Good Games & Great Friends: The Gathering 2013

The original version of this report appeared last week on the Opinionated Gamers blog... what you're about to see here is "the director's cut" with some extra pictures and a few more choice words of commentary. (That's your special prize for reading my blog!)

Set the Wayback Machine For 2002

Puerto Rico - the Gathering 2002

My first Gathering of Friends was back in 2002 and even though I’d been in the hobby for a long time, it was an overwhelming experience. Puerto Rico had just been released… and multiple copies were in play almost constantly throughout the week. (I myself played 4 times in the first 48 hours.) It was a real pleasure to be discovering a gem of a game and exploring the intricacies of it together with friends old & new. (Picture note: James Miller - my good friend & Gathering roommate - and I both had a lot more hair back then.)

In fact, what Alan Moon has created over the 20+ years of its existence is a 10 day long gaming party… where experiences can vary from being present at the coming-out party of a gaming classic to the comfortable joys of sitting down to an old favorite with old friends – and where long meals and sightseeing trips fit comfortably with long games and epic Loopin’ Louie battles. (Hats off to you, Mr. Moon… and thanks for inviting me all those years ago.)


Classic Games & Classic Experiences

I'm driving the Stanley Steamer in 3rd place...

The Gathering 2013 didn’t have a Puerto Rico. This year was memorable not so much for any breakout game – though I did find some very good games (more about that in a paragraph or two). The real highlights were a combination of classic games & classy friends:

• I enjoyed three different plays of one of my top ten games, Fast Food Franchise… Not only did I get to teach Stephen Glenn to play, but I also participated in an epic 4 player game that saw the map almost completely fill up with franchises.
• I managed a better showing in the yearly tradition of playing DTM Motorsportspiel after the prize table on a brutal track (Bruno) that saw experienced players crash & burn. I started in 3rd position (out of 10) and managed to finish 3rd place – which I count as a victory!
• I had to take a phone call while playing Wurfel Bingo with some wonderful friends… Who wrote down the numbers rolled in order so I could catch up when I got back. (I still lost… but a man with friends like that never really loses.)
• Years ago, Frank Branham strongly suggested I try Hour of Glory, a mash-up of miniatures combat & board game from England that does a fine job of getting the feel of a WW2 spy movie condensed into a playable gaming experience. However, the price kept me from ever having the opportunity – until last week when James & Sheila Davis taught me how to play using the Frank Branham-friendly “Die Zombies” expansion. Sheila & I managed to grab the plans from the secret bunker and kill off the Nazi guards controlled by James (with a great deal of help from the zombies) – but I had to sacrifice my Russian spy in order for Sheila’s American spy to escape the zombie horde with documents vital to the war effort.
• At the invitation of Ted Alspach, I ran a rather twisted version of Werewolf one night entitled “Werewolf Upon Werewolf”… which included what might be best described as “Chairs: the LARP”. (My pictures aren't particularly good - but evidently there's some great video of this out there somewhere.)
• I finally got to play some classics that I’d never played before: Auf Fotosafari in Ombagassa (thumbs up for this hard-to-find but very cool “kids” game), Hotel Life (which was fun but certainly not worth the insane prices it goes for), The Game of Politics – 1935 edition (another thumbs up – the enjoyment was increased by Kevin Whitmore’s excellent Southern campaign speeches), and Wildlife Adventure (I actually made the finals in the tournament!).
• I didn’t do all that well in the Loopin’ Louie tournament… but my one win was over the eventual winner, so I’ll claim that as a minor victory!

 

"Werewolf Upon Werewolf"

Day By Day By Day

I didn’t feel like there was one big “hit” this week. I did see a certain eclectic group of games get a lot of table time:

• Coup benefitted from being (a) short, (b) able to handle 6 players well, and (c) actually a pretty good little bluffing game. I played it four times and was surprised how much I enjoyed it.
• on the heavier side, there was plenty of Bora Bora, Terra Mystica, and various versions of 18xx in play each day. Those of you who know me well realize that I didn’t play any of these. (I will note that I want to try Terra Mystica… but the timing was never quite right.)
• Augustus started slow… but once a couple of early mis-taught rules were cleared up, I noticed lots of people playing it. My pithy & possibly quotable review: it’s “Roman gamer bingo” or “Cosmic Bingo” – essentially, Bingo with special powers and various scoring goals. I’d happily play it again after two plays last week.
• My biggest surprise was how many different times I saw Sentinels of the Multiverse played. While I’m enjoying it a lot with my boys at home, I was stunned to see it out on a daily basis at the Gathering.

Roach Coach in action!

Mark Jackson: Demo Monkey

Another Gathering first for me was placing a prototype with a publisher. I had the privilege of showing Jeff Myer’s Roach Coach – and having it taken for testing.


Some Random Thoughts on Stuff I Played for the First Time

The title of this section pretty much says it all.

