Yea probably the simpler the better, especially need something that I can "pause" play or finish a session quickly and put it away and get it back out easily. The D&D ones are just called D&D adventure?
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Board Gaming Era |OT| (Mostly) Unplugged Gaming
- Thread starter XShagrath
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Yea probably the simpler the better, especially need something that I can "pause" play or finish a session quickly and put it away and get it back out easily. The D&D ones are just called D&D adventure?
There's six of them:
Castle Ravenloft
Wrath of Ashardalon
Legend of Drizzt
Temple of Elemental Evil
Tomb of Annihilation
Dungeon of the Mad Mage
ToEE and on have campaign play.
I've been playing a lot of solo Gloomhaven lately. It's a good dungeon crawler if you like hand management, deck building, and tactical combat. It also includes an insanely huge campaign. Not really a beginner game, but it's not overly complicated either.
Thanks, will add to my wishlist and see if any store I visit has them on sale.
Just gonna say if you like Star Wars check out Star Wars: Imperial Assault. I think the theme really helps new players understand the concept of dungeon crawlers in board games also it's just a fun game with a ton of content.
Mage Knight is a VERY heavy game. I own it and have attempted to play it solo but it really is daunting. I do want to spend some time learning it but yeah, very heavy game with a ton of rules.
Gloomhaven is great, will last forever and would work well as a solo game. It might seem overwhelming at first, but isn't really that complex.
Not a great "first dive" into solo play. Something lighter and less time intensive (for setup and teardown) makes more sense in that newbie space.
Telling someone to start with gloomhaven for solo play is like telling someone to start classic literature with war and peace. If you don't completely break them where do they go from there?
Just about everything else seems easier once you've played Gloomhaven and Twilight Imperium.
Mage Knight is a great game but it doesn't really feel like a dungeon crawler. It does have the features you'd expect to see in a dungeon crawler: the combat, the exploration, getting loot, gaining experience and getting stronger. But it does so at a very different pace than you'd expect. Everything is difficult to do, even the moving about and exploration. It's all about the vicarious thrill of encountering seemingly impossible odds, and coming up with just the right combination of resources to allow you to overcome that challenge. This is a sense of accomplishment that you might get once or twice on a gaming night except that it happens all the time in Mage Knight. It's a great game, but it's much more about resource management than you'd normally expect out of a dungeon crawler. Mage Knight is also pretty complex so I wouldn't normally recommend it for beginners.
Something like One Deck Dungeon would be better for that. It's an inexpensive game that's compact and plays quickly while still getting you all of the elements you'd expect out of a dungeon crawl. I've never played the original game and I've heard that it can be really hard to beat. I have played the Forest of Shadows standalone and it's definitely playable.
Other more complex games in the same vein are Dragonfire/Crossfire and Heroes of Terrinoth. Unlike Mage Knight and One Deck Dungeon, you'll want to run at least two characters for these games though.
Almost. Wargames exist, and they can be so complex that they break BGG's Weight scale.
C'mon now. Gloomhaven isn't more difficult than something like Descent or Imperial Assault, and certainly less complex than something like Mage Knight. There is a lot of stuff, and setup is a bitch, but the core gameplay is a fairly simple card driven system. Play through two scenarios and you should have a good grasp of how it works. You can even use an app to track enemies, which negates some of the setup if you're so inclined. It's also in my opinion the best dungeon crawler by far, so why not invest some time to learn an actually good game rather than some mid-tier hack 'n slash?
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I saw one deck dungeon and it certainly has me interested. Though I may pick it up on iOS first.
Do highly recommend ODD board game or app. It's a really fun, quick dice manipulation game.
Local game store has a yearly used game sale . People bring in their lightly used games and get 80 percent in store credit. We got there about 1.5 hours before opening and 10th in line. By opening maybe 80 people lined up. They had about 1,000 games. This was my haul, pretty happy
Gloomhaven isn't complex. Messy, hard to organize, annoying setup/cleanup time? Sure, but not complex. Its firmly medium-weight and the difficulty adjusts nicely for groups/players who aren't into minmaxing.
