by Sea
.... That title took waaaaaaaaaaay longer to think than expected..
Yes, it's been a while since I last updated.
And yes, I know this doesn't look well for a new blog,
but in my defense, .... I have none :blush:
It's not even like I didn't played any games!
In fact I've already had 3 gaming sessions since my last update (twice solo), and one backlog that I really ought to get to now.... But not today!
In fact for today's post I'll be writing about my gaming session from a week ago, where we played for a whopping 11 HOURS across SEVEN different games, one of which we played 3 times, and all of which we had to learn new rules for! Then we had another 5 hour session the next day over two rule intensive games!
So without further ado, here's game number 1!
Tiny Town
(Played thrice: 2x 2p , 1x 4p) - New to me!
We started the session with a simple, easy to learn, & friend-omg-I-swear-if-you-call-glass-again-I'll-cut-you-down ...ly game of Tiny Town. Given it's humble presence & rule set, it's really surprising how much emotions this game can incite among players. In my experience, it went from pleasant experience to a chewy puzzle at about the 1/3rd mark, yet it never became the brain-churning disaster that many other players have shared.
That said, there was some differences between the 2p & 4p experience: While the latter was mostly a solitaire puzzle of rooting one another on, the former had a distinct turning point where the focus became less of how you can build your buildings & more of how to screw your opponent over. This meant calling the same pieces over & over again, and having to anticipate what your opponent would call.
Is it overkill in a light game about building a lovely town? Uh-huh.
Is it fun? I guess, if you like watching your opponent suffer.
I do have some concerns about the building's randomization, whereby some buildings just seem overly complex in terms of their placement requirements; or situations where there's an "obvious" synergy going on, which comes down to the luck of the monument draw. I say this as I was able to manage a whopping 58VP off of my overpopulated settlement that's really big into religion & is sustained by ONE measly greenhouse.... Wait a minu-
Troyes + Ladies of Troyes
(Played once: 1x 2p)
A modern classic that needs no introduction, & one which I've played many a times on BGA but am glad to finally have my own physical copy. Honestly, despite being published nearly a decade ago, this remains one of the most unique Euros I've played.
Now full disclosure, but I've always valued games that offer "special abilities" that vary significantly between sessions. Troyes has this in spades. I also enjoy games with unique mechanics & those with puzzle-ly aspects; again Troyes achieves both with its brilliantly unique pip-to-activation mechanic (Seriously I've never seen another game employ it, but they should!).
Yet, none of this makes Troyes Troyes for me. IMO the best aspect of Troyes is how tightly intertwined its systems are, making it significantly more interactive than other Euros in a subtle manner.
In addition to scoring VP through the activity cards & events, players can subtly limit one another through "controlling" each others' influence (for workers & re-rolls), dice pool, & gold (for buying other players' dice). You can be risky by activating a card once for 2 consecutive turns to save gold, or take a bigger action with both dice at once. You can choose to leave black dice for your opponents to reduce their pool, or fight it all to limit their influence. You can hinder your opponents' by anticipating their action & using up the dice 1st, or through re-roll your own 6-dice so they won't buy it. All this, and we haven't even talked about the mind games from guessing your opponents' characters in hopes of scoring big for them as well.
I can talk on-and-on about Troyes, it's just that good! Now there's an upcoming game - Black Angel - that's supposedly "Troyes in space", but honestly I don't think it holds up to the subtle complexity of Troyes. I've written a comparison between both games' supposed similar mechanics (based on reading the rules for BA), which you can read here if you're interested.
... Owh as for cons, sometimes the card combinations may not be the best, with some going unused. It's also pretty complex to teach new players. Done.
Spyrium
(Played once: 3p)
Another "older" game that I've played countless times on BGA & ended up picking up a discounted copy. I'm sensing a theme here. Anyway, unlike Troyes, this game looks.... well let's just say art isn't its strong suit. There's also limited variety in card types, the engines are simplistic (light-medium) in comparison, & no hidden VPs to spice up the end game.
It's also extremely punishing, but in a good way. IMO Spyrium is the definition of a resource management puzzle, where majority of the decision space revolves around scraping by your plans with limited money, or curse as you realize you're $1 short! And in a game where you rarely have more than $10+, yet the cards you want can easily cost $8 or more, that happens more than I'd like to admit... It's also VERY cutthroat, since the pricing of cards (& also the income you gain from workers) are based heavily on the amount of workers competing for it.
And here lies what I see as the beauty of Spyrium - the 'grid worker placement' system & push your luck element. As cards get surrounded by workers, they get more expensive (+$1 per worker), yet similarly you can gain more $$ when you choose to recall your worker for income (again, $1 per worker). That's all fine and dandy, until you realize that players need to consciously switch from phase 1 to 2, in which they forfeit their chance to any remaining workers, but can start "activating" them for income or cards.
