Board Games!

[Faraday]

Not as serious, but any new party game ideas to play at a non-alcoholic New Year's Eve party? Cards Against Humanity will definitely be played, and we got some Walmart-style party board games to play as well. I want to finagle some 1000 Blank White Cards and Mafia in there, but it might be an uphill battle.

My favourite game for New Years Eve (or any other party) is Celebrities. It's a combination of articulate, charades, and memory, but with the content more personal and modern, because you write the names yourselves - so it can be niche and nerdy, bawdy and broad, family-orientated and mainstream, depending on the tastes and interests of your players. It can handle larger and smaller groups, and is easy to understand for gamers and non-gamers. I'd say always divide into two big teams rather than more smaller ones (keeps everyone involved), and limit it to writing 7 names per person if you have more than ~8 players, or 5 names per person if you have more than ~12.

This is seriously fun too.

[Faraday]

Well we played 2 games of Arkham Horror. Hastur fucking KILLED us in game 1. Partly because we forgot to put the fucking clue tokens on the board and drew fairly shitty characters 2. I was left fighting him alone as Dram/Mina managed to get devoured just as it started and it was basically impossible for me to put a dent in the fucker.

Game 2 we won. Knowing the rules better helped! Also Mina basically one manned the whole board due to the combination of abilities we drew and sealed 4 gates on her own. Oh, yeah she drew the girl who gets money every turn so had a bunch of money to go buy stuff from the curioisity shop AND she had a thing that made her almost imposible to kill and she was the police deputy and she kept her blessing for a crazy amount of turns, too. TOO MUCH POWER. GG! I died a lot, at really bad times - just when it seemed like I was ready to seal a gate with my clue tokens LOLNO I failed a check of some point. Stll fun, though.

Second game was a lot more fun, although once we sealed the 4th gate it was fairly obvious we'd win due to the board IMO so the ending was boring for me, personally.

[Faraday]

holy heck I love smallworld.

[Faraday]

sounds like I should play it

remember that misaktonic school for girls game we kept looking at? I played it with nikanor and it kiiiiind of sucked.

[Faraday]

I also love Fury of Dracula for a great game. It's like the old Scotland Yard where everyone is hunting one hidden player, except with Dracula.

i looked into getting this but it's out of print/seems difficult to get unless you want to pay a bunch for it.

[Faraday]

king of tokyo is fun!

[Faraday]

has anyone played robinson crusoe: adventure on a cursed island? it looks fun (and it looks like there's a lot of variety + game in the box) but just wondering if anyone has played it/what their thoughts on it was?

and that's a fairly quick sale <_< damn

[Faraday]

As mentioned in the Reckoning thread, polyhaus got the GOT board game, GOT card game, and Legendary (Marvel card game). Thoughts on any/all of the above?

Got is just sooo fucking long. Ive only played it once though but that was my big problem. Marvel legendary looks excellent tho!


Playing hanabi atm! Its so awesome.

[Faraday]

It does seem a tad easy, but that might be because there were only two of us. (Although, the game booklet has some suggestions to increase the difficulty, and we've come up with a few cards we could conceivably remove from play to up the difficulty.) It might be a different story with 4 or 5 players, though. And regardless of difficulty, it seems very well-designed, and is both fun to play and has billions of replay value (and lots of built-in room for expansions as well).

When watching a review for it, I heard that's the case (although it was said that the expansions up the difficulty by a super lot, so I guess there's always that down the road)

[Faraday]

I think having played that and forbidden desert recently I prefer forbidden desert - it's slightly more challenging (I won forbidden island the two times I played it, fairly easily both times actually - although I'm sure legendary would be...difficult).

[Faraday]

A LOT Of co-op games suffer from "everyone do what that ONE GUY says and we all win, no making your own decisions because they might not be the most efficient, wow we won that was easy, YAY!" syndrome.

They do if you have someone who plays like that? Also sure, it's not fun if someone is dictating your actions or playing the game for you - but I don't think that really should be happening anyway.