• Like Dice (published by Adlung) is a very clever speed math game… and while I’m not all that great at math, I am pretty good at adding up dice pips. I could happily add a copy to my collection after playing it three times.
• I’ll be writing a full review of Arctic Scavengers in the next couple of weeks – suffice it to say that I played it four times at the Gathering and liked the way it managed to use deck-building to create a narrative story arc.
• Trains has had a lot of hype – a deck-builder with board play – and I think that having an English language edition with better graphics will be a real plus. I found that I enjoyed it more on the second play where I better understood the interaction between card & board play.
• I have big questions about the long-term viability of Rondo. Both games I played were won by the last player (this is a game with equal rounds) – and I’m wondering if the way the game works doesn’t encourage that kind of ending. It's pretty light but not particularly compelling.
• Clubs is just about the right weight for me – the guy who doesn’t particularly like Tichu. Tichu lovers need not apply.
• La Boca would have seen more play if there had been more copies there… it’s a speed puzzle game done in pairs with a partnership mechanic similar to the one in Monster-Falle. I agree with our Fearless Leader – I think this goes on the short list to win the Spiel des Jahres.
• Targi is a very good two-player game with interesting placement choices, a defined time limit, and tough resource management issues… but you need an English translation to make it easily playable. Luckily, one is on the way.
• Two games I had high hopes fell flat for me – both by the usually solid publisher, Alea: Las Vegas and Saint Malo. Both are perfectly decent dice games, but neither captured my fancy.
• Stephen Glenn's reboot of a personal favorite (Balloon Cup) arrived while we there - and Pinata is a simpler/more family-friendly version of the game, complete w/cute wooden candies. That said, it has some tougher choices (there are limits on playing cards off on the opposing side) and it's a great game. (Stephen told me that this version is closer to his original prototype.)

Looking Ahead

Rampage!

One of the privileges of attending the Gathering is getting to play prototypes. Granted, one of the drawbacks of attending the Gathering is getting roped into playing prototypes. Pick your poison.

I just want to quickly mention a few that I particularly enjoyed and am looking forward to:

• Rampage already has an entry up on BGG… it’s probably my favorite “Japanese monster movie game” ever – even over the long OOP The Creature That Ate Sheboygan
• I had the opportunity to play the Alien Orb version of the upcoming Race for the Galaxy: Alien Artifacts expansion… and now can say with confidence that I enjoy both ways to play the game.
• Brian Yu (brother of the Grand Poobah & Chief Bottlewasher of the Opinionated Gamers, Dale Yu) has a great family-friendly cooperative game coming out this fall called Treasure Hunters.
• The Suburbia expansion is very cool – and it’s not just a few new tiles. (Some details may change as we get closer to Essen 2013, but I really liked it. It adds some interesting decisions & play space without bogging down a game I already love.)
• I played two Firefly-themed prototypes: one that is still under consideration and one that is a “go” for this summer… a cooperative card game entitled Firefly: Out of the Black. A strong sense of theme permeates this quick-moving co-op.
• The big surprise for me was how much I liked Gluck Auf (from Kramer & Kiesling… to be published by Eggertspiele). Not sure what I’m allowed to say, so I’ll simply let you know that I’m looking forward to having my own copy and that it isn’t a sci-fi or fantasy game!

Big Finish

My last four games of the Gathering were the Can’t Stop tournament. I won my first two rounds, then squeaked forward in the semifinal with a second place finish over my arch-nemesis (and good friend) Larry Levy. (There were two semifinal games with 3 players each – the first two players to complete 3 columns advanced to the final.)

Daryl Andrews & I fight for the win!

So, I found myself in the final against Daryl, Rebecca, and the designer of two of my favorite games: Tom Lehmann. I quickly shot up the board & claimed the 6 and the 8… but it took what seemed like forever (thanks to a couple of near-misses) for me to finally nail down a 3rd column and the win!

That win means I get first pick off the amazing prize table next year… yowsa! (If I’d have had first pick this year, I would have picked up a copy of Mice & Mystics with painted minis and beautiful clay pieces to replace the tokens.)

Game Expansion Review - Dungeon Lords: Festival Season

It’s the same every year. You can call it the natural order of things, you can call it the “Circle of Life” – heck, you could even get Elton John to write a song about it! – but it’s regular like clockwork. You spend the four seasons hiring monsters, setting traps, and ordering minions to make things danker (with dark highlights, of course!)… then a lousy party of adventurers shows up with their torches and their sticky fingers for anything shiny and makes a mess of all your hard work.

Ah, such is the life of a Dungeon Lord – but things are changing in the kindgom, thanks to that crafty game designer, Vlaada Chvatil (no, I can’t pronounce his name correctly – thanks ever so much for asking). Through some weird fluctuation in the atmosphere, there are now FIVE seasons in the kingdom… and we’re so excited (and we just can’t hide it), so there will be a festival each year.

There’s a whole lot of other new stuff packed into this expansion box… as far as I can tell, it’s only missing two things:

1. the ability to play with more than four players
2. your own personal minion to fetch krullers & iced coffees for you and your friends while you play

Since there is probably some legal/ethical/moral questions raised by stuffing a minion into a game box – though these wouldn’t bother your average Dungeon Lord – we won’t count that against CGE or Z-Man. At the same time, I personally think the decision not to add an extra player to the game was a wise move – doing otherwise would likely involve some serious balance issues due to the design of the game.

My capsule review after my first play (with a pre-production copy nearly a year ago) was “It’s Dungeon Lord-ier!” Three more plays has confirmed my initial analysis – this is most certainly one of those “if you liked the original game & wanted more, here it is” kind of expansions. (By the same token, it’s one of those “if you didn’t like the original game, this isn’t going to change your mind” kind of expansions.)

