Non-video games

[Gormongous]

The problem with our group was not that people were "role-playing" too much. It was the opposite. People just seemed generally disinterested or just confused as to what they were actually supposed to be doing. We basically didn't get past the "first round problem" as you call it until at least three or four people had already been killed.

 

I suppose that this could be attributed to factors such as group size and the players came from two or three different groups of friends who did not know all of the other players very well, if at all, but it sort of killed this kind of game for me. At least the more free-form camp fire version.

 

Honestly, that's a problem I have with the Resistance games, too. The first round is always going to be a wash, because there's no reason to reveal any information yet and no way to know anything otherwise. In my regular group, it's gotten to the point where we all just joke about who looks trustworthy, but there's always one person who doesn't understand the stakes or doesn't take it seriously.

 

Maybe that's why I'm stumping so hard for One Night Ultimate Werewolf, because its time constraints really do obviate any kind of player listlessness. Once everyone figured out that they need to talk to win and that the worst possible consequence to saying something is not being believed for ninety seconds more, until the game ends one way or another, it seemed to draw everyone out of their shell. I definitely don't think that hidden-traitor games are a solved design problem, contrary to what you read if you look anywhere online for reviews of Ultimate Werewolf: Ultimate Edition in particular, but speaking as someone who used to check out books from the library as a kid based entirely on page count, I'm surprised how well a really brutal time constraint makes ONUW's flaws not really matter.

[taterdactyl]

Anyone here ever been to Gen Con? It's a 4-day gaming convention (primarily tabletop games) in Indianapolis and it's a blast! I fell in love with BattleTech there last year. I've seen a few mentions of Resistance: Avalon, so I'm going to have to check that out this year... which is just three weeks away! Doing a little jig over here because I'm so excited.  

 

Back to the quick game recommendation... Some friends of ours brought over Superfight! recently. It's kind of like Cards Against Humanity, except you're playing cards that will "battle" against each other and you have to convince everyone why you would win. Being able to argue it out definitely makes it more interesting. We played that as our warm-up game before Dungeon. Munchkin is also fun, though I'm sure it's already been mentioned.

[Bjorn]

Dang, my local game store did not have One Night Ultimate Werewolf in stock.  But we did actually have a game night, so that was still cool.  Got in a game of Bang!, which I almost never get to play but really like.  That was short though, the Sheriff and deputy got hosed on where they were sitting compared to the two outlaws.  And played Lords of Waterdeep, with an expansion for 6 players.  It drug on way longer than it should have because of 2 incredibly indecisive players, but was still really fun even with that.  It's one of those worker/agent placement games, where every round you have a number of agents you can place on various buildings that either gain resources for you, or let you take different actions.  It feels like the most refined version of one of these games I've played, where there are multiple winning strategies that people can employ, instead of everyone fighting over just one or two dominant things. 

[Merus]

Lords of Waterdeep is pretty great, although I think that the dominant strategy is to complete quests. But even when everyone at the table understands that's the way to win, it's still a lot of fun.

[Bjorn]

I may have had an oddball first experience, my lord card rewarded me for owning buildings, so I focused on that and managed to own 5 of the10 buildings by the end of the game.  I only completed 3 quests, but was able to rack up victory points through people using my buildings and trading in workers to get VP at another building.  Ultimately I came in second to someone quest chasing, but only lost by 3 points.  There was definitely some luck involved in player seating, as the player right ahead of me kept securing the First Player token, so I got to go early without having to expend any resources to do it. 

[tberton]

Lords of Waterdeep is pretty great, although I think that the dominant strategy is to complete quests. But even when everyone at the table understands that's the way to win, it's still a lot of fun.

 

This seems like an odd statement to me, equivalent to saying that the dominant strategy in Catan is to collect resources. How else could you win Waterdeep other than completing quests?

[Merus]

This seems like an odd statement to me, equivalent to saying that the dominant strategy in Catan is to collect resources. How else could you win Waterdeep other than completing quests?

 

There is a lot of truth to that, but our table took a while to understand that because there's lots of victory point resources from things other than quests that we were misled into thinking they were good sources of VPs and not a little bonus for letting yourself be distracted from finishing quests.

[Bjorn]

I can't remember the name, but I've played another game that is close to identical to Lords of Waterdeep mechanically, but without the quests.  And in it, there were some strategies and resource bottlenecks that allowed a couple of players to really lockout almost everyone else from being able to make serious progression.  Short of loading someone down with mandatory quests, I didn't really see any strats for how that would work in Waterdeep, as it seems better balanced.  But of course that's based on just one game of it, versus having played several games of the game whose name I can't remember. 

[TheLastBaron]

I can't remember the name, but I've played another game that is close to identical to Lords of Waterdeep mechanically, but without the quests.  And in it, there were some strategies and resource bottlenecks that allowed a couple of players to really lockout almost everyone else from being able to make serious progression.  Short of loading someone down with mandatory quests, I didn't really see any strats for how that would work in Waterdeep, as it seems better balanced.  But of course that's based on just one game of it, versus having played several games of the game whose name I can't remember. 

