If you’re Warhammer fan, then make a visit to the Wargaming Ireland forum. A lively get together for Warhammer players in Ireland.
“A nice bunch of lads”. (Well a shiver of sharks but still a nice bunch of lads)
Sunny Thur – Being a Drax Report
I won a game! I actually won a game…. this is no big deal and should not be considered a rare occurrence, It happens regularly. I’m just saying.
We had a large group so despite the safety labels we retrofitted Netrunner Infiltration to be seven players with the use of a Descent model an iPhone and some techniques I’m not allowed to speak of and off we went.
Infiltration has proven to be a great game, the alarm has proven to be a pain the hoop but the game is great. We set the proximity alarm at -1 to get a longer game and for once we rolled a whole lot of 1s at the end of the turn. All was going great…. and yes you guessed it it all kicked off and the alarm jumped like crazy and it was keystone cops to the exit. While all this was going on I decided to (borrowing a buddies expression), “bide my time and strike while the iron was hot” 🙂
I stayed near the exit. I stole everything I could and let the rest tear off onto the wondrous second floor of the complex. In fairness as noted, it’s a pretty crappy high security complex if we can waltz into it every week and it only gets easier each time. A few bright sparks hung back like someone trying to steal home and unusually three as opposed to zero or one of the experienced professional cyber criminals actually made it out alive. Well done team
I was one of the lucky once and will not speak of the terrible faith that befell the ones caught, but will point and laugh loudly at the drop of a hat.
I won on points, one point, but that’s all it took.
A quick round of Dalmuti and… there are some people out there that have never played the great Dalmuti. Honestly. they don’t know some of the nick names for some of the card combos. Which I cannot repeat for libel reasons here. One of them was at games last night. Not sure how he slipped through the net. It’s on the standard 200 question form that gets filled out by all gamers who apply to play on thur nights. If you haven’t I’ll run through it with you if not just jump onto the P200 section.
Dalmuti is a game by Richard Garfield, he of Magic the Gathering, Roborally etc. It’s a fairly simple game with a couple of nice twists and it’s best played with a group of six plus.
The game is not a million miles from gang of four which is not a million miles from Tichu which is the worlds greatest card game. no doubt.
The Dalmuti deck consists of a descending set of cards 12 cards of value 12, 11 or value 11, 10 of 10, right down to 1, 1 card. So in case I didn’t explain that, there are Six cards with a six facing on them and so on. There’s also two jokers. More of them later.
The lower the value of the card the better and as you guessed the rarer.
A first player puts down a set of cards, say 3 twelves, the person to their left can either player THREE cards of lower value say three eights or whatever or pass. Once everyone has passed the person whom played the last lowest set gets to start out the next round. It can be any number of the same cards to start, even just a single card. The idea is to get out as quick as possible. the first person out gets to be the Dalmuti (the head honcho) and gets a couple of the best cards from the last player whom got out (the lesser pion) There’s also a lesser dalmuti that gets one card from the greater pion and the round repeats, forever in some cases or you can score the game. On top of that after a win, all the players have to reoriante themselves musical chairs style in order of their exit position from the last game. The Greater Dalmuti remains where they are, the lesser beside them and so on down to the cock-a-roach at the end that is the lesser pion. Some people have house rules that the lesser pion shuffles. Some that they don’t get a seat. We have a hat 🙂 a jesters hat from a shop I will not speak of. We photograph you when you wear the hat and sent it to your employer. It’s a house rule. or maybe not
The two jokers are wild cards or 13 on their own and if you start with both you can claim the Dalmuti’s lofty job straight off.
Great game, great warm up warm down, well worth having in your collection. Get it now
P200:
After some debate we decided to split up and one group went away with Nations (a great great game) and we had a lash of the often overlooked but much loved Canal Mania.
