Tide of Iron review

After weeks of planning, phonecalls and emails it finally happened; I got three friends together for a full day and we sat down to play a game.  The three friends were Paul, Neil and Andy… and the game was Tide of Iron.

Tide of Iron is a World War 2 boardgame, focussing on tactical level combat in pre-set scenarios. It is designed for two players, but rules are included for four-player games (two per side). The game is complete in the box, with hundreds of plastic miniatures and cards, 12 double sided map tiles, loads of counters, a rulebook (also downloadable from the Fantasy Flight website) and a scenario book with a variety of missions. 

The game features a variety of units; standard infantry, elite troops, officers, mortars, machine guns, trucks, transports and tanks; each with their own specific rules, and very nice models. The scenario determines what troops you receive (which you then form into squads of your own choosing), the map tiles and card decks used and the victory conditions.On your turn you have a range of options for each of your troops: Move, Fire, Concentrated Fire, Opportunity Fire, Assault or Special Action (activating one of your Strategy Cards), alternating actions until every unit has moved.   It is the card decks which provide the best variety in the game, the scenario determines which deck each player gets (Reinforcements, Air Support, Morale, etc) and these give specific bonuses during the game. Cards are activated by using Command tokens, earned by occupying specific tactical locations on the board. For example, in the scenario that we played, there was a hill with a sandbagged emplacement at the top; the side that held it earned two command points every turn, which allowed us to purchase from our respective command decks, to represent the tactical advantage of holding such a position.

Combat is via opposed dice rolls (attack vs defence) and is generally bloody. The only exception is mortars which can choose to give suppressing fire which doesn’t destroy your opponents troops, but pins or disrupts them for a turn or two.

(Even if you don’t fancy the game, check out the video below, it features some remarkable head/facial hair combos...)

Paul, Neil and Andy are friends of mine who I’ve been introducing to modern boardgames over the past few years, so have played games of varying complexity. Tide of Iron is by no means the most complicated game out there, but it does require a bit of thought and there was frequent checking of the rulebook to make sure we played certain situations right, but overall the guys picked up the rules pretty quick. I went over the main points as we set up and then we talked through the riles on the first turn before the game got into full swing.

In our game Neil and I took the side of the Germans and Paul and Andy assumed the role of the Americans. The Germans were in a strong defensive position and it was up to the yanks to prise us out. Neil and I made great use of our cards (from the ‘Morale’ and ‘Reinforcements’ decks - mainly the latter!) and managed to hold the Americans at bay until the end of the game. There were a few hairy moments, and we only just got away with it at the end, so a good time was had by all. Our game took about six hours to play, but that was at a relaxed pace with plenty of chatting and discussion. The next time that we play, I can’t see it lasting more than four hours, even allowing time for name calling and trading of insults in a variety of comedy accents.

The rules provide a great balance of depth and ease of play that will suit most gamers, and provide a rich, deep gaming experience that all can enjoy.

As always I must ask one single question: Is it Frugal? Well, it’s £55 (or crazy foreign equivalent), it’s fantastic quality, it’s great fun and it’ll provide you hours and hours of gaming. I can’t think of many other gaming products that will give you a complete system with such potential for the same price. Go and buy it now!

P.S. You may know that when I review a product I give away my review copy if I received one. As this is my own personal (paid for) copy of Tide of Iron I’ve sent Fantasy Flight Games an email asking for a copy to give away to one lucky reader.  I’ve not had an answer yet...

Losing with my army and then against it...

Hello all,

It's been a busy week!  If you've been following me on twitter (you really should, I'm remarkably interesting), you'll have seen that I played some 40k (played twice, lost twice) and I've been working on completing my snotling pump wagons.

The 40k was against my regular gaming chum Lawrence; he had kindly agreed to lend me his Tau army so that I could play against my n00b gaming friend who would be using my Dark Eldar.  It was a rather good game; I really enjoy using the Dark Eldar, but they can be a bit fragile and susceptible to being shot at (aren't we all?) although the wyches and grotesques are amazing in close combat.  As I say, I lost the game, but I learned a lot from it.  I'm being far too cautious with my force.  I keep hiding them and trying to blast the enemy from a distance, what I really need to start doing is throwing them forward and getting them into combat as soon as possible, even if it means taking a few casualties on the way in.  Next time I imagine I'll have a good haul of slaves and a satisfying victory at the end of the game.  You heard it here first.

