2024 Q1 Report: Paved with Good Intentions

 

  

I think I’m done. I am ready to withdraw from my stated commitment to complete my stated target last year of playing six preselected games six times each against a face-to-face opponent. I managed to complete just three last year, and another in these last three months, but the ask is too great. The killer is the face-to-face opponent aspect of the equation. It seems impossible to keep to any kind of schedule when you involve a second person.

So, I’m rewriting the rules. In a recent interview, game designer Volko Ruhnke said something to the effect that, “When you buy a game, you own it. If there’s a rule that you don’t think works, take a pencil, cross it out and change it.” I’ve never done that in a war game (I may have done it a time or two in RPGs) but, when it comes down to it, this is my game, and as such I’m entitled to tinker with the rules a little.

Apropos of nothing, Volko has a new game design on GMT's P500
 list on a subject that is really interesting and, as an Australian, is
close to my heart. You can pre-order your copy here.
Now we'll return to your regular transmission. 

After my last (December 2023) quarterly report, Wednesday night game host B told me it was stupid to commit to playing the same game six times, or words to that effect. At the time I disagreed, but in the intervening months, I’ve come around to thinking that it might have been too big of an ask. It came about from a misunderstanding in the first place. I noticed people talking about their 10x10 Challenge games, and in my ignorance thought they were planning on playing ten games ten times each, when in fact “10x10” meant playing ten games (often from their respective “shelves of shame”) once each within the first ten months of the year (i.e., by the end of October), then proving it by (more often than not) making a YouTube video about it.

Dates highlighted in green are from this year.

I’ve talked before about how the end goal for me was to stop being a “game collector” and to rediscover the joy of being a “game player”, and how that worked out, so I won’t rehash it here. What I did discover over the course of the project was I enjoyed writing about games and reviewing games, and some people seemed to enjoy reading what I thought about different games.

Part of the challenge was that after – and only after – the sixth play of a given game I’d write up a considered review of it. I’ve always thought that a single run at a game is never enough to make a true evaluation of how it works and whether it achieves what it sets out to do (I can understand the pressure some content creators are under to regularly churn out new material, so I suppose being less popular/non-monetised has its perks). But I now think that sometimes playing a game too often in a short amount of time can obscure some of the elements of that makes it a worthwhile game or a special experience. I’ve found the sweet spot for me is to begin writing a review after the second or third play and to play the game once or twice more while I’m writing it up. This is the pattern I’m going to stick to in future reviews.

 So, where to from here?

Well, thanks for asking. I played my sixth game Napoléon 1806 (Shakos, 2017 near the start of the year, and wrote my review a little while after that. Since January, I’ve managed to get a couple of games played form the remaining candidate games. What I propose it to play another game or two of each and write up my reviews of these remaining three. In February, I mentioned in another self-indulgent screed I was intending to scale down my ambitions to a 5x3 game target. These remaining three games will make up the beginnings of that, but if all goes well, I’ll expand it to a 7x or 8x3 target. Also, I’m lifting the moratorium on counting solo play of two player games. I nearly always play the first “learning” run at a new game two-handed solo, unless I’m getting a tutorial from an experienced player (as I did with Great War Commander (Hexasim, 2018). I used to think that two-handing a game solo was kind of missing the point; I would only do it to “learn” a game well enough to introduce it to somebody else, but in discussions on Facebook with dedicated solo players and through my own experience doing this, I’ve found it can be a rewarding pursuit in its own right. Even some games with a dedicated solitaire function, like Pacific Tide (Compass Games, 2019), I’ve found I prefer to play the game two-handed. When I’m playing a game on my own – against myself – I also have a little more latitude to try things I might not get to against another player. I can reverse a couple of plays or a turn, if my opponent agrees, and replay it differently to test a rule or try a different action. So, from now on, solo runs get counted, but I’ll stil play two player games against another human at least once or twice before writing them up.

