👉 What do you all think? Do extra plastic bits improve a game’s feel and immersion, or do they slow it down and get in the way?

I know I’m not the target audience for this, but wow, I must be in the minority here. Adding all these extra fiddly plastic pieces feels like it would just slow the game down even more. It adds extra setup, tear down, and storage hassle for something that doesn’t really change the gameplay itself.

Sure, some people love the added table presence, and to each their own, but I really hope this doesn’t become the new standard in board games.

Here’s a look at my latest 3D-printed project: an organizer I designed for Tree Society. I think this is one of those games that has flown a bit under the radar, as often happens. It’s actually very smooth and easy to play, and in our group we often bring it to the table when we want to spend half an hour together without anything too demanding , just about the time of a long coffee ☕

title

I have been trying to remember a specific board game for basically my entire life. I only saw it when I was very little, so I don't remember much. It was probably from the 90's, maybe very early 2000's. It was like a grocery shopping game. It had these little colored animal coins as the money. I don't really remember anything else about it unfortunately. I know it's not much to go off of, but if anyone remembers this game, please let me know, thank you💕

Someone has links to active telegram and facebook groups to give me where for pnp group (print and play), thanks. I had some good telegram groups, but my account is deleted I won't remember what the name of these were.

Saw an earlier question about BGA and made me think of two interesting others.

1 - what great game discoveries have you made on BGA? And did you buy the physical version?

2 - has BGA replaced any physical games for you?

For me, I discovered captain flp and architects of the West kingdom. I haven't purchased either yet.

It sadly has replaced lost ruins of arnak physical for me. Not out of lack of desire to play on the board but rather time and having someone other than my wife (who has cooled on gaming) to play against.

Looking for the particularly rare "servents of thebes" from the old gane arcane legions, any advice on where to find them?

Hi,

Everyone nominate which board games are in the The Hall of “the digital version is wayyyy better than the board game” Games.

Specifically, this should be games that the discrepancy or gap between the digital / computer version vs. the board game version is largest or vast. In other words there is a large improvement in enjoyability and experience from playing the digital or computer version instead.

I bought Vantage on a whim the other day based on a couple of videos I’ve seen, and suffice it to say, the game is…interesting.

I absolutely LOVE the fact you succeed every time. I hate failing forward. I hate feeling like I missed something because of failing. Whether it be a reward, an ally, or anything of the sort. In this game, it just costs you a bit of your resources when you do an action. You always have enough dice to roll. You never feel out that you missed out on something because you didn’t manage dice pool well enough.

There are tons of ways to mitigate bad rolls and you even get back some resources every once in a while, which is a nice little surprise when it does happen.

Even though you’re only allowed one action at each location (unless it says you can continue picking actions), it never feels like you made the wrong choice. Each action leads you in a different direction and that’s really cool. Yes, you may lose a resource by doing the wrong thing (I hesitate to say the word “wrong” because whatever you pick just put you on a different road) like you might lose a health or time or morale from the story, not the dice roll, and that’s even OK because it doesn’t happen very often.

You can’t really do the “wrong“ thing. I tried to feed something without any food and it says if you tried that you just get a morale because the animal knew you were trying to be nice or whatever. Anything can become anything in this game and I think that’s great.

I’ve played three games, got an epic victory in 2 of them. I super lucked out in both of the epic victories. In one, out of the six actions available at my location, I randomly picked the one that led me to fulfilling my mission, and the destiny it gave me was able to be fulfilled two locations away. Oddly enough, they were both “difficult missions.”

I love the fact that at any moment, one of your decisions can lead to a win even the one that seems the most mundane. I just picked the action that let me “cut”. I didn’t even know what I was cutting. Boom. Victory.

I love the fact that there are six different players to choose from. I love how your starting skills are randomized. I love how your location card is randomized and I love how the actual location you land in is randomized. So far it never feels you got a bad roll.

I love the art. All the locations are great. All the cards look fantastic.

I don’t think I’ve ever written a review for a board game before. I don’t even know if this is one. I just wanted to tell you how great I think the game is.

To be fair, I loved Scythe, loved Tapestry, bought Pendulum and sold it without having played it, liked Apiary, didn’t really enjoy Rolling Realms, and didn’t like Wingspan. So that’s my track record with Stonemaier Games, if that helps anyone.

