Tag: DC deck building game

It’s the GAMA Trade Show 2019!

Hey everybody!
It’s the GAMA Trade Show, and as I have done in the past, I’ll be keeping an eye on the proceedings to see what we’ve got to look forward to in the coming weeks and months!

First up, it’s none other than Games Workshop, who have just updated their community site with a first look at the next expansion for Kill Team – Elites. I mean, of course they have – not to be too proud of myself, or whatever, but I saw this coming a good while ago…

We’re getting all manner of delights here, from terminators (as we can see on the cover) to Drukhari Grotesques! It was almost prescient of me, then, to have just bought a pair of these delights!

For all my cynicism of expanding the game like this, I am actually looking forward to seeing how it continues to grow – the danger, of course, being that it will soon turn into just low-point 40k if it isn’t careful. But so long as we continue to get intelligent choices with reasonable rules behind them, why not, right? Just let me take Lychguard now!

I suppose this also answers the question, where has the Thousand Sons faction box been?

Along with a Kal Jerico model for Necromunda, we’re also getting a Halfling team for Blood Bowl, with promises of more announcements to come in the next couple of days!

…let’s see what else is on offer!!

Next generation of the DC Deck Building Game, with the Rebirth branding? Very cool. Not sure about the more board-gamey aspect with moving cardboard chits around – it is supposed to be a deck building game, after all – but linked campaign scenarios and character progression do sound like they should be a lot of fun. Gonna keep my eye on this one!

You know, I’d forgotten about the two Fortune & Glory expansions until reviewing last year’s GAMA blog, but now that I’ve had my memory jogged, I really feel the need to have them in my life! It feels like Shadows of Brimstone has taken over Flying Frog, and with the third kickstarter for this game currently ongoing, I have to wonder if they have their sights set anywhere near the more traditional games manufacturing route. Not that I’m trying to be bitter or anything, but I do miss their games like Fortune & Glory, and A Touch of Evil. Last year, they were in the middle of making sure the Forbidden Fortress SOBS game was shipped in time, pushing the FANG expansions back to the first quarter of 2019. Well, we’ll just have to wait patiently for something not weird-west related to arrive, I guess!

GAMA day two has arrived, and my goodness, how exciting is this:

Traitor Command, the next Blackstone Fortress expansion, gives us a Traitor Commissar and a Chaos Ogryn, both of whom look delightful gentlemen – and will have 40k rules, to boot! Awesome! Forging alliances with unlikely friends sounds interesting, too…

I’ve said it before, of course, but I really love how GW are using Blackstone Fortress to explore these weird and wonderful bits of the 40k universe. The Commissar in particular looks like a stunning chap, I’m really looking forward to snapping these up when they’re out!

Warcry, the skirmish game set in the AoS universe and first teased a few months back now, has finally been shown off to be really quite the interesting game! Pitting different Chaos warbands against one another, at first it sounded like it might be a bit too exclusive – I mean, what about us Death players, right? But whether Chaos is just the first wave or not, it’s difficult to not be enamoured with at least one of these factions, particularly the cute looking devil-bats! I like it, which I’m a bit sorry about, as I feel like it might well become another juggernaut like Kill Team, and I’m not sure my bank balance can cope with that!

I really like the look of those pit-fighters with the welding masks, they remind me of Haemonculus Covens creations among the Drukhari, and I’m sure plenty of us will be using them for Grotesque conversions as these things move along. The scenery looks pretty amazing, too!

Not sure, of course, but this could tie in with the rumours of Warriors of Chaos/Slaves to Darkness getting an overhaul soon. I suppose we’ll see!

At any rate, that appears to be that! Plenty to look forward to from Games Workshop, who appear to have taken over with their exciting announcements of new stuff! Nothing from FFG, though the distributor Asmodee has announced a deal with Cool Mini Or Not, which may bring those incredible games to the masses (personally I try to avoid CMON as I find it difficult to resist them!)

It almost feels like the landscape of boardgame news has changed, and the big trade shows are no longer that important for getting a picture of what’s coming up next. Even the big daddy of them all, GenCon, hasn’t been that explosive for the last year or two. Is it a result of Kickstarter seemingly taking over the world of boardgame production? Speaking from an entirely personal perspective, it seems like the companies I used to watch – FFG in particular here – just aren’t knocking it out of the park anymore, with nothing really overwhelming me with its excitement. Meanwhile, established companies like Cryptozoic and Flying Frog Productions seem to be using Kickstarter more like their business model than not, and it’s leading to an over-saturation of stuff. Shadows of Brimstone has been a case in point here – when that stuff eventually found its way to me, it was like receiving 5+ years’ worth of expansion material in one hit, and I’m not sure I want that from a board game. Has our modern sense of impatience and always wanting the next thing caught up with us, to the point where we suddenly need everything for a game right now? All of these companies using Kickstarter to distribute games, and somewhat by necessity producing almost an entire game’s run in one go just to ensure the crowdfunding, seems to have led to a point where they just don’t have anything new to announce, because we had it all in one hit a year or two ago.

Makes me wonder what GAMA 2020 will have in store for us…

Game stuff ahoy!

Hey everybody!
I’ve been missing out on a lot of new game stuff coming out over the last few days and weeks, so following the news about new 40k yesterday, it’s time to get caught up!

