Nuke Con Wrap Up

Last weekend was Nuke Con 2010, and I'm still trying to catch up on sleep, chores, how to talk to non-gamers, stuff like that. The BFF and I wondered if it seemed lighter in turnout than other years, but chatting with others, we discovered that turnout was still strong. He and I figured out later that it what seemed different was less miniature war gaming. Other years, there are several tables completely decked out with homemade displays, suitcases full of miniatures, and people with measuring tapes walking around the table looking for the best angle. This year, there only seemed to be a few of these kinds of tables, I think that was the only difference.
And more diversity in games, it seemed. I did my part in stretching the diversity, volunteering to lead two newish European games. I had to sign up to GM a month early to get in the program, so I've been thinking about teaching games, and how (and why) we all learn games, and I'll go on more on that thinking in another post or three, but now the play-by-play (pun intended) of my weekend at Nuke Con 2010!
Cast of characters on this trip: Me. The BFF (that's Boy Friend Forever). Dawn Child, my 19-year-old, almost too old for me to still state his age, doesn't live at home anymore, but still games a lot! and The Munchkin, my 17-year-old who does still live at home.
First thing, straight after check-in, I rushed to the concession stand to buy a t-shirt. I had procrastinated through the on-line purchase time, and didn't want to miss out. This year is the 20th anniversary, so the theme was "It Was 20 Years Ago Today..." with a cute Sgt. Pepper's done in gaming logo. I had to have one!
Friday night, The BFF and I pretty much stuck together, starting with Temple of the Beastmen. Out-of-print old, but still very enjoyable. Searching for treasures and avoiding the beastmen through five levels, where the beastmen are x times more plentiful on each lower level (so level 5 with ten beastmen, makes them actually fifty), and each character having specific strengths and a specific goal. I won, thanks to the kind player who traded me some treasure for my 'boy'.
Side note: The prizes were awesome this year! I don't remember having second and third place prizes on very many games other years, this year, I think all games did.
So when I was victorious in the game of Beastmen, I won Warhammer Invasion! Quite a prize. The kids tried it out sometime over the weekend.
Next, The BFF and I went to a panel on Zombie Defense and Education put on by the Omaha Chapter of the Zombie Research Society. If you're interested in anything Zombie, check out their site, their Facebook, and their podcast. But since it's not specifically game related, I won't go into great details, but just to sum up: Awesome panel!
After that, we playtested The Nightly Misadventures of Pizza Guy. I love playtesting. A few years ago, I got to playtest a couple new games in development by the creator of House on Haunted Hill. His games were scribbles on index cards, Pizza Guy was very well fleshed out, lots of nicely typed and well-thought-out playsheets, cards, tip charts. My favorite part was the hilarious descriptions of the art that is hoped to be on each card, I LOL-ed. There were great ideas in Pizza Guy, and some parts that need to be worked through more. As a good playtester, I gave all my ideas and opinions to the designer. I hope to someday buy the finished product.
Then it was on to Fiasco, a GM-less RPG. Dawn Child, a very seasoned RPG-er, joined The BFF and I along with three others. I always play one RPG at Nuke Con, despite feeling like I'm not very good at it. How will I improve if I avoid it? Being GM-less, and the unique way that it is able to be GM-less, made it easier for me to get into it. I did still get the bad RPG-er blues about 2/3 into it, when I just ran out of ideas and steam. We bought the pdf, and are going to try it at our family game day this weekend. I think I will be able to get into it a bit more with just family, but we'll see.
While the three of us were RPG-ing, The Munchkin was Zombie LARPing, which he said was great fun, and he won a cool t-shirt.
Saturday started with Mythos, a Collectable Card Game, luckily with pre-made decks. I am on record as not liking CCGs, but it's not the game play (usually) that I don't like, it's trying to build a deck. I have no idea how to do that. But since the decks were pre-made, I was happy to try it out (or again, I think I played it a few years ago). I really liked how this played, when you have a properly made deck, you're trying to bring out specific things for victory points, and you fight with the other players. We had six people ready to play, so the GM put us in two groups of three, and The BFF and I each won in our trio. Since we already have a bunch of the cards, we're going to find the pre-made deck lists on-line, because I will definitely
play this again.
Next, we tried out Ruin by Buffalo Games. It would be good for a younger crowd, or party gamers. It was a fun twist on the Sorry type of game.
Saturday, I didn't do as much gaming myself, since I was leading games at different times, and I didn't want to be late for my own game!
I GM-ed Fresco, ironically being all the way in Omaha, to teach the game to two of our buddies from our Lincoln FLGS. Later, I GM-ed Dixit, and I was happy to find people excited about playing, and they loved it!
Sunday, The BFF and I joined in a huge game of Zombies!!! with three home grown expansions we play tested. My favorite was the Zoo. This game took most of the part of the day that we were awake and not driving! Then the pooped out gamers headed back home.
Can't wait for next year!!

