At Gen Con I finally had the chance to meet with Jonathan Nelson of AAW. We chatted about Snow White – not the Disney version. One amazing thing I learned about this product is it has rules for love. How sweet is that.
I look froward to reviewing this book soon.
In this interview with Bryan Steele and Dave Taylor and we talk about Dark Age And Wrath of Kings. We spend a good bit of time talking about the tournament system.
Check back soon to see the Gen Con album or hit my Facebook page later today.
At Gen Con I hooked up with Firelock Games to chat about Blood and Plunder. Blood and Plunder is a historical game set during the height of pirates plundering the coastline. All I have to say is beautiful models plus boarding rules has to make for a good time.
There frigates are amazing.
Encounters: Shadowrun
$29.99
Encounters: Shadowrun is a 1-8 player fast-paced, push-your-luck dice and card game.
Players take on the role of Mr. Johnson – a man or woman that arranges for ‘things to be taken care of’ – fixing the megacorps’ dirty work by adding new shadowrunners to their already-assembled teams.
Players then send those ‘expendable assets’ into the shadows of the mean sprawl streets of the Sixth World, fighting past magic, tech and more to collect resources and corporate secrets to defeat their rivals!
1-8 players
Ages 13+
15-30 minute play time
Conflict of Heroes: Awakening the Bear: Solo Expansion
$45.00
The Conflict of Heroes Solo Boardgame System revolutionizes solo tactical play. The Artificial Intelligence (AI) utilizes a unique Emergent Behavior and Agent Based Logic system. With this system, each battlefield situation is evaluated and the AI implements the best course of action using available resources and unit assets. Even veteran CoH players will be challenged to hone and adapt their playing styles in order to overcome this resourceful high-level AI. You will experience tense and engaging solo play like never before!
Included are several stand-alone missions, plus two full campaigns covering the German 1941 advance on Moscow. In the first campaign, you command elements of the 10th Panzer Division. In the second campaign, you switch sides and command elements of the Soviet 32nd Army trying to undo your gains from the first campaign!
This expansion requires Conflict of Heroes: Awakening the Bear.
Fantasy AGE: Basic Rulebook (Hardcover)
$29.95
The Fantasy AGE Basic Rulebook is your entry point to tabletop roleplaying. Now you can be the hero in your own sword and sorcery adventures! This is the game played on Wil Wheaton’s new tabletop RPG show, Titansgrave: The Ashes of Valkana.
The Adventure Game Engine (AGE) rules are easy to learn, and feature an innovative stunt system that keeps the action tense and exciting.
This Basic Rulebook includes full 20 level advancement for all three classes, a new magic system, advice for players and GMs, and an introductory adventure so you can get started right away. You can use Fantasy AGE to run adventures in the campaign setting of your choice or a world of your own creation. A new AGE is upon us!
Author: Chris Pramas
Cover Artist: Svetoslav Petrov
144 pages, Full Color, Hardback
Game Demo of World Championship Russian Roulette by Tuesday Knight Games.
IF you like to press your luck and to bluff this game is for your. They are still beta testing so you can head over to Tuesday Knight Games and apply, you have to email them to get in.
Ares Games announces two new games for 2015: Jolly Roger and Odyssey
At GAMA Trade Show, the publisher presented a preview of its first card game and a new Euro game, both expected to release in Summer 2015
Ares Games presented at GAMA Trade Show (Las Vegas, March 19th-20th) two novelties in the 2005 pipeline: Jolly Roger, its first card game, and Odyssey – Wrath of Poseidon, a new title in the Euro game line, both due to release next Summer.
Jolly Roger – The game of Piracy & Mutiny is a cardgame of pillage, plunder, and mutinies. Fun, rowdy, fast and easy to learn, the game can be played for 4 to 10 players. You and the other players are the crew of a pirate ship. As appropriate for a pirate, your greatest desire is gold, and you will do anything to reach your goal.
Every turn, the Captain chooses a destination for the ship. When the ship attacks, players will (more or less!) co-operate to win, playing Crew cards from their hands to win the battle and take the prize. Treasure gained is shared between all pirates, but your gold is never secure until you bury it at Treasure Island…
Unrest is always brewing, though – each time the Captain makes an important choice, it is possible for one of the other players to call “Mutiny!” to try to overthrow him and become the new Captain. And when the mutiny begins, you’ll need to decide how to use your cards during the Mutiny and the looming battle. How much will you co-operate when you assault an enemy, and what will you keep to yourself, to be ready when the next mutiny starts?
The players’ final goal is to collect the highest amount of gold and become the richest pirate in Tortuga!
With Jolly Roger, Ares Games debuts in the Card Game category. The game has been designed by Frederic Moyersoen, author of Saboteur and Nuns on the Run, and illustrated by the talented Loïc Billiau (Glen More,Cherokee, Auf die Nüsse).
The other novelty previewed at GAMA was Odyssey – Wrath of Poseidon, an Euro and deduction game for two to five players. The war is over, and the Greek ships are trying to sail back to their homeland after a long absence. They need to reach the Sacred Island to make offerings and prayers to the gods, but the irascible Poseidon will use all his powers to prevent them from getting there.
