Game Nite magazine issue 11

Game Nite

Issue # 11

the magazine of tabletop gaming

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GAME REVIEWS COLLECTING BOARDGAMES

JAMEY STEGMAIER DESIGNER/PUBLISHER

YUCATA

ONLINE GAME SITES PT.3

MICHAEL MENZEL ARTIST

AND MORE!

IN THIS ISSUE: PUZZLES 4

REVIEWS

Word Search/Crossword

Puzzle Section

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Answer Keys

Puzzle Solutions

8 Dr. Eureka Eureka!

BOOK REVIEW

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The Role-Playing Society RPG Essay Collection

EDUCATION 78

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Games in Education Game Events pt.3

Collecting Board Games Board Game Collections

INTERVIEWS 14

Michael Menzel

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Jamey Stegmaier

Artist.

Game Designer/Publisher.

SOLO GAMING 74

Phantom Leader Deluxe Jeff Rhind

COMICS 77

Stockpile Expansion Continuing Corruption.

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Sugar Gliders

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Dawn of the Zeds Third Edition.

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Vast: The Crystal Caverns

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The Networks Prime Time Gameplay.

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Grifters Dystopian Filler.

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Trajan Feld Masterpiece.

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Conspiracy!

Reptilian Overlords.

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Secrets of the Lost Tomb

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Best Treehouse Ever Build a Treehouse.

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Matryoshka

Nestor Andres Design.

Unique Assymetrical Game.

Tombs, Tales and Teamwork.

Collect Matryoshka Dolls.

CONTRIBUTORS

Comics Game Night comic strip.

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SPECIAL FEATURE

Game Nite Contributors

REVIEW INDEX

64 Online Game Sites Pt.3 Yucata.

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Issue #11

Back Issue Index

FROM THE GAMING TABLE

Game Nite ISSUE # 11

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ith this issue we’d like to introduce two new features - Puzzles and a Game Review Index.

Each issue will now feature a Word Search puzzle using board game titles, as well as a Crossword Puzzle that has clues from both current and past issues, as well as the hobby in general. The answers to each of these puzzles can be found at the back of the magazine.

We also now include an Index that features the games reviewed in previous issues, this should make searching for a specific game review a bit easier.

We hope that you enjoy these new features!

In this issue, Bill Braun reviews “Secrets of the Lost Tomb” and “Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition”.

Jeff Rhind continues his series on solo games - this time featuring: “Phantom Leader Deluxe”.

David Niecikowski’s shares the final part of his three part series on Game Events.

John Anthony Gulla presents an article on collecting board games.

Special thanks to Jamey Stegmaier for taking time from his busy schedule to share his thoughts with our readers.

Thanks also to Michael Menzel for sharing his thoughts and amazing artwork.

Congratulations to Stefan Feld and Passport Game Studios for winning an Editor’s Choice Award for their brilliant game,”Trajan”!

If you are a writer, photographer, reviewer, etc. and feel you have something unique to contribute to the magazine, feel free to contact us. We’d love to have you on board!

Cover Photograph by Serge Pierro.

Trajan © Passport Game Studios

Editor in Chief/Publisher: Serge Pierro Editor: Eric Devlin Contributing Writers: Bill Braun David Niecikowski Kevin Lauryssen John Anthony Gulla Kevin Cox Jeff Rhind Photographers: Serge Pierro Bill Braun Jeff Rhind Follow us on Facebook:

www.facebook.com/GameNiteMagazine

Serge Pierro

Visit us at:

www.gamenitemagazine.com

Editor in Chief

Follow us on Twitter:

editor@gamenitemagazine.com

Issue #11

@GameNiteMag Game Nite

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Puzzles

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(Words can be horizontal, vertical or diagonal.)

Agricola Automobiles Aquasphere Antike Amyitis Aton Archaeology

Alchemists Amerigo Abyss Attika Augustus Android Assyria

Acquire Archipelago Alhambra Arboretum Asara Arkwright Apotheca

(Solution on Page 92)

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Antiquity Ashes Ascension Akrotiri Aquaretto Automania Attila

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1. $1.8 Million Kickstarter 3. Game Designer Sergio ___ 5. Feld Classic 9. "Hera and ___" 11. "Glen ___" 12. My People 13. "Game ___ Geek" 15. Artist Beth ___ 17. 2016 Diana Jones Award winner 19. "Serra ___" 20. "____ Cities" 23. "___ & Euphrates" 24. "Dr. ___" 25. "___ Rage" 26. Game Designer Alex ____ 27. Game Designer Mac ___ 28. "Schotten ___"

2. Find the Ovoid 3. Mage Company tile layer 4. "The ___ Brothers" 5. "___ the National Parks" 6. Spicy themed game 7. Game Designer Stefan ___ 8. "Board Game ___" 10. Artist Michael ___ 14. A Major American convention 15. Game Designer Sid ___ 16. Two Player Faidutti abstract 18. The "Gen" in Gen Con 19. The "A" in AEG 21. "Tasty ___ Games" 22. Game Designer Mary ___

(Solution on Page 93) Issue #11

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Book Review The Role-Playing Society

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By Serge Pierro

t should come as no surprise that as the gaming hobby grows and becomes more mainstream, that its influence would start to permeate our society at large. In “The-Role Playing Society”, editors Andrew Byers and Francesco Crocco assemble a collection of essays that expound on the influence and potential usage of Role-Playing games in today’s society.

have a good idea of what is presented here. There are some interesting thoughts presented and could be of use for those looking to explore less than traditional avenues of teaching students. With the growing acceptance of games within our culture it would only seem natural that at some point they would become part of the curriculum in education.

The 320 page softcover book is broken down into four different sections, with each section containing three related essays.

Part Three is based on Social Change. This was the least interesting section of the book, as the ideas presented were of little interest to me. However, it is clearly indicative of the audience that they were targeting - lots of “fancy” words and bloviating, but not much for the non-academic reader or those who don’t subscribe to their agenda.

Part One: “The Player’s Guide: The Psychological and Cultural Impact of a Game Genre” Part Two: “The Tome of Knowledge: Playing to Learn In and Across the Disciplines” Part Three: “The Book of Change: Enacting Social Transformations” Part Four: “The Manual of Play: Seeding New Avenues of Gaming” The first essay in Part One is “The Satanic Panic and Dungeon & Dragons: A Twenty Five Year Retrospective by Andrew Byers.

In what could be considered the “dark age” of D&D history, Byers presents a wide range of material related to this period of time, including discussions with the designers about the inclusion/exclusion of satanic elements within the game. The subject is approached from various angles and gives readers an idea of what the environment was like upon the initial release and success of the game.

The other two essays in this section are: “Psychological Effects of Fantasy Games on Their Players: A Discourse-Based Look at the Evidence” and “Building the Culture of Contingency: Adaptive Choice in Ludic Literature from Role-Playing Games to “Choose Your Own Adventure” Books”. These longwinded titles provide an insight into the type and style of the essays contained within this book.

In Part Two of the book we are introduced to the concept of using the Role-Playing mechanic as a means to educating students. Readers who are familiar with Gamification will

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Part Four is about “Seeding New Avenues of Gaming”.

There are a variety of topics covered and it includes an essay on Gamification and Education.

While some people are going to find this book to be interesting, the vast majority are going to see it as nothing more than an academic indulgence. The writing is geared more towards an academic based readership than actual gamers who would actually be interested in the subject matter, and as such, was a bit off-putting. Several of the writers seemed to be more interested in pushing an agenda and puffing their chests. I believe that there will members of our readership that will have some interest in this book purely from an academic perspective. However, even with those caveats aside, there are some good moments contained in the essays, but you will have to sift through much of the material to find them. It should be noted that at the end of each essay there is an excellent Notes and Bibliography section providing a copious amount of material for further research. This is not a book for the casual reader or casual gamer.

Editors: Andrew Byers and Francesco Crocco Publisher: McFarland

Worth Trying www.mcfarlandpub.com 800-253-2187

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Game Review Dr. Eureka

By Serge Pierro

Eureka!

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lue Orange Games is known for their line of quality family games and Dr. Eureka is no exception. This is a game that is going to appeal to not only families, but also to a wide range of gamers.

Dr. Eureka comes in a 10 1/4” x 10 1/4” x 2 1/4” box with a plastic window that displays two of the test tubes and several of the balls. Upon opening the box you will discover the custom plastic insert that is well designed and features areas that hold each of the components, with the test tubes snapping into the insert so that they don’t move around.

The rules are printed on both sides of a strip of paper that is accordion folded into a 3” x 3” square. They are simple and straightforward and list some examples and a few variants.

The plastic components are the focal point of the game.

There are 12 plastic test tubes and 24 plastic balls. The test tubes are the first thing everyone notices when the game is brought to the table. It should be noted that due to shipping the balls that are included in the test tubes do leave a very slight ring of wear around the interior of the tubes due to movement, four of the tubes ship with no balls in them and don’t show this wear, this has no effect on the gameplay.

The game comes with 54 Challenge cards that are made of a decent card stock and are fine for what they are, seeing as they will only used to display the current challenge and are not shuffled excessively throughout the game.

To setup the game each player will receive three test tubes and six balls (two of each color). Players place a matching pair of balls into a test tube until each test tube contains a pair of matching balls.

To start the game the Challenge deck is shuffled and place in the middle of the playing area and the top card is revealed and play begins. The object of the game is to match the test tube/ball combinations that are displayed on the Challenge cards. If a player touches a ball or a ball falls out of a test

tube they are eliminated from the current round and will have to wait for the next round to begin (usually a minute or so). When a player believes they have matched the Challenge card, they yell “Eureka” and play stops. Players will then check to see if there is a correct match. If there is an incorrect match, that player is eliminated from the current round and play continues until a player correctly matches the card. When a player fulfills the demands of the card they collect the card as one victory point and a new Challenge card is revealed for the next round. Players will use their current configuration of balls/test tubes for the start of the round.

The first player to five victory points wins the game.

There are few dexterity games that capture my interest, yet Dr. Eureka has certainly done so. All of the components are well made and look great when placed on the table and they always drew a crowd. One of the things that I liked about it was that it was intellectually engaging and provided an environment for children to use puzzle solving skills in the context of a game.

The puzzles are mildly challenging, but when combined with the challenge of trying to be the first to finish, they became a little more challenging as the pressure added to the excitement and fun. This game appealed to a wide range of age groups and player types and is certainly a game that many people are going to want to take a look at, as it is very enjoyable. I’ll be bringing this out again for family gatherings and as an energetic filler game on game nights.

Designer: Roberto Fraga Publisher: Blue Orange Games Number of players: 1-4 Mechanic: Dexterity, Matching Ages: 8+ Length: 15 mins.

Highly Recommended www.blueorangegames.com

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Game Review Stockpile: Continuing Corruption

By Serge Pierro

Stockpile Expansion

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hen we originally reviewed Stockpile in Issue #5, it received an “Editor’s Choice Award” for being an outstanding game, one that still continues to hit our table. So when it was announced that there was going to be an expansion, we were all eager to see what ideas Nauvoo Games had in mind. And it appears that they had quite a few of them. Let’s take a look at an expansion that elevates an already excellent game to a new level!

The 5” x 7” box has a cardboard insert that has 2 areas for storage, but there is no need to use this box, as it appears that the original game’s custom plastic insert was designed to include this expansion as well.

The eight page rulebook has several illustrations with the majority of the material devoted to clarifying the use of each of the modules.

The first module contains 6 new Investor cards, as well as 4 special promo Investor cards, which all add new abilities.

The Cunning Carlos card uses a new component: Blocking Tokens. After Carlos bids, he places one of these tokens on the next bidding space, if a player wants to outbid him they have to use the next available space to bid.

The second module introduces a new concept: Bonds. At the start of a round each player will have the opportunity to buy up to 3 bonds. The cost is determined by the number of players. At the end of a round each player will receive $1,000 for each Bond they own. At the end of the game players cash in their Bonds for their original purchase price.

The third module adds a new deck of cards to the game called the Commerce Deck. This is composed of Commodities and Taxes. After a player has placed their cards during the Supply phase, they will draw a card from the Commerce deck. After everyone has placed their cards, each player in turn will play the card they drew from the Commerce Deck and place it face up on a pile. Winning bids include these cards as well and they are placed face up in front of the winning player.

The Commodities and Taxes cards are scored at the end of the game, with the beneficial Commodities scoring as unique cards in a set and the negative scoring Taxes, by the amount owned.

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The fourth module introduces a new method for determining the cards used for pairing with the corporation cards. It includes an Annual Forecast board, six Forecast dice and 16 Forecast cards that are added to the original deck. At the start of a round the first player will roll all six dice and then take the relevant cards from the Forecast deck and after shuffling them, deal them out with the corporation cards. The dice are displayed on the Forecast board so that all players know what values are available.

Several other goodies are included: Each of the stocks now has a 10k Shareholder certificate token made of sturdy cardboard, which is awarded to the player who had the most shares of a specific stock at the end of the game. Also included are 100k currency cards. These are the same size and design as the original ones, however, these have more of a matte finish. My main complaint with the original game was that the turn marker was a bit fragile, but this expansion adds two new markers that are sturdier. Five personal reference cards are included to help with the new additions.

If you are a fan of Stockpile, then purchasing this expansion is a “no-brainer”. I’d have to say that the Commerce deck is probably my favorite module, followed by the Forecast Dice. Each of these brought new levels of depth to the game and experienced players will certainly enjoy what they have to offer. The Bonds module provides a nice boost to the game’s monetary engine and the new Investor abilities are quite different from the base set.

