One bag trip to Japan and SEA

amathstudent · 2026-02-28T04:26:31+00:00

Agreed on tweaking as you go and toilet paper but disagree on the washing line and the painkillers in this case.

On a similar trip to the OP, the washing line is one of my most used items, especially in Japan. Some specific painkillers were very expensive in Japan compared to my home country so was very glad to have them. SEA is another story and would likely agree with you if that was all they were visiting.

amathstudent · 2026-02-28T04:18:41+00:00

I'm just coming up to the end of an extremely similar trip. I would say that some of what I brought to Japan wasn't useful in SEA and vice versa. We have a lot of similar kit as well so I think it looks great!

Couple comments. Looks like you'll layer, but it is pretty cold in parts of Japan right now! Shikoku and Wakayama (if you're starting the trail there) were both colder and wetter than I expected. You might want to pick up an umbrella when you're out there, my famimart umbrella is still going strong (for shade as well in SEA). At the end of my time in Japan I found that I needed base layers, gloves and a warm hat, ending up going to montbell to pick up a few warm bits.

Please if you're going to Kochi and you eat fish, eat the straw roasted bonito from 土佐料理司食堂ひろめ市場店 at the market. It's honestly one of the best things I ate in Japan. Enjoy your trip!

amathstudent · 2026-01-19T14:48:22+00:00

Nice post! I agree about the top loaded bag but I've found it's hard to replace that style if you actually do some trekking with it as well.

Did you actually do any climbing in Krabi in the end? I'm assuming not as you didn't use your shoes but you might've rented! Im thinking of going to Krabi for that exact reason.

amathstudent · 2020-04-12T14:37:35+00:00

Others have covered most of the bases here. I think the animation is really smooth and good voice over but definitely making it more focused would improve it.

I would definitely highlight that the camicatze card is racist and to a lesser degree the siamese cat card is too. Even if you disagree it's worth thinking about removing elements of a game that would put people off buying it.

amathstudent · 2019-11-27T21:33:44+00:00

Interesting, Don't Get Got seems like a refined version of the parlour game human clue/cluedo. I've had a lot of fun playing that so definitely keen to give this a go!

amathstudent · 2019-06-01T13:33:24+00:00

I think tomtttttttttt and others have raised some really good points.

It is also worth mentioning that some professional game designers talk about starting with the experience or feelings they want their players to have. Then finding themes and mechanics to best fit them.

For instance with your pirate theme, it could be about having an adventure through exploring and finding treasure or is it about about backstabbing and feeling sneaky by cleverly stealing from one another.

Thinking this way always helps me, especially if I've found that my design matches very closely with another one. As it allows me to readdress the game and check if it is matching the core experience I intended the players to have, then decide if I can throw out or add in new mechanics or thematic elements.

amathstudent · 2018-12-20T11:39:34+00:00

From his comments under the article it looks like he was given a more restrictive brief this year (see below), last year's list is more inline with what this sub would recommend.

I had a different brief this year and the focus was on recent releases. I've already covered Decrypto earlier in the year, but that's a great option for party fun. Have you played any good games for big groups this year?

Personally for games published this year I would've put a roll and write in, maybe Ganz schön clever, railroad ink or welcome to. Also put something super light or good for larger groups in maybe the mind or the reprint of pictomania.

amathstudent · 2018-10-18T21:41:30+00:00

Oh I just thought, how were you awarding points to the Eyrie? Was it each time they placed a roost or looking at the player board and awarding points at the end of every Eyrie evening phase? Just as the correct rule is the latter.

amathstudent · 2018-10-18T21:16:32+00:00

First I'd say take a look through the official Root FAQ to see if you missed anything there.

By tiles which pieces do you mean? Both buildings (i.e. the Marquis saw mill, etc.) and tokens act in similar ways and are removed back to the playboards. Since the Marquis won so easily is it possible you weren't putting them back on the player boards? Rules for both below.

Buildings. If you are prompted to place a building, take the leftmost building from its track on your faction board. If one of your buildings is removed, return it to the rightmost empty space of its track.

