Let’s start by talking about some Kickstarters that I will have coming in. I’m counting reprints/second editions with this, so the first one is:

Middara – This game rivals Gloomhaven in terms of size and is bigger in terms of story. There has been so much put into it, and the first kickstarter took forever to fulfill. However, I’m just backing what came out in that Kickstarter so I expect to get mine next year, and projected date places it the middle of next year. In Middara, you are in an anime-esque world and fighting through a massive story with lots of different dungeons and interactions. You make decisions that might change up things in the future, and you upgrade your characters with interesting skills and weapons. This game looks amazing, when I’ll play it, who knows, but I’m excited for it.

Village Attacks – Another reprint, I played it at GenCon last year, got a scenario and a few bits for it, found out that it was impossible to find, but then they kickstarted an expansion for it, which I backed so I could use my GenCon scenario. In this game, it’s tower defense, but you’re the bad guys who are keeping those pesky villagers with their torches and pitchforks from running you at of your house. It’s fully cooperative which I like, and the theme is just a lot of fun. I’m excited for this one to get it back to the table and properly deal with those villagers again. The scenarios are a lot of fun, and depending on what villagers come out when, the game will feel different playing the same scenario.

Dice Throne Adventures – I’ve talked about how much I like Dice Throne. This Yahtzee/King of Tokyo style game where you are fighting a character against another character. You’re part of a massive tournament that the evil emperor has set-up that isn’t at all like Mortal Kombat or anything like that. But in Dice Throne Adventures, you are fighting your way through the evil emperors lands, leveling up your characters, and playing cooperative against the game with whatever characters you want from Season One or Two of Dice Throne. It sounds like a campaign dungeon crawl, and while it does have some of that feel, it’s shorter in terms of campaign so you can get through it and play again without the time commitment like you need for bigger dungeon crawls.

Shadows of Kilforth – I blame Rolling Solo Youtube Channel for getting me into this game, the original, Gloom of Killforth is a one shot adventure game where you are in a world where things are going poorly and you as an adventurer are leveling up, exploring locations, fighting monsters, hoping to get strong enough to be able to take down whatever monster is blighting the land. The original game had a fantasy feel, and while this maintains the fantasy, it also has an eastern feel to it as well, which is cool. This game is also a smaller footprint game as you’re not setting up massive dungeons and needing a million tiles to play it.

Those are ones that I’ve kickstarted already that I’m really excited for. There are two that I know I want to kickstart in 2020, so let’s talk about those.

Frosthaven – Sequel to my #1 game of all time, no brainer I want this. I expect to get it sometime in 2021, but it kickstarts in March of 2020, so I’ll have paid for it then. It builds off of Gloomhaven and the Forgotten Circle expansion to tell you a whole new story set in the same world. But unlike in Gloomhaven where you start out of a set city, in Frosthaven, it adds in some city building and you have to worry about defending the town as well as going out on adventures. The out of the box characters seem a bit more challenging but also seem amazing to play. I’m curious to see how this game differs from Gloomhaven, but I hope it keeps a ton of the same feel.

ISS-Vanguard – A story game from Awaken Realms, sign me up. I have Tainted Grail that I’m dying to play (I’m going to try and play it over my time off around Christmas), but ISS-Vanguard is supposed to be more of an open world sort of game (or open worlds since you’re in space). You can go to different planets in different orders and experience the story that way. The art work that came in the Tainted Grail surprise box is amazing and I really love the style. I’m going to be curious to see how an open world game with a story comes together, but I like the idea of a non-fantasy big story exploration game.

Roll Player Adventure – Now, I don’t like the base game, but I got to play an early prototype of this at GenCon, and this is very different than a game where you’re rolling up your character like Roll Player is. In this, it’s a campaign game, but as compared to some games with campaigns, like from Awaken Realms or Gloomhaven, it isn’t nearly as heavy. The story is a little bit sillier, but the mechanics are fun. Can you manipulate the dice to be able to get through all the story and encounters that you run across. The mechanics were cool, and the game at GenCon, even in an early form, was a ton of fun. Helped that I might have been a power hungry sorcerer.