This expansion elevates an already excellent game to a new level and I don’t see our play group ever going back to playing the game without the expansion.

Designers: Seth Van Orden & Brett Sobol Publisher: Nauvoo Games Number of players: 2-5 Mechanic: Auction/Bidding Ages: 13+ Length: 60 mins.

Highly Recommended www.nauvoogames.com

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Game Review Sugar Gliders

By Serge Pierro

Glide Your Way to Victory

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ans of abstract games should immediately recognize the name Nestor Romeral Andres, as he is one of the more interesting abstract designers (and publisher) currently in the hobby. However, due to the small size of his company, his games don’t have the same global reach as many of the larger companies. So when a publisher such as White Goblin Games releases one of his titles, they present a golden opportunity for the marketplace to become better acquainted with some of his designs.

Sugar Gliders comes in an 8” square box with a cardboard insert that has a well in the middle and a border along the edges to hold the board and rulebook. Although this is a feasible storage solution, I would have liked to see a resealable plastic bag for the tiles, as they have the tendency to move around during transportation.

The linen finished, quad-panel, game board is made of a heavy cardboard stock and is double sided, with one side for a two player game and the other for three or four players.

The jungle inspired artwork is by Dennis Lohausen (see our interview in Issue #7).

The eight page rulebook is in four different languages, with the actual rules only taking two pages per language.

The concise rules are punctuated with spot graphics for components and an example of how movement works.

The food tiles are linen finished and are of a sturdy cardboard stock, though not as thick as the game board.

There are four, wooden, Sugar Glider meeples that come in four colors. These custom meeples look great on the board and go a long way towards enhancing the theme of the game.

Gameplay is simple and straightforward. On a players turn they may take one of two possible actions.

The main action is to Jump. To Jump, a player will take their Sugar Glider and move it in a straight line the amount of spaces as the number listed on the food tile that they started on. They are not allowed to jump over other Sugar Gliders and cannot come to rest on a space that already contains a

Sugar Glider. After they move they take the tile that they started on and place it in front of them. Besides using each tile for movement, their value will also be used as victory points at the end of the game in order to determine the winner.

The other action is called Torpor. If a Sugar Glider is unable to move, they may take the tile that the are currently on and place it in front of them with the other tiles previously collected. That ends their turn with the Sugar Glider now placed on an empty space. When a player starts their turn with a Sugar Glider on a space with no food tile, they must discard one of the tiles that they have previously collected and move the Sugar Glider the relevant amount of spaces.

The game ends when all of the players Sugar Gliders consecutively go into Torpor or if all of the food tiles have been removed from the board. Players will then add up the values on all of their tiles and the player with the most points wins.

While there would be an obvious desire to collect all of the most valuable tiles, one has to consider that your Sugar Glider will inevitably go into Torpor and you don’t want to have to discard a high value tile to move them, so collecting some lower value tiles will allow you to discard them instead and increase your chances of winning. This is one of the finer balancing acts that you need to perform in order to have a chance at winning the game.

Players who enjoy games such as Hey, That’s My Fish but are looking for something with a little more depth will certainly want to take a look at this game. The components are of great quality and the gameplay is simple, yet there are strategies that are revealed as the game gets played more. With an age range of 8+, players of all ages will find something to enjoy while playing the game.

Designer: Nestor Romeral Andres Publisher: White Goblin Games Number of players: 2-4 Mechanic: Grid Movement Ages: 8+ Length: 30 mins.

Recommended

www.whitegoblingames.com

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Interview

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Michael Menzel

By Serge Pierro

Artist Thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts with our readers, can you tell us a little something about yourself?

What are your earliest recollections of doing art?

My name is Michael Menzel.

I was born in 1975 and I’m living with my family near Duesseldorf, Germany.

Michael Menzel Do you come from an artistic family?

Artist

Yes, my grandfather was an artist. For his living he painted porcelain.

Stone Age

Andor Thurn and Taxis The Pillars of the Earth www.atelier-krapplack.de

I can’t remember a time, when I didn’t draw. Actually it was a way for me to “play”, because in those days, there weren’t all superhero figures available. I cut them out of comic-books and used different movements of a character, but most of the time a gesture or perspective was missing. So I started to draw the missing ones.

I remember a drawing of Captain Future. He walked into his ship, and I drew him from the backside. Everyone around me was almost amazed, because of the anatomical correctness of the drawing.

Continued on next page>

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Interview (Cont.)

Are you self taught or did you study art in school?

I had an education when I was about 19 in my apprenticeship. My teacher for drawing was very good and I learned some incredible useful basics about figures.

Who are your main artistic influences?

I really love the illustrations of John How and Alan Lee. My favorite painter is August Macke.

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Who are your favorite board game/card game artists?

What is your favorite medium to work in?

I work with Photoshop almost 99%. My very I like the illustrations of Franz Vohwinkel a lot. favorite technique might be pencil (on the I also think that Xavier Gueniffey Durin does a beach with the sound of the sea and wind in my hair), but I have never become really good with great job. pencils.

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Interview (Cont.)

How did you get involved in creating artwork for Do you enjoy playing games? If so, what are some the game industry? of your favorite games?

It is very different from publisher to publisher.

Some, like Ravensburger or HABA provide a very good and detailed briefing - everything is ready to get painted. In other cases, mostly small publishers, there is a lot of space for own ideas and suggestions. I like both ways a lot and I’m happy either way.

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Yes, I became a player by illustrating boardgames, because it is absolutely necessary to play the games to illustrate them. Otherwise your pictures cannot support the game it self. I like the cooperative Lord of the Rings game by Reiner Knizia. I also like Pillars of the Earth and Stone Age.

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If you had an opportunity to do the artwork for a game by a specific game designer, who would it be, and what would you like the theme to be?

I would love to work with Stefan Feld again. We started our career in this business almost at the same time and I illustrated his first game Revolte in Rom. Since then our paths have crossed some times again, but it would be a pleasure for me to illustrate a Feld again. I have no favorite theme and I’m happy for any new scenario, especially, when I don’t know anything about it (what happends quite often), so that I have to do some research and get a little smarter afterwards.

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Interview (Cont.)

When you are painting a game board, does the client supply a rough sketch of what they would like or do you do the entire graphic layout yourself?

Usually I realize the board by myself but of course there is always the prototype-board of the game author. I try to make it more beautiful but not less playable.

What is the piece of artwork that you are most proud of?

I like the cover of Legends of Andor a lot. It is so good because it leaves a lot to your imagination.

“What is it that makes the heroes stay together so close to each other?” By not telling everything it allows you to interpret it and become part of the picture.

Do you illustrate projects outside of the game industry?

Only very few. I think that my skills are perfectly for boardgames.

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The two sides of the “A Castle for all Seasons” board are stunning… Which side came first and what was your process for then doing the other side?

The first board was the “summer”-side. The winterside was just a suggestion of mine to the publisher, because I thought it was not so much effort (just reducing the colours, some snowflakes, ...). But then I realized, that the people on the picture worn “summer”-clothes and would get really ill. So I had to paint coats and scarfs and in the end it wasn’t really a little more effort :-)

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How did you go from being a board game artist to a board game designer with “Legends of Andor”?

Do you accept private commissions?

Actually yes, but to be honest, it is much easier for me to work with a big publisher because I know them well, know about their workflow.

But sometimes I fall in love with a small project and then it works, too.

It was an accident :-) My son and I are huge Tolkien fans and we wanted to play a fantasy game. But all we found were abstract or very very difficult to learn. So I decided to realize our own fantasy game, with very few rules. I guess the reason for the big success of the game is, that we didn’t had any target groups in mind How can readers keep up to date on what projects and just did what we wanted to play. you are working on?

Actually my homepage www.atelier-krapplack.

Do you have any plans to design other games? de would be the right address, but because of Andor and the huge amount of extra work it No actually not. Andor was the game I wanted causes, I haven’t updated it since quite a while. to play but hadn’t been invented. think that would be the only reason for me to do it again.

What advice would you give to aspiring board

game artists?

What projects are you currently working on and An artist for boardgames has to serve the idea do you have any news on upcoming projects? of the game. That’s the most important thing to

do. And because the great thing of boardgames I’m sorry, but I’m not allowed to speak about is their originality, it is a mistake to look for a the projects. I leave it to the publishers to let formula that works anytime. You have keep an you know. open mind and think about the best solution for each boardgame.

Thanks a lot for your very good questions.

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Game Review

Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition

By Bill Braun

Third Times the Charm or Three Strikes and You’re Out?

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ovies have reboots and sequels. Television shows often rely on something called “re-imaginings”. Board games …. well, boards games provide “editions” – first, second, third, however many it takes to get things right. Some consumers take issue with this, regardless of entertainment medium. They often make the argument that these remakes, reboots, and new editions are nothing more than money grabs. Others – and I count myself among this group – generally take things on a caseby-case basis. We ask ourselves if there is a reason to reboot a movie or television show? Was there anything wrong with the original in the first place? Was the last entry of the franchise worthy of a sequel? With board games, however, the reasons for a new edition seem to be less vague. Perhaps the last edition has long been out of print and demand has been on the rise.

Oftentimes the developer is looking to make changes, additions, or refinements to the game not previously available or within the original edition’s budget.

Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition – designed by Hermann Luttmann, developed by Petra Schlunk, and published by Victory Point Games – was a 2015 Kickstarter, backed by nearly 1300 gamers, that raised more than $93,000 in pledges (from a goal of $30,000). Promising a whole world to experience for players both new to the apocalyptic city of Farmingdale, as well as those who have experienced Dawn of the Zeds in previous editions, the third edition boasts plenty of new things to discover and a significant upgrade to the components. But does this latest edition prove that the third time can often be the charm, or is it simply the third and final strike?

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Gameplay Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition is described on the Kickstarter Campaign page as a cooperative States of Siege™ board game for 1-4 players that plays in 90+ minutes. Your heroes must defend Farmingdale and its five outlying villages from the encroaching horrors. These heroes are supported by civilians (some armed, some heroic) and what little outside help is

Photo: Bill Braun

forthcoming. You must prevent the Zeds incursion from reaching the town center or causing so much chaos around Farmingdale that the government abandons it (and you)!

To get a better understanding of what Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition has to offer and how it plays, it will be helpful to better understand what a States of Siege game involves. The States of Siege Series, as defined by Victory Point Games, is a collection of solitaire games in

which the player is the commander of a desperate situation.

In a States of Siege(TM) game, it is you against all comers in gripping solitaire game action! Surrounded by enemies in every direction, your decisions regarding your scarce military, political, and economic resources decide the game.

Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition is a fairly complex game to learn and play. While I have not had the opportunity to experience any of the earlier versions,

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Setting up the game begins with the creation of an Event deck – a deck of cards that act as both the game master (running the AI and adding difficulty) and timer. Over the years I have come to appreciate and embrace co-operative games (Eldritch Horror, Galaxy Defenders) that rely on the inclusion of event decks. They generally enforce the overall storytelling element of the game, more fully immerse the players, and provide for a higher level of replay value.

Photo: Bill Braun

this newest edition attempts to simplify things by including not one, not two, not even three, but six separate rule books and reference guides. To say that I initially felt overwhelmed is a bit of an understatement. Thankfully, these books are designed to ease the learning curve by separating the rules into options that breakdown the Basic game, through to the Director’s Cut (essentially everything), and ending with the Versus mode. The rule books start with the most basic components of the game, ensuring that players are comfortable with each mechanism before adding more involved and deeper game play rules and components into the mix.

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Although the number of rules that may be added into the more difficult versions of Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition make the game more complex, the sequence of play is fairly easy to grasp. A typical turn involves revealing the top card of the Event deck, referring to the instructions from each “tab” of the Event card (monitoring the infection rate, moving and placing Zeds on the board, eating, managing resources) and taking actions: moving, foraging for bullets and supplies, or attacking.

While there is much more to it than that, every round is conducted in essentially the same way.

The most involved game mechanism is the way Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition presents combat, either ranged or hand-to-hand. As you might expect, dice rolling is involved when players attempt to thin the zombie herd. However, what makes Dawn of

Photo: Bill Braun

the Zeds: Third Edition different from most other games of a similar genre, is with the use of combat tables. After determining the strength of a player’s character (during hand-to-hand combat) and comparing it to the strength of the encountered zombies, two dice are rolled and the results are cross referenced to determine which side takes damage, how much, and whether or not they must retreat a space on the board. Although ranged combat is simplified, the combat in general can be somewhat “mathy” and comes across as very “old school”.

Thankfully, the end result works well and makes for an interesting and strategically thematic mechanism. This is not your typical, guns-blazing zombie game. Running headfirst into a zombie horde will result in the death of your character(s) and (more often than not) loss of the game.

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Players win the game after the last Event card has been drawn, satisfying all of the conditions. Losing the game occurs immediately when any Zed unit enters the Town Center – essentially the center of the board.

In hindsight, Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition is very much a tower defense style of game. How long can you survive? Can you protect the Town Center or will it be overrun by the living dead? Surviving is more difficult than you might imagine, but it’s the experience gained that matters the most.

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Game Review (Cont.)

Theme and Components Whenever I hear about a game being developed as a new edition, the first thing I think of is the opportunity to play it with upgraded components, revised and refined rules, and a better all-around experience. While I have not played any of the earlier editions of Dawn of the Zeds, I have played other titles from the Victory Point Games’ library. They have consistently focused on “working with aspiring and veteran designers” to produce “print on demand” experiences for tabletop gaming. I interpret that particular “About Us” statement as their defining business model and a declaration that gameplay comes first. As such, their ability to develop and distribute games with high-quality components has never been a priority for them. And that’s ok. I’ve said it before, not every board game needs a box full of highly sculpted miniatures to yield a great experience.

