I'm a big fan of Ticket to Ride and I love some of the expansions but as I've previously stated I'm not too thrilled that the only announcement I've seen from Days of Wonder has been a card version of TTR. How about some Battle Lore news?

Anyway I received an email today about pre-ordering this one. See below.

As much excitement, fun and nail-biting tension as in the original Ticket to Ride board game, but now in a portable card game format ideal for travel.

The Ticket to Ride Card Game is for 2-4 players ages 8 and older. It includes 96 train cards, 6 Big Cities Bonus cards, 46 Destination Tickets and a rules booklet. Playing time is approximately 30 minutes.

The Ticket to Ride Card Game is now available for pre-order at the Days of Wonder Web Store. It is expected to ship and be in stock at your local game store around June 6. Order yours today!

I've been on a little bit of a mission recently to find some solo games, specifically war or fantasy themes. I just order Field Commander: Rommel and I hope it arrives this week. As any war gamer knows it's sometimes hard to find opponents so when a good solo game comes along it's like come early. By all accounts FCR is a very good game so I'll let you know once I get it.

In other news I see that War of the Ring is now shipping again. I'm ashamed to say I have never played this game, although I have wanted to for so long. I've got so many new games I haven't played yet it seems a little crazy to order a new one. Someone let me know how good it is so I have an excuse.

Finally if you're in the greater Chicago area the club I belong to is holding it's Spring Gaming day called KitCon on April 26th. It's a great time and lots of games are played. If you need further information go here.

D&D Goes Online

This actually sound fairly interesting to me but I can see possible problems. The main one is charging MMO prices for a product you can only use when you get a group of people together and only when one of them has created an adventure.

When I played RPG's pretty heavily we often got together once a week, if I'm paying $15 a month for 4-6 uses a month is it worth it?

Also why go through all of this effort if you character model isn't a true representation of your character? According to the article I can create a male fighter, give him a giant ass two handed sword and dwarven armor but he has none of that in the game session I am playing.

It's a crying shame that Neverwinter Nights wasn't given a true expansion from Bioware, instead we got NWN2 from Obsidian who delivered a toolset that was harder to use and had less built in features. It was awesome that we could create outdoor environments in NWN2 that weren't tile based, but they made the simplest of task from NWN1 like creating a creature or items very difficult. NWN2 was a failure on many levels and it will never even sniff the jock of the NWN community but I digress.

So while I like the concept of what they are doing with D&d 4th edition and the online aspect it sound sort of half assed. I'll still check it out but there are already programs out there that allow you to do what they are attempting and some of them are free.

Where have I been, I'm actually happy that some people have emailed and asked that. Don't worry I am not pulling a disappearing act I am in this blog for the long haul. Frankly put work has been kicking my ass, I'm so stressed out when I come home I've been feeling sick to my stomach.

Whats odd is I have found a nice outlet for my stress and that is figure painting. I'm almost through all of my Decent figures and when I want a break from those I hop over to my Battlelore figures. I'm not very good at this and the last time I painted anything was back in the late 80's, but I am getting better with each figure I do.

I'm not sure why painting is so relaxing to me, it shouldn't be trying to get everything just right, all the details. Perhaps the key is their is a reward at the end, no matter how bad or good the figure ends up. I invested my time, worked through it and it had an ending.

That's something I can't say about my current work situation as i have several clients that require so much attention and their is no end in sight. I'm not talking figuratively here, I mean literally as one client is just going to require daily attention until they leave us which could be never. While that is a good position for my company to be in, that's not what I signed up for and it certainly doesn't fit my personality.

In other news I just submitted by review of Rocketman Axis of Evil for the 360, in short stay far away, very far.

I've previously written on the tale of Key Largo before which is the last game designed by Paul Randles one of the designers of Pirates Cove. Last night was my first chance to play Key Largo with my gaming group and we had a full five player game.

The Object
The object of Key Largo is simple have the most money by the end of ten days. You acquire that money mainly from sending divers down for buried treasure and selling them at the market. You can also make money by taking tourist Dolphin Watching but the real money is made through salvaging the wrecks on the ocean floor.

The Components
The game comes with some rather large wooden pieces to represent your boat, a number of chits of items you can buy like hoses, weights and Tridents. A nicely illustrated board, lots of fake money and then plenty of cards to represent the treasure you find on the bottom of the ocean. I didn't find any of the components cheaply made at all.

The Theme
The game is set around the islands you pillaged during Pirate's Cove, or at least it is loosely based on that concept. The theme of being a salvage captain and sending your divers down works pretty well. I found it odd that the obstacle chosen for the divers were Sea Monsters and that the Trident was used to fend them off, I would of expected possibly a spear gun and Sharks perhaps. It's not a big deal and the art of the divers and the board represent that fun, humorous family ton so it works.

How it Plays
The dynamics of Key Largo are simple enough to get up and going fast. A first time game with 5 players and rules explanation only took about an hour. I think this game can be played in anywhere from 40 minutes to just over an hour depending on the size and group.

Players start with $100, a boat and a single diver. They also have a set of cards which allows them to do various actions, more on that in a minute. Then depending on the number of players you place wrecks down around the board of varying depths (shallow, medium and deep) in a 3 player game for example there are 3 shallow, 4 medium and 4 deep wrecks. Wrecks are stacks of 5 cards placed face down.

So the game is runs over 10 days, that's how much time is left before the hurricanes roll in and wash out all diving for the season. Each day is broken into a morning and afternoon, so effectively you have 20 turns of game play.


Each player has a set of cards with actions on them, you must choose two of these cards and place them face down on top of each other. The top card is your morning action and the bottom your afternoon action. What this means is you can only perform one of your actions once a day. After ten days you count up your money and unsold treasure and whomever has the most is the winner.

The Action Cards
Search a Wreck Card
Your diver goes to one of the wreck decks and draws the top card. Each wreck can only have one boat so there is a start player token and it passes each turn. If more then one player chooses a wreck action then they place their boats clockwise from the start player. You can also hire up to 3 divers, so you could be drawing 3 cards from a diving expedition.

You might remember the different wreck depths? Well in order to dive at medium depth each of your divers needs a hose, to dive at Deep depths each of them needs two hoses. So if for example you have 3 divers and two of them have 2 hoses but one of them has none you can only dive at a shallow wreck.

The wreck decks consist of either treasure or a monster. Treasure comes in the form of goods, gold, artifacts and jewels. When you draw these they simply go into your hand, a monster card just means your diver found nothing. There is a way to counter a monster, it's called the Trident. If you have one of these you can simply ignore the monster card and then draw another card from the wreck depth.

Finally each diver can have a single diving weight which allows him to discard it to draw another card off the wreck deck. When that's a lot to cover, but its best to explain everything here as searching a wreck is the key to the game.

Go Dolphin Watching Card
This card has you take tourists out to see Dolphins and collect some meager cash, how much depends on the day of the week but Friday - Sunday pay the most. There is an optional rule that frankly must be used for this card or else the Dolphin watch card will almost never get played and it's called encounters. Each time you go Dolphin watching you draw an encounter card and can keep it to use later. All encounter cards are beneficial, for example you may draw a card that allows you to immediately sell the last card you drew from a wreck deck.

Buy Equipment Card
I pretty much explained what the 3 different pieces of equipment did under the Wreck card. Just know you can only buy two items on each visit to the shop and each diver can only have 2 hoses, 1 Trident and 1 weight each.

What I am going to do is use this spot to explain the one dynamic that is going to come into play for this card and the remaining two and the one that makes the game interesting and it is the changing market. The number of people who visit the shop at the same time determines the price of goods. A hose might be $30 if you're the only one there, but if two people visit its $40 and if 3 visit its $60. In other words try and shop when people aren't around.


Sell Goods Card (ie visit the market)
This is how you make your money and of course making money is the key to the game. Up top I mentioned the 4 types of treasure goods, gold, artifacts and jewels. Well of those four only three of them can be sold at the market, jewels are never sold.

Each treasure card with the exception of Jewels has two numbers printed on it. The number of crates and the end game scoring value. As an example I might draw a Gold card and it will say 5 crates of gold and have an end game value on it of $100.

