The Sunday Miscellanea - Sushi Roll and Felithian Factories

Just before the weekend, the Lake Geneva lunchtime crew played Sushi Roll with Brad, Tom Wham, and Larry Hamilton, of Follow Me and Die, at Culver's in Lake Geneva, WI.

Then we headed back to Lake Geneva Games to playtest Tom Wham's Felithian Factories with Tom, Larry, and myself.

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Tabletopper Friday - Space Barons by Tom Wham

Space Barons is an unpublished 3X game (no eXtermination, just eXplore, eXpand, eXploit) set in the Felithian universe in which many of the space games Tom Wham creates reside.  Tom, John, Ernie, and I have all played this one before and the playtesting continues apace, this time at Lake Geneva Games.  Check out the LGG Facebook page here.

It's a fairly straightforward game where players act as captain of a single space trading vessel which they can upgrade.  They set up a network of "Transporters" which allow them to launch from a planet or they can pay their opponents to use one of theirs.  Players draw trading contracts  and fulfill them to collect credits while avoiding hazards that only Tom Wham could create with clever names and humorous artwork.

The game is great fun and this one is close to complete, I think.  A few tweaks to the drawing protocols should square everything up.  I attempted a strategy of not upgrading my ship while only taking nearby contracts and building a network of cheap transporters all of the galaxy.  This left me pretty far behind at the end.  I'll make some adjustments of my own next time I play as well.

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The Sunday Miscellanea - Bloktown

Late last week, I blogged about Tom Wham and his wonderful game The Awful Green Things From Outer Space (1979) but I also got a chance to play a game he has in the playtesting phase called "Bloktown" over at Lake Geneva Games.

I won't say too much about this game except that it is an auction style game with victory points dependent on clearing properties to ready them for constructing various building.

For four and a half decades, Tom has had games published through many companies in the US and abroad.  This is one of a dozen I have been lucky enough to play during pre-release and I look forward to playing more.

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The Sunday Miscellanea - Tom Wham's Greedy Billionaires

I've had the pleasure of playing Tom Wham's Greedy Billionaires a few times before and have written about it on this blog a couple of time here and here.  Tom has told me this game was originally conceived decades ago and then sat for some time before being rediscovered and rewritten several times since.  It was recently featured at Gary Con VII and a couple of new rules adjustments went into effect there as well.  It's a humorous send up of Monopoly-style games with some fun quirks all its own.

The description is as follows:

Each player takes turns collecting business properties and attempting to get them to pay out as often as possible to finish with the greatest wealth.

Each time I've played, there have been some improvements but, honestly, this game played very well the first time I tried it.  The well-known Tom Wham humor shines through in the artwork and naming conventions.  There is plenty to keep players busy between turns and the dice mechanics sidestep the old roll-and-move problem of similar games (you roll 3d6 but first call whether you wish to move the total or just the number on the single lowest or single highest die).  It's good fun and I recommend it if you get the chance to play.

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The Sunday Miscellanea - Dragon Lairds (2007)

I really love when I get the chance to play Dragon Lairds (2007).  It's a fun, colorful card game with lots of surprising and shifting strategies that requires real engagement.  One of the bonuses playing locally is that both designers might be part of the game.  We often make a point of playing it when both are available.

The description from Board Game Geek is as follows:

In this cousin of Saint Petersburg, each player represents a monarch dragon clan, and attempts to assert herself as the Dragon Monarch by game end, by securing the most Royals (victory points). In order to facilitate this process, players will use their Geld (money) to hire Dragon Lairds (aristocrats) and buy Resources (buildings) and Commoners (peasants). You can use precious Royals (your victory points) to acquire Dragon Havocs, which empower you to do anything from getting extra cash, to stealing things from your opponents. The Havocs tend to be one-shot little guys, however, and are always discarded to the bottom of the discard deck, as far out of reach as possible from those cards that pilfer the discard pile.

At the end of each round, you accumulate the Geld and Royals that your acquisitions generate for your clan. At the end of the game, you additionally receive any Finale Royals on cards as end-game victory points.

From the Margaret Weis web site:  

Deep in the heart of an island continent, many years ago, was a long forgotten land of ancient Saureans… Dragons of all sizes and shapes, who had, through the generations tamed the foolish races of men, dwarves, and elves that lived among them. Over the centuries, they refined their techniques and now were trying to gain control over all the surrounding dragon countries. There could be only one Dragon Monarch, but who would it be?

At the start of the game, each player is given a dragon clan and chooses to play either the king or queen of that clan. The object is for your clan to score the most points in Royals by the end of the game and thus become the ruling Dragon Monarch.