Although undeniably overused, the theme of Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition is much more than a pasted-on afterthought.

Final Thoughts

Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition has quite a lot going for it. The components have been nicely updated. The rules have been re-designed and better laid out. And the game offers a variety of modes and high level of replay value to please even the most finicky of gamers.

I’ve certainly played my share of zombie games over the years, most of which fall into the category of run-andgun with little else to offer. As fun as those game may be, they ultimately devolve into the most basic of dicechuckers. Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition delivers the satisfaction of gunning down the zombie masses, but However, having raised more than three times what forces the players to continuously think strategically the Kickstarter set out to achieve, the quality of the before ever doing so. Be smart, consider your options, components – nicely detailed and double sided game and live to fight another day. board, thick, durable tokens and standees, thematic art – far exceeds other Victory Point Games titles that I have played in the past. Perhaps not living up to the high Designer: Hermann Luttmann standards set by Publishers like Fantasy Flight Games Publisher: Victory Point Games and Cool Mini or Not, Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition Number of players: 1-4 is a triumph for Victory Point Games and a marked turning point for the level of component quality they Mechanic: Co-op have been able to provide up to this point.

Ages: 13+

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Length: 60-180 mins.

Recommended

www.victorypointgames.com Photo: Bill Braun

But, let’s face it. Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition is an apocalyptic zombie game. It’s a theme you either love or hate. It’s also a theme that the game embraces and thoughtfully works into a variety of the mechanisms.

This is confirmed across a number of the special character actions and Event cards that come into play.

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Game Review

Vast: The Crystal Caverns

By Serge Pierro

Unique Assymetrical Game

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o say that Vast: The Crystal Caverns is an asymmetrical game would be somewhat of an understatement. I don’t recall any game that has such a divergence in gameplay roles. No matter who you choose to play, it will be totally different from any of the other characters in the game, including the Cave. Yes, you can play the game as a Cave… and it’s awesome!

The first thing that you will notice about Vast is that the box is heavy and packed with a variety of components. The box measures 9” x 11 1/2” x 2 3/4” and has a somewhat standard cardboard insert that has two wells and has an offset divider.

Due to the nature of the game, the rulebook is different from what you would normally expect. There really isn’t an overall rules presentation, instead, each of the roles are given two pages of rules that are specific only to them. Each role is so different that there is no real crossing over of rules. This is further enhanced by the inclusion of separate paper rule sheets for each character that players will have in front of them, instead of having to continuously pass around a rulebook to look something up. The paper sheets are somewhat adequate, but due to the nature of in game handling, I would have preferred to have seen these printed on card stock for the sake of durability. Players may want to seriously consider laminating them.

Other than the aforementioned information, there are Variants and Component examples, as well as a sample turn. The rules were enough to get us up and running, however you will probably want to have access to Board Game Geek or other related site to look for clarifications that may arise during the game.

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The five player boards are linen finished and 1/16” thick and are made of a very sturdy cardboard. They have a very slight bow to them, though not enough to be distracting.

The game takes a somewhat novel approach to the included components. Many of the components are available as either a sturdy

cardboard token or a wooden piece. Usually one would The “board” is constructed via tile placement and the expect to see this offered as two separate versions, a 2” linen finished tiles are double sided and made of basic and a deluxe. But here you have the choice as to sturdy cardboard. what components you would care to use - including a mixture of both.

There are several decks of linen finished cards and they are all of a decent card stock.

The game also includes a silkscreened black cloth bag with a drawstring that will be used by the Cave player to As impressive as the amount and quality of the randomly draw Omen tokens. components are, it is the game play that is the main attraction here.

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Game Review (Cont.)

The setup of the game is determined by the roles chosen for that session. Two pages of the rule book are devoted to all of the various permutations possible, including the solo variant, and list all of the attributes relevant to the roles chosen, as well as the victory conditions.

Essentially each game will begin with the Entrance tile placed in the center of the table and placing four Cave tiles along its edges with the Dark side facing up. Then players will play in the order listed on their player mats.

This is another interesting feature of the game. There is a predetermined order of play, the Knight always moves first, Goblins second, Dragon third, Cave fourth and Thief fifth. It is also recommended that players sit in that order. Each player will then set up their player board and play moves around the table clockwise. Each role has a specific goal to be reached in order to win,

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for example, The Knight must kill the Dragon, but if there is no Dragon in the game, then they have to smash five Crystals and escape from the cave. The Goblins have to kill the Knight or if there is no Knight, smash five crystals and escape. The Dragon has to wake up, surface and reach the Entrance tile to escape and win.

The Cave wins by collapsing and killing everyone. The Thief wins by collecting six Treasure or Dragon Gems and stashing them on the Entrance tile. In a game with several players there are a lot of different objectives going on at the same time and it makes for a very interesting experience.

Even with all of the Role Variant combinations the game brings even more value to the table with the inclusion of additional Terrain Tiles and their variants, as well as Difficulty cards that can be used for playing

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each of the roles at different difficulty levels. These cards can be used as an “equalizer” when playing with children or beginners. However, with five different levels they can also be used by experienced gamers to offer more replayability to the game. The levels are: easiest, easy, standard, hard and expert.

As a fan of solo games, this one proved to be quite enjoyable. While it is not possible to play the Cave in the solo variant, the other roles are available. There are several different levels of difficulty that you can pursue and tailor the experience to your liking. Time-wise, the Dragon vs. the Cave solo game on the easiest level was only 15-20 minutes long with the Dragon winning with the cave already collapsing for a couple of turns.

When so many new games are being released, it is refreshing to see something that is new and unique.

While other games talk about being asymmetrical, “Vast” takes this to a whole new level. It is almost like interactive solitaire, as all of the roles have completely different objectives. In my first game I played the Cave against the Knight and the Dragon. It was a fascinating experience as I had to try and figure out how to accelerate the building of the cave (so that I could then have it collapse) while at the same time trying to figure out how to potentially slow down the other players. It seemed that with only three players it took too long for the Cave to collapse, even after spending most of the actions to keep placing additional tiles and scattering treasures about to be able to draw more omens on my turn. Just as the Cave started to collapse the Dragon escaped. However, there is a strategy that allows you Continued on next page>

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Game Review (Cont.)

to manipulate the bag’s contents in order to draw the tiles relevant to your strategy at a higher percentage.

And this is one of the things that makes the game so fascinating - the more you play it the more you delve into the intricacies of your role and come up with previously unthought of strategies.

If you are looking for a unique playing experience, yet enjoy the familiarity of a good dungeon crawl, then this is a game that you must take a look at - as there is nothing else quite like it!

Designer: David Somerville and Patrick Leder Publisher: Leder Games Number of players: 1-5 Mechanic: Tile Placement, Assymetrical Powers Ages: 10+ Length: 60-90 mins.

Highly Recommended www.ledergames.com

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Game Review

The Networks

By Serge Pierro

Prime Time Game

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ith the current popularity. A common complaint about modern board games is that many of them gravitate towards a handful of overused themes. Gil Hova’s The Networks wants to take these stale themes off the air and instead bring something fresh to prime time. Let’s see what the critics have to say.

The box measures 8 3/4” x 12 3/4” x 2”. The cardboard insert features one large well for placing the various “non-board” components and two wings to support the boards.

The large 20 page rulebook contains numerous illustrations as well as a complete breakdown of all the symbols and text on the cards. Three pages are devoted to the one and two player games. Two pages are devoted to a card almanac that further explains various cards.

The game uses a three piece modular board, with one of the sections dependent on the amount of players and displaying the relevant information for that player count. These and the five individual player boards are all made of sturdy cardboard stock.

The Money chips are the same stock as the player boards. The other non-card components include a 100pt marker for each player and various wooden disks and cubes.

The 200+ linen finished cards are broken down into four different decks: Show (55), Star (48), Ad (42) and Network (62).

To set up the game players will layout the cards and scoring track as per the rulebook and each player will receive a player board along with its matching set of starter cards.

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The main mechanic of the game is the drafting of cards by using one of six available actions on your turn. These actions are: Develop Show, Sign Star, Land Ad, Take Network Card, Attach Star or Ad and Drop and Budget.

The “Develop Show” action is perhaps the most important one, as this will be the one you will using to obtain the TV shows necessary to gain viewers in order to win the game. A player may choose from any of the available TV shows and pay its cost to add it to their station. There are a couple of caveats. The first being that some shows require a Star or an Ad, if you don’t have the match, they can’t be drafted. The other is that each show has a specific time slot in which they score the most points. If you place a show in a slot that

doesn’t match the one printed on the card, the show uses the lower number when scoring.

The “Sign Star” action allows you to take one of the available Stars and pay its cost. Some Stars require an additional upkeep cost each turn and may also have a “rotate” effect which is used if the Star doesn’t match the criteria stated on the card. A “rotated card” scores less points. Stars add their numbers to the Show they are attached to.

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The “Land Ad” action allows you to take an Ad and immediately receive the amount of money listed on the card. When it becomes attached to a Show it produces a specific level of income for that show. Ads may also have a “rotate” effect for mismatched shows.

I’m a big fan of solo variants and this one is enjoyable.

It uses an interesting mechanism called “Burning Actions”. After you take an action, you turn over the top card of the Network deck and resolve the symbols at the bottom of the card, which removes certain cards from play. If you are unable to remove a card you have The “Taking a Network Card” action allows a player to to place a cube on the Turn Order track for each card take one of the powerful Network cards. These various that can’t be removed. You lose the game if you have types of cards can either be used immediately, used once five cubes on the track. You win if you have 265 viewers per game or remain in play for the rest of the game. The or more at the end of the game. While it is challenging ones that provide endgame bonuses are highly coveted, at times, it does run into the problem of the luck of yet all of them provide a significant effect. the draw. If you happen to draw some of the better endgame Network cards you have a much better chance With the “Attach Star or Ad” action players can spend at winning. an action to attach a Star or Ad to a Show that can still accept it or it can also be used to replace a Star or Ad Clearly a lot of effort was put into this game. Everything with a different one. from the number crunching to the theme itself have nuances that become more apparent on multiple plays.

The final action is the “Drop and Budget”. This is There are many tense decisions to be made throughout used when you no longer want to take any other the game and the ability to plan ahead is significant. actions, thus ending your participation in that round Although you’ll see many of the same Shows each game, and taking either cash or viewers as per the position on the other cards will be seen less, especially the Network the associated track. cards, and therefore it has a high replay value. Overall this is a very enjoyable game, and if you like drafting A round ends once all players have used the “Drop games, then you will most certainly want to take a look and Budget” action. Then there is an Income/Expense at this one. phase that has players either receiving or paying money, depending on their Ads and upkeeps. This is followed Designer: Gil Hova by the scoring of Shows and Reruns. Each Show is then Publisher: Formal Ferret Games aged one level and a new round begins.

After scoring Season Five, players age their shows one more time and the game ends with the shows being scored once again. The highest score after this sixth round of scoring is the winner.

Number of players: 1-5 Mechanic: Card Drafting Ages: 13+ Length: 60-90 mins.

Recommended http://networksgame.tv

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Game Review

Grifters

By Serge Pierro

Dystopian Filler

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here are games where the artwork just grabs your attention and you just have to know more about them. This was the case when I first saw Jarek Nocon’s gorgeous artwork Grifters. And while the artwork is certainly striking, the more important question is -- how is the actual game?

To begin the game X amount of ISK tokens are placed in a central pool called the Coffers, this is determined by the number of players. Then each player receives a player mat, 3 ISK tokens from the Coffers and their three starting Ringleader cards. The number of Job cards used in the game are also determined by the amount of players, with each of them having this information printed on Grifters comes in a 6” x 8” x 2” box that has a custom them. Each player is dealt three cards from the Specialist designed cardboard insert. There are separate areas deck and the game begins. for the cards and the Jobs, with a well below the Jobs section to store the ISK tokens. While it’s an On a player’s turn they will have the opportunity to interesting design, it would have been nicer if the well either play an individual Specialist to perform a Caper or had more room for the tokens. You have to carefully a group of them to perform a Job. They will then place arrange the tokens in the small area in order to take them on the Night One spot on their player board. When advantage of it. a player plays a single specialist they resolve the text on the card. When they play a group of cards for a Job they The eight page rulebook has several illustrations, as have to form a pile with the correct number and type of well as an FAQ. The rules are quite short, with most of symbols to complete the Job. When a Job is completed the pages being taken up with illustrations. the reward on the card is immediately resolved.

Each of the four cardboard player tableaus are linen finished and double sided, with the second side being identical to the first.

The most unique element of the game is the concept of “Advance Time”. This is a cooldown mechanic in which at the start of a player’s turn they take the card(s) in Night One and move them to Night Two. Anything on Night The seventy-five ISK tokens are made of cardboard.

Two is moved to Night Three and anything on Night Three is placed in the Refresh area, to be retrieved at the Both the Job and Specialist cards are made of decent end of their turn. This adds an interesting twist as to how card stock, with the Job cards being Tarot sized and the and when cards are played.

Specialists being standard sized.

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as it provided an early two card advantage which is fairly strong and was always the first Job targeted for completion. Other than those caveats, this was an Scoring is determined by the amount of ISK tokens, enjoyable light filler that provided just enough strategy plus the value of the jobs, as well as bonuses granted by to keep it interesting. This is a game that I will gladly add to my “end of the night” game collection. having two or more of the same Job type (color).

The game ends when there are no longer any ISK tokens, Jobs or Specialist cards available.

