What I Played Today: June 20

Agricola

I played a two player game of Agricola and lost badly. I didn't really use my minor improvements well, and my opponent kept taking all the wood. There's got to be more ways to get wood in order for the game to work, it's just too valuable.

What I Played Today: January 11

Chaos in the Old World, Agricola, Ugh

I played a game of Chaos in the Old World at the Horned Rat. The Horned Rat plays weird. It is remarkably unclear what the objective is, except to show up with someone else is ruining stuff and kinda scavenge points from them. So...makes sense. Anyway, Khorne won because that's what Khorne does when the other players mess with each other instead of with Khorne.

Then a game of Agricola, which I won because I own the game. There was, as there always is, a small refrain of "man nothing is going my way I hate this game," but I don't know, I liked it, I had a good time.

Then a weird not fun trick-taking game that is easy to make fun of. It's called Ugh. Come on guys, it's almost too easy.

What I Played Today: January 5

Civilization 5, Don't Starve, Agricola

I ended up downloading the Civilization 5 expansion, why not, and so I loaded it up, and realized that it was awesome. I was in a game with the Carthagians, doing my thing, figuring out this new religion thing (it seems to offer a bunch of random bonuses? I'm not supersure how it works, and why I as the head of state controls it), and then Ceasar decided to get all fucking Ceasar on me and totally stormed my home city and I said screw this shit and quit.

Also was doing great, GREAT, in Don't Starve, Day 16, really close to building my meat effigy, just needed some more meat. So I marched over to the tall bird, gave it a couple of whacks, and my goddamn spear broke and I panicked and I died. HURRUMPH. So I started a new game and built a birdcage and put a bird on in it. I want to build a shitty little farm, and apparently you need a bird for that.

Also got an Agricola expansion, so I played a game of that. This expansion is ten shades of out there, not a single card is simple, but I did okay. One of the professions is a Fry Cook, who gives you a discount to found costs for your first two dudes, but your other dudes require one food more. How exactly does it work? Who cares?! Fry Cook!

What I Played Today: August 21

Agricola, Dominion

I played a three-player game of Agricola, and did a terrible job. I had this huge empty space in the middle of my board at the end of Round 13, and I missed a chance to throw up some fences, so I lost. That's how the Agricola crumbles. I also think I just plain forgot some of my improvements at times, which just kinda screwed me.

And...a few games of Dominion. I combined both Prosperity and Hinterlands, because I haven't played a lot of Hinterlands yet. One problem with this is that Scheme is literally the worst card. THE WORST. It allows you to return an action card you played to the top of your deck. It's cool in small bursts, but if someone has, say, five of them? And you combine that with Goons? That game was the worst. I did win the third game...I finally got to take advantage of City.

What I Played Today: June 1

Agricola, Victoria II

Played another game of Agricola, and lost my streak. I was depending too much on cards to provide bonus points for me, and I just didn't have the cards this time around. Unfortunate, but I packed the game up for now, because I had to move my bed into the living room. (Long story, don't ask.) (Actually pretty short: some jerk left for the weekend and their fire alarm was beeping.)

Also played some Victoria II, which is just like Europa Universalis III, only later in the timeline, and also with a higher focus on production. The English has a terrifying amount of power in this game, they are goddamn everywhere. I tried to play poor Serbia, and quickly started to hemorrhage money like mad, because nobody in the country had any money, so I couldn't tax them. Bah.

What I Played Today: May 31

Agricola, Europa Universalis III

I played a game of Agricola, because I felt like it. I'm still winning, in this one I managed to get quite a bit of stone, so that helped. I also worked really hard to keep my food up, so I wouldn't have to worry about that later, and was pulling in 2.5 food for free every turn!

Also played some more Europa Universalis III, which is a long damn name for a thing. I decided to try to French in 1399, when they weren't France yet. There a lot of little duchies and stuff for me to lord over, and while I'm the main power in the area, England is stronger than me and sailing around. Right now the goal is obviously to unite all these dumb little regions into a single France. And that will take at least 100 years in a game that moves at the speed of about a day every five seconds (at the slowest mod, but still), so...it'll be a while.

What I Played Today: May 26

Agricola, Spy Party

Welcome back everyone! Anyway, I managed to sell off a lot of my collection in an auction, which allowed me to filling some holes that I had, including Agricola, which I had lost years ago and now have again. I also bought up the expansion decks they had, which adds some interesting options. I played a few games by myself, because I’m a nerd, and was doing quite well until the third game, in which I couldn’t keep up the pace. I like the solo campaign, but it depends greatly on getting the right occupations into play and keeping them. Some of them have great value if you have them from the beginning, but for those that activate in round 8 or higher…you tend to rush things that don’t matter. I don’t know, I’m glad I have this game again, hope to complete a full campaign eventually.

