[D'rek]

Nicodimas, on 18 December 2018 - 09:41 PM, said:

Siderreal confluence

Do a thorough check of all the components! Been hearing a lot of comments that this one is often missing pieces.

[Nicodimas]

Got a chance to play Nemesis by awaken realms and damn annoyed that I cancelled my backing to back a game I am probably never gettttting...

It’s quite fun! We all died though.

[Nicodimas]

Went through a few more games of nemesis ! Found a copy tonight and took over someone’s Kickstarter at cost +$20

Tried to get high frontier out at game night no takers....sadly

This post has been edited by Nicodimas: 14 January 2019 - 06:30 AM

[Cause]

Anyone played the expansions to lords of waterdeep? Recommendations?

[Morgoth]

Cause, on 16 January 2019 - 10:53 AM, said:

Anyone played the expansions to lords of waterdeep? Recommendations?

I have the Scoundrels of Skullport expansion, and I think it ads a neat extra layer to the game.

[Nicodimas]

Cause, on 16 January 2019 - 10:53 AM, said:

Anyone played the expansions to lords of waterdeep? Recommendations?

its one of those rare ones imo that make the game better!

Talking about expansions landed Root—Riverfolk. Roots a blast and def on my 10x10 this year.

Also chilling on game buying as my shelf of shame just went above 10 games..eek.

[Nicodimas]

On customizing games. Technology is amazing-sauce.

My bud got really into 3-D printing and so he has been printing my custom parts.

Secondly, you can grab a image + then get companies to print custom game boards for (thank you boardgamegeek).

So went with a War of the Ring Neoprene Mat.

This post has been edited by Nicodimas: 06 February 2019 - 01:58 AM

[Nicodimas]

So reference this is A0 size:

This post has been edited by Nicodimas: 06 February 2019 - 01:57 AM

[Cause]

Nicodimas, on 06 February 2019 - 01:55 AM, said:

So reference this is A0 size:

That's cool, the companies don't worry about the copyright?

I have always wanted to get some boardgames printed onto actual wooden boards

[Nicodimas]

Cause, on 06 February 2019 - 09:28 AM, said:

Nicodimas, on 06 February 2019 - 01:55 AM, said:

So reference this is A0 size:

That's cool, the companies don't worry about the copyright?

I have always wanted to get some boardgames printed onto actual wooden boards

So this is people grabbing the images. This particular one was made completely from scratch by a graphic designer that shared his image, then you can use mousepad/Fabric companies online to print.

I imagine this would be limitless if you didn’t care about the original Copyrighted material, however if some savvy graphic designers just did this and shared... I don’t think a big company would go after it—I know they have to go after anyone that infringes on a TM for sure, but this may be the same area of pirate posters <how mondo started>. Just an Artist doing their own thing. Would be fun for some custom maps in some games.

Custom wood boards! i would go Wrymwood route. What games would you move onto actually wood? Now you got my wondering..

This post has been edited by Nicodimas: 08 February 2019 - 03:52 AM

[D'rek]

Anybody else heard about the recent drama surrounding Blood on the Clocktower? It's a kickstarter (of course), and a few days ago got reviewed by Shut up and Sit Down (who normally *never* review kickstarters, apparently), and the review was basically 20 minutes of unfiltered praise - multiple "my favourite game evers" and even some "this is an evolution in boardgaming" sort of fluff. But the game is... well it's forum mafia, i.e. it's werewolf but with more roles, some added mechanics, and some tokens to help the moderator keep track of the game by moving tokens around in the box. Of course the designers and supporters are always saying "it's not just a werewolf clone!".

Oh, and it's $100. Plus shipping.

Drama ensues.

[Tapper]

D, on 02 April 2019 - 06:05 PM, said:

Anybody else heard about the recent drama surrounding Blood on the Clocktower? It's a kickstarter (of course), and a few days ago got reviewed by Shut up and Sit Down (who normally *never* review kickstarters, apparently), and the review was basically 20 minutes of unfiltered praise - multiple "my favourite game evers" and even some "this is an evolution in boardgaming" sort of fluff. But the game is... well it's forum mafia, i.e. it's werewolf but with more roles, some added mechanics, and some tokens to help the moderator keep track of the game by moving tokens around in the box. Of course the designers and supporters are always saying "it's not just a werewolf clone!".

Oh, and it's $100. Plus shipping.

Drama ensues.

Yep. When I watched the review, I had the exact same reaction you have: forum mafia in a box. Personally, I think turning forum mafia into a social game is an accomplishment, if it is balanced.
But BotC comes with 99 roles included in their box, so my guess is "ehm, no?". Broken combinations probably exist, power levels likely vary wildly (I saw a permanent BP) and probably certain roles are so watered down that they hardly mean anything other than RI with a fancy name.
Whatever the case, BotC should have been called an innovation/ adaptation of an existing formula and even if it is the bees knees, just mention that is a new branch on the tree - highly exciting, but still not a concept out of left field.
The SU&SD team could have done a little more research into forum mafia, for sure.

SU&SD reactions on the discussion thread (defending their review) were amplified by BotC quickly posting the review on KS and two of their developers jumping into the discussion, which SU&SD has little control over. Perhaps they should have asked the BotC team to tone down the volume of posts in the comment section?

However, SU&SD's policy of only doing reviews of KS games when they are published for the mass market is more of a rule of thumb.
Previously, they reviewed Kingdom Death, a KS only game with a big fan community (they demolished it). They also (favorably) reviewed Gloomhaven months before it reached brick and mortar stores. Root (another Kickstarter release for both base game and first expansion that I haven't seen here in NL in stores yet - might be available elsewhere), also has been reviewed.

