Analog Games

It was a nice surprise to actually find a Shadowfist group in SV soon after I moved here.  For all its faults and age Shadowfist has actually been a lot of fun to play multiplayer.  Much like EDH, this would have never worked with my gaming groups in DFW and EDH was something I was interested in trying for some time. So what do I enjoy about Shadowfist?  Sure nostalgia plays a big part but I also enjoy the setting and at this point the depth of the card pool.  My three favorites: Architects When it comes to its settings Shadowfist is a bit of a mess that only 90s gaming could produce.  For example:  The Architects.  Rulers of the far future juncture who use said junctures to travel back in time, capture ancient demons and genetically engineer them into super soldiers.  These go down the line and hit all my archetypical favs when it comes to factions.  Sadly they aren't supported in Modern :/(another typical occurrence for factions I enjoy). Decks I've enjoyed with

So recent events have me dabbling in Malifaux again.  The difficulty here has been settling on a faction.  There are three primary problems:  1. There isn't a single faction with both strong and broad appeal, 2. My traditional method for deciding upon a faction/MMO character class/etc. haven't really worked out, 3. Faction ADD is real.  While I already own much of what is below Malifaux is detailed enough that focusing on a faction and a few masters to really grok seems important.  Current thoughts: Neverborn   Across every Master in Malifaux, the above two masters are personal favorites.   Darby and Not-Char are both cool thematically and I enjoy their playstyle too.  The real issue is the rest of the Neverborn.  I can't really say I like the look of any of their other masters and many of the other options in the faction leave me cold(teddy bears = no, horrors = yes). What the Neverborn have going for them is they are a traditional power faction. If the abov

Warmachine/Hordes( - - ) I could go into a list of details but eZaal was really the straw that broke the camel's back.  I shouldn't get annoyed at a game I spend my time, money and energy on and he sadly pushed it to that point.  After playing him for a bit I just couldn't work up the energy to finish painting anything Warmachine either which isn't a good sign.  Even the 6 year late Errata didn't rekindle my interest. It's more of a trial separation at this point.  I'm off into the miniature gaming wilderness away from the current Holy Trilogy to discover what I find out there.  It's been 2-3 weeks.  Part of me wishes I could say I miss WM. Doomtown ( + + ) Outside of some shake ups with when DT is played and dealing with the fall out from that, I'm still really loving DT.  The new factions are great and I'm happy enough puttering about with side decks after Gencon(Turns out DR Hucksters is still good because when push comes to shove you

A review of the just released Nightmare at Noon. Stolen completely from stim hack, the follow metric will be used: 5 – Great One of the strongest cards in the game: it’s powerful and always useful. It’s surprising to see a deck that doesn’t play this card in-faction. 4 – Good A good card that sees plenty of play. It’s not necessarily the best choice for every deck, but you can put it in your deck and know that it will do something for you. 3 – Playable You can’t just throw this card in any deck and expect it to do something for you, but it can be good in the right context. 2 – Weak This card isn’t good enough to be worth playing. The decks it fits tightly into are not well suited for competitive play. The stars might align such that it fits into a competitive deck, but even then it’s generally worse than a more straightforwardly good card. 1 – Bad This card sucks. doomtown db  should eventually have the full spoilers up. Junior DG - 3 If only his ability t

Thanks to graduate school I haven't been able to attend Gencon recently.  First, a gallery of all the pictures from the con that can be found here: http://imgur.com/a/CochH Overall it was a great time.  I managed to see and do a ton.  According to Fitbit it was a mere 50 miles walked over the last week.  Some more detailed impressions: Doomtown(+): I had a great time playing Doomtown and managed to come in 3rd on Sunday in the finals.  While it was a ton of Doomtown for the con, the tournaments ran well and I paid the iron price for a bunch of swag.  Thanks to restocks, Nightmare at Noon and Immovable Object, Unstoppable Force were also welcome purchases(really didn't expect that new pine box early). I'm going to try to post my deck and some thoughts on DTDB sometime this week. FFG(-): Their booth was a mess of a neverending line.  I would have liked to pick up GoT 2nd but it would require far too much effort.  The next wave of Imperial Assault was purchased

The line 30 mins before it opened Game Kastle held another swap meet.  As I learned from my first one of these, this is a fairly big deal.  Sadly, while I have plenty of things I would love to sell I didn't really have time to organize properly for this one.  This is especially true as I try to get ready for Gencon. It was still something I wanted to go to.  There were plenty of incredible deals at the last one and I can at least look for some of the rare games or rarer miniatures I wouldn't mind picking up. While there was plenty of 40k and WHFB at the last one, there was even more WHFB this time around.  It's almost like something drastic happened there.  Beyond that it was a smattering of board games, popular miniature games and random junk(Why you think anyone wants your hand painted map of an underground cultist layer is beyond me). The line from the half way point right before it opened Still, I can't complain about what I found.  Thanks to a recent 

