Coup, Factory Funner and Nexus Ops

This is the cover of another popular game over 25 years old which still has its following.

The last quiz picture was Apocalypse: The Game of Nuclear Devastation by Games Workshop back in 1980, an interesting world domination game where you had to nuke your own troops in order to provide enough units for the recruitment phase. Listed under Warlord on the geek its most interesting aspect is its combat system where the opponents in a conflict secretly choose a number on the die.

Sorry about the missed blog last week, this was due to visiting relatives naturally taking priority over other commitments. The games played 2 weeks ago on 4 tables were :- Tigris & Euphrates, Libertalia, Traders of Osaka, Russian Railroads, Medici, Star Trek 5 Year Mission, Mysterium, Roll for it deluxe, Werewolf, Codenames, Sauerbaum and Castle Panic. Links to all these games can be found Here

For the last session Coup was the warm-up game, this reminded me a lot of Hoax by Eon from many years ago but with a far neater mechanism. Each player has 2 character cards which they keep secret from the others and on their turn they take one action which could be to just collect a coin or two, the other actions revolve around claiming to be a specific character and taking their special action, this character does not have to be one of the ones the player actually has however they can be challenged by anyone and if they have played false they can lose one of their two character cards, a player can also lose a character by being assassinated, suffering a coup or incorrectly making a challenge. It is the last survivor that remains that wins. I do not generally enjoy elimination or deduction games and this has both, but this is a pleasantly nice exception.

Table 1 started off with Abyss with the Kraken expansion, i have explained this game before – I know not how the players fared.

Players layout during Abyss

Table 2 played Drum Roll, again I have covered this one before, players are circus owners and collect performers, workers and various equipment to create the biggest and best circus. It is a resource management game but timing is important with regards to recruitment and delaying can lead to some nice discounts, however recruit too early and you run out of cash very quickly, leave it too late and others end up with the bargain. It is a lovely game and very colourful.

My circus at the games end.

Main action board (before game start) Large white circles are for the players action discs (each player has 3 to play each turn)

Sadly I do not know anything about the games played on table 3 the first of which was Innovation a card game.

S > Enjoyed Innovation, it played really quick for us so I'd be interested to play again just to see more of the cards. There seemed to be a fair amount of luck tho in what you draw not sure whether that was just our game or a general thing.

Innovation achievement cards

The next on table 3 was Mammut which was over before I realised it was being played.

S > Mammut is mine so I've played a few times and I think it's quite different with gamers and non gamers. Gamers don't steal shares as much, they just agonise over a share that is big enough without being at risk of theft.

Table 1 moved on to Splendor a simple card collecting game where on a turn you collect 3 different coloured tokens or purchase a card with tokens you have collected, cards provide discounts and the higher value cards also provide victory points, the first to 15 points wins. The main tactic is to create a discount machine allowing you to take a card every turn without wasting actions collecting tokens however it will be the player who can purchase the top value cards first that is most likely to win so that must also be borne in mind when planning what early cards to take.

Players display in Splendor

Table 2 played Factory Funner a recent release by Corne van Moorsel of Cwali fame which I received through the post earlier in the week. It is based on his 2006 release Factory Fun the main changes are in scoring and visually it is now played on hexes as opposed to squares. The idea of the game is to build machines on a factory floor each player having their own factory, machines require coloured input and give coloured output however with only one source of each colour it is important to link machines so that their output provides input for the next machine.

Two of the players boards in our game, the lower board shows a machine valued 4 receiving 1 blue input from another machine whilst giving 3 yellow output to another which in turn is feeding 1 blue to another (bottom section of board).

The game is played over 8 rounds and the winner is the player with the most points, these points come from the machines themselves or from linking machines (you get 3 points per required input on a linked machine). The mechanic of the game is quite simple, each round every player simultaneously turns over a tile to a common pool, then each grabs the tile from that pool which they need for their factory – this is not always as rapid as you think as space is limited on the factory floor so you need machines that have the right input on the right side and it is more important to pick the correct machine rather than be the first to grab any machine. After you have chosen your machine you then place it in your factory wherever you want and build pipe-work so that every machine has the correct inputs and all outputs lead somewhere hopefully to another machine but more generally to a “cap”. Machines once placed may never be moved but pipe-work can be ripped up and rebuilt in any way you wish however each newly placed piece (even a piece taken from elsewhere in the factory) costs 1 victory point, so this can be an expensive process.

