Board games!

[Werthead]

9 hours ago, Risto said:

I bought GoT Board Game Second Edition and we have been trying to figure out all the rules... Not that we tried very hard, but it was a tiny bit complicated  So, we bought a poker set and now we play poker.

I am interested in more fantasy-inspired games. I heard there might be a Mistborn board game coming out and I would like to have a deck of cards from Zelazny's The Chronicles of Amber.

Never thought of asking, but has cyvasse ever been made? 

Not an official version, but fan-made ideas are out there.

[Fez]

Boardgames are the best!

19 hours ago, Werthead said:

Another friend has Arkham Horror and we've played that twice. It can be a fun game but it's very over-engineered (as in it has 15 separate decks of card and so many tokens it's absurd, and you need about four tables to put it on) and has waaaay too much stuff and complexity for what is, when you boil it down, a pretty simple game.

Similar to that, but better, is Eldritch Horror. It also has a huge number of cards and tokens, but the game at least makes pretty good use of them, and has more depth than Arkham does.

When I'm in a competitive mood, I like Powergrid quite a lot. Only downside is that it the instructions have apparently one of the worst translations from German that I've ever seen; ever single time my friends and I play it, we realize there was yet another rule that we were misunderstanding or not following. Fortunately, its still a lot of fun even if we aren't quite following the exact intended rules.

I've had a lot of fun with a lot of the other games mentioned here; except Cards Against Humanity. So tired of that.

Another fun competitive game is Carcassone. And I still enjoy Settlers of Catan, even though its a bit dated and too reliant on dice rolls.

[HokieStone]

16 hours ago, Durckad said:

Interesting idea. Not sure I like the idea of dynamically and permanently altering a board game in such a way, I would have to see it play out first. I could see it being either horribly annoying or really, really cool.

Well, you can't really see it "play out first"...you'll be spoiled to everything happening.  Yes...spoilers...in a board game.  Besides permanently changing the game, there's an actual storyline going on in Pandemic:Legacy, which unfolds over the course of multiple plays.  Knowing the story ahead of time would likely change how you play in the early games. 

I've played one game of Rob Daviau's follow-up, Seafall.  Not much to report so far, as it was an "introductory" game, playing without all the rules.  The interesting thing is that this is the first Legacy game to not start with an already existing game.  It debuted with much hype, but the reviews have been mixed so far.

On to other games...one I've not seen mentioned here yet is "Lords of Waterdeep" by - a great mid-level worker placement game.  The base game itself is really good, but if you add the expansion - "Scoundrels of Skullport", it really makes it great.  Worker placement tends to be my favorite genre.  The heavyweight king of that is probably "Agricola" by - and although I like it very much, it can be a little brutal, having to keep your family fed.  If you like the style of Agricola, but want something that's a bit more forgiving - and has a theme that's a million times better than 17th century farming, I highly recommend "Brew Crafters" by designer Ben Rosset, published by Dice Hate Me games.  In this game, you are running your own micro-brewery.  Great fun, but still lots of hard decisions.  And the granddaddy of worker placements - Caylus - still shines.  "Caverna" is the sort-of sequel to Agricola, from designer Uwe Rosenberg - very similar mechanics to Agricola, but a bit more forgiving...and it's about dwarves settling their cave system.

Another game worth mentioning is "Power Grid" - about building electrical networks across the country (which country? - there are many many, if you get all the expansions, but the base game comes with a reversible board - Germany on one side, the U.S. on the other).  Two mechanics make Power Grid stand out - the auctioning of the power plants, the supply/demand of the resource market.  There is a lesson on economics hidden in here.

I've seen a few folks mention the "Game of Thrones" board game.  There are several games with the Game of Thrones license - this one is licensed from the books.  Holding up to 6 players, this is the modern day "Diplomacy" - there's a chance of ending friendships.  The rules aren't really as bad as they seem during the first read-through of the rulebook.  This game really captures the spirit of the books - it's all about the power struggles of the great houses of Westeros - Stark, Lannister, Baratheon, Greyjoy, Martell and Tyrells.  None of the "fantasy" elements are present.  In order to win, you're going to have to make alliances with other players...but those alliances will need to be broken at some point.  Great fun...but set aside 4+ hours, especially if you have 6 players.

