HOTT In Brisbane

It was, indeed, hot in Brisbane. 

So last week we travelled up north, crossed the border into the 1950s and went to visit my son and his family. He requested that I bring some HOTT armies as he hadn't played in a while and really fancied a game. We managed one game.

For those that remember my son from the UK HOTT compettion circuit many years ago, here he is now. 

He used the Dukedom of Ceidonia (which is strictly his army, but he left all his HOTT armies behind when he moved out and they're MINE now) - Blade general, blade, two knights, a hero, a behemoth and four spears. I used the Spawn of Tiamat - Magician general, hero, four hordes, three knights, a beast and a behemoth. The Ceidonoans defended. 

The centre saw the heroes of both sides facing off, as well as the foot.

My left flank saw our knights and behemoths get straight into a fight. I felt confident here, being one knight up. The downside for both of us was thata wood seperated this flank from the both armies' generals, making command a little harder. Still, with everything impetuous, combats would be maintained with little effort; the flank would fight itself. 

The centre wasn't looking so good for me, with hordes facing spears. Tiamat used magic to try and eliminate the enemy hero but he resisted her. 

Things quickly fell apart. 

The Ceidonians were doing OK on the flank as well; they had eliminated one of Tiamat's knights, evening up the fight. You can see Tiamat's beasts assisting on the flank.

Qingu the hero was flanked and eliminated, leaving Tiamat pretty much on her own. 

Some blades drew the beasts away from the Ceidonian tank. However they were quickly eliminated by Tiamat's creatures. 

More fighting on teh flank saw more of Tiamat's army eliminated. 

Tiamat finally ensorcelled the opposing hero. Surprisongly this brought the casualties to near parity; we were both at a stage where a couple of good combats would see us win. 

This was helped by Tiamat being able to bring back all of the dead hordes. 

But the battle was decided on the flank; Tiamat's giant worm was finally defeated by the Ceidonian tank and that was enough to break the forces of Chaos. 

Cei and I haven't played against each other in a while so it was nice to have a game, even if I did lose. In a few years I'll be able to lose to his son ...

Magical Athlete

My latest boardgame obsession is Magical Athlete. Each player has a team of four racers. Each racer takes part in one of four races, with increasing rewards for victory as you progress through them. Two of the tracks are mild, so are just straight races. Two are wild, and are littered with bonus and penalty spaces. To race you line the competitors up and players take turns rolling the dice and moving their pieces that many spaces. It's a simple family race game with no skill and no fun.

Well ... no. You see each racer has a rules-altering special power. One can choose to move exactly five spaces instead of rolling. One can drag another racer to their space from anywhere on the board. One gets to advance a space every time another racer uses their ability. True, some of the abilities just happen, but others offer choices. Choosing which race to commit a particular racer to is also a decision. Some work better on the mild races, whilst others give you an edge on the wild board. But you know what racers are in the other teams and you also have to outguess your opponent - will they commit a racer that makes your power less useful?

And the fun? With multiple powers in play for each race the results can be chaotic and unpredictable. You'll enter some races at a disadvantage and still enjoy the process. 

And how does he game look? Amazing. The artwork is wonderfully quirky and childish, really giving it a lot of personality. These are the playing pieces for the 36 racers on offer. A game will use between 16-24 of them. 

The cards are equally nice. And you can see some of the powers there as well.

Racers on the start space of a wild race. From left to right they are: Lackey (gets to move if an opponent rolls a 6), Third Wheel (gets to advance to any space where they can make a threesome), Genius (gets an extra turn if they predict their die roll), Heckler (gets to move if an opponent moves badly), Gunk (slows everyone else down) and Rocket Scientist (can double their move but crashes afterwards)

The end of a set of races. Twin (copies a previously used power) has just won, whilst Dicemonger (can sell rerolls) has come in second. 

This is not a heavy game. But it's clever, looks fantastic, is good for all ages and (most importantly) a tremendous amount of fun. 

York Factory Again

It's been a hot humid weeken, so to cool down on Sunday afternoon I got out my Galleys & Galleons scenario for the action at York Factory in 1697, which is set in a frozen and fog-bound Hudson's Bay.

You can read about the first time I played it HERE.

I played it as written but with randomly scattered ice-floes ships could collide with and with the Charismatic trait on Owner's Love instead of Fireship. 

It's a fun scenario because, aside from the dangerous ice-floes and limited shooting ranges (because of the fog) both sides get a random set-up and random entry of reinforcements. The French started with two ships in play (Le Palmier and L'Equimaux), whilst the English only had the Dering. Two opposing ships actually started next to each other. 

Whilst L'Esquimaux quickly sailed to safety, Dering and Le Palmier exchanged fire. 

Le Palmier was damaged. 

Although they started with the advantage of numbers the English soon got the upper-hand as more of their ships arrived. The first was the mighty Hampshire. 

Soon they had all four ships in play, and a shift of wind gave them the weather-gauge as well. 

As teh English organised themselves the French finally got reinforcements in the form of their largest ship Le Pelican. Le Palmier moved up in support. 

L'Esquimaux engaged Royal Hudson's Bay, inflicting some damage. 

