Bargains

For about the last year I have been using trade-me quite a bit. It is a New Zealand Ebay equivalent I guess you could say. Last week I got two items I am pretty stoked about. Item one is a Monsterpocolypse starter kit a strategic war game with giant monsters. Whats not to love?

In all honesty I don't really know how to play but it is highly rated and comes with heaps of cool monsters and buildings and a map for only $30. I am picking it up at Call To Arms tournament in a weeks time. The second item is the Tantive IV which is a giant x wing spaceship. 

It is a beast.

I thought I would give some tips which hopefully apply to wider than just trade me.

1. Always ask for a better price. If you don't ask you will never know, and if they say no, no skin of your back! 
2. Create watch lists.  On trade me I have set searches for games I am interested in however don't feel any pressing need to get straight away. 

Here is a screenshot from my favourites,
I get an email if anything comes up every 3 days. 

3. Don't get it if you feel the price is to high, something else will alway come up. If the seller can't sell often they will re-list it with a lower price, I have got items this way a few times including the tantive IV.

I am sure there are other tips which are not on the top of my mind currently but you get the picture. Always ask questions, be patient, keep an eye out! If you have any other ideas put it down below. I guess I should share my major success story. Twilight imperium which is normally $150-$200 I scored for $29, bargain huh! I waited about 2 years before this bargain came up however I didn't care so much as its such a long game (looking at 8 hours) I knew it wouldn't get much table time. 

Attack Wing: D&D

Thats right folks, Dungeons and Dragons are making a game utilising the FlighPath game system seen in such games as Star Wars X-Wing which I have blogged about now and then. The game will be called Attack Wing: Dungeons & Dragons.

But there are no spaceships in D&D right? Well apparently players will control dragons which they will fly around the table. As far as I am aware like Star Wars X-Wing and Star Trek Fleet Captains they are releasing a starter set with 3 dragons. However unlike Star Wars and Star Trek D&D is planning on introducing ground units like giants and wizards.

Dogfighting dragons huh? I think it sounds like it would be a fun game and adding ground units will make it a more diverse game. However my gripe would be that in the space dogfights the manoeuvre dials which are used to fly can be quite clinical with either basic turns, banks or moving straight forward, this works well for spaceships, I would imagine Dragons to be able to move in a more versatile manor. Who knows what will happen anyhow, I look forward to see what they come up with. Admittedly I probably won't get this game due to already investing in Star Wars X-Wing. 

Gateway Games

More recently I have been trying to add board games to my collection which are more accessible to a wider audience. I have finally come to the conclusion that not all wish to sit down for a 3 hour game of Eclipse or Agricola. After reading a post on Will Wheaton dot Net I found out that the games I have been trying to add to my collection are called gateway games. On the post he gives a list of the top 10 gateway games as rated by board game geek, here they are:

1 Ticket to Ride/TTR Europe
2 Carcassonne (all)
3 King of Tokyo
4 Dixit
5 For Sale
6 Diamant/Incan Gold
7 Can’t Stop
8 Pandemic
9 Love Letter
10 Settlers of Catan

I copy and pasted directly from his website and the links to the episodes of Will Wheaton's episodes of tabletop came too, hence the links in the list. 

Will then went on to say this...

different games work for different people, and someone who loves Ticket To Ride may not like King of Tokyo at all, so ask your non-gamer or tabletop-curious friends questions, and choose their gateway game carefully. All of these games have a high ratio of luck to strategy, which makes it a lot of fun for experienced and new players alike to play together.

I feel like that makes a lot of sense, by having a decent diversity of 'gateway games' in your collection ideally there will be a game for everyone. This has an added bonus of playing more games!

As this has been something on my mind for the past while I have accumulated some more games which are easy enough to pop out and work for most audiences. Some of these games are admittedly not on the list above but still they seem to do the trick and I would consider to be gateway games. Here is a list of my new gateway games

1. Saboteur
2. Galaxy Trucker (although it doesn't work for the easily frustrated)
3. Tsuro of the Seas
4. Bohnanza. 
5. Coup (as seen in a previous post) 
6. Twilight Imperium... I kid. 

