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| Risk: 2210 AD - One of the novel reimplementations to this traditional standard are Devastated Lands. These are randomly drawn (4) from the Land card deck at the start of the game and marked with large, nuclear warning style counters. For the remainder of that game, no one may claim, enter, or march through any of these territories as they were laid waste in previous conflicts. As you might guess, this mechanic can really change up tried and true strategies. In this game, we had Southeast and Eastern Europe completely devastated and cut-off from Asia. This isolation made for some unique interaction between Europe-Africa and Africa-Asia. On top of that, the owner of Europe still received all 5 bonus armies even though needing two less territories to secure and protect! Of course, growing up at the end of the Cold War, it was easy for me to concoct a narrative of the U.S. and NATO having once defeated the U.S.S.R and the Warsaw Pact in a great nuclear conflict leading to such devastation! |
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| Red November - Oh, those unfortunate gnomes! This title is one of our favorite romps for its frantic chaos. Here, the entire ship's bow was flooded except for the missile room - and it happened to be on fire while the missiles were also about to malfunction and launch prematurely. Luckily as both events occurred, we just happened to have two seagnomes already there. Hooray! One put out the fire, while the second disarmed the missiles. Just then, it, too, flooded. Doom! However, their brave and skillful actions saved the crippled vessel as a mere fourteen minutes later, the two surviving crew members, cowering meekly in the engine room (the only compartment not afflicted by flood or fire), were rescued. Those that perished were posthumously awarded the Chit of Honor for their service to Mother Gnomia in a patriotically, moving ceremony! |
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| Axis & Allies 1942 - So anyone who has played a fair amount of A&A over the years probably has that story of the loan Kraut tank fending off the entire British Expeditionary Force in Norway; or a lone Yankee Infantry holding the Imperial Japanese Army at bay in China for a whole round. Well, here we have sort of the reverse: mass slaughter by the invaders! Just the fact that my five Infantry and Artillery all hit on one roll when needing a '2' or less was amazing. But when you also consider that I'm usually lucky to get even two hits in such a situation, the 100% hit ratio was stinking hilarious! My kids sure were impressed with their old man! |
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| Bang! The Bullet! - It doesn't take too much imagination to generate narrative in this well-themed card game. Since it can get a little long in the tooth if players are able to play a lot of Missed! cards and Beer cards to heal, then we like the Dynamite as a means to thin the pack...hehe. When laid before you, you must first draw a card as your turn begins. If you draw a heart-suited card, then boom goes the dynamite and you loose three life points! If it doesn't explode, then pass it to the next person. Funny thing is, there are two dynamites with the expansion, so when the second one is played, you can eventually get both in front of you, doubling the danger! Now, technically we may be playing that wrong because you're not supposed to have two, similar blue-bordered cards in your tableau. However, the Dynamite plays differently than those others and, besides, it is much more fun when both are played down! One time we had a pair of dynamite circling around for five turns before one finally went off! Talk about story-telling! |
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