After Action Report – Board Game Night @ Comic Quest, August 22, 2013

For a change of pace this Thursday I decided to try out the board game night that Comic Quest does every Thursday night instead of going to Paradise Perks.  I wanted to see what the people were like and what sort of games that they were playing.  I also thought I could do some recruiting for the Strategic & Adventure Game Association events on Saturdays since the location of them is right up the street.

There were 15 – 20 players in attendance which is a pretty good turn out.  There were 6 games being player at any given time.  At least one of the games being played was a miniatures game, which is does bring up the game count.

The games being player were the cheap and common Euro games which you can now pick up at your local Target or Walmart.  I brought in a number of my games which were not new but could be purchased at Comic Quest and the players opted to stick with their safe games versus trying out new games (At least new for them.)  It is safe to say that the group is not blessed with early adopters like the other events that I go to.

I played two games at the event.

The first game I played was Star Trek: Catan.  Star Trek: Catan plays just like Settlers of Catan, with one exception:  it adds personalities with special powers such as 2:1 trades with the bank.  The player can use the power of a personality twice before they are required to give it up and replaced it with a different one of their choice from those that are available.

Everything else about Star Trek: Catan aside from the theme is the same as game as Settlers.  The players roll for resource at the beginning of their turn.  If a 7 is rolled, the Klingon (Robber) is placed.  The active player can then trade resources with the other players and use those resources to build Outpost (Towns), Starbases (Cities), and Starships (Roads) for victory points.  The first person to 10 victory points wins.

The owner of the game set up the board semi randomly with the planets placed at random but placed the asteroid belt in the middle of the board as the basic rules with suggest.  I managed to get one of my outposts next to a 6 and the other next to an 8 which games me the opportunity to get resources to if either of those common numbers came up in the resource roll.  The only problem that I had was that I did not have access to one of the resources so I would be required to trade or use one of the personality powers if I was to get that resource.  I was able to get a good rhythm going in the game even with the difficulty getting that one resource by starting to grow up instead of out.  I figured It would give me enough resources to trade with the other players if possible of the bank at 4:1 or 3:1 if not.  I was the first to upgrade an outpost to a starbase, even with that advantage I was always behind the leader of the game.  I managed to catch up to the leader on my last turn and would have gotten my 10^th victory on my following turn, but the lead player ended the game on their turn.

The other game that I played was Pandemic.  Pandemic is a cooperative game with the theme that the players are members of the CDC that are trying to find cures for 4 diseases before they get beyond the point of containment.  The group wins if they can do this.  If they are not able to achieve the goal the group loses.

I am not a fan of Pandemic because it usually comes down to one player telling the other players what to do and the players executing those orders.  To me Pandemic is a solitaire game where you let the other players take roles and pretend to let them play along.

This is pretty much how our game went.  We had four players.  We took the roles of Dispatcher, Medic, Research, and Scientist.  There were 4 epidemics added to the deck.  I had the role of the Medic.  I spent the game in Asia and the Pacific fighting the diseases there which the other players were working on the cures.  We were essentially ordered around and moved at times by the Dispatcher who was the one really playing the game.  We did find cures to all four of the diseases before time ran out to win the game.

I do not really know how to add Pandemic to my scorecard point system so I am marking is as played on the scorecard and not giving it any points.

This event is not my favorite event.  I think I enjoy Thursday Night Gaming at Paradise Perks more due to the selection of games they have there.  That being said I think I will be an infrequent attendee of this event in the future.

Here is my scorecard for the evening.

Game	No. of Plays	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th	Avg.
Star Trek: Catan	1	-	1	-	-	-	-		2.00
Pandemic	1	Played
Totals	2	-	1	-	-	-	-	-	1.00