Board All The Time

Reviews: Ovation

Hey hey BATT Family! Today we are going to be reviewing Ovation which was provided to us by Grand Gamers Guild. This is an action selection, resource management, set collection game for 1-4 players and takes approximately 30 minutes to play. We hope you enjoy the review and moreso enjoy the game! Feel free to hit us up on any of our regular contact methods to let us know what your opinions are on Ovation! 
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This episode's segments:
00:00:00 - Intro
00:00:34 - How the Game Plays
00:04:26 - Learning Curve / Ease of Teach
00:05:50 - Artwork / Components / Iconography
00:12:14 - Replayability / Solo Mode
00:19:13 - Final Thoughts / Outro
--- Notes!
1) When discussing the ticket system, Mark says a word as "wane" instead of "wan". That's just Midwest accent, but you tomato/tomato yourself on that if he's wrong or not.
2) Not long after that, Mark does mention the solo mode and it's designer without referencing their name. The solo mode was designed by David Digby, not by Kirsten Lunde who did the main game. 
---
You can email us at boardallthetimegaming@gmail.com.
We can be found at www.boardallthetime.com and on Facebook at Board All The Time. 
We're on BlueSky now and loving it! At this point it really feels like BlueSky is for board gaming, so definitely check us out on there at https://bsky.app/profile/boardallthetime.bsky.social
If you would like to check out Mark's Top 100 list, it can be found at: https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/347553/top-100-games-2024-edition
If you'd like to help support the show and assist with the hosting costs, you can do so with our Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/boardallthetime
Our Discord server, which is still in Beta, can be joined at https://discord.gg/VbRWEpc6
We'd like to thank our sponsors as well:
Robin's Nerd Supply: www.robinsnerdsupply.com
Eco Owl Press: www.ecoowlpress.com 
We'd also like to thank SoulProdMusic for the intro/outro music. 

Board All The Time Episode 18

Hey hey BATT Family! We hope you've taken the time to check out our Kickstarter preview content that we've gotten to release recently, we've been really enjoying playing everything to support some folks. Regardless, on this episode we talk game balance and why it matters, play a game that Mark hated in 2021 and unintentionally played again for this episode, and managed to weirdly cross over on too many things in the other segments. We hope you have a great time with the episode and that you'll let us know what you think about everything by hitting us up!
---
This episode's segments:
00:00:00 - Intro
00:01:30 - What's Been on the Table
00:05:10 - Topic of the Week: 
00:19:53 - Why Did I Play That: Hardback
00:31:18 - Table / Shelf / Trade
00:50:27 - Rotating Segment: Surprise Party
00:57:21 - Contact Info / Sponsors 
00:58:43 - Outro
--- Notes!
1) The old fashioneds comment was due to a random Wisconsinite stopping my grandfather during our vacation when he ordered one. I don't particularly care for them, but you better believe I learned how to make them like a master to ingratiate myself to him when Natalie and I started dating. 
2) During Hardback, Scott says Single Player Solitaire. He naturally meant Multi-Player Solitaire, but that's the type of stuff you get when you record without scripts.
3) Sorry for needing to use a prop in the explanation of the Marrek Murders, but it was far simpler to have Scott understand while looking at it. If you'd like to see more of what I'm talking about, there's a decent photo someone put up on BGG that'll help you get this. https://boardgamegeek.com/image/8675978/final-girl-the-marrek-murders
4) I know the point that I was trying to make when I clearly get flustered and frustrated (flustrated?) when talking about Dice Throne's complexity, but I do find it funny while editing it that I couldn't even keep a straight thought because I was so annoyed.
5) I didn't mean to take over Scott's Surprise Party entry, but that mostly came out like that in the edit. We were recording late one night and Scott was flagging pretty hard at that point. So I came in with my opinions to keep the conversation moving and see what we could prompt out of him.
6) Apparently this was prop night for me. This is why Scott keeps saying we need to add video. If that does happen, that's more reason of why I need an editor. 
---
You can email us at boardallthetimegaming@gmail.com.
We can be found at www.boardallthetime.com and on Facebook at Board All The Time. 
We're on BlueSky now and loving it! At this point it really feels like BlueSky is for board gaming, so definitely check us out on there at https://bsky.app/profile/boardallthetime.bsky.social
If you would like to check out Mark's Top 100 list, it can be found at: https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/347553/top-100-games-2024-edition
If you'd like to help support the show and assist with the hosting costs, you can do so with our Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/boardallthetime
Our Discord server, which is still in Beta, can be joined at https://discord.gg/VbRWEpc6
We'd like to thank our sponsors as well:
Robin's Nerd Supply: www.robinsnerdsupply.com
Eco Owl Press: www.ecoowlpress.com 
We'd also like to thank SoulProdMusic for the intro/outro music. 