Anyhow I am planning on doing a post now and then about some of these games, probably quite sporadicly, to give you all some ideas. I will create a label for gateway games to make them easy to navigate for those interested.

 

Coup and a brief journey through childhood

When I was a kid I believe I first got into 'serious' board gaming when I was introduced to the classic world domination game Risk. I was especially drawn in as I won my first game. I remember then playing army soldiers with my friends using little risk pieces which eventually led to Warhammer Fantasy. My Warhammer days didn't last to long as a kid. I eventually sold all my troops only to find that many years later I would get back into painting figurines.

My antiquated version of risk I scored for 3NZD at an op-shop

Another game I got into when I was young was the bluffing and deduction game Mafia. Mafia is a game where you all a dealt secret identities and some of the players are mafia and are trying to kill everyone else. The aim depending on who's side you are on is to kill of the other side either by publicly hanging the Mafia or killing the innocent citizens in their sleep. I simply loved this game! I recall one time after going for a tramp in the depths of New Zealand in the pouring rain having a raucous time in our little cabin playing mafia. I must admit I still love bluffing and deduction games and that is why my attention was brought to a relatively new game Coup which is getting some very positive mentions.

Playing Mafia in Jerusalem at a very young age, can you read that face?

Current Coup box art

Now that we are done with a slightly off hand introduction... Coup is, you guessed it, a bluffing and deduction game for 2-6 players where the aim of the game is to be the last man standing. Each player has two influence which are represented by charter cards, each charter gives the player a special ability on top of the standard actions. There are 3 of each character making a deck of 15. Here is a photo with a description of all the different actions.

You need to reduce all the other players to zero influence with the above actions thus eliminating them from the game. The real magic is that the cards are face down so you can take actions from charters you don't have in your hand. However players can challenge you, if you were bluffing you loose an influence turning a card face up and if you were truthful you prove it, get dealt a new card and the challenger looses an influence instead. Of course if you loose two influence you are out of the game, making it a short 10-15 minute game.

Unfortunately this game, unless you want to spend exorbitant amounts is quite difficult to get due to the next print run occurring in April or May.  Undeterred I decided to play with a pack of playing cards and some fake money from Arkham Horror knowing that if I like the game I will probably get a copy when it is reprinted. In short it is a very fun game of deception and deduction. Due to the length we played multiple games back to back and had roaring time doing it. It worked well with some of my less gaming buddies so was enjoyable for the whole family.

I have read a couple of convincing blogs sharing the various strategies you can use in this game leading me to believe that not only is this a great inclusive game but it has some serious strategical depth to it. I wont go into it myself but check out a stella example by the Tao of Gaming here. Unfortunately despite multiple thorough readings of the strategy he lists I still seem to loose every game. At least I have a blast loosing! I would highly recommend taking this game out for a spin sometime, after all whats 15 minutes of your life?

Betrayal at House on the Hill

I have been meaning to do a post about Betrayal at House on the Hill since the blog began all those years ago, err well months is more accurate. Unfortunately it is really a bit cruel because in the unlikely circumstance that this post makes you want to purchase the game, you can't. Betrayal is currently out of print so a copy on amazon is roughly $260, yikes! Fortunately if you wait till the end of the year I believe another print run is being undertaken.

Please note some of the things said below could be considered spoilers but I don't really think it will ruin your experience of playing the game. Read on at your own discretion. 

So what is Betrayal? It is a game for 3-6 player tile laying game where you explore a haunted house, after 30ish minuets of exploring a random haunt begins involving (in most cases) one player betraying the rest of the investigators. There are 50 different scenarios such as one player controlling a raft of zombies or becoming a demon lord. One scenario involved the betrayers body splitting right open and a two headed snake emerging. My all time favourite scenario involved gigantic 747 sized eagles plucking the house from the ground to feed you to their kin, of course there are less parachutes (yes parachutes in a haunted house) than the number of players so you have to fight for them to jump out first.