I also mentioned in the same screed that I’d aim for twenty game reviews in 2024. Thre months in, and I’ve posted two; the Napoléon 1806 review from the beginning of the year, and another for 1944: Battle of the Bulge (Worthington Publishing, 2020 – the review can be found here). The slow rate thus far is partly because for a while I was putting a lot of time into playtesting and proofing a game called The Great Northern War (Conflict Simulations Limited, 2024), about the Russo-Swedish War of 1700-1723. When I nab a copy I'll post a review about it.

What it says on the cover.

Another reason for the tardy progress is - Reviews are really hard to do right. I put a lot of thought and effort into my game reviews. I try to present what I think makes a game worth your time and tease out some of the things that make it special or different. So, I’m not going to waste my time on a game I don’t think is worth that kind of effort, which makes me work harder on the ones I do like, and that think are worth the time and sweat.

I do have some more reviews in the pipeline. I have a couple outlined, and I’m thinking about a couple more. You should see three reviews – maybe four - before the end of the month.

Review coming soon (spoiler alert: I really like this game).

I’m also putting more effort into producing unboxings (the Stripped Down for Parts photo-essays). These have been outstripping the reviews in popularity. I try hard to bring a little more to the table than just pulling stuff out, saying, “Isn’t this neat?!” At the same time, I’m not trying to do a review. I’ll just spend some tie over the components, the artwork, sometimes the people involved, and maybe a little history or background to the game. This year I’ll also be looking at upgrading my camera equipment to warrant the popularity of the posts.

Because I’m putting so much effort into the other parts of the blog, I’ve started winding back the State of Play AARs. I was writing up pretty much every game I played when I started A Fast Game, and kept that up for nearly the whole year in 2023. From hereon in I’ll post a game report when I have the time or if it’s something special.

So, there’s a snapshot of what got me here and A Fast Game here, and where we’re going. It feels a little like the blog has taken on a life of its own, and I just feed it and clean out its cage. But It’s s lot of fun, and I occasionally get some positive feedback. If people are interested, I’ll put a post together breaking down the metrics of A Fast Game. But I’ll have to see some interest. (that’s why I kept it ‘til the end. I’m pretty sure nearly nobody reads this far.)

By the Numbers: Final-ish Game Plans for 2024; and 100 posts!

   

  

This post marks my one hundredth submission to A Fast Game is a Good Game, two weeks into the blog's second year. I’ve talked about why I started A Fast Game and how its direction and purpose has changed over time several times before, and in a previous post I sketched out some ideas I had for my gaming program for this year. Well, a month-and-a-half in to 2024 and I haven’t locked down every detail, but I’ve got some things to share, and I thought that would be a good way to mark my hundredth post.

6x6 now 5x3

If you’ve been reading from the start you’ll know that I initially started A Fast Game as a way to track my progress at my self-imposed 6x6 challenge, i.e., playing six designated games six times each, against a face-to-face human adversary. That turned out to be a lot tougher than I first thought it would – mostly due to the difficulties scheduling, so I’m adjusting my expectations. 

This year I’ve been working on picking five games to play three times each. I’m still going to try to finish the outstanding 6x6 games (as a manner of penance for my overreach – I had seventeen unplayed sessions at the beginning of the year, and that’s now down to fourteen), but looking back over the year, I’ve come to the conclusion that three runs at a game is a pretty solid position from which to critique it. While I understand why it happens, I really hate it when people review games after a single play-through. I don’t think it’s fair to the game or to the audience. Six games is great, four or five is swell, but I think three is the minimum number to begin to get a solid feel for a game. To wit, I present the titles I’ve so far settled on for the 5x3 challenge:

 - Brothers at War,1862 (Compass Games, 2022 (see the unboxing here))

 - Dawn’s Early Light: the War of 1812 (Compass Games, 2020)

 - Napoléon 1807 (Shakos, 2020)

These three are firm choices. I did a solo run-through of Brothers at War and was really impressed. I’m looking forward to playing it against an opponent. I spent some time with Dawn’s Early Light last year (and wrote positively about it here). I think that is a strong candidate for my favourite CDG. And after my experience with Napoléon 1806 (Shakos, 2017), I was keen to see how the system will play out over a bigger play area and multiple scenarios with differing strategic goals.

