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1

Dominion General Discussion / new blog post

« on: April 24, 2013, 12:54:03 pm »

Yo! Shameless plug. I thought y'all might take a liking to my new blog post on Dominion, variety in games, and Bob Dylan.

Here's the link on BGG. (Don't worry. It's fun.)

http://boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/18815/dominion-variety-and-bob-dylan

Major props to theory for his 'voice of experience' review. When I was writing this piece I thought, 'Oh hey, I should illustrate variety in Dominion with screenshots of two boards that are identical except for one card!' And then I thought of where I saw that before and decided not to be a dirty thief.

Enjoy,

-Phil

2

General Discussion / Re: Question for New Yorkers (or anybody with knowledge)

« on: January 08, 2013, 12:15:54 pm »

Syracuse hasn't seen too much snow yet, but I hear the skiing is still great. Definitely warm enough for good hiking, and the lakes should freeze around then. Plus, you could hop over to the Falls or Toronto, visit Snakes & Lattes and...

Oh sorry, did you mean The City? Fine. Carry on.

But don't you dare suggest you'll be heading 'upstate' if you stay south of Albany!

3

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Interview with Donald X.

« on: December 20, 2012, 03:51:49 pm »

Donald,

We haven't heard much from you about Infiltration--no secret history that I could find, for instance. Any chance of that happening? (If there's a contractual obligation with FFG or the like, no worries.) Thanks!

4

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Dice Tower Reviews Dark Ages

« on: August 30, 2012, 08:26:12 am »

Tom was pretty clear about not liking the 'reveal' cards. After playing three 2-player DA games, I can easily see the criticism from a more casual Dominion player. YMMV, but Wandering Minstrel and Ironmonger (used in the base/Intrigue recommended sets) slow the game down a ton IRL. At least, if you're in love with engine building. There was a great deal of 'feels-like' 2-player solitaire in those games.

I'd be interested to hear from Donald what portion of his playtesting was online vs. IRL. The secret history revealed many cards that were scrapped because of dry spells. I'm not saying I dislike the cards (love 'em when the context is right), but curious.

In other news, 'game-changer' /= strong card.

5

Other Games / Re: Last Night on Earth

« on: August 29, 2012, 08:59:43 am »

Hey Ozle,

Yeah, 'unbalanced' would be generous. For the humans, it is random chaos piled on top of more random chaos, and yet your objective usually centers on finding a single needle in the chaotic haystack. The zombie players' cards, however, are almost always useful; they are actually quite well designed, thematic and devious. Humans, not so much. I figure the only way to fix the game would be a pregame deck set-up of that human haystack.

For example, a common objective is to get ~2 gas can cards and 1 car key card from the deck, start the truck and get out of dodge. The deck has (I'm guessing) 100 cards in it, and each player could draw around 2 cards per turn, maximum--assuming they weren't running away from zombies or firing their peashooters. Since the zombies only take ~2 turns to close on the humans in any given scenario, that leaves you drawing roughly 10 cards before you absolutely must start performing actions other than searching the deck. And the zombie cards are all the while messing you up. Estimated %10 chance of finding what you need before the slaughter begins. I don't remember the dice combat values, but I think the zambies have the advantage (on top of weight of numbers, they certainly do).

So, if you want to feel like you're a stock B-Movie face-chomped farmboy, or else gnaw on your buddies' delectable brains, this might do the trick. But you'll very rarely be Ash, and the game mechanics are often very frustrating.

What else are you looking for in a game? You mentioned casual friendly. Is theme a big factor?

6

Other Games / Re: Last Night on Earth

« on: August 25, 2012, 07:23:06 pm »

I don't have time to give a full reply, but I will step in quickly to say:

I have played it ~5 times. It is among my least favorite games. There are many casual-friendly games with far superior mechanics.

So far as I can tell, the only appeal to this wreck is if your group can really get into the "Ooh ha haa, look at those zombies, at it again with their broken deck of cards!" Or the once-in-a-blue-moon "My cheerleader has a chainsaw strapped to her baseball bat, no brains for you!" Personally, I never saw the latter happen, but my friends insisted that it was possible.

Is the zombie setting an important criteria? What else are you looking for?

7

Dominion: Dark Ages Previews / Props to RobZ

« on: August 16, 2012, 09:57:32 am »

Wow, Band of Misfits makes Scout 2x awesome. Not sure what to copy? As if. It's like you have 20 Scouts to buy, except one of the piles is more accurate to Scout's real value.

8

Dominion: Dark Ages Previews / Re: Dark Ages Preview #5: Necropolis, Overgrown Estate, Hovel

« on: August 10, 2012, 10:56:34 am »

Harvest is pretty sweet now. Never would have guessed it could become a decent opener (shuffle dependent).

9

Dominion: Dark Ages Previews / Re: Dark Ages Preview #2

« on: August 07, 2012, 11:11:16 am »

Shelter prediction:

$2
Victory/Action
0 VP
Trash a card from your hand.

(Replaces Estates)

Either that, or same thing with $3 cost, 1 VP