Why It's My Favorite: ElfBall

Game Overview

Elfball is a simulation of a fantasy football style game.  The game is played on a magic infused circular field.
The goal of the game is to score by running the ball into the opposing players scoring circle.  On a player's turn they can move one of their six players on the field. How many spaces a player can move is dependent upon their jog rating.  A player can do a number of actions on their turn.  They can shove opposing players out of the way, pick up the ball, tackle a player, or throw the ball.  All of these actions are resolved by rolling custom dice.  The dice have a success icon, a fail icon, blank sides, and a conditional success. Each type of player (defender, striker, midfielder, etc) have their own stats.  The various actions require rolling dice equal to the stat number.  And each action has a needed amount of successes. For example, if I wanted to pick up a ball then  I will need to pass a skill test.  Let's say my striker has a skill of four.  The base test result is 1. This means on the four dice I need to roll one success.  If I do this, then I pick up the ball.  If I have zero successes then I will not pick up the ball, and if I roll more fails than successes I will flop.  Flopping is always bad.  Once a player is given an order, they are marked with a little marker.  This means that this player can not be used on the next turn so that single piece can not be used twice in a row.  The game will go on until someone scores and wins.

Why I Love This Game
I played this game at Gen Con 2011 for the first time, and I really liked it.  I liked it a lot.  In fact, I was a little nervous about how much I might actually get to play it.  However, how much I liked the game was greater than my reservations.  By nature of being a game, all games have a level of abstraction.  There are some games, especially war games, that attempt to negate this abstraction by getting closer to a simulation.  Often simulation games have a lot of rules and complexity that are part of them and are needed to create a simulation.  What I love about ElfBall is that it feels more like a simulations.  However, the game is a fantasy sports game, so the game is designed in such a way that the rules are easy and intuitive   The game is accessible without becoming overly abstract feeling.  This is especially true when using miniatures:


The play of this game has a lot of back and forth which I like, and the game always has hiliarious moments, like when a ball just can not be picked up or the small little thrower manages to actually tackle the big lumbering oaf carrying the ball to score.

This game has a level of depth that I have not even began to scratch.  It is possible to create a team, give players special abilities and have them gain experience over time.  I would love (LOVE) to find some people to play this game regularly with, but my wife is not that wild about it.  I will still try to find any excuse I can to play this game.  I really enjoyed painting the miniatures for the game, and while it is not practical I would love to get another team of miniatures. Especially one of these two:




I do wonder if this game will stick around on my favorite games list year after year, because I am still concerned that I will not ever get to play it as much as I like.  It is very likely that in future years this game will get replaced by Federation Commander or Dystopian Wars .  For now though, I still consider ElfBall one of my absolute favorite games, and it is always one of the games I am most wanting to play.

Why It's My Favorite: London

Game Overview

London is somewhat of a hard game to explain, because to properly understand it requires understanding the cards.  In London players are rebuilding the city following the great fire of 1666 up to 1900.  To do this a player has one of four actions they can do on their turn.  First at the beginning of their turn they must draw a card.  This draw can be from the top of the deck or from an area that players discard cards to.  The first action a player can do is draw three additional cards.  The second action a player can do is claim a borough.  These areas are represented as districts on a board.  Each borough has a cost in money that a player plays, they then put one of their markers on it and draw as many cards as indicated.  At the end of the game these territories are worth points.  Third, a player can build in their city.  The cards a player builds are placed face up in front of them in piles.  A player can have has many piles as they want.  To build a card a player must discard a card of the matching color.  So if I want to play a brown card in front of me, I must also discard a brown card.  Some buildings also have a financial cost as well.

The final action is running the city.  When a player runs a city, they activate all of the buildings they have built.  Often doing this will get the players points and money.  Most buildings are a one time use.  Running a city also generates poverty.  After a city is ran, a player adds up the number of piles they have, add the number of cards in hand, and then subtract the number of boroughs they occupy on the board.  So if I have four piles in front of me, three cards in hand, and occupy two boroughs, I will gain five poverty (4+3-2=5).

This is important because at the end of the game poverty is graded on a curve.  Whoever has the least discards all of it.  Everyone else discards and equal amount and then leftover poverty is worth equal points.  In addition to that, players can take out loans if they wish and their are some cards with special effects like adding underground tokens.  When the card deck runs out the game ends, after people have one final turn.  At the end of the game all points are added up and whoever has the most wins.

Why I Love This Game
All games fall somewhere on two different spectrum.  The first is strategy vs. tactics.  Strategy deals with long term, big picture decisions.  A strategy takes multiple turns to enact and follow through.  Tactics are more short term, immediate decisions.  Tactical decisions are ones that are made turn to turn, making the best decision with in the context of the turns.  I tend to like games that are kind of the in the middle.  I like games that require a strategy, but the way this strategy is fulfilled must be fluid.  I like games with strong tactical decisions where the overall strategy may have to be adapted on the fly because the current tactical situation demands. it.

