Classic Board Games – Comparative Opinions Episode 43

Welcome to the Comparative Opinions podcast! In honor of International TableTop Day, hosts Holly and David talk classic board games, games they grew up with, and some of the games today that remind them of those times!

Comparative Opinions is a weekly half-hour-ish podcast hosted on ComparativeGeeks.com. Subscribe for new episodes every Sunday!

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Music is by Scott Gratton: http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Scott_Gratton/Intros_and_Outros

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Handmaid’s Tale on Hulu

So this is the show that I need to find a way to watch. Everything that I have read about it makes  me want to watch it, but unfortunately right now we do not have Hulu. We ended up switching to Netlix because there were more original shows that we were watching and Hulu lost access to the CW. At the same time the question is will The Handmaid’s Tale become available to purchase somewhere else eventually or will it only be available on Hulu for such a long time that I want to just watch it there? It isn’t really like much can be given away because it is based on a book, but sitting around seeing these gorgeous visuals and hearing about the performances of some amazing actors and actresses just makes me want to watch it even more.

Actors

So the main character is played by Elizabeth Moss who everyone says is amazing, which I do not doubt. It sounds like much of her acting is about silent subtle facial expressions while her voice over tells the audience her true underlying feelings. That alone makes for such an interesting way to tell the story. In a world where saying anything against the ruling people could mean death our thoughts are the only way to rebel. Now Moss is joined with Samira Wiley, Alexis Bedel, and Ralph Fiennes all whom I have loved in other things. The little I have seen of clips and trailers all of the actors look incredible in their scenes.

Timely

There is an amazing timeliness to this series coming out now. When we see some groups who would probably be willing to see women no longer working and men should be in control it is hard not to imagine a world where this is possible because it happens. It is good to look at these dystopian futures and remember the perseverance, but also know that we do not want that to happen. These stories are important warnings about what has happened and what could happen. The ideas of many dystopias are not far off from things that have come before. People have turned a blind eye to small changes before until finally the world is on fire and they wonder how it got that far.

Hulu or Not Hulu

So the big question though is that do I want it enough to possibly pay for Hulu again. Now we could just plan for a month to try and watch the whole series, but do we really want to do that? If we get hooked then that means that we will want to pay again for the second season. The other option is to wait until it potentially comes out on DVD or to purchase digital and basically take the risk of just buying it. I am already watching so many shows, but this one just seems so poignant and the rave reviews just make it seem like a show that needs to be seen.

What do you think?

12 Wishlist Games of #TableTopDay

The past four years, we have celebrated Geek and Sundry’s International TableTop Day. We’ve led up to the day by showcasing a game a day for 12 days, in the days leading up to the day itself: the 12 Days of TableTop Day. You may have noticed we haven’t done that this year, and that’s because, well, most of our games are currently either boxed up or loaned to others. There’s a longer story there, but for now, the games aren’t around for us to do much with them!

I certainly don’t want to do nothing for TableTop Day, however, and also want to give some thoughts on games for you to check out for the big day as well! Finally, the idea hit me.

Here are 12 games from my Amazon Wishlist, that I want to play but haven’t picked up yet! I had to dodge through the huge volume of expansions to games we already own, but here’s a good list of games that look interesting that we haven’t highlighted yet in previous years!

Rough week.

This has just been a tough week. I’m running out of time on today’s calendar day on server time, and don’t have something together. There’s good stuff in the works for the next several days, but for today, sorry. My completionist feeling is complete of there being a post for today… but that’s about it.

How are you doing?

Building the Mountain King

Alright, after a couple of rough days, I’m getting things back together. In the mean time, there was something I was working on…

I got a Mountain King! I spent months agonizing about which of the now three Trollbloods Gargantuans to buy. They are really good rules-wise in the current edition, and are a solid anchor to an army (they come in at about a third or more of an army’s cost, so they better be!). Beyond that, they are aesthetically cool – there’s the Mountain King, with the little Troll Whelps hanging off and the dangingling chains; the Glacier King with all his icicles; and the new Sea King:

From a painting and gameplay standpoint, any of them would be cool, and more than one is a whole lot of money, building, and painting! So I wanted to pick one. In the end, it was rules and army value that had me go with the Mountain King.

I was pleasantly surprised to find, when I opened it up, that it had a whole lot of large pieces:

They weren’t all a perfect fit (the mountainous back, in particular), and there was quite a bit of mold flash to cut off, but those were big pieces easy to deal with for the most part. With these few pieces, the vast majority of the model is done, and looks ready to be on the table kicking butt!

Fortunately, my skills with green stuff – the affectionate name for epoxy putty – have greatly increased, and the model should hold together really well. Unfortunately, that’s not the whole model.

What I have left is a TON of chains that will dangle off all over the body. Even with epoxy, I imagine many of these will be fragile contact points and will break off over time from use or bumping. I am not sure what I want to do about that – for instance, only adding some of the chains, or having a much larger portion in contact with the Mountain King. But for now, I’m ready to get him on the table and play some games!