Game Of The Week: Are You A Werewolf?

First of all, my apologies. I've had a number of medical issues over the past couple months that have made these game of the week posts sporadic at best. Now that the doctors are finally working on figuring out what's wrong, posts should start to be more frequent and cover something besides strictly 4th edition of Dungeons & Dragons... starting with this week's Game of the Week - a modern classic, Are You A Werewolf?

Okay, so it's a not particularly original take on the classic card game Mafia, which is played with a standard deck of playing cards. That doesn't make it any less fun. A few things: the game is short and sweet, skill counts (especially the ability to bluff), and you can play with a whole ton of people (the game maxes out at 15 players).

This isn't a game to play with a very small group as you need a certain critical mass - eight players is really just about as small as you can get, but its relatively short playtime and ability to accomodate large numbers of players makes it an ideal quick party game.

Sure, play Mafia instead if you want, but for a fantasy twist, check out Are You A Werewolf? from Looney Labs.

Big Changes In Magic: The Gathering

With the new Magic: the Gathering block beginning with Shards of Alara on October 3rd, 2008, the folks at Wizards have announced a few changes that will be a comin'.

• After a "tremendous amount of feedback," they have decided that they are releasing too many cards each year and card sets will be smaller. Shards of Alara will have 249 cards, and each of the next two sets in the block will have 145.

• The concept of rarity is also changing with the institution of the new level of rarity--the mythic rare, with not a gold expansion symbol but kind of a fiery red-orange expansion symbol. Intense indeed, these babies will replace the rare in about 1 out of 8 booster packs. Shards of Alara will have 15 mythic rares, 53 rares, 60 uncommons, 101 commons and 20 basic lands. The next two sets will have 10 mythic rares, 35 rares, 40 uncommons and 60 commons. The way foils work will stay the same, with foil mythic rares actually being more frequent than usual.

• Boosters will have 1 common card replaced with a basic land. Boosters will therefore consist of 1 rare (or mythic rare), 3 uncommons, 10 commons, 1 basic land, and 1 tip card or token.

• A new product is being introduced, the intro pack, acting as an experienced player's introduction to the new set's mechanics and setting (as opposed to, like, the internet), and will be the "best tool for introducing new players into the game." It'll include a 41-card precon deck with 1 premium foil rare and 1 non-foil rare, a booster pack of the current set, an insert with the new set's mechanics and info on the precon deck, and an insert to teach newbies how to play the game. There'll be 5 intro packs with each set, and SRP is $12.29. Theme decks, however, will be discontinued.

• Coming up in the fall is the Planeswalker's Guide, an extensive book about the new set--this one in particular is called The Planeswalker's Guide to Alara, coming out September 2nd, 2008. In the winter will be a new Planeswalker novel series, in the Spring the new block will get its own set, and the Fat Packs are getting a redesign with 6 instead of 8 boosters and a current novel instead of a set-based novel (boo! Boo!).

The week's articles at Magicthegathering.com will be dedicated to those changes. The first article is The Year of Living Changerously, in which Mark Rosewater begins to explain what went through WotC's heads. (Myself, I think most of the changes are pretty cool, besides the reduced set sizes. I mean, 330 cards in Mirage meant that there were that many more cards to love!)

This Week In Tabletop Gaming

Some pretty big stuff went down this week in this hobby of ours. The most noteworthy is probably the fact that many people got their copies of Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition early--and, as we've learned from the music industry time and time again, when one person gets an advance copy of something, everyone gets an advance copy of something. VelvetDiceBag does not promote piracy, however (unless it's of the Freeport or Stormwrack or 7th Sea varieties) --if you did indulge yourself and downloaded a copy and enjoyed it, we urge you to buy the real thing when it comes out. Pretty please?

On the Chaosium and Cthulhu side of things, I previously reported the first unlimited edition of the gorgeous Call of Cthulhu dice. Also of note is Chaosium's agreement with Sixtystone Press to create Call of Cthulhu supplements (a good move, considering they're focusing on their BRP-system line lately) , and the folks at Yog-Sothoth.com just released the new Yog Radio podcast, featuring an interview with S.T. Joshi. That made me really, really excited--my final English paper in Grade 12 was on the works of Lovecraft, and as anyone who's done academic research of Lovecraft will tell you, basically everything, every academic treatise and biography of Lovecraft, was written by S.T. Joshi and it's all excellent. Do yourself a favour, check out the interview, and read some of the ample works of Joshi online.

