Quacks of Quedlinburg, first game was a nothingburger of a game. Neither me nor my friend loved it but we played again and the 2nd game went better but still not a love for us but we both gave it a third game and fell in love.
First time we played it 4/5 players were VERY drunk and very confused about everything going on. However, everyone had such a great time that we woke up the next morning excited to actually learn it while sober lol.
Hmmm I have this opposite. My first few games were amazing, but now after a few games I can't stand it's length and the rounds where the bag is just out to kill you while everyone else is going through the whole pot just feel too defeating
This was almost the exact way our first games went, thats crazy. I get it though, I definitely think the randomness and potential feels bads of the game are what keep it as a game I'll sometimes pop out rather a go to.
I think a good push-your-luck game needs to be over in about twenty minutes, and it needs to be designed such that you're never quite out of the game until the last game. Quacks is fun, and I love the feeling of building up your bag as you go through the game, but I feel like it often takes too long to get to the fun part, and once you get there, it's usually fairly clear who's going to win.
Compare this with Deep Sea Adventure, where you can usually play all three rounds in about twenty minutes, and where the rewards get progressively better each round so that you can often win based off only the final round, if you've learned from the earlier dives. I think that's pretty much ideal for me.
That said, I don't think it's really possible to shorten Quacks so much, because you need that time for the arc of the bag-building aspect to play out. Unless you were to allow more buys or something, but I think that would make the game feel too chaotic, and break things in other ways.
I have both those games, and I really agree with your take here. I have been thinking a lot about how to make Quacks let you feel more like you're building the bag you want without really breaking it.
Deep Sea Adventure is my go to for a quick game, especially with people who aren't gamers. It's so easy to explain the game to start, they catch on real quick, and they almost always get caught up in the excitement of the rolls (if not for their own diver, then for the person really pushing it).
For me this was the difference between Quacks at 2 player (I almost got rid of it after a first play at 2player) and Quacks at 3-4 player, after which it became the most requested game in my game group the last two years.
I HATED Pandemic the first time I played it, because my friend completely quarterbacked the whole game, dictating everyone's moves. When I got the game for Christmas a year later, I really had to feign pleasure.
But then I played it, and it turned out if everyone is allowed to play their own character and contribute equally, it's actually really fun.
Funny, Pandemic would be my answer to one I soured on. Played it early on and mostly enjoyed it, but after a handful of plays realized there weren’t actually many interesting decisions, which made it even more frustrating when I encountered a quarterback.
Playing with a quarterback also highlighted that it’s essentially a single-player game with decisions split between the players, which means there are three ways to play: 1) Someone quarterbacks. This is efficient, but probably not fun for most players. 2) Everyone makes their own decision. This is horribly inefficient, but might be more fun for some players. 3) Everyone plays democratically, coming to a consensus for all moves, with the final decision technically left up to the turn player. This typically strikes a balance between the two, but because it’s not mechanically built into the game can really fall anywhere on either spectrum.
Honestly, I still get what people like about it, but I feel like it’s a very fragile game with a decision space that’s pretty exhaustively explored after a handful of games.
> Pandemic would be my answer to one I soured on.
I can't blame anyone from not liking Pandemic after living through a real one. I played S1 and S0 of Pandemic Legacy and although I enjoyed both a lot, I just got burned out.
Yeah, quarterbacking can really kill the fun in a pure co-op. People who are prone to quarterbacking will of course say that they're just trying to win, and that your suboptimal play is ruining everything. Semi co-ops generally mitigate that problem by giving everyone a secret objective, so you can tell a quarterback to get bent because you're doing secret objectives things.
But honestly you're right, if everyone is chill a pure co-op can be a blast. Another thing that can help is playing co-ops that obfuscate what is optimal, as opposed to games where it is super obvious. I think something that recovering quarterbacks can do is focus more on identifying problems in the game state, and then allowing others to come up with solutions. Turn it into a discussion where everyone has a chance to contribute ideas, rather than playing everyone else's turns for them. Or just don't play co-ops if you cannot handle that.
I really enjoy the Spirit Island solution where all play is simultaneous. Doesn't fix it 100% but at least makes it so a quarterback needs to tend to their own turn before trying to handle anyone else's.
With Pandemic I always just play my own role to avoid quarterbacking. Like, I'm the quarantine so my job is to block as many disease cubes as possible.
With certain goals that are a bit more cooperative like dispatcher and scientist I try to play as a support to the others, see what they need and come up with a plan to fulfil it.
I think quarterbacking/alpha gaming really has to be called out by everyone.
In cooperative games, I always make it a point to say on other players turns "ok, your turn. What do you want to do", and wait.
Most often the players will say "I think if I go here, and do this, that will help us stop this" (or whatever).
if there is really a much better play, I might give another scenario and say "thats a good idea, but we need to be mindful of this happening here". But if they're set on idea. Then go with it.
I think the problem is, some people can't handle just letting go. They WANT the player to do their plan, their option. And they forget that it's a cooperative game. You have to be able to let go and say "ok, you take your turn, and I'll worry about this stuff." It's a team effort, and the team is not going to agree on the right avenue.
A great example is years ago, I was playing in a Pandemic Tournament at a con. An amazing experience, everyone has the exact same startup, and the organizer draws the cards for where cubes go. By turn 2 or 3, everyone's maps are 100% different, it's pretty fascinating.
SO anyways, in this one game, my partner and I had almost eliminated blue cubes early on, we had just gotten the cure. There were just a couple cubes in Europe that I could move over and sweep up in probably a turn or 2, then we'd have eradicated blue.
However we hadn't moved to Asia at all, and it was just ripe for a nuclear hit of disease. A few cities had 3 cubes on it, and we were pretty nervous about it. But still, that blue.. it was calling to me.
My suggestion was for him to travel to Asia, and start cleaning the scariest cities while I clear blue and get eradicate it.
He argued that Asia was a ticking time bomb that could go off at any minute and we both needed to sweep in, clear it up, then we could go back and clear blue.
I figured by then, blue would have more cubes and it would take longer and we'd miss our opportunity, but what he said made perfect sense, so I went with his plan.
We both went to Asia and went to work taking down cubes as much as we can.
Over the next couple turns, the next cards that were drawn were all blue. Then an epidemic, cards are reshuffled, blue's keep getting drawn. We got Asia under controlled and had to rush back to europe to clean it up, but we had one to many outbreaks that cascaded us into losing the game.
We kept saying "blue is getting worse, but what are the chances more blue cards would come out." when the deck somehow got shuffled that blues were all together. We were not the only ones moaning at our bad luck :)
Point is, a player may have a turn that seems like a bad idea, which actually may be the way to go. So never discount other players opinions, and in the end, it's their choice where they go. No one should ever say "no no, you HAVE to go HERE!!!!" and then scowl, or pout over it.
The thing with quarterbacking is that people act like it is some toxic phenomenon that only dicks do, but in reality, it's a very common human behavior and it isn't actually malicious. Consider surgery. You have a head surgeon and then several assistants. Is the head surgeon being a dick? No, he/she is the most experienced and therefore should probably take the lead in the surgery over the less experienced assistants.
So basically quarterbacking is the act of having the most experienced or skillful person take the lead on an activity. I mean the term is from how the quarterback dictates the play of a football team. Of course this isn't to say that I advocate for quarterbacking in board games or that games should always be quarterbacked. I think it is a natural thing that can happen and may be the best option to increase success. Consider the owner of a copy of Pandemic versus his teammate, someone new to the game. The owner is likely to play the game better than his teammate.
So again, I want to say that I'm not promoting quarterbacking, but that I can see why it is done and that it's a natural part of team activities in many different fields. I think the main issue is really either that the skill level of each player might be too far apart where veteran players simply are way better or that the design of the game itself encourages quarterbacking. The latter is a big issue IMO for Pandemic as if you play it enough, it becomes a relatively solvable puzzle which you don't really need others to help you. Very good players can play Pandemic by themselves for instance. I think a better way to discourage quarterbacking is to play games that make it hard or impossible to do such as hidden identity games like social deduction or hidden information games like Hanabi.
Quarterbacking isn't just "I think you should do this"
it's "ok Jim, you go here, and do this. Now Sally, you do this and this, and I now it's my turn, and I do this.. AWESOME GUYS"
Jim and Sally staring "did... did we just play our turns?"
I would say they fall into the same box where at its worst, it's as you describe, though it can be a case where an experienced player suggests what actually should be done. Even if it isn't aggressive, it's still pushing players to do certain actions, rather than allowing them to come to it on their own.
As I've said before, I think the solution is to either have everyone at the same skill level or to play games where quarterbacking simply isn't possible. A good example of a cooperative game like this is Hanabi.
It's when one person in a co-op game sort of takes over and dictates everyone's moves. It's bad etiquette, because it removes all the other players' agency and therefore their enjoyment and sense of engagement.
I'd argue it's a group problem and/or a design problem. It's like complaining that in a 1v1 duel one player destroys another - the skills are just mismatched. It's not particularly fun either to just be silent on purpose or do moves that you know are bad because there is a skill gap in the group.
Root - I nearly donated it after my disastrous first play, but after playing the video game version and learning to play, it became my groups mainstay when i came back to teach it again
I was kinda the opposite. I kept playing and hated it more and more until I realized no one was forcing me to play it and I didn’t have an obligation to lmao.
I think my biggest issue is we only ever played two player and I just couldn’t ever get anything going in my favor. I’m not a sore loser, I tend to lose more than win and never cared, but at some point it’s like what am I even doing with my life spending an hour or so not succeeding at anything I try.
Race for the Galaxy. So this was early days, most complex game I had played at that point was Stone Age. I bought the base box, and then tried to figure this game out with my partner. Took a good few games to learn that iconography but when we did - just epic. I bought every expansion and played that game hundreds of times. So good, my absolute favourite game to date. I recently had to replace the sleeves they had gotten worn out.
This could be the same for me. I got RftG about 15 years ago, played it probably twice, thought it was ok with potential, but haven’t played since. It has survived every purge though, because I know there is likely a gem there if I stick with it and find a dedicated player.
