Three Men in a classic about nothing

Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog) by Jerome K. Jerome is one of those books that I think everyone should read. It’s a classic that somehow doesn’t really say anything at all but it’s such a charming nothing.

Allegedly, Jerome was planning on writing a travelogue that described a boating trip on the Thames that he and two of his friends made. However, the humor element took over and a fictional dog got added to the mix and that led to the book we have today.

The book is still kind of about that boating trip. Indeed, the trip is described well enough that you can recreate the trip today, which many people do. But most of the book is the characters, particularly the narrater  going on long, rambling asides that are often hysterical. Jerome describing his Uncle Podger trying to hang a picture is one of the most perfect slapstick bits imaginable.

There are some odd shifts in tone. The bit where the narrater begins imagining King John signing the Magna Carta comes out of left field and always makes me wonder if I missed something. And the description of a suicide victim they come across is a drastic shift in tone unlike anything else in the book.

However, for the most part, the book is a leisurely journey that basically goes nowhere but its a relaxing, fun trip. The tone is so conversational that it feels less like a book and much more like a monologue and not in an annoying way :D

I was shocked after reading the book for the first time to learn that it was written in 1889. That’s at least thirty years older than I expected. The book is so candid and witty that it feels more modern. Indeed, while I have absolutely nothing to back this thought up, I think of it as one of the first modern British comedies.

Fleeting memories of the Book of Catan

In my memory down memory lane, I came across a memory I haven’t thought about in a long time. Die Siedler von Catan: Das Buch zum Spielen. It’s been well over a decade since I last saw what might have been the only copy I’d ever seen.

Das Buch, as it was called at the table, is a collection of scenarios for Catan. There are fifteen different rule sets in the book that tweak Catan, as well as the components in order to implement them. It’s basically a huge set of expansions. I’m also pretty sure that it was only ever published in German, although translations were available. (I think Mayfair provided one and I think that’s the one we used)

Sadly, I don’t remember Das Buch that well. It was a couple different lifetimes ago. I know that I played three different scenarios but the Great Race one is the only one I remember. Which I might have won and definitely thought was fun.

Now that I remember that Das Buch actually exists, I really want to go and take a look at it. It feels like it could be great or possibly just great for its day. Some games, like Memoir 44, thrive on having variants and scenarios. And Sid Sackson knows, Catan has had a lot of them, although I don’t know if I’d say all of them have thrived for me.

I know there are English translations floating around the internet. Boardgame Geek itself has a couple. So I can at least read the scenarios, even if actually playing them might be tricky. Could be amazing discoveries. Could be just interesting historical footnotes.

My first expansions of Catan

While I am rambling down memory lane about expansions (I promise I won’t do this too much), I find myself thinking about Catan. While Carcassonne was where I really explored expansions, Catan was another space I discovered expansions early on.

At the time, as far as my group was aware, there were three expansions: the five to six player extension, Seafarers and Cities and Knights. There’s quite a bit more now but that’s what we knew about. And, as time has gone on, my opinion about each one has basically reversed itself.

I used to think of the Five to Six Player extension as the most essential one to get. But I now think that adding more players just makes the game drag. There are much better games to play if you have six players.

I originally thought of Seafarers as the weakest expansion. I mean, it added ships and gold tiles. It didn’t really add anything new that I could see. Well, I was dumb because it adds versatility and variety to the game while still being true to the core system. (I have been told it was supposed to be part of the original game) A very important idea in the game (at least to my mind) is the modular board and Seafarers really explores the mechanic.

Cities and Knights. Man, Cities and Knights. That was a game changer in so many ways. Cities and Knights changed Catan so much it was like a different game. It added at least another level of the economy and infrastructure. It added a whole new form of conflict.

At least one friend of mine said that you don’t want to play any other kind of Catan after you first play Cities and Knights. Then you don’t want to play it again after the fifth play :D Cities and Knights added complexity but it felt like it didn’t add depth, at least compared to the complexity it added. I will say this for Cities and Knights, it did a good job of adding  theme.

It didn’t take my group long to decide that we just liked four-player vanilla Catan. And, while we live now in different parts of the country, I can safely say that we all still really like Catan. It was a binding experience and the expansions were a part of that.

