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Best Board Games (1 Viewer)

for you guys playing Pandemic Legacy, would it be fun with just 2 players?  and can you alter the number of players from game to game?
Sure.  Each person plays two characters.  Same net result.

Played three rounds last night and are now into September.  Got slaughtered third game, though.  North America got overrun in a flash.

 
My family has been playing the heck out of Splendor lately.  Great game.  Interesting game last night.  Had some guys over to play.  How I have played is build up your resources and then start buying to where you have a good base of most gems so have to pay very little to get anything else, attracting nobles as fast as you can.  However, in one game, I got way behind, like 3 cards behind other players early on, so I said screw it, I am just going balls out for the 3rd tier cards for 15 points via 5's and 4's.  By the time they saw it, it was too late.  I am intrigued how often that approach can work, fast small build and then all out for the big ones.  Every other game I had played involved nobles and usually all of them were taken by game's end.  This time, I ended it before a single one got taken and they were left just kind of staring at me.  Anyone else use that strategy?

 
Mad Cow said:
My family has been playing the heck out of Splendor lately.  Great game.  Interesting game last night.  Had some guys over to play.  How I have played is build up your resources and then start buying to where you have a good base of most gems so have to pay very little to get anything else, attracting nobles as fast as you can.  However, in one game, I got way behind, like 3 cards behind other players early on, so I said screw it, I am just going balls out for the 3rd tier cards for 15 points via 5's and 4's.  By the time they saw it, it was too late.  I am intrigued how often that approach can work, fast small build and then all out for the big ones.  Every other game I had played involved nobles and usually all of them were taken by game's end.  This time, I ended it before a single one got taken and they were left just kind of staring at me.  Anyone else use that strategy?
That's the only way I play. I ignore nobles unless I'm close.  My goal is to get premium cards.

 
Mad Cow said:
My family has been playing the heck out of Splendor lately.  Great game.  Interesting game last night.  Had some guys over to play.  How I have played is build up your resources and then start buying to where you have a good base of most gems so have to pay very little to get anything else, attracting nobles as fast as you can.  However, in one game, I got way behind, like 3 cards behind other players early on, so I said screw it, I am just going balls out for the 3rd tier cards for 15 points via 5's and 4's.  By the time they saw it, it was too late.  I am intrigued how often that approach can work, fast small build and then all out for the big ones.  Every other game I had played involved nobles and usually all of them were taken by game's end.  This time, I ended it before a single one got taken and they were left just kind of staring at me.  Anyone else use that strategy?
I'm very aggressive with gold tokens, I think that surprises a lot of people I play with.

 
Not a deep strategy game like so many of the great recommendations in this thread, but played Telestrations at a party recently and had a ton of fun and many laughs.  It's a rapid-fire hybrid of the child's game "telephone" mashed up with Pictionary.  Low stakes.  No trivia. Could play it with older kids.

 
Mad Cow said:
My family has been playing the heck out of Splendor lately.  Great game.  Interesting game last night.  Had some guys over to play.  How I have played is build up your resources and then start buying to where you have a good base of most gems so have to pay very little to get anything else, attracting nobles as fast as you can.  However, in one game, I got way behind, like 3 cards behind other players early on, so I said screw it, I am just going balls out for the 3rd tier cards for 15 points via 5's and 4's.  By the time they saw it, it was too late.  I am intrigued how often that approach can work, fast small build and then all out for the big ones.  Every other game I had played involved nobles and usually all of them were taken by game's end.  This time, I ended it before a single one got taken and they were left just kind of staring at me.  Anyone else use that strategy?
I hear a lot of game snobs say they don't like Splendor because it's broken, that if you ignore tier one and go for the second tier until the third tier is feasible, the only competition you will face are against those with the same strategy, and then it's just a game of chance based on which cards come out in which order. However, I usually play in the manner you initially described - quick, cheap resources until you essentially never need to waste a turn on a draw again and attract the nobles. I don't win every time, but I win a lot more than I lose.