Canal Mania is a lovely game, it’s basically a railway game with canals. it’s NOT and this had to be repeated, it’s NOT ticket to ride but it does share a couple of it’s traits. I think it’s a far superior game. It has a couple of mechanics going on. Building canals just like you’d build rails in ticket to ride. Picking ‘track’ sections from a communal pile. Check. Completing missions from one location to another. Check. Cockblockery. Check. But is also sports a very nice shipping goods mechanic, a set of engineers that change how you play your hand. The ability to steal the first player spot and a couple of other nice bits. I think it’s a far far better game but then again…. I’m not a fan of ticket to ride. I find it as boring as all hell.
This game reminds me of a very old GW game I can’t remember that you drew lines with markers on the map. It’s a little long but it’s worth the effort. I didn’t win, but I didn’t care I was still glowing from Infiltration.
More of that next Thur
huzzah!
Vic
All things Coffee
If you’re a big coffee fan, I recommend this podcast on everything you ever wanted to know about the bean.
http://podcasts.joerogan.net/podcasts/peter-giuliano
Bit of a long listen but very very interesting
Huzzah!
Vic
Trees Down Thur – Being a Drax Report v1.1
Coffee Coffee and more Coffee was the order of the evening, at least for me. I have a coffee problem, actually I don’t I have any issues with coffee, more correct to say I have a STOP coffee problem. In my quest for awesome coffee my radar has pinged several times to the shape of the Aerobie Aeropress coffee maker. I finally bought one and tried it out. It’s very impressive.
http://aerobie.com/products/aeropress.htm
If you squint at the picture you’ll see it’s effectively a large syringe that forces air and boiling water through the grinds up against a paper filter and out into your cup. It makes damn fine coffee, way better than drip filter, it’s cheap, easy to use, easy to clean and unexpectedly it’s not a gimmick. It does use more coffee than normal but I found I was making a pot of coffee with the machine and not drinking all of it so it balances out. If I had a larger group of gamers I’d go back to the pot but for a few or just one this is just perfect. so now.
Truth be told I can’t remember the actual name of the Thur, I just tend to differentiate them as best I can. It was Thur and after a long week of travel it was time to game, we we’re not found wanting.
First up for me was a quick game of Netrunner. It’s surprising how after nearly a dozen games I’m still not 100% there with rules. Okay maybe it’s not.. it’s probably a good thing I’m not involved in law enforcement.
I found myself still referring to the rules for a couple of questions. But I’m getting there and I still prefer being the evil corporation than the runner. surprise.
After that we had on offer some very nice new games but opted to play once again A Study in Emerald. This game hasn’t worked for everyone, it can be over very quickly indeed if you’re not careful and some people don’t like the whole card drafting mechanic. I think it’s awesome and the fact that it’s getting a lot of playtime speaks of it’s quality.
aSiE is a game you need to play a few times to get your head around, it’s also a game that changes every time you play it. Thur’s game had a LOT of agents on the board, the most I’ve ever seen. We also figured out a couple of rules we hadn’t come across before, again no surprises there. As we become more familiar with the game we’ve started to become a lot more devious in our play, specifically in how we hide our secret faction. I was in the dark with a couple of players as to whom they worked for up until the very end. I was also on the losing end from the start to the finish. I can’t imagine why but a lot of people we’re picking on me 🙂
BUT I still enjoyed the game from start to finish. It’s a great game from a great bunch of people and I wholeheartedly recommend it. I’m also excited about it’s longevity, there’s a pile of mechanics like vampires and zombies that haven’t appeared or played any major part in the game YET. Looking forward to seeing those in the future and I’m confident just like Imperial 2030 this is a game that will be hitting the table often and long into the future
Next up was Android Infiltration
The biggest enemy in this game is not the NPC, not the traps, but the timer. AGAIN we all, well most of us bar one sneaky player, got caught by the timer and very very quickly. I’m not sure we’ve ever gotten to the second floor and I really am starting to think we are not cut out to be cyber thieves.
We got into FOUR rooms of a possible sixteen +, four, just four and the game ended but not before one keen player nipped out the elevator shaft and triggered more alarms and got us all arrested. well played that cyber thief.
