I’m always interested in the history of the Knights Templar and I remember seeing a prototype of this game at Essen a few years ago.  Players send their knights in missions so they can gain money and relics.  A mission if successful if enough knights are sent and these can come from a mix of players, so there’s some possible collaboration.

Players can then buy and sell at the markets and events happen.  After this, players can send their relics to different locations to put them on display; however, transporting anything takes money and is safer if escorted by knights.  Of course, there are various enemies that may attack locations too, so players must allocate their knights and resources carefully.

Towards the end of the game, the persecution of the Knights Templar begins and players must try to rescue their relics and try to get them to their havens.  When the persecution starts, players can only use money where it is currently located too (whereas, up until then, a player can move their money freely between their bases).  The winner is the player with the most victory points scored during the game, plus points for relics, knights and cash in their havens when the game ends.

I love the setting and the game mechanics sound interesting too.  I definitely want to try this one.  More information and the rules can be found on Stratelibri’s Mystery of the Templars page: bga.me/templars

James.

Fairly soon I will be taking a holiday and visiting a place I’ve wanted to see for some years now: Gettysburg.  (I became interested in the US Civil War after watching the amazing Ken Burns documentary many years ago.)  So, why do I tell you this?  I always like the idea of playing boardgames at the location of the game itself.  If you’ve read this blog for a while, you’ll know I played Alhambra at the real Alhambra (which prompted a friend to play Carcassonne at Carcassonne).

US CIVIL WAR GAMES
It would be great to play a US Civil War game whilst at one of the battlefields but I’m having trouble finding something appropriate.  (I have Guns of Gettysburg but it doesn’t suit solo play at all).  So, can you recommend a good solo-playing US Civil War game?  (or one that plays okay solo even if not designed to)

US GAME SHOPS
Any suggestions of good games shops in Salt Lake City or Denver? (especially ones with games nights to play games at) would be greatly appreciated too.

Any suggestions, greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

James.

Rockwell is a mining game which mixes a little bit of worker placement (as you place your vice presidents at the start of each round to gain different advantages in the drilling phase) with tactical moving of your drilling crews.  Drilling is a often a joint effort by multiple players – if there are enough drilling crews of enough total strength on a tile then the resources recovered are revealed and shared between the players present (regardless of the amount of crews they have there).

Splitting the resources gained is intriguing as the players involved share out as much as they can so they have the same and any remainder is given to the player with the ‘priority’.  Players can move other players’ crews by bribing them, or they can pay to hire temporary crews (who don’t take a share of any gains).  Players can sell what they mine and buy other resources like improved drilling crews, permanent mine shafts and safety equipment.  Each player is attempting to complete some of the achievements which score fewer victory points if other players have already completed them too.

So, Rockwell looks like it contains a lot of interesting tactical decisions along with some strategy too.  More information and the rules can be found on Sit Down’s Rockwell page: bga.me/rockwell

James.

Rampage is a dexterity game of giant Godzilla-like monsters smashing their way through a city.  Each player controls a monster which consists of a wooden disk for feet, with a wooden body/head section on top.  The city is divided into different neighbourhoods and buildings are built out of card layers with meeple as the supports between floors.

That may sound kind of normal but the game actually based on flicking, dropping and blowing.  Each turn, monsters get 2 actions.  To move your monster, you flick the feet disc.  To attack buildings, take your monster piece and drop it onto a building.  To blow a building down, place your chin on your monster piece and blow.  To throw a vehicle, place the vehicle piece on top of your monster and flick it.  Players get to eat any loose meeple in their current  neighbourhood.  Also, monsters can attack each other too – a successful attack removes one of their teeth which reduces how many meeple a monster can eat during a turn and are worth points too.

Each monster has a special ability as well as some other  powers.  Each player has a monster screen behind which they hide the meeple and monster teeth they gain, but rather than simply place items here (because that would be far too normal), players push items through the mouth slot in the screen.  Nice.

Rampage looks totally made a lot of fun.  More information and the rules can be found on Repos’ Rampage page: bga.me/rampage

James.

Spyrium caught my attention from the gameplay description.  It was only after that that I discovered it is designed by the creator of Caylus and Caylus Magna Carta (the latter being one of me favourite games).  So, this doubly interested me.

The game has steampunk-ish setting and players are each head of an industrial conglomerate an spyrium is a mineral high in energy.  The player who scores the most victory points (VPs) by the end of the game wins.

Spyrium uses a clever worker placement system where players place their workers in between buildings which are laid out in a 3×3 grid.  Players take turns either placing or activating a worker; however, once a player starts activating their workers, they can’t place any more during the current round, so you have to choose when to switch from one to the other.

Activating a worker allows the player to use one of the two cards that the worker is positioned between, so you have a choice until you use them.  The cards in the 3×3 grid are either characters (which give you one off benefits), buildings (which allow you to build your own buildings used for special effects in future turns), and patents (which give you on-going abilities plus score VPs at the end of the game too).

