I brought along three options: Lords of Waterdeep, Stone Age, and Biblios. Katie still wanted to play Carcassone but before I could throw a foot-stamping tantrum she was shouted down by Mark and Sally. Still reeling from this spontaneous show of enthusiasm for a new game, I stayed out of the selection process, which ended when Mark chose Lords of Waterdeep.
All three were slightly trepidatious about the theme, but these reservations were soon swept away by the new reservations about what the buildings did. But apart from that, the game moved relatively quickly - it's so easy to pick up - and the cards 'Placate the Moving Statue' et al - remained the same source of bemusement as they are for us. Plus we had cheese.
Mark was lagging in 4th place for some time, but as I suspected he had the Lord who rewards buildings and having caught us up, he shot past me and Katie in final scoring. But Sally's concentration on very expensive Quests had brought her serially large chunks of victory points, and all four of her completed quests were (50% unwittingly) rewarded by her Lord too, so Mark was unable to fully overhaul her well-established lead, sharing the spoils:
Sally/Mark: 104
Sam 85
Katie 83
So a reasonable successful debut, most notable for Sally's suggestion of a games tent at a festival. I barely had time to register my joy before she added "for people who've lost all their friends, and have nowhere to go".
I wish I could say she was joking, but she wasn't. Another conversational nail gun pierces my heart...
A valiant undertaking, Sam, and a successful one!
ReplyDeleteI've been thinking that Waterdeep's fantasy theme might be off-putting to casual gamers, but perhaps less so than medieval cathedral-building or stone-age subsistence - if you're going to embrace your inner-geek for the evening then you may as well go the whole hog and don the D&D inn-keeper's tabard.
We've been playing lots of 10 Days in Europe and 6 Nimmt up here in Scotland - 10 Days is definitely the favourite, even with Charlotte.
However, we did get down to something a little more substantial the other evening.
It was C's idea even - let's get the kids to bed early and I'll play a game with you. It's almost 'let's play a game', with a pinch of self-sacrifice.
I chose Hammer of the Scots, the legendary block war game with not very many rules! Okay, that's 'not many rules for a war game', but still. She loves history, she loves Scotland, what can possibly go wrong.
I set it up, she sat down, looked at the board and her demeanour darkened - "Let's just play", she snapped. Oh dear. HotS isn't really a game you can just play, despite it's relatively simple rulebook.
We lasted a turn, and I think she's gone off Scottish history. It's my own fault, I know - I should have suggested Agricola or 1960, something she already knows the rules to. Problem is she already hates those . . .
Never let them see the board, Joe.
ReplyDeleteYou raise a good point about theme. I recall a friend's reaction to me explaining Tinner's Trail, which was somewhere between embarrassment and shock. I don't know why. If you explained Monopoly to someone who'd never played it, it's just as specifically banal as tin mining. But there you have it.
I should explain Sally was trying to be complimentary about the cosy nature of games as opposed to the semi-organised chaos of a probably drug-accompanied experience of a festival. But obviously not all of us need a surrounding nightmare in order to approach games with a sense of enthusiasm...
Yep, a rookie mistake . . .
ReplyDeleteThe latest episode of Boardgames to Go is all about the idea of theme in games, and raises lots of interesting points. Mark Johnson's love of euro themes is really a direct result of his wanting his hobby (boardgames) to be befitting of a grown-up, and finds the fantasy themes too childish, a sentiment I agree with (though there are times I'm happy to let my inner geek stretch it's fantasy legs).
But yes, perhaps the more the theme fits non-gamers perception of what boardgames should be, childish things for occasional indulgence, the less forbidding and peculiar they may seem. Perhaps the key to making boardgames more mainstream is a certain amount of dumbing-down (at least theme-wise, not in terms of mechanics).
That's not to say Lords of Waterdeep has a silly theme - it's approach is relatively sober and adult despite the fantasy theme.
Yeah, Sally thought LoW was a bit dry, which is slightly contrary to the theme I guess.
ReplyDeleteIt's a conundrum. I would have assumed the less silly the theme, the more acceptable it would be to non-gamers, but as you say it does seem to actually go the other way.
Mark Johnson has been surprised by how much he's enjoyed Lords of Waterdeep too, as it runs contrary to his preference for historical themes - there's an earlier podcast where he reviews it.
ReplyDeleteI guess there's a middle ground, with games like Colosseum, which have a historical backdrop but engage the players in a competition about something much more light-hearted and fun. It is perhaps a little too long to throw out as a casual gaming game, though.
And Lords of Vegas has broad appeal I think - you could almost pitch it as Monopoly-with-gambling to the uninitiated. To the initiated, of course, it's Chinatown-with-gambling . . .
"When I became a man, I put away childish things, including the fear of appearing childish" - great quote.
ReplyDeleteyeah, nice that.
ReplyDelete