Woo woo! Cross-border shopping board game madness tomorrow!

[Shortman McLeod]

Living a mere five hours away from the small-town shopping Mecca of Bellingham, Washington, and given the recent surge in the Canadian dollar (now at 96 cents U.S.!!), and given the low prices in the U.S. compared with their Canadian counterparts, and given that my daughter's grandparents live in Bellingham, and given that I'm on summer vacation with little else to do . . .

. . . I am embarking on a trip tomorrow with my four-year-old to Bellingham. I'm going to hit the gaming store there (I believe it's called Eagle Hobbies or some such) and then drive down to Gary's Games in north Seattle. Two awesome game stores (especially Gary's).

I'm hoping to score two sweet board games: RISK Lord of the Rings (is that even still out? Or is it discontinued now?) and Runebound (2e).

Question: What can you folks tell me about these fine games? I only know what I've heard, which is that they both ROXXORS. Which isn't very detailed.

And yes, I know about boardgamegeek. Read up there. But I wanted some informal comments here. Thanks in advance!

(BTW, other suggestions for cool board games are welcome.)


Shortman

 

[Mycanid]

Hmm ... ever try Arkham Horror? I have not myself, but others have said good things about it.

 

[Shortman McLeod]

Hmm ... ever try Arkham Horror? I have not myself, but others have said good things about it.

Yes indeed, sir. I currently have Arkham Horror and Settlers of Catan in my board game collection. It's a small collection.

Arkham Horror is friggin' awesome, but very complex (although it runs smoothly once you've gone through it once or twice) and has TONS of fiddly bits, including 10+ decks of cards (don't have my set in front of me) and about a million cardboard counters, etc.

In fact, I'm thinking of picking up the Dunwich Horror expansion set. Ditto the Cities and Knights of Catan expansion.

 

[megamania]

I have only done the Lord of the Rings Boardgame and expansions which were okay to me. I have heard very good things about Arham and Roborally however.

Have fun with the kiddo.

 

[Shortman McLeod]

UPDATE

Well, I am now the proud owner of the Cities and Knights of Catan (along with the C&K 5-6 player expansion). In the spirit of true geekiness, I set up the entire thing at Starbucks on one of their big tables and ran through a few turns to teach myself the rules. I think I'm going to love it. More complexity, but not too much more.

I almost bought Dunwich Horror expansion for Arkham Horror, but held off at the last second. I haven't really mastered the basic game of Arkham yet, and I don't want to buy stuff that's just going to sit on the shelf. Once I feel like I've really nailed Arkham, then I'll get the Dunwich set. But for all you horror fans out there, I can't recommend Arkham Horror enough. It's got the whole "board game that feels like a mini-RPG" vibe down pat.

Oh, and by the way, the game store dude assured me that RISK: Lord of the Rings no longer exists. That it has been out of print for some time (which I already suspected). And I couldn't bring myself to buy Runebound. I've got enough on my plate without wading through a 40 or so page rulebook!