In the first play test of AG I truly felt the crunch of realism as my poor sharpshooter took a pounding in the second game and never really recovered for the duration of the campaign. Despite his weakened condition he was still able to adventure, I simply had to think carefully and act intelligently… his spectacular death during the finale was not unexpected. The very nature of what we were trying to achieve by this point really meant that the character had to take part, so it was that he found himself as the gunner aboard an ornithimotive. The character eventually passed out in the dogfighting over parliament and broke his neck when the ornithimotive crash landed in the Thames (as a result of an explosion that also achieved victory for the party [The character piloting the aircraft survived]).

The second play test I was involved with was a one-off ‘horror’ game involving cannibals and a near-deserted town, two male PCs, three female and all lured into a trap. I was the amazing star of the game, in some ways because the character had no useless skills and just seemed to excel when things got dangerous. Though the other male PC got eaten it was a brilliant escape for the rest of the party. My character ended up carrying one of the ladies with the cannibals at their heels, helping the women mount the horses and then ensuring they escaped as the first cannibals caught up with them. He turned to face the cannibal hoard, ready to fight and die so the others could live. It was then however that he did something they did not expect… he survived.

The GM thought it was going to be a very heroic end to things, with the ladies seeing my character torn down in a chivalrous last stand as they rode away to safety. The survival was STILL amazingly heroic it just lacked that cinematic quality as the ladies rode off into the sunset. It has to be noted that it must have earned the character a lot of brownie points with the three ladies

The tension was brilliant! I was having to fight and run, sometimes ducking/twisting/rolling and generally striving for survival against a scary number of cannibals. Every time my character fell or slipped there would be a gasp from the other players and then my character would manage to fight clear and keep running. It became apparent that I was getting more and more of a lead on the majority of the pursuers until there were very few with any chance of catching me. A punch here, a punch there and a final burst of speed after, easy!

When all is said and done, Anno Geometrica is very easy to play and should mean you can spend more time enjoying a good adventure than losing an hour or two to clunky game mechanics. I have to say I’ve greatly enjoyed play testing the expansions just as much if not more…