With missing the first two weeks of the month and then making special arrangements last week for the anniversary party, this was actually the first "regular" week of attending game night for me.  So I struggled some in figuring out my evening schedule to get the girls home, feed them, and give baths all around before turning around and heading back up to Burlington.  Gwen got tied up at work, which threw me off even more, so I didn't even arrive until 7:30 or so.  I hope I can shave a little time off that in the future, but it may be closer to my new normal than I'd like. 

Our attendance was pretty terrible this week, so I assume that our winter slump is now on us in full force.  I know that some people were out of town or tied up at work this week, so maybe we'll pick up a little.  But I still had a lot of fun, starting with the game I set up while the rest of the gang finished up a play of 7 Wonders... 

Battles of Westeros [BGG]

My sentiments about Battles of Westeros have swung dramatically since I first heard about it.  After the game was announced, I was pretty indignant because it seemed to me that Fantasy Flight was going to stop their support for the "base" game of BattleLore.  For the most part, this has proven to be false, though, even though I wish that they would bring some of the innovation and creativity used in tweaking BoW into BattleLore itself.  But still, I felt no need to invest in another fantasy-ish C&C game, even after reading A Game of Thrones, the first book in the series.  Later on, however, I listened to the D6 Generation's review of BoW and interview with Rob Kouba (it's designer), and I was pretty excited about it once I heard what sorts of changes had been introduced to the Commands & Colors system.  So, when I had a gift certificate to spend after Christmas, I went ahead and pulled the trigger to see what it was all about for myself.

Before this week, I had played through the first scenario by myself just to make sure that I had a decent hold on the rules.  And since Kenny is an experienced C&C player, most of the rules teach was just about explaining the differences in issuing orders and turn structure.  When I played by myself, the Lannister forces crushed the Starks, so I gave Kenny the Lannister side as we finally got started.


Kenny contemplating his first move...

I had the advantage on the first turn, so my first priority was to try and get Maege and the units around her over to the fords so they could help defend the objectives.  I made one big mistake early on in forgetting that green mounted units can both move 4 and attack, so I didn't move up Maege herself to make my blue mounted unit Stalwart and therefore missed out on a couple of counterattack opportunities.  As I found in my solo play, those five Lannister cavalry units are just too quick and effective to mount much of a defense against. 

But on the other side of the board, my commander (Richard Karstark) assembled his archers into a pretty formidable defense, chewing up the Lannister infantry as they came up to the fords and then unleashing his own mounted unit to hammer them into oblivion.  Eventually, he even pursued them across the river and made 2 or 3 attempts to capture Kevan Lannister himself, which in hindsight was probably a waste of resources.

And while Kenny's mounted units were definitely winning their engagement with my infantry, they weren't necessarily able to eliminate them very quickly.  By the time he was able to disengage and move towards the objectives, it was almost too late.  He had one last, desperate attempt to wheel around and try to take them, but he came up short and I was able to take the day by denying him control of either of the objectives at the end of the 5th turn. 

Time: 101 minutes
Score: Me - Win, Kenny - Lose
Ratings: Me* 8, Kenny* 8


The end of turn 5.  I hold one objective and I even managed to make him retreat from the second on my last action.
Battles of Westeros was a heck of a lot of fun.  For the most part, it still feels like a C&C game, but I really like what the rule changes have done for it.  Instead of having cards that let you command units on the left-right-center sections of the board, in BoW they are played on a particular commander, who can then activate units within its zone of control (which is 2 spaced for everyone in the base set).  This feels really intuitive and "realistic" to me, and I like the little economy of resources that it establishes, since commanders have a limit to how many orders they can issue each turn.  

And in addition to the cards, you also get 4 order tokens each turn, which let you activate individual units even if they are out of command.  This adds a lot of flexibility to your choices, and also helps to make timing of when and how you activate your units something else that players can manipulate (because, for example, it is really powerful if you can activate several units after an opponent has passed for the turn, especially if you can retain advantage and go first on the next turn).

It also makes a lot of sense that you can only activate each unit once on a given turn (barring special things that let them rally and activate again).  Actually turning the flags around was a bit fiddly (as was managing all the different command and order tokens), but I still feel that the payout was well worth the extra effort.

I also liked the whole idea of units engaging each other in melee, and how that set up the possibility of flank attacks and parting shots when units disengage, but this mechanism was probably the most foreign to me (in a C&C game at least), so I still need to play with it a few more times before I completely get my head around it.

My impression right now is that Battles of Westeros is definitely the most complex game in the broad Commands & Colors family, and probably because of that, I like it a lot.  Kenny and I compared it briefly to C&C: Napoleonics (which we played not very long ago), and while that game probably has greater variety and complexity in the unit types, BoW still has more depth in rules complexity and overall strategy.  Both are really great games, though, and I hope to keep playing them whenever I get the chance! 

Ace of Aces - Handy Rotary Series [BGG]

Kenny and I needed to kill some time until everyone else finished up their marathon game of Gosu, so we pulled out my new (to me) copy of Ace of Aces: Handy Rotary Series that he had given me for Christmas.  We refreshed ourselves on the rules and played a quick basic game with 6 life points each.

