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 Wait... no. Strike that. Reverse it. Spirit Island is a game about colonization. Foreign invaders established a foothold on your home shores and are spreading over the land like a cancer, conquering the land and stripping its resources bare. The natives of the island, a people known as the Dahan, are helpless before their ruthless onslaught, but this island has far older inhabitants than the Dahan. You take control of the nature spirits who make this unique island their home and must work together to drive off the invaders before they destroy the delicate balance of nature that the spirits depend on to live. In other terms, Spirit Island is a co-op game by Eric R. Reuss that I think is pretty swell! If you're not familiar (or need a refresher), the rules are available online here. I'm looking for up to 4 players for a play-by-post game here. The exact scenario setup will depend on who signs up, so if you're interested please indicate your level of experience with the game and/or the Branch & Claw expansion (if there's enough interest I may do a separate newbie game.) Will leave signups open for a day or so and then pick randomly.
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Apr 22, 2019 04:51
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I'm interested; I have not played before but have actually been looking at the rules recently, as recently as yesterday in fact, as well as asking about it in the board game thread after it came up, because I would quite like to play it.
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Apr 22, 2019 07:59
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I'm interested. I've never played this game before but I have played other co-op board games like Pandemic and Robinson Crusoe/First Martians.
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Apr 22, 2019 17:17
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Never played but I'm a fan of co-op boardgames
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Apr 23, 2019 19:21
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Looks like I'll definitely be running the introductory scenario! 3 players is definitely enough for a decent size game but I'll wait until tonight and see if a 4th player wanders in.
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Apr 23, 2019 22:31
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You'll just be running it, not participating, then? At least for the newbie one, I mean.
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Apr 23, 2019 22:53
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Yo, I'm up for any game with Settler Destruction in the tagline. Never played it but would very much like to.
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Apr 23, 2019 23:22
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Roland Jones posted:You'll just be running it, not participating, then? At least for the newbie one, I mean. I wasn't planning on it, at least for a newbie game. Which is fine by me, I just love the game and want to share it. It looks like we've got 4, so we might as well begin. First, everyone needs to pick a spirit. I've RNGed everyone who posted interest for selection order: 1. Bendigeidfran 2. Retro Futurist 3. CirclMastr 4. Roland Jones Everyone please pick a spirit and a color: red, blue, yellow, or purple. (The color is purely cosmetic and will be used to distinguish your pieces on the board.) Feel free to post preferences out of order but I'm giving priority based on the RNG order above. Since everyone is new here we'll just be using the 8 spirits in the base game (click for full size):         The rulebook recommends that new players stick to the four "low" complexity spirits. Personally I think this is a little subjective and I wouldn't sweat the two moderate complexity spirits here, but I would think twice about going for one of the high complexity spirits. I won't stop anyone from playing one of them, just be warned that it may be a bit more difficult. I've only posted the summaries for sake of brevity but if you want more details on the spirits there's a fan wiki that has a breakdown of all of their powers and some tips if you are so inclined. Some of it might not mean a lot until you get a feel for how the game plays, though.
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Apr 24, 2019 04:06
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Going for River Surges in Sunlight, whose banks will run Red with the blood of the enemy!
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Apr 24, 2019 08:54
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Straight White Shark posted:I wasn't planning on it, at least for a newbie game. Which is fine by me, I just love the game and want to share it. That's fair, I just was a bit surprised. Also, dang, got last pick. Ah well, could still get lucky and my first choice, Shadows Flicker Like Flame, will still be there when it comes to me. (Rivers Surge in Sunlight was my second choice, actually, though Shadows was well ahead.)
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Apr 24, 2019 09:12
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I’ll take Vital Strength of The Earth’s big strong hands to help the green
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Apr 24, 2019 14:40
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Retro Futurist posted:I’ll take Vital Strength of The Earth’s big strong hands to help the green There aren't actually any green pieces. It's yellow, blue, or purple.
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Apr 24, 2019 14:46
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Good because I usually pick yellow in games but held off so I could be thematic 
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Apr 24, 2019 14:48
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I'll go with Shadows Flicker Like Flame and be blue.
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Apr 24, 2019 19:16
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I suppose I'll take Lightning's Swift Strike and be purple, then.
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Apr 24, 2019 22:16
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Just stepping in to say that the banks of River aren't gonna run red with much. It's one of the more chill spirits, and more about support, shifting baddies around, and getting the Dahan to fight than it is about killing stuff itself.
