What can I say – I’ve decided to shut the site down.

The reason?  Well, life.  LordVonTush, my main gaming opponent and best bud for 2 decades got engaged to a fine woman and moved nearly an hour away, and this obviously means that our weekly gaming sessions have come to an end.  And seeing as how the local gaming store isn’t exactly a place where I wish to spend extended amounts of time, I have basically stopped playing games cold turkey…

Simply put – a man who doesn’t play games anymore has no business maintaining a gaming blog.

It was fun running the place for the past decade, but all things must eventually end, and that time is now for drunkdwarves.com.

I want to thank all the dedicated fans out there, especially the awesome folks who contributed content through the years.

Happy Gaming – for the final time

-

DEACON

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Howdy to all! It has been almost two weeks since I’ve been able to get some solid gaming in and boy did it feel good when I was finally able to. Over the past few days Don and I managed to play a few turns of Stronghold from Valley Games and myself, I picked up Conquest of Planet Earth from Flying Frog Games for some solitaire play.

Stronghold is a two player siege game with one side taking the part of Goblin, Orc and Troll attackers and the other side plays as the humans who have to muster up their defenses to hold the attack at bay for as long as possible. Defenders gain Glory Points (the measure of victory) by preventing the Invader from breaching a wall segment for as long as possible while the Invaders start with a bunch of Glory Points but slowly lose them to the Defender over time.

The game is a resource management game where every turn you often find yourself with more that you want to do than possible, especially from the Invaders perspective. There really is a lot of detail that I could go into but since I hate readed very detailed rules recaps I’ll only assume you hate them as well and just point out that the full rules are available online elsewhere.

Don and I managed to start a game on Friday night just to learn the basics of the game and to get a general feeling. We got about half way through but then time ran out for the evening and we had to call it a night. Plus since we were pretty much muddling around poking the system to see what it could do the game was already out of whack. Since resources are so tight a lot of our early turns were wasteful since working the various bits into an overall strategy was elusive.

After those first few turns I was really surprised from the reason from both Don and myself. Some weeks back I pointed this game to Don thinking it would be right up his alley but I myself was weary of it because I tend to not do that well on tight budgeting games. And for a few weeks Don and I scheduled and canceled gaming sessions with such regularity that it became kind of a running joke that we’d never play Stronghold. And before we played I would have bet the farm that Don would have loved it and I would have been luke-warm at best. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

I ended up really enjoying the game from the Defender’s side. Everything was clicking and flowing fairly well and the game wasn’t a number-crunching as I thought it would be. Don on the other hand stated that the game was on very thin ice. The Invader’s side is a little bit trickier to get into because there’s a lot of nobs and leavers that can be pulled by him to put together an overall battle plan. So many of his assaults ended up in failure. And the one thing I never would have guessed was the level of frustration he felt towards the game. Which actually turned out to be a good thing.

Since he was frustrated it tickled his stubborn side and by the next morning he was already talking about scheduling the next game, where just eight hours ago I thought I’d be buying his copy from him. And that second game came about last night. This time he was able to put together a better offensive attack and eventually did breach the wall. A major thing that happened for me last night though was now that I’ve seen how a coordinated attack can unfold in this game I realized that as the defender the defenses I put up can’t just be in reaction to what he does as the Invader, but also to try to steer him towards the wall sections I’d rather have him attack instead of the ones that he wants to attack.

Now I’m craving the next game because I know I’ll need to step my game up to try to do a repeat performance last night with the game ending in a win for the Defenders (and it was just a narrow victory for me because of me winning the tie-breaker).

As many of you readers know I’m a fan of solitaire games. There’s an aspect I enjoy of pushing physical components around that I enjoy greatly compared to just pushing buttons on a controller. So it was really no surprise when I walked out of my local game store with Conquest of Planet Earth under my arm. Released about a year back the game takes place during the 50′s and players take the roll of aliens invading Earth with the goal of accumulating Terror Points which are rewarded when you conquer a location.

The production on the game is top-notch and the game overall is fairly simple and straight forward. It supports between 1-4 players and plays in about 90 mins. There’s  a lot of dice rolling and randomness does play a large factor in the outcome, but overall I’ve been having a blast with the game even though I’m 0-2. To me the game really feels like the games I grew up with that had simple rules and of dice to chuck around but instead of bogging down in the trappings of the 80′s and 90′s with overwrought designs, this game has used modern day abstraction techniques to make things simple, playable and very enjoyable while still keeping the game thematic.

There is a competitive version of the game as well as a cooperative version (which is what the solo rules are based off of). The cooperative adds some more detail above the competitive game and truthfully I’m not sure if I find myself that drawn towards the cooperative version for multi-player, but the competitive version sounds like a hoot and I can’t wait to get that version to the table next time I have three our four for game night.

~’Til Next Time
~Happy Gaming
~Dan

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Last night was a great night for gaming at my household! Dave and I started off the night with Star Wars: The Queen’s Gambit which is one of my personal favorites which doesn’t get played nearly often enough. As that was wrapping up Don arrives so we played his new copy of Lost Cities: The Board Game which added some great improvements over the original. After the explorers were shut down for the night we pulled out a rare Games Workshop game The Bugman’s Game which for me is a rising star in my collection. Then as the night drew long we wrapped up with DungeonQuest.

