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Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Dec 06, 2016 2:50 pm
by DharmaHelper
Going to spend the day reading the Trail of Cthulu manual.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Dec 06, 2016 9:35 pm
by Marmot
thellama73 wrote:7 wonders is pretty fun.
Agreed!

I'm a big fan of Power Grid as well. Never heard of Village though. What's that one like Snow Dog?

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sat Dec 10, 2016 7:41 am
by Snow Dog
Metalmarsh89 wrote:
thellama73 wrote:7 wonders is pretty fun.
Agreed!

I'm a big fan of Power Grid as well. Never heard of Village though. What's that one like Snow Dog?
looks great to me. You have to bring up a family in a village and send them to do work. In the church or town hall for example. Then they die. So you have several generations.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sat Dec 10, 2016 11:47 am
by Snow Dog
Just bought Hotel at a charity shop.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Mon Jan 09, 2017 4:32 pm
by Tangrowth
We got 7 Wonders and it's awesome!

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Mon Jan 09, 2017 4:45 pm
by JaggedJimmyJay
I just got Mysterium at the recommendation of a friend. I haven't had an opportunity to play it yet but I look forward to it. It appears to be a sort of combination between Dixit and Clue.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Mon Jan 09, 2017 4:48 pm
by Tangrowth
JaggedJimmyJay wrote:I just got Mysterium at the recommendation of a friend. I haven't had an opportunity to play it yet but I look forward to it. It appears to be a sort of combination between Dixit and Clue.
I've heard really good things about that game; I'm very intrigued what you'll think of it. It's a game Annie and I considered getting too.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Mon Jan 09, 2017 5:17 pm
by Golden
JaggedJimmyJay wrote:I just got Mysterium at the recommendation of a friend. I haven't had an opportunity to play it yet but I look forward to it. It appears to be a sort of combination between Dixit and Clue.
Got it for my nephew at Christmas. It's good, but we haven't won yet.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sat Jan 14, 2017 11:54 am
by Snow Dog
MovingPictures07 wrote:We got 7 Wonders and it's awesome!
Yep it's my daughter's one of her favourites. The expansions look good too. I also got Village but unfortunately they don't like it. I do. I think it's awesome. No one to play with. My other daughter is buying Dixit.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sun Jan 22, 2017 7:16 pm
by DharmaHelper
Anybody play Edge of the Empire?

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Mon Jan 23, 2017 6:47 pm
by DharmaHelper
WAIT A FUCKIN MINUTE

NEW SHERLOCK HOLMES CONSULTING DETECTIVE EXPANSION

10 NEW CASES

4 OF WHICH ARE

JACK
THE
FUCKIN
RIPPER

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sat Mar 18, 2017 11:28 am
by Long Con
I actually played Monopoly for the first time in years last night. Had Med and Baltic after my first pass of GO, and that was sweet. I had just put three houses on each of the yellows when the game got sidelined. I believe I would have won.

Interesting strategy I never thought of before: instead of building hotels, get as many properties to four houses as you can and sit on them. If there are not enough houses for your opponents to build, then they can't build houses... and they can't build hotels if there's not enough houses left to put four on the property first. Unethical! :nicenod:

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sat Mar 18, 2017 12:39 pm
by JaggedJimmyJay
I love Monopoly. It always irks me when people refuse to play because they expect it to take forever. Let me handle the banking and we'll be finished in under an hour. I've found after a lot of online play that most games end in the very way you describe, LC. Someone manages to control all of the houses and it becomes impossible for anyone else to make up the ground.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sun Mar 19, 2017 11:37 am
by Marmot
In monopoly, I have an uncle who will trade properties for ~25% of the profit gained from that property and/or free rent on that particular color. It's an interesting strategy that seems to work for him.

