On a non-Game of Thrones note, we played the 11th game of our Charterstone campaign!
I have simultaneously much and little to say about this game. At this point, I basically know where I stand on Charterstone and this game did little to change my opinion. I'm saving a lot of my thoughts for the post-campaign write up. In sum, I loved the first 1-6 games of this campaign, but since then it has gotten significantly worse. As the campaign has worn on, it becomes increasingly clear some elements of the game are unbalanced or were simply not play-tested enough.
To illustrate, I give you exhibit A:
This, my friends, is an infinite loop. We got to the late game with fewer than five cards in the advancement deck. Of the five, three were amulets, which were being constantly used by this point in the game. Daniel and I speculated that it might be possible to create an infinite loop of points out of chaining these with your minions, and lo, Daniel realized he had the right combination of gold, point, and resource production buildings in his charter plus the two robots needed to pull it off. What you see above is game over. Daniel could have churned infinite points using this combo.
So on the one hand we broke the game and that's a little hilarious. On the other, this feels like something that should have been noticed by someone in play-testing. Advancement cards, and especially treasures, are simply too strong compared to other game elements.
Also, this game dragged on for three and a half hours.
We aren't even a particularly slow playing group, but with all the charterstone boxes opened and buildings built, there are just not many ways to move up the counter. And so this game lingered on and on and on. I think it's safe to say that most play groups won't encounter this. They will build their buildings slower and not reach interminable final games of the campaign as we have. But Jesus Christ, it feels like this possibility is something that should have been caught in play-testing.
The goal of this game was to have the most advancement cards, which Dani won. This game was notable with the temporary rule that you couldn't put your meeples in your own charter. Some people, like Amanda, realized the implications of this and held on to their high-powered buildings. Megan did not, and without the Resort on the board, her Perfumery was by far the best building in a gold glutted game. I don't think she ever got to put a minion down on it, maybe once or twice. This wasn't accidental - I was taking this as an opportunity to close the gap between us and prevent her from using it. Despite suffering much in the early game, Megan managed to finish out strong. However, Daniel did not get reined in as early or consistently by other players blocking him from using his Arena. Combined with his ridiculous combination of assistants and friends, he finished with what I think was the highest score to date. In fairness though, with the infinite loop cracked, I don't think there is any doubt anymore who is winning this campaign.
Anyway, we had all but agreed to call this the last game. But then, we had our twist. The Forever King is.....EVIL.
Yeah, whatever. Our score was high enough or something so we defeated him through the power of friendship. Four of us rebelled, two stayed loyal. All of the new personas just seem alternately trolly or weak. Now we get to elect a new mayor of our village. Wooo.
Can you tell I'm not super excited for another 3 1/2 hour game of this? I could play a round of the Game of Thrones board game in that time! (which I finally got to play again this last weekend at my Bachelor Party)
Anyway, we're going to play one more, mostly just to use the new personas and put our campaign to rest. We may abbreviate it and have the turn tracker start closer to the finish. At that point, I'll talk about Charterstone as a whole. Preview TL;DR: great concept for a game, and I salute it for the quality of its components and fantastic art style. However, the game suffers from a lot of classic Legacy game issues of poorly implemented rubber-banding and feature creep, combined with a lack of play-testing the late game that heavily weighs down its overall quality for me. It's not a terrible game, it just pales in comparison to some of the other Legacy games I've played in terms of overall experience.
That being said, I have loved our play group. And the six of us getting together to enjoy/suffer through Charterstone has been one of the more enjoyable aspects of the last year. So, before I go into the last game, I want to give a shout out to Danielle, Megan, Daniel, Caralee and Amanda for all making this the memorable experience it has been :)
Oh, and all hail our new overlord Daniel! The Infinity King!
Edit: Oh, one last thing. I had bubbled in the 'extra' track before this game under the mistaken belief it gave me an additional of one of the bonus categories above this. Daniel postulated it was just for extra glory after filling out everything. I cannot find anything online that states otherwise, so I'm pretty sure I am mistaken and he is right. C'est la vie.
Anyway, it's going to be hilarious next game when Daniel has more glory than empty stars on his box XD
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