, keeping it with the scoring side-up.
  Take 2 veggie cards: The active player may take any 2 of the 6 veggie cards and add them to their personal playing area, keeping them veggie side-up and collating them into sets
  The cards that were taken are replaced by flipping and placing cards from their corresponding decks.
• Optional free action: Once per turn, the active player may flip 1 card from the scoring side to its veggie side. Players cannot flip cards from the veggie side to point side!​
• Next player: Once the active player has drafted and possibly performed their free action, player passes to the player on their left.
• Empty deck: At any time, if 1 of the scoring decks becomes empty, simply take the largest of the remaining decks and split it into 2 decks.

Endgame
Play continues until all cards have been drafted and then goes to scoring.

All cards are scored all ways! That means that if for example, a set of carrots can gain VPs from 2 scoring cards, then they are scored twice and so on.

Points are tallied, highest score wins.

Overall
Point Salad is a easy to learn game, there are only 2 actions (And 1 free action.) to choose from and 1 core tenement to remember; scoring cards score off of veggie cards.
The depth comes from what is done with those 2 decisions.

Getting scoring cards early on will give a player an objective to aim for but also can limit their drafting options.
Conversely, concentrating on veggie cards early will give a player some flexibility when it comes to acquiring scoring cards, the risk here though is that optional scoring cards may never become available because other players may get them first or they may get flipped to the veggie side or in game with a lower player count, may not even be in the game.

All of this means that planning ahead can be a two-edged sword. It's definitely worth trying to plan ahead, synergy between scoring cards, i.e., multiple scoring cards that score off 1 type of veggie can led to big scores.
However, the drafting area's landscape is likely significantly change from turn-to-turn and players will also need to adapt to circumstances as they arise. Players will also need to mange having to take cards they don't need or want and look to create or exploit new scoring opportunities as they appear.
The optional free card flip rule offers players a little flexibility. They'll be times that a points card with a negative may prove a liability might be worth flipping which negates the negative and also provides a veggie for another points cards. Again, this is all contextual.

There's also a higher level of play at work here. Players can try and anticipate their opponents are hoping to do and possibly stymy them. Taking specific veggie cards or scoring cards they might want or even taking veggie will cause points cards from the related column to be flipped to replace them

It means that Point Salad generally provides players will meaningful decisions and choices to make.

I find Point Salad an enjoyable game, it makes a great filler, plays up to 6 and also a good crossover or family game.
It's a game that you shouldn't take too seriously, it's a light, fun quick game. In fact it's so quick to play that it seems like the set up time longer than the play time! Which is my only, minor criticism of an otherwise good game.
It this sounds like your kind of thing, you should definitely give Point Salad a try.

25th September 2022

Sunday is here again and we're logged into Board Game Arena for some gaming goodness.

Sea Salt & Paper is a pun that plays on sea salt & pepper in this quirkily ocean and err... origami themed set collecting card game.

Caveat: We've only ever played Sea Salt & Paper digitally.

​What's in a game?

• Cards: Sea Salt & Paper has a deck of 50-odd cards. Each card will have several icons in the top left indicating what they are, what bonus they might provide and what victory points (VPs.) they confer.
  Cards come in quite a few different types and also importantly, in one of about 10 colours.
  • Duo cards: Many of the cards in the game are duo cards, which means they are played as pairs. They have a icon in the corner along with the outline of the icon it pairs with. Most duo sets require 2 matching icons, e.g., a pair of crabs or a pair of boats. One duo pairing however, rather grimly requires a shark and a swimmer!
  • Collector cards: These cards have an icon in the top left corner with a column of numbers below. VPs will be scored accordingly, dependant on the number of that collector card that have been acquired.
  • Multiplier cards: Each multiplier card has a number and a icon. Each card with a matching icon scores that many VPs at the end of a round.
  • Mermaid card: Mermaid cards earn VPs based on the amount of cards of 1 colour a player has the end of a round.
    Additionally: If a player manages to acquire all 4 mermaid cards, they win the game, regardless of VPs, they just win!

Sea Salt & Paper makes use of a genuinely unique art style which looks like the creators constructed origami models themed after the game such as mermaids, crabs or penguins etc and then photographed them. Or perhaps high quality renders have been produced in a computer art program. Either way, the game has what I think a fantastic, eye catching theme, colourful and of course, they get to use the Sea Salt & Paper gag.

The game uses 10 colours for cards - and that's a lot. Fortunately each colour has a unique icon associated with it which a handy and welcome accessibility aid.
The downside is that Sea Salt & Paper has quite a lot of icons, there's about 4 icons for each type of card. Luckily most of them are intuitive or fairly obvious.
I don't think it's too difficult to learn may be off putting during early plays.

How's it play?
Setup

• Deck: ​Take all the cards and shuffle them into a face-down deck.
• Discard piles: Next, the game's 2 discard piles must be created by drawing 2 cards and placing each one into the central playing area face-up in 2 stacks.

That's it for setup.

On to play
Sea Salt & Paper is played over a varying number of rounds until a scoring target has been met. Furthermore, rounds will have a varying length and after a certain point, each round can be ended by any player.
The game follows the usual turn structure with the active player taking their turn before play progress to the person on their left.
There are 3 actions a player can perform in their turn.