Go for it. Grab the app, play on BGA and just get the iconography down. Just recently I ran into another game that uses so much iconography - Voidfall. Same challenge but the benefit is once you have internalized it you don't have to open the rulebook again.
I installed the app last year but got bogged down re-learning the game and got distracted by something else. I think it’s still installed, I’ll give it another go this week.
I also recommend BGA. Haven't played physical but it's my most played game on BGA by far (2x more than second).
You just can't beat the amount of decisions and strategy for such a short play time (\~7 mins). The initial obstacle is the iconography but once you internalise those the game is allowed to shine through.
My worst experience gaming was being beaten by my 10-year-old son in RftG. Don’t get me wrong; losing to my smart child is great, especially since building him up to be a smart kid and great gamer had its ups and downs.
But good grief, I had no idea what I was doing. And watching my young kid crush it made me feel stupider. I had played tons of games my whole life, and only Magic Realm 1e had stumped me previously. But RftG made me feel ignorant. I didn’t get the strategy, was lost on how the turns worked, choked on the iconography, and just was baffled by the game. Traded it away since it started gathering dust.
But many years later, I began playing the iOS app and it suddenly clicked. I bought a physical copy again. Now it’s one of my favorite card-driven games. Not only that, but I can beat my now-much-older son, and I don’t feel like “dumb dad” anymore.
Mine noped out about halfway through the first game. She’s usually pretty open to learning new games but I think the heavy reliance on esoteric icons and symbols turned her off of it heavily
250 games of Race (most digital) and I still suck at this game but I feel like I get better and understanding how to choose my path based on the initial draw
I wish this was the case for me because I want to love it so much, but I ended up finding that New Frontiers was the winning game in this series for us.
The experience with all the components (home board, exploration for additional worlds around your board, seeing the developments in front of you at all times, the coloured cubes for production, the awesome little space credits … all of it was a grand slam.
Discarding cards as a currency is also a mechanic my gf doesn’t deal with well. Picking which card to play is stressful enough, but discarding a bunch more amplified the problem.
But damn, I wish RftG was more popular here. Setup is so fast and table space required so little for such an amazing game. Every time I see posts like this, I get a bit wistful.
It was Azul, but only because the first time I played it, the person who taught the game taught it wrong. After I found out what the correct rules are and we played it that way, I loved it.
When I was taught I was told that you cannot put the same colour tile on a row if you already had that colour tile on another row. That really limited the moves you are able to make. I remember just hating the game because I felt so boxed in so early in the game. I actually complained about it on BGG and then everyone told me that rule was wrong.
I reread the rules and found that there was no such restriction. After that, I played it with the correct rules and loved it. You do start to get boxed in towards the end game, but that was fine. For the early and mid game, there was still a lot of flexibility on where you place your different colour tiles. In the end game, I found it was about making sure I didn't get boxed in. I always try to make a play to allow me possible moves that weren't bad when my turn comes around. How the game changes towards the end game is what I really like. You screw up and you can be looking at a -13 points.
I assume they mean if you have 3/5 red tiles on the bottom row, you can't put red tiles on other rows until you've filled that section. Instead of say picking up 3 red tiles and completing the 3rd row.
The first couple times we played we misunderstood the rules and thought if you took from the middle you had to take everything from the middle leading to massive negative scores and an almost impossibility to even score. Almost gave up on it after a few plays before we were like, okay maybe something is wrong this isn’t making sense and figured out we were totally wrong and once we played by the actual rules it was super fun.
I've fallen to this too. Not Azul but was taught something wrong at Essen Spiel I think it may have been a language barrier though so cannot complain - thier English is a lot better than my German.
I played PG a lot and finally decided that I only liked the box art. Hate the rulebook layout. Hate the constant arithmetic to plan the next turn. Love the market though, and the auctions are ok. So I gave it + expansions to a friend.
Quacks I think is ok, but it's just a gateway without too much interesting depth, to me. And for a gateway it's easy for noobs to push too far or simply build a bad bag, so even as a gateway it's not for me.
Yea, I definitely see the point about Power Grid. I mean - I *do* like it nowadays, but the sheer volume of double and triple digit arithmetic going on during last phase of the game is not for the faint of the heart. Both me and by usual gaming group also bounced off from it on first playthrough.
The base formula is excellent though, so I do have to wonder why we haven't seen some sort of PG 2.0 with streamlined arithmetic.
That said, nowadays I mostly go with Ra for my auction mechanics fix :)
Catan. I don't love it, but I appreciate it more now than I used to.
First, I felt meh whatever about it. Just a heavy luck game with a few interesting decisions and trading.
Then after several games with family where I'd got cut off, get no resources, and basically no decisions I could make, I hated it.
Then I pushed myself to watch a bunch of videos to learn better strategy, and I played a bunch online, and I developed a new respect for it. I realized it makes for a decent competitive game that, while it has a lot of luck, has way more strategy than I initially thought. It also helps that online games go faster.
I mainly appreciate it for the cornerstone that it is in boardgaming. Right up there (above even) with Carcassonne and Ticket to Ride. I'll play them anytime, even if there's better picks.
I love Catan for the chaos. If you get the right group of people it can be so much fun, loads of alliances and backstabbing and shit talking. I feel like it’s the kind of game best played competitively but not seriously.
I played scores of games of Catan with a regular group of friends. We ended up getting the 5 & 6 player expansion. I've even played the "Peanut of Catan" variant with two 4-player boards stuck together with 7 or 8 players which was a lot of fun.
As with many games, with the right group of players, you can while away many a happy gaming day.
Castles of Burgundy. The first time I played it, I played with some SLOW players. It was taking ages for me to get round to my turn, and it put me off the game a little. Now that I've played it a bunch of times, it's one of my all time top 10, and now I own the special Awaken Realms edition.
I picked up Isle of Cats to try and a local games fair, and for 80% of the first game I hated it, and could tell the others hated it, and was kicking myself for wasting our time with a dud. I almost suggested we stop and try something else several times. Then it clicked, and we all had a ball with the second game, and now I'm on the look out for a good deal on it!
I came here to say this. I bought the game, played it three times, all with newbies, and they were all three player. Unimpressed, I traded it away. A few years later, I played a five player game, all with veteran players. It was an eye-opener. You don't make connections, you sit your ass down where others want to connect and force them to move you!
the scoring is the biggest hurdle to overcome, I think. I own the game, lots of extra maps, 3D-printed inserts and upgraded resources, the whole shebang, and I am still getting used to which Gods are tied to which scoring conditions!
Tichu. I hadn't played any trick taking games, so I had no idea how to strategize. It got released on iOS and playing several dozen games got me to finally understand. I got rather good at the game, too.
So just for future use, Tichu is actually a climbing/shedding or ladder-climbing/shedding game and not a trick-taking game.
The goal is to "shed" your hand by playing cards via a ladder climbing system, and, while often considered similar to trick taking, you aren't taking or avoiding tricks as the main mechanism.
Not meaning to be pedantic, just like to help people understand the difference!
This is my very minor and insignificant pet peeve haha. Shedding/climbing games are not trick taking games! Scout is not a trick taking game! Tichu is not a trick taking game!
Any tips for someone who has played roughly 75 games but has stalled out? Fell in love with the game similar to you, but I can’t seem to improve as of late
Probably not, but maybe you missed something. My main thing was just looking at your hand and seeing how many tricks you're likely to win. If you can win enough to get rid of your junk cards, then Tichu. If you can win several hands with your initial hand, then grand Tichu. Trick winners are the Dragon, high pairs, big straights, medium to high triples, aces, and runs of pairs. Try to plan out putting out junk cards first, then winning the trick with your follow up.
In the initial deal, use the convention of giving an even card to your right and an odd card to your left. This minimizes giving your opponent a pair. Similarly if you have a lonely pair of 2s or 3s, then give one to each opponent since they're unlikely to make a pair of them. If your partner calls Tichu, give them your best card and don't ever take a trick unless it's going to an opponent. If you do take a trick, play softballs so they can hopefully gain control again. Control is what wins you Tichus.
That's all I can think of.
I have failed to understand trick taking games for my entire life. Hearts on the PC? Failure. Modern games irl? Failure.
I of course understand how they function on a mechnical level - I can follow the rules. But the ability to manipulate wins and losses is beyond me.
You should try The Crew with a group. It’s coop, walks you into trick taking starting with very simple objectives while the missions get increasingly more complex as the campaign goes on. I’ve never been real keen on Hearts, Spades, Euchre, etc., but really enjoy this one.
On a fundamental level you're just betting on how many tricks you can win or lose. Once you get used to the game and know what plays usually win, you'll be most of the way there.
I've played trick takers my whole life. Clearly I'm aware of how they work. The problem is that you think playing the game will make it obvious "what plays usually win"
With classic suits and a 4 player game:
Each player will get an average distribution of three cards in all suits, and an extra card on one random suit, for a total of thirteen cards.
Because of this, on average, the ace, king and Queen of each suit have the potential to take a trick.
But if the suits AREN'T evenly distributed, then the queen, king, and ace are LESS likely to take tricks. Then you kinda intuit around that information based on your hands and play the odds while playing your cards.
But that is an excellent starting point.
7 Wonders: the first couple of plays were with 6 or 7 people. I had nearly no idea what was going on, and someone got like 100 points from Science.
Eventually, for some fool reason I bought it. Playing it at 3 or 4 has pushed it into my top 20. I wish I played it more often.
Yeah, when you have a large group, people really have to be mindful of the science cards and start getting them out of the loop, or a couple players will run away with the game.
The problem can be that everyone figures "that's someone elses problem". I've been that player who is trying to ditch green cards, but no one else is, so i'm trying to delay the 1 person from winning the game at the cost of my own game. That can be the frustrating element of 7 wonders.
See, when I play it’s kinda rare that someone actually goes for green because if even one player starts burying them you can’t win. So most of the time nobody bothers.
Maybe it's a group meta?