Because of this, turn order is CRUCIAL in Spyrium, as even choosing to put 1 more worker down (in hopes of more reward) can mean your card is being stolen. Yet going early means an expensive card, unless you go for one with less competition... However, because all information is available (including your $$ & tableau), it's fairly easy to guess which cards your opponents may want, & you try to screw them over there. Every single dollar counts, & there's no greater feeling than praying your opponent would "activate" a worker surrounding YOUR card WITHOUT taking it, because you're $1 short... and they did exactly that!
In a way, it's may be BECAUSE of how simple the engines in Spyrium are that allows players to play mind games with each other. In our 3p game, despite the game being light-medium, we spent quite some time contemplating our actions & 2 moves ahead. There's only so many options, yet each taken can be your Achilles' heel. The fun in Spyrium is not playing the game, but the players themselves.
The game also has some interesting changes in balancing depending on player count, in both the card abilities & economy changes, so I can't wait to try it at its full 5p count!
Tiny Epic Mech
(Played once: 1x 4p) - new to me!
Finally a new kid on the block, and a tiny one at that... but is it epic though? Let's see through my mech-ticulous analysis!
Jokes aside, TEM is.... an odd beast to describe. My first impression from my 4 player session was okay at best, yet it had its charming moments. Still, I think it may be more of a mindset concern than me having issues with the game mechanics themselves. Let me explain.
Firstly, as with most program planning games, TEM attempts to introduce some chaos through clashing commands, which results in players engaging in combat. Yet, the combat system, resource collection & area control aspects of the game gave the impression that it wants to be strategic as well. This is doubly so through the combat system, which in addition to being a mini-game of RPS, serve as one of the two main ways to gain VP. However, as combats are only triggered through clashing commands, they felt like random fleets of chances rather than strategic moves.
Now this may be due to my inexperience with the game, but regardless, IMO TEM's attempt to appeal to both strategy (resource, VP, RPS) & chaos (random clashes) made it such that it achieved neither in a satisfying manner. It also doesn't help that combat seemed to be the main 'attraction' of TEM, yet "attacking" the leader doesn't necessarily make things better for the trailing players. In fact, since combat gains VP for both players involved, it might be better strategically to AVOID the leader - but again, random trigger. This made it so that the game felt frustrating at times.
Yet as I thought about the game post session, it occurred to me that TEM DID have consistent strategic VP generators in the form of area control and weapon purchases - both of which players can trigger strategically. Additionally, while clashes & combat seemed clunky, we did have our laughter as we threaded in close proximity with one another, hoping to avoid the person with the biggest guns (which interestingly changes depending on whether we're in our mech suits). So I thought to myself: Would I have enjoyed TEM more as an area control game wrapped in a programming mechanic, with a dash of "engine building" disguised as combat?
Not sure what's my answer to that, but at least I'm willing to give this another try.
Dice Throne
(Played once: 1x 4p) - new to me!
Truth be told, prior to this I had little interest in the whole Dice Throne series, as I've heard it being described as similar to King of Tokyo but in PvP format. I had my fair share of dueling, so no thank you. However a friend of mine really wanted to play his copy so there we go... and after playing it, I realized that....
It is exactly King of Tokyo in PvP format. It's also quite fun in a relaxing kind of manner.
Now this may be due to us playing a 4p game - in which players determine their targets AFTER deciding on their attack through a die roll -, but IMO playing Dice Throne didn't leave me feeling pressured or "targeted" as is the case with most dueling-type games. Don't get me wrong, this doesn't mean that the game doesn't have tension - quite the contrary, in fact! There's tension as we taunt one another as we try to push our luck in rolling just the right attack, or hold our breaths hoping not to be targeted by an incoming fatal attack. There were also some memorable funny moments, like when the Shadow Thief got got "targeted" right as he bragged about having an evasive token (take no damage)... only to be targeted again by the next player as he dared us to do it again! Now, this also meant that players can be unfairly targeted by sheer poor luck, but while there may be other mechanically-balanced targeting system out there, I think this one works well to maintain the game's smooth and simple nature.
In that sense, the game is very much like King of Tokyo; however there's also more strategy involved thanks to the ability card & CP (mana) mechanic. Choosing between upgrading your attacks or holding back in anticipation of manipulating critical die rolls is a light but well-implemented decision space. Finally, I also enjoyed the counter-attack mechanic, as IMO it made being attacked feel less one-sided or 'take-that-ish'. Now while this may just be a matter of perspectives - and have no functional effect mechanics-wise -, it did help contribute to the relaxing back-&-forth atmosphere that (IMO) differentiates Dice Throne from other games of its genre.
Of course, I think its safe to assume that Dice Throne would gain back much of its teeth in a 1v1 setting, and in fact some might argue that THAT'S the intended playing experience. There's even a chance that I might not like Dice Throne as much in a 2p setting. Nevertheless, this supposed King of Tokyo-lookalike has managed to change my view towards it from zero interest to "Sure, let's play", and I think that deserves some praises.
That's enough writing for part 1! Thank you for reading, and as always eel free to leave any suggestions &/ or comments so I may improve in my future posts!
Until next time, happy gaming to all! :)
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