Top 100 Games (of all time) – 20 through 11

20. For Northwood! A Solo Trick-Taking Game

Published By: Side Room Games
Designer: Wilhelm Su

Buy For Northwood!

A solo trick-taking game seems like it shouldn’t work. But For Northwood! works really well. It’s a simple trick taker, you need to follow suit if you can. But the twist is that you need to win a specific number of tricks each time. You play over eight rounds and need to win between 0 and 7 tricks, exactly. That sounds impossible, but you get powers that help you manipulate your hand. It’s always a question of, which one do you go for, in terms of tricks to win, and as you get further along, can get manipulate your hand to make it work.

19. Marvel Champions: The Card Game

Published By: Fantasy Flight Games
Designers: Michael Boggs, Nate French, and Caleb Grace

Buy Marvel Champions

I love Marvel and this is the game that gives me the Marvel feel to it. You are a superhero and you want to stop the bad guys scheme and defeat them. But, thematically, when you are in your hero form the bad guy is going to fight you and you take damage. So you need to manage going between your superhero and alter ego form so you don’t get hit. Of course as your alter ego, the villains are going to be scheming away. And you can create all sorts of fun combinations of heroes and villains to face off.

18. Floriferous

Published By: Pencil First Games
Designers: Eduardo Baraf and Steve Finn

Buy Floriferous

This game is one that I think is really overlooked in the gaming community. It’s a clever drafting game that does two very interesting things. The first thing is how scoring works. You don’t have much scoring that just happens, instead you draft your scoring cards. So there is always a choice between, do I draft more flowers or do I draft scoring cards. The other is how the drafting works, and this it maybe a bigger twist. You draft from a column, how high you are in the column determines when you draft next round. So it’s very possible you want to draft a less ideal card to get a perfect card.

17. Stars of Akarios

Published By: OOMM (Open Owl Studios)
Designers: Brendan McCaskell, Jonathan Thwaites

Buy Stars of Akarios

I love my big campaign games, and Stars of Akarios is one of my favorites. This one works so well for me with the tactical space combat, the planetary exploration, and a story that doesn’t take itself too seriously. The tactical space combat really shines in the game as you use your dice to position your ship, attack, and avoid the enemies the best you can. And the exploration is a bit like The 7th Continent/Citadel where you flip over cards and create a map and really explore as you go.

16. Clank!: Catacombs

Published By: Dire Wolf
Designer: Paul Dennen

Buy Clank! Catacombs

While i just did sell all of my other Clanks, this Clank! Catacombs spot is for all of them. Clank! is a push your luck game where you build up a deck of cards to get into a catacombs, in this case, and get out with the most points and best treasure that you can. Of course, if you are too noisy doing that, you clank, and when the enemy activates it might knock down your health. So it’s this push your luck in making noise, and going deeper. I like, too, with Clank! Catacombs, the map gets built as you go, so the board really is different every time.

15. Roll Player Adventures

Published By: Thunderworks Games
Designers: Keith Matejka, James William Ryan, and Peter Andrew Ryan

Buy Roll Player Adventures

Another big campaign game here with Roll Player Adventures. This one is all about dice manipulation and a fun story. I had a great time playing through the first campaign, and the additional one that I have, I need to get to the table. The system works well, though I will say, with four players it becomes a bit easier than at lower player counts. But the simple map movement, the story, the skill checks and of course combat and leveling up make this a fun time.

14. The Fellowship of the Ring: Trick-Taking Game

Published By: Office Dog
Designer: Bryan Bommueller

Buy The Fellowship of the Ring Trick-Taking Game

I like trick-taking games. Not a ton make it to my Top 100 games mainly because a lot feel similar. The Fellowship of the Ring: Trick-Taking Game is one that is different. Yes, it leans into a lot of standard things, but it’s also cooperative and story based. There are other cooperative ones out there, but the story based feels unique. Especially because this closely follows the books, so you get to chapters with Goldberry and Tom Bombadil as required characters which is fun. And the cooperative elements are challenging for the game.

13. Pirates of Maracaibo

Published By: dlp games
Designers: Ralph Bienert, Ryan Hendrickson, and Alexander Pfister

Buy Pirates of Maracaibo

The second of three new games on this part of the lit in a row. Pirates of Maracaibo is a pirate resource management game. I normally would want it to have more adventure, but this one is a ton of fun. I love building up my ship and seeing what strategy of building up ship, getting treasure, exploring, and competing quests can lead to victory. And it is great because all of them feel good to do. It isn’t a game where I feel like I need to go one way, though, I think some ways are more consistent.

12. Mistborn: The Deckbuilding Game

Published By: Brotherwise Games
Designer: John D. Clair

By Mistborn The Deck Building Game

Another deckbuilding game on the list here with Mistborn. And I like Mistborn just a bit better than Clank! because of a little more pure deck building. But also it has a lot of fun elements to the game. It leans into Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn world and let’s you burn metals to play cards. I also like the turn track, you always bump up in power as you go up the track. This makes for a really great experience of feeling like the game is ramping up.

11. Sleeping Gods

Published By: Red Raven Games
Designer: Ryan Laukat

Buy Sleeping Gods

The final game on the list is another big one, though not a campaign game. Sleeping Gods is a sand box story game where you are dropped into an unknown world and need to find and deal with totems. Of course, it’s a new land, so you don’t know where those are. And there are monsters and other interesting things to deal with. You need to control 9 crew, but really, it’s one turn and you just need to remember a few key abilities as you play. So it sounds like a lot, either cooperative or solo, but it’s not too bad.

Join Next Week

Just as a reminder, I am streaming new videos most Wednesdays. Let me know what you want to see me play next on Wednesdays after this list is done. You can subscribe to the channel and click notify to know whenever a new video comes out. Currently I am playing through Legendary Kingdoms on Monday and then my wife and I are playing Baldur’s Gate 3 on Fridays. So join us for those videos.