And, finally, and these aren’t last or least, but there are a few games that are coming out in other ways that I’m definitely interested in. Might just be normal publisher, but also might be kickstarter, I haven’t researched enough.

Deranged – Wait, you’re saying, it doesn’t say 2020, but for it coming to the US, it’s coming in 2020. I played this at GenCon and it was amazing. The game play was smart and simple, the world building of the game was really cool. While it’s not story driven, there is a lot going on, and the card play is really really fun in the game. I like the light horror theming as you’re trying to avoid monsters, get rid of your curses and not become deranged. But it’s very possible that you will or that you’ll die, and then you’ll need to get rid of more curses. It seems like a cooperative game where you’re trying to escape this town with no curses, but it’s competitive, and only one person can escape, so if someone gets too close, time to get kill them and give them another curse. Can someone win in all that fighting, who knows.

Time of Legends: Destinies – I almost kickstarted this game, then I decided I wanted Oathsworn instead. But this one seems really interesting. Each character has secrets that they are trying to solve as well as solve the story that is happening in this game that is set in the same world as Time of Legends: Joan of Arc. But in this one they combined with Lucky Duck games that did Chronicles of Crime, so there’s app integration. And there is a scenario builder that people can use to create more, since out of the box it seemed to come only with a few. For me, I really want to try this one next year, and hopefully if I can make it to GenCon it’ll be there for demoing.

Pandemic Legacy Season 3 – Some of my best gaming experiences have been playing through the first two season. I’m so excited for the 3rd season and last season. I don’t know anything about the game, I just know that I want it and I’m going to be ready to play it the second that I get it. No official release date yet for it, but it sounds like it should be a 2020 release and I’m guessing first half of 2020. That’s about it that I know about it, but it’s an instant buy for me.

There’s so many games coming out and with my proclivity for campaign games, I need to get cracking on the ones that I already have. I need to figure out a more consistent time to play them on Malts and Meeples, but we’ll talk about that in a future article about New Years Nerdsolutions.

What games are you looking forward to, is there a game coming out or to kickstarter that you just need to play?

Share questions, ideas for articles, or comments with us!

Email us at nerdologists@gmail.com
Message me directly on Twitter at @TheScando
Visit us on Facebook here.

And I’ve been picking up games, I got a bunch of games at GenCon on August, I’ve gotten Lords of Hellas, Blood Rage, and Deep Madness from a local game store, used, to add to my collection. How can you keep a collection under control to have what you really want in it? And not to have games that are just going to sit around and never be played?

There are a few different factors that I look at when I consider what board games I want to keep or what games I want to get rid of. I think the mindset has to be there that you are looking for games to get rid of, not just games to keep, because I could make an argument to keep all of the games. Instead, look for the games that you can remove, not just to keep the collection smaller, but also to open up more room in your collection.

The first thing that I look at, and even though I find the extreme version of this dumb, is, does it give me joy. A lot of people take that to the extreme and end up getting rid of so much that they actually do miss it and realize it was and has given you joy. But, for a board game, I look at it this way, if I didn’t play it again, would I care that much? With the batch of culling that I’m doing right now, I considered the game Krosmaster Arena. While that game has adorable little figures, and I do enjoy the game, I won’t miss playing it. So, it doesn’t really bring me that much joy, but looking at another game I considered, Dead Men Tell No Tales. That game I’ve had more fun times with, and I would still pull it off the shelf and play it, even though I haven’t in a long time.

Next, when considering getting rid of a game, I also look at how much I have that is like it. Now, I have a number of deck builders, Xenoshyft: Onslaught, Clank! In! Space!, Ascension, and more, so I got rid of one of them? No, because I like all of those games and they give me joy, but when I considered the game Unspeakable Words, which the little chibi Cthulhu in it still entertain me, I realized that I have other word games, Quiddler and soon Letter Jam and I don’t think, when I want to play a word game, that I’d ever pull Unspeakable Words off of the shelf again. So there are times when a game might bring you some joy, but if you’re never going to play it again, it might be time to take it off of the shelf. This isn’t a hard and fast rule, because there will be times where you have some games that you just want to keep because of the memories that you have with those games.

