Boldly Going... (A Guide to the 4X Genre)

I see many bright stars in your future...

When we dig into the details of board games beneath ground level, we often talk about mechanisms and theme.  Mechanisms to a board game are kind of like the rules of grammar to a book; they are tools to help a designer (or author) connect with the end user to create an experience.  Authors attempt to create emotional connections or communicate ideas, game designers try to create enjoyable game play, but the tools do not inherently create great end products.

Theme in a board game equivocates to the setting of a book; time, place, context for the activity that is going on.  In a book, setting is usually pretty important to the story, although we've all seen remakes, fan-fictions, and retellings that change the setting of a story.  Theme in a game gives context to a players actions; in some cases, theme is central to a game experience.  In others, it simply facilitates the connection between the mechanisms that make up the game.

But there certainly more levels that we can dig into.  Something we haven't really talked about before is genre.  In books, genres are very closely related with settings; science fiction, drama, romance, historical - these all imply a sense of location, at least on the surface.  However, the genre simply defines certain characteristics of a book and sets up expectations for the reader.  What kind of book is this going to be? In the same way, board game genres define certain characteristics of the game, characteristics that are not necessarily tied to the theme directly, nor are they tied directly to mechanisms.  Yet the three can be somewhat intertwined.

So the genre I"m going to talk about today is the "4X" genre, one of my favorites.  This genre is not a set of mechanisms, and it is not directly related to a specific theme (although many 4X games are set in space).  It is simple a set of expectations and characteristics of a certain type of game.  What type of game is that? Well, read on to find out.

The Suns Are On Fire (An Interview with Emil Larsen)

This boxcover, as well as all other art and components pictured
are not final and subject to change

If you're like me, few things sound better than setting aside a good chunk of time to explore the galaxy, expand your galactic empire, exploit the resources of dozens of planets, and exterminate your enemies in epic space combat between massive fleets of ships. With some fantastic entires in the genre of 4x space exploration - Twilight Imperium being one of my favorite games of all time, and the popular Eclipse attempting to bridge the divide between thematic gamers and eurogamers alike.

So the prospect of a new 4x sci-fi game is an intriguing one.  But is Burning Suns, a new game on Kickstarter, going to fill a gap in styles of 4x games, or is it just noise beneath the games we already have?  The task of creating a great 4x game, given the scale and complexity in the very nature of such games, is a daunting one.

I had a chance to "sit down" at least virtually with game designer Emil Larsen and talk about his new game.  Hit the interview after the break and visit the kickstarter page here and judge for yourself whether Burning Suns is worth backing.

All Under Control (A Guide to Area Control/Majority)

Who doesn't like to carve out their own little fiefdom, now and then?  Whether it's a man cave at home, a special project at the office, or a particular job in some organization, there's a satisfaction to be had in owning your own personal space or role. A sense of freedom knowing you're in control. Putting your own personal touch on something is rewarding, and it's nice to see the results of accomplishing that goal for which you've exerted so much effort and planning. Of course, this overarching element has always been endemic to hobby gaming, and there's one specific mechanic that has proven to be a natural fit in capturing that feeling.

Guide to Gaming: When is it time to cull my collection?

We are living in the golden age of board gaming. More and more games are being released. More and more games are being purchased.

More and more games are sitting on players' shelves, left unplayed.

When is it time to cull your collection?

He Who Controls the Spice (A Review of Rex)

REX! Starring: Lions

The final days of the Lazax began in the seventy-third year of the war. 

These words can be found buried in the introductory chapters of Fantasy Flight Games' flagship title Twilight Imperium.  The words continue: Without warning, an alliance of Sol, N'oor, and Hacan attacked Mecatol Rex itself.  Of all the planets in the galaxy, no planet was more war-torn than Mecatol Rex.  Over the course of only a few years, the planet's ecology was ravaged by bombardments, its population decimated, and its green fields blasted into a toxic wasteland.

It is in this scenario which players find themselves during the course of Rex: Fall of an Empire, the prequel game to Twilight Imperium. Storyline-wise, TI takes place after a long period of galactic disarray and a vacancy in the seat of power; Rex occurs thousands of years before this, during the fall of the Lazax, the once-great empire that ruled the galaxy for untold ages. But does it capture the feeling of chaos and destruction described in the paragraph above? And more importantly, is the game fun to play?

