Kingmaker the Second

 

Very excited this week with the arrival of the new edition of the classic game Kingmaker.  Back in 2020 I somehow found myself taking part in some online playtest games of the revised system (it was lockdown and we were all desperate to find something to do!).  The kickstarter by Gibson games was really well run and refreshingly they didn't try adding lots of extras which would slow down production... their aim was to get the game produced and out to backers on time.  Most kickstarters I've backed have usually ended up being at least a year or 2 overdue. Bizarrely I also discovered that Gibson Games are based about a mile from me!

The game itself is very nicely done.  The map and cards have had a refresh and have lost that 1970s look. 

For nostalgia fans though the original map is on the reverse of the board and the original rules are included.

The game comes with the 'new' rules as well as the originals, a solo version and several player aid cards.

Handily each player now gets a full set of noble counters in their own colour scheme which should make it easier to track who belongs to which faction

The cards have had a major upgrade and there are a few changes to make the nobles more accurate and to replace some anomalies (for example the odd Saxon mercenaries have been replaced with Landsknechts)

The rules themselves especially are now explained in a more user friendly style... less of the 1970s lawyer-ese that a lot of boardgames had.  Mostly the mechanics are the same: the 2 biggest changes are around movement and how to actually win.  Games of KM often involved counting endless permutations of the small white squares on the map to work out the best route.  Now counters move within larger regions or to an adjacent region, hopefully speeding this up.

The game has some new rules for set up including making sure that forces are more balanced at the beginning and players can now start with some pre-set faction to ensure no one begins with a duff hand of cards.

The biggest problem with 'old' KM was that games often ended up with someone grabbing a king and hiding out somewhere like Calais or Ireland where they were too powerful to be attacked.  Games tended to stagnate towards the end with powerful factions glowering at each other across the map and not risking a fight.  Now there is an alternative way to win... prestige!  If you hold a King (it's the Wars of the Roses so there can be more than 1) you can win by capturing towns, holding offices and fighting battles and generally raising your profile until you win by default... no more skulking in Ireland!!  I think this is a great change and it really changed the dynamic of the game during the playtests.  It should also mean that games come to a proper conclusion and don't fizzle out.

Little Wars Revisited games day 2023

 

So I'm a little late with this post, but last weekend I finally made it along to one of the annual Little Wars Revisited 54mm gatherings which happen once a year in Woking (along with a sister event up north in Stockport).  I went to this first one of these a few years ago and then a combination of covid, work and a flat tyre have meant I've missed every one since.  The day is a small event bringing together players who frequent the Little Wars 54mm forum and who enjoy games with larger figures (40mm and upwards).  There are usually around a dozen or so players from around the UK who get the chance to catch up and play a few games over the day.  The event takes place in the very pretty upstairs room at Christchurch in the centre of Woking... definitely the nicest wargames venue I've been to!

I could only make the afternoon but games on offer included Age of Penda, The Men Who Would Be Kings, Lion Rampant and a Cornish smuggling skirmish game.  There was also an intriguing snowball fight game which somehow I neglected to take any photos of.

First up some of Mike Lewis's very impressive NWF game featuring an armoured train being attacked by Pathans...

Some pics of the medieval themed Lion Rampant game with some impressive ramparts...

I played the Age of Penda game which pitched Vikings against Saxons and uses an intriguing order board.  Players have an allocated number of orders which they can use to claim the available slots on the board... there are enough order slots for everyone to be able to move, attack etc but there are a couple of limited special tactics and initiative orders which it's important to bid for if you can.

In our game my Viking force was a small but elite army with a lot of order points available.  Facing it were some rather poor Saxons with few order points but a lot of troops.  I decided to ignore subtlety and to charge headlong for the Saxon centre, carving my way through several units but at a cost to my small army.  Eventually it came down to the last dice throw of the game which sadly didn't go my way and rubbish Saxons claimed victory.  An excellent set of rules and ideal for this kind of event where you want a relatively quick game.  It would be very feasible to play both sides in an evening.

Finally a pic of the Smuggling skirmish... this looked great and had smugglers, locals and government troops all trying to seize the booty and polish off the opposition. It looked great fun and seemed to be heavy on the role-playing aspect

I haven't done anything with 54mm figures since I painted up m North West Frontier figures and I came away inspired to have a think about some larger scale gaming.  I was particularly struck but how good some skirmish games with a handful of figures can look (eg the smuggling game) with relatively few figures.  I always struggle to paint up lots of models so thinking about this kind of game (and my recent Fist Full of Lead games) has set some new projects into motion....

Conan and the Princess

 This week we dug out a game I haven't played for a few years... Conan which I bought as a Kickstarter several years ago.  It has languished unloved and forgotten in the loft for too long so when Anthony and I were discussing it recently we decided to dig it out and have a game.

Conan pits a number of players against one who controls all the 'baddies' using an interesting resource management system.  Players use coloured gems representing energy levels/health to perform actions and in theory can do as much as they want in one turn until they run out.  Of course it only recovers slowly so players need to manage this carefully. The GM (or Overlord) uses a similar system but once a unit or character has activated it moves to the end of his row and then costs more to reactivate.  This forces the Overlord to spread his activations around different units or spend his precious gems to keep reactivating the same one.

Actions, combat , magic etc are all pretty intuitive and we quickly got into the game.  We played the 1st scenario in the book.  Conan has been asked to rescue a princess who has been captured by the evil Zogar Sag and is about to sacrificed.  She is hidden in one of a number of huts in the village.  Conan also has to bring back Zogar Sag's head!  He has brought along a couple of pals to help... Hadrathus, a wizard, and Shevatas who is a more nimble thief-type.

If read various opinions on how to set this scenario up and whether all of the Overlord's figures should start on the table.  I thought it was much more fun to have most of them hidden until Conan and his gang looked into a tent or I chose to bring them out.

The village seems strangely quiet apart from a couple of Picts and their pet Hyenas...

Nice doggy!   Shevatas decides to avoid fighting the Hyenas and nimbly runs away to another part of the village

oops... our heroes weren't expecting to find a giant snake hiding in the tent!

Shevatas finds the Princess guarded by some Picts who are quickly despatched

Conan had already wounded Zogar Sag and Hadrathus finished him off with a blast of lightning

Grabbing the enemy's head he teleports to the edge of the village and off to safety.  Shevatas has also escaped with the Princess winning the day for our heroes

In true Robert E Howard style,  the Princess is completely passive and exists purely to be rescued by our manly hero... slightly problematic!!  I'd forgotten what a good game this is.... some clever mechanics and well thought out scenarios really capture the feel of the books.

An unexpected seaside find

 Last weekend we took advantage of the unseasonal sunshine and popped down to Ferring in West Sussex to take the dogs for a walk on the beach... turns out everyone else had the same idea and it was absolutley hoaching with people and dogs.  Ferring has a nice beach but more importantly has an excellent dog-friendly cafe, The Bluebird Cafe and is a mecca for pooches and their owners.

On our return walk along the beach to where we'd parked the car we walked past this square building which I'd missed on the outward walk.   Turns out to be a WW2 pillbox, sited on the coast to defend against enemy invaders...

There's a whole rabbit warren of information about pillboxes here!  And here's a picture of Cleo guarding the beach against any potential invaders (unless they've brought snacks in which case she'll happily surrender!)

Bad Day at Calton Creek

A return to the wild west last week with a game of Fist Full of Lead. Having played Gunslinger a couple of times recently (see previous posts) this is a very different game. I guess if you want to know the specifics of each pistol and break down the action into seconds Gunslinger gives that really granular feel, but for this week's game we wanted something much more cinematic and fast moving and FFOL definitely suits this style of game.

We went for a simple scenario... In the town of Calton Creek Johnny Fingers and his gang of mean desperadoes have stumbled out of the saloon looking for trouble... at the other end of the street Marshal Knutt and some concerned townsfolk have gathered to put an end to the trouble  (bonus points for the name references!)

Johnny Fingers and his gang hit the streets looking for trouble

...but the Marshal and concerned citizens are determined to stop them

Little Heap and Short hit the dirt under a hail of gunfire but somehow survive.  Short mainly survives by being... erm... short... and harder to hit!

Johnny Fingers climbs onto the saloon roof but eventually is hit and collapses,  His gang scatter now the leader is dead.

A very different cowboy experience and great fun... it felt much more like a scene from a western!

Gaslands

 

Last week we gave Gaslands a rare outing as Andrew hadn't had chance to try them before.  To keep things simple we had a couple of cars each and raced around a figure of 8 track... I possibly made the track a bit too big but I was worried that my rubbish driving skills Andrew's lack of experience would make negotiating tight bends a bit tricky.  In hindsight a smaller arena would have upped the level of carnage which is always a good thing in Gaslands!

Each vehicle's weapons don't activate until they've gone through the first gate so Andrew took advantage of this by speeding through Gate 2 and immediately dropping mines in the gateway!

We'd decided to award points for completing a lap but more points for wrecking vehicles.  Andrew's lead car sped round the course and took the 1st lap before deciding that racing wasn't as much fun as concentrating on attacking enemy vehicles!

I spent a lot of the time trailing behind Andrew's lead car while his 2nd vehicle, a truck, struggled to get up to speed... his dice rolling was pretty atrocious for a lot of the game until he managed to line up a shot on one of my cars and managed to roll this...

... 6's count as 2 hits so this was pretty devastating, immediately destroying one of my cars!

He then proceeded to execute a very neat reverse turn and blast my other car into smithereens... I'm putting this down to beginners luck and definitely not my rubbish tactics!  Excellent fun and a game that I ought to get out more often

Mosaic

I've always been a big fan of the PC game Civilisation... I hate to think how many hours have slipped away on various versions of the game. So I was intrigued when Mark suggested trying his newly arrived boardgame Mosaic which draws a lot of inspiration from Civ. This was the Kickstarter edition which comes with lots of nice components... I guess the standard version won't be quite so flashy but still lovely I'd assume.

The game takes place around a map of the Mediterranean although each Civilisation isn't restricted in where they can place cities and towns. These allow you to start gathering trade goods which is one way to gain gold and buy your way to victory. But the joy of Mosaic is that there are.multiple ways to advance and win. Each player takes one action per turn including 

working to produce those vital.resources like food, stone and ideas: some serious thinking is required to access the next important resource... Technology. Claiming different forms of Technology is vital in gaining more points. You can also Build things... not just cities and towns but also roads, baths and a host of things that enhance your civilisation.

Players can also build Wonders, create different styles of Government and claim different Achievements, allow which add to your victory point tally.

Scoring is carried out at various points in the game depending on when the Score cards turn up in the different decks of cards. In both of our games I came last but I really didn't mind... I loved the game and was pleased that I'd improved my score in the 2nd game (even if I was still last!). It's always a good sign when you mull over the game the next day, thinking about what you might have done differently.  

One of the things I really loved about the game is the huge variety of ways to win. There are lots of different strategies that can lead to a victory... I just need to find one!! Highly recommended.