10 Recommended Gateway Boardgames For The Holidays

by A.J. Coltrane

Since we’re now in the holiday season, I thought it would be fun to compile a list of the top 10 games that we use as “gateway” games — games that are not found on the Fred Meyer Wall Of Games, but are not too hugely strange, complicated, or time consuming. Stuff that’s a little bit different but seems to be fairly universally enjoyed, even among people with limited boardgame experience.

There are no original thoughts, especially on the internet. Here’s boardgamegeek’s top 100 gateway games.

My top 10 is below, with boardgamegeek rank, approximate price, and a *very* brief explanation of the mechanic. For additional information, the links lead back to earlier “Recommended Game” posts on this website:

1. Ticket To Ride Europe (BGG #1 & #5, $45, 2-5 players) — Build railways across Europe by creating card sets of similar colors. Ticket to Ride easily won #1 on the BGG site. Ticket to Ride Europe got #5.

2. Gardens of Alhambra (BGG #26, $40, 2-4 players) — Place “plant” tokens around valuable buildings to block out the competition and win points. Somehow this hasn’t gotten a Recommended Game post yet — I’ll have to fix that. BGG link here.

3. Fluxx (BGG N/R, $15, 2+ players) — A somewhat wacky card game with continually changing rules and win conditions. Very fast to play.

4. Forbidden Island (BGG #11, $25, 2-4 players) — Work cooperatively to save four treasures from an island that is rapidly sinking.

5. Lost Cities (BGG #16, $22, 2 players) — Do you remember Rack-O? It’s sort of like that, but more interesting and better all around… Two players plan expeditions to one of five continents. The winner has the most valuable expeditions.

6. Guillotine (BGG #59, $18, 2+ players) — Off with her head! The nobles are all lined up to be beheaded. Manipulate the line so that you get to behead the most famous.

7. Dominion (BGG #25, $42, 2-4 players, up to 6 with expansions) — Card game where you create your deck as you go. If I had to pick one, it’s probably my favorite game on this list. It’s kind of hard to describe in just a few words, check out the link.

8. Mr. Jack Pocket (BGG #64, $22, 2 players) — Sherlock Holmes vs Jack the Ripper. Jack is one of nine suspects and it’s up to Holmes to figure out who. Players take turns moving the inspectors and changing sightlines down alleyways to try to hide and/or reveal suspects. A two player game that transports well and generally takes less than 30 minutes.

9. Citadels (BGG #52, $25, 2-8 players) — Each turn a player takes the role of one of eight midieval characters. The characters have different benefits and turn priorities. Collect gold and be the first to build eight buildings. The player with the most valuable buildings wins.

10. Rocketville (BGG N/R, $25, 3-5 players) — BGG hates this game. We like it. The board is divided into multiple neighborhoods. Win the majority of a neighborhood and receive points as a reward. The player with the most points wins. There’s some luck involved, but we always have fun.

It’s not a complete list, but it’s a good start. What else would you add to the list?

Recommended Game — Starship Catan

by A.J. Coltrane

Title: Starship Catan

Game Type: Exploration/ Euro-style resource allocation, shares traits with the other Catan titles.

Number of Players: 2

Complexity of Rules: Low-Medium/ Medium

Time to Play: 60 minutes

The Concept: Each player controls a spaceship. In the quote box is further explanation from boardgamegeek (I can’t improve on it, so here it is) –

Players explore randomly shuffled decks of cards [ed: star sectors] looking for potential colonies, good trading deals, opportunities to help planets, and either avoid or combat pirates. Players can upgrade their ships’ systems, including weapons to combat the pirates, thrusters to be able to explore further each turn, scanners to see (and avoid) cards that are coming up, and several others. Victory Points are earned by establishing colonies, building upgraded ship’s systems, having the most friendship points, and having the most hero points. The first player to 10 Victory Points wins.

Why I Like It: Like many of the other Catan and Euro games, it’s about the tradeoff between what you have, what you want, what you need now, and what you’re building towards. As the sectors are explored, the pirates get bigger and nastier, and the danger ramps up.