[Faraday]

Also I love the sense of "holy shit, we're winning, we're winning but oh FUCK next turn we're gonna get screwed what can we do?" that you get with games like Pandemic and Forbidden Island. I think the bossy gamer thing is more of a problem with your group than the game, tbh - I made sure say, when playing Pandemic with someone who hadn't to allow them to have their own input, if I wanted to play it by myself I would.

Also think Pandemic is pretty fun, sure it may get old eventually but I've got 10 plays or so out of my game which I got fairly recently and still want to keep playing it. (I think for sheer theme, I like forbidden island better - the "oh fuck we're about to sink" mechanic is super fun)


Space Cadets looks fun, but I'm not sure it's the type of co-op game I'd like to try all the time.

[Faraday]

Although Hanabi is an excellent, if at times frustrating co-op game. "HOW THE FUCK DID YOU FORGET THAT WAS A 5?"

[Faraday]

Yeah, it's really fun. I never got a chance to play with the rainbow extra deck...but it sounds like it'd be super chaotic!

[Faraday]

I got ghost stories for christmas, but haven't played it yet! I've heard it's hard, I also know hito raves about it, so I'm sure it's fun!

[Faraday]

so if there's one thing that the reckoning confirmed it's that hanabi is awesome

mascarade is pretty awesome too, though!

[Faraday]

Everyone who I played hanabi with it seemed to like it? I was drunk for mascerade but I'm a big fan of bluffing type games like that. Citadels was fun too.

Betrayal was fun too but some of those haunts are pretty bad.

Oh. Cosmic encounter is awesome without uberninja!

[Faraday]

well none of us had played this particular haunt before <_< so yeah, it was just kind of swingy/luck based, unfortunately.

edit: well even more so than usual, I felt

[Faraday]

cdb had a bunch of bats that could suck our blood. uh, 2 of us started right next to the organ room and got a lucky role to start the organ despite our poor might, so it kind of ended before he had a chance to attach many bats.

i guess, as i said, it could be potentially close - but yeah. it seems in general it's harder on the traitor with more players? (idk maybe not but IME it's been true)

[Faraday]

I am apparently successful at recruiting people to play/purchase Sentinels of the Multiverse... without owning any of it myself.

I am not. It was a complete flop at the Reckoning. Mostly because we played on a really easy mode.

I dunno, I've only played it once irl and once in mish mash and was left pretty lukewarm on it both times. It just felt kind of repetitive, which I guess can be okay but it wasn't particularly fun either.

I wanna try get/print off coup cards, since it looks a blast and I like those "bluff-type" games. Ordered Hanabi, so I can introduce it to my family - it's pretty easy to pick up and I'm sure they'll like it so that should be fun.

[Faraday]

definitely not

speaking of picked up the on the brink expansion for pandemic, it's pretty fun. (definitely adds a lot of diversity, not sure abt the bioterrorist though 0- haven't tried that yet, but the virulent strain/5th disease/new roles/new events are all add a lot. but yeah if you hate pandemic you'll prob hate FI. Forbidden desert might be a better version of FI anyway, it has a bit more going for it imo.

also got citadels which is fun.


I was meh cosmic the first time, but loved it at the reckoning, mostly due to axxles last minute HEY GUESS WHAT I WIN TOO card. it's random, but the potential to backstab and doublecross is awesome. (also 2 people winning in an 8ish player game doesn't seem a problem as long as they';re willing to also solo win). 5/6 seems a sweet spot or if not turns might take too long to come atround, but at least you've stuff to do on other peoples turns.

[Faraday]

one of the things I didn't like about Agricola was that I needed something of everything or i'd lose victory points, doesn't caverna fix that? (or it's not a rule). ive only played Agricola once though, thought it was "okay". probably needed a few repeat plays.

tsuro is amazing, tsuro of the seas seem to add stuff that isn't necessary imo but it still looks fun, just think the simplicity of the original might be better /speculation

[Faraday]

Heh, weirdly enough I was just about to listen to this.

[Faraday]

Forbidden Island's good, although I prefer Desert (well it's just a little more complex while still being simple, which is nice).

Legendary is mostly co-operative deck building, although I guess there can be a competitive element too, can't there? (It seems kind of half assed though, being the "best winner").

