FreezerBurn 2019

I think this is FreezerBurn IX...?

FreezerBurn is an annual, invitational game day hosted by my friend John - the founder and one of the organizers of ToonCon. There are spots for 12 players who all play the same games throughout the day - scores, or, rather, positions are kept track of and overall standings reconrded. Everyone brings a game to put into the prize pile and the person in first place, at the end of the day, gets to pick first - so everyone goes home with a prize.

I went to the inaugural event, eight years ago. I meant to go to the one in 2015... but ended up in hospital instead. I did make it to the one in 2017. The others... I don't make it to for various reasons - more often that not, though, because John insists on sending the invitation email to an email address that I haven't used for over five years and I find out too late!?

This year's line-up looked a lot like FreezerBurn I - with Small World, Railways of the World and Power Grid all being played in both.

This year's game day didn't start as early as I remember previous ones... We all gathered at John & Brenda's place around 9:30 and started off with Small World.



Bacchus - one of the denizens of Chez J&B.


SMALL WORLD



The first game I played in the morning was Small World, with (from left to right) Rob, Shane, Steve and Brenda. Brenda started off the game with Heroic Amazons and later took Pillaging Wizards. Rob took the Dragon Master Ghouls, Shane took Underworld Elves, and Steve took Bivouacking Skeletons. Rob was the first to put his race into decline (because, that's what you do with Ghouls - they can continue to expand and redeploy even in decline), his second race was the Spirit Giants - which was a great combo with the ghouls as, when they went into decline they didn't count as being "in decline" and thus he was able to have THREE races on the board at the same time (usually when you can only have one "in decline" if you start a third and still have vestiges of your first race, they are removed from the map). Shane started off with Underworld Elves and later took Wealthy Orcs. Steve Had Bivouacking Skeletons and later took Flying Ratment. .

I started off with Alchemist trolls. My trolls plodded slowly across the map taking up residence in as many mountains as I could because with their defensive Troll lairs it makes them very had to shift out - even when they're in decline. I eventually took five mountain areas and three not-so mountain areas. No one even bothered to try and shift them from their locations and I collected points for them throughout the game. The second race I took were fortified Dwarves. Which got bonus points for being on mines (dwarves) and for each castle they built (fortified). By the end of the game I only managed to expand them into four areas, but two of those areas were Mines and three had castles. So by the last turn I was bringing in 17 victory points. Not to mention I picked up three just for taking the fortified Dwarves, because no one else had wanted them and had been leaving victory point/coins on them in the market to skip over them.



I ended the game with 91 points - which won me the game. The rest were in the 70s and 60s..


7 WONDERS



While we were waiting for lunch to arrive a few of us busted out 7 Wonders for a quick game. This was not a part of the games that were counted in the standings. I had The Pyramids of Giza, Brent had Babylon, Darrin had Ephesos, Kevin had Alexandria, Steve had Olympia, and Dan had Halicarnassus. Dan won with 67 points, I was dead last with only 40... Throughout the game I was forever plagues with being handed hands with three or four gcards that would be really useful for me (which I could take only one of...) and then hand after hand of stuff that was of little use to me - or very expansive to put into play. Ah well - it was still lots of fun.


RAILWAYS OF THE WORLD



After lunch we played Railways of the World. I was Cornelius Vanderbilt - my secret objective was top build from New York to Chicago - never even got close to either city!? My other option had been the first to have a level 6 train - which never happens, so I didn't bother with that one. I wasn't the first to have a level six train - but I wasn't far behind - maybe I should have kept that one!? I ended up starting down near New Orleans - there had been a Service Bounty for a city down near there which I was able to do early on - which offset the early shares I had to take to get up and running. Eventually I built the New Orleans to Minneapolis major line - and just as I finished it, there was a service bounty for Duluth - and no one was even close so I extended my line up to there and snagged that one too. I actually did one six point delivery along that line (from Duluth to New Orleans) - most were 3/4 point delivery - though there were a few 6 point delivery to Chicago, which I had to share a couple points with Steve for each because I had to use his lines to get in there...



