Danger Planet session. 3-player Jump, 5-player Chill: Black Morn Manor.
Players were Cindy, Karl, myself. New players to the game were: Cindy, myself. Karl had the first turn.
We spent 13 minutes going over the rules.
This is a sky-diving themed game. There are two planes loaded with parachutists. The plane flies across a landscape that ends with a beach and water. The object is to jump as close to the water without going into the water. As a tricky jump, there's an island in the water, and a lake on land.
Each player has a hand of seven cards. Cards consist of jump, prevent jumps, push a jumper's landing spot, move a plane one space forward, (also move two, three, or for forward, as well as cards to move the plane backwards those number of spaces), and switch seats with another jumper.
Players always retain a jump card. Otherwise, a card is discarded when played and a new card is drawn to replace it. Players jump and land on the ground exactly where they jumped.
Players score by having jumpers land closest to the water ahead of other players. Highest score wins.
Karl brought this to the table, eager to try out his Unity Games prize.
What fun I had during this game. I enjoyed saying "that's not realistic" when I heard that planes go backwards and jumpers land exactly at the point they jumped. I enjoyed humming Suzzanne Vega's tune (doo-doo-doo-doo doo-doo-doo-doo doo-doo-doo doo-doo-doo) while I was waiting for Karl and Cindy after playing my card (and they were being extremely thoughtful and competitive and time-consuming in their thinking.) Of course, I had to stop humming when all the eyes in Danger Planet turned their collective gaze towards me, thoughts of mutilated vocal chords filling their vision.
As for the game, it takes too long for what it is.
I wouldn't have scored as high if some women didn't come in and distract Karl to the point of setting me up to land on the island and dumping his planeload of jumpers in the ocean.
Caption: Cindy and Karl take Jump a little too seriously, though you wouldn't be able to tell from this posed picture.
Game lasted 72 minutes. Final scores were:
Click here to buy Jump at FunAgain.com.
Click here to learn more about Jump at BoardGameGeek.com.
Players were Ralph, Cindy, Karl, Nancy, myself. New players to the game were: Ralph, Cindy, Karl, Nancy, myself. Karl had the first turn.
We spent 25 minutes going over the rules.
This is a tile-laying adventure game.
One player starts off as the minion and must return the influence item to the gate. Other players are envoys and must kill the evil master in his favored haunt with the influence item. Only the first minion knows what the influence item and the haunt are, as well as the master, when the game begins.
Envoys and minions start at opposite ends of the playing field. Players lay two tiles for the manor or the grounds, then draw two. Players then move, accumulating willpower and more cards (if they're envoys) and just cards if they're minions. Each tile requires a die roll, and losing the roll means movement stops and an envoy loses willpower.
If an envoy loses all willpower, he becomes a minion. heh heh heh.
If a minion reaches the crypt, he can see the master card. The first minion must tell the other players when the favorite haunt is reached with the influence item.
I was eager to try this game as my Unity Games prize.
Cindy started as the minion. I had to arm wrestle her to get her to draw a random card from my hand. She decided to draw a random card from her own hand.
Karl lost interest in the game when he drew cards that made him lose all his willpower and turn into a minion right off the bat (in the first two turns.)
Cindy was able to pick up the influence item close to the gate and would have won the next turn. But Ralph was able to pull out two adrenaline rushes to catch up to her and defeat her in combat.
We came to realize that the room the master was in was a dead tile, meaning it couldn't even be placed on the board... meaning envoys could never meet the winning condition. So we called the game to an end.
I think, to get around this problem, we could do two things: 1) declare an envoy victory if all minions are converted to envoys. 2) when laying manor tiles adjacent to grounds tiles, guarantee that there is actually a way way to pass between the two (as I argued as a ruling. I was outnumbered because others said the possibility of passage has to exist, not an actual passage.)
On the other hand, this was an adventure, and there are no guarantees that an adventure will succeed. So, perhaps, this isn't a problem with the game at all.
Caption: Players suffer through Chill: Black Morn Manor.
Game lasted 60 minutes.
Click here to learn more about Chill: Black Morn Manor at BoardGameGeek.com.
Click here and scroll down to "30th" for Ralph's take on our games.