Much like the shop, the markets values for selling go changed based on the number of boat captains selling their haul. Gold always sells for $30 a crate, Good sell for less when there are more people an oddly enough Artifacts sell for more if there are more people.

Getting back to my example if I went to the market to sell my card which had 5 crates of gold i would make $150, 5 crates multiplied by the market of $30. So whats the other value you ask, the $100? There is a good chance you will not sell all your goods at market instead of them not counting towards your final score you get the value on the card, in this case $100. Jewels only have a value on them and it is usually a nice sum like $200. I should also mention that you can only sell one type of good per visit. So if I sell Gold I can't sell goods, but I can sell as many gold cards as I want.

Visit the Tavern Card
This is where you can do any of 3 things, the most important of which is buy another diver. Much like the shop, more people here means it cost more to hire a diver. Each boat can only transport 3 divers and no more.

You can also buy the tavern a round of drinks for $20, this allows you to pick two treasure decks, look at whats in them and then reshuffle them. Finally another option rule is hiring a thief, which allows you to steal a card from another players treasure hand.

Conclusion
Key Largo is a decent enough game, there is a pretty good theme here and the rules seem well balanced. The one thing I really love about it is the lack of downtime, everyone is doing their things at once and the game moves. The optional encounter rule should always be played with, while the thief rule I could live without. The game lacks any kind of drama really short of pulling a monster card and most late game strategy revolves around trying to out guess your opponents and be the sole visitor at the market.

Who is it for?
Pirate's Cove fans, people looking for a nice family or dinner party game which plays fast and has no confrontation.

Who is it NOT for?
People looking for a very strategic or heavy game. If you scoff at games like TTR, Pirate's Cove or That' Life stay far away from Key Largo.

Congrats to Mike P. I'll be shipping your expansion pack out tomorrow. I ended up with only 41 entires for this contest. My site traffic is significantly higher then that, which I consider pretty good for a blog who I didn't officially start investing time in until this past January. Maybe people just don't want free stuff.

Anyway I hope to get some reviews up really soon on Key Largo, Pandemic and a few other titles.

Today is the last day to enter the contest, I've had a surprisingly low number of entries despite some real good site stats lately. Perhaps no one wants Battlelore expansions which is too bad as I have a bunch of these to give away. Regardless if you want a pretty good shot at winning this, currently 1 in 25 or so, then get your entries in by the deadline tonight.

I'm starting to see a let up in my daily workload which will hopefully allow me to get some content I have been working on up on the site. I've been spending my spare time painting my Descent figures, which is something I started a while back. I'm about 90% done and I am by no means a master painter of miniatures. Whats weird is something that should be stressful do to the details involved is a huge stress reliever for me. I think that is due to the fact that there is alwasy an end in site, which is something I don't have with a few of my current clients.

I'm behind in a review for Gameshark, I'm not going to say the name of the game yet but I'm having a hard time with it because I don't like it very much. There are so many issues that I would consider things you would find in the last decade of gaming. For example its a isometric shooter on rails and forget about it if you accidentally go too far to one side of the screen and miss and item, there is no going back.

I've been playing some Rainbow Six Vegas 2 lately, a game which I enjoy and I just picked up Viking for the 360 as well. There is some joy in slicing limbs off of opponents I'll admit. Because I got stuck in Cleveland last Thursday do to a snow storm in Chicago I missed game night so I didn't get a chance to play any of my new games. Here is hoping nothing happens this week.

Today is the final question of the contest, I'll also be opening up entires today through midnight CDT on March 31st. Remember the title of your email must be Goblin Contest Entry and then just list the answers as follows:

1. Answer
2. Answer

etc.

If you don't submit like that you won't be entered.

Question 6: Battlelore is part of the Command and Colors System. Who is credited with designing this system and what was the first game published in the system? Hint: It was published in 2000

Good Luck

Unfortunately this week is going to be light on postings as it's crazy busy at work and I am traveling for business again. I'll try and make up for it next week with some good content.

Regardless here is question #5

There were a few promotional creatures released for Battlelore, name one of them.

Going to be an extremely busy day at the real job so here is question #4.

Name one of the roles a player can be in the upcoming Galactic Emperor game.

Also a reminder, please don't send me any answers yet, I will be opening up the entry portion of this contest this weekend. if you have previously sent me an entry it is not valid.

As you can see by my recently playing list I received the Descent expansion along with a few other games I just ordered. No, I have not played them yet that little mistake in my recently played list comes courtesy of Board Game Geeks forms.

Anyway I now have all the Descent expansion and main game and let me tell you transporting this is going to be next to impossible. I also picked up Mare Nostrum and the Mythology expansion for it based on some positive feedback by Bill Abner.

Bill and I have know each other through the inter webs for a long time and I find that his tastes often run in line with mine so if I hate this game, which I doubt from my reading of the rules, then I'll be sending him the bill.

Also scored a copy of Key Largo which was designed by Paul Randles and was his last game before passing away. There is an interesting post on BGG about how this game final got completed and made it to print. I'm a fan of Pirates cove and so is my wife so I decided to pick this up, alas it needs at least 3 to play. It looks like a very fun game so I'm looking forward to getting it on the table, I can't wait until my oldest daughter who will be 5 in May can start to join us on some of these games.

Now for the most important news of the week, we beat Pandemic on Thursday night. Four player game with only 4 Epidemic cards but hey I'll take a win. Strangely winning the game didn't do anything to lessen my desire to play it, which is a good thing.

Currently the only game I have on pre-order is The Last Night on Earth expansion called Growing Hunger and I'm not even sure when that is going to ship. I'll also be putting an order in for Galactic Emperor as well. It's going to be an expensive summer, I should have stuck with video / computer game reviews as you got those copies for free, but you have to do what you love.

What new nation is joining Axis & Allies in the upcoming Anniversary Edition?

Today we have an interview with Adam west who is the designer of the much anticipated Galactic Emperor. This interviewed occurred a few days before Adam announced that pre-orders are now open for the game.

OBG: Today we're talking with Adam West, one of the founders of Crosscut Games, about his upcoming board game Galactic Emperor. Crosscut games has created some real quality computer games in the past like Runesword 1 & 2, even a game called Bronze Dragon which I recall playing on an Apple computer back in my teen age years. Adam thanks for taking the time today to discuss the game with us.

Adam: Happy to be here!

OBG: Can you tell us a little about yourself and crosscut games?

Adam: Sure. I'm the President of CrossCut Games, a tiny game company located in Indianapolis, Indiana USA. Dan Schnake is the co-founder and all around great guy. We're long time friends and have been running CrossCut for over 10 years now. Prior to that, we were called Commonwealth Software. So we've been making games together for about 25 years. We've published several computer games and are now getting ready to launch our first board game.

OBG: How long have you been designing games?

Adam: Since grade school. Well before I had a computer. My friends and I use to play home made games after school. Dozens of the things. Some I still have in my basement.

OBG: How long have you been into board games?

Adam: I can remember playing Panzer Leader in the late 1970's. I played Risk. I played D&D for the first time about then as well. I still have an original copy of the Chain Mail rules! Man, those were good times.

OBG: What was it that made you make the transitions from coding computer games to designing a board game?

Adam: I've really been back into board games for the last 7 years or so
and the games today are incredibly fun and very different from games
many of us played when we were younger. So after getting back into board games, I began thinking about board games again. Really, all my computer games were made so I could play board games by myself - specifically D&D by myself. So in a sense, I'm going back to my roots.

OBG: Is Galactic Emperor your first board game design?

Adam: It's my first intended for retail sale. But I've designed zoodles of board games.

OBG: How would you describe Galactic Emperor?

Adam: It's a very fast playing 4X board game of galactic politics and conquest.

OBG: I like the concept in GE on roles and how every player gets to take an action with each role, but only the player with the throne can use that roles special action. Can you gives us a quick run down on one or two unique roles in GE and which one is your favorite early in the game?