Our family games don't take under 2-3 hours. I'm a rapid banker, but we get into so much bickering and discussion as the game goes on when trades begin to happen.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Mar 21, 2017 12:53 pm
by G-Man
At a men's retreat over the weekend one of the guys brought a game called Tokaido. Anybody heard of it? There were a ton of rules (the rule book was like a small magazine) but by halfway through the game we more or less knew what we were doing. It was neat. It also didn't hurt that I won. ;)

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Mar 21, 2017 2:02 pm
by Epignosis
G-Man wrote:At a men's retreat over the weekend one of the guys brought a game called Tokaido. Anybody heard of it? There were a ton of rules (the rule book was like a small magazine) but by halfway through the game we more or less knew what we were doing. It was neat. It also didn't hurt that I won. ;)
I've seen it at the store and have been tempted to acquire it because it looks neat, but I could gather nothing about the game play or object of the game by looking at the box.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Mar 21, 2017 2:41 pm
by G-Man
Epignosis wrote:
G-Man wrote:At a men's retreat over the weekend one of the guys brought a game called Tokaido. Anybody heard of it? There were a ton of rules (the rule book was like a small magazine) but by halfway through the game we more or less knew what we were doing. It was neat. It also didn't hurt that I won. ;)
I've seen it at the store and have been tempted to acquire it because it looks neat, but I could gather nothing about the game play or object of the game by looking at the box.
Cliffs Notes version is as follows:

-The point is not to finish first but to finish with the most points. Bonus points are awarded at the end for certain achievements.

-Everybody (up to 5 players) picks two character cards without looking, read the two character descriptions and attributes (how much $ you start with and what your special attributes are), and select one of them for your character in the game.

-Player pieces are drawn out of a hat. Whichever piece is picked last gets to go first.

-You can only move forward along the board and can only move as far as the next hotel/inn (you start at one and move through four more). Nobody can move past the next hotel until all players reach the next hotel. So if someone is slow-poking it, they might get a few extra turns while you're waiting at the hotel doing nothing.

-Which ever piece is currently the closest to the start always moves next.

-When it's your turn, you can move to any space you like up to and including the next hotel, so long as there is room for your piece. If all spaces between you and the hotel are occupied, you must go to the hotel.

-All the spaces between hotels have different functions: a temple you can donate money to, encounters, a gift shop you can buy stuff from, three different panorama pictures you can build, and a hot spring. Just about every space earns you points, though some spaces require you to spend money to get those points. At each hotel, you can buy a meal if you have enough money for it, which gets you points.

-At the end, you count up your points and distribute the bonus points (things like most gift shop items bought, most encounters, most money donated to the temple). Whoever has the most points wins.

Some characters have bonus perks for landing on certain spaces but there's no guarantee you'll get to land on those spaces. You may have to move past a space you get perks for because it's occupied. When I played, my character got a free point and a free piece of gold each time I landed on an encounter space. Because there were five of us playing, I didn't hit any encounter spaces until the second half of the game. That's where the strategy is- where do you want to go now based on where you hope to go next. It took a while for it all to sink in but it would go much smoother the second time through.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Mar 21, 2017 6:51 pm
by nutella
Ohh my god I love Tokaido. So pretty and really well designed. One of my faves.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Thu Jun 01, 2017 7:07 pm
by Golden
Gloomhaven is the next game to arrive that I'm massively excited for. It looks phenomenal. I can't wait.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Jul 18, 2017 1:54 am
by Spacedaisy
You may have a board game addiction when you are drooling over the board gaming tables that cost a few thousand dollars... I'd say it may be time for a 12 step program but I have no intention of quitting.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Jul 18, 2017 11:52 am
by Spacedaisy
Also I saw a video ad for the Vault Gamefolio system. I'm torn honestly. I mean I can see how it would make storage neater and more uniform, and transporting games for a game night would be easier, but I am kind of attached to the boxes. Is that weird? Not all of them though, I mean with expansions such as with Firefly we condensed them down into one or two boxes instead of keeping all the boxes. We condensed Machi Koro (side note, I always want to call this one Mari Kocho, I wonder what, if anything, this translates to in Japanese...) as well.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Jul 18, 2017 3:00 pm
by Golden
I have never gone for systems that remove my boxes, even though they are technically a storage nightmare. Instead, I'm going to design a shelf especially for them.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Jul 18, 2017 3:47 pm
by Spacedaisy
I saw a picture of shelves someone had designed that slide out. Pretty cool.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2017 11:04 am
by Spacedaisy
These are the tables I was drooling over. I would go straight for the Titan. Need moar space for Firefly!!!

