August Games

We got back to playing a few games in August. Through the middle of the month, I ended up with a nasty cold that laid me low for a week or two... though I had to get up to work on a few home renovation projects... that very nearly did me in... 

Here's what we got up to! 

Sunday, 2 August 2026

Vera was in town for the long weekend, so she and Nick and Charlie were all to come over for waffle brunch and then an afternoon of boardgames... but then Nick got called into work, so it ended up being only Vera and Charlie... 

We played a couple games of Magical Athlete. 

It is a light racing game. 

You draft four different racers (each has a special power/ability/rule), and run four races with them - secretly revealing which or your racers will run each race just before each race starts. The player with the highest accumulated point total at the end of the four races wins the game. 

This is one of my racers - the Dicemonger! about to win one of the races! I did not win either game... Amanda won one, Charlie won the other. 

The only real decision making is when you draft your racers and then when you decide which one to use in each race. Everything else is just rolling a d6 and moving your racer forward and applying any applicable rules. I guess there are some instances when you decide which opponent to affect with your special rule... but usually game theory would suggest there is a pretty obvious choice. 

Still, a fun little game. Would totally play again. I might even pick it up to have around for when people might want a game, but just want to play something light... or there are people that really aren't people who can wrap their heads around more complicated games. I think the game can play up to six... which would be just bonkers. 

And fun.

Then we played a game of Space Invaders the board game - a cooperative dexterity game!? 

Vera had found it for $5 (I think) at Krazy Binz Liquidation...? She'd brought it along because I'd been posting pictures of all the Space Invaders I'd seen on my vacation in Europe! 

Ugggghhh... three of my shots totally just centimetres short of damaging the UFO... 

In the last round, Amanda took SIX shots and COMPLETELY MISSED EVERYTHING!?

So... We lost... We scored 730 points and destroyed the UFO... but ultimately took too much damage from the invaders before we could finish off the last of them. 

Finally we played a round of Just Desserts - and Morgan joined us!! I thought it was going to end before I even got a turn when, on her first turn, Charlie filled orders for two customers of the same suit!? But then it went on and on... and EVERYONE (except me!) ended up with customers of four different suits (you need five different ones to win) and at least one or two pairs of the same suite (you need three of one suite to win)! Amanda finally won - and when she did we had exhausted the customer deck and there were only two left in the shop!? 

Thursday, 6 August 2026

Thursday I played my second league game in the Bridge City Blood Bowl League - against a guy who'd played in league I ran through the Wizard's Corner 35 years ago!? 

Blood Bowl League: Match #2 - Gnarly Gobbos versus Ctesiphon Crushers (Ogres)

Saturday, 8 August 2026

On the weekend, I ended up getting in my third league game against the third Ryan in the Stunty Division (ALL of the other players in the Stunty division are named Ryan!?) 

Blood Bowl League: Match #3 - Gnarly Gobbos versus The Warman Hobbit Tossers (Halflings)

Thursday, 20 August 2026

This evening I went over to Trevor's to try out Test of Honour (second edition). We played a four-player free-for-all. I'd not played the game before - or with any of these players before! Good times were had. Not going to run out and buy it, but I would totally play it again. You can read about the encounter here:

Test of Honour - First Game!

Monday, 24 August 2026

Last Monday I played my fourth Bridge City Blood Bowl League match against The Elm Street Slashers  - a Necromantic Horror team that is currently leading the league! It did not go well... You can read all about the game here:

Blood Bowl League: Match #4 - Gnarly Gobbos versus The Elm Street Slashers  (Necromantic Horror) 

And... that was about it!? Games were played... four of them even involved miniatures! Not a LOT... but not NOTHING!!

Not sure how things are going to go in September, as I start classes again on Wednesday - this term I am FULL TIME (Winter Term I was only part time, taking a single class!). Not going to lie, I'm a little freaked out by this prospect... If I'm not posting much over the next month... or... next FOUR months... that's probably why. 

I do have two Blood Bowl games scheduled for the league in September, so hopefully, at the very least, I'll get to play those! And I'd hoped to get playing Warhammer Quest again this fall... but I don't have the minis I need for the Nemesis campaign done... Maybe that's TOMORROW's task, before things get CrAzY on Wednesday! 

July Games

For anyone paying attention that noticed there was no June games post... that's because I didn't play any games in June... The first week of June was a made rush to get things ready for our European Vacation... and then the rest of the month was the European vacation... during which we did not play any games. At least during June! 