This game over the last few weeks has become a bit of a hit with my flatmates and neighbours so it has been given a good run. Here are some photos from a recent game where Ben ended up betraying us, becoming a zombie lord and ripping us apart.

Top left is the basement; centre is the ground floor; bottom right is the upper floor

The game board towards the end of the game. The haunt started when Ben summoned the Zombie lord with the Ring of King Solomon. Our goal was to steal the ring which gave us the needed strength to kill the Zombie Lord. (Please note the game actually called them demons but one in our group wasn't so fond of demons (naturally) so we just changed the villeins to zombies).

I was playing Father Rienhardt a 70 or so year old preacher who's hobby was (yes past tense) exploring haunted houses... Unfortunately after wounding the Zombie Lord once he got his comeuppance and I got killed first. 

Flash who's hobbies are running and Shakespeare died next, its worth noting Flash was the Betrayer so he deserved what was coming! 

Little Miss Mazey died next, the creepy kid holding a teddy bear. She died from an event card, thats what you get for running away from the Zombie lord! 

The kid died next, who ever thought it was a good idea to take a kid into a haunted mansion, his hobbies are sticks and collecting bugs. Ben finished the game victorious and no doubt took over the world. Oh here is the end flavour text if the bad guy wins

The Hellgate is open. You scrub the blood from your eyes with the heel of your palm. Th sickly sweet tang in the air is just like that in your dream. The tangled bodies of your fellow explorers form a throne of flesh for the demon lord. The screaming has only just began. Just as you've always dreamed. 

Now no doubt I love this game, heck, who doesn't like acting out a good old B-Grade horror. I got it after I acquired and promptly sold the decidedly average Mansions of Madness as a replacement. It certainly doesn't disappoint and 50 different scenarios and the random nature of the house make it a totally different game each time.  The game isn't equal however, the scenarios are often weighted in one sides favour but in the end skill and strategy are only a small part of the game, the role playing element prevails making this game a real treat each time it comes of the shelf. 

Rating?

PG for pretty good. 

Twilight Imperium Steal

Not but a moment ago I won an auction on trade me (kinda like New Zealand Ebay) for Twilight Imperium 3. The auction was for a 80NZD buy now, however I went for the reserve price of 25NZD to see the auction run. This morning some guy bid on TI3 pushing me up to the steep price of 28NZDv

So what is TI3 you may ask? Well it is a game in the same vein as Eclipse where you are in control of a galactic civilisation. The general aim is to get 10 victory points by resource management, controlling planets, blowing each other up and politics. Yes politics, apparently this game has a pretty decent political dimension to it which makes it a stand out game. As I haven't played it I can only go on what I have read of the game.

A game in progress

Another thing which makes this game stand out is a whopping 8+ hours/whole day play time. That is in a nut shell why I didn't want to spend $150 as it is to much for a game which only gets to see the sunlight 1-2 times a year.

All in all I am pretty chuffed as $28 feels like I am pretty much stealing it. I must admit I feel pretty bad for the guy who probably spend a lot to get it new, it sat on his/her shelf for many years unused and he only gets 1/5 of the retail price. Alas I guess thats what happens if you make the reserve in an auction so low. 

2014 Briefing

Getting ready for another Flames of War game this week Dan and I stepped into the games room and this is what we found...

The thoughts of finishing last weeks game were crushed as Dans daughter had attempted her own game. It puts a whole new meaning on the phrase 'panzer parking lot'. So we decided the only possible solution was a pint at the pub and plan out 2014.

We discussed three key different gaming activities to be on the cards. Number one of course gaming and more specifically Flames of War. We decided to stress the fact that this was not just gaming, but training as Dan and I want to give competitive FOW a shot.

