Game: Hellas

Thread: Re: What is the "Twilight of the Gods" variant?

spearjr — 2008-10-15T01:19:19+00:00

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/197812

It's been missing for over a year.

Thread: What is the "Twilight of the Gods" variant?

Echasketch — 2008-10-14T21:32:59+00:00

Does anyone recall what the "Twilight of the Gods" variant is? Some people have mentioned that it improves game play, but I can't find out what the variant is.

Thanks!

Thread: Re: Tiles with bridges -- new bodies of water?

jgrundy — 2008-10-06T23:16:50+00:00

russ wrote:
It seems a pretty safe bet, otherwise they wouldn't have made it a bridge, but just made it land across, separating two pieces of water.Indeed.

Also, explicitly at the bottom of pg 3 it states that ships on a bridge piece can be counted for either direction, and the attacking example on page 5 shows a played bridge piece.

Thread: Re: Tiles with bridges -- new bodies of water?

jpat — 2008-10-06T17:55:02+00:00

nomad001 wrote:
We have always played it that way ... I think the rule exists to prevent players from creating new bodies of water on the other side of islands.

I tend to agree, and that's how the example seems to suggest.

Thanks.

Thread: Re: Tiles with bridges -- new bodies of water?

russ — 2008-10-06T17:14:36+00:00

It seems a pretty safe bet, otherwise they wouldn't have made it a bridge, but just made it land across, separating two pieces of water.

Thread: Re: Tiles with bridges -- new bodies of water?

nomad001 — 2008-10-06T16:22:29+00:00

We have always played it that way ... I think the rule exists to prevent players from creating new bodies of water on the other side of islands.

Thread: Tiles with bridges -- new bodies of water?

jpat — 2008-10-06T13:17:37+00:00

Is water flowing under a bridge considered the same body of water for the purposes of not violating the rule against new bodies of water during voyages? I didn't see the issue in the FAQ.

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pethulhu — 2008-09-13T11:24:58+00:00

Playing Hellas ... in Hellas

Thread: Ships as Transports Variant

Bednost Bunker — 2008-09-11T21:12:13+00:00

Ships transport Greeks:
Each Greek attacking over water must have one Ship starting in the same tile.
One Ship can transport one and only one Greek per attack.
Ships do not move with the attacking Greeks.
Each Greek attacking over water can move up to two tiles connected by water.
The Dolphin Sea tile counts as one tile when crossing it.
A Ship converted to a Greek by a God card cannot transport.
A God card allowing one non-adjacent attack cancels the "move up to two tiles" limit.

The starting player has more limits on his first game turn:
He must choose the "Burst of Strength" turn option.
He takes two, not three, actions.
He may not draw more God Cards.
As in the original rules, he may not play a God card.

Thread: Re: Is Hellas a wargame?

wargamer55 — 2008-09-10T16:50:28+00:00

russ wrote:
Interesting... I just noticed that this is somewhat analogous to the debates and discussions about "What is an Abstract (Strategy) Game", where some people say "Duh, that's a compound phrase: an ASG is obviously simply a game that's abstract, and has a lot of strategy" and other people say "No, the expression ASG as a whole has taken on additional specific meaning by convention, and so they are not merely games that are abstract and have strategy, but also are typically 2-player and have no or very little chance, and no or very little hidden information, and alternating turns etc".

So similarly some will say "A Wargame is, duh, obviously simply a game about war", and others will say "No, the term has additional specific connotations, so they are not merely games about war, but also make some attempt at some amount of realistic simulation, and have certain conventional game mechanics (hexes or point to point movement, CRT) etc". E.g. Chess and Stratego are "games about war", but many would say they're not "wargames" per se.

For me, "Wargame" remains a murky term.

I think you're generally right about this.

Traditionally the term "war game" as used by scholars on games such as RC Bell referred to any two-player strategy game that involved eliminating enemy pieces and/or controlling territory so that games like Go, Chess, Checkers and Stratego were all generic war games. Once they appeared, miniature wargame such as Little Wars and Fletcher Pratt's naval rules were also placed in this category. Under this kind of definition I think Hellas clearly fits quite comfortably as a war game.

