Board 8 > another year of tabletop rankings and writeups

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Naye745
01/29/20 5:21:40 PM
#401:


glass road is my favorite! it has some of the same resourcey crunchiness, but combined with tactical decision making and really neat card play.

bohnanza and patchwork are probably my next favorites, THEN his big euros, excluding ora et labora, which is fine but totally too sprawling and unnecessarily long.

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SeabassDebeste
01/29/20 10:23:24 PM
#402:


54. For Sale (1997)

Category: Player vs Player
Genres: Bidding, simultaneous action selection
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 1
Game length: 20 minutes
Experience: 10+ games over 7+ sessions with 4-6 players (2015-19)
Previous ranks: 14/100 (2016), 22/80 (2018)

Summary - During the first half of For Sale, players bid on property cards that are ranked in value from 1 to 30. Each round, the same number of properties as players is revealed as the offer. An auction then starts for the highest valued property. Passing means you get the lowest remaining property and that you only pay half your current bid, while the person who wins (and gets the highest-valued property) pays full price. Then, with the collected property forming their hands, all players simultaneously blind-bid on money cards, with the player who chooses the highest property taking down the largest money card. Your score is the sum of your money cards and any leftover money from the first half of the game.

Design - For Sale is about evaluation. Evaluate the worth of a property correctly and you're likely to win. However, it's also deeply interactive; you need to consider what opponents are likely to bid, what you think you'll need to win, and how high you think you can go without being forced to win before placing your bid. The decisions are juicy due to the benefit you gain by passing, meaning that the other properties on offer are very important. Say the bid is at four already on 28-27-22-4 - you really want not to take that 4, but if you bid five, odds are that everyone will pass on you and you'll be out the full five for a rather marginal benefit compared to the people who spent only two (rounding down from that four). The choice is fairly simple, but the points of consideration are many.

The second half of the game features blind bidding, which features yet more evaluation. Here, there's another nice mix of luck - in the clustering of the numbers that come out - and basic strategy. Because there is no turn-by-turn evaluation, there's something of a press-your-luck element, where you might really want to win at least second place in a 15-14-2-0 spread, but your best number is 28 - will both 29 and 30 place those numbers? Will you blow your 28? Most decisions aren't that extreme, but it's cool to see how your decisions in the first half of the game impact the rest of it.

Experience - For Sale is yet another game that I first got into during the "fear the euro" phase. It was one of the great palette-cleansers of its time and had the bonus of playing five players extremely comfortably and stretching to six if need be. Lightning-quick decisions and a simple skillset (evaluation/some gambling/some interactivity) made it a favorite of mine whenever it reared its head at game night. Since then, I've become happier playing those heavier euros and need less of a "filler-ish" palette-cleanser, often preferring something either a little more "tableau"-y in its class or a little more party-ish (but for a small player count).

Future - I requested For Sale at a game night last year to introduce new gaming pal to it, and she thought it was... okay. It seems therefore not the likeliest that I'll actually request For Sale much in the future. And that's fine - playing it once a year could probably slake my entire thirst for it. It's had a good run in my top rankings, but as time goes on, it may continue to slip.
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Great_Paul
01/29/20 11:04:28 PM
#403:


For Sale is an excellent quick game. The only problem I have with it is that the version I own comes in a box that is unnecessarily large. I've seen smaller versions since and wish I had that one haha.

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th3l3fty
01/30/20 7:50:58 AM
#404:


I've actually found Agricola to be significantly more forgiving with more people due to the better actions available at the start - it can definitely be a slog if everyone agonizes over every decision, but it works well with experienced players

I totally understand why some people really don't like it - I have one friend who straight-up refuses to play it because someone got a ridiculously broken card combo early on while everyone else was struggling to get enough food, and that can just happen sometimes and there's nothing you can really do about it

(also, yes, I tend to prefer Caverna, though that's partly because it's much easier to get to the table)
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cyko
01/30/20 10:24:57 AM
#405:


I absolutely love Agricola, but you're right - experience makes a huge difference with this one. New players are most likely going to get crushed - especially those who aren't experienced gamers . Which seems a bit odd to some casual and lighter gamers who did not expect a game about farming to be so brutal. The different card decks add a lot of replayability, too.

I also like For Sale as a light filler game, but I can't decide which I enjoy more - For Sale or High Society. I enjoy them both and they have some differences, but they both feel the same to me - as light bidding filler games.

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SBAllen
01/30/20 11:41:47 AM
#406:


For Sale is fun, mostly because I always win in my friend group, lol.

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SeabassDebeste
01/30/20 1:54:35 PM
#407:


53. Dr. Eureka (2015)

Category: Player vs Player
Genres: Pattern recognition, dexterity/real-time, separate hands
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 0
Game length: 1 minute per hand
Experience: 30+ hands over 2 sessions with 2, 3 players (2017, 2019)
Previous ranks: NR (2016), NR (2018)

Summary - Each player has six small, colored balls (of three colors) that sit in three graduated cylinders. A card is revealed with some configuration of balls in cylinders on them, and all players then rush manipulate their balls into that configuration. First player to make the shape wins the card.

Design - Dr. Eureka is beautifully simplistic. If you've ever played with logic puzzles before like "You have a container that can hold five liters and a container that can hold three liters; how do you get four liters," you'll understand the patterns at work in Dr. Eureka.

The components are simple and clear and attractive (red, green, and purple) and wonderfully tactile. (In particular, the little plastic "atoms" clink when they hit each other). Being spherical and mostly frictionless, they also make it very difficult for a panicking player to pour the correct number of balls out of their cylinder, leading to that fun frustration that happens in real-time games.

Experience - I've only played Dr. Eureka at two separate occasions, and it's been incredibly fun both times. We wound up playing dozens of cards each time. The shine could come off it in future plays, of course, but it really helps that the most recent play was with the likely primary gaming partner, and you can play it with two players and enjoy it.

