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Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II

Once again, bringing you timely reviews of the hits of 2009! … wait, really, 2009? I must have gotten this in a bundle. I apparently have the “Grand Master Collection,” which I know I didn’t pay $80 for. I only went as far as the single player campaign; if online ranked play is still ongoing, I don’t really need those achievements.

It’s fun as a small squad RTS. You do not have the usual RTS economic aspect. You just have four hero units, most of whom come with grunts that you can refill at beacons. It does not seem incredibly deep. It felt like the same thing across missions, without a big, visible difference between enemy factions. Maybe the differences are more apparent if you play as them.

I played on normal (“Sergeant”) difficulty. It was rather easy. The ability to pull back and refill your units, costing only time, makes it very difficult to fail. And there are no time limits. I followed a recommendation to clear the map, rather than race to completion, because that gives you optional objectives and advancement is based on xp (kills) and loot (which can be cashed in for xp). That was presumably part of the ease, staying ahead of the leveling curve. The game has another snowball mechanic: do well to get more missions per day, with a side objective that increases your score there. Always do your first mission on Calderis, with that maximum side objective bonus, and you get enough missions to never worry about catching the defense missions before they expire.

The humans vs. eldar vs. tyranids story feels a lot like Starcraft, even after throwing in “vs. orcs, too.” I am well aware of which IP came first, but it is hard not to see it. Can you imagine how much happier it would be to be Games Workshop if Warcraft had been a Warhammer game, and then Starcraft had been 40k?

The pack I got also had “Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II – Chaos Rising” and “Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II – Retribution,” with bonus name length and punctuation. It looks like the game got up to six races by the end, any of which can run the campaign. Keen!

But my overall feeling after the original space marine campaign was that the game was worth a few missions but not a whole campaign. The basic play was familiar and basic, and the fights did not have much variety to them. Again, they probably did with closer examination, but “attack move to shoot and smash things” covered most of the game, with some strategic redeployment and use of abilities. I ran the first few missions with the stealth hero in my squad, working on careful deployment and use of abilities. Then I realized that I could just smash through the enemy without much thought.

If you like small squad RTSes, this has a lot of enemies to smash. This is your good grind.

: Zubon

Gaming Tables

Every time I go to Gen Con, it restores my resolve to buy a gaming table, although that always remains in the “after the next time we move” category. And I haven’t moved in a while. And Geek Chic shut down this summer after their deal on Shark Tank fell through. It’s a shame; I cannot speak to the market for high quality, high margin, low volume, niche market luxury products. Last year’s Gen Con post will direct you to competitors like BoardGamesTables.com and Caroline Game Tables.

Let’s talk about a few new entrants into that space. In honor of last year’s theme of “everything seems to be on Kickstarter,” all three are Kickstarting right now. Crowded market all at once, but “just after Gen Con” is either the best or the worst time to catch tabletop gamers.

  • Transforming Designs had a Game Anywhere Table campaign, now running a sequel campaign for more versions. Their gimmick is the portable nature of the table, which folds up, along with a variety of magnetic add-ons like card holders and “player pockets.” Portability is nice, although I am not sure how often I have needed a portable gaming table. It also has a bit of that folding table feel and is built around an assumption of four players. Much less expensive than the more permanent tables, $400 versus more than $1000. At which point you may have an uncomfortable comparison versus the cost of a non-gaming folding table, which is closer to $20.
  • The Gaddis Gaming TableTopper 2.0 is also a follow-up Kickstarter, this time to a project from two years ago. Their version is also portable and, as the name implies, is a topper to covert existing tables to a gaming space, intended for miniature wargaming. Their new project is for adding customizability and options, like finishes and modular components for larger and smaller gaming spaces. It is made of foam, which helps with the carrying and floating. In case you have ever wanted to do some gaming while swimming. The Kickstarter is already successful, but it seems far less popular than the actual tables, which has a lot of reasons behind it: foam, built for the even more niche wargaming market, not actually a table, rails on only two sides, fewer options, cost comparable to the lower-end Game Anywhere Table.
  • The Table of Ultimate Gaming is a more traditional table and then some. They have fewer options than BoardGameTables.com but are much more competitive on price, capping at $1000 as a Kickstarter price where others start above $1000. They have two sizes, three heights, and a few colors, which must help with keeping down some complexity and cost. They add complexity back in with the sort of modular add-ons that Geek Chic and the Game Anywhere Table have. They have decoration packs in case you want to advertise it as a gaming table rather than disguise it as a standard dining room table. What I found most interesting was modular tables sizes. The sides are removable, so if you want a bigger table (now or later), just get a second table put them together (I am unclear on whether anything would hold them together except gravity and friction). Downside: assembly is required, and the lower surfaces of the table make that apparent. Compare these corners to these ones from BoardGameTables.com. The latter advertises hand-crafting, whereas this advertises laser-cutting. You get a bit more of an Ikea experience here, at a much lower price. Having power outlets in the table is nice for some options. I am unclear on what the “play mat” is made from.