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2017 11:10 am
by Spacedaisy
I was just reading back in this thread and I think g-man and Nutella have sold me on Tokaido being the next game I purchase.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2017 11:23 am
by Spacedaisy
We got a bunch of board games from Russtifinko and his lovely lady for our wedding gift. They bought into three kick starter campaigns so we got these brand new games in the mail unexpectedly. We got Vast, Tricksters, and Bears vs Babies. We really enjoy them all, but here's some points about each:

Vast: it's asymmetrical game play, so each player will have a character with different abilities/weaknesses and a different win con. It can be played with 2-5 players and it has the five following roles that the players can be: The Dragon, The Knight (which is a kickass woman!), The Theif, The Goblins, The Cave. The difficulty for us has been that outside of game nights it's just the two of us and it's hard for it to be a well balanced game with just two. The Knight may balance out the Theif, but the Dragon balances out the Knight and so forth. It really is probably best with the full five players. It can be a little complex since each role has its own rules and pieces and so forth, but it is very interesting to play.

Tricksters: This one was a slower start for us, because the rules are very unclear on some important aspects of gameplay. It took a bit of research for me to figure it out. And it takes a bit to get a handle on the variety of strategies involved, but once you do it makes for a fairly interesting game actually. Because there are so many possibilities for how you can approach it. This is a solid two person game, I haven't played it with more but I think it would be a lot of fun and enhance the decision making aspect even more.

Bears vs. Babies: This is from the makers of Exploding Kittens, so that might give you an idea of the type of silliness involved. It's the least complex of all three games and their introduction to the rules was brilliant. They actually walk you through a few rounds of play. The concept is you are using cards with various monster parts to build an army in order to defeat one of the three evil baby armies. The goal is to have the most baby points at the end to win. While simple there are a few different strategies you could use, and some of them can be fairly be cut throat. I think this would be a good one for family play too with kids that aren't too young.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sat Sep 30, 2017 10:05 pm
by Epignosis
I had my pick of a few board games on a shopping trip this afternoon to our state's capitol. I wanted Dead of Winter, but given the thematic intensity of that one, I figured it would be best to at least wait until Ephraim can, you know, read.

So I bought Small World. The best thing was it was misplaced on the shelf, and the salesman gave me the discount for the error. Bagged it for $35.99.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sun Oct 01, 2017 12:27 am
by Spacedaisy
Nice! I love Smallworld. My only complaint is the amount of time it takes to set up. I really like the ten rounds and done part of it. We have the Underworld expansion and some of the other race expansions. It's been ages since we played, we should crack that one out sometime. Maybe at the next game night...

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sun Oct 01, 2017 12:30 am
by Spacedaisy
Oh it's been a while since we shared our new additions to our collection. I don't know if we shared this or not but quite a while ago we got Alchemists and never got around to trying it. Well we finally did and it was fantastic! It has a high complexity rating, but it's mostly because there are a lot of fiddly bits and what not, but it's all super easy to understand really. It just takes a bit the first go round to learn it all. But it sticks easily. And the app is awesome, nice interactive touch. but you don't have to use the app either, you can do it manually or online at a website. It's really interesting.

Also, last time birdwithteeth came to visit we went to Emerald Tavern in Austin and we can never leave without getting a game. This time it was my choice and i went with Above and Below. I really really recommend this game. It is a great blend of worker management and role play. So much fun, especially if you get into using voices and so forth when you read the encounters. I could not speak highly enough of this game. :)

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sun Oct 01, 2017 7:45 am
by Tangrowth
Small World is a fantastic game. Never tire of that one.

I also echo Daisy's comments about Alchemists and Above and Below. I'm especially addicted to the former even though I'm not great at it.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Thu Oct 12, 2017 2:22 pm
by K-Ness
We picked up Betrayal at Baldur's Gate this week. Being a huge fan of Betrayal at House on the Hill and D&D, I really look forward to this game.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2017 2:04 pm
by Golden
Spacedaisy wrote: Sun Oct 01, 2017 12:30 amAlso, last time birdwithteeth came to visit we went to Emerald Tavern in Austin and we can never leave without getting a game. This time it was my choice and i went with Above and Below. I really really recommend this game. It is a great blend of worker management and role play. So much fun, especially if you get into using voices and so forth when you read the encounters. I could not speak highly enough of this game. :)
The sequel, Near and Far, is even better in my opinion. And it is available with an expansion of sorts on Kickstarter right now.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2017 2:06 pm
by Spacedaisy
Seriously? Must check this out....

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sat Oct 28, 2017 3:13 pm
by speedchuck
So, I'm going to do most of my Christmas shopping with board games, I think.