Magic the Gathering Commander

So first of all, we’ve got Commander 2017 coming on 25 August. August? I always thought these things came out later in the year! Well, anyway, Bank Holiday weekend will no doubt be full of digesting all of that stuff. Four new pre-constructed decks coming, based along a tribal theme rather than the usual colour-based design, I’m excited for this for a number of reasons. First of all, getting four will be cheaper than five, and since the C16 decks have sold out so quickly and I’ve missed out on at least the Atraxa one, I’m planning to buy all of them this time around just in case. Secondly, I love tribal stuff, so I’m sure there will be a lot here that I’ll enjoy. Definitely looking forward to seeing what’s going on here!

The Commander Anthology is of course coming out in June, and that’s something else that I’m feeling the need to pick up before it becomes impossible to find a Kaalia deck once again.

We also know the name of the next set after Hour of Devastation: Ixalan! It has that vaguely Mesoamerican sound to it that came through from the “leaked” packaging a while back, though with a different name. Hopefully it’ll still have that sort of aesthetic and will be wonderful, anyway!

Iconic Masters will apparently be a thing, but crucially the Reserved List is going to remain unviolated and intact. While I’m a huge proponent of allowing people to play the game rather than supporting people who want to hoard the components of a game and not use them for their intended purpose, I’ve recently changed my mind and have come to appreciate the fact that having a Reserved List adds a depth to the game that elevates it above its competitors.

And, I don’t think I want to actually play with cards like Kukemssa Pirates, Tracker or Boris Devilboon. I’m sure there are plenty of more interesting cards on the list (dual lands, anyone?) but by and large, I’m actually content to have the new stream of cards coming out.

Legend of the Five Rings

Let’s move over to FFG now, and their Legend of the Five Rings LCG!

Another famous CCG from back in the day, L5R is being reimagined as a LCG from Fantasy Flight and is due out at the end of the year. It looks like a really interesting game, a bit of a cross between A Game of Thrones and, well, Magic. I’ve noticed that I’ve been buying fewer actual games lately, partly because I’m saving up to buy a house, but also I’ve been throwing a lot of money at Magic singles. L5R looks like it should be a good experience, so I’m actually looking to get this thing and see what it’s all about!

We’ve got the next deluxe expansion for Arkham Horror LCG, while we’re on the subject of the living card games now, The Path to Carcosa. I mean, first of all this expansion has already been spoiled on the internet by a European game shop (I believe), so I suppose it’s about right for them to show it off here before too much thunder has been stolen.

I’ve not actually been delving too much into Arkham Horror LCG since I first played through the core set at Christmas, but I’ve picked up a couple of the expansions that have come out since, so really should get back into this game. It seems to have been really popular locally, and the boardgamegeek forums are lighting up daily with threads, so a part of me is slightly concerned that it might actually overtake Lord of the Rings LCG soon, because –

The final Saga expansion for Lord of the Rings LCG has finally been announced, and it looks splendid! We’ve got two scenarios that follow Frodo and Sam through the spires of Cirith Ungol and to the fires of Mount Doom, with the third depicting the clash on the Pelennor Fields. I am really excited to see this box, even might get me playing through the entire Saga at last!!

Ever since The Black Riders was announced, there have been rumblings about the future of Lord of the Rings LCG, with an almost consensus being that the game would lose a lot of momentum once we dump the Ring into Mount Doom. I’m hopeful that FFG will have room for two co-op LCGs in their stable but, given that they have previously cancelled one LCG in order to start up another (Warhammer Invasion for Warhammer Conquest, for example). If Lord of the Rings hasn’t got anything further to offer once we’ve been to The Mountain of Fire, and it will be retired in favour of Arkham Horror.

As much as I would love to see more content for years to come, and as much as I’m concerned that we might not see this happen, I’m sure my wallet will be relieved to have one less game to pick up each month!

Runewars Miniatures Game

Runewars has been released, and while I haven’t actually dropped the £80 on a core set, I have actually been tempted by that Rune Golem model. It does actually look pretty decent, though, and I’m concerned that my resolve will waver if I walk into my local store and it’s still on offer there! But the fact that I don’t know anyone who has even expressed a passing interest in the game has managed to keep me away from it for the time being. Maybe at some time I’ll see if I can get a demo in, and see what it’s all about.

FFG have already announced the Latari Elves expansion for the game, which I find funny, so I might actually be tempted to get it if they bring the Uthuk Y’llan out and they also look as good. For now, I’m resisting, though!

DC deck building game Rogues

It’s been a while since we’ve had anything new come out for the DC deck-building game, but finally the next Crossover pack is apparently out and available, so it’ll be time to try and sniff that one out soon enough. We’ve also got the artwork for the next Crossover pack, Birds of Prey. The Multiverse Box has recently had another preview over on the Cryptozoic website, showing some of the new content that will be coming out in the box, which is really exciting! Anything that just adds depth to the game is always welcome by me, anyway! Looks like there are elements from the Crisis packs being ported over into the more standard game, which I like, so I’m excited to pick that up, anyway!

More DC!

Following on from the Rivals blog I posted earlier, I just wanted to mention some of the other stuff we’ve slowly been seeing that will be coming out for the game in the next few months. It was the New York Toy Fair last week, which is usually the first event of the year to start showcasing new games, and always worth checking out Twitter to see what’s on the horizon from your favourite publishers!

So let’s start with this bad boy! Looks like a big box version of the Rivals game, with four iconic pairings of heroes and villains! We’ve got Superman vs Lex Luthor, Wonder Woman vs Circe, Aquaman vs Orm, and Zatanna vs Felix Faust, it seems! Bit sad that there’s no Flash in here, vs either Zoom or Captain Cold, but this box looks like it releases in Q4, so maybe there’s still time for a standalone box? I’m kidding myself, I know…

Long before that, however, we’re getting a massive storage box for all of the current content, as well as room for future expansions. It’s not just a big box, though, as there’s a Crossover Pack inside that utilises cards from across the entire range of the deck-building game, which sounds like it should be pretty great! At a really good price, it’s going to be a must-buy for anyone who enjoys the game!

