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Category Archives: Board Games

Posts about our weekly game nights.

Battlestar Galactica

Mike got me the Battlestar Galactica board game for my birthday this year, so I spent some time reading the 32-page rule book. (Clever of Mike to give me the game, so I would have to read the rules.) Actually the rules aren’t that complicated, so reading them went pretty fast…especially when you skip the examples. The game description says that “Battlestar Galactica is an exciting game of mistrust, intrigue, and the struggle for survival.” Sounds like the right game for our group. We’re already filled with mistrust, intrigue, and the struggle for survival.

At its core this game is a cooperative game where we are all just trying to get the humans to a safe planet called Kobol. What we don’t know is that one of us could be a Cylon. Even worse, by the second half of the game, we know that one of us is the Cylon. But whom? During the game the players move around various areas of the ships performing actions to hopefully help the humans reach their goal. All the while fighting off Cylon war ships, Cylon boarding parties, and various crisis that arise on every player’s turn.

As our game began, Mike took on the role of Admiral and Owen was our president. This gave them some extra special abilities. Ben was a fighter pilot and I was another military leader. From the start I suspected Mike of being a Cylon. And when I say “from the start”, I mean from the moment he gave me the game. Although his actions seemed benevolent enough, I was suspicious…even when he nuked the Cylon basestar. In the first half of the game both Owen and Ben seemed obviously human. Ben boarded a viper and went out to take on the Cylons up-close and personal. Owen was very helpful as the president. During the second half of the game, when we knew we had a Cylon among us, their actions changed. Both Owen and Ben seemed to be holding out when help was needed.

Eventually Ben revealed himself as the Cylon. He did his best to derail the human path to victory, nearly succeeding. But in the end the humans made it to Kobol…only to discover the Borg were already there. We were all assimilated. (Ok, so I made up that last part.)

We decided that the first half of the game may have been a little slow because none of us was a Cylon at the time. But once one of us became a Cylon, things livened up significantly. I’m pretty sure we’re going to get the expansion. In it, I can push Mike out of an airlock. How fun is that!?

Chaos Steve

Claustrophobia

If you have Claustrophobia (the game, not the phobia itself) then you know it’s a game about tactical survival in underground catacombs. I’m sure it will get compared to Descent, but it’s a different game that stands on its own. Claustrophobia is a two-player game where one player is evil and the other runs all of the heroes. “Heroes” is a strong word, since most of them are condemned criminals. Only one of the heroes is not a criminal, he is called the Redeemer. The back drop for Claustrophobia is that it is set in the world of Hell Dorado and takes place in the tunnels under New Jerusalem. The idea is to cleanse the tunnels of its devils and monsters. Each game is a specific, pre-defined scenario. (Later, experienced players can bid to create a more free-flow game.) The idea is that the heroes are in the catacombs and must make their way to the exit tunnel.

In our game, Mike naturally played the evil character, while I had four heroes (naturally). We were playing the first scenario which has a pre-defined number of tiles that need to be explored before reaching the exit. At first things were going well for my trusty band of heroes. We slaughtered troglodytes, and even one devil, like no tomorrow. But as we began the second half of the game the winds of fate suddenly changed. One of my heroes became badly wounded, and darn if Mike didn’t try to kill him again and again. Eventually he did….kill him. About that same time my first hero escaped the catacombs. I only needed two to escape Evil Mike’s clutches to win. Unfortunately the rest where straggling behind and beset by troglodytes. I suddenly went from looking at a confident win to staring at a disaster as Evil Mike killed each remaining hero in succession. No!

Claustrophobia is a fun, two-player game. It has a good amount of replay-ability and only takes about an hour to play if everyone knows the rules. Mike and I’s first game, including going over all the rules, lasted about two hours.

Tonight we play Battlestar Galactica…if I get the 32-page rulebook read.

Chaos Steve

Bushido: Der Weg des Kriegers

Mike got a new game called Bushido: Der Weg des Kriegers (the subtitle means “Way of the Warrior”). As you might be able to guess, it’s a German game about medieval Japan. Fortunately we have rules written in English. The text from the box says, “…players take on the roles of Daimyo, feudal lords in medieval Japan, and compete to become the next Shogun of the empire, who gets appointed by the emperor. And this truly has to be an honorable man.” Ah yes, an honorable man. If the shogun is suppose to be so honorable, why is this game all about intrigue, back-stabbing, spying, and using others to attain your goals? This done all the while you are smiling and bowing to your fellow lords? If you like games with lots of player interaction, then you’ll like this one.

