Sex, Dice and Gamer Chicks

I figure more people will read my blog with a titillating title like that.

I bought a book called, well, that very same thing: Sex, Dice and Gamer Chicks at Game Kastle in San Jose. It was $30 but felt it was worth $20. It's a very funny diatribe on all the gamer stereotypes out there, Gamer Chicks, Rules-Lawyer, Fatbeards, Games Masters, Stealth Gamers, Gothapotamus, etc. My only complaint is, it is a bit wordy and obviously told from the British POV.

I hate 'arse' , it should always be ASS!

I hate 'sod off', only shotguns are sawed-off. Otherwise, FUCK-OFF!

'Given a good drumming' what the hell is that? You mean 'Getting the shit kicked out of you?'

It's not a windscreen, it's a windshield,

It's not a lorry, it's a goddamn truck!

And it's not a tyre, it's a TIRE!

Anyway...

I also got the latest small-box expansion to the Arkham Horror boardgame: The Lurker at the Threshold.

It looks like the most interesting of the small-box expansions. I like the relationship cards and the Dark Pacts. I also like the fact that they added a King James Bible to the Common Items card deck. Now, we mean business!

Words for the Arkham Wise: People on the Boardgame Geek site say to start a novice group with Yig as the Ancient One. I say Poppycock! Start with someone with at least 12 on the doom track. 10 is just too quick, at least it was for my group. Also, kick out all the expansions on the first game, for some idiotic reason I played Dunwich and Kingsport with the base game when introducing it to some neophytes. Bad Karma.

I will say however, that Shadows Over Camelot sure got Audrey and John Petersen riled up to beat that damn game. It's a cooperative game like Arkham Horror, and lately we've been heading in the cooperative direction as far as boardgames. Don't know why. I guess they're fun.

John pulled out his Lord of the Rings coop game by Reiner Knizia and we played that twice because we were so pissed off after losing the first time (plus we corrected a few rules we got wrong the first time) It didn't make a damn bit of difference. We still succumbed to the Dark Lord in his Dark Tower. At least the second go around we got as far as Mordor before we fell. Not Bree.... oops.

Another cool coop game is Cattlecar Spectacular er I mean Battlestar Galactica. It's about as long as Arkham Horror but without 400 types of tokens and card decks. Also there is a lot more interactivity as there can be more than one traitor or Cylon on board. Shadows has 0-1 traitor (thanks Marcus for mastering the art of Traitorhood), Arkham has none because the game is so weighted against the players they don't need one.

The quickest coop game I know is Pandemic. And as is the case with all coop games, just as depressing and rigged for you to fail.

Let's see how these cooperative games fare on the Universal Doom Scale:

1 Arkham Horror

2 Lord of the Rings

3 Shadows Over Camelot

4 Pandemic

5 Battlestar Galactica

Obviously, these Doom Factors change when certain expansions are added to them. LOTR with the Sauron expansion is a bit tougher than Battlestar with the Pegasus expansion. I haven't played Shadows with the Merlin's Company expansion, but I hope to get it soon and will see how that works.

Anyway, just reporting and venting as usual.

See ya round and happy gaming!