The New Board Game Thread (Newcomer Friendly)

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StoOgE said:
1960 and Twilight Struggle are pretty meaty 2 player games though the theme can be dry for some people.

If you are looking for something more substantial you could always go with War of the Ring (LOTR theme) or other Wargames. I'm sure there are other people that can better weigh in on these games.

edit: You might want to look at Through the ages which is essentially Civilization board game or even the above mentioned Endeavor which is Civilization lite. It has an official 2 player variant posted to BGG.
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Fab, thanks for that, Stooge. 1960 might be a bit of a hard sell, but will definitely look into Twilight Struggle, and either Through the ages or Endeavour. I'll see which she fancies giving a go :D

War of the Ring might be good fun too - if anyone has played it and has an opinion either way I'd been keen to hear.
 
If she wants to eliminate randomness at least a good deal, but doesn't want ubercomplexity or heavy theme, there are some great 2P abstracts out there. Hive and YINSH may be some good ones to take a look at.
 
Manik said:
Fab, thanks for that, Stooge. 1960 might be a bit of a hard sell, but will definitely look into Twilight Struggle, and either Through the ages or Endeavour. I'll see which she fancies giving a go :D

War of the Ring might be good fun too - if anyone has played it and has an opinion either way I'd been keen to hear.
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Endeavor is not the game for you if you're going to be playing strictly 2 player. It works well only with a higher number of people.

War of the Ring is a great game if a) you can find an affordable copy before the reprint and b) can make sense out of the rulebook. Everything is so damn out of order there. The reprint will apparently have updated rules.

WOTR -is- LOTR. You're playing the entire highlights in 2-3 hours. All the battles, the fellowship, a ton of events, etc. If you guys like lord of the rings and are willing to invest time into learning a complicated game, then I say the payoff is worth it. There's just so much shit to do that the game is just never goin to get old.
 
Neverfade said:
Endeavor is not the game for you if you're going to be playing strictly 2 player. It works well only with a higher number of people.
.
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http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/437708/2-player-endeavor

There is an "unofficial" 2 player variant that was play tested extensively by the designers. They didn't include it in the official rules simply because they didn't want to include anything in the box that had a different set of rules.

It is essentially the same game, but you get to add "neutral" icons to the game that can make it a bit nastier, but make it easier for you to open up regions.

Have not played it, but it is swell recieved on BGG.

Not saying it will be ideal as a 2 player game by any means.
 
StoOgE said:
http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/437708/2-player-endeavor

There is an "unofficial" 2 player variant that was play tested extensively by the designers. They didn't include it in the official rules simply because they didn't want to include anything in the box that had a different set of rules.

It is essentially the same game, but you get to add "neutral" icons to the game that can make it a bit nastier, but make it easier for you to open up regions.

Have not played it, but it is swell recieved on BGG.

Not saying it will be ideal as a 2 player game by any means.
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3 is bad enough, mustless some scraped together bastardization, regardless of how santicioned it is by the designer.

NTY.
 
Also why does everyone keep trying Lost Cities instead of the far-superior Battle Line? I'm going to delete it from the OP!
 
Manik said:
Hi guys, haven't had chance to read through the whole thread, so apologies if this has been asked over and over again!

I'm looking for a new board game to play with my girlfriend, just as a couple, so something that's either really fun for 2, or scales down well. As a bit of background she's played and enjoyed Stratego and Risk (and is currently addicted to Civ 5 on the PC), but wasn't so keen on Lost Cities as she felt it was based more on the luck of the draw of the card, rather than any inherent tactical skill. She's also not averse to geeky themed games - she's a huge fan of Lord of the Rings, for a start, and has even shown interest in the Games Workshop Lord of the Rings games.

I've had her read through the recommendations in the OP but none of them really seemed to grab her attention. Mr Jack sounded intriguing but we wondered how replayable the game is before it becomes a bit tired. Catan, Carcasonne and Ticket to Ride also generated some interest, but again, we were unsure as to how well it really scales down to just being a 2 player game.

Any help would be muchly appreciated!
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I'd personally suggest History of the World (have both players play as 2 players each and add the scores at the end and compare totals) or Queen's Gambit, but those are older OOP games so you'll likely be hard pressed to find them easily and/or cheaply.

Otherwise I'll echo the 1960 and TS suggestions.