The game has an interesting dynamic in that you, as the Daimyo gain honor by having others—the other players—fight your battles for you. Let me explain how this works. Each round, a new player becomes the reigning Daimyo for that round. He has three other roles that he assigns to the other players. The Samurai role will be his general and attack the province of his choice. The Bushi role is to defend against the attack. The Sensei role is the Daimyo’s advisor and can play effects that can help or hurt the Daimyo. There is one other role that isn’t used in a 4-player game and won’t be mentioned here. The game description does have it right that this game is all about honor. Everyone gains and loses honor through battles on the board.

This was a perfect game for our little group, which already has an underlying current of friendly mistrust and fragile alliances running through it. Ben once again made a strategic error in the placement of his troops at the beginning of the game. This caused him to struggle for most of the game as he was most often chosen as the Bushi. He was also the only Samurai to be called upon to commit Seppuku due to his disappointing failure as my Samurai. Mike and Owen, by far, were the best two players the entire game. Mike, whose nickname is the “Silver Tongued Devil” worked his magic and convinced everyone he was harmless…harmlessly gaining honor to become the Shogun. Owen took a more straight forward approach and won battle after battle, thus earning much honor.

Usually Ben is the king-maker (or in this case, Shogun-maker) of the game, but this time it was me. By making two, no three, no…two mistakes at the very end of the game. One, I allowed Mike to invite me to a Tea Ceremony that everyone else said (afterwards) I should decline. Mike got much Daimyo honor from this. Enough to put him one short battle away from becoming Shogun. Mike also chose me as his Samurai. If I win the battle, he wins the game. If I lose the battle, I lose. Either way it’s nothing but bad for me. Mike depended upon me doing something stupid and I did not disappoint him. I inadvertently won the battle, giving Mike the game. Owen, on the other hand, was very disappointed. He was also poised to become Shogun and my ineptness stole it from him. My ineptness also vaulted me in to third place, and in our little group, that’s a win just not to be last. (Ben was last.)

Chaos Steve

Endeavor

It’s been a few months since we played Endeavor, so we broke it out again. Endeavor is a game of world exploration and empire building. You represent a European empire colonizing the Mediterranean and shipping to all parts of the world to increase the empire’s glory and status in Industry, Culture, Finance and Politics. For all of its many pieces and parts, it’s easy to play and relatively fast. The first five or so turns go pretty fast, it wasn’t long before there were only a couple of turns left in the game. Those last couple of turns take a while though, because each player has built up the ability to take many actions during their turn.

In our game, we all started off with slightly different strategies. Some failed (Ben’s). Others succeeded (everyone else’s). Although most thought I was going to blow everyone away with my Glory Point total (victory points), that was not the case. I did win—just barely. I ended up with 45 points, but Mike and Owen were right behind me, both tied at 42 points. Ben ended with a lackluster 33 points. I pick on Ben sometimes in these write-ups, but I have to thank him for his part in my win. He made two crucial moves towards the end of the game that either hurt Owen directly or forced Owen to take action other than what Owen might have wanted to do. I think, seeing how close the final scores were, that I would have lost otherwise. Thanks Ben!

Chaos Steve

Giant Settlers of Catan

One of the great things about playing games with the same guys every week is the banter around the table during the game. This week was no exception as we enjoyed a lot of joking around the table—mostly about how badly we were all playing. As you’ll see, Owen was the only exception. Oh, he joked all right, but his play was far from bad.

Settlers of Catan 002

Ben had recently completed the final updates to the giant Settlers of Catan set he made, so we decided to play that this week. It looks really cool! We played two games on it. Owen dominated both games. He also started both games. I don’t think there is any significance there, but you never know. His starting position was the best on the board in both games. Usually our Settlers games are pretty close with several players being close to winning at the end of the game. This was certainly not the case this week as we all struggled to stay up with Owen. Ben is still on his wild win/lose gaming streak–meaning that if he doesn’t win the game, he usually ends up dead last. (He did tied for last place in the second game though, so maybe things are looking up for him.)

As always we had a great time.

Chaos Steve

Ticket to Ride & Amun-Re

Playing Catch Up

No there isn’t really a game called Catch Up. Ok, maybe there is such a game, be even if there is, we didn’t play it. What I mean here is that I’ve neglected to post the previous gaming sessions. I’ll rectify that now.

Two Sessions Ago

We played a game. I forget the name of it, but I’m pretty sure I won it.

