#gaminginthetimeofcovid19

[illuminatinggames]

Trick of the Rails, on #tabletopsimulator - a module a friend is developing. This is by Hisashi Hayashi, designer of Yokohama, Trains, Metro X, and a large number of other games; I don’t watch the Japanese game design scene that closely, so I hadn’t realized he had become so prolific. I love Yokohama, but otherwise find his games a bit hit and miss; usually clever but often the ideas feel underdeveloped to me. This is another game that feels both intriguing and deeply weird; it’s basically one hand of 15 no-trump tricks, but each trick indirectly results in track, trains, and railway shares being bought in a way that’s almost completely opaque. It’s mostly a game of timing; winning a trick gives you a little bit more control over development, and where the big trains end up is super-high stakes, so you want to time it so you can win those tricks; but no-trump is always chaotic. I think if you’re a hard-core fan of trick-taking games and also like train games this is worth checking out; otherwise it’s probably too weird to get much play. #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgamenight #tabletopgames #virtualtabletopgaming https://www.instagram.com/p/CEYmXeeBBTw/?igshid=aot6i7kprm18

#tabletopsimulator #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgamenight #tabletopgames #virtualtabletopgaming

[illuminatinggames]

One of the advantages of being friends with the game designer is that we get early copies of stuff (I’ve heard some reports of this being out in the wild? But I haven’t seen it showing up anywhere yet - very soon I’m sure). We played early playtest versions of this and the published version doesn’t look much different - just an elegantly scaled down Pandemic, it should be quite familiar to fans. I have a few friends who are gaming-adjacent or not-really-gamers who I think would get a kick out of this, but ironically face-to-face social gaming is still a distant dream here. Although maybe this would be a good outdoor game? The Cure might be better though. But indoor gaming is a fairly high risk activity and COVID-19 is settling in to be a long nightmare here in the US. Our response has been plagued by reckless incompetence combined with huge structural problems with health care and societal inequality. It’s so sad that this should come out featuring our CDC-based heroes just as the rest of the developed world is coming to look at our CDC’s bungling ineffectiveness with horror. As I meet online with gamer friends we’ve been wondering when we’ll be able to game in person again. I honestly think 2021 if we’re lucky. With our numbers now looking so much worse than anywhere in Europe or East Asia, the winter of 2020-21 is going to be another round of agony in the US I think. #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #pandemicboardgame #pandemichotzone https://www.instagram.com/p/CBrPbU8hc_K/?igshid=1uglz5r7ifbnb

#gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #pandemicboardgame #pandemichotzone

[illuminatinggames]

Ascension: Year 2 Collector’s Edition (Storm of Souls & Immortal Heroes). I got out of CCGs just as foil chase cards were starting to be a thing - I think I still have a few from Decipher’s execrable Lord of the Rings game - so I’ve never gotten to actually play with this kind of shiny card 😄. The Ascension Collectors’ editions get marked down occasionally online and I’ve been able to get some of the older ones at pretty good prices by putting on a price drop alert at Miniature Market. I wouldn’t pay list for sure, but they’re very nice sets and have all the promos. The foil cards aren’t quite as usable as the standards ones (harder to read and shuffle) but they do look pretty cool 😄. I always felt like the year two sets were peak Ascension, but going back to them now after playing a bunch of Dreamscape, Gift of the Elements, and Delirium ... yeah, there are a *lot* of good Ascension sets. The only ones I’m not really a super fan of are Rise of Vigil, Valley of the Ancients, and Skulls & Sails, and even they’re OK. It really is impressive that 10 years later Ascension is not just still chugging along as one of the best games in this space, but has been often “imitated” but rarely have the imitators been even close to as good. It is still basically a 2 or 3 player game, but the Alliances expansion does have a really good team play mode. Thinking of Ascension, I did recently get the latest Shards of Infinity expansion which I need to give a whirl ... #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #ascensiongame #stoneblade https://www.instagram.com/p/CBZj0W-hDoV/?igshid=oo1ufgwnfxgx

#gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #ascensiongame #stoneblade

[illuminatinggames]