Future - Because it plays well with two and my primary gaming partner liked it, Dr. Eureka could find itself on my shelf. A few more plays could persuade me more in this direction, but they also might reveal a relative lack of staying power.
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SeabassDebeste
01/30/20 7:22:25 PM
#408:


52. Mysterium (2016)

Category: Cooperative
Genres: Clue-giving, limited communication
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 2
Game length: 40 minutes
Experience: 5-8 games (2015-2018)
Previous ranks: 32/100 (2016), 40/80 (2018)

Summary - One player is a recently murdered ghost while everyone else is a medium. Each medium is assigned a murderer, location, and weapon. The ghost, the only one who knows them, tries to clue the mediums in. They communicate by drawing cards from a deck with bizarre dream images on them, then assigning them to specific players. The players discuss and each place a guess at the same time, and if you are correct, you advance to the next tier.

Design - Mysterium is rather thin as an actual game. It's about interpreting pictures the way you hope the ghost intended, or vice versa choosing pictures as the ghost and hoping that the mediums discern your intent in what's essentially multiple choice game. It's not a "tight" game, with free redraws, the ability to dump your hand (as the ghost) just to redraw, and the ability to listen so closely to the mediums talking that you can communicate with them on almost an unfair basis.

As a result, it leans very heavily on its theme and components and the hope that players enjoy one another's company. For the most part, Mysterium succeeds big-time here. The game is absolutely gorgeous, starting from the box and large, eerie-bluish ghost screen. Cardboard ravens perch on the edge of the screen. Drawing obvious inspiration from Clue, it's got a motley crew of suspects, beautifully illustrated locales in an ominous manor, and some classic murder weapons to choose from. And the art on the dream/clue cards - if you like surreal, weird, fantasy-themed art, as you'll find in a game later on this list, you will love the images here. All the better that the game all about contemplating those images.

From there, it's up to you to adjust the difficulty level and try to have fun.

Experience - I was really excited for Mysterium. In fact, it was one of the early games that I discovered by my own research and was thrilled to have brought to the table. I was the first ghost and thoroughly enjoyed the toughness of interpretation.

Since then I've had both good and bad games. The replay in one sitting is very questionable; even in spread-out games with one group, the meta of "this card means that suspect" grows very quickly. It's a game that is perhaps most fun when players are failing and struggling; I think in an experienced group, playing with nine suspects (three dummies vs six true suspects) is way more enjoyable than with six or seven.

This game therefore seems incredibly dependent on enjoying the company. There's no objective puzzle to solve, so the game is much more fun with tabletalk among the mediums. The single best memory I had was in a game with four players, whom I like, but two of whom I barely get to play with at all due to living across the country. We spent most of the time doubting each other's options, trashing the cluegiver, and often making contradictory bets (i.e. picking the same location). Is that to the game's credit? Its detriment? All games are more fun with a fun crowd.

Future - Wanting to play Mysterium means desiring a raucous good time, whoch isn't always guaranteed. The risk is seemingly low, being short and relatively pleasant. Problem is, its setup and teardown are unfortunately rather comically cumbersome. I will typically opt for something else (in a way I won't for many games ranked this high), but I'm still willing to take the gamble on a good group, because it can be really fun when it's right.
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NBIceman
01/30/20 7:44:58 PM
#409:


My entire gaming group loves Mysterium... Except for me.

It's gorgeous, like you said, but I am not what one would consider an abstract thinker and I generally prefer competitive games to cooperative, so it holds precious little appeal to me in terms of actual gameplay. I always sort of enjoy it at the beginning, but by the end I'm just bored. I also kind of feel like the ending is kind of a crapshoot that makes the rest of the game feel almost pointless, but maybe our group is just particularly bad at it.

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Great_Paul
01/30/20 7:46:44 PM
#410:


I like Mysterium, but I like Obscurio a lot better.

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Naye745
01/30/20 11:52:18 PM
#411:


i have had fun with mysterium but my interest in playing it is very dependent on my mood and the people im with

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SeabassDebeste
01/31/20 3:06:16 PM
#412:


51. Decrypto (2018)

Category: Team vs Team
Genres: Clue-giving, hidden communication, word game
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 2
Game length: 15-45 minutes
Experience: 8+ games over 6+ sessions (2018-19) with 4-8 players
Previous ranks: NR (2016), NR (2018)

Summary - Each team has four words that only the team knows. Each round, one player on each team sees a different sequence of numbers, representing those words, and that player on each team has to give three public clues so that the other players on their team can guess the correct numbers. The catch is, while the opposing team does not know your words, they do know your clues and finds out what clues correspond to what numbers for your cards. In future rounds, they are granted the opportunity to "intercept" sequence-guesses of the opponent. Two interceptions by the opponent or two failed guesses on your own team, and you lose. Make it through eight rounds, and your tiebreaker is guessing your opponents' words straight-up.

Design - Decrypto is a true battle of the wits. You have to try really hard to outwit your opponents while not outwitting your own teammates when you give clues, and as a bonus, everyone takes turns giving clues in Decrypto. Unlike in other cluegiving games, you can't make your clues as accurate as you want them to be; they need to distinguish your cards but not necessarily identify them. For example, giving "yellow" and then "fruit" as clues for "banana" is extremely dangerous, because two rounds later, your opponent will know for sure that your word is "banana," and then any clues you give for it, when it shows up on your sequence, will be almost immediately identified. On the other hand, if you get too cute - "funny" for "banana" - your team might miss it. The danger of giving the single word that gives it away also terrifying. "Boat" is fine for banana. You can even get away with "curved." But toss in "split" in round three, and suddenly you're running up against very dangerous territory.

For some reason, Decrypto is nearly impossible to explain with words. It's one of those games that you just have to play a practice round of to get the hang of, unless you've independently read up on it. Separating the intercept phase and the open discussion phases is a little clunky, and keeping track of all the info you want to requires just a little more space than the paper gives you.

