Board Game General /bgg/

I love it but it conflicts with most people's expectations. The abstracted movement means it's not really area control. More about picking what spaces to threaten, what to go for, and what you have the resources to play.

No not really my intention to say there's anything wrong with them in asking the question. I really enjoy cube pushers and TM is one of the most beautiful games I've ever seen, that said I was thinking more like what happened with abstracts in the last year. Santorini/Onitama came out and made it clear that just because you could do a game with minimal components doesn't mean you have to. Blinging out a game isn't always the best thing, if all it does is up the price, but sometimes it's worth it if you get more people playing. Splendor is very simple mechanically and could've been done without the card art and just plain cubes; with the chips and the quality images I see it get played all the time, not sure it would otherwise.

Santorini and onitama both have the same problem though, over produced and overly simplistic garbage. No one will remember these games in 5 years, no one will even remember it in 2 most likely. That's the problem with gaming today. They're becoming just like videogames. No one wants to make a long standing classic, we just need a game that looks pretty and sells a lot on day 1 for a short term profit. That's all plastic pushers are bringing to the market.

Maybe Onitama, but Santorini has already been around like 20+ years, it just didn't get much press outside the abstract crowd. If you wanted to talk about an abstract that was overproduced with nothing there past kickstarter hype I'd say you should be complaining about something like Tak, which got $100-400 versions by Wyrmwood slapped on top of a game by cheapass, which isn't known for producing the best mechanic games ever.

As for no one wanting to make a classic, that's not the problem. Classics aren't decided by the designer but the players, hence why I mentioned Splendor, that game gets played all the time and if Asmodee hadn't bought Catan from Mayfair I think you'd see it being the ubiquitous new gamer game.

More like 10 years in print and play where it was a modest design that no one really cared about until some idiot decided "Let's make a $50 version to cash in on the millennials and their love of pretty things!"

Toss-up between Agricola and Dominant Species.I dumped a lot of my euros for lighter, trashier stuff when I moved to an area with less of a hardcore player base, but I still enjoy those two enough to hang onto them.

Why are dice still a thing? What's fun about a tiny plastic cube telling you whether you do something or not? Why would anyone want a tiny plastic cube to make your decisions for you? It literally just removes your ability to plan or apply any skill.

It's fun seeing your friends get fucked over by bad rolls

It's funner seeing your friends get fucked over by poor choices, though.

Because memoryless stochastic processes simulate reality in a way.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markov_property

For gaming purposes... I'd probably try to add that memory though so people don't get shafted by bad rolls. A nice example is how Warcraft 3 handles randomness (I think WoW has the same mechanic though I'm not sure)

If you have a test that has a probability to succeed 25%

the first time you roll it has a chance 25%
the second time you roll it has a chance of 50%
the third time you roll it has a chance of 75%
the fourth is sure

In board gaming terms you could add a chit for every failed roll that would add 1 to your dice. On a success you discard the chits.

That way you "simulate" fair memoryless processes in a easy way.

That said - man I fucking hate dice

[cont]

Though to be fair for what they want to simulate dice are usually a shitty way to simulate fighting.

For strategy games you usually want to have something like this en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lanchester's_laws for fighting forces

For tests of "strength" "perception" you'd want stronger guarantees of not failing a test than simply "roll 2 successes on 5 dice"

Though I guess YMMV and games are supposed to be fun and not necessarily supposed to simulate reality anyway.

Wouldn't you rather be able to say you beat your friends by something like, I dunno, skill? Good planning?
That's just trying to make less bad a bad feature. When there's so many boardgames that succeed in having no random elements, why do we need boardgames that feel the need to make everything random. I understand it in a children's boardgame, but we're essentially making childrens boardgames for manchild millennials, and they completely dominate and infest the top 100 list. I can't even go to a boardgame convention or game store anymore without these screaming assholes playing games of chance on every table while no one wants to sit down an learn even the most basic euro.

Well some stuff in life *is* random so you'd want to simulate that. War games are good example, you simplify the inherent randomness of fighting as dice rolls.

I agree with you that dice as a mechanic are bad... though it's an easy way to add chance to a game.

Sure you can have games with no randomness but for some genres I'd say it's necessary (wargames, RPGs are IMO obvious choices) though not necessarily implemented by dice.

OTOH like you say some games don't need dice at all, or don't need randomness at all. Personally I like the randomness of Terrra Mystica - only present at the setup.

