The Joy of Christmas

One of the best things about Christmas is getting to visit family, and then using them to play copious numbers of board games! Listed below are the games I played over the Christmas period and a short recount/review of each.

Arkham Horror: I find myself playing Arkham Horror quite a lot, which is fine as it has good thematic elements and the cooperative nature of the game makes it feel inclusive for players of all skill levels. Despite having played many times I had only ever been in a loosing game once (this is probably due to almost always playing with four players which seems to be the optimal number), so when the Ancient One was revealed to be Yig (generally considered to be quite easy) I felt confident. However, some bad luck with the Mythos deck saw our characters stuck in their current locations for a while, which caused us to get behind on gates. In all honesty I think I would get the award for most useless as the only gate I entered saw me bumping into Shub-Niggurath and being devoured.

Blood Bowl Team Manager: This I got as a present and is a lot of fun. The game captures the absurdist feel of Blood Bowl with good flavour text and the rule 'cheating is mandatory'. The game has a good amount of strategy  as the winner is the player whose team has the most fans, not the team that wins the Blood Bowl tournament. It's also worth mentioning that the teams have different skills and abilities so they all play and feel differently.

Call of Cthulhu LCG: We didn't play this for very long, as the decks hadn't been remade in six months so it all felt a bit same old, same old. It's still a fun game it was just that we had other more exciting options available to us.

Fortune and Glory: The Cliffhanger Game: The only non-Fantasy Flight game in this list. Flying Frog's Fortune and Glory is a fun take on the pulp genre and the images used on the game cards give it a cute 'I was made by a group of friends' indie feel. We only had time to play using the abbreviated rules, but these provided us with an enjoyable gaming session. The game captures the pulp feel of riding motorbikes on Zeppelins, fighting Nazi tanks armed only with a pistol, and getting malaria to save the day perfectly and I'm looking forward to playing the full version in the future.

Lord of the Rings LCG: This is the game we played the most, the way the game progresses the story and the cooperative nature of the game makes for a wonderful narrative. Being able to customise your deck means that you can choose how you want to try and progress the plot, if your heroes are only good at fighting then you will have no trouble from the creature that attack you but you won't cover much ground. Often it felt like the best course of action was to simply run as fast as you can, which considering the source material shouldn't be that surprising.

Runewars: When open the Runewars box the first thought you have is 'this is going to be complicated!' There are many different plastic figures, as each race has it's own unique creatures, as well as board sections and several decks of cards. However, the game does a fantastic job of reminding you what you are supposed to be doing and how to go about it. The cards instructions not only inform you what they do but also what you should do next, serving double duty as mini crib sheets. This in no way causes the game be overly simple, as you still have to think ahead and plan your actions, as poor planning will result in winter destroying most of your forces. The game also strikes as nice balance between heroes and armies as both need to be managed to ensure victory.