TLU is MUCH more likely to get me to give them money with an event like this.....

Tiffany,

Six Pro Bowl appearances, two Super Bowl wins, a Heisman Trophy, and inductions into the Dallas Cowboys Ring of Honor, the Pro Football Hall of Fame and the College Football Hall of Fame.

Six Pro Bowl appearances, an All-Pro Bowl appearance, three Super Bowl wins, 94 career wins, and inductions into the Dallas Cowboys Ring of Honor, the Pro Football Hall of Fame and the College Football Hall of Fame.

Who are these super stars? Roger Staubach and Troy Aikman – two of the most celebrated quarterbacks in Dallas Cowboys history. In just three weeks, you have an opportunity to have a FRONT ROW experience to see and hear from two NFL legends.

AT&T and Texas Lutheran University are proud to present “Front Row with Verne Lundquist, Roger Staubach & Troy Aikman” Tuesday, February 16, at The Westin Park Central in Dallas. A VIP reception begins at 6 p.m. followed by a general reception at 6:30 p.m., and dinner and program at 7 p.m. Tickets are on sale at www.tlu.edu or by calling 830-372-8030.

Tickets

Monday, February 8th

I know Tiffany knows this, but are y'all aware that there will supposedly be a Worldwake (MTG) release party on Monday, February 8th. They are talking about having 30-32 participants for the tournament, so Monday may be rather busy for board gaming. If there was ever interest in exploring a local restaurant venue as a test, this might be it.

However, it's likely I'll be participating in the release party. :)

Boardsandbits order

I will be placing a Boardsandbits order in early February. (Alea Treasure Chest Anyone?)

So let me know if you want anything!

You've been...Thunderstoned!

Let me join Rob (and jump the rest of the chorus) and thank Anne for hosting. Lots of new games were played, including Thunderstone. In my judgement (ha!) a pretty good game. And note (to Michael, Jon and Fred, and maybe Rob) we had a rule wrong, as Tim Isakson commented on my review. As for the other games played, I know about:

• Dominion (all expansions)
• Ticket to Ride: Europe (I think)
• Roll through the Ages
• Cuba (with expansion)
• Notre Dame
• Princes of Florence
• Eat a bunch of candy when the parents aren't looking
• That weird "Red White and Blue rectangular cube game on a city map" (Amytis?)
• I'm sure I'm missing a few ...
  

Let me also thank Rob ... I was skeptical about the whole meetup thing, but it's worked out well.

Anyway, our next (regularly scheduled) gaming is Monday Night, of course! I'll be there, looking older than normal. RSVP in the comments

Spielbox in english...

go vote now!

Here I Wait

I know we tossed around this notion of playing Here I Stand over the winter holidays, but of course we never quite got traction on this. Is there still interest in playing, and if so, what are folks' time schedule like? How far in advance can those who are interested in playing plan ahead? In light of the fact that there's President's Day next month, if we planned ahead this far in advance, can folks get the day off if they don't already have it so we can play? Or is a future Saturday the best bet?

If folks need a location to play, I'm always willing to volunteer my abode...

1pm Dragon's Lair on Monday

I'm going to plan to arrive at 1 on Monday, and hopefully I'll have company! I'll bring Agricola and Chaos in the Old World and a couple others.

Game Day at Anne's, January 23rd

I'm about to post a meetup for a game day at my abode on Saturday Jan 23rd. Heads up!

I'll probably get around to it later today or tomorrow. Feel free to give me some feedback on preferred starting times. I'm thinking 10am, but if most folks can't make it 'til noon, I'll set it up for then.

I've created a monster...

Literally and figuratively... Just finished my first Space Hulk figure after 6+hrs of painting. I wish I was a comformist. But nooooo, I have to do things the hard way. And the worst part? I loved every minute of it.

Stupid but funny (SAVG)

I'm looking forward to this one. Mass Effect had no humor to speak of, so this made me laugh. (Better in fullscreen)


There are quite a few YouTube videos of ME2 out now, including ones that show gameplay for each class. Combat is so improved that it doesn't look anything like the first game's combat, which was meh. No doubt about it--this game is going to be fantastic.

But before we get to quasi holiday Monday...

...we have the pre quasi holiday weekend. So are there any decent prospects for gaming at any point this weekend?

Gaming Monday Day?

I have monday off ... anybody else? I could try to play in the local Swiss Teams (bridge) tournament, but I figured I'd see if like-minded folk were available...

[SAVG] Just when I thought I was done

I was listening to the PC Gamer podcast today on my way to work.... bad idea. Just when I thought I was about done with Dragon Age, and I could move on to other less spare-time-consuming hobby-time-depleting games, here comes the first mega expansion.... Dragon Age: Awakening. I'm sold. Now I have less than 2 months to finish the base game.