Nuke Con 9

This year we made a lesser attack on the Nuke Con weekend, four of us went for just Saturday: me, The BFF (BoyFriend Forever), his son Yehaw McKickass, and my younger son the Artist Extreeme. Going for one day only, we completely packed the day with gaming fun. I, for one, am still pretty tired!

Since a few things we had wanted to try (separately) were full, it ended up that The BFF and I played all our games together, which was great for playing his favorite overall game, "I-Beat-You!". We played all new-to-us games this year, not wanting to waste our one day playing stuff we've played before.

We played:
* an unscheduled Kingsburg with our LGS buddies (my must-have of the day)
* when no GM showed up for Shadows Over Camelot, we filled some empty slots on Are You Smarter Than a Con Guest (super fun! but made me feel dumb)
* On The Underground (train-ish game of the London underground) (which The BFF kept reminding me that he has actually BEEN on!)
* Chicago Express (train-ish game mostly auction-y)
* The RPG Don't Rest Your Head (I'm not experienced at RPGs. I'm especially shy in a con setting, but I really liked the story, and the folks we played with)
* Robo Rally for the Brain Dead (which I proved to be by 10:00, and could not 'get' the part about when the conveyor belt turned you or not)

The kids played D&Ds most of the day, broken up with one Race For The Galaxy session, which is a fav for them both.

We also made some purchases, of course! The BFF bought Small World and Dead Lands, and I bought Silent But Deadly Night in a great tin, Martian Fluxx, and some blank Fluxx cards that the Artist Extreeme and I are going to design!

More in-depth reactions coming soon...

After Shock: No Agricola

So I waited until the deadline day to volunteer to teach Agricola. at the Nuke Con After Shock 2008.3, which was Tuesday, and the rest of the week found some free time to reread some of the rules, dig through the cards as there were still some I hadn't seen before, type up some notes, and Friday night re-watched the Board Games with Scott video on Agricola.
And no one signed up.
I even for a while put my cool jars of bits up on the sign up counter for enticement, but no takers. Oh, well.
I joined a few others in a cooperative game of A Touch of Evil, The Supernatural Game instead. We played cooperatively, and we creamed the bad guy. I even got in the last punch. But, honestly, the other three really, REALLY weakened the monster before my puny dice rolls got into play. He had twenty-two wounds to take, and by the time it was my turn to charge, he was down to just a couple wounds.
I also played Pandemic, three player, twice. We lost big time first, and won big time the second time. Both games seemed really unbalanced, but in opposite ways. It just depends on where the cards lay.
Also learned and played for the first time la Harve, created by the same designer who did Agricola. Very nice game, like Agricola in many ways, resource gathering, planning ahead, many steps to some things you want to do or buy, and victory points. Different in that there are way more resources, each resource can 'level up', actions are played on buildings that you or the town buy and then anyone can use (usually for pay) the building to do the action the building provides. The three guys I played with had all played together a few times, and were very kind to the beginner. I got a score that they said was in par with their first plays, so I wasn't too disappointed, and their scores were the highest they'd ever gotten, which I'd like to take a little credit for. ;p There are many buildings to come out, and since every building had victory points, I was trying to buy as many as possible, and the guys didn't mention 'till the end that usually all the buildings don't get bought, I just assumed we all try to buy the better buildings and keep buying 'till they're gone! Very fun and intricate game. The resource refreshing is random every game, and the number of players definitely would change how the game goes. There's only seven total actions in each round (and you feed after every round), so in a four player game, someone only gets one action per round. Some of the things that happen at round end, ie how much to feed, when buildings and ships come out, if there is a harvest or not, these things all change depending on the number of players as well. I do think it had 1-5, so it must have a solo element as well. I don't think I need to buy this one, yet, but only because I think we have many more games of Agricola in store at home before bringing this one home. I would like to play it a few more times though! I'm not sure if it's out in the US yet, we played from an Australian version picked up at Essen.