Star Wars: The Queen’s Gambit is a two player game that simulates the four main battled going on during Episode 1 of the Star Wars Saga. Theed Palace, The Plains of Naboo, Anakin’s trek to the Trade Federation Control Ship and the battle between the Jedi and Sith Lord all played out last night upon my kitchen table. SW:TQG is by far the best “tie-in” game that I have played and is actually one of the better games in general. If you focus too much on one area your opponent can gain a quick advantage, but if you spread too thin you might lack the focus to put together a winning strategy.

Last night I put all my effort to advancing Anakin as quickly as possible along his track because once at the end all my opponent’s droids would shut down leaving me just Darth Maul to deal with. This caused my palace troops to be cannon fodder as droids marched in from the battlefield but thankfully Dave didn’t pay much attention to Anakin not realizing the impact that he’d have should he reach his goal.

This actually turned into my first negative of this game so far – The Naboo forces have to spend every opportunity that they can to advance Anakin. The longer he stays out the slimmer the chances are that they will satisfy the win conditions so basically my turn as the good side was to pick any and all cards that had a chance of moving Anakin and playing those. Anything choices left over then went to other sections of the battlefield. Towards the end though Anakin reached his goal just as Darth Maul was finishing off the second of the two Jedi. As Maul started to rip the remaining Palace Guards apart the Queen popped off a lucky shot and finished off the already wounded and battered Sith Lord. Good guys win, bad guys lose!

Don arrived in time to witness the above dramatics and came packed with Lost Cities: The Board Game. Now I do enjoy the original game that this is based off of and it is a good Gin variant. Players have five colors or suits of cards which need to be played in ascending order to move a pawn along a track of the corresponding color. When a player first starts on a track he earns negative points but the further he moves along the more points that pawn gains. Along the way various tokens can be obtained which grant artifacts which provide points at the end of the game, bonus points which increase your score at the end of the game, or advance a pawn one space which provides more points.

The game is light, fun and a very good time. I personally feel the “play three rounds and total scores at the end” mechanic prolongs the game needlessly but it does even out the randomness of the game. I’ll play the full three rounds but I see the 20 mins or so one round takes to be perfect for those “We’re at the end of the night but don’t want to call it quits, but also don’t want something long” moments.

After Lost Cities I finally was able to get tot he table a game long overdue for a play. The Bugman’s Game is a GW release that is only available at the restaurant/bar Warhammer World in England. It took a little work securing myself a copy but last night I found out it was well worth it. Players play dwarves trying to make it from their table in Bugman’s Bar to the bar and carry food and drinks back to their table. All the while the patrons of the bar toss things like mugs of brew and peg legs trying to make you drop your load. Once a player has a certain amount of items stashed at their table the game ends and points are totaled.

Overall the game is the light and quirky fun that I love in games. Since the game is not a mass release the old GW quirky humor shows up in this game through piles of vomit to be placed as obsticles, mystery sausages to be eaten and visiting the bogs to take a piss to replenish your hands of cards. This all keeps a very light while maintaining a competitiveness. If you can somehow land yourself a copy of this game I highly recommend it.

At this point of the night we were hitting that “Too late for a long game but not late enough to call it a night” moment so the old tried and true game for just such a situation was pulled out. DungeonQuest yet again provided laughs and excitement as we watched Don fall into a pit, me killed off by vampire bats and Dave killed just a few spaces from the exit by a giant centipede. We once again played on the old GW version since that is the only edition that I have and yet again I started to long for a way to combine the components of the FFG release with the rules of the GW release to create the perfect game.

~’Til Next Time
~Happy Gaming
~Dan

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Finally, after a few weeks, off I was finally able to get a warm body over to my house to do a bit of face to face gaming on a Wednesday. Shortly after work Dave arrived at my place and we were able to bust out some two player game action first with Awful Green Things from Outer Space and then both of us decided that the time was ripe to pull Labyrinth: War on Terror 2001-? out and start to plow through the rules and learn the game.

In a previous entry I mentioned that I recently picked up the 8th Edition of AGTfOS and had played a few games solitaire just to get a feel for the game and the rules, not to mention it was a great time to boot! So when the opportunity arose I had that game sitting on the table ready to go when Dave arrived. I gave him the aliens since they are a little more straight forward to play and proceeded to setup my crew members.

The premise of the game is that a group of planets, after some time of war and strife, banded together under a period of peace to build a spaceship to explore the galaxy looking for other life. On a particular planet they managed to encounter their goal and brought an alien being on board the ship. In addition to the alien life form they brought back a puzzling sludge which of course turns out to be a hostile alien that grows and lays eggs at an alarming speed. Soon the ship is infested and the crew have to either fight or try to escape the ship.

The map details the various rooms and hallways of the ship and in designated areas specific weapons are setup for the crew to pick up and use. What is interesting about the weapons is that since the enemy is an alien race no one knows for sure what the weapons will do when used against them. Some help, some hurt and some just do nothing of value. So the first part of the game the crew is running around trying to test weapons just to see what effects they’ll have and once they start to get a handle on what works or not then they can start making some headway into the alien menace.

