Friday, 2 August 2019
On Friday our friend Laura joined us for a game of Nations.
I played Greece, Amanda played China, Keira played Persia, Laura played Egypt, and Finnegan played Rome. Amanda totally crushed it, ending the game with 51 points. Laura wasn't far behind with 49 - which is pretty AMAZING, considering it was her first game!! The kids and I were all in the 30s and felt like total amateur chumps... aye-yi-yi!
Saturday, 3 August 2019
Another Dungeon Crawl Classics afternoon. It's been hard to get the WHOLE gang together through the summer, but EVERYONE showed up this week - AND they even had a NEW player! (Not to mention gender parity among the players!). She was a welcome addition to the group. AS they arrived at their first encounter the Boyz were getting out their weapons and warming up their dice ready for a fight and she said, very loudly; "Hey! Could we NOT just murder the first group of people we happen to meet along this road!?" Keira was very excited about this, as this is the way SHE'd like to do things, but the Boyz have tended to be a little more on the belligerent side!
Sunday, 4 August 2019
Amanda, Finnegan and I played Race for the Galaxy with the Xenos Invasion expansion.
I played the Alien First Contact Team and thought I did pretty good ending the game with 56 points! Apparently I wasn't paying much attention, because Finnegan and his Starry Rift Pioneers gathered up 58 points! Amanda Plante, who usually does really well at this game (and... EVERY game) just couldn't get it together for Earth's Lost Colony. She ended the game with 33 victory points.
I like the Xenos Invasion expansion. You kind of have to work together to stop the Xenos invasion while still trying to work towards expanding your own influence...
Monday, 5 August 2019
Amanda demanded a rematch of Nations... I'm not sure why...? Usually one demands a rematch when one does less well than another, as a chance to prove you were just "off your game" that last time and are really good at it. Amanda did exceptionally well in our last game, as she ALWAYS does... Perhaps she needed to do this to crush me again and remind me that it wasn't a fluke (not that I ever suggested it was!?)
She also said she wanted to see how long a two player game took compared to the 5-player games we normally play.
I was crushed.
Again.
Sunday, 11 August 2019
Sunday was our anniversary, so Amanda and I planned a little bike trip out to Pike Lake to stay at a cabin. I brought a BUNCH of smaller card games along - mostly ones we haven't yet played, or haven't played in a while.
In the end we only really got to play Cthulhu Realms. Id' picked it up at the ToonCon auction last year and had tried to play a game of it around that time with the kids... but I think they were a little "gamed out" and just weren't into it and we quit part way through.
It's a fun little game that uses the same mechanics as hero Realms or Star Realms - which are, themselves, very much like Marvel Legendary - which we've played a lot of.
The first game was pretty quick. The second took much, much longer!
For our anniversary, I picked up 7 Wonders Duel. A few people have mentioned to me that it's a really good two player game and a good two-player iteration of 7 Wonders, one of our favourite games.
After a couple rounds of Cthulhu Realms, we tried out our new copy of 7 Wonders Duel!
Pretty close game - I like it - it seems like it has all the elements of the original game in a clever new mechanism to play with just two.
Amanda wanted to play again.
She apparently groked it... the second game was... not-so-close... Yikes!!!
More about the Trip over on the Bike Blog:
Anniversary Weekend Ride to Pike Lake
Monday, 12 August 2019
Back home... Amanda was still recovering from being sick, but felt up to playing another game of 7 Wonders Duel.
Oh yeah, I rocked this one... Probably because she was so sick and not really paying attention.
Better savour this, it'll probably be my last...
Tuesday, 13 August 2019
On Tuesday Amanda and Keira went out to a Stage Make-Up Workshop at the Free /flow Dance Centre.
When they got home, Amanda played another quick game of 7 wonder Duel with me upstairs - as Finnegan's Tuesday evening D&D game was going on downstairs.
I got a bit of everything... But Amanda seemed to get a bit MORE of EVERYTHING!?
Thursday, 15 August 2019
Another quick game of 7 Wonders Duel....
Somehow this one came together for me and I got all my wonders done and a PILE of blue structures... Woo!!!
