27th October 2020 Gaming night at 'The Sovereigns' in Woking continues in what would the last game of the last meetup before Lockdown 2 came into effect. The third and final game of the evening was 'Skulls of Sedlec', in what seems to be a game about digging up skulls and then errr... proudly displaying them in a pile for all to see? Skulls of Sedlec is a microgame that comes from microgame publisher Button Shy who appear to specialise in creating games with 18 cards. Their games are hand crafted and they aim to release 1 a month. What's in a game? As is befitting the name microgame, Skulls of Sedlec is small enough to fit in your pocket.
The wallet is of course a bit of a gimmick, but it's a nice addition and I like it. How's it play? Set up
The objective of Skulls of Sedlec is to create a pyramid shaped layout of cards. Points are scored depending on how cards are placed in relation to other cards. The size of the pyramid depends on the number of players but always has 3 layers of cards and thus 6 layers of skulls. Layers of cards are 'offset' (Like bricks in a wall.), this is important when calculating which cards are 'adjacent' to other cards. On to playing When 'building' a pyramid, players must start at the bottom and work up, thus there must be at least 2 cards in a layer before a card can be placed on the layer above. In their turn, a player can perform 1 of 3 actions.
Endgame Play continues until all cards have been taken and played into pyramids. Then pyramids are scored, there are 5 class of skull and thus 5 ways to score points.
Highest score wins. Overall
Simple to learn, but lots to think about. Skulls of Sedlec packs a some solid gameplay into a tiny package. I really like that the face-down stacks of cards visually represent a graveyard and 'digging' turns them over. It's a clever touch and good example of maximising what's available in a game. Less can be more. The 2 card hand limit is a great mechanic too: It gives players enough choice to give them tricky decisions, but it stops players from hording cards - making their decisions easier. Every card can potentially score points, so every decision when playing a card is meaningful and you really can't ask for more from a game in my opinion. Skulls of Sedlec is a 2 or 3 player game. It's worth noting that that there's an expansion that takes the player count to 4, adds a new class and increases the deck size up to a heady 24 cards! A good little microgame that is a perfect filler with some depth. One I'd like to own and that's not just because it comes in a neat wallet (Although it does add to the appeal.). I'm just glad that the publisher hasn't started numbering their wallet games, that would be too hard on my real wallet!
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13th October 2020 Tuesday is here and we're at 'The Sovereigns' in Woking. Time for the Woking Gaming Club to play a game and tonight we will be playing 'The Networks'. This is a game for the budding media mogul inside everybody; create TV shows, hire film stars, fire chat show hosts, stick advert breaks everywhere, well at least during primetime! Fun for everyone. When we played The Networks, a couple of expansions were also used. What's in a game? The Networks is a card game that has some nice additional components.
All the other components are standard, except the money tokens which are cool. How's it play? Setup
The Networks is played over 5 'seasons'. At the start of each season, TV show, star and advert cards a dealt in 3 rows. Network cards are only dealt out from the 2nd season onwards. After this, in turn order, players take 1 action each. This continues until there are no more actions that can be performed or all players have chosen to finish for the season, this is called 'drop & budget'. The actions are:
Endgame The game continues for 5 seasons, at the end of the 5th season the shows are still aged. Then a 6th season is scored (No new cards or other actions occur). Accumulated audience figures are tallied, highest score wins. Overall
The Networks has some cool design choices that give players interesting decisions to make. A player can keep going and acquire more stars and adverts for as long as they've got money, which can give them an advantage later on because having these cards in their Green Room means that it's easier and quicker to develop shows. But ending your season early gives you more money/audience, more importantly though, it allows the player to be earlier in the turn order for the following season. So when the new cards appear, that player will get first dibs. Because the game is very much about card drafting, players really have to think about how they prioritize their actions, as all players will be vying for the same cards. Players have to try and use their actions as efficiently as possible, there's a fine balance between doing all the actions you want to do and ending your turn quickly. All in all, The Networks gives players important decisions to make throughout the game and that's a good thing. 22nd December 2019 Sunday is here at 'The Sovereigns' in Woking. 50 Fathoms is still on hiatus so for the final get together before Christmas we're playing board games. The first game was 'Agatha Christie's Death On The Cards'. Will the other players learn your darkest secrets? Will you catch the murderer? Or will you manage to get away with murder! Only the cards can decide in... Death On The Cards! What's in a game? Death On The Cards uses 3 different types of cards. Secret cards, game cards and the 'Murderer Escapes!' card , game cards are further divided into other cards:
How's it play? First there's setup, which is a little different depending on the number of players.