At the beginning of July we were still on out European trip. The first three days of July Amanda was at the conference in Paris (which was the "REAL" reason for the trip...).  On the fourth we loaded everything up and got on a train that took us to Carcassonne... 

 

Sunday, 5 July 2026

Playing Carcassonne... in Carcassonne... with the walls of Carcassonne in the background!? 

It was crazy hot while we were there. Sunday was only 35°C, but it wasn't too bad in the shade of the rooftop terrace of our AirB&B... which afforded a spectacular view of the walls of the medieval city of Carcassonne, for which the game is named. 

We had hauled our copy of Carcassonne with us on the European Adventure (well, just the base game...) 

In the tourist offices, they actually SELL copies of the game! And a lot of the expansions AND a tile you can apparently ONLY BUY IN CARCASSONNE!? (obviously we bought one...)

(note; I later found the tile on BoardGameGeek, and there was no mention of it being ONLY available in Carcassonne... Ah, well...)

Monday, 6 July 2026

The following evening, after another day of exploring the city, we played another game. This time Amanda won! 

Amanda had been a bit grouchy about losing the previous evening and had made a comment about wondering if she EVER won games and if I just won all the time... THIS is the reason I log games on BoardGameGeek! So I did look it up. I did look up the stats…

Over the last twelve years, we have played 52 games of Carcassonne.

I have 19 logged wins

Amanda has 16 logged wins

In one game we were tied for first!

In four of the games someone other than Amanda or I was logged as the winner (Finnegan or Morgan - which does not reflect on their ability or win rate, they’ve just played very few games!). 

In twelve games, I did not record the scores or who won. 

Initially when I started logging games on BoardGameGeek, I did so just to keep track of how many games we played... (hence twelve games where no scoring data recorded) but after hearing a lot of complaints of me "always winning games" - and did NOT feel like that was actually the case - I started to track the wins and scores). There are some games that I tend to win more. Usually ones requiring pattern recognition or geometry.. Amanda tends to win a lot of others - generally ones that require executive functioning skills and planning, worker placement, task management, short-term memory, etc...  

Tuesday, 7 July 2026

in the morning we walked all over downtown Carcassonne again and took in the festivities around the start of the fourth stage of the 2026 Tour de France... and then walked up into the fortified city again and by 5 pm we were EXHAUSTED... so we went back to the apartment and ended up playing Carcassonne SIX MORE TIMES!? 

Still in cheery dispositions...

Amanda started getting tired of losing...

At this point it was apparently five games to one...?

I'm fairly certain she won at least one other game... I'd have to go check BoardGameGeek again... the whole vacation was a bit of blur at this point!?

and one more made NINE games of Carcassonne played in Carcassonne (with the walls of Carcassonne in the background!?

(and just like that, Carcassone became our most played game of the year, so far... With ten plays, that is more than double the next more played game - Sagrada - at five! I mean, we still have five and a half months to go this year and plans to get playing Warhammer Quest again... so that could change!) 

In some of the pictures it almost looks like a mural or background that would drop in with zoom... but I assure you, we rented a place with a rooftop deck that overlooked a square with a church and the walls of Carcassonne behind it...  

After this it was onto a train the following morning to get back to Paris and then flying home to Canada the next! 

Check out the Art Blog to see some of the doodles I did while I was there: 

Sketches from Carcassonne

Friday, 17 July 2026

Friday morning I rolled out to the Warhammer Store to play a game of Blood Bowl with Vera! I'd hoped to get there before it got too hot (and hoped it would be quiet there - as it often is on weekdays... Alas, there was another group setting up a game of 40K when I arrived. It ended up being not TOO noisy and I got through the game without too much troubles! 

Vera brought the Halfling team she's been painting for RJ - who I was to play on Monday! It was a bit of a preview of what COULD happen, I guess, if RJ couldn't make a successful dice roll to save his life... It was... wow... the game ended with the Gnarly Gobbos winning 4-1 - the solitary goal the Halflings scored was a pretty epic ONE TURN TOUCHDOWN where EVERYTHING went right. If things had gone right for Vera all game, it could easily have been the complete reverse! 

Read all about the game here:

Blood Bowl - Another Pre-Season Exhibition Match - against Halflings!! 

Monday, 20 July 2026

Monday I played my first Blood Bowl League game. I was pretty anxious about this. I was playing against someone I never met before and... you never really know with these open leagues that anyone can just join... but it ended up being a super good time! The fellow I played against, Ryan (or RJ, as goes by in the league, because there are two other Ryans in the league of 16 people!?) was a super friendly and fun opponent! He looks kind of serious in the picture above, but it was 90% laughs and 10% "Wow... How do I unfuck THIS situation!?" 

