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boardgames!

mx wcfc said:
A guy I (vaguely) know does boardgames. They are meant to be good, and his reputation is spreading beyond Brighton.

boardgamegeek.com

Paul Stapleton

I've been a Brightonian, keen gamer and cartoonist since the mid 90's, and in 2012 I finally got to combine all three to make my first board game, BN1: A Board Game All About Brighton. It was a continuation of a comic strip I'd been drawing for a couple of years prior, and the first run sold out...
boardgamegeek.com boardgamegeek.com

Really nice fella. Frontman of a folk punk band, Pog, as well. Just don't camp near him at a festival cos he's up at 6 in the morning playing his boardgames with his kids.
Click to expand...
Quite liked Pog.
 
Does anyone have any suggestions for what online games our gaming group can play? Something where we can do text chat while we play, cos one of us is on a rather old PC. He can run Steam, but not much else at the same time. There must be something we can sign up to to play Carcassone or something similar.
 
belboid said:
Does anyone have any suggestions for what online games our gaming group can play? Something where we can do text chat while we play, cos one of us is on a rather old PC. He can run Steam, but not much else at the same time. There must be something we can sign up to to play Carcassone or something similar.
Click to expand...
Been using discord for chat. Mainly Dominion Online or Catan Universe on steam. Enrollment for Catan seems to take a day.
 
belboid said:
Does anyone have any suggestions for what online games our gaming group can play? Something where we can do text chat while we play, cos one of us is on a rather old PC. He can run Steam, but not much else at the same time. There must be something we can sign up to to play Carcassone or something similar.
Click to expand...

Boardgame arena.
 
Orang Utan said:
Can anyone recommend boardgames for two players that are fun to play and not too complicated or strategic to play. Quizzy type games a plus, but not necessarily just those
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Codenames: Duel. I haven't played the Duel version only the team version. Probably the closest to a quizzy type game I could recommend. Assuming Duel plays basically the same as the team game, you have a set of words which you have to give clues to for your teammate(s) to guess, but your opponents also guess so you need to make clues which you think your teammate(s) will guess correctly but your opponents will guess different words. Honestly it's not my type of game but it's very highly rated and lots of people love it. Decrypto is a newer similar game which is a little like codenames crossed with mastermind but needs 3 players unfortunately. I wonder now if you've got mastermind in a closet somewhere? That's a good game if you like logic puzzles.

Patchwork is brilliant. The same designer has made a couple of other games on a similar style of which I've played Cottage Garden which is also good as a 2 player game. If you like the idea of trying to arrange odd shapes into a quilt / garden I'd really recommend one of these.

I haven't played Jaipur or 7 Wonders: Duel but both are often recommended for 2player and I don't think either are too complicated

Hive and Wingspan might be crossing the line into too strategic or complicated but might not.
Hive falls into the "simple rules, complex play" kind of game, but it's also short at 20-30min per game, it's nowhere near as complicated as chess or go, but more complex than othello or checkers (although I think checkers might be a game with hidden depth).
Wingspan has rules complexity similar to monopoly/cluedo but has a theme which helps things to flow and if you like birds will definitely be a bonus. It has strategic depth but you can just play it by feel and getting the birds you like rather than trying to min/max your score. I find it hard to judge how complex this game is because if you've played some modern board games, the mechanics will be very familiar but if you haven't, there's a lot of new things to learn which might overwhelm someone.
So I'll recommend them but with caveats because it's too hard to know how complicated or strategic is too much without knowing the people specifically.

With all of this I'm just going to mention that most games now have youtube videos showing how to play, increasingly manufacturers are making them but even if they haven't there are reviewers doing "how to play" or "play through" videos where they teach you a game and/or have a play through of the game so you can learn the rules by watching someone else play rather than reading rules. Some people find this a far easier/more pleasant way to learn how to play a game.

fwiw this is a search on boardgamegeek for games which support 2 players and are in the "trivia" category - not sure that's the same as quizzy?
boardgamegeek.com

BoardGameGeek | Gaming Unplugged Since 2000

boardgamegeek.com boardgamegeek.com
 
Tabletop Simulator is definitely the way to go for online board games. It's all set in a sand-box 3D environment with built-in physics engine, so it has the touchy-feely vibe of board gaming. You move the pieces, roll the dice, etc. just like you would in a real board game, which I think adds a whole other element above online versions of board games.