Taj Mahal on Tabletop Simulator. We played this after first trying Ra and Priests of Ra, but both of those modules seem to be broken. This module is pretty nice actually, but you’ll want to scale up the space allocated for your hand - they are too small and the cards can get hard to see if you hold too many. Otherwise though quite solid. I was *so* far out of the zone tonight; Taj Mahal is a game I’m usually quite good at, but I failed to recognize that the board was going to be very friendly for connection strategies and so didn’t compete for palaces. It ended badly 😄. Great game. #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 --- So I went back to TTS to put some feedback in for the module, and it appears that almost all of Reiner Knizia’s games have been pulled from the platform recently. It seems like I can still play the ones I’ve added to my library, but you can’t get them. I’ve also heard that the Asmodee behemoth is starting to crack down on unlicensed games on TTS. I obviously have mixed feelings about this. I support creators’ rights to protect their IP, within reason. But it is a real problem that all these classic Knizia games do not really exist online, and that there appears to be no prospect of either accessing them legally, or sorting out the licensing at reasonable cost. It’s frustrating to own these games but not be able to play them due to the pandemic, and for a workable solution to exist but be inaccessible for reasons that are basically dumb - that IP law is kind of a disaster, licensing is really hard, and that the technology to adequately protect creators’ rights doesn’t really exist. https://www.instagram.com/p/CC5T7C3B03s/?igshid=rc11j2jpfth7

#gaminginthetimeofcovid19

[illuminatinggames]

Dune, with the Ixians and Tleilaxu on #tabletopsimulator. The two new factions are cool! They are a little rulsier, are less intuitive (especially Ix) because the source material is thinner. If you’ve pressed on to Dune Messiah, that’s the source for some of the depiction of the Tleilaxu in the game. But both are quite flavorful and fit pretty cleanly into the game. We used both in a 6-player game to try them out (replacing the Guild and Bene Gesserit), and I think I’d recommend using just one your first time out. With 5, replace the BG with the Tleilaxu and don’t use the Guild; with 6, replace the Guild with the Ixians. Another thing I really like about the new factions is that they introduce potentially two more Strongholds: the Ixian mobile stronghold and the tech tokens. With at least 6 strongholds available, the 6-player game becomes a lot more open under the standard rules because a 2-player alliance can reasonably hope to grab 4 strongholds (which is why I think you should make sure Ix is in with 6). The Bene Tleilaxu are definitely an analog to the Bene Gesserit: they start weak and have only limited income, so it takes time to build up and they have to make sure to keep the pot boiling for 4 turns or so - they are not going to be doing a lot for a while. The Ixians are another brute force faction, but they have a money problems (mitigated somewhat by their ability to cycle treachery cards in their hand). The Ixian alliance benefit is super strong too, it seems like. Anyway, quite enjoyed. And TTS is not a bad platform - there was some friction initially as we got used to it, but it went reasonably smoothly after that. There aren’t a ton of handling costs, so it’s just the spice that’s a pain. It’s a long-ish game so it’s not something I’d play online very often, and even more so than many boardgames it loses something online, but it is a great game so it’s good to know it’s an option. For long-time fans, these are *much* better implementations than the old version from The General and Heroes, and *way* better then the Landsraad. #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #duneboardgame #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgameday https://www.instagram.com/p/CChHo8vhO6o/?igshid=14rq291jic3fa

#tabletopsimulator #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #duneboardgame #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgameday

[illuminatinggames]

Dice Forge on BoardgameArena. I had passed on this when it came out, because I had heard it was a bit light for my general tastes. But I had been wanting to at least try it once for a while, and finally got to play. It’s pretty fun! The thing I think it gets right is that you end up rolling your crafted dice a lot, so it seems like there is enough time for the probabilities to even out. The fairly nice BGA implementation does speed up the game a lot, but at the cost of losing the fun of rolling the physical dice and (as usual) terrible situational awareness. But this’ll go onto the list of adequate online implementations, and I might even try to find a real copy for when this is (hopefully) over. #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgamenight https://www.instagram.com/p/CCFwjjaha80/?igshid=ipbu4qsfe4nh

#gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgamenight

[illuminatinggames]

