Spiel: Boardgaming in the UK

I played 18 different titles in April, of which 14 were new to me. The new games were: Antics, A La Carte, Lord of the Rings: Sauron, 51st State, Texas Roll ‘Em, Junta: Viva el Presidente, Chronicle, Strasbourg, El Paso, Artus, aBRIDGEd, Mondo, Municipium and The Boss. Those played before were Holiday AG, Mijnlieff, London and Through the Ages.

And the best new game I played was Strasbourg, another excellent design by Stefan Feld that went down really well with the Shrewsbury Boardgames Club.

My unplayed list is now down to 10 although it will go up again this week due to a Gameslore order. On the way are Alien Frontiers, Biblios, Lemming Mafia, Mijnlieff and Pergamon.

Alien Frontiers
Boardgame for 2-4 players, ages 13+
Playing time approximately 60 minutes.
Published by Clever Mojo Games, designed by Tory Niemann

FaceEater
Card game for 2-6 players, ages 12+
Playing time approximately 15 minutes.
Published by Variant Media LLC, designed by JonMcClure

King of Tokyo
Boardgame for 2-6 players, ages 8+
Playing time approximately 30 minutes.
Published by IELLO, designed by Richard Garfield

Biblios
Card game for 2-4 players, ages 10+
Playing time approximately 30 minutes.
Published by IELLO, designed by Steve Finn

Croa
Boardgame for 2-4 players, ages 6+
Playing time approximately 30 minutes.
Published by IELLO, designed by Igor Polouchine

Snag
Party game for 2-4 players, ages 8+
Playing time approximately 20 minutes.
Published by Blue Panther, designed by David E Whitcher

The Speicherstadt
Boardgame for 2-5 players, ages 8+
Playing time approximately 45 minutes.
Published by Z-Man Games, designed by Stefan Feld

Pergamon
Boardgame for 2-4 players, ages 10+
Playing time approximately 45 minutes.
Published by Eggertspiele/Gryphon Games, designed by Stefan Dorra & Ralf zur Linde

Strasbourg
Boardgame for 3-5 players, ages 12+
Playing time approximately 60 – 90 minutes.
Published by Pegasus Spiele, designed by Stefan Feld

Lords of Scotland
Card game for 2-5 players, ages 12+
Playing time approximately 35 minutes.
Published by Z-Man Games, designed by Richard James

Just a reminder that my latest batch of games up for sale on eBay are due to end tomorrow afternoon. Many of them have not yet received a bid so bargains galore are up for grabs.

Full details are here.

Lord of the Rings – The Card Game
Living card game core set for 1-2 players, ages 13+
Playing time approximately 60 minutes.
Published by Fantasy Flight Games, designed by Nate French

Power Struggle
Boardgame for 2-5 players, ages 12+
Playing time approximately 90 minutes.
Published by Z-Man Games, designed by Bauldric & friends

Battles of Westeros: Tribes of the Vale
Expansion to Battles of Westeros for 2 players, ages 13+
Playing time approximately 60 minutes.
Published by Fantasy Flight Games, designed by Robert A Kouba

Catan Dice Game
Dice game for 1-4 players, ages 7+
Playing time approximately 15 minutes.
Published by Mayfair Games, designed by Klaus Teuber

Dwarf King’s Hold: Dead Rising
Boardgame for 2 players, ages 10+
Playing time approximately 45 minutes.
Published by Mantic Games, designed by Jake Thornton

With this site having been down for most of the week, I’ve not had chance to let you know that I have another batch of games for sale on Ebay, ending this coming Thursday.

This batch of 32 games includes some great two player Kosmos games, Babel and Avalon, sports games including the beautifully produced Wicketz and the unique Tennis Masters, some devious strategy games like Heart of Africa and Big Deal, and some rarer games like David Watts’ Winchester and Alan Moon’s Im Schatten des Sonnenkonigs. Full details are here.

You may have noticed that the site has been down most of the time this week. My web hosting service, Web Mania, seem to have lost the ability to be contacted, or at least respond to emails, phone calls etc. If it persists, I may be looking to change providers so anyone who has a good experience with a UK web host, please let me know.

It is also strange that the problem seems only to affect this site whereas my other site, which is also hosted by Web Mania, has not had any problems.

