I'm going to be hosting a Talisman game at a local game convention, now in it's 3rd year: www.gottacon.com

The past couple of years I've been there with our local Lego club doing a minifig game similar to WarHammer but far more ridiculous. Due to a scheduling change I have a free night and jumped at the opportunity to host my favourite game!

I'd like to thank Jon New, as everyone here knows is from www.talismanisland.com , who is providing some wonderful prizes that just arrived today! Hopefully I won't win the game, I really don't try to but have been on a winning streak lately.... but 1st prize ( that isn't me ) will get a Sacred Pool Expansion kit! Second prize will get the Dungeon Expansion promotional cards: Instructor & Doppelganger! 3rd Prize will get a copy of the Toad King NPC cards! ( I have an extra copy so that's my contribution )

I'm pretty jazzed about this and have been getting everything together and ironed out the past couple of weeks. Over the next week or so I'll post what I've done with my Mephisto cards and the other game assets. One major addition that I have been putting together for some time is a numbered counter system for character and ending selection. The first hurdle was finding a cheap but aesthetic amount of counters that didn't cost me $50. Beads, buttons, chips were all just too much, and found that aquarium glass stones at a dollar store to be an excellent choice, the ones that have one flat side and an iridescent finish. I made a template in Photoshop of numbers all nice and Talismany, copied those to an Avery template in Word, printed them out on sticker sheets, cut those out and applied to the glass stones, affixed clear nail polish and done. They are all in a cloth bag and you pull the counters out figure out your characters, which I have matched up on a printed out list. I've tried a couple of games like this and it's worked wonderful!

I'll get into this more with photos later, but I was wondering if I could crowd source some veteran players here with advice you would give to first time players.

What are some strategy tips you would suggest? I've heard from Dam before, that if your Strength or Craft is 11 then make a run for COC. What would you suggest for attempting the Highlands or Dungeon? What are good character attributes to focus on: Strength, Craft, Gold, Life, Fate, etc. What are some foolish moves you shouldn't attempt? At least one of the people who will be playing hasn't played Talisman before, and I find that sometimes people get really worked up about the Inner Region and don't attempt it until they are quite powerful, and then realize they could have quite awhile before.

Wow, I asked on here once about sponsorship for a Talisman Tourney in Edmonton, but got nada in response.

Good for you for running a Talisman event. I am thinking of doing one this summer at another local convention.

This was from me personally, not FFG...

That was a pretty awesome gesture on you part I'd say then. Kudos to you! (genuine, no sarcasm)

The game went great, so fun to do an actual board game at this convention for once! The people who signed up for it were a couple of guys who hadn't played since the early 90's but were very excited and a friend of mine who had never played before.

*edit* in case the browser cuts the photos off, here they are on flickr if you want a better look:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/blobfarm/sets/72157625917823235/with/5443335316/

There was the Dark Cultist, Alchemist, Magician's Apprentice ( Mephisto character ), and the Prophetess ( played by myself ) in this game. I had already become toaded at the Warlock's Cave, hence the loot there, and the Alchemist was trying to retrieve his stuff after he was toaded, but you can see a Dragon was now on top of it.

It was a failed attempt and he respawned as the Necromancer. I made about 4 attempts at the Dragon, even trying to line up a DemiGod's spell to make it work.

While the Alchemist was a toad he tried to attack me and it was a standoff! Favour fortunes the bold...

The Dark Cultist had also been toaded at this point, and now there was even more loot in the Warlock's Cave. The Toad King was responsible for a couple of these, as well as a Toadify spell.

With a couple of lucky rolls I had swooped up all the toad loot, and killed the dragon to boot. I was easily the guy to beat. The Necromancer summoned me to an Arena and actually managed to beat me, Psychic combat, and took my Colossus. I warned them that I was the guy to beat if someone else wanted to win the game.

The Necromancer made a run through the Dungeon. All of the monsters from the discard pile were put back into play, stacking the decks heavily. The Necromancer went through the Dungeon and luckily started pulling mostly Spirits, and enthralled all of them for one pivotal battle with the Lord of Darkness.



Using a host of enthralled Spirits, the Necromancer beat the Lord of Darkness by just over 8, shooting him to the Crown of Command. Little did he know ( but I did, being the Prophetess ), that the Dark Cultist could have reduced his attack roll to a 1, but it had to be before combat and he waited too long. The ending was Judgment Day, with myself and the Magician's Apprentice putting dark Fate tokens and the Necromancer and Dark Cultist putting Light tokens down, making the odds 50/50. Necromancer rolled a 5 so him and the Dark Cultist, who had the same alignment, won!

Richard Stern won 1st place with some boldly played moves and got the Sacred Pool expansion pack! Rob Sorenson got second place, the Dungeon expansion promotional only cards. Michael O'Neill got 3rd place with some Toad King NPC cards, although he didn't spend nearly as much of the game as a toad as Rob did. It was an epic game with everyone spending time as a toad, at least once!

Thanks again to Jon, that really was the best to be able to award prizes, and sure amped the game up. I told them from the beginning, I'm not in this to win but I *will* be ruthless, and had them scampering around the board for a lot of the game to get away from me, except for the winner who attacked me twice! It was a great ending, and helped Richard lock the win.

Nice game report! Looks like they all had fun anyway which is the main thing.

Good to see the Ice Queen on the table too...