 The next game on Table 3 was Nexus Ops from what little I picked up this is a combat game with racial powers where the winner is decided by collecting mission cards and winning combat. The pieces looked quite neat and had a nice “glow” factor.

S > I liked Nexus Ops, it's like a quicker, better version of Risk. My dice rolling suck tho.

The battle ground in Nexus Ops

The green pieces in Nexus Ops

Secret Hitler, Sapiens and Ticket to Ride

The quiz photo is one of my earlier games that got many repeated plays this is of the box cover (minus the title).

The last quiz photo was of Lemming a great little game from 1990 where you are trying to make all the other lemmings run into the sea before your own disappear over the edge of the cliff however on your turn you can only move one of your own lemmings forward 4 spaces, not easy to do.

My table started off with Champions of Midgard, two of us have been contemplating buying a copy and wanted to give it another go before we committed, it is an interesting worker placement game of heroic Vikings gaining fame and glory through acts of valour and occasionally going down the market to buy some goodies. It is quite thematic with players battling Trolls and a variety of monsters, there are some awkward choices to be made although generally you are grabbing dice to get the best odds of victory in the battles. The game is a little unforgiving of bad choices or really bad luck as I found to my cost when I failed to roll a hit on 9 dice (0.02% chance) in a battle, this put me a turn behind everybody else but that sort of bad luck rarely happens and on the whole it is more about good play being rewarded as opposed to bad play being punished, I have since bought my own copy.

The other 2 tables combined for a print ‘n’ play game of Secret Hitler, this was launched on Kickstarter in November 2015 and closed with 34,565 backers, sadly the “retail” deal was for the USA only so I am not sure if it will reach UK shops. The game consists of a number of envelopes which are dealt out to the players at random, in each envelope are 4 cards, everyone gets a Yes card and No card, an affiliation card (either Facist or Liberal) and lastly an identity card one of which will be Hitler, the idea of the game is for the Facist players (minority) to get Hitler elected as Chancellor, the Liberals are looking to eliminate Hitler or for either side to have a set number of policies passed in their favour.

What is in a Facists envelope

As with other games of this nature everyone at the start closes their eyes, Hitler then identifies themselves by sticking their thumb up and all other Facists open their eyes and acknowledge each other and identify who Hitler is, then everyone closes their eyes again and then everyone opens their eyes again, after all this the Liberals (the majority) and Hitler know nothing, the Facists (other than Hitler) know who everyone is. On a turn whoever has the President (turn start) card announces who they want as Chancellor then everyone votes whether they are happy for those two to pass a law, if the majority are happy the President takes the top 3 cards off the policy deck discards one and passes 2 to the Chancellor who selects one to play and discards the other. policy cards are either Facist (many cards) or Liberal (some of the cards). The game is interesting and there is quite a lot of dialogue deducing who the Facists are (in our last game there were 3 Facists and 6 Liberals) whilst they in turn try to remain secret and manoeuvre matters behind the scenes. The subject matter may not be to everyones taste however the game is definitely one of the better ones of its genre.

The Facists nearing victory with 4 policies passed

C > Secret Hitler was a great game to learn what your friends really think of you!! Jokes aside, I think it makes a nice alternative to Resistance with a stronger theme, it's crazy and chaotic and often you actually have no idea who is Fascist or Liberal. Would definitely play again to prove I am not always a Fascist!

J > I was pleasantly surprised how well Secret Hitler was received by the group. We played twice with 7 players and later on twice with 8 players. There was a lot of unavoidable meta gaming involved which made/forced the Fascist sides to be creative.
In the first game players clued in to the mechanics quite quickly even though the Fascists forgot to identify Hitler during the reveal phase.
I can't recall much of game 2 but I was surprised that the Secret Hitler was the same player in Game 1. I may have been assassinated.
Game 3 was won by the Fascists as a sly President nominated Hitler as Chancellor after the third Fascist policy.
Game 4 saw the 4 Liberal policies pass quickly leaving the Fascists to be more creative with assassinations and a veto to pass 6 Fascist policies to win the game.

BQ > I went from being completely bamboozled by Secret Hitler, to finding it very interesting. My policy was to be honest at all times, which didn't seem to work too well... tongue emoticon I was pretty certain fairly early who the Fascists were in both games, but there's always an element of doubt in one's mind.

The tables split and Table 1 played Ticket to Ride - India. I see TTR as an entry level game, the mechanics are fairly simple and it is very colourful, however among gamers it can be quite a tense battle for control of key areas of the map. The board consists of a number of routes connecting towns, on a turn you can either take cards or lay track, there is no restriction on where you can lay track however when you do so you must complete a chain between 2 towns and play cards of the same colour as that shown on the board you must also discard as many cards as there are links in the chain, you are also limited to completing one chain per turn.

The game encourages you to collect and hoard cards as this gives greater flexibility to create long groups of chains which reap large rewards, but spend too long collecting cards and key sections of the board will be snapped up by others. Victory points come from building the chains and for creating a complete route shown on bonus cards you are dealt at the beginning and collected during the game. There are a number of different maps you can buy for the game and there are some advanced rules for those looking for a bit more depth, I believe the map on this occasion was quite tight and the centre hotly contested from early in the game.

Table 2 played Sapiens a tile laying game where the tiles are domino–like and players are looking to match faces of adjoining tiles on their personal boards. I have played this before and found it to be a fairly basic game but my views are in contrast to those who played the game and I feel I must revisit the game before I should comment further and I will leave you to their views.

J > I've also been mulling about Sapiens. Other players definitely identified it as a brain burner but it may not be. In our 4 player game, I had a bear infestation early on which forced me to run out of moves so I had to start laying tiles from another cave. It was apparent at this point that the shelter points were hard to come by compared to the food points. Victory is determined by the lower point value of the two. I wonder whether it is a better strategy to start from as many caves as possible by forcing no moves to maximise the shelter points haul. The downside is that you make burn large areas of your valley. I need to check whether you can put bears in your own valley.

BQ> Sapiens was an interesting puzzle-like game and, as “R” said, it's definitely one you need to play more than once to have a hope of understanding it properly. I'll be bringing it again soon...

End of the last round in Leapfrog

My table moved onto Leapfrog a fairly simple filler game of frogs jumping one another however the fewer the players the more luck that is involved in the game and it is at its best with a full complement of 6 players.

We next fitted in a game of Incan gold which I have covered a couple of times before, this is a nice “push your luck” game. Our play was quite low scoring with the threats appearing early and a couple of times I was left on my own to collect all the loot, this did not happen the first time as I was buried by a rockfall.

The loot pile in Incan gold that was hardly touched in our game.

The evening ended with another game of Secret Hitler, definitely the fun game of the night and I hope the full version reaches our shores.

A Fond Farewell

One of the more serious games played - Pig Pong

On Sunday we had a special meeting to say goodbye to one of our members, just a couple of photos and a list of games that we managed to play.

The Giant Jaffa Cake

Codenames (x4)
Coup - City State
Manhattan (Godzilla variant)
City of Horror
Sushi Go
Hanabi (the posh one)
Pig Pong (x2)
Secret Hitler (x3)
Port Royal (x2)
Powergrid
Machi Koro
Super Rhino
Colt Express
Galopp Royal
Drunter & Druber
Vault Wars
Traders of Osaka
Fury of Dracula
Bang The Dice Game

Some of what was available for dinner (the nearest one was hot-hot-hot)

Ginkgopolis, Mach Koro, Russian Railroads and The Resistance

The quiz picture this week is of a crazy fun race game from 1990.

The last quiz picture was of Dino Race one of the nicer lightweight racing games with excellent chunky playing pieces.

The evening started with just two tables however Table 3 started with 7 players and played The Resistance an interesting deduction game in which I am usually (the correct word is “always”) on the losing side.

Players are either on the blue side or the red side (decided by cards dealt secretly to everyone at the games start), the game then starts with everyone closing their eyes and the red players opening their eyes to see who is on the red team, they then close their eyes and everyone reopens their eyes. There follows a series of rounds in which players vote for who goes on a mission and when a team is decided those players only put in a success or failure chit, these chits are shuffled and revealed, if all tokens are success tokens the mission succeeds (a point for the blue team) otherwise it fails (a point for the red team).

There are more blue players than red but as the blue players do not know who the red ones are each mission is very risky but should reveal a little information. I am not sure how balanced the game is and there is usually a lot of double talk and illogical logic going on that makes your brain fizz, however the game is an excellent ice-breaker and plays from 5-10 players, we played it twice the second time with 9 players and yes I was on the losing side both times.

Table 2 began the evening with Machi Koro a nice card game in which the goal is to be the first player to build your four special buildings. Each player starts with a couple of buildings in play, and  on a turn a player rolls a die, all players starting with the die roller activates any appropriate buildings they have after which the die roller may spend any cash they have on purchasing a single building. This is a simple game but there are choices and tactics such as whether to have a spread portfolio or to monopolise, which “chain” of cards to adopt and which special buildings to build first, all of which can affect your future turns. It is the ideal warm-up game.

