A season to do some game crafting

You would think as an avid gamer my wish list to the ‘Jolly Ole Elf’ would be heavy with games.

And that has been the case in the past.

But this year games are not exactly on my wish list.

There was hope Tak would arrive to be played over the season.

Tak is a new abstract strategy game created by James Ernest and Patrick Rothfuss, based on the game in The Wise Man’s Fear.

The game was kickstarted several months ago, and was hugely successful, in particular when it being an abstract strategy game is factored in.

The fundraising effort raised $1,351,142, and had 12,187 backers.

The game clearly caught many people’s imaginations, partly for the mechanics, which I will leave for a full review after its arrival, but also because fans of the books bought into having the game too.

It would have been great to explore over the holiday, but it was delayed, so hopefully soon in 2017 it will be in the mail box as a great surprise.

I will say I hope to use the couple of extra days off over the holidays to fashion a couple of home builds of games.

The first is Epaminondas a game reviewed previously.

I have a nice picture frame found at a local thrift store, so if I get a piece of board cut to fit I can start drawing up the grid for this great game.

Then there is Caïssa Britannia, originally known as British Chess, a chess variant by Fergus Duniho.

The game is played on a 10X10 board, which I will borrow from my Omega Chess set, which will be the heart of the set as well.

Again this is a game I will review in more detail after I have the set made and played.

Caïssa Britannia has some great rules, and some fun pieces, including the dragon, unicorn and lion.

Lions I found at a dollar store in the toy aisle. Some cutting, new bases and painting lie ahead over the holidays.

Some wooden golf tees should turn extra knights into unicorns.

The dragons are likely another toy aisle visit, which will be a bigger challenge.

Still the effort should be fun, and worthwhile, since Duniho has created a rather intriguing game with big power pieces which should create some fast games with still lots of strategy which will be decidedly different from standard chess.