And thank you for checking out the video and articles. Let me know what your favorite game from this chunk of 10 is and which one you would love to get played.

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Top 100 Games (of all time) 2024 Edition – Top 10

10. Aeon’s End

• Published by Indie Boards & Cards in 2016
• Defend the town of Gravehold against a Nemesis and their minions by slinging spells around

To kick off the Top 10, let’s talk about one that has been in my Top 10 for a while and one that I have basically everything for. I’m guessing I’m missing a few promo cards, but Aeon’s End is one of my favorite deck building games.

This is a deck building game, tower defense, and boss battler all wrapped into one. The name of the game in this one is variety. There are other elements I like too, but variety is huge. Each mage is unique, each nemesis is unique and the market of cards that you create is unique. Everything about the game can be mixed and matched and give endless replayability. I also like that this is a cooperative game.

And, finally, I like this game best as a solo or two player. I know that it can play more, but with the turn system, it works better at lower counts. You draw to see whose turn it is. In the deck there are two nemesis cards, and one per player at four players, or two at two players. So you get these fun moments where it swings from the players getting four turns in a row to the nemesis getting three and now things look dangerous. It makes the game feel more exciting, it just works best at two players though because of that.

Buy Aeon’s End

9. Roll Player Adventures

• Published by Thunderworks Games in 2021
• Explore the lands, beat monsters and complete skill challenges in a world that remembers what you did

Now to a really big game we have Roll Player Adventures. They took the Roll Player system, tweaked it and gave us a story and adventure game. And I think that it works really well as a game, clearly, as it’s my #9. Though, like Aeon’s End, I’ll give a caveat that difficulty changes based on player count, which, isn’t a bad thing, but it something worth noting.

In this game you play through chapters of an adventure. To do that you are fighting monsters, doing skill checks, and reading story. Whenever it’s a right or a skill check you are spending cards and resources, your health, in different stats to try and complete a dice puzzle. You need to get dice of certain colors and certain numbers into specific locations. But, the game is smart and it limits you in how much you can do that, and it is what they try and use to scale, but like I said, I think that it’s easier with more.

The story is also a lot of fun. There are games on my list that have a bigger and darker story. And I like dark stories, dark fantasy can be a lot of fun, but it’s also fun to have stories that are maybe a bit sillier at times. And, I will say, they manage to create a story where it feels like it matters and continues along with the choices that you make.

Buy Roll Player Adventures

8. Dice Throne

• Published by Dice Throne Inc. in 2018
• Fight in a Mortal Combat style tournament by chucking dice and leveling up attacks

My #8 is “Battle Yahtzee”. By that, I mean that it is Dice Throne. This is a game that is played either as a head to head battle or as king of the hill. You get a hero, or character, that you play as. And they have specific abilities that you can activate by rolling dice Yahtzee style. By that I mean you get three roles, you keep some dice each time, and you see what you get at the end.

But Dice Throne is more than just a lucky game. Yes, there is an element of luck with rolling the dice. But the game often comes down to how well you can mitigate that luck. If you manage to get off your ultimate attack, well there isn’t much your opponent can do, of course that does mean that you roll all sixes. That’s very unlikely to just happen. But with cards and your combat points you spend to play them, you are able to manipulate dice, turn them to different sides, or get rerolls to try and land those attacks.

Plus the game offers a ton of variety. The first set is more standard fantasy. But then you get into other characters like a Tactician or an Artificer who do different things. And I own the Marvel set and am waiting on the Marvel X-Men set to come as well. You pick your favorites to get, or if you’re like me, you get them all.

Buy Dice Throne

7. Rogue Angels: Legacy of the Burning Suns

• Published by SunTzuGames in 2025
• Change the galaxy with a unlikely group of heroes in an epic sci-fi adventure

Now for a game that isn’t even out yet. Why do I have it on the list, because I have in my collection a prototype of the game. And I’ve even played it on Malts and Meeples. The game is basically set, through there are elements of the game that will change, but that’s mainly around components not around actual game play.

I love Rogue Angels. You know that by now because it’s on every list of Crowdfunding game that I’m waiting for. And yes, it will be again at the end of this year, most likely. This is another story, adventure, and combat game. And I really enjoy the story in it. I like having some campaign games that aren’t just another fantasy setting, and Rogue Angels gives you a good sci-fi setting. And I love how the combat, or mission element of the game works.

I want to say that this isn’t a game where every scenario is a go and beat someone up. No, this is a game where you might want to dive into combat. Or you might want to sneak through, and it all depends on the scenario. I love that for a game because I don’t always want to beat up the bad guys. And with how the game activates the bad guys, well, getting rid of the wrong bad guys at the wrong time just means you’ll be dealing with the other ones all the time.

Late Pledge Rogue Angels

6. Floriferous

• Published by Pencil First Games in 2021
• Create the best scoring group of flowers in this drafting game

Now we have the smallest game in my Top 10 list. But Floriferous was there last year and it is staying there again this year because I love what the game does. I enjoy a good drafting game, and I think that drafting makes sense in a lot of different games. But how Floriferous does it works for me because it combines drafting with building out your own scoring.

And the drafting itself is clever. You either draft a flower or you draft a scoring card from a column. The scoring cards are always at the bottom of the column, though, which matters for drafting the next column. Because the turn order for that next column is determined by the previous column you drafted from, aka, the higher you are up in the column the sooner you draft again. So yes, you need scoring cards, but that means you draft later next time.

I also want to call out drafting the scoring. I like it when a game does that because it offers a great decision point. When I draft, I might want that scoring card, but if you don’t have enough flowers, it won’t do much for me. And on the flip side, if I draft too many flowers I’m not going to be scoring anything.

