1639: Analysis Paralysis

One thing you’ll almost inevitably have to deal with at some point if you play tabletop games is the matter of “analysis paralysis” — those moments where everything grinds to a standstill as one player takes ages over their turn, trying to determine what the best possible course of action will be.

It’s a problem most evident in Eurogames, which tend to have the largest variety of different decisions to make each turn, as compared to more theme-focused titles where the emphasis is more on the ongoing narrative created by your play session. A typical Eurogame provides you with a wealth of options every single turn — and in many cases, those options get broader and broader as the game progresses. This means that as you get closer to the end of the game, turns slow to a crawl until, in some cases, you have to abandon the game altogether because it’s getting too late — not a desirable outcome for anyone involved.

For the group I regularly play with, this is a particular issue with Uwe Rosenberg’s Agricola, a worker-placement game that I don’t like all that much, but which is enjoyed enthusiastically by two of our number and as such we break it out every so often according to our “different person picks each session” rota. For the uninitiated, Agricola is a game about building up a small medieval farm, and as the game progresses, more and more different action spaces become available to choose from, meaning the game gets increasingly complex as it progresses. This naturally leads to analysis paralysis, particularly as competition heats up for the more obviously useful spaces towards the end of the game.

So tonight we decided to try something different: timed turns, a la competitive chess. My friend Sam had acquired a funky little timer cube which had a different digital timer on each of its six faces, and we allocated ten minutes per player for the whole game, pausing the timer once a decision had been made so that players could move pieces and tokens around the board without being pressured by the clock.

It really, really worked! By the end of the game, the players most prone to analysis paralysis had nearly reached — but not exceeded — their ten-minute time limit, while the members of the group more inclined to take their turns quickly — usually by deciding what they were going to do during other players’ turns rather than ignoring what was going on around them or getting distracted by phones, tablets or pieces of cake — had a couple of minutes left on the clock by the end of the game.

We all agreed that it made the game feel markedly different. One of the most traditionally analysis paralysis-prone players noted that he felt like he wished there was a little more time, but conceded that this was probably the point of the whole exercise. We also agreed that it wasn’t necessarily desirable to play like this all the time, but that on occasions where it was necessary to get through games in a timely manner — playing on weeknights, say — it would be a good idea to implement in the future. More leisurely play sessions can still be had on those occasions where we have time for them — weekends away, holidays, that sort of thing.

I still didn’t win Agricola, but I think I enjoyed the experience a little more than usual, which is saying something. And if I hadn’t made a stupid mistake in the final turn, I would have probably done somewhat better than I ended up doing. Oh well! There’s always next time.

1178: Mage Knight Night

We played Mage Knight again this evening and actually managed to successfully get all the way through the introductory scenario, which allows the opportunity to explore the basic rules and get a feel for how the game as a whole works, but which is also (theoretically) significantly shorter than the other scenarios. It still took us about three hours altogether.

I have mixed feelings about long games like this. On the one hand, I really like the experience — the depth and complexity inherent in long games means that they tend to remain consistently interesting throughout, even in something like Mage Knight where there’s a fair amount of downtime. Mage Knight is designed in such a way that while other people are taking their turns, you can easily be planning what you’re going to do next, so in actual fact you can keep turns fairly snappy if you take the time to think ahead. There are still a lot of turns to take, however.

On the other hand, games that take a long time tend not to hit the table all that often, and we tend to end up playing something we’re all familiar with like Agricola, which still frustrates me inordinately because I suck at it. (I do at least have my own copy with which I can practice now, however.)

Despite the apparent complexity of the game that the “walkthrough” game guide appears to imply it has by explaining everything in exhaustive detail, Mage Knight’s mechanics are actually relatively simple. It’s basically what you get if you combine a deck-building game like Dominion or Ascension with a turn-based strategy RPG-type thing. There are random elements, but for the most part the game is a matter of setting yourself up for success, and then being able to make the best use of the resources you have to hand at any one time.

The basic mechanic involves playing cards to gain values in various abilities. Move cards allow you to, err, move; Influence cards allow you to purchase items and perform special actions in populated locations such as villages and forts; Siege and Ranged Attack cards allow you to deal damage before the enemy attacks; Block cards let you fend off enemy attacks; Attack cards let you attack the enemy after they’ve had a pop at you; Attack and Block cards with elemental affinities are more or less effective depending on the capabilities of the enemy you’re going toe-to-toe with. These “value” cards are then supplemented with cards that allow the use of various special abilities, and most cards have both a weak and a strong effect, with the stronger effect requiring the expenditure of “mana,” which can either be collected (and possibly stockpiled) through special actions or drawn from a common pool that changes every so often.

The introductory scenario is basically a case of trying to collect as much shit as possible before the game is over. Bonus points are scored for all the “extra” things you acquire over and above your starting deck — spells, special abilities, mana crystals, treasures, supporting units — and lost for any damage you’re still suffering from at the end of the game. In retrospect, triggering the end of the game when I did tonight was a silly move — I should have moved away and simply continued to try and rack up points. (Yes, I lost. Except at being wounded, which I was the best at. Yay negative bonuses!)

