The Board Game Thread

Fed up talking videogames? Why?

Do you play board games?

Hells yeah! I'm a board game geek!
53
46%
I don't but would like to get into them...
36
32%
You mean, like Snakes & Ladders? :shifty:
20
18%
No way! They're for nerds!
5
4%
 
Total votes: 114
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Winckle
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Winckle » Mon Jul 29, 2019 5:15 pm

Hexx wrote:
Tafdolphin wrote:
Ad7 wrote:I'd like to try some of these games. Me and the Mrs love playing splendor for example, and the star wars risk I got for SS a few years back, but they're really expensive to take a punt on and then find you don't really get on with it.


If you're looking for 2 player games I can highly, highly recommend Star Wars Rebellion. It looks intimidating as strawberry float but it's actually fairly simple and it's so, so much fun.

It's long though, about 4 hours, and not cheap.


Rebellion (and its Expac) is chuffing excellent.

Sometimes goes longer than that though (2v2)

Hey Hexx, I realise you posted this ages ago, but I wanted to ask a question about the SWR expac.

I've played SWR base game a couple of times last year and enjoyed it, but not played for ages. I bought the expansion too, but haven't played it. I have a free Saturday where I'll have a chance to play this, but I'm unsure whether to dive straight in with Rise of the Empire or whether to just play the base game again (that dreadful combat :| ). The person I'm going to be played with is an experienced gamer, but hasn't played SWR at all previously.

What do you reckon?

We should migrate GRcade to Flarum. :toot:
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Hexx
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Hexx » Mon Jul 29, 2019 5:31 pm

Winckle wrote:
Hexx wrote:
Tafdolphin wrote:
Ad7 wrote:I'd like to try some of these games. Me and the Mrs love playing splendor for example, and the star wars risk I got for SS a few years back, but they're really expensive to take a punt on and then find you don't really get on with it.


If you're looking for 2 player games I can highly, highly recommend Star Wars Rebellion. It looks intimidating as strawberry float but it's actually fairly simple and it's so, so much fun.

It's long though, about 4 hours, and not cheap.


Rebellion (and its Expac) is chuffing excellent.

Sometimes goes longer than that though (2v2)

Hey Hexx, I realise you posted this ages ago, but I wanted to ask a question about the SWR expac.

I've played SWR base game a couple of times last year and enjoyed it, but not played for ages. I bought the expansion too, but haven't played it. I have a free Saturday where I'll have a chance to play this, but I'm unsure whether to dive straight in with Rise of the Empire or whether to just play the base game again (that dreadful combat :| ). The person I'm going to be played with is an experienced gamer, but hasn't played SWR at all previously.

What do you reckon?


Tricky.

If he's not played Rebellion before, I think I'd stay basic. (Unless you know the rules/cards so well and need a change). He's experienced but there's a lot of rules in there.

But to be honest - open the xpac and read the additional rules. They're pretty simple. (The most confusing change has it's own FAQ :D)

A lot of what the expac does is introduce "variety" to make the game less predictable (e.g. in the base game Imps basically want 4 health units everywhere to negate lots of rebel missions, that's harder in the expac) - which doesn't sound like it would be a problem for you

You can chop/change mission sets (e.g. you could use original and he could use expac...I wouldn't for now)

BTW new combat is better, but it's still the worse element of the game (Unless you're a Rebel and get to use the KILL ENEMY leader card) - if you read the rulebook, you could just use new combat I think without any real issues.

To be honest - I think I'd go Rise (I've never played a simple base game since)

Good luck!

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Winckle
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Winckle » Mon Jul 29, 2019 5:47 pm

Thanks Hexx, you've given me some stuff to consider.

Does anyone else here buy board game inserts? I've been using the ones from Folded Space for my big games with lots of pieces, and for games I play often with long set up times. They often let you fit expansions into the base game box to save on shelf space, and the little trays make dishing out tokens/chits/player pieces really easy.

