Steve A.

One of the great things about Star Wars: Armada is the wide variety of objectives that come with the game. When setting up their forces a player will choose three objectives that hopefully match his fleet’s strengths.

While players can choose to play with unlimited rounds, this option is really only reserved for players who want to play to the complete destruction of the enemy’s forces (which takes time). Some of the objectives need a timer of sorts, but the 6 rounds that the game gives just seem to short to me especially for those who want a slugfest, but don’t have all day to completely finish off their foes. For these games at our house, I have a personal house rule that says for assault objectives, players play for 8-10 rounds instead of the 6 that the game recommends. This allows for an end in sight, but at the same time, it really gives some time to the game.

One of the great things about Euro games are that there are many ways to victory. Also, it makes scoring them a little more tedious. That being said, I use an app called Scoregeek. Its free online http://www.rebrandsoftware.com/ScoreGeekApp/ or you can get it on the ios and Android. What scoregeek does is keep track of your score (you still have to input it), but it makes scoring things easier. For example, you tell it how many green tiles you have, if you had the most, second most etc., how long your wall was, and it’ll score it for you. Then it will upload your score to BGG if you would like. It also keeps track of things like your best score, longest game, etc. I love it. Just for the record, I don’t have any affiliation with the company, but I love the app and use it for Alhambra and all my games.

Dead of Winter is an amazing game! It is one of my favorites, I’ve also lost 2/3 of the games I’ve played. I know that because of a cool app that I bought (though its free online) called Scoregeek. You can keep track of all your games. I also keep track of the scenarios so I know which ones are more likely to succeed. I also keep track of the betrayer, so I can see how many times we’ve lost because of a betrayer. It also uploads the games to BGG for you if you have an account. Its an incredible app. You can get the online version here: http://www.rebrandsoftware.com/ScoreGeekApp/ or you can buy it on ios and Android. I should also explain that I, in now way, am affiliated with the company, I just really love the app.

Agricola is one of my favorite games. I really like how you can diversify. When it comes time for scoring, though, its a pain figuring out how many points you have by counting cows, fences etc. Enter Scoregeek. Its an app on ios and Android (for a few bucks) or online for free. The online version can be found here: http://www.rebrandsoftware.com/ScoreGeekApp/

In Scoregeek, you just put how many cows you have, how many plowed fields, etc. and it will do all the calculating for you. I love it. In edition, to that, it keeps track of all your games. It is also attached to that other website and logs all your games with your account. You can see what the highest score ever has been and your lowest score. I can’t say enough how much I love this app (for the record, I have nothing to do with the company, I just love the app and use it for every game).

One of the things that makes Xia such a wonderful game is it was designed to be open, and to let the players make adjustments to how they want to play the game. One thing that we’ve tried a few times in my house is at the start of the game, each player draws a level one title (meaning it is only worth one victory point). Players then start off with that title and ability. It seems to speed things up a little bit and its fun to have a little something at the beginning of the game.

One of the things that puts people off about Relic and Talisman is the time it takes to level your character up so that you can win the game. In order to speed up the process, a little, our house rule for Relic is that we draw two Relic Cards at the beginning of the game, and select one and put the other back into the deck. That way, we start the game with an advantage and it speeds things up a little bit. Then in order to enter the center of the system, players need to have a second relic. I would say that it probably speeds up the game by a good 20 to 30 percent.