I usually play with 4-8 people when I play these games. We like games that are strategic, flavorful, and interesting. Not too difficult to pick up and play, but not boring and played out after a few games.

The games I'm familiar with are Bang! The Dice Game, Captain Sonar, One Night Werewolf, Plague Inc. (board game, not the app), Citadels, Catan, Munchkin, and Love Letter. I much prefer the games with strong strategy more than One Night Werewolf or Munchkin.

What are your strongest suggestions for a family new to the world of GOOD board games?

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sat Oct 28, 2017 3:17 pm
by sprityo
One Night Werewolf is great, we should try playing it here eventually

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sat Oct 28, 2017 6:01 pm
by Spacedaisy
What are the ages, all adults or children as well?

[mention]speedchuck[/mention]

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sat Oct 28, 2017 10:37 pm
by speedchuck
All adults.

One Night Werewolf is amazing. I would happily run a few games of it, but I don't think it fits into any of the mafia categories. Maybe the non-mafia forum games section?

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sun Oct 29, 2017 12:50 am
by Spacedaisy
We could organize that sir.

As far as board game recommendations... I'm grouping these into three kind of loose categories. Basically Simple Play Strategy are ones that I think are super easy to learn and play quickly, but still require a fair bit of strategy in order to win. Straightforward Strategy Heavy are games that I don't think are particularly unconventional, and may have more parts or take more time to learn or play, but they rely heavily on strategy in order to win. Unconventional, but still strategic games are ones that have a very different kind of game play or some aspect that I don't feel like fit it well into the other categories, but they are still are pretty strong strategy games.

Simple Play Strategy:
7 Wonders (2-7, best with 3 or more) - Very simple, lots of strategy. Lots of fun for large groups.
Dominion (2-4) - Deck building, quick play but loads of fun. They have quite a few expansions too. This is one of my all time favorites.
Splendor (2-4) - Very quick game play. Very easy to learn. But very competitive, be ready to screw each other over in this one.
Forbidden Desert or Forbidden Island - These are cooperative. Both very simple play and quick play time, but there are deceptively difficult.

Straightforward Strategy Heavy:
Power Grid (2-6) - strategy heavy
Castles of Burgundy (2-4) - Lot of pieces and setup, but it's not too hard to pick up on and is one of our favorites.
Pandemic (2-4) - Cooperative play, and if you like the standard Pandemic then try Pandemic Legacy which is fantastic as well.
Ticket to Ride (2-5) - Easy to play, not too long but not quick play either. This is a pretty standard game in most board gamers library and there are a lot of variants too.

Unconventional, but still strategic:
Firefly (1-4?) - This game is absolutely fantastic. Most spin offs from TV shows or movies wouldn't get more than a Meh from me, but Firefly is just so perfect. However, it has a LOT of pieces and it takes up a LOT of space. It also takes a long time to play, 2 hours at least. There are also like four to six expansions that you can add, this will expand the game to up to 6 players I believe and add a lot more variation options onto the game. But I cannot give this game enough of a rave review.
Time Stories (2-4) - This is a cooperative game, but it's unconventional for a couple reasons. It set out to encapsulate the feel of roleplaying, and does it very very well. The second reason is that it is a single story you play through. The base game contains the board and pieces needed and one story. The expansions provide new stories to play. Once you've played through the story it doesn't hold the same replay value for you. That said, it's also VERY difficult. We have played our base game four times and still haven't beat it yet, so... take that as you will. We really enjoy it though. Play time can get quite long too, so make sure you have a chunk of time when you start. And be open to playing it up with crazy voices and put some fun into the roleplay aspect of it. It makes it awesome.
Alchemists (2-5) - This is like Clue crossed with a resource management game. And it uses an app, so every game is randomized and it's really interesting. We still are learning to find the balance in our strategy in order to get a win. It's easy in this one to get obsessed with figuring out the elements, and not get enough reputation points. So it's hard to find the balance in order to win in six rounds. It's got a lot going on in it. Can be a little more overwhelming to learn too, but worth it once you do. Please note that if you play with 5, one of you has to play like game director and you wouldn't use the app. Only four people can compete against each other.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sun Oct 29, 2017 1:34 pm
by speedchuck
[mention]Spacedaisy[/mention] You organize something for One Night Werewolf, and I'd be happy to run it.