I've just finished putting together the SWR one and I can already tell it's going to really cut down on setup time. https://www.foldedspace.net/store/star-wars-rebellion/

We should migrate GRcade to Flarum. :toot:
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Hexx
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Hexx » Mon Jul 29, 2019 10:58 pm

Winckle wrote:Thanks Hexx, you've given me some stuff to consider.

Does anyone else here buy board game inserts? I've been using the ones from Folded Space for my big games with lots of pieces, and for games I play often with long set up times. They often let you fit expansions into the base game box to save on shelf space, and the little trays make dishing out tokens/chits/player pieces really easy.

I've just finished putting together the SWR one and I can already tell it's going to really cut down on setup time. https://www.foldedspace.net/store/star-wars-rebellion/


I saw them at the expo in Brum a few months ago - they seemed to many different manufactures and loads of differentr games, and where a big push. Nice and tidy - but seemed pretty over priced. (The cheapest I saw was £45 quid)

I back everything in "sets" in little bags so set up is pretty quick - I don't think I play Rebellion enough to justify purchase.

I've built a laser cut box for Arkham LCG storage. It's just so much easier.

I've been thinking about your question this evening - just go with Rise. It's not that much more difficult (there's just more options) but it'll be more fun for you.

Some tips

> You only have 3 green dice. Any more than 3 green dice across your fleet units is really easy to get to and a waste. Think carefully
> Now you heal damage, defenders have a massive advantage is most battles.
> If you're the Empire, put the Death Star construction on Endor (the planet Luke has to go to train) for an easy capture (or to block the Rebel from doing it)
> The 8 leader limit only applies when they return to your pool. If you have a captured leader, you can still recruit an 8th (you just have to fire someone when they rescue)

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OrangeRKN
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by OrangeRKN » Tue Jul 30, 2019 10:30 am

Was on holiday with friends over the weekend, we played a fair few games. I brought King of Tokyo, while a friend had Exploding Kittens and Thanos Rising. I hadn't played Thanos Rising before, and while it was fun (we lost the first game, won the second) I was left thinking the same as I do after playing Pandemic - it may as well be a singleplayer game. A single person could play as multiple players and the game would play out exactly the same, and in fact if you're playing with someone who knows the game a lot better, the optimal strategy is to just defer to their judgment on all things, which makes everyone else a glorified dice roller.

So my question - what are some good cooperative games where multiple players are necessary and given actual agency? I imagine it could be done through hidden information mechanics, or some form of competitiveness reintroduced.

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Winckle
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Winckle » Tue Jul 30, 2019 11:08 am

That is called "alpha gamer" I think, and it's a real problem with co-op games. Like you say, hidden information mechanics are one way, or games that have a traitor mechanic so you can't always trust the information you are given.

We should migrate GRcade to Flarum. :toot:
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Hexx
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Hexx » Tue Jul 30, 2019 11:50 am

OrangeRKN wrote:Was on holiday with friends over the weekend, we played a fair few games. I brought King of Tokyo, while a friend had Exploding Kittens and Thanos Rising. I hadn't played Thanos Rising before, and while it was fun (we lost the first game, won the second) I was left thinking the same as I do after playing Pandemic - it may as well be a singleplayer game. A single person could play as multiple players and the game would play out exactly the same, and in fact if you're playing with someone who knows the game a lot better, the optimal strategy is to just defer to their judgment on all things, which makes everyone else a glorified dice roller.

So my question - what are some good cooperative games where multiple players are necessary and given actual agency? I imagine it could be done through hidden information mechanics, or some form of competitiveness reintroduced.


It's pretty hard to do any co-op where one person can't take over. You just have to not play with asshats.

Spirit Island - too complicate for one person to follow everything

Mysterium - All to do with interpretation, so less "this is clearly the optimal thing to do"

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OrangeRKN
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by OrangeRKN » Tue Jul 30, 2019 12:02 pm

I wasn't having a problem with my friend taking over, he was fine, it's more myself feeling like I should ask him what to do whenever I'm unsure because he has played the game before. I obviously want to win the game, so I should defer to better judgement if it's available. Or just play on my own. I don't get what co-op brings to the game over it just being singleplayer, if that makes sense. Like with Pandemic, when I've played that I've always thought about what to do on my turn, but then run it past the player who owns the game to check I'm not doing something stupid or missing something better.