That said I wouldn't recommend it for solo play unless you're into playing multiple characters at once, and house ruling the difficulty against your perfect knowledge of player initiative/player actions.
That said I wouldn't recommend it for solo play unless you're into playing multiple characters at once, and house ruling the difficulty against your perfect knowledge of player initiative/player actions.
I don't know about the other ones, but Forest of Shadows is really good. I've never played the original but I've heard that it's the better of the two games. I mostly play as the Hunter and she seems really strong. Also, Caliana is a joke character so don't get her unless you know what you're getting yourself into.
Yesterday, I was at my mother in law's house and her husband has over 2000 of these games, honestly, it felt like a library of board games there.. My wife, our kids, her mom and grandmother went to go see Toy Story 4 yesterday and it was just him and I hanging out. I asked him, since I was a newbie at this, what games would you hvae someone play to break them into designer board games. We played three games.
These was the first two.
Afterwards, we played Splendor.
Anyways, I took a few pics of his mancave.
I can see myself going down this road further. He told me about boardgamegeek as a website and a few others. When I get the time, I'll look more but I genuinely had fun yesterday playing these games.
These was the first two.
Afterwards, we played Splendor.
Anyways, I took a few pics of his mancave.
I can see myself going down this road further. He told me about boardgamegeek as a website and a few others. When I get the time, I'll look more but I genuinely had fun yesterday playing these games.
Yesterday, I was at my mother in law's house and her husband has over 2000 of these games, honestly, it felt like a library of board games there.. My wife, our kids, her mom and grandmother went to go see Toy Story 4 yesterday and it was just him and I hanging out. I asked him, since I was a newbie at this, what games would you hvae someone play to break them into designer board games. We played three games.
These was the first two.
Afterwards, we played Splendor.
Anyways, I took a few pics of his mancave.
I can see myself going down this road further. He told me about boardgamegeek as a website and a few others. When I get the time, I'll look more but I genuinely had fun yesterday playing these games.
Join us.
(Those are great choices to start off with.)
Yesterday, I was at my mother in law's house and her husband has over 2000 of these games, honestly, it felt like a library of board games there.. My wife, our kids, her mom and grandmother went to go see Toy Story 4 yesterday and it was just him and I hanging out. I asked him, since I was a newbie at this, what games would you hvae someone play to break them into designer board games. We played three games.
These was the first two.
Afterwards, we played Splendor.
Anyways, I took a few pics of his mancave.
I can see myself going down this road further. He told me about boardgamegeek as a website and a few others. When I get the time, I'll look more but I genuinely had fun yesterday playing these games.
That is like the optimal way to get into the hobby. You have access to thousands of games and has someone who can teach you the rules. Dig in and discover!
If you are a fan of Marvel or Star Wars both Star Wars Imperial Assault and Legendary marvel are awesome games and mid level stuff. I see them both on the shelfYesterday, I was at my mother in law's house and her husband has over 2000 of these games, honestly, it felt like a library of board games there.. My wife, our kids, her mom and grandmother went to go see Toy Story 4 yesterday and it was just him and I hanging out. I asked him, since I was a newbie at this, what games would you hvae someone play to break them into designer board games. We played three games.
These was the first two.
Afterwards, we played Splendor.
Anyways, I took a few pics of his mancave.
I can see myself going down this road further. He told me about boardgamegeek as a website and a few others. When I get the time, I'll look more but I genuinely had fun yesterday playing these games.
Welcome to the club! It seems odd to mix Century with Splendor since they seem to tick very similar boxes. How did they work out for you?Yesterday, I was at my mother in law's house and her husband has over 2000 of these games, honestly, it felt like a library of board games there.. My wife, our kids, her mom and grandmother went to go see Toy Story 4 yesterday and it was just him and I hanging out. I asked him, since I was a newbie at this, what games would you hvae someone play to break them into designer board games. We played three games.