I've had good luck with a myriad of strategies and paths to victory with this game and it always feels like anyone could win.  I've even managed to win with the elusive all-one-color strategy, twice!  However, I have also lost miserably attempting this strategy so it's not for the faint of heart.  It's a safer route to lie in the weeds in second or a close third place and avoid making enemies with Havoc cards and stash a little more money away for the final turns.  Also, avoid snapping up too many cards early, the cards that look good but can't be brought into play right away.  Too many times I have seen those hand cards ruin a perfectly good final push.  Watch out for the high value Resource cards.  They seem like winners but too often become the targets of Havocs.

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The Sunday Miscellanea - Greedy Billionaires by Tom Wham

Tom Wham has been a fixture of game design in the industry for about four and a half decades with dozens of game design and artistic credits to his name.  You can see the full list of his work (not including the many advertisements he designed for magazines!) in game design here.  As an early employee of TSR in Lake Geneva, his easily-recognized artwork has graced boardgames, many on which he shares design credit, as well as card games and RPGs like Dungeons & Dragons.

I've had the pleasure the last few years of living in close proximity to him in Lake Geneva, WI, and gaming with him almost every week of the year.  It's been an education as a gamer and game designer, playtesting many of the games he currently has in development as well as playing scores of games he has worked on and those he loves from other creators that inspire him.  Recently, he broke out Greedy Billionaires, a game that has been in the works for a few years and which I have played with him on a number of occasions.

I don't want to give too much of this game design away but I will say it's like a bizarre version of monopoly on steroids with a humorous twist and some of Tom's coolest artwork and naming conventions.  Tom has his own website where he sells some of his games directly to the public.  These are handmade and sell at "boutique prices" but they are well worth it if you admire and love his work.  The website itself is a trip to visit, so check it out here.  Tom will be at Gary Con once again this year running some of his own designs including Greedy Billionaires.  Do yourself a favor and try to join him at his game table

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Nostalgia Thursday - Search for the Emperor's Treasure (1981) Revisited

I wrote about the cool fan-made version of Tom Wham's Search for the Emperor's Treasure (1981) that was sent to Tom and played by us here.  It was lots of fun and we decided to break it out again last Friday for what turned out to be a rather quick game.

I snapped a few pictures while we were getting the modular board together and sort the characters and spells, then dove right into playing.  One of our house rules when playing at Culver's has been that we play until one player draws a second Imperial Treasure and the winner is whoever has the most treasures overall.

As it turned out, in six turns, one player drew a second Imperial Treasure and had six treasures, one or two more than the others.  It was, perhaps, the fastest game we've played taking a little under an hour including set up.  We probably need to revise that game-end mechanism.

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Nostalgia Thursday - Search for the Emperor's Treasure (1981)

One of the great things about moving to Lake Geneva has been getting the chance to regularly play games with legendary game Designer Tom Wham.  One of the bonuses is getting to play games he has designed or even games that are in development.  Then, sometimes, something happens that seems to top all of that.  Tom gathered a few of the Friday faithful at Culver's for a little boardgaming last week to show off a copy of Search for the Emperor's Treasure (1981) that a fan had sent him.  But it wasn't a copy to sign and return, which happens from time to time, but something rather more special.  A fan who loved the game, since finding it years ago, had wanted to teach it to his kids, to instill a love of gaming in them.  He did so but wanted to make sure they had something more, so he made a copy of the game in a sort of deluxe version but also made a third copy for Tom.

In case you aren't familiar, here is the description of the game from Board Game Geek here:

Originally published in issue #51 (July 1981) of Dragon Magazine. Republished as part of the The Best of Dragon Magazine Games boxed set in 1990.

A tongue-in-cheek version of "classic" Dungeons & Dragons (some even say Mertwig's Maze is a similar treatment of Advanced D&D). As such, players become a warrior, elf, cleric, or magician, then wander around the board collecting treasure and resolving encounters. The Emperor's six magic artifacts are both high-powered magic items and a countdown clock, as when enough have been found, the game ends. (Exactly how many depends on number of players.)

Treasure, encounters and equipment are all randomized with chits in three cups. Characters obtain them by fighting monsters or lucky die rolls on result charts associated with various board locations (e.g., castles, villages, The Wizard's Tower, The Pirate Lair, etc.). Not all encounters are monsters -- some are travelers who will bestow treasure upon completion of quests, others are annoyances, and there's even Imperial Guard patrols looking to confiscate the Emperor's Treasure.

Terrain types are a key strategy feature, as a player whose current location's terrain doesn't match the encounter drawn can bestow it on someone else who does. So a character in rugged forest or mountains can get stuck fighting several monsters in succession during other players' turns.

A surprising amount of flavor is included for a magazine game. There's an assortment of magic spells, ranged and close combat, magical weapons & armor, damsels in distress, evil wizards, a volcanic demon, even a wandering elephant.

The boxed version changes the encounter mix around, adds a deck of treasure clue cards, and expands the character selection with a dwarf and a "hairfoot." Counters are die-cut, but monochrome rather than full color. The nice Darlene Pekul map painting is traded in for a hexmap with generic terrain symbols that Wham suggests you mount to cardboard and cut apart, thus creating a new map each game a la Kings & Things. The cards force characters to move a lot more, and most encounters can no longer be given away, so this edition plays quite differently.