The game features good-sized cardboard cutouts that represent the ships. You can see it in the picture below. The yellow token attaches to the back of the ship and represents an engine. The blue pointy token goes in the front and represents cannons. The arrows in the middle of the ship point to how much of a particular resource that you have. The squares represent different bays of the ship that can be upgraded for a cost. There are also the Colony and Trade pods at the back. Collect resources by exploring the sectors and upgrade as you think is appropriate. .

The boy cat was interested in playing too:

Starship Catan is now out of print. The going rate on ebay is $22-34. We recently purchased a 2nd copy on ebay with the idea of keeping one “nice” copy. As it turns out, the one purchased on ebay is in better shape, so it’s now the “keeper”. Highly recommended.

GNOIF: Bring Out Your Dead — The Recap

by A.J. Coltrane

GNOIF #10 recap — Bring Out Your Dead (Death/ Horror/ Zombie/ Vampire themes)

It doesn't look good for the Heroes (the white figures). Don't worry, they were fine. — It doesn’t look good for the Heroes (the white figures). The zombies are closing in. Don’t worry though, the Heroes survived.

Games That Got Played: Black Rock City, Dead Fellas, Zombie Fluxx, Last Night On Earth, Mr. Jack Pocket

Games That Didn’t Get Played: Bang!, Betrayal At House On The Hill, Dracula, Family Business, Gloom, Lost Worlds, Mr. Jack NY, Munchkin Zombies, Mystery Of The Abbey, Vampire Hunter, Zombies!!!

The big hits were Last Night On Earth and Dead Fellas. We wound up playing two games of the Last Night On Earth Escape In The Truck Scenario — the Heroes won both games despite some aggressive card cycling from the zombies. In the first game the heroes won easily by drawing two of Just What I Needed, which allowed them to pull the win conditions (Gas and the Keys) from the deck. In the second game we removed two of the four copies of Just What I Needed from play. That seemed to better balance the scenario: The heroes won that game with only four turns to spare.

Looking around the internet, this might be a good alternate way to play the scenario (Boardgamegeek link):

Dave the Knave:

Link to my thread on thezombiegame.com where the scenario card can be downloaded FREE. This was very well received there, please enjoy!

http://www.thezombiegame.com/forums/Thread-Escape-in-the-Tru…

1) Place the truck in the center of Town. Remove all of the Gasoline cards from the Hero Deck. The Gasoline is obtained from a “Well Stocked” Gas Station that cannot be taken over. Place counters 1-6 facedown in random buildings. Roll a d6 to determine the counter that is the Truck Keys.

2) Heroes can replace their move/search roll with a d6 to look for the Truck Keys. On the roll of 1-3 Take a Hero Card. On the roll of 4+ reveal the counter.
-If Hero is killed carrying Truck Keys then their Zombie Hero must be killed to recover them.

3) To fill up the truck with gas a Hero must give up their turn in the truck and discard the Gasoline.

4) Once the Heroes attempt to start the truck, the Hero with the Truck Keys becomes “The Driver” and the”Escape Phase” begins.
-To attempt to start the Truck and begin the “Escape Phase”, the Hero with the Truck Keys must give up their turn at the truck and roll a d6 for each Hero in truck. The truck starts on the roll of 6.

5) Escape phase – The following rule changes are now in effect.
-The Driver always goes first in subsequent human turns. All the driver can do is attempt to start the truck. They cannot fight, shoot range weapons, or use special abilities. If the Driver is ever left alone with a zombie then they are immediately killed and the game is over.
-the sun tracker stops and the 4 Hero death win condition no longer applies.
-Heroes cannot leave the truck but can get on the truck.
-Heroes killed DO become Zombie Heros and Heroes DO NOT respawn.
-Fights on the truck only happen on Zombie turn.
-When Heroes win a fight they knock the zombies 1 space out of the truck (Heroes Choice).