Shadows: Heroes & Monsters (from Keun Games) Kickstarter Preview

Hey hey BATT Family! We're back again today with another Kickstarter preview for you! Thanks so much again to Keun Games for supplying us with a copy of the Shadows: Heroes & Monsters as well as the parts to upgrade into second edition. Shadows is a game that presents itself as a PvPvE card game and it fulfills that promise as the targets on the field are plenty and varied. This new edition plays up to four players (a common request from players of the first edition) and brings new rules and quality of life improvements over the prior edition. Shadows goes live on March 18th on Kickstarter, so go ahead and listen to our preview and then go over and save the campaign for it's launch date to be a day one backer!  
Please check out the Kickstarter and their website to find their other games:
Kickstarter Campaign: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/keungames/shadows-heroes-and-monsters-2nd-edition?ref=b6qgka
Keun Games Website: https://www.keungames.com
---
You can email us at boardallthetimegaming@gmail.com.
We can be found at www.boardallthetime.com and on Facebook at Board All The Time. 
If you'd like to help support the show and assist with the hosting costs, you can do so with our Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/boardallthetime
Our Discord server, which is still in Beta, can be joined at https://discord.gg/VbRWEpc6
We'd like to thank our sponsors as well:
Robin's Nerd Supply: www.robinsnerdsupply.com
Eco Owl Press: www.ecoowlpress.com 
We'd also like to thank SoulProdMusic for the intro/outro music. 

Scales of Fate (from IV Studio) Kickstarter Preview

BATT Family! We finally get to spill all of our thoughts out on the newest obsession here in the studio. Scales of Fate is the newest game from IV Studio and a new two-player only game set in the world of Veiled Fate. If you've been listening to BATT, you know that Veiled Fate is Mark's number one game so the chance to get in on this preview was huge for the team. The game does not disappoint in the slightest. Thanks so much again to IV Studios for supplying us with the prototype copy of the Deluxe Edition of Scales of Fate. 
 
Kickstarter Campaign: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ivstudios/scales-of-fate
BGG Page: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/437356/scales-of-fate
 
IV Studio Website: https://www.iv.studio/
IV Games Website: https://shop.iv.studio/
---
You can email us at boardallthetimegaming@gmail.com.
We can be found at www.boardallthetime.com and on Facebook at Board All The Time. 
If you'd like to help support the show and assist with the hosting costs, you can do so with our Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/boardallthetime
Our Discord server, which is still in Beta, can be joined at https://discord.gg/VbRWEpc6
We'd like to thank our sponsors as well:
Robin's Nerd Supply: www.robinsnerdsupply.com
Eco Owl Press: www.ecoowlpress.com 
We'd also like to thank SoulProdMusic for the intro/outro music. 