We’ve also got two more Crossover Packs due out imminently – Birds of Prey (which you can see at the bottom here) and The Rogues, which allows you to play as some of the iconic Flash villains!

I had been hoping that we’d be seeing another big box expansion for the game by now, but it looks like the above Confrontations could well be it. I’m not exactly disappointed, but I had been hoping for something… else. At any rate, I think it’s just great to be getting new stuff for the game, in general. It’s been quiet for a long time on the DC DBG front now, probably not helped by the Rebirth stuff going on within the comic book world itself – have you noticed all of these preview images have the new DC logo on them? New 52 is now old news, it seems! Perfect timing for that new big box, then!

Rivals!

Hey everybody!
It’s time for another game day blog here at spalanz.com, and what else could I possibly feature during DC week than the DC Comics Deck-Building Game from Cryptozoic?!

DC Rivals Batman vs The Joker

Today, I thought I’d take a look at the standalone expansion released back in 2014, the first in the Rivals subseries, showcasing Batman vs The Joker. It’s a rivalry that’s almost as old as comic book superherodom itself, after all, so probably the best way to kick off what seems to be a new set of small scale expansions to the DC line.

The game plays almost exactly like the main game and its tie-ins, with a new set of starter cards and main deck cards all centred around Batman and his arch-nemesis. These cards can be used within any of the main games, so you can either view this expansion as a nice source for new cards to shake up your games, or keep it separate as a stand-alone experience. What’s more, the main deck also comes with a number of super powers and equipment that are specific to the Joker, meaning you could slip these into Forever Evil and keep the theme alive there!

Where this game is really different is the Confrontation step. Rather than starting the game with your oversized Super Hero card, which grants a static ability each round, each player has three oversized cards, for Batman and The Joker, respectively. If you have amassed enough power to do so, at the very start of your turn, you can announce a Confrontation against your opponent. This is basically you attacking your opponent as if they were the Super Villain, as each oversized card has a health value in the lower-right corner – 9, 12 or 15. Once you defeat your opponent, the topmost card is discarded, granting a different ability thereafter, until the third card is defeated, whereupon that player loses the game.

DC Rivals Batman vs The Joker

It’s a really fun variant to the DC deck-building formula, and I love the fact that Cryptozoic are supporting the game like this rather than trying to somehow put together the pieces out of existing cards. That we also get new cards for the main deck is also very cool. While there were initial plans for a Rivals 2 box to coincide with Batman vs Superman, that seems to have gone by the wayside, and we’re left without much news (as of the time of writing) about the future of Rivals. Will we ever get Superman vs Lex Luthor? Or Flash vs Zoom? Who knows. 2016 seemed a bit sparse for the deck-building game, considering there were two huge movies for the DC extended universe, with more announced for the future. Maybe 2017 will see some more exciting developments to come!

Teen Titans

It’s Tuesday, which can only mean one thing – it’s game day! Today it’s the turn of another expansion to the DC deck-building game – it’s time for Teen Titans!

DC Teen Titans

This expansion came out at the end of last year, shortly before the third Crossover Pack, Legion of Super Heroes, so I’ll be taking these games together. Let’s do this!

I’ve already covered several of the previous incarnations of the DC deck-building game, and Teen Titans isn’t all that different. This is the fourth “base game”, in effect, coming with all of the basic cards you need to play the deck-building game, of which I must admit, I haven’t always been that much of a fan, but playing this one, I think I’m getting to a place where I can appreciate the theme that comes through from having the Punch, Kick, Weakness and Vulnerability cards have set-specific art. Plus, having a set of boxes like this on the shelf is nice!

DC Teen Titans

Teen Titans brings, unsurprisingly, the Teen Titans to the game, along with another Starfire (who originally appeared as the promo hero in Heroes Unite), who I guess is more thematically fitting here. There are some nice abilities that are somewhat similar to the grown-up versions of these superheroes, such as Superboy’s affinity for super powers, Kid Flash and drawing cards, etc. That was kinda nice. Overall, there is a sense of increased player interactivity, which is really nice – something that was missing from the base game, in my opinion.

However, there’s one really big change to the rules, however: Ongoing!

DC Teen Titans

This basically allows you to have cards out in front of you – cards other than Locations, that is – and plan something of a strategy there. Of course, the Ongoing cards aren’t exactly game-breaking in and of themselves, as they predominantly allow you to discard them to re-draw in the hope of getting something better from your deck. Naturally, there are synergies among the other main deck cards, such as the above Cybernetic Enhancement that gives you +1 Power for each Ongoing card out. It’s certainly an interesting mechanic, anyway, and just underwhelming enough that it isn’t entirely broken. It would be interesting to see what happens with it next, if anything. It’s a little unfortunate that these things tend to be just one-box wonders, but who knows what Crisis Pack 4 will bring?

Onwards!

DC Teen Titans

Continuing with the teenage-superhero theme, Cryptozoic also released the third Crossover Pack last month, Legion of Super-Heroes! The time-travelling team from the 31st century come to the DC deck-building game along with fourteen main-deck cards, and their own set of eight super-villains. And of course, their own special mechanic: Time Travel!

DC Teen Titans

I’m not going to lie, I actually got pretty confused by this rule. Let me explain.