AstroLad said:
Also why does everyone keep trying Lost Cities instead of the far-superior Battle Line? I'm going to delete it from the OP!
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LC is the traditional 2-player girlfriend/wife friendly gateway, even if BL is better. You usually move on to BL from LC. ;P
 
AstroLad said:
Also why does everyone keep trying Lost Cities instead of the far-superior Battle Line? I'm going to delete it from the OP!
Click to expand...

Battle Line is clearly a better game, but LC pretty much hits the perfect "super simple, super quick, with some strategy". BL can be a bit more to grasp because of the special cards.
 
Thanks very much for all your helpful suggestions guys! Went with Twilight Struggle in the end (hoping her love of Risk will help her persevere with learning the rules for it!).

Will let you know how we get on :D Thanks once again!
 
Welp learned Glory to Rome and looking forward to playing it this weekend.

NEVERFADE few questions:
-When you play three cards of the same color as a jack to follow, I presume this means you have to follow the leader's role? You can't just as a follower play three cards as any role you want correct?

-Let me know if I have the building process down: (1) Gather material with a laborer or just into your hand; (2) Lay a foundation with an Arch or Craftsman, by putting down an Order card and then taking a matching Site card (or by using an Arch+Arch or Crafts+Crafts action to take an out-of-town Site card, which eats up both role actions) and putting it under the foundation; (3) Add material (one per role) from either your stockpile (Arch) or hand (Craftsman); (4) get materials=value of foundation (# of gold coins); (5) complete building by taking Site card and putting it up top at influence and then putting building + materials beside your camp (you now get benefit).

-What does the "+2 Materials" and such on the site cards mean? Are all same-color buildings the same value so that this is also the value of anything of that color?

-Any obvious rules that people tend to miss?
 
AstroLad said:
Welp learned Glory to Rome and looking forward to playing it this weekend.

NEVERFADE few questions:
-When you play three cards of the same color as a jack to follow, I presume this means you have to follow the leader's role? You can't just as a follower play three cards as any role you want correct?

-Let me know if I have the building process down: (1) Gather material with a laborer or just into your hand; (2) Lay a foundation with an Arch or Craftsman, by putting down an Order card and then taking a matching Site card (or by using an Arch+Arch or Crafts+Crafts action to take an out-of-town Site card, which eats up both role actions) and putting it under the foundation; (3) Add material (one per role) from either your stockpile (Arch) or hand (Craftsman); (4) get materials=value of foundation (# of gold coins); (5) complete building by taking Site card and putting it up top at influence and then putting building + materials beside your camp (you now get benefit).

-What does the "+2 Materials" and such on the site cards mean? Are all same-color buildings the same value so that this is also the value of anything of that color?

-Any obvious rules that people tend to miss?
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All of your assumptions are correct.

+X materials just notes you need that many materials under your site card to complete the building. I guess it's a roundabout way of reminding people that the site itself isn't material and doesn't count towards completion.

I haven't had a huge problem with rules missed. Our first game we forgot about the petition with three roles as a jack but you seem to have that down.

One thing that will come up is a card built on a site of a different color (some abilities/cards will allow this) is considered madr from both for reasons of adding material. So a marble building on a rubble site just needs one rubble to be completed.

Edit: to be clearer, yes all wood buildings need one wood to finish, all rubble needs one rubble, brick needs two brick etc etc.
 
Manik said:
Thanks very much for all your helpful suggestions guys! Went with Twilight Struggle in the end (hoping her love of Risk will help her persevere with learning the rules for it!).

Will let you know how we get on :D Thanks once again!
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play through the game once by yourself. Just sort of mock up a solo play and learn it.

If it's anything like 1960 it sounds super complicated until you actually see how it works and it turns out to be an extremely straightforward game.
 
Neverfade said:
One thing that will come up is a card built on a site of a different color (some abilities/cards will allow this) is considered madr from both for reasons of adding material. So a marble building on a rubble site just needs one rubble to be completed.
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Cool I'll keep that in mind. Haven't looked at any of the specific buildings yet -- just figure I'll approach it RFTG-style and get a good understanding of the core and take everything in from there.
 
