What board games are you playing?: You've had enough screen time

[thecrazyscot]

I know there used to be a thread about this somewhere, but for the life of me I couldn't find it in OT.

Board games are one of my main hobbies, and I have a collection of about 100 games. I'm currently trying to sell a few and have a few more incoming which I am very excited about.

Anyways, I just played Castle Itter for the first time. I haven't played a war game in...I don't know how many years, and wouldn't really consider myself a wargamer. But Castle Itter appealed as it promised a pretty streamlined and light approach. It is one of the Valiant Defense series of games, of which the others are Pavlov's House (set in the Battle of Stalingrad) and the upcoming Soldiers in Postmen's Uniforms (set in Danzig). I'm hoping they branch out from WWII at some point...

My first game went...ok, I guess. I didn't lose, but the end result was a draw. There was a good bit of going back and forth to the rule book, which is natural, and future games should be able to be played in less than 60 min. The goal is to survive while preventing any SS from reaching the Castle.

As you can see, it was a close shave. My exhausted defenders managed to just barely keep off the encroaching SS on the north and west flanks. My tank (that pile of orange tokens on the right) was destroyed by multiple panzerschreks which ambushed it in quick succession, which was really unfortunate because it was doing excellent work suppressing the enemy advance on that side of the board.

The North and South Terraces were both heavily pummelled by enemy Flak cannons, but I still managed to clear the southern (green) flank long enough to sneak a French POW out to inform the 142nd Infantry of my predicament, which sped up the end game so I didn't need to survive quite as long.

Spoiler for large images :

A close-up of the castle:

And finally a look at the casualties (SS the top row, my motley crew of defenders on the bottom):

My poor tank crew

Despite inflicting far more casualties on the SS than were taken by the defenders, I need to do better. The final victory score is reduced for every SS remaining on the board, so despite surviving until rescue I wasn't able to pull a victory out, as I had a negative score from the swarm of enemies still around me.

Looking forward to playing again, and making far better use of suppression...

---------------------

I'm also playing The Ming Voyages, and can share a write-up of that at some point. Also, next week Iron Helm should be arriving, and I'll be able to share some dungeon adventuring.

 

[AmazonQueen]

Its in All Other Games https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/what-boardgames-did-you-just-play.494825/

Not being able to meet up with people other than 1 other household has been a bit of a binder on boardgaming but when my sister and her family came to visit we got in as much boardgaming as possible.
Played:

• Century: A New World
• Inis
• Terraforming Mars (3 times)
• Harry Potter Cluedo (to please my little niece)

Terraforming Mars is the hit of the moment. Fairly easy to learn, lots of different strategies, no 2 games are the same, but only limited player interaction

 

[thecrazyscot]

Ah there it is...very odd to me that it's sequestered over there given that its counterpart is here. I hope the mods allow us to keep it in OT, as I think it might get more participation in OT.
---------------------
I've started doing a lot more solo board gaming since the pandemic hit. It's nice to step away from the screen a bit, and helps me to be a bit more "present" with the family.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I know there used to be a thread about this somewhere, but for the life of me I couldn't find it in OT.

Board games are one of my main hobbies, and I have a collection of about 100 games. I'm currently trying to sell a few and have a few more incoming which I am very excited about.

Anyways, I just played Castle Itter for the first time. I haven't played a war game in...I don't know how many years, and wouldn't really consider myself a wargamer. But Castle Itter appealed as it promised a pretty streamlined and light approach. It is one of the Valiant Defense series of games, of which the others are Pavlov's House (set in the Battle of Stalingrad) and the upcoming Soldiers in Postmen's Uniforms (set in Danzig). I'm hoping they branch out from WWII at some point...

My first game went...ok, I guess. I didn't lose, but the end result was a draw. There was a good bit of going back and forth to the rule book, which is natural, and future games should be able to be played in less than 60 min. The goal is to survive while preventing any SS from reaching the Castle.

As you can see, it was a close shave. My exhausted defenders managed to just barely keep off the encroaching SS on the north and west flanks. My tank (that pile of orange tokens on the right) was destroyed by multiple panzerschreks which ambushed it in quick succession, which was really unfortunate because it was doing excellent work suppressing the enemy advance on that side of the board.

