Artic Rescue

As many of you will know I have been working on a game called 'Polar Panic' for a few months and you may well have played it at CONQUEST or one of our gaming events. If you have thank you for helping us to test the rules.

We are really hopeful that we will be able to kickstart this game in the new year, but before we do we just want to test some point scoring rules which is why the games name is changing, the current working title being 'Artic Rescue'

The idea is instead of just trying to survive you are now trying to rescue as many people as possible, but don't worry there is still a polar bear, so the basic mechanics are the same. There are a couple of new tiles which may be introduce including an igloo and a submarine!

The cards which I created  couple of months back have been changed as a result of the testing that some of you may have been involved with, so thank you to those of you that gave us some feedback. Although these are not going to be part of the initial game I have added a couple of new ones which will interact with the scoring system so I hope to test these as well.

Nick and I have been playing around with various versions of the points system and I would really like to get these tested by as many players as possible, so if you around for our last KD Games Night on Tuesday or if your coming to the last Gambit Games of the year please have a go a let us have some feedback.

Announcing Star Realms Expansion: Crisis

If there’s one question I have been hearing more than any other, it’s “when is there an expansion for Star Realms?”  So I had a look in to it and I am very please that they have announced the game’s first official expansion, Star Realms: Crisis, which I have put on pre-order but as yet I have no confirmed date or price.

The expansion comes as three seperate parts each consisting of 12 cards, let’s take a look at what Crisis has to offer:

Crisis: Bases & Battleships

   

If you like to close out your games with big beefy battleships, this expansion pack is for you! Bases & Battleships includes a powerful new ship for each faction, along with eight additional ships & bases to add even more variation to your trade deck.

Here we see Mega Mech, one of the few cards in the game with the awesome ability to return bases to hand. Sometimes you’ll want to bounce your opponent’s Outpost to let your fleet slam in for big damage, but even cooler is returning one of your own powerful bases to hand so you can play it again!

Crisis: Fleets & Fortresses

Fleets & Fortresses is for those players who like to stock their side of the board with behemoth bases. The expansion pack is loaded up with a powerful new base for each faction, as well as eight new ships with a variety of cool abilities.

Death World will definitely be a favorite for Blob players, not only adding a massive four combat, but letting you remove off-faction cards from your deck in return for card draw. Very awesome.

Crisis: Events

Our first new card type, Events, add some serious fun to the Star Realms experience. When an event enters the trade row, it’ll immediately shake up the game, destroying bases, letting players draw extra cards, and more!

Supernova is a great example of how an Event can impact the board, sweeping the trade row clear while blasting each player for five authority. Events really are a ton of fun, especially in multiplayer!

Crisis: Heroes

The Heroes booster adds our second new card type to the game. Heroes are unique, because unlike other Star Realms cards, they immediately enter play when purchased! Each hero has a scrap ability which provides both a specific effect, as well as turning on ally abilities for the turn.

CEO Torres is a great buy for any player, letting you turn that extra 2 Trade into a quick 7 Authority. However the Trade Federation player will also get to activate their fleet’s ally abilities, and really put this powerful business-commander to good use!

Again, I don't have much more about Star Realms: Crisis at this point but I will post more info as soon as I have it!

Ticket to Ride

Due to the very popular Ticket to Ride being out of stock I have today ordered the 10th Anniversary Edition of this very popular game ...

For the tenth anniversary of the game's release, Days of Wonder came out with the appropriately named Ticket to Ride: 10th Anniversary edition, with this version of the game being supersized by 50% over the original model to reflect its continued success.

The U.S. game board is similarly 50% larger than the original, with updated graphics, and this edition includes 110 large-format train cards and 69 destination tickets, all of the tickets from the original U.S. game plus those from the Ticket to Ride: USA 1910 expansion. The train pieces in the game come in five different sculpts, with each being a different type of train car; each set of trains comes packed in its own tin box decorated with matching artwork.

KD Game Night

Its the last KD Magic Night before Christmas and this week we a t the Royal George. The event is STANDARD and we will start at 7pm with the aim as usual of getting 4 rounds each lasting 40 minutes.

As it is Christmas we will be using a 'cracker off' to decided who goes first each round! Using top quality 'pound shop' crackers that have a sticker in them!