At Magicthegathering.com, it was Evil Twin week. There are a bunch of excellent articles up, my favourites being How to Sneak Overpowered Cards Past Development and The Evil That Designers Do.

Not much from White Wolf except for two (admittedly intriguing) previews of the new freehold-focused Changeling book, Lords of Summer, and a revelatory look-ahead at Hunter: the Vigil, a game that looks quite good but whose cover is marred by a sunglasses-at-night-wearing douche smack in the middle of it.

The Escapist had a really cool article about the nature of the roleplaying game as a modern phenomenon, called Dungeons & Dragons Owns the Future.

The new Palladium press release has details on T-Shirts, a new Rifts anthology, and their release plans for the summer. Mayfair games announced its plans for GenCon. (I'm not even going and I'm still excited!) A new RPG company debuted, Myth Merchant Press. The much-awaited documentary, The Gamers: Dorkness Rising, found a distributor in Anthem Pictures.

That's it for now! Hopefully next week we'll be back to a more regular posting schedule. Thanks for your patience!

For Those In The Mood For Some Munchkin Booty...

Steve Jackson games has just announced the September release for their new Munchkin card game, Munchkin Booty. That's right--Pirates! Rumour has it that horrible accents (British, Spanish, Dutch or French) are a significant part of the game, a fact that by itself will probably warrant a buy from me. It will certainly go well with my copy of Munchkin Cthulhu.

So you've got the news about the Munchkin behind (sorry)... on the Munchkin front, there is some more good news, because the Munchkin board game, Munchkin Quest, is currently at printers, and it's a tile-growing dungeon-crawling good time for all.

And speaking of Munchkin Cthulhu, Steve Jackson Games has just released their first plush toy, the adorable-yet-horrifying Chibithulhu, a toy that even contains a special rule that'll help out in the aforementioned card game. If you can get over the eyelashes. Oh god, the eyelashes.

This Week In Tabletop Gaming

The foul past time of exam studying has become my only past time these days, so I have neglected to update you on what's going on in the tabletop gaming world this week. Sorry! To make it up for you, here's a mega-post of sorts with goings-on from a wide array of companies over the last few days.

• Chaosium, last week, announced that they have issued the Call of Cthulhu license to Super Genius Games, an interesting development since the latter company seems well poised to fulfill the gaps in the game by focusing on supplements that can be bought one afternoon and used that same night. On their part, Chaosium's website is now under construction, soon to become a full blown Basic Roleplaying System website since the corebook has just been released.

• At Wizards of the Coast, Magic: the Gathering has seen a lot of things happen to it. Preleases are in full force, which means that the whole Shadowmoor set has been spoiled to the public--a sortable card list and, for the first time, a complete visual spoiler. This is excellent, because the art is awesome. (Also a new devlopment in Shadowmoor: the UNtap symbol. It freaks me out. You can find videos thoroughly explaining the new mechanics--hybried, wither, persist, conspire and untap--here.)

• White Wolf announces a new World of Darkness game, Hunter: The Vigil. This makes me very happy because, unlike most, I really enjoyed Hunter: The Reckoning. The full-colour logo, in a lovely teal colour-scheme, can be seen here. Also, las week White Wolf expanded their foray into alternative publishing by means of their partnership with Lulu, raising the number of print-on-demand titles to include Mind's Eye Theatre: The Awakening, World of Darkness: Innocents, The Manual of Exalted Power: Abyssals, The Mandate of Heaven and The Imperfect Lotus. These can be bought here.

• Upper Deck Entertainment announced a Call of Duty Real-Time Card Game, where gameplay is fast-paced and players "simultaneously fire, take cover and move around the battlefield."

