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[StoOgE]

I played a base game of Shadows over Camelot, but I didn't quite like it. I like the art and the theme, but, I don't know i can't put my finger on it. I didn't like it much. Maybe it was because we only had 4 players (or because it was the first time I've played it), but it didn't click with me. The simplicity actually turned me off I think and I didn't see much strategy being employed. We had 1 traitor, who was discovered. I'll probably give it another shot though.

Shadows over Camelot is a pretty simple game and seems to work best when everyone knows what is going on. In teaching games you normally run into the problem where the experienced player has to coach people into what to do. Which makes it hard for the traitor to do much damage since everyone is being told what to do. When everyone knows the rules well you kind of each do your own thing which makes the traitors job easier.

Also, traitors seem to be pretty bad at hiding it in the first few games.. they try and do obvious bad things.

It is certainly a game whose mechanics are not all that great, they are really basic. But the overall feel of the game is a good deal of fun.

It's an enjoyable game, but Battlestar is a much better game and allows the traitor to do "bad" things much more often without anyone knowing since it is a blind voting process.

Some old Rio Grande railroad game (I can't remember the name of it, it has a lot to do with stocks)--another fun game

http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/31730/chicago-express

Sounds like Chicago Express. I've only played it once but had fun with it.

 

[platypotamus]

This is kinda interesting:

http://www.boingboing.net/2010/12/1..._campaign=Feed:+boingboing/iBag+(Boing+Boing)

Having observed that the four most common household boardgames -- Monopoly, Cluedo (AKA Clue), Trivial Pursuit, and Scrabble -- are often tedious and frustrating and overlong, the game designers at Hide&Seek set about to create a whole book's worth of variant rulesets and tweaks that use some or all of the pieces from some or all of the games.

Some examples: a Monopoly-based solitaire where you have to lay out the property cards in a grid while following certain rules (each card must touch another from its set, railroads need to be in the same row but not adjacent, etc); a Scrabble-meets-Balderdash word game where you have to make words that "beat" other words (e.g., Robot beats Twig, Twig beats Wasp) and then convince your fellow players you have the winning word; a full-blown zombie-combat tabletop strategy game made out of the Clue board, the lead pipe, and some Chess pawns; and "Dadaist Trivial Pursuit" where players are read out an answer and have to come up with odd questions that suit it.

 

[platypotamus]

Also:

Holy crap the Math trade has 1822 games in it.

I've got about 20 in my "want" list on there, so I'm pretty optimistic some sort of match will work out. Probably won't be able to unload my Sudoku board game, but I think any of the others is potentially desirable to someone... maybe not the Star Wars Monopoly either...

 

[StoOgE]

Also:

Holy crap the Math trade has 1822 games in it.

I've got about 20 in my "want" list on there, so I'm pretty optimistic some sort of match will work out. Probably won't be able to unload my Sudoku board game, but I think any of the others is potentially desirable to someone... maybe not the Star Wars Monopoly either...

Hah,

you are much more judicious in your want list. Mine has about 80 games. :lol

 

[platypotamus]

Hah,

you are much more judicious in your want list. Mine has about 80 games. :lol

Yeah, it was mainly a time concern that kept me from growing a larger list. I've done a lot of skimming the list.

Also, I deliberately avoided a LOT of games that I wanted, as they're high risk for Christmas gifts. Pretty much any time I saw the green highlight of something from my BGG wishlist, I skipped it.

 

[Chorazin]

Yeah, it was mainly a time concern that kept me from growing a larger list. I've done a lot of skimming the list.

Also, I deliberately avoided a LOT of games that I wanted, as they're high risk for Christmas gifts. Pretty much any time I saw the green highlight of something from my BGG wishlist, I skipped it.

Speaking of Christmas gifts, if I get half the games I have on my Amazon wishlist this year I'll be a happy, happy man. :lol

 

[StoOgE]

Yeah, it was mainly a time concern that kept me from growing a larger list. I've done a lot of skimming the list.

