Seriously, this is right up there with Mansions of Madness
Honestly it is not that much outside of the coins, ingredents, worker cubes, and the ribbons its basically a logic puzzle to a board game. It looks intimidating at first but there is an elegance to it. If you want fiddly, take a look at a disorganized copy of ora et labora.
Alchemists's board art is also busy and organic. Some games can tell you a lot about how they play just by looking at them. The main board of Alchemists does not.
However, like Coldguy said, there really aren't that many moving parts.
Now if you want a game with a lot of fiddly bits there's Argent: The Consortium which is a worker placement game to become head of "Not Hogwarts".
You have:
Gold - to buy things Mana Crystals - to cast spells Intelligence - to learn spells Wisdom - to develop more powerful spells Treasures - Artifacts you pick up with gold or actions Followers - You generally want more of these Marks - To determine what the end game goals actually are
Then you have different worker types based on the color of the token.
Green - Can't be assassinated Blue - Immune to spells Purple - Can be played as a fast action Red - Can assassinate other workers other than green Grey - After casting a spell can be placed as a free action. Yellow - Generic worker
I backed Mottainai and hope it will be in before PAX (Asmadi is really good for getting their projects out on time). I also bought Alchemists today after hearing a lot of good things about it.
Baseball Highlights 2045 is very good as a 2 player game.
Tonight I learned it's amazing as a 4 player tournament.
The season went to the final game of the World Series, when I managed to walk my opponent's rocket powered robot batter to clinch the narrowest 4-3 victory. We had equally matched decks, and I attribute my victory to luck of the draw on that final game. It was great.
I've never been an avid fan of baseball, and this game is getting me there.
Looking at pictures of people playing Alchemists, it definitely looks like a 10 on the Fiddly-bits scale.
Fiddly is quite literal, here. The original printing of Alchemists has cardboard discs that are too large to actually fit into a grid with circular cutouts, which you are supposed to use to track your deduction progress. The grid stands up vertically, the pieces fall out, and your knowledge is lost. I found myself taking pictures of my own board. This has been fixed now, but damn what was annoying when playing someone else's early copy.
I agree that Alchemists, Aquasphere, and Roll for the Galaxy are all great games that won't get SdJ attention at any level, for theme or over-complexity reasons.
I did play Colt Express this past weekend, and it was a good time. However, it is not great in comparison to most other SdJ winners. It is a bit of silly fun, not a very tight game. It is Robo Rally on a train, with amazing bits. Tons of luck, but fun to see how each turn plays out. I would absolutely play again, but I have zero intention of ever adding to my collection.
The only major knock on Colt Express is that the character art is really lame. Amateur comic book art.
The short of it is that they got a LOT of rules wrong this season. It's good that they recognize this is a really big problem, and that they are going to fix it in any future episodes. It's bad that Wil basically threw his producer under the bus, and the community seems to be really focused on that aspect of it.
But for me, I think this really just serves to highlight some other problems that we have already been preaching about for awhile.
Game publishers are not writing and editing rules well. Even expert game players and rules lawyers like us are not able to correctly determine the rules of a game using the included rulebooks. We have to go to BGG for rules clarifications on just about every game from the simplest to the nerdiest. This is not acceptable. If you publish a tabletop game, an average adult human should be able to read your rulebook and play the game 100% correctly. Any question they might have should be answered in those rules with no ambiguity. It only seems like this is a lot to ask for because the industry is so bad at it. It's definitely achievable. Spend less time making fancy artwork and more time on the rules.
Game players are really bad at reading rules. Most people completely avoid reading the rules because it's not fun. They get someone else to read the rules for them, and let themselves be taught. Now you have a single point of failure. If that person gets it wrong, everyone gets it wrong. And then as the teaching of the game passes along verbally, so do the mistakes. This is why even when being taught a game, Rym and I will get the rulebook and check what the person is saying. People can't be trusted. If you like playing games, then you owe it to yourself and the other players to read the rules, no matter how unpleasant it is. Get good at reading rules.
Now, Tabletop is for a general audience. It's to get people into gaming, or to introduce players to new games. It's not for experts or for competition. So it's good that most of the people actually on the show are new to a game. That's much more relatable for the audience, and is how the show should be. That being said, at least ONE, just ONE, person on each episode should be a fucking expert at the game being played. They can even find an expert from the community on BGG who looks good on video. Even if they don't look good on video, just bring them in as an off-camera consultant. I'm sure you can even get the game designer or a representative from the publisher each episode. Tabletop is a big deal. This isn't hard!