In a similar vein to the DT prep, I'm looking for feedback on what Armada list to fly.  My current core is this:  Imperial list.   From there, I have some variants with the remaining points: 1.  Two Squads of TIEs and a Gunnery Team for the VSD. 2.  Two Squads of TIEs and Expanded Hanger Bays for the VSD.  This allows the VSD to activate all 3 Bombers and an escort at the same time. 3.  Lose a single Advanced.  From there add the Gunnery Team, maybe the Expanded Hanger Bays and 3 TIEs. 4. Two more Interceptors.  Giving the list more anti-fighter answers. I don't think there is anything particularly unique about this build or the above variants.  Gunnery Teams should help soften up multiple ship lists significantly as the VSD is effectively a carrier.  Allowing the VSD to fire the main batteries and anti-squadron out the front is nice too. It is also refreshing to play Fighters Squads on the Imperial side that weren't as fragile as traditional TIE/Interceptor s

So Gencon is less than two weeks away.  It's past time to settle on a deck and get final testing done.  Currently, Desolation Row is still the deck to beat but there are options in other factions that are also good.  The Desolation Row deck is a good template for shooter decks from other factions too. Starting with the aforementioned Desolation Row:   this is the deck  that I took to my local recent Sheriff's event.  I used that starting posse for most games.  Against Deedslide or Clowns Fred Aims went in with his infinite influence(note both of those decks should run The Evidence) and against decks that wanted to fight I switched out Allie or Makaio for Angelica.  In retrospect I should probably start Angelica, Sanford, Travis, Jake and Makaio.  Starting with two studs has been very very important.  Modern shooter decks have incredibly odds to have the ability to debuff one of them so it's an important to have a backup before starting a shootout. During the tournamen

A review of the just released No Turning Back. Stolen completely from stim hack, the follow metric will be used: 5 – Great One of the strongest cards in the game: it’s powerful and always useful. It’s surprising to see a deck that doesn’t play this card in-faction. 4 – Good A good card that sees plenty of play. It’s not necessarily the best choice for every deck, but you can put it in your deck and know that it will do something for you. 3 – Playable You can’t just throw this card in any deck and expect it to do something for you, but it can be good in the right context. 2 – Weak This card isn’t good enough to be worth playing. The decks it fits tightly into are not well suited for competitive play. The stars might align such that it fits into a competitive deck, but even then it’s generally worse than a more straightforwardly good card. 1 – Bad This card sucks. doomtown db should eventually have the full spoilers up. Avie Cline DG - 5: If anything L5R taught me that Harpoons are

by Harrison Osaki 1-5 scoring. 5 is high, 1 is low. Most cards should come in at 2 or 3. The remarks will generally be kept brief. It is assumed that the reader has access to another resource (e.g., doomtown db ) to view card text. Funtime Freddy - 2 Freddy provides a wide variety of keywords and a grifter ability, but he's got pretty significant limitations. He is a stud (but only one bullet), is cheap and has no upkeep (but has no influence, so is just a body), and is a grifter with a tutor ability (but the opponent selects the spell you attach, and it aces freddy and the unselected spell). And he is a huckster, but not a good one (0). He's basically a more offensive Travis Moone. One way to use the grifter ability is to select spells which share some sort of common feature, so that you aren't at your opponent's mercy of the choice. For example, if the opponent has to choose between Puppet and Paralysis Mark for a The Fourth Ring (TFR) control deck, bot

So I was rather excited about the casters from Reckoning.  PP previewed some great character concepts and models.  The more recent caster releases had really been knocking it up a notch too. Sadly, for the casters from the factions I play it was right back to the Mk2 caster doldrums.  While it is great that they have a battle plan for a caster that isn't enough.  Your caster is the focal point for resource allocation and decision making, when they run on autopilot your list runs on far more autopilot.  This leads to boring gameplay. Zerkova 2 really drove this home.  She has a single spell, the combos with her feat that is rather powerful.  Beyond that she suffers from having a clunky arcnode with nothing to arc outside a paltry selection of two combat nukes.  There is very little decision making going on, even in order of activation, and you better hope your arcnode has survived(or hasn't been dispelled). Now, it is easy to criticize but much harder to follow through

So KublaCon was a bit of an enigma.  I was told both that it was the best local gaming convention in Silicon Valley but that most of the WM players never bothered with it because it just couldn't draw a WM crowd. I was also in a bit of a bind.  I couldn't make the first three days because I had plans to finally see San Francisco but I could attend Monday.  My guess was Monday would be dead but it would be a good chance to recon the con and see if it would be worth flying in for.  Also Monday was supposed to have a Flea Market. The con itself: The Flea Market The board game library and play area The Dealer Hall So, as predicted the con was a bit dead Monday.  Turns out they have two Flea Markets and the one Friday night fills up that entire area...while the one Monday is the left over junk.  There were several other rooms than just what is pictured above, but they were all sadly empty.  I can easily believe that wasn't the case the whole way throu

So Reckoning was a book I was rather looking forward to.  The artistic design of everything spoiled was incredible as were the pre-released models.  It looked to be an excellent book. Sadly, this didn't hold up.  As far as WM releases this is likely the most disappointing in living memory.  Far too many Jacks, in an era where Jacks are back down to minimum numbers.  Really disappointing casters(for the factions I care about at least), especially after the last batch of casters.  This doesn't seem like it has really sunk in yet on the various faction forums, but I'm honestly surprised that a faction receiving two MAT 5 warjacks is taking it as well as it is. If you somehow haven't seen any Reckoning spoilers they can be found  here . Cygnar I'm not sure what to think yet of Hailey3.  Temporal Flux is a solid spell, as is repudiate.  She is incredibly focus starved, even with 12 focus.  Revive is likely only going to happen once a turn due to this.  I'm a