I also got to try some games of Spy Party, which is pretty cool, even though I don’t know how to be good at this yet. My spy games either ended in getting shot for being obvious, or running out of time because I was trying not to be obvious. I won a sniper game, but I still don’t know the tells yet. I’m still glad I got into the beta; I love deception games, and this one offers a very isolated experience, which is nice. Just 1-on-1 is very interesting.

What I Played Today: April 15

Ultimate Werewolf, Agricola, Race for the Galaxy, Guild Wars

I took a risk and drove to Pleasanton to hang out with a new game group today! It went alright, although the meeting place was a bit worrisome. The group met at the library, and had reserved a single table in a room that could fit, at most, 10 people. It was not ideal. But the games were fun, even though I played exceptionally poorly.

First a game of Werewolf, which I had not realized I would really like! The game is super simple, and is not at all good with a bunch of people who do not know each other at all, but I quite liked it. The set we were using was Ultimate Werewolf, which comes with dozens of different roles, and the game is balanced by each role having a different numerical value. The moderator adds up all the cards you to equal about zero, and the game is supposedly balanced. Very neat idea, which convinced me to buy this game that I will probably never play again.

But anyway, the games of Werewolf. I lost both times. Me personally, because it was my actions alone that led to the villagers getting eaten alive. Both times because I was mildly prejudice against a guy who was making magic missile jokes. The first time, I singled him out because he looked shifty, but he was just a villager just making small talk, and it basically boiled down to having no chance. The second time, we managed to snare a werewolf immediately, the vote going four to three, with myself, the werewolf, and a third guy voting not to execute. Now, I'm playing a Diseased, which will cripple the Werewolf if I get eaten, so I decide being as agressive as possible will draw the remaining wolf's ire if anything. So, with some ironclad logic, I saw that we should totally hang the other guy who voted to keep the known werewolf alive. Everyone agrees! But it turns out he wasn't a werewolf, he was a secondary bad guy. Well, at least he's out of the way, and hopefully I get eaten so the villagers have a chance. NOPE. Some random other guy gets eaten, and so know its down to me and two others, one who is a werewolf, one who is a seer, and it's my vote. And...I'm a dick and don't trust the bigger nerd, even though both of their arguments were equally weak. So, we lose again. Meh, I'm over it, but I want to read the crap out of this booklet.

Then I played Agricola, and I lost pretty badly! It's been a while since I played with four people, and I just always seemed to have one resource too few to really charge ahead. It also didn't help that I wasted time playing a card that gave me no benefit and instead helped everyone else on the table. Plus I just spent a lot of time not bothering to get a food engine up, so I was just always struggling. It also probably didn't help that my minor improvements were crap, so I had no reason to take start player, and therefore was always going last.

Then in Race for the Galaxy, I was all set to charge straight ahead with a military strategy, only for an opponent to get all the cards I needed to make it really succeed. I didn't have enough to swing it back around, and always seemed to trash a card I could have really used a turn before I realized I could use it. The fact that I also wasted my last two turns hoping someone would perform a specific action when there was no reason for them to...yeah, I was just the worst today.

So I went home and screwed around on Guild Wars. It went pretty well, actually. Played some random arenas, and in the first time in my entire six years of owning this game, I finally got my first gladiator point. Oh, I only got the one, and I can't believe it really took me this long to finally get that, considering how easy it should have been to get (you just have to win two fights in a row. Just two.), but hey, I got it! I also joined a guild, the Evenfeather Family, and found a team that seems to work pretty well in six-member areas, so I'll be tackling that goddamn final Kryta war mission once more. 

What I Played Today: January 6

Agricola

I basically chilled today, but I did get in another solo game of Agricola on the web, just building up my playcount so I can actually play four player games if I want to. I almost did well, except I totally forgot that I needed food in the second round and had to take a couple of begging cards, which nuked my score.

What I Played Today: January 4

Agricola

I played my first multiplayer game of Agricola through the Internet portal I found! It went really badly! I had let the other player keep the starting player token for too long, so he was always getting the resources I wanted, and I wasted a lot of time buying way too much grain. Eventually I was hanging out with my two guys and he was running with all five, and I knew I was doomed.

