The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game—A Review

By Jeremiah Well, we've certainly done our share of gushing over this game, but we've never actually given it our full, in-depth review. Until now. If you've never played a living card game (LCG) before, know this: The rules are deep and complex, and they're very similar to a collectible card game (CCG)—the biggest difference between the two is market collectibility. A CCG is distributed through starter decks and booster packs that randomly give you the cards of a 200-300 card set. An LCG releases the complete set in an expansion, so you're not trying to buy pack after pack after pack to get that one awesome card. You know exactly what you're getting in every pack, and my pack is going be the same pack you get.

The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game, which I will refer to as LOTR from here on out, delivers what everyone would want in a CCG, but puts it in a co-operative format. It's quite simply one of the funnest card games (LCG or CCG) I have ever put my hands on!

The Core set of the game includes a starter deck of 4 spheres of influence (you'll see more about that later), several sets of encounter cards, 3 quest decks, 2 threat counters and all the various tokens you will need (progress, wound and resource).

The game is designed for 2 players...or is it? With the purchase of a second core set you can expand to 4, and the design actually scales very well for anywhere from 1-4 players (yes, you can play a solo version!). Players each control three heroes which come from 4 different "spheres of influence" in Middle Earth: tactics, spirit, lore, and leadership. As with any LCG or CCG, deck customization plays a big part in terms of your success or failure.  I won't go into the ins and outs of deckbuilding here. I will say that there is a group of 4-6 of us who play together, and we've all sort of taken ownership of our own sphere, and we all play with mono-sphere decks. It has its advantages and its disadvantages, but it's seemed to work for us for the time being.

Because the game is co-op the player turn is set up slightly differently than a standard card game. Instead of each player going through the different phases of a turn, completing their turn and then play moving on to the next player, players in turn walk through each phase of a turn or round. For instance, after the refresh phase in which players give each hero a resource token (money) and draw a card and pass the "first player" marker to the left, players start the planning phase. Whoever was just passed the first player marker now plays cards from their hand, paying the appropriate resources to do so. These are typically items or allies to add to your party. But instead of moving on to the quest phase, the next player then performs their planning phase, and so on. During each phase players are encouraged to discuss their strategies and what they are doing, making it one big team effort. You're not supposed to reveal exactly which card you're holding in your hand but you can definitely talk about the abilities that card will give you, or your teammates.

So we're all in this together...well then what are we up against? Aside from each players' deck, there are two other decks involved in the game. A quest deck, and an encounter deck.

The Encounter Deck—It's full of baddies, locations, and other stuff that you will have to encounter during the game. Defeating enemies is not how you win the game, but they can certainly be the reason you lose the game! Traveling to locations can earn you certain bonuses or penalties depending on where you are going.

The Quest Deck—This deck is usually only 3 cards, though sometimes more and sometimes less. It tells you how you win the game, and sometimes gives you alternative loss conditions as well. It also tells you which cards go into the encounter deck, which often gives you a clue as to how hard, or what type of quest, it's going to be.

Typically to successfully complete a quest you have to place an amount of progress tokens on the currently active card of the quest deck. And often fulfill some other condition. So... How does one place a progress token on the quest deck? I'm glad you asked.

The two most crucial phases of the game are the quest phase and the encounter phase.

The Quest Phase—Players must decide whether to commit their heroes and allies to the quest; if they do, they exhaust that character, and turn the card on its side (just like tapping in Magic The Gathering). This means that the character cannot attack or defend any baddies coming out until the next turn. But their "will" is committed to the quest and cancels out an equivalent amount of threat in the staging area (which is where the bad guys live after they come out of the encounter deck, and before they attack). After the last player has committed characters to the quest, out comes one encounter card per player in the game. Each of these cards have a threat level on them which adds to the threat in the staging area. AFTER these cards are revealed, if the total amount of committed will is greater than the threat, then players place progress tokens on the quest (or active location they have traveled to) in the amount of the difference. If not, then each player increases their threat level by the difference on their threat counters. (Hitting 50 on your counter signifies the end of the game for you!) Okay, take a breath. Still with me? Good.

The Encounter Phase—Things get hairier in the encounter phase. Players can choose to engage any of the bad guys in the staging area, or let them engage you later. It's often helpful if someone is primed for fighting to have them engage a tougher opponent so they don't beat on your friend who isn't ready to face such a battle. Each decision piles up on the next, because there are mechanisms in place that will cause enemies to engage players based on your threat counter. And, if you have all of your characters committed to the quest, you're taking damage points that get turned into even more increases on your threat level. Things can snowball really, really quickly.

That, believe it or not, is a very rough overview of the game play. I told you. It's deep, complicated, and meticulous. But it is so fun!

This is not a casual party game; it's not even for the casual gamer—every decision, every card played, choosing whether to commit, to defend, to attack, everything, can make or break the success of the quest.