What Dungeon Lords: Festival Season has in copious amounts is MORE:

• more monsters – to be specific, a Cockatrice, an Elderbeast (a refugee from the Cthulhu Ancient Ones Assisted Living Facility), and an Evil Eye [insert your own lame “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” joke here]
• more rooms – I wonder what kind of cocktails they serve in the Violet Lounge? On the other hand, I’m pretty sure that the gaming area of a FLGS I used to play at was the model for the Hall of Chaos.
• more traps – nothing says “Welcome to the Dungeon” better than a spot of Plague (Guns’n’Roses soundtrack optional)… or you can simply Catapult one of your monsters amidst the party. (Yes, we think the imp trap designers watched “Monty Python & the Holy Grail” one too many times.)
• more spells – as if those scrawny magic-users weren’t irritating enough, now they’ve got the ability to Level Up members of the party (without twinking!)
• more paladins – two new holier-than-thou warriors, doing their best Gimli & Legolas schtick (yes, it’s a dwarf & an elf – causing the same kind of havoc as the previous human do-gooders… only there’s two of ‘em!)
• more events – evidently the Minion branch of the Teamsters has been organizing in your area, because you can now be hit with a Minion Holiday. Or someone could send a message to the stupid human paladin and then you’ll have three knights in white satin to deal with.
• more gifts – for your minions to bring if you’re using the evil (and aptly named) Minions Bearing Gifts variant
• more delightful humor in the extremely well-written rulebook… as well as more rules variants for you to try

I guess if you want to get technical (like those inspectors from the pesky Ministry of Dungeons), the dwarven & elven paladins aren’t really new – they were an Essen giveaway. But, hey, they are new to me, so under the Inarguable Rules of Reviewer Rightness, I call “shotgun” or “dibs” or “sanctuary” or whatever.

The folks at CGE wanted more than MORE in Dungeon Lords: Festival Season – they also included a whole truckload of NEW at no additional charge:

• bards – a new character class who know a wide catalog of classic adventurer tunes (including, of course, “Brave Sir Robin”) and use them to encourage & embolden the dungeon party. The cowards (who immediately slink to the rear of the party and begin tuning their lutes) thankfully also know dirges – so as you reduce the number of the invaders, their mournful medieval Morrissey-like ballads make them less effective.
• unique opportunities – each year, four new opportunities arise, replacing one of the normal places you send your minions. Now you have traps pre-installed, hire really tough monsters, invest gold at the local bank, or even rent a basement in town as an extra room for your dungeon! You do, thankfully, have a one season “warning” about what new opportunity will arise.
• festival season – those unique opportunities lead to the Dungeon Lords version of a Pampered Chef party. You send your imps to pick up a special bonus, with the player sending the largest party of imps getting to choose first.
• improved tunnels – a new item that can be built thanks to one of the unique opportunities – you can pimp out one of your standard tunnels with extra features, chrome, and flames painted on the walls. I’m a big fan of the Dark Tunnel, which reminds me (fondly) of the “Your Torch Goes Out” room card from Dungeonquest.
• dungeon pets – because who doesn’t want a DireBunny or a Baby Golem skittering about underfoot? You now acquire one of these furry friends during the first season of each year. They can be sent into the dungeon to nip at the heels of the adventurers in a variety of ways – or you can hold onto them, feed them overpriced Monster Kibble, and gain a victory point for each one you still have at the end of the game.
• there’s even a very clever player board addition that folds to fit nicely over the base game player board & give you places for the expanded group of adventurers and your dungeon pets. (It’s really quite impressive – I was expecting stickers but this is much cooler.)
• Less sophisticated but still nice is the festival season board to add to the regular timeline.

That’s a lot of extra stuff to add onto a game… which begs the mathematical question: does MORE + NEW = better?

The answer (for me, at least) is a resounding “yes”… with a couple of reservations.

• Reservation #1: The added season and added round of combat each year do extend the length of the game. When playing with two players, the added time doesn’t seem like much, but with a full complement of four, it’s added about 30 minutes to the game. (The time isn’t due to fiddling with bits or uselessly complex rules – it’s more player decision-making & action.)
• Reservation #2: While I once again applaud the player board addition, I wish that CGE had included a sticker for the main board to remind us when to draw dungeon pets. Almost every time we’ve played, we’ve missed this at least once.

Those are, of course, pretty minor reservations. 

On the other hand, I love the variety of choices & the expansion of the ways things can go haywire in the game. The curve for planning ahead is more difficult (primarily because of the unique opportunities) – but each time we play, my look-ahead is getting better as I get to know the myriad of options. I also believe that the larger mix of monsters, traps, rooms & pets lets each player develop different strategies – I’ve been able to pursue both a “peg the Evil-o-meter at 11” strategy and a “Chamber of Commerce/Good Neighbor Dungeon Lord” strategy with success.

For fans of the game, I think this is an excellent expansion and recommend it highly.

Note: there was some word on BGG about some of the copies having printing problems – Z-Man has moved quickly to deal with those issues and continue to provide excellent customer service. Don’t let this dissuade you from purchasing a copy.

This review originally appeared on the Opinionated Gamers website.

State of the Blog: April 2013

I just got back from Alan Moon's The Gathering of Friends on Monday (it should have been Sunday, but United cancelled my flight from Cleveland due to mechanical problems and I ended up in the airport Sheraton eating room service brownie & ice cream on United's nickel) and I'm trying to get my feet back under me, blog-wise.

In the next couple of weeks, I'll be posting:

• my review of the game expansion, Dungeon Lords: Festival Season
• my review of the excellent ministry book, Dangerous Calling
• my thoughts about The Gathering, the good games I played, and the great friends I got to spend time with
• a personal response to an amazing blog post by Jen Hatmaker
• a post about our move to Texas
• and, God willing & the creek don't rise, I'll start back with more of my Top 100 games!

