Hey everyone! Welcome back to another exciting Sarah article! *crickets chirp* If you remember way way back, I did an article on board games where I talked about a few of my favourites. Well today I'm going to talk about a few more I didn't have time to talk about last time. These are games that I regularly play with friends. I have a lot more that I play as well, so let me know if you liked this and would like another one!
Also thank you to Krystle for the lovely layout!
MYSTERIUM:
Mysterium is probably my favourite of the three games, as it's super unique and has a lot of replay value. A group of mediums have to figure out details about a murder that happened to one of the ghosts they are talking to. The game is best played with at least 4 people, but really only 2 are needed if you really wanted to play.
How to Play:
One player is deemed the ghost. They will have a large board in front of them that the other players can't see. They have 3 different decks; person, place, and murder weapon. They will arrange the randomly drawn cards from each deck, so that each other player (the mediums) have a person, place and murder weapon. They will then place the matching larger image cards, as well as a few random ones, in the designated spot on the table for each player to see. The object is to try and work together to figure out each players murderer, location and murder weapon. How? This is the fun part.
The ghost has a handful of picture cards, called dream cards, with random images and colours. Here's what they look like:
The ghost will then try to find similarities between the dream cards, and the thing the players are trying to guess. Some will be more obvious, while others will be very tricky. For example, if I have the gun as the murder weapon, the ghost may hand me a dream card with guns on it, or even something like "this card has a soldier on it and soldiers carry guns". It's kinda hard to explain, but you get the hang of it once you're playing.
You have a limited amount of rounds to guess all 3 requirements for each person, so working together is key. The best part about this is the ghost can't talk through the whole game, so you can't ask the ghost questions. Or well, you can, but he can't answer.
Once everyone has their 3 aspects of the murder, the ghost gives one final clue as to which of the mediums is correct about who actually killed them.
Tips:
- Think like the ghost. If you know the ghost really well, it can be easy to think on the same wavelength as the ghost.
- Go with your gutt. Sometimes our first instinct is right, so if you find yourself second guessing, just stick with what you picked first. You will have another chance the next round, and will be given a new card which might even help you more
Why I like this game:
The art is beautiful, the game is pretty simple, and it really gets you thinking. Even if you lose, the game is fun. I haven't gotten mad once about losing because the whole game is a lot of fun and has a lot of replay value.
AVALON:
This one is really fun if you're a fan of TOS or werewolf. You are a town trying to successfully go on quests, but there are bad guys and deceit ready to stop you. You have to figure out who the bad guys are and successfully complete 3 quests, or else the bad guys win.
How to play:
The game starts by picking the number of bad guys based on the number of players. Each game will consist of x amount of bad guys, good guys, and Merlin. Once you play enough of the game and get the hang of it, there are other characters and game changes that can be implemented, but I'll just talk about the base game for now.
The cards are then dealt out to each person anonymously, and the game begins with everyone having their heads down/eyes closed. Some, usually someone who has played the game enough to memorize the speech, starts by having all the bad guys open their eyes and see each other, then close their eyes. The bad guys then put up a thumb, and Merlin opens their eyes. Merlin is a good guy who knows who the bad guys are, but if the bad guys figure out who Merlin is, the bad guys win. Merlin closes their eyes, and everyone awakens.
The active player, whoever your group decides goes first, will have the crown and then assign people to go on a quest. You get 5 chances to do 3 successful quests, but the number of people who have to go on each quest increases each time. Once the quest takers have been chosen, everyone gets to vote on whether they are ok with that group going or are they against it. If majority vote ok, the quest happens. If they vote not ok, the crown gets passed to the next person and they choose a new party.
Now, the quest. Everyone on the quest will get 2 cards, a pass and a fail. Good guys can ONLY vote for the quest to be successful, but bad guys can either vote to succeed or fail. All votes are anonymous. All successes, the quest passes, but just one fail and the quest fails. The game continues until either team has 3 successes/failures. At the end, the bad guys will guess who Merlin is. If they get it right, the bad guys win.
Tips:
- As Merlin, try to be sneaky. If it's your turn to pick quest takers, and you still have a few quests left, take a bad guy with you. It will make you less suspicious.
- If you are a bad guy and chosen for the first quest, you generally want to pass it. The first quest has the least amount of people, and it will be easier for people to figure out who you are and not take you on more quests.
- Suspect everyone. Especially with more characters added, things start to get confusing and even the bad guys don't know one of their own team mates.
Why I like it:
This is a really fun game, especially when you gave a large size group of people (the game can support up to 10 players). It's fun to suspect everyone, and throw everyone else off. It opens the books to roleplaying, being deceitful, and all around just having fun. This game can be played many times, as no 2 games are ever the same. The rounds can be fairly short, so it's easy for people to jump in or out of a game. All in all, please play this at your next party.
EVOLUTION:
This is a one of the newer games I have started playing, so I won't be able to go into as much detail as I'm still a noob. Basically the object of the game is to make new species, evolve them to give them a better chance at survival, feed and breed. You want to have the most food tokens at the end of the game to win.
How to play:
You start off with one species with zero traits and a hand of trait cards. In the middle is the watering hole, where you will get your food sources from each round. You start off by discarding a card, and adding food sources to the watering hole equal to the number in the top corner of the card. You may then place up to 3 traits on your species, start a new species, grow in body size, or grow in population. Growing in body size will help defend you against Carnivores (which I will talk about shortly), while growing in population will require more food sources, but will increase the amount of food tokens you have for the end game. This is what your board may look like:
You will then go around in a circle, taking one food source at a time, until either the water hole is empty, or no players need any more tokens. You can only take tokens based on your population. See above, they have a population of 3, but only have 2 food sources. If available, they may take one more food source. If all food sources are taken from the watering hole, and you have species that are not fed, you must decrease down to that number (above they would decrease down to 2).
Carnivores are a bit different, as they can't take food sources from the watering hole. They must attack a species of another player that has a smaller body size than the carnivore. That player then looses one of their population. After each round, the players put their food tokens into a bag, and donate another card to the watering hole and the game continues.
The trait cards help protect/feed your species and allows for better survival. There are many different traits, and they can be switched out if you have the card, so play around with them for a bit if you find you're losing population or getting attacked a lot.
The game continues until the stack of cards is out. The players then count up the number of food tokens in their bag. The player with the most wins.
Why I like this game:
It's definitely more of a competitive game but I actually think it's rather cute. The art is done well, the game is fun, and even though it can take a bit of time, it doesn't feel like ages. There are quite a number of parts, but with well organization it can be kept together nicely and not too much of a hassle to clean up.
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