 
Pandemic Legacy complete! The last turn took nearly a half-hour because we had to have the final objective on that turn or we were sure to lose.  We finally figured it out and it was high fives all around.  One of my favorite moments in gaming.  Heading to Gloomhaven next.

 
Has anyone played Bears vs Babies? Looks fun but seems too easy and gets boring fast after a few games.

 
"Secret Hitler" is fun, in the vein of Resistance, and doesn't seems as convoluted as Werewolf. My board gaming group has tried "One Night Werewolf" with some success, for those that are looking for another variation, but, I tend to shy away from the Werewolf brand. That said, I did enjoy "Secret Hitler".

In a nutshell:

Everyone is assigned a role, either Liberal, Fascist, or Secret Hitler. In a group, it's about half+1 Liberals, with the rest Fascists, and one Secret Hitler. At the start, everyone closes their eyes, and then the Fascists can open their eyes and identify each other. Secret Hitler keeps his eyes closed, but indicates who he is with a Thumbs-Up. Hitler is a fascist, but doesn't know who in the government is secretly trying to help him. Everyone closes their eyes and the game begins.

One person is randomly selected President. They nominate a Chancellor. Everyone in the group, the government, votes Ja! or Nein! on the Chancellor. If the vote fails, the role of President rotates to the left and the process starts again. If the vote succeeds, the government is formed and the pair goes to work. The President selects three policy cards from a deck. Policy cards simply read either "Liberal" or "Fascist". The President discards one card of his choice, and passes the remaining two to his Chancellor. The Chancellor then enacts one policy by playing it to the board in the middle of the table. The deck is about 2/3rds Fascist cards.

If enough Liberal policies go into effect, about 5, the Liberals win.

If enough Fascist policies go into effect, about 6, the Fascists win.

When each Fascist policy is enacted, it gives the President a one-turn power of authority to perform a given game action. The first one that goes into effect allows the current president to check the Liberal/Fascist alignment of another player. Another one allows him to pass the next presidency to someone else out of turn. Both the fourth and fifth policies allow him to "kill" another player and remove them from the game.

If 3 Fascist policies are enacted, another rule takes effect... from that point on, if the President ever nominates Secret Hitler as Chancellor, and the vote succeeds to form the government, the Fascists instantly win.

The instant-win condition for the Liberals is if one of them is President when the Fascist power to kill is enacted, and the Liberals manage to kill Secret Hitler.

...anyway, every move provides some area of suspicion, and enough added together make it fun to either try and guess what's going on, or, pull one over on the Liberals to get Hitler into power. Did the Chancellor have any choice in enacting that fascist policy? Did so-and-so vote against the Chancellor because he's a fascist? Has Hitler found his allies in the government?

It goes fast enough you can play 3 or 4 games in a row without getting bored, though keeping track of who betrayed who, and when, can get cloudy after several runs. All-in-all, fun game.


Did an online version of this on another site.  It was very fun.

 
If anyone is interested in doing an online version of Diplomacy?

There is a version here that looks pretty easy to run. Click on See Preview to get a glimpse.

 
Also anyone know if there is a version of pandemic or similar cooperative game good for kids?  Oldest is 8, not sure if the younger 2 would play but at least 3 of us with me wife and one kid.

 
While not Diplomacy, I wonder if we had enough of us here to get together and play a few games online at times. 

Most of these games have free online versions.

 
Just bought Pandemic (the original one) to play with my wife and my 13 year old daughter. We have played board games as a family with our 18 year old daughter and what usually happens is she does really well on games like Scrabble or Pit and then my 13 year old gets sad when she loses. So now that my 18 year old is off to college in two weeks, we wanted to find a game that will make her feel involved and we can lose as a team vs her feeling bad. (i know I know participation ribbons all around). Our oldest just casts such a large shadow and our youngest has lived in it--that we are going to dive into this game here in two weeks. 