The storyline continues through the release of Adventure Packs, each of which includes a quest deck, usually a set of encounter cards, some new player cards to continue spicing up your deck, and setup instructions (often using several encounter sets from the core set). I love this aspect of it; it's like playing an RPG without having one person specified as the game master who has to put in hours of prep time before everyone else gets to play. For $15 you get a new quest and can have yourself a great evening. The down side is that rarely after we beat a quest do we go back and play it again. (Although there are plenty of them that took us more than one attempt!) And because of the monthly pace that Fantasy Flight maintains in releasing these packs, I'm a good $100+ behind in my chapter packs!

Final thoughts and my rating—I was introduced to "gaming through a couple different CCG-type games, so this title hits home for me. And it provides many nice twists to what is usually a head-to-head genre. The game is complex, but that complexity gives it a platform to build and expand on continuously, and also gives great great depth to the gameplay. The cards all have great synergy, not only within each sphere, but cross-sphere, making each quest a true team effort, which is something I've come to really enjoy about the game. And the Tolkien theme is icing on the cake. I give this one a 10.

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Mayfair's Catan Junior—A Double-Take Review

Well it's probably not a surprise to you that there were more than a few games found under the Christmas trees in our homes. We both ended up adding a copy of Mayfair's Catan Junior to our growing collection of kids/family games, so we thought there's no better time to post our thoughts in yet another Double-Take Review. Let's be honest: If you're a gamer, you probably have friends who tell you how much they LOVE Settlers of Catan. Catan is to board gaming what Dark Side of the Moon is to Pink Floyd. Or Kleenex is to facial tissue. Or "Particle Man" is to They Might Be Giants. Or Coke is to Cola. Or, well...you get my point. Anyone who has had a close encounter with the geek level of gaming has played Settlers of Catan. It's not a bad thing; Catan has probably done more for board gaming than any other title since (gah!) Monopoly. So we won't go into much detail about the original version of the game; if you want to read about it, there are about seven million reviews, tutorials, and commentaries on the game scattered throughout the Internet.

Catan Junior isn't just a simplifying of the already massive hit title. The rules are somewhat streamlined, for sure, but there is also a re-theming to the game. Instead of building settlements, cities and roads, players are now swashbuckling pirates, building pirate lairs (instead of settlements and cities), and pirate ships (instead of roads). The hexes are now represented by individual islands. You start with two lairs and one ship, and you can only build lairs next to ships, and ships next to lairs. The point of the game is to be the first to build seven lairs.

The trading has been changed to be a little more kid friendly. There is a marketplace on one end of the board, and one of each of the five resources (now Goats, Wood, Gold, Molasses, and Cutlasses) are placed at a booth in the marketplace. Players can trade 1:1 with those resources (only once per turn), or 2:1 for anything not in the marketplace—or for an advanced variant, you ditch the marketplace and trade with other players. And you can also purchase Coco Cards, which feature Coco the parrot on the back. These give you various free goods, or allow you a free move of the Ghost Pirate Captain (which we'll explain in a second), and one that allows you to build a lair or a ship for free! In addition to the great stuff you get, having the most Coco cards will allow you to build a lair on Spooky Island (which is the Desert in this retheme), putting you one closer to the seven lairs you need.

The thief has been replaced by the Ghost Pirate Captain (who starts on Spooky Island), and rolling a 6 (in this game there's a single d6) allows players to move the Ghost Captain to an island and take two resources of the type that matches the hex he was placed on. And like the thief he stops production from that hex until he's moved again.

Your turn consists of:

• Roll to produce goods on islands
• Trade
• Build

And that's it. They move along quickly, so there's little downtime.

Firestone—The components are great. The resources are big and chunky and perfect for my kids' little hands to grab. The ships and lairs are small, but they do the job. It's very colorful, and the pirate theme is a hit with kids.

Jeremiah—Yeah, I totally agree; we love the resource tokens (although my wife got a little flustered because the cutlasses were tough to stack), I suppose I would have preferred wooden ships and lairs—the plastic ones seem a little fragile to me. But I will say they have survived at least four plays thus far, so they are surprisingly durable. The retheme is great, although I've taken to calling the Ghost Pirate Caption the Dread Pirate Roberts, but we'll just call that a house rule for now...

Firestone—I've played three games: a 2-player, a 3-player, and a 4-player, and it seems to scale well, though people were getting cut off right and left in our 4-player game. And by people, I mean me.

Jeremiah—I actually haven't played a 2-player game yet, because every time we pull it out both of my boys jump at the chance to play it. So most of my plays have been 3-player, and once the boys talked mommy into playing, so we played 4-player. With 4 it does get a little crowded, but I agree: It's a short game, and it's actually about perfect in play time, so before it gets too cut-throat it's over.

Firestone—One downside I've seen in my three games is that it seems practically impossible to come back once someone gets ahead of you. And if they're building lairs that are cutting you off, it's just that much harder to come back. But since it's short, I can live with this one complaint about it. Oddly, in my house, my 8-year-old isn't all that excited about playing this—he'll play, but it's not his first choice. I'm not sure if that's because he's used to playing "deeper" games with me and this one seems too simple, or what. I do know that my almost-5-year-old LOVES this one. He needs some help with decisions and strategies and the whys and wherefores, but he has a blast playing. He's cuckoo for Coco.

