Tildetablers,

What board games, card games and whatnot have you been playing this week? Don't be shy, share those sessions!

For me it was a single game of Western Legends with expansions. I've played this game, sans expansions, a couple of times and have never really been blown way, but the expansion certainly helped and I enjoyed it a whole lot more.

The game sets you as a character in the wild west. It's a bit of a sandbox game: there are a bunch of things you can do and you have freedom moving around and doing them. You can hustle cattle, play poker, buy upgrades, prospect for gold, fight, steal, &c. You basically earn points by doing each of these things and working your way up various tracks to earn legendary points which are victory points.

The expansions added a whole frontier area to explore and added story cards, which are basically thematic events that give you goals to claim. I feel like extra board and story cards really improved the experience and immersion and it was much more enjoyable this time around. We also played two characters each, which may also have helped, as this made it possible to explore different strategies at the same time.

I'm still not massively impressed with the game, but I don't think I'll disappointed if it's suggested now. If I were forced to rate it I'd probably give it a 1.8/π.

So, everyone, what have you played this week? What did you think? What are you hoping to play next?

Hey Tabletidlers,

Another week and another opportunity to share what you've been playing.

For me I was able to finally play the Zombie Apocalypse map for Age of Steam. This map sees you delivering goods (cubes) around a map of Michigan as usual, but whilst dealing with the map evolving due to a horde of zombies. The zombies move in a deterministic manner, so it's possible to plan ahead, but towns or cities the zombies reach are razed, which converts them to a colourless city and removes any cubes upon them. The zombies also add a cost to building track and add a cost to delivering cubes, unless you take the Military Caboose action, which replaces the normal Locamotive spot. Very enjoyable map and the random starting location for the seed zombies means it'll play very differently, I imagine, each game.

So, don't be shy, share what you've managed to get played this week.

Time to share your weekly board gaming.

For me it consisted of a game of Aquanauts at a monthly gathering I've only attended for the second time. The host of the group posted about his new group in a village hall in the middle of nowhere (UK) over on Reddit. Well the middle of nowhere turned out to be not far from where I live so I've been trying to make it when I can ever since.

Aquanauts was published by a UK publisher Inside the Box Games (best known for Sub Terra) but they went bust recently and another company stepped in and fulfilled the Kickstarter. The game is a basic worker placement, where you're sending your robotic submersibles (workers) out to collect or convert resources. What makes it interesting is that the worker spots are linked, and playing a spot linked to another that has a player worker on it scores you both a bonus resource. You can also build tiles on your player board to similarly receive or convert goods during the income phase. Other than that, you're trying to load up a submarine with the correct resources to score contract cards, and there's a degree of hedging your bets as the person who takes the final slot on the submarine gets to choose the order in which the players claim contracts. It's a fairly good game, fun enough on first play but largely unmemorable.

Tonight I got in a game of Carnegie. This is a great game that sees you building up your office with departments, staffing them and sending your workers on missions to build buildings across the map of the USA, linking cities. I royally screwed up my first turn and spent several rounds trying to recover which left me way behind on points. Great game with a lot to think about but which neither takes too long to teach or play.

What have you all been playing?

Hi everyone,

It's been another week and it's time again time to share what you've managed to table over the past week.

Personally I had a two player game of Barrage, the first time I've played the game in a year or two. I completely forgot just how stressful Barrage is.

I tried to screw my opponent over by adding a conduit to a basin that was his main energy source and he responded in kind by tapping mine. Thus the game became very centred on turn order and he kept beating my production and securing it each round. Whilst this happened I amssased a huge number of concrete mixers and excavators and thought I'd be able to pull his lead back by outbuilding him, but it never really happened and he ended up winning by a very comfortable margin. Great game, but very stressful to play.

We followed up with a couple of games of Santorini.

Also, participation has been a bit lacklustre the past couple of weeks. I'm wondering if this weekly thread is actually enjoyable or just annoying?

Sorry Tabletiddles, couple of days late with the thread as I've been busy on the bank holiday weekend here in UK.

What boardgames have you all been playing this week? Please share your experiences,.no matter what you've been playing.

What have you all been playing this week?

My Saturday night games got cancelled by an impromptu family gathering, so I didn't play anything other than a couple of Unlock games with my daughter. We played the first two of Escape Adventures called The Formula and Squeek & Sausage. Definitely preferred S&S out of these two and a couple of the puzzles fitted the comic book styling very well.

Share your gaming sessions!

Sorry Boardtiddleums, little late with the weekly thread!

Saturday I got in a couple of games of Bus!, securing a comfortable victory in the first and an even more comfortable defeat in the second. Every time I play Bus! I love it it that little bit more: central map with interesting decisions, worker placement where you choose how fast you burn through your workers, ability to lose a victory point to screw everyone else over...what's not to like?

After that we played Stockpile, which is always fun. We were a bit rusty on the rules so didn't play with any expansion material.

Finished up with a game of Cat in the Box, which a fantastic little spin on trick taking games. The deluxe edition that you can currently get is so overproduced, but in the nicest possible way.

So what have you all been busy playing this week?

Tabletildians,

Which games have you all been playing this week? Time to share and compare.

Personally, my group and I played a game of Racoon Tycoon, a simple but enjoyable little trading, auction and set collection game. We didn't do any auctions for quite some time at the beginning and I was starting to think the game was going to be a bit dull, but the auction really transformed it, and it was actually really quite enjoyable.

