escaping the factory...

yesterday was scheduled to be rio grande games factory manager, but unfortunately i felt that between a long day of work followed by that sport of the gods (why, yes, i am referring to bowling!), i knew that starting factory manager around 10 pm would mean another long haul night of games...

...not that there's anything wrong with that. but after gaming late every night all last weekend, i opted for something lighter and easier:

cartagena? yeah, that'll do.

the game takes it's inspiration from the 1672 jailbreak of pirates from the prison-fortress in cartagena, colombia.  the game uses cards to move pirate meeples through a passage from the prison to a sloop waiting to set sail.  the players objective is be the first to move all six meeples to the sloop.

playing this time are ed, sarah, and i! 

since the battery on my camera died, i had to rely upon the cell for pics.  i know the quality is "meh", but that really is ed's face!

the rules are pretty simple.  use the cards in your hand to move your pirate meeples to the next open space matching the symbol on the card (bottle of rum, cutlass, tricorn, jolly roger, jail keys, and flintlock pistol).  if the closest symbol has a pirate on it, you can leapfrog the symbol and place yours on the next open one.  

to get more cards, you can fall back to the last occupied symbol.  if there is one pirate there, you get to draw one new card.  if there are two pirates there, you get to draw two cards!  a symbol can never hold more than three pirates.  each turn every player gets to take three actions to move their pirates or collect new cards.  

smart cookies that they are, both ed and sarah picked up on the rules quickly.  

but in the end, they were just a bit short as i moved the last three of my pirate meeples into the sloop in one go, but they did have some constructive criticism about my playing style:

 of course that could have been the pabst talking...

today's game?  dominion.

moving ever more rapidly into the future...

no plan ever survives contact intact...

it's a mantra pretty much anyone that has ever served in any armed force knows, and it's particularly relevant here.

today's game was scheduled to be rio grande games' race for the galaxy.  unfortunately, we had five players and race only plays four.  so we decided to try out gmt games' dominant species.

if only we knew what we were in for at this point...

set 92,000 years ago, you control one of six different species evolving and trying to survive the rapidly approaching ice age.

boardgamegeek and the game itself claim that this one will take 180 minutes to play.  this is best case scenario where everyone knows the rules and how the many actions you can take interact.  when there are new learners (like me and pat j.), this game takes about five to six hours to play.

the initial set up is pretty straightforward as you can see in this pic:

but when you add the following actions:

and the fact that each player has four action points to spend among them, the board quickly gets to looking like this:

inevitably the object of the game is to collect the most victory points by becoming the dominant species in as many terrain types (sea, wetland, savannah, forest, jungle, desert, mountain, and due to the coming ice age: tundra) as possible all while fending off other species.  

because of the dynamic action selection each turn, and the fact that every action has serious repercussions and impacts on the board layout, long-term planning is nearly impossible.  hence the reference to "no plan ever survives contact intact".  

this game rewards the player who can quickly change their mindset and adapt to a constantly evolving environment and circumstances.  in other words, don't play this game if you suffer from "analysis paralysis" because someone will cut you.

here we are again, early in the game.  notice the happy smiles and the light streaming through the windows...

yet another early game pic.  see those pegs on the action panel?  that's why both travis and pat look so serious...

and finally:

notice the dark windows and the super serious expressions?  this $#!t is getting real!  of course this is about 4 1/2 hours in and after travis dropped a cataclysmic catastrophe on the board and pretty much wiped out most of my species. 

needless-to-say, i was not amused, but in all fairness, the name of the game is "dominant species" not "let's get together and sing kumbaya species".  

all things considered, it's a fun game, that needs just a slight tweak or two to the play and the game-end criteria to help it to play faster, yet retain the need for flexible planning.  

in the end it was travis who won the game, but at a much smaller margin than expected.  

thanks to alan, dave, pat, and travis (who wanted me to call him "bubba" in this post) for helping out with "30 games in 30 days"!  

tomorrow's game is scheduled to be rio grande games' factory manager, but due to the complexity and time requirement, there may be a substitution...  

stay tuned.

all images property of little mens. 

my cryx at adepticon 2011

jumped out to lombard this weekend for adepticon 2011.  got to see lots of old familiar faces from the gw days and reminisce.  keep an eye out here for some ideas for adepticon 2012!

had a chance to set my cryx models up on one of privateer press' sweet tables and take some pics (thanks felix!).  here they are in all their undead steampunk glory!

cryx 'jacks under the control of the war witch deneghra

deneghra, a reaper helljack, and some bile thralls

a cryx necrosurgeon and one of her stitch thralls supporting a unit of mechanithralls

 bile thralls shambling forward to spew their caustic spray on the enemy.