I am trying a new event system called Eventbrite which I hope to use for all future FNMs and Prereleases, it will allow you to pay online using paypal aswell as creating a Facebook event. If you have any feedback (particularly for the prerelease purchases - I would really appreciate it as if successful it will also be used to improve the CONQUEST ticket system next year)

I will try and be at the venue from about 5:30 to allow people to play some practice games, trade cards or build there decks.

This will be the last scoring event of 2014 so can anyone knock Nathan off the top spot?

New Dice Masters Products

I have had a small delivery to day of Dice Masters. In addition to the boosters I have also got two limited items.

First we have the collectors box ...

Contents:
20 custom dice
(12 all-new pearlescent Basic Action dice and 8 all-new pearlescent Sidekick dice)
1 felt dice bag
10 Basic Action Cards
4 Indicator Cards
1 Professor X – Recruiting Young Mutants Full Art Promo Card
4 Marvel Dice Masters: The Uncanny X-Men foil packs
2 dice storage trays that hold over 300 dice!

and secondly we have the Magnetic Box...

Crafted from flexible, durable plastic and designed to carry a player's Dice Masters team to their next Marvel Dice Masters game, the Marvel Dice Masters: X-Men Magnetic Box contains two internal boxes and three dividers to make organization of dice and cards fast and easy.

The Gambit Games End of Year MTG Tournament

The time has finally come to invite players to the end of year grand tournament! As we did last year we will be inviting 20 players, allowing that upto 4 can not come, meaning there will still be a minimum of 16! If it goes below 16 then I will invite the next players on the rankings!

Since January we have had a total of 90 players attend one of our events which include prereleases, launch parties, game days, Luke's drafts, leagues, junior competitions and of course KD Magic Nights (Friday Night Magic)! There have been over 70 different events of various formats and types!

Firstly last years champion will get a chance to come back and defend his title,so Sam Chapman is the first on the list! Simon Wright and David Sanders are the next as they won in 2012 and 2011!

Our winner from our very first gaming convention 'CONQUEST' is next, so Michael Pike makes 4!

The grand tournament is invite only and anyone that has won an individual pre-release during the year will automatically get an invite, so this adds in the following players:

Nathan Minter, Olly James and Nick Lewis!

Also included will be the player who has scored the highest average in all the events they have played in this year (they must have played in at least 5 events) which is Michael Pike with an impressive 8,73! As he is already on the list we moved down the highest average scores to the next player not already invited which will be Finley Williams at 8.64!

Finally we then add in the top 12 ranked players not including those already selected to take the total to 18 players which are:

Elliott Miles, Aaron Burns Lee, Ivan Miles, Bell Benstead, Nick Murphy Cunningham, Alex Tynemouth, Marc Le Cras, Darren Phipps Walker, Paul De Vall, Luke Vincent, Craig Harbour and Steve Baluci!

All players will receive an invite in the next day or so via facebook and I would ask that you please reply as soon as possible as if you can not attend then I can invite the next players on the list!

The Grand Tournament will be held on Sunday 28th December (as part of our last Gambit Sunday) starting at 10am and finishing at 6pm.

The event will consist of a draft lasting 3 rounds, followed by a break for lunch and then 2 rounds of STANDARD and 1 or MODERN. Please you will be required to use a different deck for each round of STANDARD (which must have a minimum of 20 cards different from the other deck)

Good luck to everyone that has qualified and I hope that you can make it to fight for the right of being the 2014 Gambit Grand Master!

Gary of Team Gambit

Vanguard Sneak Peak

This Tuesday at the RoyalGeorge on the Holmbush roundabout in Shoreham we will be holding ...

A facebook event has been created for the KD Games Night, which this is part of, so please confirm you attendance! If you are not on the list and want to be then simply comment on this post and I will get you invited!

There will also be Vanguard League if there are enough players interested in both events.

The registration for the event will open at 6:30pm and I hope to get things started by 7:00pm at the latest!

The cost will be £17 as normal and for those who have not been before the format will be as follows....

Players will use he six boosters to 'draft' a deck to play in three rounds of a 'swiss' tournament o find the sneak peak champion!

What is Booster Draft Booster Draft?

Booster Draft is a method of play which involves purchasing, opening and building a deck straight away for a game!

Fighters open the packs and choose a card he or she would like to use in a predetermined order (this is known as a “draft”), and decks are built right there and then!