Neverfade said:
Edit: to be clearer, yes all wood buildings need one wood to finish, all rubble needs one rubble, brick needs two brick etc etc.
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Oh yeah, one other thing, when you play legionary if your neighbor doesn't have the material he says "Glory to Rome" but how do you verify that? In Dominion you have to show your hand but there doesn't seem to be a similar requirement here. Is it just honor system?
 
AstroLad said:
Oh yeah, one other thing, when you play legionary if your neighbor doesn't have the material he says "Glory to Rome" but how do you verify that? In Dominion you have to show your hand but there doesn't seem to be a similar requirement here. Is it just honor system?
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Yeah, honor system. Can't think of a way to verify, considering someone could easily snag a card with their legionnaire action after viewing someones hand.
 
Manik said:
Hi guys, haven't had chance to read through the whole thread, so apologies if this has been asked over and over again!

I'm looking for a new board game to play with my girlfriend, just as a couple, so something that's either really fun for 2, or scales down well. As a bit of background she's played and enjoyed Stratego and Risk (and is currently addicted to Civ 5 on the PC), but wasn't so keen on Lost Cities as she felt it was based more on the luck of the draw of the card, rather than any inherent tactical skill. She's also not averse to geeky themed games - she's a huge fan of Lord of the Rings, for a start, and has even shown interest in the Games Workshop Lord of the Rings games.
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Sounds like she'd love Through the Ages!

See my previous post, here:


http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=23203017&postcount=171



Ahhh, I see you already went with Twilight Struggle, which is another solid choice. Still, I can't pass up the chance to recommend Through the Ages again. I'm still in a secret fight with Astrolad because he hasn't tried it yet. :\
 
platypotamus said:
Sounds like she'd love Through the Ages!

See my previous post, here:


http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=23203017&postcount=171



Ahhh, I see you already went with Twilight Struggle, which is another solid choice. Still, I can't pass up the chance to recommend Through the Ages again. I'm still in a secret fight with Astrolad because he hasn't tried it yet. :
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Next time you're in Virginia swing by and teach me this. I really want to get it played. :)
 
Speaking of which, I was thinking as it gets closer we should come up with a list of 1) Games people want to play at BGG-Con and 2) Games people are capable of teaching to see if we can come up with any sessions that would be easily done.

I'm sure most of BGG-con will wind up being games with random people and a lot of rule learning will need to happen for more obscure games.

But it would be nice to know if there is a game you've always wanted to try and a GAFer knows how to play it and is willing to teach/play it.
 
Yeah I'm definitely down with that. Was actually thinking of good 4-6 player games to play with gaffers since I know I'll usually have 2-3 with me + 2-3 gaffers let's say whenever we meet up creates a need for that kind of game. We can always split off a bit and do things tourney style too. (Gric tourney!)
 
The wife got me Battlestar Galactica for my birthday. Played about half a game with some friends. AWESOME! Definitely a few steps up in complexity from Shadows over Camelot but wow, does this game ooze theme. And the co-op aspect meant we could basically hand-hold the one girl who had never played a real boardgame in her life and never seen a frame of BSG, we basically put her in a viper (she was starbuck) and let her zap raiders :)

One of the guys who played it with us went ahead and ordered me the Pegasus expansion. What nice friends!
 
jason10mm said:
The wife got me Battlestar Galactica for my birthday. Played about half a game with some friends. AWESOME! Definitely a few steps up in complexity from Shadows over Camelot but wow, does this game ooze theme. And the co-op aspect meant we could basically hand-hold the one girl who had never played a real boardgame in her life and never seen a frame of BSG, we basically put her in a viper (she was starbuck) and let her zap raiders :)
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YEEEAH! :D

jason10mm said:
One of the guys who played it with us went ahead and ordered me the Pegasus expansion. What nice friends!
Click to expand...

NOOOOOO!
 
StoOgE said:
play through the game once by yourself. Just sort of mock up a solo play and learn it.

If it's anything like 1960 it sounds super complicated until you actually see how it works and it turns out to be an extremely straightforward game.
Click to expand...

Will do! Have had a watch, on Youtube, of a review of the game and it explained the basic concepts so should hopefully pick it up without too much fuss. Looks ace, can't wait to give it a go.

platypotamus said:
Sounds like she'd love Through the Ages!

See my previous post, here:


http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost...&postcount=171



Ahhh, I see you already went with Twilight Struggle, which is another solid choice. Still, I can't pass up the chance to recommend Through the Ages again. I'm still in a secret fight with Astrolad because he hasn't tried it yet. :\
Click to expand...

