Star Wars Fridays at WZKD kicks off with Armada

 Also known as, "How to run away to live another day in an Imperial Star Destroyer."

That's right - my buddy Mark and I kicked off (officially this time) Star Wars Fridays at WZKD Comics and Games yesterday with our usual go to SW lovefest, Star Wars Armada.

It was great to get the gorgeous (and pre-painted) big ships from a galaxy far, far away - it certainly seemed like a long time since we'd threw down the Armada dice and started chipping away at shields hoping for face up critical hit cards.

Apparently, I had forgotten that my fave Imperial Carrier can seem to be pretty much made of paper mache as it's first pass on the Mark's Assault Frigate Mark II and found itself with collapsing shields and hull hits aplenty.

As I quickly realized I was well on the way to a loss of shear points - I began picking off X-wing Fighter Squadrons and the occasional  Y-Wing Bomber Squadron.  But Mark's MC30c Torpedo Frigate made it's way around the central ringed planet on the board and rammed my wounded Carrier turning into some rather inglorious space debris and I decided it was time to high tail it to hyperspace with my Imperial Star Destroyer mostly unscratched.  As turn 6 ended - the points told no lies and the Empire took yet another deserved defeat.

Great to get back to some Armada...next Friday...Outer Rim (with the Unfinished Business expansion)!

Peace...

Mike

 

Quetzalcoatl Dragons take a loss in first Spring League match

Had my first match for Round 2 in the Gratuitously Rowdy Oddballs WZKD League (G.R.O.W.L.) Spring Blood Bowl League yesterday (I had a bye for Round 1) and took a 2-0 drubbing from my buddy Zeqe and his Black Orcs. This included 6 casualties inflicted on my hapless Lizardmen including the untimely death of Copperhead, one of my Saurus Blockers.

Great match with Zeqe and congrats on his first league win while I'll be bringing a Journeyman on for my next match. 

Best, 

Mike 

RPG Space

 

Due to a bit of a scheduling conflict at WZKD Comics and Games I needed to hold yesterday's WZKD D&Ders session at WZKD East (aka my place).

Waa fun to fire up my RPG space in the Game Cavern finally... 

Peace, 

Mike 

Interstellar Supremacy in a Really Big Box

 

After a long wait, I was finally able to get Twilight Imperium 4th edition to the table (and I didn't give myself a hernia doing so).  Had a three player 'Learn To Play' game with a couple of regular gamer buddies of mine after our regular monthly game of John Prado's Third Reich fell apart when one of that usual bunch had to postpone.  

Factions chosen were The Federation of Sol, The Universities of Jol-Nar, and Sardakk N'orr. 

We used the suggested three-player Galaxy Setup and the Great Races began their machinations toward seizing the throne and ruling the Galactic Council on Mecatol Rex.

Overall first impressions is that this is one helluva fun game and the possibilities and strategies are endless.  First time set up alone took a good 90 minutes for a noob like me (not too mention that the unboxing is a gargantuan task as well).  However, after seeing it all on the table and working through the game phases I think it will be much quicker next time around. 

But this is no beer and pretzel's game to be played over an hour or two.  We played a goodly six and a half hours and if we hadn't been nearing our scheduled full stop time and started space battles just for fun (and not for strategic importance) it would have easily continued on.  At that time, no one was arguably out of the game.  As we got better at understanding the mechanics play speed picked up considerably. 

When we called it quits, One player had accumulated 6 victory points and the other two of us had 4 (of the 10 required to end the game).  

The is a Fantasy Flight title - so the production quality is superb.  But this is a Fantasy Flight title - so be prepared to get your OCD on to get things properly punched out and sorted (particularly when thinking of storage that allows a reasonable unpacking to the table for future games.) 

All the cards, tokens, minis, and game pieces are well done - but IMHO the real standout is the Galaxy Map itself.  These are gorgeous map tiles and while the suggested 3, 4, 5, and 6 player galaxy preset setups are great, the concept of players drafting the system tiles to build the galaxy map looks awesome and I look forward to trying that on the next session.  A full on 6 player game is likely at least a weekend event and will take up a large amount of space (we used to 6 x 4' table space for three of us - that might have been tight for 5 or 6). 

Keep in mind if you are really looking at a multi-day game then the Prophecy of Kings expansion brings another 10 ton box filled with new content to add - seven more factions to choose from (there are seventeen factions in the base game box so what's seven more?), forty more system tiles to build your galaxy, tons of new forces to do battle with, new exploration, relics, technology, etc, and the components to add two more players for up to an eight-player game (mother pusbucket!)

All in all, Twilight Imperium is the gargantuan King of Kings of space themed boardgames - and it's a joyous thing to behold!

Peace...

Michael D.    

Outer Rim and some Unfinished Business

 Recently picked up Star Wars Outer Rim and the expansion Unfinished Business.  Been wanting to grab this one for quite sometime and finally got it to the table for a bit of a learning game or two.  

After watching a game review or two this weekend I took the advice to incorporate the Unfinished Business expansion into the Outer Rim base game eveb before my first game. After another hour of unpunching, sorting, and reading another set of rules, it turned out to be a righteous addition to the game overall.

And my first playthrough began today!  I'm playing a four player game and running each character myself rather than running a solo game with one or more of the included bots.AI bots so I can get a feel for the mechanics.  After a couple of turns for each character (in this case Han Solo, Boba Fett, Jyn Erso, and Doctor  Aphra) the game mechanics are pretty straightforward and the player turns went pretty quick.

The game started out a bit ominously as the first bounty was for Ahsoka Tano (my favorite Jedi/Not a Jedi) LOL! 

Notable events so far have been Han running into a Hutt Patrol on his way to Tattoine to pick up Chewie to have the Wookie join his crew.  Han's piloting skills were no match for the Hutts.

Jyn Erso ran into Lando Calrissian on Takodona but he declined to join her crew.

Doctor Aphra has been using her tech savvy and Imperial influence to run the transit between the Spinward Core and Trailing Core to zip back and forth between the opposite ends of the galaxy. 

 

Meanwhile, Boba Fett has been pretty much running away with the Rim.  3 Fame points, a wallet full of credits, and just met caught up to Han Solo and blew up Han's G1A Starfighter for the Elimination Reward on Han's Bounty, though it was a bit mutual as Han simultaneously destroyed Fett's G9 Rigger. 

So far....it's a great game with one hell of a lot of Star Wars thematic love and some really great mechanics.  The relayability is extremely high and I'm aware that I'm just scratching the surface of this little beauty of a game.

Peace...

Michael D.

Sacred Knowledge For Your Tastebuds

Some of us are connoisseurs of ice cream...so it can be vitally important to understand the differences of milkshakes and concretes.

G.R.O.W.L. 2023 Spring League begins...

 

Ok Blood Bowl Fans....Let's Get Ready To Rumble!  Officially announcing the upcoming 2023 Spring Blood Bowl Gratuitously Rowdy Oddballs WZKD League (G.R.O.W.L.)!!!  The next league season kicks on on Sunday, June 11th at noon when we'll have a league meeting at WZKD Comics and Games for introductions and to go over rules and regs for the Spring Season, and answer any questions.  We'll also have exhibition matches available that afternoon at the store for new players (or old ones like me) to get a chance to play a match for a bit of an intro/refresher before their first season matches.  This will be a new team league with standard starting rosters of $1,000,000 gold (no returning teams from previous leagues this time around).  Our kickoff in June should give everyone 5 weeks to decide on what teams they will be coaching, assemble teams as needed, practice a bit, etc.  Sign up sheets will be available at WZKD this coming Friday (5/12) along with flyers and league info.