So I've recently caught the board games bug and I realized we don't have a thread here to share great board games and warn others of disappointments.
So to preface, I wouldn't call myself a board game geek growing up - I played typical 80s/90s board games with my friends like Risk, Game of Life, Monopoly and a few lesser known ones but still well known like Scotland Yard and Master Labyrinth. Now that I am an adult, I am finding my game interests becoming more geeky.
I recently purchased two new board games and have my eye on a few more. Warning, buying board games is addictive and while the cheaper price point compared to video games is nice, its a slippery slope.
My brother in law hooked me on to Pandemic. This is one of the best rated board games in the world with multiple international awards. One of the key elements to this game is that it is 100% cooperative play - you either lose as a team or you win as a team. This is nice and certainly leads to fewer arguments as do competitive games.
The premise of the game is fairly simple - you're on a team of specialists looking to find cures to 4 diseases before they cause world wide pandemic. There are multiple ways to lose this game - a disease spreads too much (run out of any coloured disease cubes), have too many outbreaks, or run out of player cards.
To win, you must collect player cards that have corresponding cities and colours on them - you need 5 of a colour to cure a disease. Cure all 4 diseases before any of the losing triggers, and you win.
Each player has a different specialized role with unique abilities. The dispatcher role can move other peoples marker using their turn - enabling them to best position other players. The scientist role only needs 4 cards of a colour instead of 5 to cure a disease. There are multiple roles available and the reconfiguration of your team makes each game different.
Each turn more cities are infected with disease cubes while players travel the world and try to remove them - but tick tock - because the game ends when you run out of player cards to draw from (no reshuffle) the game does have a set limit to it and the average game takes about 45 mins to play.
I have played this as both a 2 and 4 player game and both were enjoyable. There are different difficulties available and I have only played on the easiest setting so far. I have only played with adults but my 11 year old niece is able to play with adults no problem. The rules are fairly simple and the game play is the same structured steps each turn, so easy enough to follow. I managed to get this game from BestBuy on sale for $45+tax but it seems to typically run in the $50-$60 range.
The other game I recently purchased ties in to one of my other fandoms, the Harry Potter Battle of Hogwarts Card Game. I love Harry Potter and so does my wife- so this was a good choice for us as it is another 100% cooperative game (no more fights like from Scattegories) and has great HP graphics on the cards and box.
You play as the heroes of HP - Harry, Hermoine, Ron or Neville (there is an expansion box that adds Luna). There are 7 games (for 7 books) and it gets harder as you advance. The basic premise is that you need to defeat all of the villains before they can control all of the locations. In year 1, you face a total of 3 villains one at a time. By year 5, you have 3 villains simultaneously and around 13 in total to defeat. Each villain has an ability on it, they may trigger every turn (active hero loses health) or on specific events (lose 1 health if you have to discard a card).
Each hero has their own starter deck of 10 cards and you buy new cards into your deck with money earned in your turn. This means that while you could start with the same deck every time, your deck will be different each time you play.
Each turn consists of 4 elements: a dark arts event card (sometimes more than one), the villain abilities, play your hand to acquire attacks and money, buy new cards and discard all unused tokens. You assign attack tokens to the different villains by placing them on the board below the villain who have different health points (Draco is 5 or 6 while Voldemort is 10 for example). Some turns you may have no attacks while others you might have 3 or 4, depends on the make up of your deck (if you buy attack heavy cards as my wife tends to or if you buy cards that let you draw more cards which I tend to favour for bigger turns). All the while, you manage your own health and that of your coplayers. Through dark events, villain abilities or losing your health - the villains gain control of locations. Each game has 3 locations to defend.
My wife and I played this as a 2 player game through games 1 - 5 and thought it was quite easy but enjoyable. So when we had friends join us for a game, we stayed in game 5 and played a 4 player game where we were completely destroyed at no fault of our friends playing for the first time. In two player games, you can safely ignore your health since you can usually boost your health on your turn. In a 4 player game, you can lose health on every other players turn, so by the time you get back to your health, you can have lost enough health to lose a location. There does seem to be some luck of the draw in terms of difficulty as the starting combination of villains and the cards available to buy can make it either easy or really hard. If the market place only has high value cards available (only 6 cards are available at a time) and you are spending all of your turn try to heal, then you wont get enough money to buy new cards, refreshing the market and strengthening your hand. After feeling quite cocky from playing only two players, we have been adequately humbled by the 4 player experience.
