Castle Panic: Finally At The Table

A lot later than expected, and just a quick posting but I finally managed to get a game of Castle Panic in, and well it was awesome.

When I sat down to read through the rules, I knew that my first run through, tonights session, would be a solo affair and the rule book promised me quite a challenge. It wasn't kidding! The monster descended upon the walls of the castle pretty damn fast but despite the horde, all was was going reasonably well until I lost close to half of my walls and towers within the space of a couple of turns.

To say it was looking bad was an understatement.

Thanks to a couple of lucky draws, it didn't take too long to turn the tide of battle though, and a few turns later I had replaced all of the lost walls. Just a shame that I couldn't do anything about the lost towers.

The game kept pace from then on in up until a point where I had most of my walls wiped (again) with monsters continually being thrown into the same couple of arcs in some weird twist. Whilst this wasn't too bad from a strategic point of view, it did result in just under a third of the draw deck being useless for the better part of the game. Maybe that'll even out over time though.

This kind of flow, along with a fairly consistent pace (save a couple of surges) meant that victory came rather easily, but I can't help but think with how easily all of those walls fell early on into the game, combined with the fact that I only had two walls (one of which was reinforced mind) and one tower remaining, that this game has a lot of challenge left in it.

It's certainly no Elder Sign.

If you don't own it, buy it! Like Settlers, this is one title that should be in EVERY gaming collection.

Play Report: Shadows Over Camelot: The Card Game - Game #1, Quest #1

Well I have put a couple of posts up about it of late but, tonight marks my first time actually sitting down, breaking the seal and, playing me a game of Shadows Over Camelot - The Card Game.

Not having played the original board game, I couldn't tell you how they compare but speaking for the card game alone, I can say that it is well worth the money and, that despite the fact that I was playing solo, it was still tense.

For the purposes of a play report on a memory game, I decided to note down the cards once I had committed myself to a quest (because writing them all down as I went along would be cheating frankly). So here goes!

My first quest that I embarked upon was for Excalibur. It was a middle of the road quest, granting two swords if I was successful and I had seen a couple of high value Excalibur cards go down as I worked my way through the deck. I had seen a couple of high value Saxon cards pass too but Merlin effects where going to remove those (or at least so I figured), so this seemed like a fairly safe bet.

There was a Morgan card in play that forced me to count cards aloud as I played (which really messed with my mental count) but I felt pretty confident in my decision as her effects hadn't been in play too long and, I couldn't have lost track of what had passed by that much. Could I?

As it turns out, no, but it was close! One more point in the quest for Excalibur and it would have been a failure. Still, a win is a win and none of the other quests reached the failure threshold either, netting me two white swords and no black ones. A good start.

But what does the realm of Camelot have in store for our valiant knights and their new and shiny sword?

Play Report: Dominion - Intrigue

Life can be a balancing act at the best of times and, I sometimes think that the life of gamer is far more hectic than most, with the only folks that juggle more tasks we do being CEO's and parents.. And I'm really not sure about the CEO's.

So between my various projects, new games coming in, new games coming out, following blogs, writing a blog and, the various other gaming pots I have on the boil, I haven't got around to too much actual gaming of late. So when I got an invite in on a shop demo of Dominion and Dominion: Intrigue (that is, me demonstrating the game with a few other folks to the public at large) at my local friendly gaming store I jumped on the opportunity.

It was a chance to game and, writing it up would make for a great post. ;0).

Perfect.

All-in-all and, due to a late start, we managed to get three games in and boy was there ever contrast between them.

The first game was played with the base game and the base set-up that includes the Witch, which played a large part in the game. Of all of the players around the table, I was the only one not to invest in a Witch card, instead opting for Villages and Laboratories to play a my usual strategy of a fast cycling deck.

This did bite me more than once but luckily the one Chapel I took came around often enough to dump a lot of the Curses from my deck, so with my opponents going Witch heavy (cards which become far less useful once the Curse cards are depleted), I would say that "speed cycling" was definitely the way to go. I also picked up a lone Thief that I managed to bring to bare often with my build that I found to be quite useful.

The end result of the first game was a victory for me, which frankly I was surprised at but, hey, I'm not complaining. Mostly because I'd need to save all the moaning I could muster for the next match and, I wasn't alone.

The second game was a completely random draw from the base box and, honestly couldn't have been much worse!

The problem arose from having the Chapel in play as the only option that could be purchased for 2 but, no Witch. So it was pretty much useless. This was exacerbated by the fact that too many players went Thief heavy too quickly, leaving a couple of players (myself included) with only 4 Copper in our deck on more than one occasion.

The situation was best summed up by a friend at the table as being "A War of Attrition", and he couldn't have been more right. The game crawled along at best, with no player really making any headway. It sucked.