 

bonejacks ranging in front of advancing helljacks.  black iron and burning necrotite death comes for the enemy!

 the necrosurgeon looks on, ready to remake any of the destroyed mechanithralls.

mechanithralls pouring from a defensible position, their steam-powered fists ready to crush limbs and rend 'jacks!

dark and deadly bane thralls advance up the flank.

no ticket

actually, i'm lucky in that i do have a ticket...  a ticket to ride that is!

ticket to ride is a quick to learn card management game where your hand of cards help you build train routes across all of north america.  the challenge comes in that taking time to build a better collection of cards to claim routes gives your opponents the opportunity to claim the very route you want!

playing this one with me was adam, dave, jacob, and jeff. we got a bit of a late start due to a wedding i couldn't miss (congrats mike and mikey!) but wound up rollicking along pretty quickly.  unfortunately, that meant that i couldn't post this until the next day (as we wound up playing games from 9:30pm until about 3 in the morning!).  so there should be two posts for 03 april!

here we are after the first few rounds.  dave (red), jeff (blue), and adam (black) have started working the middle american routes, while jacob and i watch...

this is early in the middle game.  i'm still not on the map very much (i'm playing yellow), but notice that dave and jeff have started battling for the midwest, adam is working a midwest north/south route and claiming a nice long route from sault st. marie to montreal.  meanwhile, jacob (green) has started an unopposed run up the west coast. 

here are jeff and jacob looking so serious as they consider their next few moves...

...and here is dave mugging for the camera looking like he's caught a face full of cinders and dirty steam from a smokestack!

 

here's the end of the game.  it was a close run thing thing up until the end, with most everyone thinking they had a victory, but it was my last two routes (duluth to toronto and charleston to miami) and the fact that I had all of my destination tickets completed that put me over the top for the win and the longest route.  

all-in-all, it was a great game, and fun was had by all.  the general consensus is that ticket to ride is a great, lighthearted game that is easy to learn, challenging to play, and just cutthroat enough.  

next game up is rio grande games' race for the galaxy, a card game that chronicles your efforts as one of earth's colonies to settle the galaxy and build your galactic empire!

indiana jones and the last crusade is property of paramount pictures.  ticket to ride is property of days of wonder.  all other images are mine! 

this may the most foolish idea I’ve had in a while…

kicking off the first ever “little mens 30 games in 30 days” event is rio grande games' power grid.  one of friedmann friese’s most popular games, power grid allows the player to enter the exciting world of power generation!   

yep, that’s right.  you get to be the electric company.  trust me it's a lot more exciting than it sounds, and it's also funny to see how fast your friends become profit driven corporate power mongers...

at the heart of the game, you balance resources (your power grid, power plants, fuels, and cash) better than your opponents all while trying to provide service to a growing area on the map.  

for this game we used the benelux (belgium, netherlands, and luxemburg) map.

one thing i find refreshing about power grid is that one person taking the lead early in the game doesn’t automatically translate into victory at the end, and actually being in the last place can provide some pretty good advantages. 

here is jeff making sure his corporate profits dwarf those of exxon, while abi looks  a little concerned about her early map position.

thanks to jacob, jeff, and abi dubs for helping me out with kicking off “30 games in 30 days”!  you guys rock!  and congrats to jacob for winning the first game played!

tomorrow's game will be day's of wonder's ticket to ride, played in the evening at my place!

all images are mine save for that first one of the box cover, that's property of rio grande game.

who's the biggest fool of all?

that might just be me.  in order to push myself to post more, and to include some of my favorite board games, i've decided to document my descent into madness, aka "30 games in 30 days"


starting on 01 april, i will play a different boardgame everyday and post the evidence here for the world to see!  the schedule for the imminent insanity is below:

01 april:  power grid
02 april:  ticket to ride
03 april:  race for the galaxy
04 april:  factory manager
05 april:  dominion
06 april:  agricola
07 april:  beowulf:  the movie board game
08 april:  the settlers of cataan
09 april:  cold war:  cia versus kgb
10 april:  albion
11 april:  roborally
12 april:  alhambra
13 april:  fearsome floors
14 april:  chaos in the old world
15 april:  beowulf:  the legend
16 april:  red november
17 april:  carcassone
18 april:  puerto rico
19 april:  cartagena
20 april:  pirate's cove
21 april:  chinatown
22 april:  pandemic
23 april:  citadels
24 april:  mystery of the abbey
25 april:  colosseum
26 april:  memoir '44
27 april:  space hulk:  death angel
28 april:  clue
29 april:  mansions of madness
30 april:  tigris & euphrates

as i post the results daily, i'll also go ahead and include where the next game will be played (my apartment, black sun games, northside chicago game night, etc.)  if you want to be a part of the madness feel free to show up!