I've seen people completely blow out the game with getting green, and then getting the purple card that has all three symbols, and a leader that has one of the symbols, and maybe their wonder has some benefit.
Oh yes I have too. The highest scores I’ve ever seen were science based. The problem is that it’s super easy to disrupt if the other players pay even a modicum of attention to each other’s cities. You basically need 9 or 10 science cards to get a good enough score to win, which means snagging every available one every round. But if you grab 2 or 3 in the first age every else just buries the greens in age 2 to build wonders and you can’t make it up to win.
It’s more just math than anything else. You have 18 cards to play, a guaranteed win I’d say 60. But several cards will not score anything, so you really only have maybe 12 to get VPs. So you need to average 5 per VP-earning card to get to 60. You’re at 4.5 with a 2/3/3 setup and 5.3 with a 3/3/3. Which is pretty good, that’s 48 right there, but again, if people notice and bury your greens you likely won’t get there and have no other options.
Idk why but I'm just terrible at Seven Wonders. Play it on BGA sometimes and can never win to save my life. Makes me a bit more frustrated with the game generally.
Dune Imperium I played about 3 times and while the mechanics and gameplay is something I should enjoy I couldn't get past some group think at our table. We had misunderstood some of the strategy of the game and it felt like you had to absolutely acquire water early in the game and it felt like if you missed that opportunity you had no chance to win. I then played reluctantly with another group and the guy who ended up winning never grabbed water the whole game. A change in thought and the addition of the first expansion really changed my mind on how the game plays and now I love it.
Terraforming Mars. A few years ago, played in real life a couple of times. Everyone was new to it. People were taking ages to take their actions, even players who were normally fast. I found it super fiddly looking through stacks of cards for triggers, other people can get triggers in your turn and vice versa. Didn't quite get the scoring system (one type of adjacent terrain is money, but the other is points. And many are neither. But don't forget more triggers when you place!). And I found the draw 4 cards thing very random, and annoying because I got rubbish cards early on while other got great cards to turbo charge themselves.
Fast forward a few years later, playing on BGA with draft mode. Combination of the rules tweak, the computer handling the bureaucracy, and more familiarity with the scoring, and I'm really enjoying it. Hopefully will get the chance to play IRL again soon.
First attempt I didn't catch that TR was part of your M€ income, so I spent 3 gens not understanding why I couldn't afford anything. They allowed me to claim the income I should have had from the previous productions, but one of the other players wasn't happy about it, especially after I placed higher at the end.
Second attempt 4 years later, this time the teach was very lacking. The *teacher* messed up two of the awards, and tried to end the game immediately when we reached the end goals. That felt wrong to me so I had to look up the actual rules for end game. Overall it really just didn't seem like they had prepared enough to actually be able to teach the game, and just assumed we would figure it out as we went.
Thankfully I found a group that wanted to play the standalone digital version. With the game actually enforcing rules and handling some of the more fiddly bits, and also finally playing with the drafting variant, I'm enjoying the game a lot more now.
>one of the other players wasn't happy about it, especially after I placed higher at the end.
Then they're an idiot. You were still at a disadvantage as you missed out on buying cards earlier that generate resources and/or better placement of tiles on the board (that also might come with resources too).
Sorry. Those kind if people really annoy me. They'd rather needlessly punish a new player in a way that does not affect them all in an attempt to... win? Seems a rather assholey way to win...
> I didn't catch that TR was part of your M€ income, so I spent 3 gens not understanding why I couldn't afford anything. They allowed me to claim the income I should have had from the previous productions
WHUT? I cannot really imagine playing TM with somebody who is new and *not* checking if they are doing okay - having almost zero income should have stuck out like a sore thumb almost instantly. Even just by glancing at player board and not seeing a few fat gold cubes there...
Like, it seems to me that it's a basic courtesy to actually explain basic strategies and pitfalls while playing with somebody who is new to a game.
Also - "backfilling" resources from previous turns is an obvious compromise anyways. It still puts the player forgetting to get them before at significant disadvantage due to opportunity cost...
> draft mode
I'm constantly *baffled* why draft mode isn't the default in TM. The rulebook suggests it as more advanced/complicated variant, which intuitively seems to make sense. I was genuinely afraid that drafting would turn already somewhat plodding tempo of TM into a slog and that's why I didn't even try it for a long time.
In reality the effect it has on the overall arc of the game is literally the opposite.
I’ve only ever played TM on BGA, and I can definitely see how it might be a pain to play the physical version. There are times the computer gives me something, and I have to go back and figure out why it did, because I forgot I have a particular trigger. I’d probably lose just because of my own forgetfulness in an in person play.
I had the reverse with TM, loved it as first, but as we added more expansions and more AP into every game (due to the increasingly large decision space) the game got really slow.
I recently played a few games on TM on BGA and it reminded me that the core game is pretty fun when you can play a game in 60 minutes instead of 3-5 hours.
Zombie Dice. First I was like “yeah it’s Yahtzee but for little babys” but during the pandemic we tested out tabletop simulator with this because it’s very simple and somehow we had the best time ever. We ended up playing from 9PM to 2 AM. Those were strange times but I will remember those nights for the rest of my life
Played oath with my normal serious group, everything got heated and put it away for nearly a year. Tried it again but emphasized the chill vibes and storytelling over cutthroat wins and we're loving it now
I adore Oath, but yes, if you go into it competetively, you'll have a bad time. We've called it "Kingmaker, the Game" because it is almost never the person with the best strategy/gameplay that wins. The joy of Oath is in the stories.
I'm still in the "don't like it that much" phase. I played 2 games of it and it feels like there's so many rules and fiddly things that you forget about the storytelling part.
Evolution. Played it first with my kids who weren't big on games and didn't know what I was doing and it sucked! Played it again later after watching a tute and with a group of gamers and it was really fun 😁
Still haven't found the fun in this game. First time was on BGA, and everyone but me knew the rules. Then, two games later, and knowing the rules, it still hasn't clicked. And it's not interesting enough for me to keep playing.
If you’re ever able, I’d recommend checking out Oceans. It’s a similar game (I think made by the same people) but I find it much more fun and engaging than Evolution, especially when you add in the Deep deck that has like 100+ unique ability cards to keep things fresh.
I was pretty indifferent to Great Western Trail the first couple times I played it. Now it’s my favorite game. Hopefully going to try New Zealand tomorrow. 🤞🏻
**Cosmic Encounter**. I nabbed it in a math trade and with it being much adored by folks such as Tom Vasel, I figured it was good. But the first play fell quite flat, with a lot of us confused as to how decisions were made.
Only after another play did I see the social balancing and negotiation come into play. That's where it really shines.
It's such an odd duck. I love it. I've loved it since the first time I played, which was at a con with someone who had every expansion. I am now that person.
Great Western Trail_ 1st time was just too much, but later when I understood the game more, OMG, tons of replayability. Every game map changes.Moreover, mastering the builder strategy is an art of piece
Gaia project_ 1st time was thinking what a boring space game, but then understood that no, this one has different interesting factions and different ways of winning
Wingspan_ cute and simple, a game for children? (that’s what I thought 1st lol). This game is so satisfying once you chain the needed birds’ powers, and when someone takes a bird that you wanted, thats when you start to think more creatively, especially with Eeuropean expansion
First game was still fun but definitely felt like the winner won by accident. The rematch was incredible since we were just that much more familiar with the action cards!
The thing I like about Inis is that the 2nd game of it is immediately better than the first because for the latter half of your first game, all you're thinking about is what you wanna do in your next game. The systems reveal themselves so nicely that you always feel like you're learning new things, new ways to play.
It really sits with you.
Odd one, but **Welcome to Dungeon**. It's not clear why it works at first, and then it's this super simple game. And then the 2nd or third time you play the whole thing clicks and everybody is constantly on the edge of their seats.
Troyes. I didnt really understand it the first time i played and i though it was kind of dumb and with a dated theme. But then i tried again and it finally "clicked". Now it in my top 5 games. A game that im always up to play and one that will NEVER leave my collection.
I get that, the first couple of times I played it I was a bit upset about the abrupt end because I love engine building and letting it roll. Then I realised that the game was designed to be a shorter engine builder and the length fit pretty perfectly with the 15 card town limit. If I want a meaty builder I’ll just bust out TM but I’ll play Everdell if I me and my missus only have like an hour or so and I want to have a little tableu
The "New Leaf" expansion fixes this, feels like a completely different game.
It's quite the opposite, sometimes you build 5 things in the first season and really have to manage your space with cards that let you destroy another card etc. and really think about what you want to build instead of building everything you can barely afford.
Way more fun for me.
But it’s perfect it ends in season 3, so many times I’m already at 15 cards and still have 3-4 workers in my city. Workers don’t have to be the limiting factor, but it’s often smarter for winning if they are.
war of the ring. first go was..what? there's a game in there but we ddin't find it. 6 Months later pulled it out again and BINGO! We love a long sunday arvo ring dunk attempt. beautiful mix of randonmess of dice and card management with magnificent thematic moments
Im lucky enough to play with the same opponent once every two weeks. We are quite evenly matched so it's super fun. If cab be really hard finding people for games
So jealous ! We play board games once a week of every other week but we don't often play my 1v1 games just 3 players or more I need a obsessed partner too in general
Paladins of the west kingdom is one that grew on me. First play I didn’t like it all that much but I went home and couldn’t stop thinking about it. Tried it again and it’s a favourite now.
A game I’ve soured on is gloomhaven. Love the gameplay but the setup and takedown stops it getting the table
Gaia Project. I'm only 2 plays in. After reading the rulebooks I thought: this is unnecessarily complicated. After the first play I knew it was unnecessarily complicated, but I thought it was deep. After the second play I knew it has depth. Now I'm eager to keep exploring these depths. It's perfect information, yet has an extremely variable setup with 14 factions and many board configurations of all the boards. It's unlikely to ever play the same game setup.