Experience - I got a lot of really good plays out of Decrypto, really fast. It has a very unique brain-burn-y, puzzle-y feeling that, in cluegiving games, can let you feel so indescribably clever. Figuring out your opponent's word is also incredibly satisfying; it's perfectly acceptable to say what you're thinking about the opponents' words because you have nothing to hide from them, and nailing their sequence also feels incredible.

That said, for a while, we had a core four thing going, and then early in 2019, the couple came back after having played a ton with their families, which made them much harder to beat. And then my erstwhile partner said, "I don't really like Decrypto." And that's the thing. As much as Decrypto can burn your brain and make you feel clever, it is one of those games where being noticeably worse than your opponent can feel really, really bad. It happened, and since then I haven't really played.

Future - With the right group I can bring it out again, but it feels like opportunities for that right group are a bit limited. The potential for negative feelings in teammate miscommunication is pretty rough; something about it is a little less laugh-filled than guessing wrong in other cluegiving games, perhaps due to the amount of thought that has to go into each clue. Additionally, the difficulty in teaching Decrypto creates another barrier to getting it to the table. I'll bide my time, though - it remains on my shelf, waiting for the stars to align again.
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Grand Kirby
01/31/20 5:44:04 PM
#413:


Decrypto seems too difficult for me. I either end up giving clues that go right over people's head, or the other team figures out everything after the second round.

Meanwhile the people I play against end up using some random indiscernible in-joke for their clues only they would ever know that would give Alan Turing nightmares. It just never ends up being as fun as Codenames when I play it.

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GANON1025
01/31/20 6:05:21 PM
#414:


I've heard a lot about Decrypto, never played it myself BUT the box looks awesome.

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SeabassDebeste
01/31/20 6:18:10 PM
#415:


50. Ghost Blitz (2010)

Category: Player vs Player
Genres: Pattern recognition, reflexes, separate hands
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 0
Game length: 5-10 minutes to go through the deck
Experience: 20+ games over 20+ sessions (2016-2019) with 2-8 players, incl "5 to 12"
Previous ranks: NR (2016), 36/80 (2018)

Summary - Five wooden items sit at the table: a white ghost, blue book, red chair, grey mouse, and green bottle. You compete for cards: one card at a time is flipped, and then you have to race to grab the correct item. The correct item is determined by looking at the picture, which contains two of the items, but possibly of different colors. If one item is of its correct color, you grab that item. If neither item is of the correct color, you examine to see which item is not represented in either color or object.

Design - Another brain-freezing game. Ghost Blitz, like Jungle Speed, knows how to mix things up just the right amount. Most of the cards are of the "grab what's not there" ilk, like a blue ghost and a green mouse (red chair), so you program your brain one way... and then, suddenly, you'll be hit with a card like a blue ghost and a grey mouse. If you try to grab red chair (grey mouse), you'll be wrong and have egg on your face as someone else grabs the correct item.

The 5 to 12 version ups the number of items to nine, among five colors, and has three items represented in its pictures. The same rules apply, but you can also add "advanced" rules that cause the game to behave differently. It's a little less clean and elegant and brainless, but the mix between grabbing and talking, plus the increased brainpower to process, is a really nice change of speed.

Experience - I discovered Ghost Blitz at a marathon meetup where I hadn't really met anyone before. I played maybe seven new games that day, and in the end, this zero-strategy game wound up being my takeaway, which I bought. It's been a brilliant filler many times as a game that anyone can play, as long as they can recognize colors and can compete speed-wise in terms of grabbing. My most fun plays in large groups where it gets contentious (we've done variants where you compete to say the item first, since eight people can't realistically grab sensibly), or in the relatively uncommon cases where I'm evenly matched (my friend got the game to play with her kids, and she is probably the only person who's as good as I am).

Future - I kind of destroy most people I play with - Ghost Blitz is a no luck game - so it's hard to bring out Ghost Blitz in general. The faster player can win over 80% of the cards quite easily. That said, if I'm not going 100% or if I just need to fill space with something cute, I'm still totally up for it. Not like it wastes any time! I might also consider getting the 5 to 12 variant, but not being a centerpiece game, the appetite in my groups for complexity here has to be there - and that's no guarantee.
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Naye745
01/31/20 8:12:47 PM
#416:


i tried out decrypto at origins 2018 and it was fun, but my friend and i were just way better at it (or at least caught on faster) than our opponents

i've heard good things but this was the only chance i got to try it out! so overall i have no idea how good it actually is

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SeabassDebeste
02/02/20 5:58:41 PM
#417:


49. Ca$h 'n Guns (2014)

Category: Player vs Player
Genres: Party game, take that, simultaneous action selection, push-your-luck, set collection
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 1
Game length: 20 minutes
Experience: 10+ games over 10+ sessions (2016-2019)
Previous ranks: NR (2016), 57/80 (2018)

Summary - Each player is a conspirator in a series of successful robberies, armed with an actual foam toy gun. Over the course of eight rounds, players simultaneously load their guns, point them, and then (after assessing which guns are pointed at them) choose whether or not to "stay in," i.e. participate in the splitting of loot. Players who both stay in and do not get shot by a real bullet get to draft the loot.

Design - There's not a lot of strategy to CnG. It's fast and mean and occasionally groan-worthy, where your agency can often be restricted by the take-that mechanisms. But given the entire game is about take-that, it doesn't always feel quite as personal as in many other games. (A safe thing to do is point your gun at someone who shot you, or at the godfather, or at anyone before you in the turn order.) At only eight snappy rounds, it flows really well.

The best part of CnG is probably the small details. It's just really, really satisfying to point the foam guns at people. If you reveal your bullet, you show either a "BANG" or a "Click" for a blank. Then there's the cardboard cutout stands for your characters, which you knock over when you bail out. And speaking of the courage round, the game encourages you to yell "BANZAI!" if you do stay in. And there's the godfather piece, which both indicates the person with godfather privilege (and who starts the draft), but which also is the sole place that lists the phases of the game. For a game with an actual structure, it's super-useful to have a (rotating!) designated player who essentially narrates the round.

It can be unfun too. If people are determined to gang up on you, you can be locked out of the game, and it's possible to get entirely killed in a round or two. That realistically shouldn't happen, though, with sane people. For me it's a light filler that works really well.

Experience - CnG might have been my first (used) blind-buy. Not every play has been spectacular, but like many simpler games, it's high-floor/low-ceiling. I really like its effortless scaling.

Future - Since I've gotten plenty of mileage out of my copy of CnG, it's no longer something I pack every time I go to a meetup. That said, it's still fun pretty much every time it hits the table, as long as people are okay with a bit of take-that. I think it's a good option to have on hand without the explicit intent to get to the table.
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SBAllen
02/03/20 12:55:20 PM
#418:


I picked up Decrypto and was really excited to play it, but it fell really flat with my usual group so we haven't played it again. I liked it, though. :(

CnG is a great "audience game". We played it at our local brewery and pretty much everyone who came in was engrossed in watching us and laughing.

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Naye745
02/03/20 1:09:35 PM
#419:


cash n guns is fine

i had fun with it, i see the appeal, but there are just better games out there in basically every category that it does - better negotiation games, better bluffing games, better games with powers, better press-your-luck games

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SeabassDebeste
02/03/20 6:10:49 PM
#420:


48. Pandemic (2008)

Category: Cooperative
Genres: Point-to-point movement, set collection, action-point allocation
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 2
Game length: 45-60 minutes
Experience: 15+ games over 10+ sessions (2015-2019) with 2-4 players
Previous ranks: 11/100 (2016), 8/80 (2018)

Summary - There are four diseases (represented by differently colored cubes) infecting the globe, each originating in a general region of the world. Each player is an employee of the CDC who gets four actions on their turn: traveling between cities, building research centers, treating diseases within cities, and researching cures for diseases. You discover a cure by collecting five city cards, which you draw at the end of your turn. After your turn, an infection deck spawns an increasing number of disease cubes in cities. The catch: sometimes the virus intensifies - i.e., the cities that were infected become the ones that will become infected again in the future.

Design - Like Catan for Eurogames, Pandemic is probably the archetypal cooperative board game. It's got a crackin' theme and an addictive puzzle and a blend of luck and strategy. It has the board fighting back violently with epidemics cards and escalating numbers of cubes added per turn. It has variable player powers. And it often has that climactic moment where you can win or lose.

Of course, this means that Pandemic also is the poster-child for some of the issues with cooperative games. The most common thing people accuse Pandemic of is being quarterback-heavy - i.e., it handles differences in player-skill very poorly; with no hidden information, the most skilled (or loudest) player can simply tell everyone else what to do. And this would actually benefit the team, while obviously not being fun for the players who are just being told what to do. Pandemic also can result in unsatisfying game arcs, if randomness hits in ways that make the game a walkover or just wrecks you in an unpreventable way. The game also vary weirdly in terms of how well it scales with respect to difficulty, depending on how the cards are drawn. All of these are pretty valid concerns to me, though I'd argue that the right cast of players can render the quarterbacking moot, and that luck on average enhances the experience.

For my money, the most brilliant thing about Pandemic is its "intensification" method, by which each game gains a distinctive flavor. Each game will start as some random smattering of cities across the globe, but depending on how you spread out to contain those cities, you'll be locked into paying attention there for essentially the whole game. I also really like the flight mechanic - you can discard a city card to fly to that city. But, in order to fly out of a city or, more importantly, build a research center, you need to discard the city you are in. So how do you balance moving around the slow way versus discarding the potentially precious city cards?

The one thing I find a little anticlimactic about Pandemic is that its "set-collection" method to cure diseases doesn't feel particularly cutting-edge. It's highly subject to luck of draw with almost zero mitigation, since sharing knowledge is an act that can happen maybe twice per game in an aggressive game. As a result, the scientist/researcher are overpowered in my opinion, and along with the medic are easily the best roles. Also, the game makes you desire to eradicate diseases, but that should happen rarely in most games. "Winning" with an overrun map somehow feels wrong. Nonetheless, these are rather small complaints that arguably simplify and make more accessible an excellent cooperative puzzle.

Experience - I first got Pandemic in 2012 or 2013 and was overwhelmed by the bookkeeping. (Indeed, the setup can be cumbersome, and I made the mistake of thinking you needed to stack the cubes). After I'd been in the hobby proper, I finally revisited the game and found it easy enough to pick up. I played it a few times at every player count and then started bringing it as a gateway game to meetups when I couldn't get myself into longer games. Letting or helping people solve stuff feels really good as an icebreaker type of game, and the theme is excellent and engrossing. While most games in my hobby group played were a bit newer than Pandemic, we also got a great night out of playing Pandemic like four times (and dying each time. Oops!) I've played it with my family and other non-gamer friends and had fun as well.

In 2019, Pandemic hit the table with my new gaming pal, for two rounds. The first time, we got blasted out by a shit epidemic draw. Fine. The second time, we simply couldn't draw into five of the same for some of the diseases. We lost due to running out the deck. It was insanely dispiriting, and that, perhaps more than anything, has dropped Pandemic's ranking hard.

Future - Given that Pandemic might have become game non grata to gaming pal #1, it feels a bit unlikely it'll hit the table anytime soon. Pandemic sits in a spot where we'll see a lot of games, where my future desire to play it is dampened in comparison to how much fun I've had in the past. I simultaneously feel that this ranking is justified and far too low. That's just how it works sometimes.
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KommunistKoala
02/03/20 7:02:23 PM
#421:


if anyone is interested in getting wingspan its currently back in print online:

https://stonemaier-games.myshopify.com/products/wingspan

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SeabassDebeste
02/03/20 11:03:07 PM
#422:


47. Hanabi (2010)

Category: Cooperative
Genres: Cluegiving, restricted communication, sequence-building
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 2
Game length: 20 minutes
Experience: 25+ games over 15+ sessions (2015-2019)
Previous ranks: 51/100 (2016), 19/80 (2018)

Summary - Each player holds four cards so that everyone else can see them, but not the cardholder. On your turn, you either use a token give a hint - color or number - about a specific player's cards, discard a card to draw another and gain a token, or play a card. Playing a card means choosing a card and seeing if it is next in line in any of the sequences: 1 through 5 in every color. Once the deck is drawn or four incorrect cards are played, you sum the top numbers of all your sequences, and that's your score.

Design - This is the highest-ranked Antoine Bauza game on my list, and aside from a Japanese theme, it's really interesting to see how different all his designs are. Anyway, Hanabi is simple and clever: You can give clues, but even those clues are painfully limited. Everyone has to be at least somewhat aware, and the game is absolutely rife with opportunities for misinterpretation.

Experience - I did not like Hanabi the first time I played it. A lot of people can get pretty damn upset if you misinterpret their clues, and it feels like there can be a lot of passive-aggressiveness. And honestly, the game kind of engenders that. Unlike Pandemic where you can really talk through things and come to agreements (and feel bad when someone is dominating the game), here you can feel bad because you misremembered or misinterpreted a clue and played out of turn or threw away a key number. It's kind of a daunting prospect.

And yet, I saw the game for $5 over a year later and picked it up at Target and therefore decided to get some use out of it. And it turns out that taking the game less seriously, like so many other games, makes Hanabi better. Accepting that you'll make suboptimal plays is a key part of what makes Hanabi good. I've seen players agonize over a card, but in the end, the game is just more fun if you trust your teammates and shrug your shoulders - you're not going to deduce anything by waiting the extra thirty seconds to make a move. And quick play also allows multiple roudns of Hanabi in a single sitting, where a rhythm really develops.

Future - The new gaming partner doesn't specifically like Hanabi (though I wouldn't play it at two much) but approves of it as a quick game that anyone can get going. The fact that it is literally pocket-sized is another point in its favor. It has a very clear niche it can fill for travel or outdoors, and that makes it valuable.
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trdl23
02/04/20 9:27:52 AM
#423:


I have never had a good experience with Pandemic, and this is coming from a guy whose favorite board game is Arkham Horror (not the new one, new one is atrocious). It feels so swingy based on luck that it pushes people to quarterback, since the players have so little thats actually under their control.

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HanOfTheNekos
02/04/20 11:05:33 AM
#424:


trdl23 posted...
and this is coming from a guy whose favorite board game is Arkham Horror (not the new one, new one is atrocious).

aww really? damn

Been thinking of picking up the game but I guess I'll just play the original version on Vassal instead

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trdl23
02/04/20 11:17:20 AM
#425:


The new Arkham Horror breaks its own action economy against the players and relies too much on creating scenarios reminiscent of Betrayal at House on the Hill, which dont work in this style of game. Plus, you are guaranteed for the worst options to happen on a regular basis. The increased consistency actually makes the game worse instead than of better since it makes every flub roll more backbreaking.

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Tom Bombadil
02/04/20 12:48:00 PM
#426:


SeabassDebeste posted...
Of course, this means that Pandemic also is the poster-child for some of the issues with cooperative games. The most common thing people accuse Pandemic of is being quarterback-heavy - i.e., it handles differences in player-skill very poorly; with no hidden information, the most skilled (or loudest) player can simply tell everyone else what to do. And this would actually benefit the team, while obviously not being fun for the players who are just being told what to do.

This was my exact experience with Pandemic, which was also my first exposure to co-op. Have tended to avoid true co-op ever since.

Played Hanabi once and liked it okay but I was crap at it

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Maniac64
02/04/20 1:26:29 PM
#427:


Same.

I've played pandemic twice and didnt really enjoy it either time.

Well the first time I didnt have a QB and we lost horribly. Having the QB we almost won but it wasnt much more enjoyable to me.

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The Mana Sword
02/04/20 2:19:00 PM
#428:


KommunistKoala posted...
if anyone is interested in getting wingspan its currently back in print online:

https://stonemaier-games.myshopify.com/products/wingspan

oh nice, thanks for the heads up!

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banananor
02/04/20 7:03:01 PM
#429:


I have a friend that plays hanabi online almost daily

What an interesting community that is

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Naye745
02/05/20 1:16:47 AM
#430:


i love pandemic and there's a reason a mountain of co-op games following its general structure and formula have come out after

the alpha gamer thing is definitely a problem in the wrong groups though. perhaps i'm fortunate to have played it with the right folks. my group for legacy (s1 and 2) had a very good dynamic when it came to weighing options and giving our opinions

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cyko
02/05/20 8:18:21 AM
#431:


Pandemic Legacy is a totally different beast from Pandemic. But even in Legacy, if you have one player that is a totally different skill level from the rest, they will either be left with little to no input, or trying not to take over the game.

I played PL1 & PL2 with a group of Pandemic vets and part of why we enjoyed it was that there was discussion every turn, so everyone felt involved. I think that made a big difference in our enjoyment of the experience.

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SeabassDebeste
02/05/20 10:20:50 AM
#432:


46. Raiders of the North Sea (2015)

Category: Player vs Player
Genres: Worker placement, tableau-building
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 4
Game length: 45-75 minutes
Experience: 4-6 games over 4-6 sessions (2018-2019) with 3-4 players
Previous ranks: NR/100 (2016), NR/80 (2018)

Summary - Each player attempts to gain the most VP by mostly raiding villages with high strength. On your turn, you play the one worker you have in hand onto an available action space and take the action on that space, then pull another worker off of its action space and take that space's action. Generally these actions give you a tableau of cards and a set of resources you must pay, preparing you for the raids... which you embark on by placing your worker, then taking the loot, then rolling a die for VP. There are also three tiers of workers that you pass through during the game.

Design - Raiders of the North Sea might be one of the most straightforward eurogames in the top section of my list. It's not incredibly elegant, nor is it super-fiddly. It's not super-complex, nor is it extremely lightweight. It's not an immense intellectual puzzle, nor is it mindlessly pleasant. What it is, is a solid experience that has some cool mechanics, some typical pieces, and some satisfaction when you count up the score.