These was the first two.
Afterwards, we played Splendor.
On a slightly different note, Race for the Galaxy and Roll for the Galaxy had seemed to me to be extremely similar games. I finally got a chance to play some Race, and to my surprise I find it to be quite different to Roll. While the two games share a lot of mechanics that are sort of similar, the game economies are staggeringly different. Most notably, Race has more built-in synergies which sounds great on paper, but it also means that a good portion of the time the cards you need won't come up and you're toast by turn 3. In light of this, I'd say that Roll is the better game by a significant margin.
I received a copy of Betrayal at Baldur's Gate yesterday after ordering it from Woot for $20 last week. Upon opening it was elated to see that they've fixed the stat clip issue from Betrayal at House on the Hill. Components look decent and a tiny bit better than House on the Hill. From what I've read the tweaks to the rules work well and the haunts are good, despite still sometimes being unclear or confusing and requiring an FAQ. One of the things I like a lot is that each character has a choice between two different classes and powers. So the half-orc can choose between being a cleric that can heal other people or himself, or a paladin that can ignore events on new tiles he enters. That should keep each character feeling different from each other and help the game feel a bit fresh when replaying it.
I'm not a huge fan of Betrayal at HotH but I'm thinking I'll like Baldur's Gate a lot more because of the additions, fixes, and rules changes. I'm hoping to try it out Tuesday night at game night at the local store.
I'm not a huge fan of Betrayal at HotH but I'm thinking I'll like Baldur's Gate a lot more because of the additions, fixes, and rules changes. I'm hoping to try it out Tuesday night at game night at the local store.
A large part of the fun of Race is figuring out how to pivot while playing based on what you get, and what's being selected role wise. Yeah, there are hands that just don't work, but as you get better at it, you can find some real fun combos.
They're just very different games. A big part of the 'economy' in Race is building up a big hand of cards, not just because cards pay for stuff, but to get a wider set of options. You're always looking for how to get to the next point of your improvised build.
I love Roll, too, but for much different reasons. It's just so fun to gather up and manipulate the dice.
Yeah, Race does have its points, it's just that I was surprised that the two games are so different given their superficial similarities. It's also really surprising that the dice game is the less random of the two, and by a big margin at that! I also agree that, once you get a decent amount of card draw, a lot more options open up in Race. However, that flexibility doesn't exist in the first few turns, and it's hard to do much when you're dead in the water by turn 2.
I'm not saying that it's not a great game though, just that Roll is a lot better. I've been just playing Race on the app, and it's disappointing that this game has a bunch of programming errors such as forcing a player to do something on a card that says "may".
I'm not saying that it's not a great game though, just that Roll is a lot better. I've been just playing Race on the app, and it's disappointing that this game has a bunch of programming errors such as forcing a player to do something on a card that says "may".
Of the four related games (Race, Roll, Jump Drive, New Frontiers), I find Roll the worst by a significant margin; it's incredibly dry and boring. Jump Drive is pretty weak as well, being a beginner's version of Race.
Race is amazing for its combination of constantly changing tactical play combined with long-term strategies. Outside of your opponent(s) playing a killer turn 1 combo (e.g., Alien Toy Shop + Earth's Lost Colony in 2P Advanced), you're not going to be out of the game by turn three based on card randomness alone. You do have to play the cards you're dealt, but there's plenty of variety and plenty of paths to victory there.
New Frontiers goes in entirely the other direction -- all developments are face up in the middle of the table for anyone to build, and worlds are drafted from a seven card draw, so you've got a good shot at getting pretty much what you want all the time. It's still an interesting game, however, but one that's a fair bit less tactical in world/development selection (but there are some neat tactics when it comes to action selection in 2P/4P games).