>Rebellion has some of the worst stands
Yes. You can leave the characters in their stands between games to avoid damage to them, but the stands will still damage the attachment rings if you attach the rings from the bottom. I cut notches in the attachment rings so I can attach them from the top instead, which works much better with the slant of the plastic stands.

boardgamegeek.com/image/2967425/star-wars-rebellion
Saw these a while back on BGG, then saw the price in his store.... I like Rebellion but seriously $35 + shipping for stands is autism beyond what I can deal with.

Agricola vs Caverna, GO GO GO!!!

Tannhauser.

Ora Et Labora

I keep seeing Descent, HeroQuest, Shadow of brimstone & Imperial Assault being compared.
What differentiate them? Who does what better? Who would you say is the best overall dungeon crawler and why?

Caverna is better in just about every conceivable way bar the hidden scoring opportunities with the cards at the beginning of Agricola.

>

Not italian, the artwork looked neat, bgg seemed to think it was pretty good, and I saw a review that said it was a pretty good game. Thanks a bunch for saving me from wasting money on it!

hold me /bgg/

about to go to board game night and *that guy* might be there. really don't want to get stuck at a table with him again.

Descent Second Edition and Imperial Assault are not dungeon crawlers, they are tactical minia boardgames.
What's the difference, you ask? In both the map is very small and fully revealed at the start of a scenario. Both assume full transparency on the part of the Overlord/whatever it's called in Imperial Assault, meaning eveyrone at the table can, by rules, read the adventure nad know what spawns where and why, for example, and as stated before there's no exploration.

Both Heroquest and Shadows of Brimstone are true dungeon crawlers, but I'm told SoB is really unwieldy with a mountain of cards, tokens and dice to roll, plus the characer development rules are lackluster. It has, however, the advantage of being autopiloted, meaning everyone cna have fun playing the hero (Descent, for example, is not really fun as OLvs4 because it's heavily skewed for the heroes)

If you are looking for a good dungon crawler you could try Warhammer Quest or Advanced Heroquest for that old good time feeling, or Descent First Edition. If you try D1st consider buying either Road to Legend or Sea of Blood, two very long campaigns, you are looking at roughly 150-200 hours of monster smashing culminating in an epic battle.

>I don't understand why chance would be in game despite Casino's literally being incredibly popular buildings full of games that all rely on chance.

People like the thrill of gambling and risking stuff based on nothing but luck, deal with it you autistic cunts.

Anybody here play 7 Wonders Duel? I haven't played the original 7 Wonders either, but I'm thinking about picking up the 2 player version.

To be fair I have a hard-on for rigoroud no-nonsense rules... Too many years of competitive Magic I think
You might be able to buy it and have a lot of fun with it if you are just willing to pass over that stuff, and I'm certain I didn't play as many games as those guys writing reviews
Tell us about That Guy of yours. What are his sins? Book thumping? Sulking when losing? Touching components with cheeto fingers?

Do it, it's a solid choice. Probably among the best 1v1 games you can get right now (and play in under 20 minutes)

I got the duel and 7 wonders for my brother's family.

I honestly don't think they understand either game.

The actual 7 wonders has two player cards to modify to a two player game, never played with less than 3 myself tho. Haven't seen duel.

>tfw helping

Random at setup is the only acceptable random chance. Everything else only exists to make the game idiot friendly.

I worked in the casino game industry. Calling "people"who enjoy those kinds of games people might be a stretch.

Deal with it you retarded fuck.

To elaborate we literally had the main programmers 5 y/o daughter as our functional tester because if it attracted her eye the idiots that played slot machines would like it too.

Cool, I'll buy it. I'm trying to find a game that my dad will like.

>tfw I'm that guy

I-I'll see you there user

pushing cubes isnt a game

>hard sells his own game group all evening
>only interested in games he brings
>always pushes his own games
>makes sure he has an advantage when "teaching" games
>gives bad advice when "teaching" games
>complains on the board about how group works
>complains on the board about how "games with more than 4 people are shit" and nobody likes them

just, I don't know he's an asshole and not the fun kind.

anyone else got that guy stories from game night?

No one enjoys poker without the money. No one cares about a game just to see whose luckier. People dragging all these coops and games of luck to the TOP FUCKING 10 GAMES OF ALL TIME are people who don't give a fuck about the game aspect of a game. They just want in on the latest fad and will drop it just as fast leaving all of us with years of garbage to wade through and a crippled economy demanding every designer pander to the lowest common denominator.