Thanks for being patient with the sporadic nature of the blog over the last year. 

graphic from http://www.briansolis.com/2009/11/rumors-of-the-death-of-blogs-are-greatly-exagerated/

One Year Later: Three Mini-Reviews

Last spring, I had the privilege of attending Alan Moon’s Gathering of Friends for the first time in 10 years. (Yes, that’s a long interval – the first Gathering I got to attend was in 2002 and the newfangled Puerto Rico was just off the boat & all the rage.) I got to play a lot of games (71 different games, some multiple times) and had a wonderful week.

Well, I’m getting ready to head out for the Gathering again this year – a thankfully much shorter interval – and that got me thinking about some games that I’d played for the first time a year ago… and wondering how much my opinion on them had changed. So, what follows are three mini-reviews of games that I left the Gathering feeling quite positive about…

Abaddon

review copy provided by the publisher

Extremely Short Summary:

What we have here is your standard “giant robot armies skirmishing on the surface of a valuable but forbidding planet” scenario – filtered through a fog-of-war command system designed by Richard Borg that is a cousin to the Command & Colors system.

Thumbs Up:

• very nice minis
• options for play with 2, 3 or 4 players – all of which work well
• variety of scenarios (with different objectives)

Thumbs Down:

• the rules could use a polish (though I appreciate the willingness of Toy Vault to include an errata page when the game was published)
• as in almost all multi-scenario battle games, the introductory/teaching scenarios do a lousy job of showing off how the good the system can be when it’s firing on all cylinders

The Verdict (2012):

When I played Abaddon on a pre-production copy last year (4 times in a week!), I was delighted by the awesome miniatures and the fast & furious game play. I understood why some gamers didn’t like it – it is more chaotic due to the use of both dice & cards for command than any of Richard Borg’s C&C games. At the same time, I could see it really appealing to my elementary age boys.

Two other observations from a year ago:

• Mike Gray (from Hasbro) passed by the table while we were playing & remarked that Richard had shown him this game as a prototype a number of years ago.
• I was given the opportunity to play one of the first “web” scenarios – and both the reorientation of the board & the interesting choices that both players are forced to make from the beginning gave me great hope for Abaddon.

The Verdict (2013):

With 15 plays under my belt now, I continue to enjoy Abaddon. My gut feeling that it would be enjoyed by my 11 year old & 7 year old was spot on.

We’ve reached a point in playing where we feel (particularly with two players) that the game tends to run a bit short… and we’re toying with adding 5-10 points to the victory point total required to win those scenarios. (There are two extra official scenarios, btw – available at http://toyvault.com/abaddon/index.html.)

I’ve come to believe that some of the lackluster reviews of the game were due to gamers wanting Richard Borg to create “C&C: Robots” rather than enjoying the game that was in the box. In fact, combined with Mike Gray’s comment, I see some commonalities with another classic “old school” Borg game – the excellent (if dated) Mutant Chronicles: Siege of the Citadel.

Escape: The Curse of the Temple

Extremely Short Summary:

A cooperative real-time dice-rolling expedition into a cursed temple… with a soundtrack!

Thumbs Up:

• extremely involving game (it’s the real-time adrenaline rush)
• seems to scale well with varying numbers of players
• the first expansion (Curses) is already in the box
• beautiful components

Thumbs Down:

• the game must be played somewhere with a decent sound system (due to the cues you need to hear from the CD)
• as with all real-time dice rolling games, there is great potential for inadvertent cheating

The Verdict (2012):

My two plays of Escape at the Gathering (also on a pre-production copy) were a lot of fun… and I watched a couple of other games. I spent half of one of my games with my hand glued to my head and my mouth shut (due to a pair of curses) – which actually made the game all the more exciting!

Interestingly, though, I walked away from the experience with some really big question marks about replay value. It was a frenetic & fun 10 minute experience – but how many times would I find myself willing to play?

The Verdict (2013):

Well, the answer is pretty straightforward – I’ve only played Escape one more time in the year since.

That doesn’t make it a bad game – everything certainly “works” in game terms & it gives a consistent adrenaline-fueled & noisy experience. The components are quite nice and the iconography is clear & useful.

But I do think that Escape will quickly become a “once a year” staple… or a game that’s simply brought out with a new group of friends. (Though there may be some limits on that – the speed dice rolling/recognition thing is not for everyone.) That makes it a game I’m perfectly willing to play but not willing to plop down my limited game-buying cash to own

Africana

Extremely Short Summary:

Michael Schacht re-purposes the “book” mechanic from his game Valdora for use in a clever pick-up-and-deliver game about exploring Africa.

Thumbs Up:

• the “book” mechanic both looks cool and adds a slight but important memory element to the game
• like many Michael Schacht designs, there are opportunities to cascade actions into each other that give you a feeling of accomplishment – even if you don’t win the game
• the production & components are lovely

Thumbs Down:

• there’s a sameness that develops from game to game – similar tactical & strategic choices

The Verdict (2012):

I played Africana (with a freshly released copy) three times at the Gathering. My first play was your classic “enjoying the discovery of the first time” experience – which led to the equally enjoyable “now that I know what I am doing” second play.

But the third play began to feel an awfully lot like the first two plays… and I walked away questioning if it would hold my interest.

The Verdict (2013):

Subsequently, Michael Schacht put a PBEM version of it online – and I played exactly one more time. Sadly, my Gathering impression was correct – while I like the game and enjoy the chances to make crafty moves & combinations of actions, it doesn’t feel like there is a great variety of storylines from play to play.