• In honour of the 25th anniversary of Warhammer (wow), Games Workshop has a limited edition Harry the Hammer miniature that can only be purchased this weekend, and they've also posted online the Warhammer Legendary Battle Rules that support armies of 5000 points or more.

As always, I'm gonna accompany this post with some Shadowmoor card art. Enjoy!

Exclusive Shadowmoor Cards!

We here at the GayGamer castle were lucky enough to get some exclusive spoiler cards from the upcoming Shadowmoor expansion to Magic: The Gathering! Well, technically only the Furystoke Giant is exclusive - we share the wicked-looking Wound Reflection card with another, as-yet-unknown site.

As exciting as our pal the Furystoke is, he's just a taste of the Shadowmoor experience, in which the Aurora has changed Lorwyn into the inky Shadowmoor, a plane of eternal night filled with warped and twisted denizens - expect to see familiar races from Lorwyn, but with seriously altered allegiances and all kinds of new powers.

Even the game itself has gotten a bit twisted: over a third of Shadowmoor's 301 cards will sport hybrid mana costs (back again), and -1/-1 counters get a kick in the ass from Wither and Persist effects. When Shadowmoor launches, Magic fans will be able to travel to Shadowmoor via booster, tournament and fat packs as well as theme decks.

Special Report: What's Going On With Pokémon Cards

So I'm well-embroiled in my exam period (which is why you haven't been hearing much from me, sorry about that!), but, as everyone in an exam period will tell you, distractions become more valuable than ever. This is why I got one of my friends to do a research report for us, checking out what's going on in the world of the Pokémon TCG because I've kind of been ignoring it in the last few months. So here is our first VDB special report by one Stefan Irwin!

What's New With Pokémon Cards

Disclaimer: To be honest this probably isn't exactly all what's new but more of an overview of what has been new for a while but by the end it gets some newer things.

The new Diamond and Pearl Pokémon have arrived! The Pokémon Trading Card Game has once again opened its doors allowing all the new Pokémon from the DS games to enter the arena. The first expansion aptly named Diamond & Pearl brings with it 130 more cards and even new strategic elements to the game, Pokémon LV.X. Level X Pokémon allow you to play the Pokémon on top of its original card adding new poke-powers and attacks while keeping the old attacks as well. The cards also come with a new contemporary look giving room for bigger illustrations and more background information on the Pokémon. The newer expansions in the Diamond and Pearl collection, Mysterious Treasures, Secret Wonders and Great Encounters all bring new Pokémon as well as attacks, and the best treat of all, new Pokémon LV. X. Everything will force players to battle with more strategy. All the expansions include powerful legendary Pokémon giving each battle an air of prominence. For all the true avid Pokémon players out there the newest expansion Majestic Dawn is coming out nationwide on May 21, 2008. An insider with the company has stated that one of the new Pokémon in the expansion will be Glaceon, one of the new Eevee evolutions and that it will boost an arsenal of impressive attacks including Snow Cloak which will deal 30 damage as well as allow Glaceon to be protected from all attacks during the next turn on a successful flip of a coin and Speed Slide which can hit for 60 damage and be completely unhindered by all effects on the defending Pokémon. Sources also indicate that Legendary Pokémon Darkrai and rare Pokémon Cresselia will be a part of the new expansion. Leafeon, the second new evolution of Eevee also will be added to the game. Two new LV.X Pokémon are also expected to be included in the game, Garchomp and Porygon. With the release of Majestic Dawn quickly racing towards the Pokémon world it appears that battles will only become more and more strategic, chaotic and fierce!

Thanks so much Stefan! Now I feel out of touch--all these new Pokémon are making me feel disoriented and confused. (Mad Pawn hurt himself in his confusion.)

Shadowmoor Previews!

The previews for Shadowmoor have been flowing fast at magicthegathering.com--here's a summary of what's been revealed thus far:

First of all, there's a Shadowmoor minisite.

Magic Arcana has had a bunch of art and release previews, including booster packaging, the Fat Pack, theme decks, a wallpaper, Tokens, another wallpaper, and a Fat Pack wallpaper.