Those two recommendations sound interesting though, I can see how something just being straight up complicated makes cooperation useful (in a division of labour kind of way).

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Hexx
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Hexx » Tue Jul 30, 2019 12:11 pm

OrangeRKN wrote:I wasn't having a problem with my friend taking over, he was fine, it's more myself feeling like I should ask him what to do whenever I'm unsure because he has played the game before. I obviously want to win the game, so I should defer to better judgement if it's available. Or just play on my own. I don't get what co-op brings to the game over it just being singleplayer, if that makes sense. Like with Pandemic, when I've played that I've always thought about what to do on my turn, but then run it past the player who owns the game to check I'm not doing something stupid or missing something better.

Those two recommendations sound interesting though, I can see how something just being straight up complicated makes cooperation useful (in a division of labour kind of way).


Well don't. You do you.

Magic Maze - You can't talk. The only communication tool is a passive aggressive DO SOMETHING indicator you can give to people.

Hanabi - Hidden information means no one person can take over, but someone can still direct a little group.

Decrypto - You need more than 1 friend though

fry87
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by fry87 » Tue Jul 30, 2019 2:36 pm

Started playing our first Legacy game the other day. The game was Charterstone and for the most part we found it interesting and charming. There was a lot of reading initially with various rules to digest, and I still don't know if we really got some of the rules or knew what we were doing. Interestingly the other 3 players all adopted a very similar strategy, while I did something completely different. My strategy won me the round, but when that's just the first of 12 rounds I might have won the battle but set myself up to lose the war when you consider everything that gets carried over! Regardless, I'm intrigued to see how playing a game with a persistent state progresses over time.

On the subject of co-operative games I completely relate to the idea of someone dominating, particularly with Pandemic. As others have said, a big part is who you play with. I find that mostly it's an even discussion, with different points of view discussed and no single person saying what everyone should do - but that might be just the people I play with nowadays. I can definitely recommend some of the other co-operative games though, which by their very nature can't really be dominated by one person, such as Magic Maze and Hanabi.

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Hexx
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Hexx » Tue Jul 30, 2019 3:17 pm

Fog of Love!

That's an interesting co-op that one person can't domineer.

Plus then you could play it with me. I'd buy it but I think no one would play with me. :( It's a bit awkard to take to the games group "Hey! Who wants to play a 2 player game where we pretend to be lovers for a few hours? Anyone?"

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Hexx
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Hexx » Fri Aug 09, 2019 10:51 am

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/n ... champions/

This is going to take so much of my money

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Victor Mildew
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Victor Mildew » Sun Aug 11, 2019 8:58 am

That looks pretty good.

Hexx wrote:Ad7 is older and balder than I thought.
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Roonmastor
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Roonmastor » Sun Aug 11, 2019 9:19 am

Dead of Winter fits the bill. A co-op game akin to Pandemic where you are trying to survive winter after a zombie outbreak but one of you may be a traitor trying to bring the team down. You all have hidden information and a personal objective that gives opportunity to all look a little shifty.

Also has a great "banish" mechanic which is hilarious.


The real solution for Pandemic is to ensure your players play their own turns. We've gotten quite good at presenting options to the player whose turn it is and letting them pick one of them. Playing Legacy helps as player death mechanics and having to consider too many future unknowns breaks the "optimal strategy" players too.

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kazanova_Frankenstein
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by kazanova_Frankenstein » Mon Aug 12, 2019 9:07 am

Trying to find a board game that my wife will play. Sherlock Holmes Case Detective looks like fun, but i have seen some complaints that the red herrings are almost impossible to detect. To the point where its almost impossible to solve the cases.

Anybody here played this and have an opinion? Is Detective - A Modern Crime Board Game a better option? Or something else completely?

