I Was Thinking, Overthinking....

 About Too Many Scenarios

Seriously, check out this album. It's great!

For those that listened to way too much Relient K in high school and college (like I did and still continue to do), that line will make you get a serious case of nostalgia. For those that haven't, I'd absolutely recommend checking out their "MMHMM" album on whatever streaming service that you can find. It's one of my favorite albums ever and really displays Matt Thiesen's range of songwriting and musicality.

Seriously, check it out now, I'll wait.

Are you back after listening to it? Good. If you liked that, check out the rest of their discography because it's also really good too. They've really had a wide variety of music over the years and as I've grown up with them, they've really evolved with their music as I've enjoyed them. It's a great band and fun to throw on from time to time.

But you're not here for music recommendations are you? You're here for ramblings about board games that are (generally) well put together and bring a fun perspective on this massive money sink that we call a hobby.

It's actually been interesting to go back and look at the various games that I've acquired in the last seven months and I realized that I've gotten more than I expected, while also selling off quite a few of my games. I found it really interesting that many of the games that I got recently don't have a solo mode and that's resulted in them being pulled off the shelf less than others that have a built-in solo mode.

Playing in Excess

Looking at my plays of the games that I've purchased in the last few months, I noted that the game with the most plays by far is Clank!: A Deck-Building Adventure. This one stands out with a massive 37 total plays for the year (the next highest being Cartographers with 32 plays), which is actually my second-highest game played overall (Cartographers takes it with 39 total plays logged), and I can point to several reasons for it:

1) The game has a solo mode that is app enabled through the Dire Wolf Digital companion app. It's actually fairly good as far as app-enabled games go and the upkeep for the solo mode is fairly limited, which makes the game quick and easy to play.

2) This is easily Sarah's favorite game in our collection, aside from Everdell: The Complete Collection, and it's far less "brain burny" for her which helps at the end of a long day of attempting to corral our 4 year old who's full of vigor and chaos. Any time I ask her what game she would like to play, I can guarantee it's about a 50/50 chance that she will want to play Clank! or Clank! In! Space!

3) The abundance of variety that I have with the game has really helped with its replayability. We have purchased the Adventuring Party and both Expeditions expansions for the game, which allows for multiple changes in setup of the game and brings fresh new cards and experiences every time we play.

4) Recently, Clank! just saw a digital implementation that I was fortunate enough to access and I've put at least six or seven games of it on the digital implementation. With the bots on the digital version, I can manage to get a game of Clank! in about 15-20 minutes. Plus the addition of "Challenge" modes to the game really add another level of depth that I can play with and even has given me some ideas to play with the table top version.

Multiplayer Mission is a Go!

Great game and I need to get it back to the table!

Contrast my 37 plays of Clank! (which fairly was bought in March) with Lords of Waterdeep (bought in June) that only has one play of it at two players. I absolutely loved the game and see it being one of our favorite things to bring to the table, but the problem lies in the fact that it's a 2+ player game only.

Fortunately, I've found a solo variant here on BGG (you guys are amazing) and I'm definitely going to be pulling that out in the next week or so, but because it took some time for me to get a solo variant, I haven't played it more than that first initial play. Which is disappointing to me as Lords of Waterdeep was really fun.

It's hard to get it to the table as Sarah has a "One new game a month" policy that she's enacted (which has made me be very picky about what I bring to the table to teach) and there's been other games that she's interested in.

Additionally, I've heard that the expansion for Lords of Waterdeep, Scoundrels of Skullport is an absolute necessity to play with as it takes a great game and makes it even better. So, I'm trying to get my hands on that as well to play with.

I've been happy to completely clear my "Shelf of Shame" of any games with my play of Land vs Sea (which was a really fun play BTW) and I'm now trying to complete my 10x10 Challenge for 2024, but I'm also trying to intersperse new games into the mix as well, as well as older games that I haven't played in a while.

That means that I'm going to be working on getting games like Lords of Waterdeep to the table as well as a few others that are sitting waiting to be played more than a single time.

Upgrading Games, Not Buying Them

I really need to get a 3D Printer to make cool stuff like this!

I also have been discussing upgrading some of the components for my games with Anthony since I'm a sucker for upgraded components. We have had several discussions about upgrading a few things in my library before going out to purchase new games and as much as I hate to admit it, he's probably right about the upgrades.

I've been on the fence about getting them, but the Geek Up Bits for Quacks of Quedlinburg are really nice and I'm very tempted to get them along with the storage boxes too. I love Quacks of Quedlinburg and having the upgraded boxes and bits would make the game even better. I've also designed a custom box for the game which I am looking to get laser cut so it'll fit in my shelf (I currently have the massive Mega Box version) and that will better fit the materials.

There's also the metal coin and wooden token pieces for Flamecraft that I'd like to enhance my game with and I've seen them both at my local board game shop, so it would be a matter of just picking them up to add to my collection. There's the dragon statuettes, but I actually prefer the little wooden dragon meeples better and think they fit the feel of the game more.

I'm also looking to get a few inserts for games, including an insert for Wyrmspan and an insert for Dinosaur World to help with storage and setup/teardown for the games. Both are fantastic, but I think that it would help to have something a bit easier to setup and teardown with my boxes to make them easier to play.

And finally, we have the most massive issue that I've found, ever since I started using them: card sleeves. There are several games that I would like to get sleeved, including Wyrmspan to ensure that the cards are safe from the grubby fingers of my kiddos. I know that sleeves are hotly debated here on BGG, but I've found that several of my games have been very helpful to have sleeves on. I've sleeved both Clank! and Cartogarphers due to the shuffling being done with the cards, and with some of my more expensive games and those that are deck-builder based, I want to ensure that they're protected enough to play them more.

Rounding Up My Thoughts

All that being said, I have so much that I would like to play/buy/upgrade that I feel like I'm constantly behind the 8-ball so to speak. There's been so much that I would like to do with my games, and the constant "ooh there's another game that looks pretty!" monologue running through my brain doesn't help.

Still, I have been reaching out to several publishers to request review copies of games and to my absolute surprise, I have had several positive responses. There will be a few games in the next few weeks that I'll be reviewing with the copies that have been provided by the publisher, so keep an eye out for those reviews as they pop up over the next few weeks. I'll be making sure that I provide a disclaimer if a copy was provided by a publisher to ensure total transparency with the reviews. It's something I'm really excited about since it means (in my head at least) that I'm a legitimate blogger! 

Give me your thoughts:What are your thoughts on upgrading your games? Do you look for officially licensed upgrades when adding things to your game or are you all about DIY projects? What games do you have in your collection that you would like to upgrade or expand?

As always, thank you so much for checking out this blog. If you liked it, please hit the green thumb  at the top of the page and feel free to leave a comment on the post. I appreciate all interactions and will respond to everything that I can. If you really liked the post and want more ramblings, feel free to subscribe and get new posts every Monday/Wednesday/Friday.

*Originally posted on BoardGameGeek on 17/7/2024*