Elder Sign - Boardgame Review

Elder Sign is a cooperative boardgame set in a noir-lovecraft universe in the 1920s. There's real potential here for an atmospheric and engrossing game, as players pitch in as various investigative types to halt the manifestation of some interdimensional horror. 

Each player uses the luck of the dice and careful employment of items, spells and the like to solve mysteries during their turn. Dice rolls must bring up certain icons in order for our plucky characters to succeed. With increasing frequency monsters appear to make completing each mission that much trickier. Completing a mystery brings points that can be spent resorting stamina or sanity - both depleted in the process of battling the nasties - or you get to buy useful items (drawn randomly of course). All turns take place during the night for obvious narrative reasons (spooky!) and as the clock ticks additional monsters arrive, locking certain dice or imposing health depleting forfeits if left undefeated come the following midnight. 

Throughout the game players must prepare for the coming of a potentially world-ending 'old one'. Collect elder signs to maybe ward off their manifestation or stockpile items, re-roll counters and such to take them on in a big end battle. 

Eldar Sign is the first cooperative boardgame I've played. It's a fun alternative to regular 'oppositional gaming'. It seems likely that non-gamers would enjoy the cinematic feel of the game, while cooperation means newer players could be accommodated easily. The character archetypes are good fun - stoic nun, nutty professor, sleazy salesman, trust fund girl - and there's the opportunity for a few laughs as you bear witness to the catastrophic end of existence as the fabric of reality is shredded. Good fun. 

Now THIS Is What I Call A Phoenix

We're all aware that High Elves just received a very high fantasy looking phoenix and it's a model I'd like to paint in the future sometime. It's pretty good. But it will have to wait in line behind this one, which is from Kingdom Death's Kickstarter-funded co-operative boardgame, Monster. As a fan of dark fantasy this just blew me away. I mean, just look at it... If this doesn't give my kids nightmares then nothing will!

Twelve Treats Of Geekmas #8 and #7

Double treats today for the refined gamer. Both of these come from the company Geek Chic, who produce wonderful furniture designed for gaming in the shape of RPGs and boardgames. First off, feast your eyes of The Hoplite, possibly the most gorgeous table I've ever seen:

And secondly, here's the GM's Valet, where the classy GM can hatch diabolical plans with which to test their plucky heroes:

These are ridiculously expensive, but when my numbers come up in the lottery I'll be putting in my order!

Chaos Space Marine Size/Style Comparison, The Old, The New

People often note or complain about the way that GW models have grown in size over the decades. One of the prime examples are Terminators, who have bulked up significantly over several regenerations. Over the last few days I've been working with some models that buck that trend. Ok, it's not really a fair comparison, as the older set of models actually comes from a board game; namely, Advanced Space Crusade. But a comparison is interesting nonetheless. So here are the before and after photographs:

On the left is one of the Advanced Space Crusade Chaos Marines and the example on the right there is one of the current push-fit Chaos Marines. I'm using both to test out some colour schemes for a Lords of Decay force that I plan to build beginning with the Chaos troops in the 40k starter box. I think the older model holds up rather well - sure, the detail isn't so clear and it seems to be wearing 1970s chaos flares, but it will serve very well as a test model, and might even make it into the final army. 

Board Game Selection Flow Diagram Idle Time Perfection

A wonderful excuse for some quality idle time today. Thanks and credit to Dr Willett's Workshop for posting. Enjoy!

High Adventure in a World of Magic... Well, Most of it...

I've been given an old and incomplete HeroQuest. The game isn't playable but there are a few of the models in there that haven't been given the slop-in-on paint job favoured by the previous owner (when he was 12). I'm not entirely sure what to do with them. Here are a few of the better ones: a couple of zombies, a chaos warrior, an evil wizard/necromancer type chap, and a couple of fimir. The fimir I suppose could be painted up and based for Storm of Magic games (I'd have to convert them though, that axe is awful), but on the whole I'm inclined to hang on to them all for my son to learn to paint with in a couple of years - he can play with them as they are in the meantime. Unless anyone has any better ideas...?

This Is A Game For Kids, Right?

Played HeroQuest for the first time in many years last night. I was the barbarian. I died like a sucker in the very first room. Notwithstanding the fact that my fellow adventurers bravely hung back in corridors and corners while I slugged away at the undead, is the game actually supposed to be that difficult? I suppose I must be cut out for more subtle and nuanced questing. It may be time to hang up the loin cloth... 

Surprisingly accurate artist's impression of our regular game nights

Apparently, it's national 'talk like a pirate day'

I have no idea why people are whining about Dreadfleet. It looks good to me, board games are great, and Games Workshop have a good track record for stand-alone games. If you don't like it, guess what? Don't buy it! Certainly (as was pointed out to me today), don't moan about GW being an evil empire and then complain that they haven't spent their time putting out another twenty quid plus army book...! The game-play will probably been marvellous, given the quality of the games development team - and if you look at the sprues on the website, there's plenty of opportunity to use the islands as objective markers. Plus, the 'seascape gaming mat' looks like it could easily be scaled-up for use with other pirate-based skirmish games. Overall, seems like a win-win to me.

All aboard!