Re: 2017 Meeples Choice Awards - Final Results

Thanks to Larry for keeping the torch burning for the Meeples Choice Award.
Every year I'm pleased to see it's still chugging along, and remain happy
with the process & its outcomes. I like that you set up a geeklist for
these, too.

https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/242585/2017-meeples-choice-award-winners

I'm really happy with Azul. Just about every year I get excited by some
attractive abstract that catches my eye, but they're often a letdown when
they are thinky games with perfect information and require lookahead. I
realize that's what a lot of abstracts are, and what abstract fans want in
them...but not me. I want the beauty of an abstract, with some luck,
imperfect info, and multiplayer interaction of our more typical wargames.
That gives me the best of both worlds. Azul was exactly that for me--a rare
find.

Ethnos was another big favorite from last year, but I see it's way down
near the bottom of the voting. Too bad. I think my third pick was El
Dorado, which I like more than love.



On Sat, Jun 23, 2018 at 9:34 AM, Christopher Dearlove
[email protected] [spielfrieks] <[email protected]>
wrote:

>
>
> Whether damning with faint praise or not is another question. And how El
> Dorado would rate up against the Knizia heavyweights is difficult. Not top
> ten, but conceivably top twenty, though I think I might find twenty Knizias
> I prefer.
>
> But in the ten year competition FITS is a competitor. In fact it and El
> Dorado are the (only I think) two Knizia games I have put in specific
> requests for, back in the tailing off days when I could pick them up for
> free. I'd pick El Dorado over FITS, but that of course is just opinion.
>
> --
> Christopher Dearlove
> [email protected]
> [email protected] is dead
>
> On 23 Jun 2018, at 17:26, [email protected] [spielfrieks] <
> [email protected]> wrote:
>
>
>
> While I can think of a few games that Knizia has released over the past
> decade that I'd rather play than El Dorado (FITS would probably be my top
> choice), none of them are by a large margin.  I quite enjoyed my one play
> of El Dorado and recognize there's some good things to explore then.  So
> while I have no problem in someone saying that this is Reiner's best game
> from the past 10 years, for me, it's damning with faint praise.  Knizia has
> not been a significant designer for me since 2006.  That year, he released
> what I consider to be his last great game (Medici vs. Strozzi), as well as
> Blue Moon City, which is quite good and has gotten a good deal of play over
> the years.  There have been a few titles worth checking out over the last
> dozen years, but hardly enough to raise him above a bunch of other
> designers of far less pedigree than him.  The good news is, Reiner is
> showing signs of life since turning 60, with El Dorado being one of the
> more prominent instances, so the Good Doctor may still have some surprises
> for us.  I certainly hope so--he was so good for so long.
>
> I also agree about being tepid over Azul.  Prior to playing it, I thought
> it would be too abstract for my tastes and that's just how it turned out.
> Combine that with the likelihood of nasty play and a reasonable shot at
> required kingmaking and it's not a game I have any desire to play again.
> I'm much more bullish about Kiesling's other two big games of the year,
> Heaven & Ale and Riverboat.  In fact, H&A and Gaia Project are my two
> leading choices for my personal Game of the Year.  So I'm pretty pleased
> with how the voting turned out.
>
> Larry
>
> 
>