Jeremiah—Both my 4- and 6-year-olds are all about this game. I do have to help the youngest one pretty often. The strategy to buy CoCo cards seems to be the choice of youngsters everywhere! They've figured out the value of getting a free lair on Spooky Island and have exploited it very well. In fact, both of my sons have figured this out, and it somehow works, because most of the time they pull out the win.

Firestone—This is a great, great family game. It's ideal for introducing kids to Euros, and the process of creating engines where you get this, to turn into that, to get you VPs. And one of the best things is that you won't feel as though you have to dumb down your play—the kids have just as much chance to win as you—but the game is still interesting for adults. Am I going to bring this to game night with the fellas? Of course not. But it's a game for kids, and it's very good at it.

Jeremiah—Yeah, we both pretty much agree on this one, the rules and theme are super accessible for kids. I will say that I "renamed" the Ghost Pirate Captain because my oldest son lately has been super tweaky about anything remotely scary. (Like when his younger brother impersonates zombie carrots... Yes, zombie carrots weird him out.) Spooky Island he's okay with. But I felt like I needed to hold back on the ost-ghay irate-pay. The game is close enough to the original that it also holds my interest and isn't total kids-game fodder. And as I said, it's short enough to hold the attention of my 4-year old!

Firestone Final Rating—As a game for adults, it's maybe a 6 or 7—it's fine, but I don't much like that it uses dice to control resources...so if people don't roll your number, yer outta luck. BUT, as a kids game I give it a 10. It's the perfect game to introduce kids to Euro-game concepts.

Jeremiah Final Rating—Completely agree, I'd say a solid 7 for adults playing with kids, the board is laid out well enough that you shouldn't get hosed for resources even though you're relying on the dice. And yeah score it a 10 for kids: awesome gateway into euro style games, great theme, perfect rules scaling of a classic game, and solid re-playability.

Get Catan: Junior on Amazon here!

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Pictures Worth 1,000 Words: A Dixit Review

By Firestone Dixit is a little game that came out in 2008. Since its release we've seen half-a-dozen sequels, expansions, offshoots, and weird siblings—and with good reason: It's a clever, fun game for a crowd.

There are numerous versions floating around out there, but for now, each of them plays basically the same. The box is full of cards with whimsical and interesting pictures on them. It's not really possible to describe what's on the cards, but that's kind of the point. Each person has a hand of these cards. Each person in turn order is the Start Player; they choose a card from in hand, say a phrase or word that describes what's on the card, and place the card face down. The phrase/word can be as literal, obvious, or abstruse as you want. Then every other player chooses a card from their hand that they feel that word/phrase could describe—because they're trying to steal votes and points from the active player.

Everyone secretly votes on which card they think is the Active Player's card, then you reveal which one is the right card, and score. If everyone guesses the Active Player's card, they all get two points and the active player gets none. If no one picks the Active Player's card, everyone else gets two points (plus another point for each vote on the card they put down) and again, the Active Player gets none. If at least one person picks the Active Player's card, the Active Player gets three points, every person who chose the correct card get three points, and each person gets a point for any votes on the card they put down. So as you can see, you want to choose a word or phrase that's not too obvious, but not too esoteric, either. It's an interesting challenge.

<-------- Let's take this picture on the left. You wouldn't want to say, "Rushmore" as a clue. Everyone would pick correctly and they'd all gain two points on you. You probably wouldn't want to say Chevy either, thinking "Chevy used to have commercials where they sang 'Like a rock,' and Rushmore's made out of rock, so..." But maybe something like, "The eyes have it..." It might just be middle-of-the-road enough to get some-but-not-all of the votes. Plus if someone else has a card with eyes on it, that helps you even more. The first player to 30 points wins.

You can find Dixit: Journey at your local Target. Consider picking this up for a fun, creative family, youth group, or party game.

A Double-Take Review—It's Alive!

-By Jeremiah and Firestone Over the holidays I (Jeremiah) was sent a copy of It's Alive! and Firestone was sent an iOS version of the same game.

Gilead Games recently ended a Kickstarter campaign (unsuccessfully, unfortunately) to retheme/revert the game back to its original theme of collecting menorah candles instead of the cartooney gruesomeness of the It's Alive! theme.

The gameplay and rules are quite simple and easy to grasp. In the It's Alive! version of the game, players are mad scientists trying to bring to life their Frankenstienish creation by collecting 8 different body parts, represented by 8 different cards. The players collect their cards and store their money in secrecy behind a screen that unfolds to stand up in front of the player's mat. The player turn goes something like this: Flip a card over, and make a decision to either buy it, sell it (For half of it's face value.) or auction it. If the player buys it, they pay money to the bank, and add the card to their mat; if they sell it, they take their payment from the bank and place the card in front of their screen. This card can now be chosen and subsequently bought, sold, or auctioned by the other players instead of turning one over from the deck.