The best part of Raiders is, without question, its central mechanism. Unlike so many other worker placement games, Raiders of the North Sea does not really offer you chances to hate-draft your opponent's actions. Placing a worker on a spot leaves that spot available as an action; the next player will just be pulling from instead of placing on that spot. I also really like the natural arc of the game as more and more people upgrade from black to grey to white, as you keep raiding - at first there will be a single higher-tier that gets fought over, but soon everyone will have that color.

The game also plays with action economy: certain actions are stronger (or only available) with later-game workers; other actions (specifically the one to get money) are actually stronger with the early-game workers. The way the payoffs change is really interesting.

While the interactivity via action-blocking is almost nil, there is a racing element to Raiders, which is essentially "achievement-drafting." While it can be tempting to sit back and just relentlessly build your engine by getting money and buffing your strength, the best loot comes from actually completing raids, even if you aren't strong enough to get the VP from your raid. It's nearly impossible to get certain resources without raiding, and there are limited raiding spots in the game - so you're heavily incentivized to go forward, pushing the game toward its conclusion.

Other than its worker placement system, there's nothing specifically notable about Raiders. It's just a snappy, fast-playing euro where the interactivity primarily comes from this racing element, which constantly lets you feel pretty good by snatching up the cool workers others place, and which gives you the occasional adrenaline burst when you roll your combat strength dice to see if you're scoring big on VP. And in that, it works great.

Experience - Due to its rather standard design, Raiders primarily makes it up here on the back of having some great plays with a fast speed. There was a copy in my group for a while because a visiting friend left it here, and it saw several plays over those months as a euro that's clearly long enough to be beyond filler and is a "complete" experience, while being much shorter and brian-burn-y than an Agricola type.

Future - Alas, that copy is back to the out-of-town friend. I don't know that Raiders is quite notable enough to buy (unlike, say, Agricola, which I think about a lot). But - especially if it works well at two, which admittedly I've never tried - it could fill a niche at a weight I'm very interested in...
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Maniac64
02/05/20 11:04:58 AM
#433:


I'm interested but would want to know how well it plays with two.

Seems like a game that could work for us.

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HanOfTheNekos
02/05/20 1:10:36 PM
#434:


I need to try out Pandemic Legacy. Already made my thoughts on base Pandemic known, but I've heard good things about Legacy.

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Great_Paul
02/05/20 1:35:09 PM
#435:


Maniac64 posted...
I'm interested but would want to know how well it plays with two.

Seems like a game that could work for us.

Ive played it with two and I thought it went well.

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Maniac64
02/05/20 1:48:27 PM
#436:


Alright I will add it to the maybe pile to show my wife. Thanks

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SeabassDebeste
02/05/20 3:53:38 PM
#437:


45. Five Tribes (2014)

Category: Player vs Player
Genres: Abstract, point-to-point movement, set collection, point salad
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 5
Game length: 60-90 minutes
Experience: 3-4 games over 3-4 sessions (2017-18) with 4-5 players (with expansion)
Previous ranks: NR/100 (2016), 26/80 (2018)

Summary - A rectangular board of tiles is laid out, each randomly populated with meeples of five different colors (the titular tribes). Each round, players bid victory points for turn order, then take their turn. On your turn, you pick up all the meeples of a tile and drop them, one at a time, on orthogonally adjacent tiles, thus moving around the board. The final meeple you drop must match one that is already on that tile - you collect the tile meeple you drop and all meeples of the same color on that tile, then perform an action specific to that color. These actions include "killing" other meeples, gaining VPs for the meeples themselves, collecting VP cards, building a tableau of special-power-cards, and gaining money. You can also build structures/claim tiles on the map. The game ends when there are no legal moves remaining.

Design - Five Tribes is nearly a pure abstract. Aside from card draws which affect the offers for markets you may visit with green or white meeples, there is zero randomness. Because of its spatial element, there are literally thousands of ways you can play each turn, especially at the beginning (albeit, some sub-choices, such as where to drop the meeples along the route, are seemingly redundant, while others are seemingly poor choices). In addition, a single meeple dropped onto the square you want can entirely change the parameters of the problem, as going from an odd number to an even number means you can no longer end on the same square you intended to. As a result, Five Tribes gets a reputation for being analysis-paralysis-inducing. Indeed, one of the major issues with Five Tribes is something of an inability to predict what the board state will look like on your turn, and the overwhelming number of possibilities available to you on a given turn.

That said, when it plays, it sings. One of the joys of a board game is its physical presence. Five Tribes has you physically doing something every turn. If you're ever played Mancala, the process of picking up meeples and dropping them off in consecutive squares, looking to claim meeples, should feel familiar - and really satisfying.

Aside from the physical element, taking the actions themselves feels rewarding. There are several very cool payoffs at the end of your turn that give you a nice sensation of payoff, since all of them contribute very directly to VPs. When you empty a square completely, you get endgame points, so the red assassins can give you a double-boost if you claim a territory when you drop the red, then claim another by killing the last meeple in a different territory. The blue builders give you coins, which are one-to-one with VP for endgame scoring. The yellow and green meeples become more valuable if you can get a lot of yellows (especially if they're not being taken by others) and/or the market offer for the set collection becomes useful. And the white tokens are of course really satisfying, because improving your powers is always nice... and they also give VPs. Sometimes, you wind up taking a suboptimal turn, and it hurts, but you bide your time hoping for more.

Turn order in Five Tribes is kind of interesting. There are slots on the turn order track you can bid for, but they cost you VP, and they are not an open auction - rather, each player chooses where they want to bid at according to a fixed track, and you're locked into paying that amount, even if several others leap you. It's a very interesting system, where sometimes you'll just throw down the 18 points to get the monster first move (the only choice with stability), and sometimes you'll meander paying 0 to 1 and just hope you can make a slightly profitable move.

