The Board Game Thread

[RobinFinderson]

So the newest game acquisition and one that I am really enjoying right now is Thunderstone. It is a great game. It is a deck building game, like Dominion, but it plays better. It also has an official solitaire variant that is really fun to play.

I also picked up Race for the Galaxy and enjoy it, but still don't quite get the strategy of it.

Cool! I can't way to try Thunderstone. We love Dominion, but haven't picked up any of the expansions after the second one.

Hey, I found THIS place to download a version of Race for the Galaxy online, or by yourself against AI opponents. I play this version of Race a couple of times a day (games go really fast without the board maintenance), and the AI is very good. Watch how the AI plays, and you will figure out some good strategies. The unfortunate thing about the download is that now I don't ever get out the cards. Faith and I compete against each other online. We'll still pick up the new expansions, as they are released, because it is one of favorites, but the online version is very neat.

[MartyFunkhouser]

So the newest game acquisition and one that I am really enjoying right now is Thunderstone. It is a great game. It is a deck building game, like Dominion, but it plays better. It also has an official solitaire variant that is really fun to play.

I also picked up Race for the Galaxy and enjoy it, but still don't quite get the strategy of it.

[UtahDan]

But have any of you played Dogs in the Vineyard?



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogs_in_the_Vineyard

Still need to play this.

The game is set in "a West that never quite was" - loosely based on the Mormon State of Deseret in pre-statehood Utah. Players are "God's Watchdogs" (Dogs), who travel from town to town delivering mail, helping out the community and enforcing the judgments of the True Faith of the King of Life. This may involve anything from delivering new interpretations to the town's Steward to executing heretics. Dogs have absolute authority within the Faith, but not within the laws of the Territorial Authority, and so their actions can lead to conflict with the government in the East.

[Scott R Nelson]

I like Ticket to Ride so much that I stopped borrowing it from our neighbor and bought our own version. My daughter has the European version that is a bit more complex, since you have tunnels and bridges added, plus train stations that you can use to get into crowded cities. And the names of the cities around Europe are spelled according to the language of the country, so you have to think a bit harder about Munchen vs. Munich, Etc.

Not exactly a board game, but one of the card games that I really enjoy is Quiddler. You make words sort of like in Scrabble, but don't get stuck quite like that game. You start off with three cards, next hand is four, on up to ten. A turn involves picking a card and discarding a card. You make whatever words you can with your cards, using at least two cards per word and must wait until the first person can lay down all of their cards. Extra points for the longest word or most words in a hand. Some cards have two letters like QU, IN, or ER. It's allowed to use a dictionary until it's your turn. Once someone goes out by laying all of their cards down, everyone else gets a turn and they put down whatever they can. They lose points for any cards they couldn't put down, but you can't get lower than zero for any hand.

I highly recommend it.

[Mrs. Funk]

The Funk family rented a (new to us) game called Stone Age this weekend. It's a worker placement game made by the same board game company as Puerto Rico.


(You'll notice that a lot of the game chits look much like Puerto Rico.)

One of the major benefits of this game is that there are relatively few components compared to a game like Endeavor (an acquisition from about six months ago currently gathering dust in our game closet). The set-up takes about five minutes. Game play is really easy to pick up, but the scoring and winning the game is nuanced enough to satisfy those who don't like to play games more to the tune of Ticket to Ride.

Essentially, one must feed and place workers to do tasks: of hunting or gathering food; collecting one of the four resources (wood, clay, iron, and gold); reproducing new workers (at which point, we both said, "Woooooo!" every time); and building huts. The number of resources attained is determined by dice roll (you get a die for each worker placed by the respective resource, thus increasing odds of getting more of that resource). I can see the chance element appealing to people who are turned off by the pure strategy games.

It differs from Agricola in that your workers aren't perpetually on the brink of starvation, though workers do require "food." I found it was fairly easy to keep all my workers fed.

The players acquire points by building huts and by purchasing cards with resources that provide various point multipliers and other advantages. The scoring took me a couple of games to really get a handle on, but after that, it's pretty straightforward. Game play is between 60-80 minutes, but I imagine it'd be a pretty easy game to step away from for awhile. Stone Age is lighter worker placement game that plays up to 4 people; it does play great with two, however.

I see us probably purchasing this one.

[OhioBlue]

I have Memoir '44 and have played it lots over the past few years since it came out. I have also had most all of the expansions at one point or another, but ended up selling a couple of them because I think the basic game stands on its own just fine.

My son learned it at age 9, it's not terribly difficult and there are game aids to help you remember basic rules. Turns and actions are based on cards that dictate your moves/attacks on the board. Unlike many other war games, this one is quickly learned and a scenario takes about a half hour. It's got some luck in it built into dice rolls and card selection, but it's no Risk-type dicefest.

Worth trying out. Not a game on the level of Puerto Rico, but an enjoyable game that many who I played it with went out and subsequently purchased for themselves.

[Mrs. Funk]

That is good to hear! I had seen that game in Montana, and wanted to pick it up. When I got online to read about it, folks were calling it a cross between traditional war games and the euro-style strategy games. Our gaming group is strictly euro, so I didn't bother picking it up. But if it plays well with two and three, I'm always up for a game with Faith and/or Little Robin. I'll see if I can pick up a copy. Have you played Memoir 44? Because I have been eying that one as well... if you have played them both, would you recommend one over the other?