Buy Floriferous

5. Slay the Spire

• Published by Contention Games in 2024
• Climb the spire, fight monsters and can you defeat them all in this cooperative deck building game

Next up is a new one to the list and it’s debuting all the way up at #5. Now it’s not the last new one to the list, there is one higher, though just barely higher. Slay the Spire is a video game that I love to play. In fact I’ve been on a kick of playing it recently. It’s a rogue like deck building game where you climb a tower.

The board game is the exact same thing. But it takes a solo video game experience and makes it multiplayer. In fact, while the solo is fun, I think that it’s even better two player or two handed. And I want to play it with more. Because you figure out a strategy of who wants to attack which enemies. Because each player has their own enemies that will attack them, but you can attack the other person’s enemies. So you might have more defense and handle it as well.

With all of that said, the game does change one thing. How some things activate is changed, so you’re not needing to keep track of “every seven turns” or “every three times you shuffle” but it makes it easy to keep track of. And they scale down everything. I like that because I don’t want to be keeping track of six enemies with 50 health each. So while the math is very much the same, the numbers are just lower.

Buy Slay the Spire

4. The 7th Citadel

• Published by Serious Poulp Games in 2024
• The Citadels are in ruins. How can you rebuild society and deal with the threats?

The other new to the list game and debuting at #4 is The 7th Citadel. I should have put it at #7 just to make it a bit more fitting. But I love this game and you can see me playing it for some sessions on Malts and Meeples YouTube.

This is an adventure game. These Citadels have fallen and now in a dangerous and post apocalyptic feeling world, though uniquely so, you need to survive. You play as leaders of a settlement has has formed out of the 7th Citadel. And now you need to deal with some threat that is coming.

The main mechanism is the same as The 7th Continent. You spend cards to try and complete checks, fight monsters, and deal with challenges. And the cards are going to be your life. Plus you are flipping over cards and exploring areas of the map and dealing with encounters that happen. But the game gives you more direction than the 7th Continent does as the threat gives you missions to go on as you build up your settlement for whatever that coming threat might be.

Late Pledge The 7th Citadel

3. Stars of Akarios

• Published by OOMM/Open Owl Studios in 2022
• Explore space, fight battles, and unravel the story of why you were attacked

This is the one that launched into the Top 10 last year and it’s sticking around. I love this game, clearly, but it’s another one of those big campaign games, and it’s one that’s set in space. But this game feels different than so many others. I don’t know why, but it gives me the feeling of stories like Ender’s Game and Space Dandy all wrapped into one with obvious nods to other sci-fi stories as well.

I really enjoy how they created a game that is split into three different element. The one, space exploration, is a bit weaker. There is some randomness to it, and I feel like I never found anything major on it. But I love the other two element. You get to have a 7th Citadel/7th Continent style exploration on planets. But instead of playing cards for checks you roll dice. And it’s a really fun time, but the biggest part of the game is space combat.

And I wasn’t sure how much I’d love the space combat. But I really enjoy it, it’s this great tactical puzzle as you use special abilities that you can only use so much. And then you spend dice to maneuver and you need to figure out how to even get into range to shoot the enemy and ideally in a flanking position. I love sitting there looking at the dice and trying to figure out how to make it work.

Late Pledge Stars of Akarios

2. Tainted Grail: Fall of Avalon

• Published by Awaken Realms in 2019
• The lands are returning to Wyrdness, you’ve been sent out to help Avalon survive, if you can

Now or one of a few campaign games that I’ve completed, at #2 we have Tainted Grail. And this is the base game and the two expansion campaigns. I love them all. I need to play Kings of Ruin as well, but I’m not sure when I’ll get to that because of, well, my #1 on the list.

But this game, let’s start off with the highest praise, has the best writing of any board game I’ve ever played. The story that it tells is amazing and for that reason we did play in story mode to be able to experience as much of that story as possible. I’ll talk about why in a little bit. This is a grim dark game, but it manages not to dwell on the darkness to the point where it’s overbearing but creates this amazing fantastical and dangerous world to deal with.

And let’s talk about that story mode and why we played that way. One of the criticisms of the game is that it’s too hard. There is too much grind and too much survival. That is what the game was advertised as, so why people thought it was bad, and not just not for me, when they got what they knew they were going to get, I don’t know. But story mode makes it easier, but not too easy. So you do need to engage with that survival aspect of the game, but you can delve into the story more so. If you find the game, get it, and I do recommend playing on story mode.

Buy Tainted Grail

1. Gloomhaven/Frosthaven

• Published by Cephalofair Games in 2022
• Battle monsters, explore lands, and build up the town in this epic campaign

Finally the number one stays the same. The #1 on the list is really Frosthaven, Gloomhaven and Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion. I don’t think it’s fair for them to be separate on the list. While Frosthaven does build on Gloomhaven and add in some elements like the town management, the core loop of the game is the same. I do think the added element of the town management would push it even a little bit higher than Gloomhaven for me though.

But the main part of the game is going into scenarios and trying to complete their objectives. This almost always includes killing some bad guys, and often times the win condition is kill all the enemies. Though in Frosthaven that is less often, though still the most common scenario goal.

The element that is the best about the game is the characters though. I love how every character is unique. And from the cards that you get to play, it feels that way. Sometimes you want to be that tanking character, or a fast damage dealer, or a support or healer character. And the games offer all of those.

And then the card play where you might want to go fast, so you can get in and out dealing damage quickly, or maybe you want to go slow to draw the enemies towards you, there is a lot of great strategy. I love picking cards, too, where I might plan to use the bottom and top halves in one way but then give myself the flexibility to change it. Needless to say, I love my #1 game.

Buy Frosthaven

Upcoming Streams

Just a reminder on my streaming schedule. It’s not just all my Top 100 Games (of all time).