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Apr 25, 2019 02:49
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Ok, here we go! Here's the starting board and invader track:  The invader track is a bit busy, I know. Your goal is to drive off the invaders, either by wiping them out or scaring them away. As you earn fear tokens (either from murdering invaders or powers that grant fear directly) you will earn fear cards, which have various minor immediate benefits and progress you towards your win condition: the further you get through the fear deck, the fewer invaders you have to eliminate before the rest pack up and go home. However, the invaders will also be growing and spreading and doing their best to gently caress your poo poo up. They act in an orderly progression based on terrain draws from their deck at the bottom. The first invader card is sands, so explorers have spread out to all the sand terrain on the island. This turn they will build additional buildings in any sand terrain they occupy. Next turn those newly built buildings will all ravage, potentially dumping blight on the island. Blight destroys your presence, and if the invader board runs out of blight, the island's ecosystem is hosed up beyond repair and you lose. There is no ravage on the very first turn, but you do not have much time before those explorers build up and ravage, so anything you can do to stop them will be useful. The first part of the turn is the spirit phase, where you build up your own power. I need several decisions from each of you (this, like most actions, is simultaneous so do not worry about order): 1. Pick one of the growth options at the top of your spirit board. Each growth option gives you several benefits; the vertical lines separate each growth option package. Gain all of the benefits of your chosen growth. 2. Since you will probably want an option that places presence, you need to choose 1. which presence track on your spirit board to remove presence from and 2. where to place the presence on the island. Presence gets removed from your spirit board left to right, and you immediately gain the benefit of any spaces you uncover. The growth option you chose will tell you how many presence you can place from your tracks and at what distance from your existing presence. 3. The low complexity spirits all have an optional rule that allows them to choose between a fixed pre-selected progression of power cards or random draws. I prefer random draws, but I'm not going to say you can't use the fixed progression if you want to (some of the chosen cards are pretty questionable, but some of them are legit, especially for Shadows Flicker Like Flame.) Whether or not your chosen growth grants a power card, please tell me whether you want to use the fixed power progression or random draws going forward (if you choose to draw a random power, I'll post your available power draw when I get a chance.) 4. (You might wait on this step if you chose to draw a random power:) Add up the energy from your energy track (including any spaces you just uncovered from presence placement) and any energy you gained from growth, and select the cards you want to play, up to the limit of the card plays available on your plays track and with a total cost less than the energy you just gained. None of your cards take effect just yet--right now you're just selecting the cards you will use during the remainder of the turn. I don't know how well I explained all this, so if you have any questions please ask. Retro Futurist   Roland Jones   Bendigeidfran   CirclMastr  
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Apr 25, 2019 05:32
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You may want to cover how Dahan work too. If I remember right from the one time I played this, there's two spots where the Dahan will clean up without help, and a few spots where they're going to get clobbered if the spirits don't help.
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Apr 25, 2019 16:25
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LLSix posted:You may want to cover how Dahan work too. If I remember right from the one time I played this, there's two spots where the Dahan will clean up without help, and a few spots where they're going to get clobbered if the spirits don't help. Without help the Dahan can never win more than a Pyrrhic victory. I assume you're talking about a scenario like this:  Left to its own devices, the invaders are going to build a town here this turn, and next turn the town and explorer will ravage. The town does 2 damage and the explorer does 1 damage, so they'll kill 1 Dahan and blight the land. The surviving Dahan will deal 2 damage back and can destroy the town, leaving a blighted land with 1 explorer and 1 Dahan. That's not a great outcome, but it's still better than what happens if you leave them alone in a land with no Dahan (allowing them to keep their town in addition to blighting the land), or worse, only 1 Dahan (who will die before they get a chance to fight back, getting your allies killed for no benefit.) At this stage in the game you usually have to pick your battles and if you have to let a ravage slip through somewhere it makes sense to leave the Dahan to do the heavy lifting where they're able.
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Apr 25, 2019 16:51
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Okay let's see if I can do something mildly effective here. For growth I'll take placing a Presence and 3 energy. I'll put a Presence from the upper track into space 5 of my land. For my card, I'll play Favors Called Due.
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Apr 25, 2019 17:06
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Ugh, colonists on my doorstep. I'll have to deal with that I suppose. Before I make any decisions, though, how is Lightning's progression deck? Leaning against using it, and my first turn's growth won't get me a new power anyway, but I'm curious. (If I remember correctly it doesn't get the major power Talons of Lightning, which is weird because it seems like it was designed after Lightning's Swift Strike between the element and bird/talon imagery.)
