Game- Takenoko

Producer- Asmodee

Price- $30 OR $300

Set-up/Play/Clean-up- 1.5 Hours

TL;DR- A great family friendly game 95%

 

Basics-It’s time to be a gardener in feudal Japan.  The Emperor of Japan has received a gift of a panda from China.  Players take the roles of different court members chosen to care for the panda.  This involves growing certain bamboo, feed different types of bamboo to the Panda, or make different patterns of tiles in the garden.  Each turn players role a die to determine the weather.  The weather lets players break the rules by getting extra actions, modifying the board through tokens, take the same action, or grow some bamboo, or move the panda.  Then players get to choose two actions that include: drawing tiles for the garden, moving the panda so it eats bamboo, moving the gardener to grow bamboo, draw victory cards, and drawing irrigation channels.  Moving the panda causes the bamboo to eat bamboo and you collect it.  The gardener causing all irrigated plots he is on and adjacent same colors to grow bamboo.  When you draw victory cards, you choose the type: bamboo eaten, bamboo grown, or tile layout.  At the end of your turn you can place their tokens to make bamboo grow faster, automatically irrigate the tile, prevent the panda from eating that bamboo, and place irrigation channels.  The first player to earn a number of victory cards also gets a bonus card from the Emperor for two extra points.  The remaining players get one more turn, than the game is over.  Players with the most number of points win the game.

 

Mechanics- This is an interesting take on an action selection game.  The game is very simple, deceptively simple.  Each turn the map changes entirely.  You may set up the perfect turn, but your opponents may completely change the map by the time it gets back to you.  Also, since each player has its own goals and these goals are hidden, players may end up working together OR massively destroying your carefully laid plans.  The randomness of the game makes this not quite a Eurogame, but the action selection and planning doesn’t throw this one into the American style either.  All told, it’s a lot of fun and it plays very quick. 5/5

 

Theme- The game has a lot of theme.  I don’t feel like a noble, but I did feel like I was caring for the panda.  The instructions start with a nice comic that tells the story of the game.  The art makes this game have a cute theme from start to end.  The mechanics work well complimenting the theme of competing nobles with different plans.  It’s not perfect for theme, but it does have a lot of theme going for it. 4/5

 

Instructions- I liked these instructions.  It starts with a nice comic before entering into the rules.  More games need that to set the stage.  The rules are well written and give lots of examples of what they mean for each specific rule.  5/5

 

Execution-  Ok there are two games here.  Asmodee released the original game for ~$30 bucks.  Its good, but the components are smaller.  That’s not bad.  The original has these nice stacking bamboo pieces that just look fun.  However, if you have the cash, for $300 you can get the AWESOME box that is much better!  I am cheap and played on http://www.boardgamearean.com for FREE!  In all the cases, it was fun with quality cards and components. 5/5

 

Summary-  I really liked this game.  It’s quick, well put together, and family friendly.  I played this online with my family.  We watched a youtube video to learn the rules as I read them from the instructions.  Then we played, and we had a blast.  I lost horribly, but I learned a lot and can’t wait to try it again.  That’s the sign of a good game.  You lost, learn, and want to do it again! 95%

Product– Pathfinder Society Adventure #5-8 The Confirmation

Producer-Paizo

System– Pathfinder

Price– $4

TL;DR– An excellent introductory adventure for any PFS player 97%

 

Basics- Time to earn your stripes Pathfinders!  This adventure is the capstone of any Pathfinders training.  Players get to go on an expedition with an experienced bard as they try to understand why Gillmen are journeying to an old cave each month.  Along the way the PCs and their guide are separated and the PCs must continue the mission alone.  After discovering the mystery, the PCs face off against a climactic battle at the end of the mission.

