On the Board: Thoughts on Citadels

I've been out of town the past week, rolling around the old stomping grounds of VA so I could spend some time with the family.  That means no plastic army men, but I was able to attend board game night.  What initially was supposed to be a quick game of Citadels turned into a full-blown eight player version, as people trickled in just in time to get dealt into the first hand.  I enjoyed the game, so I thought I'd share a few of my initial impressions.

From Fantasy Flight Games

The game is incredibly simple to pick up.  The general run of play really is as easy as reading the three paragraphs on the instruction card provided for each player.  If you add to that reading the two sentences for each of the available characters and you've pick up everything you need to play in the practical sense, if not tactically.  Game turns consist of players picking one of nine unique occupations with an associated bonus.  The previous turns King gets his choice of eight, allowing the next player choice of seven, and on down the line, until last pick who chooses between the ninth card which was placed in the middle and the final card left available from those picking.  Player turns are then taken in order based on occupation.  Each player takes their bonus, chooses to take gold or cards, and then chooses if they want to pay to add one area to their city.  Each area is worth victory points based on cost, and whoever has the most at the end wins.

While simple, the game does have tactical depth.  Power fluctuates from turn to turn as different players take the lead, resulting in assassination attempts based on deductive reasoning, attempts to protect oneself slowing down your production, and character choice becoming very tricky.  Primacy is good but not all-important.  I went last on four of the ten or so turns we played and still did very well.  Balanced cities tend to do best so all the roles associated with a certain color at least yield some benefit.  Despite some characters (namely, The Architect) initially seeming overly powerful, others tend to balance them out (The Assassin and The Thief).  The dynamic yields a lovely dance with each player trying to decide how best to move themselves forward, while deducing how to slow down the other front runners.

Of course, there are always negatives.  The cards that make up your tableau seem to be hardly more than a card with a picture.  While everything has a unique name, the potential for depth seems to have been squandered.  There are special cards that have a benefit associated with them, but it's never very impressive and they seem few and far between.  That said, the game would most certainly change with a smaller group, the alternative occupations (apparently in the set), or a more competitive focus.  Honestly, I think that is how I would choose to play it if given the choice.  It strikes me as well suited for the cutthroat types who are playing to win, and while that's not all I play for, I think that would be for the best.  It's not quite Dominion, which can be played either for fun or competitively.  It's the opposite of Race for the Galaxy, where the card selections are so vast, you almost have to play it as a casual encounter.  I liked the game, but I don't think it will ever be a personal favorite.  I would definitely play it again though.  I'm happy to have it in the group's collection, but am OK not having it in mine.

Hobby Update

It appears to be hovering around the two week (plus) mark which means time for a Hobby Update. It’s been an eventful and fun, but also busy, time in the real world lately. I’m incredibly thrilled about that, as well as the individual things that have made it so, but that does leave little time for the less meaningful dalliances involved in the business of toy soldiers and games.

On the Warhammer front, I’ve gotten in two games, which I split with a win and a loss. More details on that to come in a future post. In the more specific realm of hobby, I’ve gotten one of my drop pods to the point where one of the five facings is finished, and the other four are close. I have begun to question why anyone would ever choose to pair red and white in a color scheme, but I am persevering through. The bigger mental block right now is the thought of having to detail the interior. I know I should have kept the pieces separate to make painting them easier, but I didn’t because I’m, you know, an idiot. I would be tempted to glue the hatches shut like every other vehicle I own, but it would make no sense when it gets put down on the battlefield, so again, I press on.

I have managed to attend the last two “dork nights” as my fiancé calls them. Smallworld has been trending and a number of discussions have ensued about how to make it more modular and re-playable. It seems the biggest fascination with it is the solid and interesting mechanics. I have played, and it seems fun, but I think it has illustrated my own preference for a certain style of components. Not that Smallworld has bad components, but coming from a miniature wargames background, aesthetics drives a lot of my opinion of a game. It’s why I like Torres, Race for the Galaxy, and Space Hulk. It’s why I really want to try Rune Wars, Horus Heresy, and Merchants and Marauders.

Ironically, my game of choice also lacks “componentiness”, but satisfies my desire to avoid conflict when gaming. Two of the Dominion expansions, Seaside and Intrigue, have seen a fair bit of action, and honestly, they are far more subtle than the original. They still follow the basic premise of logically following what your card says, but the way you build a deck requires a defter touch, with more attack cards, the addition of cards that stay in play for a turn, and most of all, the dead card island. I don’t know if any card changes the way the game plays on a fundamental level as much as “Native Village.” It’s a tough mechanic to exploit as perfectly as you intend, especially if you can’t spam the card, but it’s functional in a variety of ways. I don’t know that anyone in the group has a perfect handle on it yet, but I think we all agree that it’s worthwhile.

After finishing our last pathfinder campaign, we’re all itching to play again. Sadly, again, real life is getting in the way. Hopefully soon.

Hobby Goals

- Finish Drop Pod 1

- Assemble the Land Raider

- Work on rebasing the Khorne Warriors

Hobby Accomplishments

- Not much. Did a little work on the Drop Pod

- Acquired movement trays that will actually fit my Chaos Warriors

- Played some games

I Got AGOT

Despite a setback (no gaming at the FLGS), this weekend turned out to be incredibly enjoyable for my dorky inner self.

It started off with my acquisition of the A Game of Thrones board game. Maybe that wouldn’t be too exciting for some people, but I loved the books and can’t wait for the HBO series. I bought a copy of the game for my brother-in-law and the game play was great. It really straddled the line between military game and political bargaining game, and that yielded a flavor similar to what I would imagine from the books.

And then it went out of print. I’ve been checking Ebay intermittently since then, but there has never been more than one or two copies available, and they have always been driven up to a premium price plus shipping. That got frustrating pretty quickly. So I took a shot and posted a message in a local forum. I got a line on someone with a copy of the game and ended up acquiring it at a discount. So hurray for me.

I also played my first game of Pathfinder on Sunday. Character creation was a lot of fun. I wanted to play something far from an archetype, and I wanted it to be ridiculous, so I went for a Half-orc former pimp using the Inquisitor class. He has a fur coat, a high charisma, and +11 on intimidate checks. In-game he acts as a bit of a jack-of-all-trades, but there was one moment that really got me excited.

One of my favorite podcast hosts talks about the “wow” moment in gaming, and mine happened in an encounter with a bunch of skeletons. We were pretty much on our last legs, due to our GM rolling some ridiculous to hit rolls. Our barbarian and usual tank was on his last hit point and locked in a cell, though he had succeeded in bashing two of the enemy. Our rogue was dragging our Halfling to safety, and my orc was standing in the doorway covering the retreat. The last skeleton came after me, hit me twice, and took me all the way down to zero hit points. Everyone thought our doom was assured, but I used my Orc special ability to play one more turn before collapsing. I connected on my to hit roll, and did just enough damage to waste the skeleton, and since I had pronounced the judgement of healing, I got one hit point back. Needless to say, I did my funky end zone celebration dance.

Finally, I even managed to fit in some of my more typical hobby activities. I put the finishing touches on the last two Raptors. After that, I did custom shoulder pads for the whole unit. I think they look great, and I am planning on fielding them next game, regardless of how less than optimal they are. I’ll post pictures with the next hobby update.