Yep us too - it used to be our stable game - we played Dune
to death and
whenever we get six we still play it a lot (5 is playable six
is awesome).
We created a few extra positions (Mentat Assassins were fun
for a while) and
house ruled a few of the powers.
avalon hill (RIP) created a few extras as well. If you got the in-house
magazine (forget its name) you would find them in there. The landstrad
(starts with 30 spice and has a few great abilities like stopping someone
moving, or using attacking weapons for an entire turn), and the deadies (you
pay them when you get deadies back - and THEY get to pick one traitor when
YOU get leaders back from the dead - we wave bye-bye when we lose leaders,
or make deals and all buy them out in one-go).
For example no three player
victory/alliances.
never used it. Its one person versus everyone else.
Game ends on turn 10, (everyone falls
asleep otherwise),
You got a game past turn 5 ? Wimps 
Our early turns sees huge numbers of
losses, after that victory goes to the person who goes for it.
the Fish win a lot (Guild to you),
Yeah. Slackers say 'I'm going last', and say 'i will have this one, that
one, and this last little one for a victory'. Landstrad can say 'hold in
place', which means no movement for one turn (which makes you immune to them
for the next turn). They can also say 'no attacking weapons' which upset the
harks. But they can only get one person per turn. And their 30 spices goes
QUICK. Landstrad on choom-charity is a laugh, but don't laugh aloud as he
can say at the START of the turn - 'no attacking weapons for you', so the
others throw in their 10's when they jump all over you. Of course you could
be bluffing as you can go for a win the turn after, but its all part of the
game.
with the Harkonnen and Benes coming
second.
harks. ick. Everyone takes them as traitors (if they can) since they start
with so many. They also get another leader of yours if you lose to them.
Harks on a roll (ie weapons) are deadly.
BG don't win a lot since they are "SLOW", and they can't do much if they
don't get the cards (and they are seriously broke).
The emperor wins a lot of our games since he is MEGA rich. All the spice for
cards go to him, so he can outbid just about anyone. If he gets a crap card
he stops the bidding, says 'residual poison' with a card on someone (he
picks on someone who can't afford to pay him, so the emperor reveals the
card). This card isn't the poison card, so he loses the card, pays 2 times
the amount as a fine for being caught out, and then goes back to bidding for
weapons and shields. An emperor with 4 card and no desire to get rid of any
makes everyone scared. Then since he has 4 great cards he gets to go into
combat a lot to use them up on people. AND he wins. The fishers LOVES the
emperor.
Freeman are stuffed, the landstrad can't hold them in place, or stop them
attackingm, so they are 'free'. But they don't get much spice.
The Emperor and Fremen do badly though so we upgraded them a
little. The Witches (Bene and yes you do have to speak funny
when doing the
voice), are reduced to 15 troops to keep them in check.
How could they afford to land AND buy cards ? They only win when they pick a
side and turn on a prediction.
Also the Atreides/Benes powers can't be combined in combat-
you get to use
one of them only. (Oh yeh Harkonnen Karama power is reduced
so that if you
get a Karama in a Karama swop then you can't then use that
one to Karama
more cards).To speed the game up (not quite a Civilisation game but
pretty close), we
brought in another house rule of only diploming secretly in a
Nexus.
that sounds nice. I assume you are talking about the worm spice card that is
just a pain in the bum.
Other
times it is not allowed secretly but you can discuss things.
Oh yeh you
can't prove anything (eg you got the lasgun mate? Yep here
it is - shows
card - okay lasgun shield it is then.)
Nothing better than using a lasgun/shield combo and killing everyone.
Like I said played it a LOT so happy to discuss this one some
more as we
love it. Ever tried 3 player with set alliances playing two
positions each?
3 players ? For that few we play a game that I think is called
'dungeon-quest' (?). its also a board-game, and the aim is to crawl around
the outer board so that you can stay alive in the middle board, when then
allows you to go into the inner board and try for a win. These days 3
players means starcraft.
Some of us like that - others hate it. Does your head in
though. Read the
latest Dune book? Not bad for Dune maniacs reasonably promising.
You mean the 'house atrides' book. Started off great, fell away at the end
(maybe the writer was getting bored ?), but I still reckon I got my money's
worth (and I got it hardcover). I'm thinking its better than the original
dune book. I was very impressed with the in-house politics.
I know that 'house harks' is coming out 'soon'. Not sure when 'soon' is, I
think sometimes this year.
We
created a new version of the board game on the way back from
a pubmeet which
I have to put to paper sometime.Bought Taj Mahal recently which we think is a good game, and
got quite a few
German games (best in the world really). Our other staple is
Jyhad/Vampyre
or Shadowfist (we used to be Magic heads here) which we do sealed
decked/booster draft and normal games of - great fun. For other
entertainment we play Starcraft after Sam's roleplaying
campaign on Thursday
as well as I have no doubt informed you before...
starcraft We only beat up the computer (or try to), as we get too upset
when we attack each other.
And my brother roleplays A LOT. I give them a miss since I get bored too
easily. I'm fine with playing an NPC for a night or two, but anything else
and I lose interest. Most of the games they play are their own (they like
their own character generation system). Darin is thinking of buying the new
Dungeon & Dragon rules, but since they only use ADD for the modules, its
unlikely.
ยทยทยท
We also PBM a fair bit - don't bother phoning Monday
afterroon as we have
our Legends turn back for me, Rob and John, and ME46 with
Sam, John and
myself, and Rob, Sam get their game 12 turns back as well.
I am surprised
we actually get any work done then come to think of it there
are a lot of
turns to input still...Incidentially we think PBM is great and you should all pay us
more money and
play more turns...Clint (just done 4 hours of Diploming/record in ME so fancied a break)
> dune is what we play when we have more than 4 players.
> m
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Against the computer I can take on 5