It's on half price at the moment! :cool:

The core environment costs £15 (full price), with a 4-pack available that makes it cheaper. There are some DLC games that are official releases by games manufacturers that cost a bit extra (around a fiver), though only one person needs to own a title for a group to play. But what really makes it great is that there is a massive modding community that have made versions of existing games (and some original games too) that are free to play. All the usual suspects are there, including some rare gems and archived games. The quality ranges from excellent to not so good, so you have to read the comments section before committing. It's relatively easy to tell which ones are going to be winners.

PROS
  • 3D physics environment makes it feel like you are actually playing a board game rather than a computer game
  • UI is really well thought out, once you've got to grips with it
  • Voice and text comms work great
  • There are something like 60,000 mod items available for free in the workshop (which I'd say translates to around 40,000 games) (note: I've upwardly revised these figures via edit)
  • Unless you're a real obscure games geek, your favourite games are probably in the workshop
  • Works for a surprisingly wide range of games - card games, RPG's, complex 'Eurogames' (dislike that term!) - even Subbuteo plays decently on it!
  • The DLC titles, which you pay a bit extra for, are very well curated. It's nice to reward the publishers too. In honesty - the best mods are just as good as the DLC's, so it's a matter of choice really
  • You can play in VR if you want to
CONS
  • You need to use WASD - mouse controls to navigate. If you've been doing that since you were ten, then you'll be fine. If you hardly ever play computer games then that might be a bit frustrating at first. However, you don't have to move all that much, and you can set up camera position shortcuts to help get around.
  • Networking is fairly straightforward, but if your Firewall or router are overly protective you might need to get into the tedious process of port forwarding (but that's the same with most networking activities)
  • Some of the mods are either poorly done, or have fallen into disrepair. A quick scan of the comments section lets you know which are the gems (there are often various mod versions of the same game to choose from)
You can hit me up on steam if you fancy organising a game (just remember that it's quite a commitment as they tend to take hours :D). I'm gosub_frag. I'm playing a lot of games with pals at the moment, so I can't promise I'll have the time, but if so then great.

eta: linky:

Tabletop Simulator on Steam
 
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Just had a copy of Sun Tzu delivered, a decent looking card/strategy game for two based on....you can guess who.

Fifteen to thirty minutes a game, looks like a very decent filler while we’re trapped without proper boardgaming facilities.
 
oi oi

Any suggestions for lock-down board-games night for a household of 3? Myself, Mrs A and lil'Angel.

Have previously enjoyed Exploding Kittens, Bananagrams, Cobra Paw, Pairs in Pears etc. The child is approaching 14 if relevant.
 
We managed to have an attempt at some online gaming last night over zoom. Only had complete run throughs of dice games, but I think the boards should look clear enough for other things too, thanks to my magnificent rostrum camera set up.

95560809_3513823881965143_3445661582212726784_n.jpg

rc dice1.PNG

suntzu.PNGfd.PNG
 
Santino said:
What's the game with the Chinese map?
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Sun Tzu. It's a two player board/card game - tho you reveal all your cards so it isnt much of an issue that only one team actually physically has them!
boardgamegeek.com

Sun Tzu

Will your dynasty be the one to finally bring unity to China?
boardgamegeek.com boardgamegeek.com

I think the light of day shining through the window is something to do with whatever is making the board out of focus on the right hand side.
 
Weird Monopolies and Roll-Ups: Horse Shows, School Spirit, Settlers of Catan, and Jigsaw Puzzles
Market power is everywhere. Really. It's getting strange out there.
Matt Stoller. 19/08/2020
Last week, after I described a land of monopolists, so many of you got in touch with me about your experiences with private equity and monopolies that I realized I’d have to do another issue about market power in niche areas. I’m going beyond just private equity this time, adding areas with just regular old monopolies as well.