Pandemic is fun, the On the Brink expansion gives it a lot more replayability too once you get bored of the base game. It's gets a decent amount of dislike for being "solvable" eventually, but that's whatever I think you'll get your moneys worth and I still find it fun.

[Faraday]

cosmic encounter is really fun with like 5 or 6 I thought. really enjoyed the game at the reckoning.


ordered coup yesterday, should be right up my street with the bluffing/deception element

[Faraday]

Also, Avalon and Resistance are great.

I hated avalon due to the whole merlin thing, found it super unfun.

[Faraday]

Coup is the shit. Big, big fan. Can't believe you ordered a proper set rather than a custom UK Scummers Meet 2014 homebrew design, though. I hear that's great.

Haha, I considered it, but for like 15 euro I figured I might as well support the game.

I really like the look of Dead of Winter. Traitor mechanic + Secret goals + the crossroads thing seems neat. Also apparently Pandemic Legacy is coming? That interests me, since I still really like the original (with the uh, first expansion which makes it much more fun)

[Faraday]

As long as it's not the old version it should have it.

[Faraday]

They could (probably?) conceivably all be played together

Yeah, they can (there's a bit in the manual for mixing/matching some of the weirdness.) I'm gonna pick up the villains edition I think, instead of the regular one to start with. Just because it's a bit newer and playing with villains is kinda cool. I think it was said somewhere they'll alternate expansions for them, too.


Edit: And the science fiction expansion is my favourite smash up expansion, Cyber apes, shapeshifters and time travellers are really cool, and spies are alright so it's super fun to play with.

[Faraday]

I like coup a hell of a lot, if you play mafia and other bluffing games a lot it may not be needed I guess, though? (or you could just make your own set?) Still a lot of fun. I plan to pick up Legendary soon. Steam park looks really fun too, I want it.

[Faraday]

incredibly punishing to any sort of skill imbalance

I haven't found that at all, actually? I don't think it's particularly hard to win when new to the game. I also thought it was super easy to explain, even my mom picked it up quickly.

Edit: Citadels can drag a little bit with a bigger number, though I thought. Especially with the thingymajig role...er warlord is it?

[Faraday]

and smash up since no one answered last time.

I really like smash up. over quite a few play throughs I don't think any particular deck is overpowered, either, just certain combos are very strong. If you're wanting an expansion ever just get anything but cthulu - that one kinda sucked. (though the scooby doo deck is cute)


Coup's a good lying/bluffing game. It's super quick, too, which is a bonus.

Sherrif of notthingham is a new one that's been getting pretty good reviews, too. not sure it's widespread available tho. Definitely get coup tho - it's awesome. I think the resistance will work if they like mafia, since they're basically the same.

[Faraday]

I really want it. I don't dislike the zombies theme, it just doesn't enthuse me.

In 2 player co-op I presume it's still not full co-op due to the different individual goals, right?

[Faraday]

oh, the individual goals seem one of the most fun aspects, but I guess with 2 people it makes sense. Seems like it'll be a while before it's released widespread over here tho'

[Faraday]

Jamaica always seemed like it'd be kind of boring to me, tbh <_<

[Faraday]

It looks fun, tho!

[Faraday]

Cash and guns is super quick, and something I've found super fun. Plays up to 8 too which is nice.

[Faraday]

Amazon has

Splendor

for $25.32 with free Prime shipping. Anyone played this and want to give thoughts on it? Considering scooping it up.

There's a Gamenight playthrough on YouTube you should watch if you're on.the fence.

[Faraday]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDHUNZSsq7g here's the splendor playthrough. (It looks alright to me, but I don't think i'd be able to get it played very often since it's seems kinda dry - for the price though, reck, it's p cheap)

[Faraday]

Forbidden Island/Desert for a simple co-op that looks cool.

Smash Up is also a fairly fun light card game that basically anyone can pick up. There's enough decks to offer enough replayability and it works with 2/3/4 fairly well.


For 2p only maybe try Le Fantome de L'opera - it's a deduction game, one person playing the phantom of the opera - the other trying to catch them. It's super simple, and you can scale the difficulty if one player happens to be better than the other, which is neat.

[Faraday]

Also, hanabi.