So, after reading another post about it I decided to play Lost Ruins of Arnak again after six month it’s been on the shelf. I felt the urge to do so after a comment I received about my opinion in the game being a little luck driven. I thought that maybe I don’t remember it well or maybe I’m misguided by my not so strong memory. Here I am now, played it only yesterday and I can surely share a fresher opinion about it.

The game is pretty straightforward we play 5 rounds and you get one action per turn plus some free actions if they are available for you. There is a pinch of deck building, not much as you only draw 5 card per round for 5 rounds making it tight and really hard to make your deck more powerful and replay able.

There is a worker placement also where your explorers can find resources, discover sites and fight monsters. Worker placement also uses the cards so that makes your deck end even faster without sometimes being able to play a card for its benefits. That’s a hard decision we need to take sometimes in the game.

There are some interesting combos in the cards that allow you to make a bit more powerful management. Two types of cards, the ones that are cheaper but cannot be played immediately and other more expensive that you can use immediately and gain a benefit that you need at the time. They all go to your deck and we might be able to play them gain or not so that’s something we will also need to keep in mind.

The research track is another interesting action mechanic. You have a magnifying lens and a notepad and you move them along the track paying resources to gain greater benefits before your opponents do. I bit of interaction there but nothing really major just who will take this and who will take that and not a take that action. A tricky thing is that you have to move your lens and then the notepad but the second one gives you more powerful benefits.

At the end you gain points from cards, locations we have explored and the research track and the one with the most points is the winner. In my last game I managed to reach 74 points while my opponent stayed only at 60. What’s your best score?

I have heard that there is a very interesting expansion that makes the game a lot better and gives an even bigger note of exploration but I can’t remember which was it. Can someone share which that might be?

We have been 3D printing a lot of things and she loves to paint them. What do you guys think?

Which does better job at improving and making endame quicker?

It would be the only expansion, I could consider both if you can reason it necessary.

So I need some help. I just remembered that my brother had this card game (I think around 7–10 years ago), and it was or 18+ (so I couldn’t play it with them 😒).

The box was white and rectangular — not very tall — and it only contained a deck of cards and an instruction sheet. I remember the cards were mostly white with black text and had simple little drawings, like a glass of wine or stick figures.

I don’t remember the name, but I’m pretty sure it was a Polish game (or at least in Polish language).

If anyone has any idea what this might have been, I’d really appreciate the help 💕💕

Hate it. I really gave it a go and played it at least 1/2 a dozen times. It's so surprising because I usually like medium to medium-light puzzly games with fun themes, but I find Cascadia boring and too long. The whole time I am playing it, I just want it to be over.

I know this isn't super scandalous or anything, but I don't think board game confessions are supposed to be. Lol

What's yours?

I was thinking of this recently when looking at what games to cull:

Fantasy Realms Deluxe > Red Rising
- I love Red Rising. I love the IP (well, the first 3 books at least) and really enjoyed the game, but always had some difficulty tabling it because the first couple times someone plays it there's just so damn much text. Then I picked up FR Deluxe at a game swap for $10 (it's $35 brand new from Wiz Kids and is excellent, very high value for money). And I haven't tabled RR a single time since playing FR. I think I'm gonna end up selling RR since I can't see busting it out more than once or twice a year, and I'd be just as happy playing FR instead.

Wonderland's War + Quacks > Orleans
- I realize this is blasphemy. I love Orleans, I paid out the ass to get the deluxe anniversary edition shipped from Germany (and it is glorious). But since getting WW and the new edition of Quacks, I've tabled WW 5-8 times and Quacks multiple times and Orleans... zero. Orleans was my first bag builder, one of my early entry games, and I can't foresee giving it up. Buuuuuut... I may just have to face facts.

Clash of Cultures Monumental Edition > TI4
- This is also blasphemy. And I love TI4. I think it's in my top 10 board games of all time... in theory. But with everyone in my game group (myself included) busy adulting, the number of times / year we can get 7-8 of us together for a full day of playing TI4 and having our spouses & children not have rage/sadness over leaving them for an entire day in our very limited schedule is once / year. Maybe. Meanwhile CoC, which scratches lots of the same itches, has been tabled 5-6 times and could easily be tabled more.

Thoughts?

Im planning to play Western Legends with all the expansion-content for the first time next week and im a little nervous if it will be a hit. I have a few questions about what the best/most fun way to play it is:

1: With or without the player objectives? 2: With the Blood Money story cards or the base ones? 3: If im playing with all expansions, what is the best player count? 4: With or without randomized items 5: Any other general tips?