It was definitely the fastest first half I've played yet! I don't think there was a single turn in that first half where either of our teams got to activate more than half of the team before some idiot self-downed themself or tripped over their own feet, fumbling the ball  and ending the turn!? 

It was absolutely EPIC in it's absurdity! Hilarious and ridiculous. These are the games I remember over the years; where just DUMB STUFF happens and we just can't stop laughing. This is the very best of Blood Bowl! I look forward to when we meet again on the fields of astrogranite (Where Leon Cankersore will have his REVENGE against those trees that wronged him so! I mean, there are splinters in there that will just NEVER come out!?) 

My MVP absoloutely SHOULD have been #16 S. Maulfart... who was thrown by a troll (and was NOT eaten), landed on his feet without shattering his knees, dodged through THREE tackle zones and rushed twice to score that ONE goal in the VERY LAST turn of the game... only using ONE re-roll (from his Dodge skill!) 

Instead the MVP went to Lil Bopper, the Goblin Pogoer, who, while not actually scoring any goals or beating anyone up, was probably responsible for the most forward movement of the ball during the game, having gained possession of it one multiple occasions and running it up the field before, ultimately, being brought down by those sneaky, nasty halflingses (or... as was often the case... his own HUBRIS!!)

For more pictures and some brief commentary...

Blood Bowl League: Match #1 - Gnarly Gobbos versus Los Sicarios (Halflings!)

Thursday, 30 July 2026

I have to admit... I'm not a huge fan of Uno... But I am a fan of Shepard Fairey... and after seeing his work at the Moco Museum and the Beyond the Streets Exhibition in Paris, so is Amanda! Soooo..... 

We ended up buying a copy of the Uno Artists Series featuring his art work... 

It arrived on Thursday... 

So we somehow managed to convince the kids to try it out!

Morgan dropped out after one round, when they found out that a proper game involves keeping score at the end of each round and playing until someone got to 500... We ended up playing over a DOZEN rounds before someone scored over 500... 

Will we EVER play is again...!? I don't know. 

I know a number of the people Finnegan plays D&D with love it. Finnegan despises the game... but put up with it to play with us... so maybe he'll play it with them sometime.. 

Amanda will probably suggest it. We have friends that would play it... I don't mind it so much when I'm looking at fun art on the cards...

Friday, 31 July 2026

I'd had my second league game scheduled for the last day of July - but then my opponent got unexpectedly called into work!! Hopefully we'll get to play some time in the next week! 

Forest Shuffle and Doom Diver Catapult

 I bought a board game today. I haven't bought a new game in a while. 

Amanda and I saw this game in a game store in Amsterdam and Amanda thought it looked interesting, but it was the dutch version and I figured I could look it up when we got home and pick up from our FLGS - Dragon's Den Games. 

I did look it up and saw it was on the BoardGameGeek top 200 games (currently 151 out of some 179,400 games ranked on the website!?) and it has a few expansions already. I'm not all that interested in expansions... but if a game HAS expansions, it suggests it was popular enough that the publisher decided to capitalize on that and MAKE MORE of it! 

So I picked up a copy from the Den... 

While I was out and about, I also rode out to the Warhammer Store...

...and picked up the Doom Diver Catapult!

I mostly picked it up to add a Doom Diver to the Gnarly Gobbos blood bowl team... I was looking for older metal Doom Divers on eBay and most of the individual ones were going to cost me $50+... for ONE Doom Diver... (and would arrived somewhere between mid-August and mid-September...). Then I noticed that Games Workshop has rereleased the old Warhammer Fantasy Goblin Doom Diver Catapult... IN METAL... with TWO Doom Divers... AND a catapult... for $65 and could be shipped to the local store in a couple of days... so I did that. 

Now I have a Doom Diver to assemble and paint before my next game! 

AND a spare one...

AND a catapult I could put together and use in my generic goblin army!? 

Is the addition of this Doom Diver going to revolutionize my team and make me win any games!? I severely doubt it... Is it going to be silly and fun to launch goblins about the table and watch them crash and cause chaos!? By all the gods of Chaos and Order, I sure hope so!! 

(I also picked up some Green Stuff... I don't LOVE this Army Painter "ribbon" bullshit... but they never seem to be able to get the much more economical Gale Force Nine product anymore... I may have to look into getting some elsewhere next time I'm running out... or... maybe start looking into it NOW... BEFORE I run out again and just dash over to the den to grab more of this...) 