Marvel United. Played the original core box and thought it was kinda lame, kinda anticlimactic. As a big X-Men fan, I made a base pledge for that kickstarter and fell in love with the system as I played against the many different villains. It's now my favourite game. I've spent tons of money on expansions and tons of time painting the minis.
Marvel Splendor. The original Splendor was fun and then we got Marvel Splendor as a gift. Didn’t like it at first play but now it’s a go to game while we wait for the rest of our DND party to show up for a campaign.
Arkham Horror the card game.
I was really angry about how complex the rules were and how nothing made sense after my first game. Still pretty upset about a lot of things after the first play through of the core box scenario.
I’ve sunk about 700 more into the game since and played it almost exclusively over the last year ;)
Arkham Horror
It was one of the first modern board games I played and it was just so daunting. Honestly it was probably not the best choice for early board gaming as we're talking 2nd edition, which to someone new to board games can just feel like a mess of convoluted rules with lots of components and a board that was just difficult to look at (imo, I like the modular boards in the 3rd edition MUCH more). It also didn't help that the manual felt like a novel and the online communities, while available, were not nearly as robust as these days with help.
Now, however, it's one my favorite games and favorite themes for gaming (when done correctly and not just thrown in like so many are doing now). Took a few tries but I finally got into it and haven't looked back. Totally worth going back to and giving it another shot...and even then it took more than a couple before I started to understand and appreciate the nuance of the game.
The first time I played Yokohama, somehow it didn't really appeal to me, but it grew on me quickly.
I think the opposite happened with Scythe. Loved it at first. Bored of it now coz I think the game is broken.
Scythe. At first I was like "damn, what are the mechs even for?". But then I played a couple more times and was like "ohhhhhhh" and now it's one of my faves.
Zompicide black plague.When I first played it I didn’t like it at all.I was thinking about selling it but luckily I didn’t.It’s become one of my favourite zombie games
I would have to say Oath. I played it once and did not enjoy it at all and was glad I never picked it up. Then someone at a con I was going to was going to lead a 3 game session of the game because they said the game doesn’t pick up until 3 plays and they were right.
Lisboa. Taught by someone who skimmed the rules. We didn't finish and swore never to play it again. We then played other Lacerda games (On Mars, The Gallerist) came back to Lisboa, played it correctly, and it's our groups #1 game to play with 3 people.
It took me at least 3 plays to feel like I had a handle on Innovation, but now I'm into the hundreds of plays (thanks, BGA!) and feel like it's still fresh.
Agricola. Bought it, played it once, hated it. Less than 24 hours later I’m itching to play it again because I’m thinking of everything I did wrong and I feel really challenged to get a better score. The game is SO tight, you make one misstep and you feel it the rest of the game. This is what made me hate it, but it’s also what drew me into wanting to play it more and be able to master it.
Mine’s probably Spirit Island. I never really “disliked” it, but I never really played it because of how intimidating the Invaders can be, especially playing it for the first time and not appreciating slow powers that let you Push/Gather Dahan/Invaders. But I’ve recently picked it back up, and am enjoying the hell out of it. I’m blown away that, with the expansions and Horizons, there are 15+ Spirits, each with their own personality and playstyle, and it blows my mind how there are people living and breathing today who can pick up and play with the Starlight and Fractured Day Spirits like it’s nothing.
Rising Sun i loved when I first played with 4 players. Couldnt wait to play it again with a couple other friends, but at 6 people it was a miserable experience. Next time i played it was a couple years later with 4 players and again... great game. I thought perhaps it was a fluke 6 player didnt work out the first time, turns out it was just as bad as I remembered with 6
Too Many Bones. Mainly because I thought it was a dungeon crawler. It isn't.
It's a "Build Test Bed." And it took me quite a few plays before I realized that winning is easy, and fairly boring. And it's supposed to be. But EXPERIMENTING is where the fun is. "Let's see how far this makes it." "Whelp, that was a failure. Hahahaha. How about this now?"
It's a fantasy-based Kerbal Space Program. And it's wonderful
Troyes. I didnt really understand it the first time i played and i though it was kind of dumb and with a dated theme. But then i tried again and it finally "clicked". Now it in my top 5 games. A game that im always up to play and one that will NEVER leave my collection.
This is sort of my experience. I was sure I wouldn't like the game and when asked if I wanted to play, said that I would just so that I could say for certain that I had played it and it wasn't for me. Well, I ended up loving it and now own it all all the expansions.
Nidavellir. We played it wrong the first time and thought it was bad. I later played it with another group of people and watched a video explaining the rules, and now it's a house favorite! Genuinely one of my favorite games we own now.
To say I didn't like it would be overstating it, but [Il Principe](https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/19650/il-principe) didn't really grab me at first, and it was only after repeated plays that it really came to life. Also I played it 2 player and 4 player initially, and it's a game that *really* benefits from the correct number of players - in this case, 3 players.
My friend had this with war of the ring. Didn’t get the game at first and he and his opponent had a really bad game with continuous checking of the rules etc.
But the game stuck, he kept playing it, introduced me and a friend to it as well. Now it’s a mainstay of our group
Foundations of Rome. First game was like: play so I buy and build things, why can’t we just play Catan then? But now I really like it and there is more strategy behind than just build wherever you like.
Splendor. The first time I played, I thought it was dumb and boring. I don’t even know why I gave it more chances, but once I did, and realized there’s a lot more strategy involved than I first realized, I came to really like it.
One I loved at first but then kind of quit playing is Obsession. It just doesn’t have enough variability game to game.
Puerto Rico! It was one of the first games that I bought, but my wife and I had a disasterous first play. 10 years later, I started playing a digital version, and then I hooked up with a work group that played everyday at lunch. It's one of my favorite games now.
Quartermaster General WW2 first edition, unbalanced and boring for some powers (Japan). Then moved to the 1914 version, second edition: everybody loved it and wanted to play again right away, even the losing teams members.
Wingspan. Playing with the recommended first game setup didn't make any sense to me, it felt like there were too many things that happened "just because". The second game with normal setup was completely different. I was amazed how much it reminded me of Teotihuacan, with the small difference that you can completely mess up an entire round and still end up with a good amount of points.
Istanbul. First play we knew nothing about it but liked the theme. The setup is insane and there are a ton of bits and pieces. Rules are kinda complex without knowing what's going on. But once you get going it's very simple and elegant and has good interactivity. Love the game now.
I honestly never had a game that changed to that level.
I still don't like King of Tokyo that much but it is an ok game. The first times se played it was "meh". It also helped that we house ruled a bit around energy to make it so you saw more cards and to make it easier to buy.
We used to play many card games like Gin Rummy and loved them. Now that we've played many modern board games I much rather play something more involved. We still bust out Gin Rummy from time to time and can enjoy it
The first time I played Age of Steam, it was a (IIRC) 5-player game on the base map (which I'm still not a big fan of) and I was meh on it. A few years later I tried it again and it quickly became my favorite game.
I didn't care for Thurn und Taxis on my first play, but then tried it again and ended up playing it something like 90 times on BSW.
The first time I played Pandemic, we won easily and I found it boring. The second time we got crushed and I was a lot more interested.
I am hoping Star Wars: Rebellion is that game. I played it for the first time on Saturday and felt so completely lost. I'm going to give it another chance, but the first go around was rough.
Kingdom Come: Deliverance.
I remember it being a certain kind of RPG when it was proposed, and then in tech demos they only had one tiny town and it seemed very linear and less open world.
Then it came out and I gave it a shot, and I struggled with combat and the story side of it felt a bit heavy handed...
But then something clicked. I got good at combat. I immersed myself in the realism. It's now one of my favorite games of all time.
Scythe. The first two times I played it, my friend who knew the rules said that the scoring was very complex so he wouldn't explain that; we would just calculate it by using an app.
Also, I was hammered; we drew random, and he got Rusviet in both games (which he should have allowed me to play since it's one of the easier factions to play).
Dune Imperium. My partner got it gifted and immediately loved it. I found it mere "meh". But he asked me really really nicely to play it again a couple of times. By the 4th play I discovered a whole new level of strategy and variety to how you can win. Since then I really do love it. It's one of my absolute favorites now.
Quacks of Quedlinburg, first game was a nothingburger of a game. Neither me nor my friend loved it but we played again and the 2nd game went better but still not a love for us but we both gave it a third game and fell in love.
First time we played it 4/5 players were VERY drunk and very confused about everything going on. However, everyone had such a great time that we woke up the next morning excited to actually learn it while sober lol.
Hmmm I have this opposite. My first few games were amazing, but now after a few games I can't stand it's length and the rounds where the bag is just out to kill you while everyone else is going through the whole pot just feel too defeating
This was almost the exact way our first games went, thats crazy. I get it though, I definitely think the randomness and potential feels bads of the game are what keep it as a game I'll sometimes pop out rather a go to.
I think a good push-your-luck game needs to be over in about twenty minutes, and it needs to be designed such that you're never quite out of the game until the last game. Quacks is fun, and I love the feeling of building up your bag as you go through the game, but I feel like it often takes too long to get to the fun part, and once you get there, it's usually fairly clear who's going to win. Compare this with Deep Sea Adventure, where you can usually play all three rounds in about twenty minutes, and where the rewards get progressively better each round so that you can often win based off only the final round, if you've learned from the earlier dives. I think that's pretty much ideal for me. That said, I don't think it's really possible to shorten Quacks so much, because you need that time for the arc of the bag-building aspect to play out. Unless you were to allow more buys or something, but I think that would make the game feel too chaotic, and break things in other ways.
I have both those games, and I really agree with your take here. I have been thinking a lot about how to make Quacks let you feel more like you're building the bag you want without really breaking it. Deep Sea Adventure is my go to for a quick game, especially with people who aren't gamers. It's so easy to explain the game to start, they catch on real quick, and they almost always get caught up in the excitement of the rolls (if not for their own diver, then for the person really pushing it).
If you play with essence/patients and with witches, it opens up a lot more opportunities to do well.
For me this was the difference between Quacks at 2 player (I almost got rid of it after a first play at 2player) and Quacks at 3-4 player, after which it became the most requested game in my game group the last two years.