Board-gaming is number two. There are lots of games out there we want to give a shot. I am hoping to get a copy of Twilight Imperium an epic space game at some point. There are also a few new games on the shelf like Galaxy Trucker and Firefly the group is keen to take for a spin.

A stegosaurs has taken over the galaxy in Firefly

Lastly we want to give RPGs another shot but break away from D&D and it's shoddy combat mechanic (see details of our last adventures here). We have had ideas over the last while of Call of Cthulhu which has more of an emphasis on role-playing and investigation rather that combat. Cut out the bad and in with the new I say.

Happy Gaming for 2014!

Just a small side note. After last weeks Flames of War game I have had inspiration and have got back into painting. I just have been bogged down by my large american armoured rifle platoon so it is taking a while to finish. Photos of at least the infantry by the end of the week... hopefully.  

Arkham Horror: Not a dime to her name psychologist part two

After a week of Arkham Horror sitting on the table after a week break mid game (see part one here) we began where we left off. Except of course another investigator joined us and adjusted the rules accordingly for a 7 player game. I guess it is worth briefly mentioning one of the great things of this game is the ability to play with up to 8 players although this does have its issues, namely people getting off topic.

What my Psychologist looked like mid game. 

As you recall my once Axe Wielding Psychologist took a turn for the worst. But would things turn out ok for her this time round. After all I had restored her to full stamina just before finishing up. First round I decided, screw it, I am going to go explore another world, this one was called Yuggoth, great name… How could it possbibly go wrong, as my friend and co-investigator said “I can think of a lot of ways”. First stop on my way to the gate was the Library, after all I was a learned psychologist. My encounter went something like this, “As you explore the library a books start whispering dark secrets to you, loose one sanity”. Hmmp, not even a skill check to save me. I’m not going to the Library again, ever.

By this time there was only three doom tokens needed to awaken Ithaqua the alien terror we were trying to prevent from spreading evil around the world, assuming that was his motive. I bravely jumped through a portal to another dimension Yuggoth to join my college Alex, “fancy seeing you here Alex”, we exchanged greetings in Yuggoth. First encounter “You hide behind a rock panting. The scurrying which has been chasing you seemed to have gone, no encounter”. Considering my luck it could have been worse, but hiding behind a rock, pffft what a sissy. I was feeling a little ripped of as the other investigators were getting items from some of their encounters. Alas it beats being mugged like I was previously. I moved to the next section of Yuggoth (other worlds have two parts where you have to have an encounter in each). I cant remember the encounter but it was a success! Yippee not so axe wieldery psychologist finally passed a test!

However when I returned to Arkham we were only one doom token off Ithaqua awakening and destroying us all. My fellow gang of other worldly investigators said, don’t close the gate because if another gate opens in its place (rather than a monster surge which happens if you don’t close a gate) Ithaqua will be unleashed. Being the risky psychologist that I am I said, I haven’t achieved nothing, plus I don’t want a monster surge on my (the alternative to a gate opening and a doom token being placed on the monsters doom track) location perceiving that as the worst of the two options so I went ahead and closed that sucker! Take that Yuggoth.

Whats that! I actually acheived something, I closed a gate to Yuggoth.

Ithaqua vs team why does the fate of humanity rest on
a random group of people (they need a more concise name)

I knew at this point I would be sorely treated by the gang if a gate opened on my location 'The Unnameable', fortunately a gate did not open there however one opened at 'The Cave'. This caused a fracture in the very fabric of reality, unleashing the mighty Ithaqua. I thought we were toast. The battle began, he had 77 hit points and with a -3 skill check we had to roll quite a few successes. That is exactly what we did. My first roll of fight 4, no weapons, -3 thus rolling one die was a successes! We took him down about 30HP the first round. Next round Chris gave me a Dread Curse, at the cost of two sanity and passing a -3 lore skill check I succeeded getting an additional 9 dice to my roll. Nice. I gave Ithaqua a hammering that round. In the end it only took three rounds to beat him with no deaths. Arkham and quite probably the rest of the world was saved...

