Meeple Nation Board Game Podcast

Kennerspiel des Jahres T.I.M.E Stories 0-7:03 Pandemic Legacy: Season One 7:03-9:56 Isle of Skye: From Chieftain to King 9:57-11:45 We announce our winner of the Kennerspiel des Jahres 11:46-15:02 Kinderspiel des Jahres Leo 15:03-21:41 Mmm! 21:42-25:18 My First Stone Age 25:19-27:50 Brent's opinion of which should win 27:51-29:29 Spiel des Jahres Karuba 29:30-36:27 Imhotep 36:28-42:52 Codenames 42...

The fantastic Dan Wells, author and avid gamer, joins the Nation! Dan Wells is a fantasy, YA, post-apocalyptic author known for the Partials series and his new book, Bluescreen a futuristic science-fiction cyber-thriller. He also writes the John Cleaver series. The first one, I am not a Serial Killer, has been made into a movie starring Christopher Lloyd, Laura Fraser, and Max Records. He is a co-...

This bonus episode was recorded by Brent while he attended BGG.Spring in Dallas on May 29, 2016. He sits down with three of the Spiel des Jahres judges and discusses game eligibility, judging criteria, the selection process, and the differences between the three awards. We then review the nine nominated SdJ games for 2016.

Matt and Barbara join us for another News episode. We talk of Hero Realms, Pathfinder App, Cthulhu Realms App, Descent: Road to Legend App, Campaign Manager, Game Bags, SpielSoap, two versions of Caravan. We also report the newly announced Spiel des Jahres nominees including Codenames, Imhotep, and Karuba.

You're in the trenches in the first World War, trying to stay alive long enough to return home with your  grizzled old friends. The threat are bullets, combat, toxic gas, night, winter, and rain. The only way to survive is a little planning, teamwork, and a whole lot of luck. The Grizzled is a cooperative game for two to five players from Fabien Riffaud and Juan Rodriguez.   We've had mixed experi...

In March, at SaltCON 2016, we sat down and talked with Seth Hiatt of Mayday Games. We talk about a number of their products including Twist of Fate, a microgame that is finishing up on Kickstarter at the time this podcast is released. Seth talks about manufacturing, shipping, and the benefit of being Euro Friendly.

This week's podcast come to you from Skye, the largest and most northerly major island in the Inner Hebrides of Scotland, with soft sand beaches, gently sloping hills and impressive mountain. We're not there, unfortunately. Isle of Skye: From Chieftain to King is an economic, territory building game from Mayfair Games. For 2-5 players and for 60 minutes, Isle of Skye will task you to create the be...

We interview the awesome dudes, Seth Jaffee, Michael Mindes, and Andy Van Zandt, from Tasty Minstrel Games ( www.playmtg.com ) at SaltCON 2016. We've got the insights from a game designer, an owner and a developer.   Seth caught us up on his game designs, his work on the Eminent Domain series, and his future releases. Michael talks about the latest releases of TMG and what we can expect in the nea...

We’ve hit another 5th episode so it is time for Industry News! Don’t forget to enter our contest on Meeple Nation Off Air on Facebook.   0:00 - 0:47 Introduction 0:48 - 3:07 Mombasa, World 192 of 504 and Ryan hates Stocks 3:08 - 4:59 Contest for Gold West from Tasty Minstrel Games - Ends May 1, 2016 5:00 - 5:53 The Grizzled: At Your Orders 5:54 - 7:51 Star Trek Frontiers 7:52 - 10:12 Descent: Jour...

One thing we know for sure: Saucermen are jerks. Except that Brent, for some reason, likes the Saucermen. Something is wrong with Brent. Might be that alien tech sticking out the back of his neck. Rocket Patrol unite. We have to rescue Brent!   Space Cadet: Away Mission is a 1-6 player cooperative adventure game with Retro spacemen fighting aliens, slugs, and space bugs on a modular board. The ali...

Months worth of work goes into running a board game convention. We sit with the Organizers of SaltCON and discuss the past, present and future. Join us in our newly formed Facebook Group, Meeple Nation Off Air, at https://www.facebook.com/groups/MeepleNationOffAir

This week we interview the members of HUGG, Herriman Utah Gamer Girls, a board game club of women. I use the word interview loosely, as HUGG takes over the Nation, explaining their love of heavy board game, strict competition, and the importance of integrity of the game. The worst insult within their group is that someone "isn't a real gamer." We found out quickly that they are all real gamers. Fi...