Time Travel lets you discard a card from your hand, and play a card from the main deck that has the Time Travel special rule as if it were in your hand. You can’t buy the card that turn, but you can certainly use it. The super heroes all have some kind of interaction with this, such as Lightning Lad, above, who gives any card in the line-up Time Travel if you play a villain card as your first play. Now, that part is fair enough, right? However, the super-villains really just confused me. None of them have First Appearance – Attack abilities, but instead are arrayed from lowest-cost to highest-cost. Each of them also has a Time Travel ability that, I guess, allows you to use their Attack ability if you want to mess with your opponents without defeating them. But I don’t quite see why you would want to do that, because the object of the game is to defeat the super-villains. Hm.

These two are really nice and solid additions to the line of DC deck-building game stuff, and if you have enjoyed any of that stuff already released, you should definitely look into getting these, also. Fans of either superhero group will obviously be insta-attracted to them, and probably have them already, but either way, definitely worth a look!

Check out my other DC blogs:
DC deck-building game & Heroes Unite
Crisis Pack One
Forever Evil

Why I like deck-building games so much

It’s time for something a little different for game day here at spalanz.com today! While I normally showcase something awesome from my game collection, today I thought I’d just talk more about what seems to be the largest-represented subtheme of games that I have, the deck-building game, and why I like them so much.

Dominion, of course, is the grandfather of the deck-builders, and has a whole slew of expansions. First released in 2008, it ignited the spark that brought us so many more since. However, precisely because of the developments that have taken place in board games over these past seven years, I find Dominion to be quite a dry experience today, with its generic medieval-themed cards and its basic mechanics of buying as many cards as you can to win. There’s more to it than that, of course, and I won’t deny, managing to set up those killer-combos can be a lot of fun, but I eventually sold my Dominion collection earlier in the summer, as it had become a game that merely took up too much shelf-space.

Thunderstone (2009) immediately began to shake things up. Following the basic idea of having a set of cards that you can buy from, the game included a separate action that felt so much more like an actual game, where you went into a dungeon to fight some monsters. This is where the deck-building game really takes flight for me. While Dominion’s premise was to build a deck as the end result of your game, Thunderstone combined deck-building with an actual game to simple yet highly effective ends. Fans of Dominion will recognise the village as the usual card pool, but while in the older game, you bought cards which would allow you to buy more cards, and the goal was all about trying to refine your turn and maximise your resources, here you buy cards to actually do something with them. You hire warriors and buy equipment to outfit them better to fight the monsters.

There’s something about Thunderstone that remains highly appealing to me, and it’s a game that I continue to enjoy the more I play it. It’s the idea of deck-building for a reason that is so enjoyable for me.

Ascension (2010) is a curious blend of the two, I find. The biggest departure from both is that the “village” idea of a collection of cards you always get to choose from has now been replaced by a centre row of just six cards. This combines the idea of buying cards to refine your deck, as well as elements of the dungeon from Thunderstone, so that heroes and monsters can both emerge from the main deck. I think Ascension is my favourite type of deck-building game, and it’s also one of my favourites for the theme, also. It’s a fairly generic fantasy-style world, but the theme of each faction you can recruit really comes through very strongly. The best thing about this, however, is the variety that comes from having an ever-changing line-up of six cards. No two games will necessarily be the same, while Thunderstone has the potential if you use the same set-up (though the monsters will change as you go through, of course). Of the three games mentioned so far, Ascension wins hands-down for its variety!

I play most of my Ascension through the app, which is actually pretty awesome as well, and definitely worth downloading.

Rune Age (2011) is a curious mix from Fantasy Flight Games. It’s a little bit like a pared-down Thunderstone, with just a few cards on offer to buy rather than the whole village. It also uses an event deck, which can be both beneficial and harmful. The greatest departure here, of course, is that you start out in a specific faction, and build up your deck from there. The object of the game varies with each event deck in play, and the result is almost like a third way for deck-building games. I love this game for so many reasons, chiefly among them of course is the setting of Terrinoth. However, while there is so much to enjoy right out of the box, it’s unfortunately starting to get a little stale for me now, as so much of any deck-builder is dependent on the different ways you can build your deck. For Rune Age, that depends on the faction you play, and also the event deck you use, and with only six of each to choose from, it has become clear that more variety is needed! But when it’s been a while between plays, it’s always a real pleasure to come back to this one.

DC Deck Building Game (2012) is almost a straight copy of Ascension, featuring a main deck and centre line-up of six cards, where you recruit heroes and fight villains. However, there’s an added element that makes it a little more exciting, but the theme is perhaps the greatest draw here. You get to play as classic DC superheroes, and fight the arch-nemeses such as the Joker and Lex Luthor. The design isn’t particularly ground-breaking, but the execution is really great, leading to a fairly straightforward, yet super-fun game. While the base game may be a pared-down Ascension with a superhero theme, subsequent expansions have introduced several different keywords that alter play a lot, while the Crisis expansions have really served to deliver a really interesting game experience. Importantly, Cryptozoic have used the game engine for several other deck-building games, that are all compatible with each other – Street Fighter, Naruto Shippuden, and Lord of the Rings to date!

Marvel Legendary (2012) continues the superhero theme, and has been one of the break-out games from the deck-building genre of recent years. Of course, the runaway success of Marvel movies no doubt has a part to play here, but the game is actually really, really great, more than justifying its success. It plays very much like two games of Ascension happening at the same time – or more accurately, a game of Ascension where the heroes and the villains have been separated out, so you have two decks that are spewing cards each turn. However, we’re very much back to deck-building with a purpose here, as the villains are being led by a Mastermind, who is trying to get his scheme to go off. The object of the game is always roughly the same – defeat the villains and the mastermind – but the addition of schemes means they always play a little differently. Subsequent expansions have succeeded in both appeasing the fanboy need for more superheroes and also enriching the game experience.