The heart of the gameplay really lies in the auctioning of the cards. If a player decides to auction a card, they name a starting bid (which they will pay and keep the card if no one else bids higher!) and each player then gets to bid once going in counterclockwise turns. When the last player has bid, whoever bid the highest gets the card, and the auctioneer gets the money—unless the auctioneer wins it; then the bank gets the cash! These auctions can serve multiple needs. Starting a low bid on a card that you think no one else needs can in turn score you a pretty good deal on a card late in the game. But starting a bid at about half or a little higher of a card's face value can give someone else a deal, but get you more money than just selling it outright. Different card types have several different values, depending on which one you turned up, which also comes into play as everyone is bidding.

The game ends when one player collects all eight body-part cards, and that player wins. There is an advance/variant win condition in which players add up the face value of their cards and whoever has the highest valued collection wins.

Jeremiah—I have to say I really enjoyed the game pretty much from the get go, the wheeling and dealing at the table gets to be pretty fun, I really enjoyed the interaction between players. The rules and mechanics of the game seem to set the stage for player interaction and then get out of the way while players hash out their business with one another.

Firestone—I agree. This is an underappreciated filler, I think. Every time we've played it in my group I've enjoyed it—but for some reason I don't think about pulling this one out when we need a filler.

Jeremiah—At face value the It's Alive! theme is quite gruesome, and the text of the rules stating that a "gruesome gentleman" is bringing you body parts that he's digging up and selling to you is not for the faint of heart. But the artwork isn't terribly offensive. It's definitely teen safe, but I did cringe every time my 4- and 6-year-olds came over to the table to see what we were playing.

Firestone—Yeah, my game group has no problem with the theme, but as fun as this is, it's just not coming out with the kids—or even nongaming adult friends. Like it or not, theme can make or break a game, and with some people, the It's Alive! theme would break it.

Jeremiah—When it's all said and done, I've already included this game into my "must bring" bag for parties and game nights. It plays fast making it a perfect filler, and it's really easy to learn making it a great gateway game for those who aren't deep into gaming, however the interaction and strategy make it a challenge for gamers of any level, and age!

Firestone—And the iOS version is fun, too. It plays just like the face-to-face game, and is a good implementation.

Thanks for reading!

We Review Star Wars The Card Game

By Jeremiah A long time ago, but not so far away, the folks at Fantasy Flight promised us all a new title in their Living Card Game (LCG) catalog—this time coming from the Star Wars universe. Well about a year ago they scrapped the original concept, and completely overhauled the game. It took some time, and many folks were frustrated with the lengthy wait (including myself at times!). But Fantasy Flight Games wanted to make the game the best gaming experience possible.

The final version of the game made its way to stores this week, so I grabbed up a copy and gave it a test drive!

The game is a head-to-head battle between the two sides of the Force (Light side and Dark side). The way a player wins the game depends on which side they are on. The Light side wins if they destroy three of the Dark side's Objective cards (each player has a 10-card objective deck, which gives them resources and other game enhancements). The Dark side achieves victory by reaching 12 on the "Death Star Counter," which always increases by at least one at the start of the Dark side player's turn. This seems a bit unfair at first, but simulates the the vast availability of resources and troops that the Empire has at the ready; without the tenacity of the Rebels and/or Jedi, the Empire will simply win out by outlasting their opponent.

Player turns are about what you would expect from an LCG: a refresh phase, a drawing phase, deployment, conflict, and finally a force phase.

Players put cards into play—units (characters, creatures, droids, or vehicles), and enhancements—by paying with resources from their objective cards. Once they have their units in play, they can choose to attack their opponent's objective (both Light and Dark side players always attack the objectives of their opponents). When they attack, the other player chooses to defend or not, and then chooses a defending unit. Once a defending unit is chosen there is an Edge Battle—one of the more unique areas of the game. Edge battles work like this: Each card in the game has a number of Force icons on it. Players take turns adding cards face down from their hands to the Edge Battle until they both pass. Once players are done adding cards, they're turned face up and the icons are tallied; whoever wins the Edge Battle gets first strike in the conflict, and there are also certain attacks/powers that are only activated on units if they have won the Edge Battle. After the Edge Battle is resolved, the units deal out damage either to an opposing unit or to the targeted objective.

Once conflicts are settled, the player moves on to the Force Phase. Players can commit units to the Force by placing one of three available Force cards; once a unit is committed to the Force they add Force icons to the Force struggle. This is good. The bad thing is that if you use them in a conflict when you "focus" them, you have to place two focus tokens on them. This is bad, because on each turn during your refresh phase, you can only remove 1 token at a time. The balance of the Force is an important facet of the game; if the balance is in favor of the Light side, the Light side player gets to place a damage token on one of the Dark side's objectives at the beginning of their turn. If the balance is in favor of the Dark side, that player gets to increase the Death Star counter by +1 (for a total of two) at the beginning of their turn. So keeping the balance in your favor becomes a big deal!

My thoughts—

Edge Battles—To be honest, when I first heard about the Edge Battles I thought they sounded a little like the battles in the old Young Jedi CCG from the late 90's, and, well, the prospect of playing that game again sounded about as fun as a root canal. That's not the case, though. The key is to play slowly your first turn or two, so you can get some units on the table and still have some cards in your hand to win the Edge Battles. The advantage to winning an Edge Battle is typically worth the sacrifice to get the win.