Nuke Con: Other Games

Yes, I did play a few other games at Nuke Con besides Agricola! ;p
I also played Cash N Guns, Race For The Galaxy, Bang, Monsters Menace America, Rock Band, Run For Your Life Candyman, Torres, volunteered for one two-hour block, and play tested Boltz & Voltz.
I didn't play an RPG I meant to, because of a table mix-up (we were at the right table, but they had changed to a different table). The BFF (boy friend forever) really wants to play RPGs, and I'm not very good at them yet, so I didn't want to play without him there for moral support. I feel self conscious if I try to play with real RPGers. So I was a little bummed about the table mix-up, but I probably would have clogged up their game, so it's ok that I didn't play.
We also tried to play Power Grid, after hearing and reading so many good things about it, and we checked it out from the game library. But it was late into the night, and the BFF and I were very tired, and we couldn't get through the rules, we were just that tired! That's how we ended up playing the Candyman game, it was much simpler to understand at the late hour. It was actually very cute, it was basically the broken Candyland game in the playing of the board, with the added element of attack! Each player (he was Stinky, I was Butch) has a grid sheet to keep track of attacks on each body part, so hitting someone in the peppermint was hitting them in the head. This ended up being a perfect silly game for overly tired oldsters, even tho it went on too long, like the game it's parodying.
Cash N Guns les Yazukas was also very fun. This was one I had heard about first from the On Board Games podcast as a fun group game. It was also getting late the night we played this, and we had a fun table of folks to play with. The throwing stars, that are in this expansion were so much fun, maybe someone can perfect the double-knock-down move that our Yazukas were trying to do.
Bang was a little less fun, but not as silly. With part of who you are being hidden from the other players, it maybe was hard to first play with people you don't know. That's one part of a game convention, from all my little experience, that I've learned; some games are hard to learn with complete strangers, or maybe some strangers are hard to learn new games with. Either way, it's a dice roll, proving once again that Gaming = Life.
Monsters Menace America is a good game with a cool movie monster theme. I've played it once or twice before at game days or mini-cons, and have always enjoyed it. My kids and I played while we were waiting for scheduled games to start, and had a bonus player of an adorable Baby Bug who was an excellent player for such a young age. This is a game we've enjoyed each time we've played, and we've not bought it for our own collection only due to it being 3 player and up. The BFF and I usually only buy games that can be played two player, for those times when it's just he and I playing.
I learned at last year's Nuke Con that I really enjoy play testing new games, so when I saw one play test on the schedule this year, I made sure to sign up for it. Since it's just in playtesting, I don't know how much to say about it, but Boltz and Voltz is a good solid game with great artwork. I will be watching for it and will buy it as soon as it comes out!
Race For The Galaxy is a great game, which we have enjoyed many times since we got it last month. The time slot at the con was going to be a tournament, and there were something like 64 slots available. The BFF and I were getting pretty good, and were excited to play in a tournament, but including he and I, there were only six of us, and none of us being the tourney leader. Don't know what happened with that. We six separated into two games of three (good thing we brought our copy) but each table only played one game, with no tourney, it was more appealing to go play Agricola again! In my game, we were all pretty concentraty, and not talking much, and I commented to my group that I had read or heard that the game wasn't very social, and now I saw why.
Torres was a game I had seen the cool bits for and was very interested in, so I was excited to see it close up. I love that people bring their favorite games to a convention, just in case they can find someone interested in playing, and that was what happened. It is a very spacial game, almost a puzzle, and it reminds me of the kinds of games my brother and I would buy for and play with my dad when we were kids. I would like to pick this one up sometime, or maybe buy it for my dad.