Ithaqua feeling the pain of my Dread Curse! 

Team photo after defeating Ithaqua,
I am 2nd from the right next to Dan (far right). 

What a victory! It was quite a fun night finishing off the game involving plenty of laughs. The final battle did seem disappointingly easy but looking through the other old ones the game provides this was probably the second easiest. The Dunwich Horror should arrive in the mail soon so hopefully we will take it for a spin in a a few weeks. Next up however Empire of the Dead and maybe even Battlestar Galactica the game. 

Uncle Thulu, coming from another dimension soon

Arkham Horror and the Axe Wielding Psychologist: part 1

Monday night saw our gaming group playing a game of Arkham Horror. I had to wipe the dust off the box due to how long it takes to play. It hardy ever sees the light of day, or night. Or perhaps my gaming group is normally too frightened to play. Luckily we had a plan, play in the games room and leave the game set up to finish off the following week.

For those who don’t know, Arkham Horror is an epic co-operative game where you all take the role of investigators of H. P. Lovecraft alien terrors such as Cthulhu. The investigators traverse the town of Arkham and other dimensions closing portals to other worlds to try and stop the alien terror / old one. In our case, the old one was the abominable snowman Ithaqua. I will share the first half of the game from my experience as Carolyn Fern, an axe wielding psychologist, what could possibly go wrong…

Axe Wielding Psychologist...

What could possibly go wrong indeed! My first turn involved me going to a creaky old house in Arkham called “The Unnameable” on the way to Ye Ol’ Majik Shoppee to get myself some magic! We joked that the game designers had ran out of Lovecraft locations so ended up calling this location the Unnameable. Yet, old creaky houses are never a good idea. During the encounter phase, first turn, my encounter sounded something like this… "You hear rats in the walls, when is too late you realise they are moving to surround you! Roll some kind of skill check and if you fail get lost in time and space." COME ON! Getting lost in time and space due to some silly rats in the walls of a house with no name. In the end it wasn’t so bad as getting lost in space and time only involves missing a turn then going to any location you choose in Arkham, nice!

Things were back on track for my investigator, although the once quiet streets of Arkham were getting crowded with monsters and gates to other worlds were popping up all over the place. I spent $5 out of my $7 to get myself a spell - little did I know this was to be my undoing.  It was getting high time to try and close some gates so I thought rather than pissing around as I had been doing I would join my fellow investigators and go on a journey to some alternate realities. One other world adventure particularly of note was Chris Kirby AKA the magician Drake (who also had a carnival in the North side streets as the result of a mythos card). While in the Dream lands he had a skill check which he needed to pass, Chris only had three dice... What do you know he passes, all 5+ which is what you need to pass a skill check! Unfortunately for Chris once he got out and closed the gate another gate opened right on top of him so he got sucked into the Abyss.

Chris' successes

On my way to a gate I stopped into the Silver twilight lounge. At the top of my game, full health, an axe, I drew an encounter which read: Join our pretty neat club for $3 or we will beat you up and put you on the street or something like that. Unfortunately as you recall I only had $2! I failed passed my check to sneak away so as a result lost 3 of my 4 stamina and then was subject to Ithaqua’s special ability which makes you loose a stamina if you are on the streets at the end of a round due to icy winds. Brrr.

Gaarh! My investigator was frozen stiff and while recovering in Arkham emergency department the hospital staff stole half my precious equipment including my gorram (wrong game, thinking of Firefly there) axe! Bastards. They did a bad job of healing me only returning me to 1 stamina and after loosing 3 stamina and I was hardly going to spend my last $2 to return to full health. (When you get KOed in Arkham you have to discard half you items) Big mistake, the next round I got in an arm wrestle with some punk at the university costing me my single unit of stamina knocking me unconscious again, other half of my positions gone although this time I paid to restore my health. No longer an axe wielding psychologist, I was Mrs "Not-a-dime" to her name psychologist Fern. It was at this time we called it quits for the night to return next week to finish the game.

