Dead Man's Draw

The last few days have been a frenzy of driving around, preparing for the coming month and playing as many new games as possible in order to complete the 200 different games in one month challenge. The list is getting rather extensive now, even with the occasional interruption of a few cheeky games of Imperial Settlers and the like, I believe we have played 174 different games and there are still some days left to complete it - it shall be done! Hitting Draughts, Thirsty Meeples and Marquee Models in the past few weeks was fantastic, as I have discovered so many new games through this.

In order to play 200 different games in one month, whilst maintaining work and a home has been a challenge in itself. It has been made easier, though, by great little filler games, Such as Dead Man's Draw. This piratical push your luck card game is published by Mayday Games and was originally released as a digital game by Stardock. It is all about plundering bountiful loot, without going bust and losing it all; a game about taking risks and reaping rewards. 

Players take it in turn to draw cards from the deck. You keep flipping over cards to reveal the loot, or peril, and lay them in a row by the deck if they are safe. Some cards make you immediately go bust, causing you to lose all the cards you just drew. On your turn, you can bank as many cards as you wish, providing you have not gone bust. You stop flipping cards and declare you have stopped, taking the cards you drew and keeping them face-up in front of you. How do you go bust, you ask? If you pick up a card that you have already revealed in that suit then you go bust! If you draw the Kraken card then that forces you to draw two more cards - which puts the rest of the cards you just drew at stake! Luckily, if you draw the Anchor card then that saves you a little, as it allows you to keep all the cards you just drew before it, even if you go bust afterwards. 

Much like a pirate, you are making a gamble with your treasure if you get too greedy, and you are doing dastardly deeds to try and come out on top. The Cannon card allows you to destroy an opponent's banked card, and the Sword lets you steal a card from your opponent. You may additionally use cards to combine abilities in order to source more or destroy more cards. The game ends when the deck is depleted, and whoever has the most points after totalling up their card values wins the game.

There is a simpler version and a more advanced one, but as we were on a time limit with stacks of games to play in the cafe we stuck to this version.   

Dead Man's Draw is a fun, fast-paced card game with beautiful illustrations and fine quality cards. It is simple to play, yet still involves some careful strategic thinking. In my endeavour to play as many games as I can, I have come across numerous pirate-themed card games and board games, and this game (along with Cartagena) is one of the best I have encountered so far.

Thanks for reading

Marisa xx

Eight Minute Empire: Legends

One of the first games I played at Thirsty Meeples was Eight Minute Empire: Legends, by Red Raven Games. This is a sequel to the original Eight Minute Empire, and it is a standalone game rather than an expansion. The game focuses on building an empire by gaining territory and using strategic moves, in a fast-paced fashion. Eight Minute Empire is one of my most played games at home. I picked it up at MCM London in May and I have played it an obscene amount of times. It is wonderful how the game is so compact, with so much to offer in eight minutes - possibly longer if you deliberate over your turns like I do at times. All of the dilemmas approach; which card to choose from the row, which block to move? Do I want to start amassing a small army abroad or produce more armies in the starting base? Oh, the choices!

Eight Minute Empire: Legends, like the original, is played on a modular board that gives you options in the set-up of your map. Once the board is assembled you may select which colour you wish to be. Each player gets a number of blocks and three cities, they place four of the blocks in a central area on the board. The blocks represent armies, that you will be sending out to seize land and populate the areas with. In the two player version I played, another colour is selected to act as a third player on the map and ten more blocks are placed in random places. At the start of the game, players bid to see who goes first using the coins they are allocated, the number of coins will depend on how many players are in the game. 

The deck of cards is shuffled and six cards are laid face up in a row, at the top of the board. The deck lies nearby, ready for the players to draw again and replenish the cards taken. Players take turns to select a card and carry out the action on it, it could be to add more armies, build a city, move armies, or destroy an opposing army block. When cards are taken, the rest are shifted to the left, and a new card is revealed from the deck and placed down. The first card in the row is free, then the rest can be bought using coins from your hand. Once shifted, the older cards become slightly more affordable and the new one is the most expensive. The Legends cards have special abilities that allow you to gain extra Victory Points. To win the game your armies must control the most territory, and your collected cards can help give you bonus points. 

