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Post by Whiterook on Nov 24, 2022 18:32:25 GMT -5
…pre-Thanksgiving gaming at a buddy’s house this Wednesday! I’d brought my RISK: Game of Thrones game, which my wife bought me for Christmas a few years ago, but never got (no pun intended) a chance to play. It quite cool, really, though we played the basic Skirmish mode, which is just standard RISK, using the Westeros map (though you can do t(r same with the Essos map). The more advanced mode is called Dominion, which brings in character cards and purchasing powers for special stuff… I can see how it will be more GoT immersive in that form; and there’s another mode called World at War, that uses both the Westeros map and the Essos map!
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Post by Whiterook on Nov 28, 2022 19:42:31 GMT -5
The next game for the table! Pacific Tide, by Gregory Smith
An area movement game (see, I can adapt to new game styles!), it takes place within five turns, each turn being a year from 1941-45 in the Pacific Theater. It’s a 2-Player game, but also has a Solo Bot that helps guide the intent of the Japanese as the bot. It begins with the Japanese attack Pearl Harbor, and the goal for the US is to control the whole Pacific (excluding Japan and Okinawa) by end of 1945.
I intend to get the system down over the next several days, so that I can play it on December 7th (next Wednesday). As background to why this is hitting the table next… I played in a playtest of a game called “Desert Blitzkrieg” at the Compass Games Expo a couple weeks back, which s centered on the lead up to Tobruk; which happens to have a similar mechanic of area movement up to two areas out that are connected by lines, which really stuck out as very cool in my mind. Well, a new acquaintance at the Expo, who lives in my town (and who just happens to be the designer of Desert Blitzkrieg!) plans to do a lot of gaming with me, and he asked in an email several days ago that he bought “Imperial Tide”, and asked if I’d like to give it a try. Well, I’d remembered I’d bought a “…tide” game some time ago, and low and behold, it was Pacific Tide! (bought from the Expo several years ago and still in shrink). I figured if I learned this, I can pick up playing Imperial Tide pretty quick! Aaaaaaaaand, low and behold, I again, remembered why I bought this game in the first place… it’s frickin’ cool!!!
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Post by mikeh on Nov 28, 2022 23:52:59 GMT -5
Looks good! I personally am fond of area movement games and this may really work good for the great expanses of the Pacific Ocean. Solo bot is a good touch also.
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Post by Whiterook on Dec 2, 2022 20:25:56 GMT -5
Looks good! I personally am fond of area movement games and this may really work good for the great expanses of the Pacific Ocean. Solo bot is a good touch also. It’s a cool little game! …got it half price at Compass Games Expo a few years ago, so that was a plus. I’ve heard the second edition comes with a mounted map so, as I’m planning to go to the May Expo (they decided to have their expo twice a year!), I’ll probably pick up the new 2nd edition and either sell this one, or pay it forward. I’m having a little bit of an issue with the rules, but I’m getting the gist. I am hoping to get a first play tomorrow or Sunday. Started clipping the counters today…dug out an old 20-cell counter holder for the 80’s, haha, to organize things. Gorgeous counters on this game!
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Post by Whiterook on Dec 5, 2022 22:44:36 GMT -5
Counters all clipped and in a tray, and have been reading the rules… the latter has been a chore, with even though there are only about a dozen pages, there’s a lot of fiddly details to remember, there’s a bit of repetition, and there’s some scattering on some mechanics split between sections that need to be pieced together in your head to remember it all goes together. This is not to say this is a bad game… in the contrary! …this is shaping up to be a very cool game indeed!
Current plan is to play around with it on the table tomorrow, for a dedicated playing Wednesday, December 7th. This looks to be a good Pearl Harbor Day game…. Hopefully, with a good WWII movie through the day.
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Post by Whiterook on Dec 10, 2022 17:26:17 GMT -5
Pacific Tide — First Go! This is a neat little game; little, as is not a ton of components and counters, and a 12-ish page rulebook… it went from tearing off the shrink to the table in just a few days, which probably would have been quicker with rules that were a little more well laid out. I can tell already that this is a fav, and that’s been the case with every game from Greg Smith to date for me. Setup is a breeze, with pre-set units for each side well defined. Again, this plays out on five turns, each turn representing a year from Pearl Harbor 1941 to end war 1945. Card driven, you play the Japanese and American/Commonwealth forces in alternating card pick from a hand of cards, exhausting a years’ hand (or two consecutive passes to play by each side) ends the year. You earn Build points at the end of the year for certain conditions met, in which you can buy cards that were discarded, back! The cards are brilliant and I love the mechanic… it gives a great fog of war, in being limited in what you can do based on what you have in your hand for cards, and also introduces strategy in what and when to use them.
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