AustinTranslation

CHADES CHALLENGE XL:
ABJECT COLOSTOMY BAGS

Easily the most disgusting Chades Challenge to date. I thought a Christmas spin on the subject would up the appeal a bit. I was wrong.

My second attempt was a full embrace of the potty-humor.

If you have any colostomy designs, let me know and I'll post them below. Or you can join me December 17th for the new challenge, in honor of NASA's latest discovery, CHADES CHALLENGE XLI: ARSENIC MONSTERS.

Meanwhile, in the gaming world...

The Dandies (my gaming group, derived from "dnd" to "dandy") tried out a new game last night that we can all heartily recommend. The game is called Cosmic Encounter, and comes from the 1970's. Apparently there've been dozens of editions released throughout the ages. Every player is assigned an alien race who starts with five worlds. Here's Chris with his foppish feline race, the Traders.

The goal is to colonize five of your opponents' worlds (the more players, the more worlds in the game universe), and the first to five colonies wins. With 75+ races, each with different abilities, every game is guaranteed to be a different experience. Races can ally with an alien invader (victorious defenders get to build colonies), or ally with the native defenders (victorious defenders may regenerate previously defeated warships).

My race was the Spiff, whose ability was to crash land one invading ship in the event of a severe loss, to insure colonization. I loved the race for it's obvious homage to Calvin and Hobbes, and loved even more that I won the game without a single colonization on my home worlds. The moment called for an extra nerdy photo-op.

So for all you nerds who love strategy board games like Risk or Dominion, Cosmic Encounter would make a great addition to your Christmas List. But don't take my word for it, check out this review by fervent Scottish nerd Robert Florence.

22 days...