As per usual, it was a game lunch at work. I forgot to bring any games, but Bryan brought a few and the quickest one seemed to be...
Citadels 2-8 players
This
is the game that got me back into the tabletop hobby. That is, this is
the game that reminded me to get into the tabletop hobby now that I had a
regular paycheck. A co-worker brought it (the same one who brought it in this time) and a number of us played
it during the lunch periods. It's a great game. It's biggest plus is
that it can suit a gaming group of 2 to 8 and plays just as well with
any number. It doesn't hit the table as often since I have so many other
games to play, but it's a great go to in a pinch. In a game, there are 8 characters, each with different powers. Everyone
picks one character (in 2 or 3 player games everyone picks two) secretly
and passes the rest to the left. You use your characters powers to get more gold or districts or even you kill and rob other characters. You can't target
any player since you have to name the character not the player when you
put out the hit. The game ends when someone builds 8 districts and most
points from districts wins.
We had a four player game going and two of them were new to it. Everyone had a good go, except Carol. She was assassinated twice, had her hand swapped, and was very nearly robbed. We probably spent too much time setting up and explaining the game because we had to end early. Most of us had built 5 districts. I won, but I was running out of steam and I'm pretty sure Jason (Justin? dammit it's one of those!) would have won. Pretty soon we have to play games everyone's played so we can get to the meat fast.
After work Liz and I headed to the
Hawthorne Hophouse for food and more games.
Merchants 2-4 players
I
was on the search for small games that could be played in bars and
restaurants. I did a Google search on that and found
an article mentioning this game. I
had never seen it in any game shop so I ordered it from the Board Game
Geek Market.
In the game, you own a shipping company.You each start with two ships each with one of six goods (corn, fish, indigo, fur, lumber, and cotton). You also each start with a hand of 4 goods cards. Six more goods from the deck are placed out in an array. On your turn you can do two things. Your first action can either be swapping the goods on your boats, passing, or buying a special card. There are four special cards that make you more powerful (i.e. more boats, money, actions, or goods). Your second action can either be drawing two more goods cards or playing goods on the array to earn money. When you play goods, you can play as many as you like and cover whichever cards you want in the array. You and all the other players earn income based on what goods you have on your ships and how many cards there are in the array that match the goods you played. The game ends when the goods deck runs out and the richest player wins. The box shown is actually the box that comes in the box. It's a little weird. It should also be noted that I had to paint the fish cubes to be a lighter blue so they didn't match the indigo cubes so closely.
It has been a long while since we played this. Our game was pretty neck and neck, but near the end my bonuses from the special cards started kicking in and I was able to jump in the lead.
We both like it. It's a good game, but there is something about it that keeps it from being a great game. You do have to think out your options and it plays quick and casually, but the special cards are limited which makes the beginning of the game a mad dash to get something good before it's gone and the second half a game about planning your goods well. If the game were any longer it would probably drag, so it's nice they made it short and sweet. I just wish the special cards gave you more strategy than Gimmie Gimmie Gimmie!
Gloom 2-5 players
Yup.
This is a gloomy card game. You are a family of 5 that has a number of
calamitous things happen to them. You play cards that effect the moral value of your or other
players family members. The cards usually make them more depressed, injured, or dead. As soon
as one persons entire family is dead, the game ends. The family with the
lowest moral value on all it's dead members wins the game. Morbid, huh? The most
interesting thing about this game is that all the cards are clear. So
when you play a card on a family member, you might cover up certain
values, but leave other values visible from cards lower in the stack.
It's utterly unique and makes choices tough when you want to get rid of a
positive value on your dog, but the only card you have that will cover
it will cause you to lose that extra card bonus you have. There is
flavor text on each card that can be ignored, but I find the game is a
bit more "lively" if you continue the saga of each members depressing
tale as you play the cards.
This is not the box this game comes in either. It actually comes in a small tuck box, but I needed something better that would hold my two expansions and not be as annoying to use when cleaning up and putting the game way. I like what I made.
Liz isn't gangbusters for this one so it doesn't pop out too often. It can be hard to read the cards in low light and she says she doesn't quite grasp the strategies. After this game, I thinks she's warmed up to it. She was playing really well and started out with some great plays. She did a great job at ruining her family's lives while improving mine. I was able to catch a second wind and made a run at killing off my family. Liz only killed three members, but they were worth a lot. I had two good ones and the rest were nothing very notable. I won, but it was pretty close. If she warmed up enough, I might be able to actually use an expansion sometime.
Tally: 49/152 Bonus: 12/50
No comments:
Post a Comment