• Monday night, time varies, I play different small solo games, though I might be looking to start up a campaign again. And generally the streams do start between 8 and 8:30 PM central time.
• Wednesday at 9 PM central is going to be my 200 through 101 next week. After that I’m going to do some videos looking back on 2024. So expect to see my Top 10 Games of 2024 and probably Top 10 crowdfunding games I backed in 2024 as well.
• Friday at 9 PM central my wife and I are streaming a playthrough of Baldur’s Gate 3. Join us for the adventure of Nina and Kaerok and see what choices we make.

The best way to know when we go live, though is to subscribe and click that notification bell. I can’t promise, and in fact it’s pretty unlikely, that I’ll have events to click on ahead of time. Though I do want to get better at it. I hope that you can join a stream and hop into the chat. And let me know what games in this list are your favorite or that you want to try.

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Catch up on my Top 100 Games (of all Time) 2023 Edition:

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Top 100 Games (of all time) 2023 Edition – 10 through 1

10. Detective: A Modern Crime Board Game

Let’s start off with Detective: A Modern Crime Board Game at #10 this year. Detective is deduction game where you and your teammates are trying to solve cases. The base box comes with five cases that take about 2-3 hours each. And you’re up against the clock, in the game, to solve everything and figure out what answers you need as you get quizzed on what happened and the who, what, and why of the case at the end. Plus little details that you might have missed or you can piece together.

This is like a crime television drama. I don’t love watching those, but playing in one is amazing. You actually get to put together deduction skills and piece together what happened. Sometimes it’s easy, and other times it is hard, but it’s always worth it.

And this game does a good job using technology as you play. Part of how you get information is interacting with a computer and a database to pull up details that might already exist on the case. Or it might be details that already exist on people in the case. It really helps make Detective into a great immersive experience.

Buy Detective

9. The Great Split

Next up we have The Great Split, a new game to the list and one that does a single thing well. In The Great Split, it is primarily an “I split, you choose” game. What does that mean? It means that I have a group of cards and I put them into two groups. You pick one of those groups and I get the other one back. Then we both use them for scoring, which is what everyone is doing at the same time. So, I love the simplicity and simultaneous nature of the game play.

Plus the scoring is nice in the game as well as it isn’t too difficult or too easy. What it mainly is, is pushing up on on tracks for artwork, literature, gems, and money. And each of them is going to score in a different way. Some of them score with how well you are doing against a market or against a scoring track. Others score, the gems, with your lowest of the two gem tracks. So it’s figuring out what you want to go for, because that’s not all the scoring.

There is also contracts in the game. Those are on the tracks as well, but you have other tracks that you want to push up on. Because they make the contracts you have, loaning your art pieces out to museums and stuff like that, worth more. But if you’re pushing up on those tracks, you aren’t on the main scoring tracks, so it’s a really good balance. And all of that with very simple rules teach and very simple game play.

Buy The Great Split

8. Floriferous

Now we have Floriferous, a game that has made it’s way higher up on the list from last year. And some of that is what I redid how I thought about the list, some. I now put more stock into the games that I want to play all the time and do play often, as well as the ones that give me a great experience when I play them. Which is why there are fewer campaign games in the Top 10, though, don’t worry, their are still several.

But Floriferous is a drafting game of building up your best bouquet of flowers. But how you draft and how you know what you are scoring is what I love about the game. You lay out the cards to be drafted from at the start of the round. And then players take turns drafting from the first column of cards. Where you draft in that column then determines your drafting order for the next column. It makes for great decisions as decide to take a less ideal card to make sure you get the perfect card next column.

And then there is the scoring. A little of the scoring just exists at the start of the game. Most of what you score you need to draft. So I need to draft a card that says “2 points for all purple flowers”, for example. And I can do that, but the scoring cards are always at the bottom of the column. That means when I take a scoring card I’m going to be going last next round which is a choice, as I said above, that I really love.

Buy Floriferous

7. Planet Unknown

Next up we have Planet Unknown a terraforming, polyomino laying game. And it’s one that is not that hard to teach, if you have the game in front of you. But it does some very cool things, which I’ll get to in a second here. But the game is about filling up your planet with tiles, clearing out meteors that have hit your planet, and building up on various tracks of nature, water, technology, rover mobility, and civilization.

The game is able to be played in two ways. The first way is a simple generic way where everyone has the exact same thing. I think it is a solid system if everyone is learning the game, and you have new to gaming people in there. But once people know the system at all, flip over the boards and the groups going to the planets. That is when the fun begins as everyone is working a little bit differently and has their own ways and timings as they go up the tracks while still playing the same game.

And the one thing I haven’t touched on yet is how you pick your tiles. There is a lazy susan in the middle with all of the tiles on it. And on your turn, you turn the lazy susan to the side you want facing you so you get the tile that you want. It’s a tough decision, and then everyone else takes from the side facing them. Or at least kind of facing them, because they’ll have a marker, placed at the start of the game, that determines where they take from. I love that mechanism as I can get what I want, or I might choose to mess with you.

Late Pledge Planet Unknown

6. Lost Ruins of Arnak

Then we have Lost Ruins of Arnak. And this one I do want to specify that it is a top 10 game for me with the first expansion. The second expansion definitely keeps it up this high as well, but the first one is needed, in my opinion. It takes Lost Ruins of Arnak from a fun game to one of my top games of all time.

So how does it play, and why do I like the expansion so much. Well, at it’s heart, The Lost Ruins of Arnak is a resource management game of going out, collecting resources and turning them in to move up a research track. But there are a number of twists with it as well. Because I also am building up a deck of cards that let me do more actions or power up the actions that I do take. And I love that aspect to it.

So let’s talk about what the expansion adds and why I think Expedition Leaders is very important to the game. In Lost Ruins of Arnak, base game, everyone has the same camp, same workers, and same starting deck of cards. And there are two tracks which you can go up on. It’s fun. But Expedition Leaders says your camp, your cards, how many workers you have, all of that can be unique now. Because you have a leader that makes you unique and I really love that.