It sucked big time!

Thankfully though, our third game was a massive redemption. With one of our new players having just purchased a copy of Intrigue (how's that for the effectiveness of shop demos) and, wanting to break it open, we happily switched sets, giving me my first look inside the box.

Combining my initial impressions from the first game I have played of Intrigue with my experience as a Dominion player, I honestly have to say that given a choice between purchasing the two, I would take Intrigue any day of the week!

In fact, if I came to play the standard set after playing Intrigue I would be quite disappointed. That's the magnitude of the difference between the two sets.

It's hard to pin down but, I think what makes the difference is that Intrigue has a lot more going on. It is the first set that I have played that contains split victory cards. So, no longer do green cards simply block up your hand. Now they offer, Treasure, Actions and, the ability to draw more cards. Sometimes several of these!

Some of the cards included also offer greater strategic depth too, such as Ironworks. You can use it to take any card up to value 4 but, depending on the type of card you take, the Ironworks will have a different knock-on effect. For example, if you take a Treasure card, it gives you an additional 1 to spend on a buy this turn. Other options offer you additional cards or Actions and, considering that some of the cards out there now, like the Great Hall are both Actions and Victory cards, you can trigger multiple effects at once.

So, as you can see, there is a lot going on and, if you can buy only one copy of Dominion, I'd make it Intrigue.

The Torch Bearers Flame

Found this great play report in my feed this afternoon and just had to share it.

It really takes me back and reminds me of my first interactions with the hobby, when my elder brother patiently sat down with me and guided me through my first session of Warhammer: 40,000. It was also my brother who taught me how to play chess, bought and painted the copy of Warhammer Quest that we all (my niece, my nephew and, I) played with as youngsters and, whose copy of Dungeon! I received one summers holiday and just couldn't put down.

Many, many fond memories there, all still as vivid as the day they were created.

It's really great to see that the torch is being passed on from generation to generation.

Borador: "It's Worth How Much!"

Buffalo Castle has always been a go to solitaire adventure for me.

In the early days this was largely due to the fact that it was one of the only adventures that I happened to own. I had picked it up at the same time as the 5.5 rulebook from a second-hand book stall, Tunnels and Trolls products where hard to come by back then and, this was long before the days of DriveThruRPG.

I still love coming back to Buffalo Castle though. It's my training ground for new delvers and, an absolute classic of a dungeon hack. So with the creation of Borador in my last post, there was only one place I could send him. :0).

What follows is a play report of what I can only describe as being my most memorable experience among my many journeys here over the years yet. I didn't delve far (for reasons that will become quite apparent, pretty quickly) but, I'm pretty sure with what I managed to achieved in those few encounters I broke some kind of record. A personal record if nothing else.

The first paragraph of Buffalo Castle places you in front of the castle itself, with the option of picking up some useful items at a knock-down price. Admittedly, this was no use to me as I was flat broke but, hey, the offer was a nice touch. So with shopping out of the question, it came down to a straight choice between three doors and nothing to pick between them. So I chose left. What's the worst that could happen?

Well considering that in the very next chamber I entered after walking along a short corridor sat a troll on a treasure chest things weren't looking great. This is by all accounts the same troll that splattered the last Dwarf to come this way.

As I saw it negotiation wasn't really an option here and, given the animosity between the two kindreds it seemed unrealistic to hope for anything other than a bloody out come, so I figured, attack! Attack!! ATTACK!! Crossbow out in a flash, I took aim and unleashed hell.

Making the L2SR on DEX seemed like a sure thing with such a high value in DEX and 4+26 was certainly going to make a dent in the troll if not kill it outright. So I rolled. I rolled a 1 and a 2! Disaster! My bow string broke and the troll looked less than impressed. Crap!

Predictably the troll spent the next few rounds bashing Borador from wall to wall, all of which thankfully got soaked up by his armor. The spite damage was beginning to add up though and 4 rounds in he had lost 1/4 of his CON while the troll had only taken one pitiful flesh wound.

Enough was enough and Borador had taken more than his fill. Considering that I had little to lose in the way of defense, I opted for all out attack, throwing myself at the troll screaming, bleeding and, yelling general abuse the trolls way that brought into question its parentage.

Boy did that ever work!! In a complete reversal of fate, the troll only managed a measly CBT of 25 (after rolling 4 1's and a 2) compared to Borador's mighty 48.

BLAMM!!

After this point it was only a matter of a couple of rounds before the troll was mince meat.. Much like my crossbow (which I had pinned a lot of hopes on). Still, it could be repaired, so I decided to I would take it with me. Certain that the troll had to be guarding something of value, I opted to loot the chest, finding a jewel worth 300GP and, my successful ransack roll revealing a small pouch of rough cut crystals worth in the region of 120GP.