No money to her name psychologist Fern

I guess its worth mentioning how the game was going for the rest of the team while I was, err, wasting time. People were out killing monsters left right and centre, some were braving the other worlds closing gates. However were we completing our ultimate aim of closing all the gates. Hard to say, there were 2 or 3 open gates on the board by the time we called it quits, but we only had four gate tokens out of 6 needed if we closed all the gates (one of the three ways to win). We had only one elder sign on the board out of 6 needed to stop Ithaqua from general destruction and the end of the world (another way to win). Unfortunately Ithaqua's doom track only had 4 more tokens to go before his awakening. Anyhow Monday will see if we stop Ithaqua from awakening and if he does we will see if we manage to kill him in battle (the last way to victory, but the most unlikely).

A blurry shot of the between game

My thoughts on this game are mixed. I find I enjoy a game less if I am attempting (badly) to teach people how to play. Also its not great when the game seems to stop your character from achieving anything useful. However the theme really stands out and certainly makes for a fun night of gaming. I decided that I would get the expansion Dunwich Horror for the game. After researching some of the expansion this one seemed to fix one of the key problems, going insane or getting KOed in Arkham by nifty injury cards. Instead of loosing half your hard earned stuff you can take a permanent injury. Not ideal however it certainly beats the alternative. It also adds a bunch of cool stuff to stop the mid game slow down namely the Dunwich Horror. Anyhow I am sure after a few more games I will be able to give some more concrete thoughts on this game.

The Sabines and a bit more

When I was just a young lad I had a friend who would host monthly mystery movie nights where we would watch films so bad they were good. This got me into a whole world of weird and wonderful films. At these events we would also watch trailers, one trailer which was particularly humourous was for the film "The Rape of the Sabines". Legend tells us that Rome wasn't built in a day, and they didn't have any women either so they went about using less savoury measures to acquire women and reproduce. The trailer had some great lines in it such as "we doubt this film will fill a gap in history, however it will broaden your mind" and "a film for the whole family" as well as exclaiming "The Rape of the Sabines" repetitively. Anyway here is the trailer for your enjoyment, don't worry it's mostly PG.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=E7FKcUOi3-8&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DE7FKcUOi3-8

I thought of this film while in Florence because one of the squares we visited had some statues detailing the rape of the Sabines. Until now I only thought the film made up that idea as i didn't realise it was an actual myth. The statues are slightly less PG than the trailer: 

The square with the statues under the arches.

The rape of the Sabines statue with two men carrying off an unsuspecting Sabine women all in their birthday suits, and unsuspecting tourists (not in their birthday suits) sitting on the steps in front. It is quite an odd myth. 

While walking around Florence I also noticed a church I recognised.

I recalled quite clearly climbing to the top of the tower while playing Assassins Creed 2. I'm not much of a video gamer but that is one I have dabbled in and can appreciate it for its vast replicas of cities in Italy and the ability to climb all over them. While walking through Venice I felt at times I could almost recognise some of the streets from the game.

As this hasn't really been a gaming post I thought I would quickly go through some of the boardgames I have been contemplating while overseas. First up is Firefly the game, based on the amazing TV show Firefly. It comes out mid November in NZ. I have watched and read some reviews and read the rules, and it sounds like a lot of fun and quite thematic. I am getting excited about adding this to my collection and am considering pre ordering. 

