RThorp said:

---

Azariah said:

---

RThorp said:

---

I have not tried Star Wars Destiny. Does it have a draft format?

---

As of December it does. I'm going to a draft in town tonight.

---

Nice! I'd be willing to try and pick it up for draft format.

---

I run a game shop out of my house in Kingwood, so I have plenty of Destiny for you. I'd be happy to show you the game sometime. Maybe at a Starbucks or even up at Ettin. You probably would want to learn the rules before you jump into drafting.

Azariah said:

---

RThorp said:

---

Azariah said:

---

RThorp said:

---

I have not tried Star Wars Destiny. Does it have a draft format?

---

As of December it does. I'm going to a draft in town tonight.

---

Nice! I'd be willing to try and pick it up for draft format.

---

I run a game shop out of my house in Kingwood, so I have plenty of Destiny for you. I'd be happy to show you the game sometime. Maybe at a Starbucks or even up at Ettin. You probably would want to learn the rules before you jump into drafting.

---

Rules are for non-force users! Haha a meet up at Ettin sounds good. I'm not sure if I'll be able to make my way there this weekend but plan on a trip there in the next two weeks for sure.

For anybody into miniatures...gotta check out this guy's page. Quite literally jaw dropping.



https://www.facebook.com/ryan.devoto/photos

I played my first game of Rising Sun this weekend. I really enjoyed it. I loved the poker aspect of war, the Puerto Rico style mandate selection and the variable player powers. I played the Koi clan and the others played Turtle, Dragonfly and Bonsai. This is also the order of finish. I have read a bit only and have seen some complaints in balance, and because of that I did not offer Fox clan for the initial play.

The one thing I kind of regret is we have a player who is really bad at analysis paralysis and i discouraged her from playing the Lotus clan on this first play. I do think Turtle and Koi had a much clearer path to victory and that is also why we finished 1st and 2nd. For this game, and most games, we learn the rules beforehand, but the various cards are still a mystery. So not knowing what the 2nd and 3rd season cards were like probably set the Bonsai player back quite a bit.

I finished with a 3 point lead over Turtle, 10-15pts on Dragonfly and 20-30 over Bonsai. The negotiations and bluffing led to some fantastic moments, including my wife getting incredibly pissed at me and starting to act fairly childish. I couldn't say much in the moment, but for the last two days have blasted her for the way she acted. This morning was quite fun bringing it up again and suggesting she reach out and apologize to the other couple. May not sound as funny, but it is/was.

Highly recommend.

Fleff said:

---

The negotiations and bluffing led to some fantastic moments, including my wife getting incredibly pissed at me and starting to act fairly childish. I couldn't say much in the moment, but for the last two days have blasted her for the way she acted. This morning was quite fun bringing it up again and suggesting she reach out and apologize to the other couple. May not sound as funny, but it is/was.

Highly recommend.

---

Clearly you have a different relationship with your wife than I have with mine. Blasting my wife for behaving poorly during a board game would lead to her never playing again, a divorce, or both. What is your secret sensei?

I set a very low bar from the beginning, but i probably need to change my wording. Good natured ribbing, or needling would probably better reflect what I did.

Played Castles of Mad King Ludwig last night. Awesome game and very surprised. Has some strategy elements similar to Ticket to Ride and a low learning curve.

If there's anybody in Austin interested, I'm looking to clear out a few games from my collection. On the chopping block: Twilight Imperium 3rd ed (opened but not played!), Smallworld, Princes of Florence, Traders of Genoa, Munchkin Deluxe, Power Grid (first edition I believe), Imperial Settlers, and Netrunner (base game only). Email my handle @ gmail if interested.

There is a copy of Star Trek Catan at the College Station Half Priced Books for $50. I would have picked it up but the wife was with me. Hard to say it was an accident when she is there to witness. It's not much different from the original, but the secondary online market has it valued at over $100.

Any board game players in here Dallas? More up near the Frisco/Colony area.

Crystal Blue Meth said:

---

Has anyone used tabletop simulator on steam? If you're unfamiliar, it is basically a way to play board games with other folks on the internet. There is a sandbox mode where users have re-created popular board games (think basics like uno, scrabble, spades, in addition to newer games like Betrayal at House on the Hill, secret hitler, gloomhaven etc.). I recently got it and it is pretty cool, although it did take 20 minutes or so to figure out the mechanics. Movement and camera angles can still be a bit of a struggle. Nothing beats playing in real life, but this definitely gives me that fix if I can't get a group together to play a specific board game.

There are definitely some legal issues to think about, but the creators have done a good job of pulling games (like marvel's legendary, pandemic, etc.) from the simulator when they get copyright claims.

---

I use it constantly to play SW: Destiny. They also have free mods for other FFG games like X-Wing, Armada, Imperial Assault, and Legion.

