Hobby Day May 10 2014

Hobby day is put on by the St. Crispin's Irregulars on the second Saturday of each month at the Knights of Columbus Hall in Anaheim. They have recently started having themes for hobby day. This means that ideally they want the games played during that day to be in some way related to the theme. This month's theme was "Adventure on the High Seas." I arrived in the morning and stayed until the early afternoon. I usually stay the entire day, but I had a family birthday to attend in the evening. It was a good day of gaming despite the low numbers of people who showed up for the event.

I managed to get some board games on the table that day with my friend Eric. We played "Dread Pirate: Buccaneers Revenge," "Agricola," "Pirate Fluxx," and "Rock, Paper, Scissors, Lizard, Spock."

"Dread Pirate: Buccaneers Revenge" is a game where the players maneuver their pirate ship around the map, completing quests. The quests are in the form of mission cards which have a start location and and objective. The game was good with two players, although its a lot more cutthroat when played with four people. The bag of loot and gold coins are a nice addition to the game. It feels like a euro-game in simplicity and ease of play, with some depth in the abilities that the completed quests give you. All in all it is a nice family game. I would recommend this game to anyone of any age who likes pirates.

 

I have previously blogged a review of this game, so I won't go in depth here. I had a fun time playing this game on Saturday and adding some of the expansions as well. Eric and I got in two games of this. It was his first time playing this, and by the second game, he had already grasped the concept extremely well to the point that we added several decks of cards in the second play. It was my second time playing with the "Legen*dary forest deck" which is the second non-serious expansion for the game. I had a great time teaching the game to Eric, and look forward to getting Agricola back on the table more often.

 

In keeping with the theme of Hobby Day "Adventure on the High Seas," I also got this game on the table. Pirate Fluxx. As with the other Fluxx games the game is never the same twice. It begins with the mechanic of "draw 1 card, play 1 card." As cards are played however, that changes rapidly. Many of the cards are new rules, or meta rules. After several hands the rule might be "Draw 5 cards" "Play All." The goal of the game is to have "keeper cards" in play that match the goal. And when that occurs, you win!

 

This fast paced dice game worked alright with two players, but would be better in a larger group. You are trying to defeat the black die with a roll of the three red dice. If the black die defeats your red dice, then you lose a chip, placing it back in the center. If a red die matches the black die, you pass a chip to the right. If you roll a "pass left" result, you pass a chip to the left. The object of the game is to be the only one left with chips at the end. It was a quick and simple game to play.