The Previous Session

We play two games of Ticket to Ride using the 1910 expansion. We loved the new cards the expansion added and we loved the new size of all the cards the expansion added. We played the mega game using all of the cards. Mike came in dead last both times and is considering banning the game. I won both games, and Mike has banned the game. (He’ll forget he did this and we’ll still play again in the future.)

Back to the Current Session

Last night we played Amun-Re, yet another game by Knizia. The object of the game is to claim provinces along the Nile, build pyramids, and score points. But be careful, you also have to make sacrifices to Amun Re or risk his displeasure. The game is separated into 2 game parts: the old and new kingdoms. Each of the two parts has 3 rounds. Each round has 5 or 6 phases.

During the first half of the game, we were all getting a feel for the game and how to score points. Everyone else did much better than me during this part of the game. Meaning I was dead last…and pretty far behind the third place Pharaoh.

During the second half of the game, everyone had a much better idea of what was going on. Many more pyramids were built and players vied for the possible point producing Power cards. Owen, who had been hording Power cards, ended up winning with Mike coming in second, Ben in third and you-know-who in last place. It seems to me that the point scoring Power cards can be the make or break of the game. If you get them early, you can create a strategy to take advantage of them. If you get them late, or not at all…well, you come in last place.

Chaos Steve

Cyclades

Owen brought a new game for us try called Cyclades. If you think this a game of bicycles and lovely ladies, you’d be sadly mistaken. It is a game of cycles, just not the kind you ride. During each cycle the players buy favors from the gods to expand their strength and build buildings. The winner is the player who can build two cities in a group of Greek islands known as the Cyclades.

Our game started off great, with Ben completely missing a play that would have garnered him a lot of gold in the future. And believe me; this game is all about gold. You need gold to do everything! Nevertheless, Ben was doing a fine job expanding his fleets and taking over islands. Mike too, was growing powerful. While not powerful, I was on my way to getting my first city. I held off though, because I knew that would place a target on my forehead.

Mike ended up getting the first city and I ended up giving the game to Mike. I failed to do one thing on my turn that would have hampered Mike’s ability to attack me, but I didn’t see it. On my turn, I also built a city. I protected it with a couple of armies using two of the three creatures available to me on my turn. The third creature I left. I couldn’t imagine anyone using it. Little did I know that Mike had big plans for that creature. The last creature allowed you to sell anything you owned to get gold. Mike was in the perfect position to sell his needless possessions so he could do only one thing—attack me. By taking my island he could win the game. He did just that…and easily too.

Nicely planned Mike. I came in second. :)

Chaos Steve

Dungeon Lords

I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking how great it would be to build your own dungeon complete with special rooms, terrifying monsters (and ghosts), and insanely clever traps. Then you’d sit back and watch the clumsy, ill equipped party of heroes try to survive while searching for your carefully hidden treasures. I am right? Well then Dungeon Lords is the game for you. (And if Evil Mike would figure out why we can’t upload images any longer, there would be a nice graphic of the game box at the top of the post.) In the game each player is the lord of a dungeon. Through the clever use of you minions (administrators) and imp (imps) you construct a dungeon, create traps, and hire fearsome monsters (and ghosts). But don’t think that being a dungeon lord is all gold and lilies. You also have to pay those fearsome monsters (and ghosts) that fill your dungeon. If you don’t, they go rampaging around the countryside mumbling about your horrible administrative skills. Worse yet is the Ministry of Dungeons that requires taxes from all dungeon lords. So you see, you have your job cut out for you. There is also the matter of your reputation, if you get to be too evil, the paladin may come knocking on your door. And I know you don’t want that to happen, so you need to manage your evilness as well. One last note: the rules, although long, are extremely clever and filled with several training dungeons. The training dungeons are so you can get a feel for the nuances of killing heroes foolish enough to delve into your dungeon.

Now let’s talk about our game*. Our game* was a lot of fun. Never have I seen so much inept game* playing. Although all of us had occasions of not being able to afford something we selected during dungeon construction, Ben wins hands down for using awesome strategy to acquire a dragon and then was not able to pay for it. But by far the best (or worse) case was Mike and Ben not being able to pay their taxes to Ministry of Dungeons. You get -3 victory points for every gold you can’t pay. At the end of the game Mike had a -15 and Ben -21 from “fines”. As I mentioned, Ben was on a roll…straight down the tubes. At one point Owen commented, “His (Ben’s) cheating is coming thick and fast now. My head is swirling.” But Ben’s cheating mattered little in our game*. We were doomed, doomed I tell you. Mostly because of the plethora of rules Ben neglected to tell us or just had completely wrong. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not pointing any fingers at Ben. (Yes, I am.) The game* was all the more fun because of our outrageously inept playing and getting so many rules utterly wrong. Our ending scores (in no particular order): Ben -12, Steve +21, Owen +13, Mike -06, and Ben with -12. Ben came in last with -12. I won the game*. We liked the game* and plan on playing it (somewhat) correctly next week.

