What's the deal with board games?

As part of the Staff Bonding Committee, I organized a one-and-a-half hour board game session for my colleagues last week. The main aim of the session was to get everyone together to socialize, enjoy themselves by playing some board games and get to know each other a little better.

Sounds boring, right? A bunch of working acquaintances forced by an over-zealous committee (probably formed by a manager who has read Happy Workplace Management for Dummies one too many times) to play Monopoly? It's like going through Chinese water torture, except that you're also forced to make awkward small talk.

Well, another objective of the session was to show my colleagues that tabletop gaming is not Monopoly, and there are literally thousands of better board games out there. Objectively speaking, Monopoly is a terrible game. You can't really affect the outcome of the game because there are almost no useful decisions to make (it's pretty much always a good idea to buy any property you land on), so you're completely at the mercy of your die rolls. In terms of useful decisions, Monopoly is in the same category as Snakes & Ladders, Battleship and flipping a coin, except that you have to do it for hours if not days (pop quiz: how long was the longest Monopoly game ever played?). Ain't nobody got time for that.

Listen, if you just feel like spending a couple of hours rolling dice and moving a top hat around the board with a couple of like-minded friends, by all means go ahead. Maybe you sometimes need to switch your brain off for a while, and who am I to judge? However, if you feel that board gaming is boring based on the faulty assumption that all board games are like Monopoly (or Risk, or Chess, or Cluedo), you could be missing out on something that you'd really enjoy. This is the curse that Monopoly has wrought on the board gaming hobby.

"All who think of board games shall think of me! Muahahahaha!"
(sources: http://www.thelmagazine.com/binary/a429/1251222802-moneybags.jpg,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:MargaretHamiltoninTheWizardOfOz.jpg)

To give you an idea of the possibilities behind board games, let me briefly describe the game that got me into this hobby. It all started in 1999 when a good friend hosted my wife and me on our honeymoon in Melbourne at his house. When we got there, we saw a board game on the dining room table and got curious, so we asked him to explain the rules to us (on hindsight, I think my friend planted the game there with an ulterior motive). The game was called The Settlers of Catan. 

"Who has wood for my sheep?" - Sheldon Cooper, The Big Bang Theory
(source: http://boardgamegeek.com/image/268855/the-settlers-of-catan?size=original)

The board is modular and made out of individual hexagons that are randomised for every game, as are the numbers on the hexes. You begin the game with two settlements. The aim of the game is to be the first player to get to 10 points, which you achieve by building roads, settlements and cities using resources. Two dice are rolled every turn, and the number rolled determines which hexes produce resources; if you have a settlement or city adjacent to such a hex, you get that resource. Therefore, it is better to build your settlements next to hexes with more probable numbers (e.g., 6 or 8) instead of the improbably numbers (e.g., 2 or 12).

Each turn you can also trade resources with other players, or trade four of one type of resource for one of another. If you have a settlement or city next to a port, you get a better trade ratio, but since ports are on the edge of the board, the settlement will be adjacent to at most two hexes (compared to three hexes for an internal settlement). The trading aspect is a major part of the game, which requires creating temporary alliances and negotiating mutually beneficial trades. There are a few other mechanics in the game (like the dastardly Robber that steals stuff when a 7 is rolled, or development cards you can buy for a one-time boost), but this is mainly how the game is played.

Wow. For a guy whose previous experience with board games came solely from Parker Brothers, this game blew my mind. Just by having the rules explained to me, I immediately thought of a bunch of tactics and strategies. Do I prioritise getting wood and brick to build roads early (required to expand since settlements can't be built too close together), or just go for the most probable numbers and trade for the wood and brick I need? Is it worth having a port settlement? Should I get a wood for his sheep? (Sorry, had to throw that one in there)

If you're not particularly inspired by my description of The Settlers of Catan to try playing board games, I'm not surprised. There is a vast difference between reading a description of a game on your monitor and actually seeing and playing the game. The objective of my post is just to explain that there are thousands of board games out there that are much, much better than Monopoly (and some of them don't even require boards). If you are at all interested in getting together with a few friends around a coffee table for a fun social activity, where you get to talk, taunt and laugh at each other, then you might want to look into the board gaming hobby. It's an alternative to watching a movie or playing an online game.

As for the staff bonding session, I got a decent turnout of about 20 people, and I think quite a number of them had fun. Admittedly, I suspect a few of my colleagues did not quite get into it, but I appreciate them for giving the games a try. For this first session I focused on party games and other lighter fair, and I wasn't afraid to toss a few silly "children's" games into the mix. For the record, the games that saw play were:

• Rattlesnake (something I threw out for early arrivals as I set up the other games; helped to blow the "board games = Monopoly" mindset out of the water)
• Liar's Dice (the big hit of the party; saw constant play throughout the session)
• Dixit and Dixit Odyssey (very much enjoyed by one group, less so by another)
• Say Anything and Say Anything Family Edition (played by two groups with moderate success)
• Squint (didn't work too well for some reason)
• For Sale (quick and fun)
• Martian Dice (note: it is interesting to see math lecturers arguing probabilities as they play)

Epilogue: We got permission to hold another board gaming session, and this could potentially be a monthly affair. Any gamers reading this with suggestions for suitable games for the next session, please comment below!