The winning layout - a diverse portfolio.

BQ > Machi Koro: Light, easy to understand, and plenty of cheers and good-natured groans as the "right" or "wrong" numbers get rolled. Moderating your luck is the order of the day, and whilst I feel that one *could* suffer badly from a run of bad luck, or cruise to victory on a good streak, there's enough choices to keep things interesting, plus it doesn't outstay its welcome.

After The Resistance Table 3 split into three tables (1, 3 & 4), Table 1 commenced with a game of Ginkgopolis  an interesting game of territory control, the winner is the player with the most victory points at the end. The game starts with a grid of tiles in the middle of the table, each player then goes through a drafting process with a small hand of starting cards ending up with three which are laid face up in each players personal display, these start cards also dictate a players starting goods (points, tiles and tokens) then each draws a hand of four cards. The cards are the driving mechanism for the game and contain 3 pieces of information, the first is colour (red, yellow or blue) a number (from 4-20) and a bonus type once they have been played into your personal display.

A sample of the cards, the bottom section of a card shows the bonus for that type of action, the right hand card is showing a game end bonus.

On a turn all players select a card from their hand (compulsory) and may also play a tile with it, the selection made allows a player to undertake one of three actions, to take a tile or token, to extend the city or to place a building on top of another building, the last of these actions also permits you to lay a card into your display. The action you take may also trigger bonus points tokens and tiles, all from the cards already face up in your personal display. These cards and tiles are played simultaneously after which the hand of 3 cards is passed to the left and a new card drawn to bring it back to 4 thus you need to be aware that any card you do not use your opponent may use.

The Ginkgopolis city near the games end

The game ends when the stack of tiles runs out for the second time at which point players get extra points from all areas of the city where they have dominance. The game is about controlling the city but at minimal cost, there are various tactics that can be employed and the interaction between players can make for a tense and interesting game, not one for novice gamers though.

Table 3 went with Russian Railroads which is one of the best worker placement games I know, players are constructing three different railways and a variety of industry to gather victory points, the game last 7 turns during which players undertake a number of actions to build and improve railways, purchase Trains and industry, advance Industry, purchase an Engineer and hire extra workers. A round ends after everyone has placed all their workers then there is scoring during which each player scores for each of their rails and their Industry. Each rails score depends on how far they have been built, what quality they are and for the distance served by their attached locomotive.

Reds player board early in the game, Moscow-Kiev is being developed with the black rail triggering an extra worker bonus and the grey rail scoring 3 points because of the 3 train, the black rail is scoring a bonus 6 points.

The skill in the game comes from the timing and use of trigger points along the various rails, the Moscow-Vladivostok line gives an extra man and all the upgrades required for rail building whereas the Moscow-St Petersburg line has 2 token bonuses that when reached a player can choose a specific bonus to use, the Moscow-Kiev line is where a lot of early points in the game can be made and at its best provides 40 points a round.

Some of the worker placement spaces on the main board and the score markers around the edge. A player board is to the right

The industry when built gives one off bonuses throughout the game which are triggered when you choose the improve Industry action, the Engineers purchased during the game provide extra worker placement spots for the purchasing player and can be very useful. This just scratches the surface of the game and there are numerous strategies which can be adopted to gain victory, choice of strategy is usually based on what Engineers you obtain but can also be influenced on what other players are striving forand the best strategy may well be just avoiding being in conflict for worker placement spots. There is always a lot going on in this game and the first game will always be a learning game (against experienced players you need to adopt a solid strategy from the start), our game went well with me taking an early lead with the Moscow-Kiev bonuses, however in the last round a player who had concentrated on the Moscow-Vladivostok line made about 50% more points than me for that one round which made it a very close game.

Table 4 started with Om Nom Nom a nice simple dice and card game where the idea is to collect dice by second guessing your opponents may play on one of three food trees. The game was very much enjoyed and made another appearance later in the evening.

The Blue players score at the end of a round, 2 pts for each red die and 1 pt for every other die and card. 18 points.

Table 2 moved on to Above and Below which I covered a few weeks ago in Evolution, Tiny Epic Galaxies and Codenames.  I will leave this one for BQ’s comment.

The building card display for above and below - the above ground cards are at the bottom!!!