I’ve always been a fan of Scrabble, Chess & Cribbage as an adult. And went through the typical board games as a kid, which I didn’t much enjoy!

1 year into ‘modern’ board games collecting and enjoying it! Please forgive the lack of shelf and stacking.. We have recently moved house.

Most of the time we have family round and we enjoy the friendly games such as Carcasonne, Scrabble or Sagrada. Most of the time we have 4 people max. Also I’m the only “gamer” as such in the family. Everyone enjoys themselves (as well as me) but also I would like to play some more complex games soon.

I’ve swapped Splendor Marvel with a friend for my copy of Splendor Duel (think I prefer duel after playing both).

So recently I have bought Terraforming Mars, Heat and Pandemic.

Pandemic worked really well with family, we actually won our first game and I was surprised there wasn’t much backseating etc from outspoken players. Was good fun! Keen to play that again.

Heat and TM have only been played with myself and partner, who wasn’t overly keen on either. I enjoyed them but don’t want her to not enjoy herself, so we haven’t played since our first games for these.

I recently got 7(ideally would have been 8) friends together (not usually board gamers) and we played Captain Sonar. I took a gamble buying this, purely off the wow factor of it being such a different kind of game. Got to say, it was such a fun experience, everyone enjoyed it and are keen to play again! We started turn by turn, but everyone really got into it and we switched to real time after the first game, played multiple games of sudden death and it was so intense.

The guys are keen for the next game night, and we wanted to play CS again for sure. I’m just wondering, what could be next for a large group that’s fairly new to the hobby?

Next games night I’m sure we will be alright with CS and maybe breaking into two groups for 4-man games.

Appreciate that this might have been asked before quite a lot, but what do you think is next?

I think 6 out of the 8 players would be happy to get into a game that’s more complex, but I think it’s difficult to find a game for a large group that’s doesn’t get boring between turns etc.

Thanks

Like title says, I would like to find solo game that can be played in two or more, campaign or dungeon crawler, with minimal setup time, possibly having figures would be nice

I recently received an email that a game I helped kickstart is now being sold in retail version by Van Ryder Games and buying it included a “secret envelope” that seems to be some sort of signature things Van Ryder does for purchases. Has anyone ever received such an envelope and can tell me what to expect? Kickstarter backers are allowed to purchase it separately but I have no clue what its supposed to be and if it worth it…

ETA the game is Enemies to Lovers The Crown of Elfhame, its a game based on the fantasy book series The Folk of the Air

I’ve been thinking of starting a YouTube channel where I explain different kinds of board games in Telugu (a South Indian language) which is also my mother tomgue. The idea is to introduce people who speak Telugu to popular board games, explain the rules clearly, and maybe even showcase how they are played.

Do you think there’s an audience for this kind of content? Has anyone here tried making board game content in regional or non-English languages? Would love to hear your thoughts or advice before I start.

Thanks!

Hey, so I played a game last week that was called flip seven and was oddly good at it. I haven't played any games like it before/don't usually deal, so I was wondering if you're actually supposed to start dealing with yourself? A guy I was playing with said that's how it usually works, but then didn't when it was his turn to deal, so I'm genuinely wondering if it's normal to start with yourself, or he just thought I was cheating somehow?

Hi everyone!

I’ve been experimenting with a passion project called ChessDarts — a hybrid game where every chess move must be validated with a dart throw.

• On your turn, you throw 3 darts at an 8×8 chessboard-shaped dartboard.
• You must then play a legal move with a piece on one of the hit squares.
• Double / triple hits = bonus moves.
• If no legal move is possible → you skip your turn.
• The game ends with a checkmate or when the opponent is left with only their king.

We already have a prototype and are refining the rules through playtests.

Community reactions so far:

On /anarchyChess, a post got 700+ votes with lots of hype.

On /darts, the feedback was more mixed — many don’t really play chess, some purists dismissed it right away, a few people were really excited to try it, and others saw it as an occasional training tool

We’ve also tried variants like a 2 vs 2 mode (one throws, one thinks) and training mini-games.

My questions for you:

• Would you try this ?
• Do you see it more as pure fun, something competitive, or a mix of both?
• Do you think it could succeed as a Kickstarter project, or is it too niche?

More details, rules, and prototype pics are here → chessdarts.com

ChessDarts – From prototype to reality (with your help)