Board All The Time Episode 17

Hey hey BATT Family! We're back with our next main episode! We hope you really enjoyed the Live! episode from PopiCon, we had a blast recording that one. Last week didn't have an off-week release unintentionally between returning from vacation, an absolute nightmare of a week at work, and preparing for MacWagCon (the studio honestly has probably never looked better). This week though we get to talk about theme and what brings us to games, finally getting Scott to play one of my all time favourite games, and a return to one of our favourite rotating segments. 
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This episode's segments:
00:00:00 - Intro
00:00:58 - What's Been on the Table
00:05:38 - Topic of the Week: What's In a Theme?
00:29:31 - Why Did It Take So Long To Play That: Aquatica
00:40:58 - Table / Shelf / Trade
01:02:05 - Rotating Segment: Visions of the Future
01:16:19 - Contact Info / Sponsors 
01:17:41 - Outro
--- Notes!
1) I know when talking about Skymines I could have said Moonbasa instead of Space Mombasa and frankly I'm as disappointed in myself as you are. 
2) Not sure what or why that weird metronomic popping is there for a few a bit around the 30:20 mark, but it appeared to be buried within the audio itself and I couldn't clear it out. Apologies! I'm still trying to get better at audio engineering!
3) It is ironic that we discussed theme for so long in the episode and then Faraway's gets discarded out of hand so fast when talking about it. The game was taught to me without using that theme and unforunately nothing in the gameplay reinforces it so I just kind of breezed past it.
---
You can email us at boardallthetimegaming@gmail.com.
We can be found at www.boardallthetime.com and on Facebook at Board All The Time. 
We're on BlueSky now and loving it! At this point it really feels like BlueSky is for board gaming, so definitely check us out on there at https://bsky.app/profile/boardallthetime.bsky.social
If you would like to check out Mark's Top 100 list, it can be found at: https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/347553/top-100-games-2024-edition
If you'd like to help support the show and assist with the hosting costs, you can do so with our Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/boardallthetime
Our Discord server, which is still in Beta, can be joined at https://discord.gg/VbRWEpc6
We'd like to thank our sponsors as well:
Robin's Nerd Supply: www.robinsnerdsupply.com
Eco Owl Press: www.ecoowlpress.com 
We'd also like to thank SoulProdMusic for the intro/outro music. 

Board All The Time LIVE: Top Ten Games That Need a New Edition

Hey BATT Family! We recorded this episode LIVE!!! at PopiCon 2025 on January 31. We're presenting it to you here largely unedited to just give you that live experience (and also have you see all the stuff that normally gets edited out!). We had a blast with this one and we're looking forward to our next time we get to do this. 
---
You can email us at boardallthetimegaming@gmail.com.
We can be found at www.boardallthetime.com and on Facebook at Board All The Time. 
We're on BlueSky now and loving it! At this point it really feels like BlueSky is for board gaming, so definitely check us out on there at https://bsky.app/profile/boardallthetime.bsky.social
If you would like to check out Mark's Top 100 list, it can be found at: https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/347553/top-100-games-2024-edition
If you'd like to help support the show and assist with the hosting costs, you can do so with our Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/boardallthetime
Our Discord server, which is still in Beta, can be joined at https://discord.gg/VbRWEpc6
We'd like to thank our sponsors as well:
Robin's Nerd Supply: www.robinsnerdsupply.com
Eco Owl Press: www.ecoowlpress.com 
We'd also like to thank SoulProdMusic for the intro/outro music. 

