Exit: The Secret Lab - 2 January 2019

Thin on the ground for the first Wednesday of 2019 so David and I played this "escape room" game that I picked up at a charity shop earlier this year... Exit: The Secret Lab.  It was missing a couple of pieces but I recreated them from an image on Board Game Geek, and I was keen to try it, particularly after a show-and-tell where Stuart said he'd played and enjoyed it.

This can't be played a second time - not just by the players who will subsequently know the answers to the puzzles, but by anyone, as the materials are drawn on and cut up to solve some clues.

There is a booklet, a decoder wheel, and plenty of cards with clues, hints and solutions.

We really enjoyed it - challenging but do-able.  We finished it in about 90 minutes with the use of just three hint cards (out of 30) and two of those were for the final clue which used the pieces I'd printed out - and we were partly scuppered as I didn't get the scale exactly right!

Notre Dame & Skull - 19 December 2018

It had been a while since we played Notre Dame.  I tried a new tactic of ignoring the rats and taking the damage each turn - it almost worked but David acquired lots more victory points through good use of the characters.  Final scores: David 70, James 55, Stuart 54, Andy 37.

Then we tried my Christmas present from Adrian - Skull.

This is a bluffing and bidding game - a simpler but much more colourful game than Perudo, with Skulls and Flowers rather than numbers.

One of those games which looks very simple but there is more to it.  It worked pretty well with three (Andy spectated) but we suspected it would work better with more - and indeed I played this again with six players with friends over Christmas and it was fun with more interaction between the players.

Love Island - 28 November 2018

At long last, the scenery I bought two years ago at Reading made it to the games table yesterday evening.

Coupled with a shrine on a small island connected by a bridge, the table was set for a clash between two rival buntai factions of six figures each.

Andy and Stuart's samurai arrived by a couple of newly-painted watari bune (river ferries) acquired from Oshiro Model Terrain. 

David and James' samurai prepared for action.

The buntai were quickly engaged.

First blood to David and James.

I introduced a climbing rule for the figures to clamber up and down the terrain - failure was rolling 1 on a D6.  Stuart's comedy character failed this a couple of times, ending up lying stunned and wounded at the bottom of a small cliff.

The Ronin rules and their use of attack and defence combat tokens went down very well.  Inevitably, a lot of the critical wounds were the result of attacker and defender getting extreme rolls, but there were combats that took several rounds where figures were stunned or lightly wounded, and continued the fight.  We thought though that we would modify the climbing rule to slow armoured characters and allow unarmoured figures to continue into combat.

Eventually, just two of David's and one of James' figures were the last men standing - bloodied but victorious.

Wagon Train - 24 November 2018

Another Legends of the Old West scenario played with Stuart.  A lightly armed group of "innocent bystanders" had formed their wagon train into a circle...

...threatened by Stuart's band of Native Americans about to attack...

Fortunately for the civilians, help was at hand in the form of the US Cavalry, who entered the game if a 6 on a D6 rolled in the first turn, a 5 or 6 in the second turn, and so on.

And fortunately, James' roll brought them in on the second turn, and they split up to support the circled wagons.

The Indians rode up to the wagons and exchanged fire with the handful of armed civilians, losing a figure each.

After some disastrous hand-to-hand combats, the US Cavalry got wiped out pretty quickly, leaving the civilians at the mercy of the Indians.  The unarmed women put up the strongest resistance, battering the braves with their handbags, but eventually were overcome.  A clear win for Stuart.

Century: Eastern Wonders - 21 November 2018

First play of David's new game Century: Eastern Wonders which is a companion game to Century: Spice Road.  Eastern Wonders can be played as a standalone game or integrated with Spice Road.  Even the box art integrates...

Eastern Wonders uses the same core dynamic as Spice Road with four commodities which can be traded one for the other to create sets that can be used to buy treasures for victory points.  This time, instead of a hand of cards, players sail their ship across a series of islands, creating markets which can be used to trade the various commodities.  So different enough to feel like a different game rather than a re-implementation but familiar enough to get playing quickly and enjoy the connection with the first game.

David was the first to collect a fourth treasure and initiate the final round, winning the game with 79 points against James 73 and Andy 56.

Warfare 2018

Andy and I head off to Reading last weekend for the annual Warfare games show.  Fewer visitors this year but still as many traders and demo games so plenty to see, and easy to see it.  I enjoyed looking around but restricted my purchases to a single pack of figures from Bad Squiddo Games who specialise in female miniatures - fortunately not the usual designed-for-teenage-boys figures that many other manufacturers come up with.  I bought this set, no doubt inspired by the more active female roles in the recent Dad's Army film, so they'll be a fun addition to my Home Guard project.

Here are some of the highlights from the demo and participation games...

Treasure Island with 54mm figures

WW2 North Africa

Playmobil Pirates

English Civil War attack on Bristol

Elephants!

Pirates - amazing game using Legends of the High Seas with superb scratchbuilt scenery (I want that fort!)

WW1 Trench Warfare

WW2 Stalingrad - incredible detail

Pegasus Bridge and Eastern Front - WW2 tournament games

BKC Eastern Front - 29 October 2018

There was quite a furore last year following the publication of BKC version 3.  Pendraken bought the rights from the author of version 1 and 2 but took ages to release their update and the changes, particularly to the army lists, were not well received.  After waiting months for the promised re-write, Andy and I finally got our money back at Salute this year.  Version 4 is reportedly in advanced preparation and release is planned for Christmas.  We'll see.

In the meantime, we went back to version 2 for an early WW2 game Andy arranged between Germany and Russia, utilising a dedicated approx 4x4ft board that Andy had painted along with recently purchased buildings and hedgerows.

Andy's Russians were defending the town and had to hold off James' German blitzkrieg.  James advanced tanks to line-of-sight of the town's defenders and starting the attack, supported by devastating mortars on the hill.

German infantry were transported on the other flank, before dismounting and making an assault on the town via a swamp.

The Germans were supported by a Stuka which did some damage to Russian troops in the town before being taken out by some sharp shooting by the Russian command unit.

It was James' third Command Blunder that actually did him some good - one of his commands had to advance full move towards the nearest enemy.  This resulted in a pretty effective Close Assault on the Russia defenders. 

At the end of the seventh turn, the town was being cleared of Russians but the Russian reinforcements were holding the ford behind the village, so a minor victory for the Germans.

We managed with the rules reasonably well - still a struggle to find the thing you're looking for but it didn't hold us up too much.  We won't rush to buy version 4 until we've seen how it goes down on the Pendraken forum.  Good to get the tanks out on the table again!