 
Played Terraforming Mars last night for the first time.  Very engrossing game with a lot of variety and not overly difficult.  We played the 'short' version and still took 3 hours, but it was worth it.  The 3 of us ended up separated by 4 points at the end.

 
Also anyone know if there is a version of pandemic or similar cooperative game good for kids?  Oldest is 8, not sure if the younger 2 would play but at least 3 of us with me wife and one kid.
Not like pandemic, but castle panic is good coop to play with kids that age

 
Bought Keltis at a yard sale for 5 euros, still shrink wrapped a few weeks ago.  Won game of the year here a few years ago.  One of the few games we play in our house (Nexit, Cribbage) with a twelve year old.  We'll see how well it ages I guess.

 
after a summer getting tired of Life, Sorry, Charades and the inevitable tears from 6yo floppinha over War or any other card game (where 10yo floppinho inevitably cheats :lol:  ) , we started playing Mancala and Batik again for the first time in years. daughter doesn't quite get the strategy and cries (pretty much a natural state at this point) but it's fun to see my son appear to get it and play smart. daughter is smarter than him, so will learn quickly once she stops crying. if she ever stops crying.

 
Been playing a bit of Superfight! lately.  Fun party game where you pick a character card and an attribute card, then are given an additional random attribute card and then argue about who would win in a fight to the death (although there is an expansion that changes the "fight to the death" into random competitions, ie - Fastest lumberjack, who you wouldn't want to meet in an alley, etc).

For instance you could end up with:

  • Character: Deadpool

    Attribute: Has throwing stars
  • Random Attribute (given after you pick your character/attribute): Is a parapalegic

Versus

  • Character: Staypuft Marshmallow Man

    Attribute: 1000 of them
  • Random Attribute: Chainsaws for arms

Then the two players present their arguments and the rest of the players vote.  Winner stays to fight the next person in line.

 
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I haven't gone through this whole thread but I'm guessing it has been mentioned but just started to play Sequence with my kids and really like it.

 
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We picked up Forbidden Desert.  It's kind of a lesser version of Pandemic - many of the same mechanics.  It's a cooperative game to beat the map.  So far, it's too easy on beginner level - we'll crank it up and see if it gets dicey.

 
Any recommendations for a good cooperative game that would be good to play with a family?  Have a 7 year old son and 5 year old twin girls.  My son can be so competitive but if working as a team I think it would be more fun for all.    

 
shifty said:
I got Exploding Kittens and Joking Hazard for my birthday. The family had grown tired of "Trouble" and "Crazy 8" so I got those. The family liked both, probably liked Joking Hazard a little more, we all have a dark sense of humor.
Exploding Kittens is amazing.  We have been playing the heck out of that one for over a year.  Kids love it.

 
Started attending a Thursday night meetup at a gaming store just to meet new people and try out some games.

Ethnos: an area control and set building game. High replay ability factor owing to the fact that you only use a random selection of 6 of the 12 races each game. Not very complicated once you get past the initial learning stage. And it's a very fast moving game, your next turn is often only seconds away. Thumbs up.

Bang! The Dice Game: another really enjoyable game that isn't hard to learn. Players have different roles, Sheriff, Deputy, Outlaw, and Renegade. Only the Sheriff is known to others. And each role has a different way to win the game. I definitely recommend this one for all kinds of gaming settings. Serious, casual, family friendly or party atmospheres. It's just good times.

Sheriff of Nottingham: Everyone takes turns being the sheriff and trying to export and sometimes "smuggle" goods and contraband out of the city. The fun is in trying to guess when the traders are being truthful in their declarations or not. Add in some bribery or deal making for flavour and you've got a really good time on your hands.

 
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One of the best ways to learn game rules is youtube.  There are several channels dedicated to running few a round or two of different games to help you see them in action.  Very instructive. 