Adam: There are 7 roles in the game: Explorer, Steward, Merchant, Engineer, Warlord, Regent and Scientist. The person who chooses the role gets to use the special ability - a bit of a bump for the chooser if you will. That's just an incentive to pick a role rather than letting someone else do it for you. So the optimization here is deciding which role benefits you the most at different points in the game or hurts others if you choose a role they are not ready for. Early in the game, Explorer is pretty much a no-brainer since getting good sectors early (those with a nice amount of resources) is important. That depends a bit on what sectors are available of course. Also, Scientist is important early since there are limited technologies and Scientist goes out of the game about 2/3's through. A Regent is a good choice (if you didn't get the throne) so you can control the flow for a few rounds.

Hmm. I guess it depends!

OBG: If GE were a computer game, would you consider it a 4X game? If not what kind of game would you equate it too?

Adam: Yes, it's a 4X game - but without the micro-management. In fact, while we were making the game we looked up 4X on wikipedia and we meet all the attributes very well. Think of GE as a lighter 4X game - all the X with less fat.

OBG: Is there a lot of combat / conflict in a typical game of GE? Can you briefly describe how conflict is resolved?

Adam: That's something we worked on through out development. Early on, combat didn't happen too often - maybe only at the end of a game, some gigantic clash. So we had to tune the game over time - loads of play testing - to get combat to happen at the right time in the game. Now the economy is turned up so you can afford to have combat and you can get all your ships into play if you work it right.

Conflict is resolved by rolling dice - the big dreadnaughts roll 3, crusiers roll 2 and fighters roll 1. It's resolved in phases - dreadnaoughts fight and remove casualties, then crusiers fight and remove casualties, etc. So if you've played for example Nexus Ops or Axis and Allies or other American games, you'll quickly pick up what happens. But a given battle resolves in just a few rolls - it doesn't go on and on.

OBG: From reading the rules it sounds like every game of GE can play out differently. By that I mean there is not set opening strategy and a player could win by brute or diplomatic force. Would you consider that a correct statement? If so how much time was spent in play testing GE to make sure if had that dynamic nature?

Adam: Yes, I think that's right. That's been my goal too - to allow for various strategies to be viable. It starts pretty easy - find sectors, take them over. But as the galaxy unfolds, things begin to settle in, you need to start on a path that will work for you. For example, maybe you have several food sectors. Then playing the market is your best bet - since you get money for food and can control prices. And then you have to think about technologies that fit that strategy. In general, you have to always watch out for a balance in economics, warfare and politics. I've seen players win without a single combat, I've seen them win with loads of combat. The best strategy is playing what's in front of you - and figuring out your opponents.

OBG: So would you consider GE a streamlined alternative to TI?

Adam: Absolutely! You know this has come up many times now and I really do like what TI has done in board gaming. It's really epic - and there's a place in my heart for those types of games. Unfortunately, I can almost never play them. Partly because I can't find the amount of time that a game like TI requires and partly because my patience is shrinking over the years. So yes, GE is trying to fill my need for a galactic conquest game in a reasonable amount of time. It's epic in scale without an epic time commitment.

OBG: I know many of my readers might want to pursue getting a game published someday wit that in mind. How long did it take you to go from original concept to sending the game to the printer? How much play testing did you do with GE?

Adam: Hmm. I think it was about a year. The original concept was put together in about a week. But then we went into play testing. And that's where we've spent our time - a year of play testing. Hundreds of games with loads of different people. Game clubs, conventions, strangers - gamers from all over the world. I love the internet!

OBG: Did you do all the art work yourself?

Adam: I did everything but the box cover. That beautiful box cover is from Hugo Award Winning Stephen Hicks. Amazing and perfect for our game. I love the box.

OBG: Was there some information out there to get you started down the right path to self publishing a game?

Adam: There's been a few other pioneers, so I drew from their experience. On Board Game Geek (BGG), several folks have posted their experiences. And then there's Peter Morrison, the designer and publisher of Viktory II. If you haven't seen his web site, you really should. He poured himself into the effort and describes every part of it. So that was really inspiring. In the end, I came to the conclusion that I wanted CrossCut Games to have a top tier product with high quality production values. If we're going to do board games, we need to have the components that make it lots of fun. So that's why I went with a complete outsourcing of printing. No regrets at all. The game will be of the same quality as any AAA game - something I could never hope to do in a computer game.

OBG: What was the one thing that surprised you the most in getting a game self published?

Adam: Many folks have heard I made a board game and say, "You know, I've got this idea for a board game...." And really, it's a ton of work. It takes far more than a great idea. It's not like you can just send the stuff off and everything is done. And marketing, distribution, selling the thing - that's also a ton of work. I like it all right now - but it's so very much more than just a good idea and a color printer.

OBG: How did it feel to get that final production copy in your hands?

Adam: I don't have that feel yet! I'm still awaiting that feeling - and I long for it. I hope it's really as good as I think it will be. I'm pretty certain about parts of the product - but other parts - we'll just have to wait and see!

OBG: Many board games are making their way onto Xbox Live and doing quite well. Catan and Carcassone have been pretty big hits and there are rumors of more games on the way. Do you think this is a good thing for the hobby? Do you think a game like Arkham Horror for example could be put into that environment?

Adam: I do think this is a good thing. It exposes more players to the games, it explores interactivity, it gives players opportunity to play with lots of other people. It's fantastic for the console market - hopefully, console and computer games designers will wake up to what's going on in game design! I think a game that is more heavy on theme will translate less well. The mechanics are part of those games, but really, they are about the feeling of the game. So something like Arkham Horror or Descent - they have to compete more directly with other classic computer games. And you can get that same feeling with other computer/console games.

But Catan, Carcassone - these are perfect choices. They are simply great games.

OBG: When do you expect GE to be available?

Adam: June? I really hope June. I actually hope for sooner. But let's stick with June.

OBG: At what price?

Adam: $54.95 MSRP.

OBG: Will it be a limited print run?

Adam: It's just a very small run - 1,000 copies. I have a sinking feeling those will sell out too fast - that's actually one of my worries right now.

OBG: Will you be selling it at Origins or GenCon?

Adam: Naw, it didn't seem like a reasonable thing to do just yet. First, I don't want to be stuck in a booth during those conventions - I want to be playing games! Second, we only have the one board game right now - so it probably doesn't justify the booth cost. I do hope somebody else will have us on the shelf at those venues. We'll see!

OBG: Finally top 5 board games you enjoy right now that weren't made by Adam West?

Adam: Puerto Rico, Settlers of Catan, Memoir '44, Age of Empires III and up and coming is Race for the Galaxy. Age of Empires III came out of nowhere for me and I really love it. Race - I wanted to hate it, but dang it, it's just a flat out great game. I admire it - let's put it that way. I enjoy playing anything new too, so maybe "any new game" is #1 for me.

OBG: Anything else you would like to add?

Adam: If you want a galactic conquest game that plays smooth and fast, go get Galactic Emperor!

I'd liek to thank Adam for taking the time to answer a few questions and if you interested in Galactic Emperor you should head over to the cross cut games site and pre-order a copy now.

If you've followed my recent links to the Descent:RTL previews this one should be easy. In case anyone is confused all of these questions will be board game related and the Geek is a good resource. Anyway...

What is the name of the town that you Heroes have been visiting in Descent when taking a town action?

(I have to start making these harder.)

I'll be posting an interview with Adam West creator of the upcoming Galactic Emperor game. Adam and I discuss the game and a few other various topics.

Also a hint about question #1, it's a game i recently discussed in a new brief.

In what game can you find a nurse named Becky, a drifter named Jake and a farmers daughter named Jenny?

This month I'll be giving away a copy of the Goblin Skirmishers Battlelore expansion. For the next two weeks on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays I will be posting a trivia question. I will then be taking entries from March 29th - 31st.

Only one entry will be accepted per email account, I will then take all the people with the most correct answers and randomly select a single winner from those people.

I want to be perfectly clear, I will only be accepting answers on those 3 days. Your single entry email should contain all 6 answers, have your name and return email and be titled Goblin Contest Entry. Any emails sent before or after that date, will not be accepted. Bottom line folks is if you don't get all 6 right, chances are you won't be in the random drawing. Also you need to be located in the United States to enter this contest.

Good Luck

FFG has changed the status on their upcoming and I must saying highly anticipated expansion pack for Descent to shipping. That usually happens once they have it in their warehouse. Figure it will get to distributors next week and then to retailers, I'd say if you're lucky you may have it by the end of next week but more then likely the following week.