I have also looked into A Study in Emerald a bit more, a kickstarter game which is getting shipped out this month. I pre-ordered it from my flgs a few months back. It's theme is a mix of Sherlock Holmes and Cthulhu, in some ways similar to Empire of the Dead. You may remember we did a play test of a print and play version of this game a few months back. The last two games are Sparticus which I mentioned a few posts back, although with A Study in Emerald and  Firefly I may wait a bit before possibly grabbing it, and the last one Bohnanza. Bohnanza is a card game where you grow and trade beans, it's pretty simple and quick but my wife likes it and it's good for the casual gamer. Another cool thing about Bohnanza is it is designed by the same guy who made Agricola one of my favorite boardgames. My wife has agreed for us to add it to 'our' collection. 

A photo of myself, my wife Sharlene and her sister playing bohnanza while staying at their place in London.

Harry Potter SBG

We went to Oxford a few days back. One of the highlights was going to Christ Church College and seeing the great hall and stairwell where some of the first Harry Potter film was filmed.

That being said I never did get into the Harry Potter films although I loved the books while I was growing up and still appreciate them to this day. I also checked out a couple of games shops while we were there. Well only one actually as the other was closed but it was a neat little store.  

I love the writing up the top 'Games Puzzles Magic Juggling Science!' 

They had a great boardgames selection including Cthulhu gloom which I was tempted to get as I have been keen to pick up its original Gloom. Gloom is a pretty simple game which is fun for the whole family. The premis is, you have a family of misfits who you have to make really sad and die while making other people's families happy. Will Wheaton did an episode on Table Top once making it look like a bit of fun. I do worry that the black humoured nature of this game may not suit everyone as being psychiatric nurse tends to correlate with a greater appreciation for black humour that others may not share. 

As you can see on the photos the store claimed to sell second hand games. I talked to the sales lady who said they had a small collection but mostly just had games which look like they are old. The ol' sell new stuff to look like its vintage when you could just go to an op shop (they're called charity shops here).

In the end it was a great day in Oxford checking out where lots of posh people study. Just a disclaimer, I understand the title was a little misleading, I'm not aware of any Harry Potter SBG as of yet. Oh and the obligatory because this was written on my ipad the photos formatting will be off. 

We only ever make it to turn 8, a 7 player game of Eclipse.

Well as the title suggests whenever our gaming group plays Eclipse, one of my favourite boardgames at the moment, we only make it to turn 8/9. This is probably due to the epic proportions of the game, this particular game taking 6 hours! Yikes. This was due to multiple factors, trying to watch the All Blacks vs South Africa (which we won), teaching a new player, two players leaving during the game. Anyway I wont get into the nitty gritty as Eclipse just doesn't make for great session reports like Flames of War. If you haven't played before feel free to read a review of the ipad app I did which has an overview of the rules here. 

We played with some of the additions added by the expansion, most notably increasing the game to 7 players. However this didn't last as one of our players had to quit in turn 3 as mentioned above so we helped him bankrupt his society (this was our new player). Then around turn 5 or 6 Dan left so Chris played both Dans Orion Hegemony and his Rho Indri Syndicate who had formed an alliance earlier. Anyhow here is a shot of the starting set up...

Sorry Zac you got an action shot.

• The players and Races in order of play were: 
• Stephen (me), Enlightened of Lyra
• Zac, Machanema
• Ben, Hydran Progress
• Alex, Magellen
• Chris, Rho Inhri syndicate 
• Dan, Orion
• Matt, Humans. 

So the game went down something like this: During initial exploring some diplomacies started, and by turn two Dan and Chris formed and alliance a new component of the expansion. This was worrying for the rest of us as they were the combat races. They then swept through taking over alien hexes. Ben and I being Lyra and Hydran races best at turting kept to ourselves while Zac steadily expanded. Zac and I kept positive relations aware that we may need to team up to beat up Chris and Dans forming empire. I sublimed my mind to my shrine grid, a Lyra special abitily where I build shrines on my hexes, eventually giving me advantages. 

Finally combat broke out between factions, Dan and Chris attacked me, luckily Zac and I had formed an alliance by then so took them out together. Whew. 