My trouble with strategy games like this is that I often lack the confidence to try certain more adventurous things. I’ll give you an example: in Mage Knight, when you uncover a “Mage Tower” structure on a new map tile, you can conquer it if you can defeat its guardians, who are typically quite strong and resistant to certain types of damage. The rewards are great — particularly when you take end-game bonuses into account — but it’s a bit of a risk, especially if you have a crap hand of cards at the time. This is where the “planning ahead” bit comes into it, I guess — something I clearly need to work on, since I spent most of my time earning points from exploring the map and defeating the “rampaging” enemies on the map rather than the more difficult opponents that would have earned me both more points immediately as well as the potential for bigger bonuses at the end of the game.

Anyway. I’m pleased we got through a whole game, and I’m keen to try it again — perhaps just the introductory scenario again, making some different decisions along the way — and see if I can do any better. I’m also quite tempted to get my own copy, since there are full rules for playing it solo, which I think will be quite an interesting experience. It has the feel of an old-school computer role-playing game — moving a bit at a time over a sprawling map, interacting with people through abstract systems and gradually growing in power. It works well — it’s just very time-consuming!

#oneaday Day 899: I’ll Be There For You

I have social anxiety. I may have mentioned this before once or twice.

What that means is that sometimes I get tongue-tied and don’t know what to say. Sometimes I let conversations run inside my head but worry about what the possible outcome of them will be, and end up saying nothing. Sometimes I quite literally have nothing to say whatsoever. And sometimes I do say something and don’t get the reaction I expected and consequently feel weird.

As you might expect, this makes the prospect of “making friends” a fairly terrifying one. Obviously I have made friends over the years, otherwise I wouldn’t have any right now, but I can never quite remember how it happened. In some cases, it was a simple matter of being thrown together in some context — living together, studying together, working together — but in others, it’s not quite so clear.

While I am more than happy with the friends I do have, I do sometimes wish I could have more. That may sound greedy, but the fact is that I don’t get to actually see the friends I have all that often. The vast majority of them live in the States (thank you, Internet) and the others live just far enough away for it to be A Big Effort to go and see them. And, you know, sometimes I just want people to play board games with. I bought a copy of Legend of Drizzt, one of the cooperative Dungeons & Dragons adventure games, this week and I’m hoping I get the chance to play it more than once or twice. If I had more friends (who liked board gaming) then I’d be able to play it more often — at the moment, however, it’s determined largely by mutual availability and whether at least one of us can be bothered to drive about 50 miles. I’m more than happy to for the prospect of board game fun, but it’s the former bit that can be tricky sometimes. Hopefully if and when Andie and I manage to move a bit closer to Southampton it’ll be a bit easier to be more spontaneous — as it stands, however, it’s a relatively rare treat to see people.

This is all rather self-pitying I know, but I direct you back to the first line of this post. Social anxiety makes the act of making new friends — even the prospect of just talking to strangers — a terrifying and difficult prospect. Even in an environment that should be “friendly” — I know there’s a local board game shop in Bristol that does games evenings, for example, but I don’t even feel especially confident about that. My mind gets caught in a cycle of “what ifs” and I just end up deciding not to go.

Perhaps one day I’ll get over this social anxiety and be more confident about making new friends and considering that people might actually want to spend time with me if they don’t have to. That day is not today, however, which means that I’m all the more grateful for the friends I do have and the time I do get to spend with them.

Anyone fancy a game of Legend of Drizzt?

#oneaday Day 622: Party Smart

I may be voluntarily indicting myself into the “I am an old man now” club but I have come to the irrefutable conclusion that You Do Not Need Alcohol to Have a Good Time.

Well, duh, you might say. We’ve been told that for years. But how many people really believe it?

I’m speaking purely from my own perspective here as I’m more than aware that plenty of people use booze as a form of social lubricant prior to slipping their conversational penis into the Vagina of Meaningful Interactions. I’m saying it doesn’t really work for me.

I thought it did for a while. At University, as most people tend to do, I drank a lot, mostly out of a desire to be sociable and fit in — even with seeing a close friend suffer from (and, thankfully, subsequently beat) a drinking problem. I quickly confirmed my early suspicions that I didn’t like beer at all, which precluded me from most Student Night promotions, and instead opted for spirits or alcopops.

Even with those, however, I found I had an obvious “line” which, if crossed, would switch the night from being “entertainingly blurry” to “unpleasantly blurry”. Sometimes I crossed this line by accident with just one sip too many; others I was goaded and cajoled into it by the company I was with at the time; others still I, like a child in some ways, wanted to “test my limits”. The result was always the same, however; a kebab on the way home, a longer-than-average dump during which I’d often almost-but-not-quite fall asleep, a night of disturbed sleep wondering whether or not I’d be sick (to which the answer was usually “yes”) followed by a morning of being sick, barely being able to move and always taking a bin into the bathroom with me in case disaster struck while I was the wrong way around to puke in a manner which didn’t require cleaning up.

