Dude! Take Your Turn!
A Gaming Life
Combat Commander – After Action Report – Scenario LoM #11 – La Villa Strangiato
Combat Commander can be a game of wild swings of luck, back and forth so much that it might make you dizzy (and make bad decisions).
Sometimes, though, there is just one swing.
You know how, when you were a kid, sometimes your dad was swinging you on the swing on the playground, and you were laughing away, totally enjoying it.
Until he started swinging you higher and higher, and you were so far off the ground that you thought you would fall off and break your neck?
And then you did fall and broke your arm!
Yeah, this game was like that.
(This was all a joke, my dad was awesome so I have no actual experience at that)
Anyway, welcome to the latest tale from the Combat Commander ladder, that monthly tournament of one of the finest games around, administered by the striking Patrick Pence, he of Patrick’s Tactics & Tutorials fame.
He’s getting his star on the Walk of Fame in May!
What year in May? Who knows? But it will be in May!
This month’s scenario is from the Leader of Men battle pack, a set of tournament scenarios that are actually very good.
My opponent was Greg M, somebody who I had never faced before in my 4-year ladder career.
The scenario has the US (Green – me) face off against some tough Italians (Teal – Greg) in Sicily after the Allied invasion.
(You can click on a picture to blow it up)
Let’s talk about the very few special rules to this scenario.
Read MoreClank! – Sunken Treasures Coming to Digital This Summer
(Edit 5/15/25): The release date (on Steam at least) has been announced as May 21! I’ve asked whether that includes iOS and Android but haven’t heard back
Or at least that’s what “Quarter 2 2025” means to me!
Don’t quote me on the exact time frame.
Anyway, Clank is one of the Dire Wolf digital apps that I keep coming back to for asynchronous games, and the occasional solo one!
Now the first expansion for the game, Sunken Treasures, has been announced to be hitting the Steam version of the game.
This is great news!
As much as I love this game and keep coming back to it, the dungeon environments are getting a little stale.
Not stale enough for me to stop playing, but stale enough that some fresh content would be good!
Here’s a screenshot from the Steam page where you can put it on your Wishlist for when it finally does come out.
The expansion adds two new dungeons: The Pirate Ship (shown above) and the Seaside Castle.
It also has 35 new cards, from new monsters to new stuff that can help you with them!
I’m always in at least two asynchronous Clank games, especially since they made so many quality of life improvements to the app (skipping replays can be a godsend at the beginning of the game!).
This may force me to try and get into more games.
If you’re fan of the game itself, did you like this expansion?
Are you (any of you) excited about this release?
At least as much as I am?
If so, let me know!
Exploring the Underworld – Faraway: People From Below review
Some expansions for games make huge changes to it, maybe fixing something from the base game or giving new avenues to win the game.
Maybe the Mask strategy is really weak and this expansion makes it stronger?
Some expansions just add a bit more stuff to the game, not making any major changes but instead just additional content.
Some companies (like Alderac) call those micro-expansions because they’re just a bunch of cards.
Other companies just label them “expansions” and put them out for retail sale like any other expansion.
Catch Up Games and Pandasaurus Games did the latter for their new expansion (it says 2024, so I assume it’s only 2025 in North America where Pandasaurus is finally able to distribute it) for the really popular (and awesome) game, Faraway.
The game (and expansion) were designed by Johannes Goupy, Corentin Lebrat with artwork by Maxime Morin.
Faraway: People From Below is simply a 17-card expansion that adds some content to the game as well as the ability to play with 7 players.
The expansion comes with 8 new Sanctuary cards and 9 new Region cards. Nine new regions, eight rounds in the game…hey, that’s enough for another player!
One fun aspect of these expansion cards is that finally the grey cards (newly named “Mystical Havens”) may actually get you something other than the symbols on them (or scoring opportunities).
Friday Night Shots – A Quick & Dirty Top 50
Welcome back to the bar!
Last month, I mentioned how this is almost becoming a monthly thing instead of a weekly thing.
That was…one month ago.
I guess it is!
Welcome to the finest bar in the city, because it’s so clean.
It certainly is uncontaminated by customers.
So that gives us time to talk boardgames!
Don’t mind the jukebox. It was fixed, but for some reason it just started putting out loud white noise.
The workmen said that it was a glitch in the system, but I’m pretty sure they actually just put that in there because I wouldn’t pay them.
Anyway, since we have the bar to ourselves, how about we take another gander at our Top 50 board games?
Read MoreNew to Me – March 2025 – Part 1
As I mentioned in my March Games played post, I played a lot of games last month.
Not only that, but a whole 14 of them were new to me!
That means this post would be monstrously long if I tried to pack it all into one.
Or I would not really say much about either one.
Thus, it’s been split into two parts, with the first seven games below.
The Cult of the New to Me gave me a little bit of a side-eye, given that so many of the games were pretty new (some even 2025!)
One’s not even out yet!
