Recap of International Tabletop Day
Last Saturday was International Tabletop Day. All my meetup groups around the Valley were hosting their own special event. I ended up going to a friend’s event at his home and then moved over to my usual biweekly gaming group event. It was nice to see friends who don’t usually make it to all the events, so there was some time spent catching up on everybody’s lives.
The first game I played was Lords of Waterdeep. Strangely enough, I’ve never had a chance to play it before. I love the heavy crunchy games, and this game has never been suggested during my usual meetups. It’s a great game though that’s on the short side that introduces the concept of worker placement for new board gamers. I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it.
The game takes place over eight rounds. You place your meeples on various spots on the board to collect resources or quest cards. You can then trade in resources to complete quests, which may help you toward your personal goal. You can also collect intrigue cards, which give you bonuses or special abilities for completing quests. Also, you can pay to build buildings, which give you victory points as well.
Next up was Elder Sign. I totally forgot to take more photos of this game. It’s basically the dice version of one of my favorite games Arkham Horror. There’s no board for the game, but instead cards come up, which represent various rooms in a mysterious museum. Investigators go to various rooms to complete tasks by rolling dice. Completing tasks reward you with various items, which can help in defeating the Great Old One. Failure to complete those tasks has negative effects for the humans. We were all rolling horribly, and ended up waking up the Great Old One and dying in the final combat.
By this time, half the day had finished, so I moved onto my next event. The first game I played there was Caverna. I love, love this game, but I don’t own a copy of it, so I hardly get a chance to play it. The game costs about $90, which is way out of my budget right now. I’ve been waiting for it to go on sale, but alas, it hasn’t.
The game is similar to Agricola, but it also includes a mining and expedition element. The game is more forgiving than Agricola because you can trade your animals and resources at any time to feed your people. You don’t need a special oven to process your animals. Our game went pretty quickly for such a heavy game. There were only 3 of us, and all of us knew how to play. Still, there are choices that can slow us down a bit. When excavating the mines, you can build special rooms to give you bonuses or victory points. There are 48 rooms to choose from in the game. Also, when your dwarves go on expedition, you can pick various rewards based on how strong your dwarf is.
Lastly, my friends and I played Homeland. which I’ve talked about here. The first time I played I was the political opportunist; this time, I was a loyal agent so I had a very straightforward mission. I felt like I got the hang of this game better the second time around. There were 4 of us playing, and one of the guys isn’t into heavy board games. So again, Homeland plays about 90 minutes, which makes it more appealing to all types of gamers.
Then on Monday, I was able to play Twilight Struggle again. Such an awesome game. The scores were close, and we ended up going through all 10 turns. This triggered end-game scoring, which means you add up all the regions as if the scoring cards were just played. I ended up losing as the U.S. because my opponent had control in Central America and it pushed him to 3 victory points. Gahhh, one day I will totally win this game!
So that’s the recap of the gaming I did earlier this week. What did you guys all play?