Kevin (black) mostly built around the south east along the sea. Steve (purple) built a few things around Chicago. Rob (yellow) was building right in the middle of the map - mostly south east of Chicago and west of the mountains. Dan (green) totally dominated the Northeast - and so he won... NEVER let anyone be the lone builder in the Northeast...

PRINCES OF THE RENAISSANCE 



Princes of the Renaissance is a  fun game by Martin Wallace which I had never played before. It's played over three Decade/Turns. unfortunately it took me the entire first decade to figure out the economy and mechanics of the game and by that point all of the good military stuff had been snapped up and hoarded by a few of the players and they dominated any military confrontation for the rest of the game - which can vastly change how many victory points you get at the end of the game... Super fun, though, I'd really like to try it again now that I have an inkling of what you're actually supposed to do.



Despite having no clue in the first decade, and feeling like I was floundering in the next two. I did quite well - one point off of first place.... One of the biggest sources of victory points were from city tiles - you got victory points per tile based on the prominence of their related city at the end of the game - though my cities had been driven down in prominence (due to loosing a lot of military conflicts) I still did well because I'd actually bothered to collect city tiles - I had six (the maximum you can have - and I think the most anyone else had was four...?

John had the standings posted on his widescreen TV all day.



At the end of round three I was actually in first place.... and then we played Power Grid...


POWER GRID DELUXE



I ended up playing Power Grid Deluxe - the other table was playing the original Power Grid. Power Grid deluxe is actually the one I own - and have played twice in the last week, although the last two plays were on the North American side and this evening we played on the European side.



The game was pretty fast and furious - it ended before we even got into the third step!? I ended the game only being able to power 10 cities. I had really hoped that 36 - or ANY 5 or 6 city generator would drop down into the available market for me to pick up in the last round we played... but it all ended up being 2 and 3 city generators (which were utterly useless to me). My network had expanded to 12 cities, and I had a pile of cash that I could have expanded to a few more and/or bought any larger generator that became available and at least tied for last with 12-13 cities... alas... Still, lots of fun. I just like playing this game.


FINAL RESULTS



That total flop in Power Grid dropped me down to 4th...



These were the games that were brought for prizes. They're supposed to be new or "near new". A few people bought new games, others brought games they had that they weren't going to play anymore. I brought the Neanderthal - which I never even got to play, but ended up crowdfunding the new edition along with the new edition of Greenland, so... didn't really need it. I ended up going home with Sidereal Confluence, which looks pretty interesting. It was a game of Brent's - he figured since John also had it he didn't really need to own a copy any more as if he was ever playing it, it'd either be at john's or with whoever took his copy home. The same thing happened at FreezerBurn 2017 - I took home Brent's copy of Nautilus - I've played it twice since then - both times with Brent!

All in all - a totally fun day of gaming - and I got rid of a game I didn't need (hopefully Rob who took it home gets to play it and loves it as much as I love Phil Eklund games!) - and brought home a new game that I would probably never though to buy, but looks pretty interesting just the same. Finnegan had a good look at it when I got home and seems pretty interested in it.


Coming Soon to Tim's Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Aa update on the Wargaming Birthday Bash/Winter Wargaming Weekend (there have been some changes...).

I'm hoping to update a few of my miniatures Galleries - as they are all hopelessly out of date. Some I just need to copy pictures in from painting update posts. Others I want to take new pictures for.

By the end of the week there will be a post about all the gaming we got up to in January and an update on the progress of our assorted Gaming Challenges I laid out in Game Plan 2019 (Spoiler: We're doing pretty good so far!)

There might even be a game report of some 40K or Kill Team action in the not-so-distant future, and the next painting update will probably be the Reaver Titan I've been working away at...

September Game-A-Day Challenge: Week One

...or was it the September 30-Games-in-30-Days Challenge? I can't remember... The idea is the same, we're trying to play a different game every day through the month of September, and we've just finished up our first week. 