So, my first encounter hadn't been the walk in the park I had been expecting but it was at least worthwhile.

From here it was another straight up choice between two doors with nothing to pick between them. One to the north and one to the west. I figured that the heart of the castle probably lay ahead... So I decided to head west. After all, I didn't want to venture straight into the maws of something nastier than a troll just yet and, there could well be more treasure to be had around the outer walls.

The door here lead straight into another chamber and, straight into another fight! This time with a giant snake. Well, it was certainly no troll, combat was swift and brutal in the favor of our hero but, he took one nasty nick and that was all it took. This giant serpent was of the venomous variety and that one small wound was more than enough to get its poison cursing through Borador's veins.

The effects of the venom caused Borador to lose half of his STR for the rest of this adventure, which also translated to him losing half of his Combat Adds. So now I had lost more than a 1/4 of my CON, Half my STR, Half of my Combat Adds and, my Crossbow was little more than fancy firewood. Only two rooms in I decided it was time to retreat. Not before i ransacked the room however, which turned up a silver ring set with a cluster of small polished stones and a solid silver crown adorned with rubies.

Nice! with a combined value of 2,480GP the hell that Borador was being put through almost seemed worthwhile. It did lead me to question just where all these gems and pieces of jewelery where coming from but, being in such bad shape I figured I would look for answers when I was safely rested up at an inn or tavern somewhere, which hopefully wouldn't be too far away as the exit was within sight. Only a few more feet...

When another snake decided to rear it's scaly head. Sword still in hand, combat was a quick affair and it was then that Borador noticed something odd. This snake had swallowed something or, at least someone wearing it. There it was, a cheap brass brooch set with a kings ransom of turquoise stones worth something close to 13,505GP.

Amazing! This has to be far my biggest find in any random treasure haul, in any solo adventure that I have played to date. I still had the room to ransack too! Which not wanting to hang around to be attacked again, I cracked on with. This search turned up another small pouch, this time containing assorted variety of studs with a combined value of 3,520GP. Another great find!

So securing all of his loot Borador stepped back out into the daylight and prepared to begin the journey into town. He would now have to broker all of the gems for coin to help repay his clans debt, seek the help of an apothecary, find a place to rest and, of course replace that bow string. ;0).

Totting this up Borador managed to walk away with 104AP and the following:

4 Mithril Studs, each set with a medium piece of rough cut Onyx (520GP, 6WU Each).
6 Copper Studs, each set with 11 medium sized pieces of rough cut crystal (440GP, 56WU Each).
Brass Brooch set with 60 big rough cut Turquoise Stones (13,505GP, 605WU).
Jewel (300GP, 1WU).
Silver Crown set with 7 medium sized polished Rubies (2,110GP, 45WU).
Silver Ring set with 40 small polished Turquoise Stones (370GP, 42WU).
Small pouch of 60 small rough cut pieces of Crystal (120GP, 62WU).

Total value: 21,125GP

Not bad for a second level Dwarf eh?

Play Report: Mijnlieff #1

As gamers we soon learn that there is a great difference between knowing the game and, playing the game. In my last post we took a good look at the former but, how does the theory work as practice?

Well one thing that I have certainly learned from play is that changing the board drastically changes the game. Now this may seem like an obvious point to bring up for those of us who have played games with variable boards before, like ZOMBIES!!!, Space Hulk, Dungeonquest and, The Legend of Drizzt to name but a few.

Mjinlieff differs however in that the shape of the board drastically alters the value of the pieces to you as a player. If for example you create a board with very few diagonal connections, then the diagonal pieces become worth a lot more to you because they place greater limitations on your opponent and the spaces that they can play into in response.

Something tells me that this is only the tip of the iceberg too.

This is certainly a game I expect to be playing a lot more of in the future as it's right up my street! Abstract, Strategy and, Rules light. Stay tuned for more reports as we see just how deep down the rabbit hole we can trek with this gem.

Links

Boardgame Geek Entry

Order your copy here!

On The Cards: Monday 16th July

On the cards is going to be my weekly news bulletin that that I hope to be posting up every Monday, showcasing the posts and topics I want to be covering in the coming week.

It's by no means a "to do" list (well until I get more organized at any rate) but, if you see something in the post that you like drop me a comment and i'll try and get it out a little quicker.

On the cards this week:

Quickstart: Mijnlieff
Play Report: Mjinlieff
First Look: Claustrophobia
Review: Fluxx

There are also a couple of other items that may get posted up that I have in the works if time permits (First Look: Project Pandora, First Look: Diablo II Fast Play Edition, Homebrew: Expanding Diablo II Fast Play) but, as this week is already set to be commitment heavy (lots of odd hours at work) these may have to go on the back burner for a week or two.