6) Once truck is started all zombies or Zombie Heroes in the truck must be either killed or knocked off the truck by beating them in a fight. No more zombies can get onto the truck after it has started and the Zombie player can not draw new cards.
-Driver now rolls 2 dice at the start of each subsequent hero turn that the humans fail to clear the truck. If the Driver rolls doubles then the truck crashes and the escape failed.

We played four games of Dead Fellas as well. It’s quick and easily accessible, and it’s possible to have a dramatic comeback at the end of the game.

For fun, here’s a list of the games offered over the first ten GNOIFs:

Game	Total Times Offered	Not Played	Played
Agricola	5	1	4
Bang!	2	1	1
Betrayal House Hill	3	1	2
Black Rock City	2	1	1
Caesar and Cleopatra	2	1	1
Cards Against Humanity	3	0	3
Carcassonne, Castle	1	1	0
Catan, Settlers	3	3	0
Catan, Starship	2	2	0
Citadels	2	1	1
Dead Fellas	2	1	1
Dominion	4	1	3
Dracula	2	2	0
Family Business	3	3	0
Fjords	1	1	0
Flash Duel	1	0	1
Fluxx	1	0	1
Fluxx, Eco	1	1	0
Fluxx, Pirate	1	0	1
Fluxx, Python	1	0	1
Fluxx, Star	2	0	2
Fluxx, Stoner	1	1	0
Fluxx, Zombie	2	1	1
Fluxx, Any	9	4	5
Forbidden Island	3	0	3
Gardens of Alhambra	4	2	2
Gloom	5	4	1
Guillotine	3	0	3
Hector and Achillies	1	1	0
King of the Elves	2	2	0
Last Night on Earth	3	1	2
Lost Cities	3	1	2
Lost Worlds	1	1	0
Magic The Gathering	2	0	2
Mr. Jack, Pocket	7	5	2
Mr. Jack NY	4	4	0
Munchkin	1	1	0
Munchkin, Zombies	2	2	0
Mystery of the Abbey	5	3	2
Omega Virus	1	0	1
Pirate’s Cove	2	1	1
Poo	2	1	1
Run For Your Life Candyman	1	0	1
Revolution	2	2	0
RoboRally	2	2	0
Rocketville	5	1	4
San Juan	1	1	0
Small World	1	1	0
Stone Age	1	0	1
The Worst Card Game Ever	1	1	0
Ticket to Ride Card Game	4	2	2
Ticket to Ride Europe	5	2	3
Vampire Hunter	2	2	0
Zombies!!!	1	1	0

The list is 53 games total, 124 “Total Times Offered” (in other words, we’re offering 12.4 games per night). “Played” is 53 also (a coincidence), so we’re playing an average of 5.3 different games per session.

Most played games:

5 nights played – Any Fluxx

4 nights played – Agricola and Rocketville

3 nights played – Cards Against Humanity, Dominion, Forbidden Island, Guillotine, Ticket To Ride Europe

The Longest Borderlands 2 Monologue

by A.J. Coltrane

We had a discussion last night about what was the longest monologue in Borderlands 2..

There are a few of the quests that, when completed, elicit really really long monologues from the story-central npc characters. (“We must defeat blah blah blah blah blah or else blah blah blah blah. We must go to the blah blah blah and…………..”) And the action isn’t allowed to proceed until they’re done talking.

I wasn’t able to find out *which* monologue is the longest one, but I did find this in the process. It’s a Psycho. Reciting Hamlet. Sort of.

I think it might be even stranger in German:

GNOIF: Building A Better Tomorrow — The Recap

by A.J. Coltrane

GNOIF #9 recap — Building A Better Tomorrow (Building themes and Future themes)

Games That Got Played: Agricola, Dominion, Guillotine, Rocketville, Stone Age, Ticket to Ride – Europe

Games That Didn’t Get Played: Carcassonne – The Castle, Settlers of Catan, Citadels, Eco Fluxx, Gardens of Alhambra, King of the Elves, Ticket to Ride Card Game

We’ve gotten to the point now that people show up, grab a game, and get started with little or no help from the hosts. This time that game was Rocketville, which has been played every time we’ve offered it lately. Three experienced players taught a fourth how to play. The table then transitioned over to Guillotine.