Since the rise of the modern board wargame hobby afteer Charles Roberts' Tactics and the subsequent Avalon Hill and SPI lines, the term "wargame" (by convention one usually one word) has taken on a more specific meaning of a game that attempts to simulate armed conflicts in with some kind of accuracy and explictness, usually with counters, blocks and fingures and usually on a mapboard based on real-life terrain features that may have a hexagonal, square or area-grid. Even here there are exceptions, so the term does remain somewhat murky.

Under this more restrictive definition, murky as it is, the case for Hellas being a wargame is much less clear.

Thread: Re: Is Hellas a wargame?

russ — 2008-09-10T05:32:00+00:00

Interesting... I just noticed that this is somewhat analogous to the debates and discussions about "What is an Abstract (Strategy) Game", where some people say "Duh, that's a compound phrase: an ASG is obviously simply a game that's abstract, and has a lot of strategy" and other people say "No, the expression ASG as a whole has taken on additional specific meaning by convention, and so they are not merely games that are abstract and have strategy, but also are typically 2-player and have no or very little chance, and no or very little hidden information, and alternating turns etc".

So similarly some will say "A Wargame is, duh, obviously simply a game about war", and others will say "No, the term has additional specific connotations, so they are not merely games about war, but also make some attempt at some amount of realistic simulation, and have certain conventional game mechanics (hexes or point to point movement, CRT) etc". E.g. Chess and Stratego are "games about war", but many would say they're not "wargames" per se.

For me, "Wargame" remains a murky term.

Thread: Re: Is Hellas a wargame?

Bednost Bunker — 2008-09-09T21:26:34+00:00

Interesting topic, swayed by both arguments pro and con. Hellas is listed on Web-Grognards but so is Source of the Nile which is strictly an exploration game.

Here's the definition in BGG's glossary:

Wargame
n. A game in which players put military units in direct conflict with each other. The goal of these games is typically either annihilation of opponents or the attainment of certain strategic conditions. These types of games will often have high thematic content and a varying degree abstraction. (See also miniatures game). Wargames are subdivided into three general scales: Strategic, Operational and Tactical. (See also simulation)

Hellas has these:
military units
a goal to attain a strategic condition
high thematic content
a degree of abstraction
strategic scale

Are the military units in direct conflict?
I am leaning yes. Though it is possible to win without ever attacking, conflict is always present in the form of the possibility that that opposing military units can be placed and attack. A player's decisions must take this into account.

The topic question begs a more general question:
Are civilization games war games?

Thread: Re: English Rules

Atomic Wedgie — 2008-08-01T14:43:03+00:00

Does this game come in an english version?

Thread: Re: Is Hellas a wargame?

DrunkDwarves — 2008-07-11T13:36:30+00:00

I may get some flack on this, but could one argue that it would fall more in line with AmeriTrash?

I don't think it has enough Euro mechanics which is why a lot of people are questioning if it is a wargame or not, which would be the next logical choice since it deals with a historical period and conflict within that period.

Perhaps the largest argument against it being AT would be the lack of dice and relative lack of randomness to resolve combat, but the way mythology has been worked in as well as it using more abstracted combat (meaning not typical tactics associated with wargames) makes me think it might have a little AT in it.

Whatever the game is though, it is a hard one to pin down but it is an absolute blast.

Thread: Re: Is Hellas a wargame?

russ — 2008-06-30T04:48:54+00:00

It depends on your definition of "wargame" of course. For me, Hellas doesn't really try to really simulate history or war in any remotely serious/realistic way. For me, it's essentially an abstract Fjords-like game with some additional enjoyable very simple wargame-esque mechanics and a sort of pasted-on theme for me. (Just as Fjords doesn't really seem like any kind of simulation of Norwegian history, Hellas doesn't really seem like it truly has much to do with ancient Greece.)