[Faraday]

Also I think I'm really in to Cosmic Encounter right now and I'm curious as to everyone else's thoughts. Basically I'm worried that it might not go over well 'cause it's pretty personal; like Resistance and Lifeboats don't do so well but the basic mass-market Survivor game and the trading part of Settlers do.

I love it, the few times I've played it. At the very least you have the whole cool powers thing going on, unlike the resistance and lifeboats. I think it's very different than the Resistance though, er and not pure cutthroat like lifeboats is. (Which I've never played, but basically that's the whole game, right?) Still not sure they'd really like it, though.

[Faraday]

I have been nearly, neeearly playing Cosmic Encounter for about two years now. I really want to finally try it.

Highest on my to-do list at the moment, though, is

Dead of Winter

. Looks fantastic.

Come to Oxford over half term, then.

Can I come??? (I really wanna get my hands on it, though for real)

Cosmic is great, the powers are super fun (mostly). We played a game with like 7 or so at The Reckoning and it went by pretty quick, so it varies, but I've played it a few times now and only had a bad experience with UN!


edit: I don't think Cosmic would work very well with 3, Chevre. (Never played it with that number...but, it seems like it'd remove a lot of the fun)

[Faraday]

Ya, 2nding ticket to ride, reck. REAL good game bet you'd love it.

[Faraday]

4 epidemic cards is just like super novice level though, right? It's supposed to be p easy.

[Faraday]

Yeah. But 2 extra epidemic cards is quite a lot. I'm pretty sure it only recommends 4 for your first game?

And 6 is more like hard mode with 5 being the regular game. Even one extra makes a big difference ime.

[Faraday]

Also some of the roles are stronger than others; so that's something to consider.

[Faraday]

on the brink is a really great expansion, I thought - tho i've not played with the actual bioterrorist

(I really like pandemic in general though, so grain of salt i guess)

[Faraday]

I'm trying out a few games online today that I've wanted to try for awhile... Race for the Galaxy, Takenoko, and Seasons. Let me know if you want to join

The best part of Takenoko is moving the panda around, the game itself is pretty mediocre. (It looks cute, though)

Played Lost Cities on Vassal. Simple, but quite fun, I found.

[Faraday]

Forbidden Island would probably work pretty well, actually. It scales in difficulty - and is simplistic enough he would be able to get it, I think? Plus it's co-operative so even if he doesn't 100% get it straight away he will quickly.

Survive: Escape from Atlantis and Takenoko are both fairly simple and fun games - but I'm not sure if they'd be beyond a 7 year old. There's probably playthroughs on youtube if you wanted to check them out.

Zooleretto is also faaairly simple and has people collecting animals and such.

[Faraday]

Ya, also what quadz said would probably be okay - love letter is super simplistic.

[Faraday]

I've been looking for a good 'Whodunnit?' type game. I guess similar to Battlestar Galactica, but with more Cluedo elements of gathering evidence and putting together the puzzle, but I'm not sure anything like that exists.

I'm not really sure what you mean, exactly but Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective? It's an actual like investigation. Shut up and sit down did a review.

[Faraday]

There's also like Sleuth, but that doesn't seem very BSG ish?

[Faraday]

Woo, just beat ghost stories for the first time. (2 player, played 2 monks each). Satisfying! Nightmare mode looks...interesting.

[Faraday]

Played

Tokaido

. It's kind of serene, I guess, in theme. It's fairly light and easy to pick up. Was fun, but not something I'd play a super lot. I'd rank it low amongst the bauza games I've played (But I like some of his other games a lot), but I like it well enough.

[Faraday]

Playing Robinson Crusoe on VASSAL. Really cool, and there's a lot of rules (with a questionable rulebook) - but it's super hard, and super satisfying as a co-op.

[Faraday]

Reck (or anyone else who has it), what is dice masters like? It seems relatively cheap (yes, I know I'll need boosters) and looks neat.

[Faraday]

Mysterium is the dixit like game? With the cool art? How did that play. It sounded like a cool concept.

Also interested in your thoughts on spyfall and tragedy looper which I was considering buying.

From all I've seen of the cure I don't think I need it, I already have pandemic. Looks fun though with the custom dice.