Is your group so small that you HAVE to play with him if he shows up? If he's at a table you don't HAVE to play with him. If you are invited to sit at the table then you can excuse yourself to play something small and solo as a 'warmup' or to 'decompress from a long day at work' or you can just say you have to discuss something with someone over text and don't want it to get in the way of the game.

Or bring a smaller player count game and get it filled up with 'not that guy's.

And if he wants in on a game that's filled up (e.g. five players want to play a four player game) you can use this easy method of determining players. Using just a plain deck of cards take #of players face cards (minus 1 face cards if you're for sure going to play) and one numbers card. Shuffle them up and deal them out to everyone. Face cards are players in the game. And because you used to do lots of card tricks you know how to convincingly fake shuffle and top/bottom deal him the numbers card.

Or you can just tell him and/or others you don't enjoy playing with him.

Why has no game successfully imitated HeroQuest, or improved on it?

There is literally no Dungeon Crawl that comes close.

HeroQuest has everything (theme, models, exploration, look and feel) but needs a modern overhaul and complexity and depth increase.

yeah I thought about that

>I'm the LOUD one
>one guy is the "mastermind" who will spend a half hour on the "perfect" turn
>one guy takes an hour to explain a game so poorly nobody understands how to play
>that guy
>people who show up late (no you can't just jump in to the 2nd age of 7 wonders)
>normies (oh I thought you meant games like monopoly)

there are probably decent people too but I'm so busy hating everyone and everything I haven't noticed. nah... actually I like everyone except >that guy. and the normies.

the size varies from three to like eighteen, and I always try to wind up at another table. I'm not alone though, me and a few of the above regulars joked about how awful he is, so it's kind of like reverse musical chairs.

I love that this triggers you so much. I love dice games, and think they deserve to be higher rated than all Euro games. Deal with that you stupid faggot :)

Hero Quest was a fantastic toy but realistically a meh game. It was easy to invest in that toy back in the day but it would take such a risk to invest a ton of money into the toys that made Hero Quest what it was while gambling on people loving the design and mechanics to make it a hit.

translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=auto&tl=en&u=https://www.hall9000.de/html/spiel/terraforming_mars

Seems like the germans didn't get caught up in the Terraforming Mars hype for some reason.

Fuck the sacred cows! Goodbye Agricola and Through the Ages, you will NEVER EVER be in the Top 10 again.

Lets get Puerto Rico and Caverna out next :^)

Can you stop saying 'Toy' please? That makes literally no sense.

It was a simple game, primarily directed at children, but appealed to many people older than that too. Which is why I said it needs a modern overhaul and a complexity upgrade.

is it good tho? I just finished re-reading the mars trilogy by robinson and terraforming mars sounds neat.

reminds me I've been working on a competitive version of Candy Land without introducing any new elements.

?

I don't mean to use the word toy derogatorilly. I love my toys. I guess the mature word to use is "components" but that's such a vague term. I always just refer to my games with rather grander production values as toyboxes.

Literally Advanced Heroquest
And "toy" is fine if its main appeal is the little carboard bookshelves and whatnot

didn't have near the same level of love applied to it when being made.

A remake is required.

If you're gonna try that, at least be a little subtle. Everyone knows you don't believe that for a second.

I like dice placement mechanics

Why not just play worker placement?

I very much dislike a lot of Euro games. Whilst saying dice games should be rated higher than all Euro games is an exaggeration, I am happy to see the top 10 change to include, in my opinion, much more enjoyable dice rolling games.

How the fuck are you doing that?

because they're not games

What's your opinion on Troyes?

Please explain

They're more games than relying on dice to make your decision.
Your opinion that you'd rather your decisions not be your own? What does a dice add to a game? Far as I can tell, it only removes. What other than the removal of decisions does, say, Roll for the Galaxy add over Race?

>Bang!: the dice game
>One Night Ultimate Werewolf
>Codenames
If you had to recommend one of these as a party game, which should I get?

Bang! for up to 10
Codenames can play a lot more

Codenames and Bang has alot more versatility when it comes to the number of players and also werewolf is shit.

I'm not going to bother answering your questions, because no matter my reasoning, you will not change your opinion. Therefore, you like what you like, and I'll like what I like, and whatever happens, happens.

