3 Boardgames with a BIGGER Brother

Sometimes a boardgame mechanic or theme is way too good to let it languish in just one game.  Here are just a few boardgames which have spawned big brothers or little brothers.

Ticket to Ride / Ticket To Ride The Card Game

Alan R Moon's classic train set collection game was released in 2004.  It is often seen as a gateway game and an introduction into the world of modern "Euro" boardgames.  

It's little brother was born 4 years later in 2008 and is a pretty neat little 4 player travel version of the original.  It does away with the board and all the little carriage meeples replacing it with the "railyard" and "on the track stack" to represent the cards you have at your disposal and those used to fulfill your route tickets.  

It's a different and faster way of playing Ticket to Ride and makes a nice change.

Ticket to Ride & Ticket To Ride The Card Game

Citadels / Mission Red Planet

Bruno Faiduti really knocked it out of the park when he came up with the action drafting / variable powers mechanism for the game Citadels.  He's used it in a bunch of games since including Mission Red Planet which replaces the city building concept with area control.

These play like two very different games and there's a lot more going on in Mission Red Planet and more opportunities for Player vs Player shenanigans.  The additional secret missions aspect can lead to some surprising end games with noone really sure who's won until the final scores are tallied.

Citadels & Mission Red Planet

San Juan / Race for The Galaxy

Whilst some will say "Hey wait a minute! San Juan and Puerto Rico are brothers!!" and indeed that is a fair point as they are both by Andreas Seyfarth.  I think the similarities in mechanism are much greater between San Juan and Tom Lehman's Race For The Galaxy.  In fact I usually introduce people to Race for the Galaxy by first playing San Juan.

There are so many similarities; the turn order role order mechanism, the action drafting and the concept of playing cards into a tableau and paying for it with cards in your hand make these spiritual siblings.  Race for the Galaxy is one of those rare games where the expansions really take a game to the next level and don't break it.  The inclusion of missions and prestige in the 3 main expansions; The Gathering Storm, Brink of War and Rebel vs Imperium, add so many new combos and ways to win that I now only play the game with those expansions. 

IMHO Race for the Galaxy is the greatest card game ever invented as it has so much replayablility and there are so many different ways to win and strategies to adopt.  It has consistently been high on both BoardGameGeek and The Dice Tower All Time Rankings and having won numerous awards including the Golden Geek and JoTa Best Card Game in 200.  

Infact I've played over 2,000 games of the Race for the Galaxy iPad version and I'm still coming back for more.  The game is also available on Android Play Store, Steam and on BoargameArena.

San Juan / Race for the Galaxy

2000AD Playing Cards - What Better Way to Play Savage Dredd

6 months ago I thought I would be back in the community hall with my friends at my Roleplay Club in South East London, Dragons Keep running my Judge Dredd Savage Worlds campaign in the flesh.  

Savage Worlds uses a playing card deck to determine initiative order and so I turned to eBay to see if I could buy a Judge Dredd themed deck.  Strangely all I could find was the 2000AD Playing Cards given away as a promotional item in an issue of SFX Magazine.  

2000AD Playing Cards - SFX Magazine Promotional Item

I'm now running my game online so I still get to use them by showing them to players via webcam but I would be cool to be able to add them to Roll20 as a custom deck of cards. 

I'd also love to know if anyone knows of any other Judge Dredd decks.  If you do leave a comment in the box below.

Carlos Ezquerra Colouring Book

I recently discovered this freebie gem via Slaine and Ro-busters creator Pat Mills website.

Carlos Ezquerra's 2000AD & Judge Dredd Colouring Book includes 5 free sample images of classic 2000AD characters for you to print out and colour in.

You can also purchase a printed book or a PDF copy of the full version of the book which contains 50 of the late great 2000AD art droid's most iconic renditions of characters like Judge Dredd, Judge Anderson, Strontium Dog, Wulf Sternhammer and Durham Red.

Carlos also has a facebook group (Colour like Carlos) where you can upload your completed images for all the world to see.

Zarjaz!!

Colour with Carlos - Judge Dredd, Judge Death & Johnny Alpha

Reaper Bones #26 - Translucent Terrors

Following on from last week's Ghostly Summons, this week I managed to finish off two more translucent minis.