Lastly...at the risk of self promotion, my first published board game will be coming out this fall (I hope).  Published by Rio Grande Games, my game is called "Santa's Workshop".  It's a worker placement where your workers are Santa's elves, and you send them around collecting to get materials to build gifts, and do things like feed the reindeer.  I set out to make a game that would be fairly entry-level, for families with kids - but also of interest to gamers.  My kids were 7 and 9 when started on it...it's now 3 years later.  In any case, the journey to getting it published has been quite an adventure so far, I'm happy to to talk a little about the "behind the scenes" stuff if there is any interest.

 

[KiDisaster]

19 hours ago, polishgenius said:

Me and my sister keep buying board games for each other as presents but since I live in Berlin and she lives in London, and neither of us really knows anyone else where we live who we can persuade into playing them. So far we've got Red Dragon Inn, which we did manage to get a couple of games in and it's alright but simple, seems more of an icebreaker kind of game, plus 7 Wonders, which we didn't have time to actually play before I had to leave. Plus something else I can't remember but we also didn't play...

Living in Berlin & London there must be tons of board game groups around. I've used meetup.com to go to a few and I live in Nowhere, Florida. Granted Florida does seem to have a weirdly high population of board game related people. The Dice Tower and several other reviewers are here. Maybe it's cause there's nothing else to do here  

---

I actually have a copy of Gloomhaven from the Kickstarter that I have yet to get played. It's just so damn large. My friends and I used to play D&D but couldn't seem to keep a regular group together so it kinda fell apart, I thought Gloomhaven could be a good replacement. Also because none of us are any good at DMing really and with this you don't need one. Haven't had a chance to try it yet though. 

I used to enjoy Cards Against Humanity but it just bores me to tears now. I still have my copy with most of the expansions in the closet somewhere. It can be worth pulling out once in a blue moon if you have people in the group who've never played it before. But there are way better party games that actually require a bit more thought to be funny. Rather than "Haha, I have played the most ridiculous card." I like The Metagame in particular for similar games. But we tend toward hidden role stuff when we have a larger group these days. Secret Hitler mostly, it basically killed The Resistance for us. 

[polishgenius]

Just now, KiDisaster said:

Living in Berlin & London there must be tons of board game groups around. I've used meetup.com to go to a few and I live in Nowhere, Florida. Granted Florida does seem to have a weirdly high population of board game related people. The Dice Tower and several other reviewers are here. Maybe it's cause there's nothing else to do here

Probably, tbh I've never even thought of looking. Maybe I should, I'm not hugely good at finding and starting that kind of thing (lingering social anxieties) but since I'm here for the long run...

Bit different for my sister, who really doesn't have the spare time to be hunting gamegroups as a midwifery student.  

[DaveSumm]

On 08/04/2017 at 4:47 PM, Werthead said:

I'm also keen to try Pandemic (and ultimately the Legacy edition), but I'll have to get that myself as no-one in my group has it.

I recommend the app, that's what I did to get good at Pandemic before buying Legacy. And I would recommend getting good at it, or you'll end up losing your first few months and possibly doing irreparable damage to the board. Or of course, you could just play regular Pandemic on the Legacy board. The app has a great tutorial though.

On 08/04/2017 at 6:33 PM, Werthead said:

I have the GoT board game, the original edition with the ACoK expansion, but we've never quite nailed playing it for some reason in a dozen years and several attempts. I believe the new edition is a lot better in how it sets out the rules and ideas, but I'm reluctant to stump out more money for a game I effectively already own.

The second edition basically adds in the sixth player that you already have with the CoK expansion, and simplifies the rules a little. As far as I can tell nothing from the aSoS expansion made the cut. But, there is a huge problem with the second edition: because it adds Martell to the board permanently, they had to rethink the 4 and 5 player set ups, and they're awful. 4 player particularly is flat out broken, I've seen Baratheon win just by invading the neutral forces in the south and never once going into combat with an actual player. The most common solution is to print out overlays that resemble the first edition......which you already have. So I definitely wouldn't bother with the second edition, unless maybe you're only ever playing 6 player.

I was really excited by Chronicles 1: Origins, which combines a Legacy game with a new system called 'Echo', which provides continuity between different board games. But it seems to have been put on hold indefinitely, I haven't seen any info in a while. Basically (and this may be out of date info or possibly partially made up to fill in gaps by myself), you play a board game in which each player is striving to become the leader of a Stone Age tribe. Each time you play, you play with a different tribe and give this tribe different characteristics and territories and resources. After 8 Legacy games, the 6 most successful tribes are transferred via the Echo system to the next board game; the Bronze Age. You then play a whole new Legacy campaign with cities that have evolved from the tribes that you created. So the whole thing forms a giant alternate history which, if successful, would work its way through 5 planned games (I think). Whether they all have two games in each box I don't know. Sounds exciting, though to be honest I have no idea how the actual mechanics work in any of the games. Cool concept though.