The Artwork—I'm really glad we didn't get another rehash of screen shots from the films, and designers trying to be clever with some obscure character or item in the background that is only seen for three frames. The artwork is beautiful, and also gives a means to incorporate some of the more popular characters from the novels, and other stories in the Star Wars universe. They really outdid themselves in this department—the cards look great!

Deck-Building—This is another innovative approach to an LCG. Instead of hand-picking each card and building your deck in that manner, you create decks by selecting your 10 objective cards, and each objective card has a five-card set that corresponds to it. By selecting an objective card, you're also selecting the other five cards to go in your "command" deck. This offers a quicker solution to deck-building for beginners, and a challenge for veteran gamers. It's a unique twist on the concept that I like; instead of spending hours tweaking your deck, you can easily swap a couple objective cards/sets and wham!—you've got a new gaming experience!

Overall— I'm sold on the game! The mechanics and card abilities are deep, making the learning curve somewhat slow. And finding card synergy seems a little more difficult than in other games. The upside is that because there's so much attention to detail, not just in the game components, but in how the different characters, items, and locations interact with one another in the Star Wars universe, that it makes for a very deep and nuanced experience for gamers and Star Wars fans. It's a real collision of two worlds. The only real downside is that the multiplayer support is (at this time) not the greatest. I see a great potential for running almost a campaign style of game with multiple players controlling different factions, but for now there isn't much there for gamers who want to bring more than one other player along for the ride.

It took a long time for this game to get to market, but it feels like Fantasy Flight got it right in the end, and that makes it worth the wait.

Thanks for reading! And if you missed it, we interviewed Eric Lang, designer of Star Wars The Card Game—you can read that interview here!

Beware of Metalvore Sharks—A Review of Get Bit!

Filler: A short game, played at the beginning or end of a game session—or while waiting for other people to finish their game. Get Bit is an excellent filler game: It’s short, the rules are easy, and it’s not too mentally taxing.

The original game is five years old, but it’s been reprinted recently by Mayday Games. The game can accommodate 4-6 players, and plays in about 15 minutes. Each player gets a set of colored cards numbering 1-7, and a matching cute plastic robot with removable limbs. The original edition of the game only came with a shark card, but the new one also comes with an actual plastic shark—but aesthetics is the only difference. As soon as my kids saw the robots and shark , they were begging me to play.

You line the swimmers (robots) up in any order. Then each person picks one of their cards in hand and lays it on the table facedown. Once everyone has chosen, players all reveal their cards.

If two or more people choose the same number, their swimmer stays in the same position. All other players move their swimmer to the front of the line—going from lowest number to highest shown.

Then the shark gets to chomp a swimmer. Whichever one is at the end gets a limb ripped off—if it’s the last limb, that player is out of the game. Otherwise, the owner of the bitten robot gets all of his or her cards back. (If a player only has two cards left in hand, that person also gets all cards back.) Discards are left on the table, so you know exactly which cards are left in people's hands. This creates an interesting tension as you try to figure out which of that person's two cards they're going to play. If you guess wrong, you might get chomped.

There's also a variant where you play discards facedown, so people have to remember what's been played, but I think that would slow the game down way too much. If you want a longer game—maybe you don't want to use this as a filler game, but as the main game with a group of nongamers—you can lengthen it by removing half of the arm or leg when a swimmer gets bitten. (The legs and arms are articulated, so you can take the whole arm off, or just off at the elbow.)

You keep going until there are only two swimmers left; the player in the front wins!

Other than the slightly rude name, there’s nothing questionable about this game. Yes, robots get their limbs ripped off by a crazed, metalvore shark, but it’s very cartoony. As far as ages go, this one is probably for 8 and up. You could maybe go a little younger but they'd need some help determining which card to play.

Get Bit! is a terrific family game, and it would be a great game to play with your youth group. It’s super fast, super easy, and if you don’t mind some super randomness, it’s super fun. Thanks for reading!

(Theology of Games would like to thank Mayday Games for providing us with a review copy of Get Bit.)

A Double-Take Review—The Resistance: Avalon

Avalon

It's no surprise that we love The Resistance here at TOG. So a new version with some special powers sounds great. Is The Resistance: Avalon as good as it sounds? Well let's find out. We're not going to explain the mechanisms of the game. You can read our review of The Resistance here, where we explain the game in detail. The new game is identical in basic gameplay; the difference is that there are roles in this game.

The whole thing has an Arthurian legend theme, so the roles are characters from the mythology. The game seems to assume you'll play with at least the Merlin and Assassin cards. Merlin gets to know exactly who the Minions of Mordred are. When everyone's eyes are closed, the evil players raise their thumbs, and Merlin opens his or her eyes. So they have perfect knowledge in the game...but, they can't be too obvious about letting their teammates know who the baddies are, because at the end of the game, if the Servants of Arthur have won, the Assassin gets one last chance. He can talk things over with the other baddies, and then he assassinates the person he thinks is Merlin. If he's right, the bad guys win.

good

Ever since I heard about that, I was troubled. It seemed awful that the baddies could win based on a complete blind guess. After playing, I'm less concerned. Usually the Assassin seems to be basing the decision on the way people acted, but there have been a few times when it's a blind guess that happens to be correct. It's really frustrating. Yes, the Loyal Knights who aren't Merlin need to be doing more to make themselves seem like Merlin, but that doesn't take the sting away.