Thoughts? Comments? More information or other recent entrants into the market?
: Zubon

4000 Achievements

steam achievement showcase: 4000 achievements At the end of the year, I will have been on Steam for 10 years. I just earned my 4000th achievement, so I earn about 8 achievements per week. Many of those must come in large lumps, because I do not play Steam games everyday, nor does everything generate achievements. Still, we all have those days when you complete a game and get seven achievements all at once for various options you chose along the way.

You have heard me have strong opinions about achievements in games. I apparently have some experience with them.

: Zubon

“Imagine if Starbucks was run like Steam”

Wilhelm strikes back on the gaming market. Excerpt:

The video game market is overloaded with choices, most of which are uninspired imitations or direct knock-offs of worn-out concepts we’ve seen many times before hidden behind a series of horrible user interfaces that defy people to actually find the gems in the huge steaming stack of dung that is the video game market.

: Zubon

Gen Con 50

Gen Con was this past weekend, its 50th anniversary. It was the largest ever, with 207,979 “turnstile” attendance (about 60,000 people, most of whom went for multiple days). It overflowed into the football stadium next door, and it still completely sold out before the convention started. Those are impressive numbers for a bunch of gamers getting together.

I skipped this year, and Gen Con may be too big for me at this point. That is a lot of people to have crowding into even a large space. Extroverted nerds are exceedingly excited, and cosplayers will have an ever-growing audience.

: Zubon

Lost Cavern – Mirror Match

Heroes of the Storm does, however, occasionally set its ARAM mode as a mirror match, 10 copies of the same hero. These are never fun, combining the worst elements of HotS and LoL. These games are decided early but take too long to actually resolve.

There was not a rating offer after my last one, so this post suffices. I uninstalled Heroes of the Storm and the Battle.net Launcher. I would rather never play again than ever play that mode again. And since the mirror matches are handed out at random, bye HotS.

: Zubon

Lost Cavern

The brawl map of the week for Heroes of the Storm is Lost Cavern, HotS’s version of LoL’s ARAM. In many ways, it solves some of the problems with both HotS and ARAM.

The basic problem of HotS has always been that minigames trump laning and fights. ARAM removes any objectives except team fights in one lane.

ARAM is as random as the name suggests. Lost Cavern lets you pick from three heroes and shows you team comp while you do. Controlled randomness, rather than absolutel chaos. You can still win and lose on team comp, but not utterly and before the game starts.

: Zubon

Rubber Duckie

A friend blogging at The Unit of Caring writes about rubber ducks as the ideal of gaming … if you are a baby. Excerpt:

… the reason we enjoy different media at different ages is that interesting things are things that are the right amount of surprising and comprehensible. … Interesting things are in the sweet spot where they make enough sense you can form expectations and not so much sense that your expectations are wholly sufficient and the follow-through completely predictable.

And to a baby, the most delightful game in the world is ‘throw the duck out of the bathtub; throw the duck back into the bathtub’

She discusses what “the right amount” means to us and to a baby. Please do read for a delightful vignette. “Merlin” is the baby in question; she is not bathing an ancient wizard of inestimable power (or if she is, that is a different person).

: Zubon

The blog name is a reference to this post, discussing a concept better known as “earning to give.”

Card-Based Rogue-likes

Two games in my recent rotation are Guild of Dungeoneering and Hand of Fate. Both use card-based mechanics and a bit of deckbuilding alongside roguelike elements. Both games set you against fixed challenges, where the path there is built from a player-influenced set of cards. Your weapons against them are player-influenced sets of cards.

Hand of Fate gives you more control over the enemy deck but less on how it comes into play. You pick out what cards (challenges) are in the dealer’s hands, subject to restraints like fixed cards for each quest and based on your progress through sidequests. Once that happens, it is all in the dealer’s hands. The dealer lays out cards on a path you must follow, sometimes with paths you can choose, but always with cards face-down. That is its most rogue-like element. You never know what you’re walking into until the card flips over, and there are few chances to flip cards other than walking into them. In Guild of Dungeoneering, the player has no control over which cards form the dungeon, but the player chooses which, where, and how many to play each turn. You are occasionally dealt nigh-impossible cards for your hero, but it feels like a lot more control. The interesting decisions in Hand of Fate come during deck construction, while they come during gameplay for Guild of Dungeoneering. Score one for Guild of Dungeoneering, since most of your time is spent playing.