[KiDisaster]

We tried the GoT board game (2nd ed.) a couple of times and it never quite clicked for us for some reason. Probably didn't help that one of our group was already quite drunk and kept trying to play the collect money (or whatever it's called) action on water spaces, no matter how many times we told him he couldn't do that  

[DaveSumm]

2 hours ago, KiDisaster said:

We tried the GoT board game (2nd ed.) a couple of times and it never quite clicked for us for some reason. Probably didn't help that one of our group was already quite drunk and kept trying to play the collect money (or whatever it's called) action on water spaces, no matter how many times we told him he couldn't do that  

I forgot how into it I used to be......I made this for just such people:

http://s13.postimg.org/96yyhzhg7/image.png

[Denvek]

5 hours ago, DaveSumm said:

I recommend the app, that's what I did to get good at Pandemic before buying Legacy. And I would recommend getting good at it, or you'll end up losing your first few months and possibly doing irreparable damage to the board. Or of course, you could just play regular Pandemic on the Legacy board. The app has a great tutorial though.

Please note that the Legacy board is not the same as the normal board, even before any of the Legacy stuff happens. There are some routes the normal board doesn't have, including a second route out of Santiago.

[RedEyedGhost]

A Kickstarter popped up today that I'm really excited about - Get Off My Land!  It's got area control, area management, hand management, resource management... basically a lot of gameplay in it.  I love the tightness of the game, and the thought you have to put into the fence placement as demonstrated in their gameplay video on that page.  It also looks like it will scale extremely well for all player counts.  They have an earlybird discount today if anybody else is interested.

[Guy Kilmore]

On 4/9/2017 at 7:49 AM, Fez said:

Boardgames are the best!

Similar to that, but better, is Eldritch Horror. It also has a huge number of cards and tokens, but the game at least makes pretty good use of them, and has more depth than Arkham does.

Eldritch Horror is an upgrade over Arkham.  It made things a little more fun, so even if you die, it is still interesting.  The little stuff gets used more and there is more team work with abilities and strategies.  I highly recommend it over Arkham.

 

If any of you end up in the Twin Cities, Fantasy Flight's Headquarters is located here (Specifically in Roseville), and they have a great Game Center attached to their building that you can go, grab food, beverage, get a good size table and play boardgames.  They have a huge wall with just free ones to grab of all stripes.  (Not just Fantasy Flight ones).  It is really clean and comfortable, my wife and I will frequently meet friends there to play something

If you like team games and can fork over the cash, Fortune and Glory can be a ton of fun.  It has three methods of play, competitive, cooperative and competitive/cooperative.  Basically it takes place in the 40s and you are treasure hunters trying to make your Fortune.  In competitive, it is just who is the person who can get the most treasure.  In the cooperative, you, as a group, are trying to acquire treasure before the Nazis, Mob, or the Secret Cult can.  In the Cooperative/Competitive, you are trying to get the most treasures, but you are also racing against the Nazis, Mob, or the Secret Cult.  (Basically if Bad Guys get the most treasure, everyone loses, so you are sometimes forced to work together sometimest.)  It has an Indiana Jones feel, especially if you play against the Nazis.

[Lightning Lord]

7 hours ago, Guy Kilmore said:

 

If any of you end up in the Twin Cities, Fantasy Flight's Headquarters is located here (Specifically in Roseville), and they have a great Game Center attached to their building that you can go, grab food, beverage, get a good size table and play boardgames.  They have a huge wall with just free ones to grab of all stripes.  (Not just Fantasy Flight ones).  It is really clean and comfortable, my wife and I will frequently meet friends there to play something

I went there on my visit last year and gamed for a few hours.  It's a great place to chat about games, try some new ones, and just unwind.  And they have Surly on tap 

[Guy Kilmore]

17 hours ago, Lightning Lord said:

I went there on my visit last year and gamed for a few hours.  It's a great place to chat about games, try some new ones, and just unwind.  And they have Surly on tap 

In the summer they sometimes have deserts so great place to stop after dinner too!

[Swordfish]

Second to Carcassonne. Valeria also good. Tiny Epic Kingdoms is fun.