BQ > Above and Below is fast becoming a favourite of mine. I'm not usually one for "flavour text" in games, since it's usually spurious, but in this instance the decisions you make can actually have a genuine benefit - the scoring system gives remarkably close finishes, and so those one or two extra points from reputation that you got from being a nice guy to the little old lady or the fish-man can really make a difference...

Table 4 played Parfum a game which I have not yet played so cannot tell you much except that as the title suggests it is a game about perfume making and according to the geek it is a set collecting game.

Parfum board

Table 1 next went with Welcome to the Dungeon, this is one of the better “push-your-luck” games with a bit of “playing your opponents” thrown in. I have described this one in depth before so in short on a round you decide to either take a card or pass, if you take a card (which depicts a monster) you may either put it in the dungeon to be fought or you can remove it from play along with an item of dungeon fighting equipment. Play continues until only one person is left (the last player to take a card) at which point they have to face the monsters placed in the dungeon with whatever equipment has been left. This is NOT a game of luck, careful choices at the right time can stitch up your opponents nicely.

Om Nom Nom cards for the red player

My Table joined up with Table 4 to play Om Nom Nom it worked very well 6 player and we played it twice.

In the meantime Tables 1 and 2 joined to play Codenames  (described last week) which proved to be the last game of the evening.

Codenames grid card showing locations of red and blue spies and the assassin "X"

London, Codixit and Fury of Dracula III

Not sure but may have done this one before but that should just make it easier for you

For the quiz photo this time I have some cute guys for you?

The last quiz was of the box lid of Patchwork  a highly recommended 2 player game from Uwe Rosenberg a nice tile tessellation game.

Table 1 started with Thurn and Taxis a route laying game where the playing area is a map of Germany showing various towns which are them-selves grouped into different coloured zones. On a turn you may play a special action, take a town card and lastly play a town card into a row in front of you. On future turns any cards you lay must be adjacent to a town at either end of your row thereby extending the path, after laying a card you can close a route and play pieces onto the board to show that it has been established.

Thurn and Taxis board

The special actions you may do consist of taking a second card, replacing the 6 cards on show, playing a second card onto your row or getting a route extension when closing your row of cards. The idea is to earn points by placing tokens onto the board, getting bonuses for placing a token at every town in a coloured zone and by making routes of increasing length. It is a good game which rewards the player who makes good economical use of the special actions.

BQ > Thurn and Taxis was light and just about what my brain could cope with last night...”W” trounced us by a lead of nearly 10 points. I replaced the card display too many times to be in with a shout - it's never a good use of one's special action unless there's no alternative.

Table 2 played Fury of Dracula (third edition) despite having got the first edition game I have never actually played it and so do not know anything about the game in any of its three guises, however I did note that it proved to be an absorbing game which although it had a slow start (there was a steep learning curve for all the players) it did gather momentum and everyone seemed to enjoy it.

C > Really enjoyed the hide-and-seek of Fury of Dracula - it was a little slow to start as most of us were new to it but once we got going it was really good and it ended the way Dracula should have: a fight to the death in the Mediterranean Sea with garlic.

My table started with London which is played on a map of the boroughs of Inner London, in the game players build up a row of cards (the driving mechanism of the game) which grant various benefits,  all with the aim of gaining the most victory points. On a turn a player draws a card either from the discard display or the top of the deck, then takes one action finally they then discard down to 9 cards. There are only four actions to choose from, the first is to draw three cards, the second is to lay claim to a borough paying the cost marked on the board (in doing so the player gets rewarded with Victory points and a quantity of cards), the third action is to play cards to the players personal display and the last is to “run” your part of the city.

The London Board

When you play cards they are played face up next to each other in “card slots” however for each card played the player must discard a card of the same colour, there is sometimes also a financial cost. When you “run” your part of the city you trigger the effects of the cards in your card row and collect the benefits of them which may bevictory points, cash or help reduce your areas poverty, however after collecting everything you gain poverty tokens based on the number of “card slots” you have plus any cards in hand.

A sample of the cards - the centre box at the bottom of the Ship Building shows the rewards for when the card is activated

The game is about balancing cash against gaining victory points whilst avoiding the penalties of poverty. I have played this a fair number of times 2 player however my knowledge of cards in the deck did not help at all. I found the 4 player game to be totally different, money is a lot tighter and therefore loans much harder to repay (I failed to repay any of my 3 loans), similarly poverty was rife, the lowest number of tokens at the end of the game was 11 whereas in a 2 player game I would expect to get rid of them all. It proved to be an interesting and challenging game with a well deserved win for the victor who timed the games end to perfection.

