The Big Board-Gaming Catch-All

Hoping to soon. I have a 5 and 9 yr. old I keep for just such an occasion.

Thanks for the lists all. You're giving me confidence in my scope of perspective. Nothing really unexpected on these lists.

Games I've loved that were published in 2012, listed in no particular order because that changes from minute to minute:

Android: Netrunner
X-Wing (though really a miniatures game and not a boardgame)
Lords of Waterdeep
Wiz-War
Smash Up
Epic Spell Wars of the Battle Wizards
For the Win
War of the Ring 2nd Edition

I'm not counting expansions, though there were some good one this year. Especially Rook City for Sentinels of the Multiverse.

I have Seasons and Mage Wars but haven't had a chance to play either yet.

Stilgar Black wrote:
Atras wrote:

I ordered Eminent Domain after playing it at PenguinCon, I'm not usually much of a deck-building game fan, but I liked the way the game allowed interactions between the players.

Glad my late night schizo explanation didn't turn you off on the game. I swear your next play through will go faster.

The only 2012 games I've played this year in ranking order are:
Libertalia
Wiz War
Seasons
WaterDeep
Zombiecide
edit: Forgot Infiltration. Will continue to forget it, wasn't a fan.

And none of them beat the games (primarily Eclipse & Risk Legacy) from last year that I'm still playing. Not really complaining though, as it's nice to not feel like you're missing out on something new. Speaking of which, has anyone tried Mice & Mystics with kids yet?

I like Infiltration but not really because of the game itself. It's really easy for me to explain to others, especially non-gamers, and have them play. Makes it a good group game. I managed to get my sister, my older cousin, and my much younger cousin all to play that game with no issue. That being said I do find it rather shallow, and prefer netrunner instead (which is a pain to teach really). I feel the same way about ticket to ride.

I'm looking at mage knight and all the great reviews for it. I'd got some money to burn too...

I'll also suggest Lords of Waterdeep and X-Wing for great 2012 games. I just played my first game of Netrunner a few days ago, and so I'm still wrapping my head around it. I have Descent, but I haven't gotten it to the table yet.

Libertalia was OK the first time I played it; would probably be more fun now that I've learned the rules.

Waterderp has gotten an insane amount of play this year. Was CAH this year, or last year?

CAH actually lists a 2009 release year. This was certainly the year it got big tho. My wife and I attended a PAX panel with the creators, even though we hadn't bought it yet. A few weeks later when it was up on Amazon, she bought it straight away. I'm planning to break it out Thanksgiving weekend, which tells you a bit about my extended family.

SommerMatt wrote:

Can anyone with an iOS device please pick up RACERFEUD, the FORMULA D clone? I'm completely sick of the BGG people I have joined games with... they're never taking their turns. We have a 10-player race going, and we're still waiting for the 4th player to move after 3 days. Ridiculous!!!

I'm racing against Pocket Tactics people http://forums.pockettactics.com/disc.... Players taking regular turns include telos81, bjornkri, Z3RO5UM, nn12, Gable, Owen Faraday. Also superrobot, adhiri, VanderLegion & elzoodori.

Of course, even with the best will in the world a 10-player race will take time but your BGG experience is crazy. Some people are giving up on the app due to the sub-optimal UI and lack of explanation of game mechanics (not such a problem for those that know Formula De). Plus the lack of Game Center support - although that will come based on developer posts in a couple pf threads at PT.

But turns are quick and the actual game works great - had some excellent pass and be passed dashes through the last few corners. I've sent you a friend request at Racer Feud.

Tanglebones wrote:

Libertalia was OK the first time I played it; would probably be more fun now that I've learned the rules.

Waterderp has gotten an insane amount of play this year. Was CAH this year, or last year?

Libertalia is always just OK or even "less than OK" on the first 1-2 plays. But, get a group that knows how to work the cards and it really comes together. It is my game of the year so far, but it does have that caveat that may make it a tough gateway game. Unless people are willing to sit down and play 3-4 times in a row, they may not ever want to revisit it.