[Faraday]

Got Betrayal for €25 incl shipping from amazon uk. Very happy, since they went super quick. Sad I missed dixit yesterday, but c'est la vie.

[Faraday]

Got Imperial Settlers, Survive: 30th Anniversary Edition, Bang: The Dice Game and Forbidden Desert from various people at Christmas. Really happy with them all, except Imperial Settlers which I've not tried yet -- but having seen it played am pretty sure it'll be lots of fun.

[Faraday]

Awesome Level 9000 expansion for Smash-Up

It's a pretty good expansion. I'd avoid Cthulu if you don't LOVE Cthulu though, Science Fiction Double Feature is a pretty great one, though. Love Steam Punk and Bears, though.

[Faraday]

And ya, Tales just looks too long for what it's trying to be, which is basically a lighthearted funny storytelling game. I really wanted Sheriff Of Notthingham but it's not available over here again, atm. Hope you enjoy it!

Oh, I also got 7 wonders. Just found that out, Woohoo. I like it quite a bit, though have only played it a few times.

[Faraday]

Got

Cards Against Humanity

and

Masquerade

for Christmas. Loved Coup so hoping masquerade is good fun.

It's definitely fun when drunk. It's a lot more chaotic than coup because invariably people forget things quickly or aren't sure of the switch they made.

[Faraday]

(I do prefer Coup though)

[Faraday]

Imperial Settlers

: So yeah, this is fun. I played the Barbarians, my friend played the Romans. The factions play super different, it seems, so that's cool. It does seem rather dependant on what cards you draw, but that's no different than any card draw and I think there's plenty of ways to mitigate it by trying to draw more cards. We played a few rules wrong, nothing major but it feels like it'll be easier for us to do more next time. So yeah, that's encouraging.

Also played a few games of 7 wonders, 3 player. Very fun, had only played it a few times before this, but it's relatively simple to pick up and my brother and his friend grasped it pretty quickly. Can't wait to try it out with a few more players.

[Faraday]

Oh, also got the Guardians of The Galaxy expansion for Marvel: Legendary. Can't wait to try it. Thanos!

[Faraday]

I SUPER DUPER WISH Dead of Winter was in stock anywhere.

Ya agreed

[Faraday]

Faraday is Coup expansion any good?

not played it. er i wasn't rly interested in it, i liked the simplicity of the base game well enough

[Faraday]

Finally got

Imperial Settlers

out. Loved it. Played with my brother - who seemed a little overwhelmed at first (he's used to lighter style games) but quickly got the hang of it. The iconography is pretty clear, and there's not much. The factions felt very different. It does seem a bit luck dependant - in that it depends on what you draw, but most card games have that and there are ways to draw more cards fairly easily. Really, really liked it. Also there's a decent amount of interaction, the barbarians in particular are fairly attack focused. Need to try the different factions.


I thought Tokaido was okay. I've only played it twice or three times, and it was fun, and surprisingly "haha took your spot" given the theme, but I feel like it'd have limited enough replayability.

[Faraday]

Try the arcane wonders website? They have a video thing for it, I think?

[Faraday]

I SUPER DUPER WISH Dead of Winter was in stock anywhere.

Ya agreed

Woo ordered it. Also pre I ordered specter ops from plaid hat.

Spyfall is a fantastic social deduction game btw.

[Faraday]

We didn't find that much of a problem. Non spy's tended to glance at the list when asking questions to make sure they weren't narrowing it down too much. Also after a couple of games I had it p much memorised.

Little player aids in front of people might work of you were worried. Being spy in your first game would be tougg.though, no denying that.

[Faraday]

canada, obv

Try Ireland! (via an English website!)

[Faraday]

Tokaido seems like the perfect game if you want something zen, because you're always collecting things. If you like stress, panic, and hard choices, this probably isn't the right game.

It's not

that

zen though. It can be pretty cut throat in terms of blocking people off. There aren't that many difficult choices admittedly but.

[Faraday]

Can't really afford this and dunno if I'll be able to break it out before April ... but who knows when next I'll see it in stock?

Spoiler: yes

Ya that's why I.bought it. I.reallllly want mysterium now though but!!

[Faraday]

Dead of winter is prettttttty cool.