So Lawrence left and his Tau remained behind for me to use the following evening.  This was the first time 'The n00b' had played 40k and to cut a long story short, he won and loved it (I wonder if the two are connected?), he keen to try it again so expect more n00b 40k updates.  I'm glad he enjoyed it, but I was really hoping he'd get into Necromunda which we played last week.  There's been some talk at the club of setting up a Necro campaign, so I may have to get involved in that instead...

So yeah, a good week, with plenty of projects on the go as well.  Hopefully the snotling pumpwagons will be complete in the next week or so; when they're done I'll post a full 'how to' guide on their construction. I've also got another conversion project for my orcs and goblins in the planning stages, based on a Heresy miniatures kit, are there any guesses?

Happy Gaming!

Don't get more games, get more gamers!

As regular readers know, I like to game.  I like to paint, I like to model, I like to write my silly little blog, but in the past year I have made a conscious effort to play more games.  Inevitably, like many other gamers, I have now started to look around for other gaming experiences; new games systems, new armies, bigger and more spectacular battles.  Of course, as a frugal gamer I fear the required expense that comes with these options.

Recently though, I have come across another option, which improves my gaming for minimal outlay;  I’m not getting more games systems, I’m getting more gamers.

This has come about in two ways, firstly I’ve joined the excellent gaming club here in Plymouth ‘Cross Swords’ and secondly I’ve managed convinced a non gaming friend to take up the dice.

Heavily themed, skirmish games such as Necromunda can really appeal to new players.

The benefits of joining a club are well known, but can’t be overstated.  Plenty of new players to face, lots of other armies to battle against, trial games of new systems, and even the ability to share lifts to tournaments and other events.  Of course, going to a club does have it’s costs.  Cross swords costs me £2.50 per visit for entry, a couple of pounds in petrol and the cost of a couple of drinks.  I visit every couple of weeks so the cost averages out quite well, and the idea of laying out my army in front of a room full of other players helps me to focus on getting figures painted and building the best army I can.

The second option is perhaps one that gamers rarely try; getting non-gamers to have a go.  I’m excluding those of us with children; we seem to be pressing dice into little pudgy palms before our poor sprogs can even sit up on their own.  As gamers, we can be a bit shy about telling our workmates and acquaintances about our hobby, and those of us that do will probably only mention that we ‘play wargames’  and if pushed we’ll tell them what game system we play. This is generally met with a fixed grin and a patronising nod of the head.  It is only rarely that others will ask for further details.  I do make a point of subjecting one of my work mates to terrifyingly detailed battle reports on a regular basis in an attempt to annoy him, try it, it works.

Anyway, I had the rare pleasure of a friend popping round a few weeks ago, looking at my figures on a shelf and asking me if he could try a game.  I thought it was some elaborate sting operation, but I eventually set up a couple of small scale trial games of different systems (Warhammer and Necromunda).  He really enjoyed the games and we’ve arranged some more for the future.

Gaming at a club can be great fun... and may include chocolate.

So over the last couple of months, I’ve managed to massively expand my gaming, without a huge outlay of cash.  I’ve also made a few friends, and brought a new person into the hobby.  Playing any existing games you own with new people, whether seasoned pros or n00bs, can be great fun and put a spark back into your gaming.  Give it a try and let me know how you get on.

Happy Gaming.

Game Review – Order of the Stick

I’ve noticed this blog has become really active in the last month, with some great wargaming and frugalling articles, so I thought I’d contribute something slightly different. To keep up with my frugal resolutions – I’m a couple of weeks behind my painting obligations, but catching up fast and well within my budgetary limits (I’ve spent nothing) despite several temptations (having played more Gorkamorka/Necromunda and read more of tUGS). Not just spending less, but definitely playing a lot so far this year (see here and here)! Without further ado, a schizophrenic game review.

The Order of the Stick is a humourous webcomic, which lampoons tabletop RPGs – the basic question being ‘how would the characters (without players) live, act and converse if they understood the rules of the game?’. There is also an adventure game, which gives the flavour of a tabletop RPG without actually being one. Being a fan of one, I picked up the other.