If you get a card that allows you to build a city then you get to place the insanely cute castle on an area of the board where you have one of your armies, and then you can spawn armies from there in future turns. This is ideal if you have a rogue block across the sea, then you can dominate more territory.          

The game ends when each player has a certain amount of cards, again, this depends on how many people are playing as Legends is a 2 - 4 player game. At the end you score points based on how many regions and islands you control, and add up any extra points that your cards have added. This is a highly enjoyable game, it is brief but it gets very heated and after one game I always want another straight after. The board and the cards are beautifully illustrated by the designer, Ryan Laukat, with legendary creatures and mythical lands. The rich artwork, quick set-up and smooth game mechanics make this one a perfect choice, building an empire in 8 minutes or so never looked so good!

Thanks for reading.

Marisa xx

Thirsty Meeples

I have just returned from a relaxing and indulgent mini break to Oxford, where I spent three days at Thirsty Meeples, the board games cafe. 

The cafe is cosy, with a vibrant and lively atmosphere. The walls are piled high with games to play, such a vast amount that some shelves are even stacked to the ceiling. The front of the cafe houses games that are available to purchase, a generous selection that tempted me greatly. The counter is adorned with mini games, card decks and colourful cakes behind the glass (keeping them safe from the likes of me). The interior of the cafe is like a gamer's dream come true; a haven for table top lovers and anyone who wishes to get engrossed in a good game whilst eating and drinking yummy things. The staff were friendly and keen to explain the rules of new games, as well as recommend some of their favourites to customers or ones they thought would appeal.   

All three days we were there, the cafe was bustling with customers, booking tables in advance was a great idea. It felt rather good to sit back, drinking delicious milk shakes whilst playing absorbing and exciting games. I like to think of myself as a milkshake connoisseur, so I was very pleased to sample the Terry's Chocolate Orange milkshake. it was just like drinking a dessert - fantastic!  

But back to the most important part of this post: The games. We played twenty-five games, lots of different genres including brief dice games, card games, set collecting, dungeon crawling, worker placement, strategy and adventure games. We arrived at the cafe armed with a handwritten list of all the games we wanted to try out, thinking we would get to play maybe half of them. We actually got to play all but three on the list and instead played four that were not even on the list. Some of the highlights for me were Waggle Dance, Five Tribes, Cartagena 2, Mai-Star and Eight Minute Empire Legends.   

Board game cafes are a brilliant idea, I have only visited two so far but I hunger for more. There are others opening in the near future, Dice is opening in Portsmouth after a successful Kickstarter, Board are in Exeter and Dice and Donuts are opening in Lancashire with a Kickstarter still in progress, and there are more board game cafes in the works that are yet to be finalised. I feel a few more road trips are in order.

Thanks for reading, go and play a game now! I shall write more about the games I played in the next post.   

Marisa xx

    

Get Lucky

A grey and wet Sunday in August means no outdoor skating or frolicking on the beach, it means indoor time, which means game time (although, any kind of weather forecast means game time at the moment!). Today's morning game was Get Lucky by Cheapass Games. Get Lucky is the card game adaptation of Kill Doctor Lucky, the classic board game and first game by Cheapass Games. You can still fully appreciate the card game even if you are yet to play the classic, and I think it is a nice way to introduce it to people. 

Doctor Lucky certainly lives up to his name, he has managed to sail through life angering everyone he has met along the way and has lived to a ripe old age...so far. Now it is time for his enemies to seek revenge, their lust for his blood has built up and one of them will be victorious tonight and succeed in killing him. We hope. 

Like most evenings that end in vengeful bloodshed, it begins with a dinner party. Doctor Lucky is hosting an elegant soiree at his mansion and has decided to invite every person who wants him dead. Every dinner guest has a reason for killing him, which is printed on the beautifully illustrated guest cards. The flavour text is witty and fun, all ending with the same reasoning: that Doctor Lucky must die!

The set up of the game is simple, I have been playing the two player version which involves an imaginary player called Howard, I shall elaborate on Howard later. Each player starts with three characters and a hand of 8 cards from the deck. Three additional characters are placed in the Drawing Room, laid out on the table in a row, with the main deck of upgrade cards face-down nearby and the other guest cards at the other end. Doctor Lucky is represented by the pawn, he moves from character to character on every turn, in numeric order. When he is on your character this signals it is your turn to play. I like to imagine him shmoozing around the room, drifting around party guests and leaving once he has delightfully insulted them enough.