A few games of note that released in 2012 that no one has mentioned: Virgin Queen, Andean Abyss, Agricola: Creatures Big and Small, 1812: The invasion of Canada and The 2nd edition of Wallenstein.

Virgin Queen was great, but I'm an HIS whore and I'd like more plays of it. I've heard good things about Andean Abyss and I hope to try it soon. It's been two months of no gaming, and that's just wrong.

Went over to my cousin's house last night to play board games with him and his friends. They were all dead set on Risk but I got them to try 7 Wonders. They liked it and we ended up playing it 4 times in a row

A bit too early to put together a definite 2012 list since I have a bunch of games sitting unplayed on my shelf still. Any GWJ folks in Indy, btw? But so far I've had the most fun with Wings of War (the new one with the minis) and Wiz War. Mage Knight gets a special nod even though it's a 2011 title. Other I played at Gencon and would like to have more time with are Rex, Chaos in the Underworld and A few acres of Snow. Tsuro also get a slight nod as its something me and daughter can play together.

master0 wrote:

I'm looking at mage knight and all the great reviews for it. I'd got some money to burn too...

Pull the trigger – you won't be sorry that you did. I feel like I'm the Mage Kinght cheerleader around here, but it really is one of my favorite games of the past decade.

UMOarsman wrote:
master0 wrote:

I'm looking at mage knight and all the great reviews for it. I'd got some money to burn too...

Pull the trigger – you won't be sorry that you did. I feel like I'm the Mage Kinght cheerleader around here, but it really is one of my favorite games of the past decade.

I've only played it twice so far, but I love the game. I'm really looking forward to the expansion coming out soon.

Got Racer Feud. Name on there is raptordinance

UMOarsman wrote:

Pull the trigger – you won't be sorry that you did. I feel like I'm the Mage Kinght cheerleader around here, but it really is one of my favorite games of the past decade.

Not the only one. I adore it to pieces. Can't recommend it enough.

Cragmyre wrote:
UMOarsman wrote:
master0 wrote:

I'm looking at mage knight and all the great reviews for it. I'd got some money to burn too...

Pull the trigger – you won't be sorry that you did. I feel like I'm the Mage Kinght cheerleader around here, but it really is one of my favorite games of the past decade.

I've only played it twice so far, but I love the game. I'm really looking forward to the expansion coming out soon.

Awesome, I hadn't heard anything concrete about an expansion yet.

Was A Few Acres of Snow this year or last? I thought there was a lot of buzz around that at the start of the year.

shoptroll wrote:

Was A Few Acres of Snow this year or last? I thought there was a lot of buzz around that at the start of the year.

2011. Not sure when it came out on yucata.de, that might be the buzz you're thinking of.

I have Mage Knight, but haven't really gotten to play it yet. I suspect I'll want the expansion. Thing is, I hate getting the expansion when I haven't played much of the base game, but MK stuff tends to vanish fast. It'd suck if it was gone when I ultimately want it.

My damage from the GMT fall sale:
Sword of Rome
Fighting Formations: Grossdeutschland Motorized Infantry Division
Pax Baltica (P500)

This is, of course, in addition to the copy of Labyrinth that just arrived from NWS store. Similar to DanyBoy, Sword of Rome was just too good of a deal to pass up at ~75% off and I figure having a nice multiplayer CDG around should come in handy for a wargaming weekend. With Fighting Formations I'm pumped to see what it'll be like to take the next step up from Conflict of Heroes, which my gaming group has grown a bit cold to in the past few months. Finally, I'm a sucker for all thing 17th and 18th century Sweden, so Pax Baltica was a no brainer. Plus it was actually released on a limited run a few years ago, so it's a fairly known quantity at this point.

This talk about getting Here I Stand / Virgin Queen games in makes me quite envious. I fear that getting a group together for one of those is a beyond what I can reasonably expect from my humble gaming group. Especially since the consensus seems to be that you really need a full 6 players to get the full experience.