FDQ: What Gaming Moment Was Epic?

You don't have to be playing an epic board game to have an epic board gaming moment, a moment when time seems to stand still, when all of the universe conspires together, when the stars align, producing a scenario that could not be repeated even if you tried. So that's today's question: what was your epic gaming moment?

@FarmerLenny speaks his mind:
I'll admit it. What brings this question to mind is last Friday's game of Ra.

I was playing a three-person game, and one of the players (that is, not me) had taken a pretty sizable lead that seemed all but impossible to overtake. In the final epoch, my highest bidding sun was a 7 (for those who don't know Ra, the highest in our game was a 13; 7 being my highest did not bode well). My tableau was mostly Niles (10 of them!), but I couldn't for the life of me win a flood tile in the last epoch.

Well, to speed things up, both of my competitors had used all their bidding power and were out of the epoch. It was just me, the draw bag, and my 7 sun. The Ra track was almost full: only one Ra tile would trigger the end of the game. The 13 sun was in the middle of the board. I still had no flood tile.

My dilemma should be obvious, but I'll lay it out here: if I called an auction on an empty track and traded the 7 sun for the 13 sun, I could easily seal the highest sun category in the final scoring, but I was fairly certain I wouldn't have enough points to win the victory. Then again, I could draw a tile, trying to reach a flood or another point-scoring tile, but the bag was primarily Ra tiles (the other rounds ended before the Ra track filled). If I drew a Ra tile, I not only lost my chance at more points; I lost the 13 that would seal highest suns.

I decided it was all or nothing. I reached into the bag and pulled out...a flood. The table erupted (or, at least what you can imagine a table of editors erupting to be). The tile was the difference between first and second place. Apparently we were a little rowdy because a coworker stopped to say, "What game are you playing? It certainly looks like you guys are having fun." That, my friends, is why Ra is awesome.

@Futurewolfie grunts:
You don't necessarily have to play an epic game to have an epic moment, but the epic moments in those epic games are pretty excellently epic.

Take the last game of Twilight Imperium I played. Bryan was making a bid for victory, with a huge fleet and a large army controlling the central planet, Metacol Rex. The other five players launched their fleets in a desperate bid to stop him. One by one, each player sent every ship within range to attack; one by one, Bryan's ships took hits but fended off the invaders. The final player that had any chance sent a large fleet, complete with War Suns, and took out every single one of Bryan's ships - except 1.  That last ship held, all invading fleets were destroyed, and Bryan was able to claim the point for controlling Metacol.  It was a space battle worthy of Return of the Jedi.

Admittedly, my contribution of 6 fighters and a carrier was fairly weak

Speaking of Metacol, we had another epic moment in the prequel game to Twilight Imperium, Rex. Bryan and I formed an alliance after about 5 turns to make a bid for victory.  We had to control 4 strongholds at the end of the round.  I had a stronghold but its shield was destroyed and in danger of the incoming Sol Bombardment Fleet; I also controlled the spaceport - another stronghold.  Bryan had another stronghold solidly controlled.  So I sent an army after the 4th stronghold, and Bryan sent his after the 5th.  The vulnerable stronghold was ignored as the Bombardment Fleet would have destroyed it; and the spaceport was targeted by another player.

In Rex, combat works by essentially "bidding" from your current army since in a particular location.  If you bid higher than the other player, you win the battle but sacrifice all the troops you bid.  (There are also leaders and cards to adjust the totals).  In the first combat, I bid all my troops but 1 and emerged victorious, taking over the 4th stronghold.  Bryan tried to take his stronghold but just couldn't make the numbers and was defeated by overwhelming force.  His other Fortress was unthreatened.  So, we had 2 fortresses secured, one under threat of bombardment, and one about to face a battle against outnumbering forces.

My opponent and I set our bids, chose our leaders.  Neither of us had action cards to play.   We revealed our numbers... and my opponent was winning by 1 point.  Until I revealed the traitor card from my hand matching her chosen leader, meaning that her leader betrayed her and she lost the battle.  Immediately after, I played a card to set the bombardment fleet movement to 0.  If we hadn't pulled out the victory, we would have had very limited troops in deployment and a very weak position on the board, but instead we just squeaked out a victory!

FDQ: What Game Is Beautiful?

