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Board Games (Reviews, Rules, Regulations, Random)


The Gnat

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8 hours ago, HorizontoZenith said:

Where do you guys find people to play these games with?  I've been trying to find enough players to play The Thing: Infection at Outpost 31 and I've got exactly two other people who want to play.  Also, has anyone played it yet? 

I have a bunch of friends who are board game nerds, so that helps, including someone who works for Fantasy Flight and was part of the Legion design team.

Depending on where you are at, I'd look for local conventions. A lot of them have board game rooms or sections, and that would give you a chance to meet people who are interested in playing games. Or if you have a local game shop that would be another spot. A lot of those places have spots to play games, so with the friends who are interested, go play games there and meet other people. 

 

10 hours ago, titansNvolsR#1 said:

Been playing Gloomhaven for past couple weeks. I'm going with the scoundrel and happened to draw the "Collect 200g" card. Friends have been pissed since I've been snagging every gold coin on the board and forgoing battling at times. Or play slow and waited til they took out a room then swept in with my loot cards.xD I want to tell them I'm not doing it to be an a-hole, but I'll let them figure it out once I've retired Scabby the Scoundrel. 

We haven't run across the Collect 200g card. We had one player start playing the Scoundrel, then we had the Tinkerer (whom I'm playing) and Cragheart. It's an interesting team, the Scoundrel has been retired, and I should be retiring the Tinkerer soon.

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15 minutes ago, The Gnat said:

We haven't run across the Collect 200g card. We had one player start playing the Scoundrel, then we had the Tinkerer (whom I'm playing) and Cragheart. It's an interesting team, the Scoundrel has been retired, and I should be retiring the Tinkerer soon.

We’re rolling Cragheart, Scoundrel, Tinkerer, and Spellweaver. Only completed 3 scenarios so far. 

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26 minutes ago, titansNvolsR#1 said:

We’re rolling Cragheart, Scoundrel, Tinkerer, and Spellweaver. Only completed 3 scenarios so far. 

I'm not going to go with the Spellweaver next, but I am really tempted to try that one at some point in time. However, I get to open the character with the music note, and I already know I want to try that one to see what it is.

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Retired my Gloohaven character yesterday and got a fun new one, with music note one. I went from playing a character that had been someone support and ended up being a ton of damage and then went to a character that is 100% support, but it's a great support character and can really control the battlefield in a fun way. It is Bard in flavor and I have an interesting objective for retirement that I can control how quickly or slowly it goes.

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48 minutes ago, MathMan said:

question for the gamers: How do you decide when to retire a character?

In Gloomhaven specifically?
When you start a character you are given two cards with a notebook on back, those have retirement conditions on them. Looking at both of them, you pick which retirement condition you want to aim for and keep that card. Then when you hit that condition, once you've completed the scenario, you go back to town and retire the character. You do this immediately, so you don't end up playing more scenarios with a character who is ready to retire as this progresses along some storyline pieces that might influence your decision.

Also, here's a decent write-up on the Tinkerer if you're interested in knowing how a character plays or how someone else has been playing that character: http://nerdologists.com/2018/05/gloomhaven-characters-tinkerer/

It does have spoilers.

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2 minutes ago, MathMan said:

thanks @The Gnat.

i didnt realize there were retirement conditions.

i assumed it was up to the player.

i dont really game (except solo games) but i like to follow the conversation

Yeah, there are a lot of fun/random conditions that you can have to retire a character. 

I'd say that Gloomhaven might be worth picking up to Solo game. It will take you a while, but you could get through it, and I've heard it's a very good solo gaming experience.

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5 hours ago, The Gnat said:

I'd say that Gloomhaven might be worth picking up to Solo game. It will take you a while, but you could get through it, and I've heard it's a very good solo gaming experience.

If it weren't for the $200 price point, that might make sense. Keep hoping it drops down to something a bit more reasonable.

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Just pulled up the Amazon read out on it (cheapest is $199 with free shipping, others have lower price but $25 shipping) and discovered the following:

  • Product dimensions: 16.2 x 7.5 x 11.8 inches
  • Item weight: 20 pounds

I'm waiting for the first murder mystery where the game box is the weapon.

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16 hours ago, Woz said:

If it weren't for the $200 price point, that might make sense. Keep hoping it drops down to something a bit more reasonable.