Buy The Lost Ruins of Arnak

5. Terraforming Mars: Ares Expedition

Terraforming Mars: Ares Expedition is the next game on the list coming in at #5. And it is one that I haven’t played in probably eight months. I really need to get it back to the the table. But I love this engine building game and another game about terraforming a planet, but this time, I’d say, it’s way more about building up that engine to generate more resources and points.

The game, like I said, is about building up that engine and determining when to activate everything, and when to pick an action to do based off of what you think your opponent is going to do. How does that work? Well, the game has five actions and the actions that are played out by the players that round are the ones that are going to happen.

The actions also fire off in a particular order. So if I pick research it’s action #5, so it’ll go last. Someone else might pick activating actions, and that’s #3, so it goes in that order. Which ever one you pick, you get a special bonus for it, while your opponents get whatever the basic action is (which you do as well). So it’s about trying to not match with your opponents to get more actions done and to figure out what benefits you the most. Of course, if everyone is doing that, well, then no one might pick that one action everyone wants.

Buy Terraforming Mars: Ares Expedition

4. Stars of Akarios

Now we’re onto one of the big campaign games. And you can see game play for this one on Malts and Meeples. Stars of Akarios is a game that I absolutely enjoyed all that I did. Some parts are better than others, but as a whole, I think the game is a ton of fun. It’s a big space adventure that gives me vibes from Enders Game and Space Dandy, two really different things, but it works for this game.

The game is split into three parts, but we’re going to talk about two of them. First part is planetary exploration. This has a 7th Continent type feel to it with flipping over locations and interacting with places. Plus there is a lot of story that you can find as well for the different planets. There are skill checks and things like that, but a lot of it is story and the choices you make in that story unlocks new things that you can do.

The main part of the game is tactical space combat. It’s about using your dice to flank and out maneuver the enemies so that you are in the right spot for a big hit and they can’t hit you back. I adore the puzzle that this game provides in this space combat. It is good enough to just be a game by itself, but the story and the world/universe that is being built in the game is just amazing. I can’t wait to get back to it, and maybe it’ll be a campaign game that I come back to and try and play through solo sometime.

Buy Stars of Akarios

Note the 1.5 version of Stars of Akarios is coming out. There should be a late pledge available soon.

3. Dice Throne

Next up is Dice Throne. I believe that my #2 and #3 flipped spots from last year. Dice Throne is a battling game of taking characters up against each other and rolling dice, Yahtzee style, to deal damage. You get a better roll, like a large straight or all sixes and you get to do more damage.

The game really shines in two areas. The first is how they manage to make all of the characters feel different. I have Marvel Dice Throne pictured here, but in the video I have Dice Throne Season 1 and I figured out coming soon there will be 35 different characters. And all of the characters do feel different. They come with different tokens that change up how they interact with the enemies or how they ramp up to deal more damage themselves.

And then there is the card play in this game. What doesn’t make it just pure dice chucking are these cards. Some of them are upgrades to your attacks that offer better results and more damage when you roll them. Other times, and I’d say most often this, it’s about getting better results on your dice. You don’t want to end up being stuck doing nothing if you try and shoot the moon and go for all sixes. So you keep cards to manipulate the dice. It’s a great system that offers more depth than you’d think from the initial description.

Buy Dice Throne

2. Tainted Grail: Fall of Avalon

Now we have Tainted Grail at #2. This one moved up, I think, because I made it through all three campaigns, wrapping up the third one this year. And all of them offer something unique and fun that is really enjoyable to play. I love how you start in the middle with the first campaign and then the second takes place 500 years later and the first 500 years before it. It offers a lot of interesting storytelling, which the writer really takes advantage of.

The game play is also pretty slick once you get into it. The combat and diplomacy checks are done through card play. And while that is an important part of the game, it’s not too hard to build up something that is powerful enough. Or players with specialize in different areas. One element about the combat that I really like is that you need to pay attention is to the enemies attack. How much damage you deal determines the enemies attack. If you aren’t careful, you’re going to take a lot of damage.

But the game really shines around the exploration and survival aspects of the game. I think it’s best on story mode because the story is so good. But you always need to be keeping track of the menhir that you have lit. Because if they go out, then you start to lose parts of the map as the wyrdness takes over. And that limits where you can explore. And as I said, exploration is the best part of the game. It is a chance to dive into that story. So it’s a balance of story, resource gathering, and then just surviving that makes Tainted Grail work so well.

Buy Tainted Grail

1. Gloomhaven

My #1 hasn’t changed, it’s still Gloomhaven. Though, you can say that it is Gloomhaven, Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion, and Frosthaven all rolled into one. Jaws of the Lion might be a game that I show off here on Malts and Meeples. And I’m now playing through a campaign of Frosthaven.

This is a classic dungeon crawling game where you go into a scenario and need to tactically move around and kill all the bad guys. Or at least that’s the objective in a lot of base Gloomhaven’s scenarios. The other ones offer more variety. But it’s also a game of leveling up your characters, unlocking more abilities, and then eventually retiring and getting a whole new character to play with.

And getting those abilities and playing them out is where the game is amazing. You play out two cards from your hand each turn. They have abilities on the top and bottom. And you’ll activate one of the top abilities and one of the bottom ones. Plus you need to figure out where in initiative that you want to go as well.

And the variety in them and how different the characters are is impressive. It’s like a lot of the games in my Top 10, I like the variable player powers and variability in what you are doing. Gloomhaven and all the following games offer a ton of that. And it’s sad to lose a character to retirement that you’ve spent time with, but exciting to unlock something new. This is just an amazing game that deserves the love it gets.

Buy Gloomhaven

Thanks for Joining Me

Thank you for joining me as I went through all of the games on this list. I really have fun doing this every year. And I hope that you have fun watching along. I appreciate everyone who has been in the chats and watched the videos. It means a lot to me to see that people are enjoying it. Let me know what some of your favorite games are.