Join Meeple Nation as we host a live podcast as a panel at SaltCON, a board game convention in SLC, Utah. We talk to several guests about how they approach attending conventions, including the big one--the long CON, whether that is GenCon or BGGCon or another convention. We grilled two professionals, Ryan Bruns from Mayday Games and Ben Hillyard from Daedalus Productions about attending convention...

Meeple Nation celebrates episode 100! We talk with Barb and Matt about reaching this milestone, talk SaltCON, our local board game convention, and discuss board game news of the day, including new or newly announced games, Kickstarters, and some related events. Games discussed include Goonies, a possible new fantasy version of Star Realms, Pack O Games 2, and expansions to Mysterium, Dominion, Imp...

Warhammer Quest: The Adventure Card Game, is a cooperative game for 1-4 players based on the Warhammer property from Games Workshop. This Fantasy Flight game is played mostly with cards, with a few supporting items such as custom dice, and health and exploration tokens. Each player takes the role of one of the four heroes in the box and uses unique Fight, Explore, Aid, and Rest cards to survive th...

In October of 2015 we noticed a number of threads complaining about games that get used up or cannot be replayed for other reasons. We sit down and talk about these games

Everyone likes expansions, right? Especially good ones? This episode we talk expansions for games we have already reviewed. Roll for the Galaxy: Ambition, is the first expansion for this popular dice game. It adds a slightly accelerated start with new black leader dice, and new starting planet and factions. We first discussed Roll for the Galaxy in Episode 37. Firefly has a number of expansions, i...

It has been six months since we last discussed Kickstarter, and Jeff Siadek joins us to explain why publishers use Kickstarter. Jeff's project, Battlestations Second Edition! Tabletop Starship Simulator, is currently on Kickstarter, with an end date of March 3, 2016. This is Jeff's tenth kickstarter, with a relaunch of his flagship game, Battlestations. His company, Gorilla Games, has been around...

No one likes a lying cheaterface when playing board games, but what about all of the games that have made lying, cheating, and bluffing core mechanics of game play. This week on Meeple Nation, the primes discuss games with these mechanics such as Sheriff of Nottingham, Coup, Werewolf, Cockroach Poker, Intrige, Lifeboats and Illuminati. We all hate cheating as a mechanic, but find out our take on B...

This week we review the game, Deception: Murder in Hong Kong

This week, we discuss all things Pandemic, including spoiler free talk of Pandemic Legacy. Luckily, we have Barb and Matt back to keep things from getting too hostile. Everyone seems to like this game, except for Ryan. What's wrong with Ryan? Join us to find out. We cover Pandemic (2008) by Matt Leacock, including the expansions In the Lab (2013) and On the Brink (2009). We also discuss Pandemic:...

Your caravan arrives in the fabled Sultanate of Naqala. The sultan is dead. Do you have what it takes to maneuver the five tribes, invoke the old Djinns, and gain enough influence to fulfill the prophesy and become the new sultan?   Five Tribes is a clever, meeple-heavy work placement game where the workers are already in place on the table and you use a Mancala-like movement on your turn to maneu...

We finally review Mysterium! For this seance, we all put on our Medium caps and find meaning in our dreams, conveniently provided by the ghost player in the form of full art cards. Mysterium was designed by Oleksandr Nevskiy and Oleg Sidorenko. The English version was released in 2015 by Asmodee.   The Meeple Nation Primes are joined by Barbara and Matthew Allen as we gush about this outstanding a...

In this episode we talk about our gaming year, including a review of what goals we completed from those we set back in Episode 33. What were our gaming highlights? Can Brent's highlight be Ryan's lowlight? What are our plans for 2016? Join us while we enter the new year. Let us know what you are wishing for!

This week, we travel to ancient Egypt and try to win over the big guy, the Pharaoh, with dice. Favor of the Pharaoh,by Tom Lehmann and Bezier Games, is a re-implementation and re-theme of To Court the King. We liked the first version well enough, are were excited to see what Tom came up with. Spoiler--we all thought it was fabulous.   We loved all the options available to randomize each game. We l...