Like Escape, this doesn’t make Africana a bad game. It just makes it one that I enjoy but don’t have to own.

This article originally appeared on the Opinionated Gamers blog.

Yom HaShoah

First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.

Then they came for the socialists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Catholic.

Then they came for me,
and there was no one left to speak for me.

one version of a quote form Martin Niemoller

Meet the Unappreciated Pastor!

No, this is NOT a comment on my current "between churches" ministry status - this is an introduction for all my faithful blog readers to my favorite Twitter feed. Anonymously, a Southern Baptist pastor (you don't make WMU jokes w/out a little SBC in your blood) has been Tweeting some truly funny (and truly pointed) stuff.

What follows are some personal favorites...

on worship services

• Excited about my sermon this morning "Christ is alive! So why is our Church So Dead?" Working on my resume too.
• Why do we have an invitation? Mainly to keep the worship leader from leaving the service when the preaching starts.
• I don't know what the big deal about changing the music style is. What does it matter which type of music you don't sing?
• Special thanks to the Seminary student for his topical sermon on why we should preach expositionally.
• "It's important to be yourself in your preaching. Now, sign up here to learn how to preach like Andy Stanley."

on being a pastor's wife

• Well, I met this beautiful girl & she said "The Lord told me I was going to marry a pastor" & that's how I found my calling.
• I have no idea why so few people have signed up [for the Valentine Banquet]. My wife is super excited about spending Valentine's Day at the church.

on church life

• Some people are so politically minded they're no heavenly good.
• Nothing says “discernment” like saying “There’s a sign up sheet in the foyer if anyone wants to teach children’s church.”
• Most people came to Jesus wanting one of three things: Food, a miracle or to argue. I'm so glad things have changed in the church.

on Baptists

• Pretty sure the groundhog is a Baptist. He makes his once a year appearance and expects everybody to listen to him.
• The Buffalo Bills are looking for their 5th coach in 11 years. I'm betting a Baptist owns those guys.

on being a pastor

• I think I'd do well on American Idol. I'm used to criticism and getting voted out.
• I became a pastor because I desperately need the disapproval of others.
• How did I become a pastor? I was abandoned at birth, dropped off in the Bible belt and raised by a pack of wild deacons.
• The Pastorate is the only job I know of in which people that don't like you get mad because you don't visit them.

Want to follow the Unappreciated Pastor? His Twitter handle is @Rev_Norespect... and he also has started an Unappreciated Pastor blog.

Thinking With Your Heart (Classic)

This meditation on pizza & universalism was originally a supplement to a sermon series I taught on Heaven & Hell back in 2011...

They're just sitting there in the fridge, calling your name.. the last couple of pieces of pan pizza. It tasted so good a couple of hours ago.
 
If you're really honest with yourself, you're not that hungry. Actually, you're stuffed. But with all that tasty goodness waiting for you just a few feet away, it's easy to ignore the "No Vacancy" sign in your stomach.

And if you allow yourself a rare moment of gut-level honesty, you realize that someone else in the house (roommate, spouse, kids, rodents of unusual size, whatever) will eat it later if you don't eat it now - and you won't get any. You'll be cheated of the greasy cheesy pepperoni-covered yumminess.

So you make a decision to eat that ends up with your best friend being a couple of extra-strength Tums.

We've all done it at one time or another - made a decision based solely on our emotions rather than any kind of rational thought. Whether it was a couple of slices or choosing the wrong girl to date or blowing off studying for a test, we all can look back at moments in our lives and acknowledge that IF we were thinking, we were simply thinking with our hearts.
We live in a culture that enshrines our desires as the ultimate judge of morality & ethics - where our wants act as the rudder for our decisions. And it doesn't take much effort for us to fall in line, regardless of what we believe that the Bible teaches.

Now, you're probably expecting me to make some kind of personal application about turning to Christ or using our God-given wisdom rather than allowing our feelings to drag us around by our hair. That would be a really great article, by the way - but it's not where I'm headed today.

When this was originally written, I had just taught about a biblical response to universalism - the belief that every person will be saved, regardless of their relationship to Jesus Christ here on this earth. I have to admit that universalism is an attractive idea - it feels right. While it's almost impossible to argue convincingly from Scripture, it's not difficult to build a case based on the nature of God.

But those arguments break down in the light of the Bible & a full-bodied picture of Jesus - and yet it still feels like universalism is a good idea. I mean, who wants to see people separated from God? Who wants to try & talk about an eternity in hell?

Yet if those two pieces of pizza (or the ex-girlfriend) has taught us anything, it's that just because something feels right doesn't make it good or true. The winsomeness of a belief system - in other words, how much I like the sound of it - has nothing to do with the objective truth of that system.

So, as you think about & struggle with what happens after we die, I'm asking you to prayerfully engage the Bible and these ideas based not on your feelings but on a deep desire to know truth... even if it makes you shudder & cringe.

Kickstarter: Dungeon Roll

Up till now, I've avoided Kickstarter like the plague... while there's been some good games come out of the crowdfunding model (Flash Point: Fire Rescue, Eminent Domain), there's been some real stinkers as well (Carnival & Dragon Valley, to name two that I've played). 

But Dungeon Roll grabbed me, both with the basic mechanic (a push-your-luck dice game) and the theme (stripped-down dungeon crawl). It didn't hurt, of course, that the price was a mere $15. So, I backed it.

