Coffee Shop, the one stop shop for chit chats.

It has been a long time since I last visited a cafe for the sole purpose of paying for a cup of coffee. I always thought that it is a waste of money to pay someone to serve coffee / latte / cappuccino / whatever when I can probably get something twice the amount at half the price (and twice as unhealthy).

But what I find most interesting is the social benefit of such occasion. Having a drink with friends over a cup of coffee is never really about that cup of coffee. In fact, it probably has nothing to do with drinking at all. It's about being in an environment that promotes interaction among people.

Seeing friends chit chat, laugh, talk about life, gossiping, etc. is worth a whole more than the price of the coffee. Of course, a good cup of coffee at a scenic location certain helps.

I still think the coffee cost too much, but with the right company, it is all worth it.

Arkham Horror - More than the name suggests

A new board game this week. Yep, more board games. This one is called Arkham Horror. As the title suggested, it has a horror theme to it, but all we ever got is not terrified, but confused players.

Out of all the board games that my friend has introduced us to, this is my least favourite, not because I don't like horror, but because this game is convoluted, the rules are overly complex and luck plays a big, if not a significant, part in the outcome.

Basically, there is The Ancient One that is hell bent on destroying the world and each player chooses an Investigator to investigate and shut down any gates that connects between the human world and the evil world. Close or seal enough gates, and you win the game. Otherwise, you will have to fight the evil monster which will more likely than not resulting in your demise.

This is the first time I have played it, and based my first impression, this could be the last time too.

I have several complains about this game (this will only make sense to those who have actually played or understood the rules of the game):

Checks - Each character has his own sets of stats that could be changed at the start of a round, each time that an event happens (like fighting monsters), a check must be performed. It's basically rolling the number of dices based on the difference between your stats and that of the modifier. So let's say one of your stats is 5, and the modifier is -3. Then you roll 2 dices, at least one of the dices has to show a 5 or 6 in order to pass the check (there's a card that can skew the dices roll in your favour or the exact opposite, but that's another story). It's double dipping. You need to be able to roll the dices first, and THEN you need to get a high number.

Horror checks - Every time you want to fight a monster, you need to do a horror check first before you can even get a chance to fight the monster. You pass, you can fight, you fail, you loss a certain amount of sanity and then you fight. This check just adds an extra layer of chance unnecessarily.

The green and red zones - Locations are separated into green and red zones. I have been told that the green zones are generally safe and can provide positive effects. My ass they do. Of all the green zones I've been to, one sent me to jail, one made me lose Sanity, one that made me lose Stamina, etc. None were good in any way. And all requires me to do a Check of some sort. Again, chance dependent.

Relies too much on chance - The whole game just relies on luck way too much for my liking. They don't give you twelve dices for no reason! The game has shit load of checks everywhere that requires you to roll the dices. Picking a card is a chance event. Even when you pick a good card, there is a likelihood that you will need to perform a check before you can receive the goodies. It's almost to the point of ridiculous. I might have a better chance in winning the lottery than this.

Money / Sanity / Stamina - For all I know, I haven't been able to regain any of them in any meaningful amount. You can take out a loan, but even that requires you to roll a die to see whether you need to repay the loan bit by bit. So how do I get money? No idea. I haven't been able to encounter an event that would give my money.

Sanity and Stamina can be regained at certain locations, but if a monster is in the way, how am I going to go through? I can evade, but guess what, more checks. Lots of spells, effects, etc. requires you forgo sanity as a trade. With a replenish rate so low, the spell or effect is pretty much useless. You'll never be able (or willing) to use them.

Too many things to keep track of - Gates, monsters, environmental Mythos, rumour Mythos, the terror count, shops, money, sanity, stamina, spells, items, allies, so on and so forth. Just so much things to keep track of. You might be able to remember how your own sets of card affect your stats, but might forget to take into account the environmental Mythos which might also affect your stats.