Baycon 2011 will be held at the Exeter Court Hotel, Kennford, from 1.00pm Thursday 28th April to 3.00pm Monday 2nd May 2011 (the weekend after Easter). Kennford is situated approximately 5 miles south of Exeter on the main A38 (at the first junction following the end of the M5 motorway, and signposted Kennford Services). There is ample free parking in the hotel car park. More information can be found here.

Letters from Whitechapel
Boardgame for 2-6 players, ages 14+
Playing time approximately 150 minutes.
Published by Nexus Games, designed by Gabriele Mari & Gianluca Santopietro

Bugs & Co.
Memory game for 2-8 players, ages 8+
Playing time approximately 5 minutes.
Published by Asmodee, designed by Bruno Faidutti, Thomas Vuarchex & Pierrick Yakovenko

Skull & Roses
Card game for 3-6 players, ages 10+
Playing time approximately 45 minutes.
Published by Asmodee, designed by Hervé Marly

Magnifico
Boardgame for 3-5 players, ages 14+
Playing time approximately 90 minutes.
Published by Fantasy Flight Games, designed by Spartaco Albertarelli & Angelo Zucca

Pastiche
Boardgame for 2-4 players, ages 10+
Playing time approximately 40 minutes.
Published by Gryphon Games, designed by Sean D. MacDonald

Magestorm
Boardgame for 2 players, ages 13+
Playing time approximately 60 minutes.
Published by Nexus Games, designed by Piero Cioni

The Heavens of Olympus
Boardgame for 3-5 players, ages 13+
Playing time approximately 60 minutes.
Published by Rio Grande Games, designed by Mike Compton

Saboteur 2
Expansion to Saboteur card game for 3-12 players, ages 10+
Playing time approximately 30 minutes.
Published by Z-Man Games, designed by Frederic Moyersoen

I had a good time at this year’s Telford Mini-Con. The venue was excellent with plenty of space and just a few yards from Shifnal High Street. Although I wimped out after nearly 8 hours gaming, I enjoyed some good company with Mark K, John Roach and another guy who I’m embarrassed to have already forgotten the name of. Sorry! That said, I was also struggling to remember one of the games we played.. maybe dementia is setting in.

So, what did we play? We started off with a game of 51st State, an engine building game that I’d passed on at Essen last year. I quite enjoyed it although it did go on a little too long for my taste (2 player may turn out better). We all expected John, who was the only one of us to have played before, to romp this and he seemed to surge out to a hefty lead. However, Mark K had a couple of very good turns at the end and caught him to win on the tie-break.

We then tried Texas Roll ‘Em, a Liar’s Dice variant that Mark K has been bringing to the Shrewsbury club for a few weeks to try, unsuccessfully. I think we all liked the way it played but there was a big issue in that, if one of the last two players managed to win a sizeable pot, it didn’t matter if they then played to lose their remaining dice as the winner is the one with the most chips rather than the last dice. My Liverpudlian / Wirral Tottenham Fan won this one after scooping a nice pot just towards the end.

Mark K and I then went and grabbed something to eat while the other two played Jambo. To fill in time, I then taught Mark Mijnlieff, a really clever Noughts-and-Crosses type game, where the piece you play dictates where your opponent can play their next piece. Over in 5 -10 minutes, I scraped a win here.

Next, the four of us tried London, a Martin Wallace design that I’ve tried once two-player and really enjoyed. Mark K hadn’t played before but the other two were obviously veterans. This ended up extremely close and I’d expected to lose out as I’d kept my city very tight (just five cards) whereas the vets were both up to about nine cards in theirs. However, even though I was unable to repay one loan, I’d got enough VP’s through running my city which, when added to my boroughs and card VPs, gave me a single point victory.

My final game, and my one purchase of the day, was Junta: Viva El Presidente, a dice version of the backstabbing original boardgame. Verdict, it’s not as good as the original but it is a lot shorter and, now knowing what the spread of action cards is, it could be an interesting 45 minute filler. I was never in this, having lost my first turn battle against the President (because the git only offered me a paltry 1 million pesos bribe) and then having been attacked on my next turn. After one change of President, Mark K remained in charge for the rest of the game but the other two both amassed the game-ending 5 VPs on the same turn and John had the most money left to break the tie.

And that was when I decided to leave. The others went on to a three player game of At The Gates of Loyang. None of us won anything on the raffle but it was still a great day. Many thanks to Paul and Co. at Gameslore for organising the day – it was a big success from my point of view and the venue was great. Let’s make sure there’s another one in 2012.