Gunner wrote:

Finally, I'm a sucker for all thing 17th and 18th century Sweden

This is why everyone loves Gunner.

I got Chicken Caesar last week and played one round with the local game group. We played with the max of 6 people which meant each of us had 4 Chickens who we were trying to get lots of badges. After the first attempt at bribing, everyone got real down on the game for its potential to take forever. Essentially every player action is bribeable and so theoretically everyone can just wait to see if anyone will bribe them all the time. It has the potential to make a really long game.

Or, everyone gets upset at that possibility and short tracks the game by killing off their own chicken and ending the game in 30 min. Much of that 30 min was discussing the potentially long game as a result of the bribes.

We did have a 30 minute explanation of the rules which was really 3 or 4 explanations restarted as additional people kept being added on.

I think the game has a lot of potential, but its 100% player interaction and essentially 80 - 90% discussing bribes with players. The actual number of turns for a 6 player game seems really short. I would think this game would play better with 3 people. I did a solo test run of a few turns and in this scenario, a player has so many chickens on the board he can stack certain offices and essentially bribe themselves. It would probably make bribing only 10% of the game or so and make most of it strategy about how to fill your family in the best offices.

For example, you could fill the tax office and Caesar's office in order to keep Caesar in office longer. Or you could fill the army office and tax office in order to have the high taxes create a lot of traitors who the army office then positions on everyone else's chickens.

Those maneuver's are probably doable with 6 players, but it would be really really difficult. Then the bribing just comes down to "vote for me and I'll give you 1 coin" or "don't kill my chicken and I'll give you 1 coin".

And 2012 list:
Android Netrunner
X-Wing

Panda's post reminds me of some of the things I noticed at our game group yesterday.

We've got a second game group we are now playing with on Saturdays. They are all much more avid gamers than my Tuesday night group. But most of them aren't very good at teaching rules. They'll say "let's play X" and then pull it out. And then they realize they need a rules refresher, and they start reading parts of the rulebook to me.

I've always thought a good rules explanation was part of the experience, and now seeing so many weaker explanations in the same day it just firms up the idea in my mind.

What do you guys think?

Now that I've been spoiled with a regular gaming group, I will straight up refuse to play a game if no one knows the rules. It always adds way too much time to the game and sucks the enjoyment out of it if we have to stumble through an explanation at the start, and then repeatedly look up the rules through the course of play. If a person just got a new game and wants to play it, I always encourage them to do their homework ahead of time. It's a bit disrespectful to the other players' time to do otherwise.

That said, finding the best way to convey the rules to a group isn't a natural talent for everyone, but it does come with practice. Also watching online videos about the game can help immensely. The presenters in the video are usually trying to give an overview in a very compressed time span, so using parts of their explanations helps convey the game in a succinct manner. They aren't a complete substitute for knowing the full rules though, there will always be edge-case questions and details that the videos don't go over.

WHenever I get a game, I look for rules summaries from a BGG users called Universal Head. He takes great care over his summaries both in detail and design; they aren't just Word documents.

Here's a list of them

http://www.headlesshollow.com/freebi...

Here's my interview with him

http://hatchetjob.libsyn.com/hj94-he...

You should always have at least two copies of the rules at the table.

It's not always about how you teach the rules but also about how some people like LEARNING the rules. I'm pretty thorough when I teach in the spirit of having a good game, so while I won't necessarily read the rulebook cover-to-cover I do like to cover a very basic framework and then emphasize some things that might turn into pitfalls later if people aren't paying attention... all while trying to keep it from turning into information overload (fine line). It takes a little longer to get going but I think it's worth it. A friend I game with regularly can't handle this, at all. He's up for some VERY basic instruction and then just wants to dive in, preferring to learn on the fly.

I got to stop reading cardboard children on rock paper shotgun. It just makes me want to buy everything.

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/11/04/cardboard-children-spartacus/

Damn it that looks fun.

Cardboard Children and Shut up and Sit down are essential readings for reviews for me. What other places would you recommend?

Universal Head is awesome.