Social disgrace What's social disgrace? When a player has all of their secret cards turned face-up, all of their secrets have been revealed and they're disgraced. What does this mean? It means that when they become the active player, all they can do is discard exactly 1 card and draw 1 card. It is possible to come back from social disgrace as there some cards that allow secret cards to be turned back face-down. Endgame How the game ends will depend on the player's role in the game.
Overall
'Death On The Cards' plays with 2-6 people and what's interesting is how the game changes depending on the number of players. With 2 players, there's no secret to who's the murderer. The game is a war of attrition. Now, for some maths (Hopefully my maths is correct.). Let's look at it with 3 players.
Now lets look at a 6 player game.
This means it becomes easier for the murderer to get away with it in bigger game. Now I don't see this as a flaw, but it is definitely something that changes the dynamics of the game. With 3 players for example, 'Death On The Cards' can be played as a straightforward card game. With 6 players, it's much harder to capture the murderer. Players will need to form alliances and target suspicious players as quickly as possible. But then, this gives the murderer and accomplice opportunities to bluff, lie, double cross and sabotage their 'allies'. It becomes a lot more like a hidden role game. Anyway, regardless of the mathematics, the game mechanics fit the theme very well. 'Death On The Cards' can learned quickly and plays quickly too . It's a great filler game and even though I'm not a fan of hidden role games, it's a lot of fun. It's definitely worth giving it a try. 16th November 2019 Gaming night at 'Matakishi's' continues. The final game of the night was 'Ringmaster: Welcome to the Big Top'. Step right up! Step right up! Come and see which player can creates the most magnificent circus. Watch! As players become catastrophically confused by cunning card-plays of weirdness Gasp! As players are perilously perplexed by uncannily unpredictable game mechanics. Yes Sir! All the fun of the circus! What's in a game? Ringmaster is a card and all it has and needs is a deck of cards. All the cards are illustrated with nice and occasionally humorous pictures. Many of the cards are tongue-in-cheek. Finally, the game comes with a nifty little draw string to to carry the game in, if you don't want to lug the box about. It's a cool little addition. How's it play? First, the deck is shuffled and 3 cards are dealt to each player, the remaining cards from a draw deck. A first player is then determined. The active player draws a card from the deck and then plays 1 card. There are 4 types of card in the game:
I can't really explain much about the rules, because players simply do what's written on the card they're playing. Endgame There are no endgame conditions in Ringmaster! OK, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but the endgame is determined by cards that are played. This means that different players will most likely have different winning criteria. This makes Ringmaster unpredictable and the game tends to end very suddenly and abruptly. Overall
Ringmaster ticks the right boxes! Easy to learn, quick to play and fun. As well as random ending conditions, there are cards that occasionally completely change the game, forcing all players to discard their entire hands or every card they've played etc. Ringmaster can be random and chaotic, but retains enough strategy to still engage players. If you've just spent the last 3 hours playing a monstrosity of a game that's made your brains dribble out of your ears. Then Ringmaster makes a great finisher for the evening. 27th October 2019 Sunday at 'The Sovereigns' in Woking and our gaming continues. The final game of the day was 'Forbidden Desert', the second game in the 'Forbidden series' of co-operative games. 'Forbidden Desert' is a co-operative game of exploration. The players are a band of adventurers and explorers, scouring the desert (Which I guess is a forbidden?) for the remains of a legendary flying machine. But during your trip, a ferocious sand storm forces your helicopter to crash in the remains of a lost city. The only way to escape the desert is to fly back out of the desert. Your helicopter is a wreck, so your only hope of survival is to find and reconstruct the flying machine before the storm and desert spell your doom! What's in a game? 'Forbidden Desert' comes in a natty tin box, the game's components are good quality with some nice artwork.
How's it play? Setup.
Player actions During the active player's turn, they have 4 actions that they can perform (in any order and repeatedly.). These are:
Once the active player has completed their 4 actions, the storm gets to act. Cards are drawn from the storm deck, the number drawn depends upon how severe the storm is, this ranges from 2-6 cards. There are 3 types of storm card.