This or That: Wingspan vs Wyrmspan vs Finspan

Hey hey BATT Family! This week's episode is another episode of our This or That (or (in this case) the Other Thing) as we run down the three games of Stonemaier's Span series. We've been deliberating on two of the games for quite some time and now that we have Finspan in hand and have gotten to play it quite a bit, we felt it was finally time to break this down. We hope you enjoy this specific deep dive (pun unintended) into the three games!
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This episode's segments:
00:00:00 - Intro
00:01:45 - Game Overviews
00:03:36 - Theme
00:08:41 - Production
00:18:39 - Gameplay
00:26:54 - Teachability
00:29:22 - Replayability
00:29:55 - Expansions
00:35:33 - Solo Modes
00:38:00 - Final Thoughts / Pick
00:44:39 - Outro
--- Notes!
1) Our conversation is making the assumption you know the basic system of Wingspan as we don't go into specific detail of how to play any of the three in particular. We discuss their various differences but not how the games fully function.
2) All copies of the games we discussed were purchased by Mark and are his personal copies. This is not a sponsored set of reviews/comparisons in any way.
3) When choosing which game Mark would pick of the three during the Final Thoughts section, almost a minute of deliberation was cut as he couldn't choose. That's how close two of the games are for him. 
---
You can email us at boardallthetimegaming@gmail.com.
We can be found at www.boardallthetime.com and on Facebook at Board All The Time. 
We're on BlueSky now and loving it! At this point it really feels like BlueSky is for board gaming, so definitely check us out on there at https://bsky.app/profile/boardallthetime.bsky.social
If you would like to check out Mark's Top 100 list, it can be found at: https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/347553/top-100-games-2024-edition
If you'd like to help support the show and assist with the hosting costs, you can do so with our Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/boardallthetime
Our Discord server, which is still in Beta, can be joined at https://discord.gg/VbRWEpc6
We'd like to thank our sponsors as well:
Robin's Nerd Supply: www.robinsnerdsupply.com
Eco Owl Press: www.ecoowlpress.com 
We'd also like to thank SoulProdMusic for the intro/outro music. 

Board All The Time Episode 16

We're back! Episode 16 is a really fun conversation with Mark and Scott getting to talk about a surprising amount of ways to end games, geeking out entirely over a game that hasn't even hit crowdfunding yet, and starting in on series of games and the way they get out of hand sometimes. We hope you have a great time with this one - they were both focused in enough that there's really only one note of correction below. Who knew they could do such a thing?
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This episode's segments:
00:00:00 - Intro
00:01:01 - What's Been on the Table
00:08:13 - Topic of the Week: Game End Conditions
00:24:23 - Why Did I Play That: Azul Queen's Garden
00:34:27 - Table / Shelf / Trade
00:56:28 - Rotating Segment: Visions of the Future
01:03:05 - Contact Info / Sponsors 
01:04:28 - Outro
--- Notes!
1) In Mark's Vision of the Future, he said the game was from Nova Aetas Games and that's wrong (that's how ridiculously excited he was about it that he didn't even get that right). It is coming from Ludus Magnus Studios who developed the Nova Aetas world that Black Rose Wars and some of their other products are in. 
---
You can email us at boardallthetimegaming@gmail.com.
We can be found at www.boardallthetime.com and on Facebook at Board All The Time. 
We're on BlueSky now and loving it! At this point it really feels like BlueSky is for board gaming, so definitely check us out on there at https://bsky.app/profile/boardallthetime.bsky.social
If you would like to check out Mark's Top 100 list, it can be found at: https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/347553/top-100-games-2024-edition
If you'd like to help support the show and assist with the hosting costs, you can do so with our Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/boardallthetime
Our Discord server, which is still in Beta, can be joined at https://discord.gg/VbRWEpc6
We'd like to thank our sponsors as well:
Robin's Nerd Supply: www.robinsnerdsupply.com
Eco Owl Press: www.ecoowlpress.com 
We'd also like to thank SoulProdMusic for the intro/outro music. 