Thanks for the suggestions! I've played Ticket to Ride before, good game. I've heard of Dominion before, and lots of good things about Pandemic (I really want to get into the legacy version with some friends once I finish SeaFall.) I'll definitely be researching all of these. Alchemists, Pandemic, Castles of Burgundy, and all of the simple games especially. :)

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Oct 31, 2017 10:18 pm
by sprityo
I'd be happy to trade off on hosting with you speedchuck so you get a chance to play as well! (that's also the thing about One Night Werewolf is that you can have anyone host since the rules and everything you need is gonna be in the OP, similar to an Open Setup)

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Mon Nov 20, 2017 1:49 am
by Gumshoe
I'm sitting on a personal collection of almost 150 games here. This is my kind of thread/forum. I wonder if you guys feel my mafia + boardgaming pain of not being able to play mafia in person due to not having a large enough group.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Mon Nov 20, 2017 10:50 am
by JaggedJimmyJay
Gumshoe wrote: Mon Nov 20, 2017 1:49 am I'm sitting on a personal collection of almost 150 games here. This is my kind of thread/forum. I wonder if you guys feel my mafia + boardgaming pain of not being able to play mafia in person due to not having a large enough group.
That's a frequent frustration for me. When I'm at a party, "let's play mafia" is pretty much my only move, and it drives me nuts when I can collect about 6 willing participants and nobody else feels like it. One needs a solid 9 at least for it to really be worth bothering.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Nov 21, 2017 4:49 pm
by speedchuck
Gumshoe wrote: Mon Nov 20, 2017 1:49 am I'm sitting on a personal collection of almost 150 games here. This is my kind of thread/forum. I wonder if you guys feel my mafia + boardgaming pain of not being able to play mafia in person due to not having a large enough group.
Got any recommendations for a board game newbie?

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Nov 21, 2017 5:43 pm
by Gumshoe
speedchuck wrote: Tue Nov 21, 2017 4:49 pm
Gumshoe wrote: Mon Nov 20, 2017 1:49 am I'm sitting on a personal collection of almost 150 games here. This is my kind of thread/forum. I wonder if you guys feel my mafia + boardgaming pain of not being able to play mafia in person due to not having a large enough group.
Got any recommendations for a board game newbie?
What games have you enjoyed in the past and why? Which games have you not enjoyed and why? I'd have to know what you're into to give a good suggestion. My favorites might be game types that you hate. :smoky: Or are you a complete newbie and don't know any games?

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Tue Nov 21, 2017 5:46 pm
by speedchuck
Gumshoe wrote: Tue Nov 21, 2017 5:43 pm
speedchuck wrote: Tue Nov 21, 2017 4:49 pm
Gumshoe wrote: Mon Nov 20, 2017 1:49 am I'm sitting on a personal collection of almost 150 games here. This is my kind of thread/forum. I wonder if you guys feel my mafia + boardgaming pain of not being able to play mafia in person due to not having a large enough group.
Got any recommendations for a board game newbie?
What games have you enjoyed in the past and why? Which games have you not enjoyed and why? I'd have to know what you're into to give a good suggestion. My favorites might be game types that you hate. :smoky: Or are you a complete newbie and don't know any games?
Catan, Citadels, Ticket to Ride, One Night Werewolf, Plague Inc. (the board game), Bang! the dice game . . . thats about it

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Wed Nov 22, 2017 12:42 am
by Gumshoe
speedchuck wrote: Tue Nov 21, 2017 5:46 pm
Gumshoe wrote: Tue Nov 21, 2017 5:43 pm
speedchuck wrote: Tue Nov 21, 2017 4:49 pm
Gumshoe wrote: Mon Nov 20, 2017 1:49 am I'm sitting on a personal collection of almost 150 games here. This is my kind of thread/forum. I wonder if you guys feel my mafia + boardgaming pain of not being able to play mafia in person due to not having a large enough group.
Got any recommendations for a board game newbie?
What games have you enjoyed in the past and why? Which games have you not enjoyed and why? I'd have to know what you're into to give a good suggestion. My favorites might be game types that you hate. :smoky: Or are you a complete newbie and don't know any games?
Catan, Citadels, Ticket to Ride, One Night Werewolf, Plague Inc. (the board game), Bang! the dice game . . . thats about it
Ok, I'll just have to assume that you liked all of those games. I have no real knowledge of Plague so I'm ignoring that one in favour of the others. So none of your games are too heavy on the theme (although far from abstract). Longer than a filler but not about to eat through all of your play time.