ZÈRTZ on #tabletopsimulator with my brother back in Ohio. I have long lamented that there isn’t a really good way to play the terrific GIPF-series games online, but TTS has them all and they look like really nice modules. I also found out like 20 minutes ago that they’re also all on boardspace.net (along with Container, another quirky personal favorite). But TTS’s 3d visual modeling is (for me anyway) a nicer way to play these games which have such a terrific aesthetic component. It’s funny, I do love these games, but virtually the only chance I get to play them is with my brother and we play very infrequently - like, once every 1-2 years when I’m in Cleveland - so I have to work out all the patterns almost from scratch again every time. Which I find pretty entertaining. #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgamenight #gipf #gipfproject #zèrtz #zertz https://www.instagram.com/p/CBj10vvhF5V/?igshid=1jkls3o503f6y

#tabletopsimulator #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgamenight #gipf #gipfproject #zèrtz #zertz

[illuminatinggames]

Taluva with 5 on BoardgameArena.com. The deluxe edition that came out a few years ago added a fifth player, and while Taluva doesn’t really *want* a fifth player, sometimes you have 5. Probably if we weren’t #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 we’d have a bunch of good options for 5 and this wouldn’t get a second look, but here we are. As this has gotten a bit of play again in the last few months I’ve been reminded of the couple very small things that annoy me about it (the tactic of sleazing an additional temple by breaking up one of your own settlements is a little unsatisfying I find). Plus online you don’t have the physical beauty of the classic game (the deluxe edition is overdone in my opinion). Still though, a nice game that has a solid niche for mixed crowds. #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgamenight #tabletopgames https://www.instagram.com/p/CBfDCPRh85B/?igshid=1d88h0x1v86la

#gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgamenight #tabletopgames

[illuminatinggames]

6p Dune on #tabletopsimulator: Atriedes, Harkonnen, Emperor, Fremen, Ixians, Bene Tleilaxu. The Ixians pulled off a crazy solo win (!) by holding their hidden stronghold and surgically targeting the Emperor, winning on a traitor call in the last battle (Captain Aramsham handed over they keys to Arakeen). As the Harkonnens I was in an very dominating position on turn 2 after having crushed the Atriedes and Emperor in early battles, but then I lost two big battle on turn 3, both on traitors (!) - Feyd and Beast Rabban both turned on me. The game went 5 turns; I really like the dynamics with 6 players and the Ixians, the extra stronghold really makes a big positive difference - the game rewards aggression again under the standard rules (alliance limit 2 with +1 stronghold). Both the new faction are great in my opinion; a little rules-y but really mix up the game in interesting ways. I wouldn’t play 6 players without Ix at this point, and I personally prefer the Bene Tleilaxu to the Bene Gesserit. The technology tiles I’m less sold on - they might need to be amped up a bit, or we might dump them - they just don’t seem to do a lot? Haven’t tried the new treachery cards yet, some of which seem kind of bonkers. 5 turns took us 4.5 hours on TTS; not great, it’s definitely slower than face to face, and a game that went the distance would be a grind. But what can you do; at least in the US, we don’t have a lot of options. Still a great game. #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgameday #tabletopgames #duneboardgame #dunegame #thespicemustflow #j2s #brettspiel https://www.instagram.com/p/CD7PPhahR9Y/?igshid=15jo3ne6bxkcc

#tabletopsimulator #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgameday #tabletopgames #duneboardgame #dunegame #thespicemustflow #j2s #brettspiel

[illuminatinggames]

GIPF. The game that started it all way back in 1996, and which I bought at Origins in 1997 - and the game in the series that I’ve played by far the least. But #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 changes everything, so I’ve had a little more time and less resistance to playing online. I love how all these games are so distinct, and yet have all these interesting internal echoes. GIPF, as the “core” game, is definitely the meatiest and longest, with more scope both for longer-term thinking and for more intricate structures to develop. The really clinical, tactical thinking usually required of abstracts isn’t usually my jam, but structure does really interest me, and maybe that’s why the GIPF games appeal to me. Another thing I like about GIPF is how capture moves require removing your own pieces, usually significantly weakening your board position, so it gives the game something of an ebb and flow - a capture move can open up opportunities for your opponent, and can relieve board stress. This sort of Hamlet’s-Hit-Points-esque ebb-and-flow is why I think this is more narratively satisfying. Anyway, always impressed by these games, so great to be playing them again a bit. #gipf #tabletopsimulator #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgamenight https://www.instagram.com/p/CDz6YzfBXC9/?igshid=nnoggf2zmng3

#gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #gipf #tabletopsimulator #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #virtualgamenight

