The next entry in Marc Specter’s continuing column chronicling his journey to organizing a new gaming convention in Michigan:

I love listening to gaming podcasts (especially the one that is allowing me to use his blog).  I have about a dozen on my listening roster, and I was a fan of Cody & John before they retired their microphones.

About a year ago, they mentioned participating in Extra Life. Extra Life (www.extra-life.org) is a national initiative of gamers, gaming in support of their local children’s hospitals.  It is officially a video gaming initiative, but Cody & John did theirs as a tabletop gaming event.  The idea resurfaced this year just prior to a meeting that Brian and I were going
to have with our local independent bookseller, Schuler Books & Music (www.schulerbooks.com).

Schuler had found out about us because one of their employees is a gamer, and they wanted an active group like the West Michigan Tabletop Gamers (http://www.meetup.com/West-Michigan-Tabletop-Gamers/) not only to be aware of their game inventory, but also to help make other gamers aware.

So we were sitting in that meeting, hammering out the details of an allience, when I looked over at their great space and popped the question.  No…they wouldn’t marry me, but they WOULD host our overnight game-a-thon.  (Or at least that was the conclusion they came to after a few weeks of decision-making.)  This would not only serve as a fantastic charitable event, but it could serve us as a sort of pre-convention, and put us in front of all of the gamers we were hoping to attract to our main event in less than a year.

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We love this time of year – leaves falling, crazy-faced pumpkins appearing on every doorstep, and lots and lots of new games popping up in our local store, and on Kickstarter! For this episode, we wanted to capture a bit of that October game ghoulishness, as well as talk about the spooky spirit of Halloween. And what better way to do that than to run a little bit long on the podcast talking to four different people? So sit back, admire your finely-crafted Jack-O-Lantern and enjoy this holiday hodgepodge of game designers and publishers, talking up their craft.

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Dice Hate Me and Go Forth and Game have joined forces to bring you some of the best gaming interviews on the web! That’s right, from time to time here on Dice Hate Me, Tom Gurganus will contribute one of his comprehensive conversations. In this interview, Tom talks with fellow Carolinian Doug Bass, designer of Garden Dice and founder of Meridae Games. Enjoy the interview and be sure to let us know if there are other designers, artists or gaming insiders that you would like to know more about!

Tom: Tell us about yourself.

Doug Bass: I’ve lived in the South most of my life, am married, and enjoy playing my banjo and collecting record albums. I would like to travel more. Generally speaking, I have a very optimistic outlook on life. “Where there’s a will, there’s a way” is an attitude that has served me well.

Tom: Meridae Games. Give us some info on it.

Doug: Designing games has been an interest and hobby of mine for several years. Primarily, I formed Meridae Games to self-publish Garden Dice, but there will be other games that come after. At some point, I may try to recruit other designers to join me, presumably after I’ve done at least one more on my own.

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Today on Dice Hate Me, we are lucky to have another guest review from the multi-tasking master, Marc Specter. On the last State of Games podcast, we talked to Stephen Buonocore from Stronghold Games about his plethora of fall releases, and Little Devils was mentioned. Since we love trick-taking card games, we were definitely interested in knowing more. Thankfully, Marc read our minds and now provides a sneak peek for all you little devils out there who love card games as much as we do. Enjoy!

I am not really a card gamer.  There is nothing that sounds less interesting to me than a night with friends + a deck of cards.  And I live in Michigan, home to that Midwest stalwart Euchre.  I could just groan whenever a fellow Michigander whips out his deck and says, “I know this great trick-taking game!”  So you can see why, given the nature of Little Devils, it was with significant reservation that I made my approach.

BUT BOY WAS I WRONG!  Little Devils has proved to me just how much fun a card game can be.

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Hello, dear readers, and welcome to another installment of The Crowded Table. Despite all the work that’s been piling up here at Dice Hate Me HQ, we’ve been able to squeeze in a surprising amount of gaming, including one weekend visit by Compounded designer Darrell Louder in which we fit in 23 different titles, all while working on some game design. We didn’t sleep much, but it was worth it. Below you’ll find four games that have graced our table in the past few weeks, a couple of which you’ll probably see pop up again on Dice Hate Me before too long. Enjoy!

Star Wars: X-Wing Miniatures Game

There were a lot of overly-hyped new releases from game companies at GenCon this year, but no company had their hype machine humming quite as well as Fantasy Flight Games. While Netrunner had the honor of being the belle of the ball – selling out in about 15 minutes on opening day – X-Wing was the prize thoroughbred most had their money on before the big show. For this old miniatures wargamer, I’m not sure why it didn’t really grab my attention; maybe it was Star Wars burnout, or the thought of paying over $10 for a single miniature, or maybe it was just that Netrunner was too enticing. But now that I’ve actually played X-Wing I can safely say that FFG certainly has my attention now. And, soon, they’ll probably have a little bit more of my money, too.

Yeah, yeah, so it's not an X-Wing. Real men fly Y-Wings.

In X-Wing, Fantasy Flight has distilled the essence of miniatures wargaming magnificently, providing a system of movement orders and tactical operations that is a breeze to grasp and put into practice. Issuing movement orders is done secretly and simultaneously and then revealed according to pilot initiative. This provides a solid simulation of dogfighting where you do your best to anticipate your opponent’s maneuvers. And gone are the old school rulers typically used to gauge movement distances in a minis game; instead, FFG provides punchboard templates that are placed at the front of the miniature’s base, just inside handy notches. FFG has also done a great job of providing customization and replayability, with an intuitive system of pilot, weapon and gadget upgrade cards that can be mixed and matched to a certain fleet “build point” total.

Overall, it’s a very satisfying system that breaths new life into what I often consider of late to be an underwhelming and over-saturated universe. And Steve Jackson Games, I hope you’re paying attention – The X-Wing system is very much what the new Car Wars should aspire to and surpass. I’ve got my finger on that particular money trigger – and it’s getting itchy.

Impression score: 6 out of 6

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From time to time on the podcast we like to just sit down and talk to some of our favorite people in the gaming industry. We’re lucky to have not only met one of our favorites, Stephen Buonocore, but we’ve also gamed, imbibed and worked side-by-side with him. As it turns, out we had a lot to talk about with him this time around, so we decided to break the episode down into a listed timeline of important talking points for your listening convenience. Enjoy!

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Sometimes profound things come out of Monkey238’s mouth. One podcast she identified why certain types of luck are good and bad in a game depending on when they happen. In another, she pontificated on the popularity of zombies. And last podcast she practically invented a new game category, just on the fly. This is probably why I can’t seem to win at most of the games we play…

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