Tried out the fairly new deckbuilding game, Mistborn, set in Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn world. At a game meetup we played cooperatively but were defeated. The game mechanics have a lot of similarities with Harry Potter: Hogwarts Battle, but inflicts a strict turn limit to defeat the boss. I dislike this mechanic because it tends to be quite punishing and in this case highly unbalances the game when scaling up to 4 players. Because there are only X turns available and you get stronger each turn you take each player will now be only X/4 as strong by the time the turn limit runs out. This is a fundamental issue with this game because you realistically cannot do any damage to the boss until you reach a minimum level of strength. So I think cooperative mode probably plays better with 2 or 3 players. You can also play it competitively instead.
Jess and I replayed the first scenario of Peacemakers: Horrors of War. We were victorious in bringing about a peace negotiation. It’s still a very unusual game of having minimal power to achieve your ends. Will eventually need to proceed to the later scenarios and see how they differ.
With friends we played Call to Adventure. This is the “story-arc generator” game. Your character begins with an origin, motivation, and destiny and then you cast lots to let fate decide if you are successful in achieving your goals along the way which shape your character’s story. I won.
At another game meetup we raced our cars around the track in HEAT: Pedal to the Metal. I lost. I continue to really enjoy this game. The mechanics are pretty simple and turns move fast, but I have yet to see anyone “solve” the game with a definitively winning strategy. And it comes with a ton of variations to layer in to keep it fresh. That and it’s a game in which you need to play aggressively to win, but playing aggressively doesn’t mean targeting and attacking other players. I typically adopt defensive / cautious play styles and this game pushes me to change that without feeling like I have to choose someone to pick on–which I don’t like doing.