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Apr 25, 2019 17:10
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Roland Jones posted:Ugh, colonists on my doorstep. I'll have to deal with that I suppose. Here's Lightning's progression and the first few cards from it:  Personally I am not a fan. A fast air card that costs 1 is kind of a waste for Lightning. It does fill a gap in Lightning's toolkit but there are much better answers for it, and while it plays nicely with the major power they picked you probably don't even want to pick up a major power that early. Call to Bloodshed is cool and plays very nicely with the rest of Lightning's kit but Lightning can't afford to pick up too many minors with >0 cost. You're correct that there's no Talons of Lightning, which is weird thematically but is for the best: it's one of the most expensive powers in the base game and your energy income is bad, and as a fast power it doesn't benefit from your ability to make slow powers fast. I'll post the other progressions too when I get a chance to round them up. the holy poopacy fucked around with this message at 17:25 on Apr 25, 2019 |
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Apr 25, 2019 17:22
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Yeah, I'll pass on that progression and stick with random draws. It looks like, after the first power, it has a decent middle (I looked it up and Purifying Flame would be legit good with those elements and has a useful effect besides), then gets boring/bad again. As for my actions, hm. That town in my starting territory is annoying; I'm going to need to clear a town this turn and next if I don't want a city to get established and want to avoid blight, but it could be worse. Makes my plan for the next two turns fairly straightforward, too. I just need to decide where I'm spreading presence. As I see it, I have two options: 1. Spread toward the others, possibly onto the jungle Strength of Vital Earth already has 1 presence on due to how much it borders giving me a lot of future targets, and if Earth upgrades it to a sacred site at some point it'll be defended as well. 2. Spread east to complete my coverage of my own board. Though, that jungle with the city is the ideal spot for that, but the city is also a potential threat to my presence if I put it there and the next card to come up is jungle. Also that spot adds almost no additional coverage, even if I'll probably need to be able to zap things over there sooner or later. Anyone have any thoughts or advice? (And before anyone asks, I can't give anyone Boon of Lightning this turn, sorry. Need to smash that town. It'll be used next turn though.)
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Apr 25, 2019 18:26
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Here are the other 3 spirits' power progressions: Vital Strength of the Earth  Mixed bag, but playable. You still get an off-element card thrown in but Dahan movement is something you badly want since you can defend them easily for counterattacks. River Surges in Sunlight  Pretty good. River Surges in Sunlight depends more on matching its innate elements so off-element cards hurt more, but again, this one is a great fit. Shadows Flicker Like Flame  These on the other hand are great. The other three starter spirits get a fairly odd grab bag of powers but this is basically a Greatest Hits compilation for you. It's not perfect but these would be really good draws if they came up randomly. Again, let me know if you want to use these progressions or go with random "draw 4, keep 1" draws for your spirit.
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Apr 25, 2019 19:05
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My plan is to gather Dahan onto the city on my land, let the town get built, then next turn play Concealing Shadow and have the Dahan wipe out everything on the tile. If I could push/gather the explorer there too it'd be great, but I doubt we'll have the elements for it.
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Apr 25, 2019 19:10
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Roland Jones posted:Anyone have any thoughts or advice? (And before anyone asks, I can't give anyone Boon of Lightning this turn, sorry. Need to smash that town. It'll be used next turn though.) You really drew the short straw on initial invader placement, ouch. Longer term, I think you might be better served by trying to set up overlap with other players. Lightning tends towards an artillery role, you're great at blowing up hardened targets but struggle to hold ground. Playing zone defense means you may have a hard time finding good targets for your big destruction effects while small problems pile up around you. CirclMastr posted:My plan is to gather Dahan onto the city on my land, let the town get built, then next turn play Concealing Shadow and have the Dahan wipe out everything on the tile. If I could push/gather the explorer there too it'd be great, but I doubt we'll have the elements for it. I'm not sure what you mean by "we", but for sake of clarification each player's element pool is separate. There's nothing stopping you from moving up to 2 card plays next turn and playing the elements you need, though.
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Apr 25, 2019 19:25
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Okay, for my actions: Growth option 2, taking both presence from my Energy track and placing both in jungle 8 of the lower-left board, the one with two Dahan and one yellow presence already there. Playing Shatter Homesteads as my only card this turn, and though it's admittedly not necessary to state yet, I plan to use Swiftness of Lightning to make it Fast.
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Apr 25, 2019 20:36
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I'll take a random draw, seems like a more exciting choice. 1) I'm taking the middle growth option for 2 presence, placing one in the energy track and one in card plays. 2) I'll use Flash Floods to kill the Explorer in Space 4, then safely put a presence there. 3) Then use River's Bounty to gather the Dahan in Space 2 and one Dahan from Space 3 to Space 4, gaining one energy and generating an extra Dahan in Space 4 once it resolves (leaving 3 there total). 4) This gives me the elements I need to use my innate Massive Flooding, to push the Explorer in Space 7 to the adjacent Jungle space w/ 2 Dahan and a Yellow Presence. Retro Futurist, tell me if you'd rather it get moved somewhere else. 5) I can then add presence to Space 7. I'm still not 100% certain about how Ravaging resolves yet, does this look OK?
