Space Hulk

[Kamakazie]

Ahoy, tabletop gamers! Today the third edition of Space Hulk has gone up for preorder through the Games Workshop website. This is a limited run and after stock runs out GW will not be reprinting the game again for a very long time.

I have personally never played Space Hulk tabletop but I loved the old PC game and I have always viewed the board game as an unattainable relic. This is the same game that tends to go for $100 used on EBay with pieces missing and upwards of $300 new; being able to buy it now, new, for $100 is very awesome.

[[PinPals]Apu]

Man I hate you. Id love to pick this up but I cant afford it right now. Wonder how long itll be around.

[taggart6]

I'd love to get, it but I have no one to play with and no reason to buy it.

[Recon]

First off I'm a huge Table top player, I own 3 complete armies and several super heavies....read that as I've spent thousands of dollars on this stupid hobby

$100 for what they are offering is a damn insult you could buy a damn Battle Force for that much...

[taggart6]

First off I'm a huge Table top player, I own 3 complete armies and several super heavies....read that as I've spent thousands of dollars on this stupid hobby

$100 for what they are offering is a damn insult you could buy a damn Battle Force for that much...

So It ake it you think 100 is too much?

[Timman_24]

Yes but a force pack you have to put together, paint, then buy the warhammer 40k rule book, buy dice, buy the accessory pack, and THEN you have to find someone else that has done all that as well.

This is a stand alone game and a great way to get into the 40k universe. I ask for it for christmas if it was closer to time.

[Kamakazie]

First off I'm a huge Table top player, I own 3 complete armies and several super heavies....read that as I've spent thousands of dollars on this stupid hobby

$100 for what they are offering is a damn insult you could buy a damn Battle Force for that much...

But this isn't WH40k, its Space Hulk. Think of it as a self-contained Scenario-based 40k game.

[Recon]

trust me I know what space hulk is I have 2 version of them in my basement....

The thing is they should have made plastic corridors, metal figures, and some decent fluff books for the forces (similar to codex's).

I think this game would have been a must have at $50, and a serious thought at $75. But $100 is just to much

As for the Battle Force bad reference I guess, but you could buy a AoBR (Attack on black reach) Set for 50 bucks and still end up with more...and better armies at that both BA nad Nids are somewhat gimped right now.

[Kamakazie]

Got my game yesterday, punched out the counters/tiles and started putting the pieces together today. It looks freaking awesome and I can't wait to give it a shot.

[Timman_24]

Do you know if they are still selling these or if they sold out? How did you enjoy it Kama?

[Kamakazie]

Do you know if they are still selling these or if they sold out? How did you enjoy it Kama?

It was only a limited printing, so they are sold out online as well as in most stores. I'm sure you can still find some stock left over at some game shops so if you're interested, there's no harm in calling around.

The game itself is great. It is very fun and the numerous scenarios included in the box give the game some good replay value and if I ever get tired of them I could always craft my own or refer to fans online for more. Unfortunately the game doesn't get a lot of play time in my group simply due to the fact that it is 1v1 (barring any house rules) and game night usually involves 3-6 of us.

The one negative thing I have to say about the game is that the given rules are terribly ambiguous or otherwise lacking in detail. The first night we played we couldn't actually figure out some of the basics because of how the rules were worded. Checking BoardGameGeek later that night revealed that I'm not alone in my confusion, as anyone trying to learn the rules all had questions that could not be answered. The only people who claimed to know what they were doing just used the rules from the 1st edition of the game. There is now official clarification on most things by Games Workshop themselves, but that first night was rough.

So even though I don't get to play it nearly as often as I'd like, I do not regret the purchase in the least. It is a fun game, the quality of the pieces is fantastic and its easy enough to teach quickly and play a game in under an hour.


EDIT: I should also mention that this took me several hours just to put the pieces together. After cutting out two figures from their sprues I drove out to my local game shop and purchased a sprue cutter and a set of files. After that, work went much faster but it still took me a very long time.

[Timman_24]

Great, called around and no one had one. I got one on Ebay for 124 shipped sealed. They shipped it today.