Day One - Friday, 1 September 2017
Legendary and Tales from the Loop



In the afternoon I played a game of Legendary with the kids. I'd wanted to play a "quick" game so I'd have time to reread some of Tales from the Loop. Finnegan went and chose Mysterio as the Big Bad Guy (Mysterio is NOT a quick game...). He did come up with a good selection of Heroes, however, which worked together really nice - Spiderman, some Spiderfriends, Black Widow and... someone from the Deadpool Expansion? It actually felt like I was able to BUILD a deck that worked well. 

The Girl had a really good deck going on with a lot of Black Widow. She ended up with two cards that allowed her to do damage equal to the number of innocent bystanders she rescued, so we let her recuse ALL of them. I think she had ten by the end of the game, and on the last turn drew BOTH of those cards! 

It was a fun game - even if it did take a little longer than I would have liked! 

Later in the evening I did start a game of Tales from the Loop - but we spent the entire three and a half hours making characters. I think it was the funnest session of making characters EVER! I'm actually glad we didn't get to playing the first adventure - partly because I didn't really have a chance to read through it and think it over, but also because the characters have so much depth I can try and weave elements of their own backgrounds into the adventure a bit better! Looking forward to actually PLAYING Tales from the Loop, but that probably won't be until October now...

Day Two - Saturday, 2 September 2017 

Forbidden Island

I'd hoped to run the family through a game of Pax Renaissance in the afternoon, but in the end Amanda dragged me all over the north end of town to look at tiles of backsplashes and dishwashers and sinks and taps and such... in the end we only had time for a quick game before watching a few movies I'd picked up at the library earlier in the day. 

So we all played Forbidden Island. I played the Engineer (can shore up two tiles with one action), The Girl played the Helicopter Pilot (with one action can move to any tile on the map), Amanda played the Navigator (can move other players two spaces with one action), and Finnegan played the explorer (can move or shore up on diagonals). Finnegan quickly picked up the golden lion. Keira grabbed the flame ruby thing. Amanda grabbed the bluish-green chalice. I nabbed the purple globe... and then the helicopter landing pad flooded and we lost... 

so close...

Ah well. It was going really great until then. Afterwards Finnegan pointed out that if I'd shored up the helicopter pad BEFORE moving to the place where I got the globe-thingie (because I had started next to the pad), we totally would have made it out... So... it's ALL MY FAULT we lost... 

Day Three - Sunday, 3 September 2017

A Study in Emerald (Second Edition) 

Again, I had planned to run the family through Pax Renaissance, but we kind of ran out of time. I suggested A Study in Emerald, because the last time we'd played we were getting games down to 30 minutes. This wasn't QUITE so quick because Amanda had kind of forgotten how to play and what you were supposed to be doing... 

The Girl looks a little grumpy because, as we found out at the end of the game, she was a Loyalist . AGAIN. She HATES playing the Loyalists 

(as in loyal to the dark gods that have seized control of the world!)but almost always seems to end up being on the Loyalist side ! 

Amanda gave up her identity pretty early by assassinating one of my agents. I'm pretty sure it was obvious from the get-go I was a Restorationist as I grabbed three restorationist agents in the first few turns, along with St. Petersburg (which can be played for Restorationist VP).

I ended up playing 8 Restorationist VP - and the Loyalist hadn't played one all game - which is pretty much what brought the game to an end. I don't think The Girl was trying very hard, though. 

The sh!t about to get real in Madrid! (Well, not really... I just went there in force to snatch up that City card and make sure Amanda couldn't assassinate any of my agents!)

Finnegan, it turned out, was also a restorationist (which I had suspected, but didn't know for sure).

Day Four - Monday, 4 September 2017 

7 Wonders

Monday was Labour Day. Amanda seems to be under the impression that on Labour Day one must do hard labour and decided WE MUST WRECK MORE OF THE KITCHEN!! So... still no Pax Renaissance... 

Instead we got in a quick game of 7 Wonders at the very end of the day. I got skooled by the lot of them. Oi! I just could not focus on any one sort of thing and didn't do well at anything. I think I was trying too hard to make things work with the Leaders I had, and should have just not bothered... Amanda did amazingly well, and the kids weren't too far behind her. It was a fun distraction from the utter chaos our house is in at the moment. 