There are only 3 days left to get in on the Cuba give away contest over at BGG. I've played this game a few times already an to be honest I am unsure how I feel about it. but the giveaway is for a special Cigar box edition which gets the collector in me interested.

Ahoy,

Check this out, I don't think it is associated with the board game of the same name, but a new game is coming this summer called Plunder. Sounds right up my alley, Abner book me for the review!

One of my favorite games of Last year was Last Night on Earth something I stumbled on at GenCon. At the time my friends thought I was nuts to drop $50 on this little game but I'm always on the cutting edge.

Anyway the game is pretty popular now and the first expansion is on its way. The company who makes it Flying Frog has opened it up for pre-orders. I was kind of hoping to snag one at GenCon but it seems like this will be a limited quantity shipment so I may have to order one.

Another title I'm excited about is called Galactic Emperor by Adam West. I don't know Adam personally but I have played many of his PC games and did some testing for one of them back in the day. It sounds like a shorter and frankly more enjoyable alternative to Twilight Imperium.

I didn't forget about the contest I am just working something out, look for it this week.

Well after 3 nights of trying to figure out why Civ IV would reboot my system after playing it for 5 minutes and give me Blue Screens turns out that one of my nvida.dll files was corrupt. After much research I see this is a common problem.

Removing this and reinstalling yourself has a smaller success chance then me running off with Jessica Alba. After hours of troubleshooting I spent $10 on a little utility called Driver Cleaner and followed the instructions provided in its helps file and now my system is back to 100%.

Anyone who knows me realizes I can't put a problem down without some kind of resolution to this was my entire night time existence for the last 3 days.

So in what little free time I have this week I have been playing Hannibal which is just a fantastic game. Spending so much time looking at the board got me thinking how I wish I had a version of the map framed as a poster. Which in turn got me to thinking what a fabulous idea for decorating my bare gaming room walls.

I figure I could fit 4 or 5 framed pieces of art down there so what would they be. I'm open to suggestions, of course trying to get some of these framed is going to be next to impossible but don't let that limit your top 5 list.

Whats mine? Well I haven't thought of the top 5 yet, but I know two of them.

1. The Hannibal Map
2. Tide of Iron Box cover

Neither of those are great shots but they get the point across, now the question is what to use for the other 3.

Well I was feeling run down all week never really 100% from last weekends bout with the flu. Last week was a rough one at work and I didn't get a lot of sleep. I woke up Friday morning about 2 am and proceeded to get sick all over the bed after a few hours of that I passed out. Yesterday I was running close to a 103 fever all day, I got out of bed twice the whole day thats how wrecked I felt. Today I'm running on about 60% engine power, it's amazing when I lived on the east coast I never got sick but since moving to Illinois I've been prone to more illness, maybe it's a sign we should get out of here.

Anyway while I was down for the count the Descent:RTL rules were posted, haven't had a chance to read them myself yet but I put this in with a big order I placed on Tuesday this past week so I'll be getting it for sure.

Pandemic hit the table at game night this week and we lost again, everyone at the club is complaining the game is un-winnable, yet every time I turn around someone is asking to borrow my copy. The same people walking away complaining are the ones playing it all the time. Personally I like how hard it is and it's ok to lose, that makes winning so much sweeter but thats just me I guess.

Finally got to play Britannia this past week, we only played half a game since the playing time is so long and 3 of us were playing for the first time. I really enjoyed the mechanics of this game and I hope to get a shot at playing a full game come convention time.

Well thats it for me today, I'm going to take it easy this weekend but i will be back with the Battlelore contest rules on Monday.

Upon hearing the news yesterday of Gary Gygax’s passing I was a bit surprised at my reaction. While I always take a second to pause when I hear someone has lost their life it is usually just that, a second. However the news of Mr. Gygax’s passing stopped me dead in my tracks, it was possibly the busiest day of the week for me at my day job and I just sat there for several minutes motionless.

It wasn’t shock that stopped me in my tracks as I didn’t know him personally. It wasn’t grief, while I admit I was saddened by the news, he was not a family member. What it did for me was jar memories, lot of memories, lots of good memories.

Back in 1980 I was a freshman in high school, I played 3 sports and was pretty good at two of them and I had been playing D&D for several years. I started by playing Chain Mail, then went to boxed sets of D&D. From there I moved up to AD&D, then version 2 of the rules. I had a very active imagination and Dungeons & Dragons allowed me to express that part of me. I can credit D&D for starting me down the path of gaming, a path that led me to Top Secret, Star Frontiers, Traveler, Diplomacy, Paranoia, Advance Squad Leader and tons of other games that still liter my closet and basement to my wife’s dismay.

I can remember a lot from high school, big games I had on the baseball field, proms, girlfriends and special moments like graduation. None of these are as vivid in my mind as the ones I have from gaming sessions. We had a core group that gamed together weekly pretty much from the early 80’s until the time I move to Chicago in 1990. That’s almost 10 years of gaming, people came and went in our group but there was a good core of 5 of us who were there from beginning to end. I can’t speak for them but it is something I have been unable to capture again in my life time.

I can recall one time in the early days just playing with my friend Dave, he was controlling one guy and I decided to run him through a little module I just bought. That module was the Tomb of Horrors, imagine that two guys playing that module. He was controlling one PC and I was the DM, anyone with a slight knowledge of that module knows that it is impossible to play that module with one guy. There lies the beauty of D&D, while there are rules and there are certainly rule whores as we liked to call them, the game was about so much more then rolling dice and checking stats. The game when played the way it was meant to be played, at least in my mind, was about letting go, being free and having a good laugh with your friends.

Should Dave of gotten through that module, not a chance in hell. But my choice was guide him through it, adjust encounters and have a good time or kill him in about 5 minutes and then figure out what the hell to do next. So I guided Dave through that module and we had a blast and when he met mean Mr. Lich at the end and there was no way for him to win, he was battered down to 1 hit point and I said “Dave the only way you can win this is if you roll two 20’s in a row, if that happens we’ll say you severed his head”

You can guess what happened next, he rolled two twenties, we laughed, he gave a yell it was a blast. I’m 41 and if I called Dave today and just started talking about D&D the first words out of his mouth would be “Two twenties baby!”

You can’t replace these kind of memories and you can diminish the effect a game like this had on people’s lives, D&D allowed you to be yourself and in high school that is a hard thing to be. If you think I was the most popular kid on the baseball or football team because I didn’t hide the fact that I enjoyed D&D or a good game of Axis & Allies you would be kidding yourself. The truth of the matter is I didn’t care what people thought of me, I only cared what my friends and family thought. That’s another lesson that I chalk up to Mr. Gygax and his wonderful game, be yourself and never hide that fact for anyone.

I think the best tribute I can pay to My Gygax and the game of Dungeons and Dragons is this. Today I received an email, from one of the old group’s members. We seldom get the chance to talk to each other anymore, it’s just a fact of life the older you get the busier you are. His email simply stated that the gaming world had lost a great innovator and it was copied to every core member of the old adventure gaming club. The first reply was from a particular friend I haven’t heard from since my wedding which was 10 years ago. He was in Paris on business and like the rest of us was saddened by the loss, but informed us that Mr. Gygax’s death was news in Paris as well. I think it’s the first time the 5 of us have all been involved in a single discussion since 1997, and we may even meet up at Gen Con this year.

So Mr. Gygax I want to thank you. Thank you for playing a small part in who I am today, thank you for some of the longest lasting memories in my life and thank you for inspiring me. You had no idea you had done it but that’s what great people do, they inspire without knowing.

To my old group I leave you with these names and quotes, let us not ever forget them.

Quill Nightshade, a ranger should never be that nice.

C the incredible thief who is still probably polishing his life sized gold statue

Tamchuck the grump dwarf who will always remember this line, “DON’T CUT THE STRING!”

Rob whose characters names escape me, mostly because they died once a session.