The North and South Terraces were both heavily pummelled by enemy Flak cannons, but I still managed to clear the southern (green) flank long enough to sneak a French POW out to inform the 142nd Infantry of my predicament, which sped up the end game so I didn't need to survive quite as long.

View attachment 569461

A close-up of the castle:

View attachment 569462

And finally a look at the casualties (SS the top row, my motley crew of defenders on the bottom):

View attachment 569463

My poor tank crew

Despite inflicting far more casualties on the SS than were taken by the defenders, I need to do better. The final victory score is reduced for every SS remaining on the board, so despite surviving until rescue I wasn't able to pull a victory out, as I had a negative score from the swarm of enemies still around me.

Looking forward to playing again, and making far better use of suppression...

---------------------

I'm also playing The Ming Voyages, and can share a write-up of that at some point. Also, next week Iron Helm should be arriving, and I'll be able to share some dungeon adventuring.

Have you ever played Escape From Colditz? I played that... about 25-30 years ago, and it was a hoot. One player takes on the role of the Germans, trying to prevent the other players (prisoners from various countries) from escaping. The first player to get all four of their team out and to a rendezvous point wins... unless stopped by the German guard, in which case that player wins.

What the guy who owned the game didn't realize is that he was playing with several SCA people, who have a habit of slipping into role-play mode during board games. By halfway through, he was getting frustrated, and by the time I won the game, he was completely frustrated.

He had never before played with a group of people who cooperated so much. We didn't actually care who won, just as long as someone did, so instead of being everyone for him/herself, we helped each other by trading things we needed - lengths of rope, wirecutters, bribes for the German guards, and so on.

We pointed out that the rules didn't say we couldn't do things like trade a piece of rope for a package of cigarettes, or wirecutters - we were trying to make sure each team had the best possible chance to get out.

Its in All Other Games https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/what-boardgames-did-you-just-play.494825/

Not being able to meet up with people other than 1 other household has been a bit of a binder on boardgaming but when my sister and her family came to visit we got in as much boardgaming as possible.
Played:

• Century: A New World
• Inis
• Terraforming Mars (3 times)
• Harry Potter Cluedo (to please my little niece)

Terraforming Mars is the hit of the moment. Fairly easy to learn, lots of different strategies, no 2 games are the same, but only limited player interaction

I am a recent convert to Harry Potter fandom, and of course Amazon has been shoving HP recommendations at me now... I had a look at the Clue game, and it looks very... sepia. As in all the rooms are sepia. That in itself was enough to make me decide against it.

There's a version of Clue that has extra rooms, that are outside the house. The only place I've seen it is when a Calendar Club booth is set up in the local mall around Christmas (that's where I get my Gary Patterson cat calendars every year).

Ah there it is...very odd to me that it's sequestered over there given that its counterpart is here. I hope the mods allow us to keep it in OT, as I think it might get more participation in OT.
---------------------
I've started doing a lot more solo board gaming since the pandemic hit. It's nice to step away from the screen a bit, and helps me to be a bit more "present" with the family.

Back when I had people to play with, we played a lot of Scrabble and various versions of the Mayfair rail games (ie. Empire Builder, Eurorails, etc.).

What I'd really love is to have another go at the original Civilization board game (the Avalon Hill one). Now that I understand more about the strategy (I played in an online PBEM game a few years ago), I'd enjoy it more.

Somewhere in my stuff I have a "make your own 'Opoly" set.

 

[thecrazyscot]

Have you ever played Escape From Colditz? I played that... about 25-30 years ago, and it was a hoot. One player takes on the role of the Germans, trying to prevent the other players (prisoners from various countries) from escaping. The first player to get all four of their team out and to a rendezvous point wins... unless stopped by the German guard, in which case that player wins.

What the guy who owned the game didn't realize is that he was playing with several SCA people, who have a habit of slipping into role-play mode during board games. By halfway through, he was getting frustrated, and by the time I won the game, he was completely frustrated.

He had never before played with a group of people who cooperated so much. We didn't actually care who won, just as long as someone did, so instead of being everyone for him/herself, we helped each other by trading things we needed - lengths of rope, wirecutters, bribes for the German guards, and so on.