Thankfully Starcraft 2 and Diablo 3 won't be out for a while. But Mass Effect 2, and Bioshock 2 are on the horizon... And Assassin's Creed 2 is frowning on the corner waiting for me to pay some attention to it. And I just started to paint my SH figures the hard way, not the Jon way, unfortunately because it takes 10 times as longer (but look awesome).

I think we need to officially add an extra day to weekends. 2 day weekends are not enough.

Since we're discussing electronic stuff

... I figure I'll mention my recent purchases for the XBox.

BioShock -- Solid. Decent story, hella atmosphere. Good sneak and smash shooter. More importantly, a nice duration. Four or five sessions (~3 hours each) and I'm done. I could go and redo it at a higher difficulty, but that's fine.

Oblivion something (IV?) Elder Scrolls -- Came with BioShock. I'm not into RPG games, and despite SIR Patrick Stewarts voice acting, nothing has changed. I was bored inside of an hour.

Left 4 Dead -- Nice shooter. My "I have 20 minutes" game of choice (apart from Rock Band). I like the team work aspect, and I think this would be a good game for a Saturday get-together. No complicated back story, and teamwork is mandatory. Not bad as a single player (computer controlled team-mates). I'm sure that the harder difficulties are beyond me.

Fallout 3 -- Uh, I thought this was more shooter than RPG, I was apparently wrong. Still, it's a post-apocalpytic setting. I almost turned it off after 30 minutes, but lasted another 30 (past the introduction). I'll probably give it another few hours.

So overall my purchases have been hit and miss, but seeing as how I got all 4 games for ~$60, I'm pretty happy. And with no Bloodbowl on the horizon, they'll do.

Heroscape: Dungeons and Dragons Arrives

My new copy of Heroscape: Dungeons and Dragons dropped off the back of the big brown truck this week. Engaging mental shield as I noticed the "For Ages 8 and Up" on the cover, I greedily popped open the box for a look.

First, let's be clear.... this is not the same value as the original Heroscape Master Set that included something like 40 painted miniatures, many of them quite large, and more terrain that could ever be forced back into the box. This set includes ten. But, for a $25 price tag (on-line), this isn't too bad, considering there is still a healthy portion of terrain, glyphs, and other odds and ends.

Next, the rulebook. I have to say I felt better inside when I hefted the thick rulebook and dropped it down on the table with a nearly-graphic-novel-sized smack (cue billowing clouds of dust, scrolls scattering, my winged familiar chittering off to hide in a dark corner... but I digress). The rules do a good job in incorporating all the various loop holes and FAQs that have been discussed and patched over the past few years. Yes, the game is relatively simple, perhaps along the lines of say Memoir '44, but the system is also now quite tight (cue Michael), with fans being actively involved in development.

On to the scenarios. There is a fairly lengthy linked campaign included in the rulebook, with connected modular areas in a dungeon, giving the game almost a Descent-like feel, without all the spawning. In addition, WotC have posted five more scenarios on their website, plus the developers posted another official one at Heroscapers.com, this time using some of the prior module materials and figures for more advanced play.

Lastly, the miniatures themselves. Before this set was released there was a fair amount of teeth gnashing about WotC recycling D&D CMG miniatures into Heroscape lowering the overall quality of the game. I have to say, I'm actually pretty impressed with what came in the box. The large Troll figure in particular looks like he stepped right out of the original Monster Manual. The Black Dragon could be bigger, but has nice detail. The Drow are suitably evil looking, and the adventurers are.... okay. These are definitely not showcase quality paint jobs, but they're probably about as good as any average gamer could ever paint. I've seen some CMG stuff that is certainly better (HorrorClix Alien vs. Predator, for instance), but these will work just fine.

So... this appears to be the future of Heroscape. The next expansion wave is supposed to arrive in March 2010 and will be 100% D&D figures. I suppose this is okay, as we have plenty of robots, space marines, and the like to mix in. I'm still bummed the Marvel line stopped at the original release set, and I am still hoping for more WotC-licensed content coming into the game (Star Wars?). In any event, this is good value for $25, particularly if you have some youngsters to game with.

PC Game suggestions

Does anybody have any suggestions for the best PC games out there at the moment? (Yes for those of us who still do not own a game system.) Personally, I tend to lean towards turn based or equivalent over real time but short of the few postings on this blog I really am not tuned in to what is available.