Being my first face to face game I determined the game is a blast and I can’t wait for the next play. Our first game took about an hour with rules explanation so the play time will just go down from there. The one thing that I’m confused about with the game though is how the crew is supposed to win by eliminating all the aliens. They spawn and reproduce so fast I can’t see how the crew has any chance eradicate the aliens unless they blow up the ship and attempt to make an escape via the escape pods. But, with time I’m sure more strategies will open up.

The game wrapped up with my crew escaping the self destructing ship but a large portion of my crew dying due to a virus of some sort attacking the life boat. But enough warm bodies were left over to secure me the victory. Once that ended we decided to start cutting our teeth on Labyrinth: The War on Terror, 2001-?. Since Dave is my Twilight Struggle partner I figured the similar nature of the card play would make this one fairly easy to get into, but boy I was wrong! Outside of the similar way that cards are played, Labyrinth shares no other similarities to TS and ends up being fairly abstract.

Labyrinth is a two player game where one side takes control of the US and attempts to improve governance in Muslim regions through propaganda or force. The other side takes the roll of the extremists and dispatches terror cells to countries with the goal of creating chaos within the country and try to worsen the governmental structure and quality. To make the game easier to learn GMT Games provided a Play Book which walks players through a scripted game round and slowly details the different options players have on their turn.

This did make the game easier because you played through what amounts to a big interactive example and allows you to learn the mechanics and then see them in action. The downside though is that it took an extremely long time to do. Throughout the example you’ll end up reading just about all the rule book plus seven or so additional pages from the Play Book. At the three hour mark we finally got through the Play Book’s first round and were able to cut ourselves loose and start playing a hand on our own, which took another hour to do as we puzzled out the game’s various mechanics and tried to pan back and figure out how they all work together.

At that time it was getting late and we decided to call it but with both of us very excited for our next session where we can get together and try to recall what we learned last night. As it stands now I think Labyrinth has a slight edge for me over TS which is a great game, but both Dave and I feel the way the scoring cards work in that game breaks the flow and momentum of the game slightly by providing opportunities of having some wild swings in points and at this point we don’t see that potential in Labyrinth (but of course could be wrong). All that said though, we still haven’t even scratched the surface to the game and right now all I have is a general idea of how to play the game so take any enthusiasm I have with a grain of salt. I can’t wait for the next play though!

~’Til Next Time
~Happy Gaming
~Dan

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Last night I decided to brave the storms predicted in my area and head out to Joe’s place for some gaming. I brought a handful of games with me but the only one that was played was Thunder Road and after that game wrapped up Joe recently bought Settlers: Cities and Knights that he’s been hankering to play and even though vanilla Settlers isn’t my cup of tea I decided that it’d be a great time to see what this highly regarded expansion adds to the game.

As I mentioned we started the night with Thunder Road and as expected it was satisfying. Joe received Jason’s attention early (even though I attacked Jason with my first move) and very soon Joe was down to just one car, Jason two and I found my cars untouched. But then Joe’s dice caught fire and soon he had all three of his cars repaired and bounding down the highway. Even though Jason and I focused on bringing Joe back down to Earth his repairing of three vehicles at the end was just too much for us to handle and soon Joe was the last one on the road.

Something was troubling me by the end of the game though, the game feels like it starts at a climax and then it just starts winding down from there. Since the game isn’t a race and the goal is to be the last one standing the early game has car on car combat all over the place, but as numbers start to dwindle the pace of the game stalls out and comes to a screeching halt (sorry for the car wordplay there). Inevitably the game comes down to a one on one race (typically with the hulks being the last ones left) and then it just comes down to who rolls lucky dice first. I wish there was some way to keep the excitement of the early game all the way through the en, but at this time I don’t see how it is possible.

The other thing about the game is it feels like it is missing something. Nothing major but a few tweaks here and there I think would go a long way to help make the cars feel a bit different and speed the end game up so people aren’t just thinking “Damn, I wish that was a six so the game would be over and we could move on” which I found myself thinking for about the last half dozen or dozen attack rolls. Still though, it is a great and easy game with amazing components and I don’t see me parting with my copy any time soon.

After Thunder Road wrapped up we decided on Settlers of Catan with the Cities and Knights expansion. My personal feeling on SoC is that it is an alright game and not one that I actively seek out to play but I have heard many good things about the C&K expansion so it was an easy choice to agree upon for myself. I was actually quite amazed at how much that expansion changes the game and just how much better is makes the game.

There’s a small building tree where players can build better buildings for their cities, there’s some slight teamwork to make sure that the barbarian hoards who have a tendency to raid the lands back, cities function in a slightly different way when it comes to resources and various other tweaks here and there which I have to say are all for the better. But with all that said, I still don’t have an urge to go out and get a copy of the game for myself. I’m sure the sporadic times the game gets played at Joe’s will be enough to satisfy me, but I will say that the expansion shifted the game from an “avoid” title to an “I really don’t mind playing” title.

~’Til Next Time
~Happy Gaming
~Dan

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