What I Played Today: December 30

Duels of the Planewalkers, Agricola

I bought the new 2012 version of Duel of the Planewalkers, because it was on sale. It's about what I would have expected. Nothing to report.

I've been really digging into this Agricola website that I've been playing. The interface is dang wacky, sure, but it's still Agricola, and I'm getting the hang of it again. The instanteous set up is pretty nice, although my game is way off. I still can't get a score of 50 in single player. And of course to be able to play with other people, I need to play 20 games first. Oh well.

What I Played Today: Christmas Vacation

Saints Row the Third, Rift, Skyrim, VVVVVV, Dungeons of Dredmor, Pushmo, Dance Central 2, Agricola, A Few Acres of Snow, Sentinels of the Multiverse, Various

Listen, I'm not going into great detail of all the games that I've played over the past few days, in which I was not working very hard. So let's hit a few highlights:

I beat Saint's Row the Third, and the ending is pretty good. I won't be ruining exactly what happens, but there is a part where you have to choose which ending you get, and "Holding Out for a Hero" starts playing, and it is great. Also, the after-the-finale mission really confused the hell out of me for a good three minutes until I remembered, "Oh right. This game is crazy, but not that crazy." But yeah! Great game. Although I think, from hearing some gibber-gabber, that I watched the "bad ending," which makes absolutely no sense to me. Oh well, they left the final mission replayable so I can see the other ending if I want.

I partook of a few board games over the Internet, one being a deckbuilding game that I sure wasn't going to buy, A Few Acres of Snow. It's not that great... I have decided that I just don't like Martin Wallace, and he can get over it. His games feel crunchy to the point of boredom, simulating a lot of things that don't really need to be. In this, you're trying to gain control over a certain amount of the board by playing location cards and connection cards, and to build up territories and bleh. You spend a lot of time cycling your deck because you do not get the locations you need, and I only won the game I was playing because my opponent kinda refused to actually attack me. I also found a poor man's version of Agricola online, which is just weird and wonky. This guy bought 12 physical copies of Agricola and hid them in his closet, so technically you are playing with those sets. The interface is way wonky, and you better know exactly how to play the game, because nothing is automated. If you need to pay food, or gain food, or anything, you gotta do it yourself. Still, nice there is a space where I can play this by myself, because I've completely lost my actual copy of it.

Also on Rift, my guild completely up and switched servers, which is apparently really easy to do. So I followed, and screwed around some. I ran a couple of regular dungeons that were way too easy for someone of my level, but I wanted to actually see them before I tried them at Tier 2. They also added an Instant Adventure mode, which immediately teleports to an area and tells you, "go on, kill 10 boars. Kill 10 boars until you die." It's good for experience I guess, but not as good as chronicles. But it's handled pretty strangely.

Also played other stuff. I won't go into any details, but I acknowledge that I played it.

What I Played Today: February 5

Agricola, Incan Gold

I’m a member of a Meetup group that has a biweekly gaming night to play a more complicated game. It’s a private group, so the members are pretty constant. It’s hosted by a really nice guy who provides meals and everything, and it’s always a fun time, so I’m really happy with the group. Anyway...tonight was a game of Agricola, the supposedly best board game ever made, according to BoardGameGeek. I take it with a grain of salt, it’s a pretty good game, but it’s very Euro centric and becomes very difficult to track what’s going on late in the game.

I played with four others, one of my friends, the newest couple to join, and the host’s wife. We all knew how to play, so we got into it pretty quickly. I was the bank, which was the hardest task, because there’s always so many resources that need to go on the board each turn. It was a bit scattering, and because everyone was so confident in their plays, I got a little flustered.

It was fun, however. Each players starts out a random assortment of occupations and improvements that are unique to each player, so every game is a little bit different. We played with a more interactive set of cards, although I didn’t see much in that level. I did get some good cards, but not good enough, because I tied for second. I managed to get enough of every resource to avoid negative points, but didn’t build enough structures to rack up enough bonus points. Not much else to say except that I had fun and I’ve forgotten how much I like this game.

There were two groups playing, and we finished a good 45 minutes before the other, so we looked through the host’s collection and pulled out a short game to finish up the evening, a stinker called Incan Gold. It was a push your luck game with a poorly-attached theme and some crummy components, and our luck was just right (or wrong) that we had some real flub rounds that ended without anyone getting any real reward. It was just too random to be really enjoyable.

I surely have more to say, but my mind seems to be too tired to recall any more details. So, good night then.