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Apr 26, 2019 03:15
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So, slight misconception about order of play: only fast powers (marked by the red bird icon under "speed") go off before invaders act. So Flash Flood will kill the explorer before it can do anything, as planned. Slow powers (with the blue turtle icon) do not resolve until after invaders act. So by the time Massive Flooding triggers, the explorer in 7 will have already built a town. You can still use it to push the newly built town out, though. A single explorer doesn't do enough damage to cause blight or kill Dahan, so this still renders the land safe for the next turn's ravage. (Also, technically presence placement happens before fast powers resolve, although for most intents and purposes it doesn't matter because they both happen before the invaders do anything.) I was not planning on doing the entire turn in one go, so once everyone hashes out their card selection/presence/growth and decides what to do with fast powers I'll post an update with those actions and invader actions before people finalize their slow power targeting. (You still declare and pay for all powers at the start of the round, including slow powers, so that part is correct. And it's good to announce your plans in advance so that other players know what lands you plan on cleaning up during sloe phase.) the holy poopacy fucked around with this message at 04:16 on Apr 26, 2019 |
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Apr 26, 2019 04:02
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Ah, right, I suppose there's no reason for me to not declare that for Shatter Homesteads (which, again, I made Fast with Swiftness of Lightning), I'm blowing up the town in my starting region. Was probably obvious admittedly, but it's worth stating anyway. That'll be all I'm able to do this turn, because I'm saving up for next turn anyway.
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Apr 26, 2019 04:32
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OK, I'll sweep the town out then. Retro Futurist, do you mind ending its sorry existence?
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Apr 26, 2019 04:46
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1- I’ll do the third growth option there, add 1 presence and gain 2 energy 2- as noted above I’ll finish off that town with Rituals of Destruction (I think?) 3- random draws for me
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Apr 26, 2019 05:20
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I need clarification on a few actions still but I figure I might as well go ahead and process the actions we have so far (there aren't many fast actions) and do the invader phase. Technically speaking this gives you advance information on a couple decisions but I don't think it's going to make much difference and I'd just as soon keep things moving. Fast Powers Flash Floods deals 1 damage and kills an explorer in Board A Land 4. Shatter Homesteads destroys a town in Board D Land 7, earning 2 fear (1 for the card + 1 for killing a town.) Invader Phase Surviving explorers build in sands: land 7 on Board A, 3 & 5 on board B, 2 & 6 on board C, and 4 & 7 on board D (rebuilding the town that was just destroyed.) Invaders flip their next card and explore mountains.  That's a lot of towns that are going to ravage next turn; you've got your slow actions this turn and whatever fast actions you can squeeze in next turn to deal with as many of them as possible. 2 invader damage is the threshold at which Bad poo poo Happens, so any sands you can reduce to a single explorer will be safe. There are still going to be more ravages than you can do anything about (and then all those mountain explorers will be building up to ravage the turn after) but that's par for the course: you're at your weakest at the start of the game and will be scrambling to catch up for the first few turns. As you advance on your presence tracks and get new cards you'll be able to handle more threats. It is now time to resolve slow actions. Your chosen cards are set at this point but you can freely choose what to do with your slow powers at this point, so don't feel compelled to stick with your announced plans. Slow powers are "weaker" in that you can't use them to preempt the turn's invader actions, but the flip side is you get to wait and see what the invaders do before you decide what to do with them. CirclMastr 1. Confirm use of Favors Called Due (gather Dahan into land 2: how many and from which adjacent lands?) 2. Decide whether you want to use your spirit's fixed power progression or go for random draws for your future card gains Bendigeidfran 1. Confirm use of River's Bounty (gather 1 Dahan from lands 2 & 3 into land 4, add 1 Dahan and gain an energy) 2. Confirm use of Massive Flood innate (push 1 town from land 7 into the adjacent board's land 8 jungle) Retro Futurist 1. I still need to know which presence track you are taking your presence from (you will gain the benefits of the space you're uncovering this turn.) 2. I also need to know where on the board you want to place your presence, within 1 range of any of your current presence (remember that spaces with at least 2 of your presence get an automatic, permanent Defend 3, and several of your powers rely on those sacred sites for targeting) 3. Lastly, confirm use of Rituals of Destruction (destroy the town that will be getting pushed into land 8) the holy poopacy fucked around with this message at 16:46 on Apr 26, 2019 |
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Apr 26, 2019 15:53
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drat that’s a lot of explorers. I’m confirming my slow actions as declared, need to build up and destroy what we can.
