NotWinlogon: just a normal day at work in russia - 6 pts

firemummy: "It is always surprising where we find ourselves when the ADHD meds kick in" - 9 pts

Soxfan196o: Somone was on thin ice at work. - 11 pts, 6 vts

Chadomancer: This isn't exactly what she meant when Jill said she wanted a cool new job. - 8 pts, 2 3's

JoeyX: "Take your time, we can start the zoom call whenever. I'm just chillin'." - 8 pts, 1 3
KoL Miners Daughter: So, you say you had to walk uphill through the snow to get to school? Well... - 7 pts
LukeMcNuke: The influencers are returning to the frozen lakes- nature is healing :) - 6 pts
HuntaNomad: It's a dry cold - 1 pt
noobsauce: just chillin', WFH life - 2 pts
SirStabsalot: "when hell's frozen over but your name is summer" - 3 pts
Not Me Yet: when the elder scrolls 6 drops - 0 pts

Gawea: Elsa gets an office job. - 11 pts, 5 vts

	2					1				3			6
			1		3	2	1		2				9
2	1			2				2	3		1		11
3					1		3			1			8
		1	3				2				2		8
				3		3		1					7
		3	2	1									6
									1				1
		2											2
											3		3
													0
1	3				2			3		2			11

Game Review: Aces of Warfare

Wargames need not be ornery. Aces of Warfare simplifies the solitaire wargame to a deck of cards in a system of sorts.

The aces and courts of the deck represent enemy forces that you have to defeat in a battle taking place in four locations. In general you play two cards at a time either to the left or right of each location until all eight slots are filled(you can use up a joker if you want to rearrange cards already in play), then an attrition phase follows where you might lose cards, and if aces show up on board extra powers kick in. Then comes your turn to fight, the result determined by the difference of the number on the right from the number on the left, negatives counting, you can lose, rout the enemy out of the area or win the battle outright but if you get zero or less expect reinforcements. 

You win by eliminating all 16 enemies but if you are unable to do this as you don't have enough cards special game end conditions kick in.

Designer Mike Heiman supplied the game with 10 historical battles, each with their own goals, geographical quirks, special rules and ace powers. You can probably even make your own battle with your own mix of these things.

In the interests of speed (reviewing each battle might be a later project), this review will cover the system, which is pretty intuitive for a wargame. Though the battle mechanisms are a bit too simplified to fit the material, it does use the luck of the cards to make the game have that bit of uncertainty. In the game your discarded cards can still be used for later but lost cards are "buried," this distinction might be confusing at first and there's no getting away from it.

Speaking of losing cards, what a great way to bring home the risk of losing too many troops out of either bad tactics or superior enemy forces. Strangely, even if you do have to play with a reduced hand it doesn't mean your fighting chances would change dramatically; there are only two battle outcomes with precise values.

Game Review: Sandcastle Solitaire

Kicking off my attempt to cover as many solitaire games in the 2023 Traditional Deck Game Design Contest, Sandcastle Solitaire is not just any column-piling game. True to the name, these cards are now made of sand and can collapse, not to mention the tide kicking in.

Each turn you draw and play a row of cards onto columns and discard some cards into a discard pile. You must start your row on an existing column can only play it in either the order drawn or the other way around. If a card is played onto a face-up card it must either be higher or the same suit lest the entire column collapse and all its cards flip. After playing your row, you discard half the number of live columns in cards from the draw pile. This cycle continues until the deck runs out. If you have more face-up cards than discarded cards you win.

Easy enough rules to get the hang of while having some flexibility in trying out different plays(you can draw a row from 1 to 7 cards), the game's strategy includes both foreplanning how many cards to draw and which columns to save and tactical considerations in choosing how to play the row and what losses can be taken. 

In my playthroughs so far I have played with long rows which meant risking inevitably losing columns as extending the tableau means more discards to try to outnumber. Someone in the linked thread used a more conservative strategy that requires precise card-counting. Most games end with close margins but is not at all unpredictable as it would seem.

The game can be played with jokers: they don't have a suit and represent the highest card in a column, a joker played as the first card of a column immediately collapses.

NISEMONO: Joji playing Shogi by the Sea - 2 pts
Chadomancer:

Man: Check

Nature: Uh...tidal wave to Rook 4, mother f****r!s

- 13 pts

Soxfan196o: When you play chess on the beach, every move is a 'shore' thing! - 9 pts

bitnb: Dolphins, it turns out, are not as playful as he had assumed. - 10 pts
Gawea: "GO to the beach day" wasn't as popular as Brian thought it would be. - 9 pts

Unconventionable: Ling on a hot date - 3 pts, 2 vts

panic lord: Man takes Go to the beach too literally - 4 pts
HuntaNomad: And just like that, the house of cards falls like dominoes. Bingo. - 4 pts
Blamefulrednas: i heard there are good chess players at the beach, but i think they are cheating, they are all acting fishy. - 7 pts
Leonardo Da Turtle: "You're using the Wade Defence?" - 3 pts

LukeMcNuke: The only time I'm ever able to use my favorite chess move without being mocked is when I play myself. Oh "bongcloud" attack, the scandal of our affair makes it all the better! - 2 pts

			2										2
			3	2	3		1	1	3				13
	3				2			3	1				9
	2			3	1			2		2			10
2		3				1	3						9
						3							3
3		1											4
			1							3			4
	1	2		1					2	1			7
1						2							3
							2						2