C&C: Ancients - both fast and good.

For the last two slots, I’m tossing up between Undaunted: Battle of Britain (Osprey Games, 2023), No Retreat!: the Polish & French Fronts (GMT Games, 2018), Fate of the Reiters (Hexasim, 2019), Dunkirk: France 1940 (Worthington Publishing, 2018), Old School Tactical, Vol. 2 (Flying Pig Games, 2017) and a Columbia Games block game, maybe Athens and Sparta (Columbia, 2007). If I can’t choose and I’m feeling game, I may stretch to a 6x3.

Solitaire Play and Review Challenge

I mentioned this in my previous goals post. In the past couple of years, I’ve built a decent collection of solitaire or solo-friendly games. I’ve managed to play quite a few, but certainly not all of them (probably about half), and most of them have gone unreviewed (well, five of the twelve reviews I posted last year were solitaire games, but I feel like I could have done more). I said in my last By the Numbers post that I was going to aim for twelve solitaire games, wither new or revisiting (I’ve recently had a hankering to get Skyhawk (Legion Games, 2022) to the table again). I’m going to wind that target back to eight, but I’ll concentrate on new games, or at least, games I haven’t played yet. This will also be open to games with a dedicated solitaire mode (like Atlantic Chase (GMT, 2021) and Pacific Tide (Compass Games, 2019).

My most recent acquisition.

I haven’t settled on all the solo games I’ll try to get played through the year, but I’m planning on starting with titles I already own. The first couple off the rank will probably be:

 - Skies Above Britain (GMT Games, 2023)

 - Redver’s Reverse: The Battle of Colenso, 1899 (Legion Wargames, 2016)

 - Midway Solitaire (Decision Games, 2017)

 - Beneath the Med: Regia Marina at Sea1940-1943 (GMT Games, 2020)

Redver’s Reverse, set during the Anglo-Boer War, only arrived this week; I’ll post an unboxing in the next week or so. I’m currently reading though the rules, and it looks promising, if a little daunting. Technically, I have played Beneath the Med before; I ordered it through GMT’s P500 program and played it when it arrived, but it’s been a while and I’d like to run through it again to get reacquainted before reviewing it.

I’ll aim to play all these at least three times, and review each of them here at A Fast Game. This should help toward my third goal for the year.

Twenty considered, generally positive game reviews in 2024

My first year of A Fast Game saw me post a total of game reviews. The reviews I post are the most popular features on the blog, read by an order of magnitude more folks than anything else here. Not to blow my own horn, but I feel like I’ve gotten better at writing my reviews. And it can be tough, but they are the most rewarding posts to put together. I think I can put twenty reviews up this year (I’ve already posted one in January for Napoléon 1806, so only nineteen to go). Eight solitaire game reviews, five or six for the 5x3 challenge and three more for my outstanding 6x6 games will get me most of the way there.

1944: D-Day to the Rhine (Worthington Publishing).

At this point, I’d just like to reiterate for anyone who’s joined us recently that you’ll only see positive reviews here. I don’t think I’ve come across too many games over the years that I absolutely didn’t like or that I couldn’t find any redeeming factors in, but if I do through the course of writing about games, I won’t review it. This is partly because whatever I don’t like, somebody is going to think it’s the best thing since the last really good thing, then they’re going to start spamming me with vitriol and I don’t need that. I used to write music reviews back when the internet was still shiny, so I know of which I speak. Mostly, though, it takes time an effort to write a review, good or bad. If I’m putting that much effort into a piece of work, I want to promote something I think is worthwhile.