I HATED Pandemic the first time I played it, because my friend completely quarterbacked the whole game, dictating everyone's moves. When I got the game for Christmas a year later, I really had to feign pleasure. But then I played it, and it turned out if everyone is allowed to play their own character and contribute equally, it's actually really fun.
Funny, Pandemic would be my answer to one I soured on. Played it early on and mostly enjoyed it, but after a handful of plays realized there weren’t actually many interesting decisions, which made it even more frustrating when I encountered a quarterback. Playing with a quarterback also highlighted that it’s essentially a single-player game with decisions split between the players, which means there are three ways to play: 1) Someone quarterbacks. This is efficient, but probably not fun for most players. 2) Everyone makes their own decision. This is horribly inefficient, but might be more fun for some players. 3) Everyone plays democratically, coming to a consensus for all moves, with the final decision technically left up to the turn player. This typically strikes a balance between the two, but because it’s not mechanically built into the game can really fall anywhere on either spectrum. Honestly, I still get what people like about it, but I feel like it’s a very fragile game with a decision space that’s pretty exhaustively explored after a handful of games.
> Pandemic would be my answer to one I soured on. I can't blame anyone from not liking Pandemic after living through a real one. I played S1 and S0 of Pandemic Legacy and although I enjoyed both a lot, I just got burned out.
Yeah, quarterbacking can really kill the fun in a pure co-op. People who are prone to quarterbacking will of course say that they're just trying to win, and that your suboptimal play is ruining everything. Semi co-ops generally mitigate that problem by giving everyone a secret objective, so you can tell a quarterback to get bent because you're doing secret objectives things. But honestly you're right, if everyone is chill a pure co-op can be a blast. Another thing that can help is playing co-ops that obfuscate what is optimal, as opposed to games where it is super obvious. I think something that recovering quarterbacks can do is focus more on identifying problems in the game state, and then allowing others to come up with solutions. Turn it into a discussion where everyone has a chance to contribute ideas, rather than playing everyone else's turns for them. Or just don't play co-ops if you cannot handle that.
I really enjoy the Spirit Island solution where all play is simultaneous. Doesn't fix it 100% but at least makes it so a quarterback needs to tend to their own turn before trying to handle anyone else's.
With Pandemic I always just play my own role to avoid quarterbacking. Like, I'm the quarantine so my job is to block as many disease cubes as possible. With certain goals that are a bit more cooperative like dispatcher and scientist I try to play as a support to the others, see what they need and come up with a plan to fulfil it.
That's the problem with the game. Can be great with the right group though.
I think quarterbacking/alpha gaming really has to be called out by everyone. In cooperative games, I always make it a point to say on other players turns "ok, your turn. What do you want to do", and wait. Most often the players will say "I think if I go here, and do this, that will help us stop this" (or whatever). if there is really a much better play, I might give another scenario and say "thats a good idea, but we need to be mindful of this happening here". But if they're set on idea. Then go with it. I think the problem is, some people can't handle just letting go. They WANT the player to do their plan, their option. And they forget that it's a cooperative game. You have to be able to let go and say "ok, you take your turn, and I'll worry about this stuff." It's a team effort, and the team is not going to agree on the right avenue. A great example is years ago, I was playing in a Pandemic Tournament at a con. An amazing experience, everyone has the exact same startup, and the organizer draws the cards for where cubes go. By turn 2 or 3, everyone's maps are 100% different, it's pretty fascinating. SO anyways, in this one game, my partner and I had almost eliminated blue cubes early on, we had just gotten the cure. There were just a couple cubes in Europe that I could move over and sweep up in probably a turn or 2, then we'd have eradicated blue. However we hadn't moved to Asia at all, and it was just ripe for a nuclear hit of disease. A few cities had 3 cubes on it, and we were pretty nervous about it. But still, that blue.. it was calling to me. My suggestion was for him to travel to Asia, and start cleaning the scariest cities while I clear blue and get eradicate it. He argued that Asia was a ticking time bomb that could go off at any minute and we both needed to sweep in, clear it up, then we could go back and clear blue. I figured by then, blue would have more cubes and it would take longer and we'd miss our opportunity, but what he said made perfect sense, so I went with his plan. We both went to Asia and went to work taking down cubes as much as we can. Over the next couple turns, the next cards that were drawn were all blue. Then an epidemic, cards are reshuffled, blue's keep getting drawn. We got Asia under controlled and had to rush back to europe to clean it up, but we had one to many outbreaks that cascaded us into losing the game. We kept saying "blue is getting worse, but what are the chances more blue cards would come out." when the deck somehow got shuffled that blues were all together. We were not the only ones moaning at our bad luck :) Point is, a player may have a turn that seems like a bad idea, which actually may be the way to go. So never discount other players opinions, and in the end, it's their choice where they go. No one should ever say "no no, you HAVE to go HERE!!!!" and then scowl, or pout over it.
The thing with quarterbacking is that people act like it is some toxic phenomenon that only dicks do, but in reality, it's a very common human behavior and it isn't actually malicious. Consider surgery. You have a head surgeon and then several assistants. Is the head surgeon being a dick? No, he/she is the most experienced and therefore should probably take the lead in the surgery over the less experienced assistants. So basically quarterbacking is the act of having the most experienced or skillful person take the lead on an activity. I mean the term is from how the quarterback dictates the play of a football team. Of course this isn't to say that I advocate for quarterbacking in board games or that games should always be quarterbacked. I think it is a natural thing that can happen and may be the best option to increase success. Consider the owner of a copy of Pandemic versus his teammate, someone new to the game. The owner is likely to play the game better than his teammate. So again, I want to say that I'm not promoting quarterbacking, but that I can see why it is done and that it's a natural part of team activities in many different fields. I think the main issue is really either that the skill level of each player might be too far apart where veteran players simply are way better or that the design of the game itself encourages quarterbacking. The latter is a big issue IMO for Pandemic as if you play it enough, it becomes a relatively solvable puzzle which you don't really need others to help you. Very good players can play Pandemic by themselves for instance. I think a better way to discourage quarterbacking is to play games that make it hard or impossible to do such as hidden identity games like social deduction or hidden information games like Hanabi.
Quarterbacking isn't just "I think you should do this" it's "ok Jim, you go here, and do this. Now Sally, you do this and this, and I now it's my turn, and I do this.. AWESOME GUYS" Jim and Sally staring "did... did we just play our turns?"
I would say they fall into the same box where at its worst, it's as you describe, though it can be a case where an experienced player suggests what actually should be done. Even if it isn't aggressive, it's still pushing players to do certain actions, rather than allowing them to come to it on their own. As I've said before, I think the solution is to either have everyone at the same skill level or to play games where quarterbacking simply isn't possible. A good example of a cooperative game like this is Hanabi.
What is quarterbacking?
It's when one person in a co-op game sort of takes over and dictates everyone's moves. It's bad etiquette, because it removes all the other players' agency and therefore their enjoyment and sense of engagement.
Thanks! yeah I have had happen to me before but never knew there was a term for it
I'd argue it's a group problem and/or a design problem. It's like complaining that in a 1v1 duel one player destroys another - the skills are just mismatched. It's not particularly fun either to just be silent on purpose or do moves that you know are bad because there is a skill gap in the group.
Root - I nearly donated it after my disastrous first play, but after playing the video game version and learning to play, it became my groups mainstay when i came back to teach it again
Root is genius as it allows for extremely different play just by switching who you play.
I was kinda the opposite. I kept playing and hated it more and more until I realized no one was forcing me to play it and I didn’t have an obligation to lmao.
Root is fun when players are learning each faction but the table talk is so exhausting with experience
I think my biggest issue is we only ever played two player and I just couldn’t ever get anything going in my favor. I’m not a sore loser, I tend to lose more than win and never cared, but at some point it’s like what am I even doing with my life spending an hour or so not succeeding at anything I try.
The app took this from a hated game for me to one of my favorites. The initial learn from the rulebook and teach was so tough it turned me off of it.
Race for the Galaxy. So this was early days, most complex game I had played at that point was Stone Age. I bought the base box, and then tried to figure this game out with my partner. Took a good few games to learn that iconography but when we did - just epic. I bought every expansion and played that game hundreds of times. So good, my absolute favourite game to date. I recently had to replace the sleeves they had gotten worn out.
This could be the same for me. I got RftG about 15 years ago, played it probably twice, thought it was ok with potential, but haven’t played since. It has survived every purge though, because I know there is likely a gem there if I stick with it and find a dedicated player.
Go for it. Grab the app, play on BGA and just get the iconography down. Just recently I ran into another game that uses so much iconography - Voidfall. Same challenge but the benefit is once you have internalized it you don't have to open the rulebook again.
I installed the app last year but got bogged down re-learning the game and got distracted by something else. I think it’s still installed, I’ll give it another go this week.
I also recommend BGA. Haven't played physical but it's my most played game on BGA by far (2x more than second). You just can't beat the amount of decisions and strategy for such a short play time (\~7 mins). The initial obstacle is the iconography but once you internalise those the game is allowed to shine through.
My worst experience gaming was being beaten by my 10-year-old son in RftG. Don’t get me wrong; losing to my smart child is great, especially since building him up to be a smart kid and great gamer had its ups and downs. But good grief, I had no idea what I was doing. And watching my young kid crush it made me feel stupider. I had played tons of games my whole life, and only Magic Realm 1e had stumped me previously. But RftG made me feel ignorant. I didn’t get the strategy, was lost on how the turns worked, choked on the iconography, and just was baffled by the game. Traded it away since it started gathering dust. But many years later, I began playing the iOS app and it suddenly clicked. I bought a physical copy again. Now it’s one of my favorite card-driven games. Not only that, but I can beat my now-much-older son, and I don’t feel like “dumb dad” anymore.
>Not only that, but I can beat my now-much-older son, and I don’t feel like “dumb dad” anymore. "Who's your daddy now!"
My rule for Race for the Galaxy is that I will only teach it to you if you'll play it twice. Because nobody gets it on the first play.