There are some other roles, too.

Percival is a Servant of Arthur, and he gets to know who Merlin is.

Mordred is a Minion of Mordred (duh). He doesn't reveal himself to Merlin at the beginning of the game.

Evil

Oberon is a Minion of Mordred, but he doesn't show himself to the other Minions—nor does he get to know who the other Minions are.

Morgana is a Minion of Mordred, and she gets to show herself as Merlin when Percival is in the game. So both Merlin and Morgana will have their thumbs extended, but Percival won't know which of them is Merlin and which is Morgana.

The Kickstarter copy also came with Lancelot, who might change allegiances halfway through the game.

Firestone—The first thing I have to comment on are the components. First, a couple of the cards have a misprint on them: the word unknown is spelled unkown. This is a small mistake that doesn't affect the game at all. It's just shocking that it wasn't caught. The other problem is this: Instead of voting cards, as you have in the original Resistance, you have tiles you vote with. After just one game, these were showing considerable wear—and after many games they're in awful shape. I'm not sure why they went with tiles over cards, but it seems like a terrible idea in retrospect.

Jeremiah—I couldn't agree less! The first thing that I loved about the new version of the game was the tactile feel of the new voting tiles; it seems to  streamline the hands-on feel and it's easier (along with the Leader tile) to keep track of each different component and stage of a round. With the first version, cards always seem to get shuffled into the wrong pile or mixed up, etc. The durability of the tiles is questionable, but even my sleeved cards from the first set are showing signs of wear (and they don't fit in the box as well). I also really enjoyed the new set of tableaus that are included. There is now a separate tableau for your game dependent on the amount of players, and each quest is labeled with how many knights are to go on that particular quest. It again streamlines the gameplay and requires less squinting from across the table to see how many folks you are selecting for the next quest.

Firestone—Madness! :) But I do agree about the tableaus. Those are super helpful and convey just the sort of info they need to.

The roles are interesting. I like the uncertainty Morgana creates. Percival seems hard to play well; there are times when he really should reveal himself—or help in some way—and new people still seem hesitant for some reason.

Oberon creates some fun situations: In one game I was Merlin, so knew the baddies, but didn't know who was who. At one point a baddie put two Minions on a mission and I realized he had no idea he'd done that because one was Oberon. Of course, I voted that mission to go because I was more than happy to see them both on it; even if it failed they would almost certainly both vote to fail it, and now the group had a lot of information. The problem was that everyone noted that I'd voted for the failed mission to go forward, so now I was suspect! At any rate, I liked the mayhem that character caused.

The Lancelot promo comes with a few variants, and we've only played one so far, but I didn't like it. Two people are dealt Lancelot cards—one of which is a Minion and one of which is Loyal. You play as your card, just like normal, but starting on the third mission you draw cards from a deck and there's a chance the loyalties will switch. Sounds cool, but if you're on the last mission, and your side is about to win, and you suddenly have to switch to the losing side because of a card flip? Blech. What should have been interesting was just frustrating for whomever was winning (and now suddenly wasn't), and a cheap victory for the person who was losing, and suddenly wins.

Jeremiah—We haven't delved too deeply into the different roles; it is stressed very clearly in the rules that you shouldn't start adding more roles to the game if there are too many new/inexperienced players in the game, and as of yet, every time I have played there have been several folks new to the game. And grasping the roles, along with Merlin and the Assassin and how to play off of those roles, is quite the task, without muddying the waters too much.

Firestone—Overall, this is a mixed bag for me. I like this version better than regular Resistance. But I don't think I like this better than regular Resistance with the plot cards. You can play Avalon with the plot cards from the original game (we haven't done that yet), but it makes no thematic or aesthetic sense to mix the two. I'm not sure why they didn't create plot cards for Avalon that fit that theme. They could be the same exact ones, just with new names and art.

I'm glad I have both, and we've certainly been playing Avalon exclusively since we got it, but I wouldn't be surprised to see us return to the original over time.

Jeremiah—With this I agree; I thought I would be more excited about this game than I actually am. I enjoy the level of strategy that Merlin brings to being a good guy; in the original it becomes a chore to hide your disappointment when you've been dealt an operative role. Trying to figure out who Merlin is, and then act as if you are Merlin definitely makes it fun for everyone at the table. The absence of the plot cards is palpable, even more so is the stark contrast in the theme when you try to add them in. The way the plot cards are played is a HUGE part of my strategy when playing a baddie, so I would LOVE to see them re-themed and offered as an add-on sometime soon.

At its core Avalon is The Resistance, with more options and different aesthetics; I have yet to introduce the game to someone who didn't want to play again as soon as the first one was over. And Avalon is no different.