Also, I deliberately avoided a LOT of games that I wanted, as they're high risk for Christmas gifts. Pretty much any time I saw the green highlight of something from my BGG wishlist, I skipped it.

I went ahead and went for the Civilization and Agricola copies. I figure if I get stuck with 2 copies of one of them I can retrade them later since they are always in very high demand. I'll just keep my mouth shut about getting them until Xmas.

Edit: the "submit your wants" button is now live on the math trade. It's right next to the other options on the "edit your wants" screen. Be sure and click it, then confirm before Tuesday night.

 

[Steve Youngblood]

So, after having owned it for almost a year and never really finding the right time to break it out, I finally got a chance to play a couple of games of Dominion Friday night. Given its near-universal praise, it's hardly surprising that it went over well. I really enjoyed it, and everyone who played seemed to enjoy it as well. So, I'm pretty happy with how that went down.

The one thing that has me scratching my head though was that it seemed to last much, much longer than the playtime suggested. I'm pretty sure that our first game took close to two hours. Granted, nobody had played before, so there was some rules debating/inefficient play/indecisiveness due to lack of familiarity, but I thought after that initial 15 minutes or so we were playing at a decent clip. After that, the second 3 player game took about 90 minutes, and I thought we were much more comfortable with the game that time. I'm not complaining, as we had fun, but I'm just sitting there thinking "do we just suck or something, because we're taking 3 to 4 times as long as suggested to play this game?"

 

[AstroLad]

So, after having owned it for almost a year and never really finding the right time to break it out, I finally got a chance to play a couple of games of Dominion Friday night. Given its near-universal praise, it's hardly surprising that it went over well. I really enjoyed it, and everyone who played seemed to enjoy it as well. So, I'm pretty happy with how that went down.

The one thing that has me scratching my head though was that it seemed to last much, much longer than the playtime suggested. I'm pretty sure that our first game took close to two hours. Granted, nobody had played before, so there was some rules debating/inefficient play/indecisiveness due to lack of familiarity, but I thought after that initial 15 minutes or so we were playing at a decent clip. After that, the second 3 player game took about 90 minutes, and I thought we were much more comfortable with the game that time. I'm not complaining, as we had fun, but I'm just sitting there thinking "do we just suck or something, because we're taking 3 to 4 times as long as suggested to play this game?"

Yeah, those do seem to be on the long end of playtimes. Learning games I'll never really pay attention to playtimes, but 90m for a 3P is quite long. There are a lot of variables though, such as cards used. If you use Village for example, and everyone is buying up villages and just piling on actions each turn that could add a half hour to your playtime. With some of the expansions, like Alchemy, normal playtime can double due to the nature of the cards. Another is that people may have been waiting to long to start buying VPs. If there is no one pushing the game to its conclusion (e.g., if no one is buying VPs and people are buying from a variety of decks and not emptying any) the game can theoretically go on for a very long time.

I think you'll find that game goes faster and faster though as you get more plays in. The way I play I basically have my turn ready to go well before my next turn, and I only very rarely change that. If you play with an experienced enough group, you can have players basically finishing turns during the previous players' clean-up phases. We play like that sometimes, but it does make the game feel even more solitaire-y (and can lead to errors, which Dominion is very prone to) so it's not necessarily the best way to go. But generally 3P with normal cards should take 30-45 tops of actual gameplay not counting setup or cleanup.

 

[Vinci]

Last night, my wife continued her Carcassonne dominance. The group has played that game a dozen times and she's never lost. It's just insane. We all love playing it, though, so it's not game-breaking or anything. Just impressive.

 

[AstroLad]

Last night, my wife continued her Carcassonne dominance. The group has played that game a dozen times and she's never lost. It's just insane. We all love playing it, though, so it's not game-breaking or anything. Just impressive.

If you are playing as a group you guys need to gang up on her. Never let her complete a city and box her in at every opportunity.

 

[Vinci]

If you are playing as a group you guys need to gang up on her. Never let her complete a city and box her in at every opportunity.