Day Five - Tuesday, 5 September 2017 

Small World: Underground

The kids and I played Small World: Underground. 

I started the game with Vampire Mummies - mostly because they sounded cool... They weren't THAT cool. I only got to use the vampiric ability once during the game (there was a second time that I could have used it, but forgot...). You do get a LOT of guys with the Mummies - but it cost an extra token to take over stuff... So they're a bit ponderous, but often leave your places well defended. In the first turn I got two popular places - one that controlled a Balrog and another than gave bonus points for each of the same type of location (which happened to be mushroom forests). I think by the end of the third turn I controlled ALL of the mushroom forest areas on the map and was bringing in 13 gold per turn, which the kids weren't even close to doing. So I was willing to just sit on that and collect my 13 every turn...

Then Finnegan went into decline with his first race and took Fisher Shrooms and we started battling for control of the mushroom forests - which, ultimately, doomed us! A turn later The Girl was brining in 17 (SEVENTEEN!) gold per turn and we were both brining in six or so... I eventually took back control of the mushroom forests, but the damage had been done.

Then I lost control of Balrog. 

I put the mummies into decline and took some Wise Cultists and seized control of the area that controlled the Balrog, but wasn't able to do much of use with it at that point.

The Girl ended the game with 132 gold, I had 115, and Finnegan had somewhere around 85?


Day Six - Wednesday, 6 September 2017 

Star Trek: Five Year Mission

Wednesday we played Star Trek: Five Year Mission. We actually played with the Next Generation crew this time, which we've never done before. I played Captain Jean-Luc Picard, Finnegan played Commander Riker and The Girl played Dr. Beverly Crusher. 

It's been a LONG time since we last played so I don't know if they were any different from the original series crew. We played at the easiest level - also because it's been so damned long - and we actually won! Wasn't even that hard - definitely have to play at the Lieutentant level next time. I would have suggested that we continue on, but we had the Communication Failure card in effect (players are not allowed to communicate with each other in any way!?) and still needed ones on two red and one yellow to resolve it, so... I kind of let it go and called it a win and a night... 

I feel I'd like a different Star Trek game... This is okay, but a little abstract. I don't LOVE dice games and we already have Elder sign if I feel the need to just roll dice. We do have Star Trek Catan - which we'd actually bought for my dad for xmas a few years back, but he's since passed it on to us. I only played it once (it's also the only Catan game I ever played) and I just don't care for it. Star Trek: Ascendancy looks COOL but it's also a bit pricey and it looks like another 4X game... do I NEED ANOTHER 4X game!? Actually I don't personally own that many - but within the members of this group, there are LOADS...

Star Trek Panic? Maybe? Anybody out there played it? I've never played any of the Panic games. Has anyone played Star Trek Panic? fun? does it fit the theme? Are there any other Star Trek games out there!?

Day Seven- Thursday, 7 September 2017 

Dominion

Today we decided to play Dominion. I decided to let Finnegan come up with a group of cards for us to play with.

He does enjoy putting little themed sets together. So he came up with a set of cards from Intrigue (Mining Village, Bridge, Scout, Trading Post, and Margrave) , Hinterlands (Oasis, Silk Road, and Nomad Camp), and Guilds and Cornucopia (Hamlet, Horsetraders). The theme for this one was "Trade Beyond the Borders". The Thematic sets he comes up with  have more to do with the THEME of the cards rather than whether any of them will actually work together or not... We don't play nearly enough to have any clue what works together... 

These weren't too bad. There were some that we've played with before and I kind of had an idea how to play with them. Others we had never played with (or I've forgotten about playing with them) and had no idea what to do with them - just couldn't wrap my head around some of them. 

So we got off to a slow start and I felt like I just couldn't get the deck working and then all of a sudden the Hamlets were gone and then the Duchies were gone and just started buying up whatever victory point card I could - I think there must have been at least a half dozen turns where I had a bridge and 6 gold - one short of being able to buy a province, but I WAS able to buy a Silk Road AND an Estate... meanwhile the kids were still adding actions to their decks!? I tired warning them that the game was just about over and they should just try and pick up whatever victory cards they could - Estates and Silk roads if they couldn't afford Provinces, but they kind of turned their noses up at those... 