However the small French vessel received a shattering rake from Owner's Love.

Royal Hudson's Bay finished the job. Holed below the water-line and with it's tiller gone, L'Esquimaux struck. 

Royal Hudson's Bay then moved to engage the newlt-arrived Le Profond. 

Meanwhile Hampshire was working it way around the ice in pursuit of Le Pelican and Le Palmier. Le Wasp arrived in the vicinity as well. 

Royal Hudson's Bay and Le Profond exchanged fire, and to the surprise of the French the English ship struck. 

Le Wesp took one broadside from Hampshire and also struck. 

Hampshire took a risky course through some ice to head off the French ships, whilst Owner's Love came up aiming to engage Le Palmier. 

Owner's Love took fire from Le Pelican and Le Palmier and was soon on fire. She took no further part in the action, and eventually burned to the waterline. 

Hampshire moved up. 

Hampshire and Le Pelican engaged. Dering came up in support of the Hampshire, but Le Pelican fought both sides and Dering caught fire. They soon extinguished it, but the delay took them out of the fight. 

The two large vessels blazed away at each other. Both ships took damage and Le Pelican lost some rigging. 

Hampshire ran aboard Le Pelican and grappled. 

The crew of Le Pelican resisted bravely for a while, and it looked like there might be an upset for the English. But the Hampshire's crew persisted and the French ship struck. 

At that point I called the game finished, with the English gaining a marginal victory. They still had Hampshire and Dering, whilst the French has Le Palmier and Le Profond. All ships were damaged but the odds probably favoured the English. However it would take several turns before the two sides could properly engage, and I was running out of time to play. So I assumed that in the fog they'd break off and see to repairs. 

Ten Years Ago - February 2016

Ten years ago I got a 3D printer. They seem to be ubiquitous now - a few members of our club seem to have ones that are running full-time turning out terrain and armies - but back then they were pretty new. I had about a year's worth of fun out of it before running it simply became a chore. I understand they are more reliable now, but mine was constantly in need of having the nozzle unblocked or the bed recalibrated.

Anyway, after a couple of years I needed the space it occupied for something else and it went into storage. I got rid of it when we moved house a coupe of years ago.

But this month's time-machine takes us back to the time I first got it. 

More 3D Printing

Battle Of Hoth

Last night I got a chance to play Battle Of Hoth, which is a new boardgame using the Battle Cry/Memoir '44 system and covering the Imperial assault on the Rebel base at the start of Star Wars Episode V. Keegan had the game and (as a bonus) had painted all of the figures. Daniel, Keegan and I took turns playing. 

It ises the same card system as the other games, but each side has their own deck. In additon you can choose a leader for each side and the chosen leader adds three cards of their own to that side's deck. Each side has their own troop types. Both have infantry, although that of the Rebels only had three figures to a unit. The Rebels also have snowspeeders and laser cannons, whilst the Imperial forces add probe-droids and the mighty AT-ATs. Each have their special rules.

Here you can see a lone Rebel infantry figure under attack by two lots of Imperial infantry and an AT-AT.

We payed four of the scenarios and some of those more than once. It plays very quickly compared to Memoir 44. mostly because it has a lower unit count and the board is smaller so units get stuck in much more quickly. 

This picture has all of the unit-types in it aside from the laser-cannons. The snowspeeders move quickly and have a lot of firepower at point-blank range, but can be a bit vulnerable. Probe droids are weak in combat, moderately hard to kill but, unless a scenario dictates it, they don't count for victory medals. 

AT-ATs are quite powerful in combat, and very hard to hit. However they are slow and can only take one hit. They could be killed by the first long-range shot directed at them, or resist shot after shot if the Rebels are unlucky. This one was brought down by three Rebel units playing the odds. 

There are several scenarios in the rules, starting with small couting skirmishes and then finishing up with the main assaults on the Rebel base. The rules also come with four mini-campaigns that link various of the scenarios together adding in special rules and advantages as one side gains or loses the upper-hand. So the designers have milked a lot of game out of one battle.

We played around eight games and the Rebels didn't win any of them. I don't know if the scenarios are weighted against the Rebels (Memoir 44 certainly doesn't pretend to have balanced scenarios) or if the Rebals are harder to play. Discussion on BGG suggests the latter - it just takes time to understand how to organise a Rebel defence or counter-attack, whilst the Imperials are fairly straightforward. The Memoir 44 approach of playing each scenario twice (swapping sides and aggregating the scores) is certainly the way to go here; can you lose as the Rebels less badly than your opponent? 

Having played it I can say that I enjoyed it, but I'm ot sure whether I'm desperate to own it. It is a lighter version of Memoir 44, which is no bad thing, but I'm not sure that, at this stage, it has enough depth to be worth getting. Maybe if more installments are produced covering other battles it might be worth getting. It doesn't feel like a game that's as versatile in terms of scenario design as either Memoir 44 or Battle Cry, but I can imagine if you're a Star Wars fan you'd find this a welcome addition to your game collection.

Update: I've added this image from Ralph showing a game in play, since it shows it better than the few photos I took: