Board 8 > Recommend the perfect board game to me

(+) Yeah! (+)

To keep this brief, a year ago my wife and I discovered the perfect board game for our needs: Ticket to Ride. As we've looked into more games that didn't quite capture the perfection of Ticket to Ride, it got me thinking about the attributes that we need in a game:

1. Must be just as fun with 2 players as it is with 6. For example, we like Werewolves, but that game really cannot function without a larger group. We generally play just the two of us, but will occasionally break out a game when guests are over. And that leads to the next one...
2. Must be learnable after a maximum of 2 playthroughs. We don't have consistent enough board game friends where rules/strategies can be developed over several nights, so we need something simple enough to pick up in one evening.
3. Games should last between 1-2 hours. I don't foresee having time for a Risk-like marathon
4. Can incorporate phones/YouTube videos if necessary--no limits there

Feel free to tag any of the known tabletop connoisseurs that I know tend to lurk here!

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Pandemic / legacy
Libertalia
Dominion

Are a few i can think of without getting more info on what type of games you like.


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Azul
Wingspan
Century: Spice Road

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yahtzee

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It doesn't quite fulfill all of your requirements (2 players only, games are typically < 1 hour) but my wife is a big fan of Patchwork.

It's super easy to pick up, but it combines strategizing about how to best organize tetris pieces together to fill your board while also competing with the other player to get the ideal pieces that you need. It's pretty well designed as far as two player board games go.

If you don't mind another train game (well, subway) On the Underground is also pretty good. I like it better than Ticket to Ride as I think the gameplay is a bit more interesting. You are building train lines like in Ticket to Ride, but there is a passenger token that moves around the board to various destinations following some set rules, and which lines the passenger uses dictates scoring. There's other ways to score too (linking amenities with your lines, building loops), and while it has similarities in theme to Ticket to Ride it definitely plays differently.

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I'm not sure about perfect, but can you really call yourself a board gamer if you haven't tried Catan at least once in your life?

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Was just about to post Catan, though that game really needs three players to work.

Ascension is good, though I would stick to the base game and maybe the first expansion. My preferred deckbuilding game.

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2 player catan is not very fun
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VintageGin posted...

It's super easy to pick up, but it combines strategizing about how to best organize tetris pieces together to fill your board while also competing with the other player to get the ideal pieces that you need. It's pretty well designed as far as two player board games go

This sounds good, but can it flex to include more players? I think that's the best feature of TTR--it's just as fun, albeit a little different, with 2 players or 5.

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Colegreen_c12 posted...

Pandemic / legacy
Libertalia
Dominion

Are a few i can think of without getting more info on what type of games you like.

We don't know what kind of games we like! Something relatively straightforward but not too simple where it's over in 20 minutes, you know?

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any other questions I can answer to help paint a clearer picture of what we like?

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Lords of Waterdeep
Elder Sign
Splendor

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Looked up all of these, and Pandemic seems to be the best fit. I like the idea of starting with vanilla Pandemic and then being able to go nuts and play "the best board game ever made" in Legacy if we are digging the mechanics.

Has anyone else played these?

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If you like Ticket to Ride, then TransAmerica might be a good one

Also Power Grid

I second Pandemic.

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operation

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If you count slightly different versions of the same game (like, actually different, sold separately), then 7 Wonders is about the best choice I can think of. 7 Wonders is great for big groups, and 7 Wonders Duel is easily one of the best 2-player games.

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Yeah, Pandemic's good. And since it's fully co-op, it's easy to introduce new players- there's no information hidden from the other players and you all have the same goal, so you can advise someone who's not sure what they're doing the best way to play their cards. Once they pick up the basics, they should be able to strategise on their own.

Just be warned that it's not an easy game, and a bad draw in the setup can be brutal. I once played a game where we hit multiple loss conditions at the end of the first turn.

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Pandemic is fun and relatively quick, but yeah failure is right around every corner and it can be muy dificil

Gloomhaven is easy to get into, it's like a streamlined/simplified DnD.

But if you ever have six players and a whole day to burn and someone owns Twilight Imperium 4 that shit is worth learning

I will also second splendor. Its easy to learn but has some good strategy in it to where you can improve. It's a little simple but I enjoy it.

TomNook posted...

If you count slightly different versions of the same game (like, actually different, sold separately), then 7 Wonders is about the best choice I can think of. 7 Wonders is great for big groups, and 7 Wonders Duel is easily one of the best 2-player games.

I will also second this. But I would recommend starting with sushi go first as its both very cheap and easy to learn. Its a good way to introduce people to the play and pass concept. (Only downside is I don't find it much fun with two after a few rounds but you can probably get it for like 5 bucks anyways)

turbopuns3 posted...

Also Power Grid

This one is also quite fun but its a little higher in the complexity (I don't think it's too bad, but its definitely a step above ticket to ride complexity wise).

Nelson_Mandela posted...

any other questions I can answer to help paint a clearer picture of what we like?

Do you prefer euro style (indirect competition) or american (direct competition). Ticket to ride is euro style where everyone is trying to achieve their own goals and the only real interaction is resource denial. (Taking routes or cards another person needs). Stuff like risk and werewolf is more american style due to directly competing and fighting/lynching each other.

Do you prefer competitive or cooperative?

How complex of games do you like. I usually just use boardgamegeek as a guess point but i usually like decent complexity because I find it makes its more interesting. Although for party games I tend to want it to be easier so it's easy to explain.

How do you feel about Timed stuff? Pandemic has a spinoff called Rapid Response that has that cooperative nature but with a timer.

Do you like wordplay stuff? Codenames is a good game and has a duet version for 2 people.

What exactly about Ticket to ride do you guys like? There are other games with elements similar to it. Is it the hidden agendas or the fast simple turns? Or the having to balance getting resources and using them

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I would second wingspan. Surprisingly fun and easy once you grasp it

Catan is the GOAT though

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Played Wingspan last night and it was fantastic

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Do you prefer euro style (indirect competition) or american (direct competition). Ticket to ride is euro style where everyone is trying to achieve their own goals and the only real interaction is resource denial. (Taking routes or cards another person needs). Stuff like risk and werewolf is more american style due to directly competing and fighting/lynching each other.

In general, American style but definitely open to either.

Do you prefer competitive or cooperative?

Team competitive would probably be ideal (as long as it can also be played 1 on 1), but again, we're open!

How complex of games do you like. I usually just use boardgamegeek as a guess point but i usually like decent complexity because I find it makes its more interesting. Although for party games I tend to want it to be easier so it's easy to explain.

Probably tend toward the easier end

How do you feel about Timed stuff? Pandemic has a spinoff called Rapid Response that has that cooperative nature but with a timer.

We're down!

Do you like wordplay stuff? Codenames is a good game and has a duet version for 2 people.

Not big on word games (these tend to be flimsier with rules) but we do enjoy Codenames quite a bit

What exactly about Ticket to ride do you guys like? There are other games with elements similar to it. Is it the hidden agendas or the fast simple turns? Or the having to balance getting resources and using them

So I think the thing about TTR is that it really hits the sweet spot of a lot of things you mentioned before. It's not too hard to pick up (maybe 1 or 2 games at most), but each new session sort of reveals a hidden depth to it that you don't necessarily pick up on at first. We also like TTR because you can play it from various angles (ie, you can play to screw over the better player or you can stick to your own devices and try to win that way). And finally, it is about the ideal length that we want in a game.


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shame wingspan is out of stock qq

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Have you ever played Flashpoint: Fire Rescue?

Its pretty light, scales well, and is very American style.

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I'ma throw out a few games that meet some of your preferences but not all. I would look at them and see if they interest you at all

Betrayal at House on the Hill
+It starts out as cooperative but at some point the scenario gets revealed and it may stay cooperative or become one vs many.
+Each scenario plays very differently
=Fairly easy to learn, but not the easiest
-Doesn't work for 2 people

The castles of Burgundy
+Works well for two to four players
+Once you know how to play its pretty simple and turns go pretty quickly
+Similar to Ticket to Ride in it's easy to play it "ok" but you'll learn new strategies and get better every time you play
+Kind of a mix of Euro and American imo. It's mostly competition through resource denial (and turn order denial) but its a lot more impactful/common than in Ticket to Ride.
+Has enough randomness to keep the games varied, but is less swingy than something like catan imo.
-A little bit to learn, the gameplay is simple its just learning what every tile does. (Complexity 3/5 vs 1.86/5 for US Ticket to Ride). This is probably one I would recommend to someone looking for something like Catan but a little better more complex.
-Not team based

The Resistance: Avalon (Or regular resistance but that one has balance issues)
+Team based, but hidden teams in same way that werewolf is
+Bluffing with a lot of potential strategy
+Easy to learn
-Doesn't work for two people

Tragedy Looper
+Team based, with it being 1 vs the rest
+Works with 2-4 players and is fun with any number (4 is probably ideal though)
+Has a very cool premise where one player is trapping everyone in a time loop and trying to prevent the other players from figuring it out
-Higher complexity than the rest (Will take some time to learn). Only the person playing the mastermind needs to understand everything though, the other players have it a bit easier
-Probably more complex than your looking for, but maybe down the road you can branch out into it if it interests you. (Complexity 3.51/5 vs 1.86/5 for US Ticket to Ride)
-Due to it being scenario based can't play infinitely. But I think there is a good number

Splendor
+Easy to learn (Easier than Ticket to Ride)
+You can play ok at first but similar to Ticket to ride you start to pick up little tricks as you go along
+Works well for 2 to 4 players
+Fast game (30 mins or so) so you can play lots of rounds
-Euro style with the only direct competition being resource denial (although it's a little more common here than TTR I find).


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DoubleTangicide posted...

I would second wingspan. Surprisingly fun and easy once you grasp it

Catan is the GOAT though

I'm very interested in trying wingspan.

Catan is a good entry game but i'm honestly kinda meh on it. Admittedly I've never played with the expansions though so that might be why.

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Colegreen_c12 posted...

I'm very interested in trying wingspan.

It's very good, would recommend. I was worried about it at first because I heard people were comparing it to Terraforming Mars (my least favourite game) but it actually pleasantly surprised me. I also don't need to ever own it because I have 5 friends that do.

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Great_Paul posted...

Terraforming Mars (my least favourite game)

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Just played a game of pandemic.

Holy shit this game is perfect. Very unforgiving though... Got a pretty rough hand to start.

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