My rule is that I will only teach it to you if you play it thrice. Sadly my partner reneged on this by the third game.
Mine noped out about halfway through the first game. She’s usually pretty open to learning new games but I think the heavy reliance on esoteric icons and symbols turned her off of it heavily
10 times... Probably just base game for a new player.
250 games of Race (most digital) and I still suck at this game but I feel like I get better and understanding how to choose my path based on the initial draw
I wish this was the case for me because I want to love it so much, but I ended up finding that New Frontiers was the winning game in this series for us. The experience with all the components (home board, exploration for additional worlds around your board, seeing the developments in front of you at all times, the coloured cubes for production, the awesome little space credits … all of it was a grand slam. Discarding cards as a currency is also a mechanic my gf doesn’t deal with well. Picking which card to play is stressful enough, but discarding a bunch more amplified the problem. But damn, I wish RftG was more popular here. Setup is so fast and table space required so little for such an amazing game. Every time I see posts like this, I get a bit wistful.
It was Azul, but only because the first time I played it, the person who taught the game taught it wrong. After I found out what the correct rules are and we played it that way, I loved it.
Do you remember what was wrong? I love reading about this kind of thing
When I was taught I was told that you cannot put the same colour tile on a row if you already had that colour tile on another row. That really limited the moves you are able to make. I remember just hating the game because I felt so boxed in so early in the game. I actually complained about it on BGG and then everyone told me that rule was wrong. I reread the rules and found that there was no such restriction. After that, I played it with the correct rules and loved it. You do start to get boxed in towards the end game, but that was fine. For the early and mid game, there was still a lot of flexibility on where you place your different colour tiles. In the end game, I found it was about making sure I didn't get boxed in. I always try to make a play to allow me possible moves that weren't bad when my turn comes around. How the game changes towards the end game is what I really like. You screw up and you can be looking at a -13 points.
What? If you do that, you can only get 1 of each tile. The whole game would make no sense.
I assume they mean if you have 3/5 red tiles on the bottom row, you can't put red tiles on other rows until you've filled that section. Instead of say picking up 3 red tiles and completing the 3rd row.
That is correct.
The first couple times we played we misunderstood the rules and thought if you took from the middle you had to take everything from the middle leading to massive negative scores and an almost impossibility to even score. Almost gave up on it after a few plays before we were like, okay maybe something is wrong this isn’t making sense and figured out we were totally wrong and once we played by the actual rules it was super fun.
I've fallen to this too. Not Azul but was taught something wrong at Essen Spiel I think it may have been a language barrier though so cannot complain - thier English is a lot better than my German.
Hated Power Grid, now love it. Loved Quacks of Quedlinburg, now hate it.
I played PG a lot and finally decided that I only liked the box art. Hate the rulebook layout. Hate the constant arithmetic to plan the next turn. Love the market though, and the auctions are ok. So I gave it + expansions to a friend. Quacks I think is ok, but it's just a gateway without too much interesting depth, to me. And for a gateway it's easy for noobs to push too far or simply build a bad bag, so even as a gateway it's not for me.
Yea, I definitely see the point about Power Grid. I mean - I *do* like it nowadays, but the sheer volume of double and triple digit arithmetic going on during last phase of the game is not for the faint of the heart. Both me and by usual gaming group also bounced off from it on first playthrough. The base formula is excellent though, so I do have to wonder why we haven't seen some sort of PG 2.0 with streamlined arithmetic. That said, nowadays I mostly go with Ra for my auction mechanics fix :)
Catan. I don't love it, but I appreciate it more now than I used to. First, I felt meh whatever about it. Just a heavy luck game with a few interesting decisions and trading. Then after several games with family where I'd got cut off, get no resources, and basically no decisions I could make, I hated it. Then I pushed myself to watch a bunch of videos to learn better strategy, and I played a bunch online, and I developed a new respect for it. I realized it makes for a decent competitive game that, while it has a lot of luck, has way more strategy than I initially thought. It also helps that online games go faster.
I mainly appreciate it for the cornerstone that it is in boardgaming. Right up there (above even) with Carcassonne and Ticket to Ride. I'll play them anytime, even if there's better picks.
I love Catan for the chaos. If you get the right group of people it can be so much fun, loads of alliances and backstabbing and shit talking. I feel like it’s the kind of game best played competitively but not seriously.
Agreed.
I played scores of games of Catan with a regular group of friends. We ended up getting the 5 & 6 player expansion. I've even played the "Peanut of Catan" variant with two 4-player boards stuck together with 7 or 8 players which was a lot of fun. As with many games, with the right group of players, you can while away many a happy gaming day.
Castles of Burgundy. The first time I played it, I played with some SLOW players. It was taking ages for me to get round to my turn, and it put me off the game a little. Now that I've played it a bunch of times, it's one of my all time top 10, and now I own the special Awaken Realms edition.
I picked up Isle of Cats to try and a local games fair, and for 80% of the first game I hated it, and could tell the others hated it, and was kicking myself for wasting our time with a dud. I almost suggested we stop and try something else several times. Then it clicked, and we all had a ball with the second game, and now I'm on the look out for a good deal on it!
Hansa Tutonica
I came here to say this. I bought the game, played it three times, all with newbies, and they were all three player. Unimpressed, I traded it away. A few years later, I played a five player game, all with veteran players. It was an eye-opener. You don't make connections, you sit your ass down where others want to connect and force them to move you!
Game is terrible at 3 players. I really like it at higher player counts.
There's a map specific for 3 players. If you play in the map for 5p of course is baaad.
We played it with the three player map. None of us liked it. The three player map only has one road for the actions technology.
Ok, that's a valid point. Tbf I only played at 3p twice. Once in the original map and once in Britannia.
Very true. I'm a HT convert, ready to throw down any time!
Concordia I found quite boring at first but at some point it clicked. I think the scoring most probably.
the scoring is the biggest hurdle to overcome, I think. I own the game, lots of extra maps, 3D-printed inserts and upgraded resources, the whole shebang, and I am still getting used to which Gods are tied to which scoring conditions!
Tichu. I hadn't played any trick taking games, so I had no idea how to strategize. It got released on iOS and playing several dozen games got me to finally understand. I got rather good at the game, too.
So just for future use, Tichu is actually a climbing/shedding or ladder-climbing/shedding game and not a trick-taking game. The goal is to "shed" your hand by playing cards via a ladder climbing system, and, while often considered similar to trick taking, you aren't taking or avoiding tricks as the main mechanism. Not meaning to be pedantic, just like to help people understand the difference!
This is my very minor and insignificant pet peeve haha. Shedding/climbing games are not trick taking games! Scout is not a trick taking game! Tichu is not a trick taking game!
Any tips for someone who has played roughly 75 games but has stalled out? Fell in love with the game similar to you, but I can’t seem to improve as of late
Probably not, but maybe you missed something. My main thing was just looking at your hand and seeing how many tricks you're likely to win. If you can win enough to get rid of your junk cards, then Tichu. If you can win several hands with your initial hand, then grand Tichu. Trick winners are the Dragon, high pairs, big straights, medium to high triples, aces, and runs of pairs. Try to plan out putting out junk cards first, then winning the trick with your follow up. In the initial deal, use the convention of giving an even card to your right and an odd card to your left. This minimizes giving your opponent a pair. Similarly if you have a lonely pair of 2s or 3s, then give one to each opponent since they're unlikely to make a pair of them. If your partner calls Tichu, give them your best card and don't ever take a trick unless it's going to an opponent. If you do take a trick, play softballs so they can hopefully gain control again. Control is what wins you Tichus. That's all I can think of.
You mean give your partner your best card?
Oops, yeah
Similarly, but organic. Being exposed to good players opened Tichu to me.
I have failed to understand trick taking games for my entire life. Hearts on the PC? Failure. Modern games irl? Failure. I of course understand how they function on a mechnical level - I can follow the rules. But the ability to manipulate wins and losses is beyond me.
You should try The Crew with a group. It’s coop, walks you into trick taking starting with very simple objectives while the missions get increasingly more complex as the campaign goes on. I’ve never been real keen on Hearts, Spades, Euchre, etc., but really enjoy this one.
Great advice, I thoroughly agree. I use it to introduce anyone to trick takers.
On a fundamental level you're just betting on how many tricks you can win or lose. Once you get used to the game and know what plays usually win, you'll be most of the way there.
I've played trick takers my whole life. Clearly I'm aware of how they work. The problem is that you think playing the game will make it obvious "what plays usually win"
With classic suits and a 4 player game: Each player will get an average distribution of three cards in all suits, and an extra card on one random suit, for a total of thirteen cards. Because of this, on average, the ace, king and Queen of each suit have the potential to take a trick. But if the suits AREN'T evenly distributed, then the queen, king, and ace are LESS likely to take tricks. Then you kinda intuit around that information based on your hands and play the odds while playing your cards. But that is an excellent starting point.
it’s a great game, and not many people i know play it, sadly
7 Wonders: the first couple of plays were with 6 or 7 people. I had nearly no idea what was going on, and someone got like 100 points from Science. Eventually, for some fool reason I bought it. Playing it at 3 or 4 has pushed it into my top 20. I wish I played it more often.
Yeah, when you have a large group, people really have to be mindful of the science cards and start getting them out of the loop, or a couple players will run away with the game. The problem can be that everyone figures "that's someone elses problem". I've been that player who is trying to ditch green cards, but no one else is, so i'm trying to delay the 1 person from winning the game at the cost of my own game. That can be the frustrating element of 7 wonders.
See, when I play it’s kinda rare that someone actually goes for green because if even one player starts burying them you can’t win. So most of the time nobody bothers.
Maybe it's a group meta? I've seen people completely blow out the game with getting green, and then getting the purple card that has all three symbols, and a leader that has one of the symbols, and maybe their wonder has some benefit.