On your turn you may equip a card to a character, draw a card from the deck, swap the character whose turn it is for one in the Drawing Room or make an attempt on Doctor Lucky's life. Luckily there is no hand limit in this game, which is great because if you play like me you may end up with quite a few cards! The upgrade cards in the deck are Weapon, Motive and Opportunity cards. There are also some dubious looking Spite cards in the deck that can be used to weaken your opponent's characters, but they can be used to weaken yours too so be prepared! You can equip the upgrade cards to your characters to make them more powerful and give them points that can be used to kill Doctor Lucky. The points to kill him are counteracted by luck points, these can also be found on the cards and will be used by your opponents when you make attempts to murder him. You do not want to let anyone beat you to the killing, your character wants to be the one to kill him because that is how you win the game!

There are specific upgrade cards for your character in the deck that share their name and number, if you equip these to your character then you get extra points, this helps build up your character's strength for the slaying and helps out if you are stung by a Spite card. Spite cards are used to stop a murder, they are worth one luck point and are attached to the murderer permanently, giving them -1 points. This is when the swapping of your characters with characters in the Drawing Room can come in handy, you may want to do that if one of your characters is bombarded with Spite cards. The swap also comes in handy if you have a nice stash of upgrade cards in your hand for someone in the Drawing Room and your current people are milling about with no weapon, motive or opportunity to kill. 

So, now I shall talk about Howard; the imaginary player. He comes into the game to help you out if your opponent makes an attempt on Doctor Lucky's life and you are running low on luck points to halt the murder. To counteract the murder attempt you produce luck points from your hand that correspond to the points the murderer has. If you use an upgrade card with their number on it then they immediately cease the attempt. You can also use any card that has luck points, depicted by lucky clovers on them. But when you do not have the relevant cards you must call upon Howard. He takes the reins and plays from the top of the deck, he may play up to the amount of luck that was passed to him. Any spite cards revealed are attached to the murderer whilst others are tossed onto the discard pile. Howard has been my saviour quite a few times in the past, it was rather like we were in sync, he knew the gravity of the situation and rushed to my aid like a gallant knight on his trustworthy steed, until this morning. He screwed me over big time, and our relationship will be forever strained; thanks for nothing, Howard!

Get Lucky creates a great atmosphere and is a wonderfully balanced game. The simplicity of the game play makes it appealing, and it still feels exciting even after multiple games. I find this is the case with a lot of games designed by James Ernest, such as Brawl and Button Men, which are two games that helped start my gaming obsession last year. I recommend giving Get Lucky a play soon, I think I will give it another play tonight to let Howard try to redeem himself.

Thanks for reading! I am off to Oxford tomorrow so wish me table top fun :)

Marisa xx            

    

    

                 

Dungeon Roll

In my last blog post I wrote that I would talk about the other game I played by Tasty Minstrel Games; Dungeon Roll. I was rather distracted last night from writing as we had a full-on gaming session with new friends, and it was quite epic! We ended up playing Burgoo, Machi Koro, Broom Service, Imperial Settlers (twice), Button Men, Star Wars: Imperial Assault, Hannibal Island and One Night Ultimate Werewolf. I was proud of my performance in the last round of One Night Ultimate Werewolf, as I was the werewolf but pretended to be the troublemaker in a way that finally fooled everyone, I lied for the first time without going bright red or quavering!

But, back to the main event, Dungeon Roll is a dungeon delving dice game designed by Chris Darden, where you push your luck as the adventurous Hero, creeping into dark dungeons to seek fortune and glory with numerous companions to assist you. The game components are plentiful and very attractive; gorgeous custom dice, illustrated cards and counters all rest in the treasure chest. The cards depict the Hero characters, the counters are the treasure and the XP, the white dice are the companions for the adventurer to roll, the black d6 dice are the encounters in the dungeon and the d10 die is to record what level your Hero is at.

The white die faces are the Champion, Fighter, Cleric, Mage, Thief and a scroll that can be used to re-roll dice. Each companion has different abilities that could allow you to defeat a foe, defeat multiple foes or open chests. The black die faces consist of the perils of the dungeon and the spoils; a treasure chest and a potion for quaffing that can be used to revive companions, and perils are goblins, skeletons, oozey creatures and the dreaded dragon.