This phase, alas, certainly does not help with the importance of analyzing the board state, resulting in more potential for AP. What's a little more disappointing is that the endgame of Five Tribes is less interesting and fun than the opening, for pretty much all players. At first, with all the meeples on board, you can be assured of taking a cool move no matter what, even if it's not strictly optimal. At the end of the game, when the legal moves are few, "hate-drafting," defensive placement, and countably optimal moves take over, and even the optimal move probably grants fewer points than the early-/mid-game moves that get the oohs and ahhs. As a result, the game's arc is a rise and then something of a sputter/drag as it finishes out.

Experience - Played this at a meetup and, in a rare moment, a friend decided to buy it based off that. Since have played it a few more times, and indeed have found that AP can be a bit agonizing. And yet, the game has always managed to fit that "arc of fun," where you get a few monster moves per game that make you feel great.

Future - There are so many middleweight euros out there that it's kind of hard to think of when this will be the #1 choice. I have heard it's best with two though...
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SeabassDebeste
02/05/20 5:11:46 PM
#438:


Naye745 posted...
cash n guns is fine

i had fun with it, i see the appeal, but there are just better games out there in basically every category that it does - better negotiation games, better bluffing games, better games with powers, better press-your-luck games

wait, are there powers in cng?! maybe in an expansion?

trdl23 posted...
I have never had a good experience with Pandemic, and this is coming from a guy whose favorite board game is Arkham Horror (not the new one, new one is atrocious). It feels so swingy based on luck that it pushes people to quarterback, since the players have so little thats actually under their control.

i'd think the reverse - if luck is gonna drive a lot anyway, then it's ok for players to gamble a little and go with their gut, since different actions are better depending what cards are drawn
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Great_Paul
02/05/20 5:12:45 PM
#439:


SeabassDebeste posted...
wait, are there powers in cng?! maybe in an expansion?

I think the second edition does.

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SeabassDebeste
02/05/20 10:35:03 PM
#440:


44. Karuba (2015)

Category: Player vs Player
Genres: Tile-laying, point-to-point movement, racing
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 1
Game length: 15 minutes
Experience: 10+ games over 4-6 sessions with 3-4 players (2016-2019)
Previous ranks: NR/100 (2016), 49/80 (2018)

Summary - You have an unfilled 4x5 grid of an island and four explorers. The four explorers start on the western and northern edges, while the respective temples they must reach are on the eastern and southern borders. From there, each player has a stack of identical tiles. One "leader" draws a tile randomly from their stack, and then everyone finds their corresponding identical tile and either lays it or discards it to move an explorer down a track. The game ends when all the tiles are drawn or when one player has moved all their explorers to their corresponding temples. You can also pick up jewels on the way. You get points for the jewels or for getting to each temple fastest.

Design - Karuba is perhaps the least interactive game left on this list, with one or two exceptions. It is literally multiplayer solitaire and could easily be compared to a roll-and-write type; if you refuse to look at your opponents' boards, it literally is purely solitary. That's probably the first thing to accept about Karuba: the lack of competitiveness.

That said, as its own unique puzzle-generator, good god it's addictive. The positions of the explorers and temples are randomized each time, and the moment you draw your first tile, you're able to start making meaningful decisions. You'd always want the dream of having a beautiful, efficient path with minimal branches so your explorers can share their exploration, but in reality, you'll draw those tiles out of sequence, you'll want the gems, and you'll need to burn some tiles just to get your guys moving. Sometimes your guys will move smoothly along, and sometimes they'll crash into each other, and sometimes you'll in effect block off temples from ever being reachable. Are you waiting for the perfect piece so you can set your explorers on their path? It may never come! Sometimes you just lay pieces and have no perfect plan. But before you know it, the game is ending and you've made a mess but achieved some stuff and... ah, let's just play it again!

Experience - Played this game like four, five, six times in one glorious weekend during GenCon 2016, when I was introduced to it. Tons of heavier options, but this game was so quick and addictive that it captured many of our attention and wound up arguably stealing the show. It has mostly sat on various shelves since then, but it came out again last year and was good for two or three more straight adventures.

Future - Probably the multiplayer solitaire game I'd most like to replay! I don't own a copy, but playing this game is like playing Tetris. Thankfully (?) it has some controls in place, as setup is a little cumbersome.
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Tom Bombadil
02/06/20 9:09:07 AM
#441:


that sounds right up my alley

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Maniac64
02/06/20 10:07:58 AM
#442:


Can that be played with 2 players?
Seems Like it could and would be really fun

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HanOfTheNekos
02/06/20 10:09:14 AM
#443:


Played Five Tribes at a board game bar once. Was a lot of fun. Have wanted to play it since, but not enough to purchase the game.

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SeabassDebeste
02/06/20 10:22:33 AM
#444:


Tom Bombadil posted...
that sounds right up my alley

didn't know you liked more microgames! it's really good

Maniac64 posted...
Can that be played with 2 players?
Seems Like it could and would be really fun

no reason it couldn't! better chance at scoring points for being first to the temples, too!
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Maniac64
02/06/20 10:36:07 AM
#445:


Added to my list lol

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The Mana Sword
02/06/20 11:01:00 AM
#446:


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SeabassDebeste
02/06/20 3:39:13 PM
#447:


43. Magic Maze (2018)

Category: Cooperative
Genres: Restricted communication, point-to-point movement, dungeon-crawling, tile-laying, real-time
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 1
Game length: 5-15 minutes
Experience: 20+ games over 6-10 sessions with 3-6 players (2018-2020)
Previous ranks: NR/100 (2016), NR/80 (2018)

Summary - Four pawns explore a shopping mall, tile by tile. One player doesn't control one pawn; rather, each player controls all pawns, but can only move them in certain directions and take certain actions, like laying tiles and going up/down escalators. Other players move them in the other directions and take the other actions. The goal is to lay out enough tiles that each pawn can go to its "base" location, then escape the mall by going to its specific exit. The game is played in real time with a sand timer with no talking, except when you turn the timer by going on timer spots. As you advance in the game, you add more tiles to increase the number of tiles you need to explore, as well as rules that can help or hinder you.

