From video gaming to card games and stuff in between, if it's gaming you can probably discuss it here!
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We have a wider circle of friends who are boardgame enthusiasts, so we go through a rather lot of them. Some stick, some don't. These we play regularly and have a lot of fun:
There are more that made an impression on me, I remember playing them a few times, but do not want to play them again (Do you know that feeling? :D ), eg. Eclipse (the galaxy-wide battle 4X preparation-takes-as-long-as-playing-and-playing-takes-a-whole-day strategy), Agricola, Mice and Mystics...
Brass Birmingham is a masterpiece. I absolutely love that game. It's and absolutely heartbreak that my SO dislikes it.
Have you tried Lost Ruins of Arnak? It's great!
I really like board games that don't take that long to play. It's a lot easier to rope your friends into a game that takes 30-40 minutes to play and is easy to learn rather than a game that takes 4+ hours.
Some that I've found
Hive is a modern, fun take on chess with a dynamic board. Its super fun and unlike chess its not figured out and people just don't bother to throw a "book" at it. Every board game convention I try to find someone wirh Hive and it'd awesome!
My partner and I love playing Wingspan. A game about bird may not sound great but it's full of strategy without being too hard to pick up. It's competitive, but just total points at the end, you can't screw each other up during play.
There is a board game I played years ago at a comic shop, and I can never remember the name of it. I only played it once but it was super fun. Kind of like if Freelancer were a board game. You had a huge game board with a bunch of planets and you picked up missions. I dont remember what the win conditions were, but I remember I had a lot of fun with it.
I vaguely remember totalbiscuit and the gang play some games that would fit the description. Maybe worth a shot digging through his old stuff
Yeah, I'll have to go and check some of those out, thanks for the suggestion!
That could have been:
• Xia, legends of a drift system
• Star Wars, outer rim
• Firefly
• Merchant of Venus
Those are probably the most well-known games along that line 💁🏻♀️
You had me at "Freelancer the board game". I love that game, and what you're describing sounds fun as hell
I like the ones that platform socialisation and banter - things like hidden role games, party games, etc. Less focus on the game's strategy and more on the people you're playing with.
Codenames (and Codenames Duel) is slower-paced but an engaging word-based game.
Just One is a simple word game that even drunk people can play (and likely have more fun in).
Detective Club is a bluffing hidden role game, where all of you are using weird art cards to match a prompt, but one of you didn't have the prompt and is spinning bullshit - guess who!
Concept is Pictionary for people who can't draw.
And my all time favourite:
Telestrations, a blend of 'the telephone game' and illustrations. If you're familiar with Gartic Phone, you already understand the gist. Every event that I've brought it out, it has been a good time.
I realise this doesn't really count (well, it does but you know), but chess. The rules are straightforward and it has infinite replayability. And you can play a game online any time you want in an instant.
Other boardgames I enjoy are Arkham Horror and Twilight Imperium, though I haven't played either in a while.
Jeez, when you play a board game you really decided it's an all day event. Both Arkham Horror and Twilight Imperium take forever every time I've played them
Try the Arkahm Horror Card Game. It moves quite a bit faster but shares much of the difficulty and has great stories.
Was into the tabletop simulator version of TI4 for a while. But even with automated set up and digital streamlining, the games are still 6-8 hours.
Love the game, but just don't have time to play anymore.
I’ve been getting into Go/Baduk lately, it’s a shame how few people there are playing it in the US! Would love to play in-person instead of always online
It might be Marrakech now that I think about it. It's not too time taking and friendly to casual players yet not completely luck based. Also placing the rugs just feel so good. Are there other board games that comes with neat little items like Marrakech?
My city is an astoundingly good game. My wife and I are playing it basically every weekend at the moment. Super easy to learn, tactically rich, the art is lovely and you make your own city story to some extent. It's just wonderful.
The Red Dragon Inn is fun, especially when you drink real alcohol when you "drink" in game
I really love Spirit Island because i find the setting really nice. You are Spirits and need to destroy the invaders to your island. Another great part is that its a coop game and you can chose many different spirits with each different playstyle.
Feels like everyone I know has eventually ended up with their own copy. Hands down my favorite coop board game - it does a good job of minimizing the problem where one person effectively ends up playing for the whole table. Plus as you said the flavor is great.
I run a board game store so my list will be rather lengthy.
But short answer is Gaia Project... Until Age of Innovation drops
I've been absolutely loving a couple of the Button Shy games at the moment! They're really nice because I can just slip them into my work bag and play them at lunch. In particular, I've been playing a fair bit of Sprawlopolis and Food Chain Island, both of which are really great solo games.
With other people, I've been playing a whole lot of Spirit Island, which is probably one of my all-time favorites. The amount of diversity in how each of the spirits play is mind-boggling and makes every game feel very different. My regular play-group is also getting pretty excited for the new expansion that's coming out in the next couple of months.