Ken whose guys was always away on a secret mission

Finally John, my friend who I heard from today after 10 long years, I have one word for you my friend:

“BEHOLD!” (with the double finger point of course)

Well as previously stated I had a hard time picking a winner, I got it down to 3 submissions and then down to 2. I just couldn't decided because I liked both so I let my wife mull it over for a night and she has ended the dead lock for me. Since I never asked permission to put the contestants names up here I will not be using a last name. The winner has already been notified by email.

The winner is Matt T. and his banner will be going up in the next day. So congrats Matt and enjoy Sins.

My review of Commanders: Attack of the Genos is up over at GameShark who I do an occasional review for. I liked this game but it's certainly not what I would call a hard core strategy game.

We picked the winner of the Sins contest and it was a really tough decision as I was torn on two entires. I announce it later today but I am going to do my best to get the second runner up some kind of prize because I could really use both of these banners.

I'll be back later in the day with some more news.

One of my gaming buddies passed this along. I'll post my thoughts when I have time, but best wishes go out to his family.

I've settled on 3 banners I really like, I wish I had a prize to give all of them but I don't. Because I can't decide which one works best I am going to leave it up to my wife. I'll be announcing the winner tomorrow night.

Days of Wonder has announced a Ticket to Ride Card game, I love TTR as much as the next guy and think the Swiss expansion is a must buy. But I wonder if this is just milking the name for some cash at this point.

Preview #7 is up over at the FFG site, this time covering monster I do believe. I must imagine this game will arrive very shortly to their warehouse to be promoting it this much. Also of interest while I was sick over the weekend, word has broke that an Anniversary Edition of Axis & Allies is due this year in October. This newest edition brings the number of Axis & Allies versions up to 1 million. All kidding aside here is the blurb found on the Geek.

The Axis & Allies Anniversary Edition will feature the debut of Italy as the third Axis nation, the introduction of the cruiser unit to the naval lineup, and the largest Axis & Allies board to-date measuring 24x46 inches. With over 600 pieces, players will be able to recreate and decide the outcome of WWII like never before. The Axis & Allies Anniversary Edition is designed and developed by Larry Harris, the original designer of Axis & Allies, and will release on October 23, 2008.

A&A was one of my favorite games when I was in college, we use to play it all the time. I don't think I've touched the game in many years but I will probably pick this one up. Another Avalon Hill classic being re-printed in anniversary form is Diplomacy, this is due out this month. I still have a version from when I was a kid, it has better bits then this new version.

Thats all for today, this months contest will run later in the month and it will be for one of the Battle Lore expansions, I'll post moreo n that later.

I'll be announcing the winner of the contest in a day or two, the flu has hit my household and my youngest daughter and I our the lucky winners of feeling like a train hit us. I'll try and get back in the swing of it tomorrow.

This time we learn how to pack up the game, yes pack up the game. Road to Legend is an expansion adding a campaign aspect to the game so it can't be done in a single session, at least not by normal people. You can read about it here.

Latest preview is up for the Descent expansion, I think this is preview #5. Also played 3 more games of Pandemic tonight and we lost all of them. That game sure is tough, we missed winning on the last game by just a few moves. The second game of the night was over in about 10 minutes, the game really plays differently each time, I really enjoy it.

Also correction to something I posted last night the game is 2-4 players. Played some Nexus Ops tonight and that is a first for me, I enjoyed it. Tomorrows the last day of the contest and then I will be doing the judging over the weekend.

Pandemic is a great new game which pits 2-5 players against the game. In other words it is my favorite type of game a cooperative one. I'll do a full blown review another time but after just one session I highly recommend it.

My wife Idy and I choose to give this game a whirl tonight, having just got the game today wasn't an issue as it is easy to learn and teach.

Idy drew the Operations Specialist who has the ability to create a research station anywhere they wish without having to have that cities card. I drew the scientist who can cure a disease with 4 cards instead of 5.

Our initial set up saw a large concentration of the Blue disease in North America and a small bit of yellow in South America, Black had a few cubes out and red was almost no existent. Of course Blue had 3 cubes in New York and Atlanta to start the game.

Turn 1 - Idy
She heads to Kinshasha and builds a research station and then does some treatment to remove 2 yellow cubes. Yellow has the second largest concentration so we want to cut down those 3 cube spots.

Turn 2 - Dan
I move to Kinshasha to meet her and wait a turn to get her black cards via shared knowledge. I'm a bit unsure but the card reads that you can pass a card for an action with shared knowledge which we determined means she has to pass it to me. If she had just passed it to me in Atlanta I could be curing the black disease on turn 2 but i didn't notice what cards she had before she made her move.

Turn 3 - Idy
She uses an action to share her black card with me, then moves off to Miami and makes her way to Toronto to try and treat Blue.

Turn 4 - Dan
I cure black, and since there is so little on the board I decided to move through the area trying to eradicate the disease.

Turn 7 - Idy
Idy moves to Baghdad to share some more yellow cards with me, as we have collected 2 apiece and my scientist can cure with 4.

Turn 8 - Dan
I make my way back to Atlanta via a direct flight and then cure yellow. Things are looking good except on my draw phase I get our first epidemic card. Fortunately it is in Hong Kong and Red isn't an issue at this point.

Turn 11 - Idy
Well Blue isn't looking to hot, since the Epidemic I know that it's a matter of time before we have blue outbreaks. I'm trying to treat blue just to get the numbers down and Idy is over in China removing Red. Unfortunately on her Infecter stage she pulls Mexico city which already has 3 yellow cubes so an outbreak occurs and even though we have a cure for yellow a Mexico city Outbreak is an issue.


Turn 12 - Dan
We still don't have any Blue cards in our hands and I know that Atlanta or some other Blue city is due up. I'm still treating Blue and Idy is trying to make her way back to start eradicating yellow.

Unfortunately on my draw phase we have another epidemic and I pick Chicago and this causes and out break. Which chains to Atlanta and that chains to Toronto and in a matter of seconds all of North America is covered and we are out of Blue cubes. Which resulted in many curses from my wife which was funny.

Conclusion
Overall it was a great first game my whole purpose for buying this game was to find something new my wife would enjoy and she gave it a 10 when I asked her to rate it. We saw that we squandered a turn and then took too long in getting to the blue. The first few turns when black wasn't an issue and we had a cure I squandered trying to eradicate black. There is definitely some luck and randomness to the game, but thats what makes the game fun in my opinion. I know we can't wait to play again, tomorrow night I get to see how the gaming group likes it.

I unfortunately forgot my camera and this AAR is from last week. I had to stop penning it due to work and tried to finish it out tonight. Some of the details are a bit hazy at this point. Good news is i am playing another one tomorrow in my gaming room so I should have pictures with that.

Operation Crusader AAR
Todd and I decided to try the Operation Crusader scenario, we figured it would play fast and we were eager to give an all vehicle scenario a try. I took the Germans and he the Brits. Initial placement had both of us grabbing our country specific objects to start gathering command.

Turn 1 – Initiative Brits
The Brits made a quick dash with their Matilda’s and got behind the cover of the small buildings on the left edge of the map but also grabbed the neutral objective there. I elected to move my Panzer III’s up the other edge of the map but couldn’t reach the objective, I was able to find some good ground to cover this edge and the center of the map.
His Crusaders then made the move up the right side and middle, securing another 1 point neutral objective and in prized position to gain the neutral 2 objective. My final play was to move my Panzer IV’s up the left edge and position them so that if those Matti’s stuck their nose out I would blast them.
Reinforcements arrived at turns end and the Brits were concentrating on that left edge so I positioned to counter.

Turn 2 - Initiative Brits
The Crusader in the middle of the map moves into the Dunes capturing the last command point. From this point on I will never have initiative or will I capture anymore command. He fired his Crusader at one of my Panzer III’s on the right map edge and lightly damages my tank. I return fire with the lightly damaged tank first and the second Panzer III the results of both attacks leave his Crusader heavily damaged.
He captures the 2 point neutral command token near the Dunes but I’ve brought a Panzer IV and a Panzer III to bare on this tank but don’t manage to score any hits. The rest of his reserves make there way up the left edge and I reply in kind. The left edge and Center of the Map is Tank Heavy next turn the fire fight is going to begin.
We get our final reserves on this turn and they will move up next turn to join the fray.