The problem is... my wife is adorable. Anytime we harm her in games, she gives us a sad, puppy-dog look - and it just drives guilt through every inch of your body. So we don't want to gang up on her. We just keep hoping that eventually one of us could take her down without having to resort to anything too obvious.

I wish I were kidding. I actually stopped playing the Catan Card Game with her because I was thrashing her so badly at it.

 

[AstroLad]

carc is the most secretly evil game out there and you guys need to open up the pandora's box. come join us in carc iOS games and we will show you the dark arts

just kidding play any way you want but screwing people is fun although my wife also gets sad when i mess with her in carc but that doesn't stop me :lol

edit: to be fair, my wife is the reason we swapped out warlord from our citadels deck -- she kept paying to destroy my districts no matter the cost or benefit to her

 

[ultron87]

Played BSG last night. 4-players so we played with the damn Sympathizer card. No cylons in the first half, so we were killing it on resources.

On the second loyalty card draw, one person got both the sympathizer and the Cylon card. So he has to reveal himself as sympathizer and can then pass his Cylon card to someone else. He chooses the person who's turn is after his, who is also the president. She immediately send me to the brig with a Quorum card. My attempt to get out of jail is unsuccessful by 2. The other human very nearly succeeds at getting her sent to the brig, but it doesn't work out. On the President's next turn the other human gets put in the Brig as well. We forfeit, because there was no way in hell we were getting out of there.

It was an extremely unfortunate series of events for the humans. :lol

 

[Vinci]

carc is the most secretly evil game out there and you guys need to open up the pandora's box. come join us in carc iOS games and we will show you the dark arts

just kidding play any way you want but screwing people is fun although my wife also gets sad when i mess with her in carc but that doesn't stop me :lol

Oh, we'll eventually have to go evil on her if this keeps up. But maybe only after a few more tries.

 

[Steve Youngblood]

Yeah, those do seem to be on the long end of playtimes. Learning games I'll never really pay attention to playtimes, but 90m for a 3P is quite long. There are a lot of variables though, such as cards used. If you use Village for example, and everyone is buying up villages and just piling on actions each turn that could add a half hour to your playtime. With some of the expansions, like Alchemy, normal playtime can double due to the nature of the cards. Another is that people may have been waiting to long to start buying VPs. If there is no one pushing the game to its conclusion (e.g., if no one is buying VPs and people are buying from a variety of decks and not emptying any) the game can theoretically go on for a very long time.

Well, the spy was in play and all those were gone, so there was a lot of hands involving "play Spy, get a card, play other spy, draw another spy, play that, etc." Also, I don't think I had quite managed how to properly clean up the useless cards. It was probably a little too deep into the mid-game before learning the value of having the cellars to discard the victory cards, and using the chapel to permanently get rid of the less valuable/detrimental cards as deck sizes got bigger and bigger. I'm sure it'll go faster next time.

It was kind of sad playing those turns where I would chain several +1/2 action and +1/2 draws together and still not come up with anything even remotely eventful in the buy phase.

 

[AstroLad]

Yeah exactly, after a few plays you'll definitely start to notice that in many cases (general, fairly common strategic advice)

Spoiler

cheap action cards merely take up space in your deck, and often the best strategy is to go for money and then move quickly to VPs as soon as you have the ability to buy Provinces

.

 

[StoOgE]

Well, the spy was in play and all those were gone, so there was a lot of hands involving "play Spy, get a card, play other spy, draw another spy, play that, etc." Also, I don't think I had quite managed how to properly clean up the useless cards. It was probably a little too deep into the mid-game before learning the value of having the cellars to discard the victory cards, and using the chapel to permanently get rid of the less valuable/detrimental cards as deck sizes got bigger and bigger. I'm sure it'll go faster next time.

It was kind of sad playing those turns where I would chain several +1/2 action and +1/2 draws together and still not come up with anything even remotely eventful in the buy phase.

The Spy can quickly slow a game down. It's just one of those cards. It's a fun card, but it will add a solid 15 minutes to play time if everyone is using them.