The wargame part is very simplified and abstract (e.g. the winner loses no pieces in a battle, unless they brought in more than 3). For me, if Hellas is a wargame, so is an abstracted game like Chess. (Yeah, I know some would call Chess a wargame. It all depends on your definition...)

Bonus question: can a serious wargame about ancient Greece really have concrete beneficial supernatural effects from temples and the gods?

OK, point by point response in the spirit of feedback and brainstorming:

Hexes: don't imply wargame. Settlers of Catan, Fjords, Gipf project games, ...

Two opposing sides: Many many nonwargames: Go, Trax, Gipf project games...

Little solders: Uh... that seems like a total red herring to me. If you made the player pawns in Candyland be little plastic soldiers, no one would think Candyland was a wargame.

"Attack" moves: Many many nonwargames: Go, Trax, Gipf project games... depending on what "attack" means, every game that has player interaction has "attacks".

Incentive to fight because conquering a city also reduces the opponent's score by one city, for a net swing of 2: This is true of any game where you can take something from another player.

On the other hand:
Not listed as a wargame: of course that could just be due to oversight or irrational prejudice. There are probably some other games more commonly considered to be wargames which are also not listed as such. (I have no idea of any such examples, though!)

Don't have to attack. True in various "real" wargames. I have seen wargames where one player could win a marginal victory by just pulling back and not fighting. Arguably these were wargames with broken victory conditions, but wargames nonetheless...

There's an incentive NOT to fight because wars are more resource intensive. Also true in many "real" wargames. I have played wargames which seemed broken because whoever attacked first seemed to usually end up losing due to combat favoring the defender, so the first attacker ended up losing more material and thus the game.

Thread: Re: Is Hellas a wargame?

unixrevolution — 2008-06-30T01:30:13+00:00

I think it is. I made a geeklist a while ago you may want to read:

What, Exactly, is a Wargame?

Thread: Re: Is Hellas a wargame?

squash — 2008-06-30T01:12:21+00:00

It is if you want it to be!

Thread: Is Hellas a wargame?

wargamer55 — 2008-06-30T00:46:30+00:00

A popular past time on BoardGame Geek is questioning the "wargame" credentials of games like Memoir '44, but I think there are some more questionable one out there, like Hellas.

Hellas sure looks like it might be a wargame, but it isn't marketed as one and doesn't seem generally perceived as one.

Things which make it seem like a light wargame:

Hexes

Two opposing sides

Little soldiers

"Attack" moves

There's an incentive to fight because conquering a city also reduces the opponent's score by one city, for a net swing of 2.

Things which make it NOT seem like a wargame:

It's not listed as a wargame

You don't have to attack the other player. It's possible to win through voyages. As a matter of fact, winning is based on achieving an absolute result (10 cities) so there is no requirement for taking any away from the other player. A 10-9 win is as much a win as a 10-5 win.

There's an incentive NOT to fight because wars are more resource intensive.

I'm generally in favor of an exapnsive and inclusive definiton of wargame, so I'm inclined to consider it one, but I do think it's a marginal case.

Pondering from my game blog http://pawnderings.blogspot.com

Thread: Re: Wiki for Hellas FAQ

sefton — 2008-05-23T12:03:23+00:00

Well done! That's fantastic. It's been a while since this one hit the table, and this will make it a more likely candidate.

Thread: Wiki for Hellas FAQ

russ — 2008-05-23T10:06:35+00:00

I have combined the info from various FAQs in the file section and forum threads I could find into a single wiki page so it's easier to find and keep updated. Hopefully this will be useful for other Hellas players, especially new folks confused by the unfortunately confusing text on many of the cards!

Hellas FAQ

Thread: Re: Where did the "Twilight of the Gods" variant go?

squash — 2008-05-14T14:19:00+00:00

m3rabb wrote:
I recently learned that when someone cancels their BBG account, all of their posts disappear as well.

Well that's no good! But thanks for the reply - I had given up on anyone responding to this and was quite shocked to see this thread come up in my GeekMail!