[illuminatinggames]

Undaunted: Normandy on Tabletop Simulator. After playing scenarios 1 & 2 and finding them a bit disappointing, we just skipped ahead to scenario 5. The Americans have to seize two bridges, while the Germans have hang on. This is the first scenario with a robust equipment mix - mortars, snipers, machine guns. The OOBs are basically still symmetrical, although the Americans have to cross a lot of open ground to get to their objectives. I made the fatal error of playing the game as if it were a WWII tactical game, instead of a deckbuilder with WWII chrome 😆. It’s still a game that is all about deck efficiency, especially as there is no time limit, with relatively little time for any kind of historical detail. But! It’s still evocative in its own way. After having a pretty lukewarm experience with the first two scenarios, I found this one much more enjoyable and engaging. It still has details that bug me a little - it could *really* use some sort of clock to make sure the game doesn’t drag on for longer than about the 45min that it wants - but the whole package works for me (even if I’d still prefer Up Front! in almost all cases). As I get older, I’m trying to find ways to feed my desire for novelty without having to go to new games, and this is an area where Undaunted: Normandy (and I see North Africa is out now) seems to have a lot of potential: the scenario mix seems to provide a lot of variety to dig into. This contrasts with games like Command & Colors or even Tank Duel (I like Tank Duel) which have a lot of scenarios but the actual range maybe isn’t that great. So anyway, I’m hopeful. Undaunted: Normandy also works really well on Tabletop Simulator, which is good for these trying times. Hopefully there will be a similar option for North Africa. #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #undauntednormandy #ospreypublishing #tabletopgames #virtualgamenight #onlinegamenight https://www.instagram.com/p/CDS62Vrhi0G/?igshid=exivbf3z0swj

#gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #undauntednormandy #ospreypublishing #tabletopgames #virtualgamenight #onlinegamenight

[illuminatinggames]

I’ve been giving boiteajeux.net a spin over the last week. They have a few games that I like that aren’t anywhere else, including Tzolk’in with expansions (get on that BoardgameArena), The Alchemists, and Ginkgopolis, and a few more I am not exactly a huge fan of but could play at need in these trying times, including Concordia, Torres, Dungeon Lords, and Deus. The platform is extremely similar in feel to Yucata, plus or minus, just with different games. Their membership model is unfortunate, though. For €5 a month, they’ll let your browser keep open a server connection so you’ll see when it’s your turn if you’re playing live. So unless you give them the €5 the site is almost unusable for synchronous play. Which is more that what BGA charges. It’s not great given the limited number of games available (even fewer of which I’m actually interested in), the generally mediocre interfaces, and the fact that BoardgameArena and Tabletopia now exist at similar or lower price points - even setting aside Tabletop Simulator and its legal grey area. So I don’t think they’re going to get my €5 or much of my traffic in future. But it was nice to remember that the Tzolk’in expansion is pretty cool. The 5th player isn’t great in face-to-face gaming just because of the downtime, but it works ok online and the Tribes and Prophecies are cool and mix things up nicely even if I’m not totally convinced they’re well-balanced (otherwise Tzolk’in can get kinda samey). #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #boiteajeux https://www.instagram.com/p/CDLGB3jhqTw/?igshid=pujtqy74s7va

#gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #boiteajeux

[illuminatinggames]

My super-early radio advertising in Food Chain Magnate. This was the first time I tried this strategy, which was 1) Trainer 2) Marketer 3) Recruiter, then run the Marketer up to Brand Director while filling out recruiters and trainers to aim for a large, low-skill, low-cost workforce to fulfill the scads demand when it comes crashing onto the scene on turn 5. That “First Errand Boy Played” milestone can be huge; I was able to get it here because the drinks were otherwise quite isolated so nobody was pursuing that path, but four doubled Errand Boys can deliver a lot of product. I love Food Chain Magnate, but it’s honestly not a *great* game for live online play. On play.boardgamecore.net the UI is awkward enough that basically every game is likely to have at least one devastating misplay, at least when played live and you’re trying to be somewhat time-sensitive. Tabletop Simulator doesn’t have that issue, but its 3d-rendered-environment scheme just isn’t as effective for a sprawling, information-dense game like this imo. But even if it needs a better online platform, the fact is that in the low-cost online boardgaming space, the bar is set very, very low. And you can crank through a game in 90-120m tops live, which is great and faster than face-to-face. Plus I virtually always win. So there’s that. Not many games I can say that about, especially not in this particular niche. #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #boardgamegeek #boardgames #bgg #foodchainmagnate https://www.instagram.com/p/CAhcgvbA2vF/?igshid=r7bv6e0z67ec

#gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #boardgamegeek #boardgames #bgg #foodchainmagnate

[illuminatinggames]

Finished Detective: Case IV, the King of Milan. I forgot to get an in-game shot, but it’s not a super-photogenic game anyway. The key to this case is to stay on-task; it’s filled with red herrings. Not my favorite thing. They’re mostly fleshing out the backstory of this intricate conspiracy; that’s both good and bad. Good in that at least they’re interesting; bad in that it’s really tempting to go investigate the, you know, actual murder that shows up and is obviously related to the case, and get side-tracked from the background checks you’re nominally supposed to be doing. So read your brief and stay focussed. Overall, it’s enjoyable and nicely fleshes out the long-form story arc - it just would have been better to stay a little more narratively focused. One more case to go! But I’ve already picked up LA Crimes for us to do next. #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 https://www.instagram.com/p/CC2pnnrBNyw/?igshid=1vuv9shiynn6

#gaminginthetimeofcovid19

[illuminatinggames]

A couple games of #DVONN on #tabletopsimulator with my brother back in Ohio. I haven’t played this in ages, but had remembered this as being one of the “lighter” entries in the series, similar to ZERTZ. But it’s not really! There is a lot going on here! It’s not as complex as some of the meaty entries in the series (which I think of as YINSH and PÜNCT, although I’m rusty on all of them as I haven’t had a chance to play any of them in ages). But this has the same great feel for me as the other games, a wide open early game followed by a high stakes mid-game and than end game of both constricting choices, but also the possibility of dramatic reversals. Like all the GIPF games, there is a significant advantage to having some flexibility left in the end when your opponent runs out of options. In our send game I was able to turn around an unpromising board position by playing to burn off moves, and was able to win by just having one extra move at the end after he ran out. Really enjoying playing these again. #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 https://www.instagram.com/p/CCsA3EhhrOT/?igshid=1eebnkt4tvwlr

#dvonn #tabletopsimulator #gaminginthetimeofcovid19

[illuminatinggames]

Polis: Fight for Hegemony on Yucata. I played this a couple times years ago, when it was new, and it never clicked with me. Possibly a combination of the mediocre rulebook and a few funny abstractions (the land area control/combat system works, but is not intuitive). Revisiting it now though, I enjoyed it much more! It does portray the competition between Athens and Sparta in the time leading up to and including the Peloponnesian War in some interesting ways that the more militaristic wargames (Pericles, Hellenes, Victory or Death, Athens and Sparta) don’t capture - more details of economics and trade, as well as “soft power” prestige. I think it helps too that I’m now just a lot better-read on this historical period, which I think helps support a game like this taking a more narrowly-focussed model. The abstractions don’t always really work (the usual trade-offs on how to integrate Syracuse and Sicily aren’t totally convincing, although it takes an interesting and different route), it has some finicky complexity, and it’s pretty unforgiving, but it’s short-ish. Anyway, I know many of you guys are ahead of me on this one 😄. I found the usability of the Yucata interface to be a catastrophe. Because the game is unforgiving, we opted to use the generally finickier Yucata simply because it has an undo. And this was probably the right choice. But OMG the scans are low quality, the text is largely unreadable, there are no zoom controls, hover text sometime is there, sometimes isn’t ... it’s really awful. The lack of undo on BGA would be painful in a different way I’m sure, but now that I’ve been through it once I think I’d take it over this mess. That said, for learning the game, having a UI which nicely highlights your available actions and walks you through does make it easier. Or at least is a thing. Anyway, I don’t know that this is a winner for me, but now I’m definitely curious to explore it a bit more. #gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #polisfightforthehegemony #virtualgamenight https://www.instagram.com/p/CCfUVfih7LJ/?igshid=yvmivsqz1rsy

#gaminginthetimeofcovid19 #bgg #boardgamegeek #boardgames #polisfightforthehegemony #virtualgamenight