 

Story- This is a fun one.  As a GM, I get to learn lots about the Pathfinder Society history and organization.  The players get to learn about the ancient history of the world as well as bits of Chronicle lore.  The basics of the adventure is a dungeon crawl, but the extra bits make it that much more fun.  5/5

 

Mechanics– This is a fast paced one.  It’s aimed at newer players so the game doesn’t have lots of show stopper enemies.  The last enemy is pretty tough, but over the course of the adventure the party gets some help from their guide.  What the adventure does have is random encounter tables.  That’s new to me, and it makes the adventure more fun. For the PCs the best part of the adventure will be the rewards.  I promise if you are a Pathfinder and low level, DO THIS ONE JUST FOR WHAT YOU GET AT THE END! 5/5

 

Execution- I liked this one, but it’s got a few minor problems.  The adventure is aimed at newer players. But, most newer players will need some help with their characters and turns will take a bit longer.  That’s not bad, but the adventure has a lot packed into it.  That’s good for experienced people, but for new players it’s a bit much.  Otherwise the layout is great.  Every major person and the last bad guy get a nice picture.  A good adventure.  4.5/5

 

Summary- This is a fun one.  It’s worth your time as a GM and as a player.  Go out and play this one! 97%

How about a dual review?  I’m late, so two should make up for being lazy!

 

Product– Pathfinder Player Companion Pirates of the Inner Sea

System-Pathfinder

Price-~$11

TL;DR-  Not much magic, but a darn fine book 93%

 

Basics- Ah hoy landlubber!  It’s time to be bad guys!  Pirates of the Inner Sea discusses being a pirate in Golarion, Pathfinder’s default setting.  The book opens with a chapter discussing different pirate histories of the inner sea ranging from sanctioned privateers all the way to all and out pirates.  Next the book moves to different pirate gear.  After gear, several different archetypes are introduced as well as the Inner Sea Pirate prestige class.  The book then discusses Besmara, the god of Pirates and sea monsters.  After Besmara, the book introduces a few pirate focused spells and then pirate codes and rules aboard ship.

 

Mechanics–  I liked this book, but it’s not perfect.  The prestige class is a nice pirate focused martial character.  The archetypes are great pirate focused changes to the core classes.  The magic spells build upon what you would expect a pirate would need.  The gear is cool.  All that is great, but I felt like magic was a bit left out.  The spells are good, but there are not many of them.  Spell casters didn’t really get any pirate focused prestige classes.  The bard got one, but his stuff didn’t focus on magic.  It’s good for what you get, but it leaves half the available classes out. 4/5

 

Theme-  This book is amazingly theme-tastic.  I liked all the different kinds of pirates discussed in the book.  I can play a scallywag, but at the same time I can be a good guy as an Andorian privateer.  I can play evil and play a slaver.  Awesome.  The book ends with a small section on terminology and pirate codes.  The codes give the feel of being on a lawless ship where someone has to hold court.  The terms make my home game that much more interesting when I bust out random phrases to get my players into the game.  Besmara has a nice pirate feel for a god who really doesn’t care what you do! 5/5

 

Execution- The book is arranged well.  I loved what I saw.  The art is beautiful.  The test isn’t hard to read.  I’d like bigger, but then Paizo would have to cut stuff.  I enjoyed reading this.  Standard Paizo quality. 5/5

 

Summary–  If you want to play pirates in Pathfinder, then go pick this up.  If you want to fight pirates then go get this.  In both cases, you need this book to make your game that much better.  If you plan to run a game inland with absolutely no water, then don’t get this book.  All and all I liked what I saw and can’t wait to put more of it to use in my home game. 93%

 

and now the second review

 

Product– Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Isles of the Shackles

System-Pathfinder

Price-~$15

TL;DR- An amazing textbook of the Shackles 97%

 

Basics- It’s time to set sail in the most lawless island of all Golarion!  This book discusses the different major populated islands of the Shackles, the pirate islands of the Inner Sea of Golarion.  The first part of the book give a major island by island run down of each isles people, towns, races, languages, religions, and what you can plunder from the towns there.  Each island gets its own story seeds for your game.  After the islands, the book shows different random encounter tables as well as new Shackles specific monsters for you to throw in your home game ranging from a CR 1/2 pirate to the CR23 Blood Queen.