Board game design, at least within the hobby, is considered an art form. Mechanics in harmony create a well-oiled machine that is wonderful to take part in. But there are some games that go the extra mile, and beyond being beautiful mechanically are beautiful to behold. What game best falls into this category for you? Answer in the comments!

@FarmerLenny answers:
It's hard to choose just one...so I'll choose two. The first is Fresco, which is a fairly obvious choice. The components in this game are astounding, and even the insert is beautiful. The artwork throughout captures the feel of master painters fulfilling their commission. A game about master painters that wasn't beautiful would lose all street cred, so Fresco seems like an obvious choice.

Next to Fresco, the next most beautiful game I can think of is Troyes. I love the artwork style in this game. While the theme is bland, the artwork more than makes up for it, drawing the player back in time to the Middle Ages. The subdued art and color coding make it a game that's easy to stare at.

@Futurewolfie answers:
The choice for me is obvious:  Twilight Imperium. Fantasy Flight Games, with their commonly hefty rulesets and lengthy playtimes may not appeal to everyone, but one thing is certain: they consistently go the distance with art, design, and the inclusion of fancy bits.  Twilight Imperium is no exception.  All the pieces and bits are excellent quality, with lots of color.  It all feels very space-y, with art for each race that fits well within the theme, and the ships! Oh, all the tiny little plastic mini ships.  Fleets of them! Fleets of these finely detailed constructions, all in one box.  This game is a delight to unpack, and it has one of the finest looking boards (once assembled) I've ever seen.

Takenoko is a fairly recent acquisition, but it too carries the banner of beauty.  With vibrant colors, solidly crafted stackable wooden bamboo pieces, and painted minis, Takenoko is definitely easy on the eyes.

Honorable mentions:  Battlestar Galactica, and Small World.  I seem to have a lot of beautiful games because I could go on.

FDQ: Minis or Cubes

It's an age-old topic of debate. Games come with a variety of parts. Sometimes tokens are relegated to printed cardboard circles; some games resort to classic meeples and cubes to represent various elements of the game board. And then some companies, attempting to pack in as much flavor in the components themselves, fill their boxes with detailed plastic minis.

The idea of minis excites many gamers, but some just wish the parts were simpler and the games were cheaper. So, fellow gamerites, what do you think? What is your preferred style of game component?

@Futurewolfie says:
I know that @Farmerlenny will probably hate on the minis, but honestly, I love 'em. I love theme and flavor in games, and detailed plastic minis just add a whole lot to that. Starships in Twilight Imperium? Awesome!  Knights in Shadows over Camelot? Sweet! Zombies and heroes in Last Night on Earth? Dude!

I realize there are drawbacks, and I can certainly understand why someone might prefer wooden parts; the colors are more distinct and easy to check at a glance, and minis definitely add to the cost of a game. Not every game needs minis—in Carcassonne, for example, it would be pointless to have minis instead of meeples (which are sort of like wooden minis anyway; they have such personality!)  Ascending Empires, while we love starship minis, just wouldn't work—the disks are needed for flicking. Fortunately, detailed stickers fill in some of the flavor so we're not stuck with plain colorized cylinders.

But you know what? Last Night on Earth would just not be the same without the minis. The crowds of zombies help the story and enhance the flavor. Battlestar Galactica's Viper and Raider minis may not be entirely necessary, but the ship designs are visually distinct and again, it adds to that Galactica feel. Twilight Imperium just wouldn't have the same feel if you have different sizes or shapes of cubies to represent the different types of ships in your fleet.

And over time, I think the cost difference between meeples and minis will shrink. As the board game hobby overall grows, more and more games will be purchased, and games will get bigger print runs. Bigger print runs means smaller cost per game—and the costly part of detailed minis is creating the original mold. Heck, even wooden tokens are getting more detailed and unique, with animeeples, vegemeeples, fruitimeeples—all sorts of meeples coming in various shapes and sizes. Woohoo! I love this stuff!

@Farmerlenny says:
@Futurewolfie only gets it half right (which is half more than normal, by the way) when he says I will hate on minis. I don't hate on minis. Minis are kind of cool...when they aren't used as a mask for shoddy game design. That I don't like most games that include minis isn't a judgment on minis themselves but on a certain type of theme-rich gameplay that ignores the more important aspects of game design: decisions, downtime, and a preference for simplicity over convolution.