Commands and Colors: Napoleonics

I know a few of us are considering this next version of Richard Borg's gaming system of a thousand colors, C&C: Napoleonics. I've never had a huge interest in the subject matter, but reading some of the development discussions intrigues me enough to keep this on my radar. Some of the key differences over previous versions:

-- Units will lose effectiveness as they lose blocks. This will add a minor bit of complexity to the game, but I think also a much needed increase in realism. It always seemed ridiculous to me that the final few legionnaires left standing in a decimated (term actually used in proper context here) cohort could cause as much damage as a fresh, undamaged, fully manned counterpart.

-- This ruleset was the original C&C system and has been on the shelf since 1995 when no one was interested in publishing it. Apparently its been tinkered and toyed with since then and is just waiting on art.

-- The initial set will apparently only include partial orders of battle (OOBs) from a few countries. Future expansions are likely to be country specific, plus the inevitable Epic expansion.

Anyway.... I'm not ready to push the button yet, but I figure perhaps I'll just play Chris' copy to see if its any good. :-)

Any Gaming this Weekend?

Is there anything going on this weekend gaming wise?

Runewars

Did I really beat Ben in posting this here? Well, I have to say that FFG's marketing skills have improved significantly in the past couple of years.... I'm impressed (both with the quality of the video....and yes, the game).

Viva Le Meetup...

Like I've said before, I don't mean to replace this blog with the meetup's page, but the last couple of months have proven that it is a great tool for recruting new gamers to the group. Just here off the top of my head, I know Mike S, Zach and his wife, Doug and Sandy, Andrew, Mark, and Adam (et al.) last night have been more than great additions to the group. If it weren't for them, our Monday nights would prob have about 4-5 showing per night (as opposed to as many as 19 like last night).

Awesome ...

You don't call, you don't write...

I skip writing one Monday night call to arms and the blog goes dead for a week? Sheesh.

I'll be there on Monday. I just got back from a convention in Houston which went pretty well, although I didn't get to try out that many new games. (Played lots of classics, though). I did see lots of new games being played, though. The ludic equivalent of Tantulus. Fortunately for me, the grapes games looked sour. One of the games I saw was Heads of State, which one website has for dirt cheap (limited time offer). I'm not sure if it's good, though.

Recent Gaming

So.... Happy New Year, everyone. Any good gaming resolutions out there? Mine is to play lots more games.

Unfortunately I haven't really been doing much board gaming lately, unless you consider selling, trading, sleeving, organizing, and rulebook reading gaming. Theoretically Republic of Rome and Heroscape: D&D should be showing up this month, as will Where There is Discord via trade from Belgium. I have such a huge backlog of unplayed games now... ugh!

In the mean time I've been obsessing over two non-board games, both of which I initially didn't really like that much. This actually isn't an uncommon pattern for me. Some of my favorite movies, books, music, and, yes, games were ones that took a bit of time to grow on me. Perhaps their originality was somehow a shock to my system... Anyway, here they are:

First, Sword of the Stars (with all three expansions shuffled in, of course) is a game I acquired recently via the insanely low holiday prices at Steam. The game is another in the popular line of 4X (explore, expand, exploit, exterminate) space opera games. If you can get past graphics 3-5 years old and some fairly spartan interface features, this game is as close to Twilight Imperium 3 as I've encountered in PC gaming. In other words, its awesome!

I would still have say Sword of the Stars is still slightly less good than Master of Orion 2, just because I prefer turn-based combat over real-time, but other than that, the game totally rocks. I had to play a couple hours before I could start to look past the initial ugliness and see the depth and richness underneath. The game has six races, each with different tech trees and game mechanics; loads of hidden ancient enemies on the map (ala' MOO2, but think multiple evil ancient ones out there actively hunting you and your fellow fledgling races); and tons of features pulled from sci-fi movies, novels, and etc. For instance, one of the evil ones developing (and trying to kill you) on the map is an ancient probe replicating itself via the resources of whoever it encounters (think Star Trek 1, the movie). Another feature is that if you push your research on computers too quickly, your AI will rebel, form SkyNet, enslave a chunk of your empire, and go after you.... hard. Okay... there's more, but that's enough blathering. If you get the game, get on Steam and join me in a co-op game!

The other game I'm enjoying right now is.... Modern Warfare 2. Okay, yes, me and 7 million other people apparently. Still though, at first I was pretty underwhelmed, thinking this wasn't much more than a shallow rehash of MW1. Then I kept playing, exploring Special Ops mode and multi-player in addition to the campaign. Wow.... the little details are pretty incredible. For example, you actually hear the sound of tires popping and hissing then see a slight lurch downward as bullets hit the car you're hiding behind. This game is very good. If you see me on XBL, Notre Dame 89, feel free to invite me to a co-op game.

Okay, back to Sword of the Stars...