Extra Credit Goals

At the beginning of the year and the first flush of enthusiasm over new beginnings and such, I had a list of things I hoped to achieve in the coming twelve months. With just ten and a half of those months left, I’m trying to be a little more sober-minded about what I can accomplish. So, there are a couple of things I’d like to do, but I won’t castigate myself if I don’t get there. Part of the reason I didn’t complete my 6x6 challenge last year is the multifarious ways life outside of gaming would trample on plans and curtail the best intentions.

Fire and Stone (Capstone Games).

I already written up a wish-list of extra-curricular accomplishments I’d like to make happen this year, so I won’t reiterate it here. The most realistic might be learning Fields of Fire, Vol. 2 (GMT Games, 2019), as that would tick off another solitaire game, but if I don’t get tick any of them off this year, I’ll still be cramming in a lot of gaming goodness.

So, if you’ve been following A Fast Game for the duration, thank you, and I hope you’ll stick around. If you’re a newcomer, please don’t feel like you have to go back and read everything, but browse the index and see if there’s anything of interest (some of the reviews are quite good, and if there’s a particular game you’re interested in, you might find some of the AARs interesting). Here’s to a game-rich 2024 and a diverting blog going forward.

State of Play: Brothers at War: 1862

 

 

Charles S. Roberts Award nominee: Best American Civil War Game (2022)

 

I’ve been eager to get Brothers at War: 1862 (Compass Games, 2022) to the table since it arrived around the middle of last year. It’s a brigade-level command game covering four battles from the second year of the American Civil War that haven’t traditionally got much if any attention, especially at this level. The production quality is solid, map art is provided by the designer, Christopher Moeller (who also designed Napoleon’s Eagles: Storm in the East (Compass Games, 2020), and the upcoming Burning Banners (Compass Games, ~2024)). The maps are both gorgeous and functional, with lexes large enough to accommodate two of the .75” counters side-by-side.

The Fifth Virginia Cavalry choose the better part of valour.

I took Moeller’s advice for my first outing (a two-handed solo run) and set up the first scenario (numbered Scenario 5) for the Battle of Fox’s Gap (a narrow pass west of Turner’s Gap, and a minor but crucial action which was a pivotal part of the general unpleasantness at South Mountain). This scenario is an ideal introductory situation to get to know the rules. It has a low counter density overall, starting with just two full brigades and a cavalry brigade, and only adding a single brigade each for the US and the CSA as the action continues.

Brothers at War uses a chit-pull activation mechanism, making it especially friendly for solo play. Each unit begins with two tokens in the draw cup, along with two timer chits. When the second timer chit is drawn, the turn is over; the turn marker is shifted the next turn, and the drawn chits go back into the draw cup.

The object of the scenario is for the Union forces under Scammon to take (control) either Wise House or Hutzel Farm, and the Confederate player must prevent this from happening. At first blush, the situation would appear to be fairly one-sided, with Scammon’s three regiments spread out across the board (and his rather ordinary attached artillery some distance behind), while Garland has five regiments at his command, two of them already occupying Wise House, and a detached command of Stuart’s Cavalry under Rosser – mounted infantry and horse-drawn light cannon – screening the meandering western approach to Hutzel Farm. But Scammon’s regiments are not to be sneezed at.

Crook's 11th and 36th Ohio break form to cross into the walled paddocks.

I’ve played out the opening couple of rounds twice so far. The first game I played three rounds, to get the feel of how the rules worked, before getting down to a proper game. In both instances, Scammon was the first draw, and each time the 23rd Ohio moved quickly and effectively to engage Rosser’s unmounted screen. In both instances, the screen was pushed back (the first time it was nearly annihilated – not just disrupted – but there are provisions a player can take to keep their brigades intact). When Rosser got his chance, he pulled both his mounted infantry and his paltry cannon back along the wide-curving road to Hutzel Farm. Even combined, the light brigade is no match for the 23^rd Ohio fighting in the open.

