Top Three Board Games

Cat[0] and Tomasino[1] both recently phlogged about
their top three favorite board games. I have decided
to share my three favorites as well. So, without 
furtherer preamble....

1. Go (いご) / Baduk (바둑) / Weiqi (围棋)

  Go is by far my favorite board game. In general I
  tend to be a big fan of abstract strategy games.
  Go is the grand-daddy of them all.

  I have read no less than seven books filled with
  strategy, tactics, common plays, etc. That is not
  even to mention the books and websites filled 
  with go problems/puzzles. After all that I am a
  fairly low ranking player. At this point, for 
  those familiar with the ranking system, I hover
  around 12/13 kyu. 

  I have never played a game the can be so different
  from play to play with such endless variation. I
  always walk away from every game having felt like
  I learned something or saw something new. It is a
  slow patient game that is extremely brutal once you
  know what you are doing (and I only just barely
  qualify).

  In go two players take turns playing pieces on
  the board. Once placed, pieces do not move. They
  can be removed if captured, but otherwise remain
  in place. However, capturing pieces is not the 
  goal of the game. The goal is to control the 
  largest amount of teritory. Final scores, 
  depending on the scoring system used, can also
  incorporate the number of captives though. The
  standard size board is 19 x 19. I tend to play
  a lot on 13 x 13. 9 x 9 is also available as a
  size on which to play quicker more tactically
  oriented games.

  The rules to go are very simple, but the
  strategy is infinitely complex. It is said that
  there are more legal board positions than atoms
  in the known universe. My favorite go saying,
  there are many, is: "Lose your first 100 games
  quickly". The point being, you are going to lose
  a lot at first as part of the learning process.
  Get what you can out of them and then move on
  to, hopefully, applying that knowledge and
  defeating your opponents.

  If you have not played and are on linux, most
  systems have gnu-go installed. It is a decent
  start to the game. I highly recommend reading the
  wiki article[2] about the game as it is a good
  place to learn the rules and some basics of 
  strategy and tactics.


2. Ricochet Robots
  
  Ricochet robots[3] is another thinking game. This
  one is more social... to a degree. It can support
  any number of players.

  In Ricochet Robots the game board is a grid. On
  the grid are walls, open space, and target icons.
  Four robot pieces are placed on the board in 
  random locations. These robots are four different
  colors.

  At the beginning of a round a marker token is
  flipped over (or otherwise revealed). The token
  will match one of the target icons on the board.
  The icons have an image and are of a color. The 
  goal is to get the robot of that color to that
  specific target icon.

  To do so you move robots. Once a robot moves in 
  a direction it keeps moving in that direction 
  until it hits a wall or another robot. That
  counts as one move. You repeat this until you
  get the correct colored robot to the correct
  target icon. You may move any and all of the
  robots regardless of what color the goal is.
  In doing so you can use robots to set up
  blockades to get the correct robot to its
  destination. 

  Now for the fun part: you do all of this in
  your head. You do not actually move the robots.
  Once someone thinks they have a solution. They
  call out the number of moves they think it takes
  to complete the round. If they are the first 
  person in the round to do so, they flip over
  a sand timer that goes for one minute. Everyone
  has that minute to figure out a path with fewer
  moves to the goal than the one that was called
  out. The original caller is also allowed to call
  out new numbers if they have optimised their
  route as well.

  At the end of the timer, the person with the 
  lowest number of moves called shows everyone
  their path. If it is valid, the robots are moved
  and the next round is started with the robots
  in that position. If it is not valid, then the
  person with the next highest number goes.

  At the end of the game, the player with the most
  tokens (having received them for winning the round)
  wins.

  I have played this game with upwards of 20 players
  at once and had a great time. I also play it with
  my wife quite often on our own. It scales well
  and is great fun... for the type of person that
  enjoyes this sort of thing. My parents hate it.


3. Cosmic Wimpout

  Cosmic Wimpout[4] is a dice game created by deadheads.
  The baords that I have, which are not required for
  play, are screen printed cloth. The pieces are any
  random markers a person has. My wife and I collect
  little trinkets to use as pieces. Often stones,
  computer parts, figurines, etc.

  It is a simple game that is fun to play. You roll
  dice and keep score based on various rules. You
  are often presented with the ability to keep 
  rolling, and risk losing the points you accumulated
  for that round, or bank your points.

  This game can also support a large number of
  players. I have played with around 15. It is a
  good game to take with you on trips or camping
  since it can fit in a small pouch and support as
  many people as you have with you.



[0] cat: baud.baby:70/0/phlog/fs20190528.txt
[1] tomasino: gopher.black:70/1/phlog/20190529-board-games
[2] Go: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_(game)
[3] Ricochet Robots: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ricochet_Robot
[4] Cosmic Wimpout: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_Wimpout