Also, you were all probably doing the most common "new player" thing in Dominion. Buying lots of action cards. It's fun but it's ineffecient and can lead to very long player turns. Everyone goes through it at some point, but you'll eventually settle on the best strategy (or read Astrolad's spoiler).

 

[StoOgE]

So.. bad news on the Christmas front.

I don't know what is going on, but my father warned me that my mother went.. well off wish list for my gifts. They are still coming from CSI (according to my dad) so we'll have to see what I wound up with.

My mom really, really likes meeples. And Agricola was on my list.. so maybe she got me that + meeples? Or bags of meeples?

Who knows.

 

[Chorazin]

I'm going to my friends place tonight to play Tannhauser! However, it's going to be with three people...I'm not confident how well it'll play with an odd number of players.

 

[platypotamus]

but I'm just sitting there thinking "do we just suck or something, because we're taking 3 to 4 times as long as suggested to play this game?"

Probably a little bit of newb-mistakes. How big were your decks by the end of these games?

One of the things that happens a lot when newbs play (I did it for sure), is that everyone just sorta buys a bunch of cards to try them out, and end up with very slow and very large decks, and thus it takes awhile to wind down.

Not really edit: I see I've been beaten to the Dominion observation.

just kidding play any way you want but screwing people is fun although my wife also gets sad when i mess with her in carc but that doesn't stop me :lol

My group should kind of be renamed "Domestic Disturbance Boardgaming". My wife and I, and her sister + husband both take special pleasure in beating our spouses. After every game, guaranteed, the second or the third place person will say something like "I don't care that I lost, I beat SPOUSE, that's all that matters".

Hell, on our third or fourth date, I deliberately made a pact with another person in the game to block my future-wife's train in Ticket To Ride, then taunted her about it... right up until the point when she connected the train via a longer alternate route, winning longest route + the game. She still taunts ME about that.

 

[NorrenRadd]

I have been debating buying Amazon's Dominion bundle but I can't find a picture of the 'Full Color Play Mat'. This is the make-or-break item in the bundle for me but I can't seem to find a picture.

Has anyone bought this item or know what the 'Full Color Play Mat' looks like?

 

[joeyjoejoeshabadoo]

I have been debating buying Amazon's Dominion bundle but I can't find a picture of the 'Full Color Play Mat'. This is the make-or-break item in the bundle for me but I can't seem to find a picture.

Has anyone bought this item or know what the 'Full Color Play Mat' looks like?

I can't really speak for the expansions but you don't need a play mat at all with the base game. I know Spielbox magazine put out a player mat (which was pointless) but a play mat, I'm not sure.

 

[StoOgE]

I have been debating buying Amazon's Dominion bundle but I can't find a picture of the 'Full Color Play Mat'. This is the make-or-break item in the bundle for me but I can't seem to find a picture.

Has anyone bought this item or know what the 'Full Color Play Mat' looks like?

Not sure about the "full color playmat".. but it's largely not needed since you literally hold your cards in hand.

I will say it looks like a good "deal". The cheapest you can get the base game is 27 dollars, 27 for Prosperity and 19 for Alchemy. The two promo cards also cost 5 dollars to get off of BGG, and the playmat would cost 10 dollars to buy the magazine it came in.

Throw in free super saver shipping and it's a pretty amazing way to get into Dominion.

edit: appears to be this gaming matt: http://www.hans-im-glueck.de/201.0.html

Like I said, the matt is completely useless and would probably never be used, but it's a good deal. Saves you about 8 dollars *and* you don't have to spend 100 bucks to get free shipping.

 

[AstroLad]

Not sure about the "full color playmat".. but it's largely not needed since you literally hold your cards in hand.

I will say it looks like a good "deal". The cheapest you can get the base game is 27 dollars, 27 for Prosperity and 17 for Alchemy. The two promo cards also cost 5 dollars to get off of BGG.

Throw in free super saver shipping and it's a pretty amazing way to get into Dominion.

