I am glad to be able to run story games again this PGX.  I dropped Microscope from the offerings, but I can run it instead of Fiasco, if it's a preference.  New players are welcome to these games; absolutely no experience is necessary.

GAME: Fiasco
TEACHER:  Chad R
START TIME: 1:00 PM
DURATION: 2-3 hours
# OF PLAYERS: 3-5
URL: Board Game Geek

Fiasco is inspired by cinematic tales of small time capers gone disastrously wrong – inspired by films like Blood Simple, Fargo, The Way of the Gun, Burn After Reading, and A Simple Plan. You'll play ordinary people with powerful ambition and poor impulse control. There will be big dreams and flawed execution. It won't go well for them, to put it mildly, and in the end it will probably all go south in a glorious heap of jealousy, murder, and recrimination. Lives and reputations will be lost, painful wisdom will be gained, and if you are really lucky, your guy just might end up back where he started.

FIASCO is an award-winning, GM-less game for 3-5 players, designed to be played in a few hours with six-sided dice and no preparation. During a game you will engineer and play out stupid, disastrous situations, usually at the intersection of greed, fear, and lust.* It's like making your own Coen brothers movie, in about the same amount of time it'd take to watch one.

*It's still the afternoon! We'll decide the playbook together from a pre-printed, family-friendly collection.


GAME: The Quiet Year
TEACHER:  Chad R
START TIME: 4:00 PM
DURATION: 90 minutes
# OF PLAYERS: 1-6
URL: Board Game Geek

"For a long time, we were at war with The Jackals. But now, we've driven them off, and we have this – a year of relative peace. One quiet year, with which to build our community up and learn once again how to work together. Come Winter, the Frost Shepherds will arrive and we might not survive beyond that. But we don't know about that yet. What we know is that right now, in this moment, there is an opportunity to build something."

The Quiet Year is a map game. You define the struggles of a post-apocalyptic community, and attempt to build something good within their quiet year. Every decision and every action is set against a backdrop of dwindling time and rising concern.

The game is played using a deck of cards – each of the 52 cards corresponds to a week during the quiet year. Each card triggers certain events – bringing bad news, good omens, project delays and sudden changes in luck. At the end of the quiet year, the Frost Shepherds will come, ending the game.

While space is available, please sign up Chad R for 10 AM Gaslands.

Please sign me up for 9:00 - Pitchcar Mini.

GAME: Fiasco
TEACHER:  Chad R
START TIME: 10:00
DURATION: 2-3 hours
# OF PLAYERS: 3-5
URL: Board Game Geek; Tablecard

Fiasco is inspired by cinematic tales of small time capers gone disastrously wrong – inspired by films like Blood Simple, Fargo, The Way of the Gun, Burn After Reading, and A Simple Plan. You'll play ordinary people with powerful ambition and poor impulse control. There will be big dreams and flawed execution. It won't go well for them, to put it mildly, and in the end it will probably all go south in a glorious heap of jealousy, murder, and recrimination. Lives and reputations will be lost, painful wisdom will be gained, and if you are really lucky, your guy just might end up back where he started.

FIASCO is an award-winning, GM-less game for 3-5 players, designed to be played in a few hours with six-sided dice and no preparation. During a game you will engineer and play out stupid, disastrous situations, usually at the intersection of greed, fear, and lust.* It's like making your own Coen brothers movie, in about the same amount of time it'd take to watch one.

*It's 10:00 AM! We'll decide the playbook together from a pre-printed, family-friendly collection.


GAME: Microscope
TEACHER:  Chad R
START TIME: 1:00
DURATION: 2-3 hours; players may drop out when they wish
# OF PLAYERS: 1-6
URL: Board Game Geek; Tablecard

Want to explore an epic history of your own creation, hundreds or thousands of years long, all in an afternoon? That's Microscope.

You won't play the game in chronological order. You can defy the limits of time and space, jumping backward or forward to explore the parts of the history that interest you. Want to leap a thousand years into the future and see how an institution shaped society? Want to jump back to the childhood of the king you just saw assassinated and find out what made him such a hated ruler? That's normal in Microscope.

