Not at BGG.con

Nope, I didn't make it back to BGG.con this year. I never manage to be a regular attendee of conventions--even though I've been to many of them once. Last year it was BGG.con, the year before was the Gathering, before that was Essen, and before that was Kublacon when Knizia was there. A few years prior I was lucky enough to go to Gulf Games. All of these have been great fun, and hopefully someday I'll return to a few of them. BGG.con, especially, has a lot of my local friends this year, plus lots more internet friends and listeners. Who knows? Maybe I'll make it back in 2007.

In the meantime, we're still playing games here on the home front. Friday night was SCB, and even with a small turnout of 3 gamers (others were at BGG.con!) we had a good time. In fact, 3-players doesn't restrict your game night at all, something I may bring up in a podcast. Better yet, my daughter Molly was excited that games were at our house, and played several light openers with us. I knew she'd ask for Cloud 9, a solid favorite, but we've played that a lot lately and I wanted to try something else. Looking over the shelves I spotted a couple more she'd learned in the past: Dancing Dice and Hick Hack in Gackelwack. To that I added Raj, which I think is fast fun with nice, plastic tiles.

Raj kind of underwhelmed her (it did with Sam when I tried it him, too), so I wonder why I keep hanging onto this one. I need them to try it with the full complement of players, so more people get zapped by ties. Dancing Dice, on the other hand, was a hit. Again. This one is definitely a keeper among dice games--we played again last night with just the family. Hick Hack was another good one, a title I hadn't touched in a couple years, probably. The more the merrier with this game.

Then it was time for just the grown-ups. We'd expected to have just 3 players, and picked two games that excel with that number: End of the Triumvirate and San Marco.

I've also played Dynasties a few times over a couple lunch hours at work. I think is a fantastic little 2-player gem. In fact, a podcast I should do in the future is one comparing three interesting 2-player games: Dynasties, Aton, and En Garde. All use pretty simple decks of numbered cards to very different, interesting ends. (I guess you could lump Lost Cities in there, but everyone knows that one. What about Clash of the Lightsabers, though?)

-Mark