lol, so much for the constant assurances that Gloomhaven would be in stock for those who wanted it for time to come and there would be more than enough supply to meet demand. Now it's "distributors will release the games to all stores who pre-ordered, and there might not be any left from them. We don't really have many left past that though."
After that great Blood Rage win last week that I mentioned a few days ago (pictured below), I was in the mood for more Norse action. I decided to finally learn Yggdrasil. Rahdo's walkthrough of it did wonders for helping me learn the game. He went through every action on the board and all enemy abilities really quick and I realized 'oh, this isn't that complex at all.' Still a tough game though. Maybe not as bad as Ghost Stories in the difficulty department but still hard. After a game of Pandemic and an Imperial Assault mission at game night, everyone else left and the two of use who remaind gave it a shot.
Above: Last week's Blood Rage game. They were talking about it tonight when I arrived and telling the person who wasn't there of my score. I'm sure it isn't all that high of a score compared to whatever the max possible score is, but the host said it is the highest anyone has ever gotten on his board. Up in the top right are all of the blue figures I released from Valhalla at the end of the game that scored me a ton of points.
We got set up really quick and I was able to explain it quickly as well. We dove in, with me playing Freya and the other player controlling Tyr. We quickly got all level three artifacts but it didn't go well for us. I rolled a white face on almost every single combat that I entered, meaning I hardly ever pushed any enemies back. Seriously, out of maybe 10+ rolls, I rolled white/0hits (which is only two of the faces on the die) for all but two of them. So I was pretty useless. I had been working hard to clear Fire Giants out of the White Island bag and get Vikings/Einherjar into it, but Jörmungand repeatedly blocked off the White Island whenever I needed to go fishing for help in it. And then I'd not commit enough Vikings in combat and roll a white, or the enemies got so strong that I didn't have enough to overcome my white rolls anyway. I couldnt really depend on Alfheim's elves since there were only three and the other player was using them a lot.
My favorite board art of any game out there. Pictured is where we were at a couple rounds deep into the game.
The player controlling Tyr was doing good in combat with his rerolls and killed a lot of Frost Giants in Jötunheim. We didn't get close to completing any runes though.
We eventually lost with only 9 cards left to go for the win. Nidhögg, Surt, Fenrir, Loki, and Jörmungand all breached the walls of Asgard and I failed combat twice in a row with my white die rolls trying to push Jörmungand back beyond the wall to keep us from losing. Nidhögg had already reached the walls of Valhalla. We only had one more Nidhögg card in the 9 remaining cards and no more Hel cards, so a win was maybe possible had I succeeded in combat. Once we drew Nidhögg, he would have pulled Hel into Asgard though and it would have probably been over at that point. The game took about an hour to get through.
It just wasn't in the stars for us tonight.
Things we didn't do much of: Venturing to Vanaheim and moving the Vanir forward. It didn't seem that useful in the beginning and towards the end, we had more important actions. We used it once to push a God back and then moved the Vanir forward a bit after. Also we didn't go to Niflheim to trade at all, but I think that action is probably more important in games with more than two players. If either of us had elves or Vikings, chances are we needed them for combat that round. We didn't start fighting any Jötun/Frost Giants until Loki activated them. Maybe it might be a good idea to defeat some early on, especially before the one who buffs them all appears? Then we would be closer to collecting a rune set later in the game and some of those are powerful. Oh well, things to think about for the next game.
Nidhögg, Jörmungand, Surt, Loki, and Fenrir have all passed the walls of Asgard, triggering the game's end. Nidhögg is pretty close to Odin's Residence as well. Only five Frost Giants had been defeated by this point, Muspellheim and Helheim were blocked off from being used, and Jörmungand had blocked off the White Island.
I look forward to trying it again soon, and hopefully winning too. I really did like it. It still has the best board art of any game out there, imo.