Night Spectre - Julie Guthrie (SKU: 77099)

Spirit - Jason Wiebe (SKU: 77098)

As you can see I haven't nailed the photography or the painting just yet.  Translucent minis are more difficult than you imagine especially if you are trying to incorporate lighting.  It's weird how some paints block the light and others don't. 

Still I am pretty pleased with how the Night Spectre came out.

Newsround - Jan 31st to Feb 6th 2021

In the best tradition of John Craven's Newsround here's my rundown of "What I Learned" on the Internet this week.

D&D Beyond Team Exit

I'm an occasional user of D&D Beyond so this almost slipped under my radar.  Several of the D&D Beyond team left parent company Fandom including co-founder Adam Bradford, Tom Kenreck and community manager Lauren Oboe.  Now this might not seem like a big thing, but it might also be a foreshadowing of things to come.  

From a managerial perspective it makes a lot of sense that you subcontract out the creation of game software to people who are expert at that sort of thing and reduce or shift the risk of development.  

However, if it's a big hit, you now have a situation that a significant proportion of your customer base is using a product you don't technically control and have to pay twice for the same content.  Whilst you might get a cut of that cash under a licensing deal with said software company, it's a significant barrier to your future growth.

Is this the precursor to a WotC acquisition? Potentially, but it could just be individuals wanting to take advantage of new opportunities which have arisen. Time will Tell. 

SJWs Don't like D&D Puppets with Big Bewbs

Arieloa Borealis
(It's even in the name dudes)

As reported by Clownfish TV, apparently the social justice gatekeepers on Twitter are up in arms about the portrayal of one character in the new WotC approved D&D video stream The Stuff of Legends.  This outrage comes despite that voice actress Shanna Malcolm specifically requested that her puppet be a big bewbed lady Dragonborn Barbarian. 

I'm not usually a huge fan of these Critical Role style games but Stuff of Legends is doing something pretty cool which appeals to my generation raised on The Muppet Show and Fraggle Rock.  IMHO, having the puppets acting out the scenes really adds to the seperation between character and player.  I love it.    

Honestly, I get so tired of the box ticking virtue signalling manufactured outrage that I feel the only answer is to say:

"You go girl!!" 

£438 for a Digital Boardgame!!

Dropping into my inbox thanks to Asmodee Digital was this article touting the latest innovation in boardgame technology, the digital boardgame.

SquareOne is essentially a square tablet with an interactive border giving you a new way to play some of the most popular boardgames on the market.  Obviously Asmodee are heavily invested in this with 3 of their titles (Ticket to Ride, Terraforming Mars and A Game of Thrones) already having implementations.  The indiegogo project is backed by some of the other big names in boardgames including Kosmos, Ravensburger and Call of Cthulhu creator Sandy Petersen.

Backers can get in on the action for a mere £438 for the standard edition with an 8 game starter pack.  Whilst my eyes watered at this sort of investment (remember these crowd funded projects aren't guaranteed) when you consider that the average cost of a board game these days is about £40 then you are approaching a price point parity.

However, one of the great attractions of boardgames for me is that they are physical products.  They don't require an ongoing subscription to an internet service to play them, or an app to be downloaded.  If I want to thin out my collection and sell one, I can.  Unlike technology they don't have a product lifespan and tend to hold or even appreciate in value. 

That said, I do own several digital editions of boardgames for my iPad.  One of my favourites being Race for The Galaxy (also on Android, Steam and Boardgamearena) which has to be the best card game implementation I know of.  I've playtested the crap out of it during COVID-19 lockdown and racked up some 2,000+ games.  I guess for me the holy grail is to have an implementation which can run on ubiquitous hardware which I already own and be a VTT for Role Playing Games.

I can see the appeal of having all your games in one little box compared to having a house full of cardboard (particularly for the millenial generation rent) and it does look like a pretty cool way of playing some of your favourite games.

See It on Board Game Geek Firefox plugin

If like me you are constantly firing up a new tab to check what BGG thinks about a game you have just read about then this firefox plugin is for you.  Simply highlight a word on a web page and right mouse click to open a new tab with the games BGG entry on it.  So simple even Oleg would approve.