With this unique style, fighters get to experience the thrill of selecting cards, and the joy of playing with a different deck every time!

How to do a Draft?

1. Decide on the seating arrangement around the table with a random method.

2. Each person will open one pack, and check the cards inside that pack.

3. Choose a card and place it face down in front of you. (On you first pick for a pack you will take a trigger unit and one other card) Fighters may not peek at the face down cards.

4. Once everyone has chosen their cards, all fighters will pass the rest of the cards in hand to the person on the left, in a clockwise direction.

5. With the cards received from the fighter on the right, choose a card and place it face down. Once everyone is done, pass the rest of the cards in hand to the left again. Repeat until all the cards have been taken.

6. Between the third and fourth pack, you may check your own face down cards.

Starting from the fourth pack, pass the cards in hand to the person on your
right(anti-clockwise).

7. Once all 6 packs have been opened and passed around, the draft ends. The fight will now begin with the 30 cards chosen and formed as a deck!

Deck building

1. The 30 chosen cards becomes your deck.

2. The rules which restrict only 4 of the same card, as well as only 4 heal triggers in a deck do not apply here.

Game conditions

The basic rules of Cardfight!! Vanguard can be found here:

http://cf-vanguard.com/en/howto/

The rules of a normal cardfight apply, but with the addition of a special rule:

“During a trigger check, if a vanguard or rear-guard of the same clan as the trigger unit is not present on the field, the trigger effects will still activate.”

Therefore, please ignore the clans of the trigger units when choosing cards to build your deck

King of Tokyo or maybe New York

Restocks of King of Tokyo and King of New York are due tomorrow and make great Christmas Gifts...

In addition I am also expecting the two expansions for the original game which are ...

King of Tokyo: Halloween, which is subtitled "Collector Pack 1", includes two new monsters for use with the King of Tokyo base game: Pumpkin Jack and Boogey Woogey. What's more, each monster comes with its own set of eight Evolution cards – first introduced in King of Tokyo: Power Up! – so that each monster can mutate into an even more nightmarish version of itself!

King of Tokyo: Halloween also includes six orange-and-black engraved dice (to fit the Halloween theme, of course) and twelve new Power cards to be shuffled into the deck. These cards are all Costumes, a new type of card that provides a powerful effect, but which can be stolen by any monster that rolls three claws and rips the costume off of you.

Finally, King of Tokyo: Halloween includes an exclusive promotional card for King of New York,

With King of Tokyo: Power Up! –  Included is the new monster Pandakai, a giant panda bear. After choosing a monster, each player takes the eight Evolution cards associated with that monster, shuffles those cards, and creates a personal deck. At the end of a player's turn, if she has three hearts, she draws one Evolution card and adds it to her hand; this is possible even in Tokyo (when hearts are normally useless) and even if the hearts are used for some other action, such as healing.

A player can reveal and play an Evolution card at any time. Some Evolutions are temporary, allowing a one-time bonus, while others are Permanent, such as Gigazaur's "Tail Sweep", which allows him to change one die to a 1 or 2 each turn. Each Evolution card also identifies whether a monster is a Mutant, Invader or Robot, and while not relevant for Power Up!, this species identification could come into play in future expansions.

The rules for King of Tokyo: Power Up! contain a few variants: Players start with a random Evolution in play, or draw two cards and choose the one they want, or draft a set of Evolutions prior to the start of play. However you play, the goal of the game remains the same: Score 20 points or be the last monster standing amid the rubble of what was once Tokyo.

Marvel Dice Masters

This week Esdevium will be getting a restock of Dice Masters so we will finally be stocking this item.

I will be getting starter sets and boosters from either the AvX sets or Uncanny X-men. If you have not seen this game before then have a look at this video...

I know that a couple of players have already got this game and I hope that we might get some play tomorrow night. I should have stock by this weekend and aim to do some demo's at next weeks KD Games Night.

£1 each booster

£12 each

Lords of War at Dragonmeet

 On Saturday I had the pleasure of joining the Lords of War team at Dragonmeet to celebrate the games anniversary and run the end of year tournament.

We were busy all day demoing having to extend our play area and at one point we were even demonstrating the game on the floor as there was quite simply no more space. For the tournament we had 12 players which was as much as the space would allow.

We had a real mix of ages and abilities from children as young as 9 and players that had learnt the game just a few minutes before the event. Everyone played well and in the spirit of the game and after 3 rounds we had two players joined at the top of the field with an impressive 76 points.