3. Tabletop Games

A few years ago, French board and card game publisher Asmodee bought the popular tabletop game Settlers of Catan. Asmodee was owned by private equity shop Eurazeo, and was engaging in an aggressive strategy to roll up the industry. According to one of their executives, "Over recent years Asmodee has been a consolidator in the board game market. As investors we want to continue to support the company to consolidate this highly fragmented market."
Click to expand...

Tabletop game business strategy is based on having intellectual property, because buyers of games are an affinity group with allegiances to specific games. Under Eurazeo, Asmodee bought 20 different companies, and Asmodee now publishes dozens of popular games 7 Wonders, Dead of Winter, Dixit, Splendor, Star Wars: The X-Wing Miniatures Game, Pandemic and Ticket to Ride, and “distributes Magic: The Gathering, Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh! in some European countries.” Asmodee’s strategy is is to acquire intellectual property via merger or licensing and then it use to control distribution to stores, and then raise prices accordingly. Fans of these games have been complaining about price hikes for years.

In 2018, Eurazeo sold Asmodee to another private equity firm, PAI Partners.
Click to expand...
 
Stop Doomscrolling and Play a Board Game About Class Warfare
New Yorker. September 14, 2020 Outline - Read & annotate without distractions
Pinçon-Charlot is tiny, with heavily lined, no-bullshit eyes peeking out from under dense bangs. (The hair style, an interview subject once gingerly informed her, marked her as an interloper on the society scene.) She was sitting in the dining room of the couple’s row house, in Bourg-la-Reine, a suburb of Paris, offering a visitor hand sanitizer and sparkling water while her husband trimmed hedges in the garden. A red (like Communism) Kapital! box sat on the table. Pinçon-Charlot (“a Communist of the soul,” if not currently a Party member) opened it and took out a game board, a die, and a stack of K, the game’s paper currency.

“Let’s roll the die!” she instructed. The visitor rolled a two. Pinçon-Charlot rolled a six, establishing her as the “dominant” player to the visitor’s “dominated.” “In life, it’s like that,” she said, sighing. “Frankly, it’s all chance.”
Click to expand...
 
Picked up second-hand copy of Underwater Cities the other day and had it out last night with the OH.
Seems really well suited for 2 player so far. It does take a bit of learning for the first play, wondering what things do and learning off symbols, so we had to finish up halfway through last night! Both more than happy to get back to it today though.... seems like there will be a high replayability factor for this one going forward too, there are a lot of different moving parts going on in tandem with limited round numbers and moves per round (frustrating!...but in a good way), so will take a while for either of us to figure out the best strategies and paths to victory :)

Underwater Cities | Board Game | BoardGameGeek
 
(posting with permission)
I've made a board game which I'm taking to Kickstarter next month :D



Is an unboxing video so you can see what the game looks like.
Based on the phrase "re-arranging deckchairs on the Titanic" - taking pointless actions in the face of disaster - the game wonders what it would be like if the saying was based on reality. You play as a deckchair attendant on the first class promenade of the Titanic, competing with other players to reserve the spots your customer like to earn tips (points to win the game), using a block of ice that has fallen on to the deck to disrupt your opponent's plans and keeping an eye on the movement of the ship as it starts to sink and moves your chairs around each round.

It's a short light game (about 15-30 minutes) with some decent tactical depth for a game of that time/weight. Plays and feels like an abstract but was designed from the theme, and the theme and mechanics are well integrated - had quite a lot of disagreement on this, with some people thinking it's really highly themed and others feeling the theme is a bit pasted on. Personally I think it's decently thematic - the mechanics of the game mostly make sense with the theme, but you aren't going to come away from this feeling like you've just been arranging deckchairs!

If you have TableTop Simulator, you can try the game using this mod: Steam Workshop::Deckchairs on the Titanic
Or if you are coming to UKGE, we'll have a stand there.
Or if you are in Birmingham or nearby, I've got a review copy that you can borrow, just let me know if you are interested.