The game plays quick and is both easy to learn and play. While the two player version is okay, it plays much better with 3 or 4 players. The cooldown mechanic was interesting and allowed you to visually plan ahead as to what jobs you might have access to in “X” turns.

The main downside to the game is the randomness of the draw. Unlike deckbuilders that display cards for players to choose from, the cards in this game are drawn randomly from a deck, with the only mitigation being that some cards allow you to draw multiple cards and choose one. I also felt that “Kidnap Weapon Experts” was unbalanced compared to the other level one Jobs,

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Designer: Jake Tlapek and David Fulton Publisher: Indie Board & Cards Number of players: 2-4 Mechanic: Deck Building/Hand Management Ages: 14+ Length: 30 mins.

Recommended

www.indieboardsandcards.com

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Interview

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Jamey Stegmaier

By Serge Pierro

Game Designer & Publisher

“Jamey Stegmaier is a game designer and publisher of Stonemaier Games.”

Thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts with our readers, can you tell us a little something about yourself?

Hi, thanks so much for inviting me to answer these questions! I’m Jamey Stegmaier, and I run a little game company in St. Louis called Stonemaier Games. I’ve designed 3 of our games (Viticulture, Euphoria, and Scythe), and I helped develop our fourth game, Between Two Cities.

I also write about crowdfunding at stonemaiergames.com.

Did you start designing games at an early age? If so, do you remember what your first game design was like?

Jamey Stegmaier

Designer/Publisher Scythe Viticulture Euphoria Between Two Cities

I did indeed. I started when I was around 8 years old. At that point, the only games I knew of were Monopoly, chess, Labyrinth, and Mille Bornes. I was really into castles, knights, and anything medieval, so I designed a game called Medieval Quest that looked quite like Monopoly.

It definitely had roll-and-move as the primary mechanism, but I also vaguely recall some kind of level-up element as you attempted to work your way to the head of the round table.

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Due to the fact that you write a blog and wrote the book: “A Crowdfunder’s Strategy Guide” (see our review in Issue #7), it appears that you are interested in writing. Who are your favorite authors and what are your favorite books?

We gave “A Crowdfunder’s Guide” an “Editor’s Choice Award” due to the brilliance and the range of material that was presented. Do you have any plans on writing any more books? If so, what would you consider writing about?

I’m a voracious reader, so I’ll try to keep my answer as focused as possible. I mostly read speculative fiction. My favorite fantasy trilogy of all time is Acacia by David Anthony Durham.

My favorite sci-fi trilogy of all time is Red Rising

by Pierce Brown. Some of my insta-buy authors are John Scalzi, Brandon Sanderson, Ernest Cline, Patrick Rothfuss, Dan Simmons, and Lev Grossman.

Thank you! I’m honored by that distinction.

The only other book I’ve written from start to finish is a dystopian novel called Wrinkle that I wrote in 2012. I’ve thought about polishing it up and continuing the series (it wasn’t a standalone book), but the vast majority of my creative time and energy is spent designing games. If I did find the time and motivation to write, it would be fiction. I love to create worlds.

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What games have you been playing lately?

If you had the opportunity to co-design a game with another designer, who would you like to work This month, the new-to-me games I’ve played with and what type of game would it be?

are Castle Knights, Captain Sonar, Guilds of London, Can’t Stop, Vast, Imhotep, Mystic Vale, Well, I had the good fortune of working with Hansa Teutonica, Merkator, Brewin’ USA, Rick Uwe Rosenberg on the Moor Visitors expansion and Morty, Suburbia, and Burano. to Viticulture. I prefer to work alone on my designs (though we have plenty of help from What games over the years have had the most playtesters), so I think expansion design is the impact on you as a game designer? best fit for me to work with another designer on.

That’s a great question. I love learning from other games. I think Tzolk’in has had the Which one of your games do you consider your biggest impact, as it’s influenced several of my best design, and why? designs (Euphoria and Scythe). Fresco had a huge influence on Viticulture. And both Terra Mystica There aren’t many questions I’m uncomfortable and Kemet taught me a lot as I designed Scythe. answering, but this is one of them! :) I guess

Who are your favorite game designers?

Rob Daviau, Uwe Rosenberg, and Alexander Pfister are the big three for me, purely because they have multiple games that I really admire and love. There are many other designers who have at least one standout game for me. I also have to mention Morten Monrad Pedersen, my coworker and the genius behind the solo versions of Viticulture, Between Two Cities, and Scythe. I don’t play solo games, but I’m in awe of what he does.

I’d like to think that I continue to evolve as a designer, so by that theory, my latest game should always be my best game, right?

Can we expect Stonemaier Games to be publishing any other games that were not designed by you, (Ex. “Between Two Cities”) and if so, what do you look for in a design?

I heard about 40 pitches at Gen Con, and I’m going to be seeing a number of games in a few weeks at an annual Stonemaier event called Design Day. So yes, I’m definitely looking for a non-Stegmaier game to publish. I look for a lot Continued on next page>

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Interview (Cont.)

of different things—we have a lot of information on our website about submissions—but a few of the keys for me are as follows: • The game needs to be fun. If a game is mechanically sound and meets all of the following requirements, if it’s not fun, none of these other factors matter.

• The game needs to capture my imagination, both in terms of theme and mechanisms.

• The game needs to flow well so I stay immersed in it. If there’s a checklist of phases I have to use throughout the game, it’s probably not a game for me.

• I look for games that play with a broad range of players, ideally 2-6.

• I look for games that are powerfully unique.

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When starting a new design, do you start with a Your games are known for having high production theme or a mechanic? values, do you think about the production costs as you design your games?

I start with a pencil and paper, and I see where they take me. Both theme and mechanisms are interspersed within the brainstorming cloud. If I really have to answer either way, I’d say theme.

I have lots of ideas for mechanisms, but I never take mechanisms to paper unless I already have a theme that’s a good fit.

Oh yes, I think this is the burden and the delight of all designer/publishers. I’m never not thinking about cool components I can put in my games and how those components might impact production costs. Fortunately, my manufacturer, Panda, works with me through the entire design process. I prefer to avoid What do you think defines your “style” as a game spending tons of design time on a game with a designer, is there a specific mechanic, rule set, etc. specific component if we’re not going to be able to afford that component at the target MSRP. ?

I think the biggest common denominator between my games is that I like fast, simple turns. That translates into a few things: One, I want players to be able to plan their turn in advance. I like player interaction, and that has the potential to change your plans, but I like for clear decision trees that allow players to pivot or take a slightly less optimal version of their planned turn even if an opponent interferes with their plans. Two, I like for the decisions you make on your turn to be as streamlined as possible. You’re not doing 5 of 10 things or 4 different actions. In Viticulture and Euphoria, you do exactly 1 thing on your turn. In Scythe, you choose 1 of 4 sections of your player mat and do the thing(s) on that section.

As a full time game designer/publisher, can you give us a breakdown as to how you spend your time during the day creating/publishing games?

It changes throughout the year. For example, I would say that I spent about 4-5 months of the last year working on things related to the Scythe campaign (campaign preparation, running the Kickstarter, coordinating data collection and project management after the Kickstarter, communicating with backers, troubleshooting, and fulfilling the campaign).

Beyond that, I spend a lot of time each day on customer service, both proactive (social media) and reactive (e-mail). On any given week I’m usually able to spend at least 5-10 hours on game design, but during periods where I don’t have to manage anything Kickstarter-related, I can spend as many as 40-50 hours a week on design, which I absolutely love.

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“Scythe” was a huge success. ($1.8 million raised wtih 17,739 backers). Now that it has been delivered to backers, when you look back, what factors do you believe inspired such a response?

I think Jakub Rozalski’s art and worldbuilding certainly played a huge role. There are many, many games with great art, but I think Jakub’s 1920s alternate-history world tickled something in our gamer brains that is drawn both to farming and mechs. As for the Kickstarter itself, I think it helped that Stonemaier had a decent-sized following at that point of people who trusted our brand. As for the response on BoardGameGeek, I’ve been elated to see Scythe rise through the rankings, so it seems like people are finding joy in playing it. If I’ve made one person smile when they played Scythe today, I’m happy.

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Your next game, “Charterstone”, is going to be a Legacy game. Can you tell us how it is differs from other Legacy games?

Sure, there are a few key features that are a little different. I should preface this by saying that I absolutely love legacy games in all of their various forms. I adore Risk Legacy and Pandemic Legacy, and I can’t wait to get my copies of Seafall and Gloomhaven. So the things I’ll mention below aren’t meant to slight these other games—they just happen to be different.

1.

Charterstone has no limit to the number of times it can be played. Eventually players will unlock everything and resolve the story, but after that you’ll have still have a full-functional medium-weight Euro game to play as much as you want.

2.

Charterstone plays from 1-6 players. It’s a small thing, but no other legacy game has allowed for play up to 6 players yet, and I think only Gloomhaven features solo play so far.

3.

Charterstone is an additive legacy game, not a destructive one. You’re not tearing up cards in Charterstone; rather, you’re permanently constructing buildings on the board. (And yes, to some people that will feel like they’re destroying the board by putting stickers on it.

Charterstone isn’t for those people.)

4.

Charterstone doesn’t have a rulebook.

This is the latest feature I’ve added to the game.

When you start playing Charterstone, there’s no rulebook at all. You simply arrive at an

untouched patch of land in the Kingdom of Greengully, and you and your fellow travelers unpack the zeppelin you arrived in. It’s an act of collective discovery. You essentially build the rulebook together during the first 15 minutes or so, then you play the first game, which lasts around 30 minutes.

5.

Charterstone follows the mold of classic Euro games, but it also has a story to discover.

It’s a worker-placement, village-building game that Euro gamers should feel right at home with.

How has the playtesting/developing process of “Charterstone” differed from your previous works and can you give us some insight as to how you playtest/develop a Legacy game?

It’s a work in progress—I’m discovering as I go. It helps that Rob Daviau has spoken extensively on the subject, so I’ve listened to a lot of his podcast appearances. The design process is uniquely different because there are so many interlocking yet variable parts. I’ve had to start over (not quite from scratch, but close) a number of times after local playtests.

As for development/blind playtesting, the process will be quite different from the mass of data we collected on Scythe. Instead, it’s a lot more focused on specific groups: I’ll send the prototype to a group for 2 weekends, they play a number of games and report back to me, and then I figure out what to do next. Then we do that again and again until the game is as good as it can be. I don’t know when that will be.

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Interview (Cont.)

Will you be publishing “Charterstone” via Kickstarter or will you be releasing it on your own?

I’m 99% sure that we will release Charterstone directly to distributors without any kind of pre-order.

What advice would you give to people who are interested in using Kickstarter to get their game published?

I don’t profit in any way from my blog, so I’m comfortable saying this: Read my crowdfunding blog. Nothing I can say here will sum up the sheer bulk of information I’ve written on the blog. I’m not saying that I’m always right, but I think every one of the nearly 200 Kickstarter Lessons I’ve written will at least open your eyes to some decisions and strategies you’ll need to consider before running a crowdfunding campaign.

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What advice would you have for aspiring game designers?

There’s plenty of things I could say here, but I’ll just pick one: Find the fun or let it go. As a designer, I know how easy it can be to get caught up in making a game work. Any designer can make a game functional. The challenge is to find the fun. The even bigger challenge is admitting that you’re not going to be able to find the fun in a game you’ve invested a lot of time and energy into. But if you can do that—if you can let it go—I think you’ll be a lot happier when you later design a truly fun game.

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Game Review

Trajan

By Serge Pierro

A Feld Masterpiece!

O

ne of the side-effects of the “Cult of the New” is that there are amazing games that are often overlooked because of the attention given to the latest “hot” release. This even holds true for some recent classics that are only a few years old. Stefan Feld’s Trajan is published by Passport Games and is somehow a game that some people are still somehow unaware of.

Trajan comes in a 9” x 12 1/2” x 3” box and features a cardboard insert with two wells and a shelved top for the storing of the board and components.

The twelve page rulebook is the size of the box and is heavily illustrated, as well as having numerous examples. The rules are clear, though there are a couple of minor typos, and there is a separate section that explains all of the tiles.

The four panel board and the four player mats are made of the same quality cardboard (2mm thick) and are linen finished.

There are a lot of wooden pieces included, including 60 small player tokens, 48 action markers, 4 large arches and more. The 60 commodity cards are of a better card stock than I would have expected and the 200+ cardboard tokens are of similar quality to the player mats. The game even includes a linen bag to draw the bonus tiles out of.

You will need to spend some time setting the board up due to the amount of components. It’s not long, but you won’t be able to play within a minute or two from opening the box. On the main board there are six main sections which will be filled with their corresponding tokens. Each player will also have their own player mat which they will set up with the action tokens and their starting Trajan tiles, as well as their initial 3 commodity cards.

Each player will also be given a random bonus tile.

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The genius of this game is displayed in the use of the Mancala mechanism to determine the action a player will take on their turn. Players will pick up all of the action tokens from one of the “dishes” on their player board and proceed to move in a clockwise manner, dropping one token in each bowl that they pass. On the final placement, the player will then take the action listed on that dish.

If a Trajan tile is present at the final dish and the colors of the action tokens match the colors on the tile, the player will score those points as well as well as receiving the extra bonus.

The Seaport action allows players to either draw additional cards from the commodity deck or the discard pile, as well as trading in cards for points using the ship tokens. Points are awarded depending on the quantity and type of cards traded. The first player to use The player board actions are: Seaport, Forum, Senate, a particular ship scores the blue side and flips it over to Trajan, Construction and Military. the grey side, for the remainder of the round the lower scoring grey side will be used.