 

Mechanics–  This book is only about 1/4 mechanics with new monsters and random encounter tables.  I the monsters and well done and most of them are flavored for high seas battles.  Don’t read this book expecting new crazy rules, but what’s presented is done well.   5/5

 

Theme- Most of this book is stories of fantasy places.  It does read like a geology and history text book, which can get a little boring even at the best of times.  What’s there is great and the seeds that are set in the book do give you a lot of places to run with if you want to run a Shackles campaign.  I’d have liked a section on the Isle of Empty Eyes since that’s where the players end up in the Skull and Shackles adventure path.  4.5/5

 

Execution- The book is well put together as you would expect from Paizo.  I’ll admit I did take a few breaks to read this as it is primarily a history textbook of a fantasy place.  Don’t get me wrong, this is an amazing textbook of a fake place and its well written with a nice layout so I can read it easily.  But, it does get a bit long as you march from one island to the next. 5/5

 

Summary–  If you want to play in the Shackles, this is the book for you.  I liked this one a lot.  It will take a bit to march through, but if you can pull through you will enjoy what you fine.  Most likely though, this is a GM only book.  97%

Game-The Witches

Producer-MayFair Games

Price- $50

Set-Up/Play/Clean-Up– 2 Hours

TL;DR- A fun, non-competitive, competitive game 87.5%

 

Basics-Welcome to Discworld!  Take the role of the younger witches of Lancre.  Players take turns setting out random problems.  Then players get to do two actions after moving.  The actions are solving problems or having tea.  When you want to solve a problem, you roll two dice.  You can then play cards or run away.  If you don’t run away, you roll two more dice.  If your total beats the number on the problem, you take the problem for its points.  If you fail, you must move away and take a cackle token.  Ones on the dice are cackles; cackles are tokens you take and when you can’t take any you gain negative points.  Instead of solving a problem after moving, players can have tea with other players at your space and remove cackle counters from everyone involved.  There are two types of problems: minor and major.  For every two minor problem’s you solve, you increase your hand size by 1.  For every two major problems you solve, you gain a permanent +1 to your dice pool.  The game ends when all the problems are solved or until a situation where everybody loses occurs.  If the problems are all solved, then the player with the most points wins.

 

Mechanics-This came is competitive, but there is no fighting between players.  This is an interesting experience.  Someone wins, but you can’t really hurt them at all.  Everybody can lose if you don’t work together, but you have to play smart to make sure that doesn’t happen.  I honestly enjoy the experience.  You cheer other players on since if they don’t win it gets worse for everybody.  The simple mechanics of rolling four dice make turns go fast.  Cards give you powers, bonus to your rolls, or movement abilities.  The whole game works well together. 5/5

 

Theme- The game does make the Lancre come alive.  All the problems of the books show up here.  Also, all the major locations from the books are here as well.  Players get to be four of the different, junior witches with each one having different starting powers.  The randomness of events does take a bit a way as the problems come up in strange combinations.  That’s not game ending, but it’s something to note. 4.5/5

 

Instructions- The instructions are not great.  They get the point across, and there is a nice cheat sheet.  But, the Board Game Geeks forums are full of questions that should have been answered in the instruction book. 3/5

 

Execution- Tokens are nice quality cardboard.  The board and cards all have beautiful artwork that looks like the artwork from the books.  I liked what I saw when I opened the box. 5/5.

 

Summary- If you like Arkham Horror and the Discworld novels, this is an instabuy.  If you want a game with a winner, but no real losers, then this is a great game.  It’s fun to play a game with your family where you don’t compete so much as just try to be the best.  I love this game, my wife loves this game, and most likely you will love this game. 87.5%