FFG is fully aware of the mods, but turns a blind eye towards any infringement. Legit resellers of Destiny run full, advertised tournaments on TTS. I imagine they understand how much it promotes their physical game.

Backed the Warfighter Pacific theater KS going on right now.

Really, really want to dip my toes into wargaming but very intimidated. Figured this would be a good starting point somewhat. Although, I do have Memoir '44 somewhere...Should probably start there overall.

To get to this level is the ultimate goal.

Memoir is indeed light on the wargaming side. If you'd like to go a little deeper with a thematic feel and more strategy (and a CRT!) you might look at Washington's War or Hannibal. Not quite hex and counter, but a great point to ease in.

First, there are many boardgames are listed on Amazon's Today's Deals. Can't promise that they are all really good savings, but there are tons of titles listed.

I also played Mansions of Madness for the first time this weekend. Really fun game, app integration is really good; however, it took us 3 hours to play the first scenario, which the app lists as 90-120 mins. Since it was the first time it probably took longer, and two of our players are slower, also looked up several rules as we played. I hope we can get it down but there is a lot of text to read and screens to navigate. I had my computer hooked up to a TV and thought that worked extremely well. Miniatures are crap though. Still, really enjoyed the experience, and can see myself buying all the expansions.

I have also played Spirit Island a few more times. Really enjoyed this cooperative game. Asymmetry really makes this game shine, highly recommend.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/kingswildproject/5-stack-a-chip-stacking-game-of-strategy-and-chanc-0/description

This game was designed by a friend of mine, not an Aggie though. I did however think that this is something that you guys might enjoy or at least find marginally entertaining.

Wyatt Earp is a great card game for up to 5 or so.

Pre-Holiday Bump

What have you played recently? What are you waiting on? Wish List for Santa? Backlog games you want to get off the Wall of Shame over the holidays?

The last year has seen some ups and downs.

Ups: Still rolling through Gloomhaven. Probably close to 50% done overall in terms of scenarios and characters completed. Just a great game overall. Will definitely leave a hole in our boardgaming life if/when we complete this for me and the wife.

Found my wife's favorite game to date in Dice Throne. It's basically Battle Yahtzee. Can't wait for Season 2 which will double the characters and provide a bit more complexity

Terraforming Mars is amazing solo and was pretty fun in my one time group play though a little too long.

Downs: Pandemic Legacy Season 2 was a huge bust for our group. And that's rating Season 1 as my top game. Not sure what happend but we flamed out towards the middle and just went through the motions the final few months. It hit such a bad note our group has only met up a couple times since we finished in mid-July lol. We're just now trying to get a regular meet going again.

Got a real time strategy game that I thought the group would enjoy in Kitchen Rush and turned out to be a bust with everyone.

Tried to play a campaign of 7th Continent which turned out terrible and was a bust for half of the group. Me and the other person who enjoyed it will have to try it on our own/.

Wall of Shame to tackle over the holidays: Spirit Island(still only gotten through a solo setup and a few turns played), Aeon's End, Memoir 44

Waiting on: Dice Throne Season 2, Detective City of Angels and Teotihuacan

javajaws said:

---

185 pieces of wood, some glue, and 6 hours later...FINALLY ready to unbox Gloomhaven!

---

I feel your pain, just put together the go7gaming set last month for Gloomhaven.

Boiling Denim said:

---

Pre-Holiday Bump

What have you played recently? What are you waiting on? Wish List for Santa? Backlog games you want to get off the Wall of Shame over the holidays?

The last year has seen some ups and downs.

Ups: Still rolling through Gloomhaven. Probably close to 50% done overall in terms of scenarios and characters completed. Just a great game overall. Will definitely leave a hole in our boardgaming life if/when we complete this for me and the wife.

Found my wife's favorite game to date in Dice Throne. It's basically Battle Yahtzee. Can't wait for Season 2 which will double the characters and provide a bit more complexity

Terraforming Mars is amazing solo and was pretty fun in my one time group play though a little too long.

Downs: Pandemic Legacy Season 2 was a huge bust for our group. And that's rating Season 1 as my top game. Not sure what happend but we flamed out towards the middle and just went through the motions the final few months. It hit such a bad note our group has only met up a couple times since we finished in mid-July lol. We're just now trying to get a regular meet going again.

Got a real time strategy game that I thought the group would enjoy in Kitchen Rush and turned out to be a bust with everyone.

Tried to play a campaign of 7th Continent which turned out terrible and was a bust for half of the group. Me and the other person who enjoyed it will have to try it on our own/.

Wall of Shame to tackle over the holidays: Spirit Island(still only gotten through a solo setup and a few turns played), Aeon's End, Memoir 44

Waiting on: Dice Throne Season 2, Detective City of Angels and Teotihuacan

---

Wow, impressive about Gloomhaven. We've played a couple of scenarios with the family so far. I'm enjoying it. Wife and I will probably start playing it often here soon.