I bought this for around $40 on Amazon and see it as something the kids will very much enjoy as they get old enough.
On my radar with at least one likely imminent purchase and others possibly as birthday gifts in October are:
Sentinels of the Multiverse - coop game with comic book style as knockoff superheros battle villains in a card based game. One element I like to this one is that in addition to play a villain deck and the hero decks, there is an environment deck which adds a dynamic that can impact both heroes and villains. For example, in the dinosaur environment, the Raptor card will attack the weakest on the board, which could be a hero or the villain or one of their minions. Can be played as a solitaire game or as a group.
King of Tokyo - each player is a monster battling for control of Tokyo. On your turn, you roll 6 dice and make Yahtzee style decisions of what to keep and what to reroll. The dice have attack, heal, points or energy. Use energy to buy additional powers for your monster. You can win by achieving the score limit or by being the last monster standing.
Smash Up - I love the idea of this one but doubt I can get the wife to play too much. Different factions have decks and each person chooses two factions to combine. Dinosaurs, wizards, zombies, pirates, aliens, ninjas, etc with unique abilities get combined to make different variations on each game. Players battle to control game base locations to score points. Lots of expansion packs available so could be an expensive one if the wife enjoys it.
Roll for it - simply roll your dice to try and score combinations to match the 3 active cards. Yahtzee style decision on what to keep in play and what to roll next time. Multiple players vying for the same card combo but whoever matches up all dice first, wins the card and the corresponding points. Strategy and dice luck combined.
Forbidden Island - by the same guy who made Pandemic and another coop game. Try to get the treasure before the island sinks. Play with different roles and abilities same as pandemic.
Lost Cities - all in on coop games at this point since my wife is the main person I play with.
Sleeping Queens - good for our soon to be 5 yr old and seems like a laugh.
Spot it - good for both kids under 5 and can be played anywhere.
Exploding Kittens - played with coworkers and thought it was fun and quick (15 mins)
Bears vs Babies - will play with coworkers after vacations are over and seems ridiculous but fun
For board game details I often check boardgamegeek.com
For enhanced details, YouTube has great video overviews, the most entertaining ones Ive seen are Will Wheatons Table Top. Will and other friends in the industry such as Barry Krypky from Big Bang, Seth Green, comic writers, and such play the game providing rules and gameplay and great commentary (on the game AND each other).
So to preface, I wouldn't call myself a board game geek growing up - I played typical 80s/90s board games with my friends like Risk, Game of Life, Monopoly and a few lesser known ones but still well known like Scotland Yard and Master Labyrinth. Now that I am an adult, I am finding my game interests becoming more geeky.
I recently purchased two new board games and have my eye on a few more. Warning, buying board games is addictive and while the cheaper price point compared to video games is nice, its a slippery slope.
My brother in law hooked me on to Pandemic. This is one of the best rated board games in the world with multiple international awards. One of the key elements to this game is that it is 100% cooperative play - you either lose as a team or you win as a team. This is nice and certainly leads to fewer arguments as do competitive games.
The premise of the game is fairly simple - you're on a team of specialists looking to find cures to 4 diseases before they cause world wide pandemic. There are multiple ways to lose this game - a disease spreads too much (run out of any coloured disease cubes), have too many outbreaks, or run out of player cards.
To win, you must collect player cards that have corresponding cities and colours on them - you need 5 of a colour to cure a disease. Cure all 4 diseases before any of the losing triggers, and you win.
Each player has a different specialized role with unique abilities. The dispatcher role can move other peoples marker using their turn - enabling them to best position other players. The scientist role only needs 4 cards of a colour instead of 5 to cure a disease. There are multiple roles available and the reconfiguration of your team makes each game different.
Each turn more cities are infected with disease cubes while players travel the world and try to remove them - but tick tock - because the game ends when you run out of player cards to draw from (no reshuffle) the game does have a set limit to it and the average game takes about 45 mins to play.
I have played this as both a 2 and 4 player game and both were enjoyable. There are different difficulties available and I have only played on the easiest setting so far. I have only played with adults but my 11 year old niece is able to play with adults no problem. The rules are fairly simple and the game play is the same structured steps each turn, so easy enough to follow. I managed to get this game from BestBuy on sale for $45+tax but it seems to typically run in the $50-$60 range.
The other game I recently purchased ties in to one of my other fandoms, the Harry Potter Battle of Hogwarts Card Game. I love Harry Potter and so does my wife- so this was a good choice for us as it is another 100% cooperative game (no more fights like from Scattegories) and has great HP graphics on the cards and box.