S > I enjoyed London, not sure I knew what the best play ever was but the pressure to take just one action per turn was perfect.

In the meantime a late arrival tried out Tiny Epic Galaxies in solo mode. I have covered this game before but in brief you collect victory points by taking actions through die-rolling, the first part of the game is usually a race to complete the technology path before moving on to colonizing planets as fast as possible. The solo game pits you against a robot empire which takes its turn after the player, its dice are rolled one at a time which you may copy (at the usual cost) however as it starts the game with 5 dice (the player starts with 4) and colonizing actions affect EVERY matching planet it does collect victory points at an alarming rate; on top of this every 5 culture it rolls an extra 3 dice and every 5 Energy it gains a technology level.

One of the Robot cards for the solo game

Variety is provided in the Robot Empire by each of the player boards having a different line up of special technology powers. As with most solo games it does not replace the joy of playing with other people but it is a workable and highly playable version of the game.

Table 1 moved on to play Codenames a team deduction game where a grid of 25 words is laid out at random then one player (the leader) from each team sees a secret grid showing where 7 of their own spies are placed, the other 11 cards are neutrals and an assassin the revelation of latter immediately loses the revealing team the game. The leaders may only give 1 word clues and a number which relates to the number of words which match the clue they are giving, the others try to deduce where their spies are.

BQ > Codenames (classic version, not the "Codexit" or "Dixnames" hybrid smile emoticon ) was also not a brain burner - well, not in the complex decisions category anyway. Plus, I had a right gift of a grid when I was playing the spy controller - "Pitch", "Boot", "Match"...of course the clue had to be "Snooker". No, sorry, "Football". I know little about sports...

My table next played Pingvinas (probably better known as Hey Thats my Fish), the game consists of a large number of Hexagons with either 1, 2 or 3 fish marked thereon, these are laid out in a hexagonal grid pattern to start players then place their Penguins on a tile with a single fish, the idea of the game is to collect the most fish.

Part of the play area for Pingvinas

On a turn a player chooses one of their a penguins and moves it in a straight line as far as they wish to land on another tile however they cannot leap other penguins or holes in the playing area nor share a tile with another penguin, when you move your penguin you remove the tile your penguin was on and put it into your score pile in this way the playing area not only decreases in size but holes begin to appear. Although the first few turns can just be a fish grab it can become quite a tense game as players jockey for position to cordon off areas of the board for their own score pile a tactic often more rewarding than taking part in the initial 3 fish tile grab.

Our table next played Fluxx  a simple card game where the rules continually change. The deck consists of action cards, rule cards, goal cards and keeper cards, the basic game is draw a card and then play a card, the keepers are played in front of a player and the goal card usually shows 2 keepers which if a player has them in front of them when the goal card is played they win the game. The rule cards expand the number of cards drawn and played whilst the action cards add another level of mayhem.

My winning combination but the chances of getting the goal card for it were slim

This is can be a fun little game but (my viewpoint) with little control, I stopped being a fan when I ended up in a game lasting over 45 minutes once, the fun began to wear thin about the 15-20 minute mark however this has not stopped me from owning three different versions, the original, the Monty Python, and the latest Nature version.

Table 1 next played Biblios an interesting card game where the idea is to collect cards and have control of a suit (or preferably several) at the end of the game, there are a few cards which enable players to alter the value of the suits during the game.

Share set up at beginning of Biblios

BQ > Finally Biblios...I always find it interesting - the auction phase particularly, as you find out what rubbish other players managed to dump into the auction pile smile emoticon .

The last game on my table was a hybrid of Codenames (described above) and Dixit, we laid out a grid of 25 Dixit cards then followed the normal rules of Codenames with the addition that nothing could be named that was on the cards – this caused some minor headaches trying to give clues to more than one card whilst not naming anything on them. The game raised quite a few laughs especially with some of the obtuse interpretations we could put on the clues one of which was “Predated” which was initially taken as “Pre-dated” a totally different meaning which seemed to make our leader squirm a bit but perhaps that is my imagination but he did start the timer to end the round an action which is normally reserved for the opponents.

Dixit cards laid out for Codenames

S > I think Codenames is more fun with pictures, partly because the words can make it feel quite dry, partly for the confusion some clues can present. It definitely forces different tactics for picking 'good' clues as a result.

It was an excellent evening of fun frolics with a bit of mayhem and minor brain burning thrown in.