This game does a lot of things I’ve seen in other games, but it does them differently, and the overall effect is really quite good. The chit-pull activation adds a measure of drama to the back-and-forth of the action; nothing new, especially for ACW games (Herman Lutmann’s Blind Swords system springs to mind), but the inclusion of the timer chits ratchets up the tension a little. Each battle represented in BaW has its own bespoke Activation track. During a turn, each activation chit is placed on the track in the order drawn. If a timer chit is drawn and placed in a position on the track with a matching clock icon, another (third) timer chit is placed in the mix. Remember, on the second timer chit draw, the turn comes to an end. One turn in my full game only saw three on-board brigade activations (plus one free activation for Crook’s (Union) brigade, just coming on that turn, which began on the track), from an in-pot total of nine activation chits. This unreliability really adds to the “no plan survives contact with the enemy” vibe of the game.

Activation chits to be drawn.

The units do something interesting as well. Various regiments have differing strengths going into a fight. The steps aren’t captured on the pieces, though. Rather, the overall brigade strength is recorded off-board, on a brigade track. Each brigade has its own quota of Reserves, and these can act like hit-points for any of the regiments from that brigade. The counters have two sides, but these represent the disposition of the unit. For infantry, the sides are formed or unformed. Unformed units are much less restricted by terrain but field a slightly lower weight of lead in combat. The Cavalry units are either unmounted (fighting like light infantry, as was the doctrine of the time) or mounted, and artillery, of course, are unlimbered and capable of firing but not moving, or limbered (on the reverse side) and mobile but mute.

Brigade leadership is represented by a Brigade commander marker, bearing the name and a portrait of the commander and a coloured band, which is shared by all the units in their command for easy identification (not a new idea, but one more thing I like about this game). For all the individual regiments to be “in command” they have to be placed within four hexes of their leader marker. A leader can’t be targeted by the opposing side, and they can be repositioned after the regiments have all move/d acted to best fit the situation. If a regiment is out of range of their leader, they will need to perform a Command check at the beginning of their next activation. If they fail that, the unit is automatically disrupted and is limited in its actions until it is back within command. I can see there might be instances when it would be worth the gamble to purposely place a unit out of command and hope for the best, but I’d be hard-pressed to make that call.

Confrontation at the Wise House.

Early in the ruckus (and under threat of decimation from the 23^rd Ohio) Rosser’s mounted troops pulled back to all the way to Hutzel Farm, which they may not have had to. On retrospect they could have had a couple of fall-back positions for defence in the unlikely event of the 23^rd pushing ahead on the long road and trying to take Hutzel Farm, though the stone walls of bordering the farm’s fields would have lent he cavalry better cover. Wise House is the more obvious target, being closer to the starting point of the Union and there is a road leading to Hutzel Farm from Wise House, which the Confederate forces could use to reinforce Hutzel Farm if the Scammon had tried to circumvent Wise House in favour of the second target. And then there is the issue of Scammon keeping his forces in his command radius; not impossible, but a big ask, even for his seasoned troops.

Due to time constraints, I wound the scenario up after the seventh turn of nine. At that point a Union win seemed inevitable. G.B Anderson’s brigade was set to enter the fray in the next turn, but unless they received their second activation immediately after the first “free” activation, and maybe get a couple of timer chits in quick succession, it was unlikely they’d make enough haste to change the outcome. I called it as a likely but costly Union win.

An early round. Scammon received the first activation
in the first five consecutive turns.

I’m still getting to know the BaW system, and I’m certain I made a few mistakes on this first run, but at first blush, I really like how the narrative unfolds. Brothers aw War was the first game I settled on for my 5x3 challenge for 2024. I think the hard part will be stopping at just three games.

 

By the Numbers: Further thoughts on Wargaming Goals for 2024

 

 

"I thought it was your turn to bring the ASLSK?"