Turn 3 - Initiative Brits
The Brits have pretty much ignored the right side of the map, he has 2 Crusaders there and is moving up a Matilda to strengthen his units. I’m only covering this area with 3 Panzer III’s, two of which are behind some light cover and the other is exposed. He fires bottom of his Crusaders at my lightly damaged tank and only manages to heavily damage it. I return fire on this side with both of my tanks and manage to tank out one of his tanks. His Matilda moves up and next turn will have his choice of prime targets. Still not wanting to make a move on the left edge he moves a Crusader to support the lone tank on the Dunes.
I fire with my last tank on the right edge and manage to lightly wound the crusader. I decide for my next action to fire my IV at one of the Tanks on the Dunes and again manage a light damage. Some positioning is done along the left edge but no one has made a move yet.

Turn 4 - Initiative Brits (Germany 1 – Brits 0)
His Matilda on the right side manages to finish off my damaged Panzer III but his Crusader missed. I return fire with both my P3’s on his Matti and manage to heavily damage it. He finally makes a move on the left and brings 2 Crusader around the building to fire on my P4 and P3 trained at the Dunes, neither shot hits. I still want to clear the Dunes so I don’t return fire on the newly exposed Crusaders and concentrate on those tanks and miss.
His other Matti’s roll out of the other side of the building, one shot and heavily damages a Panzer 3. Again I regret forgetting my camera but the left edge of the map is now a mishmash of cross fire. He has 4 tanks trained on my 2 tanks covering the dunes. We each have 2 tanks squared off on the other side of the building and each of us a 3rd coming up to support.

Turn 5 - Initiative Brits (Germany 1 – Brits 1)
The Brits 2 tanks on the Dunes open fire again on my PII and IV who have been opposing them and both miss. I switch back to the right side destroy the Matilda and heavily damage the Crusader. The right side is pretty much mine at this point although he manages to lightly damage one of my tanks.
Back to the left two more shots at my exposed Panzer III results in the loss of that tank. I open fire on the left side of the building and manage no hits. His 3 tanks on the left side fire and manage to down a Panzer IV.

Turn 6 - Initiative Brits (Germany 2 – Brits 3)
The Brits have so much command he can pretty much play any card in his hand. He plays one that allows him to interrupt my move and another that gives him 4 actions on a turn. He plays 4 actions right out of the gate. The results are a heavily damaged Panzer III on the right side of the board. A lightly damages Panzer III and Panzer IV on the left side. He then interrupts my move and manages to lightly damage another PIV.
Things aren’t looking good at this point, all but one of my tanks is damaged at this point. I am down in VP and there are two turns left. I take a shot on the left edge with a III on a Crusader and manage to kill it with a single shot. This was to me the turning point of the game. My Panzer III and IV who have been covering the Dunes also shoot well and I manage to take down another Matilda and heavily damage his support. Over on the right I manage to kill his heavily damaged tank.

Turn 7 - - Initiative Brits (Germany 5 – Brits 3)
Turn seven turns into a lot of missed. He does finish off my heavily damaged Panzer to close the score. But it is going to require some good shooting in Turn 8 for the Brits to pull this out.

Turn 8 - Initiative Brits (Germany 5 – Brits 4)
Once again the card is used to give him 4 actions, it’s pretty much all out attack. All of my tanks are damaged at this point but none are heavily damaged. Of his remaining Tanks he has 2 heavily damaged tanks. The trend for the Brits this game has been miserable die rolling and it continues, he scores zero hits with any of his tanks this round. I manage to take down another one of his.

Final Score: Germany 9VP British 4VP
I’ll be honest even though I won I didn’t care much for this scenario. It certainly plays fast and is an excellent introduction to using Tanks in the TOI game. But it has a real Death match feel to it, putting Tanks in Op fire is pretty much pointless unless you manage to grab a big early lead and your opponent is forced to move into your LOS.

Preview 4 is up and this time it is on the OverLords. I've finally pre-ordered this game.

This is going to be a crazy week for my real life job, I'm still going to try and get some good content on the blog though. I've got 2 AAR's and a review for Days of the Fox they just need to be polished up a bit. I should have an Out of the Box post on Pandemic and I've got something cooking in the video arena in the near future.

I've gotten only a handful of entries, none of which I have looked at yet other then to verify they were legit. So if you want a chance at winning this game see the contest link on the right.

Next months contest won't involve any art skills I've learned my lesson.

Some of you may have noticed that I switched to an actual domain name. The old blogspot address will still work and there may be some issue resolving the DNS for the next day or two.

The new one is www.oldboardgamers.com

Road to Legend preview #3 is up this time covering towns. I hate Fantasy Flight with a passion as I will be buying this game, I should just get a job their it would be cheaper. Speaking of my future employer news has broke that they have hooked up as a publishing partner with Games Workshop. Which means they will pick up the printing of Talisman and future expansion for it.

Got to play the Operation Crusader scenarios for Days of the Fox last night and I am penning an AAR of it, forgot the camera though so no pictures.

Days of Wonder publishers of Ticket to Ride, Pirates Cove and another favorite of mine Battlelore has been very quiet lately. Many are wondering whats going on with Battlelore and what new products they might be releasing. Well today the dropped a press release and unfortunately it doesn't cover any of that information, it does however tell us that they are raising their prices across the board. My advice if you are in the market for any of their games hit the online retailers before this takes effect in full.

I've order a new game called Pandemic and I hope to have that by next week and I'm also waiting on the release of Key Largo. So hopefully lots of reviews coming up.

Finally I submitted my review of Commanders: Attacked of the Genos to GameShark and that should drop next week unless Bill Abner hates it, then he just comes to my house and hits me.

The next preview for the Road to Legend the upcoming expansion for the game Decent has been posted at FFG's site. Curse them and their previews I'm pre-ordering it right now.

The above title could be used to describe my work week but it is also the first scenario in the Days of the Fox expansion that I played last night. I will post a full AAR sometime soon with photos. Also planning on playing again Thursday night to get a few scenarios in so I can write a review.

I really like the way Days plays compared to the original TOI scenarios. Desert warfare is wide open and cover is pretty much non existent at least in the Hellfire Pass scenario. As the Brits you only start with 2 tanks and then receive reinforcements each round. The goal is to take out two 88's which are positioned on two hillsides behind an entrenched German squad. Before I had even made a move I lost one of my Tanks it was crazy and fun.

In other news I am working on a review of The Genos game I mentioned last week for Gameshark. It's a blatant Advance Wars rip off but it is fun, I've yet to get in a multi player match which I need to do for the review so if anyone is interested let me know.

According to a report at BoardGame News whose link you can find to the right the game Wits & Wagers is coming to live. The game is a trivia type game with a twist and i can see how it would translate well onto Live. I'm not a big fan of it myself but it will certainly entertain a lot of people.

I also read at Kotaku that Magic the Gathering is coming to Live as well. Not many details on that at this point but I like the trend that I am seeing on Live.

I received a few emails as to my thoughts on Gencon filing for Chapter 11. I really don't know enough about the situation at this point to comment, I'm glad that GenCon Indy isn't canceled this year but it doesn't bode well for the future of the hobby that the biggest convention might be no more. It's also another reason for me to hate George Lucas beside the new trilogy, although to be fair if Gencon LLC did what the suit claims then they are scum.

Hmm I guess I did have some thoughts after all.

Finally I have gotten 2 whole entires for the banner contest, so if you're on the fence your chances are good. I've decided not to look at them until judging time so i am not swayed. It's nice to see traffic increase on the blog as well so thanks to all the new readers.

So I had a chance to sit down and open up DOTF yesterday and snap a whole bunch of pictures. You can see all of them if you go to my Flickr page, otherwise enjoy some here. This isn't a review of the expansion that will come after I have had a chance to play at least 2 or 3 scenarios. This is simply an OOTB impressions post.



The game comes with a 19 page rule book although only 6 of those pages contain rules. The rest are the 6 included scenarios.

A full compliment of British figures (76 in all) which is highlighted by the Matilda II and Crusader tanks plus the Bren Gun Carries and QF 6 pounder anti-tank guns.



I should also note that the British squad bases had no issues, i was able to pop in the figs without any problems, unlike the original game where many people had to take drill bits to the bases to widen the holes.