Upcoming Streaming

And join me for future upcoming streams. I made a comment that my Monday streams might be changing. We’ll have to see on that, it might just be less often, or it might move to a different night, it depends on some variables as I look at the new year. Right now, though, that it’s changing. I plan on streaming Monday nights at 9 PM Central. I won’t have some on the 25th of December, I will be around next week.

Then on Wednesday, I generally stream a campaign game. I won’t be doing that this upcoming week. And I’ll be missing the following week. But as I start 2024, I plan to stream Rogue Angels. A game that I think will be in my Top 100 starting next year. One of my rules was that I needed to have played a physical copy. And thus far I only have played it digitally. Now I’ll be able to play it in person, which I’m really excited for. So join me for that starting in 2024. And Wednesday streams start at 8 PM Central time.

But the best way, if you want to know when I go live or a new video goes up (it’s basically always live), please consider subscribing. You can do that here. And click that notification bell on the channel and you’ll always know when I go live.

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The Game – Stars of Akarios

So I can only give initial impressions on this so far. There is a lot to potentially look at because there is a lot of game in the box. I’ve done one, kind of two, of three parts of this game. I did a little bit of space exploration, but not really. There is a spot on the map to interact with, but that just immediately takes you into your first combat. Instead, what I’ve done thus far is space combat.

The space combat is intriguing to play. Mainly because positioning has so much to do with it. Get behind an enemy ship, and you get advantage. That can take a miss into a nice success. Or push you over the top to get the damage out that you need to. Or even stay out of the firing arc of an enemy for a turn. There is a lot to think about, and I appreciate that.

At the same time, with that planning, you still don’t feel bogged down with the game. The space combat turns go fast, you have a limited number of actions that you can do. And the dice further limit that. And that isn’t a bad thing, I think it’d make a multiplayer experience work well. For me playing solo, it matters a little bit less, but it makes controlling two characters easier. I thought about just doing one ship, but I’m glad that I have two to play around with. It allows me to try and see more things.

The one initial knock or thing to be aware of is how big this game is. It takes up a ton of table space. It doesn’t seem too large, but it is very large. I think I could play four characters solo. But to get the camera and lights where they need to be, and to show the board, I can’t do that. So know what you’re getting into. It could maybe be scaled down in size slightly. But I do appreciate that it has the giant nature to the game, it makes it feel more epic.

Upcoming Streams

So Monday I had plans to do a Top 10 list, but Etherfields is finally shipped. This is a Kickstarter that I backed probably in 2018 and is now just making it here. Granted, Wave 1 has been out for a bit, but I didn’t pay for two wave shipping. So I don’t even know all of what I have coming with my pledge level anymore. Whatever it is, I’ll be unboxing it.

Then next Wednesday another Stars of Akarios live stream. I put out a question if we should follow orders or not? So there is going to be a poll down below to help decide. Let me know what you think I should do. I’ve seen one of the two ways played on another YouTube channel, so I’m tempted to one direction but vote and let me know.

If you’re enjoying this content. Please give the video a thumbs up. And you can always subscribe to Malts and Meeples over on YouTube to see the new content as it comes out. If you click the notification bell, you’ll know when I go live. You can do all of that here.

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I have a few companies like that where I generally will pay attention. And for me, that doesn’t mean back or buy everything. But it does mean that I will always check it out in detail. Rarely, if ever, will I just gloss over a game from these companies. So here are my Top 10 companies I’m always interested in

Top 10 Board Game Companies

10. Fantasy Flight Games

Fantasy Flight Games is probably a company that’d have dropped off for a lot of people. They used to come out with a whole lot more games and a whole lot bigger announcements. But I still am interested. When I saw a Twilight Imperium Roll and Write, I was interested, even with a long play time. And Marvel Champions I still buy everything for that.

I wish they would come out with something more. A new version of Star Wars Imperial Assault? I would love to see that. Or something more original from them. Maybe a smaller version of a Descent 3.0 to go along with Descent: Legends of the Dark.

9. Thunderworks Games

Thunderworks is also just on that edge if I check everything out. I will look at any announcement because I am curious about anything set in their Roll Player World of Ulos. However, anything, like Tenpenny Park, those I’ll look at, but generally aren’t what I’m interested in. But I see them because I am curious if it is more stuff for Roll Player, Roll Player Adventures, or Cartographers.

8. CMON

CMON is either on your list or not. There is no in between I feel. Some people wait anticipating what CMON is going to announce next. Other people pledge $1 so that they can complain. That is basically how it goes on everything that CMON does. And I understand some of the complaints, I also don’t care on some of the complaints. They end up being complaining for the sake of complaining. But that isn’t the point of this article.

I wait to see what CMON comes out with next. And there is no company where they can announce a game and I will always back it or buy it. But when CMON announces a Stranger Things Game, see here, I get really excited. On the flip side, I like the idea of a big Dune battling over the planet game, but it is not one that I will back.

7. Chip Theory Games

Chip Theory Games is moving up the list for me. The more I see and mess around with their games, the more interested I am in their games. I enjoy Too Many Bones, and I think the more I dive into it the more I will like it. Then I almost backed Hoplomacus Victorum because it was a solo version of a game that I thought looked cool. And Burncycle, after watching a Brother’s Murph play through, see below, I really want to get it. Their games aren’t cheap though, so I need to pace myself.

6. Horrible Guild

Probably the biggest break or one of them, from the big games on the list is Horrible Guild. Horrible Guild does some campaign or legacy games with King’s Dilemma and then Queen’s Dilemma coming to Kickstarter. But I like their small games. Stuff like Potion Explosion, Railroad Ink, I’m so excited to be getting Tiny Turbo Cars, stuff like that.