You play as the heroes of HP - Harry, Hermoine, Ron or Neville (there is an expansion box that adds Luna). There are 7 games (for 7 books) and it gets harder as you advance. The basic premise is that you need to defeat all of the villains before they can control all of the locations. In year 1, you face a total of 3 villains one at a time. By year 5, you have 3 villains simultaneously and around 13 in total to defeat. Each villain has an ability on it, they may trigger every turn (active hero loses health) or on specific events (lose 1 health if you have to discard a card).
Each hero has their own starter deck of 10 cards and you buy new cards into your deck with money earned in your turn. This means that while you could start with the same deck every time, your deck will be different each time you play.
Each turn consists of 4 elements: a dark arts event card (sometimes more than one), the villain abilities, play your hand to acquire attacks and money, buy new cards and discard all unused tokens. You assign attack tokens to the different villains by placing them on the board below the villain who have different health points (Draco is 5 or 6 while Voldemort is 10 for example). Some turns you may have no attacks while others you might have 3 or 4, depends on the make up of your deck (if you buy attack heavy cards as my wife tends to or if you buy cards that let you draw more cards which I tend to favour for bigger turns). All the while, you manage your own health and that of your coplayers. Through dark events, villain abilities or losing your health - the villains gain control of locations. Each game has 3 locations to defend.
My wife and I played this as a 2 player game through games 1 - 5 and thought it was quite easy but enjoyable. So when we had friends join us for a game, we stayed in game 5 and played a 4 player game where we were completely destroyed at no fault of our friends playing for the first time. In two player games, you can safely ignore your health since you can usually boost your health on your turn. In a 4 player game, you can lose health on every other players turn, so by the time you get back to your health, you can have lost enough health to lose a location. There does seem to be some luck of the draw in terms of difficulty as the starting combination of villains and the cards available to buy can make it either easy or really hard. If the market place only has high value cards available (only 6 cards are available at a time) and you are spending all of your turn try to heal, then you wont get enough money to buy new cards, refreshing the market and strengthening your hand. After feeling quite cocky from playing only two players, we have been adequately humbled by the 4 player experience.
I bought this for around $40 on Amazon and see it as something the kids will very much enjoy as they get old enough.
On my radar with at least one likely imminent purchase and others possibly as birthday gifts in October are:
Sentinels of the Multiverse - coop game with comic book style as knockoff superheros battle villains in a card based game. One element I like to this one is that in addition to play a villain deck and the hero decks, there is an environment deck which adds a dynamic that can impact both heroes and villains. For example, in the dinosaur environment, the Raptor card will attack the weakest on the board, which could be a hero or the villain or one of their minions. Can be played as a solitaire game or as a group.
King of Tokyo - each player is a monster battling for control of Tokyo. On your turn, you roll 6 dice and make Yahtzee style decisions of what to keep and what to reroll. The dice have attack, heal, points or energy. Use energy to buy additional powers for your monster. You can win by achieving the score limit or by being the last monster standing.
Smash Up - I love the idea of this one but doubt I can get the wife to play too much. Different factions have decks and each person chooses two factions to combine. Dinosaurs, wizards, zombies, pirates, aliens, ninjas, etc with unique abilities get combined to make different variations on each game. Players battle to control game base locations to score points. Lots of expansion packs available so could be an expensive one if the wife enjoys it.
Roll for it - simply roll your dice to try and score combinations to match the 3 active cards. Yahtzee style decision on what to keep in play and what to roll next time. Multiple players vying for the same card combo but whoever matches up all dice first, wins the card and the corresponding points. Strategy and dice luck combined.
Forbidden Island - by the same guy who made Pandemic and another coop game. Try to get the treasure before the island sinks. Play with different roles and abilities same as pandemic.
Lost Cities - all in on coop games at this point since my wife is the main person I play with.
Sleeping Queens - good for our soon to be 5 yr old and seems like a laugh.
Spot it - good for both kids under 5 and can be played anywhere.
Exploding Kittens - played with coworkers and thought it was fun and quick (15 mins)
Bears vs Babies - will play with coworkers after vacations are over and seems ridiculous but fun
For board game details I often check boardgamegeek.com
For enhanced details, YouTube has great video overviews, the most entertaining ones Ive seen are Will Wheatons Table Top. Will and other friends in the industry such as Barry Krypky from Big Bang, Seth Green, comic writers, and such play the game providing rules and gameplay and great commentary (on the game AND each other).
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