Despite the inevitability of the above scenario, I still continued to do it. Drinks of choice changed — vodka and Red Bull being a favourite for probably the longest, despite its ludicrous cost — but the presence of social occasions did not. Drinks down the pub after a session with a club. Monday nights at the local grotty nightclub following Theatre Club rehearsals. And, of course, the occasional house party.

I used to hate house parties, but I’d still go. Most of them tended to devolve into me finding my “line”, stopping just short of it and then spending the rest of the evening looking longingly across the room at some girl I’d arbitrarily decided that night that I fancied, and then didn’t go and talk to for fear of her thinking I was a dick, a perv or quite simply just someone she didn’t want to talk to.

In short, then, in a good 8-9 cases out of 10, alcohol didn’t particularly work as the social lubricant it’s sold as. A few half-hearted “woo, I’m so drunk!”s do not make for meaningful friendships and relationships, and as such I’m pretty sure that most of my aforementioned meaningful relationships and friendships started and were best cultivated when sober. Sure, there were times when I’d gone out, got drunk and had a great time with said people — but as time passed, these got less and less frequent, and the booze became less and less important.

When I finally left university and started work as a teacher, the demands of the job meant that for the most part I didn’t have time to drink, let alone the inclination. I dabbled with having a stiff G&T upon coming home from the first school in which I worked — which was a nightmarish shithole conjured up from between Satan’s very buttocks — but it didn’t particularly help with the growing feelings of stress and depression I had, and nor was I expecting it to. I had an occasional G&T because it was a nice drink in the summer, and it happened to be one of the few alcoholic beverages which I didn’t hate the taste of.

Fast forward to now and I haven’t drunk for quite some time, and I don’t miss it. The last few times I drank wine or vodka or gin, the taste was not something I enjoyed, and it felt like it “burned” on the way down, leaving me with a slight lingering feeling of unpleasantness after just one sip in many cases. Certainly it was enough to put me off a university-style binge, but it’s also pretty much enough to put me off it altogether. It’s unnecessary for me, it doesn’t particularly help me open up to people — though it does help me act like a dick, but then, I’m in no hurry to be the butt of everyone’s jokes for being wasted — and, in more cases than one, I’ve seen what it can do to people, and that’s not pleasant.

In short, then, I think I’m knocking it on the head. This isn’t a strict teetotal policy or anything but I’m certainly not going to seek out alcohol or feel pressured into it on social occasions.

I’ve been away this weekend and heard the phrases “you need to be drunk” or “you need to drink more” uttered several times. No you don’t. Or, more accurately, Idon’t. No-one needs to be drunk. No-one needs to drink “more”. You should be free to enjoy a drink if you enjoy it, but it should not be a necessity.

If this has come across as in any way sanctimonious, that certainly wasn’t the intention and I apologise — I’m simply saying how I feel about it and what works for me in this instance. I’m certainly not judging those who do enjoy a drink and know their limits — and equally, I’m not judging those who have a genuine problem and are taking steps to deal with it. Everyone’s different, after all. All I’m saying is this: if you’re socialising with me or at a party I’m throwing (haha, yeah, right) then have a drink or two by all means — just don’t expect (or, worse, demand) than I join you.

And don’t throw up on my carpet.

#oneaday Day 57: Startlegal Ballactegar

Board games really are great. The incredible lateness of this entry can be almost entirely attributed to them. The one which took up most of our evening was the adaptation of the new-ish Battlestar Galactica series, which I still haven’t got around to seeing and really should, from everything I’ve heard.

Fortunately, the game doesn’t require any specific knowledge of the show and doesn’t appear to include any spoilers. What it does provide, however, is a lengthy cooperative experience tinged with mistrust and doubt thank to the fact that at least one player is, at some point, going to turn out to be evil. The exact manner in which this player chooses to conduct themself is part of the challenge of the game, both for the non-traitorous players and the traitor themselves.

What the game does an excellent job of is introducing just enough in the way of random elements to the mix to freak everyone out a bit while allowing the Cylon player the opportunity to subtly undermine everything the others are working for. Later in the game, too, the Cylons have the opportunity to reveal themselves and cause havoc more directly.

The game, like other co-op experiences such as Arkham Horror, initially appears deceptively complex but it’s actually reasonably straightforward to play. It does, however, appear to take quite some time—again, like Arkham Horror. This is fine, but it does mean you need to set aside a substantial amount of time to play, and if you’re hoping to fit a lot of games into a day of board game geekery, this may be one to save for a time when you can focus on it.

Our first attempt was an unmitigated disaster thanks to a combination of terrible luck (three Cylon fleet attacks in a row) and the fact that we had not one but two traitors in our midst, one of whom made themselves reasonably obvious almost from the outset, while the other did a masterful job of undermining things very subtly. It was an entertaining experience despite our failure to save the human race, however, and now we understand the mechanics better hopefully future play sessions will proceed much quicker. I’m looking forward to trying it again.

So of you’re a fan of co-op with a touch of betrayal, Battlestar Galactica is a great game to give a shot, even if you’re only familiar with the TV series in passing.

And now to bed!