Jake Cambell-Smith and Kevin Hearne then played the final match which was as tense a game as you would expect, it was clear that both players really wanted to get their name on the sword and in only a few turns both players had lost their Generals, a few turns later they had both lost 3 command cards. As both players tried to get the fourth command Kevin started to move ahead on units and eventually claimed his 20th to win and become the first player to win the right to wield the Sword of Champions!

The final scores were ...

1st Kevin 105 (claiming an extra 25 points for winning along with a well deserved command star)
2nd Jake 95 (claiming an extra 15 for second place)

3rd Kieran 68
4th Alistier 61
5th Innes 60
6th Jamie 57
7th Gabriel 55
7th Hamdi 55
7th Rob 55
10th Binh 51
11th Jasper 50
12th Tobey 46

All of the points have been added to the Lords of War Role of honour for 2014, details of which can be found here...

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1GsN3b9cw8xuW4XXa7WR6iSGobOuVs6FtTG2aXpX0Ikk/edit?usp=sharing

MTG Anthology

RELEASED TOMORROW

Duel Decks: Anthology contains all eight decks from the first four Duel Decks products:

Duel Decks: Elves vs. Goblins
Duel Decks: Jace vs. Chandra
Duel Decks: Divine vs. Demonic
Duel Decks: Garruk vs. Liliana

This is a very limited offer, and once they are gone we will not get any more.

KD Magic Nights for December

So there has been a little bit of change in regards to the KD Magic Nights. Firstly we have a new venue which is The Royal British Legion in Shoreham. We will be using this and the Royal George this month, so please check FB for any updates. As normal we will start all the events at 7pm. 

The other change is the increase of Modern events. As these have been quite well attended in the last few weeks and following a request from a number of players we will now be hosting modern events every other week (starting each month with standard)

The venue will open between 5:30pm and 7pm each week to allow players to trade, have some casual games or test their decks for the evening.

We will try and get 4 swiss rounds of 40 minutes each week after which the top two players will get prizes.

Here is the proposed schedule of events for this month, in addition to these there will be draft events being held on Tuesday Night, more details to follow soon.

THIS MONTHS DATES AND FORMATS

Friday 5th December ...... Standard 7pm £3 .... Royal British Legion

Friday 12th December ...... Modern 7pm £3 .... Royal British Legion

Friday 19th December ...... Standard 7pm £3 .... Royal George

Friday 26th December ...... NO EVENT

All events will be confirmed in the days proceeding it when the facebook event is created. If you are not getting invites to these events and would like to the please let me know.

Dragonmeet

This weekend I have the pleasure of joining the Black Box team at ...

I have also been given the privilege of running their end of year tournament. As this is the venue that the game was launched in 2012 it seems fitting to have something of a special prize for the winner, so in addition to winning a command star and some 'shiney' prize cards the overal event winner will have their name engraved on the Lords of War Sword. They will also get to take home a mini sword in the form of a letter opener.

   

The event will start at midday and players will need a constructed deck. It will consist of 4 rounds of swiss followed by a top 4 play off. The best bit is that there is no extra charge to join in the event - so if your going to Dragonmeet you might as well give it a go!

Last Sunday at Gambit Games

Last weekend at Gambit Games we hosted another Lords of War Tournament which saw Will become the first two star general of the year. It was pretty close but he kept the pressure on all of his opponents and never lost a game. The final result was ...

Will 76 point and 3 wins (gets an extra 25 points for winning)

Gary 76 points and 2 wins (gets an extra 15 points for second)

Olly 63 points and 2 wins

Tobi 53 points and 1 win

Kevin 50 points and 1 win

Alex 41 points

We also had a lot of games of Star Realms which was by far the most popular game of the day. It is really easy to play but great fun, its well balanced and caters for 1 one 1 as well as multi-player. More details on how to play can be found here ... http://kidsdreamsgames.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/how-to-play-star-realms.html

Another very popular game was Space Cadets ...

Space Cadets: Dice Duel pits two star ships against each other in quick-paced combat. The players are divided into two teams, each team playing the crew of their ship. The team will win or lose together. The game ends when one side destroys their opponent by causing four points of damage through torpedoes or mines.