They make games with amazing toy factor to them. And I just really enjoy sitting down and playing them. They also make games that are accessible. Railroad Ink is a bit challenging for a roll and write with Railroad Ink Challenge, but it’s not hard to teach. Same with Potion Explosion or Similo. Plus with so much fun in their games, I always want to see what they make.

5. Mythic Games

Getting back to big games, we have Mythic Games. Mythic Games has made such games as Reichbusters and Solomon Kane, but the one of theirs I play the most is Super Fantasy Brawl. I really love that game, but I mainly pay attention to their big games. Now, with that said, I don’t back a ton of their games on crowdfunding. I have backed Super Fantasy Brawl and HEL: The Last Saga, but that is it.

One of the reasons is that their rule books first time around tend to be poor. You need to get, and they do send out, a new rule book. But also because their games are big and epic and tend to have a lot with them. They are like CMON in some ways, I might want to back all of them, but I certainly don’t have room to back and store all of their games. Just between Super Fantasy Brawl and Solomon Kane that takes up a lot of space on top of a Kallax shelf.

4. Roxley Games

Last game on the list that makes that many smaller games. Though, when you get everything for Dice Throne, it certainly isn’t that small. And Dice Throne is the reason Roxley is so high on the list. They have some heavy euro games, I am not interested in those. But I want more Dice Throne. And their lighter games, I am interested in.

I really only own two games from Roxley, Dice Throne and Radlands and I need to play Radlands still. But when Santa vs Krampus came out, I backed immediately. When Marvel Dice Throne was announced, I knew I’d be all in. That is going to be case whenever they come out with anything new.

3. OOMM

OOMM is a very new company to the list. And honestly, I should likely keep them lower on the list, but we’re not talking about backing everything, we’re talking about being interested. I bought Stars of Akarios because of what it looked like after the fact. I backed Mythwind because the game looked so different.

OOMM really does something that I love in creating games that feel unique. Mythwind seems really different than anything else out there. Stars of Akarios is a big space campaign game. Do I need more space campaign games, not really but I want them. And the new legacy game they announced looks very cool as well.

2. Awaken Realms

Awaken Realms maybe could be #1, but it’s at #2 because there is Awaken Realms Lite, technically it’s own company I believe, but a lot of the same people and process. But the last two on the list, I will always look and almost always back whatever they do.

There are two exceptions for Awaken Realms. I didn’t back The Great Wall as it is a massive euro game. It looks cool, I’d love to try it, but I wouldn’t buy it. And I didn’t back Lords of Ragnarok from them. Why, because I already own and love Lords of Hellas. Lords of Ragnarok might be better, but I don’t need to own both.

1. Cephalofair Games

I doubt that this is a shock. I went all in on Frosthaven. And I love Gloomhaven. I never looked at Founders of Gloomhaven once I realized it was a euro. But Cephalofair announces something, I am interested. I hope it is more for Frosthaven, after that has been out for a bit. Or another big box game, but really, anything at this point. Even with my #1 company that I will be intrigued to hear whatever they announce, not every game will be for me.

Still, I can’t wait until Frosthaven gets here. And I even started a campaign of Gloomhaven Digital recently. It is just a fun experience to play that game and it is fun to dive back into it. And I will for sure dive heavily into Frosthaven almost right away when it shows up. I suspect we’ll be done with the final Tainted Grail expansion by then, but we’ll see.

Final Thoughts

Firstly, I’d love to know what companies you are generally interested. Which ones make games that seem fun to checkout or different. I want to know what gets you excited. And as I said, I don’t like every game from all of these companies. In fact, there are some that just miss completely for me, even though I love the company.

And that is very fair to not like everything. I talk about how CMON is polarizing, the people who love CMON don’t like everything from CMON. The people who dislike CMON will never know what they are missing out on. I think it’s more important to remember that some games are going to be for you and some won’t no matter the company. And even if you enjoy all of them, some will be better than others.

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Stars of Akarios

Stars of Akarios, just for a brief overview is going to be an exploration game in two parts. It’s set in space so in one part you are flying around, battling enemy ships and going between planets. Then you came down to a planet level view and go on adventures there.

This is done with some cool looking minis, dice rolling, and a modifier deck. I think the giant book of scenarios, the modifier deck, and people are comparing it to Gloomhaven for those things. But the rest of the game feels quite different. Obviously, Gloomhaven has no die rolling.

What drew me to this game, besides it being a big campaign game, is that you can upgrade your characters and there seems to be a lot of story there. As I flipped through the rule book and scenario book, I wish there was more or better art in those books. But the whole of the game and the story seems to be bigger than the artwork in those books. And the artwork on the planets looks nice.

My hope with Stars of Akarios is to start streaming a play through of at least a few chapters of this coming up soon. I feel like it’d be something different than the fantasy that I’ve been streaming recently. And it is also a game that looks big but should be able to fit, barely, onto the table for streaming.

Upcoming Streaming

So, like I just said, I want to stream Stars of Akarios once I finish up the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game. I should wrap that one up in the next couple of weeks, but we’ll see for sure. So I’d think that Stars of Akarios will likely get started post GenCon at the start of August.

But this Wednesday, and it’s already up, we have Pathfinder Adventure Card game for tomorrow. How will Seoni and Amiri fair this time?

And then, next Monday, I want to bounce between doing an unboxing or chat and a Top 10 List. I will eventually start to do some lists about specific games, like gateway games or stuff like that. But I think it might be 10 things to know before going to GenCon or something like that? I also want to do a list of GenCon games again to buy or demo there that have caught my eye.

Is Stars of Akarios on the list of games you’d want to buy? Or would you like to see a game play of it?

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Anticipated Crowdfunding Games

10. Quantum Shock

The one that I consider least likely to come out. The latest that they have said about it, this was in 2021 mind you, that they were going to be launching in 2022. The game is still in that get notified at launch stage. And when asked in January and June about a timeline, there is no response/information.