I'm going to ask for some boardgames for christmas, just started to get into them. I've never played the "hobbist" board games, only the mainstream stuff but am looking forward to getting into them. I'm looking at getting Agricola and Through the Ages. Plus the WoW boardgame actually looks kind of cool.

[taggart6]

If your open to card games, I'll suggest Munchkin which is awesome.

[Kamakazie]

Munchkin is lots of fun though our group stopped playing it.

Agricola is excellent and is my second favorite game right now. Its reasonably easy to learn but doing well is extremely challenging and it can get pretty cutthroat. We've also started playing Power Grid lately which has a bit more player interaction and has a lot less brain-melting than Agricola.

My favorite game currently is Race for the Galaxy. It is a complex card game, a bit difficult to teach due to the various symbols present on each card, and it takes about 3-4 games before you get into the swing of things but once you understand what's going on and what is available to you in the deck, it becomes extremely fun and very satisfying. I say if you get this one, definitely get the first expansion, The Gathering Storm, right there with it. The base game is a bit geared towards one type of strategy, TGS expands your options much further due to some new cards and starting worlds as well as optional Goals that gives you even more options to gain points.

Some things worth noting:
-Munchkin is very much a social game. There is a high luck factor and strategy comes from being able to manipulate your buddies into helping you and knowing when the right time to annoy another player is. We played this (and pretty much all of the alternately-themed versions) for about a year regularly until we got bored of it. Having new players rotate in every once in a while would help keep this from getting stale quickly. This one is extremely simple for new players to get into, especially so if they are already familiar with basic RPG concepts such as levelling up and loot. Can take anywhere from 1 to 2+ hours depending on how many people are playing.

-Agricola is very complex with many layers to it. Every game is challenging and new and keeping that balance on your farm as well as being able to compete with the other players requires you to plan several moves ahead and be prepared to have contingencies ready in case another player blocks you from doing something. Because of this, in some way, Agricola can feel like Chess but with no clear victor until the end. This one takes roughly 2 hours to play.

-Power Grid is all about money management. You and the other players compete to buy power plants (this is actually handled in an auction), buy resources to power these plants, and then build offices in cities to earn the right to power them. In essense, this game boils down to numbers. Lots and lots of numbers. You will need to do lots of addition in your head as you plan your next moves and try to determine whether outbidding the other players on this one plant would be beneficial to you. That being said, the concept is very easy to understand and thus, while a good deal of strategy is required to win, Power Grid is an easy introduction to players who might not yet be ready to tackle a more demanding game such as Agricola. Power Grid seems to take us around 2-3 hours per game.

-Race for the Galaxy tasks each player with building a space civilization from a deck placed in the middle of the table. The way the phases work is somewhat unique in that you only do a phase if it was chosen by a player (this is done face-down). Because of this, you will find it beneficial to be able to read your opponents, to know what they want to do next so that you can choose a phase that will benefit you based on that knowledge. As a result of this, it may also be necessary to bluff or at least anticipate that another opponent is going to react one way based on what you've done and react according to that. The key to understanding how to play RftG is synergy. You must be able to determine what cards can work together, how you can make them work together, how to get them on the table and if its worth the risk going for one path over another. These paths are not immediately obvious and will only become apparent after you've played the game a few times in order to have gone through the deck and actually see every card that is available to you so you know what you might expect. I've had to teach this game a few times now and while I feel that I'm getting better at doing so, this is easily the most difficult game to teach that I have personally seen. Each card has many symbols, colors and numbers that will look like another language to you your first time playing, but after a few games you begin to understand what certain things mean and once you do the game will just click and everything makes sense. The problem is that not everyone is willing to spend their first couple of games not understanding what they can do or what their cards even do, so this isn't a great game to teach non-gamers unless they are exceptionally patient. Once everyone knows what they're doing this game takes about 45 minutes to an hour to play.

[lonewolfroger]

I liked Battle of the Roses and Recon, also all the Dungeon and Dragons board games. i don`t think they make many of them any more.