Reviews: Eila and Something Shiny

Welcome to another review from the BATT team. Eila and Something Shiny is a  narrative adventure scenario/campaign game designed by Jeffery CCH and published by NorthStar Games (though it's original printing was from ICE Makes). It was acquired as a Christmas gift and so this is not sponsored by the publisher. It should be noted that the entirety of the Final Thoughts section is going to heavily spoil the game, so please keep that in mind if you want to listen to the first half of the review. We do timestamp and call out when that spoiler territory will be crossed and give ample time to stop listening. 
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This review's segments:
00:00:00 - Intro 
00:02:30 - Gameplay
00:04:50 - Learning Curve
00:05:31 - Art and Theme
00:06:03 - Components
00:08:28 - Iconography and Font
00:10:02 - Ease of Teach
00:10:16 - Replayability
00:11:11 - Final Thoughts (00:11:37 for getting past the spoiler buffer)
00:22:16 - Outro
---
Links!
As stated, here are safe links to go read RubyQuest and NanQuest at. Please keep in mind that these become very adult and dark relatively quickly and I wouldn't recommend reading them around children or at work or on work devices. 
Ruby did come out first and I think is a better first read to get acquainted with the style but push comes to shove I actually think NanQuest is the superior of the two. 
RubyQuest: https://mozai.com/quests/RubyQuest/
NanQuest: https://mozai.com/quests/NanQuest/---
You can email us at boardallthetimegaming@gmail.com.
We can be found at www.boardallthetime.com and on Facebook at Board All The Time. 
We're on BlueSky now and loving it! At this point it really feels like BlueSky is for gaming, so definitely check us out on there! https://bsky.app/profile/boardallthetime.bsky.social
If you'd like to help support the show and assist with the hosting costs, you can do so with our Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/boardallthetime
Our Discord server, which is still in Beta, can be joined at https://discord.gg/VbRWEpc6
We'd like to thank our sponsors as well:
Robin's Nerd Supply: www.robinsnerdsupply.com
Eco Owl Press: www.ecoowlpress.com 
We'd also like to thank SoulProdMusic for the intro/outro music. 

Board All The Time Episode 15

So there was a flood. Things were lost and that's never any fun. We ended up losing the original episode 15 and so what should have been Episode 16 has now taken it's place. We recorded as Jason's place to test through all of our equipment and just to make sure we had some extra content recorded since we went through our backlog during the holiday season. Every once in a while you may hear an odd echo or Stark (Jason's dog) running around but I did my best to clean all that out in the expedited editing process to get this episode out. I cut over 90 minutes out of this and it still ended up being our longest episode yet. This week we talk the flood, Scott is finally forced to play Tech Tree: the Game, and Mark is overly concerned that he talked an enormous amount. Thanks to Jason for the space and just being on the pod again. It's great to have his voice to start out the year with us. 
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This episode's segments:
00:00:00 - The Flood Notes 
00:02:21 - Intro
00:03:51 - What's Been on the Table
00:15:39 - Topic of the Week: Games Replacing Other Games
00:33:27 - Why Did I Play That: Beyond the Sun
00:56:34 - Table / Shelf / Trade
01:34:40 - Rotating Segment: The Archives
01:42:40 - Contact Info / Sponsors 
01:44:02 - Outro
--- Notes!
1) There are a lot more ums and uhs in the audio this time around. Blame that on the excessively abbreviated editing period and wanting to get this out even remotely on time. If/when I need to come back in and remove the preamble about the flood and episode numbering, I'll probably end up cleaning those up too. (And frankly while those filler words don't make for the cleanest audio ever, it's the inhales that drive me up a wall much, much more.)
2) When talking about Weirdwood Manor I realized just how much Scott and I talk with our hands and that is just a terrible thing to translate to an audio medium.
3) We know its Sagitarius A*, we just didn't say the * part.
4) Scott would have been talking about the new 2023 version of Castles of Burgundy from Awaken Realms, not the 2019 reprint from Alea. 
5) If anybody has a spare box for Kingsburg (2nd ed preferably, but I don't really care at this point), please reach out! That was one of the games that was lost. 
 
---
You can email us at boardallthetimegaming@gmail.com.
We can be found at www.boardallthetime.com and on Facebook at Board All The Time. 
We're on BlueSky now and loving it! At this point it really feels like BlueSky is for board gaming, so definitely check us out on there at https://bsky.app/profile/boardallthetime.bsky.social
If you would like to check out Mark's Top 100 list, it can be found at: https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/347553/top-100-games-2024-edition
If you'd like to help support the show and assist with the hosting costs, you can do so with our Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/boardallthetime
Our Discord server, which is still in Beta, can be joined at https://discord.gg/VbRWEpc6
We'd like to thank our sponsors as well:
Robin's Nerd Supply: www.robinsnerdsupply.com
Eco Owl Press: www.ecoowlpress.com 
We'd also like to thank SoulProdMusic for the intro/outro music.