Geeking With the Wife – Episode 1: The Couch

“If you kill my ninja, you’re sleeping on the couch.”

* * *

Kate’s in a bad mood. No, that’s not quite accurate. She’s in a feisty mood. The day has been decent enough – it’s a Saturday, and we slept in, ran a number of errands, took the dogs for a walk, cleaned up the house – but something intangible just has her dander up, and she’s looking for a fight. Luckily for us, our fights never occur as shouting matches or cruel words. We do, however, meet on various fields of battle.

On a shelf in our back room sit a little over a dozen card and board games. Some are meant for parties or at least work best in groups of three or more: Apples to Apples (which I used in my Introduction to Composition class on Friday as both an icebreaker for my students and an introduction to argumentation – they were to write down the best arguments for or against certain cards, and in a few weeks we’ll categorize them as logical, ethical, or emotional), Munchkin (with two expansions), Ingenious, Citadels, a double-sized Scrabble board that my dad made. Some are just for the two of us: Guillotine (which is far more tactical with only two players), Bohnanza, Lost Cities, Fairy Tale, Settlers of Catan: the Card Game. But up in the loft at the front of the house are three boxes filled with the stuff kids’ dreams are made of – train-swinging apes and flying saucers and metamorphosing dinosaurs and swift ninjas. This is a two player game quite unlike our others, far more complex, far more visceral. This is Monsterpocalypse.

* * *

“How many dice does this mean again?”

* * *

We haven’t played in a while, so the rules aren’t fresh in Kate’s mind. Now be aware, this woman has her PhD in chemistry and is slated to start work as an assistant professor this coming Fall. Math, rules, formulas – all come fairly naturally to her. Once she gets the hang of a system she’ll strategize with the best of them. But again, she’s feeling feisty, and the system is a bit complex, so the task of setting up the game falls to me.

This isn’t a bad idea. I’ve made some, ahem, acquisitions since we last played, and both our forces are a little more complicated thanks to expansions that increased the scope of the game. When I first got into Monsterpocalypse, I’d bought into all six available factions – essentially themed teams of giant monsters and their smaller allies, called units – figuring that after playing with each we would decide upon our favorites and build from there. She immediately took a shine to the Shadow Sun Syndicate, the Ultraman faction, consisting of fast units and a powerful yet agile lead monster called Zor-Maxim. I was enamored with the Terrasaurs, the dinosaur/Godzilla faction, with (ironically?) long-distance blasters and ground-pounding behemoths like Armodax for monsters. Now that we’ve basically settled on these areas, I’m looking to sell off some of the others and make a few purchases that will augment our current forces.

I set up the city with a variety of buildings useful to each of us – skyscrapers and Sun Industries buildings for Kate, Mt. Terras and low-defense apartments for me – but I’m not too careful about placement. I’m looking for a balance between strategy and aesthetics, so there is more variety than is strategically necessary. She chooses her own units with a bit of guidance, needing reminders as to what various symbols indicate. I select a combination of Terrasaur and Empire of the Apes (an allied faction) units, looking to disrupt her strategy, but not too soon.

* * *

“You can do what? I think you’re making some of this up as you go.”

* * *

The most basic idea behind Monsterpocalypse is to use a combination of your monster (which has two forms – a weaker Alpha and a stronger Hyper) and its supporting units to destroy your opponent’s monster. In the process, you alternately control and topple a city full of miniature buildings ranging from apartment complexes to sports arenas to the Statue of Liberty.

There’s actually a 60-odd-page rulebook that makes this half-boardgame-half-miniatures-wargame. There are different types of attacks – close range brawls, long range blasts, and powerful (wait for it) power attacks. The monsters and units also have special abilities that might let them shoot farther, or use extra dice (at the heart of the game is dice management), or make special movements on the board. It’s this plethora of abilities that becomes hard to keep track of, though I’ve spent enough time looking at the rulebook and visiting the game’s official message boards that I recall most of the pertinent ones.

We start our game in a pretty typical manner. Each of us secures a power base – a set of buildings that grant us bonuses in the form of extra dice and extra abilities so long as we have several units surrounding said buildings. Then our monsters, Zor-Maxim and Armodax, begin working their ways towards the center of the map, destroying other buildings as they go. These initial turns are slow-going as we remember how to play the game, but within a couple of turns, Kate’s got the hang of attacking down well enough to launch an assault on my power base.

She brings in a couple of Katanas (think hovercraft with lasers) and fires full blast at a Bellower (think dinosaur that can yell so loudly the sonic waves destroy whatever’s in their path). If this attack hits, she’ll cause a chain reaction that will likely decimate my forces. Luckily for me, the dice are not with her. Because of the nature of the game, however, my units don’t get to retaliate yet. There’s an alternation between monster and unit turns. My dice are over on my monster’s side of the board, meaning I can only act with my monster. I get Armodax up to full speed and rampage him through her power base, taking out a Shadow Gate and knocking down her primary skyscraper. Now it’s her monster’s turn, and she asks for advice on how best to proceed.