Gear cards are all beneficial for the players and can be played at any time by the owning player. Endgame Losing conditions:
If the players manage to retrieve all 4 missing parts of the machine, all manage to reach the launch pad at the same time and the launch pad is unblocked. Then the players win the game. As the adventurers escape in their new flying machine. Overall
Forbidden Desert has essentially 2 timers running, the sand tokens pouring on to the tiles and the strength of the storm (Which also increases the rate in that sand tokens appear.). Water is a resource that must be managed. Players are faced with the choice of being prudent to preserve their water levels, acting to manage the sand token levels or having to work towards their objectives. Especially since the storm can move the game area about which can cause big problems or be an opportunity to exploit. I think the key to doing well in Forbidden Desert are the characters. Each character has their own special ability. Remembering to utilise these abilities and working them into any strategy used vital in my opinion. Forbidden Desert is a cooperative game in which the players play against 'the game'. Games of this type must balance strategy and randomness in order to be good games. Too much strategy and once the players learn the game's systems, they'll learn to rinse it every time. Too much randomness and player decisions become meaningless as their fates will be left to the whim of luck. Forbidden Desert manages to straddle this line pretty well and is one of the better examples of this type of game. 15th October 2019 Tuesday evening has rolled around again and we're at 'The Sovereigns' in Woking. This can only mean it's games night. Our game of the evening is 'Gold West'. A game for rootin' tootin' prospectors and quite possibly outlaws and bandits. What's in a game? There are quite a lot of components in Gold West. The general game components are:
How's it play? Before beginning, setup needs to be carried out:
Supply resources Resources are supplied through the supply track.
Use metals So now that resources have been moved out of the supply track, they must be used. There are 5 resources and 3 of them are precious metals - gold, silver and copper. In this stage, the precious metals are 'spent'.
Build camp/settlement or loot After using metals, the active player has to build a camp or settlement, or loot. This is done using wood and/or stone resources that were bought out of the supply track along with the metals.
This means that having more than 1 stone or 1 wood is a waste as these will be discarded. A player only needs a stone or a wood, or a stone and a wood. That's it for a player's turn, it seems like a lot, but in play it's pretty straightforward. Endgame Gold West is played over 11 rounds, players have ten tents to use and there's a further round with no tents. Then we get on to scoring, points are scored in the following ways:
Overall
There's a lot to like about Gold West. The supply mechanic is equal parts infuriating and brilliant. If you put your resources in the lower boxes and have trouble getting them out effectively, it's only your own fault for being greedy for points. But if you're able to manage the flow of resources well, it's a good source of points. Talking of points, Gold West presents players a good variety of ways to score points. There is always a way to accumulate points, it's a question of optimisation and individual strategy. Players are always given meaningful choices on how to approach scoring. Even if a player fails to bring out a stone or wood resource, they still have the open to loot. I also like how resources become revealed as players build camps and settlements on the map. It's a nice touch. The game is also a nice looking game, I like the stagecoach meeples and there's something pleasing about looking at the game map covered in lots of tent meeples. All in all I liked Gold West. 5th October 2019 It's been a Saturday evening of gaming goodness at Matakishi's place. It's been an evening of small games. The fourth and final game of the night is 'Iunu', which is actually pronounced as er... 'uh wah nu'. Iunu is a card game set in the ancient time of the legendary Pharaohs of Egypt. With deserts and the Nile and the pyramids... or at least some four-sided dice. What's in a game? All the art on the cards is a clean and smooth almost minimalist style that is quite appealing. I guess it's also designed to resemble hieroglyphs? Components include:
How's it play? So we begin with setup.
There's no mention of afterlife cards, what do they do? Well when a 'priest' citizen card is played, the active player take a afterlife card and keeps it face-down in their area. Afterlife cards provide the opportunity to gain extra points during scoring. Players can only have 1 afterlife card each. If a player acquires more afterlife cards, they draw another one and keep one of the two. The other one is shuffled back into the afterlife deck. The dice Dice are rolled every round, what for? Certain citizen cards make use of these vaguely pyramid shaped dice. For example: The 'noble' card will earn the active player currency equal the result of all 3 dice (The dices' values are lowered after this.). The 'baker' citizen card can buy up to 3 bread tokens at a cost equal to the highest single dice. Bread tokens Talking of bakers, what do bread tokens do? After acquiring bread tokens, the are placed on citizen cards that have been played to increase their value in the endgame scoring. Additionally, bread tokens on your 'farmer' citizen cards will protect them from being 'enticed away' by pesky 'soldier' citizen cards. Endgame Once the citizen deck is depleted and all players have had an equal number of turns, we go into scoring. There are 5 ways to score:
Overall Iuni is a game with some interesting mechanics. Having to return 2 cards to the forum during every turn forces players into making some hard decisions, because not only are you discarding cards which may be useful, you're also giving other players the opportunity to take them. The dice are also an interesting idea and not something I've seen before in this style of game. The randomness can throw a real 'curve ball' into players' strategies. Once players have gotten their heads around the slightly unusual way the game works, it's quite quick to play and would be good as a filler or finisher game. 5th October 2019 Gaming night at Matakishi's is underway. The third game of the night was 'Campy Creatures'. Put yourselves in the shoes of a 'mad scientist'. Misunderstood, never trusted and unloved. But there's a reason why the mad scientist is the way they are and why they kidnap innocent people. It's to stop those other pesky mad scientist from doing it first!! Campy Creatures is a blind bidding game where you bid to capture teenagers and other hapless victims and put them into sets in order to score points. What's in a game? All of the cards in this game are nicely illustrated with art that wouldn't look out of place on posters for the 'creature feature' movies that this game is emulating.