It's possible you've found some bugs, but my bet is that either you don't understand the rules or you don't understand the interface.
All this talk about One Deck Dungeon caused me to open my copy. I bought on sale like last August and it has just been sitting on my desk for almost a year. Played it solo and absolutely loved it. Took the Archer through the Hydra dungeon and got killed at the boss fight but still loved it.
Yeah but for solo play meaning most likely the newbie has to figure out how to play themselves and there's a 50 page rule book. Even for someone quite into board games like myself, getting through that rule book is a chore.
Solo game go Arkham Horror LCG - still tricky but has a learn to play guide that gets you playing quite quick.
Your only Dead in the water by turn two of your a inexperienced player. As someone who has played upwards of 500 games of Race I see this all the time with new players.
Often they will look for combos in the hand and hold on to cards or explore because they think they need to. Race is (much like Lehmanns new game Res Arcana) a game about efficient use of your hand. It's not about working towards a super engine, but much more about micro engines.
Roll on the other hand is a more forgiving system and almost bloated version, and imo a strictly worse game.
This says what I tried to say earlier in a much better fashion :) You can't look at your starting hand & stick with it, you need to pivot with what you draw.
It is another dungeon crawler and it did have interesting mechanism for level up but the rule is complex and confusing even for experience gamer like me. I didn't really care much for it after couple scenario I was pretty much done with it, but my brother-in-law love it and he think it's great. Personally I think Gloomhaven is much better in every regard.
Also to the above discussion, I wouldn't recommend Gloomhaven for solo especially if they are new to the hobbies, it's not difficult but there can be so many rules and things to remember. If you want easy simple dungeon crawl, start off with something like Zombicide or Mansion of Madness 2nd Edition before moving up.
How long are these Race games supposed to last? A pivot is usually going to take 2-4 rounds of doing not much and I find the games to only last 10-14 rounds total. Sure, in some of these cases you can still be competitive, but there are a lot of cases where it's basically impossible. Is there a difference between the base game and the expansions?
The expansions have more start worlds, goals that give out more points, and some add new mechanics to the game.
Also, a standard game does take around 10-14 rounds as by that point, either someone filled their tableau or drained the VP pool.
Anyone have much experience with Unicornus Knights? Caught my eye at a local game store and it's the same designer who made Love Letter, which I love. They had it on sale but seems this didn't sell well in the US or something as impressions and reviews seem limited but it has enthusiastic fans. I love the theme and the idea of a Princess charging head first into peril and players chasing after her trying to ward off dangers.
You might want to take a look at some of the PBF games on BGG to see how you can make the most of your draw, without spending turns on pivoting. Here are a couple examples:
Roommates are leaving and taking their nice big table sadly. Looking for a new one. I never really eat on a dining table so looking for something well for board games.
Anyone own this or have any opinion?
Barrington Poker Table I would probably reupholster it myself but a $500 table with those features sounds too good be too with the price drop.
Anyone own this or have any opinion?
Barrington Poker Table I would probably reupholster it myself but a $500 table with those features sounds too good be too with the price drop.
I haven't played it yet. I've looked into it as well but the longish playtime (some suggested much more than the advertised playtime) plus the lack of interaction between players and heavy quarterbacking scared me away. I love the look and idea of the game though... just not sure it is good enough to own.
There was a big thread on Reddit about this table.
Pretty much unbeatable value for a game table especially if you plan on resurfacing it. The OP said it was rock solid. Cup holders are a bit shallow and it is a bit narrow for some games were the biggest drawbacks.
As I watched it it reminded me of the Sonic Board Game last year. Basically a thin game mostly coasting on the license. I've not read through the rulebook so perhaps that is unfair, we'll see.
Do you have a link to that thread?
Now that I have a group for Gloomhaven space does matter since it was probably my largest game. The table we used before though is about 56 inches in length and 40 inch depth so I don't have to worry about it.
It does look great too just have to add a red felt and I'll love it.