Thanks!

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Tafdolphin
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Tafdolphin » Mon Aug 12, 2019 11:45 am

kazanova_Frankenstein wrote:Trying to find a board game that my wife will play. Sherlock Holmes Case Detective looks like fun, but i have seen some complaints that the red herrings are almost impossible to detect. To the point where its almost impossible to solve the cases.

Anybody here played this and have an opinion? Is Detective - A Modern Crime Board Game a better option? Or something else completely?

Thanks!


Sherlock Consulting Detective is great...if you ignore the primary goal. Which is an odd thing to say.

The 'goal' of the game is to beat Sherlock to the solution of each case. This is almost impossible and if you play the thing with this in mind it's not fun. Just try and solve the cases and it's great.

Detective: A Modern Crime is also great, like Sherlock but with digital elements and some really interesting time based rules. It's more of a continuous campaign too, but it's a lot shorter than Consulting Detective which has 10 cases in the box and multiple expansions.

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kazanova_Frankenstein
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by kazanova_Frankenstein » Mon Aug 12, 2019 11:51 am

Tafdolphin wrote:
kazanova_Frankenstein wrote:Trying to find a board game that my wife will play. Sherlock Holmes Case Detective looks like fun, but i have seen some complaints that the red herrings are almost impossible to detect. To the point where its almost impossible to solve the cases.

Anybody here played this and have an opinion? Is Detective - A Modern Crime Board Game a better option? Or something else completely?

Thanks!


Sherlock Consulting Detective is great...if you ignore the primary goal. Which is an odd thing to say.

The 'goal' of the game is to beat Sherlock to the solution of each case. This is almost impossible and if you play the thing with this in mind it's not fun. Just try and solve the cases and it's great.

An alternative is Detective: A Modern Crime boardgame. It's like Sherlock but with digital elements and some really interesting time based rules.


Thanks for the reply - that's what I had heard.
Oh, and thanks for the recommendation with Detective - and read my initial post all the way to the bottom ;)
Heh, beaten by the edit. Thanks again!

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Hexx
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Hexx » Wed Aug 21, 2019 10:37 am

Fog of Love

So this happened. Myself and chum had a great evening laughing over this.

I'm not entirely sure it was a Rom-Com though - both our runs through Love Stories involved a domineering, assertive horrible person (or stalker in one case) and a nicer meeker partner just going along with it. Proper passive aggressive stuff as well. But giggles were had by the players - and the characters stayed in their relationship. Their toxic nasty relationships.

I think much came down to the RP experience and how you roll with it. The gameplay is actually quite strong, but also out of your control a lot of the time. (We both agreed there needed to be more ways to discard/redrawn scenes if you had nothing that would help you with you goals). What we probably did badly on was trying to work out the others goals and helping with that

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Hexx
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Hexx » Thu Aug 22, 2019 9:33 am

TIME Stories: The Asylum

2nd session of this to finish to after a run last week.

Took us 3 loops to clear it - we could have possible done it in 2 with some luck, better choices. Really liked it - really like the mechanics and the theme. Choices were hard, and you could RP to add to the game/

2 actual puzzles occurred (one more in depth than the other) this time too - which pretty nice beyond just working out where to go/which order

We become 2nd Class Agents based on our rating.

The "look up the plastic box insert for bonus tokens" blew my tiny little mind


I think I'd be a little peeved if I paid £35 quid for this though. The in box stuff is now "done". I can't see anyway you could replay it. (even with a different group, only me the same, I wouldn't really have much to do). ~£20 is much more palatable. Having to pay £10-15 per xpac to keep playing feels on the steep side (although it's a cinema ticket and drink)

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Rax
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PostRe: The Board Game Thread
by Rax » Thu Aug 22, 2019 11:07 am

Actually managed to win a game of Pandemic yesterday, I think we got pretty lucky with our roles and how the infections went but it felt good, especially since it was only the groups second time playing it together. Feels good. :datass:


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