Using a card by activating one of your workers next to it costs money equal to the cost of the card being used plus the number of workers (of any player) that are positioned next that building.  So, placing your workers can hinder others, give you a choice of uses, and the order you use them in can make a difference too.  Workers can generate money too which is also based on how many other workers (of all players) are next to the same building. Read the rest of this entry »

Armadöra is a new game by Blackrock Editions who published The Boss in 2011 and Blackrock City in 2012. The Boss is one of my favourite games as it has a superb information revealing/deduction game mechanic, fits a lot of game into a short play time, and fits a lot of game into a very small box. Blackrock City was quite different in gameplay and was good too, (although not as good as The Boss in my eyes).

Armadöra appears to be a re-themed version of a game called Nuggets where players are trying to stake claims on gold mines. Various mines are on the board and players take turns either (a) placing their markers face-down (which have different strengths) on any empty board square, or (b) placing 2 fences between squares on the board. When an area is completely sectioned off by fences (so long as it’s large enough), the players’ markers in the area are revealed and the player with the most strength receives the gold for any mines in that section.

Armadöra has a fantasy adventure theme (with players after Dwarves’ gold) and has some extra rules for an advanced version. Sounds simple, fun with plenty of tricky decisions and entertaining tension. Read the rest of this entry »

Relic Runners looks like a nice light game of jungle/temple exploration.  It’s a race to grab as many victory points (VPs) as possible.  During the game, players place markers along jungle paths.  When a player moves, they can move along one continuous stretch of their own colour pathways (any distance), plus one section that is not their own as the first or last section of their move.  When a player reaches the end of their move, they can spend a ration to explore their location which means they can pick up a ruin tile or temple tile.

Most jungle paths have a marker next to them.  When a player passes any path markers that are face-up during their move, they turn them face-down and can advance their toolbox markers on their player board  These toolbox markers can be used at any time for the power/ability on which they are located – there are three separate columns they can advance up and the higher up the column, the better the power/ability.  Players can have multiple toolboxes on the same columns, and even the same spaces, if they want.

I like the sound of the toolbox markers as players can build up the different powers they want (a bit like a simple tech tree).  Also, I like the movement logic and the rush to grab the different tiles too.  Relic Runners sounds like a relatively light and fun game (I expect along the lines of Ticket To Ride). Read the rest of this entry »

Days of Honor (Czas Honoru) is an asymmetric,  2-player card game set in WWII.  Players are the Polish and Germans who are trying to recover pieces of V2 rockets that have been tested.  This is based on real historical events when the Polish managed to find pieces and send them to Britain which gave them valuable information about this new weapon.

The game is played over 4 rounds.  At the start of each round, players draw 5 more cards and they then continue to take turns until both players pass in succession.  The player with the most rocket fragments at the end is the winner (unless one player has a unit in the enemy’s home zone and there is no opposing unit there – which means they win regardless of rocket fragments).

On a player’s turn, they get to either play a card from their hand into their Home zone, or they can activate a card already on the table (usually exhausting it for the current round), or they can play an action card.  Some cards are units which can move around the 3 zones as well as attack and perform other actions; and other cards are special actions and events.  As well as their action each turn, players can also play some cards with immediate effects too. Read the rest of this entry »

Expedition: Northwest Passage looks like a very interesting game.  Players each have a ship, a sled and some crew and are trying to explore the unknown, find the Northwest Passage and return back to Greenland (from where they start).  Players score victory points (VPs) for finding the Northwest Passage, returning to Greenland, and for finding evidence of the (real-life) expedition that disappeared in a previous attempt.

Two key things make this task tricky.  First, the landscape of land and sea is only revealed by the players placing tiles as they cross into the unknown territory.  Second, and more unusually, the position of the sun (which moves predictably each round) makes a massive difference because any tiles that are north of the sun’s position are frozen – this means ship’s on frozen tiles can not move across the frozen sea, but sleds can.  Of course, you need to be careful not to trap your sled on the frozen sea when it melts too or it will be lost. Read the rest of this entry »

I really like the game Kolejka which is about queuing in 1980’s Poland – in fact, it’s one of my favourite games as it’s a superb game, plus it has a great theme and is actually educational about the real situation that occurred in Poland too.  Like Kolejka, The Outcast Heroes is a game with the backing of the Polish Institute of National Remembrance; however, it is by a different designer and publisher.

The Outcast Heroes is a semi co-op card game about the soldiers that continued to fight Soviet influence after WWII.  Players send their soldiers on missions – placing soldiers in different roles of the mission give different benefits/abilities.  The missions are assessed based on the soldiers sent and the order cards assigned to them.  One or two players may be working for the Government (so are traitors) and will have their own objectives and want the mission to fail.  The player who is the commander decides whether to assess a mission each round, or wait until later so that adds some uncertainty/tension.  It seems the main gameplay is about jostling for position so you can achieve your objectives – especially as some positions in the mission can only be occupied by one soldier at any one time.  You also need to manage your hand, allocate your soldiers, and get good cards.

For more info, you can read the rules of the game which are on the game’s BGG page.

James.