Paul: What is this?! Why, it’s the Shut Up & Sit Down Podcast! At last, you can enjoy SU&SD while shelling crabs, or during an exceptionally banal bout of lovemaking. As our chat bubbles (and meanders) like a mountain stream, we touch on some of our viewer responses, beautiful hexagons, a dream about plants, some … Read more
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Paul: What is this?! Why, it’s the Shut Up & Sit Down Podcast! And it’s also available right here. At last, you can enjoy SU&SD while shelling crabs, or during an exceptionally banal bout of lovemaking.
As our chat bubbles (and meanders) like a mountain stream, we touch on games we haven’t reviewed yet (and why), some of our viewer responses, beautiful hexagons and a dream about plants. But we also cover games! Lots of them. Topics of discussion include
Rex,
Mage Knight,
Runebound,
Alien Frontiers,
Race for the Galaxy,
A Game of Thrones,
Dixit,
The Castles of Burgundy,
Galaxy Trucker,
Kingdom Builder,
Arkham Horror,
Carcassonne,
Skull and Roses,
which I misunderstood the rules for, Sneaks & Snitches,
Shadow Hunters and some of our recent experiences with birds.
We’re between episodes right now, and also up to our necks in all sorts of business, be it our jobs or Mr. Smith’s trouble with his internet connection, but we also wanted to try something a little different. Do tell us what you think of the podcast idea and, who knows, perhaps this could be the start of something exciting.
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We’re trying a new format! Sometimes Paul and I don’t have time to assemble a true, riotous review, but we are always playing new games, our bodies like a pair of unreliable steam engines powered by a smouldering pile of cardstock. So how about this: a quick’n’dirty roundup of the best games we tried last month.
Click on through, then, for some impressions of Star Trek: Fleet Captains, German hit Thurn & Taxis and the talking-tastic Baron Munchhausen. But were we actually impressed? Well!
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April 20, 2012 Reviews, Specials The Walking Dead: The Board Game, Catacombs, Belfort, Cyclades Thabwam! That’s the noise of another half-hour of board game review goodness landing in your world like a bit of glittering space junk. You’re very welcome. In this episode, the boys are going to be on REAL LIFE TELEVISION! They’re just … Read more
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Quinns: Listen up, ladies. Fiasco: A Game of Powerful Ambition & Poor Impulse Control (which you can buy from that same link) is very much outside the realm of what we usually cover. It’s a two hour table game, but it has no cards, cardboard, winners or losers. It has almost no rules. But despite that, it’s perhaps the best game you’ve never even conceived of.
All you’re paying for here is a very thin, very affordable book. And with this book, you and some of your friends are going to roleplay your evening away. And you’ll laugh like garbage disposal units doing it.
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Quinns: CAPITALISM! It’s what’s for dinner.
Paul: It’s what’s for dessert, surely, especially if it’s about excess. The Mines of Zavandor is just the kind of cash-clutching economy management we can put all of our pasty weight behind. That’s because it treats running a business
with the same giddy lack of dignity as J.K. Rowling gave to the arcane.
The Dwarf king is dead. Two to four players control Dwarf clans attending his interminable funeral procession, winding through an entire mountain. Yet what you’re doing isn’t mourning, but receiving gems from back home and using them to buy, buy, BUY at the many auctions of useful or decorative tat you’re passing by. That’s because at the end of the procession (game) the richest clan is the new king (winner)!
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March 19, 2012 Reviews, Specials Cold War: CIA vs KGB, Chess, Stronghold, A Few Acres of Snow, Memoir ’44, Jungle Speed, Memoir ’44: Operation Overlord THE FINEST (and only) board game review show going has, for episode two of season two, turned its wet, wide, child-like eyes towards two player games! Four of them! And … Read more
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In Kingsburg, players are Lords sent from the King to administer frontier territories.
The game takes place over five years, a total of 20 turns. In every year, there are 3 production seasons for collecting resources, building structures, and training troops. Every fourth turn is the winter, in which all the players must fight an invading army. Each player must face the invaders, so this is not a cooperative game.
The resources to build structures and train troops are collected by influencing the advisers in the King’s Council. Players place their influence dice on members of the Council. The player with the lowest influence dice sum will be the first one to choose where to spend his/her influence; this acts as a way of balancing poor dice rolling. Even with a very unlucky roll, a clever player can still come out from the Council with a good number of resources and/or soldiers.
Each adviser on the King’s Council will award different resources or allocate soldiers, victory points, and other advantages to the player who was able to influence him/her for the current turn.
At the end of five years, the player who best developed his assigned territory and most pleased the King through the Council is the winner.
Many alternate strategies are possible to win: will you go for the military way, disregarding economic and prestige buildings, or will you aim to complete the big Cathedral to please the King? Will you use the Merchant’s Guild to gain more influence in the Council, or will you go for balanced development?
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Paul: So, you know that Merchants & Marauders game we looked at a couple of weeks back? Well, we didn’t. I was desperate to get my pirate paws on it and Quinns went ahead and played it without me. You know why? His excuse was that I was ill.
That’s not an excuse, that’s just exploiting a good man’s sickness. I could’ve been dying, and there he was, laughing over a game that I could only grasp at in my most moribund of visions.
Kingsburg, then!
Here’s a review of both my first and my favourite dice-placement game, and Quinns isn’t allowed anywhere near it. Come with me, readers, as I take you on a right regal journey around its royal court.
Phantom Leader places you in command of a US Air Force or US Navy Tactical Fighter squadron in Vietnam between 1964 and 1972. You must not only destroy the targets but you must also balance the delicate political repercussions of your attacks. If you strike too hard, your air offensive might be put on hold, strike too light, and you’ll be blamed for losing the war.
Welcome to the Vietnam Air War!
Each of the campaigns can be played with either an Air Force or Navy squadron. The targets assigned to each service are different and change the complexion of the campaigns. Each campaign can be played with three different durations of: Skirmish, Conflict, or War.
Each mission takes roughly 30 minutes to set-up, plan, and resolve.
Each of your pilots has their own skills. Selecting the right pilots and weapons for a mission is vital to its success. As you fly missions, your pilots will gain experience and fatigue. With experience, their skills improve, but as their fatigue increases, their skills decrease and they might not be able to fly for several missions.
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