The Game

As I said, the game I played was Marvel United. In particular I broke out the Enter the Spider-Verse expansion. I thought about doing the Tales of Asgard expansion instead, but when the choice was between Spider-Ham and Beta Ray Bill, I think I made a solid choice. I played the game as if it was a two handed cooperative experience versus a purely solo game, though I talk about how the solo mode works for the game.

Marvel United is a cooperative game where you take 2-4 heroes up against a villain. You are trying to stop their evil plan. You fight thugs, thwart plans, and rescue civilians until you can track down the villain and attack them. What that means, is basically you have three things to try and complete. After the first one is done the villain becomes more active, after the second one you can start beating up the villain, and you need to take out the villain, at least in the case of the Green Goblin.

The Beer

Yesterday was National Beer Day, and while I was a bit distracted in my description, I had a brew from Outstate Brewing in Fergus Falls, MN, my home town. I picked it up when I went up for Easter. A New England style Hazy IPA, it is pretty solid. I like IPA’s a lot, but I don’t always love hazy IPA’s. Too often they taste like someone dumped fruit juice into an IPA, which is how a lot of them actually are made. That is too sweet for me and too fruity, I want a bit of bitter or tart when I drink a fruity beer. The beer name was Edge Catcher, and unfortunately it’ll be hard to find unless you are in that area of Minnesota as Outstate Brewing was founded right before the pandemic and has very limited distribution.

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The Computer

Now, you can go with a lot of different types of computers. Some people do a laptop, personally I go with a desktop computer. Then there’s also the debate between Mac or PC. Personally, you can’t go wrong with either. I know some people will swear by one or the other, but I’ve used both in my video days, and the differences are so minimal it doesn’t matter. What you are looking for when streaming though is a fast processor and ram. Streaming shouldn’t be hitting the hard drive much at all, if you can help it, because that’s going to be the slowest part of your system. This is unfortunately an area that I’m less well versed in, but a solid gaming computer is going to have enough for a decent stream.

The Camera

The camera can actually be one of the priciest items of the set-up. A lot of big streamers will use a nice $5,000 plus dollar camera for their streaming. And going up to 4k can push it well beyond that. But since people watch a lot of stuff on their phones, right now I don’t think you need to go nearly that fancy. In fact, you can probably get away with one $100 web cam if you want. That’ll be good enough to show off your game. I go with two cameras personally, I have a web cam, and compact video camera that I use for my overhead shot. The reason for this is that it gives me better zoom control, and I like to be on camera as I’m playing also. You can also use a DSLR, there are a few things to consider with that, though, you need to trick them into not shutting off while you are streaming because what is being shown is the display. Connecting a data cable can do that. You can use a cheap tripod with your camera to make it work.

The Sound

So sound is an interesting one. When I first set mine up and did some tests, I tried using my sound board to be able to control it better, but the sound board was processing the sound too slowly so that by the time it got to the computer, it was out of sync. Right now, and for a beginner, just use the sound off of a web cam. As long as it’s not picking up too much background noise, you’re going to be fine.

Lighting

This, again, can cost a lot, if you want it to. Personally, I’m using a fairly classic lighting style where I have three points of lighting, this helps cut down on shadows. I have one over my left shoulder, one in front of me and one to the right. This is overkill for what you need to start. A $50 ring light (or even cheaper) is what you need. You want to limit the amount of light that you have in the room as much as possible and be able to highlight it by putting the light on the game. The better lit the game is, the clearer it will show on camera. But don’t point the light directly at the board, doing that will cause glare off of the board and flood parts of the image with too much light so that it’s a white out. I think my full ight set-up cost me $250, which isn’t bad, but I was able to find some cheap LED lights a while ago.

Software

This is where it can be really nice. You can just use a free piece of software like Streamlabs OBS. This will give you a nice free set-up to layer on different levels of video and text. You can also use overlays with it as well. But Streamlabs OBS is nice because it connects up really easily to either Twitch or YouTube. There are a lot of different versions of the OBS software, but I’m really liking Streamlabs and it’s working quite smoothly.

Is That All You Need?

No, that’s more than you need, at the start, if you want, you can simply go with a good computer and a web cam on a tripod pointed at the table with the Streamlabs OBS software. However, that is going to look a little bit rough, so I do really recommend the two cameras and a ring light, so not counting a computer, you can probably get started for $200-300.

But I didn’t mention one part of streaming that you have to think about. And that is talking on camera. I don’t have an issue talking on camera. But for some people that’s a big thing talking on camera. And no matter who you are, myself included, it does take some time to figure out what being on camera feels like. I might be pretty comfortable, but what makes an entertaining patter going throughout the streaming. It’s a lot of work to fill in dead time in a game. What do you chat about in Onirim when you’re shuffling cards for the 30th time in one game (might not be that much but still it’s a lot). How are you entertaining others. Now, you might be like myself where I started my channel, honestly, for myself, because at least streaming I have a pretend audience out there whom I could interact with in the moment, and now I’ve actually had some people join in which is great. But be yourself on camera and that’s going to be the hardest part to get the right amount of entertaining, but that is something that only comes with practice.

Would you consider streaming board games, do you now? Let me know your YouTube or Twitch channel in the comments below.

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It was a long holiday break, mainly because it’s also generally a Kickstarter deadtime so I didn’t do a Kickstarter show, but I’m back to streaming a game. This time it’s Tainted Grail by Awaken Realms. This is a massive and immersive story set in a dark Arthurian legend.

I’m playing as Arev, a resident of Cuanacht Farmhold. I used to be a mercenary, but no more. Now I’m just a simple farmer. When the Menhir in the town started to fade, the best from the town went out to find a way to save us, but they haven’t returned. Now, even though I’m not one of the best, I’m going out to explore in hopes of savings my town and all of Avalon.