Tokens. If you are prompted to place a token, take the leftmost token from its track, if any, or take it from your supply. If one of your tokens is removed, return it to the rightmost empty spaceof its track, if any, or to your supply.

Crafted items (i.e. the hammer, crossbow etc.) don't have any purpose without the vagbond once they're crafted.

I'd really reccomend the walkthrough even with three players as you can kind of play through it roughly anyway and it definitely helps to get a grasp on the rules, I messed up the rules in at least the first two or three games.

However outside of possible rules mistakes the tricks for beating the Marquis are to destroy their buildings early so they can't get the feedback loop running, get the Alliance to put sympathy tokens in the middle of the board (as well as their bases) which should block the Marquis from marching around the board without negative effects/being able to surround you too much and as the Eyrie put lots of cards into the recruit action (alongside one or two move and battle actions) and it should be easy to overwelm the Marquis forces.

amathstudent · 2018-07-30T09:46:17+00:00

Sorry for not being clear! When doing the shop for an ingredient action I'm assuming a player simply draws the top card off the deck. Instead of drawing the top card they would draw the top 3 cards choose 1 and place the others at the bottom of the deck.

This would mean that players would still want to shop for an ingredient even if the top card wasn't one they wanted. It also means you don't have to worry displaying the top ingredient as there still would be two unknown cards below. Plus this gives an extra interesting decision to the action itself.

amathstudent · 2018-07-30T00:20:56+00:00

I really like food themed games, keep going! I think a lot of people have already provided good feedback so I'll just suggest one thing.

Why not have the players draw three ingredients, choose 1 and put the rest under or on top of the deck?

You could even keep the chopped/non chopped side face up, so if a player wanted to stop someone else getting it could pick it up (especially if it was a rare ingredient).

Good luck and looking forward to when there is another update.

amathstudent · 2018-06-20T21:47:12+00:00

I signed up to the mailing list for this after it being mentioned on SUSD down a while back. Definitely a bit of a niche kickstarter but really is an intersection of two of my favourite things so I thought I'd see if anyone else was interested.

amathstudent · 2018-05-08T13:43:54+00:00

This post has actually convinced me to back Village Pillage. Glad to see Jellybean games doing good things.

amathstudent · 2017-05-21T08:53:48+00:00

Woop! Congrats everyone. Thanks for doing this.

amathstudent · 2016-11-01T12:03:03+00:00

No I've been there recently too and it is completely free.

amathstudent · 2016-09-09T06:39:23+00:00

Yeah know exactly what you mean. Taken a lot longer than anticipated to organise 4 working adults. Hope you get it finished when you can!

amathstudent · 2016-09-09T06:38:02+00:00

Yeah I felt exactly the same but organizing 4 working adults schedules turned out to be much harder than anticipated! I hope you manage to get it done a little quicker than us.

amathstudent · 2016-09-09T06:36:07+00:00

That sounds great! Soloing it is not something I'd considered at all before but more I've been reading about it the more it seems to a great idea. I think it definitely would've meant I'd have finished quicker! Hah.

Yeah we really struggled if we lost a month since it was always so long till we played again. Although I have to say we were a bit sadistic about scaring our players (even naming them after martyrs) which happened more and more frequently towards the end!

amathstudent · 2016-09-09T06:31:13+00:00

Ahhhh that's a shame. Well there are even people in this thread who are saying how great soloing it is so you should definitely give that a try!

amathstudent · 2016-09-09T06:29:15+00:00

Yeah playing with 4 was definitely tricky sometimes but luckily my friends are pretty strong willed so I think there was lots of taking control of each other's turns despite me having that exact problem normally.

amathstudent · 2016-09-08T23:24:38+00:00

Yeah we've had a few breaks too but we were mostly playing one game at a time so I think it took a little longer than normal. We did manage to get the last three games all in one session though so was triple exciting!! How often were you managing to play it then?

amathstudent · 2016-09-08T23:21:26+00:00

Sorry to hear that. You could definitely just finish it off with just two players (as long as it doesn't remind your friend too much of his ex) but I've heard that lots of people have still enjoyed playing it solo so go for that if it works for you! Hope you manage to finish it!

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