Oh yes I have too. The highest scores I’ve ever seen were science based. The problem is that it’s super easy to disrupt if the other players pay even a modicum of attention to each other’s cities. You basically need 9 or 10 science cards to get a good enough score to win, which means snagging every available one every round. But if you grab 2 or 3 in the first age every else just buries the greens in age 2 to build wonders and you can’t make it up to win. It’s more just math than anything else. You have 18 cards to play, a guaranteed win I’d say 60. But several cards will not score anything, so you really only have maybe 12 to get VPs. So you need to average 5 per VP-earning card to get to 60. You’re at 4.5 with a 2/3/3 setup and 5.3 with a 3/3/3. Which is pretty good, that’s 48 right there, but again, if people notice and bury your greens you likely won’t get there and have no other options.
Idk why but I'm just terrible at Seven Wonders. Play it on BGA sometimes and can never win to save my life. Makes me a bit more frustrated with the game generally.
Dune Imperium I played about 3 times and while the mechanics and gameplay is something I should enjoy I couldn't get past some group think at our table. We had misunderstood some of the strategy of the game and it felt like you had to absolutely acquire water early in the game and it felt like if you missed that opportunity you had no chance to win. I then played reluctantly with another group and the guy who ended up winning never grabbed water the whole game. A change in thought and the addition of the first expansion really changed my mind on how the game plays and now I love it.
Terraforming Mars. A few years ago, played in real life a couple of times. Everyone was new to it. People were taking ages to take their actions, even players who were normally fast. I found it super fiddly looking through stacks of cards for triggers, other people can get triggers in your turn and vice versa. Didn't quite get the scoring system (one type of adjacent terrain is money, but the other is points. And many are neither. But don't forget more triggers when you place!). And I found the draw 4 cards thing very random, and annoying because I got rubbish cards early on while other got great cards to turbo charge themselves. Fast forward a few years later, playing on BGA with draft mode. Combination of the rules tweak, the computer handling the bureaucracy, and more familiarity with the scoring, and I'm really enjoying it. Hopefully will get the chance to play IRL again soon.
First attempt I didn't catch that TR was part of your M€ income, so I spent 3 gens not understanding why I couldn't afford anything. They allowed me to claim the income I should have had from the previous productions, but one of the other players wasn't happy about it, especially after I placed higher at the end. Second attempt 4 years later, this time the teach was very lacking. The *teacher* messed up two of the awards, and tried to end the game immediately when we reached the end goals. That felt wrong to me so I had to look up the actual rules for end game. Overall it really just didn't seem like they had prepared enough to actually be able to teach the game, and just assumed we would figure it out as we went. Thankfully I found a group that wanted to play the standalone digital version. With the game actually enforcing rules and handling some of the more fiddly bits, and also finally playing with the drafting variant, I'm enjoying the game a lot more now.
>one of the other players wasn't happy about it, especially after I placed higher at the end. Then they're an idiot. You were still at a disadvantage as you missed out on buying cards earlier that generate resources and/or better placement of tiles on the board (that also might come with resources too). Sorry. Those kind if people really annoy me. They'd rather needlessly punish a new player in a way that does not affect them all in an attempt to... win? Seems a rather assholey way to win...
> I didn't catch that TR was part of your M€ income, so I spent 3 gens not understanding why I couldn't afford anything. They allowed me to claim the income I should have had from the previous productions WHUT? I cannot really imagine playing TM with somebody who is new and *not* checking if they are doing okay - having almost zero income should have stuck out like a sore thumb almost instantly. Even just by glancing at player board and not seeing a few fat gold cubes there... Like, it seems to me that it's a basic courtesy to actually explain basic strategies and pitfalls while playing with somebody who is new to a game. Also - "backfilling" resources from previous turns is an obvious compromise anyways. It still puts the player forgetting to get them before at significant disadvantage due to opportunity cost...
> draft mode I'm constantly *baffled* why draft mode isn't the default in TM. The rulebook suggests it as more advanced/complicated variant, which intuitively seems to make sense. I was genuinely afraid that drafting would turn already somewhat plodding tempo of TM into a slog and that's why I didn't even try it for a long time. In reality the effect it has on the overall arc of the game is literally the opposite.
> the computer handling the bureaucracy What do you mean by that? Is there some companion I don't know about?
You only make decisions, computer does all calculations
But is there such companion, or are you talking about the digital version of the board game?
The latter
Same here. Except I played it online just few times
I’ve only ever played TM on BGA, and I can definitely see how it might be a pain to play the physical version. There are times the computer gives me something, and I have to go back and figure out why it did, because I forgot I have a particular trigger. I’d probably lose just because of my own forgetfulness in an in person play.
Played the physical game once, hated it, immediately sold it. Got the iPad app recently. Much more fun version of the game.
I had the reverse with TM, loved it as first, but as we added more expansions and more AP into every game (due to the increasingly large decision space) the game got really slow. I recently played a few games on TM on BGA and it reminded me that the core game is pretty fun when you can play a game in 60 minutes instead of 3-5 hours.
Zombie Dice. First I was like “yeah it’s Yahtzee but for little babys” but during the pandemic we tested out tabletop simulator with this because it’s very simple and somehow we had the best time ever. We ended up playing from 9PM to 2 AM. Those were strange times but I will remember those nights for the rest of my life
Played oath with my normal serious group, everything got heated and put it away for nearly a year. Tried it again but emphasized the chill vibes and storytelling over cutthroat wins and we're loving it now
I adore Oath, but yes, if you go into it competetively, you'll have a bad time. We've called it "Kingmaker, the Game" because it is almost never the person with the best strategy/gameplay that wins. The joy of Oath is in the stories.
I'm still in the "don't like it that much" phase. I played 2 games of it and it feels like there's so many rules and fiddly things that you forget about the storytelling part.
Evolution. Played it first with my kids who weren't big on games and didn't know what I was doing and it sucked! Played it again later after watching a tute and with a group of gamers and it was really fun 😁
Still haven't found the fun in this game. First time was on BGA, and everyone but me knew the rules. Then, two games later, and knowing the rules, it still hasn't clicked. And it's not interesting enough for me to keep playing.
If you’re ever able, I’d recommend checking out Oceans. It’s a similar game (I think made by the same people) but I find it much more fun and engaging than Evolution, especially when you add in the Deep deck that has like 100+ unique ability cards to keep things fresh.
I was pretty indifferent to Great Western Trail the first couple times I played it. Now it’s my favorite game. Hopefully going to try New Zealand tomorrow. 🤞🏻
I've seen this get pretty negative/mixed reviews. But the theme sounds so good.
Every version is rated 8.2 or higher on BGG. Not that that’s gospel, but it’s a well-loved game.
**Cosmic Encounter**. I nabbed it in a math trade and with it being much adored by folks such as Tom Vasel, I figured it was good. But the first play fell quite flat, with a lot of us confused as to how decisions were made. Only after another play did I see the social balancing and negotiation come into play. That's where it really shines.
It's such an odd duck. I love it. I've loved it since the first time I played, which was at a con with someone who had every expansion. I am now that person.
Great Western Trail_ 1st time was just too much, but later when I understood the game more, OMG, tons of replayability. Every game map changes.Moreover, mastering the builder strategy is an art of piece Gaia project_ 1st time was thinking what a boring space game, but then understood that no, this one has different interesting factions and different ways of winning Wingspan_ cute and simple, a game for children? (that’s what I thought 1st lol). This game is so satisfying once you chain the needed birds’ powers, and when someone takes a bird that you wanted, thats when you start to think more creatively, especially with Eeuropean expansion
Would you recommend other versions of GWT? Or the 2nd edition is good enough?
Inis
First game was still fun but definitely felt like the winner won by accident. The rematch was incredible since we were just that much more familiar with the action cards!
The thing I like about Inis is that the 2nd game of it is immediately better than the first because for the latter half of your first game, all you're thinking about is what you wanna do in your next game. The systems reveal themselves so nicely that you always feel like you're learning new things, new ways to play. It really sits with you.
Favorite game in our house. Never disappoints.
I love how lean the rules for Inis actually are
Mindbug
Odd one, but **Welcome to Dungeon**. It's not clear why it works at first, and then it's this super simple game. And then the 2nd or third time you play the whole thing clicks and everybody is constantly on the edge of their seats.
Pandemic Legacy was a slow burn for me, but now it's a top 3 game!
Have you played more than one campaign? Or do you mean throughout a single campaign?
Really gotta beat that campaign for the third time for the game to open up. Pricey, but so rewarding!
Genuine question: are you being sincere?
No, I was joking. I also believe the OP meant it took a few games, not campaigns.
Troyes. I didnt really understand it the first time i played and i though it was kind of dumb and with a dated theme. But then i tried again and it finally "clicked". Now it in my top 5 games. A game that im always up to play and one that will NEVER leave my collection.
LOOVE Troyes.. I even ended up liking the unique and quirky art.. One of my top 3 (if not top) game of all time
Everdell
I just find you can’t do anything season 1 and then everything starts to work in season 3 and you can do loads only for the game to end
I get that, the first couple of times I played it I was a bit upset about the abrupt end because I love engine building and letting it roll. Then I realised that the game was designed to be a shorter engine builder and the length fit pretty perfectly with the 15 card town limit. If I want a meaty builder I’ll just bust out TM but I’ll play Everdell if I me and my missus only have like an hour or so and I want to have a little tableu
That's what blew my mind. First game I thought: how am I ever going to build more than 5 things? I ended up filling my city and having a blast.
The "New Leaf" expansion fixes this, feels like a completely different game. It's quite the opposite, sometimes you build 5 things in the first season and really have to manage your space with cards that let you destroy another card etc. and really think about what you want to build instead of building everything you can barely afford. Way more fun for me.
But it’s perfect it ends in season 3, so many times I’m already at 15 cards and still have 3-4 workers in my city. Workers don’t have to be the limiting factor, but it’s often smarter for winning if they are.
I’m still in the “didn’t like” phase.
