Comptes-rendus › God save the John !

Le sémillant John nous décrit ses soirées chez les ludochons !

Fil des billets - Fil des commentaires

jeudi, juin 25 2020

25 juin 2020 - John or the English lock-down way...

As I sit at my desk after a nice meal of pasta (cream, bacon and a topping of grated cheese but really you should stop being so nosy about what other people eat) I settle down into the usual routine of an e-sport show for my ears and a manga (more accurately a manhua this time) for my eyes. Then suddenly I am startled out of my reverie state, induced by the lull of a simple fantasy setting in a martial art world and the screams of the casters growing uncomfortably excited at the sight of professional prowess in a video game.

The startling ? Caused by my phone reminding me that in 10 minutes a group of women and men would be reuniting around multiple tables of varied states of disrepair to play boardgames. However, what certain... For the sake of propriety we will call: Less logically minded and uninformed, people are calling a Chinese weapon is affecting the world and preventing, among other things, our little club from officially gathering. So... What can I, as an unofficial English correspondent of the Gamerkin activities, talk about when they aren't... Activating ? Well for one thing, you could nuke France as much as you like, or other less violent catastrophes if you so prefer like a fluffy pink fuzzy unicorn Tsunami, and still the members of the Gamerkin would play games.

Ludochons  2012 !, juin 2020 A long time ago (2012) in a galaxy far, far away.... So it seems !

Somehow, even though our members are in the lower half of double digits, I believe them to be wholly guilty for the massive explosion of online board game website users. Impossible you say ? Preposterous ? Well I have no doubt that many of our sleezy members created multiple personas from all around Europe just to be able to play more games of this or that through the web! I mean did she really think she was fooling me ? Suzellina del Arte... Come on! At least try to create believable fake identities Magali. I digress, other than these websites, and other virtual platforms, now that quarantine has been relaxed the Gamerkin have returned to a more traditional version of gathering: Going to each others homes.
I am thus comfortable in my little cave that, geographically, all around me lounges, kitchens, torture basements are being used to ritualistically open boxes and sigh at the sound of cardboard brushing against cardboard. Then they will proceed into wholeheartedly focusing at the total annihilation of the degenerate scum smiling at them thinking they could possibly score a single point against them in Keyflower! Do you score points in Keyflower ? Anyhow...

The point is even though I have abandoned my Gamerkin friends to return to my own roots of being a giant video game nerd, I am happy and content knowing boardgames will never abandon them. Except hopefully Quartemaster. Screw that game.

vendredi, octobre 18 2019

17 octobre 2019 - John is p*ssed off !

It is a hard lesson. To see what one painstakingly builds destroyed so utterly... One constructs, brick by (fun) brick, but then one sees ash strewn before ones feet. I speak not of the whispers of a new "billet" writer. No I feel no threat from more writers! I'm the only English writer, as long as they stick to french their most appreciable prose and style are of no consequence to me. Other than, of course, the wonderful moments of reading they bring. As usual I digress, when what I want to talk about is a blatant attack on my wonderful little towns in "Minivilles"!

Before I start the atrocious tale of the boy who could not. I would like to speak of another plague. The infinitely troublesome imps that decide to ignore rules. I forgive any Football player that might decide to simply pick up the ball. Because Rugby is such a better sport. But I do have an issue when they try and pass, said picked up ball, to someone in front of them. Because American Rugby is NOT much more of a better sport. Though it can have some moments... Sometimes... Also issuable: Those that decide to play a game with 5 people. What's wrong with that ? You ask. Well nothing by default, but when the rule for the evening is "2 player games only" one has to wonder... Is our president, though dashingly handsome, a troublemaker ? Possibly... He does like to play orcs and chaos creatures in Warhammer...

King of Tokyo, oct. 2019 King of Tokyo - Se plaindre de la destruction de la ville, et jouer ensuite à King of Tokyo....

Anyhow. Now that you know the other crime of this evening lets go back to our sheep. In this case the sheep are my cities. Miniville is a great little card game, where you build a city. The buildings are represented by your cards, and are built, via currency that those buildings might earn you. Each type of building has a number (sometimes more), at the start of a players turn she/he rolls a dice (later on two if desired) the result determines which card is activated, generally that activation earns you cash. A coyote won both games. But I wasn't mad. He obviously cheats. He's a coyote. The WB cartoon after all is not called "Kind and generous Coyote". Anyhow said coyote won, unfair enough. However he then proceeded to summon a giant rabbit monster creature and flattened my city! I speak of course of a game of King of Tokyo we played to end the evening. I mean who does that ? Yes I suggested the game... But I didn't think my poor little mechanical lizard would be so brutally murdered!

I sometimes wonder where the kindness of men goes... One spends his time stealing everyone's money in one game, still looses, then gets stomped angrily in the next game. It's as if karma was a word that existed already. One good thing from the evening though, I learned the existence of a game named "Raptor". I can't wait to play it.

I bid thee adieu for now. Essen calls. It's voice sounds like a group of overly exited Ludochons demanding people explain to them various games. So I'll be going to explain some Bankiiiiz games to a bunch of foreigners. I'll warn them against coyotes in the process...

vendredi, octobre 4 2019

3 octobre 2019 - John is back!

On this night of the 3rd of October 2019, a group of people gathered at 8 this evening. A gathering not unlike a cult, every member continually droning on and on at their families about the values and wonder of worshipping the M.A.N.U. (Man Affordable Not Unkind). Well, I say every, some are curiously reserved in their sharing of our Thursday activities... Presumably simply afraid that if too many ask for the benedictions of our leader, the grace of the latter will falter...

I digress, falter the leader did not tonight! We gathered at 8, as I was saying, for the annual cult administrative themed game night. Something about re-electing stuff and things...
I mainly remember three things:

  1. There was a weird Bingo game where instead of being the first to complete a row of numbers, one had to be the first to complete ones whole grid of words... Except everyone had the same grid, and of course not ALL the words were spoken... I mean our esteemed Olivier (cult necronomicon guardian) chose the words! What did people expect...
  2. I was asked to start writing again! The poor sheep, lost without their English host. Like all good parasites I have become a writhing mass of inescapable necessity. So at least where that cult agenda is concerned: Check!
  3. As I started musing on the food I had not yet consumed this evening, and my future works of literature for the cult, I heard whisperings. "Magna Carta..." They sounded like to me. And indeed I eventually received a piece of paper demanding personal information about me. Most demanded by the powers that be was our age. I am guessing some kind of strange sacrifice will be taking place. Where persons of a certain age will be sent in the cupboard to "make room" in the cult. I will be immensely sad to see some of our glorious members depart. As we say often though " Alea iacta est" or in modern terms "Don't roll a 1"...



John, oct. 2019 John, alias Superman, is back !

As is customary after pleasing the gods of paperwork we turned to our pleasure time. I shared mine with Bertrand, Cecile and Elsa. Now some would say Bertrand beat me at the game. I would say "Ye wee bugger stole me cards all game!". Thus our game of Overbooked, a game all about positioning victims in seats in a plane in a way to assure... I think the easier feeding of Cthulhu ? A giant octopus was outside my plane so I imagine it was some kind of apocalyptic simulation... So a little peeved at the thieving taking place at the table, it was non the less with a little pride that I had my hopes destroyed. Ending third place having saved 2 babies from the sacrificial flight. And confusing a granny for a lover in my seating arrangement. The negative points accrued in my disfavour.

Remains to write a warning to people that are like me already afraid of air travel to not read the previous paragraph, and of course as is customary, to wish you all a wonderful week until our next game!

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