Just don't play Alchemy for a while! Makes the game about twice as complex and long.

 

[StoOgE]

Just don't play Alchemy for a while! Makes the game about twice as complex and long.

yeah, but you are essentially getting Alchemy for 10 bucks with the two promo cards thrown in for free, so you can afford to ignore the two expansions for a while. If you don't own Dominion, this seems like a no brainer.

 

[AstroLad]

Yep I was just giving practical advice.

 

[NorrenRadd]

Not sure about the "full color playmat".. but it's largely not needed since you literally hold your cards in hand.

I will say it looks like a good "deal". The cheapest you can get the base game is 27 dollars, 27 for Prosperity and 19 for Alchemy. The two promo cards also cost 5 dollars to get off of BGG, and the playmat would cost 10 dollars to buy the magazine it came in.

Throw in free super saver shipping and it's a pretty amazing way to get into Dominion.

edit: appears to be this gaming matt: http://www.hans-im-glueck.de/201.0.html

Like I said, the matt is completely useless and would probably never be used, but it's a good deal. Saves you about 8 dollars *and* you don't have to spend 100 bucks to get free shipping.

Thanks for the link, that's not the type of map I was looking for. What I was hoping it would be, is a layout for the cards that make up the community area (estate, duchy, curse, the 10 stacks to buy from, gold, etc.). This looks more like a personal mat, which is dumb.

 

[AstroLad]

tbh they would both be kinda dumb and unncessary

 

[StoOgE]

Thanks for the link, that's not the type of map I was looking for. What I was hoping it would be, is a layout for the cards that make up the community area (estate, duchy, curse, the 10 stacks to buy from, gold, etc.). This looks more like a personal mat, which is dumb.

yeah, "player mat" usually means one for each player (like Puerto Rico, etc)

I wouldn't want a community map either. Other than the VP cards and the money cards I always arrange the action cards by price. So there will be different numbers of rows and columns each time I play.

Not sure what the map would really add to the experience anyway. All the pertinent info is on the card itself.

 

[platypotamus]

yeah, "player mat" usually means one for each player (like Puerto Rico, etc)

I wouldn't want a community map either. Other than the VP cards and the money cards I always arrange the action cards by price. So there will be different numbers of rows and columns each time I play.

Not sure what the map would really add to the experience anyway. All the pertinent info is on the card itself.

I do the following:

Copper Silver Gold Estate Duchy Province
A1 A2 A3 A4 A5 Curses
A6 A7 A8 A9 A10 Trash Pile

With A1-A10 sorted by price. I guess I should have chosen K, since they are kingdom cards taht are usually but not always actions, but you get it.

 

[StoOgE]

I do the following:

Copper Silver Gold Estate Duchy Province
A1 A2 A3 A4 A5 Curses
A6 A7 A8 A9 A10 Trash Pile

With A1-A10 sorted by price. I guess I should have chosen K, since they are kingdom cards taht are usually but not always actions, but you get it.

I used to do it like that, but found I had friends sorting through for what they could afford.

So I have it

Copper, silver Gold
Estate Duchy Province

Then off to the side I have

All action cards with a cost of 5
All action cards with a cost of 4
All action cards with a cost of 3
All action cards with a cost of 2

So the action cards are all out of whack, but it makes it easy to see what you can buy. If I get prosperity or Alchemy I will likely have to adpot a different system since they have wacky price things.

 

[NorrenRadd]

yeah, "player mat" usually means one for each player (like Puerto Rico, etc)

I wouldn't want a community map either. Other than the VP cards and the money cards I always arrange the action cards by price. So there will be different numbers of rows and columns each time I play.

Not sure what the map would really add to the experience anyway. All the pertinent info is on the card itself.

Good point.

I do the following:

Copper Silver Gold Estate Duchy Province
A1 A2 A3 A4 A5 Curses
A6 A7 A8 A9 A10 Trash Pile

With A1-A10 sorted by price. I guess I should have chosen K, since they are kingdom cards taht are usually but not always actions, but you get it.

