Author: Damion Schubert (Page 5 of 136)

Battle together to fight off zombies in the Old West… or die trying.”

Link: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/331224/zombicide-undead-or-alive
Playing Time: 60 mins
Weight: Medium
Genre: Horde bashing ‘Dungeon Crawl’
Designer: Raphaël Guiton, Jean-Baptiste Lullien, Nicolas Raoult
Players: 1-6

I’ve played several of the Zombicide games and none of them really spoke to me – until this one. I don’t know what it is, I think the western theme really just speaks to me.

Like all Zombicide games, your motley crew of cowboys is given a simple task (usually ‘find a foozle then get out of town’), and then everyone needs to work together to make it happen. Zombies die in waves quickly and satisfyingly, but they also spawn in waves, so there’s that.

But something that seems different – at least to me – about Zombicide: Undead or Alive is that the characters are well-designed enough that stories just generate themselves. In my last game, I was chucking dynamite from a brothel window to clear a path so that a straggling player could jump a train that was close to leaving town. Normally, missions in games like this feel mechanical, but after this one was over, we all just wanted to talk about how we wanted to watch the movie version of this experience. Games are most magical when they can create moments that memorable.

“Bid to acquire the most valuable sets of Egyptian artifacts and resources.”

Link: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/12/ra
Playing Time: 45-60 minutes
Weight: Light
Genre: Auction & Set Collection
Designer: Reiner Knizia
Players: 2-5

Yet another classic board game rescued from the dustbin of history with a superlative reprint.  Ra has long been one of famed designer Reiner Knizia’s most elegant designs, an auction game boiled down to its barest essence.

One by one, players draws and adds to a central row of tiles, until one player declares instead that the lot is worthy of auction and places a bid, which other players can then counter.  The tiles collected are scored in a set collection sort of game, but the bidding currency (called ‘sun tiles’) are worth points too, so the end game requires a lot more nuance than blowing your whole stack.

Again, this is merely a very good game, but if you can, look for the 25th Century Games reprint, especially one with the tiles.  It elevates this classic to a new level.

“Post-apocalyptic bands of punks fight to destroy the rival tribe’s camps.”

Link: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/329082/radlands
Playing Time: 20-40 minutes
Weight: Light to Midweight
Genre: Card Duel
Designer: Daniel Piechnick
Players: 2

Radlands is a unique little post-apocalyptic skirmisher, offering a faceoff that feels like a simple Magic the Gathering duel with none of the deckbuilding and all of the chaos of both players pulling from a shared deck.

At the start of each game, players start with 3 ‘bases’ – each of which may have powerful abilities. The player’s job is to defend these bases by using their precious water (the currency of the realm) to summon defenders. Defenders may have powerful abilities but more importantly they act as meat shields, providing a line of defense that must be broken before bases can be destroyed.

Games are fast and furious. All players are pulling from the same deck, so games are more about surfing chaos and finding synergy wherever you can. Pile this onto some great production values and a slick post-apocalyptic neon art style and you’ve got a tight little dueling game.

“Explore the waterways, map the land, and chart the stars in medieval Baghdad.”

Link: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/350316/wayfarers-of-the-south-tigris
Playing Time: 60-90 minutes
Weight: Heavy
Genre: Dice Manipulation & Tableau Building
Designer: S J Macdonald, Shem Phillips
Players: 1-4

Garphill Games has completed their ‘South Tigris’ trilogy, three games that really want to mess with dice manipulation as a concept.  All three of the games are the heaviest Garphill has done, but only one really rewards you for that weight, and that is Wayfarers.

Players will roll dice and then use their dice to activate worker placement spots.  The goal is to, eventually, expand their tableau, especially the panorama of sun and stars above your lands which rewards the players with not just victory points but a startlingly attractive board presence you can feel proud of at the end of the game.

The engine that drives the game though is what the game calls the ‘caravan’, which is their term to describe being able to make certain numbers on your dice more flexible or powerful.  One upgrade can let you treat a 6 like a 5, whereas another can allow you to use a 5 as a navigation action (and yes, they can chain).  This core idea of finding ways to make a standard six sided die more powerful is deeply interesting, and the results are wonderfully combotastic.

“Build the canals, repel the barbarians, and rise to fame as Yu the Great!”

Link: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/354934/legacy-of-yu
Playing Time: 60 Minutes
Weight: Midweight
Genre: Worker Placement Solo Game
Designer: Shem Phillips
Players: 1

Last year, Shem Phillips, a game designer with an impossibly good track record that includes hits like Raiders of the North Sea and Architects of the West Kingdom decided to take a swing at making a solo game. Now, a solo game doesn’t seem like a great fit for a worker placement game, but reinventing worker placement as a core game concept is kind of his whole bag, and he ended up hitting a home run.

In this game, you play as the titular advisor ‘Yu’, where , you’re trying to rejuvenate a chinese province after years of misery. You’ll be placing workers in order to hire advisors, rebuild your houses, fend off barbarians, and prepare for upcoming floods.

But as the title of the game suggests, this game is actually a whole campaign, laid out in a series of missions which get increasingly difficult. As you take actions you may unlock story nuggets which are well-written and may have drastic effects on future games, both in ways that make things easier or (much, much) harder. The whole thing creates a nice little narrative for Yu. And You. Who plays as Yu. Yu know what I mean.

“Travel to cities along the silk road, trading silk, spice, gold & jade along the way.”

