Sizing Up My Collection: Heavy Strategy

In my last post I reviewed the light strategy portion of my collection. This time I'll tackle a somewhat smaller set of games: my heavy strategy board games. What you will not find here are kids' games and 'classic board games,' the former of which will get studied in future posts and the latter, while I still do enjoy playing them occasionally, are not a central part of my collection.

Heavy Strategy Games

Fury of Dracula
5 plays (mostly 2-player with one 4-player game) I don't think this is best with 2.
8/10 Very initial rating, could certainly change w/a couple more plays.

Fury of Dracula features some very interesting mechanics especially those involving Dracula's movement system and his hidden trail. I like the deduction element here, but the real key to the game is the heavy theme. The game falls a little flat for me with 2-player simply because the theme feels weakened. Rather than a group of heroes combing the countryside for the elusive Count, discussing strategy, perhaps stumbling a little with miscommunication, sharing moments of both frustration and elation, 2-player is a bit more cerebral, chess-like if you will: quiet, contemplative. I just don't feel that sense of adventure when one player is forced to control all four hunter characters. Fury of Dracula needs several more multi player games before I can really rate it.

Agricola
5 plays (all 2-player)
8/10

This one I do enjoy playing with two, although, as with most of my heavy strategy games, it really needs to see some plays with different groups of people for me to grasp where it fits within my collection. The farming theme is fun, and the worker placement mechanic works rather well here.

Puerto Rico
2 plays (both 2-player)
10/10

Just tried the 2-player variant this year, and it is surprisingly enjoyable. I love this game with 3 or 4-players, in fact it may be my favorite board game. I've probably played this one 20 times overall (mostly in previous years), so I know it is a great game and probably the key title amongst the heavy strategy games I own.

Caylus
1 play (2-player)
5/10

Thus far I've not cared too much for Caylus. It is a very dry, quite heavy resource management game, and generally as I move through the actions of the game I don't feel as if I'm accomplishing anything, but rather just going through the motions. Caylus is a very well designed game from a technical standpoint, as there are many mechanisms that mesh together beautifully, and I can certainly see the potential for a great game here. It is certainly possible that I'm still overwhelmed by all the information and difficult choices in the game, and maybe, just maybe when I grow a little more comfortable with it I will enjoy Caylus much more. Thus, it needs more plays.

El Grande
0 Plays
8/10 Could certainly be higher with more plays.

I've only played this one three times total, two of which were 2-player learning games. So, although I think this is a great game, I really don't have the play time to get a good feel for it. I can easily see this being a perfect 10 game and a mainstay of my collection, but not until I start getting some of these heavier games to the table more frequently.


Where To Go From Here

Really there is a ton of potential for great multi player games on this list. With the exception of Caylus and to some extent Agricola, these all work much better with more players, so exploring these current titles will be plenty to keep me busy during multi player sessions. My next purchases in this category will almost certainly be focused on heavy games best (or only) for 2-players. Right now I'm looking at Twilight Struggle, 1960: the Making of the President, and War of the Ring, all heavy 2-player games. I'm not sure what the Mrs. will think of the card draws in the first two games and the dice in the latter, however.

Next up: party, filler, and abstract games.

Home Again

(My dog Max checking out our board games. There is barely enough space in our '95 Escort to comfortably hold them both.)



So, game night:

A couple games of For Sale in which I was soundly beaten by the Mrs.

Several rousing games of Wits & Wagers, a game at which we discover my uncle Ned is rather proficient.

A partial game of Fury of Dracula.

In the end, people bail early and game night is a bust.

Lame.

Session Report: Odds & Ends

A quick recap of my gaming over the last few days:

Sunday night I played Settlers online with Jennie, Katie, and Toph. Jennie took game one and Toph game two (although I was on the verge of victory...) Jennie's been playing a lot, so perhaps she's gotten pretty good. We will see.

Monday I played a solo game of Pandemic. I had played this once before with all five roles, only giving each role one player card to start. Last time I came within one player turn of winning. This time I lost on turn #2. Three adjacent three-cube yellow fever infections to start the game and a first turn epidemic are not a good combination! Pandemic is a fun diversion as a solo game, but not nearly as fun as four-player. I'd like to get a feel for Pandemic's viability with all five roles, but the jury is still out.

Yesterday I played a bunch of Sorry Sliders games with the kids and we all had fun. Both of them can compete fairly well against me, although I do avoid doing anything particularly mean.

Also, the Mrs. and I played another two-player game of Fury of Dracula. I played the four hunters this time and found the number of cards and decisions a little much. Also much of the game featured screaming and/or yelling children, which was painful. As with our first two games, Dracula lost, although this time it came down to a final dice roll. I don't know about Fury as a two-player game; I'm thinking it is best left to at least three. The hunters being somewhat split up amongst different players is much more thematic in my mind.

Fury of Dracula: First Plays

I played Fury of Dracula twice yesterday.

Our first was a learning game between the Mrs. and I. She had read about half of the rulebook and I had finished it, but since Fury is on the heavier side I knew the game demanded a play between the two of us before introducing it to new players. Since I had read the rules more thoroughly I decided to play Dracula and consult the rulebook, and the Mrs. controlled the four hunters. We both had our hands full between my immersion in the rulebook and the Mrs. playing all four hunter roles (which is a lot of work for a first time player!) Our game covered the majority of the rules, although I never went to sea and we only drew a fraction of the event deck. Victory went to the hunters.

James and Karin came over for dinner and games last night and we started off with Fury of Dracula. I took on the Dracula role once again, the Mrs. played Lord Godalming and Dr. Seward, Karin Dr. Van Helsing, and James Mina Harker. We were a little worried that the game would be too difficult to teach especially because we had only played through once, but it really wasn't too bad. Helping with this was the game's semi-cooperative nature so the Mrs. could guide the other players throughout much of the game helping everyone to understand better. We didn't explain going to sea or Dracula's special powers, or the resolve track, or combat until each of those came up during the game, which simplified the pregame explanation considerably.

I felt like I made some excellent decisions as Dracula, but the hunters kept finding me through well-timed event cards and I was never really able to get any separation from them, even with going to sea twice during the game. I was two turns from maturing a new vampire and thus advancing the vampire track to six for the victory when Mina Harker, with the hunters' last chance to catch me, took a train to my locale (during the day!) and successfully staked me on two consecutive rounds of combat. Oh the humanity!

The game probably took us between 2 1/2 and 3 hours to play, which did feel a little long. There are a lot of unique event and item cards in the game that need to be reviewed when drawn and again every turn to make sure they are played at an opportune time. During future plays when we are more familiar with the cards and options each turn Fury should play a bit more quickly. Everyone did seem to have a good time, and Fury of Dracula will definitely see future plays with the same group.

We ended the evening with a couple quick games of Wits and Wagers which was fun as always.