A week ago, I posted about my desire and reasons for setting some goals for myself around wargaming in 2024. Since than I’ve spent some time thinking about over the last seven days, mostly because I wanted to be able to make a big announcement for the first anniversary of A Fast Game is a Good Game. I had hoped this would be the 100^th post to the blog, rounding out the year nicely, but with other demands on my time, it wasn’t to be (this is actually the 96^th post). But like most things to do with A Fast Game, 

I haven’t got all the details bedded down as yet, but I have settled on the structure of my goals. My first priority is to complete the outstanding 6x6 obligations that were left uncompleted last year. Playing six games six times each – thirty-six games in all – seemed like an achievable goal, but various circumstances conspired to make it impossible. Nonetheless, I am committed to finishing that goal. I have fifteen games outstanding, having knocked off two already in January and completing my run of Napoléon 1806 (Shakos, 2019), and played my first game of Great War Commander (Hexasim, 2018). My review of Napoléon 1806 can be found here). I won’t put completing the outstanding games ahead of everything else, but I’ll try to complete them in the first half of the year.

On to the new goals. Learning from last year, I’ve decided to have two ranks of goals; Primary goals – the ones I will strenuously try to complete in 2024, and Extra Credit goals – the ones that I would like to get to but won’t die in a ditch over. Any Extra Credit goals I don’t complete this year may become Primary goals in 2025.

The bottom of the fourth in Napoleon 1806.

As I said earlier, I haven’t squared away all of the details regarding these goals, but I can present the essential structure I’m setting for myself and fill in some of the details. So, without further ado:

Primary goals for 2024:

A 5x3 Challenge

I thought about increasing it to a 6x3 or 7x3, but with the outstanding 2023 6x6 games to be played, a big chunk of my gaming year is already spoken for. If I get to November having completed this, I may add another rank or two. I haven’t settled on all five games yet, but there are a couple that will almost certainly make the cut; Brothers at War: 1862 (Compass Games, 2022), and Napoléon 1807 (Shakos, 2020). As with the previous year’s program, only plays against another human opponent will count to the tally. I’ll post a session report for each game and a full review after completion of the three games for each title. This won’t be as thorough as the six-game regime of the past, but three games is still a good sample for appraisal (considering many reviewers seem to base their opinions on a single run-through*).

Twenty Game Reviews posted in 2024

In 2023 I posted twelve game reviews. Writing reviews is hard if you’re doing it right. Anyone can say, “This is the best thing ever!” or “I had to scrape this game off my Hushpuppy with a stick!” It may be a little easier for me because I only post reviews of game I like. That doesn’t mean I won’t point out their weak points or how they might be improved. But if I can’t be positive about a game, I’m not going to waste my time telling you why you should hate it (there are enough people doing that already). I’ll stick to my three-play minimum promise for games I review that I made last year; a game is a dynamic experience, and if it’s worth it’s salt, it might throw you under a bus your first time out. In my opinion, three bites of the cherry is a minimal requirement for beginning to get to know and understand a game. I wouldn’t trust myself to offer a considered opinion with less.

WWII Commander: Battle of the Bulge (Compass Games, 2020), one of the
games I'm planning on getting around to reviewing in 2024.

So, three more 6x6 reviews, another five from the proposed 5x3 challenge, and one down already. Eleven more reviews (minimum) to make my goal. Which leads me to my third Primary goal for 2024.

12 Solitaire or Solo-Friendly games, New or Revisited, in 2024 (with reviews)

One of the things that made the 6x6 out of reach for me last year was the stipulation of the games being played against a human opponent. A full half of the individual games I played last year were solitaire or two-handed learning games. These also made up about half of the reviews I posted in 2023. I own a handful of solitaire games that I either haven’t played yet or haven’t played in years (Skies Above Britain (GMT Games, 2022) and Beneath the Med (GMT Games 2020) spring to mind). If I still have them in my collection, it's because I enjoyed them and could see myself revisiting them, or I think I’ll enjoy them. It’s time I started getting some of them back to the table (and thinking more deeply about them for review purposes).