The game is fun, and funny, although in my experience some of the jokes go over people’s heads if they’re not familiar with the comic. Although it stretches to about five book collections (possibly more) the game was produced early on, and really only re-enacts events from the first book – and the additional expenditure of a book isn’t required, since all the comics are online, free to view. How’s that for frugal?

Gameplay revolves around getting your pseudo-RPG character down the levels of a randomly generated dungeon (draw cards for rooms) until you reach the bottom level – where you need to defeat the boss (a lich named Xykon) and then escape. Along the way, you level up by gaining ‘shticks’ – additional cards that represent your powers increasing. You also gain loot from defeating enemies, which is important at the end – whoever escapes with the most loot, wins. An additional twist, however, is that loot needs to be relevant to your character. One character loves food, another loves treasure, a third knowledge... occasionally, these will cross over and loot will be desired by more than one player.

The game is very good at providing new experiences – rooms are selected at random by drawing cards, many of them have special rules, some of the loot is actually a trap, and everything has the flavour of the comic strips humour. Unfortunately, if you play too many times in a short space of time, the jokes can feel a bit overplayed. They would probably work well in a games night setting, where people, beer and popcorn often bring up those sorts of jokes anyway. Typical game-table humour.

Unfortunately, I’ve never tried it out at a games night because the rules are not quick to learn, especially to an audience not familiar with the common concepts of an RPG. The same people would probably not enjoy the jokes so much either, which need an understanding of popular RPGs even more. To them, it would probably appear overly-complicated and irreverent. Some people might like that sort of thing, but it’s difficult to predict that. Even if all those things come together alright, for me as a fan of the series already, there seem to be a lot of the jokes based on knowledge of the Order of the Stick comic and not just in the style and source of it’s humour. People might get the rules quickly, understand the dragon-colour jokes, but still fail at the fun poked at a character’s personality quirks. This can be off-putting to some players.

Another problem with this as a party game is that it takes a long time to play – a bit like Talisman, you’ll probably want to take an evening playing one game of Order of the Stick and nothing else. Games nights are best when there is a variety of games to play, when everyone can pick up the rules to a sufficient level fairly quickly (ie, Kill Doctor Lucky!) and when everyone feels included. An alternative is when a significant proportion of players already know the game being played so everyone can help new people learn, and everyone knows what game they’re going into beforehand. It’s less of a ‘games night’ and more of a ‘Talisman night’ or ‘Order of the Stick night’ (although it’s still hard to stop games nights becoming ‘Kill Doctor Lucky nights’).

So, despite being a very fun game, the time investment to play it is a little too high to make it an frequent occurrence. I’ve not tried to play it since our son got walking around, because (with the random dungeon layout / size) it’s difficult to find somewhere to play that he won’t end up walking on things, and he’s likely to finish any nap before the game is done. At around £35 (although I can’t find it in 30 seconds on Amazon to confirm), it’s just a little too high for a game that can’t be picked up and played anytime, especially if you already own games that fit into the same sort of ‘long-play, complex rules’ bracket. It probably won’t get a lot of action.

That being said, while researching for this review, I found reference to a new expansion for the game (board game expansions are still something a little strange to me...) called ‘The Shortening’ that promises to make the game quicker and simpler – which is a good move, given what I’ve mentioned here. But then, that’s increasing the cost ever so slightly again...

Finally, this is a Frugal game review – is the game good value for money, will you get a lot of use and play out of it, what does it require that you bring along with you. If you have enough cash for an expensive board game, oodles of time, and loads of gamer mates who have nothing to do of a weekend, you’ll love this game – it’s very funny, and great fun. I’m not so lucky, and our regular roleplay group is having enough trouble trying to find time to roleplay without bringing them another game to play!

(images stolen from www.ookoodook.com)

Game Review – Kill Doctor Lucky!

Kill Doctor Lucky is a board game, the spiritual prequel to Cluedo. Instead of stalking around a mansion trying to work out who did it, you’re stalking around the mansion trying to do it.

The way to win the game is relatively simple – get yourself in the same room as Dr Lucky, make sure no-one can see you, and try to do him in with whatever weapons you may have picked up (or your bare hands). Other players then take it in turns to play failure cards to try and thwart your attempt. If you succeed, you win! If you fail, you get a spite token – which, for as long as you hold it, increases your chances of success.