I arrange mine similar, but I imagine everyone arranges them differently so one map wouldn't be helpful for everyone.

 

[AstroLad]

Yeah I just have it like in the manual.

 

[Neverfade]

I feel like I haven't made a post in forever. I've been back on the WoWsauce, so that's one reason...


An update. A buddy of mine reeeeeeally wanted to try out the Pegasus stuff for BSG, so I pulled it out and played with some of the stuff to show him. I've had a ...slight change of heart. I still hate Cylon Leaders and New Caprica and will never be playing those again. I don't have so much beef with Treachery cards and while executions are very flawed, Exodus will be slightly changing the way those work so you don't just instantly execute the Admiral "just in case". I have a feeling these two elements will be working their way into the game more & more once Exodus releases.

My main beef with the stuff I play with now is that Cylons are able to camp the ressurection site to build up as many Super Crisis Cards as they wish. (There's an overlay that tweaks the cylon ship locations for those who didn't know). In a game where the crisis deck just isn't going the human's way, this is insane. Sometimes its a non-issue...but I still think it may be worth house ruling.

 

[StoOgE]

I've actually been thinking about getting the Pegasus expansion for the new characters, base-stars and the Pegasus board only.

Sounds like killing off your civilian ships

Spoiler

Razor style

helps you win the game when using the new Caprica board.

But from my readings the Pegasus is too overpowered for the humans, the new characters are over powered for the humans and you basically throw certain characters out the airlock no matter what just in case they are cylon.

Seems like a better rule would be a character out the airlock doesn't return if human. Makes it harder for the humans to win, though I know there is a hesitation to eliminate players from the game.

That said, it's 20 dollars on CSI right now, so I'm going to order it just for the base stars and the hope that the new expansion balances some issues out.

 

[StoOgE]

So, Coolstuffinc ruined Xmas for me

It updates your want list with what people bought.

Boo.

 

[AstroLad]

hahah that's lame. at least now you don't have to peek! so what did you get?

 

[StoOgE]

hahah that's lame. at least now you don't have to peek! so what did you get?

Agricola, all of the Power Grid maps I didn't have (save the Benelux map, which my girlfriend is getting since she is dutch) Le Havre expansion and a couple of the smaller Carcassonne expansions.

Kind of what I expected. My parents really really like Power Grid, so I kind of thought that was where they were going to go.

They have an aversion to the price of board games, and like lots of presents under the tree so it was kind of expected. They would shit themselves if they ever saw MSRP on these games :lol

There is still my Amazon wishlist. but that would be more video games and movies.

I'll see how the math trade goes tomorrow night and then see about my Xmas present to myself :lol

 

[platypotamus]

Quick Stooge, edit your want list in the math trade!

 

[ultron87]

I couldn't resist hitting the "show purchased items" thing on my Amazon wishlist. Now I now I'm getting the Catan America thing. This makes me happy.

 

[StoOgE]

I couldn't resist hitting the "show purchased items" thing on my Amazon wishlist. Now I now I'm getting the Catan America thing. This makes me happy.

yeah, I have pretty good self control. I like Xmas morning be a surprise.

Congrats on the Settlers of America. I've heard extremely good things. Let us know what you think about it.

Quick Stooge, edit your want list in the math trade!

Ha! Yeah, had to jettison Agricola from my want list.

 

[Mashing]

So, I stayed out unti 6 am last night (I was gaming from 2pm on Sunday till 6am on Monday). I played a shit load of games. I can't even remember them all

Bombay
Cuttroat Caverns (holy moley is this game a blast to play--we had 5 people playing)
Carcassonne
Orgeon
Blue Moon
Dixit
King of the Ring (custom made game)
The Resistance
Shadow Hunters

 

[LethaL ImpuLse]

So I'm completely new to board games and picked a few games to buy based on this thread (thanks for it btw!). Among those were Pandemic, Ticket to Ride, Carcassonne, Dominion, and Citadels. Naturally I convince several of my friends to get into these games with me, and they're all really fun stuff.