• Draw card: The active player must draw a card into their hand, there are 2 ways this can be done.
  • Draw from discard pile: The active player may draw a card from either of the 2 discard piles.
  • Blind draw: Alternatively, the active player may draw 2 cards blindly from the deck.
    Then they keep 1 card and place the other on either of the discard piles.
• Play duo: In addition to drawing a card, the active player may also play cards. Cards are always played in pairs (Or duos.). Each type of duo gives the active player a benefit of some sort.
  • Pair of boats: Active player immediately gets another turn.
  • Pair of crabs: Active player takes a card from a discard pile into their hand.
  • Pair of fish: Active player adds a card from the deck into their hand.
  • Shark & Swimmer: The active player takes a card from another player's hand.
• End round: Finally, provided the active player has scored at least 7 points from duos they have played and cards in their hand, they may choose to end the round. There are 2 ways this can be done
  • Stop: The active player declares 'Stop', the round immediately ends and goes to scoring.
    Scoring: there are various sources for scoring points. Unusually, both played cards and un-played cards in hand are scored.
    • Duos: Each pair of duo cards scores 1 VP, regardless of whether it has been played or not! However, cards in hand do not activate their special abilities in any way.
    • Collector cards: These cards will score points VPs depending on the size of their respective collections.
    • Multiplier cards: These will score VPs as per the number of that icon the player has in their possession multiplied by the scoring multiplier.
    • Mermaids: Mermaids score using something called a colour set. A colour set is all of a player's cards of the same colour.
      The active player scores 1 VP per card in their largest colour set. I.e., the player gains 1 VP per card for each card with the colour which they have the most of on their cards.
      Additional mermaids: If a player has a 2nd mermaid, it scores the second largest colour set and so on.
    • Finals scores: Once scores are calculated and tallied as described above, they should be recorded before play progresses to the next round.
  • Last chance: This is the other way the active player may trigger the end of a round. This method adds an extra element to the scoring criteria which is essentially a push-your-luck mechanic where the active player is betting that their score for the round will be higher than all the other players.
    Final round: When the active player declares 'last chance', all other players get one more turn to draw and play cards.
    Scoring: The game then goes to scoring. This is essentially identical to how scoring is calculated above but with a significant change once points are tallied.
    • Active player has highest score: If the active player (Who declared last chance) has the highest or tied highest score, they have won their bet! They then also add the value of their largest colour set to their score for the round.
      Other players: All the other players ignore their current scores, instead only scoring their largest colour set.
    • Active player does not have highest score: This means the active player has lost their bet! The active player ignores their score and only scores their colour set.
      Other players: All other players score their cards as usual.
    • Final scores: Once scores are calculated and tallied as described above, they should be recorded before play progresses to the next round.
• ​​End turn: If the active does not or cannot end the round, then play progresses to the player on their left.
• End of round: Regardless of how a round ends, players should record their scores and all cards are shuffled back into the deck in preparation for the next round.

Endgame
There are 2 ways Sea Salt & Paper can end.
Firstly and least likely, if a player manages to acquire 4 mermaid cards... they win!

Otherwise, the game has a endgame scoring target, which is 30-40 VPs depending on player count. When this target is reached during scoring it triggers the game end and players calculate their final total VPs.

Points are tallied, highest score wins.

Overall
Broadly speaking, Sea Salt & Paper is fairly straightforward; collect sets and play duos. There are several ways to collect sets, including based on colours. Players will often be faced with various on which card to take and optimisation is key here.
Although players will also need to adapt to circumstances as they may need to deal with cards they might not initially want.

Sea Salt & Paper however, puts some quite unusual and unique mechanics into play that have unusual impact on the game and the way some of these mechanics synch up is interesting.

I'm struggling to recall another card game in which cards that are played and cards in hand score equally. It's very important here though since it ties in with the mechanic that allows players to bet on 'winning' the round. 
When a player chooses to announce 'last chance', they'll know what cards other players have played but they won't know what they've kept in their hand. This means there's always an element of push-your-luck because the announcer will never know what others have kept back.
Canny players may decide to not play duo cards in an attempt to lure others into a false sense of security but the trade off is that they won't get utilise those cards' benefits.

There's also a higher level of play about noting what cards other players take and responding. 
Drawing cards blindly gives the player a useful ability of using one of them to cover a card in one of the discard piles, potentially denying it to another player if you think they want it.

While Sea Salt & Paper players has a moderately quick playtime and is mostly easy to learn, it's a bit fiddly when it comes to scoring.
Not only do players have to score both played cards and ones in hand but sometimes they need to discard their scoring and score again... but differently thanks to someone triggering 'Last Chance'.
I'm not sure the the gameplay this push-your-luck mechanic adds to the game is worth the extra hassle it causes with scoring.
Sea Salt & Paper is also seems like something of a slow burn when it comes to gameplay which boils down to choosing which card to take and whether to play duos or not. It can feel a little unexciting or unengaging.

Mechanically, there's some fun things going on with Sea Salt & Paper but the game didn't quite grab me in the times that we played it but as I said, it could just be a slow burn that requires a few more plays to grasp. I wouldn't object to trying it again.

30th August 2022

Tuesday night gaming with the Woking Gaming Club continued with The Crew: The Quest for Planet Nine.

The Crew: The Quest for Planet Nine is actually an earlier iteration of The Crew: Mission Deep Sea which I've already blogged about and the two games are more or less identical.
Read about The Crew: Mission Deep Sea here and it'll give a good idea how The Quest of Planet Nine plays.
As such I'm not going to do a full write for ​The Crew: The Quest for Planet Nine, instead I'll just note one area of difference between the two.

Task cards: These are much more straightforward in The Crew: The Quest for Planet Nine.
All the objectives are exclusively about acquiring certain numbers in certain colours, e.g., blue 7, yellow 2 and so on.
Consequently, The Quest for Planet Nine is a bit more straightforward, this makes it perhaps a little easier to play as it does not present players with having to deal with more left-field tasks like 'I can only win the first and last hands'.
The upside is that it has greater accessibility and will be easier to play with people who aren't so heavily into games.