While that was going on the Dominion and Agricola games got started. Always have a *lot* of children when you play Agricola! It seems like the first player to produce offspring has a big advantage. The “breeder” won the game of Agricola handily. That table then evolved into a big game of Ticket To Ride Europe. The winner wasn’t the player with the longest train, which seems to me to be the key to victory. Not this time though.

I’ve been playing Card Hunter lately, and it’s put me in a CCG frame of mind. Dominion is a good fix with real cards and deckbuilding. I did well the first game, then got trounced in the second. I think we got in five or six games total, and they were all different despite using the same basic cards.

Good times! Thanks to everyone who played!

Recommended Game — Card Hunter

by A.J. Coltrane

Recommended Game — Card Hunter

It’s a lot of things. It’s a free-to-play browser based game. It’s a CCG (collectible card game) like Magic the Gathering, only it’s also a tactical turn-based high fantasy game with an old-school D&D flair to it.

Confused yet?

You control a party of three characters. The characters can be one of three archetypes – either fighter, wizard, or priest. I’m running with one of each, but if you wanted to you could have three wizards, or two fighters and a priest, or whatever else you wanted. Like almost every other rpg, the characters fight monsters to gain experience and better gear and become more powerful over time.

The monsters you fight live in modules (a themed adventure featuring 4-6 encounters, each on a different map), much like they can in D&D. When you defeat all the maps (“complete the module”) the characters gain the experience and gear mentioned above. Phat “loot”!

The loot is where the CCG elements come into play. Every piece of equipment that your characters can wear is represented by 3-6 cards. As an example, here’s a card that might be associated with a crummy low-level weapon:

If a character has that card in his hand he could hit an enemy one square away and do 3 damage. In this case up to two enemies could be targeted, as indicated on the card text.

Here’s a much better card that would be associated with an weapon that was either rarer or higher level:

That card is way better, it does six damage instead of three, and it pumps up the effect of any other Chop that you play. That’s more like it!

So, every weapon is the game is a mixture of up to six different cards, some strong, some weak, and some that even might harm the user.

Each character’s deck (the cards that he has available to play) is the aggregate of the cards that are associated with the equipment that he’s wearing. Get a better sword? Great, now he can do more damage. Better armor? Now he can withstand more punishment.

The game is now out of Beta, the release date is September 12. If you like CCGs, or tactical turn-based games, or some flavor of D&D, or loot based games like Diablo or Borderlands.. I’d strongly recommend giving Card Hunter a try.

Hopefully this trailer will make all of that a little more clear. (The whole thing is intentionally somewhat tongue-in-cheek.)

It got this glowing review from Tycho at PAX 2012: “My favorite game of PAX 2012 was Card Hunter. There is no pause between the question and the answer. Card Hunter now, Card Hunter forever.”

(That’s a big deal.)

Link to the Card Hunter home page for more info and to sign up to play.

Seattle Pinball Museum and Dorky’s Barcade

by A.J. Coltrane

Somebody tell me how I missed this one:

Seattle Pinball Museum. $10 all-you-can-play in the I.D.

There was even a Seattle Times piece written about it two years ago.

I couldn’t find their homepage. They do have that facebook page though.

And they got a walkthrough on youtube:

That walkthrough led me to another arcade I didn’t know existed. Dorky’s Barcade in Tacoma:

Do I hear…. Roadtrip!!!

Seattle Pinball Museum and Dorky's Barcade

by A.J. Coltrane

Somebody tell me how I missed this one:

Seattle Pinball Museum. $10 all-you-can-play in the I.D.

There was even a Seattle Times piece written about it two years ago.

I couldn’t find their homepage. They do have that facebook page though.