We play a fair amount of Pandemic Iberia, but have not yet played Legacy.  Sounds intriguing.

We also play a lot of Jaipur when it's just the two of us.

 

[Clueless Northman]

On ‎08‎.‎04‎.‎2017 at 7:33 PM, Werthead said:

Another friend has Arkham Horror and we've played that twice. It can be a fun game but it's very over-engineered (as in it has 15 separate decks of card and so many tokens it's absurd, and you need about four tables to put it on) and has waaaay too much stuff and complexity for what is, when you boil it down, a pretty simple game.

That's horribly difficult when it's your first game. You get destroyed, that's something to experience once in your life

Love Letter is indeed a good short fast game.

I absolutely love Bang! as a fun party game.

I like a lot Betrayal at House on the Hill, considering there are tens of possible scenarios.

Obviously, played my fair share of GOT board game, specially 1st version. Actually played it first before even having read the book.

I like games like PowerGrid and Ticket-to-ride when it comes to good old classical. On the other hand, I've always found Catan to be quite overrated; I'll never understand why people rank it so high - probably because rules are simple and it's usually one of the very first games they play, but still, even for first board games, there are several others who are way better, imho - Jaipur for instance, since it's already been mentioned.

Of those I tried that last year, Splendor was quite good, though I'd like to play more than 2 games to really appreciate and assess it fully.

Still, one of my very favorite games is Puerto Rico - and its card version, San Juan. Close to my favourite board game ever.

When it comes to fav games, Citadels ranks very high as well.

I also have fond memories of playing Junta with friends back in the 90s. Though I've no idea how I'd like the game nowadays, it might be a bit dated, and possibly badly balanced - but we had huge fun at the time.

[DaveSumm]

I just found out about this Terminator game that looks cool:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/evildead2/the-terminatortm-the-official-board-game

Also I bought Inis earlier, which was weird cos I wasn't planning on it.....then I read it was good and (here's where I was hooked) hard to get hold of. So when I found one, I realised afterward that I had quite unexpectedly taken out my wallet and purchased it.

[Lightning Lord]

4 hours ago, Swordfish said:

Second to Carcassonne. Valeria also good. Tiny Epic Kingdoms is fun.

We play a fair amount of Pandemic Iberia, but have not yet played Legacy.  Sounds intriguing.

We also play a lot of Jaipur when it's just the two of us.

 

What's Valeria?  Also... Tiny Epic Kingdoms...how does it compare to TIny Epic Galaxies?

[Iskaral Pust]

I'm taking notes here for ideas.  I bought Hero Quest for my son a year ago (then 9) and then added Catan this past Christmas.  We have some other simpler board games, but these are the only two in the right direction.  We like chess, scrabble, etc too, but the interactive strategy games can be the most fun.

There's no question of me sacrificing family time to play board games with strangers so I have to nurture my own board game crew at home.  Only problem is that I'm much better at strategy than my wife and son, so I have to find ways to level the field until Invan coach them along. 

I don't know if he's ready yet for Risk but he did enjoy his first and only (so far) game of Civ2 last summer.  There's potential there.  

[RedEyedGhost]

4 hours ago, DaveSumm said:

I just found out about this Terminator game that looks cool:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/evildead2/the-terminatortm-the-official-board-game

I backed that one.  It's the one kickstarter I've backed recently that I'm a little worried about, but the creator seemed very receptive to the commenters during it and definitely wanted to tweak things to make it the best game possible.  

 

Another KS I'm really excited about is The Grimm Forest.  I love the artwork by the Mr. Cuddington team (the same couple that did Santorini) - it looks positively charming.  It's ending on Friday at 2:00pm EDT.  

[Werthead]

Picked up a copy of Pandemic, might get to try it at the weekend.

Got to play Ticket to Ride and King of Tokyo this week. The former I'd played before, so was able to leverage my experience to win (I drew the Los Angeles to Seattle and Seattle to New York routes, which allowed me to outflank everyone else fighting over the eastern seaboard).

King of Tokyo I'd been interested in until I discovered you weren't stomping around Tokyo trashing building tokens or something, which seemed the way to go. However, the game itself is still quite fun, even if it's more about monsters getting pushy with each other when queuing up to destroy Tokyo then it is about the actual trashing of the city.

Quote

 I bought Hero Quest for my son a year ago 

Wait, it's still being made? Or was this from eBay? There was a complete set going a few weeks ago, but it ended up selling for about three times my budget.