However, one was from 2017 and it was a convention where I played most of the new stuff, so I did a little begging.
Ok, a lot of demanding, actually.
They were mollified…for now.
Personally, I still think they’re plotting against me.
The life of a cult leader is never restful.
Anyway, without further ado (all of my ado was eaten by some carnivorous fish anyway), let’s begin!
Read MoreMarch 2025 Gaming
I knew March was going to be a big month for gaming, considering the Terminal City Tabletop Convention weekend.
However, I had no idea how big it would be!
Last month, I had 20 plays of 14 different games, and I thought it was good.
I knew March would be better…but my mind was blown.
Literally!
Well, figuratively, but still…
That’s right.
I had 44 plays of 33 different games in March.
That’s, like, an infinity of numbers higher!
But anyway…
Here are the games I played in March 2025.
And here they are in grid format. There are two pictures!
Many thanks to the wonderful Boardgame Stats app for these pictures and numbers.
With that many games, I’m sure there were a bunch of highlights, right?
Let’s take a look.
Read MoreLike Sands Through the Hourglass – Sandbag Review
Trick-taking card games are no longer “dime a dozen” examples of games just quickly designed and then thrown out the door to the teeming masses (though really, up until a little while ago, were there teeming masses for trick-taking games?).
Now they all involve some kind of hook, a unique mechanism (or a unique twist on a standard mechanism) that tries to make them stand out among all of the other trick-taking games that are coming out during the Great Trick-Taking Renaissance (TM Mike Dilisio).
Some make a massive impact on the consciousness (or at least my consciousness), and some have a decent impact but get in their own way just a little bit.
Sandbag is one of those latter games.
Sandbag was designed by Ted Alspach, with artwork by Greg Bartlett, and was published by Bezier Games in 2024.
It plays 3-6 players.
Trick-taking games always have a choice to make: is winning tricks good? Or is it bad?
Are points good? Or are they bad?
Sandbag falls into the “bad” category, as you are trying to take as few tricks as possible.
The number of twists in the game, though, makes this stand out in the genre.
Read MoreWanna Join the Circus? – Scout Review
Joining circuses can be fun!
But who knew the process of joining was just playing a bunch of cards?
Do the cards with people’s names and circus skill set represent them being rejected when they are placed on the table? Or are the combinations of these cards placed down the groups of circus performers who are actually hired?
Ok, let’s forget the theme. No more circus talk.
Scout is a card-shedding game published by Oink Games in 2019. It was designed by Kei Kajino with art by Kajino, Rie Komatsuzaki, Jun Sasaki, and Shohei Asaoka.
Like many card-shedding games, players will be trying to lay down sets (same number) or runs (sequential numbers) in order to empty their hands.
This is called “showing”
However, Scout has some unique mechanisms that make it stand out in this crowded arena.
(That was a gladiator reference, not a circus one)
Read MoreTerminal City Tabletop Convention Retrospective – 2025
Last weekend was the 10th (maybe 11th?) annual Terminal City Tabletop Convention (though I guess it was interrupted by COVID so not actually 11?).
I have to say it was probably the best yet.
In previous years, the people running it didn’t do the best job.
Right after the COVID lockdowns were over, a new group took over but it was so late (and I think they actually lost the reservation for the previous space for some reason?) that they didn’t have a lot of choice in venues.
The venue they were able to get was…not ideal.
Last year, they moved to the Vancouver Convention Centre and it was much better! Though space was still a little bit of an issue, it wasn’t as bad.
This year, it was almost perfect.
The initial getting in process on Friday was still awkward and kind of stressful, but once we were in (and on Saturday and Sunday), the convention was the best in I don’t know how long.
Plenty of space for people! Sure, no outside food and drink was allowed (though they were pretty lenient as far as drinks go, at least in my experience) and the in-room cafe was way overpriced, but that’s not their fault. Those are Convention Centre rules.
Overall, I had an amazing time. I got lots of games played, saw a bunch of old friends I haven’t seen in a while, and met some new people as well!
Conventions are awesome, that’s all I have to say.
But you’re here for the games, right?
So let’s take a look at those.
Read MoreLacrimosa – Storage Solution from Folded Space
It’s been a while since I’ve put together a Folded Space insert (some of the best game inserts out there right now), but when I bought Lacrimosa direct from Devir Games when it went on their Black Friday sale for a steal, I knew I had to get this one.
There are a bunch of pieces and tiles and cards and tokens, all forming a mish-mash of bags. Along with the various player boards and main boards!
It was a mess.
Picking up the Folded Space insert, though, putting it back together was a breeze!
It fits the game box perfectly, though they didn’t quite account for the thickness of the rulebook.
The insert page says that there is no lid lift, and that is totally true.
If you leave out the rulebook.
Because the rulebook is thick enough that there’s just a bit of lid lift on it.
Not enough to worry about. I’m happy about it.
But it is there.
Read More
Dude! Take Your Turn! 