The second spectrum is luck vs. skill.  A game like chess is zero luck, and all skill.  On the exact opposite end might be a card game like War, where the players have no control and it is all luck.  I like games that do mix luck and skill.  I like games with meaningful decisions where a player with skill  can make the more informed decision.  However, I also like it when the skills aspect is tampered with a luck component, so that players need to make the best of their luck.  Luck can not be the decisive factor, but I do not mind when luck levels the playing field a bit.

So that is a long, theoretical description to basically say London hits the sweet spot on both of those spectrums for me.  Every turn offers several big decisions, and each decision is multi-faceted because they have long term implications but the decision is very tactical as the decision made on what is best for that turn.

I also really like the tableau building aspect of this game.  I enjoy the building aspect, and watching my segment of London grow and advance throughout time.  I also enjoy finding neat and interesting combos as certain cards can compliment each other.  The game has a large deck that it plays out of, and this allows for every game to play out differently.  

So Finally . . . 

If you skimmed everything else, here are my thoughts summed up in a couple of sentences:  London is one of my favorite games because it offers a great mix of strategy and tactics, plus a great mix of luck and strategy.  The interaction of the cards adds a lot of depth to the game,  and every play is a satisfying game play experience.   

Why It's My Favorite: A Touch of Evil

It has been a LONG time since I have attempted any kind of series (heck it has been a while since I regularly wrote more than one blog a month) so this is my attempt to remedy that.  Earlier this year I made my list of favorite games.  Then I gave a brief overview of the games, but now I hope to give a more full picture of my top ten games  and why I like it so much.

A Touch of Evil

Game Overview

In a Touch of Evil the players play as heroes who have come to the town of Shadowbrook to help fight against an evil monster who is threatening and terrorizing the town. The board represents a map of the town and surrounding areas. There are several different heroes and monsters to choose from. On a player’s turn they first roll a six sided die and move. They will then encounter the space. The corners of the board are unique areas such as the abandoned fort, windmill, manor, and old woods. Each of these locations have their own deck of cards, and to encounter the space a player draws the card. These cards can be items that help the players, cards that attack the players, or cards where players can gather investigation (the currency of the game). To make these investigation test players will roll either their spirit, cunning, or honor attribute. The way these rolls work is players roll a number of dice equal to the attribute, and certain number is needed for a success. For example, if a spirit 5+ test is needed and my spirit is a 3, then I roll three dice and each five or six I roll is a success. Combat is done much the same way, where fives and sixes cause wounds. Combat is simultaneous, and one of the other players will roll for the enemy. 

The non-corner named spaces will often provide event cards which can be helpful. There are also other special locations that allow the purchase of items, healing of wounds or increasing stats. After a player encounters the space they can do a couple of other things. They may pay investigation to heal wounds, look at town elder secrets, or lairs cards. Looking at a town elder secret is important, because in the final showdown, a player can take two town elders with them. However, some of these secrets may actually reveal the elder to be evil and so taking an evil elder on a showdown actually has them help the villain. Lair Cards are needed to initiate a showdown with the villain. 

After every player has a turn there is the mystery phase. There is some book keeping that takes place, but the main thing that happens is a mystery card is drawn. These are always bad for the heroes and represent the actions of the villain. As the game continues the heroes will be getting stronger, until someone initiates a showdown against the villain. The first player to win the showdown and defeat the villain is the winner

Why I Love This Game

The primary reason why I love this game is because it is probably the closest  I will ever get to playing a role playing game with Abigail.  This game always have a really strong narrative to it.  The cards in the game are what really make this.   Many of the location cards have flavor text written in the second person.  This is much like a gamemaster describing what is going on.  Obviously the story is somewhat abstracted by the strictly board game mechanics.  For example, I can investigate the town elder's secrets but the game does not give any narrative as to how that is done.  While this game stops just short of creating a true narrative story line like a true RPG it creates all the dots, and it takes very little for the player to connect them.  Every play tells a fantastic story that is full of all drama and excitement.

I also enjoy the components of the game.   The game board that looks like a map is great, and I love the photos used for the card.  For me those cards really capture the theme of the game and add a lot.  The hero miniatures are also really nice, and someday I would like to attempt painting them like this person did:


I also really enjoy how much this game has been expanded.  At this point the game has two full expansion boards and two hero packs.  Plus, there are several villains that have been released online.  When this game, with all expansions is laid out, it begins to move into epic game territory.  

Since the greatest appeal of the story is exploring and creating a story, having more space to explore only adds to the game's enjoyment.  

So Finally . . .
If you just skimmed everything else, here are my thoughts summed up in a couple of sentences:  A Touch of Evil is one of my favorites because it is a game that really captures it's pulpy horror theme, and every time I play the game the experience tells a great story that really captures my imagination.