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Game Review (Cont.)

The Forum action allows players to take one of the displayed Forum tiles. This is the main area in which players can obtain the tiles necessary to “meet the people’s demands”, as well as additional Senate votes (see below) and tiles that grant extra actions. At the end of each round there will be 3 tiles revealed that represent the “demands of the people”, each player must have the exact 3 tiles or they will be penalized for missing tiles. −15 points for missing 3 tiles, −9 for missing 2 tiles and −4 for missing 1 tile. So it is important to try and obtain these tiles each round.

The Senate action allows you to immediately score points and the points increase each time you land there during a round, which can add up to a lot of points if you set up your Mancala accordingly. Another feature of the Senate area is that the player who has the most votes (by placement on the track and/ or obtaining Vote tiles from the other areas of the board) gets to choose from the 2 available bonus tiles at the end of the current round. The player with the second most votes gets the other tile, however they have to flip it over to the less valuable grey side.

The Trajan action allows a player to take the top Trajan tile from any stack and place it on the space where the Trajan Arch is, then the Trajan Arch is moved to the next empty space on the player’s mat. These tiles grant additional bonuses and points by matching the colors on the tile.

The Construction action is used by players to build in the District area. To do so a player will place one of their available workers in the worker camp onto one of the tiles in the District and remove and place the tile onto their player board. The first time a player removes a unique tile from the area they will receive a special bonus action. However, once a player places a worker in the District, all of their following placements must be adjacent to a previously placed worker. This area is usually a point of contention as players try to block other players from specific tiles.

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The last action is the Military action and this allows a player to move their Military Leader around the map at the top of the board. When a Leader moves into an

area they pick up any tile that is available there. This is another area where you are able to obtain the tiles necessary to “meet the people’s demand”. If a Military Leader already occupies an area they may they may place one of their Legionnaires from the Military Camp in that area as an action and score the points listed.

While most of the scoring is done during each player’s turn, there is a substantial amount of endgame scoring that takes place. One VP is given for each card remaining in hand, unused meeples on the main board and unused Trajan tiles on a player’s board. The Bonus tiles that were collected at the end of each round are scored in the endgame with the Gold side receiving more points than the Grey. The largest bonus is given Continued on next page>

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Game Review (Cont.)

for sets of Construction tiles, with each matching set of 3 tiles being worth 10 VP’s and sets of 4 being worth 20 VP’s. Games can often be won or lost on the endgame bonuses, so attention should be given to trying to obtain the necessary components throughout the game.

Stefan Feld is my favorite designer and I consider Trajan to be his masterpiece. This game is easily amongst my top 10 games of all-time. The gameplay is brilliant and there are so many paths to victory that players can choose a different route each game and still be competitive.

While at first is may seem to be overwhelming with all of the choices offered, but this disappears after the first couple of turns as the game becomes more intuitive and you can turn your attention to setting up the Mancala mechanism to aid in your strategic efforts. This is one game that I would always be interested in playing as there are so many strategic threads that one can pursue.

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Due in part to its flexibility in scoring, it also has a high replayability factor. So if you haven’t had the opportunity to play this game, I would highly recommend that you search it out and give it a try, as it one that is certainly worth your time to explore. Besides... that “Cult of the New” game can wait!

Designers: Stefan Feld Publisher: Passport Game Studios Number of players: 2-4 Mechanic: Mancala/Action Selection Ages: 13+ Length: 30 mins./player

Highly Recommended www.passportgamestudios.com/

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Game Review Conspiracy!

By Serge Pierro

Conspiracies Abound

C

onspiracy! from Shoot Again Games is a set collection game with a twist: when the cards are placed into play, they trigger a card specific effect.

The game comes in a 5x7 box and features a black plastic insert that is divided into two sections to store the cards.

The 10 page rulebook is the same size as the box and is sparsely illustrated, with only three examples shown and a little over a page of card clarifications. The rules are succinct and to the point.

The 72 linen finished cards are broken down into: 45 Conspiracy cards, 23 Action cards and 4 player aides. The cards came in a sealed cellophane wrapper, however, when opened they were clearly warped along the horizontal axis.

To begin play, each player is dealt 10 cards and the remaining cards are placed in the center of the table with the top card being placed face up in the discard pile. Players then have the option to either put a conspiracy into play or strengthen a conspiracy that is already in play. Putting a conspiracy into play requires either three matching conspiracy cards or two matching cards and their related “Proof!” card. To strengthen a conspiracy, players add one or more cards to a conspiracy that is already in play, placing the card(s) they played in front of them. Players may play and strengthen one conspiracy per turn, or if they don’t play a conspiracy, they may strengthen two conspiracies.

When a conspiracy is placed into play or is strengthened, it triggers the effect that is printed on the card and the effect is resolved.

You are only allowed to play one Action card per turn. These are designated by the lightning bolt symbol on the card. This is important, as the “Proof!” cards also have lightning bolts on them, so it is not possible to play a conspiracy with a “Proof!” card and then play a separate Action card.

At the end of a turn each player has to discard one card to the top of the discard pile.

Play continues until one player is able to “go out” by playing the last card in their hand to the discard pile at the end of their turn.

Each of the remaining players will then discard one card to the discard pile and then scoring commences.

Players will then check the discard pile for any cards matching any of the conspiracies in play. Then the highest scoring conspiracy loses a card for each card that matches. This is checked one card at a time and can lead to multiple players losing cards. If there is a tie, then each tied player loses a card.

Players will then check the collective value of each conspiracy in play. Any conspiracy that has a value of 10 points or higher will have their points doubled, otherwise they are scored at face value. Players who had cards left in their hand will subtract their value(s) from their score.

Players will check to see if anyone has a score above 100, if so, the player with the most points wins. If not, players will play another round until the endgame condition is met.

What makes this game interesting is the triggering of abilities when conspiracies are put into play or strengthened.

The scoring system was also noteworthy, as players tried to have conspiracies worth more than 10 points, yet this allowed opponent’s to “piggyback” and share in the doubling they provided. One of the more interesting strategies was to “attack” players by discarding conspiracy cards to the discard pile that their opponent’s had in play, since these cards would “breakup” conspiracies and possibly bring them below the 10 point threshold.

Overall this was an enjoyable game. Although it weighs in on the filler end of games, the threshold of 100 points could push it beyond a filler if all of the players score low, due to having to play multiple rounds. We found that at least two rounds were needed to meet the endgame conditions. Fans of card games in the vein of Wyatt Earp or the Mystery Rummy series will want to take a look at this.

Designer: Diane and Nick Sauer Publisher: Shoot Again Games Number of players: 2-4 Mechanic: Set Collection Ages: 13+ Length: 30-45 mins.

Recommended

www.shootagaingames.com

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Game Review

Secrets of the Lost Tomb Tombs, Tales and Teamwork

T

he first Indiana Jones movie, Raiders of the Lost Ark, directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Harrison Ford, holds a special place in my heart. I was ten years old when the movie first released in theaters and I recall desperately pleading with my parents to give permission to accompany my then-neighbor’s family to see it. A mild tantrum and a few shed tears later and I had my seat at the theater, ready to experience what I would recognize much later as the defining cinematic experience of my life. Everything about that movie – the World War Two setting, the high level of action adventure, with just enough supernatural mysticism sprinkled in for good measure – effected me in ways few other movies have since been able to live up to. It was everything that I ever wanted (or would want going forward) in a theatrical experience.

Imagine my excitement when I first heard about Secrets of the Lost Tomb. Marketed as a cooperative, pulp action board game, it boasted tomb exploration, ancient artifacts, high adventure, and nightmarish creatures. Hell, there’s even the opportunity to equip a character with a leather jacket on his back, a fedora on his head, and a bullwhip at his side.

How could I not jump at the chance to re-live my boyhood fantasies in board game form? But is Secrets of the Lost Tomb able to live up to my own personal expectations, or does it crush my youthful memories with its oversized game box?

Gameplay Secrets of the Lost Tomb accommodates for 1-6 players taking on the roles of individual adventurers within the Eternal Order of Perseus. Including seven, highly thematic and story-driven scenarios, players will work together, utilizing their character-unique talents and equipment to explore the lost Tomb, and face “inconceivable evils and long-forgotten

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By Bill Braun

knowledge” to protect the world from “mysteries so powerful that, in the wrong hands, could alter the course of Fate itself.”

While the story and objectives of each scenario are unique, the game’s set-up is generally the same. The Tomb entrance, Pharaoh’s Hall, and Mongols Hall tiles are pulled from the stack of more than 40 tiles and laid out to represent the three levels of the tomb, while the remaining tiles are shuffled together and placed face down to create the unexplored rooms. Similar to the game Betrayal at House on the Hill (Avalon Hill, Wizards of the Coast), the back of each tile indicates the level at which a room may be placed when exploring. Some tiles are specific to one level, while others will apply to any of the three. As such, when exploring, players discard tiles until the level their character currently occupies has been found.

Each of the available 18 character sheets detail their attributes (strength, dexterity, knowledge, mythos, and movement), indicate any starting equipment cards and/or abilities, and list their starting health, courage, and audacity. In general, a character’s attributes list how many dice the player will be allowed to roll when facing a variety challenges during their adventure, (most commonly counting any five or six rolled as a success), while a character’s audacity points can be spent to help mitigate these same challenges. Spending a single audacity before rolling any dice checks will count 4s, 5s, and 6s as successes, while spending an audacity point after a dice check will allow the player to re-roll their entire dice pool.

Audacity is an interesting feature of the game, but refilling a character’s audacity is a difficult proposition. Knowing when to spend it can make all the difference.

The game mechanism that stands out the most is the concept of courage, how it fluctuates for each character,

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and the unique effects that may result of losing or gaining courage. A character’s courage is adjusted when encountering and destroying the creatures hidden within the tomb. Each creature card identifies the number of courage points (in addition to all other relevant statistics needed to manage the creature) a character will lose the first time it is encountered.

This represents the shock and terror associated with exploring a room, only to be surprised by giant spiders, and axewielding skeleton, or an undead raptor pack. As a character’s courage reduces (between +10 and -10) it will begin to adversely affect their attributes, their health, and their overall ability to complete the mission. Conversely, building up a character’s courage will yield additional benefits that make them stronger and better adventurers. Should a character’s courage ever reach its lowest levels they have lost the will to continue, drop all of their items and equipment, and immediately begin to flee the tomb. They are no longer competent to assist with the mission and, should they ever

reach the tomb’s entrance, will be removed entirely from the game (subsequently replaced with a new character = no player elimination). The idea of a character’s courage is incredibly thematic while also generating interesting character-specific responses.

The number of actions a character will have available each round is dictated by the number of players; more players equates to less individual actions per turn. I’ve found this to be fairly accurate when managing the overall difficulty of the game, but I have not yet had the chance to play with the full complement of six players (two actions each). And while the actions available to each player – move, explore, trade, search, combat, etc. – are mostly generic, they are what I have come to expect from any number of action-based cooperative games I’ve played before it. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. No need to fix what isn’t broken, especially when the focus and highlight of Secrets of the Lost Tomb is its story.

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Game Review (Cont.)

The story, and how it develops over the course of a scenario, is what drives this game. In addition to other symbols printed on the various room tiles that provide immersive events and thematic elements, several tiles will also identify specific scenario effects. When these scenario effects are revealed players are instructed to read passages from the scenario book that advance the story, trigger new encounters, and unleash new horrors. These scenario effects are what sets Secrets of the Lost Tomb apart from other story-driven games that I have played. Each of the seven scenarios that come with the base game provide different objectives and missions, and how the stories unfold speaks to the efforts and accomplishments of the creative team at Everything Epic games. They wanted players to experience an epic, Indiana Jones immersive gaming experience, and I believe they succeeded.

Theme and Components I think it’s safe to say that Secrets of the Lost Tomb is firing on all cylinders when delivering theme. If you enjoy pulpstyle adventures, a good dungeon-crawl type of game, and the mythology that Steven Spielberg and Harrison Ford created 35 years ago, then you’ll feel right at home.

What about the components? Did the developers at Everything Epic spend all of their time on theme and storytelling, only to provide a game with lackluster components? While it’s undeniable that the component quality of titles developed by more established gaming companies exceeds the component quality of Secrets of the Lost Tomb, I am far from disappointed by what first-timedeveloper Everything Epic was able to accomplish with their successful Kickstarter campaign.

Both the artwork and included miniatures are passable, but it was their attention to other details that is worth mentioning - specifically, the A.R.M. (Archimedes Retrieval Machine). Providing a nice overlay that is placed on top of the individual character sheets, the A.R.M. includes two dials that track your character’s health and audacity, as opposed to so many other games that often

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include an abundance of damage tokens needed for such purposes. In addition, the overlay utilizes a pegboard on the bottom to track the character’s courage to more easily identify the cumulative effects that apply when courage is gained or lost. This simple, yet well thought out game component expedites a good portion of the game’s maintenance and is presented to fit thematically with the rest of the game.

Also worth noting are the creatures that inhabit the tomb.

Represented by smaller, double-sided cards, displaying both the image of the creature and all relevant attributes that come with it: movement, courage attack, combat rating, armor, health, evasion difficulty, and special abilities. Where most games would prompt players to place these creature cards next to the game board for reference, Secrets of the Lost Tomb places them into their own plastic stands and onto the board – keeping the theme of the game intact while likely reducing the overall cost of the game (to develop and purchase) by not forcing an abundance of additional miniatures into the base game (optional miniature add-on purchases are available).

Lastly, the included dice deserve a mention of their own.

More than just nicely etched to represent critical successes (6s) and critical failures (1s), Everything Epic took it one step further by including eight, double-six sided dice (essentially a 12-sided dice with 1-6 represented twice). I’m not sure how everyone else feels about rolling the all-toofamiliar six-sided dice, but for me they always seem to land with a non-dramatic thud, rather than a graceful roll. The dice included with Secrets of the Lost Tomb roll with the best of their 12-sided brethren. The odds of rolling a success are all the same, but these feel so much better doing it!

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Final Thoughts While there are a few stumbles along the way – combat is slightly convoluted and there a few rules that beg to be revised and clarified - Secrets of the Lost Tomb lives up to its developer’s name. It truly is an “epic” experience. Granted, players are likely to see certain mechanisms resembling games that have come before it, but I think at this point, with so many new games being developed on a regular basis, it’s becoming more and more difficult for game designers to be truly unique. What matters is how the game makes you feel when playing it. If you enjoy cooperative games and accept the fact that strategy most definitely takes a backseat to immersion and storytelling, then I think you should give Secrets of the Lost Tomb a try. If you’re anything like me and are looking for a game that can capture that pulp adventure experience so genuinely captured by the imagination of Steven Spielberg, then adding Secrets of the Lost Tomb to your gaming collection will be essential.

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Designer: Christopher Batarlis, Jim Samartino Publisher: Everything Epic Games Number of players: 1-6 Mechanic: Co-op Ages: 13+ Length: 60 mins.

Recommended www.everythingepic.us

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Special Feature Online Boardgaming Sites

By Serge Pierro

Part III - Yucata

I

n Part Three of our series featuring online board gaming sites, we take a look at the German site, Yucata. This site features 117 games, including the recently released Castles of Burgandy Card Game.

This popular site is well known for their large collection of games, featuring a wide range of designers and companies. Some of the featured games are: A Few Acres of Snow, Antike Duellum, At the Gates of Loyang, Automobiles, Cacao, Can’t Stop, Carcassonne: Hunters and Gatherers, El Grande, Finca, Glen More, Jaipur, La Isla, Luna, Roll Through the Ages, Russian Railroads (and the German Railroads expansion), Stone Age, Targi, The Castles of Burgundy, The Palaces of Carrara, The Speicherstadt, The Voyages of Marco Polo, Thunderstone, Thurn and Taxis and many more!

To navigate around the site users will click on the Navigation tabs near the top of the screen. These include: Overview, Games, Other Players, Communication, My Yucata and Info.

The Overview page shows how many games that you currently are playing, a chat feature, personal invitations and your recently finished games. In the Recently Finished Games area, when you click on the small

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arrow icon it opens up a display giving you additional information about the completed game. This includes your True Skill points, Ranking Points and assorted material about the game - including a link to the completed game in case you would take another look at it, as well as having the ability to replay the game.

The Games tab is where you will be spending most of your time and it includes several sub-tabs, they are: Your current games, Create new game, Create random game, Invitation list, Rules, Game information and Statistics.

“Your current games” takes you to a page that has all of your current games listed, along with some basic information about each of them including how many players, if the game is rated and when the last move was made. There is also a “Start Game” button which launches the first game in the “queue”. This is one of the stranger things about the site, it “forces” you to play games in a certain order, even if you get an extra turn in a game that you are currently playing, there is a message stating that you have an older move in another game to make first. The other thing is that the games open in a separate window. You can enlarge the window and the site will remember the settings for the next time you play that game. Games that are listed in a bolder text font are the ones in which it is your turn to move.

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The list of games that are currently available.

The “Create new game” tab takes you to a screen that lists all of the games and then you can choose one and it will then take you to the specific page for that game in which you can create an invitation. This page also features several options to tailor the game experience to your liking, including rating range and what speed of play you desire.

The “Create Random Game” tab is unusual. Based on the game preferences listed on your profile it will find a group of players with similar “likes” and choose a game that everyone enjoys.

The Invitation list shows all of the games that are currently looking for players. It shows the amount of players wanted, the optional rating range listed, the speed of play and if the game is rated. If the optional rating range is listed, if your rating falls within that range the numbers are green and if you fall outside that range they are red and you will not be able to join the game. If you are interested in joining a game you can click on the little icon on the left and it will reveal the cover of the game and the TrueSkill ratings/ number of games played for each of the players. Across

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Special Feature (Cont.)

A two player game of Thurn and Taxis.

The Game Information page has some of the same the top of the page there is a list of checkboxes that can information as the Rules page, sans the rules, and be used to filter the list of invitations. instead has the Top 10 players by TrueSkill ranking and The Rules page uses the same format as the new game the Top 10 players with the amount of games played. creation page, however when you click on one of the The Statistics page breaks down the games in several game names you are instead taken to a page that lists the rules for the game and may include a video review. The different ways. The main graph shows the amount of designer, publisher and other information for the game games played on the site. Example: the most played game is Can’t Stop with 528,169 games played. Besides is also present. individual game statistics, there are also graphs for

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A three player game of Automobiles.

Active Users over times, how many active games over time and how many moves are made per day. There is also a graph that shows the distribution of the player ranks.

The Other Players tab gives information about the various players on the site and this includes: Players online, Ranking tables and a map that shows where the players are located.

The Communication Tab features the ability to send and receive messages, as well as linking to the site’s forums.

The Forums are in both English and German.

The My Yucata tab allows access to your personal information and stats, and the Info tab contains the site’s FAQ and the people behind the site.

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Special Feature (Cont.)

An open information variant of Jaipur.

This is one of my favorite sites to go to due to their broad range of games. I have played many different games on the site and yet I have a long way to go if I’m interested in trying them all. It’s great to have access to games such as Glen More and The Speicherstadt, as well as perennial favorites such as Thurn and Taxis. One of the stranger things about the site is their use of “titles” for the ranking system. Players start out as a “New Villager” and move up the list of “titles” by meeting a specific criteria. I’m not sure why this is used, as it makes no sense on its own, after all when you look at a player’s ranking, what is the higher rank? Merchant, Chilian Priest, or Judge? Who knows? This is perhaps the weakest aspect of the site. I would have loved to have been able to ask about this, but they never responded to our request for an interview.

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A two player game of Russian Railroads with the German Railroads Expansion.

The main downside of the site is that there are players who will not make a move in a game that they are losing and then the game will time out after 30 days. Not surprisingly, this is annoying and frustrating. The site doesn’t seem to have a decent deterrent in place in order to deal with this. However, many of the players are quite friendly and I’ve had the pleasure of meeting many who are willing to help you learn a new game.

Generally I have 20-30 games going on at once, and I always look forward to logging in, as there’s plenty of gamers here who also enjoy the large library of games. www.yucata.de

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Game Review Best Treehouse Ever

By Serge Pierro

Build a Treehouse

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cott Almes seems to be everywhere these days. This time we find Green Couch Games publishing one of his recent efforts, Best Treehouse Ever. With the combination of a noted designer, a publisher with a good track record and a unique theme, let’s see how they all add up.

Fans of previous Green Couch Games will be familiar with their small standard box size. There is no insert, but the box is designed so that the wooden components can fit between the two decks of cards when stored.

The 12 page rulebook is clear and concise and features the graphic design and artwork of Adam P. McIver.

The 95 linen finished cards are of a decent card stock and feature the whimsical artwork of the aforementioned Mr. McIver.

There are 8 wooden components included. These are broken down into four colors, with each color receiving two tokens, one for scoring and the other for tracking the “balance” of the treehouse.

To begin the game each player will receive a Starting Tree card, as well as a scoring token and a balance token. The scoring token is placed on the score track and the balance token is placed on the center position of the Starting Tree card.

Each player is then dealt six cards and will choose one of them and place it face down in front of them. After everyone has chosen a card, they are revealed and added to their Treehouse. The cards added must follow the criteria stated in the rule book, which covers the physical position of the cards, the use of color when placing, how many levels may be built and the importance of the balance marker.

The balance marker is one of the more interesting aspects of the game. When a card is added to the treehouse it moves the balance marker in the direction of where the card was placed. There are three spaces available. So if the marker is on the right side of the card and a card was placed on the left side of the treehouse, the marker would move one space to the left, which would place it in the middle. However, a card may not be placed if the marker is already on that side of the Starting Tree card. For instance, if the marker is already on

the right side of the card, you are unable to place any cards on the right side of the tree. Players have to make an effort to try to keep their tree “balanced”.

After each player has placed a card in their treehouse, they take their remaining cards and pass them to the player on their left.

Play continues as above, until each player is left with one card, which they will then discard.

Then the scoring portion of the round begins. Each player will choose a Game Changer card. Then in reverse order, each player will place their Game Changer card on one of the Scoring cards, thus making some Treehouse cards worth 2VP’s each and others worth 0 VP’s each. Scores are tallied and the next round of the game begins. The game is made up of three rounds.

On the final round of the game the players will count how many of each color room they have and the player with the most of a specific color will receive the appropriate bonus card, which grants an endgame bonus of 1 VP for each card of that color.

Also included are optional Bonus cards (hidden objectives) that are used for endgame scoring. Each player will receive one card and keep it hidden from the other players. At the end of the game they will receive points if they match either, or both, of the two configurations listed on the card.

This is a fun filler game that should appeal to younger players, though adults will also enjoy playing it. The use of the Balance token makes the game challenging at points and the scoring method is also of interest. With a unique theme and family friendly design, this is a game that will appeal to many gamers and their families.

Designer: Scott Almes Publisher: Green Couch Games Number of players: 2-4 Mechanic: Card Drafting Ages: 8+ Length: 30 mins.

Recommended

www.greencouchgames.com

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71

Game Review

Matryoshka

By Serge Pierro

Collect Matryoshka Dolls

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lthough I’m not a fan of bluffing games, Sergio Halaban’s Sheriff of Nottingham was one of the better ones that I’ve played. So I was looking forward to playing his new card game design, Matryoshka. And like its namesake, there appears to be several levels of interest nested within itself.

like formation throughout the game, scoring in both horizontal and vertical directions. At this stage of the game players will have their first glimpse as to what their opponent may be interested in collecting.

After laying down the cards, each player will draw two cards. Then the active player will choose one of the cards Matryoshka comes in a small 4” x 5” x 3/4” box that in their hand to offer to the other players and place it face has no insert. up on the table. Each of the other players will take a card from their hand a place it face down. The active player The 70 linen finished cards fit perfectly within the will take a look at the face down cards and choose one. box due to the fact that they measure 2 1/4” x 3 1/2”. Whoever’s card was taken gets to take the card the active Eduardo Bera provides the artwork for the cards and player had offered. If a player’s card was not chosen, they does a great job. However, it should be noted that return it to their hand. some players complained about the colors of some of the cards as being too similar, but if you focus on the After each player has had the opportunity to be the actual illustrations, this is not a problem. The game active player the round ends with each player returning also comes with several promo cards for the game all the cards in their display area back into their hand.

Crooks.

Then players will again build their grid, but this time they place more cards, as each round the number of cards The rules sheet is double sided and the rules are displayed increases. Initially each player had two cards in concise. There are four sheets included, each of them play, the next round they reveal four cards, then 6 cards, in a different language. then 8 cards and then finally in the last round they reveal 13 cards. On each of these rounds players can choose to To start the game players will need to reference the reveal any cards they wish, they don’t have to reveal cards rule sheet to see how many sets of cards are used, as that were previously played. this is determined by the number of players.

After four rounds the game ends and the scores are Each player will receive six cards and will then choose tallied. to place two of the face down in front of them. Once everyone has placed their cards, they are all revealed.

The scoring system is unique, but it is easy enough to They are then arranged in numerical and color/ pickup. Essentially players will score both horizontally illustration order. Players will be constructing a grid and vertically the cards that are in their tableau.

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This game is an enjoyable filler that has some interesting things going for it. First of all the art is excellent and looks great on the table. Second the scoring system keeps players attuned to the spatial aspects of their tableau. The trading of a card for another player’s card is the core mechanic and as the game progressed there were times where players found themselves having to reluctantly give up a card that they would have preferred to have kept.

The only downside is that the layout of each player’s tableau can take up a fairly large chunk of tabletop realestate, so this is something to keep in mind, especially when playing with five players.

This will be joining our collection of solid filler games that we can break out at the end of the night. You might have to do some hunting to find a copy, but you will be rewarded with a compact and fun game that will appeal to a wide range of players.

Designers: Sergio Halaban Publisher: White Goblin Games Number of players: 3-5 Mechanic: Set Collection, Trading Ages: 8+ Length: 20 mins.

Recommended

www.whitegoblingames.com

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Solo Gaming

Phantom Leader Deluxe

By Jeff Rhind

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hantom Leader Deluxe from Dan Verssen Games is a solitaire game set during the Vietnam War between 1965 and 1972.

You will be commanding US Air Force and US Naval pilots who each have unique skills and their planes each have different weapons to attack their targets. As pilots become fatigued and stressed, their accuracy will decline and could become unfit to fly.

If your pilots succeed, they will earn experience so that they may “level-up” to higher skill levels and awarded victory points toward various campaigns.

First, you will select a campaign card, each with its own special rules and choose either a short, medium or long campaign. The sequence of play is broken down into five phases. First is the PreFlight Phase. You’ll draw target cards and select the one you wish attack based on your politics counter on your campaign sheet.

Every target has a political value assigned to it. The higher the value, the less choices of targets will you have later as you choose from less politically sensitive targets. The harder a target is to destroy the better defended it is and the more victory points it will be worth.

Based on the card, ground-based air defenses are placed on the tactical display. Then, you choose you’re a certain number of pilots/aircraft. Each aircraft has six copies — one for each skill level of pilot from “newbie” to “veteran.”

This game is first and foremost a planning game. Each aircraft has specific types and amounts of weapons it may carry. Also, your distance to the target will affect this. You will spend a majority of your time playing this game in this Pre-Flight phase while you study the target area determining what munitions are the best choice. These are agonizing decisions, but it is a good agonizing, as this is where the meat of the game lies.

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Next is the Target-Bound Flight Phase.

After you have resolved an event card, you place your aircraft in a pre-approach area on the edge of the tactical display and their exit path markers. Aircraft must exit the tactical display at these or their adjacent areas.

Finally, enemy “bandits” are placed and the Over-Target Phase begins.

Photo: Jeff Rhind

You’ll need to destroy the target for the most victory points while defending yourself against ground and air defenders. But you can’t loiter over the target for long as you only have five turns to get in and exit the map before you run out of time. Pilots are fast or slow. Fast pilots get to attack first, followed by enemy sites and bandits and lastly your slow pilots. Then, all aircraft including bandits move and may adjust their altitude. Weapons counters

on your aircraft are expended to attack sites, bandits and ultimately the main target in the center. Combat results are based on die rolls as indicated on the weapons counters. Some weapons can only be used air-to-air, others at low altitude, and others are ranged. While this is all an oversimplification of game play, it’s really not that difficult, and is easy to master after a mission or two.

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Solo Gaming (Cont.)

Photo: Jeff Rhind

As pilots gain stress through evading attacks or taking damage from enemy units, they can become shaken which adversely affect their die rolls and possibly make them “unfit” to fly which would force them to bug out home! Until unfit pilots are rested and regain some of their cool, they cannot fly another mission.

Once you have completed the Over Target Phase, the player draws an event card and resolve the Home-Bound Phase event. Finally, you move on to the last phase called Debriefing. This is essentially, a records keeping phase where you record victory points, pilot stress, pilot recovery and experience on your player log sheet.

You sit in command of your Naval or Air Force squadrons trying to best figure out how to efficiently take out the target as well as defending yourself from enemy bandits and ground sites. With repeated plays, you will be more

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accustom to the types of weapons and what targets they are best suited for. There is a lot luck involved with regard to dice rolls. You think you have an enemy in your sights whether it’s a ground-based missile launcher or a MiG-17 trying to blow you out of the sky, you roll your dice…a hit! The target is destroyed! That level of excitement and the “edge-of-your-seat” stress in the Over Target Phase is thrilling and fast playing but it can also be frustrating if you get some bad rolls.

The “leader” system is an easy system to understand and play. DVG has other games in the series if perhaps you are more interested in tanks, submarines, helicopters or A-10 Warthogs! Phantom Leader Deluxe is the flagship of the series and considered by many solo gamers as the best. Good luck on your missions and may all your pilots get home safely.

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Comics

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Education

Game Events

By David Niecikowski, ABD, MAED/CI

Part 3: Coordinating Game Events - During and After

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his is the is the third article in a three part series on the description, benefits, preparation, and coordination of game events. The previous two issues discussed the description, benefits, and before preparations of game events.

Game events are vital for anyone interested in promoting game literacy and nurturing and growing a game community.

What follows is an excerpt from my book Game Design in the Classroom about during and after preparation considerations when hosting your own game event.

Preparation Review To review the sections from the previous article, preparations for a game event include setting the event’s purpose/goals and possible theme, e.g., math night, selecting a convenient location that can meet the needs and number of potential attendees, determining the date and time of the event, recruiting and training volunteers, determining who to invite, promoting the event, processing RSVPs, possibly contacting manufacturers and retailers to provide assistance, and obtaining games that will meet the age, experience, and comfort level of attendees. Other preparations include preparing, purchasing, or coordinating any food and drink preparations, creating a rules poster or flyers, sending reminders a week to a few days before the event, and verifying that the location’s tables and chairs are adequate to meet projected attendance. For volunteers, at a minimum name tags or badges should be prepared and some may consider wearing the same color shirts or wearing custom t-shirts that mark the event. A checklist of volunteer responsibilities and duties may need to be typed and printed. Consider printing pages that summarize the rules for games that will be available during the event. Volunteers could create these pages (possible student assignment?) or are sometimes available from manufacturers, included with some games, or available on game fan sites. Also print attendee sign-in sheets and plenty of surveys. Finally, consider bringing large blank nametag stickers on which attendees may write their names.

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Day of and During - Holding a Game Event As coordinator, be sure and arrive at least an hour before the event to make sure the space is set as desired. More time may be needed if the space is not preset. Preparing the room may include setting up and wiping the tables and chairs, hanging decorations, posting signs to direct the attendees to the correct location, placing out any food and drinks, displaying door prizes on the prize table, and presetting any games or game stations, e.g., games for ages 3-5, games for ages 6-8, etc. Depending on the size of the event, one or two volunteers may need to greet and sign in attendees as they arrive and help them fill out nametags. About 10 minutes after the scheduled start time of the event, consider making any important announcements for the total group to hear that may include expectations, rules, directions to bathrooms, introductions of volunteers, thanking sponsors, the layout of the room, safety issues, any tournament procedures, and the prize drawing process. Remind your volunteers and attendees that the emphasis is on having fun and that a game does not need to be finished if you are not enjoying the game. It may be helpful to provide a quick preview or introduction of available games.

After announcements, it is vital that volunteers help players find games they like, teach games, answer questions during game play, and help attendees find different games if the they do not like the current game. Volunteers should also assist in helping attendees reset or put away played games and monitor attendees cooperation with food, drink, and caring for game pieces rules. Be sure and take photos during the event and obtain any necessary photo clearance forms. Allow enough time at the end to thank participants for coming, to present any awards, and for attendees to fill out a survey. A sample is provided on the next page.

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After - Holding a Game Event The day following the event, thank you cards should be sent to volunteers and those who made donations. Organizations who supported the event need to be informed if the purpose/ goals of the event were met. This may include providing attendance data, games that were played, and testimonials from attendees. A summary describing the event could be written with an attached photo and posted online or included in a newsletter, e.g., school website or principal newsletter. Consider following up with those who did not show to determine if any changes could be made to increase participation. Finally, if appropriate, begin planning the next event.

· Place cell phones on vibrate, no texting, please take calls outside game room · House rules need to be agreed upon before the games starts · No wagering, gambling · Games brought to the event need to be appropriate subject matter

Game Event Survey

Consider having attendees answer the following survey questions to collect data and how to improve the next game event and to create a contact list to invite participants to future events.

Name: Rules 1. What is your age?

What follows is a short list of possible rules to post at a game 2. What is your Email address?

3. What games did you play? event: 4. What was your favorite game and why? · Have fun, be good sports 5. Is this your first time coming to a game event? · Respect game parts, play with clean hands · Only nongreasy foods that don’t leave a residue at the game 6. Would you come back? Why or why not?

7. Do you have any suggestions for future events? table, e.g., M&Ms and pretzels.

8. Would you like to be contacted by your email address · Only drinks with twist on caps at the game table above to attend future game events?

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Collecting Too Many Games!

By John Anthony Gulla

Board Game Collections

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fter living in a smaller, shared residence for the last few years, my family is finally moving into our very own house. While this is a great thing for us overall, doing so also means we will be forced to get rid of our nearby storage unit, wherein a large amount of the board games in my collection currently reside. Perhaps, a little too many….

Perhaps, much, much too many.

You see, my wife, who is keenly aware of my gaming habits (and who plays a few games herself ), was nevertheless mostly unaware of the rather enormous collection of board games I had actually amassed over the previous few years, and which I kept shoving into that same storage unit after having run out of space in our current living arrangement long ago. It had become my job to manage the storage unit and all of its contents and, as such, she had not been to see it in quite some time, nor did she have a need to do so. Thus, it had become my personal board game repository …with maybe a few of our other possessions in it.

During one of our strategic preparation sessions for the upcoming move a few short weeks ago, my wife innocently and sweetly inquired as to how many board games we actually owned at that point in time, presumably for shelving/storage purposes in the new digs. Sweat began to form on my brow as my thoughts immediately flashed to an image of the giant pile of game boxes in our storage unit, lying in wait for the next unsuspecting victim to open the garage-style door and be buried beneath the falling avalanche of cardboard, dice, and meeples.

I had never made an effort to hide the collection from her, but I also had not been very forthcoming as to just how many games were actually in there either. This was a problem. In that flash of time, however, the leading edge of a second, I somehow made the decision that now was the time to come clean. There would be no real use in obfuscating or hiding it: in just a week or less, we would be wading knee-deep in those boxes either way. Now was the time. I went to speak, and with dry mouth and sweaty palms, I managed to grunt, “uhh… it’s a lot.”

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This would buy me perhaps a few seconds of time – not to figure out how many games I actually owned (for that was a number I knew all too well), but to figure out how best to actually say the tally out loud, so that she would hear the actual amount without sending her straight to the emergency room for heart failure-- or, without sending me straight to the emergency room with internal injuries!

On cue, she shot me a wry stare in return for my non-answer.

I felt the blood rushing to my extremities. I was either going to tell her right now …or run. I could run out the front door, turn the corner and just keep running, a la Forrest Gump.

Running cross-country barefoot would probably be easier than fessing up anyway. Yet, my feet stayed planted to the floor, and my mouth ran instead.

“You mean, like, the total number of games,” I stammered, “or, uh, just the ones I play? Or, ummm,… the games that aren’t solely kid’s games--” “All of them,” she quickly answered, breaking off my verbal onslaught.

I once again opened my mouth to speak, with labored intent, only to be mercifully interrupted again by her continuation, “I mean is it 100? It’s gotta be around 100 or so by now, I would guess.”

100?! I may have close to that in the trunk of my car, I thought.

In my head, this just went from bad to, well …really, really bad.

She set me up, so I finally responded with the whole truth and nothing but. “…ehhh, it’s more like 4x that,” I heard myself say out loud from outside of my body.

Truth be told, I love my collection, but I’m also a tiny bit embarrassed by it at this point, too. 400+ board games can certainly be seen as excessive by all but the most hardcore gamers and there was just no earthly way for me to justify owning them all, especially considering I don’t get enough time to play even

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my top 50 games often enough as it is. And yet, I had purchased them all over the course of my time exploring this great and wonderful hobby, convincing myself each and every purchase that I simply had to own this newly-released, hot-list game, or the one that I knew was hit-or-miss after researching it, but that was such a great value at only $5 or $10 that it didn’t matter anyway -- or that long out-of-print game that is so difficult to find and that I’d never have another chance to own for that price (and even if I didn’t like it, it was likely that I would be able to sell it for at least as much as I purchased it for). These were all “must buys” for me for years, while my house shelves sat ready and full of tried-and-true great games, 95% of which had not been played in well over a year, in addition to the many never-been-played games in the storage that continued to breed and overtake the space like tribbles. It was just so easy to buy the games that I thought would eventually see table time at some point, while having that extra space to put them that was so conveniently out-of- sight (and out-of-mind). But now, they seemed to be crashing down on top of me all at once.

I sheepishly looked toward my wife, sitting on the couch adjacent to me, fully expecting the worst.

“Seriously?” she said, though not nearly as indignant as I’d imagined, but certainly not pleased either.

“Seriously,” I flatly replied, awaiting the inevitable fall of the hammer. After a few seconds of eternity, she finally continued.

“Well,” she sighed, “we’re going to have to go to Ikea to get shelves for that many games. There’s no way we will be able to fit them all on what we have already. We may even have to do a floor-toceiling shelf across the entire wall in the living room area.”

Wait… What?! …Did I hear her correctly?

Gamers, this is how you know you married the right person.

Not only was she willing to hold on to more games than what she had estimated, she was fighting to figure out how we might hold onto the entire collection! I fell in love with her all over again in that very moment.

Encouraged and excited by her willingness, I responded with good news in kind,

“True. And, actually, I had been meaning to sell off more than a few of the games in the storage unit anyhow, so it shouldn’t be a problem to fit them all on a setup like that.”

At this, her neck twisted slightly, raising her chin to the side as her eyes darted up into her forehead. It was as if I could physically see the thought arise into her head at that very instant. Had I said too much?

“I’ll tell you what,” she started, “you sell off enough games to buy the shelves needed to hold the rest of the games on that wall and that works for me.”

“Deal,” I said quickly in response, feeling as though I had won the lottery already and did not wish to provide any more time for a change of heart.

And so, with that, we began looking together for the right storage solution to hold what I wanted to keep.

The point, however, of how many games is too many games stuck with me after this conversation. I do know of gamers who own a great many more games than I do –some collections even numbering in the thousands— and in no way am I attempting to be judgmental about the size of a person’s collection, either big or small. This is, of course, ultimately up to each individual to decide.

What I do feel a valid question to ask ourselves is: how many games should I (i.e. you) own? Is there a formula or set of tenets that I could go by to arrive at a round-about number? And, by logical extension, would those principles have any carry over to a more general idea of how large a collection would be best for gamers, using their own set of information? How would such a thing be determined?

Here, I will attempt to lay some potential guidelines for how one should (at least begin to) think about the appropriate size for their own collection, respecting the fact that such thoughts are merely my own musings and in no way meant to be an actual, informed, or scientific study based on data collection and/or well-researched information based on multiple collections, but more of an “armchair” philosophical approach to the subject.