I've fallen in love with Arkham Horror The Card Game. It's difficult and can be played solo if I really feel the need.
https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/products/arkham-horror-the-card-game/
Some of our favorites are Catan, power grid, ticket to ride, azul, and bananagrams.
Ticket to Ride is so fun.
We've been playing Camel Up a lot. It's nice because there is some skill and a good amount of luck involved, so no matter your board game experience, you have a shot at winning.
Agricola is my favorite but it is pretty complex so we don't play much.
We play all the dune games at work. The new remake of 1978, done betrayal and dune imperium. And sometimes twilight imperium.
With friends we have bought spirit island, which is fun but really difficult. We also play dead of winter and some DND spinniof games. My mate works at a Games Store so he has lots of games i haven't played yet. Oh and I've joined a poker home game.
My favourite is twilight imperium if we can ever find enough people who can spend their whole day playing a game.
Not sure if this counts as boardgame, but I've been enjoying Farkle a lot (a dice game) thanks to Kingdom Come Deliverance xD
I never really like this kind of stuff but Farkle is quite simple and fun!
My current favs are Wingspan, Dune Imperium, and Deep Rock Galactic (both a great video game and board game!).
Dune imperium is really fun - worker placement with some deckbuilding and bumping tracks (as the brothers murph says).
If you like campaign games you might enjoy something like Kingdom Death Monster - dark, boss battler/settlement builder. Definitely mature game though.
Marvel champions is a ton of fun but it can be very expensive if you want to keep buying more and more packs. Baiscally a deck bilding game similar to arkham horror LCG but for marvel and not a campaign unless you buy the campaign expansions.
Not so much a traditional "board" game, but I've been a lifelong enjoyer of Munchkin! It's a whimsical dnd-esque card game with (almost literally) hundreds of different themed versions, from Space to the Wild West to Cthulhu even.
Some of my favourites right now: -Wingspan: 1-5 player game about birds from all over the world (with the European, Oceania and Asia expansions). Build up your board of birds and make future actions you take have more effects. There's a solo mode and Asia expansion introduces a special 2 player and 6-7 player mode. As a birder myself, can't recommend this game enough. -Parks: Small but in depth 1-5 player game about exploring US national parks. You buy gear and set your hikers off on a trail that changes every round, to collect tokens and visit national parks. Games last up to an hour that feels like it flies by. Box design is the best I've seen, everything just fits together perfectly in a tiny box, making it much easier for travel. -Terraforming Mars: Most complex game I own, for 1-5 players. Games can take 2-4 hours sometimes. You play as a corporation and compete with others to terraform mars the fastest. You raise the three global parameters (temperature, oxygen level and water) and increase your terraforming rating, all while managing your resources by playing various project cards. Has a challenging 1 player mode where you're racing against the generation counter to terraform mars in under 14 generations. Expansions are a bit expensive but I can recommend Prelude and Hellas & Elysium, for extra cards that can be played at the start of game to kickstart your resource generation, and a double sided map you can use as a replacement for the base game board.
Other notable mentions are 7 Wonders, Tokaido, Mystic Vale and Ticket to Ride
Carcassonne and Rummikub.
My favorites shift far too often, but Twilight Imperium and Merchants & Marauders are aleays ones I get to the table when given the chance.
I have very little experience with board games so I'm using this thread for ideas to try out. But I did play Betrayal and liked it so I'll say that one is my favorite.
My favorite long game (as in over a couple of hours) is Merchant of Venus. For shorter games I like Azul, Splendor, 7 Wonders Duel, That's Pretty Clever, Lost Cities R&W, Star Realms, and more.
For a newer board game I like Ticket To Ride, especially the Rails and Sails edition but I'm most partial to the old Avalon Hill games like Titan and Merchant of Venus.
Ticket to Ride is our go to.
My group doesn't have much time for board games, so we like 5 Minute Dungeon. The 5 minutes is a limit using a timer, and it's co-op so it's everyone against the clock.
I'm not sure what my favorite is. My family and friends and I love Pandemic, Catan, Ticket to Ride, Throw Throw Burrito, and the first Walking Dead board game, the name of which is escaping me currently.
Gloomhaven came out at the perfect time in my life- after my party days but before my marriage/kid days. I had a friend group that would play at least one scenario per week, and sometimes we'd just spend an entire Sunday playing. That's been my best experience so far.
I wish I could play Frosthaven with them but we've all moved away and I don't have a group that would ever be consistent enough right now.
I'm mostly into deck builders and I haven't seen these mentioned before so I'll drop two of my favourites Dune: Imperium and (TBOI:) Four Souls! Also an honorable mention to Dominion but I haven't played that in a while.
Wiz-war!!!
Maze runner, spell slinging, death match, capture the flag game... Summon stuff, blast people, and capture treasure. Seriously so fun.
It was printed in the 90s, 2013, and is getting a less favorable reprint pretty soon.
My single favourite board game is the Game of Thrones. No dice. No luck. Pure tactics and the occasional alliance.
I have apparently terrible luck so games that involve dice, especially d6's do not interest me.