Not a Mail Call: New Board Games

Not really a "Mail Call" but it feels like one. I was down visiting my brothers and sisters this past weekend and look what my brother had for me!

YES! I have finally got my hands on a copy of Imperium! But the box is full of surprises.

In addition to the Imperium game there is a complete mini-game, Sticks and Stones, the Monster that ate Sheboygan, tourney rules for Imperium, and either another game or pieces of two other games. And a little zine "The Halfling Magazine."

I am going to need to go through it all and see what I really have but it looks like it was all bought at Origins in 1980.

In addition, there is a game I am completely unfamiliar with.  The naval battle game Trireme.

Not only does it look intact, it looks like it has been completely unplayed!

These will provide me a lot of fun over Christmas break to be sure.

The Village Crone (2015)

 Some more witch board games today and the last one for this season.

The Village Crone (2015)

You play one of six witches (1 to 6 players) and work to take control of a village (Wickersby) without a crone. You send out your familiars (up to 5) to gather ingredients for spells. The first to 13 points wins and becomes the new Village Crone of Wickersby.

The game is fun enough and the rules are easy enough. The replayability is high so that is good and there are enough random elements to keep it interesting enough. 

I rather like the idea from an RPG standpoint. Witches going out into the world to find a little hamlet to call their own. Certainly, something they would all like to brag about at the Tredecim. 

You can get The Villiage Crone here: https://firesidegames.com/games/village-crone/

AFFLICTION: Salem 1692 (2017)

A witch-themed board game that I have had forever it seems. 

AFFLICTION: Salem 1692 (2017)

This game was successfully Kickstarted back in 2016. I picked up my copy soon after. 

In the game you try to influence the powers of Salem (Judge, Magistrate, Governor, Minister) to either exonerate or damn others to set them free or arrest them.  The game features many of the famous names from the Salem Witch Trials. 

The game itself is rather gorgeous, as you can see from the pictures below.  But for us there was too much going on in the game to really enjoy it. Now I could see my family having fun with this at Gen Con with someone knowledgeable to show us all the rules. 

The game is well-reviewed and I can tell a lot of work went into the design, it just wasn't a good fit for my family mechanically speaking. The theme though was fun.

You can get a copy at the publisher's webstore.

Use in My War of the Witch Queens / Traveller Envy

Obviously I got to fuel my Traveller Envy. I wanted an experience that was a little more than what we get in the Witch Hunt RPG from 1983  (which I just now realized I have never reviewed!). Somewhere between this board game and the Witch Hunt RPG is the perfect Salem game for me.  I haven't found it yet and I might need to write it myself.

Still kudos to the designers of AFFLICTION: Salem 1692. 

Cauldron: Bubble and Boil - Deluxe Edition (2017)

Ah, now this one has a special place in my heart. I backed this on Kickstarter years ago and went in for the deluxe edition. This allowed me to add a character design to one of the cards.

I'll get to that in a bit.

Cauldron: Bubble and Boil - Deluxe Edition (2017)

Cauldron is part of the "new wave" (or at least to me) of board games that have a lot of resource management and various goals.

In this game you take the role of witches and warlocks in a potion-brewing contest. Play involves planting gardens, harvesting ingredients, and hexing your opponents.  There are points you collect and the goal is to win the potion-brewing contest and win the coveted Witches Eye.

There are game pieces that represent ingredients and all players get a little cauldron to put all their materials in. There are four Cauldrons and four player mats, so the max is four players. 

Players start the game with five resource cards. These cards tell you what you can do each turn. They all have a hex, ingredient and recipe. Each player on their turn can choose what to do with the card. They can hex an opponent which could take their ingredients or steal their victory points. They can add an ingredient to their cauldron or get a recipe. They discard and draw another. Then we move to the next player.

The strategy comes from knowing when to complete your own potions or stop another player from theirs.  Hexing another player costs victory points

Once your ingredient is in your cauldron you need to keep track of them.  You are never allowed to look into your cauldron or into other players!  There are also black "Corruption" tokens that can ruin your potions by destroying an ingredient. The player with the most corruption earns 5 points. The player with the least earns 10 points.

Once you have the ingredients in your cauldron (colored cubes) then you can make the potion listed on your card.  BUT be careful! if your ingredients are wrong your potion fails. The goal is to get the most of seven potions.

There are expansions to this as well. Like the Moon Deck which will add or subtract effects from other cards. Like removing corruption or adding extra ingredient colors.  There are other expansions like the Cove pack (which I am a fan of).

It took a bit to get into it but once we did it moved pretty quickly. Our first game took a little bit longer than an hour, and the next one was fast at just under an hour.

The biggest issue were people (who will be nameless) remembering what was in their cauldron.  This was a combination of one not paying attention and another not actually caring what they had in their cauldrons. 

The art for this game is amazing. I really love it.  The characters are interesting as well. 

For Use in War of the Witch Queens

Feeding deep into my Traveller envy today. My idea was that this Potion Making contest is something they have at the Tredecim. Which has grown from just a meeting of high-level witches to something akin to a carnival of seven days where the high witches hold their conferences and meetings, but all witches gather to discuss plans, trade secrets, and generally enjoy themselves. 

I still might do this, but in this round I do not have enough magic using characters to make it work.  Ah well.