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Collecting Guideline #1: How much variety the owner prefers in his or her collection

Guideline #2: board games

Living in this glorious, golden age of tabletop games has its advantages: There are more games available now than ever before in human history, with various mechanics, styles, themes, art, player-counts, etc… making for many robust and quality offerings being released each year. If you’re into Norse mythology themed games, you have tons of options; if you adore worker-placement games, you could fill an entire shelving-unit with just those; if you prefer only abstract, strategy games endorsed by Mensa, then you’re in luck, because there is more than enough of those! Whereas a few hundred years ago, you’re options would have been quite limited overall, today, you can literally build a fort with a selection of games from one of the above categories, put a twin-sized bed in it, and sleep comfortably inside your very own gamebox-castle.

While most people would agree that such an explosion of offerings is mostly a good thing (other than perhaps having to sift through many mediocre and/or overhyped offerings put out every year now), the question is: do we really need to have that many games belonging to the same (or similar) category in our personal collections? Well, this is a question that can only be answered by you.

While some may feel that there is more value inherent in owning a game than merely how often it gets played (an idea which can and should be explored further), most people do own board games with the specific and pointed intent of actually playing them, and not solely for their aesthetic (or any other associated) value. Thus, it stands to reasons that the amount of time the owner of the collection has to play his or her games should correlate with how many options they would like to have available to do so, assuming variety (Guideline #1) is at least somewhat important to the gamer. Stated more plainly, the more time you spend playing games, the more games you may justify owning, given your preference for variety among play.

I’m sure that there are people who do prefer more variety; so much so, that every game night their preference is to play a different game, with very little repeating of any past games, psyched to try out every game that comes to market. On the other hand, some gamers and/or game groups don’t want to bother learning a new set of rules every game night, opting instead to stick with a smaller, pre-approved list of selections as their mainstays, while trying a new game only once in a great while. Still others are content to find a happy middleground between those two.

The takeaway here is: if you can identify your preference for variety over time (and factor in your regular gaming group’s/ partner’s preferences, when applicable), then you can use this information to determine how large (or small) a collection you will need to satisfy that level of varie

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How often the owner plays

But how many games does that actually amount to for hobby-enthusiasts? For those of you who, much like myself, don’t typically play more than once a week on average, let’s do a little calculation exercise together to investigate. The following presupposes that other gaming groups share similarities with my own. If this is not the case, adjust accordingly to derive your own, more accurate calculation.

The average game night typically lasts anywhere from 5 to 7 hours – let’s call it 6 hours. The average amount of players on any given game night is typically 4, and the average hobby game we play is approximately 2 hours in length. We typically operate close to a 50% ratio of new games to old games, which adds some time for learning. Therefore, we typically play 2 to 4 games each game night, with the average being closest to 3. So, to reiterate, I play roughly 3 games in a week, ½ of which are new. With 52 weeks in a year, minus a few weeks for out-of-town vacations, holidays, illnesses, etc… that prevent our regularly scheduled meetup, and adding the very few times we might manage to get together more than once a week, I’ll estimate that we have approx. 42 sessions per year.

42 game sessions per year x 3 games each session = 126 games played per year 126 games per year divided by 2 (new games v old games) = 63 new games played per year

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Of those 126 games played, one must also consider how many, in a typical game group of 4 to 6 people, will be games you own? This will vary, depending upon the dynamics of your group. Often, a person who owns the majority of the games will host and others will just show up to play your games. Other groups will determine whose games will be played based on who hosts that week. Still others are even more equitable in sharing which games are played, providing each member with a turn to pick a game form their personal collection (regardless of host location), since many or all of the group’s members are gaming hobbyists and everyone wants to play that new game they recently bought, or the old game they love that’s been sitting around not played for a good length of time. Couples who game almost exclusively will need to use a different calculation as well. For me, I will choose to go with a safe 50% number once again – i.e., I supply 50% of the games my gaming group plays (new or old). With this information, we now calculate the following: 126 games played per year divided by 2 (games I own vs others) = 63 games I own are played in a typical year. (approx. 36 new and 36 old) The next thing that must be accounted for is how many of those games are played more than once in a year. While this, too, will be heavily group dependent, a good guess for most groups is 25%, bring the total of different games played in a year to approx. 47. For ease of handling, let’s go ahead and call this number 50 even.

50 different titles (i.e. games) that I own are played by me (and my gaming group) in the span of 1 year.

Armed with that information, we can assume that a good number for a collection using the above approximate calculations is at very least 50 games large (to support the play), accounting somewhat for variation of playing new vs old games, and recurring plays of some favorites throughout.

This provides us with a decent floor for collection size (for those of you who play twice a week, double that number; for those who only play once a month, quarter it). It does not, however, entail that a gaming collection shouldn’t be any larger than 50 games, for many reasons. Nevertheless, I think this is a good number to keep in mind as the collection grows, however. If your gaming collection reaches 500+, for

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example (and using the above scenario/calculations as our baseline), then 90% of your collection would go untouched every year. One may wish to seriously consider that notion.’

Guideline #3 How much space there is to properly house the collection Obviously, space is a huge factor in deciding how many board games one should own. While each person can determine their own point of comfortability for having games in their living area and where/how best to store them, it feels right to say that they should not consume your life, nor your living space to the point where they become problematic.

For those who are lucky enough to have a basement, extra room, or storage area appropriate for housing cardboard game boxes and components, stockpiling games isn’t really an issue. Hoard away! Many gamers, though, do not have such a luxury and must often decide how many games they can keep within the limited space that they have. I would add to that point that it is somewhat detrimental to a collection to keep a large number of games that are not able to be properly displayed, since the out-of-sight, out-of-mind phenomenon often applies, and that collections are meant to be displayed and easily accessed, if they are to be used often. With that in mind, a ceiling for anyone’s collection must account for the space they have available for storage, and (in my personal opinion) that the optimal storage is not in the back of a closet somewhere, underneath a bed, or off-site in a storage unit, but prominently displayed on a proper shelf, where your gaming partners can bask in the glory of the myriad options you have presented to them.

For me, I’m quite happy with my 8 feet of shelf space to house at least 250 games, and every time I feel the tug of a new game purchase on my heart, my brain will heavily consider all of the above in an effort to determine whether or not the value is really there, whether it will replace a game from my current collection or not, and whether I might actually be better off saving the money for a plane ticket to GenCon, DiceTower Con, or Essen Spiel next year instead.

Are there any other guidelines that we should consider as part of our efforts? Drop me a line at BGG username: JohnAG68, if so.

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Contributors Serge Pierro

Serge

has playtested numerous games for several companies, including Wizards of the Coast and AEG. He has also written for Duelist, Inquest and Gamer print magazines. His award winning photography has appeared in both newspapers and magazines. He has self published a game, and has several other designs scheduled for a 2016 release.

Eric Devlin

Eric has been the North East Regional Representative for Wizards of the Coast, the brand manager of Legends of the Five Rings, as well as working with Sabretooth and Third World Games. He has an extensive background in playtesting for top companies. He has also written for Games Quarterly, Duelist, Inquest and others.

Bill Braun Bill has been a contributing writer for PSNation and High-

Def Digest, an Editor and Publisher Relations Director for 30PlusGamer, and the co-creator and podcast host of A Band of Gamers.

John Anthony Gulla John graduated with an M.A. in Humanities, wherein he focused his study on games, the history of gaming, and game design as it relates to the Humanities. He is an avid board gamer and game collector, with over 200 games in his current collection. You can reach him on BGG.com under the username JohnAG68

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Jeff Rhind Jeff is a single father raising a 17 year-old son and a 6 year-old daughter,

and slowly coaxing them into the world of tabletop gaming. He has been gaming for many years and shares his love and appreciation for the hobby by reviewing and talking about games on his web site: completelyboard. com as well as his You Tube channel at youtube.com/completelyboard.

You can also follow him on twitter @jeffrhind

David Niecikowski David is a published game designer and recognized expert on using traditional

games with families and students. Since 2000, over two dozen of his board games, role-playing supplements, books, and articles have been published. He has also worked as a freelance marketing and event consultant with scores of industry companies such as Alliance Game Distributors, Gen Con, Wizards of the Coast, Upper Deck, Mayfair, Rio Grande, AEG, and Out of the Box.

Kevin Lauryssen Kevin has a Master in Audiovisual Arts and majored in

Animation. He works as a Freelance Draftsman for multiple companies in Belgium. He’s an avid gamer who has created a web-comic about boardgaming. His work can be found at www.game-night.be

Kevin Cox Kevin is a published game designer, graphic designer and co-owner of KnA Games. His first tabletop release is a sci-fi co-op called Space Movers, which he created with his wife, April. Kevin has been gaming for over 30 years and has an extensive collection, which features many vintage games. In addition to gaming, Kevin enjoys being a husband and all around geek.

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Game Review Index

• • • • • •

This Town Ain’t Big Enough for the 2-4 of Us Small World Stella Nova Shoot-Out Postcard Cthulhu Postcard Empire

• • • • • • •

Tile Chess Cards of Cthulhu Samurai Spirit Golem Arcana Pairs Sutakku Timeline

• • • • • • • • •

Baseball Highlights 2045 Samurai Sword Paperback For the Crown Trench Firefly Cutthroat Caverns Rise of the Zombies Shadow Throne

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• • • • • • • • •

Rhino Hero Attila Spurs and Sprockets Chaosmos March of the Ants AquaSphere Fidelitas Rise of Cthulhu Maha Yodah

• • • • • • • • • •

Animal Upon Animal Sushi Draft Stones of Fate WWII: Stalingrad Stockpile The Magnates Sentinel Tactics Flip City Space Movers 2201 Dark Tales

• • • • • • • • •

Nevermore Gold West Arcadia Quest Dragon Flame New York 1901 Lift Off! Tesla vs. Edison Yashima Targi

Issue #11

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• • • • • • • •

Outer Earth 1944: Race to the Rhine Runecast Cycling Tour Witkacy Firefly: Fistful of Credits Dozen Doubloons King Down

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Game Review Index

• • • • • • • • • • • •

Steam Works Web of Spies Cartography Xia: Legends of a Drift System Orleans Raiders of the North Sea Hoyuk Wizards of the Wild Myths at War Ring It! Hogg Wild for Wealth The Martian Investigations

• • • • • • • • • • •

Cosmic Run Imperial Harvest Under the Pyramids (Eldritch Horror Expansion) Bomb Squad Through the Ages: A New Story of Civilization Luna Biblios Dice Trekking the National Parks Fuse Skulldug!

Horrible Hex

• • • • • • • • • • • •

Cuisine a la Cart Foragers The Shadow Over Westminster Scoville Valeria: Card Kingdom Onitama Knit Wit Worlds Fair: 1893 Flip City: Reuse Gruff The Walled City Empires at Sea

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Issue #11

Game Review Index

• • • • • • • • • • • •

JurassAttack!

Oh My Gods!

Looting Atlantis 13 Days Apotheca Tiny Epic Galaxies Automobiles Daxu Slaughterville Kheops Scoville: Labs Ancient Conflict Treasure Chest

Issue #11

•

Dr. Eureka

Stockpile: Continuing Corruption

•

•

Sugar Gliders

•

Dawn of the Zeds: Third Edition

•

Vast: The Crystal Caverns

•

The Networks

•

Grifters

•

Trajan

•

Conspiracy!

•

Secrets of the Last Tomb

•

Best Treehouse Ever

•

Matryoshka

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Answer Key

Games That Begin With The Letter “A�

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(Words can be horizontal, vertical or diagonal.)

Agricola Automobiles Aquasphere Antike Amyitis Aton Archaeology

Alchemists Amerigo Abyss Attika Augustus Android Assyria

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Acquire Archipelago Alhambra Arboretum Asara Arkwright Apotheca

Issue #11

Antiquity Ashes Ascension Akrotiri Aquaretto Automania Attila

Issue #11 Crossword Puzzle 1

S

5

9

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2

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Issue #11

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Down

V

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A A

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2. Find the Ovoid [CHAOSMOS] 3. Mage Company tile layer [HOYUK] 4. "The ___ Brothers" [BAMBOOZLE] 5. "___ the National Parks" [TREKKING] 6. Spicy themed game [SCOVILLE] 7. Game Designer Stefan ___ [FELD] 8. "Board Game ___" [GEEK] 10. Artist Michael ___ [MENZEL] 14. A Major American convention [ORIGINS] 15. Game Designer Sid ___ [SACKSON] 16. Two Player Faidutti abstract [ATTILA] 18. The "Gen" in Gen Con [GENEVA] 19. The "A" in AEG [ALDERAC] 21. "Tasty ___ Games" [MINSTREL] 22. Game Designer Mary ___ [FLANAGAN]

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A

G 28

L 1. $1.8 Million Kickstarter [SCYTHE] 3. Game Designer Sergio ___ [HALABAN] 5. Feld Classic [TRAJAN] 9. "Hera and ___" [ZEUS] 11. "Glen ___" [MORE] 12. My People [MEEPLE] 13. "Game ___ Geek" [BOY] 15. Artist Beth ___ [SOBEL] 17. 2016 Diana Jones Award winner [ERICLANG] 19. "Serra ___" [ANGEL] 20. "____ Cities" [LOST] 23. "___ & Euphrates" [TIGRIS] 24. "Dr. ___" [EUREKA] 25. "___ Rage" [BLOOD] 26. Game Designer Alex ____ [RANDOLPH] 27. Game Designer Mac ___ [GERDTS] 28. "Schotten ___" [TOTTEN]

L

S

E

Across

C

G

R D

G

V

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N G E

E

8

C

M O R E

Z O B

N

A

A

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13

A

A

19

N

N

L

N

Issue #12 November 2016

www.gamenitemagazine.com