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Apr 26, 2019 16:56
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I'll use fixed progression because it seems good. For my power I'll pull one from C3, two from C5, and one from C1 into C2. Edited to correct for the fact that I can't read. CirclMastr fucked around with this message at 22:59 on Apr 26, 2019 |
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Apr 26, 2019 18:10
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Sorry I’m having an idiot moment; I’m not following the spirit track stuff and I don’t see it in the rules
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Apr 27, 2019 03:04
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So here's your spirit board: The tracks are the two lines for "Energy/Turn" and "Card Plays." Whenever you place presence, you're physically removing one of the yellow pieces from one of these two tracks and placing it on the island map (the pieces get removed in left to right order, but you can choose which of the two tracks to take the next piece from.) When you remove a piece, it exposes a new number (also visible in the small print beneath each spot) that then becomes your new energy income or card limit. So, for example, if you took a presence from Energy you would get 3 energy this turn (and subsequent turns) instead of 2. If you took a presence from Card Plays, you'd still only be able to play 1 card this turn, but you'd be one step closer to getting your second card play on future turns.
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Apr 27, 2019 03:09
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Retro Futurist posted:Sorry I’m having an idiot moment; I’m not following the spirit track stuff and I don’t see it in the rules When you use a Growth option that adds Presence, you remove it from your presence tracks, revealing more of them and possibly granting more Energy or cards played per turn or giving you other stuff, and add that Presence to the board within the indicated range of your existing presence. So, as an example, you used the third option here: That means you can take one of the Presence tokens off either the Energy/Turn or Card Plays track, and put it up to one space away from any of your existing Presence on the board. For Vital Strength of Earth, you have great Energy/Turn growth and terrible Card Plays growth, as well as some expensive powers to start with, so you might want to lean into that and remove more from the top track than the bottom, using one or two big powers per turn, fueled by the ridiculous amounts of Energy you can get per turn. But it's up to you. As for where to put it, well. Next turn the Invaders will ravage the sand areas, so putting one presence in sand land 5 on your tile this turn and one next turn could be good, as one of your innate abilities defends against up to three points of damage in lands you have sacred sites (i.e. 2 or more Presence); essentially you'd nullify the damage that would be dealt next turn, preventing Blight. But you or other people might see a better place to put it. Edit: Beaten to the explanation.
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Apr 27, 2019 03:20
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Ooohh those are presence tokens covering stuff up, ok that makes way more sense. 1- let’s do the card play track 2- put the 2 presence I have unmarked on 5 3- confirm Rituals of Destruction
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Apr 27, 2019 05:15
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| # ? Apr 27, 2024 21:51 |
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Turn 1 Slow Powers River's Bounty gathers 2 Dahan into Board A Land 4, generating 1 Dahan and 1 energy. River Surges triggers Massive Flooding with 1 Sun + 2 Water to push a town from Board A Land 7 to Board B Land 8. Rituals of Destruction destroys a town in Board B Land 8 (+1 fear.) Favors Called Due gathers 4 Dahan into Board C Land 2 (+3 fear.)  That wraps it up for the first turn, so it's time for the spirit phase of turn 2! Once again, pick a growth option and choose presence placement and card selection (this might wait if you need to draw a card.) The energy tokens I've placed on each spirit board represent your energy after your current income for turn 2, so if you increase your energy/turn or pick a growth option that adds energy remember to add that to what's shown here. Turn 2 spirit phase Retro Futurist   Roland Jones   Bendigeidfran   CirclMastr   So, strategy talk. The first ravage of the game is going to happen this turn. Any towns in sands you can eliminate with fast powers are going to save you blight. Any defend powers you can use to reduce the damage from a ravage will also stop a blight. If you can get Dahan into defended lands before the ravage it is also helpful, because then they can safely counterattack and trim the invaders' numbers. If you're feeling bloodthirsty you can also suicide Dahan into undefended lands to take some of the invaders down with them. Just remember that invaders hit and do casualties first and a town will kill at least one Dahan, so you need overwhelming numbers if you want to achieve anything. Even if you can't stop every ravage this turn (and you can't), don't despair. Remember that mountains are coming up next, so whatever headway you can make on clearing out mountains is going to help make the next turn go smoother. This is a good use of slow powers you have in your hand, since they won't go off until after the sands ravage this turn.
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Apr 27, 2019 05:48
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