How deep can a dry erase game be?

One of my fantasy goals is finding a dry erase game that has the heft of a game that, you know, has components. Basically, the idea of playing a heavy game while sitting in an airplane. And, yes, we already have that and it’s called use a tablet, silly. Which we have done, in fact.

Still, the idea of going low tech is appealing. There’s the ‘look ma, no batteries’ factor, of course. However, actually doing something with real stuff with your hands adds a visceral level to a game.

A few years back, I checked out a game called Akua that looked like the ideal I was looking for. It was a perfect information game that was just a board then add different colored markers. So, mechanically, it is the kind of game you can play on a Greyhound bus. Which was a really cool idea to me, even though I haven’t been on a Greyhound in a dog’s age.

The problem was that Akua was intricate to the point of being convoluted. It didn’t flow. I am not saying I’ve completely given up on it but it’s got issues.

Basically, I’m asking for the unreasonable :D The game I want needs to be simple enough that it can work within the medium but deep enough to be meaty and satisfying.

Well, I’m going to craft a couple games that I think will scratch a similar itch.

One is Tempus Imperium, which I understand to be the prototype of the Tempus Quest series. It’s a Roll and Write but you use the time and date instead of dice. I’m quite curious to see how it turns out and I might check out the Tempus Quest series if I like it. It’s infrastructure building with a random setup based on when you’re playing it. No dice required, just a watch.

At the same time, it’s a solitaire so it kind of fails one of basic my needs. But the idea, if it works, seems like a good building block.

The other game I’m looking at is a Catan variant called Catan Coop. It’s an ink friendly Roll and Write where you’re working together to each get seven points before the bandit destroys too many hexes, which the bandit can do in this variant. You keep track of resources on a table on the same sheet of paper as the map. You do need dice and a pawn for the bandit. Beyond that, everything is either drawn or notated on the one page. 

It does lose some points in that you do need dice and some sort of pawn. But I suppose that a metal clipboard and a magnet for the pawn plus some sort of tiny dice tray could make it work for the mythological Greyhound that I’ll never get on.

Still, for a stupidly portable form of Catan, it’s worth my looking into. Print the board with the table one side, the rules on the other, and laminate it. I can stick that in my bag where it will take up no space and play it anywhere. This is Catan for a backpacking trip.

If it’s any good, of course. I mean, it doesn’t have development cards which is a major loss but understandable to simplify the game.

As I’ve already mentioned, the idea of a travel dry erase heavier game is unnecessary. Honestly, tablets make more sense. But it’s fun to think about.

Lord Dunsany gets in your brain

At least once a year, I find myself reading the early works of Lord Dunsany. (Because those are the ones that are public domain and I can’t seem to find any version of his later stuff online or even affordably in print. Seriously, who is sitting on the rights to the Jorkens stories!?)

One of the side effects of reading early Dunsany is the urge to write like he did. Ursula K. Le Guin even referred him as “the First Terrible Fate That Befalleth Unwary Beginners in Fantasy" and boy was she right. It even happened to Tolkien and Lovecraft. Neil Gaiman may have never recovered :D

(Just joking, Mr Gaiman, sir. You mastered Lord Dunsany’s tropes to tell your own stories)

And it happens to me every time.

‘In the black halls of the Fortress Inconsolable walks the almost forgotten god T’rtl Wx. All know that he is truly a god but none can recall him what nature of godhood was given to him. Even in the moldering library of Bubblbth, which lies on the far end of the catacombs of the decadent city of Rhode Hows, the oldest and most faded of scrolls mention his name but not his nature.

‘Of all the wizened sages and plucky nimble-fingers who dare to enter  the Fortress Inconsolable to seek out T’rtl Wx and discover the truth of his nature, none have yet to return. For the dark halls were built without a floor plan and every bathroom is undiscoverable.

‘And eternally does T’rtl Wx walks, forever waiting for an honestly good cup of tea for Oolong will never suffice for him.’

Seriously, Dunsany rewires your brain.

 https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Author:Edward_John_Moreton_Drax_Plunkett

Yahtzee, Ducks, and Dice

When I ‘make’ a copy of a Roll and Write game, I like to either laminate it or put it in a plastic binder sleeve. Then I can just use a dry erase marker and play that copy over and over.