In Odyssey, one player takes the role of Poseidon, God of the Sea, while the others become Navigators in search of the Sacred Island. The game is played over two copies of the same board, separated using the box so that they are not visible to each other. The Poseidon player throw powerful storms against the Navigators, driving them off-course and confounding them, so they cannot reach the Sacred Island in time. Only Poseidon knows the real position of the ships, indicated on his copy of the game board.
The Navigator players sail through endless storms, blind to all around them, trying to gather clues to their whereabouts to stay on course. They also keep track of the position of the ships on the board, but the positions indicated there are only their best guess, and they can become very inaccurate as the game goes forward.
The Navigators must reach the Sacred Island before the end of the game to win, using their wits to stay on course, while Poseidon wins by preventing the other players to reach their destination.
The author of Odyssey – Wrath of Poseidon is Leo Colovini, the game designer of Cartagena, Clans, Aztlán and Inkognito (with Alex Randolph). The game is illustrated by Francesco Mattioli (Micro Monster, Sails of Glory and Dino Race).
Jolly Roger and Odyssey are due out at GenCon 2015.
About Ares Games
Ares Games is an Italian board game publisher established in 2011 to create quality hobby products for the international audience. Ares Games is the publisher of the award-winning “War of the Ring” board game, “Wings of Glory” range of airplane combat games and miniatures recreating aerial warfare in WW1 and WW2, and more recently, the tactical ship-to-ship miniature game “Sails of Glory,” and the cooperative tactical Sci-Fi miniatures game “Galaxy Defenders.” The Ares Games’ catalog also includes Family Games and Euro Games. For further information, visit the website www.aresgames.eu and the Facebook page – https://www.facebook.com/AresGames.
Gear & Piston
$55.00
It is 1888, and everywhere you turn, people are talking about the horseless carriage. They are also talking about Jenatzy and Cugnot, Benz and Diesel, Atkinson and Butler – visionaries now remembered for their passion to create, to progress, and to succeed.
But this game is not about them, these giants of engineering. No, in Gear & Piston, you play one of the unsung heroes of history, an engineer of meagre means but great ambition, trying to build a prototype for picky investors seeking to profit from the future of transport. Will you make a name for yourself as an automotive pioneer, change the history of motorized transportation, and win the race that is Gear and Piston? With a lot of skill and a little luck, maybe. If nothing else, try not to blow yourself up in the process.
In the game, each player builds an automobile prototype by taking actions in different locations. You may patent brand-new parts in the Patent Office, look for rejected, volatile pieces of machinery in the chaos of the Junk Yard, try to gain an edge through the Back Alley, and finally build your prototype in the Workshop. All this just to please the two investors who are doing the rounds of the different engineering outfits, and who will be evaluating your rickety mess of an automobile. Good timing, keeping an eye on your competitors, and even a dash of luck are all you need to succeed in this business. So grab a wrench, some elbow grease, and your wits, and put some gears and pistons together!
Monster Hunters is set in the Edwardian Europe, where the idea is Gothic horror. Werewolves, vampires and other strange beasts run rampant in this setting. This unique setting mixes the traditional fantasy setting with one that is quite a bit more technological than you might be accustomed to. Monster hunters focuses heavily on new classes and their origins, but it also introduces new rules like modern weapons.
The Book doesn’t waste any time and dives right into the origin stories. There are 8 and each focuses on the following on helping the player round out the character. The origins can easily help the player define his motivation, how they learned about the monsters, and why you hunt the things you do. I chose to make a character using the Romani origin story because it reminded me of the gypsies in several b&w horror movies.
The 10 classes are basically reflections of the core classes that have been customized to fit this particular game world. For example the hunter closely resembles a Ranger. This class grants class abilities like favored enemy, favored terrain, and Hunter’s Tricks. Which is what I think is a cool ability that is a Hunter’s trick. Once per day the hunter can, when reduced t 0 hp, take a five foot step instead and be staggered until his next round. It could be a very beneficial ability.
All of the skills and feats offered in this book help further the characters development within this Edwardian horror setting. Since that time frame for this is 1911 it includes skills like drive, collect evidence, and jury rig. All of which can prove to be very advantageous in this setting.
It’s also worth mentioning the inclusion of a modern day currency system that reflects 1911. The system includes a conversion for gold. The flavor created by this is a much better reflection for purchasing aeroplanes or Harley’s. Not to mention some of the more interesting equipment like the Luger, and telescoping sights.
The most detailed or critical section of the book is the mechanics covering modern firearms. Avalon Games spent a lot of time explaining the nuances the new weapons bring. Some of these are rate of fire, strikes are made against touch AC. But my favorite is called shot by location. They cover both the advantages and disadvantages of targeting just about any portion of the body imaginable. For example if I target a large part of the body, like the torso, I suffer a minus two penalty, while shooting something smaller target grants a larger penalty. If you hit there are three possible outcomes,called shot, critical called shot, and debilitating called shot they cause anything from inconveniences to permanent damage. I feel you should know that these optional rules teeter on 50 pts of damage being done in order for the more sever effects to occur.
I have found this to be a good read, it offers a unique break from your normal fantasy game. The rules are well written for a setting that has become a classic genre in literature. If you are creative this is a great book that you can easily adapt for your own projects.
Monster Hunters is available at Avalon Games and DriveThuRpg. It is part of the Pathfinder Drivethru sale that ends tomorrow October 20th 2014.