Tainted Grail: Fall of Avalon is a story driven game where you explore various locations, meet people, and try and survive the wyrdness that is creeping across the lands by keeping Menhir lit. In the first chapter my goal, thus far, is to find out how to light Menhir. I’ve made it two days in, and thus far, I still don’t know.

You can join me again probably next week as I’m going to continue the story again. I plan on streaming every other Thursday around 7:30, but, because I’m really enjoying the game thus far, it might be more often than that.

And, of course, it’s Malts and Meeples, and while there were no Meeples showing up in the episode, I of course had a malt. That is, I had Dragon’s Milk White Stout from New Holland Brewing. This is a very enjoyable beer. It has a good flavor to it, but I do think that compared to regular Dragon’s Milk which is a very big beer, 12% or so, barrel aged beast of a beer, the White Stout, while barrel aged doesn’t quite hold up.

Bottoms up!

Join me as I take on the Dresden Files Cooperative Card Game. I take a crack at the first scenario, Storm Front, based off of the Dresden Files book by Jim Butcher of the same name. This game is a cooperative game that plays well solo and plays quickly. It’s a challenging game that often can come down to some luck, but if you are smart about it, you can set yourself up to succeed in the end.

If you are enjoying these videos please consider subscribing to the Youtube Channel and following me on Twitch. I plan on getting back to streaming soon after some business of family visiting, so I thank you for your patience waiting between episodes.

Bottoms up.

Back again last night, still on Youtube, but still planning to move over to Twitch soon here. I played two different roll and write games while drinking a beer from Dogfish Head brewery.

The games were Welcome To… in which you are building up your perfect 1950’s neighborhood. It’s a good and a bit more complex than some roll and write games. The solo mode that comes in the base game, I think is okay, though it doesn’t stand out as amazing.

The first game played was Criss Cross. Technically, this game has no solo mode, but it’s simple enough that it’s easy enough to play a few times and just see how good a score you can get, which is really how it works for Welcome To… as well.

I’ve had a lot of fun getting these games to the table with groups, and it felt like a good pallet cleanser sort of game for between some larger games. So hopefully it was fun to watch.

I also had Slightly Mighty Lo-Cal IPA from Dogfish Head. It’s not a beer that I’m a huge fan of, it mainly just is not a stand out beer in terms of an IPA. The bitterness level isn’t that high, and the hop flavor isn’t coming through all that strongly.

Bottoms up!

After an exciting run of games, I am wrapping up Pandemic Legacy Season 1. See how it all ends and find out how well I did in the game.

Pandemic Legacy is a Cooperative board game that I’m playing as a solo game where you try and cure diseases that are ravaging the earth. But we play a team from the CDC who are trying to stop it. Was I able to stop it all in time or did the diseases get the better of me? You can find out more about Pandemic Legacy Season 1 on Board Game Geek HERE.

I, of course, also had a beer. This was Phosphorescent by Freethought brewing out of New York. I was not a huge fan of this beer. For a Pale Ale, the beer was quite sweet and didn’t have a hop profile to go up against it.

Join me next time as I take on a new game. I might do a few non-campaign games, Welcome To…, Criss Cross, and The Reckoners before I jump into a bigger game. I am also thinking about making the move to Twitch, but more on that when it comes up. The videos will still be uploaded to Youtube, just not streamed there.

Bottoms up.

What’s going on in the world in this game of Pandemic Legacy? We had some surprises come when we played last time. How will that affect our game going forward?

Pandemic Legacy is a game where you are trying to cure diseases on a changing board that is unique to your game play. In the end, your game is going to look different than any other copy of the game. You can find more information about this game on Board Game Geek.

As for my beer yesterday, I drank Into It from Modist Brewing out of Minneapolis, Minnesota. It is a Raspberry and Lime Lager. An interesting taste up front, but it ends up just finishing like a lager, which was kind of disappointing.

Bottoms up!

Back again last night with another game of Pandemic Legacy. How did it go this time? And what is happening in the world that is probably going to cause me to lose?

Pandemic Legacy is a Legacy game where you destroy components, add in new rules, and generally change up the board so that each person’s play through is unique. While all of that is going on, you’re still trying to cure a number of diseases so that the world isn’t wiped out. You can find more information on Board Game Geek.

Last nights malt was from Goose Island out of Chicago. It was the 312 Dry-Hopped. A good tasty summer beer where you can really tell that it’s dry hopped with the hop profile.

Bottoms up!

Back again last night with another game of Pandemic Legacy. How did it go this time? And what is happening in the world that is probably going to cause me to lose?

Pandemic Legacy is a Legacy game where you destroy components, add in new rules, and generally change up the board so that each person’s play through is unique. While all of that is going on, you’re still trying to cure a number of diseases so that the world isn’t wiped out. You can find more information on Board Game Geek.

Yesterday’s malt was from Odell Brewing Co. It’s my personal favorite beer, the nice and hoppy and summery beer Saint Lupulin, and Extra Pale Ale.

Bottoms up!

Join me again as I come back and try and win Pandemic Legacy Season 1 with style.

If you aren’t familiar with Pandemic Legacy, it’s based off of the game Pandemic from Z-Man Games where you are trying to cure four diseases. However, in this Legacy game, things change and you might not be able to cure a disease, the board might change, rules might be added, or cards might be destroyed. More information can be found on Board Game Geek.

And what about the malt on last nights Malts and Meeples. Last night it was a Raspberry Blood Orange Fruitsicle from Odd Side Ales. It’s an interesting beer, a bit sour from the raspberry to start, and then finishes with a sweet orange flavor. I wish it was a bit more tart overall, but generally, it was quite refreshing.

Bottoms up!