Link: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/283948/marco-polo-ii-in-the-service-of-the-khan
Playing Time: 60-120 Minutes
Weight: Medium
Genre: Dice activation & Manipulation
Designer: Simone Luciani, Daniele Tascini
Players: 2-4

As an explorer and merchant in ancient China, you will travel the countryside, join guilds, trade for goods, complete contracts and building trading posts. Dice activation is the watchword here – you can take one of 7 actions by placing one (or more) of your five dice on that location. In many cases, the strength of the die determines the power of the action you’re trying to accomplish, so the game also has a fairly liberal dose of dice manipulation as well.

But what the game is REALLY known for is being the ‘ludicrously overpowered player power game’. Each player chooses a character at the start of the game, and in most cases you read the description of what they can do and say ‘wow, that sounds really broken.’ One gets free gold, one gets effortless travel, one gets to copy any outpost tiles anyone else acquires. They ARE all bonkers, and yet, somehow, the game balances itself flawlessly.

“Prepare, serve and sell amazing doughnuts to customers. Most tips wins!”

Link: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/188021/doughnut-drive-thru
Playing Time: 20-30 Minutes
Weight: Light
Genre: Worker Placement
Designer: Heiko Günther, Otama (おたま), Rinyori (りにょり)
Players: 2-4

You wouldn’t expect it from the cute little box but Doughnut Drive-Thru is one of the most cutthroatworker placement games you can play.

It works like this. Each player has two meeples (that look like little cheerios) at the start of the game, which they use to try to prepare and serve their doughnuts (which involves rolling dice to try to hit targets on the card). But these workers are not specific to a color, and there’s no ‘reset’ event, where everyone has to take up their workers. Instead, if you’re out of meeples, you can choose an action which lets you take all the doughnut meeples from any one card.

But sometimes, you get screwed, because no single card has two meeples on it.

The result is a game that is surprisingly interactive – there are numerous ways you can mess with the guy after you and force him to have a sub-optimal turn – and this is one of those games where being cruel to someone else may actually be more fun than taking the most optimal turn for yourself. Which is fine, because the game is short and fast enough that you don’t care when you’re the target. The end result is a fun quickie game perfect for ending game night with a lot of laughs.

“Recreate various creatures from myths and gain back your reputation as scientists.”

Link: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/380677/biohack
Playing Time: 60-90 Minutes
Weight: Midweight
Genre: Worker Placement
Designer: Yofiandhy D Indrayana
Players: 1-4

In the future, a group of scientists are expelled from polite academia for their dangerous and reckless flirtations with animal experimentation. Unbowed by social pressures, these scientists continued their attempts to build the biggest, baddest freaks of nature that humanity could envision. You are one of these unethical scientists.

Biohack is a worker placement game with a twist. At the start of a round, you choose three of five public locations for your workers to start off in. On your round, you can either pick up a worker from one of these public locations – which generally offer resources – or you can place a worker on an Experimentation slot on the board – such slots are exclusive. Clearly the first action you take has to be to pick up a meeple, but after that the choice gets interesting. On one hand, you want to take the good Experimentation slots before anyone else does. On the other hand, the resources given by public locations are more lucrative the more meeples are on there, so you kind of want to be the first to do that too.

Biohack was a kickstarter from a Japanese country, and as such it’s a little tricky to get. But if you’re a fan of worker placement games, it’s a real gem worth seeking out, due both to the above mechanic as well as the slickness of the presentation and theme.

“Amass spaceships for your fleet as you roll your way to domination.”

Link: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/242302/space-base
Playing Time: 60 mins
Weight: Light
Genre: Tableau Builder & Dice Chucker
Designer: John D. Clair
Players: 2-5 players

The “Dice-Based Tableau Builder’ genre was probably invented by Machi Koro but it’s been experimented on by numerous other designers, and probably the best of the bunch is Space Base. Players serve as commodores, trying to assemble the best fleet which they use to acquire the most valuable substance in the galaxy: victory points.

In Space Base, everyone has a fleet of 12 ships, ranging from 1 to 12. When they roll dice, they can choose to score the dice seperately, or together (i.e. you can count your 6 and 4 seperately or instead activate the 10 spot). But what keeps things moving is that so does everyone else. Which is to say, you’re getting resources on your turn, but so am I, and hopefully by the time my turn comes, I’ve accrued enough that I can buy something big.

Because the other thing about Space Base is your spaces can be improved. If you buy a new ‘7’ ship, the old 7 ship is flipped over and put under your board, effectively increasing the income whenever someone else rolls a 7. The end result is a game where you’re engaged on every turn, and ramps nicely to some pretty impressive and broken special powers.

Manage your dice to build profitable markets and grand monuments in historic India.”

Link: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/220877/rajas-of-the-ganges
Playing Time: 45-75 Minutes
Weight: Medium
Genre: Worker Placement & Dice Manipulation
Designer: Inka Brand, Markus Brand
Players: 2-4 Players

A simple worker placement game with a beautiful presentation. where your primary goal is to use your workers to buy dice, manipulate dice, and then use the dice you’ve acquired to add new buildings to your personal estates, which are the primary source of victory points.

Overall, this is a tidy little worker placement game with an attractive theme it nails. Personally, I’m a sucker for the little Shiva-esque 8-armed statue that hold your dice between turns, even if according to Wikipedia Shiva typically only had 4.