The King is Dead - A review

The quality of the components of this game are very good - cards have a nice feel, the box and board have good quality art work. There are a number of printed faction counters and coloured cubes to represent followers of each faction. 

The cleverness of this game is the different levels of strategy required to win. 

There are 3 factions Scots (Blue), Welsh (Red) and Romano-British(Yellow). 

To win you need the most followers of the winning faction, the factions win by controlling the most regions of Britain - but by collecting followers you reduce the number of that colour to win the region. To win a region a faction need the most followers in that region. 

However if there is a tie or no followers in a region then the Saxons take control..... If they do this 4 times then the game ends and the method of identifying the winner (leader of the resistance in this case) changes to the most number of complete sets (1 of each colour) each player has. 

You also only have 8 cards to play over the whole game - each player has exactly the same cards. 

The challenges are -

Forcing them to play cards - playing the last card can be a game changer. 

Bluffing your opponent about your intentions. 

Knowing when to let a region go - either to the Saxons or a different faction. 

Not identifying with a colour or faction - as this can lead to a faction controlling a number of regions but not have the faction's colours!

I have only really played this a 2 player game - roughly 25 minutes a game. It is worth the money to buy as there is plenty of depth to it. Would like to play with 3 and the 4 player "team" game. The game also has a variation to add extra challenge!

A recommend game!

Thanks to Steedo for coming over and winning one ..... Out of seven I think!

Morts 

Santa has been!

Well this is my gaming haul this Christmas!

To be honested I picked and probably paid for these but it is nice to get some stuff in the Christmas pile. 

I have read both Kings of War and Dragon Rampant which both seem to be good games, which I look forward to getting them to a table. 

I have managed to get the Better Half and Thing 1 to play The King is Dead, which appears to be a clever and subtle game - with different strategies to get a win. Unfortunately my opponents didn't seem to get the subtleties of the game (although Thing 1 did win!). I really want to play this again as it appears that it plays quickly and with lots of sneaky ways to win or lose. 

Morts

Star Wars - the force awakens - my thoughts

Well I got to see Star Wars - the force awakens last night. 

So for what it's is worth here are some of my thoughts on it.

1- did I enjoy the film? Yes I did thank you very much.

2- did it pass the numb backside test? Yes it did. It moved along at a good pace.

3- did I enjoy it? Yes - fits in with the Star Wars we all know and love.

The new and returning characters were developed and you cared for them - remember Peter Jackson characters you care about drive the story not big set piece special fx! Still narked how PJ managed to not make a good version of the Hobbit - I think there is a good film in there just needs editing, I digress. 

So it is a good film, but ....... Something was missing from it.

There wasn't anything new in this film to the Star Wars universe - it followed the same basic story as the original - even some of the ship scenes came out of 1977 (but with better special fx). Some of the plot twists were similar to those employed in Star Trek into darkness - changes of character, dark having doubts/worries of going to light. 

For all of the prequels failings and there were many they did expand the universe and how things worked politically - the big picture. In the force awakens set 30 years after the fall of the empire there is talk of the New Republic, the First Order and the Resistance. 

Now I know that I am massively over thinking this but after the fall of the Empire there would be chaos across the galaxy far far away - lots of peoples carving out their own bit of space in the aftermath - this is only 50 years or so since the clone wars and the Rebellion would have struggled to manage a smooth transition as it had been fighting the Imperial military for a number of years - or did most of the old imperial commanders just sign up with the Rebels and the New Republic? If so they would have lots of imperial kit.

So as I see it the First Order are a gang of old imperials trying to restore the empire - the Resistance are a front for the New Republic to fight the First Order. But I am guessing, so I personally think a bit of background development would have benefited the universe development... But perhaps they were worried about repeating the errors of the prequels.

Anyway go a watch it - it is a good film.

Morts

Men of Gondor

Well got some more figures painted - Men of Gondor or Numnenoreans for the Lord of the Rings range by GW.

On the whole pretty happy with them - not the best paint job I've done - but it'll do ....

Also did Denathor - again an ok job. 

Plan to use this lot with the GW games skirmish and War of the Ring, Lion Rampant (the soon to be arriving Dragon Rampant 👍), HotT (using sabot bases - see the old posts) .... They might also make in into a Frostgrave warband - Denathor would make a good wizard!

What to paint next ..... Should try and finish something, but my attention span probably means I won't!

Morts

Got some painting done!

Finished off some archers for Warhammer and or Lion Rampant! Or for Dragon Rampant which is on order from Amazon with release date of the 20th December, but if I'd ordered from Northstar would be in my grubby mitts! Hey oh my fault for going with the global beast .....

There are 12 - but not in the picture. Just got to varnish and base.

Morts

Cheap super glue!

Wasn't even making a model ..... Fixing Christmas decorations and this happened!

I keep buying cheap super glue and the nozzle doesn't seal probably, so the  bloody stuff escapes onto the tube! Had a number of finger sticking incidents when I put the gripping beast Vikings and Saxons together!

This was the worst to date 15 minutes of wiggling under running water sorted it!

Caught the index finger on the same hand on the gate latch - blood and ouch!

Hopefully will get some painting done so I can update with something else!

Morts

Battlelore - first game for me!

DK brought over his nicely painted copy of Battlelore. 

Took a little time to set up but I enjoyed  it. A nice cross over between a boardgame and a wargame (could be a nice diversion from all those computer games for you and the boy bro!).

The setting is Fantasy Flights Runebound world - which appears similar to the Warhammer old world. 

If I am honest l'm not that keen on the Chaos demon thing but I am obviously in a minority - I like the Knights versus barbarians thing. 

The game flowed well with the orders/action deck dealing with what units did what - no order no action - which was a little frustrating at times, no doubt the intention of the cards. These cards could be used in conjunction with the lore cards which allowed you to act in the others players turn or buff up units for an attack.

The purpose of the game is to get 16 objective points to win. You pick your objectives and the terrain on your side of the board and your opponent does the same using cards. The points are scored every turn so getting your objectives holding and knocking you opponent off theirs is the key to victory - something I didn't really grasp in the game we played so even after starting first I ended up chasing DK for points until he won :(

I did kill many more of DK's troops - which should be worth points so a moral victory to me :)

Overall a good game of that I'd like to play again, which also (with DK's painting) has some of the spectacle of a wargame - and certainly not beyond the wit of man to make some 3D hills etc for it.

Morts