He put together two rules booklets and included some Tom Wham artwork from other sources to fancy it up a bit.  The Darlene map is included both in the original form as as the hex version.  He even made draw bags of Dice (and wounds), Encounters, Weapons, and Treasures.  It's a wonderful set and lovingly handcrafted.  More photos of the game can be found in my Facebook albums here and on my Google Photo albums here.  Quite the tribute!

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Nostalgia Thursday - Mertwig's Maze (1988)

Mertwig's Maze (1988) is a Tom Wham design published by TSR.  I got the chance to play this with Tom and our friend Wendy late last week.  While it does have that old school roll the dice for movement mechanic, which can sometimes prove frustration, it also has some other very fun features.  There are definitely RPG-influenced aspects of the game as well.

The description from Board Game Geek (and the back of the game's folio):

Wise and beloved King Mertwig lays dying. His only children, a twin boy and girl, were stolen by gypsies long ago when they were still babies. Mertwig, desperate that his kingdom not fall into evil hands, announces a contest: Anyone who can present to him a Royal Treasure and a Royal Birthmark will be named heir!

But treasures (not to mention birthmarks) are not exactly easy to find. And after a would-be Royal Heir tracks them both down, he (or she) must present them to King Mertwig - and that requires braving the dangers of Mertwig's Maze!

The Mertwig's Maze game is a lighthearted fantasy boardgame from Tom Wham, designer of numerous games published in Dragon magazine, including the classic Snit Smashing and Snit's Revenge. In the Mertwig's Maze game, you are the would-be heir to Mertwig's throne! Can you complete your quest, get past the Mystic Musk Ox in Mertwig's Maze, and reach the finish before the other players? More importantly, can you claim the throne before Mertwig passes on and the kingdom falls into the clutches of evil?

The Mertwig's Maze game contains a large game map, eight smaller maps, full-color counters, and hundreds of cards depicting hirelings, magical items, arms and armor, and random events to aid your quest - or hinder your opponents'! Mertwig's Maze game can be played by two or more players, and is recommended for ages 10 and up.

The map is colorful and delightfully Tom Wham-ish, with all the little touches his artwork brings to his games.

The Hireling cards are nifty and your main character as well as the Hirelings have Attack and Defense values that match up when you place the cards head to head for combat.  Mundane and Magic Item cards slip beneath the characters and add to one or the other value.

The various locations where your gathered party explore run the gamut of fantasy locations with tricks, traps, and monsters to overcome.

Each location is unique, so there is not a lot of repetition in the game.  We had a great time playing this classic and I look forward to tackling it again someday.

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with an eye toward the last century and before.

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Systems Saturday - Feudality (2011)

Playing Feudality (2011) is always a treat.  As often as not, I get the chance to play it with the game designer, Tom Wham.  When he is going to be at one of the small conventions I attend, I always look to see if it is on the Sunday morning schedule and sign up right away.  I've tried a number of strategies and have as much fun not winning as I have winning.  This is a good thing, since I have only won a couple of times in dozens of attempts.  Earlier this week, our friend Dave was in town from Colorado and we played several games, wrapping up late at night with this excellent Tom Wham game published by Z-Man Games.  We used both the base game and the hard-to-find expansion.

The description from Board Game Geek is as follows:

A long time ago in Europe, ages were pretty dark. The distribution of wealth back then left a lot to be desired. Greedy people banded together to take things from other people so that the rich could get richer and the poor could have even less. Twas ever thus. Step into the middle of the normal state of human affairs as a Baron or Baroness somewhere almost in Europe a long time ago. Thanks to your birth you have a lot of little people working to make you richer, and you, in turn, are doing your best to make your king even more prosperous. If you do things right, you might someday be king.

Each player starts with a Fiefdom Management card, divided into 64 squares (49 of which can have tiles played on them. Into four of these squares you deploy your Keep, in which you will put your fortification of some sort, and your soldiers. Elsewhere in your land you deploy assorted resource gatherers and buildings in an effort to grow, prosper, and score victory points. Along the way there may be wars, invasions, tournaments, taxes, and a lot of other nonsense.

I have found with this tile placement /resource management game that despite the luck of the dice being a fairly prevalent factor, being able to over-produce a single resource can be immensely helpful in staying competitive.  I've tried being heavy on victory point tiles and leaving my fortifications fallow, but the one thing that has always been true in my own game play, having better-than-solid production in at least one resource has led to me being within a point or two of victory or even winning.  I have also come to the belief that building up your fortifications early can lead to a quick victory but can also strain your resources if the dice aren't going your way (or at least staying neutral).  Check the game out if you get the chance and grab one for your own collection.

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

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