Red Golem Blog

A fun and easy-to-learn game (altough I had to flip through the few pages of rules quite often but it was our first game ever). There isn’t a great deal of strategy involved and luck plays an important role, especially when wild animals enter play. We loved the cavemen tribe theme. First boardgame we played with cavemen (and cavewomen!), sabertooth tigers, and mammoths! There was many laughing moments. I remember one when (not to name him) Mace got stuck without any food just before the winter with his large tribe… Most of his cavemen starved to death during that season. He should have taken control of the fire! I was lucky and ended up winning but at one time during the game, a mammoth stomped my camp (and my wheat field!) and killed most of my tribe. Fortunately for me, I had a genetically superior big cavewomen mama that produced a few twins to fill the ranks of my depleted tribe!

I recommend this game. It is light, it is fun, and it is very funny! Only a few more rules than your usual Beer & Pretzel game.

I played my second game of Combat Commander: Europe by GMT Games. I was really looking forward to this second experience. I played Russians in my first game. I won by successfully storming the map (”For the Motherland!”) and keeping control of my objectives against an angry group of Germans. We played Scenario 12 this time: German defenders against attacking Americans on a map with lots of topography, buildings, and woods. I ended up playing Axis side. My forces consisted of:

• 3 leaders (Sgt. Esser, Sgt. Biermann, Sgt. Pfeiffer)
• 9 Volksgrenadier squads
• 2 Weapon teams
• 1 Heavy MG
• 2 Light MG
• 1 Light Mortar
• 1 Bunker and 2 Trenches

American forces were made of:

• 3 leaders (Lt. Blankenship, Cpl. Hubbard, Cpl. Jensen)
• 8 Line squads
• 5 Weapon teams
• 2 Medium MG
• 2 Medium Mortar
• 1 Light Mortar
• Additional Reinforcements coming into play during the game: Sgt. Smith and 8 Green squads

The picture to the left shows the initial setup. It does not take too long to prepare the board for a game: 10 to 15 minutes. That’s if all your chits are well sorted of course but my game partner seems pretty good at keeping his stuff well organized. Two objectives were identified with a value of 4 and 5 victory points. Both were on the large hill making half of the map. Elevation was a new concept for this game that we had to deal with (mostly line of sight questions). Also, we used mortars for the first time. Americans had to setup first. They divided their troops in two.

A small group was placed near an orchard close to the wooded area. The larger part of his initial troops was setup near the building in the other corner of the US side. The board became more crowded when reinforcements arrives (time marker reaching the “7″ space). Unfortunately, the troops were Green and not very effective at changing the outcome of the skirmish. One special rule that really affected game play was the FOG. This hindrance (-3) made all fire attacks really difficult to make all game long. The game would have been more lethal and probably over much sooner too. The CAVES rule allowed German snipers (which represent other events on the battlefield: bad luck, injuries, etc.) to affect enemies two hexes away instead of one. I used this rule quite a few times to break US units!

Being the defender, I got to setup second. I decided to put my bunker on the farthest objective and divide my troops in two groups. A small group was entrenched near an objective, keeping an eye on it. The other group was setup in what would end-up being called the Eagle’s nest. It was a building on the edge of the hill and surrounded by a stone wall. This proved to be a very strong point to lead my fire groups against US troops.

Summary of the game:

I did not move much. I used my orders/actions to Read the rest of this entry »

I played Combat Commander: Europe for the first time this weekend. I will definitely buy this game and its expansions! You can read a nice review on BoardGameGeek that covers most of what I think about the game after one try.

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/183436

In short:

• Well-organized rulebook
• Nice, thick counters
• Battlefield chaos is awesome: do what you can with what you have now!
• Great tactical play based on your hand of cards
• Each nation’s characteristics are implemented in their Nation’s deck
• Excellent replayability
• Variety of maps

I always wanted to have two-dimensional terrain tiles to play tabletop games. 2D terrain can be stored easily and doesn’t take much space! What I was missing was some good dungeon artwork. Fortunately, I stumbled on the excellent work of Ed Bourelle and his e-Adventure Tiles (bonus sample tiles here!). His business, Skeletonkey Games seem to have been around for a few years. He has a very nice and extensive selection of packages: dungeons, caves, sewers, inns, wilderness, tombs, desert, spacecrafts, hives, temples, lairs, warehouses… I bought a few e-Adventure tiles packs (mostly dungeons and caves) that I intend to use for Roleplaying games (Dungeons & Dragons, Rolemaster, Warhammer, etc.) and for Miniature games (Blood Bowl / Dungeon Bowl rules, Mordheim with underground rules, .45 Adventure, Two Hour Wargame rulesets, etc.).

Here’s a short tutorial detailing how I am building my 2D modular tiles using SKG e-tiles.

Step 1. Get yourself a pack of self adhesive vinyl floor tile (12″ x 12″). They’re pretty cheap. I got mine at my DIY store (RONA) for 0.46$CAD per tile.

Step 2. Cut them in half. Use an Read the rest of this entry »

Last night I played Settlers of Catan with the Cities and Knights expansion for the second time. It was fun (and I won)! I must say this expansion changes the basic game quite a bit. I’m not sure if it’s balanced yet. People gets many more Progress cards than in the original game. Also, knights are a priority in the first turn if you don’t want to get your city whacked by barbarians (like what happened to me!). The game takes more time to play but provide additional ways of scoring victory points (cathedrals, stopping barbarian attacks).

There’s another expansion that looks very interesting: Seafarers of Catan. It includes many scenarios and other stuff (ships, pirates, gold mine, etc.).

P.S. I didn’t bring my custom tiles because we didn’t know beforehand what we were going to play. Next time!