Machi Koro, Takenoko, & Five Tribes are all fun games that you might compare to Catan in the sense that each player can devise their own technique for acquiring points and you can choose to step on each other's toes or do your own thing. Machi Koro is about building shops and such to form the nicest town, Takenoko is a battle over bamboo between a gardener & a hungry panda, & Five Tribes comes down to balancing your use of workers in order to best control a board that at it's core is the game Mancala (this game is an arabian theme featuring powerful djinns :nicenod: ).

If you love Citadels due to choosing when is the best time to use which character then you may like Libertalia or Beasty Bar. If you like it for the drafting mechanic you can go heavy with 7 Wonders or light with Sushi Go. I'm gonna go out on a limb though and kind of stretch out a bit here and maybe find something you haven't considered before. First, Mr. Jack - as long as you're okay with a Jack the Ripper theme then this game is a blast. It's a deduction game (like Bang & ONUW) but it also allows you to choose which characters to use and when (ala Citadels). One player is Mr. Jack. The other is a detective. The game features many characters that are eligible to be moved by either player but only Jack knows which character he is. His goal is to subtly move that character to the exit without being exposed and stopped by the detective. My other recommendation in that area would be Smash Up. Smash Up (along with it's 10 million expansions) features over 89.86 billion different ridiculous(ly awesome) factions (I counted :srsnod: ). Each player chooses two factions and smashes the decks of those factions together for that game. That makes your team. Your team may be Pirate Zombies, Rockstar Killer Plants, Grandma Princesses, etc. Then the players fight over bases. You choose which base to assign which cards to in order to break the bases that are in your favour. Buying the expansions for this game is addicting. :beer:

The only recommendation I can think to make off of Ticket to Ride, personally, would be Tsuro. This is a bit of a stretch but you could say Tsuro is like Ticket to Ride due to path building. Tsuro is much more simple. It's a game that you put in as much thought you want. You could just place tiles and you'll probably lose hilariously but could accidentally win. Equally hilarious. You could try your best and run others off the board or just get a bad draw and lose anyway. Luck based but fun. The theme is nearly abstract but you're meant to be dragons forging your path in hopes of staying on the board for as long as possible.

For deduction games like ONUW & Bang, you could always go with Ultimate Werewolf (Deluxe Edition) as that is basic werewolf/mafia and nothing can trump that in my opinion. For a new spin you could go with The Resistance (or Resistance: Avalon) or Secret Hitler if you like the idea of deciphering who the baddies are so that you can exclude them from missions and law-making. You could go with Spyfall or The Chameleon if you like the idea of a solo baddie attempting to suss out secret information being given via clues by the good guys as they try to figure out which player doesn't seem to have the same information that they do (aka the baddie who knows nothing). If you're willing to try a longer game with heavier theme (although still a simple game), you could try Dead of Winter (or Dead of Winter: Long Night). I would highly recommend this game. You control survivors of the zombie apocalypse that have formed a colony in order to help each other survive. You can gather food, build barricades, rummage through buildings (finding objects and fun, game status changing stories), etc. Why do I recommend this under deduction you ask? Because each player has a hidden goal and one player's hidden goal MAY be to cause everyone else to lose. Are you all working toward similar goals or is a traitor in the mix ready to let the zombies overwhelm your home?

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Wed Nov 22, 2017 12:42 pm
by speedchuck
Gumshoe wrote: Wed Nov 22, 2017 12:42 am
speedchuck wrote: Tue Nov 21, 2017 5:46 pm
Gumshoe wrote: Tue Nov 21, 2017 5:43 pm
speedchuck wrote: Tue Nov 21, 2017 4:49 pm
Gumshoe wrote: Mon Nov 20, 2017 1:49 am I'm sitting on a personal collection of almost 150 games here. This is my kind of thread/forum. I wonder if you guys feel my mafia + boardgaming pain of not being able to play mafia in person due to not having a large enough group.
Got any recommendations for a board game newbie?
What games have you enjoyed in the past and why? Which games have you not enjoyed and why? I'd have to know what you're into to give a good suggestion. My favorites might be game types that you hate. :smoky: Or are you a complete newbie and don't know any games?
Catan, Citadels, Ticket to Ride, One Night Werewolf, Plague Inc. (the board game), Bang! the dice game . . . thats about it
Ok, I'll just have to assume that you liked all of those games. I have no real knowledge of Plague so I'm ignoring that one in favour of the others. So none of your games are too heavy on the theme (although far from abstract). Longer than a filler but not about to eat through all of your play time.

