- Dune: Imperium, maybe plus Expansion. Nice mix of deckbuilder and worker placement. Only thing that bothers me is the (missing) redraw mechanic for the pool of cards to buy (if there's only crap in the pool, some sucker needs to buy something for good stuff too show up; which the next player then buys). The expansion reduces this because the player can do other things and there are more cards causing cycling/trashing, but I'm still pondering a house rule (auction mechanic).
- Unfathomable: Did not play!!, but this reimplements the Battlestar Galactica board game, which we played a lot during university (maybe a bit too much? Naaa, who needs sleep). Social deduction/traitor mechanic. This is on my wish list, since BSG with all expansions costs about 500 bucks these days (and we only have one copy in my peer group). Drawback: The vibe of BSG is awesome, a lot of aspects of the show are well captured, and I only saw the show much later. Compared to that, Lovecraft [Unfathomable] feels a bit generic. But the principle is still great. And it seems to be streamlined, which is great if you don't have 4 to 8 hours (depends on number of expansions used). [oh, mathgladiator was quicker than me. Well^^']
- Hidden Leaders - played the demo in Essen and liked it. I don't recall details on the mechanics (except: card game), but it's still on my list.
I also got relatively new:
- Goetia, nice worker placement in which you summon demons.
- Galaxy Truckers, which was out of print for a while and is back as a second edition.
Classics:
- 7 Wonders, new edition. I love how it trades player interaction (which is limited in the base game) for scaling well into 7 players (less downtime).
- Power grid, also a new edition. Great auction mechanic. And there is no clear winner until the end (or unless everyone but one player plays bad).
- Hanabi. Cooperative card game in which you only see the other player's hands and can give them tips. The goal is to play cards 1 to 5 in 5 different colors. The basic variant is easy to master, but the real fun begins once you're playing with special colors (e.g. rainbow receives all color tips), or combinations of these. Can also be played at hanab.live - I've got close to 1000 games there. Best (at least imho) is to start playing as a group and develop your own way to play, guided by logics and experience. (And now you know how friends and I spent our time during Corona shutdowns).
The ones I upvoted included
- Root: mixed results with friends, but I like it. There is also a good online adaption in Steam, nice to try it before committing to buying the physical game.
- The Crew, as well as Mission Deep Sea.
- Secret Hitler
I also liked Caverna (again, worker placement).
From other people's posts, think I'll reconsider Betrayal at the house on the hill legacy (need to setup a group for that) and the revised Arkham Horror (we played the original plus various expansions a lot, still have it, but always felt the experience varies wildly between "wow, gg, had a great time" and "meh, what a waste of time", at least after dozens of plays).
First what I did not see:
- Dune: Imperium, maybe plus Expansion. Nice mix of deckbuilder and worker placement. Only thing that bothers me is the (missing) redraw mechanic for the pool of cards to buy (if there's only crap in the pool, some sucker needs to buy something for good stuff too show up; which the next player then buys). The expansion reduces this because the player can do other things and there are more cards causing cycling/trashing, but I'm still pondering a house rule (auction mechanic).
- Unfathomable: Did not play!!, but this reimplements the Battlestar Galactica board game, which we played a lot during university (maybe a bit too much? Naaa, who needs sleep). Social deduction/traitor mechanic. This is on my wish list, since BSG with all expansions costs about 500 bucks these days (and we only have one copy in my peer group). Drawback: The vibe of BSG is awesome, a lot of aspects of the show are well captured, and I only saw the show much later. Compared to that, Lovecraft [Unfathomable] feels a bit generic. But the principle is still great. And it seems to be streamlined, which is great if you don't have 4 to 8 hours (depends on number of expansions used). [oh, mathgladiator was quicker than me. Well^^']
- Hidden Leaders - played the demo in Essen and liked it. I don't recall details on the mechanics (except: card game), but it's still on my list.
I also got relatively new:
- Goetia, nice worker placement in which you summon demons.
- Galaxy Truckers, which was out of print for a while and is back as a second edition.
Classics:
- 7 Wonders, new edition. I love how it trades player interaction (which is limited in the base game) for scaling well into 7 players (less downtime).
- Power grid, also a new edition. Great auction mechanic. And there is no clear winner until the end (or unless everyone but one player plays bad).
- Hanabi. Cooperative card game in which you only see the other player's hands and can give them tips. The goal is to play cards 1 to 5 in 5 different colors. The basic variant is easy to master, but the real fun begins once you're playing with special colors (e.g. rainbow receives all color tips), or combinations of these. Can also be played at hanab.live - I've got close to 1000 games there. Best (at least imho) is to start playing as a group and develop your own way to play, guided by logics and experience. (And now you know how friends and I spent our time during Corona shutdowns).
The ones I upvoted included
- Root: mixed results with friends, but I like it. There is also a good online adaption in Steam, nice to try it before committing to buying the physical game.
- The Crew, as well as Mission Deep Sea.
- Secret Hitler
I also liked Caverna (again, worker placement).
From other people's posts, think I'll reconsider Betrayal at the house on the hill legacy (need to setup a group for that) and the revised Arkham Horror (we played the original plus various expansions a lot, still have it, but always felt the experience varies wildly between "wow, gg, had a great time" and "meh, what a waste of time", at least after dozens of plays).