Sorry to hear about Pandemic Legacy Season 2. We've got 2 months left and it's going pretty well for our group. Though I do agree that Season 1 is better.

I'm anxiously awaiting the arrival of Betrayal Legacy (releases today) which is a Legacy version of Betrayal at House on the Hill. This should be epic. A big benefit is also that you get to keep playing on your custom board game after the year is over.

If you like Betrayal, Mansions of Madness is also a great game and has a tablet app that's essentially your game master. We enjoy it as well. It's more complicated than Betrayal and takes longer but still fun.

We picked up Villainous the other day and played it with friends and it's actually a very cool game. It's based on the Disney villains but is a complex strategy game that's somewhat reminiscent of SmashUp along with some additional strategy game play. I would recommend it.

Some favorites we enjoy are Escape: Zombie City and Escape: Curse of the Temple. These are timed games (10 - 15 minutes) which are cooperative dice rolling games where you're trying to complete objectives and escape before the time runs out. We also recently played Fuse which is similar.

Another we keep pulling out to play is Splendor. It's a competitive kingdom building game where you're collecting coins and cards to build up your kingdom.

I'm sure there are a couple more, the wife and I have a large collection of games, but these are the ones that come to mind right now.

Anyone have any updates after Christmas? FFG has me going after the LOTR game and now this new Star Wars game.

Recently popped the shrink on Western Legends, really enjoyed it, but i feel like replayability may be limited. I also think it will excel at larger player counts and medium to long game. Plan to play it again this weekend.

Been really quiet these last 6 months.

Finally played the first scenario or Arkham Horror: The Card Game with some buddies Saturday night after picking it up months ago. Took a little while to get the flow down, then really enjoyed it. Our decks are garbage since we didn't know what to expect, but going to stick with them and build on them through the whole 3-scenario campaign. I think this is going to take me down a content rabbit hole.

Played Western Legends and Pandemic Legacy Season 2 again this weekend.

I like Western Legends, but it seems to be a game where you need to make it fun. What I mean by that if you try and play optimally you may be stuck doing the same three actions all game long, versus the fun of the game which is doing a bunch of different things. There are some cards that can help shake things up, which helps some.

Pandemic Legacy Season 2 is kicking our butts. I dread playing it to be honest.

Really interested to hear about Betrayal Legacy, Chronicles of Crime and Root, if anyone has been playing those.

Just found this thread thanks to dlance. Any Austin peeps in here interested in meeting up? The new Central Library has a ton of games.

There's a pretty active gaming scene in Austin, usually divided between the north and south groups. Board Game Bash in August is a great place to meet locals into the scene.

Grant,

Are you the guy that does the WOTR game day?

I am- Austin War of the Ring Day is my event. Should be our tenth this year!

Though I play a lot of other games, WotR is my favorite.

Ah, thought I recognized your name. My buddy Alan R has attended in the past. Been a while since I spoke to him about it though... he's a huge fan of WOTR and said you do it up right.

Small world! I saw Alan at BGG in November and got to teach him Great Campaigns of the American Civil War. Great guy to game with!

If you play WotR, come down with him this year. We put on a great event!

I've got the anniversary edition and about done painting my LOME figures. Played it quite a few times as well as BOFA. Used to play all the time with Alan when I was up in DFW. In Houston now, but still keep in touch with him. I think I was actually supposed to meet up with him at your place a few years back but got caught up at an ASL tournament.

He kinds of introduced me to war games... Napoleon's Triumph, Columbia series, Hannibal, etc.. not sure if I should hold that against him or thank him.

Anyway, I'll see if I can sync up with him and come out. Thanks for invite.

The Bloodborne boardgame Kickstarter starts tomorrow. There's a bonus for day one backers.

Finally got Middara after only 3 short years after pledging the kickstarter. Massive game. 4 sessions in and we've just beat the tutorial, and it's no pushover. Lots and lots of mechanics. Best description I can give is a JRPG makeover of gloomhaven complete with crazy stylized art, technomagic lore, and tentacle monsters

Kickstarter just canceled the projects that Kolossal had running, including one recently completed project. It looks like the policy of Kickstarter is only one project open at a time, including through to fulfillment. And while many companies don't abide by this, Kolossal had 8 project open, and possibly had two accounts under which they ran Kickstarters to mask the number of open projects.

I don't know if this has any long term effect on Kolossal or their outstanding projects, but it is not a good look, and also brings to light the Kickstarter policy and potential enforcement down the road. Other companies, like CMON are very Kickstarer friendly and make Kickstarter a lot of money, but also run multiple concurrent campaigns.

Bryan98 said:

---

The Bloodborne boardgame Kickstarter starts tomorrow. There's a bonus for day one backers.

---

It's up! It also appears that it's $10 cheaper today only. I thought they were saying there was an exclusive figure for early backers, but less money is even better.