That said, we have Dominion in our house and have yet to play it.  Need to read/watch the rules. :bag:
I have since learned how to play this one and it is great!  Have our Bro's Book Club tonight at my house, which is guys night at my house to play games and eat food.  Trying to decide what to play.  I have so many new ones, I just need to learn those to get them going.

 
Exploding Kittens is amazing.  We have been playing the heck out of that one for over a year.  Kids love it.
Yeah, that's a popular one with my wife and kids too.  It's not my favorite, but it's better than playing Monopoly or Yahtzee. 

 
Something a lot of fun and very simple is to play what we call Juiced Uno.  Take 4 or 5 decks of Uno cards.  Leave one normal.  Discard all of the numbers from the other decks then form them into one giant deck.  You have not lived until you drop the final draw 4 wild on the next person and they are drawing 32 cards. :lol:

 
Something a lot of fun and very simple is to play what we call Juiced Uno.  Take 4 or 5 decks of Uno cards.  Leave one normal.  Discard all of the numbers from the other decks then form them into one giant deck.  You have not lived until you drop the final draw 4 wild on the next person and they are drawing 32 cards. :lol:
We played that on the cross country running team in high school.  Good fun.  P.S. The guy you're throwing Draw 32 at has a Reverse.

 
Got a few new games recently.  We have played Bang! a lot, but grabbed Bang Dice game, and it is a nice version to make it faster to play and still is a lot of fun.  Got another Munchkins version - Marvel this time, and it was a lot of fun.  Just grabbed Smash-Up today at lunch at one of my LGS's, look forward to trying that one out.

Any FBG's that play the X-Wing miniatures?  I know I have asked before, but man for the :nerd: inside, it sure scratches a big itch.

 
Introduced to a new game - Tokaido.  It was the best game I've played in years.  So much fun!  The best part is that you can "steal" moves that an opponent wants to make, so there ends up being a lot of yelling and "you don't really want to go there!  It's not good for you at all!"

Edit: Here's an Amazon link to the game.   And here's a different link - game

 
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Introduced to a new game - Tokaido.  It was the best game I've played in years.  So much fun!  The best part is that you can "steal" moves that an opponent wants to make, so there ends up being a lot of yelling and "you don't really want to go there!  It's not good for you at all!"

Edit: Here's an Amazon link to the game.   And here's a different link - game
I heard great things about that game. As with any competitive game, a good way to lose friends. :lol:  

 
My family is still into Catan.  Thinking of getting Pandemic since it gets so much hype.  Like successful games like Catan there are a billion expansion packs, can someone ELI5 which is the best to start with?

 
Anyone play Dead of Winter Crossroads, and anyone have a solid 2 person catan setup?
2 player catan I use the suggestion over on reddit.

Each player rolls twice - roll again if you get same number 2x. If you can get two different colors of dice. Speeds it up a lot.

No Trading between people, obv.

Don't get wiped out if holding too many cards on a 7

Add 2 points to whatever the win condition is for the base set you have.  

Some don't play with the robber at all.  

 
Kids (13  yo boy & 9 yo girl) and I have been playing a lot of Fluxx lately. Great little card game that is easy to learn and pretty fun based on the humor involved and the different sets available. We have the Original and the Batman sets, but have played Adventure Time, Firefly and Holiday Fluxx at different comic shops and comic-cons.

 
culdeus said:
My family is still into Catan.  Thinking of getting Pandemic since it gets so much hype.  Like successful games like Catan there are a billion expansion packs, can someone ELI5 which is the best to start with?
Pandemic Legacy is the current best rated game on BGG.  Depending on the kids' ages it should be considered.

hagmania said:
Isle of Skye is what Carcassonne always wanted to be. Great game.
Don't know about the game, but the actual place is spectacular.  :namedrop:

 
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Son and I have started playing Star Realms - fun deck building game with a destroy the other guy's armada theme.  Fun and quick, like 15-20 minutes.

 

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