Board Gaming Bonanza

One of things I'm really thankful for is that I am starting to play board games more and more frequently now. Just this month, I got to play three times. The first game night was hosted by Cla at her house. She just got a copy of Flamecraft, which is a relatively new game that has been getting really good reviews from people. Players take turns placing dragons in shops around town, gathering items, and casting enchantments. The actions per turn are simple so this is quite an easy game to learn and play. It also looks really cute!

Flamecraft

I feel like it's a good game to play with casual gamers and I was tempted to get a copy but I decided against it because I still have way too many board games that I haven't played yet haha. We played Flamecraft twice that night, and I was lucky to win both times by really slim margins (in fact, the first time we played it, I won by only 1 point!)

Winning my first Flamecraft game by the slimmest of margins!

We also played Acquire, a game which Cla says she really loves. The good thing about this game is up to 6 players can play it so all of us that night were able to participate. This game is essentially a business and stock investment game. It mirrors reality quite well because you have to predict which businesses will grow and which ones may acquire others, and your decision to invest in stocks will be based on these predictions. It took me a while to get the hang of it, but an early decision to invest in a certain stock that grew massively turned out to be a great move. I ended up winning the game, much to my great surprise!

My winnings in Acquire

We also played Acquire, a game which Cla says she really loves. The good thing about this game is up to 6 players can play it so all of us that night were able to participate. This game is essentially a business and stock investment game. It mirrors reality quite well because you have to predict which businesses will grow and which ones may acquire others, and your decision to invest in stocks will be based on these predictions. It took me a while to get the hang of it, but an early decision to invest in a certain stock that grew massively by the end of the game turned out to be a great move for me because I ended up winning the game!

My next game night was with my FGTC friends (yes, our board game group has a name!). I used to be able to play until dawn with them but since the pandemic, I realized I don't have the energy to play until the wee hours of the morning anymore so now, I am usually the first person to leave. Despite this, I was able to play a few games with them that night. The one I enjoyed the most that night was The Lord of the Rings: Shadows over Middle-earth Exit game. This is like a tabletop version of escape rooms. We managed to figure out most of the challenges unassisted save for one, and for that, we had to get a clue. It took us about an hour and a half to solve the game and we had to get a clue so I thought we didn't do very well but we actually did get a decent score.

We also got to play That's a Question, a really interesting game where you present a questions to one of the other players and everyone else has to guess what that player's answer is going to be. If all players answer it correctly or no one does, you score zero points. If no one gets it correctly, you also score zero points. But if some people get it, you score points. On other players turns, if you answer the question correctly, you also score a point. It's a really interesting and fun game but it works better if you know the other players well enough.

Just last weekend, I met up with another set of friends for my third board game day/night of the month. This time, I got to play with some people who hadn't played board games since before the pandemic, including Denise and Mike. Most of the games played that night were games I had played before, including Lords of Waterdeep which Denise requested, Parks which I asked Mitch to bring, and Wingspan which Mike really wanted to play.

I have several more game nights lined up in the upcoming month so I am definitely looking forward to those. The key now is for me to start playing more of my board games that I hadn't played before yet.