Ride forth to the Weekend (Friday Thread)

[Gusington]

I haven't had a chance to get to my gaming rig tonight BC. Maybe MP isn't ready yet?

[JasonPratt]

I still have at least one entry, maybe two, to write up on my TC2 1st Battle of Bull Run AAR; though considering (a) I already theoretically 'won' the battle with two regiments and blinding military genius, and (b) what should have been something that ended the war in two hours if my AI superiors had thought to exploit it, ends up with me morosely marching away to try to pull a points-win out of the fire that Beauregard is making with his own men... {inhale}

...I spent the week, when I had gaming time, trying to finish up Far Cry 3 for the coming of Arkham Knight later in June (and only finishing the first half  :o ).

And then last night, I spent several hours gaming about thirty years of Victoria 2 as Xinjiang, aka the least ranked nation at the start of the main campaign in 1836. There were "primitive" nation/factions higher ranked, simply by virtue of having some brigades!

Well, being safely nestled in the armpit of the Chinese Empire, north of the Himalayas, I didn't have to build any brigades at all, so I could focus on shifting my soldier and officer populations into clergy and administrators. It only took me 30 years (I'm at around 1866 now, America already had its Civil War, started early and won early by the Union, with New Orleans breaking off temporarily into its own small nation), and... I am now at about 55% westernization.  :P

Still, a good way to learn the system without being bothered much. Send my few diplomat points to making nice with my neighbors, their armies don't bother me, and there isn't much I can do nationwise until I westernize so I'm not swamped with play options. At one point I had taxes for all three population strata cranked to over 90%, and they were all still mostly getting 100% every day needs (not just life needs, or partial life needs). Though for some unclear reason I may have hit an economic death spiral -- I had been hit with a few years of tuberculosis and (two rounds of) cholera, so I had been encouraging migrations, and one of those two factors may have messed with me. All of a sudden no strata is getting more than partial life needs, regardless of how high I crank the taxes (so I can import things they want to buy) or how low I crank them (so they'll have more cash to buy things). The good news is that I also unlocked a higher financial system (for an uncivilized state) so now a bunch of foreign countries are borrowing money from me; maybe I can reduce taxes a lot more with that, even though in the short run it means I'm running a deficit. But I've saved up plenty of money in surplus, so I can do that for a little while.

Meanwhile it's hilarious wandering around the map and remembering how different the nation maps looked about 150 years ago. Hawaii? Still its own nation! (And significantly more higher ranked than me! -- I'm up to the high 70s, low-to-mid-80s, depending on how other nations are doing.) United States of Central America? The US still without Colorado or California or anything in between? The asston of tiny Germanic states? 

[KyzBP]

So far it's been WiTP:AE.  I'm slowly pushing my way through the Iron Mod.  I like that it's a lot less predictable than the vanilla game.

Last night I watched The Gamers: Dorkness Rising and it's sequel Hands of Fate. If you've ever played pen and paper RPGs (lots) or CCGs (none) then you owe it to yourself to check these out. Production dollar per laugh is on the same scale as Clerks.

[Blucher]

War Plan Orange PBEM
France '14 PBEM
Danube Front '85 PBEM

[BanzaiCat]

Last night I watched The Gamers: Dorkness Rising and it's sequel Hands of Fate.

Not bad acting for a web series. Pretty good stuff, thanks!

[Airborne Rifles]

CMANO for me. Things are getting interesting on X-Ray station and I'm going to try my hand at tearing the heart out of the Red Banner Northern Fleet with isolated but stealthy submarine attacks. We're moving next week, so I'm not sure how far I'll actually get in the AAR.

[Nefaro]

Last night I watched The Gamers: Dorkness Rising and it's sequel Hands of Fate.

Not bad acting for a web series. Pretty good stuff, thanks!

Gonna check it out sometime too.

[JasonPratt]

War Plan Orange PBEM

Impressive!  O0

[Tuna]

Last night I watched The Gamers: Dorkness Rising and it's sequel Hands of Fate.

Not bad acting for a web series. Pretty good stuff, thanks!

Is this what you guys are like when you do these games? Now I think I'm understanding the 80's Music Love! 

[Gusington]

Finally done with the tutorials and started a Japanese campaign in Order of Battle - Pacific. Finished and won the Pearl Harbor scenario...very fun, if not a little odd playing the enemy. Got my first 'perks' as well. Now it's on to Luzon!

[Skwerl]

I couldn't resist the Relic sale on Humble Bundle - even though I already had a couple of the games.

Therefore, the weekend's playlist will include:
Dawn of War II Retribution
Space Marines
Company of Heroes II

[BanzaiCat]

Gus -

I tried the Japanese campaign but I think a bug messed my game up. I can't get any further now and it was only two or so missions in. Let me know if you run into any issues like that.

[Gusington]

Hmm that sucks...I will keep you posted BC. So far no issues.

[Arctic Blast]

Going to finally bust out Xenoshyft Onslaught on the table this weekend. I'm also going to at least read the rules for the first batch of acquisitions which have arrived from the most recent Canadian Math Trade : 12 Realms, Entdecker and Super Giant Monster Showdown.

PC-wise, perhaps some more GTA V will get played. And I think I may delve back in to Kaiju-A-Go-Go. I also just finished reading a book about Sandy Alderson and the Mets which has me suddenly craving a baseball sim...

[Nefaro]

Going to finally bust out Xenoshyft Onslaught on the table this weekend.

My first game was downright brutal.  That's coming from someone who enjoys co-op games you lose more often than win.   

Kept thinking maybe I screwed up and advanced the swarm too quickly or something.  The players' overall buying power is fixed throughout the game, so it couldn't be the available resources.  The Hive swarm difficulty grew faster than I could buy new improved cards to counter with.  Thought I started off fairly well but things started steadily going down during the 2nd wave & I got murderized in the 3rd.   

Good luck stormin' the castle.  ^-^