Thread: Re: Where did the "Twilight of the Gods" variant go?

m3rabb — 2008-05-11T19:19:31+00:00

I recently learned that when someone cancels their BBG account, all of their posts disappear as well.

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fractaloon — 2008-05-06T00:08:04+00:00

English edition box back - Higher resolution photo (high enough to read all the text).

Thread: Re: Fixed Ships

Zingraff — 2008-04-13T01:48:40+00:00

Well, obviously you're right. However, I believe it all comes down to how you play the game and for that matter what kind of gameplay you want the game to encourage.

In my opinion, with the current rules the ships are semi-useless and tend to ruin the atmosphere of the game. Furthermore, all-out exploration makes for a dull game. I've played Hellas quite alot recently, with several distinctly different opponents, and the game really shines when it's played almost as a card game, with both players trying desperately to maintain Temple Majority and wage bitter, wasteful wars against each other.

I just want to make the ships a more vital part of the game, I want to make exploration more controlled and finally to promote player interaction over running away exploring the Aegan Sea on your own (or whatever).

Thread: Re: Fixed Ships

sdiberar — 2008-04-12T23:21:19+00:00

I respectfully disagree.

They tend to only be good at two things, exploration ...

Which is at least one-third of the game and the usual means of final victory.

Thread: Fixed Ships

Zingraff — 2008-04-12T23:02:27+00:00

I played Hellas a few times today with my room mate, and having played it before at my club, I once more became gradually annoyed with the overall uselessness of the ships in this game. They tend to only be good at two things, exploration and as stand-ins for soldiers with the appropriate blue and red cards. The ship majority as explained in the rules, is hardly ever an issue, and although most games have ended after a player reached the ten city goal through exploration, the game does not encourage or reward a player who builds ships.

I want to change this. A game about Greeks and islands *should* have boats in it as well. I suggest two easy changes, as detailed below.

1. "Voyage" can only be performed by the player with "Ship Majority". "Ship Majority" now refers to the player with the highest number of ships in play. In case of a tie, both players are allowed to "Voyage".

"Voyage" still abides to the existing rules, which involves the exchange of a nearby ship for a Greek in the newly discovered city. The rule of ship majority on adjacent tiles is ignored. The Poseidon cards which reads "Your voyage is successful when you have at least as many of your ships in the adjacent cities." is redefined account for the change of ship terminology. Now this card permits a player without "Ship Majority" to attempt a "Voyage".

2. Each attack "costs" one ship, and this ship has to be taken from a tile adjacent to the tile under attack. This applies to *all* attacks, not just the attacks that are carried out over water. Furthermore, each attack costs no more than one ship, the actual number of units involved in the attack is inessential.

For those in need of rationalization, consider the spent ship the transport and supplies necessary to carry out warfare. As with every historical seafaring nation, sailing was the predominant and preferred mode of transportation for the Greeks, and so it only makes sense to assume that the "attack across land" as carried out in the game, should involve men moving by ship along the coast, as this would by far be the most efficient.

Consider then the following "new" dynamic of the game. To perform an attack you now need to build ships as well, while the usual "victory through exploration" becomes slightly harder and by far easier to predict and hinder for the opponent. The overall effect is the added significance to the ships of the game, while not altering the game in any significant manner, at least to me the rule of "Ship Majority" as I suggest to implement it, seems both more comprehensible and obvious.

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Festivus — 2008-02-18T01:38:18+00:00

Back of main unpunched tile set.

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barnyams36 — 2008-02-14T08:10:29+00:00

Zeus finger will attack the whites!

Thread: Re: 1st play - What am I missing?

DJ Kuul A — 2008-02-12T20:41:26+00:00

My limited experience with the game was that two players of relatively equal skill go back and forth until one makes a mistake or draws *just* the right card to snag that 10th city. It was OK, but the neat components call to us more than the gameplay does.

