What board game are you playing - chat thread

My two love sleeping queens :) my DD's best friend is getting it for xmas too.

Had a friend round today and played Randomise - really cute and to my amazement both kids actually "got it" and joined in well. They are almost certainly both autistic and I often feel like they don't get concepts like this but to see DS willingly drawing etc was brilliant. Definitely taking it New Year's Eve when we are seeing friends, there will be 4 kids and 4 adults and I reckon boys against girls

We also had an attempt at 7 Wonders - blimey its complicated! We played sort of open handed (three adults) and muddled through, we didn't understand all of it (possibly because I didn't discover the symbol list until near the end ) but it seems like one of those games that needs to be played a few times to really get it. And for a complicated game it is actually quite quick so that's a bonus. Really pleased with it, the concept it great!

Sleeping Queens has kept my two amused over the past year.

Great practice for some maths too is City of Zombies...love the tag line for this..."You needs brains to survive!"

Oh I bought Nefarious a few weeks ago too! It went on amazon deals. I had been unsure as I'd read a review that said the quality of the pieces was much worse in the new version. But I couldn't find a copy of the old one, so as it went cheap I thought it worth the risk. It's a great game, and I don't particularly agree that the pieces were poor quality - not as beautiful as some games certainly but not shoddy. So glad I risked it!

Bumping the thread just in time for Christmas

We have a lot of games this Christmas:
Colt Express is our annual family game purchase, DH chose it.
Dinosaur trivial pursuit - DD will love this, it was a panic buy as the other game I ordered (Dino Hunt Dice which I believe is the same as zombie dice etc) is still out of stock.
Monster Cafe for DS.
Across Africa - cooperative kids game that I found really cheap.

DSCs came round yesterday and they gave us 7 Wonders! Wow! And a card game called Randomise which looks fun.

They were thrilled to open a ticket to ride expansion and Star Wars dobble

Great idea for a chat thread, love all the suggestions! Superb gasme to play and use some maths too is: City of Zombies... the tag line is you need brains to survive! It is excellent...tonne of reviews/awards

Thanks for all the recommendations, your procrastination is v helpful .

I shall look at For Sale and Port Royal first I think, they sound great. We don't have any bluffing games yet either, so praps I should look at those two as well. I'm leaning more towards a card game than a dice game. We haven't got any purely dice games, not really sure why. I'll swerve Monopoly Deal though, it will only encourage ds1 to want to play the board game version, which I'm not a huge fan of.

We already have Guillotine, I'd've thought an 8 year old could play it quite easily, as long as they're not squeamish about chopping people's heads off ...

Hi again crankyagnes, just thought of For Sale as an option as well, great fun and lovely silly art! We have had several friends with dc in the 10-14yo range go and buy it after playing it. Apparently there is a travel edition too.

Sorry for getting a bit carried away... Pretending to be a card game expert is proving a very fun way of procrastinating from dissertation writing...

Oh, Guillotine is another card game I have heard lots of good things about! I am saving it another year or two as I want to make sure my 8yo can join, but might be good for a 13yo?

For a 13yo I would perhaps go with Port Royal, we love it! Very addictive, no set up time and plays in 15 minutes! Or Monopoly Deal perhaps? We must have played that hundreds of times, but tired of it eventually. We prefer both of those to Archaeology.

Nobody But us Chickens and Cockroach Poker are both bluffing games that are fun for all ages, but we have played Port Royal and Monopoly Deal much more.

I am thinking about Hive Pocket for DSs stocking, that might be an idea. Lots of people seem to like Zombie Dice or Ninja Dice, but I haven't tried those. Or Coin Age perhaps? Not sure how fun it is, haven't tried it.

What card games would you recommend for a 13 year old, vikjul? I'm also looking for a card game stocking present, something fun or silly and easy to learn that doesn't take too long to play. I've looked at Archaeology. Are Cockroach Poker and Nobody But Us Chickens worth looking at too for that age do you think?

Does anyone have experience of Forbidden Island, Pandemic and Flash Point Fire Rescue?

DS's 11th birthday is coming up, and as he absolutely loves Forbidden Island but is starting to beat it at the advanced levels, I would like to get him a different cooperative game as a step up/variation. (We already have Forbidden Desert but prefer the more streamlined design of Forbidden Island.)

If you have Forbidden Island, which would you recommend of Pandemic and Flash Point for an 11yo who loves TTR Europe, King of Tokyo, Jaipur, Splendor etc?

Also, has anyone played Memoir 44? Am thinking about that for DS for Christmas as well...

Buildersbum Zeus on the Loose is another fun Gamewright title that works well around that age. Otherwise our favourites are the ones you already have, as well as Duck Duck Bruce (but that is difficult to get hold of, and we played it more when the children were younger). We also have Too Many Monkeys and Moose in the House (wouldn't recommend either, no meaningful decisions) and Toss Your Cookies which hasn't caught anyone's interest either. We also had Frog Juice but gave it away as we didn't find it fun, but it tends to get good reviews so you might want to look that up. I bought BraveRats last Christmas (not Gamewright but Blue Orange games, a microgame by the same designer as Love Letter), but it didn't hit the sweet spot either.