I think it's between prints right now too, so the price is higher. Generally, I believe, when in print and it should be getting stocked again soon it's $140-150, which is a decent drop. I look at it this way when I've played it (and if you're playing with two other players it'll work out similar math wise). Already at this point we've combined put 90 hours into the game, so our entertainment is about $1.67 per hour. I would say that we're maybe a quarter of the way through the game, so if you figure a combined 360 hours, that's very cheap entertainment, way cheaper than a sporting event or movie. And that's just for playing through it once. I think there's a chance, maybe not immediately, but not long once we're done, that I'll replay the game just by myself. It's a game that is well done enough so that it's worth the initial investment, I think. And if you can find two other people (I don't think I'd play with 4 players) and split the initial cost, that's a whole lot more reasonable way than one person purchasing it.

The product is huge for sure, when my box showed up, it said 22# for the shipping box, game box, and everything. That's part of why it's so expensive, obviously, and there are a number of miniatures, which are expensive to produce. Now, I will say, if you don't have that kind of scratch, there are other solo games as well that are fun. The Arkham Horror LCG is a lot of fun, and a much cheaper entry point, and if you want something with some more combat and minis, Mansions of Madness 2nd Edition can be solo played (but that will add up if you get expansions). Also the Dresden Files Cooperative Card Game has some nice solo play in it, and there are so many more that are cheaper. But Gloomhaven is an epic game in an epic box.

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On 5/25/2018 at 12:48 AM, HorizontoZenith said:

Where do you guys find people to play these games with?  I've been trying to find enough players to play The Thing: Infection at Outpost 31 and I've got exactly two other people who want to play.  Also, has anyone played it yet? 

For me, it started with my family.  Some of them were into strategy games and such, so we play when we get together.  That led to me talking about it with people i'm closer to at work, and some of them displayed interest.  So now i host game nights a few nights/year with those people.

Sometimes you get gamers in people you don't expect.  There's a couple we game with occasionally who are very sporty, into the night life on occasion, etc.  Just have to ask around.

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I'm going through my board games as I need to move them from the office to the basement so that my wife can move crafting supplies from the future nursery to the office. I was able to get rid of 17 games. There is only one that I'm waffling on getting rid of right now, which is Smash Up. It's a fun game, but we never get it to the table, and it's a game that has a ton of expansions for it. Beyond that, I culled Dominion and Power Grid as the other two big name games from the collection. We have friends who have all of Dominion/Expansions, so I don't feel the need to keep it, and I have other deck builders that I prefer and probably will get more deck builders, like Legendary: Buffy, Legendary: Big Trouble in Little China, or Legendary: Firefly sometime soon since I can play those solo. I guess we're also getting rid of Cards Against Humanity as well. That's a game that once you've played it a few times, you don't need to play it again, because you always play it for a while, so you have seen so many of the jokes, especially with just the base set.

I'm also sorting game as I go through stuff as well and putting silica gel packs into my games. I think right now I have 8-9 games that I can play solo, that was the first category that I split it into it, then I'm going to sort down my collection further, so when we have board game nights I can find the games that can handle a larger group of people easily or find games of the weight that I feel like playing at that point in time. It's fun to pull out the whole collection and see everything that I have. There are a lot of games.

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53 minutes ago, The Gnat said:

I guess we're also getting rid of Cards Against Humanity as well.

Good decision.  This game, and all the other games that copy Apples to Apples, are terrible.  They're not funny, and get boring after about 10 minutes. /rant lol

Surprising you're getting rid of Power Grid.  Never play it?

Not as surprising to get rid of Dominion.  Especially if your friends have it.  It's not a game you can play with newbies, because there's definitely an advantage to having played it.  And newbies will hate you pretty quickly into the experience.  I hate playing it with my brother and sister-in-law because they know what card combinations to go for.  I can figure it out half way through, but at that point the game is over.  

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1 minute ago, theJ said:

Surprising you're getting rid of Power Grid.  Never play it?

I've played it a few times, it was fun, but doesn't get to the table, and with other games that I have, I don't see it getting to the table again.

8 minutes ago, theJ said:

Good decision.  This game, and all the other games that copy Apples to Apples, are terrible.  They're not funny, and get boring after about 10 minutes. /rant lol

100% agree.

8 minutes ago, theJ said:

Not as surprising to get rid of Dominion.  Especially if your friends have it.  It's not a game you can play with newbies, because there's definitely an advantage to having played it.  And newbies will hate you pretty quickly into the experience.  I hate playing it with my brother and sister-in-law because they know what card combinations to go for.  I can figure it out half way through, but at that point the game is over.  

Agreed with this, and it's also a game that fakes theme and once you get into it, you realize that it doesn't matter what the cards say their name is, it could really say anything. And there's just the strategy of only buying money to win the game and that just makes the game dull, even with the expansions.

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