Thanks for reading!

Firestone Update—Well, we've played this a bunch more, and have had no desire to return to the original yet. Still lots to be explored with just the roles, and we're having a great time. I recommend this completely.

Review: Star Wars: X-Wing Miniatures Game

By Firestone I love Star Wars. I really, really love Star Wars. Of course there are problems, and plot holes, and inconsistencies, and those awful, terrible Episodes I, II, and III. But no film/franchise/toy line is so firmly entrenched in my memories of childhood.

So, of course, I was giddy when I heard they were making a miniatures game based on my beloved franchise.

I played a friend's copy—he'd picked up two copies of everything. At this point that includes the base game, which includes two tie fighters and one x-wing, and the Wave 1 expansions, which include another tie fighter and x-wing fighter (with new pilots and powers), a tie advanced, and a y-wing. The minis are terrific hand-painted plastic. They are awfully fragile, and at the prices these fetch, I admit I'm hesitant for my 4-year-old to be anywhere near this thing.

The gameplay is superficially similar to the Wings of War game—but with some significant differences that ensure this is no knockoff. First, each person build a squad using points. 100 points seems to be the norm, and you get there by choosing various ships, and then adding pilots (such as Wedge Antilles and Darth Vader), and then adding upgrades (such as proton torpedoes). Each one of these things costs a different number of points; you add them all up to get to your squad total. Here's where I come up against my first problem with the game: You'll need more than the base game to make a decent game—either more base games or a bunch of expansion pieces. I get that this is Fantasy Flight's business model, but someone opening up just the base game on Christmas morning might be disappointed with how small their game will be.

Game play is straightforward: Each type of ship has a unique set of maneuvers it can make, and has a unique movement dial that lets you set its next move and then set it facedown until everyone has made their movement selection. Then in turn order people reveal their dial and move. There are templates that you place in front of the mini's base, and then you simply move the ship to the end of the template. It's easy and unambiguous.

Then each person can choose an Action from the choices on their various pilot and upgrade cards; these might include focusing on fighting, or evading a shot that comes at you. Then each ship determines whether there's a target in their firing arc and attacks if possible. Attacks are resolved using dice, with various abilities affecting the attack or defense dice. The various ships have different defenses: Tie fighters have great maneuverability, but have no shields, while X-wings have shields but have fewer maneuvers available to them.

That's a basic overview of the game.

The components are great. The minis are cool, the cards are nice and clear, and the numerous tokens are thick. I'm concerned about the movement dials rubbing away over time, but we'll see.

The complexity is low. My 8-year-old might need a little help with the smaller details and fine strategy, but I think he'd hold his own...

There's a fair amount of luck in this—in fact, more than I'm generally comfortable with. It gets some grace because of the theme, and because I know my kids will love this game, regardless of luck. The playing time is short—games should take no more than 30-45 minutes. And while the game says it's for 2 players, we've played team games of 4 people (two on each side), and it worked great. Of course, for that size game you'll need some expansions.

Speaking of expansions, Wave 2 is scheduled for February. And it includes two larger models, one of Boba Fett's Slave 1, and one of the Millenium Falcon. I can't wait!

My biggest complaint is how much money this will cost me over time. I understand that I can choose to not buy the expansions, but if you think that's an option, you obviously don't know me very well! :)

Bottom line: If you have kids who love Star Wars—or if you love Star Wars and can get over the randomness and the price—then this is a great game to consider. It'll tide me over until Star Wars The Card Game comes out!

Thanks for reading!

A Review of Jungle Speed

By Firestone Remember the classic youth group game Spoons? What's it known for? Bloodshed... Well if you like Spoons, you'll probably like Jungle Speed—which plays up to 10 people. Once it's out of the now-unnecessary box, it's a simple cloth bag, a set of rules, a deck of 80 square cards, and a plastic "totem." The goal is simple: Get rid of all of your cards. Like Spot It!—which we reviewed a few weeks ago—there are a few variants that mess around with how you deal out cards and how the game is played and so forth. In the basic game, you place the totem in the middle of the table, shuffle the 80 cards, and deal them out as evenly as possible to everyone playing. In turn, players flip over the top card of their stacks—using only one hand—to create a face-up discard pile. The cards feature various designs of various colors. Whenever a just-flipped card matches the design—not the color—of another card on the table, those players are now in a duel! Both players try to be the first one to grab the Totem. The loser takes the winner's cards, their own discard pile, and any cards that might be in the middle of the table (from other card effects I'll get to), and place them face-down under their draw stack. Play continues as before, with the loser of the duel starting.

The insidious thing (and I mean that in a good way), is that the designs look VERY similar. So often people will incorrectly grab the Totem—and in that case they have to take all of the face-up cards on the table. That's the same penalty you take if you accidentally drop the Totem as you're trying to grab it. There are a few special cards, such as one with a bunch of arrows pointing in, and everyone is basically in a duel as soon as that comes up, with the winner placing his or her discards in the middle of the table under the Totem. There's also one that changes what triggers a duel to matching colors, rather then designs—so one more chance for you to accidentally grab the Totem and mess yourself up.