We pointed out that the rules didn't say we couldn't do things like trade a piece of rope for a package of cigarettes, or wirecutters - we were trying to make sure each team had the best possible chance to get out.

I have not played Escape From Colditz, but I have heard about it multiple times, and it looks like great fun! I think co-op games have had a bit of a renaissance in the past few years, so hopefully people actually working together would be less of a surprise if you were to play it again.

Back when I had people to play with, we played a lot of Scrabble and various versions of the Mayfair rail games (ie. Empire Builder, Eurorails, etc.).

I have many, many wonderful memories playing Eurorails and Empire Builder - I was always more partial to Eurorails as I think the board was far more interesting than the massive blob of building nodes that is the USA. Ticket to Ride has kind of replaced the old crayon train games for me, though, as they are a bit quicker to play. I do miss the freeform nature that Eurorails had, though...

What I'd really love is to have another go at the original Civilization board game (the Avalon Hill one). Now that I understand more about the strategy (I played in an online PBEM game a few years ago), I'd enjoy it more.

You really should. My family has a standing agreement to play Advanced Civilization once every 4 years at Thanksgiving, during the US presidential election years. This gives us something to look forward to during inevitably depressing election seasons and allows us all to recover from the 18-hour epic marathon that it entails.

 

[Yeekim]

Have been playing a lot of Scythe.
Very much recommended.

 

[Narz]

I played my 1st OTB (over the board, as opposed to online) chess tournament since March while visiting NYC last week (we played outdoors in Washington Square Park). I got my ass handed to me unfortunately.

http://www.uschess.org/msa/XtblMain.php?202009126962 (I'm Norris, which is Narz is you say it fast enuf repeatedly)

The only other board game I've played recently (and play regularly) is Dominion but I always play it online (its a deck building game, pretty fun but about 5x faster to play online w no shuffling)

Oh and I played a cute game called Dixie w my mom, daughter and two friends while visiting back in July

 

[Narz]

Years ago I played the newest Civilization the board game. I played it only once or twice, the setup alone took about an hour.

There was a young adults (I barely qualify but no one carded me ) board game meetup at a local brewery about 1.5 miles from me but I don't think that's been going down since coronatime

I also used to work at a board game store back in '09-'10, that was fun. Unfortunately it was very hard fot my boss to make a living that way in the age of Amazon, Magic and Yugioh kept him afloat for awhile but eventually he closed up about two years ago

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I have not played Escape From Colditz, but I have heard about it multiple times, and it looks like great fun! I think co-op games have had a bit of a renaissance in the past few years, so hopefully people actually working together would be less of a surprise if you were to play it again.

Unfortunately the guy who owned the game was a friend of a friend, and I have never had a chance to play again. It's been over 20 years since I've been part of any in-person gaming group.

I have many, many wonderful memories playing Eurorails and Empire Builder - I was always more partial to Eurorails as I think the board was far more interesting than the massive blob of building nodes that is the USA. Ticket to Ride has kind of replaced the old crayon train games for me, though, as they are a bit quicker to play. I do miss the freeform nature that Eurorails had, though...

We tried all the different versions we could get our hands on - North American Rails (includes Canada and Mexico), Nippon Rails, Australia Rails, Iron Dragon (a fantasy version that has two layers of map - part of it takes place underground), and I also have Lunar Rails, Mars Rails, India Rails, and China Rails. There's one for Russia as well, if memory serves (though that one will be greatly out of date by now).

We tweaked the rules to make the game a bit harder, since after you play it a lot of times it gets too easy. So the house rules are that you have to have ALL the major (red hexagon) cities connected (and have delivered cargo to them; no connecting to cities without making a delivery there!). We doubled the amount of the penalties, and instituted a new one: Derailments mean having to pay an Environmental Cleanup fee - which is the same amount as the taxes.

This did make the game a bit longer, but it was also a bit harder - which was discovered by the person who initially taught us this game. The first time he played with us using my board, we used my house rules... and he lost. He's not used to losing, and he carped and whined about the "connect all cities" rule since he couldn't just choose between Stockholm and Madrid; he needed both.