How's it play? As always we begin with set up.
Campy Creatures uses blind bidding. The highest bid gets to go first and pick the victim card of their choice.
Endgame Campy Creatures is played over a total of 3 rounds. After the final round, final scores are tallied, highest score wins. Overall
Campy Creatures is a quick and interesting game to play. This is down to the special abilities on the monster cards. They can really throw a spanner into the works (And player's plans.). Special abilities include cancelling other cards special abilities, acquiring 2 cards instead of 1, forcing someone to discard a card they captured etc. Learning to watch other players is important. Looking at what cards they have collected gives you the chance to anticipate what other cards they will want. This means you have the opportunity to mess with them! It gives the game an extra level of depth, which without the game would be too simple. Even so, with so few special abilities (That are identical for all players.), after prolonged play, the game could become 'samey'. But as a occasional filler game, Campy Creatures is a good game. 24th September 2019 Tuesday evening is here and we're at 'The Sovereigns' in Woking for games night. It was an evening of several short games. We begun with 'Sushi Roll', this game is a follow up to the rather good 'Sushi Go!'. Will Sushi Roll live up to expectations? Let's see. What's in a game Sushi Roll comes in a largish box and a whole bunch of components. These are solidly made and of a good quality.
How's it play? We begin with set up:
And we're ready to go.
Overall There's a lot to like about Sushi Roll. There's a pleasant tactile sensation to be had when you slide or hand the conveyor belt tile over to another player. The same is true when using chopsticks to snatch away a die from someone else's conveyor belt. The theme fits the game perfectly. The mechanics with the dice is very clever. You can see what dice are coming your way, but since the dice are rolled again, you don't know exactly what you're getting. It does a very good job of replacing the card mechanic from Sushi Go!. No need to try and memorise cards now! Everyone I've played this game with, preferred this version to its predecessor. It's less portable and takes a little set up time, but it feels more tactile, it's a little more 'open', therefore giving players more choices to make. The scoring and pudding tokens make it a bit more 'user friendly'. Meanwhile the chopsticks and menus lend the game a bit more strategy. So, is it worth getting Sushi Roll if you've played Sushi Go!? In a word; yes! 22nd September 2019 Sunday lunchtime at 'The Sovereigns' in Woking. Unfortunately 50 Fathoms is still on hiatus. Instead we shall play some board games. The first board game of the day was 'Roll Player'. Have you ever enjoyed creating characters for an RPG more than playing them? Then maybe, just maybe, Roll Player is the game for you. Roll Player is sort of a set collecting, dice rolling, worker placement game that's all about creating what is ostensibly a D&D character. The main of the game is that players use dice to generate their stats, but it's not a case of just rolling the dice. What's in a game The components for Roll Player are of a good quality.
How's it play Firstly there's set up: This is fairly straightforward.
Taking dice After a player takes a die, they must place it on to their character sheet board. When doing this, there are 3 things they need to bear in mind in order to maximise their scores.
Market cards There are several different types of card available to but from the market. When a player takes a market card, it is placed alongside the character sheet board in it's specified spot.
A new row of market cards is dealt every round. Endgame Play continues for 18 rounds until all 6 stats have 3 dice. Points can earned from several sources, these include:
Overall Roll Player is a game with an intriguing theme. Because placing a die has so many consequences, play slows down quite a lot when both choosing and placing a die, so there feels like there is a lot of downtime between turns. Apart from this, the game fine to play and when you complete Roll Player you will have an interesting character. My first Roll Player character was: 'A concentrating, knowledgeable, intimidating, dedicated, honest, famous, chain-armour-wearing, blessed-mace-wielding, druidic, elven chosen one who's good at sleight of hand. His name is Derek!'
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