But Quantum Shock very much falls into that category of a game that I’d be interested in. It is cooperative, sci-fi, and horror. Three things that I really love. And the aesthetic, at least of the box artwork is interesting to me. I’m poking about to find more information on the game because I’d love to see what the whole look and play of the game is.

9. Moon

From the company that brought us Villagers and Streets, they now have a new game coming, Moon. I don’t know much about the game or about their games in general. But I know the look of the games, and Moon looks amazing in terms of the artwork and graphic design. That is what has me interested. Generally, I feel like my thoughts have been with Villagers and Streets, try before I buy, but Moon, if it looks interesting enough, might be a spot to jump into Sinister Fish Games.

8. Sea of Legends: Vengeance of the Empires

An expansion for a game that I own, Sea of Legends. This is going to be a big pirate adventure game. I love the idea of a big sprawling pirate game. And while I haven’t played this one yet, because I’ve heard the app was getting improved upon, I do really want to play my copy. That is likely going to determine if I back this game.

Sea of Legends, like I said, is a big pirate game. You pick a Captain, Lover, and Nemesis, and that drives your story in the game. It is a competitive game, but I like that the story of each character weaves together which intrigues me. I hope that when I play it, I’ll love it. I thought that Merchants and Marauders might be the big pirate game for me, but that one fell flat. And Seafall didn’t seem like pirates.

7. Drop Bears

You heard about this one last week. Drop Bears, based off of the Australian legends for tourists, are basically bears that look like koalas. But instead of being all cute, they drop out of trees and attack with big pointy teeth and claws, if you aren’t careful. I’m very curious about this one. Again, a horror them, which I like and I really like the legend. I’m hoping to get my hands on some press release content if I can to cover it before it launches.

6. Globetrotting

Globetrotting is on here because of the toy factor. But from the same company that makes Canvas, Globetrotting seems to be a roll and write where you are connecting things on a 3D globe. Just that toy factor is great, so I want to see it, play it because of that. A game with good toy factor might not be a great game, but it does make me interested. And Canvas has very good toy factor as well with it’s artwork and is a good game. So I want to see what this one is.

5. Cyberpunk 2077: Gangs of Night City

Again, another one that I’ve mentioned before. CMON is doing a game set in the Cyberpunk world. I don’t know a ton more about it than that. I’d guess this game will have a lot of minis, a lot of expansions, but probably be a fun beer and pretzels type of game.

For me, I wish that it sounded like it had more story. But the theme of cyberpunk is cool. I like games like Shadowrun, or that setting, for that reason. So I’ll be curious to know what this one looks like. Area control is also a mechanism that I like quite well. However, I want more going on in a game than that, so one that I’ll be keeping an eye on.

4. Trick Shot

This one is a reprint of a game that is already out. Trick Shot is a hockey game, very hard to find right now, that comes with minis. I don’t know a ton about how it plays, but generally reviews seem pretty favorable. And the idea of a game where you play hockey seems like a good amount of fun to me.

I would love to watch a video of this being played. My main concern about the game is that it’ll be too slow. Hockey, as a sport, is a fast moving game. Baseball works okay for board games because it is a slower moving sport. But Hockey, Basketball, Soccer, and Football are all harder for me to get behind because they move fast. But we’ll see with Trick Shot, because it looks fun.

3. Stonesaga

OOMM games is putting out a lot of things that interest me. I backed Mytwind. I want Stars of Akarios eventually but it is spendy to get right now. It isn’t that I expect it to get cheaper, but it hopefully will be available for a bit. But Stonesaga is a cooperative legacy game. That right there makes it interesting to me.

Plus it has a story that unfolds over time, also interesting to me. And it can be played solo. It seems to be about building up a society and your world over generations. But of course, as a legacy game, the world remembers what you do and changes and grows the story as you go.

2. Tainted Grail: Kings of Ruin

Top two were easy to pick. Firstly, an expansion, though I believe a standalone expansion, for Tainted Grail. I love Tainted Grail. I am playing through the third of the stories in the original crowdfunding campaign right now. And I love each story.

Kings of Ruin is something I didn’t know I wanted. And I do not need Kings of Ruin. But I absolutely want it because I love Tainted Grail. This is a story driven game in a grim dark fantasy world around Arthurian legend. It just works well for me and more story in that world isn’t a bad thing, there is just so much content.

1. Rogue Angels: Legacy of the Burning Suns

Rogue Angels is my easy #1 game coming to crowdfunding hopefully in the next few months. And I should soon have some more content coming out on it. I just need to split up some video that I did with a couple other content creators and the designer playing a scenario of the game. You can already see Rogue Angels game play on Malts and Meeples (or below).

But I adore my plays thus far of Rogue Angels. The characters are great. The story is fun, and it is a challenging game. The best way I can describe it and this is a very high compliment is that it is a game that isn’t too complex to play. But, every decision that you make has a ton of depth. You can’t just walk into a room full of bad guys and expect it to work perfectly for you. So how do you plan what is best and work together as a team?

Final Thoughts

I am sure that I missed some big Kickstarter or Gamefound campaigns coming up. I looked for what I could. And I didn’t do anything that you can still late pledge or is out on Kickstarter currently. There are some strong games coming up, and I know there will be a lot more that I don’t know about. That is what them monthly content is for. Plus then the videos that Tantrum House and BoardGameCo put out twice a month or monthly on upcoming Kickstarters.

One that I really would love to put on the list is Slay the Spire by Contention Games. I know they want to get it right before it launches. But Slay the Spire is another game that was supposed to be in 2021, like Quantum Shock, and I haven’t heard anything recently about it. Looking on Board Game Geek it appears they still plan for this year. But it’s not on the list because it was Spring of 2021 and then on and on delayed and reworks. But if they get it right that’ll be awesome.

Is there a Gamefound or Kickstarter you are looking forward to?

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