Marvel Legendary is definitely the deck-building genre grown up.

So what is it about these games? Why do I have so many, and why do I keep coming back to them?

Well, first of all, I love variety. I could have the same game in several different themes, and love them all equally. I love card games such as the LCGs from Fantasy Flight and the recently-discovered Magic, and deck-building is obviously a highly intrinsic part of such games. I’ve said it before that, for me, the best part of Android: Netrunner is the deck-building, as you try to put together the perfect deck that should, in theory, run like clockwork. Getting to make a game out of building a deck just sounds so cool, and the fact that it actually is cool is just the icing on the cake, really. In a game like Ascension or DC, you get to choose the cards you want to buy not because they’ll be worth a lot in the end (though that is certainly a strategy you could go with), but because they’ll allow you to do much more. It’s always fun to see people around the table start with the same basic cards, but end up building entirely different decks as they attempt to go about their strategies.

I said at the beginning that I’m not the biggest fan of Dominion any more, but I’m certainly more than grateful to it for having provided the basis for so many of my favourite games!

Catching Up!

It’s been a while since I’ve seen a good documentary, although my Sky planner is full of the things. I’ve decided to try and catch up with a lot of the stuff I’ve been recording, anyway, starting with this two-part series on the Incas. I was always very interested in the Incas, the Aztecs and all that sort of Pre-Columbian, meso- and south-American history when I was growing up, but somewhere in my late teens I seemed to lose interest.

While Machu Picchu is probably the most famous Inca relic, this documentary has introduced all sorts of other sites that look absolutely incredible, principally among them (to me), the Moray agricultural terraces shown in my tweet above. Designed to facilitate crop cultivation at high altitude, it’s another of the really humbling scientific innovations of the past!

I’ve decided to sleeve my entire Lord of the Rings LCG collection, a project that has been going on fitfully this past week, but is sufficiently mindless to occupy my while catching up with these things. I think I’ve used around 30 packs, which has allowed me to sleeve four decks, along with pretty much all of the scenarios released to date – not counting print-on-demand or Saga stuff. It’s a demanding task, but hopefully will be worthwhile in the end! Lord of the Rings, I’ve recently realised, is my most-played card game, and I’m concerned that the player cards might not hold up much longer. As it is also my most-beloved card game as well, it’s time to make some effort to protect it against wear and tear, methinks!

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Time to relax #StarWars #novels

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Over the last few weeks, I’ve been enjoying a return to some classic Star Wars with The New Rebellion, one of my all-time favourite stories from the Bantam era! Published in 1996, the story details the efforts of the Force-sensitive Kueller to set himself up as a new Emperor. Some of the story is a little, well, daft, with occasionally unclear motivations for the characters, but overall, it still stands up for me. I really enjoy the way the story is paced – it’s a big book, 532 pages in paperback, and has pretty much exactly the right amount of story within its pages. This could so easily have been padded out to form a trilogy, which would probably have diminished its impact, I would say. Lots of plots, lots of intrigue, and lots of subterfuge, with Han returning to his smuggling roots, Luke doing some Jedi stuff, and Leia going up against former Imperial senators. Even the droids have a significant part to play in the plot! Really good stuff.

Only a couple of things really detract from it. First of all, the chapters are fairly short, and a significant number of them end on cliffhanger-style “tune in next week to see if Han survives being shot in the ass” sorts of things, which kinda gets old after a while. Also, the title kinda bothers me. While “rebellion” is defined as armed resistance to the established order, within the context of the GFFA, “rebellion” conjures a different sort of sense to that which is portrayed in the novel. We see very little of Kueller and his forces until the very end, which is kind of necessary for the plot, but this means the novel is primarily one of intrigue and subterfuge – the sort of novel that I really, really enjoy, but it just feels like the title is a bit misleading.

But that’s all pretty secondary. The novel is great, and if you can still manage to find a copy, I can definitely recommend you pick it up!

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#StudioGhibli #awesome

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Last week, I read this excellent post from fellow blogger, travelling in my bookcase, which reignited my interest in Studio Ghibli. I was first introduced to these anime films back in 2008 by an ex-girlfriend, with the classic Spirited Away, and really enjoyed the everything about it. We watched a couple of others, which I also enjoyed, and while I had often thought of getting some of them to watch again since we broke up, it wasn’t until now that I did anything about it. Having had an amazon voucher burning a hole in my pocket for about three months now, I hope you’ll agree, I’ve made a sound investment with it!

In the coming weeks and months, anyway, I’m sure these will be featured as I get through them!

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#PathfinderACG #Pathfinder #DrunkenMaster

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Games now. Last week I finally got round to getting a copy of the new Wrath of the Righteous core set for the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game, having had the character pack and adventure pack two delivered from my Paizo subscription. While I haven’t actually played a game with it yet, I have found myself returning to the Rise of the Runelords game, playing with Sajan, my drunken master Monk, which has been pretty good anyway! I’m still only playing through Burnt Offerings, so there’s still a long way to go, but it’s good to be within this universe once again, though the card game can be quite repetitive so I’m not intending to play this a lot. But I have made up a new deck using the Wizard class deck, for the necromancer, Darago. Looking forward to seeing how that works with the adventure! The class decks are pretty exciting, anyway, so it’s good to see they’re going to be putting some more out this year – including that for the Monk!