I think I had one of my highest scoring game ever and left both kids in the dust - doesn't happen often, they usually destroy me at Dominion. It's been a while and they weren't on their game, but I'll take it!

Coming Soon to Tim's Miniature Wargaming Blog:

I do have a Jet Bike finished up that I shall hopefully get to posting tomorrow... 

Other than that...? I have been working on rebasing and priming most of the Tallarn and I've even been painting a few. 

February 2017 Boardgames Roundup

At the beginning of the year I decided to make a list of 50 games I’d like to make sure I played this year – about one per week. I tried to encourage the kids to do the same – so we’d ALL get to play at least 50 games we wanted to. I’ve even encouraged Amanda to pick at least one game each month – she enjoys playing with us, but couldn’t really be bothered to pick out a game each week (that would also mean finding time for FOUR boardgames each week…).

Last month I posted a January Boardgame Round up. For a full list of the 50 games for this year, check out the Game Plan 2017.

This Month’s Picks

The Girl picked:

Space Junk

Linkage

Agricola

Smash Up

Finnegan picked: 

Small World

A Study in Emerald (Second Edition)

Arkham Horror

Firefly

My picks:

A Game of Thrones

Railways of Mexico

Pax Porfiniana (or Pax Pamir)

Illuminati (which I haven’t played in YEARS – probably even a decade! or MORE!).

Amanda Picked:

Nations

(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)

We kicked off this month’s picks with a game of Smash Up with our firend Bruce. (one of The Girl’s picks). I can’t remember how it went down. I think I had kitties and ponies…. This was fun enough when I first got it, but I have to admit, I've grown rather tired of it. 

I also ended up playing Bananagrams with The Girl later in the evening. Not anyone’s pick… just another game we found time to play…

Saturday (4 February 2017) Finnegan and I had planned to play A Study in Emerald (Second Edition) in the afternoon with some friends, but then no one was able to show up. So we ended up playing it in the evening when The Girl got back from dance classes and Amanda was out… or.. busy…?

This game is funner with five players - and everyone is having to guess who is on which side - and you know that at least ONE other person is on your side! 

Sunday (5 February 2017) we got in a game of Linkage - another of The Girl’s picks.

Tuesday Evening while the Girls were out at Karate, Finnegan and I tried out a game of Faustus Furius - I have a whole separate post about that game: Faustus Furius MMLIII

On Wednesday, 8 February 2017, the kids and I played a game of Railways of Mexico. I had not played on the Mexico map before. I thought it might be a bit daunting – all those MOUNTAINS! I’d heard from a friend that played and people had wracked up so much debt trying to drive rail lines through those mountains that they ended up taking bonds just to service their debt! I also thought it might be a longer game. It turned out to be neither a long game of a bank breaking game. I thought it was really fun and relatively quick. The map is smaller than the Railways of the Eastern U.S. and the cities aren’t terribly far apart. There were lots of quick little coastal lines that could be built.

We actually ended up with a continuous rail line that went right around the country in a bit circle.

Friday, 10 February was our biweekly D&D night. Not really a board game, but it’s gaming… and it ends up on  my BGG Games Played Calendar, so… I though I’d mention it.

Saturday, 11 February, Bruce, Adele, and Jasper joined me and Finnegan for a game of  Firefly.

We actually finally finished a 5-player game in an afternoon – that wasn’t the “First Time in the Captain’s Chair” scenario. Of course we tried out the accelerated version (where you START the game with a bunch of crew and equipement). This time we played “King of All Londinium”. I think Bruce or Adele won. They’re, like, PROs at this game now.

I wasn’t even close. I don’t think I even had my first goal token! But I still had a lot of fun playing. I could just faff around all day doing jobs, hiring crew, buying new equipment, and such. It’s sometimes hard to stay focused on the fact that there is a GOAL to the game.