Android Infiltration is a nice little (and short) game. I’m going to revisit the rules on the alarm, we keep getting hit by it, I’m sure we’re (against all odds) getting the rules wrong, we have to be. I’d blame certain players in the group but they’re weren’t even there so I can’t. But I will. Great game, surprising more fun than it thought it would be. This one is going to appear again and again I reckon
After that is was the normal warm down of Turtles, discussions on what’s going to happen at the next Knavecon and what games we want to play next
More of that sort of thing soon
Huzzah!
Vic
Knavecon IV – It’s Back!
In case you didn’t hear (the Interwebs are abuzz with the news). Knavecon is back on the 30th August 2014 at a new and bigger location, The Castletroy Park Hotel, in Limerick.
More gaming, more trading, more coffee
https://www.facebook.com/events/245146505668518/
Book your weekend off from everything and slide into the fur lined mouse trap that is Knavecon !
Huzzah!
Vic
MrSaturday Turns 40 Part 2
It’s actually today, so it seems appropriate
This is part two of my report on the gaming events from last weekend’s epic gaming sessions
Next up was
Ca$h and Gun$ live
If ever there was a stupid ass game this is it. Each turn the GM counts out an amount of cards equal to the standing players on the back of which is a monitory amount 5k – 20k and hidden on the front is either a
- Knife
- Kevlar
- Grenade
- Handgun
- Double Handgun
- Shotgun
Each of the players get to move around and when the GM blows the whistle they all Stop and point their guns at another player, by THEIR guns I mean they pretend they have certain guns, which may or may not match their actual weapon cards.
At this point people get a chance to chicken out (quite intimidating to have half a dozen guns pointed at you)
Then in order the weapons are resolved
Knife wielders can reach out and stab someone
Grenades turn around on the spot and anyone they touch gets hit by the grenade
Single guns go next injuring those they’re pointed at
then double guns
then shouguns that do double damage
Kevlar stops all bullets bar shotguns
Each shot cancels the person who got hit from firing with their weapons next. so for example if one player was shot with a single gun the target wouldn’t get to fire their shotgun later on.
Players who get injured are sent to the hospital for a round and these along with they who wimped out don’t get a share of the cash. Rinse and repeat for six rounds.
It’s actually great fun, at one stage a veritable conga line formed as people pretended they all had grenades.
now as the GM I got the rules fairly wrong it must be said, but it didn’t matter we all had fun and it worked well. The game should have had teams and the exact order in which things happened should have been different but so what. Come Knavecon 4 this will definitely be on the cards. It’s a goodie
Huzzah!
Vic
Clock Forward Thur – Being a Drax Report
“Did you know I’ve lost weight since I started gaming with you guys”
I very much doubt that and how we’re all not washing ourselves with rags on the end of sticks is beyond me.
Two cakes AND donuts from Dungeons and Donuts which as you know are the best Donuts in Ireland. Yes they are.
Good start
Krystian from boardgamerguys was in Limerick this week so he swung by to join us for gaming. He brought along a few games for us to try. You might remember he and his wife were running the Dobble demos at Knavecon 3
First up was Fauna which I had heard of before but never tried. It had the essential trinity of ingredients
- Polish
- Kids game
- Can be played by adults
Well in truth I’m not sure if it’s a Polish game as such but this version was in Polish and I’m sure kids would love it.
It’s a sort of Top Trumps/Trivial Pursuit map based game. Unusual I hear you say.
Players start with six betting cubes which they use throughout the game. A game last up to a certain score (in this case 80 with six player) and a number of rounds are played until someone crosses that finish line. In this case by Krystian, but we claim foul as the game was in Polish, Krystian is Polish and several other reasons I’m sure we can come up with.
Each round an animal is shown with it’s vital statistics hidden, say a White Rhino and players take it in turns to place betting cubes on
- the map where they think the animal lives
- The weight of the animal on a scale
- The height/length of the animal on a scale
- the length of it’s tail on a scale
Sounds like a kids game but it’s not bad at all. during a round you can bet on one of the four above or pass, once everyone is passed the actual details are revealed and scored accordingly. You get points for being bang on and half points for being close. If you get it bang on or close you get your betting cubes back for the next round otherwise you start the next round at a disadvantage.