And they got a walkthrough on youtube:

That walkthrough led me to another arcade I didn’t know existed. Dorky’s Barcade in Tacoma:

Do I hear…. Roadtrip!!!

GNOIF: The Good, The Bad, And The GNOIF — The Recap

by A.J. Coltrane

Pirate's Cove components. — Pirate’s Cove components. Photo at BoardGameGeek.

GNOIF #8 Recap – The Good, The Bad, And The GNOIF (Outlaw Theme)

Games That Got Played: Bang!, Betrayal At House On The Hill, Cards Against Humanity, Pirate Fluxx, Pirate’s Cove, Run For Your Life Candyman!, Rocketville

Games That Didn’t Get Played: Black Rock City, Dead Fellas, Family Business, Stoner Fluxx, Gloom, Last Night On Earth, Mr. Jack Pocket, Mr. Jack NY, Mystery of the Abbey, Poo, Revolution

Playing fast and loose with the “Outlaw” theme. It was obvious that there weren’t enough cowboy and gangster themed games in the closet, so the theme expanded to include undead, politics, and feces-throwing monkeys. The turnout was excellent; it looks like it’s time to add another table.

Cards Against Humanity was a huge hit again. We played Pirate’s Cove for the first time and had a lot of fun with it. (Though I got completely screwed by the dice. My awesome pirate ship was completely crippled by a couple of bad rolls of the dice. I’m not bitter or anything.)

Bang! was a big hit too. It’s a card game where every player plays a random role in a stereotypical spaghetti western. From BoardGameGeek:

There are 22 different types of cards in the draw deck. Most common are the BANG! cards, which let you shoot at another player, assuming the target is within “range” of your current gun. The target player can play a “MISSED!” card to dodge the shot. Other cards can provide temporary boosts while in play (for example, different guns to improve your firing range) and special one-time effects to help you or hinder your opponents (such as Beer to restore health, or Barrels to hide behind during a shootout). A horse is useful for keeping your distance from unruly neighbors, while the Winchester can hit a target at range 5. The Gatling is a deadly exception where range doesn’t matter – it can only be used once, but targets all other players at the table!

Every “role” is secret except for the Sheriff’s. The Sheriff and Deputies try to shoot the Renegade and the Outlaws. The Outlaws try to take out the Sheriff. The Renegade basically tries to shoot everybody — if the Sheriff dies while any Outlaws are still alive then the Outlaws win. The issue, of course, is that nobody can really be sure who they’re supposed to be targeting. Another catch is that initially you only have enough range with your Colt .45 to shoot the person sitting next to you, but as you get better weapons you can shoot further around the table. It’s a fun, noisy game.

I also heard about some epic fights in Run For Your Life, Candyman!, though I was at the other table getting my ship blown to smithereens.

Thanks to everyone for playing!

AFK Tavern

by A.J. Coltrane

It was time for some food and beverages in Everett. Many options were considered. Then Annie S. found this place using her phone.

Yes, a gaming tavern!

A place gamers and geeks feel at home? AFK Tavern is that place.

Video games, RPGs, card games, board games, and miniatures, every gamer can play at AFK Tavern.

Our signature gamer themed cocktails will tickle your funny bone while tantalizing your taste buds. The local produce and free range beef on our menu will keep you fortified for any occasion. See if you’re up to the challenge rating of our Dragon Burger, or savor our soups we make fresh daily.

AFK Tavern was made by gamers and geeks for gamers and geeks to game and geek out. Come out and show your colors at our events like Pirate Night, costume contests, release day parties and tournaments of every variety.

Get your game on at AFK Tavern.

The food was solid. The beer selection was good. The service was pleasant. The menu itself featured silly titles for the food, and had “powerup” themed add-ons available. It’s all very tongue-in-cheek, in a good way.

We’re told they have a room full of board games that you can check out. They also have multiple video game systems that you can play on, provided you get some grub.

Recent events at the Tavern have included a Star Wars night, Cthulu night, and a Zelda night.

We’ll be back.

Definitely recommended.