The other problem is that they aren't finding out they got things wrong until after the episode is live. This is probably pot calling kettle black when you consider GeekNights, but if you make something, and it's bad, don't upload it! If you didn't find out you got the rules wrong until after uploading the video, that's a really big problem. Even though you spent money to make that episode you can just throw it out. Or in the worst case you can at least edit out the parts where you got things wrong, or put notes or other edits to explain how you got things wrong in the episode itself.
Another possibility is to do like we did when we streamed the X-COM board game. It was clear that we were all reading the rules and learning as we went along. We were the ones asking the rules questions, not making rules assertions. By changing the perspective like that, it is expected of us to make mistakes. We're learning a real-time game in real-time! What else do you expect?
They've been fucking up the rules since Season 1. I became, and remained, highly skeptical of the show when they didn't play the Mountain/Giant rule correctly in Small World.
The amazing part is how he treats his producer anonymously in his blog post but the damn guy has been very publicly the face of tabletop to the gaming community, while Wil is the outward face to the non-gamers. Everyone in tabletop land knows who the fuck Bo is, ESPECIALLY after you crowdfund your third season and are very public about who is really running your show.
They've been fucking up the rules since Season 1. I became, and remained, highly skeptical of the show when they didn't play the Mountain/Giant rule correctly in Small World.
The amazing part is how he treats his producer anonymously in his blog post but the damn guy has been very publicly the face of tabletop to the gaming community, while Wil is the outward face to the non-gamers. Everyone in tabletop land knows who the fuck Bo is, ESPECIALLY after you crowdfund your third season and are very public about who is really running your show.
"Don't be a dick," Wil. Good fucking job.
This whole thing I think leaves a big opening for competition. We can not only teach games correctly, but also how to win. Not many can offer that.
Wil Wheaton has always struck me as being kinda-sort-of a dick, and this just reinforces that. Like, before I read the "apology," I thought maybe people were blowing it out of proportion - but naw man, pretty much out the gate he's like "FUCK THIS ONE GUY IN PARTICULAR AND DEFINITELY NOT ME BUT I'LL TAKE SOME BLAME BECAUSE I'M SO FUCKING AWESOME."
Wil Wheaton has always struck me as being kinda-sort-of a dick, and this just reinforces that. Like, before I read the "apology," I thought maybe people were blowing it out of proportion - but naw man, pretty much out the gate he's like "FUCK THIS ONE GUY IN PARTICULAR AND DEFINITELY NOT ME BUT I'LL TAKE SOME BLAME BECAUSE I'M SO FUCKING AWESOME."
The law is called Wheaton's Law not because he came up with it, but because he's the guy you're not supposed to be like.
Wil Wheaton has always struck me as being kinda-sort-of a dick, and this just reinforces that. Like, before I read the "apology," I thought maybe people were blowing it out of proportion - but naw man, pretty much out the gate he's like "FUCK THIS ONE GUY IN PARTICULAR AND DEFINITELY NOT ME BUT I'LL TAKE SOME BLAME BECAUSE I'M SO FUCKING AWESOME."
yea, I never understood that either Wheaton always came off kind of dickish but not a unfamiliar type of person in those hobbies.
Quick, I think slightly relevant anecdote about Wil...
I was at a con with a friend of mine many many years ago in LA. Before the modern resurgence of his career. There was a person at the Con trying to unload their 40K army. My friend negotiated a price with the gentleman but had to go to the ATM to get the cash to pay him. While my buddy was off going to the ATM, Wil ninja'd in and made a better cash-on-the-spot offer, which the man accepted.
While most of the blame here does go to the seller for not honoring the agreement he made with my friend, Wil was absolutely a dick in this case.
They've been fucking up the rules since Season 1. I became, and remained, highly skeptical of the show when they didn't play the Mountain/Giant rule correctly in Small World.
The amazing part is how he treats his producer anonymously in his blog post but the damn guy has been very publicly the face of tabletop to the gaming community, while Wil is the outward face to the non-gamers. Everyone in tabletop land knows who the fuck Bo is, ESPECIALLY after you crowdfund your third season and are very public about who is really running your show.
"Don't be a dick," Wil. Good fucking job.
This whole thing I think leaves a big opening for competition. We can not only teach games correctly, but also how to win. Not many can offer that.
You want to turn this into a thing, I might know a guy somewhat local to NYC who knows a lot about games.
They've been fucking up the rules since Season 1. I became, and remained, highly skeptical of the show when they didn't play the Mountain/Giant rule correctly in Small World.
The amazing part is how he treats his producer anonymously in his blog post but the damn guy has been very publicly the face of tabletop to the gaming community, while Wil is the outward face to the non-gamers. Everyone in tabletop land knows who the fuck Bo is, ESPECIALLY after you crowdfund your third season and are very public about who is really running your show.
"Don't be a dick," Wil. Good fucking job.
This whole thing I think leaves a big opening for competition. We can not only teach games correctly, but also how to win. Not many can offer that.