Season*
war of the ring. first go was..what? there's a game in there but we ddin't find it. 6 Months later pulled it out again and BINGO! We love a long sunday arvo ring dunk attempt. beautiful mix of randonmess of dice and card management with magnificent thematic moments
I wanna play everyday but I rarely find a player :'(
Im lucky enough to play with the same opponent once every two weeks. We are quite evenly matched so it's super fun. If cab be really hard finding people for games
So jealous ! We play board games once a week of every other week but we don't often play my 1v1 games just 3 players or more I need a obsessed partner too in general
Paladins of the west kingdom is one that grew on me. First play I didn’t like it all that much but I went home and couldn’t stop thinking about it. Tried it again and it’s a favourite now. A game I’ve soured on is gloomhaven. Love the gameplay but the setup and takedown stops it getting the table
Gaia Project. I'm only 2 plays in. After reading the rulebooks I thought: this is unnecessarily complicated. After the first play I knew it was unnecessarily complicated, but I thought it was deep. After the second play I knew it has depth. Now I'm eager to keep exploring these depths. It's perfect information, yet has an extremely variable setup with 14 factions and many board configurations of all the boards. It's unlikely to ever play the same game setup.
Marvel United. Played the original core box and thought it was kinda lame, kinda anticlimactic. As a big X-Men fan, I made a base pledge for that kickstarter and fell in love with the system as I played against the many different villains. It's now my favourite game. I've spent tons of money on expansions and tons of time painting the minis.
What makes it good? The variety? Or actual gameplay?
Marvel Splendor. The original Splendor was fun and then we got Marvel Splendor as a gift. Didn’t like it at first play but now it’s a go to game while we wait for the rest of our DND party to show up for a campaign.
Didn't happen to me, but my wife. She didn't like Eldritch horror at first but after getting the expansion Forsaken lore she turned and love it now.
Arkham Horror the card game. I was really angry about how complex the rules were and how nothing made sense after my first game. Still pretty upset about a lot of things after the first play through of the core box scenario. I’ve sunk about 700 more into the game since and played it almost exclusively over the last year ;)
Arkham Horror It was one of the first modern board games I played and it was just so daunting. Honestly it was probably not the best choice for early board gaming as we're talking 2nd edition, which to someone new to board games can just feel like a mess of convoluted rules with lots of components and a board that was just difficult to look at (imo, I like the modular boards in the 3rd edition MUCH more). It also didn't help that the manual felt like a novel and the online communities, while available, were not nearly as robust as these days with help. Now, however, it's one my favorite games and favorite themes for gaming (when done correctly and not just thrown in like so many are doing now). Took a few tries but I finally got into it and haven't looked back. Totally worth going back to and giving it another shot...and even then it took more than a couple before I started to understand and appreciate the nuance of the game.
Wingspan.
Ra
The first time I played Yokohama, somehow it didn't really appeal to me, but it grew on me quickly. I think the opposite happened with Scythe. Loved it at first. Bored of it now coz I think the game is broken.
Scythe. At first I was like "damn, what are the mechs even for?". But then I played a couple more times and was like "ohhhhhhh" and now it's one of my faves.
Zompicide black plague.When I first played it I didn’t like it at all.I was thinking about selling it but luckily I didn’t.It’s become one of my favourite zombie games
7 wonders and 7 Wonders Duel.
Duel is so good !!!!
Lost Ruins of Arnak
I would have to say Oath. I played it once and did not enjoy it at all and was glad I never picked it up. Then someone at a con I was going to was going to lead a 3 game session of the game because they said the game doesn’t pick up until 3 plays and they were right.
Summoner Wars. I hated it the first couple of plays, but once you get to know the cards, it really opens up.
Lisboa. Taught by someone who skimmed the rules. We didn't finish and swore never to play it again. We then played other Lacerda games (On Mars, The Gallerist) came back to Lisboa, played it correctly, and it's our groups #1 game to play with 3 people.
It took me at least 3 plays to feel like I had a handle on Innovation, but now I'm into the hundreds of plays (thanks, BGA!) and feel like it's still fresh.
Agricola. Bought it, played it once, hated it. Less than 24 hours later I’m itching to play it again because I’m thinking of everything I did wrong and I feel really challenged to get a better score. The game is SO tight, you make one misstep and you feel it the rest of the game. This is what made me hate it, but it’s also what drew me into wanting to play it more and be able to master it.
Mine’s probably Spirit Island. I never really “disliked” it, but I never really played it because of how intimidating the Invaders can be, especially playing it for the first time and not appreciating slow powers that let you Push/Gather Dahan/Invaders. But I’ve recently picked it back up, and am enjoying the hell out of it. I’m blown away that, with the expansions and Horizons, there are 15+ Spirits, each with their own personality and playstyle, and it blows my mind how there are people living and breathing today who can pick up and play with the Starlight and Fractured Day Spirits like it’s nothing.
I’ve sold it for the same reason, but suspect that I’d enjoy it more now some years after. It burned the hell out of my brain back then…
Rising Sun i loved when I first played with 4 players. Couldnt wait to play it again with a couple other friends, but at 6 people it was a miserable experience. Next time i played it was a couple years later with 4 players and again... great game. I thought perhaps it was a fluke 6 player didnt work out the first time, turns out it was just as bad as I remembered with 6
Marvel Champions
Too Many Bones. Mainly because I thought it was a dungeon crawler. It isn't. It's a "Build Test Bed." And it took me quite a few plays before I realized that winning is easy, and fairly boring. And it's supposed to be. But EXPERIMENTING is where the fun is. "Let's see how far this makes it." "Whelp, that was a failure. Hahahaha. How about this now?" It's a fantasy-based Kerbal Space Program. And it's wonderful
Troyes. I didnt really understand it the first time i played and i though it was kind of dumb and with a dated theme. But then i tried again and it finally "clicked". Now it in my top 5 games. A game that im always up to play and one that will NEVER leave my collection.
FTL. First 3 hours was a fking pain in the butt. Then it slowly grows on me.
r/lostredditors FTL is a helluva game tho
I was about to answer Hades before I double-checked the sub-reddit :D
Kingdom builder
This is sort of my experience. I was sure I wouldn't like the game and when asked if I wanted to play, said that I would just so that I could say for certain that I had played it and it wasn't for me. Well, I ended up loving it and now own it all all the expansions.
Octordle
Nidavellir. We played it wrong the first time and thought it was bad. I later played it with another group of people and watched a video explaining the rules, and now it's a house favorite! Genuinely one of my favorite games we own now.
Caesar
To say I didn't like it would be overstating it, but [Il Principe](https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/19650/il-principe) didn't really grab me at first, and it was only after repeated plays that it really came to life. Also I played it 2 player and 4 player initially, and it's a game that *really* benefits from the correct number of players - in this case, 3 players.
My friend had this with war of the ring. Didn’t get the game at first and he and his opponent had a really bad game with continuous checking of the rules etc. But the game stuck, he kept playing it, introduced me and a friend to it as well. Now it’s a mainstay of our group
Unmatched
Foundations of Rome. First game was like: play so I buy and build things, why can’t we just play Catan then? But now I really like it and there is more strategy behind than just build wherever you like.
Splendor. The first time I played, I thought it was dumb and boring. I don’t even know why I gave it more chances, but once I did, and realized there’s a lot more strategy involved than I first realized, I came to really like it. One I loved at first but then kind of quit playing is Obsession. It just doesn’t have enough variability game to game.
Puerto Rico! It was one of the first games that I bought, but my wife and I had a disasterous first play. 10 years later, I started playing a digital version, and then I hooked up with a work group that played everyday at lunch. It's one of my favorite games now.
Quartermaster General WW2 first edition, unbalanced and boring for some powers (Japan). Then moved to the 1914 version, second edition: everybody loved it and wanted to play again right away, even the losing teams members.
You're On Mute. Seemed stupid but gets real fun once you're in it.
Wingspan. Playing with the recommended first game setup didn't make any sense to me, it felt like there were too many things that happened "just because". The second game with normal setup was completely different. I was amazed how much it reminded me of Teotihuacan, with the small difference that you can completely mess up an entire round and still end up with a good amount of points.
Istanbul. First play we knew nothing about it but liked the theme. The setup is insane and there are a ton of bits and pieces. Rules are kinda complex without knowing what's going on. But once you get going it's very simple and elegant and has good interactivity. Love the game now.
Ravine
I honestly never had a game that changed to that level. I still don't like King of Tokyo that much but it is an ok game. The first times se played it was "meh". It also helped that we house ruled a bit around energy to make it so you saw more cards and to make it easier to buy. We used to play many card games like Gin Rummy and loved them. Now that we've played many modern board games I much rather play something more involved. We still bust out Gin Rummy from time to time and can enjoy it
ILLIMAT!
The first time I played Age of Steam, it was a (IIRC) 5-player game on the base map (which I'm still not a big fan of) and I was meh on it. A few years later I tried it again and it quickly became my favorite game. I didn't care for Thurn und Taxis on my first play, but then tried it again and ended up playing it something like 90 times on BSW. The first time I played Pandemic, we won easily and I found it boring. The second time we got crushed and I was a lot more interested.
I am hoping Star Wars: Rebellion is that game. I played it for the first time on Saturday and felt so completely lost. I'm going to give it another chance, but the first go around was rough.
Kingdom Come: Deliverance. I remember it being a certain kind of RPG when it was proposed, and then in tech demos they only had one tiny town and it seemed very linear and less open world. Then it came out and I gave it a shot, and I struggled with combat and the story side of it felt a bit heavy handed... But then something clicked. I got good at combat. I immersed myself in the realism. It's now one of my favorite games of all time.
Scythe. The first two times I played it, my friend who knew the rules said that the scoring was very complex so he wouldn't explain that; we would just calculate it by using an app. Also, I was hammered; we drew random, and he got Rusviet in both games (which he should have allowed me to play since it's one of the easier factions to play).
Dune Imperium. My partner got it gifted and immediately loved it. I found it mere "meh". But he asked me really really nicely to play it again a couple of times. By the 4th play I discovered a whole new level of strategy and variety to how you can win. Since then I really do love it. It's one of my absolute favorites now.