Thread: Re: 1st play - What am I missing?

franchi — 2008-02-11T20:28:00+00:00

One play is definitely not enough for Hellas. I like this game a lot, but I think that it is not as popular as it deserves because many people don't want to try further.

With the deterministic combat system, the only "randomizer" in the game are the cards, so knowing how they act, can combine, and how many of them are in the deck is very important. I think there are some strategy tips somewhere here, but don't remember exactly where, so I'll throw some ideas.

First you need to voyage if you want to lead on temples. If you find one first, you put pressure on your opponent as you'll get more reinforcements. Of course if your opponent does, you may try to take it with the card exchanging cities. Or go for it through the shorter path.

Your objective should be reaching 8 cities with some cards allowing to get 2 more cities in your hand (repeat voyage, attack 2 cities...). Till then, cities will go from one side to the other, but that's not a problem. The 15 greeks limit is good in that you have always a chance to recover, and you should do it before your opponent gets to 8 and has several cards in his hand!

Identify which cards are better than others, depending on your position. The one adding 1 greek is often good to abort an attack, you should keep it if possible. Or if you have the one adding ships to your greeks try to setup a trap (one city with 1 greek and many ships is a temting target).

That's all I can tell by now, I haven't played Hellas for a while now...

Thread: Re: 1st play - What am I missing?

FerrumEtBombyx — 2008-02-11T20:18:40+00:00

I wrote a strategy article listed in the Hellas forums. Check that out, and perhaps that should give you some things to think about. I think the game will flesh out for you more with repeated plays. Have fun!

Thread: 1st play - What am I missing?

stormseeker75 — 2008-02-11T19:53:15+00:00

We played our first game of Hellas over the weekend and I have to say it left me quite flat. To me, it seemed like players basically take turns building up their cities and then once one player attacks, the other player attacks back into the weakened cities. And all of this centers around the luck of the draw regarding the God cards.

So, am I missing a key point? Anyone care to share a different play style that would make the game better?

Thread: Re: Chaining multiple Voyages

franchi — 2008-01-27T19:03:52+00:00

I think the answer to Q6 is right. Q15 is a bit of a mess, of course if the card is canceled you have not swapped the ships, so there's no point in saying that the greeks obtained must participate or not in the attack.

You saw this in a few seconds???? I had never seen it before, and I've read this FAQ several times!!!!!

Thread: Re: Ares card to attack remotely... is this by land or water

franchi — 2008-01-27T18:52:03+00:00

jgrundy wrote:
So since I'm talking not bringing greeks from any other city, you are implying it's an attack "over water" if the non-adjacent cities are on separate land masses.Yes.

jgrundy wrote:
Is this an interpretation, common sense, a FAQ somewhere?FAQ, here:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/file/download/12931/Hellas_Coll...

Thread: Re: Chaining multiple Voyages

jgrundy — 2008-01-27T18:50:38+00:00

Rats. The answers in that file to Q.6 and Q.15 contradict each other, which lowers my confidence a little.

Thread: Re: Chaining multiple Voyages

franchi — 2008-01-27T18:38:34+00:00

Joe,

after having a look I realised that the answer to both questions (and maybe others coming!) can be found in the file posted here:

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/file/download/12931/Hellas_Coll...

Quite useful. The answer to this question is yes, but I would say that the probabilities are sooooooo small... You would need having exactly these 3 cards from each god, and successfully voyaging 3 times!!!

Thread: Re: Ares card to attack remotely... is this by land or water?

jgrundy — 2008-01-27T18:37:17+00:00

So since I'm talking not bringing greeks from any other city, you are implying it's an attack "over water" if the non-adjacent cities are on separate land masses.

Is this an interpretation, common sense, a FAQ somewhere?

Thread: Re: Ares card to attack remotely... is this by land or water

franchi — 2008-01-27T18:32:23+00:00

If you can trace a land path from the non-adjacent city, it is considered a land attack.

If I remember well, other adjacent cities can join the attack. If any of these adjacent support attacks is over sea, the whole attack is considered naval.

