Tannhauser Recap

Mike W. Greg, Tony A., Sam and Chuck played a couple of games of Tannhauser at the club today, and I wanted to share a few thoughts:

- The graphic, the figures, the board, all awesome. The color scheme, even, sets a mood of dark and erie encounters. Everyone was impressed with the thick card stock, nice figs, robust counters, thematic art. FFG, all the way.

- We played the simple Kill Team scenario, no finesse just kill-'em-all. It was easy for one side to quickly get the upper hand and make the game lopsided. I think that this game is going to shine in the Story, Capture the Flag, and Domination scenarios, where the idea is to accomplish objectives rather then just gun down foe. So, we'll have to try a few of those now that we have some grasp of the rules.

- The mechanics are not 'realistic' skirmish rules... well, lets face it, having a zombie Nazi aristocrat General hurling a mystic glass skull to immolate an enemy fighter isn't too realistc either. There were some rumblings about the need for opportunity fire and questions about the resolution mechanics. I suspect that the combat system has its own 'rythnm' that we just havn't picked up on yet. I'm up for drafting some house rules to see how they work, but it would probably be a mistake to try and turn this into a full fledged miniature skirmish game.

- One or two weapons seemed completely broken, like smoke grenades that can cover 1/2 the board in a pall of attribute-inhibiting haze in one toss, or mega blasters that auto kill with predictable regularity. Maybe it was because we were in a shoot out scenario and all that mattered was who had the biggest gun... or maybe we are misplaying some rules... or maybe smoke grenades are broken. In any case, all agreed that the game is good enough to take a few more shots maybe with some house rules.

- Our limited knowledge of all the special gee gaws made it both fun and frustrating... in future games we will know that Karl Zemmer has a magic gun that shoots around corners and plan our moves accordingly. However, there was a bit of "What the F?" when your character was gunned down by a phantom bullet whizzing around an open door and turning a corner. A few more games and a bit more familiarity and I think that factor will go away.

- We all took the basic combat equipment pack; there is a lot of customization you can do to your character by selecting different mixes of weapons that compliment each other. We'll find out in future games.

All in all, it was fun and creepy, and we are all looking forward to a few more games.

Friday Night at the Flights

It has been a while, so we decided to give Wings of War a spin. We have a complete collection of the WoW WW1 airplane miniatures at the club, and recently added the new play mats. Mike W. and Mike D. flew for the Allies in a SPAD and a Sopwith Camel. Chris R. and Tony took to the sky with a Albatross Va and a Folker DIII.

The star of the show were the great new play mats just released by FFG. They look great, lay very flat, are geomorphically designed, and actually cut down on the slip and slide of the airplane miniature bases. As you can see in the picture, they really enhance the game.

To get accustomed to the rules we played a simple 2 on 2 dogfight. The play was spirited, but the inexperienced Chris spent too much time turning the wrong way, leaving Tony in a fatal 2 on 1 duel with the Mikes, and after T went down in flames Chris managed to escape off the board.

In the second dogfight we added the special damage rules, altitude, tailing, etc. This was a tense, interesting, exciting duel. The combatants used every trick, with swooping dives, unexpected loops, clever traps. Tony burst into flames at one point and simply could not sustain the damage.... down in flames again. This time Chris's Folker was too far from the edge to flee, and faced the combined fire of both Allied planes. After a valiant but brief struggle he too was sent plumetting to the ground.

We all agreed that WoW needs to get more table time. We resolved to give some of the more advanced scenarios a try, which include bombing runs, balloon busting, and escort missions.

Metro Is Now An Official FFG Cthulhu LCG Location

Mike W. has been named a servitor, so we will be hosting Call of Cthulhu LCG tournaments and official events for this great game from Fantasy Flight Games.

Keep your eyes open because Mike should be bringing some of his new schwag down to the club as prizes for tournament play. And spread the word because this can be a great way to publicize the club and get some competitive play going now that Neutral Ground is "between locations".

Plus, check out the custom deck boxes that were created by Keith and shared on Board Game Geek. http://www.boardgamegeek.com/filepage/43265