Machi Koro, Takenoko, & Five Tribes are all fun games that you might compare to Catan in the sense that each player can devise their own technique for acquiring points and you can choose to step on each other's toes or do your own thing. Machi Koro is about building shops and such to form the nicest town, Takenoko is a battle over bamboo between a gardener & a hungry panda, & Five Tribes comes down to balancing your use of workers in order to best control a board that at it's core is the game Mancala (this game is an arabian theme featuring powerful djinns :nicenod: ).

If you love Citadels due to choosing when is the best time to use which character then you may like Libertalia or Beasty Bar. If you like it for the drafting mechanic you can go heavy with 7 Wonders or light with Sushi Go. I'm gonna go out on a limb though and kind of stretch out a bit here and maybe find something you haven't considered before. First, Mr. Jack - as long as you're okay with a Jack the Ripper theme then this game is a blast. It's a deduction game (like Bang & ONUW) but it also allows you to choose which characters to use and when (ala Citadels). One player is Mr. Jack. The other is a detective. The game features many characters that are eligible to be moved by either player but only Jack knows which character he is. His goal is to subtly move that character to the exit without being exposed and stopped by the detective. My other recommendation in that area would be Smash Up. Smash Up (along with it's 10 million expansions) features over 89.86 billion different ridiculous(ly awesome) factions (I counted :srsnod: ). Each player chooses two factions and smashes the decks of those factions together for that game. That makes your team. Your team may be Pirate Zombies, Rockstar Killer Plants, Grandma Princesses, etc. Then the players fight over bases. You choose which base to assign which cards to in order to break the bases that are in your favour. Buying the expansions for this game is addicting. :beer:

The only recommendation I can think to make off of Ticket to Ride, personally, would be Tsuro. This is a bit of a stretch but you could say Tsuro is like Ticket to Ride due to path building. Tsuro is much more simple. It's a game that you put in as much thought you want. You could just place tiles and you'll probably lose hilariously but could accidentally win. Equally hilarious. You could try your best and run others off the board or just get a bad draw and lose anyway. Luck based but fun. The theme is nearly abstract but you're meant to be dragons forging your path in hopes of staying on the board for as long as possible.

For deduction games like ONUW & Bang, you could always go with Ultimate Werewolf (Deluxe Edition) as that is basic werewolf/mafia and nothing can trump that in my opinion. For a new spin you could go with The Resistance (or Resistance: Avalon) or Secret Hitler if you like the idea of deciphering who the baddies are so that you can exclude them from missions and law-making. You could go with Spyfall or The Chameleon if you like the idea of a solo baddie attempting to suss out secret information being given via clues by the good guys as they try to figure out which player doesn't seem to have the same information that they do (aka the baddie who knows nothing). If you're willing to try a longer game with heavier theme (although still a simple game), you could try Dead of Winter (or Dead of Winter: Long Night). I would highly recommend this game. You control survivors of the zombie apocalypse that have formed a colony in order to help each other survive. You can gather food, build barricades, rummage through buildings (finding objects and fun, game status changing stories), etc. Why do I recommend this under deduction you ask? Because each player has a hidden goal and one player's hidden goal MAY be to cause everyone else to lose. Are you all working toward similar goals or is a traitor in the mix ready to let the zombies overwhelm your home?
Wow, that's pretty in-depth. Thanks! I'll look these up!

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Wed Dec 06, 2017 3:46 pm
by speedchuck
Forbidden Island is fun.

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sat Dec 16, 2017 1:20 am
by DharmaHelper
You could also try Munchkin, Avalon, Coup, Love Letter, Sheriff of Nottingham, Betrayal at House on the Hill,

Re: General tabletop games discussion

Posted: Sat Dec 16, 2017 1:21 am
by DharmaHelper
DharmaHelper wrote: Sat Dec 16, 2017 1:20 am You could also try Munchkin, Coup, Love Letter, Sheriff of Nottingham, Betrayal at House on the Hill,