* Scott's blatant plug - Tulipmania 1637
* Contest announcement - Contest to create music for the show
(Contest Details to be posted later today)

Round Table
Player scale-ability Scott, Erik, & Donald


* Erik's traitorous work for the Print and Play podcast
* Scott's Game Lab work
* Donald talks about boardgamepodcasts.com

Correspondent Segments
* Games in Education - Giles reveals game uses at school.
* A Guide to the Geek - Ben covers the advanced search feature on Board Game Geek.

Reviews
* realpolitik from Peccable Productions reviewed by Scott
* HeroScape Master Set: Rise of the Valkyrie from Hasbro reviewed by Erik

Promos
* Wandering Geek http://wanderinggeek.podbean.com/
* OBG Music Contest
* Infected by Scott Sigler http://scottsigler.com/

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RSS Feed: http://onboardgames.libsyn.com/rss
Email us: onboardgames.net@gmail.com
On Board Games Guild at Board Game Geek
On Board Games MicroBadge at Board Game Geek

- - -

Share your thoughts!
* What games do you feel scale particularly well or poorly?
* What games scale well back to two player?
* Do you play HeroScape? What is your favorite expansion?
* What do you think of the current music profile for the show?
* Have you heard the Wandering Geek podcast before? Did you enter the contest?

MY THOUGHTS ON #20

* What games do you feel scale particularly well or poorly?
Pandemic seems to work well with 2,3, or 4 players

ColosseumDOES NOT WORK with 3-players (but the box says it does), This really gets me mad, If the game only plays well with 4 or more players than the box should say so.

Leonardo da Vinci Is the first game I played that had a way of allowing 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th players not to be at a disadvantage when going first is an advantage. I like the asyemetric setup and I think this allows the game to scale very well.

I also like Ingenious and the way the playing area expands as you add 3 or 4 players.

* What games scale well back to two player?
The first game that came to mind was Attika the box says 2-4 players but I think the game plays best with 2-players.

I also think that the Ticket to Ride: Switzerland expansion makes the TtR series scale back almost perfectly.

I also like Carcassonne with just 2 players.



* Do you play HeroScape? YES!
* What is your favorite expansion? HeroScape Marvel: The Conflict Begins unfortunately the hero's are too powerful to use with the base game in my experience.

* What do you think of the current music profile for the show? NOT A BAD IDEA.

* Have you heard the Wandering Geek podcast before? Yep Did you enter the contest? Going to enter it NOW!

I think Pandemic could be played with just one player. In fact, with a strong personality at the table, the game seems to default to that person being the driver with everyone else being more like tag-a-longs than full fledged players. Right now I like Pandemic a lot; it is new, innovative, and I'd be willing to play it on a regular basis. However, I think it may not maintain long-term interest the way Puerto Rico and even Settlers has. I could be wrong, and hope I am, but I-calls-it-like-I-sees-it.

We didn't really talk (in-depth) about scaling players for a game by switching the physical map used like in TTR:Switzerland. I really think Power Grid could use maps created for use with different numbers of players - a three player map, a four player map, and so on. China has a two sided board, each side specialized for different numbers of players. What other games customize the play area based on the number of players?

As for HeroScape Marvel: The Conflict Begins, we didn't have trouble working in the Marvel Hero but then I'm playing against a 9yr old. We just make sure everyone has the same value in Marvel characters, then the same value in standard HeroScape figures. (Plus whatever bonus points I give him.)

Most co-operative games scale really well, though they often have a different "feel" with a different # of players (Lord of the Rings comes to mind immediately.)
Games like Yahtzee have a tendency to scale very poorly, because players have no vested interest in the other players' turns. So as you add more players the downtime between turns can get excruciating. I also find that Citadels can be painful when played with too many players.



Again, co-operative games like Lord of the Rings or Pandemic scale remarkably well back to 2 players.



I only own the Marvel Heroscape, but I do find it enjoyable.



I'm fairly indifferent. I appreciate music as a buffer between segments, but don't really care what form it comes in.



Nope. Never heard of it, never listened.

There was actually a geeklist about this very subject the other day: http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/29610

* What games do you feel scale particularly well or poorly?
I find carcassonne the discovery works well with 2 but gets better with more. Santiago needs as many players as possible. Civilisation and risk can suffer with to few or even to many. Wings of wars seems to asborb players like the western front itself
* What games scale well back to two player?
wings of war, any wargame (in particular ones with minis ie GW, DBx etc)the old classic of "card games"
* Do you play HeroScape? What is your favorite expansion?
Bought 3 boxes..never played...other half went mad...sold all... 3d terrain was good but not good enough for cca 20/28mm lead and plastic figures I have for wargames
* What do you think of the current music profile for the show?
seems good...like the chanting (cant remember it proper name right now)
* Have you heard the Wandering Geek podcast before? Did you enter the contest?
no but will have a look...


PS
Tulips....rules printed, pre order sent in...looks interesting..other half will love ripping me off!!!
I heard that you can eat tulips...dont recommend it...apparently in the war the dutch had to eat tulips bulbs to survive from starvation.

One of the Tulipmania stories is that a hungry sailor found a tulip bulb, thought it was an onion, and started to eat it. It was a bulb worth a lot of money, and the sailor was imprisoned.

Lots of games scale well until you hit the extremes of what they're rated for. You get the idea that those games only have those particular extremes in an attempt to be more marketable.

Attika springs first to mind as far as scaling well. The only other games I can think of that scale well with 2 although they're rated for more are partnership games.



I was there from day one... and left after the first wave. The game is great to look at, but absolutely tedious to set up. It's simply not worth the time it takes. I recently bought Marvel Heroscape because of the super sale on it (and I'm a comic book geek). That game is AWFUL. Maybe you can mix it with your original Heroscape and make something playable, but it absolutely stinks on its own.



As long as there's something, I'm good with it. I think musical seques are essential to a good podcast.

I appreciated the piece from Giles on his use of games in the classroom. I used to use games in my class as well, both in elementary and secondary schools, and it was nice to hear his experiences.