If you're interested the kickstarter will run from the 29th July - 20th August.
you can sign up to the email list at www.deckchairs.games - there's also some reviews there.

Would appreciate sharing of social media pages if you can:
facebook - Deckchairs On The Titanic
twitter - https://twitter.com/SilverBirchGame
instagram - Silver Birch Games's (@silverbirchgame) Instagram profile • 14 photos and videos
 
Lazy Llama said:
Hey BigTom - the game came up on a couple of my feeds recently, and I even mentioned it to a colleague (admittedly in relation to a project we’re involved in).
Reckon I’ll be up for buying a/several copies.
Click to expand...

Awesome :) thank you - I'm curious about the project you're working on that relates to this of course!

It's been a bit weird on facebook with adverts - when I was playtesting this in person, I didn't get anyone saying they thought the theme was offensive/inappropriate but on facebook we've had quite a few people complaining about it. I think the phrase is not as well known as I thought it was which doesn't help but even so I've been surprised that more than a couple of people are offended by having a game themed on the titanic because of the deaths, especially when there are so many war games around.
 
BigTom said:
I'm curious about the project you're working on that relates to this of course!
Click to expand...
Just a hideous mess which the management fail to acknowledge and constantly change personnel and features. So about the phrase rather than the game.

I saw the reactions on FB: had never occurred to me that people would take offence at a game using a well-known phrase as its title. I’ve never heard anyone object to the phrase itself so it’s a bit strange.
 
Lazy Llama said:
Just a hideous mess which the management fail to acknowledge and constantly change personnel and features. So about the phrase rather than the game.

I saw the reactions on FB: had never occurred to me that people would take offence at a game using a well-known phrase as its title. I’ve never heard anyone object to the phrase itself so it’s a bit strange.
Click to expand...

ah, that makes sense, yeah it's a phrase that applies to lots of occasions in life and I've never heard anyone object to the phrase either, so also been a bit surprised by the reactions, but there's also plenty who clearly do know the phrase and have commented about the game being about UK government policy etc.
 
BigTom said:
(posting with permission)
I've made a board game which I'm taking to Kickstarter next month :D



Is an unboxing video so you can see what the game looks like.
Based on the phrase "re-arranging deckchairs on the Titanic" - taking pointless actions in the face of disaster - the game wonders what it would be like if the saying was based on reality. You play as a deckchair attendant on the first class promenade of the Titanic, competing with other players to reserve the spots your customer like to earn tips (points to win the game), using a block of ice that has fallen on to the deck to disrupt your opponent's plans and keeping an eye on the movement of the ship as it starts to sink and moves your chairs around each round.

It's a short light game (about 15-30 minutes) with some decent tactical depth for a game of that time/weight. Plays and feels like an abstract but was designed from the theme, and the theme and mechanics are well integrated - had quite a lot of disagreement on this, with some people thinking it's really highly themed and others feeling the theme is a bit pasted on. Personally I think it's decently thematic - the mechanics of the game mostly make sense with the theme, but you aren't going to come away from this feeling like you've just been arranging deckchairs!

If you have TableTop Simulator, you can try the game using this mod: Steam Workshop::Deckchairs on the Titanic
Or if you are coming to UKGE, we'll have a stand there.
Or if you are in Birmingham or nearby, I've got a review copy that you can borrow, just let me know if you are interested.

If you're interested the kickstarter will run from the 29th July - 20th August.
you can sign up to the email list at www.deckchairs.games - there's also some reviews there.

Would appreciate sharing of social media pages if you can:
facebook - Deckchairs On The Titanic
twitter - https://twitter.com/SilverBirchGame
instagram - Silver Birch Games's (@silverbirchgame) Instagram profile • 14 photos and videos
Click to expand...


That’s awesome.
 
Now that I'm fully vaxxed and on summer holiday I really want to do some board gaming.

I have a whole bunch of games taking up shelf space and I'm iching to play some of them.

I am doing online pathfinder stuff fortnightly but am hoping to switch stuff up and do something face to face.

20210425_191029.jpg
20210425_175535-1.jpg

Even have the whiteboards for gaming.
 
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