12 German figures consisting of Panzer III and Panther Tanks plus the famed German 88mm AT gun.

You also get 4 American MI 57mm AT guns as well.

Two new unit reference sheets which felt a little flimsy but I didn't have my original TOI opened to compare so this may just be my imagination.

9 new Map overlay pieces consisting of Desert terrain as would be expected. These look and feel phenomenal just like the original games boards.

14 map overlays including new Terrain overlays for Dirt Roads, Crevasses and Dunes to name a few.

55 new cards including some new decks such as Desert Tactics and German Air Support.

Of course you get all the standard chits you would need for the British which I won't bother to detail out here. There are 3 new Specialization Tokens called Recon, Alpha and Bravo. You can read about those in an older post or wait for my review.

On the whole everything was at Fantasy Flights high standards when it comes to components. Surprisingly all the Tanks and all of the individual figures were in perfect shape out of the bag.



The 88 guns however where bent to hell. Some such as the one in this picture probably unfix able as it feels like it is ready to snap already.

Anyway I will be playing one scenario tonight and I hope to be able to review it sometime in the next week or so.

A preview is up on FFG's site about the upcoming expansion to Descent which is one of my favorite games.

I'm very interested in this expansion as it adds a campaign option to the mix. Whether I will be able to muster up a group to play this regularly enough to justify purchasing this expansion is another question altogether. Anyway the preview covers some of the cool new features and is worth the read.

I spent the afternoon shooting pictures of the Days of the Fox expansion so I hope to have something up tomorrow about that.

I'm going to be away for my day job for the next 2 days so I won't be posting much, it kills me of course because Days of the Fox arrived today. I'm also seeing a lot more traffic thanks to a few friends promoting my contest.

I continue to be impressed by Sins each time I play it, I'm still a turn based guy at heart but I really like the pacing of it. When I get back this weekend I will do an "out of the box" for Days and hopefully have some more information for you on a board game I got to play test recently.

I was just strolling over at Bioware's site and saw this, it will probably hit all the major news sites if it hasn't already.

It's obvious that most Bioware titles that are 360 "exclusive" aren't really the case. Had I know about this I had plenty of 360 games and I would have waited for this on the PC.

I completely forgot to mention that Commanders: Attack of the Genos an Xbox Live arcade game hits this week. This is a turn based strategy game that is aimed at all levels of players. While I'm not expecting anything as engrossing as Catan or Carcassone I'm still in support of any games that have board game qualities. For those who don't know both Talisman and Blood Bowl are expected to make Live appearances this year.

Here is the deal I need a banner image. See that lovely templatized image sitting behind my blogs name? I think it should be more representative of a board gaming site. So if you're interested in trying to win a copy of Sins of the Solar Empire here is your chance.

All you need to do is click on the email link in the upper right and send me an email. Title it Sins Contest and then either attach or link to your submission. You can enter as many times as you want.

The winner will get a copy of the game and full credit on my blog for the use of the image.

The image needs to be a jpeg and the size is 740 x 150. The contest will run until the end of the month. I'll probably post soem finalists then make a decision so by entering you're giving me express permission to feature your images on the blog whether you win or not.

For those of you without artistic talent like myself don't worry I will be having more contests in the future.

I managed to break the tip of my left pointer finger yesterday when the lid of my washing machine decided to slam down on it. A lesson was learned however and that is don't help out with the laundry.

So I am typing without the use of that important finger since I am a speed two digit typist. I didn't have a chance to do any board gaming this week which is a big let down. Missed my normal Thursday night group and couldn't swing the weekend session either. Hopefully the TOI expansion will arrive this week and I also place an order for some other items.

I'll be posting the details of the Sins contest a little later today.

Occasionally I will discuss something other then board gaming because the bottom line is I'm a gamer. Many have tried to rid me of this passion but no one has succeeded yet. I own a 360, PS3, 6 PC's, PSP, DS (soon to be cobalt black one as well), Wi and about a dozen other platforms that no longer see any AC coming their way. My motto has always been "Gamers go where the Games are" I'm not a fan of any console just good games. I've dogged the PS3 for the better part of a year but it still delivered one of the top 10 gaming experiences of my lifetime with Drake's Fortune.

So along comes Sins of the Solar Empire by Stardock which has been described as a cross between Home World meets Civilization. That's a pretty fair comparison in my initial days with the game. Sins on the surface could be mistaken for you run of the mill RTS but it's not even close. I need to come clean I am not a fan of RTS games I can count on one hand the number of RTS games that have seen extended play from me. In case your curious those would be Total Annihilation, Age of Mythology, Rise of Nations, Company of Heroes and that's about it.

Sins has the potential to be the next one on that list, there is just so much depth to this game it is hard to phantom at times. To give you an idea of how over whelming this game can be let me give you my thoughts 10 seconds after starting my first game. "What the Hell should I do first"

It certainly wasn't through lack of information that I arrived at that thought. There were four decent tutorials to take me through Logistics, Interface and numerous other skills and information I would need to get going. It wasn't from a clear cut idea of what I needed to do, the goal is simple dominate the stars.

I sat there staring at my screen letting the seconds click because I couldn't figure out what my little empire should do because there were so many choices. Develop my planet, create construction frigates, set up mining facilities on the nearby asteroids, get a ship yard up and going to create a fleet, put planetary structures in place, perhaps start my way to controlling the black market.

As I sat there I kept thinking to myself the clock is ticking, lets get those frigates up and going. Lets get some defenses going tick, tick tick... I need metal for my fleet get mining set up on that asteroid tick, tick, tick...

As my minions went about doing my bidding without the babysitting required by your typical RTS I waited and waited for the inevitable rush to occur. You know what I mean it happens in almost all RTS game, hell it happens in Civ IV and thats possibly the best turn based game ever made. Before you're ready, because you haven't followed the formula for success the AI is scouting or worse attacking you.

In case you're wondering there it is, my problem with RTS games in general. Many of them are suppose to feel grand in scale, AOE you're colonizing the new world. Nothing kills the illusion of such a grand design as an instant rush by elephants while your still chopping trees to build animal pens.

In Sins I waited and I waited and it never came. That's not to say that contact didn't occur because it most certainly did. However I felt in control, I felt like I knew my empire and what was going on. I had a plan, my little cruiser and frigates were doing what I told them to do and better yet they were doing what needed to be done at times without me telling them. My solar empire was living, breathing on it's own and I was sitting in a throne room on my planet with a smile.

Will Sins make it to my top 5 list of RTS games, time will tell but so far I am enjoying the ride. I read this somewhere and it was a simple quote but spot on. "Sins has that one more turn feeling except there are no turns"

I doubt I will do a full review of this game, that's not my blogs purpose but I am going to give you a chance to win a copy of the game. I'll be announcing a contest over the weekend which will give you a chance to start your own empire.

Considering the current traffic to my site your chances should be good.

Well news today out of Fantasy Flight that they will be releasing a game based on the Sci-Fi channel series BattleStar Gallatica. Here is a brief blur from the press release:

Battlestar Galactica: The Board Game will be a semi-cooperative game, in which players work together to solve problems confronting the fleet, ranging from mechanical to political issues, all the while remaining vigilant for Cylon attacks. However, suspicion clouds the ship and its crew, as one or more players may indeed be a Cylon!

You can find the whole release here.

Lara Crigger has posted a review of a new version of Risk coming out over at GWJ. I haven't played Risk in a very long time but this seems a bit interesting and the packing looks cool too.

The Tide of Iron expansion should also be on shelves here in the U.S. in the next few weeks. It's already out in Italy and the UK, once i have my grubby little hands on it I will get something up very quickly.

I mentioned Through the Ages a few weeks back, apparently it is out but going to be very hard to find. They did a limited print run and if you didn't pre-order I think you will be SOL.

Once upon a time back in the early 80's when Dungeon and Dragon's was hitting one of it's many peaks of popularity there were a slew of fantasy themed board games released. The first edition of Talisman was published by Games Workshop in 1983 and it was a fun little title which has gathered somewhat of a loyal following. Fast forward to 2007 and a company called Black Industries has published the 4th Edition of the game. Interestingly Black Industries recently announced that they were getting out of the game publishing business to concentrate on publishing books, what this means for the future of Talisman expansions or even a 5th edition is anyones guess at this point.