The rules themselves are easy to pick up, and the game has become a staple in our games nights for being quick to learn, quick to play, ruthlessly mercenary and with a splash of gambling too. “Should I play this failure card to stop Ann, or should I refuse and make Carl use his cards... ensuring that my own murder attempt will be more likely to succeed!” This does, of course, backfire occasionally – we’ve had more than one game end early due to over-ambitious would-be-killers.

The game has nice, black humour and each failure card includes a reason for the failure - “The doctor spins around and waxes lyrical on his recent polar adventure.” The weapons in the game are also good – a monkey hand (bonus in the lobby), ‘loud noise’ (bonus in the carriage house, picture of a French horn) and killing joke are all in there, as well as simpler ones (revolver, knife, etc). Besides, competing to murder someone is a fairly funny thing to do when you’ve got a bunch of friends, a glass of wine and some takeaway pizza.

We picked up the reprint of the game in full technicolour glory, nice wooden playing pieces and big box. Originally, it was released by Cheapass Games in much less glamorous style. Cheapass Games are a frugal gamer’s friend – they believe that all you need to play a game is the rules and any unique components (such as cards). Everyone has dice, false money, pawns and counters so there’s no need to pack all that stuff in a big box and hike the price up. They argue that the quality of those components is generally poor anyway, so it’s better to leave them out, keep the cost down, and allow people to invest in one really good set of gaming accessories to use for all their games. Of course, since the big games companies are unlikely to follow this pattern, the only games you’ll really get good use out of this philosophy are other Cheapass Games. The big box version is good quality, but possibly a little over-priced looking at the content alone, and I believe that the Cheapass printing is no longer available.

There are also expansions to the game that introduce the Doctor’s dog, and a prequel game still sold by Cheapass Games called Save Doctor Lucky – wherein you must stop the Doctor drowning on the Titanic (making sure people do see you save him!) The game is slightly harder, since the Titanic is sinking while you play, and there is the potential for nobody to win!

Overall, I would heavily recommend this game – even the more expensive big box version – because it is quick to learn, doesn’t seem to get old, provides a lot of potential strategy or luck, and appeals to a wide range of people. I have even had to consider banning it, because about half the time in any games night we hold is spent playing Kill Doctor Lucky – and it usually comes out again for rematches the following day too!

A Night To Remember

As I mentioned before, I plan to hold more Games Nights this year than I have previously. Here’s what I’ve found that works for me, but I’m refining my process continually and if anyone else has any advice I’d be happy to try it out next time.

Know Your Audience - “What Do I Do Again?”

Not everyone games like a wargamer games. Wargamers are a little scary, they can assimilate any rules system almost on contact, and be playing the game without the rulebook in under ten minutes. However, not everyone has this ability. They need a little more time to pick something up, and maybe a couple of practice runs.

Knowing what sort of people have come to your games night is important, unless you want to be a speaking rulebook all evening!

Know Your Audience – “Has Someone Won Yet?”

Some games take a long time. Everyone’s been part of a 30-hour Monopoly marathon, where four players are gripping onto their last mortgaged properties in the face of the last two players, who’ve neatly divided the board between them. Being one of those destitute four is not fun. Games with clear end goals are best – ones that state that ‘the winner is the first to grab the McGuffin’ are better than ‘the last one standing’.

Cheat Sheets

If you know what games you’re playing in advance, get an A3 pad and some marker pens and make some quick bullet-point notes to remind people of key rules. Good things to put on these reminder sheets are the win conditions, the order of actions in a turn, or the options available to a player. As noted above (“What do I do again?”) if you need to use too many bits of paper, you might have picked a complicated game!

Bit of Fun

One thing we ask people to do is to bring along a token or pawn for themselves to use in the games. Wargaming friends are likely to bring a painted model, whereas normal people usually bring more interesting or unusual things (a bolt, small crystal, box of staples, etc). I recommend limiting to things that generally balance themselves and are no more than an inch square at the base. I reserve some goblins for people who neglect to bring their own.

Survival Considerations

This is less specific games advice and more basic party etiquette – you should have a selection of sweet and savoury snacks, and drinks around. We normally ask people to bring their own beer, and stock up on cheap colas ourselves. Popcorn will go a long way. Another good practice is to appoint someone as Pizza Prefect. It is their job to memorise a takeaway pizza menu, calculate available offers, sort out what each individual wants and then make the order. If you happen to be ordering a lot of pizza, you may get an additional discount.