Thread: Teetering on the edge...

jgrundy — 2008-01-27T17:02:33+00:00

Having only played a couple of times myself I taught Hellas to a colleague of mine, a Risk player of many years.

After our initial four placements each, we'd mostly stuck to "our own" sides of the board.

We both started with a couple of early Voyages, during which he found the first temple and successfully played the Poseidon "voyage again". I also played a "voyage again", but was not successful, leaving me down a city early.

He had a Burst of Strength and built up his dolphin-neighbouring cities with enough greeks to mount an attack, so I responded with a Burst of Strength and bringing my two frontline cities to two greeks each.

I played the Ares "attack a non-adjacant city" to take his temple (expecting him to have to spend the next turn re-taking it) which he responded to with a "make two attacks" and took another of my cities and re-took the temple across water.

Things were looking grim for me, with him now being several cities up on me.

We both did some bursting and filling our defenses, jockying for an advantage where an attack could be made without immediate recapture. He played the "reduce the opponents hand to three cards", and subsequently "draw a card from your opponent's hand". At this point he had the city advantage, the card advantage, and the temple advantage. And with the attacks and counterattacks he kept flipping between 8 and 9 cities, just waiting for a "voyage again" card or "attack twice" card to give him the edge to take two cities in a turn.

I did manage to flood him down a bit, cunningly keeping most of my cities at only two greeks and waiting for the right moment.

His 8/9 city situation went on for a surprisingly large number of turns, with me on 6/5 cities alternately. At last I managed a double whammy and for one brief exciting moment we had 7 cities each, although that was at the end of my turn. (Never count your position in this game at the end of your own turn, except when you actually win.) A couple of turns later he retook his advantage.

I built a hand of cards. He clobbered it down to three again. D'oh! BUT... I managed to keep two "voyage again" cards and a "keep the card just played". I was hoping to start a turn with 6 cities, or get one more "get a city" card, but alas several more see-saw turns went by without opportunity.

He mounted a surprising attack across water into my strongest island. Surprising because I was able to immediately retake the city at a significant profit of Greeks and a ship to me. Even this didn't help much.

At last I played the voyage gambit. He voided one, and one failed (in spite of my variety of options I had nowhere to place an island) but that still gave me two new cities to a total of 8 each. He of course immediately took one city, and alas I'd misplanned it... I had no viable attack on my next turn and was vulnerable. I chose a Burst of Strength, but even collecting an "attack/defend as though you have one extra greek" card on my first draw I was not able to bolster my front lines enough to prevent him attacking and winning on his next turn.

Notes to self:
- Make fewer attacks where I know I can't hold the advantage afterwards... try going for more cards instead since it's the cards that have the "gain two cities" options. (Otherwise we're just trading a city each turn.)
- Don't let your opponent sit on the temple advantage most of the game. In this case, I should have played the extra voyages as soon as I could to try to find new temples.

Thread: Ares card to attack remotely... is this by land or water?

jgrundy — 2008-01-27T16:36:24+00:00

If you play "Attack one non-adjacent opponent's city" and the only greeks you attack with are the ones you teleport from the other side of the world (from a separate land mass) is this still an attack over land? (ie needing only equal Greeks for the attack to succeed.)

Thread: Chaining multiple Voyages

jgrundy — 2008-01-27T16:34:09+00:00

Can you play a sequence of "After a successful voyage you may attempt another voyage" all in one turn, thus suddenly expand your cities by several?

(Using three Poseidon "attempt another voyage" cards and three Zeus "instead of discarding the god card you just used discard this one instead" you could potentially bloop six new cities in a single turn?)

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ZiggyZambo — 2007-12-06T15:20:27+00:00

God cards (back)

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kiko_chirol — 2007-11-01T03:47:20+00:00

cards size: the smaller game (hellas) have bigger cards

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kiko_chirol — 2007-11-01T03:45:47+00:00

size comparison: hellas X catan

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kiko_chirol — 2007-11-01T02:55:51+00:00

size comparison between a boat, a greek and a himalaya politician

Thread: Re: Voyaging

Hustle Kong — 2007-09-11T15:31:34+00:00

I just bought the game yesterday, and had this exact same question. Glad to see it has been addressed!