You have vast power to create... and to destroy. Build beautiful, tranquil jewels of civilization and then consume them with nuclear fire. Zoom out to watch the majestic tide of history wash across empires, then zoom in and explore the lives of the people who endured it.


GAME: The Quiet Year
TEACHER:  Chad R
START TIME: 4:00
DURATION: 90 minutes
# OF PLAYERS: 1-6
URL: Board Game Geek; Tablecard

"For a long time, we were at war with The Jackals. But now, we've driven them off, and we have this – a year of relative peace. One quiet year, with which to build our community up and learn once again how to work together. Come Winter, the Frost Shepherds will arrive and we might not survive beyond that. But we don't know about that yet. What we know is that right now, in this moment, there is an opportunity to build something."

The Quiet Year is a map game. You define the struggles of a post-apocalyptic community, and attempt to build something good within their quiet year. Every decision and every action is set against a backdrop of dwindling time and rising concern.

The game is played using a deck of cards – each of the 52 cards corresponds to a week during the quiet year. Each card triggers certain events – bringing bad news, good omens, project delays and sudden changes in luck. At the end of the quiet year, the Frost Shepherds will come, ending the game.

Quote from: Henning on April 17, 2015, 06:00:53 PM
bzarhands,
We have filled our schedule, but don't let that stop you. As long as you are happy with a few players, just bring the games and we will announce that you are looking for players. I'm sure you will get at least some of them to the table over the weekend. We always like to try out something new.

Thank you, Henning.  Everything I host with be an introductory session, and so perfect for drop-ins/randoms. 

I will run these games Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.  If anyone is interested in playing something at a specific time, please feel free to PM me.

Are hosts still needed?  I'd be interested in demonstrating the following games, if there is space/players.

QuoteMicroscope
Want to explore an epic history of your own creation, hundreds or thousands of years long, all in an afternoon? That's Microscope.

You won't play the game in chronological order. You can defy the limits of time and space, jumping backward or forward to explore the parts of the history that interest you. Want to leap a thousand years into the future and see how an institution shaped society? Want to jump back to the childhood of the king you just saw assassinated and find out what made him such a hated ruler? That's normal in Microscope.

You have vast power to create... and to destroy. Build beautiful, tranquil jewels of civilization and then consume them with nuclear fire. Zoom out to watch the majestic tide of history wash across empires, then zoom in and explore the lives of the people who endured it.

QuoteThe Quiet Year
The Quiet Year is a map game. You define the struggles of a post-apocalyptic community, and attempt to build something good within their quiet year. Every decision and every action is set against a backdrop of dwindling time and rising concern.

QuoteFiasco
Fiasco is inspired by cinematic tales of small time capers gone disastrously wrong – inspired by films like Blood Simple, Fargo, The Way of the Gun, Burn After Reading, and A Simple Plan. You'll play ordinary people with powerful ambition and poor impulse control. There will be big dreams and flawed execution. It won't go well for them, to put it mildly, and in the end it will probably all go south in a glorious heap of jealousy, murder, and recrimination. Lives and reputations will be lost, painful wisdom will be gained, and if you are really lucky, your guy just might end up back where he started.

QuoteStarmada
Starmada is a miniatures board game of starship combat. At its most basic level, players take command of space fleets in a general attempt to reduce each other to just so much space junk. At its most advanced, the game can be customized to breathe life into any science fiction background that players might imagine.

Novices shouldn't fret; the core set of rules has been designed with simplicity and ease of play in mind, accessible even to beginners. On the other hand, seasoned veterans should find the concise nature of the rules quite refreshing. It allows players to concentrate on the finer points of squashing their opponents rather than arguing about rules interpretations, without sacrificing any of the flavor or excitement of more complex games.

I haven't played Magic since before Ice Age, but a friend linked to a Savor the Flavor article that outlined the background of the set and showcased some art.  I was surprisingly impressed on both counts, especially that which concerned the Machine Orthodoxy.

Do they usually put that much work into fluff?
Do they ever publish collected art books after the set has been out for a while?