Agricola @ Nuke Con

The most anticipated game in our house recently was Agricola. (and that is pronounced ah-GRICK-oh-lah)(and yes, I am the annoying one who has corrects everyone who pronounces it like a soft drink)(and by everyone I mean every game store clerk, every potential player, even the guy who taught us the game)
Last weekend at Nuke Con, I finally got to play it. I preregistered on-line to make sure I didn’t miss it. And the guy that taught us during the slotted time was happy to teach more new players and play more games during the rest of the weekend, so I actually got to play three times. I was a little afraid that I had read and heard too much hype, like a movie where all the good parts were in the trailer, and it wouldn’t be as good as anticipated. But playing it everyday of the convention only made me want it more!
Since this is leaning toward a review, let me mention what kind of games I usually like. My official favorite game is Carcassonne. I love all it’s expansions, I love all sorts of Eurogames, give me wooden bits and I’ll be very happy. My close second favorite game, or maybe I’ll say my favorite game series, is Zombies!!! I love all things zombie and gross like that, zombie movies and comics are always watched and read, and zombies are a theme in my arts-n-crafts, too. So I’ll play any and all games related to zombies, but the Twilight Creations Zombies!!! series will always be at the top of my list. (Now if I can figure out a game with zombie meeples…) I like various card games and party games, I don’t lean toward collectable card games though, and I’m usually turned off by war themes. Good mechanics of a game will win me over, but it’s the bits I love. Gimme good bits!
Speaking of good bits, back to Agricola! (who doesn’t love a good segue?) I opened the box this morning to get the rule book out to read, and there’s all the great bits! Nothing like the smell of cardboard and wood in the morning. ;p The first thing that impressed me was that they included a bag full of baggies, for when you separate out the bits. That’s game packaging at it’s finest. There are quite a few different kinds of bits, and I had wondered if it might get confusing, but I haven’t really run into that yet, except for clay is the lighter brown disk, and wood is the darker brown disk. I’m not sure if so many kinds of bits will be confusing for younger or older players, we’ll test it out with my mom next month.
The first two games we played, we just used the E deck. The coolest part, IMHO, about Agricola is the different sets of cards, and the quantity of each, so that the cards you use each time will be different. The three sets are: E which is basic, I for Interactive, and K for Complex (remember, the game was written in German). In each set there are Occupation cards and Minor Improvement cards, and you are dealt seven of each, and with a total of over 300, depending on how many players and which set you use, the possibilities are virtually endless. There are different cards used for different numbers of players, last weekend all three games were five player games, so we used the most cards available. The cards give you ways to do things easier, or allow you to break a specific rule. But a warning for new players, when you're first learning, and someone has a card that lets them break a specific rule, it's easy to forget that they get to do it because of the card, and get confused on the actual rule. That happened to us a couple times, when someone had a card that let them bake bread at harvest time.
Since I had watched the "Board Games with Scott" video of Agricola, I had a pretty good idea of the rules before sitting down to be taught. The best thing I learned from the video was to watch the scoring. As Scott says, ‘you want a little bit of everything’, and I really kept that in mind playing my first game. I’m proud to say that the tip from Scott even helped me win a little prize! Our game teacher played with us, and since he’d played many times before, he outdid all of our scores by plenty, almost doubling them. But out of us four newbies, I had the highest score, thus the prize. Watching the scoring is one of the keys, as our teacher pointed out, it is a two point swing, having nothing of something will give you a negative point, where even only one of something will give you a positive point in most cases. I only beat the BFF by that two point swing (but don’t feel too bad for him, he watched the video, too!).
The progression of playing is interesting, the second time playing, I also did pretty good (tied for second after our experienced teacher), and tried to incorporate more of my cards. The third time, with no newbies, we advanced up to the I deck and used one of the advanced rules, where you are dealt 10 cards and have to decide on the 7 that you want. I really got too focused on the cards that time, trying to use all the cards together, and ended up messing myself up, and even having to take ‘begging cards’. Begging cards are what you want the least in this game, and what you have to take if you can’t feed your family at a harvest. I was so intent on making my cards work together, I forgot that I had already eaten my sheep, and had to take two stupid begging cards! Our teacher had been saying all weekend that everyone he had ever taught hadn’t had to take begging cards, and I messed up his good record. (Sorry, Jerry!) At the end of that game, one other player who I think won that time around gave me some good advice: try to get maximum regular score points, focus on that, not on the cards. Why didn’t I think of that?!?
I always like learning strategies from other players, I watched our teacher save up his wood and build his fences all three times we played. I figured he's had good luck with that strategy, but it didn't leave him a lot of time to get animals out. It will depend on what cards you have, I suppose, when I had animal cards, I really needed to build my fences early! Another good tip I picked up from our teacher is the difference between the stage and the round. Some cards specify stage, which is a set of rounds, and he had a player with hurt feelings when he misunderstood the card.
Now I'm off! I have a date with the rest of the rules, and all the bits, and maybe a solo game tonight.