October's Games

October featured 25 plays of 14 different games. Top of the list?

Werewolf I have played 29 games of Werewolf this year so far, 5 of them in October, and I foresee some more in the future. Well, when I say play, I can assume that actually for the majority of these games I've been Moderating the game for others rather than playing it myself. But moderating it is fun and creative so it still counts :)

Forbidden Island (3 plays) is by game designer Matt Leacock who also designed Pandemic which I played twice this month. They share similar mechanics and are both cooperative games where the players join forces as a team to beat the game. In forbidden Island the goal is to rescue 4 treasures from the island before it sinks into the ocean. I like the way the pace of this game speeds up as the game continues. It starts off looking easy to do but the island starts sinking faster and faster and so some difficult decisions have to be made. Ultimately a lot comes down to the shuffling of one deck of cards to whether you can achieve your goal or not. I enjoy this and I think it is a good gateway game to introduce people to cooperative gaming.

Haggle is a game that deserves special mention as it doesn't get played very often. I ran this game on our Men's Retreat this year. I handed out over 45 envelopes each containing 10 random colored cards and two rules. The men had approximately 24 hours to negotiate and trade deals with one another. At the end of that time they submitted an envelope with a set of cards that I scored according to all 15 rules.

A large part of the game is in obtaining and interpreting all 15 rules. Not an easy task. Of all the envelopes I handed out I received back 7 which I scored using a spreadsheet that my friend Bill prepared for me - scoring by hand is a real hassle, so thanks Bill!!!!

Some of the guys got really into trying to obtain all 15 rules. They managed it, but even then interpreting their interplay is not the easiest task, and they were beaten by the youngest kid at the retreat who only saw half the rules but took a very educated guess. I love surprise upsets!!!

Snowtails made a welcome return to the table, as did Die Aufsteiger.

In a few weeks I will be off to Dallas for my yearly boardgame convention :) 5 days of playing boardgames with other aficionados. Who knows what new and exciting games I will return with!!!