Thread: Multiplayer variant with only one set of Hellas?

Schroinger — 2007-09-01T09:45:04+00:00

Have anybody think about a multiplayer variant that takes only one set of Hellas to play it? Hellas is a nice game, buy buying to sets to play it with more than two players is like a little bit too much for me.

Thinking loud, the multiplayer variant for four players using only a set of Hellas could be something like this:

1. The game is played in partnership.

2. Partners sit in front of each other in the table.

3. In the setup, each player puts two tiles.

4. Everything is played normally except for these modifications:
a) Only the player sitting left to the active player can play God's cards when it is not his/her turn. This way players would atack the player sitting at their left, and defend from the player sitting at their right.
b) Only the first white player is unable to play God's cards in his/her first turn; so, the second white player may play them right at the beginning of the game.

5. The first team to reach to 10 cities wins.

I have to advice that I haven't tried this variant yet, so any comment will be welcome.

Thread: Where did the "Twilight of the Gods" variant go?

squash — 2007-08-21T13:44:26+00:00

I had thumbed this particular variant a couple of months ago, but when I went to look at it again a message came up saying this thread no longer exists. Does anyone know what happened to it?

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cristiano.batista — 2007-07-30T03:49:21+00:00

Ship close up

Thread: Re: Hellas Strategy

TermiGator — 2007-07-16T08:24:31+00:00

Nice Article.
Although your strategy relies on your opponent going for discovery often enough. What if you encounter an opponent playing the same way?

One minor point of criticism: Be careful with loosly handling percentage numbers.

Claiming that Poseidon cards are only picked 1% in the game means:

Regarding that each stack has 16 cards means that Zeus and Ares stack (in total not each) have to be gone through and reshuffeled at least 5 times (assuming that almost no cards are kept on the players hands - otherwise ad a reshuffel or two) - for each Posidon card drawn.

Posidon cards drawn may be few but in my opinion not THAT few.

Thread: Re: Victory conditions incomplete?

Psauberer — 2007-07-08T12:21:00+00:00

Michael Ward wrote:
First off, pointing out I said islands instead of cities is irrelevant, since every island has a city on it. That distinction is about as important as whether you call your wooden figures in Carcassonne followers as the rules state, or meeples as most people do.

Every island may have a city on it, but not every city is necessarily on an island. Or, if you wish to look at all of the land areas as islands, then some islands have more than one city on them.

Saying that "island" and "city" are the same is like saying that since every man (I am talking gender specific here) is a human being, all human beings are men. I, however, can see this is not the case.

Second, insinuating I did something wrong rules-wise because I wiped my opponent out is pure speculation. Trust me, 15 Greeks is more than enough to control eight islands. What that game (my 13th) boiled down to was I had great cards and the other player had very poor (easily countered) cards. Every attack I made worked, every one he made failed. Even my ships (via the proper card play) helped me in combat. It was a slaughter. The game lasted 22 minutes. And by the way, I was playing against a very experienced gamer.

I realize wiping someone out is an unusual situation; that's why I brought it up.

It is not pure speculation. You misunderstand the victory conditions and had a result that is at the very least very difficult to achieve without an opponent playing extremely badly (e.g. making attacks that are known will be failures.)

There are several ambiguous cards and rules in this game. Many people have stumbled over this. Despite your claim of infallibility, it is still possible that you could have erred in play in order to arrive at your situation. It is highly unusual, to the point of seeming nigh unto impossible.

Given your continued insistence on the ability to interchange "city" and "island" I am still unconvinced that there was not some error in rules interpretation. Of course, getting rules wrong is not a big deal, especially in a game like Hellas, where the cards are not as clear as they should be. You took it as some sort of personal attack, which it was not intended to be. I apologize for making you get your underwear in a bunch.

Thread: Re: Victory conditions incomplete?