So I said, "How often do I win against you in any board game? Less than half a dozen times so far, in all these years?" He nodded, and so I told him, "Be a good sport and let me enjoy it."

As I recall, I also beat him twice at Civilization. He didn't mind the second time, though, since it also meant that I beat the person he'd been constantly warring with. Those two were so intent on beating each other that I sneaked up the middle and then dropped a Civil Disorder card in with the commodities in the trading round. Nobody expected that, since the 'other person' was my boyfriend - who definitely assumed I'd be on his side. He sat there in disbelief, while he lost city after city as his empire crumbled past fixing (this was the last turn of the game), while the "I never lose" guy (who also lost) sat there and admired all those lost cities. He didn't mind losing that time, because I'd used strategy neither had expected, and it was against his opponent. He pronounced it "Beautiful! Just BEAUTIFUL!"

You really should. My family has a standing agreement to play Advanced Civilization once every 4 years at Thanksgiving, during the US presidential election years. This gives us something to look forward to during inevitably depressing election seasons and allows us all to recover from the 18-hour epic marathon that it entails.

Alas, I don't have a copy of it, and it's godawful expensive - it costs hundreds on eBay, even if I can find it. And then I'd have to find enough people to play with, teach them...

This building has a social room that would be perfect for board game get-togethers. It's got large tables, lots of chairs, and a kitchen and bathroom. But nobody ever does it that I'm aware of. I think there were D&D players here a few years ago, as I saw someone leaving and he was carrying a dice bag. Dunno if they're still here.

But given that we're having a pandemic, I think I'd hesitate to start something up unless it had limited numbers of people, and excluded anyone who normally is part of a large group (ie. school-age kids). That wouldn't fly with people, so that's that.

 

[AmazonQueen]

Probably the world's oldest boardgamer.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...s-oldest-ever-person-with-cola-and-boardgameshttps://www.theguardian.com/world/2...s-oldest-ever-person-with-cola-and-boardgames

 

[HEF]

Probably the world's oldest boardgamer.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...s-oldest-ever-person-with-cola-and-boardgameshttps://www.theguardian.com/world/2...s-oldest-ever-person-with-cola-and-boardgames

Fascinatin'.

Ms. Kane Tanaka completely defeats Ms. Hamako Mori's record!





A 90-year-old Japanese grandma Hamako Mori flexes her fingers every day to keep them in shape for playing video games.

Hamako Mori is the oldest video gamer on YouTube, according to Guinness World Records.

Known as “Gamer Grandma” to her 320,000 subscribers on YouTube, Mori says she hopes to keep herself going and fit to play for as long as possible, and she says her favourite game titles are Grand Theft Auto V and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.




Would You Like To See More?

 

[thecrazyscot]

I played Castle Itter again, and lost on the last turn. The SS hit me with an absolutely brutal mortar barrage and machine gun suppression, which killed two of my officers on my northern flank, which in turn cause the remaining two riflemen there to panic and also be lost as casualties. With my northern flank wide open and unable to sneak a French POW out to call for reinforcements sooner due to constant pressure, SS Sturm troopers pushed their way in.

 

[thecrazyscot]

My copy of Iron Helm finally arrived, and I have made 5 attempts to beat the dungeon so far. 5 failures! I managed to get to the final boss twice, though.

It is a solo dungeon crawler where you play a single character. You start with some gold and equipment, and have the option to purchase additional gear with your starting gold. Once you are ready to descend into the dungeon, you try to make your way down (potentially) 5 levels until you encounter the boss. If you defeat the boss, you win. If you die, you lose.

The heart of the game is the room exploration. Each of the 5 levels has 8 rounds of play. During each round you will draw 2 "door" cards - facedown - then choose one to flip over and explore. After seeing what that room has to offer, you can stick with that room, in which case you discard the other door card sight unseen, OR you can discard your first door card and commit to exploring the second room. This is the core gameplay mechanic, and primary decision-space in the game.

The rulebook is not particularly well written, but after a game or two of referencing the forums and FAQ it flows very nicely.

Spoiler Pictures :

 

[tuckerkao]

I definitely want to play Triopoly - the 3 layers version of the monopoly. Best if each layer has the hexagonal shapes.