It’s quite a tactical game with a lot of cock blockery, quite fast and a surprising amount of fun. There’s a great reply value as there are hundreds of double sided animal cards and we only went through a half dozen in our game.
I could see myself playing this again, possibly in polish.
Next up was a revisit to Infiltration with the correct set of rules for the alarms learned.
I like this game. The whole get in, steal as much as you can and get out makes for a great tense game. The game designers only missed two things in this game
- We’re way too greedy to leave before we’ve filled our boots
- We’re way to spiteful to allow another player win
NEAR the end and it was not that close, rather than let me win, one of the players decided he’s end the game for EVERYONE including himself so no-one won.
I have to applaud that sort of play
Another Polish game which I’ve quite forgotten the name of Forjaf or something like that. Again the magic trio ingredients we’re in place. I’m really liking the whole Polish vibe. They really know their games
This is a simple bluffing game with a clever swap feature. It’s sort of unusual as well as the idea is to knock one player out, that’s it, no winning for anyone, just one person losing. I like that too. As you know it’s not about the winning its’ about the others losing
We rounded off with a bit of Coup then time to talk rubbish, finish our coffees and go home
More of that soon and more of MrSaturday’s 40th
Huzzah!
Vic
MrSaturday Turns 40 – a Drax report in a number of parts
If you’re going to do a review on Twilight Struggle then you have to use a picture from Doctor Strangelove, it’s a rule. I checked.
A glorious weekend of gaming stretched out before us in a very nice location in Connemara, no 3G, no Laptops, just good buddies, a stack of food, (None of it good for you) and a horse load of games…..
MrSaturday successfully beat Jesus by 7 and we celebrated in true gaming style. I’m going to split this big event up into a few smaller snippets and look at the games I got to play.
First up was Twilight Struggle
Let’s cut to the chase, I want a copy of this, it’s awesome, there’s a good reason it’s number one on the boardgamegeek list of games, I have it set-up on VASSAL, anyone who wants a game let me know. So without any prejudice let’s begin
TS is a two player only game where players take on the roles or either America or the USSR and duke it out in the cold war from the late 40s to the fall of communism. The game is essentially map based where players use influence to turn countries around to their ideology. Each turn of which there are ten consists of drawing a set of eightish cards from a communal stack and picking one event to kick off that turn. The other player doing likewise. Then the rest of the cards are used either for their resource value or card event. All of the events are actual historical events, like the Berlin wall coming down, the bay of pigs and so on and all have effects on influence around the world or just screw with the other players plans.
The cards available to draw from get added to at certain turns along the way so middle era and late era card stacks get added as the game progresses. Resource are a number on the top let hand corner either Red (USSR), White (USA) or two colour (either) and these can be spent to up your influence levels in different countries, usually ones that border your other countries. Up your influence enough and you’ll be in charge of that country. Coup actions, realignment and just increasing influence will change both your influence and the influence of the enemy in a specific country so it’s a juggle to protect your interests and screw up the opponents with limited resources.
If you’re Russia as I was, you generally burn Red or Red and White resources but it’s possible to use White only resources belonging to the Americans but you also have to kick off the event which is in favour of the Americans as well. I found myself trying to pick the lesser of two evils several times when I wound up with a number of American cards.
As the game starts the only areas open for business are Europe and Asia but as the game progresses through the three eras, South America, Africa and The Middle East open up and cause more headaches. The game is very much a zero sum game with one score track that runs from +20 USSR to +20 USA. As you score which itself is an event card you play, you advance the track in either direction. Get to +20 for either and it’s game over. A few other late game events can cause the game to end as well. I found myself scratching my head (it may have been the company I was keeping) to figure the best way to manage things, do I dig my heels in in one place and give the opponent a free ride in another region? Go for this event and screw him up here but leave myself open to a coup?
