Nostalgia Thursday - Formula Dé (1991)

Joe was kind enough to bring out his Formula Dé (1991) game to the last First Sunday event.  He has all of the racetracks and picked one out that was fairly easy since the rest of us were very new to the game or complete novices.

The description from Board Game Geek is as follows:

Formula Dé is a fast-paced racing game in which the cars' top speeds are limited by having to end a certain number of turns in each curve of the racetrack. This can be tricky, because although players can regulate their speeds by choosing which gear to be in and each gear allows a certain range of movement, the exact amount is determined randomly. Great fun for a big group.

Joe gave us each an extra pit/repair token and we had a blast running around the track for three laps.  The weather was wet and rainy the first lap but cleared up swiftly and stayed that was the rest of the race.  One player stalled out at the start and never really recovered but ran a good race trying to catch up.  Only one player had any significant damage but managed to finish the race in second.  I had some very good luck and never pushed my vehicle to its limits, so I managed to finish without any real damage.  All in all it was a good time and I can see how this has been a longtime favorite of its fans!

Nostalgia Thursday on MFWARS.com 

Focusing on the roots of current tabletop gaming

with an eye toward the last century and before.

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Systems Saturday - Last Night on Earth (2007) - Mall Madness

It was just about a year ago when Norm ran us through the Mall Madness scenario using Last Night on Earth: The Zombie Game (2007) and I blogged about it here.  We were pretty pleased with ourselves at the time because the cards just seemed to keep going our way.  Not so this last Lake Geneva Games gameday because we had our hats handed to us with our brains in them!

The description of the game from Board Game Geek is as follows:

Last Night on Earth, The Zombie Game is a survival horror board game that pits small-town Heroes head-to-head against a horde of Zombies. A team of four heroes is chosen by one set of players, and the Zombies are controlled by 1 or 2 players. Each hero has its own special abilities. The board is modular, which changes the layout of the town and start positions of each hero. The game comes with several scenarios, which include simple survival, rescue, or escape. Differing combinations of heroes, scenarios, and board configurations offer a lot of replayability. 

A Hero deck and a Zombie deck deliver tactical bonuses to each side. Combat is resolved using 6-sided dice, modified by the weapon cards heroes may be equipped with. Many of the cards include zombie movie tropes to achieve a feel of playing out a horror movie. All the game art is photographic, enhancing the cinematic feel. The game also comes with a CD Soundtrack of original thematic music.

Each hero has its own plastic sculpted miniature. The game also has 14 zombies in two colors. Other objects and effects are represented by high-quality cardboard counters.

And the Last Night At The Mall: A Last Night On Earth/Mall Madness variant scenario can be downloaded through the link at Board Game Geek here.

If you haven't played this variant, and can get your hands on an old Mall Madness game to facilitate it, I highly recommend it.  It's still a fun game, even when you lose (perhaps more so!) but we were short on time so we kinda ran a truncated version of it.  That may have favored the zombies a bit, or so I will claim until the next time we play!

Systems Saturday on MFWARS.com 

A look under the hood of various Games, Rules and Systems.

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Wargaming Wednesday - Line of Sight, American Militia, & Northern Conspiracy

Over on markdecoteaugaming.blogspot.com, he has a "New Way to Determine Line of Sight on the Game Table" here.

Also, on gilesallison.blogspot.com, we get a closer look at his "American Militia" figures here.

Finally, on ajs-wargaming.blogspot.com, he tells of the "Northern Conspiracy September 2015 Game Night" here.

Wargaming Wednesday on MFWARS.com 

A closer examination of board and miniatures Wargaming.

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Mid-May to Mid-June Gaming 2014

There were some great gaming events happening in Southern Wisconsin and Northern Illinois from the middle of May through the middle of June in 2014, and I snapped pictures to stand in testament to the fun.  There are more of them located on Facebook here and Google Plus here!

Over Da Top Gaming Website

Let me take a moment to point toward a fun blog for those who might enjoy "A Blog of Tournaments, Painting, Terrain, and Podcasts about Warhammer Fantasy Battles. Over Da Top Gaming claims to take gaming to the extreme with conversions and painting to test the limits of miniature warfare!" Chuck Jiardina, who runs the blog, has been at it for over half a decade, so there is plenty of back reading to do for those who are new to it. See more here!

Intl TableTop Day in Southern Wisconsin

We started our Intl TableTop Day a bit early with some Friday gaming at Culver's.  There we played a couple of fast games of Love Letter with the lunchtime crew.  After that, we swept over to Ernie's place to play a game of Le Havre.  Come Saturday, it was off to the Monthly Burlington Gameday, two weeks early since we didn't want it to fall on Easter weekend and figured one more week forward to fall on this gaming holiday just made sense.

To warm up for Intl TableTop Day 2014, we opted to play a game of Le Havre 

Ernie was pleased we could come by to play

On Saturday at the Burlington Gameday, the first game played was good old Dungeon

Baron von Deekin broke out his Wings of Glory, Wings/Aces/Dawn/etc. mashup

Later, a game of Francis Drake was played

Someone photobombed the board closeup!

Perhaps the highlight for me was playing Search for the Emperor's Treasure, originally published in Dragon as designed by Tom Wham then sold later with other Dragon Mag games

Quite a nice logo and font

The rules were in good condition

As was the encounter booklet

This one was modified by Tom with ramdomized map hexes

Which we took turns placing

There was a handy hex legend

And it all featured Tom Wham characters

Some were modified further at some stage

It was a busy and fun event

A Gathering of Gamers - March 2014

Every third Sunday, some of us local boardgamers meet at the Pizza Ranch in Elkhorn, WI, for fun, food, and games.  This month, yesterday, we played plenty of games, as you can see below.

Karl, Tom, and Wendy are ready for some Advanced Space Barons

Warrior Knights was ready to go

I have been wanting to play Warrior Knights for a long time

Rich and Ian tackle Lords of Waterdeep

Tom even taught some Dragon Lairds

Love Letter was played

In fact, Love Letter was played on two tables at the same time!

Dale was happy to be playing Give It to the King

Even a game of Asara was slipped in at the end

My only regret was forgetting to take pics of our game of Revolution. Next time!