[Faraday]

It's p good. Never been interested in BSG because of its playing time + lack of theme interest.

[Faraday]

Ooh. Mysterium just arrived. Excellent.

[Faraday]

Ooh. Mysterium just arrived. Excellent.

I have heard very promising things.

It's excellent - we won once in five games. Plays pretty quick. Being the Ghost is tough, you always feel you have "bad cards". It works very well, though. The Italian version from Boardgameguru has the little crystal balls which look super nice, too. It might need an expansion or two eventually to keep it fresh - but hell even Dixit cards could probably work for the Ghost "dreams". Really, really fun.


Also played more Spyfall - went down excellently again. Though the one new player who was a bad liar drawing spy the first two times was cruel Still, really fun.

[Faraday]

Just throw in all the expansions too, Quadz!

[Faraday]

Played

Bang: The Dice Game

last night. Lots of fun. Very quick, and everyone enjoyed it. Except for that time when the deputy killed me, his sherrif, because he had no other target to shoot with his [2] Dice >___> Oh well!

Played more

Mysterium

and other than a small spill, it was great again. (Luckily no lasting damage was done, so everything is okay). Still getting lots of replayablity as the characters/locations/weapons come out with different combinations of the Ghost deck. Lost on Hard, though

[Faraday]

The guardians of the galaxy expansion is really good! Thanos + the forge the infinity gauntlet scheme is very fucking difficult! The new artifact cards are cool - they're basically cards that stay there every round.

[Faraday]

Yep! Star-Lord has quite a few. They're certainly cool, not sure how strong they all are (like the one from Drax that gives you +1 fight every round for a cost of 3 is nice, but it's not like super great - still fun though!) The infinity gems villain group work the same way once you defeat them (but with the scheme I talked about, every scheme twist means one player loses one, so it's hard to get enough power up to beat thanos)

[Faraday]

The ugly doesn't sound that bad from how you're describing it.

Isn't there a walk-through for the first game? On the app?

Still have no real interest in it. The mechanics just looked 'ok' and the IP doesnt sell me. The ' comes down to dice' is p disappointing.

[Faraday]

Unknown is kinda sucky too, I find!

W/r/t desert vs island. Island is a good introduction game, desert a p big challenge on the higher difficulties tho.

Haven't watched tabletop yet but hope they did the game justice. They've had some stinkers this season (geek out, mmade sherriff seem boring etc)

[Faraday]

Haven't watched tabletop yet but hope they did the game justice. They've had some stinkers this season (geek out, mmade sherriff seem boring etc)

thought it came across p well actually!

[Faraday]

I also lost a game of dead of Winter! It was the 'kill them all'. Ultimately rolling three death symbols in 5 turns on the exposure dice WILL kill you. It was still fun though!

[Faraday]

Come to Ireland!

[Faraday]

Yeah, probably not. Surprised there hasn't been one yet, tbh.

[Faraday]

Played

K2

for the first time, on Boardgame Arena. Was pretty fun. Top of the mountain gets surprisingly tense - not sure how often I'd want to play it, but it's actually pretty simple and easy to learn. Enjoyed it, wouldn't be adverse to trying it with more players too, might be more fun/cut-throat/blocky.

[Faraday]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7zFKVMVUUc

[Faraday]

I think Vassal is more for playing games online! I agree though, but he has so much content it's still very useful. Watch it played have made me super excited for my specter ops pre-order though.

Oh, debating getting

Witness

. Only 4 players means it might be hard to get played, but it just looks so fun I think it's worth the risk. Saw CDB praise it earlier, and it looks like something I'd enjoy.

[Faraday]

Red7 ordered! (And splendor, since despite hearing mixed things I think my family would like it)

[Faraday]

Specter ops is on the way. Yay!

[Faraday]

Played specter ops last night. Really fun. Never played letters from Whitechapel or anything like it but I really love specter ops. Unfortunately the Agent escaped but!

[Faraday]

Yeah, I really liked bohnanza too

[Faraday]

Kobayakawa.

[Faraday]

I wanna get

Witness

.

Come back in stock somewhere!

[Faraday]

Yeah I prefer the short /medium dow scenarios for that reason.