Michael Ward — 2007-07-08T09:11:45+00:00

First off, pointing out I said islands instead of cities is irrelevant, since every island has a city on it. That distinction is about as important as whether you call your wooden figures in Carcassonne followers as the rules state, or meeples as most people do.

Second, insinuating I did something wrong rules-wise because I wiped my opponent out is pure speculation. Trust me, 15 Greeks is more than enough to control eight islands. What that game (my 13th) boiled down to was I had great cards and the other player had very poor (easily countered) cards. Every attack I made worked, every one he made failed. Even my ships (via the proper card play) helped me in combat. It was a slaughter. The game lasted 22 minutes. And by the way, I was playing against a very experienced gamer.

I realize wiping someone out is an unusual situation; that's why I brought it up.

Thread: Re: Victory conditions incomplete?

Psauberer — 2007-07-07T13:42:35+00:00

It sounds to me as if perhaps there was an additional misunderstading of the rules besides the "control 10 islands" glitch.

With the limited number of Greeks allowed on each tile and the way the combat works, I find it hard to figure out how someone can get totally wiped off the map that quickly.

Thread: Re: Victory conditions incomplete?

TermiGator — 2007-07-07T13:30:45+00:00

Well if you want to be a rules lawyer you gotta do it right:

Technically the games wasn't finished because the victory condition wasn't met.
So the game continues.
Without any units your opponent is left to only two possibilities:
a) Draw new god cards - he can only do this to the maximum of 7 though.
or
b) Make a voyage. Because he has no ships on the map he will never be allowed to place the tile though and it will go back under the stack.

So he will be able to make (useless) turn untill you managed to get 10 cities (by sucessfully voyaging yourself of course) and you win by meeting the endgame criteria.

Tah Dah!

Of course your opponent could concede the match instead and ask for a revenge. I would prefer that to mindless fulfilling the rules

Thread: Re: Attacker placing ships after successful attack - optiona

TermiGator — 2007-07-07T13:21:14+00:00

franchi wrote:

Please tell us if one day you do refuse to place ships!
Yeah - and tell us why.
a) Strategic reasons. If yes - which reasons?
b) Out of a special mood.
c) They were badly constructed/maintained by your opponent and you don't want those crappy ships
d) Diplomatic reasons. Unusual in a 2 player game but who knows...

Image

jgrundy — 2007-06-28T05:52:28+00:00

"Beware Geeks bearing gifts"... especially the legendary "Odin Rabbit"

Thread: Re: Attacker placing ships after successful attack - optional?

jgrundy — 2007-06-25T23:07:52+00:00

franchi wrote:
Please tell us if one day you do refuse to place ships!

Thread: Re: Attacker placing ships after successful attack - optiona

franchi — 2007-06-25T22:13:47+00:00

Yeah, then you're right.

Please tell us if one day you do refuse to place ships!

Thread: Re: Attacker placing ships after successful attack - optional?

jgrundy — 2007-06-25T21:05:48+00:00

franchi wrote:
jgrundy wrote:
The only ways a ship can get on the board from supply is via Burst of Strength, or the card "After a successful voyage, place two extra figures in the new city". So it's possible, I suppose, you might also want to save a ship in supply for this action.
You don't need to save them, when you run out of ships/greeks you can take them from any other tile.
If there's no Greeks in your supply, you may take a Greek from any other tile in order to populate a discovered city after a successful Voyage.

There is a Poseidon card which says:
"After a successful voyage, you may place any two additional figures (Greeks or ships) in the new city from your supply"

This is the card I'm talking about, and id doesn't look like you can pick your two figures from anywhere except supply.

Thread: Re: Attacker placing ships after successful attack - optiona

Altaira — 2007-06-25T16:52:41+00:00

jgrundy wrote:
I also wonder, if there were two ships would it therefore be logical to say you may only replace one?
From
jgrundy wrote:
may place the same number of shipsfollows that it must be exactly or nothing. For a partial, the wording should be "may place at most the number...".