* * *

Just recall for a moment that initial quote about killing her ninja and sleeping on the couch. Then go over here and read Zach Bunn’s post about winning, and how winning is defined in different ways. After nearly seven years of marriage you realize that winning is not always about victory at the game. Players talk about the meta game, the local factors that affect playstyle. Here’s my local factor – I want to sleep in my bed tonight.

* * *

I point out to her that she can move Zor-Maxim up and stomp three of my units and two buildings. That’ll crush my power base and bring her power dice to their maximum. She’s already got ten out of ten power dice available to her monster, having taken early control of the Imperial State Building (apparently Privateer Press couldn’t get the rights to the real name). She squeals, just a little bit, realizing that this will be the first truly destructive move we’ve made in the game. She counts out the dice, weighing the odds, then decides that it would be more fun to require both hands to throw the dice. She doesn’t quite throw all of them, but there are so many dice on the board that it takes us a good twenty seconds to count them. Needless to say, she makes her roll.

* * *

“So what’s happening with the instrument?” I’m asking about a difficult piece of equipment in her lab at the University of New Hampshire.

“We have two pumps that don’t work. No, three pumps. No, two pumps plus the one that just broke… It’s the Spanish Inquisition.”

* * *

Small talk about the workweek turns into Monty Python references which turn into brief philosophical discussions which turn abruptly into trash talking. She forcefully suggests that my masculinity is inadequate to take on her ninja skills. She demonstrates said ninja skills. One of our dogs, previously asleep on the recliner behind Kate, bolts awake. I consider the hypocrisy in one trash talking while being coached by one’s opponent. I consider, and I continue to get my butt handed to me, increasingly without any guidance.

I’m holding back a little. I play Monsterpocalypse online from time to time. I visit Team Covenant and take part in its puzzles, contests, and advice columns. I am, in so many words, more familiar with the game than Kate is. What I’m starting to realize, though, is that I’m not necessarily better than she is. Our monsters have just met for the first time. I made a poor move and opened  myself up to a power attack, a bodyslam into one of my own buildings. I return the favor, and for a couple of turns we’re just slugging it out in the middle of the map. There’s no holds barred, no strategy, just two adults with advanced degrees making a miniature giant ninja and a miniature giant dinosaur pick each other up and, with the appropriate sound effects, beat the crap out of each other.

By her next unit turn, Kate is making advanced plans, thinking a turn or two ahead in her movement, lining up figures to prevent my future attacks. She’s controlling space on the board, grabbing power points now that all but three buildings were destroyed, combining attacks with her Katanas to gain further power dice by taking out my own units. I’m pretty far behind in the damage race, gaining only moral victory as I Command an Airborne Ape clear across the map to prevent her from using the Imperial State Building. I probably could have done that on the first turn, but again, see above re: couch.

The move that most impresses me is one that ultimately doesn’t happen. She needs to clear that Airborne Ape away from the Imperial State Building and surround the building with units to prevent me from doing the same thing over again. Here’s the catch, though. There’s an order to events in Monsterpocalypse. First you put down new units, then you move them, then you attack with them. That means she can’t blow away my ape and then move someone into the available space. But wait, she realizes that she has access to a special ability called Teleport that will allow her to attack, then instantly move a figure into the space even if it’s not the movement phase anymore. She sets up her pieces in an intricate layout…only to realize that I’d be able to get through anyway. She settles for pushing her offense to the max and, once again, destroys four of my units in one quick go, earning her most of the power dice she would have gotten from securing the Imperial State Building anyway.

* * *

I’m not going to tell you how this game ends. Suffice to say Armodax was literally hiding in a corner by the end of it all. What’s a bit more important is that you’ve learned a little bit about Kate and me, how we interact, how we play, how we learn. Monsterpocalypse is a game that involves management of dice, development of strategy, lots of cool miniatures, but it also involves people. In future weeks, we’d like to give you some insight not just into a game, but the way two people (and their dogs, for that matter) interact around it.

* * *

As we’re getting ready for bed, we discuss the game. She reiterates that she had a lot of fun, it’s just that there’s so much that can be done, the turns take so long. To make her feel better, I bring up the Masters Tournament at GenCon. I note that even the eventual winner of the whole thing was nearly stymied by his very first turn in that last round.

“I love you,” she says. “I will support you in anything you ever do. And if you ever want to play in Monsterpocalypse tournaments, I will support you. But I’ll also get to tease you mercilessly.”

I’m sleeping in my own bed tonight.