But the best and most fun game we played, by far, was Citadels. It was a complete blast. All four of us, really engaged into the game's thorough strategic elements, had tons of moments of enjoyment; destroying others' districts, assinating/robbing, laughing at those unable to keep their poker face. I think the elements of strategy involved with picking the correct characters each round plays a huge role in making it work. And unlike the other card game, Dominion (while still great), Citadels did not start to feel a bit stale after several matches. I think it's really something we'll play over and over again.

 

[Suairyu]

Arkham Horror received.
"Happy Birthday!"
"Aw, thank you!"
"Hope you enjoy it. Given it takes 4 hours, you'll be enjoying it without me."
" : ( "

So I'm completely new to board games and picked a few games to buy based on this thread (thanks for it btw!). Among those were Pandemic, Ticket to Ride, Carcassonne, Dominion, and Citadels. Naturally I convince several of my friends to get into these games with me, and they're all really fun stuff.

Awesome. Carcassonne (vanilla) makes for a great 15-minute warmup game. I've never really been interested in card games, Chrononauts aside, if that even counts. What makes Citadels so special?

 

[Chorazin]

Played Tannhauser last night. I like the theme, and I like the components, but the game itself plays like an unnecessarily complicated Heroscape, just with less setup and fantastical elements. (To be fair, we only played the Deathmatch variant, as it was our first game and that's what the instructions suggest.) You need to refer to the instructions near constantly as the player cards don't tell you anything about items or abilities, you need to check and see what your items do and what your opponents do. The rules themselves aren't too hard to grasp, luckily.

I'm so glad my girlfriend got me an extra copy of the revised rules, I would HATE to have to share it between two people.

 

[AstroLad]

So I'm completely new to board games and picked a few games to buy based on this thread (thanks for it btw!). Among those were Pandemic, Ticket to Ride, Carcassonne, Dominion, and Citadels. Naturally I convince several of my friends to get into these games with me, and they're all really fun stuff.

But the best and most fun game we played, by far, was Citadels. It was a complete blast. All four of us, really engaged into the game's thorough strategic elements, had tons of moments of enjoyment; destroying others' districts, assinating/robbing, laughing at those unable to keep their poker face. I think the elements of strategy involved with picking the correct characters each round plays a huge role in making it work. And unlike the other card game, Dominion (while still great), Citadels did not start to feel a bit stale after several matches. I think it's really something we'll play over and over again.

Citadels is a great party game. I think it's a bit underrated because while most definitely not a Euro it's also not particularly thematic. It's just basically the perfect vehicle for backstabbing, bluffing, and screwage. Add in some of the goofy expansion Districts and roles and it's even more silly fun. Dominion is a more "serious" game though it's certainly not complex to learn, which is nice. I would strongly recommend doing random card sets by using one of the many Dominion randomizers out there (either Dominion KD for iPhone or one online) if you haven't yet. But yeah if you guys are into conflict, Citadels by far has the most, followed by Carc (though the conflict can be subtle at first, it's most certainly a very conflict-heavy game once everyone's on the same page), then TtR (totally depending on number of players though), and then Dominion and Pandemic have zero or near-zero. A pretty good variety there I'd say.

 

[Mashing]

Arkham Horror received.
"Happy Birthday!"
"Aw, thank you!"
"Hope you enjoy it. Given it takes 4 hours, you'll be enjoying it without me."
" : ( "

Well, that's how I tend to play (at least initially). It's such a long game it will be hard to find someone play it with, unless they really like the game already.

 

[AstroLad]

If you learn it well by playing a solo game (and thus not having to reference the rules), you can knock out a 2p game in 2.5, even with inexperienced players. It's one of those games people usually play with 5+ and that's where it's starts to take 4+ hours. When you play 2-3 it's really not generally that long.

 

[Chorazin]

Maybe I'm the only one this is new to, but there is a BGG iPhone app. Search the store for "boardgamegeek." It's pretty damn sweet!