 

[thecrazyscot]

My wife and I have started a new goal: play through all of our games (alphabetically). We are trying to set aside Monday nights as our standing game night, and we played the first game on the list last night: 7 Wonders. As it was just the two of us, it took a little while for us to figure out the official 2-player variant, as the game is really designed to be played with at least 3 (preferably 4+) people. We tied and she won on the tiebreaker. I'm not sure I'm a fan of the 2-player variant, which utilizes a dummy player. There is a 2-player version of the game (7 Wonders Duel) which might be worth replacing it with as we did enjoy the overall flow of the gameplay.

 

[AmazonQueen]

7 Wonders Duel plays better than the 2-player version of 7 Wonders. It does play somewhat differently. War can be a valid option for winning the game rather than just a way of wrecking your opponents if they neglect their military.
Sadly I'm now in a region of the UK with a stricter lockdown so boardgames are totally off the agenda for a while.

 

[HEF]

Tuesday, 29th September 2o2o


Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus: The Game by Mattel




This is a board game that has sat on my book shelf for years gathering dust; although I've never played 'Men from Mars, Women Are From Venus', did review the gameplay topics and questions.

Someday, I will find worthy opponents mature enough to play with & against.

'Men from Mars, Women Are From Venus' can be the perfect icebreaker for gamers of all stripe exploring relationships with 4 or more intimate partners.

 

[aelf]

Do card games count? I recently played Exploding Kittens, Azul, 6 Nimmt!/Take 6! and Wavelength.

I own the Dilbert board game myself, but it's difficult to get anyone to play that because it's so long and complicated. And I'm starting to design my own board game that I believe has a lot of potential.

 

[Zkribbler]

I recently played Exploding Kittens,

Iiiiiiiiieeeeee!

 

[thecrazyscot]

My wife and I have been playing a few different solitaire games over the past week, and both of these make excellent de-stressors.

First up, Limes (Latin pronunciation). This is more my type of game, my wife has little interest in it. You are setting up a 4x4 grid of cards with different terrain on them, and as you place them one at a time you put workers on different territories to score points at the end. You need to strategically place the cards in order to maximize your scoring opportunities, and as there are 24 cards in your deck, each final landscape will look different as you randomly draw 2/3 of the deck. It's a "beat-your-own-score" game, which are usually not my favorite, but this one plays so quickly (10 minutes or less, usually) and cleanly that I don't actually mind. I've been setting scoring goals for myself and having quite a bit of fun trying to surpass them.

It can be played with other people, but it's essentially multiplayer solitaire, as there is no player interaction.

Spoiler Limes :

---------------------------------------
Next is Food Chain Island. In this one you also have a grid of 16 cards, but rather than trying to build it, you are trying disassemble it and end up with a single stack. Each animal card has a value and a special ability, and you must figure out how to have the higher-value cards "eat" (move on top of) the lower value cards in order to have a single stack remaining. There are limitations to make this more difficult, of course: you can only move orthogonally, and each animal can only eat animals which are up to 3 less in value (so the 15 can only eat 14, 13, or 12). The special abilities which are activated whenever you use an animal also can force your hand in unpleasant ways, or can allow you to break certain rules when eating the next animal so you can reach ones that you've accidentally isolated. You also have sea creature cards off to the side, which are essentially one-time-use powers to help you.

The basic 4x4 starting grid is not too difficult, but you can set up the starting grid in any configuration, and the rulebook has multiple more difficult variations to try - and they are more difficult! Both my wife and I really love this one. It plays in 10-15 minutes, is not too complicated, but provides quite a good mental exercise as you try to optimize your moves to overcome the random card layouts and have all the animals end up in a single stack.

Spoiler Food Chain Island :

Two piles left...better try again!

The publisher for this game (ButtonShy) has three other 18-card spatial puzzle games which I thoroughly enjoy, all of which are pretty unique and very clever. Sprawlopolis, where you are laying out a city while attempting to meet variable scoring conditions; Skulls of Sedlec, where you are organizing bones in an ossuary to make macabre art pieces; and finally Circle the Wagons, where you are drafting cards to try and match tiles while preventing your opponent from scoring their own.