 

It's probably not what you're thinking of, but Lords of Waterdeep is very similar to Caylus.

 

I found Lords of Waterdeep alright, it's certainly a perfectly serviceable worker placement game, but it didn't really stand out to me amongst the field of other worker placement games that are out there when I played it.  Also I thought the mandatory quests only made the game worse/less enjoyable to play.  I only played a few games of it right when the game first came out, so 2-3 years ago, and all the games were with 3 people so maybe if I played it again now with more people I'd like it more.  It's also worth pointing out that in general I'm not a huge fan of any worker placement games (I don't dislike them and I have and will play them).

[Apelsin]

I really recommend Guild Hall!

http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/132372/guildhall

 

It's a card game where you are trying to complete sets of proffesions in your Guild Hall. To complete a profession you need to place 5 versions of that profession card into your guild hall, one of each color. Once a set is completed it can later be used to purchase victory point cards, which constitute the winning condition.

 

Each profession card has a effect that is activated when it is brought into play, which is improved depending on how many instances of that card you already have in your Guild Hall. If a player plays the "Dancer" card for instance, s/he will be allowed to draw as many cards into his/her hand as s/he has Dancer cards in his/her Guild Hall.

 

Combining the different effects from the cards in order to reach victory(!) is quite fun, and there are quite a few ways to annoy other players.

I think we may have played with the expansion though, which adds a few more professions to the mix.

[Erkki]

I played Mansions of Madness again after a long while. It's still kind of awesome and a bit shit at the same time. The rules are kind of badly structured like many Fantasy Flight games and there's just so much stuff to keep track of (as the Keeper) that I completely forgot to make investigators do sanity checks when encountering monsters. I only managed to get one player's sanity down enough for serious traumas, thanks to setting most of the map on fire. Even with the players mostly sane, though, I still won, although I wasn't sure I would in the middle of the game. I managed to kill two investigators and when one of the two remaining failed a dexterity check and dropped his weapon fighting the end-boss, we decided that there's no point playing to the end since they have no chance (it was kind of late already and everyone was sleepy). At the end it definitely seemed that at least that particular variant of the story was easier for the keeper, while in the middle I was sure I was going to lose when my key monsters were being destroyed with some lucky one-hits. That kind of reversal of fortunes is awesome about the game, but also prone to leave that impression of unbalance.

 

Listening to the "RPG Dungeon" soundscape on http://mynoise.net/ while playing was pretty cool.

[Bjorn]

I played Mansions of Madness again after a long while. It's still kind of awesome and a bit shit at the same time. The rules are kind of badly structured like many Fantasy Flight games and there's just so much stuff to keep track of (as the Keeper) that I completely forgot to make investigators do sanity checks when encountering monsters.

 

Yeah, I'm split on MoM.  I've only ever run Keeper on it, and have ended up treating it more as a collaborative story telling session rather than a truly competitive game (though I've never told the players that).  I try to push the players as hard as I can, without actually causing them to reach a fail state.  I don't really enjoy a win with it very much as keeper for some reason, so it's a lot more satisfying to deliver a fun adventure for friends than it is to really push to win.

 

The best ending we've ever had was with my wife, daughter and another friend playing.  Their victory condition was to escape the mansion after having solved the mystery.  My wife was the last one out, on their final turn to escape, and she only had one movement point to spare when she reached the front door. 

[YoThatLimp]

Anyone here ever been to Gen Con? It's a 4-day gaming convention (primarily tabletop games) in Indianapolis and it's a blast! I fell in love with BattleTech there last year. I've seen a few mentions of Resistance: Avalon, so I'm going to have to check that out this year... which is just three weeks away! Doing a little jig over here because I'm so excited.

 

Back to the quick game recommendation... Some friends of ours brought over Superfight! recently. It's kind of like Cards Against Humanity, except you're playing cards that will "battle" against each other and you have to convince everyone why you would win. Being able to argue it out definitely makes it more interesting. We played that as our warm-up game before Dungeon. Munchkin is also fun, though I'm sure it's already been mentioned.

 

I've always wanted to go,but it looks to be pretty expensive, don't you end up paying to play?

[undermind9]

Anyone here ever been to Gen Con? It's a 4-day gaming convention (primarily tabletop games) in Indianapolis and it's a blast! I fell in love with BattleTech there last year. I've seen a few mentions of Resistance: Avalon, so I'm going to have to check that out this year... which is just three weeks away! Doing a little jig over here because I'm so excited.

i had never realized there was a con like this so close.  i'd be interested in learning more about it, the website requires an account that i am not prepared to make just yet.

 

perhaps next summer i can convince the wife i need a solo vacation to indy...shes not too keen on most table (or video) games

[osmosisch]

Just tried Thunderstone Advance. Ugh. It takes the elegance of Dominion's deckbuilding and turns it into a confused mess. Its stated playtime is 45 mins and should probably be doubled at least for upwards of 3 players, especially the first plays because all the rules questions that crop and the nonintuitive things you need to do (like go lose to monsters on purpose to thin your deck).

[Merus]

That's weird, because I think base Thunderstone is pretty good.