Quinns also has a fondness for social games/ deduction games/ social deduction games and he makes no effort to hide it (iirc a Two rooms and a Boom, Fury of Dracula and Sherlock Holmes' Consulting Detective also got pretty good reviews from him, and his Netrunner review also mentioned how much he loves its community, game mechanics aside). The fact he really liked BotC is thus in and by itself not surprising (on the other hand, that should have made him aware that such a thing as forum mafia exists...). The SU&SD team run social deduction games on conventions, too.
In the same vein, the intern echoing Quinns' sentiment in her first video appearance for SU&SD is unfortunate as it reinforces the idea it is less an objective review and more of a sales pitch, but what if she really did like this game as much as he did? And is it even surprising that someone they'd hire has the same taste in games?

[Morgoth]

Yeah, I saw the review and was not at all surprised. It seems to be the kind of game Quinn (Quinns?) loves.

[Tapper]

Anyway, what sites (if any) do you (readers of the thread) turn to for reviews?

I read/watch SU&SD, but I find Quinns especially appreciates different (elements in) games than I do - it seems to me that Matt Lees' solo reviews have a bit more in common with what I like in a game. Their playthroughs (most recently on Twitch) give me a much better opinion of whether or not I like a game than their reviews do - I bought Great Western Trail and Flamme Rouge based on those playthroughs.

I personally love the So Very Wrong About Games podcast, as well as the Heavy Cardboard youtube channel for their Teachings and Playthroughs videos - more for the rules and game overview than for the actual playthrough.
Jamey Stegmaier's My favorite game mechanism is also very interesting, but never a complete overview of a game.

[Morgoth]

I like the SU&SD style of giving me the feel of a game rather than the nuts and bolts of it. Even though their tastes differ from mine, I still feel like I get a good idea of whether I'll enjoy the game or not.

[D'rek]

Tapper, on 03 April 2019 - 10:59 AM, said:

Quinns also has a fondness for social games/ deduction games/ social deduction games and he makes no effort to hide it (iirc a Two rooms and a Boom, Fury of Dracula and Sherlock Holmes' Consulting Detective also got pretty good reviews from him, and his Netrunner review also mentioned how much he loves its community, game mechanics aside). The fact he really liked BotC is thus in and by itself not surprising (on the other hand, that should have made him aware that such a thing as forum mafia exists...). The SU&SD team run social deduction games on conventions, too.

Right?! We're hardly unique in our crazy TMDI10+ mafia games. How can he be unaware that that already exists (and has for years)?

Tapper, on 03 April 2019 - 10:59 AM, said:

In the same vein, the intern echoing Quinns' sentiment in her first video appearance for SU&SD is unfortunate as it reinforces the idea it is less an objective review and more of a sales pitch, but what if she really did like this game as much as he did? And is it even surprising that someone they'd hire has the same taste in games?

I feel bad for the intern. She was basically stuck parroting Quinns for most of this one, and her only prior video was a "card games that don't suck" one where she was basically just a silent prop for Quinns.

And no, not surprising that they might all have similar tastes and could all deeply, deeply love this game. But they deeply love twilight imperium, too, and had a 10-minute section on helping people figure out if it was worth the price or not in that review. So strange to not see something similar and other "big picture analysis" here.

Oh well, I've had miffs with other reviews of theirs before, too, not the first and not the last! And really interesting to see the fire it has sparked in the online communities about it.

Tapper, on 03 April 2019 - 11:25 AM, said:

Anyway, what sites (if any) do you (readers of the thread) turn to for reviews?

I don't really follow any regularly now. Every now and then I go and read all the Meeple Lke Us reviews I've missed, but I wouldn't exactly recommend the site - their reviews are mostly all about analyzing the game's accessibility (everything from colourblindness to it's depiction of minorities) - but it's kind of sorta interesting to see the "woke" analysis... pretty sure it doesn't influence my actual playing preferences though.

[Nicodimas]

I finally found a TI 4 group. Psyched. Hoping to put together a league sometime this next year...


And Middara got dropped off today after a reallllllyy long wait.

[D'rek]

A league?! That sounds awesome. You could track scores and rotate races and everything!

[Nicodimas]

D, on 09 April 2019 - 02:37 PM, said:

A league?! That sounds awesome. You could track scores and rotate races and everything!

The person who wants to help me run is a lawyer so he is drafting a league rule set, so hopefully it's iron clad...

Spitballing here:

-It would a "scramble" style tournament--best 10 games you score of 26 games in a season.
-Tier the races into four-five tiers and give different VP based off number of player count/which race/margin of victory of course
-Can't play the same race until so many times later
-Action card piles <x3> by type of effect, limit sabotages
-Tier the Agenda Deck--we have all played a game where that would have been AWESOME early game, but completely useless late game.
(https://boardgamegee...a-decks-variant)

-Balancing elements to the above.

<<Some leagues have a time component we are exploring, though for fairness to me this is extremely difficult to implement, but have heard this has outstanding benefits in keeping the time down--no agreement has been met yet--but how to avoid that random game due to AP that goes forever....>>

OH yeah living FAQ, all questions that come up in league are recorded and posted to a common area, player responsibility to stay on top of these rulings..would in theory keep up pace of play /crosses fingers

A few other ideas are being floated...

This post has been edited by Nicodimas: 09 April 2019 - 06:14 PM

[Morgoth]

So I am weak and have backed the new Bloodborne boardgame on kickstarter.