Now, one of the perks of backing was getting access to print & play files for the game... so Braeden & I mocked up a copy and have played it multiple times. Without getting into detail, let's just say that the game delivers exactly what the designer & publisher promise - a light & very enjoyable dice game with some interesting decisions. Couldn't be happier I'm on board.

If you'd like to jump in at a $5 discount (the actual MSRP will be $20) and get the Kickstarter stretch goal goodies, you've got about 38 hours. What are you waiting for?!

Kickstart Dungeon Roll

Five & Dime 2012: This Time, It's Personal

Here's my own personal Five & Dime list (the games I've played 5+ and 10+ times in 2012). (Yes, it's very late. It's been a crazy start to 2013.)

 Games with an asterisk [*] were on my Five & Dime list last year, games with two asterisks [**] have been on my list for the past two years... and games with three asterisks [***] have been there for three years!

For the last couple of years, I've sorted games into "with kids" and "not with kids" - but now that the boys are playing "big people" games with me (that's Braeden & I playing Battlelore in the picture), that seems kind of redundant.

DIMES

• Summoner Wars 80 *
• The City 32
• Quarriors! 28
• Ticket to Ride 18 *
• Roll Through the Ages: The Bronze Age 16 ***
• Friday 15
• Dungeons & Dragons: The Legend of Drizzt Board Game 14
• The Rivals for Catan 13 *
• 7 Wonders 12 *
• Fast Food Franchise 12
• Innovation 12
• Risk Legacy 12 *
• 1st & Goal 11
• Flash Point: Fire Rescue 11
• Abaddon 10
• Memoir '44 10 **

NICKELS

• Nefarious 9 
• Animal Upon Anima 8
• Web of Power/China 8 *
• Sentinels of the Multiverse 8
• The Settlers of Catan 8
• BITS 7
• Bounce It-In Game 7
• Archaeology: The Card Game 6
• Chaos in der Geisterbahn 6
• Eminent Domain 6
• Galaxy Trucker 6
• Monopoly 6
• Monster-Falle 6
• Race for the Galaxy 6 **
• Suburbia 6
• Zooloretto Würfelspiel 6
• The Ares Project 5
• Ascension: Return of the Fallen 5
• Battle Beyond Space 5
• Express Monopoly Card Game 5
• Forbidden Island 5
• Heroscape 5 **
• Monopoly: The Mega Edition 5
• Small World 5 ***
• Smash Up 5
• Tumblin-Dice 5
• Turbo-Team 5
• Würfel Bohnanza 5 
• Zauberschwert & Drachenei 5  

How Many Lumps Do You Want?

First things first - if you haven't seen the entire classic Bugs Bunny cartoon ("Rabbit's Kin"), you need to remedy that as soon as possible. (And while you're at it, make sure you see two other great Looney Tunes masterpieces: "Hair-Raising Hare" and "Rabbit Seasoning".)

More to the point, I feel an awful lot like Pete Puma right now, thanks to the reading & studying I'm getting the chance to do. (Being "between churches" means I have the luxury of studying without struggling to craft a message for next Sunday...)

It's as if God had a big hammer and was pounding a significant piece of capital T truth into my brain.

From Steve Brown's book, three free sins:

Prison, public humiliation, shame & failure are a big price to pay for freedom. But then again, maybe not. In fact, it may have been worth it all. Jim Bakker is dangerous now, because he doesn't have anything to protect.

From Paul David Tripps's book, Dangerous Calling:

In pastoral ministry, it is very tempting to look horizontally for what you have already been given in Christ. It is possible to be a pastor and a functional identity amnesiac. When I am, I begin to need my worth, inner sense of well-being, meaning, and purpose affirmed by the people & programs of the church. Rather than the hope & courage that come from resting my identity in Christ, my ministry becomes captured & shaped by the treasure of a series of temporary horizontal affirmations of my value & worth. This robs me of ministry boldness and makes me all too focused on how those in the circle of my ministry are responding to me.

From The Message (a Bible paraphrase), 2 Thessalonians 2:15-17:

So, friends, take a firm stand, feet on the ground and head high. Keep a tight grip on what you were taught, whether in personal conversation or by our letter. May Jesus himself and God our Father, who reached out in love and surprised you with gifts of unending help and confidence, put a fresh heart in you, invigorate your work, enliven your speech.

The question of the day is whether I'm going to take these knocks on my spiritual noggin seriously, or if I'm going to blow them off and default into a life & ministry defined by the opinion of everyone besides my Audience of One.

While doing studious (and important!) research for writing this piece, I stumbled upon What's Up, Doc: Top 10 Classic Looney Tunes Cartoons. Kiss productivity goodbye... and, of course, you're welcome.

Game Expansion Review - The Rivals for Catan: Age of Darkness & Age of Enlightenment

The Rivals for Catan: Age of Darkness

The Rivals for Catan: Age of Enlightenment

• Designer: Klaus Teuber
• Publisher: Mayfair Games, Kosmos
• Players: 2
• Ages: 11+
• Time: 25-90 minutes
• Times Played: 23x (Rivals for Catan), 10x (Age of Darkness), 3x (Age of Enlightenment)
• MSRP: $20 U.S.

Reviewer: Mark Jackson (review copy of Age of Enlightenment was provided by the publisher)

Nearly two years ago, I reviewed the reboot of the Settlers of Catan Card Game for the Opinionated Gamers blog – and I gave The Rivals for Catan a glowing review. I praised the quicker game play, the cleaner card interactions, the new structure of the game (particularly separating out the city cards into the theme decks), and then yammered on a bit about how much fun I was having getting a better version of a well-loved Euro classic to the table.