May Games

In May... I played games...  

Wednesday, 6 May 2026

Vera was in town and suggested we try out the new version of Blood Bowl. She's been playing in a league. I've not played since the late 80s... (but I DID use one of the teams I still have from the 80s!). It was good fun! you can read about all of the ensuing shenanigans here:

Blood Bowl - Gnarly Green Guys versus Shitsberg Stealers

Friday, 8 May 2026

On Friday, Amanda invited some friends over to play Wingspan. It has been nearly two years since I've played Wingspan. Amanda played it a few times last summer with some other friends... but the last I played it was June of 2024! 

Thursday, 28 May 2028

Vera was in town, so we got together for another game of Blood Bowl. I'd been hoping to have the Tomb Kings done by the time she was in town again... alas... 

I ended up playing my Hammertown Tiger-Rats Skaven team against her Mi’ami Daggfins Dwarf team. 

On their very last turn of the game, the Tiger-Rats ran in a third goal winning the game! 

Friday, 29 May 2026

On the final Friday in May, Kurtis and Tania came over to play games. They suggested Castles of Mad King Ludwig, which they've been playing a lot of lately... I have not played it in over two years!? I do like it, it's a lot of fun... 

I came in second last, but I had fun making a castle, so... 

Amanda mentioned we hadn't played a lot of games lately, but we'd picked up Sagrada a while back. Kurtis said he'd never played but had always wanted to try, so we played a game of that as well.. 

I did even less well in Sagrada, coming in dead last... 

And that was it for May!! Not a lot... but more than the last few months! 

April Games

 I actually played GAMES in April! 

Well... not until the second half of April (after my projects and final exam were finished!)... and it wasn't a LOT of games... and there were no miniature games... or war-games... but there were still games!? So that's something! 

Saturday, 18 April 2026 

MORGAN actually suggested doing something Saturday evening - which was surprising in itself, as they usually want little to do with us! I can't remember the last time they played a game with us - let alone the last time THEY SUGGESTED playing a game!!

We played a pretty quick game of Carcassonne - with just the base game... Despite Amanda and I splitting a 50-point megalopolis, Morgan ended only a few points behind! I just snuck ahead of Amanda at the end of the game by ruthlessly cutting her out of the farming... 

After wards we played a few games of Retro Loonacy. I won the first game. Morgan suggested we play two more - best two out of three...? It's like they didn't even CONSIDER that Amanda could possibly have won a game... As it turned out Morgan won the second and I won the third. While Amanda very often DOMINATES at a lot of other board games... Loonacy is not one of them. 

Afterwards we all watched a couple episodes of Resident Alien! 

Friday, 24 April 2026

Initially we'd planned to have friends over on Friday to play Wingspan - which we have not played in ages.... Amanda had played it a couple times last year with some of her friends... but I have not played it since June of 2024!? (Despite that, I did finally pick up the latest Americas expansion for Amanda's birthday earlier this month! It is still one of our MOST PLAYED GAMES ever!) 

But there was a late-season snow storm on Friday (THE THIRD ONE in as many weeks!?) so that got cancelled... but since Amanda had slated that time in as "play board game time" I convinced her to give Sagrada a try... 

I picked up Sagrada a while back. It was on sale... I realized later it was probably on sale because there is a slightly newer version out now... but I think it MOSLTY plays the same...? Earlier in the week I'd watched a how to play video. 

While she was eating supper, I tried a couple of quick solo games - the solo play version is very quick and easy enough to play, but difficult to win! I totally didn't read how to determine the target score for the first game so wasn't even remotely close... 49/109

The second game I scored lower... but was closer to the target score... 44/73

After Amanda had finished supper and ran some of the pizza I made over to Morgan who was house-sitting for a friend a few blocks away and busy studying for their final exam for English the following morning... we sat down to try out a game. 

We got part was through the second round and realized Amanda had been doing placement all wrong... (Started in the wrong place... didn't place the next few panes adjacent to already placed panes...) So we called them "practice rounds" and started over again... 

So much fun was had utterly destroying me the first time, Amanda decided we needed to play a second game... which she also won... 

Amanda suggested we bring it on our little vacation together the following week... though I wasn't entirely sure WHEN she was hoping to play as the "vacation" was her going on a work conference and me tagging along for fun... and, looking at the itinerary, I'm pretty sure she was supposed to be doing stuff from 7am-8 to10pm, depending on the day. The spa that the conference was held at seemed an odd choice, considering the very full itinerary, I'm not sure when the participants were supposed to make use of the spa facilities... maybe they figured most of the participants would be men and they'd be  bringing their wives and the wives would want to make use of the spa facilities...? I wasn't entirely sure what **I** was supposed to do for the four days...!?