Through the Ages is definitely on the list. That might be the game to pick up once she's finished her next playthrough of Civ! :D
 
Bought some stuff.
Dominion: Intrigue
The first three expansions for Arkham Horror: Curse of the Dark Pharaoh, The Dunwich Horror and The King In Yellow.
Setting up future Arkham Horror sessions away from my home will be kind of a pain.
I also have to look up what expansions (and especially what cards...if any) I should always keep mixed with the base game and what things I should store separately, especially for when I will have the other 2 big box expansions because I doubt I will use all the added boards together all the time.
Are the small expansions "safe" to keep in the game always or do they change the game a lot making it wiser to keep them aside as well?

I wanted to buy DungeonQuest too but they will have them on Friday. I will see then if I still want it.


Also a few days ago I managed to play Chaos in the Old World a couple times, both were 3 players games.
I won both times thanks to the threat dial. I'm not gonna deny that this fact could have contributed to how much positive my impression was.

The first time I used Slaanesh against Nurgle and Tzeentch and it wasn't close, I massed advancement tokens every turn and after a few Old World cards there were Nobles and Heroes in many regions, they were much slower in their advancement and didn't really try to stop me that much (not many warriors saw the field).

The second time I used Khorne against Slaanesh and again Tzeentch. This time it was a little more of a challenge, both me and the Slaanesh player reached the Victory mark on the dials, but I had 3 times his VPs doing nothing more than just placing a miniature wherever there was something killable and sometimes trying to get some VPs dominating regions like Estalia or The Empire.

Both times we all pretty much ignored the scoring aspect and concentrated on the Threat dials and some gods seemed to have a much easier time advancing it than others (namely Khorne and Slaanesh) so that could be why I won. Probably if they tried to go for different win conditions (especially the ruin one, I guess?) it would have been more difficult in the second game.

In later stages the board gets a little confusing with chits everywhere and sometimes the Hero chits or the Noble chits are not enough so you have to start adding other stuff to replace them and remembering what is what becomes a pain, but overall the game gave me a great first impression. The gods are very different, the chaos cards seem to open some cute little tactics and the way it all fits together seemed quite promising for future sessions where hopefully we will try to differentiate our strategies from one another.
 
StoOgE said:
This is what I did. They had a 4' x 6' fold out table with a nice card table like pleather surface for 30 dollars. It is big enough for 1960 and Power Grid which were my two tightest squeezes.

Also works well for Puerto Rico and other games that give each player their own board.
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Wish I could find a table of that size. They didn't have anything like that at Target or Walmart today. Sucks because 4 x 6 sounds perfect, but I just saw 3 x 3 and such. Nothing big enough.
 
Petrie said:
Wish I could find a table of that size. They didn't have anything like that at Target or Walmart today. Sucks because 4 x 6 sounds perfect, but I just saw 3 x 3 and such. Nothing big enough.
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ikea has some good stuff that isn't terrible.

I'm going to eventually upgrade to one of their tables with built in leaves.
 
I picked up and tried Castle Ravenloft solo just to learn the rules, but I really don't see the appeal. Maybe I am doing something wrong, but the mechanics of the game just seem really boring and basic. It doesn't seem like there are any strategic options even with a group of players. I think my major problems are that players move square by square, while monsters can pretty much teleport around the dungeon, and the fact that monsters always get to attack first.
 
Just got back from board game night at the bar.

First - I won 10 bar dollars for next time! Shazam.

Endeavor Round 2 - Much better feel for the game. I really, really, really like this game.

It is at it's core an economic engine game not unlike Puerto Rico. Except in this case, instead of cashing in for VP you wind up gaining abilities that let you grow your economic engine even further, and the largest economic engine wins defacto without having to use any kind of produce -> consume cycle.

I think I wound up using too much shipping, which obviously gained me some awesome governor cards, but don't get you VP at the end of the game, and we wound up having a good amount of attacking going on in this game as well.

My one potential issue is it really felt like I was wiping the floor with the other players but I only won by 4 points. I think my engine was stronger, but I *really* focused on shipping goods which doesn't net you VPs at the end of game. So I think going forward I will probably try and balance the shipping and the settling better. That really seems to be the key to the game. Everything in balance.