>there are people who legitimately enjoy straight euro games that don't understand the thrill of taking a uncertain chance

I feel sorry for you miserable lot

pic related made me laugh when I was doing a bit of browsing for prices of 18xx games a few days ago

>what are modifiers

I like the on-the-fly strategizing that it offers

>Codenames can play a lot more
The hilarity of codenames is that the bigger the team is the more they will be fucking up. The hints need to be precise so the person guessing will know you're getting at. That's possible with 1 or 2 people, not so much with team of 5.
And obviously the more you know each other, the better. The most wicked play I've seen was a couple scoring 5 cards in one round - the hint was "me".

In other words, you have nothing.

Ah shit ya got me :')

>And obviously the more you know each other, the better. The most wicked play I've seen was a couple scoring 5 cards in one round - the hint was "me".
This is why when I play games like Codenames/Spyfall we split couples, it's funnier to see people flounder than let a husband/wife run the table.

>werewolf is shit
This, will only play it if I absolutely have to

I'm gonna wood you real good f a m

>werewolf is shit
Really? I've heard it's fun to play

Anyone played Triumph & Tragedy or Churchill?

Looking for a 3 player war game and both recently got a reprint. Which one should I get.

I actually managed to gather 5 other players for a Virgin Queen campaign game this weekend. Can't wait, it only happens about twice a year

I also bought a slew of old wargames from some guy. Some of them have playtimes that make Virgin Queen look like Love Letter. Particularly Carthage looks cool, I haven't played a hex-and-chit game at the strategic level before

I admit, the game has had a surprising amount of staying power, and with only 2 expansions, all but the added cards I tend to ignore from them.
>You will never find and obtain the deluxe components from the Paris Festival

So my friend and I got Twilight Struggle for Christmas and we finally managed to play it. We were a little bit afraid that the game would have a reverse-hype effect and that we would end up disliking the very popular game... oh boy we didn't, one game in and we are both extremely happy with it. First session was very satisfying, though a little bit slow and uncertain at the beginning but that's normal for a game like this I suppose.
I manage to win in turn 9 playing the URSS after a good mid-game even though I was lost during the early war. She ended up getting two scoring cards right when I used “Lone Gunman” as first action to peek into her hand and that was a killer. She got me hard in Europe (late war is devastating there I sense), I won Asia (bless Vietnam Revolts), Africa by grinding and mostly Central America (Control) with an early devastating coup (3+6) in Panama which stayed unchanged up to the end of the game, "Fidel" and multiple attacks against Mexico (and luck against one of her coup). South America and Middle-East both ended up in a stalemate, Middle-East was particularly intense. She was extremely unlucky in the Space Race and I got up the Space Shuttle, giving me a large boon in vp.
The game is really good both gameplay-wise and thematically. The content is good enough (getting a bit tired of semi-heavy game with 1kg of content anyway) and the map is gorgeous and well-made game-wise. The whole thematic cards adds a lot to the game, we both thought of War of the Ring where they are very close to the source-material and help a lot to bring the theme while being well-connected to what they represent. All in all it's quite the great game, dice rolls can be a bit of a problem, but at least the whole game don't really hold to them. Can't wait to see what's like to play the opposite side...

Damn that looks nice.

I played Seasons only once and with only 12 cards it seems like it would be a "dumb game" but it's actually quite thematic. Had a lot of fun.

Not only is it thematic the depths of learning the game can go with is quite large, a skilled player will pretty much never lose against an unskilled player

Really want to buy this next but i dont want to pay full price for it

Wanted to write quite thematic and deep.

But user its worth it at full price

Its amazing. Just make sure you sleeve those tiny cards because they get beat up fast. I play it with my gf and its such a balanced and Strtegic game that is very satisfying for its short play time.

Just bought the expansion too. While i think it adds a lot of strategic depth, I think it adds too much and I usually just play the base game

Bgg top 10 has always fluctuated heavily with cult of the new shit (although i do think scythe and duel deserve to be there, just maybe number 9 and 10 instead).

>twilight stuggle, puerto rico, and castles of burgundy don't belong in the top ten

I really feel like Pantheon is an alternative, not a straight improvement, to the base game

Not what I meant, I was saying games like pandemic legacy, star wars rebellion, and blood rage usually are in the top 20 range for a while when they are new and then eventually sink down to the thirtys when the hype had written off, while classics like TS and puerto rico are fairly consistent

Oh, okay.

That's usually the case with bestsellers for example most NYT bestsellers only really sell the first year while books that have more cumulative sells but spread out over 10 years are ignored (and arguably - more important)

See also:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_effect

>Millennium blades will never be top10 because muh anime artstyle