[Faraday]

Got sushi go and mystery rummy: jack the ripper while in the US. Sushi go is quite fun!

[Faraday]

Eldritch doesn't even seem particularly streamlined and now has a bunch of expansions too, eldritch seems way too long though to even interest me.

[Faraday]

Seems ok, though I'm more interested in Deception: Murder in Hong Kong atm on the social deduction side of things.

[Faraday]

In Europe <.<

[Faraday]

http://www.coolstuffinc.com/p/221013

[Faraday]

Got Pandemic Legacy, Sherriff of Nottingham and Samurai Spirit for Christmas!

Legacy is p fucking amazing so far. Lost our first game in April!

[Faraday]

Jaipur is probably my favourite 2p game that I own. It's so simple, but can be sort of complex in places.

we played like 4 games today, It's really good. It's a lot like rummy. Except with more shit.

If you like rummy you could try Mystery Rummy:Jack the ripper. Played it a bunch and it's fun. Jaipur js excellent though, also patch work is a good suggestion.

Pandemic Legacy is excellent and works fine with two (you can do one character each or two if you're finding it easier ). However it's probably worth finding out if you like coop games first so maybe pick up somethung cheap like forbidden island or forbidden desert?

[Faraday]

Dead of Winter is another good co-op with a betrayer.

I don't really see how a game where everyone wins individually is a co-op <.<. Sure you're somewhat dependant on the colony goal but given the individual win-cons Dow doesn't feel like a co-op.

Mysterium works totally fine with less than 5-7 btw. Actually 7 is maybe too many, maybe, as the ghost is just overwhelmed with choices. I like 4-5 people best but find all numbers good.

-1 to sentinels tho, I seem to be in the minority of not finding that v fun.

Pedit: lol

[Faraday]

From my (not extensive) experience dead of winter played mostly like a co op game where people did shady shit and other people tried to determine if the shit was too shady to let slide. But ultimately it primarily felt like a co op game because the shared objectives were challenging enough that no one really wanted to just go off and do *entirely* their own thing

But like you need to complete your personal goal to win. So you have to do stuff that looks weird, usually.

If my win condition isn't the same as the guy next to me I'm not playing a full co-operative game for me.

Panzer, Ghost Stories is difficult but not as hard as people make out. It is really fucking good though. I love the feeling of getting beat up and just barely surviving in a co op. Ghost stories really hits the sweet spot for this.

Robinson Crusoe is also really good, probably a bit more difficult but a fun experience. It's kind of fiddly and the old rule book was awful were the only negatives. Once you play a round it's not particularly complicated and fairly intuitive

[Faraday]

Been playing a bunch of Neuroshima Hex on the iPad. Super addicting, and I really love it.

[Faraday]

I've just been playing the a.i. and versus my brother so no clue about online. You can buy more armies - which I've done but that's just like actual physical expansions so.

Also bought onirim which works great on the ipad and is a quick solo game.

[Faraday]

Same.

[Faraday]

Could get the five tribes expansion that lets it play 5

[Faraday]

Got gloomhaven and pandemic legacy 2.

Looooord.

[Faraday]

So, gloomhaven is fantastic.

Other than setup taking a while, but it's sort of permanently setup on our kitchen table for the moment, which alleviates that.

The card combat is super interesting, and the mini legacy aspects/choices have been cool so far. Also the characters play fairly differently, so combining that with lots of unlockable characters + battle goals + different enemies means there's so much variety to it.

[Faraday]

many many many hours later gloomhaven campaign 1 is kind of finished i guess.

still not unlocked all the characters.

still enjoy it immensely. absolutely amazing game.

3 months into pandemic legacy season 2. really fun so far, waiting for the story hook like season 1 had - but im sure it'll come. character creation option was a lot better though, very nice improvement.

[Faraday]

Enjoy! Set up is a bear but worth it.

[Faraday]

Ya it's gr8

[Faraday]

D&D is only as good as the people that you play with

i think this is true for a lot of boardgames too, especially social deduction games

tho ofc a dnd game can be completely thrown off track by one random shitter, so far i've managed to be in groups w/ fairly decent people.