You want to turn this into a thing, I might know a guy somewhat local to NYC who knows a lot about games.
We can't even finish Utena videos, and I can't even put out all the Netrunner videos I record. To make it a thing we would need someone else to do the video work. I can definitely provide the content, though. That's no problem.
We can't even finish Utena videos, and I can't even put out all the Netrunner videos I record. To make it a thing we would need someone else to do the video work. I can definitely provide the content, though. That's no problem.
I could crank out an Utena video every two weeks easily if I didn't wait for you. =P
As for a show like this, the setup is pretty simple.
Mic everyone with the Mackie. Bunch of cameras Lighting and all that
Record ALL of the following: Read the rules and learn the game Teach the game Play the game Analyze the game
Then we cut this stuff down into segments for the actual show. Imagine a bunch of footage of us sitting around arguing about a rule and looking it up on BGG. Then the teaching session (which can also be split out to be its own then). Then the full game play.
The biggest things preventing this are
1. Need to read/buy a few more mics 2. Need a space that we can use for an entire day 3. Need an entire day where everyone is 100% available all day and committed.
We could do a jank version with just the two of us and a relatively simple game (like the Mouse Guard game, Oshi, or Battle Line).
I'm pretty sure they shoot the entire season in a few days, all the sessions back to back. I assume this would place more pressure on all cast and producers involved thus the mistakes. Everyone complains but no one can make a competitor.
I still find it fun to watch because it gives me an idea of how the game plays and I can work out if I want to buy the game or not.
I thought that was adorable, how he tried to play the "our schedule is so grueling!" card. Playing games from sun up to sun down, for several days in a row? That's called a con. We've all been there, and it wasn't the nightmare he described.
It's a subjective party game that can fill the slot of something like a Cards Against Humanity, but for bullshitters. You are each dealt out 4 Qualifications, like "Really Bad Aim," "Russian Accent," or "Has an Umbrella" and then everyone has a few minutes to interview for the job that comes up, and must include all of their qualifications in their pitch.
I think it could be fun - and uniquely suited to people with HR training.
It's a subjective party game that can fill the slot of something like a Cards Against Humanity, but for bullshitters. You are each dealt out 4 Qualifications, like "Really Bad Aim," "Russian Accent," or "Has an Umbrella" and then everyone has a few minutes to interview for the job that comes up, and must include all of their qualifications in their pitch.
I think it could be fun - and uniquely suited to people with HR training.
Oh, THAT'S what that game is about? I actually want to play that.
I played Funemployed at PAX East 2014 and it was a blast. It felt like playing an improv game on Who's Line. It trumps Cards Against Humanity because you get to make the jokes and feel like you've earned the laughs. It felt like a great party game or icebreaker.
Not sure if I should create a separate topic for this, but September 12th is WashingCon, Washington DC's first dedicated tabletop gaming convention. It's one day only, and until July 12th, tickets are only $10 for the day. If you happen to be in the DC Metro area, or want to come and play cool board games in the nation's capital, you should check it out.
Comments
However, like Coldguy said, there really aren't that many moving parts.
You have:
Gold - to buy things
Mana Crystals - to cast spells
Intelligence - to learn spells
Wisdom - to develop more powerful spells
Treasures - Artifacts you pick up with gold or actions
Followers - You generally want more of these
Marks - To determine what the end game goals actually are
Then you have different worker types based on the color of the token.
Green - Can't be assassinated
Blue - Immune to spells
Purple - Can be played as a fast action
Red - Can assassinate other workers other than green
Grey - After casting a spell can be placed as a free action.
Yellow - Generic worker
Tonight I learned it's amazing as a 4 player tournament.
The season went to the final game of the World Series, when I managed to walk my opponent's rocket powered robot batter to clinch the narrowest 4-3 victory. We had equally matched decks, and I attribute my victory to luck of the draw on that final game. It was great.
I've never been an avid fan of baseball, and this game is getting me there.
Version 1.0 of shelves, most of games can fit but sadly a third will soon be needed. Somehow my copy of Channel A is AWOL.
I agree that Alchemists, Aquasphere, and Roll for the Galaxy are all great games that won't get SdJ attention at any level, for theme or over-complexity reasons.
I did play Colt Express this past weekend, and it was a good time. However, it is not great in comparison to most other SdJ winners. It is a bit of silly fun, not a very tight game. It is Robo Rally on a train, with amazing bits. Tons of luck, but fun to see how each turn plays out. I would absolutely play again, but I have zero intention of ever adding to my collection.