Almost from the beginning, Kenny drew a bead on me and got in a good shot.  A little later, he managed to get behind me and get in another hit, and then guessed correctly when I tried to stall and let him fly over me, keeping up the pressure and nailing me once again.  I turned things around for a little while, first tailing and then sniping in a couple of hits against him, but in the end he regained control and delivered the last two hits to swat me from the sky. 


Kenny swoops in to blow me from the sky!
Time: 24 minutes
Score: Kenny - Win (4 life remaining), Me - Dead
Ratings: Kenny 7.5, Me 7

I've had a pretty good love afair with this type of dueling, book-based game (created by Nova Game Designs) for most of my gaming career.  Between Lost Worlds, the Battletech combat book game, Ace of Aces, the  Dragonriders of Pern book game, Star Wars Lightsaber Dueling, and even the cowboy-themed Bounty Hunter: Shootout at the Saloon, I've had a lot of fun with these games through the years.  Ace of Aces is definitely harder than the Lost Worlds model, mostly because you have to find your opponent and get yourself into position before you can do any damage.

If you're not familiar with the system, you basically have two books that are filled with pages showing a picture of what you see at the top and a grid of moves and linked page numbers at the bottom.  In Ace of Aces, you decide what you want to do and call out the matching page number to your opponent.  You then turn to the page they called out and find your move at the bottom, which sends you to another page showing the actual result of your moves.  It's a pretty brilliant little system, and no matter how many times I play it, it always amazes me how it always works out to send you both to the same pages!  

Kenny, Keith and I talked about maybe running a little tournament one night (or over one month), and I'd like to see who else in the group might be interested.  So, are ya interested?  

Forbidden Island [BGG]

I stumbled onto some official (as in, published in the German version of the game) alternate island configurations for Forbidden Island this week, and thought it'd be cool to try one out this week.  Chip and Kenny joined me as we played the "Bone Island" layout.


See?  It looks like a bone!

We were pretty lucky that Fool's Landing and all four types of treasure tile were together in the center of the island.  But we still had a really tough time of it, and things looked like they were about to come completely apart as the game was winding down.  I thought we had it won, until we realized that we had already used all three Helicopter Lift cards.  So in order to win, we would have to top-deck a helicopter in the next two turns. 

Since we had exhausted the draw deck, we shuffled it up for Kenny's turn and hoped... only to be rewarded immediately when he pulled that glorious Helicopter Lift card as his very first draw!  We flew away to safety, watching the island sink away behind us. 

Time: 31 minutes
Score: Explorers (Chip, Kenny & Me) - Win; Bone Island - Lose
Ratings: Chip 8.5, Kenny 8.5, Me 8

We had a really great time playing this game.  I always enjoy these coops, but they are so much better when you've got other players with you that know what they're doing and are truly bought into the game.  I also liked the extra little twist that the alternate layout threw into play, and I hope to try out a few more in the next little while. 


7 Wonders [BGG]

And then I wanted to get in a play of the Game of the Month! before I called it a night.  I sort of went for heavy blue cards, but scored a little in a couple of areas as well.  I completed my wonder and ended up racking up a lot of money by the end, so when I tied with Kenny for points, my huge wad of coin gave me the advantage for my first ever win! 

Time: 30 minutes
Score: Me 53 (+29 coin), Kenny 53 (+7 coin), Chip 39
Ratings: Me 8, Kenny 8.5, Chip 8

I don't know if I really understand the game any better than I did last week, but I won no matter what the reason.  I definitely continue to like 7 Wonders, even though I wonder how much real strategy is available in the game.  At 30 minutes, though, I'm happy with it as a filler even if it doesn't have a lot of strategic depth.


Michelle thinks about her choice in an earlier game of 7 Wonders.
Other Games Played

7 Wonders
Time: 24 minutes
Score: Kenny 71, Chip 56, David 52, Michelle 50, Charles 47, Chris 43
Ratings: Kenny 8, Chip 8, David 8.5, Michelle 7.5, Charles 9, Chris 9

Ascension: Chronicle of the Godslayer
Time: 21 and 20 minutes
Game 1: Sceadeau 81, Chris 74
Game 2: Sceadeau 65, Chris 59, Charles 58
Ratings: Sceadeau ?, Chris 10, Charles 7

Escalation!
Time: 10 minutes (for 3 hands)
Score: Chris 27, Chip 67, Sceadeau 69
Ratings: CHris 7, Chip 7, Sceadeau ?

Factory Fun
Time: 41 minutes
Score: Chip 73, Chris 62, Michelle* 53, Charles* 45, David* 35 
Ratings: Chip 8, Chris 8, Michelle 7, Charles 7, David 7

Gosu
Time: 85 minutes
Score: Charles* - Win; Chris (2), Chip* (0) & Ian* (0) - Lose 
Ratings: Charles 5, Chris 6, Chip 5, Ian ?

Space Hulk (mission #1)
Time: ??
Score: Charles* - 2 wins, Matt - no wins
Ratings: Charles 7, Matt 8

And for extra credot on the test, can anyone identify what game this token comes from?  We found it on the floor, and don't know who it belongs to...

* First play for that Person