[Faraday]

nah mate

[Faraday]

i'm real interested in spirit island tho, since i like co ops and everyone seems to love it

[Faraday]

Deception: Murder in Hong Kong

Get this if you like social deduction imo

[Faraday]

Yeah I wouldn't really reccomend DOW. I don't think the game is very well balanced

[Faraday]

glad you had a betrayal game that worked out ok and didn't completely shit the bed, there's like a 50/50 chance either way imo (I still like it, but it's definitely flawed. the legacy version might be fun, i guess)

[Faraday]

tbf some of the haunts are pretty broken, or you'll end up in a situation where the winner is really obvious due to positioning, flipped tiles etc. when the game works it's a ton of fun, but there are definitely haunts that just aren't very good/wildly unbalanced

[Faraday]

I'm slightly concerned Kingdomino will be too simplistic for him and its also vaguely similar to Scarabya, but it's a lot more likely to be tolerated by the grandparents

You could look into Queendomino instead, which is Kingdomino but a little bit more advanced.

I think of the other 3 you mentioned Clank would definitely be the most accessible (Or you could try Clank!in!Space! if the theme matters?) and shortest. Obviously I don't know your nephew but Cyclades is fairly complex, for any 10 yr old. I'd just avoid dracula as I think there are more streamlined hidden movement games that do a better job in a shorter time but YMMV since people love it.

[Faraday]

ghost stories is a fantastic co-op. last bastion a fantasy re-theme (and maybe reworking? dunno) just came out.

other reccomended co-ops are robinson crusoe (which isn't medium, I think? just due to the kind of badly written rulebook to some degree tbh) or any of the pandemic series of games, legacy if you like campaign shit.

[Faraday]

I heard Robinson crusoe is p complicated. Same with the Mars game that guy made.

eh, the actual turn order stuff you have to do in the game isn't super complicated at all. I think just learning the rules from the rulebook was(is?) a bit tricky since it was badly laid out. there are like scenario specific rules you have to remember and a few minor rules that aren't super intuitive, but it's not like spirit island complexity or anywhere close.

[Faraday]

yeah 5-6 people is the sweet spot, any more is a clusterfuck that will probably be not fun for at least one person

[Faraday]

stamina potions are broken anyway, the common house rule (and rule the digital game uses) is to reduce the amount of cards they bring back by 1. and even with that they're still super strong.

the moon class is probably the strongest class i think just because it doesn't really need anything from anyone, it has weaknessess admittedly but it can apparently solo most scenarios by itself if played well. i've only played it a bit at lower levels and even then, once you find the groove it's pretty much comboing into itself.

mindthief/lightning bolt/angry face/cthulhu are my four favourite classes though. tho honestly i've enjoyed every class i've played to some degree!

[Faraday]

You do have to retire, yes. It's not like you've no control over it, though. Not killing elites should be pretty easy.

[Faraday]

Although 25 xp is a crazy amount, even for the mindthief. (Also Spellweaver should be able to keep up xp wise for the most part)

[Faraday]

You do have to retire, yes. It's not like you've no control over it, though. Not killing elites should be pretty easy.

Wait is it only landing the killing blows?

Yep. You have to be the one to kill it.

Same for anyone else that has a kill X <things> life goal.

[Faraday]

Also we got 10 just for finishing the thing. One of them I got a few extra XP just for the fact that I hit things with multiple debuffs. All of a sudden one of my cards got me 4 XP

For scenario 1? Unless you're playing it on super high difficulty you shouldn't be getting 10 xp extra. I'd double check that, it should be 6 if you're playing level 1 monsters. Either way, that's much more normalised. The Spellweaver should be able to keep up even still, they can bring back most of their powerful lost cards so make sure the person playing knows they can be a bit more agressive losing cards.

Also given there's a lot of rules here's a list of the more commonly missed ones:
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/172770 ... miss-rules

[Faraday]

i've only played machi koro once and absolutely trashed ariel doing so, just because i happened to roll a 4 or a 6 or whatever number a bunch of times in a row. the game was over fairly quick though, that's the only big plus I had.

can't stop and bang: the dice game are my fave fun, quick dice games.

I like roll player too, but that doesn't really feel like a dice game due to the level of mitigation available.