While this goes on a few other slider mechanics are being affected, a big one being the conflict track. Not necessarily a bad thing as it scores you points if you’re ahead but it also ups the defcon level and it’s game over man if you reach the highest one. The space race is also another recipient of influence and getting ahead at this allows you to see what you’re opponent is going to do in advance. So all in all a plate juggling affair with limited resources.
I have to say I really liked it, it’s surprisingly fast for such an epic period. It says 3 hours on the box but I reckon we got through it quicker than that on our first game, but we did have an advisor whom unlike us knew the rules and had managed the world a few times. The game definitely needs a few play throughs so you understand what can happen. Even thought it’s pretty much the same thing each game, events can change or not happen and it should stay pretty fresh. The artwork, components and cards are of high quality and although it’s not a FF game it does have a great solid feel to it. It is a longish game but it’s well worth the investment in time. I found myself waking up the next day with the game going around my head and thinking about new angles I could have come at. All in all a cracker
More to come, what this space
Huzzah!
Vic
Omega Thur – Being a Drax Report
Omega Protocol is a futuristic version of Descent with some nice mechanics and big guns. What’s not to like?
Level 7 Omega Protocol to give it it’s full name is a fairly simple game that plays in a similar fashion to Heroquest/Space Crusade/Descent. You have an ‘overlord’ how controls the bad guys and a team of marines in a variety of flavours played by everyone else who must complete missions in a hostile environment full of clones and aliens. All pretty normal in a days gaming. What makes it a little different is as each marine takes an action they generate adrenaline points which at the end of the turn are handed over to the overlord to carry out their action. So the more you do in the marine turn, the more action points are available to the overlord to mess up your day.
The marines start with a number of different types available to them, soldier, recon, heavy weapons guy and so on. They also get to kit out their guys with a variety of equipment, weapons and armour before the mission starts. Then it’s off to zombie land and fighting their way to the objective which has thoughtfully been put in the furthest room by the overlord and in the case of this mission back again to a lift again conveniently at the other end of the map.
Movement, opening doors, interaction and shooting takes adrenaline points which are finite depending on whom you choose. The heavy weapons guy plods along armed to the teeth whilst the recon dude can run and jump like a happy elf. The overlord does their best to throw speedbumps in the shape of clones and aliens at the marines to slowdown and hopefully kill them along with some other unusual stuff like dropping a ceiling on them action points depending.
All in all it’s good fun, the adrenaline points handover is novel and we encountered a few room types we’d never seen before in this type of game (the noisy rave room was good). We of COURSE got a few rules wrong and it was a bit easier on the marines than it should have been. We also in tune with the group left one of our men behind who much to our surprise also survived. “No man left behind” is more of a Guideline than a code. We also threw in a few clichés like “Game over man” but since we had messed up the rules a little it was more of a stroll then a hard struggle.
Would I buy it? No. If I didn’t have descent I might but since I have I won’t. Just like Descent is a re imaging of Heroquest this is very much a re imaging of Space Crusade. The models are nice, not out of this world but nice. We didn’t get to see some of the nastier aliens but got a good ghost story about them. I’d definitely be on for playing it again. Shooting aliens is always fun, no-one lost an eye, then is was time for MrSaturday’s 40th
Huzzah!
Vic
Knavecon 3.5 ?
It’s my good buddy MrSaturday’s 40th at the weekend, so a bunch of us are celebrating in true Knavecon style with a weekend of gaming in a secret location somewhere near Loch Corrib. This grown up affair will feature, games, coffee and discussions on the next Knavecon…. nah I’m only kidding it’s an excuse to game, eat junk and get riotous…. this could be my last post 🙂
Dave was one of the oldhammer crew that ran the Fimir/Halfling game at Knavecon 3. If you saw it you couldn’t help but be blown away by his painting skill. If you haven’t checked out his blog then now’s a good time, I highly recommend it, he’s a funny dude and has a great turn of phrase.
http://mrsaturdaysmumblings.blogspot.ie/
Happy 40th Dude!
Huzzah!
Vic
Victor Gannon Games 