To me, cubes are serviceable, and most of the time that's enough. I opted not to upgrade my copy of Agricola, being perfectly content with discs and cubes. I don't need sheep that look like sheep. I make my living by reading: I can imagine a story overlaying drab bits if I want to. But most of the time, my games don't need the extra layer. What's the story in Ticket to Ride? I don't care. The decisions are interesting enough that I'm not thinking about it. If I want a good story, I'll read a book. I play games for different reasons. I'm so boring that I came this close to not applying the included stickers in my copy of Belfort. But then I realized that @Futurewolfie cares about such things, and since he is the person I'm most likely to play it with...

All of this being said, however, I am not immune to the draw of fancy components when they are paired with a good game. Show me a beautiful game (with beautiful mechanics to match), and I will likely be putty in your hand. I'm sure this is nine-tenths of the reason I purchased Troyes, and one-half the reason I haven't traded away Fresco. It was also what kept me on the fence about El Grande and what keeps Stone Age hitting the table again and again. I have a soft spot for beautiful games and components, whether made of wood, plastic, marble, or glass.

But I'm also plenty happy with my original Director's Cut edition of Kill Doctor Lucky, which I taped together myself.

When We Played Twilight Imperium

 

[Disclaimer: This is not a review.  A single play could contain unusual circumstances that might not be realized until after further playthroughs.  When I've played enough for an honest and fair review, you'll get one.  Until then...]

Twilight Imperium.

That name strikes fear into the hearts of many.

It's sort of an enigma among board-gamers.  Like any other game there are those who love it, and those who don't care for it.  And then there are those who have never tried it, who look on it with wonder and probably confusion, and maybe even awe.  It is arguably the most epic of all epic games, a space-civilization-simulator in which players must manage combat fleets, planetary exploration and conquest, politics, research, and diplomacy, all while pursuing secret and public goals that lead to the claim of the imperial throne.  The game lasts anywhere from 4 hrs to upwards of 10-12 hours, depending on how many players, their experience level, and how many of the expansion rules you include.

Though the idea of an 8-hour game was intimidating, I'm a sucker for epic space games, and I dove in to my first experience on December 17, 2011.  We were 5 brave souls that ventured into the universe, none of us having played before.  We loaded up with snacks and pop and set forth in the morning, starting at about 11:15am (after a few late arrivals and a tasty breakfast) with rules explanation, and finishing around 8:00pm.

FDQ: What Game Is on Your Radar?

Conventions, blogs, and BGG—they seem like an endless source of inspiration (and temptation). This leads to today's FDQ: What new game is on your radar? Or, if not new, what game is at the top of your wish/to-play list? Answer in the comments!

@FarmerLenny answers:
As a huge Dominion fan, I'm obviously pretty stoked about the new Donald X. Vaccarino titles, Nefarious and Kingdom Builder, to see if lightning struck twice. (Admittedly, Kingdom Builder's name is lame.) I'm also pretty curious about Ora et Labora from Uwe Rosenberg. I love Bohnanza, Agricola, and At the Gates of Loyang, and this one—combined with a theme that interests me—is one I will follow with interest.

As for games on the to-play list, Fresco is at the top. It looks like a beautiful game, an interesting twist on worker placement. I'm quite excited about trying Glory to Rome—with schnazzy new art! I had avoided the older version because of the kiddish artwork, but I kickstarted the black box edition. I am anxious for its arrival. And thanks to The Card Gamer, I'm pumped to try out Ra. If any of you have a copy and are holding out on me...

@Futurewolfie answers:
This is pretty easy for me to answer.  Rex is the number one title I'm looking forward to right now. As a huge fan of Cosmic Encounter and the designers of that game, I've had my sights on the impossible-to-find-if-you-don't-want-to-spend-hundreds-of-dollars Dune game for a long time, so imagine my excitement when I learned it was being re-released in a new form in the Twilight Imperium universe. Incidentally, though Twilight Imperium isn't new, I haven't had a chance to play it yet, so it's also high on my want-to-play list.

I also really want to get my hands on Star Trek: Fleet Captains. I'm a huge Star Trek fan, but as there have been a number of pathetic excuses for star trek games milking the franchise, I was apprehensive. After trying it at Gencon, though, I found it to be excellent. 

Apparently I really like Space-themed games.

See, Nemesis, I can put in a bunch of random hyperlinks too!