Before the game begins you choose a Hero card from the stash. The cards are double sided, you start with the novice and you can turn over your card to reveal the master when you level up at 5XP. 

The game starts by the adventurer rolling the white dice to determine who will be accompanying them to the dungeon, whilst the opposing player acts as the Dungeon Lord, setting the ten-sided die to level one then rolling one black die to see what the first encounter will be. For each time you push your luck delving into the dungeon, ascending a new level, the Dungeon Lord will roll that many die for you to tackle. You use your companions to kill the monsters, quaff the potions and open the chests, then the companions are retired for that turn. 

If you roll three dragons on the black dice this means you must fight it with three different types of companions, so knowing when to stop pushing your luck can be a good strategy! You do not want to be facing a dragon with only two or less companions, unless you have a special ability on your card that aids you. Opening the chest allows you to pick up a piece of treasure at random, I like to pour all the counters in the chest and fumble around inside with my eyes closed. The treasure you gain presents the adventurer with abilities that can be used once then returned to the chest, and some count as XP if you still possess them at the end of the game.

After defeating monsters, unlocking chests, looting treasure and possibly evading or slaying a dragon, the Hero flees the dungeon and regroups at a tavern with any leftover survivors. Here, they toast their victory if they have uncovered a fortune, or drown their sorrows if they lost their comrades and return empty handed.   

This is another enjoyable game from TMG, that can be set up quickly and has more to it than some of the other push your luck dice games out there. The Hero cards give you options with their abilities and the treasure you pick up can help you when you are in a jam. The game could be brief or more lengthy, depending on how many players you have. An additional advantage is that it can be played solo, as well as with up to four players. and I think that is handy as I know a few people I would like to keep occupied while I am in the bath! 

Thanks for reading :)

Marisa xx 

  

      

Burgoo - Stewing on it!

Last weekend I played two games by Tasty Minstrel Games; Burgoo and Dungeon Roll. I purchased Dungeon Roll from Orc's Nest in Covent Garden, the majestic-looking treasure chest caught my eye as I was browsing the shelves and the description on the box sounded quite fun and appealing to a fan of dice rolling games. Burgoo was given to me by a friend to help me reach my goal of playing 200 games in August, it is a loan but I have a feeling I may be purchasing it at some point. My notes on both of these games were quite lengthy, so I will concentrate on Burgoo tonight, to save my blog from turning into an essay.   

Burgoo is designed by Dan Manfredini and consists of a collection of counters, with six different images of food ingredients to make a special stew. The premise of the game is that it is a cold Autumn month, and the community have gathered together to prepare a warming stew for all. The winner of the game will be the first one to add all of their ingredients to the Burgoo, whilst sampling it the most. It is making me hungry all over again, just typing this! 

The game is set up by each player by randomly arranging ingredients of the six types into a column, this is called the Batch. In the two player version, as I have been playing it, each player constructs two Batches. They additionally take one of each ingredient into their hand and hide this from their opponent, keep it secret! All leftover counters are placed in the middle of the table and this becomes the Pot. As the game begins, there are three actions that players can take; adding ingredients, sampling the Burgoo and splitting a Batch.

Adding ingredients is how you empty your Batch; throw a robust onion into the hearty stew to give it a little kick! You can add an ingredient from the top or bottom of your Batch by throwing a matching one from your hand in the Pot. If your opponent has the same ingredient in the same place as yours then you acquire that piece in your hand, thus making your secret stash even bigger. 

To sample the Burgoo you simply grab a wooden spoon and dip it in to the simmering Pot. Or, in reality, you pick up a piece from the Pot that would benefit you in a future turn. 

When splitting the Batch you toss any ingredient from your hand into the Pot, then you split one of your Batches in any way that will benefit you, such as splitting it so you have two potatoes at the top, then when you next discard a potato you will be ridding your Batch of two. You can split a Batch multiple times, even down to one counter that is deemed both top and bottom, but you can only split once per turn. Doing this also could help out your opponent, though, so keep a watchful eye over their Batches and make sure you are not emptying their stack as much as your own!