Saturday, 17 August 2019
Finnegan ran the final session of his Dungeon Crawl Classics campaign that he has been running (mostly) weekly since January. It was a pretty epic conclusion, I am told. They are already making plans for a new campaign in the fall - at this point they thought it might be Dungeon Crawl Classics again or it might be D&D 5E.
In the evening our friend Kurtis joined us for supper and games. Amanda, Kurtis, Keira and I started off with a game of Abyss.
I triggered the end by collecting my seventh lord. I was feeling like I had done pretty good... heh... not-so-much...
This was Kurtis' first game and he apparently totally figured it out and won with 72 points... Amanda was just behind him with 68. I managed 65, and Keira ended with 54!?
Afterwards, Amanda, Kurtis and I played castles of Mad King Ludwig.
Folks, I don't CARE what the points were - I got to build a SECRET LAIR (beyond the Venus grotto right next to a fully-stocked armoury!) It's like a castle I would have designed as a young teen, so, that's a WIN for me!!!
Wednesday, 21 August 2019
On the weekend I was in Dragon's Den Games and noticed the sale table had gone from 40% off to 60% off and it still had the brand-new, in-the-shrink copy of Perikles on it... so I had to pick it up. I mentioned this to Kurtis when he was over on Saturday and he suggested I bring it to his place on Wednesday...
So I did...
Perikles with Darrin, Kurtis, John and Brent.
I really like this game -as I have every Martin Wallace game. As with most Wallace games, there are many moving parts and it's a little overwhelming, at first, to get a sense of how to do the things you need to do to get ahead in the game... I felt like I was floundering, but in the end it turned out I was floundering less than others... Kurtis won with 55 victory points and I was a not-too-distant second with 53. The rest were in the 40s/30s...
Thursday, 22 August 2019
Thursday Keira sat down to teach me to play Patchwork. She bought it for my mother for her birthday or Xmas last year and she's played it once or twice with her. She borrowed it and brought it home to play with us.
Such a fun little game! Very clever.
I thought she was going to CRUSH me as she had WAAAAAAAAY more buttons than I had at the end of the game, but after losing 2 for each empty square - I just squeaked ahead of her 15-13 - because I'd filled out more of my quilt!
Saturday, 24 August 2019
Saturday afternoon, while the kids were making characters for their new D&D game, I taught Amanda how to play Patchwork.
And she basically did the same thing to me that I did to Keira.
Way too much open space on my quilt at the end. I think it's better to take more cheaper, larger, faster pieces and fill it completely out than to go for more expensive ones with more buttons on them....
Monday, 26 August 2019
For the last week of August I'd planned to run a little narrative Necromunda campaign for the kids and their friend Ian...
Monday we played a short learning game.
Finnegan played with his Genestealer Cult, Keira played with her Escher gang, and Ian borrowed my Cawdor gang for the week.
There is a full game report (and MORE pictures) here:
Necromunda - First Game
We ended up not being able to play Tuesday and Wednesday because I've been ill...
Thursday, 29 August 2019
Thursday I ran a campaign where the three gangs had to stop Karloth Valois and his zombie horde from getting into a populated area and running amuck!
A full report (and MORE pictures) of this action can be found here:
The Return of Karloth Valois
Friday, 30 August 2019
On Friday, the gangs were hunting a team of Spyrers that has come downhive to hunt underhivers fro fun...
The Battleground fought over.
Keira's gangers gassing the Spyrers... and some other gangers...
A full report (and MORE pictures) of this game can be found here:
The Hunters Hunted
Saturday, 31 August 2019
Kicking off the new D&D5E fall campaign. The kids made characters today and then started off on the first adventure. Only Heidi was missing.
Later, in the evening...
Brent stopped by in the evening to play Terraforming Mars with me and Amanda.
We played with Venus Next.
I played Ecoline (one of my favourites - though I didn't really get the plant-thing going until nearly the end of the game). Brent played the Tharsis Republic and Amanda played Aphrodite - one of the corporations from Venus Next.
I ended up with the Builder milestone and was first for the Thermalist Award, which I'd sponsored. Brent grabbed the Mayor milestone quite early in the game and ended upping second for both the Scientist and Venophile awards. Amanda scooped up the Planner milestone (Sweet Jupiter! She put a LOT of cards into play by the end) and was second for the Thermalist and first for the Scientist and Venophile awards.