Finnegan plays D&D every other Tuesday at King Me Boardgamery. Also not really a boardgame… nor one I have anything to do with (other than walk over there and meet him to walk home – because they finish up quite late)…

Wednesday, 15 February the kids and I played Small World. We haven’t played much Small World lately – Okay I played it at FreezerBurn in January… but before that…? and I can’t remember playing on the 3-player board – I’m sure I have – probably when I first got it I played it once or twoice with just the kids – but usually we end up playing with 4-5 players.

18-20 February was the Family Day long weekend in Saskatchewan this year. So I planed a weekend of family gaming fun!

We actually kicked things off on Friday with a game of Mutants and Death Ray Guns with my friend Aaron and his boys – because his boys had the afternoon off school. You can see the full game report of the ensuing shenanigans here:

Mutants and Death Ray Guns

Saturday afternoon we played A Game of Thrones: The Board Game (Second Edition). We played this almost exactly a year ago, either on the family say weekend or my birthday. This year Jasper and Kurits joined us. I ended up playing the Starks again. Amanda was the Greyjoys, Kurtis the Lanisters, The Girl played Dorn, Jasper the Tyrells, and Finnegan played Baratheon. It was okay. Jasper had to leave about two turns before the end. WE probably should have called it then, but I was winning at that point so I felt like calling it would have seemed like I was doing so because I was in the lead... No one else suggested it so we played on..

It’s kind of an odd game.  The Greyjoys basically have NO chance at winning ever – sandwiched between Stark and Lannister. The best they can do is harass and annoy and make it hard for one (or BOTH) to get anywhere, which, really, is all they want according to the books? They want their own kingdom and they want to reave the shores of Westeros. What care do they have for collecting castles – let along 7 or 8 of them – which is what you need to win the game!? Seems like maybe there should be separate victory conditions for the other houses.

That’s pretty much all Amanda did all game with the Greyjoys – alternately attacked the Lanisters and Starks and got nowhere in return. I tired to make an alliance with her, but so did Kurtis (the Lanisters). I tried to point out that there was NO POINT in attacking me – as there were not enough castles in all the north for her to take over and win the game – her only hope was to go SOUTH and attack the Lanisters – which I was perfectly willing to help her do!

Instead she just remained a thorn in both of our sides the whole damned game… I couldn’t get past the Neck.

It didn’t help that they event cards just didn’t work out – there were hardly any supply cards - where supply was worked out – so most of the game I was stuck with my initial starting supply – which meant – even though I had captured enough areas with barrels (supply areas) that if supply had been worked out I would have been able to field more armies I was stuck being unable to concentrate my forces into more that two armies – which meant I had to spread any forces I gained out and was unable to make focused attacks. There were even a few muster cards where everyone else got new troops, but I couldn’t simply because the army/supply limits meant I could not put new guys in the castles where they mustered because there was already a unit there and a second unit makes an “army” and I already had my limit (of TWO!?) armies elsewhere!? So frustrating. SOOOOOO frustrating.

(there may have been a few f-bombs dropped during the game...) 

Sunday afternoon just the four of us played a game of Agricola.

This was my sad little farm at the end.

Amanda was very pleased with hers – probably the most diversified farm she’s ever built. Look at all though ploughed fields!? How did she find the time to do that!? (Oh, maybe she had a card that allowed her to plough three with one action...?) 

And she won with it.

I think it’s an odd game too. It’s way easier to raise animals – I actually find it really hard to get more than a couple of areas ploughed and sowed with grains or vegetables. It’s because there is ONE spot to plough a field to start with – which ploughs one little section – but when you do the build fences action you can essentially cover half (or more!) of your land with fenced in pastures?! Or in one build sheds action you can build up to four sheds – occupying four areas – provided, in both cases, that you have sufficient wood. I mean, I like the game… I just wish there was more opportunity to plough fields and sow them!

Sunday evening we played Space Junk

Finnegan played a ship/captain that was SUPER slow, but collected a LOT of junk – it looked like he was super far behind all game because he wasn’t scoring points for laps or for blasting away at other ships ( I had “lapped” him on the score track at one point – one hundred points ahead of him!), but when we counted up points for junk collected he shot past all of us.

Both of Sundays game had bee The Girl’s picks.