The only major knock on Colt Express is that the character art is really lame. Amateur comic book art.
http://wilwheaton.net/2015/06/tabletop-kingdom-builder-and-screwing-up-the-rules/
The short of it is that they got a LOT of rules wrong this season. It's good that they recognize this is a really big problem, and that they are going to fix it in any future episodes. It's bad that Wil basically threw his producer under the bus, and the community seems to be really focused on that aspect of it.
But for me, I think this really just serves to highlight some other problems that we have already been preaching about for awhile.
Game publishers are not writing and editing rules well. Even expert game players and rules lawyers like us are not able to correctly determine the rules of a game using the included rulebooks. We have to go to BGG for rules clarifications on just about every game from the simplest to the nerdiest. This is not acceptable. If you publish a tabletop game, an average adult human should be able to read your rulebook and play the game 100% correctly. Any question they might have should be answered in those rules with no ambiguity. It only seems like this is a lot to ask for because the industry is so bad at it. It's definitely achievable. Spend less time making fancy artwork and more time on the rules.
Game players are really bad at reading rules. Most people completely avoid reading the rules because it's not fun. They get someone else to read the rules for them, and let themselves be taught. Now you have a single point of failure. If that person gets it wrong, everyone gets it wrong. And then as the teaching of the game passes along verbally, so do the mistakes. This is why even when being taught a game, Rym and I will get the rulebook and check what the person is saying. People can't be trusted. If you like playing games, then you owe it to yourself and the other players to read the rules, no matter how unpleasant it is. Get good at reading rules.
Now, Tabletop is for a general audience. It's to get people into gaming, or to introduce players to new games. It's not for experts or for competition. So it's good that most of the people actually on the show are new to a game. That's much more relatable for the audience, and is how the show should be. That being said, at least ONE, just ONE, person on each episode should be a fucking expert at the game being played. They can even find an expert from the community on BGG who looks good on video. Even if they don't look good on video, just bring them in as an off-camera consultant. I'm sure you can even get the game designer or a representative from the publisher each episode. Tabletop is a big deal. This isn't hard!
The other problem is that they aren't finding out they got things wrong until after the episode is live. This is probably pot calling kettle black when you consider GeekNights, but if you make something, and it's bad, don't upload it! If you didn't find out you got the rules wrong until after uploading the video, that's a really big problem. Even though you spent money to make that episode you can just throw it out. Or in the worst case you can at least edit out the parts where you got things wrong, or put notes or other edits to explain how you got things wrong in the episode itself.
Another possibility is to do like we did when we streamed the X-COM board game. It was clear that we were all reading the rules and learning as we went along. We were the ones asking the rules questions, not making rules assertions. By changing the perspective like that, it is expected of us to make mistakes. We're learning a real-time game in real-time! What else do you expect?
The amazing part is how he treats his producer anonymously in his blog post but the damn guy has been very publicly the face of tabletop to the gaming community, while Wil is the outward face to the non-gamers. Everyone in tabletop land knows who the fuck Bo is, ESPECIALLY after you crowdfund your third season and are very public about who is really running your show.
"Don't be a dick," Wil. Good fucking job.
I was at a con with a friend of mine many many years ago in LA. Before the modern resurgence of his career. There was a person at the Con trying to unload their 40K army. My friend negotiated a price with the gentleman but had to go to the ATM to get the cash to pay him. While my buddy was off going to the ATM, Wil ninja'd in and made a better cash-on-the-spot offer, which the man accepted.
While most of the blame here does go to the seller for not honoring the agreement he made with my friend, Wil was absolutely a dick in this case.
As for a show like this, the setup is pretty simple.
Mic everyone with the Mackie.
Bunch of cameras
Lighting and all that
Record ALL of the following:
Read the rules and learn the game
Teach the game
Play the game
Analyze the game
Then we cut this stuff down into segments for the actual show. Imagine a bunch of footage of us sitting around arguing about a rule and looking it up on BGG. Then the teaching session (which can also be split out to be its own then). Then the full game play.
The biggest things preventing this are
1. Need to read/buy a few more mics
2. Need a space that we can use for an entire day
3. Need an entire day where everyone is 100% available all day and committed.
We could do a jank version with just the two of us and a relatively simple game (like the Mouse Guard game, Oshi, or Battle Line).
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/12333/twilight-struggle
I assume this would place more pressure on all cast and producers involved thus the mistakes. Everyone complains but no one can make a competitor.
I still find it fun to watch because it gives me an idea of how the game plays and I can work out if I want to buy the game or not.
It's a subjective party game that can fill the slot of something like a Cards Against Humanity, but for bullshitters. You are each dealt out 4 Qualifications, like "Really Bad Aim," "Russian Accent," or "Has an Umbrella" and then everyone has a few minutes to interview for the job that comes up, and must include all of their qualifications in their pitch.
I think it could be fun - and uniquely suited to people with HR training.
Washingcon.com