Well, two years have passed… and in that time span, Herr Teuber & the good folks at Mayfair have managed to put out two expansion boxes: the Age of Darkness (which was released in the fall of 2011) and the Age of Enlightenment (which just hit your local game store in the last week or so). I’m going to take this opportunity to review both of the expansions, giving an overview of the changes incorporated into the game as well as a brief stroll through Catanian history.

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

The underlying game system is not changed by either of the expansion sets – in fact, what each box offers is 90+ cards divided up into three Theme decks. If you have the entire set, you have 9 different Theme decks to choose from… and when you use the Duel of the Princes ruleset (included in the base game), you have another 84 different possible decks to play!

With the release of Age of Darkness, the revised rules for the Tournament version of The Rivals for Catan were published online. This requires each player to have their own set of cards & “build” their deck. As this particular style of play has never interested me, I can’t comment on how well the revision has worked.

The real changes in the game are because of new types of cards introduced in the various Theme decks:

• Region Expansions – which are placed adjacent to resource-generating regions
• Extraordinary Sites – which are expansions that are neither units or buildings
• Road Complements – which lay on top of a previously built much as a city is placed on top of a settlement
• Metropolis – which further develop a city
• Marker cards – which track various points & resources but are not physically a part of the geography of Catan
• Foreign cards – which are placed in your opponents’ kingdom to undermine his development
• Sea cards – which are used in the Era of Explorers deck

This variety allows for a great deal of freedom in building kingdoms – players are not constrained to follow one particular development path in order to accomplish their goals.

The Age of Enlightenment Theme decks add a variety of new symbols as well:

• General – “any resource of your choice” (Era of Explorers)
• Cannons – required to fight pirates (Era of Explorers)
• Sails – required to move & explore with ships (Era of Explorers)
• Wisdom – the currency of the “sages” (Era of the Sages)
• Contentment – public mood (Era of Prosperity)

The History of Catan

One of the interesting thematic ideas for the base game & the expansions is that each Theme deck reflects a period in the history of the isle of Catan. Each deck also has it’s own “character” – some are more concerned with speedy development while others encourage a player to hobble the other player by the judicious use of action cards and building powers.

The next bit of this review is a quick overview of each of the nine decks – three each in the base game, Age of Darkness & Age of Enlightenment – in “historical” order.

Era of Gold (base game) – a fast-playing deck where accumulating gold and creating a trade fleet are keys to victory. You can employ pirate ships to sabotage your opponents’ progress, but the deck is balanced toward growing & building rather than attacking the other player.

Era of Turmoil (base game) – the nastiest of the base game decks, the focus here is on developing heroes and buildings to support them to mitigate the effect of the action cards.

Era of Intrigue (Age of Darkness) – a religious clash looms on Catan between the worship of Odin & the followers of Christianity. Probably the deck with the least flexibility in strategy – you need to get at least one if not both of the Church and Odin’s Temple built in order to succeed.

Era of Merchant Princes (Age of Darkness) – once again, commerce points and trade ships play a major role. The Parish Hall (from the base deck) is important as well, as it allows you to search for key cards in the Theme deck.

Era of Progress (base game) – playing with this particular deck feels the most like the original Settlers of Catan Card Game… the need to create Bath Houses & Aqueducts in order to fight off the Plague leads you in one of two directions – quickly building cities & health advancements or choosing to expand your kingdom with a multitude of settlements.

Era of the Sages (Age of Enlightenment) – this deck will remind some of the old Dragons & Wizards expansion to the Catan Card Game… but it has been substantially reimagined & balanced. Sages are region expansions whose wisdom (owl points) feed a variety of effects on the Grove cards. We’ve discovered that you need to use these new powers, but that the “care & feeding” of them can waste precious time and resources and distract you from winning the game.

Era of Explorers (Age of Enlightenment) – exploration is the key here… in fact, one side of your kingdom now leads to a 3×3 grid of sea cards with islands, shipwrecks & pirates. This reminded my son of Klaus Teuber’s Anno 1701: Das Brettspiel – which we both think is a very good thing. Warning: exploration speeds up development and so you should work to stay “on par” with the other player.

Era of Barbarians (Age of Darkness) – a slightly longer game ensues as the victory point total is extended to 13 and the recurring Barbarian event means that both players are fighting an uphill battle against the system as well as each other. Building up heroes with strength points is very important.

Era of Prosperity (Age of Enlightenment) – rather than barbarian hordes (who you defeated earlier), you are now attempting to bring prosperity to your kingdom… and keep the people content. The Insurrection event has a similar effect on game play to the Barbarians… it slows down development until about the mid-point in the game, then the increased production & building powers send the game rocketing toward the finish.

So, which deck(s) do I like best? I’m particularly fond of Merchant Princes and Sages… both are tricky to play well and offer lots of interesting trade-offs in strategy. My son loves Explorers (for the exploring part) and Barbarians (because he usually makes it a point to get the strength advantage anyway).

A Few Final Questions

Q: If you could only choose one expansion, which one would you buy?
A: I like both of them. The Age of Enlightenment has slightly more difficult decks to set up & learn, so I’d probably buy that one second… but I’m very glad I own the entire set.

Q: This sounds like yet another glowing review… do you have any complaints?
A: The only complaint I have is that the counters used for ships in the Era of Explorers deck (Age of Enlightenment) are not very attractive. I’m working to replace them with small Settlers of Catan ships.

