Dice tower - part 1

Dice towers aren't for everyone, but with the kids chasing dice across the table - especially when we play Munchkin (and I'm not keen about them tossing the dice into the Munchkin Dungeon rooms) I figured it was time for a tower.

Thick card for base and half the walls,

 Thin card for the other walls, giving the 'boot'shape,

 Thick card struts to support the rolling surfaces,

 All glued together,

 Starting to add the texture to make it a bit more exciting,

Stay tuned for the next update!  :)

More Munchkin

Had another game of Munchkin tonight.   The new board is getting some good use.

I've finished it off a bit more since the last post - it now has a flocked grass surface and I've added some extra fittings to the rooms.

So now we have the rooms with the following thematic influences:
1- Greecian mythos
2- Water myths
3- Destroyed by lava
4- Knights and Kings
5- Witches hut
6- Egyptian tomb
7- the Dark Forest
8- the Labyrinth
9- standing stones
10- the cave of gems

then as we played a game the other day, and the dice went for a roll - I thought "hmmm, maybe we could use a dice tower?"....

Gaming, gaming, gaming...

Invited the (now ex-) work crew to come around for another day of board and card games.  These are regular successes, and I think we are starting to make a tradition of them.

We got rolling at 1130am and first game on the table was ...

"Boss Monster". C brought her copy over that she got for xmas.  It is a great little game where the players are the monsters that rule their own little dungeon.  Each turn you try to improve your dungeon and try to either attract or avoid the adventurers who are ready to head out from town.  If your dungeon is dangerous enough, you can kill off 10 adventurers before being wounded 5 times yourself.
Neat little mechanics, easy to play (Kn grabbed it immediately) and the eight-bit game graphics on all the cards look great.  I'm gonna buy this ASAP.

Then we played 'Gloom'.  A game where killing off your own cards is the way to win.  You make your own family of cards as sad as possible, while cheering up the opposition, and then arrange an untimely demise for them at their lowest point.  The transparent cards are a great mechanic for altering the 'pathos'on each card, and the way the game becomes enhanced by each player telling the story of their family (and other families) as each unfortunate or fortunate occurance it played adds to the dark humour.  Kr loved this one, as did everyone. 

Then I introduced the crew to "RoboRally", being a bit more crunchy I wasn't sure how it would be received.  I shouldn't have worried - the first game didn't take too long, and everyone got into the mechanics and learnt a few lessons... and were challenged.  So (and this is pretty rare for our game days) a second game was called for.
Awesome RoboRally funtimes.  Lasers lased, Robots crashed, pushed and fell down pits (multiple times), flags were captured and robots wandered off in the wrong directions.  All great fun.  Went down really well.

Then 'SmallWorld' came out.  All the usual good stuff.  Trolls are becoming a favourite way to churn over coins while in Decline, as no one usually wants to go through the effort of digging them out.  Amazons provided the usual scary invasion, and I took the DragonMaster Dwarves more for the fun of using the Dragon than for more good tactics.  C, J and myself finished close - but T streaked away for a solid win. 

Then we all gathered around the new Munchkin board for a game of Munchkin: Legends expanded with Únnatural Axe'.  The board was warmly received, which was gratifying, and we had a great game of Munchkin with plenty of monster slaying, wheeling and dealing, a few backstabs and a final thrilling race to the finish - as C stole monsters from Kn to fight, and everyone threw in efforts to make the monster too hard for her to defeat, but she kept coming back with another card and finally got the win.

It was time for the crew to go home then (after about 10 hours of gaming) so that left the family to try "Hey, That's my Fish!".
A cute, simple game to set up and play.  Works a bit like checkers where you move your piece (the penguin) in straight lines to capture tiles - picking up the tile you just left.  The player with the most fish at the end wins.  Elegant.  Kn is enjoying it.

 Then we finished off the night with a final game of "Gloom", which everyone wanted to try again.

A great, tiring, but really fun day.  We'll line up another one for sometime soon.

Sometimes, ya just gotta go overboard

So, you may recall that after playing Munchkin at the last big game afternoon we held I ran out soon after and bought Munchkin: Legends for the home collection.  I then drew up a basic version of the game board that can be used to indicate Level progress for the Munchkins, rather than just the counters that the basic version suggests.

Well, I then got all carried away, and L got carried away, and we brainstormed, and decided to make a big board for Munchkin...

So I...

-got some foam (that nice denser blue foam, for improved carving)

-drew out the 'dungeon' (roughly based on the original Munchkin Advanced layout)

- started carving out the rooms, card spaces, discard spaces and dice holder.
- let it age for a couple of months.  (Like a home brew, it should be laid down for a while to mature. Or maybe I just got distracted by family and pre-xmas for a while)

- realised that I wanted to use it soon, so frantically got back into it.  Adding a base and starting to cut out and stick down cardboard pavers and the numbers on the floor.

-eventually had to pull an all-nighter where I paved and bricked the rooms, floorboards in one case.  Added room dressings to give each room a unique theme.

-got out ye olde airbrushe to base coat the rooms in black...

- used the airbrush to add texture to the pavers, bricks and walls.  This was fun as I hadn't used the airbrush as a detail brush in a looong time.  Had to re-learn how to get the right consistency for the paint and adjust the needle and seat and keep the tip clear...  Really happy with the result though. 

- did more drybrushing, detail painting, and painted the 'surface'green in readiness for flocking.

-ready enough to go for the games day.  (which was only a few short hours of sleep away) However, each room needs more detail, and there still is flocking to do.  So there will be more to come on this project!

Yay!  clunk...snooooorrreeeezzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Christmas bounty

So its been Xmas time again, and this year I made sure we all got a bit of gaming goodness under the tree.

I was lucky enough to score 'Gloom' from T at work, and I gave him the Munckin starter set.

Kr also got some Munchkin goodness, expanding the home deck with the "Munchkin 2: Unnatural Axe" deck.

Kn got "Hey, that's my fish!", a game of penguiny fish snatching.  He's quite enjoyed it.

And L got "Last Night on Earth, the Zombie game", which she really enjoyed at the last big game afternoon we held.

The hoard grows!  Muah ah ah aaah!