Since watching the new Titansgrave series from Geek and Sundry, combined with the recent focus on the Pathfinder ACG, I’ve been feeling the need for a RPG adventure in my life. Soon, hopefully!

On the subject of card games, though, FFG has released a couple of expansions for the LCGs in the last week, and taken another look at the upcoming Great Devourer for the Warhammer Conquest LCG. The Tyranids were always going to be fun to play, and the previews for this box definitely support that idea. Of course, I’m still looking forward to the Necrons more than anything, but it looks great all the same. Some guys have recently started a LCG group at my local store – after that demo of Android Netrunner I gave, no less! – so I’m hoping to get in some more games there.

The Thousand Young expansion for Call of Cthulhu is another deluxe expansion that’s looking pretty exciting, as does Attack Run for Star Wars, the latter bringing a brand new Fate card that looks really powerful! I’ve recently made up a Sith deck for this game, in the hope that some more games aren’t too far off. We’ll see, anyway!

Remember this? It was set to be released in June, I seem to remember, but that seems to have been pushed back to next month now, I suppose in reflection of the Marvel comics being delayed, too. I haven’t kept up with the comics in years, but the Secret Wars storyline does sound vaguely interesting. Beware of following that link if you want to avoid spoilers for the comics, however!!

What’s that Volume 1 all about, on the lower-right? Hmmm!

I haven’t played Legendary for a long while now – not since February, in fact – so should probably make some effort to correct that soon… I’ve finally found the new Fear Itself expansion to Legendary: Villains on sale here in the UK, so looking forward to seeing that when it arrives in my hot little hands… I seem to recall reading somewhere Iron Man will be a commander in his enchanted armour…

While we’re on the subject of comics-based games…

DC Teen Titans

The fourth core set for the DC deck-building game, Teen Titans brings, well, the Teen Titans to the game, with playable heroes such as Red Robin, Wonder Girl and Beast Boy. Man, I love these names! The most interesting aspect of this one is the Ongoing Abilities that certain cards will have. Something that very few deck-builders incorporate (as far as I can tell), it’ll be interesting to see how the game plays when you have more options available to you on your turn. It’s coming out next quarter, along with another Crossover Pack with the Arrow TV series. I’ve not watched the series, unfortunately, but I believe it’s awesome. However, this pack uses stills from the show rather than comic-style art, so I’m currently thinking I’ll pass on this one. Later in the year, we’re getting Legion of Super Heroes with some time-travel mechanic, and then a Watchmen Crossover Pack, presumably before the end of the year, which gives a co-op with defector flavour to the game. Interesting…

Forever Evil!

DC Forever Evil

Hey folks! Happy Game Day!

Yes, it’s Tuesday, so it can only be one thing! Time for the spotlight of awesome to shine on another game, and today we’re looking at another deck-building game. Today, we’re looking at DC: Forever Evil!

DC Forever Evil

Okay, so I’ve been super-busy recently, and unfortunately haven’t had the time to play that many games, so this is going to be a fairly short blog again. Apologies for that. It also feels a bit like cheating, because this is very similar to the DC base game that I took a look at before Christmas, to the extent that I’m almost questioning why I’m doing this at all… But still!

DC: Forever Evil allows you to play as some of the most iconic villains of the DC universe, such as Lex Luthor, Sinistro, or Harley Quinn, and take on the Super Heroes in what essentially amounts to a mirror image of the base game. The Super Heroes form a separate deck, with The Flash taking point, and each turn you attempt to gain cards into your hand to enable you to go up against the Super Heroes. Each one after the Flash has a First Appearance-Attack that must be resolved when they’re flipped over, and when the stack runs out, the game is over and the points are tallied.

DC Forever Evil

It’s very similar, as I said, to the base game. There are the same mix of card types in the main deck for this game, and overall, you can blend this with the base game with next to no problems whatsoever – in fact, you could do so with no problems at all, actually…

Some people might be thinking that this is a bit of a cheap shot, that it isn’t the clever re-imagining of the base game that Legendary: Villains was to Marvel Legendary, and to an extent, you’re right. However, Forever Evil does have a couple of things in its favour.

First of all, the new main deck cards revolve around a few sub-themes, predominantly card destruction, which the base game really needs (in my view). Deck-building games all follow the same basic course, where you have a starting hand of weak cards, but you go through the game buying more useful cards with allow you to do better things, but you’ll always have those starting chump cards unless you manage to somehow destroy them. Base-game DC has a couple of things you can do, but you’re usually stuck with them until the end. Forever Evil has cards that give some pretty good bonuses for destroying cards, and allow you do destroy cards all over the place. Furthermore, it creates a specific destroyed pile, and there are more cards in the main deck that improve depending on what types of cards are in that pile. It’s something that the base game definitely needs, so it’s well worth integrating these two games for that, if nothing else.

Secondly, you can now earn Victory Points in-game, and there are a number of cards that work off how many Victory Points – as defined by VP tokens – you have. I’m not a huge fan of tokens in card games like these, but it’s not like these are a real problem or anything. At the end of the game, these tokens get added to the VP total of your cards, and it’s a nice little addition to the game.

DC Forever Evil

There are a couple of other things, such as Captain Cold’s Cold Gun, which allows you to freeze a card in the lineup until your next turn, in case a really good one comes up but you can’t afford it right then. However, there’s no Captain Cold in this box! Very disappointing.