Q: Seriously, that’s it?
A: Well, I’m still frustrated a scoreboard for the various points (victory, strength, commerce, skill, progress) wasn’t included in the original game, but that’s a rather small nit to pick.

Q: Will the expansions make me like Rivals if I don’t already like it?
A: No. But if you do enjoy Rivals, they will increase your enjoyment exponentially.

This review originally appeared on the Opinionated Gamers website.

The Last Juror (Classic)

This classic post from 2005 is about legal thrillers & Isaiah 6 & what that might mean for each of us...

I'm about 3/4 way through John Grisham's The Last Juror, which is probably the 10th or 11th Grisham book I've read. (OK, I just went up to Amazon.com and counted - this is actually my 15th Grisham novel. I didn't actually make it all the way through Skipping Christmas, but I'm counting it anyway.) 

I'm really enjoying the book so far - he captures the feel of northern Mississippi almost perfectly, as well as the disorientation someone from the "North" can experience moving into the small town South. (Since I served a church in northern Mississippi as a summer youth minister, I'm stunned at Grisham's ability to peg those feelings accurately.) 

Here's what I'm afraid of, though. I'm afraid this is going to be the typical John Grisham novel. 

"What do you mean by that, Mark?", you ask. And I, as the writer of this piece, am obliged to let you in on a little secret. Mr. Grisham has a disturbing tendency to write 7/8's of a brilliant novel followed by a slapdash ending that is vaguely unsatisfactory. 

Witness The Firm, which is an amazing thriller novel with legal implications that devolves in the last 20 pages as the bad guys turn stupid and the good guy becomes darn near omnipotent. Or The Partner, which comes to its depressing logical moral conclusion way too quickly. (We won't even talk about The Brethren, which is filled with unlikable characters doing unlikable things coming to justly deserved ends... or The Client, which is just a profoundly silly book.) 

I must pause a moment to give Mr. Grisham credit where credit is due: The Pelican Brief is a good movie and a great book, one of my favorite legal thrillers. The Runaway Jury made me laugh. And The Testament is one of the best "Christian" novels I've read. 

BTW, I have the same fears about my own life. I don't want to spend 7/8's of my earthly existence making a difference in the lives of people, then spend the last eighth coasting to the finish line. 

Look, this isn't just about retirement. In fact, that's the least of my worries right now. It's about my moral character - the way I stick to what I believe. 

The weird cross-pollination of John Grisham & Joe Broussard's sermon this last Sunday (way to go, Joe!) is what sparked all this. Joe spoke about Isaiah 6, which starts out telling us that "in the year that King Uzziah died..." A seemingly inconsequential detail from Isaiah, intended to set the story in time - like if I'd said "in the year the Beatles broke up". 

Ah, but there's more to the story than that. Uzziah was a pretty decent king (and, let me tell you, decent kings weren't exactly falling out of the sky in ancient Israel). According to 2nd Chronicles 26, he "did what was right in the eyes of the Lord." (This, as well, was a pretty rare commodity.) He rebuilt Jerusalem, opened more land for farming, and helped increase the strength and technology of the army. (This guy could run for president!) He reigned for 52 years. But... (you knew it was coming, right?)  

But then the strength & success went to his head. Arrogant & proud, he fell. One day, contemptuous of GOD he walked into The Temple of GOD like he owned it and took over, burning incense on the Incense Altar. The priest Azariah, backed up by eighty brave priests of GOD tried to prevent him. They confronted Uzziah: "You must not, you cannot do this, Uzziah - only the Aaronite priests, especially consecrated for the work, are permitted to burn incense. Get out of God's Temple; you are unfaithful and a disgrace!" 

But Uzziah, censer in hand, was already in the middle of doing it and angrily rebuffed the priests. He lost his temper; angry words were exchanged--and then, even as they quarreled, a skin disease appeared on his forehead. As soon as they saw it, the chief priest Azariah and the other priests got him out of there as fast as they could. He hurried out--he knew that GOD then and there had given him the disease. Uzziah had his skin disease for the rest of his life and had to live in quarantine; he was not permitted to set foot in The Temple of GOD. His son Jotham, who managed the royal palace, took over the government of the country.
2nd Chronicles 26:16-21 (The Message)  

Ouch.Uzziah ended his days alone when "strength & success went to his head." It doesn't invalidate the good he did, but it drastically decreased his opportunities to enjoy it. 

So the questions start ping-ponging off the walls of my mind:

1. where do I trust in my own "strength & success"?
2. am I pacing myself to live a "right in the eyes of the Lord" life, or am I burning myself out emotionally, physically & spiritually?
3. who is speaking truth into my life about where my actions are taking me... and am I listening?

What about you? Are the choices you're making going to lead you into quarantine... or deeper & closer to Jesus Christ?

Making Special Teams Special Again...

...while I really enjoy designer Stephen Glenn's football board game 1st & Goal and thought that the individual dice sets for each team was a great idea, I haven't enjoyed the "duct tape & bailing wire" d20 fix that was originally published to deal with how these wildly varying expansion team dice sets messed with the base game's special teams rules.

Well, my griping days are over - somehow I missed that Stephen and R&R Games have web-published individual cards for each expansion team that allows you to play by the original rules without having 70 yard field goals. (You can download them as a PDF from the R&R Games website.)

If you have NO IDEA what I'm talking about, you can read Erik Arneson's excellent review of 1st & Goal on the Opinionated Gamers website. (Erik was the winner of the 1st & Goal tournament at The Gathering of Friends last year... and knocked me out in the 3rd round on his way to victory. Sigh.)