1906

Also I played Twilight Imperium for the first time last week! The 4th edition with 4 players took about 4 hours, I had a blast! The politics actually reminded me of Spartacus (really wish more games had this type of political engagement), but the depth of the rest of the game, stood out all by itself (eclipsing Eclipse)

Though I really wish I could find a game that had the political depth of Empire of the Fading Suns board or PC…

1907

Both Champions and Raiders are pretty heavy in “gamer” theme. I’m leaning towards something a bit less combat oriented. So far, I’ve got Viticulture and Harvest on the short list. Possibly Pioneer Days too,.

1908

I think Viticulture would be a very solid introduction to worker placement, with more legs than some of the really introductory ones.

1909

What are you looking for exactly? I can offer a couple of suggestions in this direction, Fief, John Company, Republic of Rome, etc.

1910

Bring it to my house.

1911

Dominant Species. This way you can teach worker placement and two area control games at the same time.

1912

Yeah, that’ll be great if your non-gamer friends like 6-hour long games where you have to count and re-count your pieces hundreds of times. #NotAFan

I think Lords of Waterdeep is the canonical “introductory worker placement game”. The rules are very simple, and can be explained in a few minutes. The actions you take are mostly very basic (take one or two cubes). The only downside is that the D&D theme might be too geeky for non-gamers.

1913

We need @tomchick in here.

1914

Well, that and it being boring.

1915

How dare you! No, wait, actually, that’s pretty fair. It is better with the corruption expansion.

1916

My experience included that expansion, but in fairness also getting stuck with the beholder Lord, who is just bad.

1917

I just got introduced to Rajas of the Ganges. If you like Champions of Midgard you would probably dig this one.

image
45B04031-F796-470C-B060-3352C2D246C3.jpeg2851×2138 1.91 MB
image
DD967526-B258-4DED-A19B-A2DD7F86B96F.jpeg1511×2015 1.24 MB

1918

@Dave_Perkins and @JoshL are playing that game online through Yucata, and based on Dave’s enthusiasm, would probably play more. I played a game with them and didn’t really click with it. Yucata’s implementation is really solid, I learned about half the rules just by playing it.

1919

Ha, yeah, guilty. I kinda like it. It is a simple game in a complex wrapper (so many icons!). There’s a zillion actions on the board, but three of them you use 80% of the time (and a lot of them you never use except in emergencies). It may or may not have legs, but I’m having a good time with it.

1920

For new gamers, Stone Age>Lords of Waterdeep. That is simple mathematics.

1921

Yeah, that’s not a bad choice either.

1922

If you’re going to really play Lords of Waterdeep, man up and play Yedo:

  1. It’s got a better theme - Feudal Japan (better because I like it more and D&D themed games are a dime a dozen ;)
  2. The missions and rewards are more interesting.
  3. Game can be a brutal if you aren’t prepared.
1923

Am I weird in saying Carcassonne is a worker placement game? Also a tile laying game. If it counts, definitely that is a better introduction than Lords of Waterdeep. I own both but Carcassonne is the better game. Especially in two-player and with anyone of any language.

1924

I can see where you’re coming from but I don’t think it has the basic worker placement structure of limited action spaces you place workers in.

1925

I just added Dinosaur Island to the mix as well. I think the Jurassic Park theme might mix well. I don’t find it to be a particularly difficult game to teach as long as you make it clear the victory points are the goal cards to work towards.