Overall, it’s another fun game added to the line, and definitely worth getting if you enjoyed any of the other DC games from Cryptozoic. I’m not a huge fan of pure deckbuilding games, but the theme definitely wins out on this one, at least. However, something that I feel the game misses out on is tying into the actual Forever Evil storyline in the comics, where the super villains form the Injustice League to combat the Crime Syndicate. There’s no attempt to show the villains teaming up, it’s just the DC base game but in reverse. Not necessarily a bad thing, but there we go. The game line in general doesn’t seem to want to particularly build up its theme, as I’ve mentioned before, so I suppose at this late stage of the game I can hardly hold that against it!

Can you believe this game has been going over two years now? Sheesh!

Buy it from amazon:
DC Forever Evil

Games Sunday!

Hey everybody!
It feels like a while since I’ve been posting anything of substance here, apologies to all who have missed my sagacious words this past week! I’ve been feeling a bit rough, sadly, between one thing and another. I’ve also been working madly at an essay that’s due on Thursday – I managed to get about half of it done yesterday, eventually, but that’s been heavy-going. Additionally, I’ve been asked to produce a promotional video for a meeting in work, which has involved a steep learning curve on Windows Movie Maker, but I’ve managed to throw something together. That’s actually been lots of fun, and I’m hoping to make use of these skills for this here blog in the future! You have been warned!

However, due to all of these shenanigans, I’m more than likely only going to have time for another small-scale game day blog next week. It’s about two weeks until I’ve got some time off, however, so such meagre offerings will hopefully be mitigated then!

So what’s new in the world?

Not sure if you’ve seen the news, but FFG put up a preview for the first deluxe expansion to the Warhammer Conquest LCG, The Great Devourer. Tyranids are coming to the Traxis Sector! While I was hoping for Necrons, it’s still exciting to see!

The Great Devourer

I picked up the third war pack last week from the local games shop, and was taking with the manager there about how I’ve only actually managed to get in one game with this one, back when the core set released before Christmas. That needs to be remedied, and soon, I feel! I seem to remember that it is a really great game, with a lot of strategy and such, so I hope I can get it to the table more, anyway. The new deluxe seems to offer a lot of interesting options, anyway, so I can definitely see myself picking this up. I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned it before, but Tyranids would have been my army of choice had I not gone for Necrons.

Speaking of Warhammer, I’ve not painted anything for what seems like an age. Luckily, I’ve also not been buying things in a similar timeframe. Since I hit the wall, I’ve sold off a few of my kits on ebay to try to thin the ranks, but it hasn’t really helped! I’ve been pursuing more traditional tabletop gaming pursuits, such as Thunderstone, which helped to redress the balance in my life after Warhammer had been taking over. However, there are still odd moments where I find myself wanting to be more creative once again, so I think it might only be a matter of time before I pick up a brush.

Not before I finish the essay, however!

As far as Warhammer Fantasy goes, the fifth and final round of the End Times is currently raging, with Archaon the Everchosen coming down from the Chaos Wastes to wreak havoc among the shattered remains of the Empire. I pre-ordered the books on Friday, but haven’t gone for a Bloodthirster – it’s a nice model, but I still prefer the daemon prince!

Back to FFG, who have also announced another Reinforcements pack for Battlelore, the Razorwings. Still really excited for new stuff for Battlelore, though part of me is really concerned as to the expansion model we’re seeing here. While it is, of course, a tactical miniatures wargame, I was still hoping it would be expanded in the traditional manner of a boardgame, with a big box for more stuff. Instead, while they have announced boxes of army reinforcements, we’re seeing more of these smaller packs of just a couple of minis, and my wallet cries out in dismay! However, the Razorwings are something of an iconic Terrinoth monster, so it’ll definitely be fun to have these in the game.

Battlelore Razorwings

We’re currently looking at a similar situation for Imperial Assault, which has had another preview of the new ally packs that are expected shortly. I still haven’t been able to play Imperial Assault, unfortunately, so I’m currently hoping to abstain from buying these things. Yeah, right…

Back to LCGs now, and Escape from Mount Gram, the second adventure pack in the Angmar Awakened cycle for Lord of the Rings, has been announced. I’ve mentioned it before, of course, that I was a playtester for this cycle, and this adventure is just awesome. The preview article only hints at the actual quest, which I’m not going to spoil here, but suffice it to say, this quest is hard for solo play. The final pack in the cycle was my absolute favourite, with some awesome effects involved. I’m pretty sure a lot of people are going to be pleased with this one!

JSA crossover 1

Over to Cryptozoic now, where the DC deck-building game continues to expand! Crisis Pack #2 was released a couple of weeks ago, and that looks like more of the same from Crisis Pack #1, though obviously tailored to Heroes Unite rather than the base game. The JSA Crossover Pack #1 looks like a really cool way of expanding the line, too – more heroes, more super-villains, and a smattering of new main deck cards, all for £8! It gives it almost a LCG-like feel! Of course, a lot of people have been complaining that there is only one current actual expansion for the game, the Crisis Pack, as the other stuff released so far has been new core sets, with punches and kicks etc that are just superfluous if you only want more options for one game. Well, now you have them! As ‘Crossover Pack 1’, it means there’s a whole host of options for more in the future! According to boardgamegeek, Packs 2 and 3 are Arrow and Legion of Super-Heroes, respectively. I believe Pack 2 will have screencaps from the TV show, unfortunately, but even so, it’s always good to see games expanded! Pack 3 also links to a fourth core set that is expected sometime soon, Teen Titans. I’m sure I’ll keep buying these things, as it is an enjoyable game.

Ghostbusters

And speaking of Cryptozoic, there are just three days left on their Ghostbusters kickstarter!