I think this is a really slick game, and can't wait to see how it scales beyond 3P since it seems like the conflict and options would really improve with 4 or 5 players.
 
There's almost TOO MUCH conflict with 5 players. You run out of space on the board probably 2 rounds before the end of the game. With even up to four players, I tend to ignore the cannon action, as it seems a bit less beneficial than other options, but with five players, you have no choice but to use it by end game.
 
platypotamus said:
There's almost TOO MUCH conflict with 5 players. You run out of space on the board probably 2 rounds before the end of the game. With even up to four players, I tend to ignore the cannon action, as it seems a bit less beneficial than other options, but with five players, you have no choice but to use it by end game.
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That's my hope. The game is never resource starved in a 3 player game. You can always get whatever building you want, there are plenty of places to land, it is easy to become governor.

Not saying these are problems as it makes the game a purer economic engine game to some extent. However, I could see resource starvation really kicking the intensity up a notch and making strong culture even more important.

I think the game has a kind of iffy end game.. in that it just sort of ends because that's the prescribed turn that the game ends in. With a 4 or 5 player game I would hope that the "exploration" comes to an end with 1-2 turns left and the end game becomes the war over the map.

I also want to stress, my complaints really are minor squabbles as it is one of the most fun games I have played.. but it just lacks the end game of some of my favorites (Power Grid) because it lacks a certain tension that I think it would have better if it were more resource starved.

I'm still toying with some variant ideas, it is very strange to have a game that literally has no scaling apperatus at all. You use the whole map, all of the buildings, all of the cards, etc. no matter how many players.
 
I got my first official bargain game.

1 dollar for "Road to the White House" which is some sort of political game from 1992 from Mayfair. Looks like it has been out of print just as long. Basically I saw the Mayfair logo on the box at a thrift store and grabbed it.

Has a 6.1 ranking on BGG so it can't be absolutely horrible. Looks like a really really involved game though. 4 hour play time, tons of stats for each politician to track. I'm a political junkie, so this could be right up my alley.

I'll give it a crack this weekend. If it bombs completely I'll put it up in the BGG-Con Math Trade. It's out of print, someone might bite.
 
Sounds like something I might like just for the political angle as well. I never really thought to check thrift stores for games. I think I'd be to afraid of damaged/missing parts.
 
I've dipped in and out of thrift stores every now and then but I never really found anything. The only boardgame I did find was a Kinizia Sudoku game. Let's just say I passed.
 
My Lords of Vegas game just got serious.

qrhxmh.jpg


Upgrade! 11.5 gram chips. You could brain someone with a fistful of these.
 
xater how much would 51st state be w/ shipping to NY?

getting it from funagain at BGG.con currently but i could get it earlier too
 
joeyjoejoeshabadoo said:
I've dipped in and out of thrift stores every now and then but I never really found anything. The only boardgame I did find was a Kinizia Sudoku game. Let's just say I passed.
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There are two thrift stores within 2 minutes of my house that I pop into on occasion to check for stuff. I like to pop in for potential gag gifts and/or really weird oddities to decorate my place with.

Board game wise, normally it's 8000 copies of Scene it or Monopoly. This is the first thing I've seen that I thought about buying.

On BGG they have threads dedicated to finds at thrift stores and the like, and some people walk away with real gems.
 
So, Birthday gift time.

The girlfriend and my parents are going in on a split order from CSI for me. They were each going to buy me a game at the local B&M, but I put them in touch with each other so they could save some scratch. I know it shouldn't really matter since it's a gift, but I hate people spending 70 dollars for some of these games that can be had for almost half that price.

Things I know I'm getting because they are cheap party games from my 'rents:

Bang!
Lupus in Tabula

The ones I'm trying to decide on:

Richard III - 2 player war game about the Wars of the Roses with a 3 hour playtime.
Twilight Struggle - I like 1960 and the theme of this one is pretty legit.
Steam
Le Havre
Through the Ages
Caylus
Agricola

I'm going to give them a list of games and let them pick from them. I'm thinking of taking Caylus, Agricola and Through the Ages off of the wishlist for various reasons. Namely Caylus and Through the Ages probably being too much for my friends to comprehend (seriously, Endeavor was giving them problems) and I know someone who owns Agricola.
 
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