Chaos Steve, Dungeon Lord, Monster Lord, and Battle Lord (You get titles in this game* too.)

*The guys kept telling me that this game had so many *’s that I thought I should note that.

Galactic Emperor

Monday night found us each struggling to become the Galactic Emperor. Galactic Emperor resembles Twilight Imperium III in many ways. You’re building a galactic empire. Each round you chose roles which cause certain events to occur. You use star ships and wield political influence to expand your empire and the planets in your empire produce resources. It plays much differently though. For one thing, there is a greater emphasis on combat. I like this. Conquering plants with your fleet is fun–as is taking planets from other players. And as an added bonus, you get victory points for taking planets away from other players. Mike and I had actually played this game before at Gencon a couple of years ago. Neither of us remembered any details, so for all practical purposes it made little difference during the game.

Our game started well. All of us were expanding our empires. It seemed by the look of it that Mike and I were doing the best based up goods and technologies. That all changed once our empires grew within striking distance of each other. Evil Mike broke our truce and attacked me (and won) with his fleet. I retaliated AND I attacked Owen to the other side of me. Now I was stupidly fighting a two front war. Ben’s empire had dwindled some, so he took advantage of me attacking Mike, to attack Mike on the other side of his empire. Owen kicked my butt in the coming space battles and I eventually lost all of my ships. (Rolling four 1’s on four attack dice didn’t help either.) Mike actually told Ben what to do at one point during Ben’s turn. Amazingly Ben listened and had his best turn ever.

We were running out of time, so we ended about a round short of finishing the game. We thought Mike was going to easily have the most victory points. It turned out that he and Owen tied for first with 24 VPs. Ben came in last with 18 VPs. I floundered in the middle with 20.

I think we all liked this game. The one thing I learned was that if you buy a technology, have the presence of mind to use it! I forgot every single time and finally on the last round the guys let me use it just so I wouldn’t appear to be a complete idiot…even though it was too late for that.

Chaos Steve

Gloria Mundi & Kingdoms

After winning at Gloria Mundi last week, I was pretty sure that everyone would want a rematch this week. For some reason, my friends seem to have a hard time swallowing the fact that through cunning strategy and impeccable timing I am able to win once in a while. Luck might have a little to do with it too…LOTS of luck. So how did this week’s game go? Well…

We first decided to randomly choose our positions at the gaming table. I know that might seem rather odd, but changing our table positions can change the dynamic of the game a bit. The game started off just like the last game, but soon one fact became very clear to Mike and I. We were not going to win. And we were only about half way through the game. Both Owen and Ben had been able to develop several buildings that gave them movement points, which is how you win the game. I, on the other hand, was inexplicably using Ben’s strategy from the previous game. (I think Ben came in last in that game.) I could generate vast amounts a certain resources, but no movement. Mike was struggling to get both resources and moment points. So as Mike and I watched, Ben and Owen got further and further ahead of us.

In the final moves of the game, Ben took a big risk and called for a Farm turn that gave both Ben and Owen vast amounts of moment points. It moved Ben within two moves of winning, but propelled Owen to within one move of winning. Now, Owen only needed a gold resource behind his screen; because if he did, he could use it to move and win the game. Alas Ben’s risky move paid off. Owen did not have the gold he needed, so Ben won the game. Mike came in last.

We still had some time so we played Kingdoms. Kingdoms is played over three rounds in which you score points on a grid where you have castles in the rows and columns. After the first round we were all in the same point neighborhood. Mike was in the lead, but was catchable. That all changed after the second round. Mike jump 100 points ahead of the rest of us. And the rest of us were all within 10 points of each other. So the final round turned into not so much trying to stop Mike as it was to try not to be last! After much backstabbing by the rest of us, Mike won with 289 points. Owen did a good job of catching up (much to his surprise) with 229 points. I had 219 points and Ben brought up the rear with 198 points.

Next week we’re playing Galactic Emperor.

Chaos Steve