And again... that was it... 

Maybe next month I'll get out the toys and play with them! Seriously, it's gotten to the point where I'm thinking about solo games again! 

March Games

Well... February was a bit of a bust.. 

We were kind of slow to get things started in March, cancelling Warhammer Quest the first two weeks, and then moving it to Wednesdays in hopes that might work better.... but it didn't.  

Thursday, 12 March 2026

Vera (the human formerly known as Orion) had some extra time off so we met up to give Warcry a try. 

You can read about the game here:

Warcry - No Quarter! 

Saturday, 14 March 2026

On Saturday it was Amanda's turn to give Warcry a try! 

You can read about that one here:

Warcry - Cursed Relic 

Aaaaand that was it! Two games of Warcry... 

January Games

I played a few games this past month. Here is what I got up to... 

Saturday, 3 January 2026

For the first game of the year, Amanda and I played a game of Age of Sigmar - Spearhead format. I am less keen on Spearhead these days, but I had recently finished painting all the necessary units for the Nighthaunt Cursed Shacklehorde, so Amanda gathered her Sylvaneth Bitterbark Copse and gave battle. We played in Shyish using the Sand & Bone gaming pack and fought in Dolorum. I managed to squeak out a victory - in terms of victory points... but there was very little left of my force at the end of the game... while most of Amanda's army was still intact and on the field of battle... 

You can read more about the clash here:

Age of Sigmar: Spearhead -  Sylvaneth and Nighthaunt in Dolorum

It was confusing to Amanda to switch back to Spearhead, because so many things are just slightly different than regular Age of Sigmar, which she was just starting to get her head around... We should probably just stick to regular Age of Sigmar... If I finish up more of the Spearhead armies I own... we could just use them for really small games of Age of Sigmar. Or I just play Spearhead games against Orion or others... 

Sunday, 4 January 2026

Sunday we got in our first game of Soulbound this year - carrying on with our What We Do in the Realm of Shadows campaign - where our undead "heroes" were still trapped in the Gaunt Summoner of Tzeentch's Silver Tower! 

Saturday, 10 January 2026

On Saturday, Amanda and I walked over to our friends', Shannon and Kevin's, and played a game called Kingsburg - which I have never played before. 

In it you are a noble house and trying to gain influence at court to gain resources and build infrastructure and raise troops... 

The troops are to fight off invading forces that come every winter. Some of the infrastructure you build helps with that as well... but ultimately the game is decided by victory points. Some of which are from infulence gained or buildings and infrastructure built. There are annual awards for who has the most infrastructure built and who beat the enemy the most... 

I kind of felt like I was flailing and had no idea what I was doing most of the time... but somehow did rather well... I think a lot of it came down to the influence roll (3d6) and how you used your dice. I had incredibly average dice rolls. Amanda had more than a few turns with utter crap rolls... otherwise I think she would have done much better...? 

Tuesday, 13 January 2026

Tuesday we were back to playing Warhammer Quest after a bit of a break. Still trying to finish up the Cursed City - Night Wars campaign - this was the last of the Pillage Journeys! Next the heroes would face Kritza the Rat Prince in a Decapitaton Journey, and then, if that was successful... face all three of the Vampires again in a final boss battle!? 

Finnegan and I were both very, VERY tired and had pretty low energy and enthusiasm for this game... I had kind of considered postponing it... but then it would have taken even LONGER to finish off the campaign and I kind of just wanted it wrapped up... so we played on! 

Warhammer Quest: Cursed City - Night Wars 13 - Pillage Journey

Tuesday, 27 January 2026

After ANOTHER break (and cancelling a few other games!), we were back to playing Warhammer Quest. Getting SO CLOSE to finishing the Cursed City - Night Wars campaign! This evening the Heroes faced down Kritza the Rat Prince! 

It was a two-part scenario... first they had to defend Haven against assaults by Kritza's minions... 

Then they had to go hunt down Kritza, himself, in his palatial estate! 

Warhammer Quest: Cursed City - Night Wars 14 - Desperate Frenzy Decapitation Journey

There is only one more Journey to play to finish up Warhammer Quest: Cursed City - Night Wars... but that will have to wait until February - and then it's on to Warhammer Quest: Darkwater!! (If I can get the miniatures finished!!) 

Kind of a slower month... at least compared to DECEMBER!!