What You Get
The game comes in a nice package which has tray insert for the many cards you will find. Their is one 6-Fold Playing Board, 14 Character Cards and card board pieces, 104 Adventure Cards, 24 Spell & Purchase Cards, 4 Talisman Cards, 4 Toad Cards and 4 Alignment Change Cards.

Also included is a nice easy to read Rules Book, which once again has no index a pet peeve of mine but these rules are so short it hardly matters. Six 6-Sided Dice and a load of Plastic counter for Craft, Strength, Life tracking and Gold-Colored Coins.

The art work is very nicely done in the game and everything is in full color. I found the card stock to be a little on the cheap side, just getting the shrink wrap off caused some slight damage to the cards. The tray in the box while nice is not large enough to hold the 104 adventure cards securely. It was also common during our play sessions for the card board figures to come out of their plastic bases.

How does it Play
Talisman is a game that plays itself by that I mean it is pretty much card driven. You will refer to the rules for combat and a few other items on your very first play but by the time you're 15 minutes in the game will flow very nicely.

The board is set up into 3 regions those being Outer, Middle and Inner. the goal of the game is simple reach the Crown of Command in the inner region and then kill off the other players. The only time a player is really eliminated from the game is when a character is in the inner region so while PvP combat will occur in the outter regions to try and get an item from another character it will not allow you to win the game.

A turn is simple you roll the dice to move if you're in the Outter or Middle regions. You must move your fill die roll but you can go in either direction. Each location on the board has instruction for example the Woods might have you draw an adventure card, the Crags might cause you to get lost and lose a turn, the Village offers a Mystic, Alchemist and Healer each with different results.

The main component of the game our the adventure cards that you draw. You might draw something simple like a bag of gold which gets you a coin. You might draw a location like the cave which stays on the board in that spot and causes the player to roll a die and use one of it's result. You will also encounter creatures from the very fantasy themes Dragons, Ghost and Demons to the mundane like the wild Boar or Lion. Defeating these creatures is key to game as you keep their cards as trophies which you can then trade in in multiple of 7 to increase your attributes.

There are 3 attributes in the game they are strength, craft and life. Increasing these very high is a key to the game because to get past 2 spots on the board in the inner region is going to require a high score in at least strength or craft.

Combat is either physical which is strength based or physic which is craft based. So encounter a Lion with a 3 strength uses physical combat and encounter a Demon with 5 Craft uses Physic. Combat is pretty simple you roll a die and add your appropriate attribute to the result and someone rolls for the creature. If you roll higher you kill the creature, a tie is a stand off and if you roll lower you lose a single life and combat does not continue. The creature stays on the spot for someone else to come in an pick off on future turns.

That pretty much sums up the entire game play. You move, read and react as I said the game plays itself. The problem with the game is while fun, people can tend to linger in the outter and middle regions to long. First time players get caught up in visiting the location on the board which have die roll results and seldom look for encounters when in fact defeating monsters and trading in their cards for increase attributes is what you need to do.

Is it Worth It
That's a tough question to answer and it depends on your gaming style. Talisman is not so much a game you play every week or month, although gamers with children might find more frequent play, but one you play a few times a year.

It's a game you experience more then play and if you like that style then Talisman is worth every penny. For me it's a valuable addition to my collection.

Score on the D10: 6

FFG (what you say? why yes i am a fan boy) has posted the rules for the Tide of Iron Expansion Days of the Fox.

Click Here

An interesting article on the new terrain and some of the new strategy decks included in the expansion. The more I read the more I think this expansion is going to be a must buy for TOI fans.

Well the holidays are over and some news is just now finding its way to my door step. First for BattleLore fans wondering what direction the game was heading in you can check out this news from Days of wonder.

Tide of Iron fans the much anticipated (by me anyway) Days of the Fox expansion should be here in a month or so. You can check out a small article on the inclusion of Anti Tank guns on FFG's site.

Got a chance last night to see but not play production version of Through the Ages and the RRT expansion Rails of Europe.

I've seen Rails before as the prototype had been played at our gaming group, but it was nice to see it in the final production box. Through the Ages looks right up my alley, I glanced at the rules and it looks great. Unfortunately they were starting a game very late and I didn't have time to sit in on it.

Anyway the word I got is if all goes well expect to see both on shelves in about a month.

Last night I played a miniatures game call Wings of fire which is WW2 air combat. I think we had 12 people playing so it pretty much ate up my whole night. I'll just say that while I love miniature gaming something about the pace was just off last night.

I should have some review up shortly of Dust, Hannibal and Tannhäuser.

If you're into board gaming their is a very good chance you're going to be playing a game or two that is not published currently in the United States. It's not uncommon for many gamers to import (or trade) for overseas titles and then find translations of the rules on Board Game Geek.

Fortunately for you Jetzt schlägt's 13 is not a game you're ever going to need a rules translation for. According to BGG the title transl;ates in English to "That takes the biscuit" but I've heard other translations as well.

So what is Jetzt schlägt's 13? It's a card game for 2-5 players (I wouldn't play it with less then 3 players) that takes about 30 minutes to play. It's got elements of blackjack in it's theme so there is the random / luck factor, It also has a fair share of strategy for such a simple game. What Jetzt schlägt's 13 really is however is one of the best games I have played this year.

The way the game is played is very simple, the start player draws a number of cards face down equal to the number of players. He then turns over one of them and elects who to give the card to. Each player will receive one of the cards and place the card face up in front of him or herself from left to right. The order is important so make sure that players are following this procedure. Once each player has a card including the dealer, the next player will repeat the process until someone gets 13 and busts. Once a player busts the rest of the players take their scoring cards, I'll go over cards in a minute, and put them in their score pile and the start player cards passes to the next player on the left. It is entirely possible for every other player to gain victory points in a round, the only person who is guaranteed none is the player who busts.

So how do you track the score in each round and victory points? well lets take a look at the cards themselves.

The game has several types of cards and until I get some images posted you can see a shot of all of them here.

You have your base card which have a blue background and those cards come in 3 varieties. Each blue card will have a numerical value at the top, this number is what is used to calculate your round score to bust. In the picture I link to you can see blue cards with the numerical values zero through three, the values go up to five however.

In addition to this numerical value each card may posses one or two plus signs. These plus signs are victory points and if you end a round without busting any cards in your hand with these plus signs go into your scoring pile. The final blue card will have an image of a card depicted below the numerical value. When you give this card to a player they must immediately draw another card off the deck (not the dealers hand) and add it to their face up hand. You can and often will draw multiple cards of this type and you must continue to draw cards of the deck.

Another type of card is the immediate scoring card, these two green cards come with either one or two plus signs. These cards do not go into your face up hand, they are immediately put in your victory point pile. This makes them very valuable as the are guaranteed victory points.

The final cards are the special cards and they have a yellow background and there are three of them. The first gives you the ability to increase your hand limit for the current round to 18. The second card is depicted as a hand and is the refusal card and is very powerful. Once you're given one of these it sits in your hand and you can refuse a card given to you and then discard the refusal card. It is possible to have multiple refusal cards in your hand for the round. The final card is depicted as a U-turn and if you give it to someone they must discard the last card they put face up, you finally see why the order of left to right is important.

As I previously stated you play a round, someone busts and everyone puts victory point cards in their victory point pile (face down) and the start player passes to the left. The game ends when you get through the deck, if you reach the end of the deck and your in the middle of a hand simply reshuffle the discard pile and finish out the round.

Jetzt schlägt's 13 is a game literally anyone can pick up, plays fast and is one you can break out at a dinner / holiday party and get the casual gamers in on. I highly recommend it if you can find a copy.

Bill Abner a fellow gamer for life has posted his review of Age of Empires 3. Personally I am in the small minority of people who don't like the game. But Bill does a great job covering the mechanics. So go give it a read.

This year I have made a promise to myself to update this blog at least once a week if not more and really try to make it a place to visit for board gaming news. I'm going to start this off by posting a review of a slew of games on Jan 1st.