Like you I am searching for a new small simple card game as a stocking filler for dd8 (who loves Love Letter, Sleeping Queens and Rat a Tat Cat but doesn't enjoy anything too complex.) I am considering Cardline Animals, but am not sure how small the actual box is. Otherwise, smallish card games (not Gamewright) we have had a lot of fun with over the past year are Cockroach Poker and Nobody But us Chickens, so those might be worth looking up.

We have also enjoyed Archaeology the Card Game and Monopoly Deal, both simple set collection card games in small boxes (although I think that there is a newer version of Archaeology that comes in a larger box).

Another small card game is Best Treehouse Ever. We opened it today but haven't quite figured out the scoring yet, so we haven't quite fallen for it yet. The artwork is lovely though!

As for Lost Cities recommended above, I love it but the rest of the family (dh, ds10 and dd8) find it too dry/abstract.

And there are so many lovely pieces and cards to admire, too, aren't there BuildersBum You've reminded me I must get on with learning how to play it, if I don't how am I going to justify another board game for Christmas?!

Lost Cities card game is good, don't know if it's Gamewright or not, but it's quite easy to learn and we enjoy playing it.

We've been planning to play Stone Age with little, but not got round to it yet. Without the cards on the bottom of the board - can't remember their name.

The memory bit of My First Stone Age puts me right off. I'm memory games out . .. . .

We got Caverna preloved a few months CrankyAgnes, we've got as far as admiring too

Gamewright Games recommendations please.

We have Sleeping Queens and Rat A Tat Cat, that she loves,
Got Sushi Go & Party, love them too.
(Got Love Letter)

I think I'm going to get Dragonwood for Xmas Eve, but wanted a simple card game or two for the stocking.

She'll be 7.5 and can play more complicated games, but I was after something simple. So she's got more chance of winning ;-)

Thanks Agnes :) sounds good. Really amused at the whole loveshack thing :o

I'm also pondering Celestia, anyone played that? Looks lovely.

3 separate people IRL have asked today if I can advise them on Christmas board game purchases. :o

Stone Age - box says from 10+ and I think that's fair. You take turns to put your meeple on action spots- to collect resources, visit the loveshack to make another meeple, etc. You use those resources (wood, clay, gold and stone) to either pay for civilization cards or build huts with them, both of which get you points at the end of the game. The tactical bit comes in because the action spots are limited - some of them can only be used by one person per round.

If you look on YouTube, Will Wheaton's tabletop does quite a good run through, it gives a good flavour of the game. It's not as dry as my summary suggests, both ds1 (13) and I enjoy it The pieces are wooden and it comes with a leather dice shaker, which are good quality - only thing is the board unfolds to be quite big.

DH got me Tokaido today! I've been poring over the instructions, my word it's beautiful! Looks complicated at first but I think when we've played it a couple of times it'll be fine :)

Camel Up is great, we play it with 7 year old and she loves it, everything changes all the time and we talk about likely outcomes which is fun to figure out, doesn't really matter who 'wins' and the stacking camels are so cute.

We are playing Imperial Assault (star wars game) which she is also loving, complicated but fun enough to want to learn it.

Ooh please tell me more about Stone Age! What age do you think? The 'my first Stone Age' is on my wish list too but not sure if I would be better off getting the proper one

I've been reminded of this thread by the games you are getting rid of thread.

We've really been enjoying Stone Age and Champions of Midgard recently, both worker placement games which take about an hour-ish to play. While you pay for an extra worker in the Viking game, you send 2 of your meeple off to the village hut (loveshack ) to 'make' another person in Stone Age!

Got Caverna for my birthday - after dropping seriously heavy hints So far I have taken all the pieces out of the box and admired them, they are excellent quality. Hoping to actually learn and play the game soon!

I am shit at poker! I got a little betting game the other week and tried it with friends last night, it's called Kobayakawa (I am obsessed with all things Japanese) and you have to weigh up risks etc. I was pretty rubbish at that too :o good little filler game though.

I'm wanting to get rid of some games which is a massive step for me! But I'm actually quite looking forward to weeding out some of the crappy ones. Actually may start a separate thread.

I'm eying up Arboretum at the moment. Because trees.

I am not a fan of board games. I like card games (poker my fav). And usually play online on en.casinoz.me . Poker is an analytical game where you're constantly sizing up your opponents, finding the correct betting sizes, and searching for cracks in your opponent's game that you can exploit at a later time period.

I've no idea about Camel Up, I've not played it as betting type games don't really appeal.

I ordered Coloretto today. I have had it on my wishlist for years since playing with friends. It's gone cheap on Amazon. :)

Does Camel Up follow similar lines as the Really Nasty Horseriding Game?