Orion and Rho verses Lyra and Machenema

Things were getting hot but Zac and I had a pretty good defensive position, unfortunately our attempts to expand were not so successful but fun none the least. My Shrine system was going well giving me and extra disc first up (turn 4) and wormhole generator (turn 6), and I was having a lot of fun playing them. Ben as the Hydran was researching like a boss, he had filled all research tracks by turn 8! He was in a healthy position and conflict broke out between Zac and him but ended with neither being better off. I attacked the Orion and Rho alliance and got wasted, however this was more in order to keep them off my turf. Then the game ended. 

The end game shot

The game score looked like this

1. Machanema and Lyra allicance (Zac and I) both on 43 points.
2. Hydran on 42 points, very close
3. Magallen, 37
4. Orion and Rho alliance on 32
5. Humans, bankrupt. 

It was a pretty high scoring game in the end and I think we all enjoyed it. Having 7 players really added to the game, as did the expansion. The length was not so great, although we added in the fast play variant at the end having multiple players taking turns at the same time around turn 5. The rugby and Chris having to play for both himself and Dan slowed things down a bit. One of the best parts was I thought the Enlightened of Lyra, the race suited my play style and were a lot of fun to play with their special shrine grids. It is worth noting I was able to build a shrine per turn and if we had finished the game should have been able to finish with all 9 giving 12 VP. 

My shrine system

My player board end game. 

Once again can't be bothered editing this post so please excuse grammatical errors. 

Birthday aliens, tanks and drills.

Well its that time of year again where I grow a year older and get some sweet new toys. This year my dad got me a nice Bosch drill! Pretty happy with that, now I just need something to make holes in. I am also getting some tanks, priests, a thunderbolt and M4 mortars for my americans. I ordered (I order my own presents, its easier that way) from caliver books, they came within a week, not bad. However I ordered the rest from Wayland 3 weeks ago, all marked as in stock, and they haven't been posted yet. They sent some response a week back saying

Unfortunately the delivery from our supplier has had a slight delay, I have been informed that it should arrive by the end of next week.

Once this delivery arrives your order will be processed and shipped as soon as possible.

I apologize for any inconvenience caused.

Maybe they meant to say it the packaged got destroyed in transit.

However surely that means what was in stock was not. In the end it isn't a huge biggie as my Wife and I are going to Europe in less than 2 weeks so I would not have been able to paint them up anyhow. When I get back they should be safely posted to Dan's office. I might contact wayland again and give them a hurry up.

The other present I got was the expansion for Eclipse, Rise of the Ancients. It makes the already epic game even better. It adds quite a few elements, most notably however 4 new alien races. The Mallelan which are equivalent to humans and are on the back of their player boards the more specialist races. There are the Exiles a turtling race which specialises in defensive strategies; The Rho Indi Syndicate which are space pirates; and the shinny bug ninjas the Enlightened of Lyra who are a mix of a defensive race who can lash out at the end game effectively. This can increase the game from a 2-6 to 2-9 player game. This is pretty epic as even a 6 player game can take 4-5 hours, luckily they added a fast play variant involving two ridiculously large pawns so two players can take turns simultaneously.

New races

Large simultaneous play markers. 

The expansion box compared to the game box

We played a game last night and added in some of the extra features such as new research, warp sectors and Chris and I played a new race each. I played the Rho Indi Syndicate and Chris the Exiles. I using my superior pirate intellect decided to take over sectors in a straight line down the middle of the map leaving me exposed to, well, everyone... I was winning but everyone quite rightly teamed up and took me down to town, I mean blew me up. Still I came second although we finished on round 8/9 due to time. Humph. I think part of my problem is I don't like being mean and attacking other players first in Eclipse, next game I think I will play the Enlightened of Lyra so I don't need to worry so much about this. All in all I am pleased with the expansion as it adds quite a bit but doesn't change the game play dramatically.

I have organised to play some boardgames with some mates from around town and am hoping to play Arkham Horror and Eclipse on Saturday so will keep you all posted.