I’m still pretty excited by this game, having been a huge fan of this IP as a child. A lot of negativity has surrounded the game, something I only vaguely touched on when I last looked at the campaign earlier in the month. It is currently 390% funded, and has seen twenty stretch goals to get there. Of these, seventeen are kickstarter exclusives. And there are some pretty iconic Ghostbusters characters among those exclusives. A lot of people have read this as a cash-grab, with the company wanting to just make as much money from a one-time deal as they can, then drop the thing, while recently some more level-headed arguments have been put forward.

The game is primarily based around the comics series from IDW publishing, with the ghostbusters themselves having this comic-book look to them. The game has barely scratched the surface of the universe that has been continued in this medium, so it’s entirely possible that the game is more comics-centric than movies-centric. While that makes a lot of sense in terms of the game itself, from a business point of view, it seems overwhelmingly short-sighted, as I imagine most people aren’t even aware of the comics. (If you’re one of these people, start here!) I’ve currently thrown $300 at this campaign, anyway, as I’m thinking I’ll cover all bases by getting the exclusives add-ons while they’re available, then if the game isn’t supported post-release, I’ll at least have plenty of options for a long time!

While I’m on the subject of comics…

Years ago, I was an avid comics collector. It became something close to an addiction, however, and I made the herculean effort of selling them all. I’ve still been a Star Wars comics fan, of course, but all my Marvel and DC stuff I got rid of. However, I can’t help feeling that I didn’t do the right thing, and playing games like DC and Marvel Legendary has shown that I still have a love of comic book universes. So I decided to get a couple of things at the end of last month, including the new Flash comics that are part of DC’s overhaul, the New 52. They’ve only just arrived, and I haven’t had a chance to read them yet, but I’m looking forward to it. Flash has forever been my favourite DC hero, in part because it remains to this day the only computer game I have ever completed…

That’s right, kids – these are the kind of games I grew up with!

Crisis!

Hey folks, welcome to game day!
I was intending to have a truly mammoth blog ready for today, as a sort of Christmas-special game day blog or something, but real life has intruded and I’ve not been able to write anything up. So that’s been pushed up to the beginning of next year now, and instead I’m going to share some thoughts with you on a game expansion I tried out for the first time yesterday – the Crisis Expansion to DC Deck Building Game!

DC Crisis

Yes, it was only last week that I took you all through the main game, but what the hell. The Crisis Expansion Pack is the first proper expansion this game has seen, introducing some new heroes, new main deck cards, and two new modes of play. Pretty impressive, really! As I only played this for the first time yesterday, this will be more of a first thoughts style blog than anything else, at any rate.

So first, we have new superheroes – six of them, in fact:

DC Crisis

There are some really interesting abilities on these superheroes, four of which have been in the base set as Hero cards, the other two being supported with the new main deck cards:

DC Crisis

I didn’t use any of these when I played with the game, but it looks like there are a few interesting twists being added to the game here, nonetheless!

The first of the two new modes of play is Impossible Mode, which replaces the base game’s Super Villain deck with much tougher variants:

DC Crisis

You can see in the comparison above that the new super villains (the bottom four) are slightly more difficult to beat, but some of them also have more difficult first appearance-attacks, and grant better bonuses once you’ve defeated them.

The second, and to me, much more interesting new mode is Crisis Mode – more interesting, because you can now play DC solo! Crisis Mode is probably the bulk of this box, as you use the Super-Villains and the main deck cards, along with new Super Hero cards, and a new Crisis deck:

DC Crisis DC Crisis

The new mode of play is co-operative, and involves a few rules-changes, but these new Super Heroes support that by having benefits to your team-mates such as drawing extra cards, stacking your deck, etc. It also does away with the Victory Point conditions, and you win if you defeat 12 Super Villains, but lose if the main deck runs out. With the main deck therefore acting like a timer, there are twists added, such as adding the top of the main deck to the game at the start of your turn, but also the new Super Villains and, particularly, the Crisis cards add more cards from the main deck, trying to defeat you that way.

DC Crisis

These new cards are essentially the opposition here. They act almost as gate-keepers to the Super-Villains, as you need to defeat the Crisis card before you can attempt to defeat them. One of these cards in particular, Dimension Shift, can only be beaten if you reveal a card with cost of exactly 2 from the top of your deck. When I played this game yesterday, I was playing as Martian Manhunter, whose effect allows you to place a hero on top of your deck from your discard pile if you played two or more heroes that turn. You’d think it would be fairly straightforward to beat this card, therefore, given the number of heroes that cost 2, but no! It caused me to cycle through my deck repeatedly over about 45 minutes while I tried to get past it! Bah!

DC Crisis

For me, Crisis mode is awesome. Even setting aside the fact that it allows for solo play (always a winner with me, remember!), it adds an extra layer to the game that elevates it from being “just another deck-builder”. In fact, I would go so far as to say it begins to approach Marvel Legendary as an awesome game experience. See, while I do like deck-building games, they can tend to be very much of a muchness, and I usually like to have a good break between playing games with them as a result. However, when the deck-building aspect is suitably masked behind deeper mechanics, such as with Marvel or Arcana, then you focus more on a game experience and less on the purely nuts-and-bolts “I have this much currency in my hand, so can afford this card, which I place in my discard pile before doing it all over again”. It’s pretty exciting to note, of course, that this is explicitly Crisis Pack 1, so I’m hoping we see further packs that expand on the number of Crisis cards available, increasing the options for this mode of play!

It’s all about the levels, people!

Buy it from amazon:
Crisis Expansion Pack 1