In all honesty, my first impression of Arkham Horror is less than impressive. Chance / luck plays too much in the outcome of the game. Many of the checks are unnecessary, I think. And it only adds to the complexity. Something that relies more on strategy is much more interesting than just blind luck.

Ice Skating at Docklands

More ice skating today. It almost caught on to be one of my better past time entertainment in recent times. This time, we went to the Water Front City at the Docklands. The actual ice rink is, I reckon, about half the size of the ice hockey field we went to earlier in the month. But it felt just as good.

Afterwards, went to visit a friend who lives in the precinct. It's a small two bedroom apartment. The view was good, I thought. It's not a 360 panoramic view of the water front, but the location of the apartment allows the occupants to see both side of the precinct, out into the yacht parking (or whatever you call that), and inland. Look (a lot) further and we can actually see the sea beyond. The apartment includes swimming pool and gym, neither of which I would use even if I do live there.

But man, the view is nice, if not great. If only I have that sort of money. But then again, I don't work anywhere near the Docklands, which seems to be a major factor for my friend to move there in the first place...

Ticket to Ride Powergrid

That's actually two board game titles, Ticket to Ride Europe and Power Grid.

Ticket to Ride Europe

Ticket to Ride is a game about building a railway network from one city to another. Basically the aim is to build the longest linked railway network. For more info, just check out this BoardGameGeek link. Anyway, the game is not hard to understand, but I think it lacks sophistication found in other board games like Puerto Rico. Hardly any strategy needed as all you ever really do is to build your designated routes as quick as possible.

Power Grid

Ranked number 2 at BoardGameGeek, this game better be good. And in some respect, it is. The aim of the game is to provide the most electricity to most cities that are connected. You bid for a power station (coal, rubbish, oil, nuclear or eco-friendly), then buy raw materials, and connect cities. The amount of money you receive depends on the number of cities you can supply your electricity to.

The cycle starts again, this time with potentially more efficient power plants. Buy more raw material to burn off, connect more cities, etc. The game ends when someone connects a certain number of cities (depending on the number of players). The game is actually quite interesting. I think I still like Puerto Rico a bit more, because it involves a little more strategy. But Power Grid has its own appeal. The bidding war for a power plant could get quite heated sometimes.
But then players have to worry about buying material and connecting cities as well. Quite an interesting game. Better than the train ride.

There is always a first in everything in life. First day at school; first step; first word; first time to ride a bike, etc... Today, it's my first time ice skating. There is apparently an ice skating rink close to my house that I didn't even know about even though I have been living in the same area for more than half my life.

Anyway, it was actually easier than I thought. I had tried roller skating before (ice skating on concrete), and sucked at it, really bad. So I wasn't putting much hope on ice skating. After all, there were four of us, but only one of us knew anything about ice skating. One can only imagine the chaos that ensued.

Well, it turned out quite well. Only took me an hour to get the basics. Need to thank my friend for being such a good teacher. I never knew I can skate, albeit badly. I didn't fall once, and that was my first time skating! I felt so good, though my left foot is a bit sore from the tight boots. But overall, a great afternoon, and I get to meet a new friend.

P.S. Photo is not mine.

Puerto Rico, it's a place, it's also a board game.

More board game madness at the friend's place over the weekend. This week it was Puerto Rico. Apparently voted number 1 on the Board Game Geek website. It's not that hard to see why. Basically, the whole point of the game is to get Victory Points. The one with most Victory Points wins. To get them, the players can build buildings that give Victory Points, or produce and then ship goods off to gain Victory Points, or doing both.

The initial setting up and explaining the rule was quite daunting, to be honest. But once we got going, it was actually quite simple to follow. And for someone whose board game experience is confined to Monopoly, Chess and Scrabble (and Cluedo last week), Puerto Rico is actually quite fun. I lost in the end, but the whole concept is quite interesting. No wonder it's voted number one. My friend said he had already put in orders to get two other board games. He is turning us into board game geeks.