That's basically it. So let's talk about the Totem. It's just a plastic piece that you grab. You're not worshiping it or praying to it or anything else related to the traditional Totem you think of in other religious traditions. Since it's just a name, if you felt strongly about it, you could easily change the name of your Totem. Call it the banana, or the grabby stick or the whatever.

Bottom line: It's not the best party game I've played, and it's certainly not the worst. But it's a fun, party game that everyone can play, and would be great for a group of teenagers.

Thanks for reading!

A Double-Take Review: Ruse

- by Firestone and Jeremiah Earlier in the week we were both sent advanced copies of Bonsai Games' latest endeavor, Ruse—they're Kickstarting the game in collaboration with Game Salute's Springboard program. So today we're both giving our thoughts on the game in this Double-Take review of the steampunk, who-dun-it.

The game takes place in the very steampunky Victorian city of St. Sebastian. A murder has taken place, and the players spend the entire game pointing fingers, placing blame, and weaving convincing tales so as to prove their innocence, and find the true killer.

The Game Play—The actual game itself is quite simple. The deck is based on a traditional 4-suited deck of cards. Two suits are accusations (split into 3 types: motive, method, and opportunity), and two suits are alibis. Each player chooses a character card,  is dealt five cards and the game begins. On their turn players draw a card and then performs one of the following actions: Play an accusation, provide an alibi, or simply discard. If a player cannot provide an alibi, once per game they can turn their character card over to a portrait that has pretty shifty eyes, and simply cover up an accusation... If you have a number 9 accusation in front of you, the only thing that can get rid of it is the 9 card from one of the two alibi suits. So hand management is fairly important here. Do I save that alibi for myself? Which card should I discard? They might want that one! But if I put that accusation on top, they'll just draw it right away and play it on me... The game is full of interesting decisions on how to manage your hand and discards.

End Game—The game ends when you've figured out "who-dun-it," and that happens when, at the end of a player's turn, that player has one of each accusation type played on them, and can no longer provide an alibi for any of them. That player is then given the spotlight to tell their tale, and why they had no choice but to do the dastardly deed.

Our thoughts:

Jeremiah—The mechanics of the game are ultra streamlined—they seem well-thought-out and tested. When I read the instructions, I thought for sure it was going to be a pile-on-the-weakest-player situation, and it almost never got to that.

Firestone—Our game got to that a little. Two of the four suits are for accusations, and in our 4-player game, three people had one of those suits in front of them, and I had the other. I think because I was all alone in that suit, it made it easier for me to be a target. I don't blame them; they smelled blood in the water and came after me. Surprisingly, I was able to fend them off and not lose.

Jeremiah—The game takes its charm because of the storytelling aspect, and the steampunk world it is set in. The meat of the game lies in the fact that instead of just simply trying to play 3 accusations in front of someone, the whole time players are telling a tale of lies and deception while trying to pin the crime on everyone but themselves.

Firestone—That was my group's favorite part. There was a lot of smiling at the table as someone would happen to pull just the alibi they needed for an accusation in front of them, and they could dramatically say, "Ahhh! You may have thought I was the last person to be seen with the victim [throws down just-drawn alibi], but in fact, she was seen alive afterwards, so it couldn't have been me!" Truth be told, there were a few cards our group thought didn't make a whole lot of sense. For instance, I'd been Exposed As a Fraud, and then later I played the alibi Sold Out. I have no idea how selling out was an alibi for being exposed as a fraud—and I certainly didn't have a chance to think of it in the middle of the game. So I just kind of awkwardly played it down, read the card, and we moved on.

Jeremiah—The art is super cool, I'm a fan of the steampunk look in a lot of things. It brings back fond memories of the old Max Fleischer Superman cartoons in that retro future-y Magnetic Telescope kind of way.

Firestone—Love the art. I was a fan of steampunk before it got popular—anyone else love Tim Powers' The Anubis Gates? Awesome book! Anyway, the art is great, and goes a long way to keeping the morbid theme from being too dark.

Final Thoughts -

Jeremiah—This is a game where the players truly make it or break it. It's a great game for those who are creative souls but maybe aren't hard core gamers yet. Even with the potentially dark subject matter of the game, it never got too creepy to me. Even the opportunity card "Victim's Medium" was played off as cheesy, with the medium character obviously wearing a false nose. We had some really good laughs, coupled with pretty tense moments during the games we played. It's a game that does what it set out to do very well!

Firestone—As I said, my group of hardcore gamers liked the storytelling aspect a lot. And while there are some interesting decisions to be made, they felt it was a little light for their taste. But I'm SURE I'll be bringing this out with my family over the upcoming holidays. It's light enough that it won't put them off with heavy rules, but still full of decisions and luck and fun and storytelling and creativity. My biggest concern is that—with only two accusations and two matching alibis—stories will quickly start to look just like they did last game. Still, this is a fun game for families and nongamers (and the occasional filler for gamer-groups).

Thanks to Bonsai Games and Game Salute for sending review copies, and thank you for reading!