Monday (Family Day – a stat holiday in Seakatchewan), Kurtis joined us again for a game of Nations. I played China again. I am determined to win with them at some point – there has got to be a way (totally didn’t THIS time around)! Amanda played Japan – which was really interesting (I’d like to try playing that sometime). I think it came from the expansion that Kurtis brought along. Kurtis and I played at Prince level, Amanda and the kids played at Chieftan (They got more resources during growth).

Later Kurtis’ wife Shannon joined us for supper (I made a GIANT vat of veggie chili) and then we played a few games they brought over.

First we played Dicetown, which was pretty fun.

The Kurtis, Shannon, Amanda and I played Castles of Mad King Ludwig. This was really fun – It tapped into that part of my brain where pre-teen Tim still resides designing and planning “dream homes” that are a bizarre cross between D&D dungeons, a mad scientists lair, a nuclear fallout shelter and homes of the rich and the shameless. I must play this again sometime.

This was my little castle.

I’ve been trying to cut back on the game-buying and maybe even try to pare down the collection a bit, but I might consider getting this game at some point. It is officially one the boardgame wish list.

The following week was a school break so some of the kids friends came over to visit. Games were played. I didn’t play with them so I didn’t really keep track of them, but I took pictures of a couple.

Munchkin Legends

Smash Up

Friday was another D&D night for me and Amanda. 

Saturday, 25 February, was my Birthday. For the past dozen years I’ve hosted an annual Wargaming Birthday Bash – which usually involved MINIATURE wargames, and sometimes were entire weekend affairs – like last year’s Quest for the Skull Sword Frostgrave campaign, or the Ronin Campaign (and other games) two years before that, or the Dark Age DBA Campaign. Other years it’s been a bit more low key and just involved one evening’s game – like Top Malo House in 2013, or the Raid on Tantoone Station and Warrior Knights in 2011, or a Mega HOTT game in 2009, or the Fear and Faith Zombie game I played with the kids in 2015…

This year with all the Vimy stuff going on, I didn’t think I really had time to plan and host any sort of bigger event so I invited people to come over and play one of the Pax games by Phil Eklund in the afternoon and some old school Illuminati in the evening (which I probably haven’t played in 15 years!).

Brent showed up to play Pax Pamir with me and Finnegan in the afternoon. I tried playing this once with the kids about a year ago. I have since played Pax Porfiriana a few times, but hadn’t had another stab at Pax Pamir.

I love this game. I need to play this MORE! We ended up playing two games Saturday afternoon. The first game was sort of a "learning game" (well... the second was kind of a "learning game" too, as we continued to figure it all out...). After about four rounds a "topple" card came out and I happened to fit the victory conditions so I kind of won...

In the second game. we paid a bit closer attention to what everyone else was doing - there are so many ways to win, but the whole game can change in the play of a card - sometimes your OWN card, if you're not paying close enough attention - which can totally mess up any sort of plan you had... I think you kind of need to work at a couple of options simultaneously and hope to take advantage of any sudden changes of the political winds...

I'd REALLY like to try tout with 4-5 players. Both games we happened to each be allied with a different empire (British, Russian, or Afghan) which meant that favour didn't really play into it all that much - as if one of those empires gained supremacy, whoever was aligned with it would win. It would be interesting to see a game where more that one player was aligned with of or more of the empires and they had to co-operate to get their empire into ascendancy, yet at the same time try to curry more favour with that empire than the others for the win when their empire gains supremacy.

There were no takers for Illuminati, so after Amanda and The Girl got back from Dance classes we played a quick game of Race for the Galaxy, had supper and then watched a couple of movies (while I did some painting). 

My game was all over.. I started thinking I’d go for Genes stuff… but then other opportunities came up and I kind of went for novelties in the end…

And that was pretty much if for gaming this month… We didn't end up getting to play two of the games we'd initially picked to play this month (Arkham Horror - which Finnegan had picked - and Illuminati - which I had picked) but we got to play some other games, so... 

I think we’ll probably lay off the gaming a bit through March a bit to give me chance to concentrate on the Vimy terrain building – which I really need to get cracking on!!!

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Great War Canadians!