I also consider if there is a new edition, and this ties into the previous point, but in some ways it’s a little bit different. For example, I am getting rid of Arkham Horror because I have the newest edition of Arkham Horror, and while I’ve had fun with the 5-6 hour game that the Arkham Horror was, I’m not going to get that to the table over a 3 hour or slightly less Arkham Horror 3rd Edition, or even a game like Arkham Horror The Card Game or Mansions of Madness. Or I’m getting rid of Machi Koro: Bright Lights Big City. Now, I don’t have another version or edition of that on my shelf, but I know that Machi Koro Legacy is out, and when you are done with Machi Koro Legacy, you still have a playable game of Machi Koro. So I’m not going to need both versions of the game in my collection, because they would fill the same need, and I can simply pull out the completed Legacy version.

I also ask myself if a game is still my taste or if I need a game like it still in my collection. Your collection can have only games that you love in it, and maybe only one type of game, but I personally think that you can have a breath of games and find some things out of your comfort zone that you kind of like, you should keep that in your collection or add it to your collection. Now, these games might not give you joy, but there are times and occasions to pull them out. I’m not a huge of Splendor, I think the game works decently, but it doesn’t excite me to play it. But that game came off the shelf a few weeks ago, because we needed a short game that is easy to teach. So sometimes you keep a game that you don’t love and you maybe have other versions of it that you like better, Century: Golem Edition scratches the same itch that Splendor does for me, but you keep the game because it is easy to get to the table in certain situations.

Finally, it might be a game that you’ve never played and never will play. Maybe there is a game so important to keep in your collection just to have collected it, that isn’t a thing for me, but sometimes, if a game has sat around long enough, it’s time to move on from it, because you won’t be able to play it. This is especially the case if you’ve tried to play it or tried to learn it and it just doesn’t look interesting or you can’t find the group. If you’ve tried to play it and you can’t find people to play it with, you have to decide if it’s worth keeping in your collection and if it’s stopping you from adding something you can play to your collection. Now, it might be that it is worth having it, and that is cool, because there will probably be a time, sometime in the future, where you find the right group to play it with, but if you don’t care that much, it might be time to move on from it instead of letting it eat up space.

So, let’s talk a little bit about what I’m getting rid of and why:
KrosMaster Arena: I think this game is the hardest to explain why. I enjoy the game, but I just know that I’m not going to consistently get it to the table again. And I think when it comes down to it, I have other dice chucking fighting games that I like better.
Rise of Queensdale: I was looking forward to playing this legacy game, because it’s a legacy game. With that said, the group I was going to play this with fell apart and I haven’t even removed it from the shrink, and that was about a year ago. So I don’t think I’ll find a group to play it and I have other legacy games, Betrayal Legacy, and probably in the future Clank! Legacy, Machi Koro Legacy, and Pandemic Legacy Season 3 that I’m going to prefer to play.
Unspeakable Words: This game was mainly kept around because the Cthulhu minis were cute. I have other word games that I’d pull out before it, and for me, the game is too random with it’s dice.
Forbidden Desert: A lot of people would keep this game as an introductory coop game in their collection. And I considered it for that reason, especially since I got rid of Forbidden Island before, but I have Pandemic, and I can teach and play that game as an introductory coop game.
Machi Koro: Bright Lights, Big City: Machi Koro Legacy is a thing that I’m going to want to play.
Albion’s Legacy: An interesting one to get rid of, because I haven’t played it, nor have I tried to play it. I got it for free at GenCon, and I wasn’t really that interested in it, but free things. So might as well get rid of it instead of having it take up space on my shelf.
Arkham Horror 2nd Edition: I have the 3rd Edition, and it just takes too long. I’m not going to get it to the table again over the 3rd edition because of the amount of time. I’d prefer to open up room for expansions for 3rd Edition.

That’s all of the games that are leaving this time. I could have maybe found a couple more small box games, but the small box game area still had room, so I didn’t look too hard at it.

Now, what I didn’t talk about was where to get rid of these games. I think that’ll be a separate post, but I sell mine for store credit, you know, to get more games.

Share questions, ideas for articles, or comments with us!

Email us at nerdologists@gmail.com
Message me directly on Twitter at @TheScando
Visit us on Facebook here.