This is an enjoyable game, I like the idea of neighbours coming together to make a big stew but trying to out-cook each other and finish up first. It is almost like a cooking show on the Food Network, with the chefs racing against time to finish their dish, but also sampling it and keeping a little stack of secret ingredients on their person. I have a bit of a penchant for games with a food theme (you may have noticed) and this one certainly ticks all the boxes with its accessibility and strategic game play. It even has a recipe for Burgoo printed in the instructions sheet!

Thanks for reading, next post will be focusing on Dungeon Roll :)

Marisa xx                   

200 Games in One Month!

On a whim, I have set a personal goal of playing 200 different games this month. It is quite a feat, even though my household holds around 150 games. The collection includes a wide array of tabletop games, from brief and fast-paced games like Brawl and Button Men to more lengthy and heavier games such as Shogun and Zombicide. We are in the tenth day of the month and I have played eighty different games so far, that leaves 21 days to cram in 120 more games. This is achievable! On top of the challenge, I have still been playing my favourite games multiple times. Although they do not count as part of the 200, a girl can't limit herself.  

Visiting Draughts, Marquee Models and friend's houses for board gaming sessions has given me a plethora of new games to discover and indulge in. The games that have had the biggest impact on me so far have been Imperial Settlers and Mysterium. I raved about Imperial Settlers in my last blog post, since then it has been purchased and played profusely. I think I may be a bit obsessed. 

Mysterium's Box and Imperial Settlers in play.

Mysterium is a unique game, it is a co-operative game of deduction with a murder mystery and paranormal theme. One player acts as the silent ghost, using illustrated cards to help the other players who are acting as mediums. The cards allow the mediums to decipher who killed the ghost hundreds of years ago, how they killed them and discover the location of where the slaughter took place. The mediums may converse together and analyse the cards, it is a rather social game! To play this we gathered around a table like we were present for am actual seance, all we needed was the ambience of a darkened room with flickering candles and the wind howling outside. But, alas, it was the morning and a very fine sunny day with sunlight streaming in, and the only howling was my stomach as I had eaten an inadequate breakfast.  

Get Lucky, Hare and Tortise, Drakon (1st Edition) and Fast Flowing Forest Fellas:
Four of the games I have played so far today.

The 200 Games challenge is allowing me to access more games, break out of my comfort zone and learn lots of new strategies. I recommend setting yourselves a challenge such as this, blitz through your own collection, dust the cobwebs off of that ancient game you have lurking in the cabinet and give it some play!

Thanks for reading. If you would like to catch up on my crazy challenge more then follow me on Twitter https://twitter.com/tabletopstop

Marisa xx

A Trip to Draughts

This week I ventured up to London to visit the board games cafe, Draughts, to see how many games I could rip through from opening to closing. The cafe is situated in Hackey, a short walk from Haggerston station, so locating it was fairly easy. On weekdays it opens at 5pm, so we made sure we were there early, loitering around outside - even though I had a table booked in advance, because I am silly like that.

Draughts is a really unique place, it was a very fun experience and reasonably priced at £5 each to play as many games as you can handle. The food and drink were quite affordable too for a London venue, and amid the mass rounds of pear juice and Jalapeno pretzels we got quite a few games in. At the back of the cafe there is a library of games to browse through, over 500 games of all genres under one roof like a treasure trove. The staff were friendly and keen to recommend games, then demonstrate how to play them. We started off with something light to warm up; Elk Fest. This is a simple little dexterity game where you and your opponent flick counters from either end of the table. The counters act as stepping stones for the wooden elks who balance upon them, and you must move them across to the other side without the elks falling off.

After settling in with the elks, we moved onto Machi Koro, which I have wanted to play for a while now and was happy to finally crack open the box. It is a city building and dice rolling game, and it is very addictive. You build up your city by collecting various cards through dice rolls and coin counters. Some cards give you extra benefits and hinder your opponents, I had a cheese factory stolen by my opponent! As soon as it was over I was ready to go again, but other games were calling so I relented and moved on to Imperial Settlers.   

       

Imperial Settlers is a civilisation building game, where you are playing as early settlers from major continents, collecting resources to build and trade with. The concepts and mechanics of this game were not ones I was too familiar with so I found the first round rather daunting but I soon adapted and was racking in the apples and meeples. This game is fantastic, and I ended up going home and ordering it for next day delivery.

The next game up was Agricolam as it was highly recommended by the staff at the cafe. This echoed some of the themes in Imperial Settlers, but is more of a worker placement game. You collect resources to build upon your farm and land. and take a number of actions depending on how many people live in your farm. I was so focused upon growing obscene amounts of carrots that I forgot to reproduce, so I had less people in my farm and less actions to take!

We managed to squeeze in three versions of Timeline towards the end. Timeline is an educational card game where players must use their knowledge (or guess, as I do a lot) to pinpoint when certain events occurred throughout history, and place their cards in chronological order in a row. As the hours flew by, it was so tempting to stay until closing at 11pm but the thought of missing the last train and having to wait for the night bus was too traumatic, so leaving at 10,30pm was preferable. But I must admit, on the way home we played a few games on the I-Phone...and perhaps more games upon arriving home. We have problems!  

Thanks for reading :) 

Please feel free to recommend games to me or just talk about games to me at

kookycherry@hotmail.co.uk

Marisa xx 

   

New Games!

I purchased three new games from Marquee Models this week; Agent Hunter, Fluxx and Hanabi. I am looking forward to playing these, especially Hanabi as it is a cooperative game and I rather enjoy those. Holding a new game and unwrapping the packaging is almost like opening a Christmas present.

I have a sneaking suspicion that even more new games will enter the collection next week, as I have a few game related events lined up! Keep your eyes peeled for updates :)

Have a good night

Marisa xx  

Cartagena

Who doesn't like a pirate themed game? I would choose pirates over zombies, any day. Cartagena is a game about groups of pirates racing each other through an underground passage, to escape the fortress prison they were held in and to reach the port where a sloop is waiting for them. This will transport the lucky pirates away to a land of rum and, probably, booty.

According to the rules sheet, the game Cartagena is themed on a pirate jailbreak in 1672. I did a little research into it and could not find any information on this jailbreak. It seems others also looked into it and found no actual record of this, but there is an imposing fortress in Cartagena that was built in the 16th Century to ward off pirates so perhaps there is some kind of legend surrounding it after all. Also, I am sure the internet does not know every single detail of history.

I love this game. I have played it on numerous occasions and taken a vicious beating, only tasting victory one sweet time. It is very strategic, planning ahead to get your pirates through the underground passage, but also hindering your opponents. You are navigating a path for your pirates, and making sure you do not run out of cards.

This game is for two - five players and there are two different versions of the game; the Jamaica version and the Tortuga version. In the Jamaica version the cards in your hand are concealed and the rest of the deck is placed face down, where all players pick new cards from. In the Tortuga version the players lay their hand face up for all to see, and twelve cards from the deck are dealt and placed face up in a row. The row is re-stocked once it has run out. I tend to favour the Jamaica version as I like the secrecy!

The board is in six segments, you can assemble them together in many different ways, as long as the passages connect either end. Each player is allocated six cards in their hand. The player who looks the most like a pirate may take the first turn. This has only been me once, after I had a particularly manic hair day. 

The cards have a piratical theme, with six different symbols. There is the skull and crossbones, the Captain's hat, a key, a dagger, a pistol and a glass bottle. You play a card to move one of your pirates to the nearest symbol that matches your card on the board. The aim is to get all six of your pirates across the passage but using a strategy that hinders your opponents. When you need more cards you must move one of your pirates backwards, to the nearest pirate behind you, regardless if it is your own or your opponents. If you move to a space with one pirate resting there, then you pick up one card. If you go back to a space with two pirates there then you may pick up two cards. There can only be a maximum of three pirates on one space, so this makes life rather difficult when you are running low on cards, but you can use it to your advantage when trying to stop your opponent from picking up new cards. 

The player who gets all six of their pirates across the passage and onto the sloop is the winner. When I first played this game I hastily sent all my pirates out on my first six turns, it seemed like a good idea but I had so many stragglers and did not want to leave any pirates behind! I became rather obsessed with this game a few months ago, trying to crack the secret to winning and not running out of cards so severely. It takes a lot of plotting, going backwards whenever you see a space occupied by two pirates within your reach, and holding fort by keeping three pirates on a space behind your opponent rather than advancing at times. I am still working on the formula. It is a rather brutal game, but great fun. I hunger for more victories, but I enjoy a challenge so I keep swashbuckling away.