In terms of articles, there's an introduction to the dark fairytale of a setting that is Shadowmoor, the first card previews, an article about a very angry troll (that can gain +20/+20 when circumstances are right), an article on the tribes-but-not-tribal nature of the set, an article about a card that combines aggro and disruption, an article about monocolor hybrid costs in which a card can cost (2/B)(2/B)(2/B)--anywhere from three to six mana, more previews, an article about how Shadowmoor twists ideas previously seen in Lorwyn, an article about the new keyword "Conspire," and an article about a card that will really help out late-game Black/Red aggro.

Of course, the most important things are the card previews themselves--here's a site with all of them so far. There's a scary card that instantly brings all copies of itself back into play, there's the aforementioned huge-getting troll, there's tons of cards centred around -1/-1 counters, a buncha muncha cruncha scarecrows, a creature that makes every other creature a 1/1, a two-mana two-card-drawing card that has the expense of a -1/-1 counter on one of your creatures, and more. Interesting set, certainly. Keep checking the site everyday if you want more!

Decipher "Reinvents The Trading Card Game", Still Somewhat Indecipherable

Decipher, as previously reported, recently began a countdown to some unknown development, the company responsible for the Star Trek CCG, Star Wars CCG and Lord of the Rings CCG, among others, having previously been defunct for quite a while.

Well, the countdown finished on March 31st--unfortunately close to April Fool's Day, leading many to believe that their new website was a joke. It's safe to say now that it's not: some big things are going down.

Decipher is releasing a new game, Fight Klub, that promises to instigate a "player revolution" and "reinvent the Trading Card Game"--"No Starters. No Boosters. No Distributors. No Retailers." It's a multi-licence game that also incorporates "viral-marketing on steroids" and a whole whack of gang terminology. There's a lot to talk about, so head on after the jump.

Breaking News In The Industry

As previously reported, Atlas Games has announced that they're being acquired by RoninArts.

RoninArts, however, has announced that with the current state of the market, the company has been sold to Steve Jackson Games.

Hot on the heels of this announcement, Steve Jackson Games, inspired by their D&D 4e playtesting, revealed their plans to release a new series for GURPS: Tank, Striker, Healer, Buffer and Debuffer. Not only that, but Steve Jackson games has been acquired by Atlas Games. So there you go!

Meanwhile, Wizards of the Coast has begun extensive Magic: the Gathering previews--no, not just for Shadowmoor, but for their upcoming Duel Decks: Pirates vs. Ninjas, complete with full deck lists!

Elsewhere, some big things are going down at Decipher. But that might be real, so I'll save it for tomorrow.

Predict What's Coming In Shadowmoor

Today marks the launch of the Shadowmoor Orb of Insight, a little flash program in which you can predict what's coming in the next set of Magic: the Gathering. The way it works? Enter a word, any word, and it tells you how many times the word appears in the set.

Here are some interesting finds by people on TCGPlayer, including two that intrigue me most of all:

Scarecrow: 38

-1/-1: 86

The flavour of this set is becoming clear. But there's another shocking development:

Gay: 0
Queer: 0
Lesbian: 0
Transgendered: 0
Drag: 0
Fabulousness: 0
HawtManOnManAction: 0

After the flamingness that was Lorwyn (so much Rebecca Guay!), this looks to be a mighty bigoted step backwards. For shame, Wizards! -1/-1 to fabulousness, that's what you deserve!

Game Of The Week: Killer Bunnies And The Journey To Jupiter!

For this week's game of the week, we have a special treat, just for Easter: BUNNIES. That is, Killer Bunnies, who are due to launch next month their next adventure, Killer Bunnies and the Journey to Jupiter. I love the bunnies games so much that I'm going to give this one my unbridled recommendation sight unseen. Playroom Entertainment does a fantastic job with this franchise in gaming, and I can't help but be pleased at the news of the new installment.

Journey to Jupiter is NOT mixable with Quest for the Magic Carrot (as Kinder Bunnies was), it is a standalone game with similar mechanics. Just like Quest, however, Journey to Jupiter promises to be the gift that keeps on giving... as there will indeed be expansion sets to further drain your wallet. For more information on the game feel free to take a look at the website located here.