Into the Home Stretch....
Well the year is 2/3 over and we've gotten 43% of our 10x10 Challenge games played...
Oh, I'm still not giving up or anything... We could knock off the rest of the Splendor, Century: Golem Edition and Race for the Galaxy games in a weekend... I figure we'll play through a Blackstone Fortress campaign after the Necromunda weekend in October.
I've been thinking maybe next year we could do quarterly 5x5 challenges...? Five games we're going to play five times in the next THREE MONTHS!!
Little movement on the personal challenge... I did play a few games of necromunda though and that was awesome. This is the hard part of a challenge like this, my interests change throughout the year!? I don't know if I'm going to get any more of this done. Maybe the Wrath & Glory... I will hopefully be playing a lot of necromunda over the coming months and the plan is to have all the Hellboy stuff painted by Xmas so we can play a campaign of that over the holidaze... and if I can pull THAT off, I'd say it's been a pretty good year!!
Coming Soon to Tim's Miniature Wargaming Blog:
MORE NECROMUNDA!!!
Always amazed at how many games you get in in a month. Incredible!
ReplyDeleteThanks! It's kind of the thing we do... and it's summer - so there has been much less regularly scheduled activity. I expect the game-playing to drop off sharply next week... In previous years the kids and I did a 30 games in 30 days challenge - to ensure that we don't stop playing games altogether and remind ourselves that we can find time if we're motivated... but there has been no discussion of doing so this year, so far...
DeleteI also think that you should be able to swap out games that you thought you would play but haven't with games that you acquired in 2019 and have actually played and enjoyed. I think you can count Necromunda as basically equivalent to Kill Team and the new Warhammer Armageddon replaces Warhammer Quest.
ReplyDeleteIt's pretty great that you can game so much with your family. Keep it up!
I do count myself VERY fortunate to have a family that not on puts up with my shenanigans, but are often willing to participate.
DeleteI feel like the kids are getting a little less interested in playing games. Or at least playing board/miniature games with me! (Finnegan LOVES playing in his role-playing games and has been playing a TONNE of Four Against Darkness!)... Sure they played in the Necromunda campaign last week - but that was mostly because Ian, their friend, wanted to. The kids would probably rather have just hung out...
At the beginning of the year we'd said we'd set aside Friday and Sunday evenings as "Family Game Night" - two games a week would have completed the Challenge, easily. But now I ask them which game they'd like to play and... it's like pulling teeth to get them to answer... teens... Anyway, I don't want to FORCE them to play games (they would if I insisted, because, if nothing else, they are compliant!?). On one hand, I am a little sad that they are less interested in playing with me... but on the other hand I am so glad to see them growing into their own person with their own passions and opinions!
Maybe next year the challenges will be entirely personal. Game I'D like to play. And as I suggested, make them quarterly.
I am TOTALLY going to play Warhammer Quest: Blackstone Fortress before the end of this year!!! I just picked up the Escalation expansion - which is totally bonkers, considering I haven't even played it ONCE yet!? But, GW seems to do one print run of these things... and then they're gone! (like all the card sets for Necromunda!?) and I really, REALLY like the hero figures that came with the set! Murad, the Rogue Trader, just looks way cooler than Jainus Drake - the one that came in the base set. Madellan, the Psyker, looks wicked cool too! I'm excited to have a knight figure as well - as it's an archetype one can play in Wrath & Glory (and I STILL desperately want to get a game of that going!!)
I think your kid's decline in interest in playing games with you is perfectly normal. You quite rightly observed that you really can't force it though because that leads to resentment because, as you said, "teens". Don't worry because once they exit that stage of their life, because they were interested before, they'll become re-interested again. You'll just have to muddle through with personal objectives until that happens.
DeleteCheers!
DeleteThat's a lot of great gaming, the necromunda campaign looked like it was pretty neat and a load of fun!
ReplyDeleteBest Iain
Necromunda was AWESOME! I'm hoping to convince the family to play through a Dominion Campaign this fall. I think I might play it over thirteen weeks (instead of the suggested seven) so we each only have to play one or two games every two weeks...
Delete