Both games let you customize your hero and equipment. Guild of Dungeoneering gives you an expanding roster of heroes to pick from. Hand of Fate has an expansion that lets you pick “Fate” modifiers (characters). More choice up front for Hand of Fate, at an extra dollar cost, but less choice throughout the game. Equipment generally comes with victories in both games. Guild of Dungeoneering lets you pick one of a few choices for each victory. Hand of Fate has far fewer choices but more equipment slots and a fair number of shops to buy and sell equipment. You customize a deck of possible equipment finds at the start of each Hand of Fate game; Guild of Dungeoneering unlocks more cards with the same cash pool that lets you unlock more heroes, and all cards are available each time. Better equipment customization options in Hand of Fate, and more individual choices in Guild of Dungeoneering.

Hand of Fate has a lot of random events. Most of them are a card-based “subgame,” although the whole game is “pick one of four face-down cards.” Not a terribly interesting decision. Equipment and curses can influence it, which has led me to the question of whether the odds are as they appear or if the cards are simply a graphic covering a percentile chance, as the wheel is in Renowned Explorers: International Society. In REIS, the wheel always likes to show a very close spin, nearly winning or losing on each. In Hand of Fate, there is equipment that straight up eliminates a “fail” card from the mix, but other equipment refers to changing odds in a way that makes no sense if you have a 25% chance of getting each card. Hand of Fate also has a combat subgame, which is somewhat entertaining but not great; if you see combat as the centerpiece of a game, and why wouldn’t you in a fantasy quest about getting loot and killing foes, it is not a strong centerpiece.

Guild of Dungeoneering uses a card game as its combat. Each character and monster has base abilities and skills, which translate into cards. Your equipment adds skills, which adds cards. Specialize, and you get stronger cards. Diversify, and you get more variety in cards, but you still play just one per round. The card game is nothing enormously special, variations on two types of attacks and blocks along with some exotic effects. It is entertaining, but most of the decision seems to be made by how well your class/equipment plays against this sort of monster plus whether one of you gets extremely bad luck. That makes your play in the other level of card game very important, but there are relatively few chances to feel like your beautiful mid-combat play saved the day. You can play well, but stacking the odds in your favor is stronger than playing the odds.

On the graphics and atmosphere side, Hand of Fate is dark and brooding. It has an aura of mysticism, although it seems skin deep. Guild of Dungeoneering is cartoony and cute, its narrator somewhat meaner. Hand of Fate has a bitter fortune teller laying out the cards and commenting on your progress. Guild of Dungeoneering has a bard taunting death for every quest. Graphics for either game are decent enough for what they are trying to do.

I think I have been enjoying Guild of Dungeoneering more, because its card game combat is better than Hand of Fate’s combination of random choices and action combat. The card game combat is not top tier, but it does one thing pretty well as opposed to having two “meh” mechanics.

: Zubon

Early Endgame

What I have often found dissatisfying about the tabletop games Pandemic and Agricola is that the endgame starts now. If you do not start with the end in mind, you will do badly.

A usual plan in games as in stories is to have a satisfying beginning, middle, and end. In games, that often means a bit of feeling out the game and exploring the space, seeing how the variability came out in this game, with some balance between rewarding exploration and early specialization. I feel like Pandemic and Agricola are games that require almost immediate pursuit of long range plans to be effective, otherwise you get behind necessary curves and realize you needed to be planning ahead several turns ago, in a game with not that many turns per player. Commenters: care to recommend other games that do this well or badly?

In a competitive game, accelerating the endgame can be a strong strategy, although it can be taken to absurdity. Most games that allow an early rush to the finish have an easy counter to it, so there is the standard rock-paper-scissors of early rush, balanced defense, and immediately building for the late game. Is calling for “no rush” games still a thing, for people who want paper to be the only option? I remember Blizzard discussing that in Starcraft balance, explicitly considering an early rush a legitimate and risky strategy, so no they were not nerfing scissors. (Pandemic is cooperative and Agricola has a fixed length, so perhaps this paragraph is just digression before the topic comes up in comments.)

I tend to be a strong strategy gamer, and there are certainly times that I like being reward for immediately being goal-oriented, but I do like a bit of wiggle room for exploration and unfocused fun, and it feels like a nasty surprise on the other players who were not starting their endgame plan on turn two. It feels a lot like games that give you lots of options, but on the highest difficulties only one or two of them are really viable. In a competitive game like Agricola, you can just play with people who are also content with somewhat lower scores and we all play in that league. In a cooperative game like Pandemic, we all lose if someone is not on the ball, so it leans towards the degenerate problem of one player effectively making the decisions for everyone.

: Zubon