 

I've had the same experience with Mansions of Madness; a keeper win feels like a damp squib, I think partly because it's often fairly sudden. Does the keeper have a way to fulfil their objective? Only the keeper knows on any one turn.

[Nachimir]

I may have had an oddball first experience, my lord card rewarded me for owning buildings, so I focused on that and managed to own 5 of the10 buildings by the end of the game.  I only completed 3 quests, but was able to rack up victory points through people using my buildings and trading in workers to get VP at another building.  Ultimately I came in second to someone quest chasing, but only lost by 3 points.  There was definitely some luck involved in player seating, as the player right ahead of me kept securing the First Player token, so I got to go early without having to expend any resources to do it.

 

Pretty sure I've drawn the same Lord and won, but had to supplement it with a few big quests. Building ownership is one thing, but IIRC it also made sense to use the resources I could get from them/other people using them.

 

I found Lords of Waterdeep alright, it's certainly a perfectly serviceable worker placement game, but it didn't really stand out to me amongst the field of other worker placement games that are out there when I played it.  Also I thought the mandatory quests only made the game worse/less enjoyable to play.

 

I think the mandatory quests are one of the favourite things of the group I played this with. They tended to make late appearances once strategies and leaders were more visible. Sometimes they just irretrievably stop someone who'd otherwise win, but I've also seen people fight past mandatory quests magnificently.

[osmosisch]

That's weird, because I think base Thunderstone is pretty good.

The base? I think it's even worse than Advance, so in that sense I guess it's OK.

[Merus]

Let's be fair here, I hate most deckbuilding games. The idea of having to trash cards - getting rid of perfectly good cards - is anathema to me; I hate doing it, and I hate being forced to do it, so generally I enjoy deckbuilding games that are balanced around players not trashing their cards. I think Thunderstone's XP-upgrading mechanic is a good way to have decks get stronger over time without it being 'trashing'. Puzzle Strike's probably better, but there's a big conceptual hurdle to get over with Puzzle Strike, with the gems both in the gem pile and your hand, that makes it a little frustrating to play.

[osmosisch]

In that case, it's amusing that the breaking strategy for base Thunderstone is to spend your first 5 turns trashing your basic dudes.

But yeah we have very different tastes in deckbuilding then. I love thinning my deck. Ascension and Star Realms are among my favourites for that reason.

[Erkki]

Wow, you suddenly made me realize that I miss Ascension. I used to play it with only certain people, and I always claimed to not like it very much (but maybe secretly did), then later started playing it on iPad and started to like it more. Since my previous iPad got stolen months ago, I haven't played it at all and now I'm suddenly thinking of buying a physical version to play with some guys I play Dominion with.

[Gormongous]

Wow, you suddenly made me realize that I miss Ascension. I used to play it with only certain people, and I always claimed to not like it very much (but maybe secretly did), then later started playing it on iPad and started to like it more. Since my previous iPad got stolen months ago, I haven't played it at all and now I'm suddenly thinking of buying a physical version to play with some guys I play Dominion with.

 

Not to dissuade you, but Ascension is a lot less charming in physical form. There's a lot of really fiddly upkeep that made the game much less enjoyable for me, to the point that I was shocked to hear the popularity of the iPad port, until I saw how it did away with it all.

[TheLastBaron]

I actually really like Thunderstone (haven't played it for a while and I don't know what's different in Advance) and I really dislike Dominion. I own Dominion and never ever play it because I find it so boring and solitary. I found Thunderstone a lot more engaging, though I know there are some cards in Dominion expansions that make it more interactive.

I think my main problem with any deck-building game is that I'm a huge fan of card games like Magic where you can draft decks and deck building games come really close to giving me the same feeling, except then that's the whole game so instead of building a deck and then playing with it you build a deck and the game ends. It always just feels a little empty to me on its own and maybe I like Thunderstone more because the whole adventuring and fighting monsters and leveling up distracts me from that.

Speaking of drafting, I saw that Netrunner was adding drafting a while ago. Has anyone tried it? That might be the thing that finally gets me into Netrunner if it's done well.

[tberton]

I haven't tried Netrunner drafting, but it seems fun. It's expensive though. I will say that if you're on the fence about trying Netrunner, you should just hop over that fence and play.

[miffy495]

Back to the quick game recommendation... Some friends of ours brought over Superfight! recently. It's kind of like Cards Against Humanity, except you're playing cards that will "battle" against each other and you have to convince everyone why you would win. Being able to argue it out definitely makes it more interesting. We played that as our warm-up game before Dungeon. Munchkin is also fun, though I'm sure it's already been mentioned.

 

My girlfriend is fascinated by fanfiction stuff (and is currently working on a proposal for a thesis based around it) so I picked up a similar game for her. It's called Slash. The judge draws a character from popular culture, and the other players need to select another character from their hand to form a romantic pair with the judge's. In the boring normal game, the judge then just picks the funniest pair. In the real game for people who like to have fun, each proposed pairing must be accompanied by a synopsis of the romantic relationship between the player's proposed match and the judge's character, from how they met to their relationship's ultimate fate. Hilariously fun if you get the right group for it.