After that we played Iberian Railways. I wasn't too impressed with the board, as it looked bleached out like it had been left in the window of a shop. But the game was fun, marking routes with cubes, taking loans and claiming business contracts. Interestingly you're trying to earn money to buy the routes but you're measured equally on other criteria, like longest route, most cities, &c. It amusingly (read: disappointingly) ended in a three-way tie, with no tie-breakers. Don't think I can recommend this one, due mainly to the scoring.

Finally we played a few games of Cat in the Box. Absolutely fantastic trick-taking game where your cards have numbers but no suits and you decide the suit of each card as you play it, marking off that colour and suit combination on a board. Thus the gamut of possibilities for your remaining cards shrinks as cards are played. Really recommend this one, it was great fun.

Hi boardtiddlers,

It's that time of the week again already. Another opportunity to discuss what you've been playing this week.

Personally I've only managed a single game of Hegemony, this time as the middle classes, with my opponents playing working class and state, and with a robot for the capitalists. It was a bit of a crazy game: capitalist automaton managed to open companies across all three rows of the board. I, as middle, had a fair number too, so production was massive and there was little unemployment. We actually ran out of unskilled middle class workers and influence cubes. Working class managed a comfortable win with state and middle coming joint second some twelve or so points behind. I really think we need to work out how to nix the working class, because they've been strong in every game so far.

So tell us about your sessions this week.

Hey tabletilders,

It's been another week. Let's share what we all played this week!

For me it was a single play of Pax Renaissance with a promo expansion that changes the starting state of the board. I completely dominated the trade routes and accumulated a huge stash of cash, but was unable to get the comet out to activate the win condition that would leverage it. My opponents then mowed down my commissions, so I had to pivot quite heavily. But I wasn't too worried as I had so much cash, so could nab any card I wanted, including the next comet.

Unfortunately two of us took our eyes of the ball and our third player managed a sneaky protestant victory. Annoyingly there was an apostasy I could have bought that would have nixed this, but I totally didn't see it coming. Great game.

After that we wound down with a quick game of Scout. Fun little game that makes me want to explore the trick-taking space a bit more, but it seems all the highly praised ones I read about are out of stock. I might see if any of these can be played with a poker deck.

So what have you all been playing?

It's been another week and I thought – if there's not too much protest – we could all talk about what we've been playing again.

Personally I got in the one game of Hegemony at three players. I've played it twice before at two, and adding the third player really took the tension up a notch.

I played as the proletariat, which I think is the simplest class to play. Once again played no strikes or demonstrations, so I really think I might be missing a concept as it never seemed like a worthwhile pursuit. But it's really hard to predict how pulling any particular string in this game will resolve, so I think I'd just go for it in a subsequent game to see what happens.

The capitalists, like in previous games, started very weak but by the last few rounds were raking in the points. I managed a very narrow victory of four or five points over the capitalists. Middle class, who had to take a loan mid-game, never really recovered and were twenty points behind. Fun game, I can see why it's popular.

So what have you all managed to get played this week?

Personally I've received Earth and managed to get in a game at two players and another at five. I like the big stack of cards and the fact it plays so fast, but I think I prefer Ark Nova, which adds the tile laying puzzle too.

Earth does look funky by the end though, with all the shoots sprouting up from the table.

Also managed to get in a couple of rounds of Fugitive, the card based hidden movement game from Tim Fowers. I think this is an excellent little game to fill half an hour at the end of the evening. I keep eyeing up the events cards it comes with but have not yet been brave enough to actually play with them.

What have you all been playing?

This topic is part of a weekly series where we can talk about board games. Feel free to talk about any aspect of board gaming you'd like. Here are some potential talking points to get you started:

• Are you looking for a recommendation? Tell us a game you'd like, and we'll see if we can think of one that may suit you.
• Have you tried something new and want to chat about it? Tell us about why you like a particular board game!
• Did you have a particularly interesting tabletop gaming experience? Tell us about your 9-point swing in Catan, or the time you managed to finish off the entire village in Ultimate Werewolf!

This is a recurring thread in ~games.tabletop where we can talk about board games in a fun way. Feel free to discuss boardgames in any way you want! Each week I add a guiding topic / question, just to help things along:

What's the last game you played?

This is a recurring thread in ~games.tabletop where we can talk about board games in a fun way. Feel free to discuss boardgames in any way you want, but I like to add a bit of a hook each week to spice things up. Here's my hook for this thread:

What's one of your favourite board game and why?

Edit: I made the question a bit less hard to answer - instead of your absolute favourite, pick a favourite, and talk about it.

I'd love to see a recurring thread here in ~games.tabletop where we can talk about board games in a fun way. Here's my hook for this thread:

List one boardgame that you like, and we will suggest a boardgame that you may also like based on your one selection. Ideally, there will be an explanation for "why" as well.

Edit: I also encourage other people to post suggestions!

I'd love to see a recurring thread here in ~games.tabletop where we can talk about board games in a fun way. Since this is the second in series, my dream has become a reality! Here's my hook for this thread:

If someone were wanting to start creating a collection of board games, what one game would you suggest that they put in their collection, and why? To standardize the question a bit, let's assume that the person is relatively into board gaming already, so it's not "introduce someone to the basics of board games".