Design - Real-time games are naturally frenetic. Magic Maze adds to the madness by preventing any single player from doing anything without coordination. It also prevents players from talking and instead hands them a red wooden piece that you place very passive-aggressively in front of other players to indicate "Do something!!!" Which pawn should you do something about, if someone puts it in front of you? You'll have to figure that out. Granted, this results in various levels of cheating as can often happen in co-op games that are designed to be unintuitive and restrictive toward communication, but that (as often is the case) adds to the hilarity. To be fair, the game anticipates this chaos and encourages you to laugh along with it - the rulebook is fairly forgiving about the inevitable cheating, and for god's sake, the theme is that an elf, a wizard, a dwarf, and a mage get together to... rob a shopping mall.

On the flip side of the chaos is the sublime. This happens for all counts, but especially at two, you can really get locked in. If you can properly time the timer-flips and discuss your plans, then coordinating feels really good. Two players can move a pawn twenty consecutive steps without pausing, and a locked-in third and fourth player can just chime in occasionally as one pawn goes a very far distance. There's a special sort of pleasure that can come from feeling like you're in "the zone," but it's amplified when it's shared with another player without talking.

Experience - Magic Maze might rank even higher with a re-rank, because before I started making this list, I hadn't played it in months. I played it at a meetup with both small and large groups and cleared and failed at levels repeatedly each sitting, four or more games a pop. It was a mix of smooth and hilarious but with occasional bad-feels when people (including me) couldn't figure out why we were being paged with the red stick.

Then, Barnes and Noble held a sale at the end of the year which dropped MM to $16. I've played the game around ten times since then with two through four, with players I trust more, and it feels like its potential was unlocked. The main couple I play with had tried it at a con before and hadn't liked it then - I suspect one or two bad players can tank it, which is a bit unfortunate, because those players will also not have a good time.

Even the worst part of the game design itself now seems like a feature instead of a bug. Magic Maze is visually noisy. Pretty, but noisy - it can be hard to distinguish where each player's weapon is, or where their exits are. Without players being allowed to talk, I'm now thinking that the five-to-ten-second lag it will take to discern where those sites are actually part of the difficulty that makes the game fun. (It is of course far more painful if the group sucks...)

Future - I've finally played with every rule laid out! Now it's just a matter of the special scenarios to fill out. Want to get gaming pal #1 more involved than she has been on this one; its franticness feels similar to Overcooked, which makes me think it has that potential. I get the feeling that introducing this to newer players should be pretty fun, as long as people aren't impatient and don't try to make the worst players feel bad.
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Great_Paul
02/06/20 4:08:56 PM
#448:


My problem with this game is that my group has never won because the guy who brought it out decided to put in every module whenever we played it (and also didn't tell us this was the case until way later). I like the game fine, but I might've liked it better if I wasn't thrown in with everything from the get go.

Interestingly enough, I was just talking to my game group about this game yesterday. Apparently there's an expansion coming now or soon that adds a hidden traitor, which I think is a bit unnecessary. Oh and there's a space version coming out too.

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SeabassDebeste
02/06/20 4:52:41 PM
#449:


Great_Paul posted...
My problem with this game is that my group has never won because the guy who brought it out decided to put in every module whenever we played it (and also didn't tell us this was the case until way later). I like the game fine, but I might've liked it better if I wasn't thrown in with everything from the get go.

oh god. progressing through the modules one by one is SO much more satisfying.
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SeabassDebeste
02/06/20 6:31:56 PM
#450:


42. Celestia (2016)

Category: Player vs Player
Genres: Push-your-luck
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 2
Game length: 25-40 minutes
Experience: 8-12 games over 8-12 sessions with 5-6 players (2016-2019), incl A Little Help expansion
Previous ranks: NR/100 (2016), 20/80 (2018)

Summary - An airship is voyaging into the land of Celestia, and the further it goes, the more valuable the loot. Everyone on board gets to take turns piloting it. One problem though: there are hazards to overcome at each stage (which the pilot encounters by rolling dice.) The dice represent challenges the pilot needs overcome (i.e. discard cards from hand) in order to progress - else, the ship crashes. Everyone gets to decide at each stage whether to stay on (except the pilot, who must stay on). Once the ship crashes, it just starts right back up again.

Design - Celestia is a simple game by decisions. Your decision is influenced by your tolerance for risk, how likely you are to become pilot again, and whether you think the current pilot has good cards. But it always boils down to "am I in or out?" For any game with such simple decisions, it needs to be super-fun.

And for the most part, Celestia succeeds at that. The chrome helps - each player is represented by a little pawn that physically goes inside an airship. The airship physically progresses down a straight line, which looks super-cute and kinda intrepid/badass. When you roll the dice, everyone must announce "I'm in!" - possibly in rapid succession. The dice themselves feel great. Plus, the game plays at an incredibly rapid pace given the simplicity of the decisions, which keeps you moving along, and everyone is invested - either positively (if you're still on the boat) or negatively (if you're off it) - in whether the pilot succeeds each mission. And you can villainously toss down a few Take That cards as well just to be a jerk.

Experience - I've had a lot of fun playign Celestia. Just moving down the track feels good, as well as animatedly declaring whether you're in or out. That said, I want to discuss two issues I've had with the game.

First, when I started out, I made the mistake of playing one rule wrong: you're supposed to roll the dice before letting people decide to stay in or get out. I actually liked it better when you didn't have that info, even further simplifying the decision (to "am I feeling lucky?" as opposed to "oh no way you got that man"). Second, playing with the expansion worsens the game in my opinion. Asking for "help" slows the game down and adds nothing in terms of fun, and those cards randomly can clog the deck.

Future - While I don't own Celestia, at least two of my gaming friends do. I've seen the entirety of the decision space of Celestia, but there's still space to have positive experiences with it.
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