That’s all I’m committing myself to. Actually, that’s quite a bit. I hope I’m not over-extending myself. These are the things I’m going to focus my efforts on. My Extra Credit goals are more opportunistic in nature. If the situation avails itself, I’ll grab it, but I’m not going to flagellate myself if I don’t meet any or all of these. Well, maybe a little.

Extra Credit Goals for 2024:

Learn the GBACW system

After a long hunt, I’m the proud owner f a pre-loved (clipped and trayed) copy of Death Valley: the Battles for the Shenandoah (GMT Games, 2019). The hunt came about, in part, because I already had the confusingly titled Battles for the Shenandoah: a Death Valley Expansion (GMT Games, 2022), and Into the Woods: The Battle of Shiloh, April 6-7, 1862 (GMT Games, 2022) which several people said in no uncertain terms was an inappropriate game to try to learn the Great Battles of the American Civil War (GBACW) system. Hence the hunt for Death Valley. 

Now By Swords and Bayonets (GMT Games, ~2024) has made the cut on GMT's P500 and is likely to be released this year; covering smaller battles often overlooked in ACW series, probably will be the best game to learn the system. I’ve made a significant investment in time and cash sourcing these games, and I really want to sink my teeth into some wargaming rib-eye, but in the short term, I’m willing to wait for By Swords and Bayonets, which may drop as early as June. That date isn't carved in stone, however, so that's why this one has been relegated to an Extra Credit goal.

Teach myself to play Fields of Fire

Another GMT game, Fields of Fire (2008) is a company command solitaire game, covering three theatres of war, WWII Europe, Korea and Vietnam. The original game – long out of print – is getting a Deluxe Edition release, probably later this year. In the meantime, I have Volume 2: With the Old Breed (GMT Games, 2018) in the series. (A third, covering the British Parachute Regiment is in the works.) The game has a reputation for being difficult and for demanding much from the player in terms of concentration and commitment. But if I can crack it, that would potentially count to my 12 Solitaire Game goal, so it would be a win-win.

Table and play Chase of the Bismarck

I bought Chase of the Bismarck (Vuca Simunations, 2023) last year, along with Task Force: Carrier Battles in the Pacific (Vuca Simulations 2023). Vuca make really beautiful games and chase of the Bismarck is an unruly beast of a game that has probably the biggest overall footprint of any game I own (with the possible exception of Death Valley with its expansion). A game of Chase will require several things; a place to set it up (probably the night before), a full day clear to teach the game, then actually play it, and an opponent equally committed to the task. This is probably the Extra Credit goal I would most like to achieve, and the one least likely to occur, but a fella can dream. (To get an idea of the scope of this undertaking, have a look at my unboxing post of Chase for the Bismarck here. I forgot to mention just how distractingly beautiful the whole ensemble is.)

-----

So, that’s the plan in broad brushstrokes – more details as they come to hand. I want to nail down the 5x3 games in the next week or two, and I need to take inventory of what I have on had to play, because I anticipate not having the luxury of buying as many new games this year as last. Nobody is supervising me in this, and I have a history of flaking on commitments when they get difficult. So, I write a blog to self-police my own behaviour. That it’s fun to do – not as fun as the games themselves, but quite fun in its own way.

Anyway, if you're still reading this far in, thank you for being a part of this, and helping to keep me keep for playing new games and writing about them. I hope you've enjoyed it, and I hope you'll stick around for year two.

 

* That jab was not directed at anyone in particular. I do understand the pressure to produce new content can force some to cut corners. That’s why I write a blog – Nobody reads anymore, so no pressure, I can do what I want; I could spend a month writing about the intricacies of diplomatic relations in Here I Stand (GMT Games, 2006), and probably nobody would notice or care. There is one outstanding exception; while I don’t always agree with his opinions, I am in awe of the consideration Calandale puts into every game he reviews on his YouTube channel.