Going to Hammercon

Give me some of that sweet sweet galactic domination

So by Friday I'll be hanging out in Hamilton Ontario (in Canada) with a bunch of friends and a bunch of beers, and on Saturday afternoon I'll be at Hammercon.  I would like to say I'll be running play tests of Beacon but in fact I'll be using this as an opportunity to do something I rarely ever get to do - playing Twilight Imperium!

If Hammercon was longer and I had more time I might run some Beacon but the opportunity to sit down with 6 folks and slug it out for galactic domination is just too good to pass up.  It's a game that I've only managed to play through twice because its just too hard to get that many like minded folks together for that length of time.  It's like Civilization (the one by Avalon Hill) or Machiavelli in this respect - fantastic game experiences but only when you have a lot of engaged people with a chunk of time to spend.  I used to have a similar problem with the game Titan - the classic monster Slugathon game - but some clever folks managed to make a Java on-line version called Colossus which satisfies that particular itch and is a great way to spend a few hours during an evening.

I'm actually doing a double header to maximize my boardgaming and will be playing another Fantasy Flight game afterwards - A Game of Thrones the board game. This game I have played many times and it's one of my favourites because it is very fun and compelling - but doesn't take as much time as the some of the aforementioned games. It is theme based on the Martin books but pretty much a cross between Machiavelli and a euro game with nice turn mechanics to keep the play from bogging down and some great bid voting and supply mechanics. Both Thrones and Twilight Imperium have a similar feel in this respect which makes sense because they were both designed by the same dude - Christian Petersen.  And even though I've played A Game of Thrones quite a bit, it's not often I get to play a full on 6 player game - so here's hoping.

I would have liked to have some copies of my Beacon 5th draft available to give out at the con, but it's not finished yet.  I hope that I'll be able to hit Hammercon next year and play some Beacon - but then again it would be almost time for another game of Twilight Imperium, or maybe some Civilization - zug zug.