The down side of that approach is dry erase markers tend to be smudgy. Which is fine for doing things like checking off boxes but it’s a pain for games that require more finesse. Games that require me to write little numbers or letters are frustrating. (Six Sided Stout, as an example)

So, from that perspective, Ducks in the Pond from the 2019 Roll and Write Contest is perfect. It’s pretty much nothing but checking boxes. Which, quite frankly, is why it was one of the first games from the contest I tried out. I didn’t even bother printing it out, I just drew the boxes and put that paper in a sleeve.

Ducks in the Pond is a game about being a bird spotter who specializes in ducks. Over the course of six days, you try and spot as many ducks as you can, resting on the seventh day because counting ducks is hard work!

Okay. Brutal honesty time. The theme allows for a design that I think is quite visually nice but doesn’t really have anything to do with the mechanics. Mechanically, the game is a Yahtzee variant. Not that I have any problems with that. Yahtzee is an okay game in and of itself and shines as a really good starting point for other, usually better games.

To get points, you fill out two rows of dice combinations. One is triples and the other one is other stuff, like full houses. Unlike Yahtzee, you don’t automatically get rerolls. Instead, you get some limited dice manipulation. You can pay a die to do something to another die. A one lets you adjust another die up or down a pip. Three let’s you reroll. Two dice can be a wild. And you can pay a six for the next day to be sunny.

Okay, this is actually the most interesting part of Ducks in the Pond for me. You get six dice on day one. Every subsequent day, you get one less die with only one die on day six. But paying a six lets you get six dice the next turn. Which is kind of a huge deal.

I’m not sure what to think of Ducks in the Pond. Frankly, it’s more luck-based than Yahtzee. After all, you have to use dice to get any rerolls and not being able to a six to get six dice in your next turn can be catastrophic. 

On the other hand, I have had fun with it. You are so strapped for resources, each round is a puzzle to figure out how to get the most out of a roll. And it’s so quick that the luck factor doesn’t bug me. It’s good for one more time. 

On the third hand, there are a lot of quick little dice games out there in the land of free PnPs. There’s nothing in Ducks in the Pond to make it stand out in the crowd. It’s just another tree in the forest.

Eh, Ducks in the Pond free to download and doesn’t require any construction. I’ve enjoyed it enough I’ll make a nice copy at some point. If you think you’d like it, check it out.

https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/2211924/wip-ducks-pond-contest-ready-31may19

More blathering about expansions

I used to have a love-hate relationship with expansions. Now I have a love-hate-meh relationship with expansions.

Don’t get me wrong. Expansions can breath new life and expand the breadth of a game. That can be a good thing. But they can also bloat a game or just make it different, not better or more interesting.

Ignoring all the supplements and expansions that I ran into with D&D, my first poster child for expansions was Carcassonne which happens to be an example of the good and the bad of expansions. The first two expansions, Inns and Cathedrals and Traders and Builders, are great expansions that add a lot of interesting choices to the game. But things slowed down for my group with Princess and Dragon, as well as the Tower. By the time we hit the Catapult, we were expanded out.

And there were folks who wanted to always play with every expansion they had. That led to games that were literally three times as long as the vanilla game. And you had so many different rules to keep track of. I remember coming to really hate the King and Scout expansion during one of those games.

In the end, I actually got rid of the base game and all the expansions as well as some of the spinoffs. The only Carcassonne I kept was Hunters and Gatherers, along with The Castle. And over the course of many years, that’s all I’ve ever needed.

And that’s the crux of the matter. Expansions are only worth it if you are going to play the game enough to get the intellectual and monetary value out of them. And that’s why I’ve become meh to them on a whole. I have found I can get a lot of play out of a game before I need them.

(And if the argument is that the expansion fixes a game? Oh, that infuriates me. I heard that for both Thunderstone and Pillars of the Earth. I don’t want to buy a broken game and then spend more money to fix it. I don’t want to buy or play a broken game period. If it’s broken out of the gate, then it should have been fixed before it was printed.)

When it’s actually necessary and actually good, an expansion is great.