I haven't played Memoir 44, but it comes very highly recommended by our local board game store. My intuition is that they would likely recommend it over Small World, as a lot of them are more into the serious war games. Small World is war game light. I've heard Memoir 44 recommended for playing with kids, too. I can't speak from personal experience. Funk wants to try it, so maybe we'll rent it and compare it sometime.

[RobinFinderson]

Holiday season == family board gaming around these parts.

Some observations:

1. Ticket to Ride Europe > Ticket to Ride America
2. 8-player Robo Rally is a crazy unpredictable game no matter how you slice it.
3. small market + large market coffee/corn Trader > 4-different-type-of-goods factory Crafter... wow, I've never been so abused in a Puerto Rico game.

good times.

cheers.

I've hardly played Puerto Rico once we picked up San Juan (very similar game, same theme, but cards only). We managed to play a couple of games of Puerto Rico over Xmas, and I forgot how fun that game can be.

[RobinFinderson]

Small World (not the dopey Disney ride) is been fun. We rented it over the weekend, and it's a riot. It's a take over territories and conquer lands to gain victory points game, with various fantasy races and somewhat hilarious illustrations and such.

The game is limited to 10 turns, too, so the game has a finite playing time and at the end of the turn, whoever has the most victory points wins. Victory points can be attained by how many territories one controls at the end of each turn.

It's quick, pretty simple to pick up, and plays well with 2 people because it has different boards for 2-3, 4, and 5 players. Worth checking out.

That is good to hear! I had seen that game in Montana, and wanted to pick it up. When I got online to read about it, folks were calling it a cross between traditional war games and the euro-style strategy games. Our gaming group is strictly euro, so I didn't bother picking it up. But if it plays well with two and three, I'm always up for a game with Faith and/or Little Robin. I'll see if I can pick up a copy. Have you played Memoir 44? Because I have been eying that one as well... if you have played them both, would you recommend one over the other?

[Mrs. Funk]

Small World (not the dopey Disney ride) is been fun. We rented it over the weekend, and it's a riot. It's a take over territories and conquer lands to gain victory points game, with various fantasy races and somewhat hilarious illustrations and such.

The game is limited to 10 turns, too, so the game has a finite playing time and at the end of the turn, whoever has the most victory points wins. Victory points can be attained by how many territories one controls at the end of each turn.

It's quick, pretty simple to pick up, and plays well with 2 people because it has different boards for 2-3, 4, and 5 players. Worth checking out.

[Indy Coug]

This game has been lots of fun for the family since Christmas.

[OhioBlue]

small market + large market coffee/corn Trader > 4-different-type-of-goods factory Crafter... wow, I've never been so abused in a Puerto Rico game.

<begin boardgame geekspeak>

I'm a fan of that tactic. I'd call it a strategy, but since Puerto Rico depends so much on how the other players are playing the game, it's not a fail-safe, use-every-time kind of thing. But yeah, add a harbor and a token indigo or sugar, and I've been able to blow people away before doing just that. I had one game where I filled my building area--including 3 large violet buildings--before all the multi-farmers even had a chance to get going. Love that game.

<end geekspeak>

[TheBYUGuy]

Carcassonne also works great for 7-10 year old kids as a puzzle building exercise. They just draw tiles and try to fit them together into a continuous city. Between the rivers, towns, and roads, it really challenges their developing critical thinking skills. If you're really brave, afterwards you can let them use the meeple to stage a battle for the kingdom, but you're risking all the casualty and loss concomitant with war when you do so.

Thanks to this thread, we got Carcassonne for Christmas. So far it has been a huge hit, although only TheBYUGal and I have played together. I'd be interested in playing with more people, but I guess the nice thing so far is that it's an interesting game that we can enjoy without having to get more people together. We've played 3 or 4 times since Christmas.

[DU Ute]

I hope we don't get any pictures on here of you wearing nothing but the Bananagrams pouch, you crazy hippie!

[RobinFinderson]

X-Mas is coming, so I put in a massive order for board games. If someone is related to the Findersons, they will probably get a game from us this year. I've played some really fun ones lately and thought I would report:

Dixit:



This is a very cool casual game for folks who don't like European style boardgames. It consists of a deck of cards having beautiful illustrations. Each player has a hand of five cards. On a player's turn, she looks at her hand and says a word or line of poetry that reflects what is going on in the illustration of one card. Then each of the other players looks at their own hand and selects their own card that best matches the caller's word/phrase. All of the cards are mixed together, unseen, and then flipped over. Players have to guess which card belongs to the original caller. Points are awarded for correct choices. It is a great party game, and the whimsical illustrations are guaranteed to delight everyone.

Fairy Tale:



I'm always looking for good card games, because they tend to be less expensive, and they travel well. Fairy tale is a great one. It has a strong fantasy theme that might turn some people off, but like all of the great games, the thems is just a superficial wrapper over a great game mechanic. In this game players draft cards into their hand and play them to the table in turn, attempting to simultaneously build up their own score (specific card combinations score points) and thwart the other players. The game looks great.

Bananagrams:



This is another great one for those that don't like European-style games. It plays like scrabble, except people don't take turns. Players race each other to use up all of their tiles, and may rearrange the board in any way they see fit in order to add new tiles to the mix. This is a great word game that will teach spelling skills and vocabulary. It is also fun to play in teams working together.

Finally,

Himalaya:



This is a great new serious European-style board game from a relatively new production house. It plays as a resource collection game, area majority game, and a travel and trade game, but it feels completely fresh and unique. If you are a serious board gamer, this game will give you something fresh and fun to play with your gaming group. It is a bit expensive, but a great addition to any collection.