The Boardgames Thread / Board games

Labyrinth from Ravensburger. One of those games that adults don't get bored when playing with kids. Used to share a flat with a bunch of board game geeks who would play it for relaxation between the more complex games. Or if they were too stoned to manage a more complex game.

+1 for Labyrinth. My son used to like playing that when he was 5ish.

Thanks for the suggestions, I’ll look them up.
It’s good to find games that are good when it's just two players.
Looking forward to Christmas as that’s the only time we can get loads of players. People that don’t play board games all year seem to break them out.

Likewise, really good 2-player games are rare I think so I'm also open to suggestions!
Some friends got us a copy of Terraforming Mars' a little while ago. We've played it with 4 (with the buyers) and it was excellent, apparently it's good with 2 as well. Will report back, but I really would recommend it already.
Nice, but pricey...

I need to work out what of the games shelf gets packed to go to the inlaws for Christmas.

Exploding and Imploding kittens, Bears vs Babies, maybe Snake Oil, Fluxx & Saboteur

Not sure we'll manage them all.

Sadly Terror in Meeple City and Splendor are a bit big, although I may drop Snake Oil for one of them.

Pandemic works well with 2.

I can imagine it does. I think cooperative games often do work well for 2 - you're still playing against the same challenge.

Can confirm Terraforming Mars is just as good for 2 as for 4/5, i.e excellent!

So what did santa bring you lot?
My son was given Flux Nature by grand parents. He’s really into it at the moment.
I decided to save King of Tokyo until his birthday which is next month (even though I really want to play it).

Also What are your thoughts on game expansions? Are they any good or is money better spent on new games?
My son loves Carcassonne so I was thinking about an expansion to that. There are quite a few so I’m not sure which one.

A classic from my girlfriend - balderdash (after we played it with her family) and I picked up the Terraforming Mars expansion play boards (Hellas & Elysium). Meeting board gaming friends tomorrow so there may be more to come!

@dangeek @hamrack
You may already have this recommendation as it is a few years old but I have found Forbidden Island is great as a two player as it's a co-operative game.

Thanks to everyone for the chat on this thread ahead of the holidays. Our 5 year old is getting into board games a bit so it was really useful. He now has Labyrinth, Scrabble Jr. and Rat-a-tat Cat. We picked up Pandemic too. The wife also went nostalgic and picked up this out of production board game which is cracking good fun and quite challenging.

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Sheriff of Nottingham is great with older children.

Yeah we have that, it’s a good game.
I’m getting him Ticket to Ride for his birthday too. It’s so good now he’s a bit older as I get to buy games that I want to play too.

After not being able to find a genuine version of Secret Hitler available, I used the print & play version from the website several times over the last few days.

Great fun, similar sort of game to Mafia/Werewolves and a great opportunity to shout 'Fascist!' at your mother-in-law.

Love this thread, so many games I've never heard of. Looking forward to trying some out with my son, he's five.

Anyone played Dixit?

I've been enjoying Zombies!!! with Mrs Hammer.
Pit and Kittens in a Blender have been pretty fun with the family over christmas and I want a copy of https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/36218/dominion at some point (bit more eggy/less frantic).

Yes! We played this at my girlfriend's place over Christmas and it's really good! Nice balance of trying to make in-jokes/references only certain people will get whilst also being creative.

I feel it probably works best with a group of people who all know each other.

Intrigued, will look it up

Playing Patchwork.

Sooooo much better than I ever expected. The fact that it's the first game ever that I am constantly beating Mrs. Hugo at does help. But still definitely worth a look.

I’ve had Patchwork on our wishlist for ages. Everyone says it’s great fun but the theme has always stopped me buying it.

Also What are your thoughts on game expansions? Are they any good or is money better spent on new games?

If a good game has expansions, I would generally get them all. I tend to get stuck on one game more than play lots of different, simpler games. It really depends on whether you and your players like making games more complex. Some people actively dislike that.

My son loves Carcassonne so I was thinking about an expansion to that. There are quite a few so I’m not sure which one.

They're all worth getting just because they contain extra tiles, which is, of course, the number one bait. I think some of them are duds, though. 'Catapult' is just daft--perhaps good for very small children, but otherwise to be avoided. I also don't like 'The Princess and the Dragon'--I don't think the extra rules add anything interesting to the game, and they're cumbersome and only slow it down. Finally, 'The Tower' is good just because you get the card storage tower, which is very useful (with all the expansions, there are now more cards than fit in it, but it's still very good), although I find the extra rules end up taking over the game a little and we rarely use them.

(I think many of the expansions are aimed at giving weaker players a shot at freeing stuck figures or breaking open a game situation (a weakness of the original Carcassonne was a lack of flexibility--once you had placed a figure, it could be stuck until the end of the game), but at the price of introducing what to them will feel like undue complexity. I like that, too, but I've never found it to work in the way that it seems to me has to be the intention. Instead, better players love it because it just adds and adds rules and gives a considerable advantage to a player who can remember and apply them all.)

I think the best expansions are 'Inns and Cathedrals', 'Traders and Builders', 'Abbey and Mayor', and 'Count, King, and Robber'. I'd consider all of those 'essential' in the way that non-essential things can be. :)

I don't know all of the mini-expansions (there are so many now, people seem to be producing them all the time), but of those I know, apart from the ones collected in 'Count, King, and Robber', I don't consider any 'essential'. Most of them give you new tiles, so may be worth getting just for that. I don't like the fact that they all have very different designs on them (e.g., the 'Corn Circles' designs) that you then don't end up using, though.

Have fun!

https://boardgamegeek.com/wiki/page/Carcassonne_series

Thanks for that detailed reply!
I’ll get a couple of the expansions you recommend.