Each ship has six Bridge Stations:
Engineering generates power for the other stations.
Helm maneuvers the ship on the map.
Weapons loads the torpedo tubes to attack the enemy.
Sensors locks onto the enemy so torpedoes can hit, and uses jammers to stop the enemy from locking on.
Shields helps protect the ship from enemy torpedoes.
Tractor Beams can grab the powerful crystals, move the enemy ship on the map, and launch Mines.

There are no game turns in Space Cadets: Dice Duel. The game continues with players acting as quickly as possible until one side wins.

Each player will be in charge of one or more of these stations, or have the overall roll of Captain to coordinate everything.

Here is some of the action from Sunday ...

This game is available to order, so if you are interested please let me know.

Young Guns Commander League

During December at the Young Guns club we will be holding a Commander League...

This will be 5 weeks in total.

This is a simplified version of the rules set used at Shrunken Terra in Burgess Hill and I would like to thank them for devising the system in the first place.

The League is multi-player, with games of 3/4 players rather than 1 -Vs- 1 -- each Tuesday there will be time for 1 or 2 games, each running for a maximum of 1 1/2 hours.

To encourage social play we are utilising the Shrunken Terra "+/-" points system to determine the winner of each game as well as the League overall, by means of a Living Ladder - as you'll see it is possible to have a winner without a single player being eliminated (unlikely as that eventuality may be).

**League Points System:**

(M) = You can get it multiple times

(P) = Each player can get it once

(I) = Only the first player to achieve it gets it

1) I'm Too Young To Die! = - 4 Points (M): Eliminate a player prior to their 5th turn.

2) Colour Blindness = -3 Points (M): Be the cause of a player being unable to cast spells of any given colour.

3) ZZzzzzzzz = -1 Point (M): Take a turn of 6 minutes or more - this includes any extra turns you may get

4) Too Many Options = -1 Point (P): Have Sol Ring or Mana Crypt in play on Turn 1.

5) Help a Brother Out = +1 Point (P): Assist another player in some way.

6) Mark of the Beast = +1 Point (P): Control exactly 6 lands, 6 creatures, and 6 non-land, non-creature permanents.

7) Watch Out, We got a killer = +1 Point (P): Eliminate 3+ Planeswalkers during the game. - Combat damage and exile counts for this one.

8) Serial Killer = +1 Point (P): Remove 8+ creatures from play at one time.

9) Creatures of the Night = +1 Point (P): Control 6+ non-token creatures with the same creature type. 

10) I Brought Extras = +1 Point (P): Control 12+ creature tokens at one time.

11) Die Already! = +1 Point (P): Survive being attacked for lethal damage 3+ times.

12) Prepared for the End = +1 Point (P): Control 3+ Equipment at one time.

13) Your Time has Come = +1 Point (M): Eliminate a player or be directly responsible for a player's elimination.

14) You're Not an Extra = +1 Point (P): Prevent another player from being eliminated from the game.

15) Final Credits = +1 Point (P): Finish the game without being eliminated.

16) Next in Line = +1 Point (M): Have the lowest life total, which must be lower than 10, when another player is eliminated without the game ending.

17) I've Seen This Movie = +1 Point (P): Be the first person eliminated from the game.

18) There can be only None = +4 Point (I): Eliminate every player, including yourself, within a single turn!

19) I'll let these guys do the talking = -1 Point (P): Play no spells in a turn but use three Planeswalker abilities 

20) Well he's brave.... = +1 Point (P): Play a 5 colour or mono-colour deck

21) Please don't counter this = +1 Point (P): Tap over 10 lands to play a spell 

22) What did you do! = +1 Point (P): Be attacked by each other player in one round of turns. 

23) Who is in charge here? = +1 Point (M): Put an opponents commander into their library. 

24) You had me worried for a bit = +1 Point (M): Tutor to find your commander in your library. 

25) The original is always the best = +2 Point (P): Win with a pre-constructed deck 

26) Next time he's in charge! = +2 Point (M): Deal 21 damage to a single player with a single creature other then your commander 

27) I hate each of you equally = +1 Point (M): Swing with three creatures, each targeting a different player. 

28) Well he lasted long = +1 Point (P): Kill a Planeswalker the turn it was brought out 

29) Fair weather friend = +1 Point (P): Take control of an opponents planeswalker. 

30) How the Mighty have Fallen = +2 Point (P): Kill the same Commander in the same game 5 times