What Board Game Are You Currently Playing?

[japes]

Those of you that have played Mice and Mystics with your kids...what is the youngest age you would recommend? Also how often would your child want to play? It's a big investment for a game for us and we are still looking for our family CO-OP game.

[rudyvalentine]

Originally Posted by japes

Those of you that have played Mice and Mystics with your kids...what is the youngest age you would recommend? Also how often would your child want to play? It's a big investment for a game for us and we are still looking for our family CO-OP game.

I got Mice & Mystics when my youngest was 6. Personally, I wouldn't start much younger than that, but I'm sure others would. It was easy enough for a 6 & 8 year old to understand moving and attacking, but keeping track of equipment and abilities will have to be managed by adults.

It's a fun game, but be realistic about what you are getting and how often it will hit the table. Will your family enjoy the idea of adventuring through a castle, finding new items and encountering new characters and enemies or are you more of a sit down, open a box, and play for 30 min type of family before the younger ones lose interest and want to move along to other things?

I believe the game can work well with younger ones if they get into the theme and enjoy the explore and fighting opportunities. There are other good starting points for family co-ops too. Forbidden Island and Forbidden Desert are both solid family co-ops for $20 or less. I've never played Castle Panic, but friends of ours really enjoy it.

[Hahma]

Originally Posted by rudyvalentine

I got Mice & Mystics when my youngest was 6. Personally, I wouldn't start much younger than that, but I'm sure others would. It was easy enough for a 6 & 8 year old to understand moving and attacking, but keeping track of equipment and abilities will have to be managed by adults.

It's a fun game, but be realistic about what you are getting and how often it will hit the table. Will your family enjoy the idea of adventuring through a castle, finding new items and encountering new characters and enemies or are you more of a sit down, open a box, and play for 30 min type of family before the younger ones lose interest and want to move along to other things?

I believe the game can work well with younger ones if they get into the theme and enjoy the explore and fighting opportunities. There are other good starting points for family co-ops too. Forbidden Island and Forbidden Desert are both solid family co-ops for $20 or less. I've never played Castle Panic, but friends of ours really enjoy it.

Great answer Rudy. My girls played when they were 9 (they're twins), and it wasn't difficult for them at all. But one of them is not into games that much but will humor me on occasion with Love Letter, Splendor, Coloretto, Hey That's My Fish, or some other lighter/quicker games. The other one will still play M&M on occasion (we just played a couple weeks ago), but she's not always dying to play it.

So it depends on the kids and their interests, but as Rudy said, it also really depends on their attention span, because M&M a couple hour commitment per chapter, give or take. However, if you have the extra table space and can leave it setup for a couple days, it can be stopped mid-game and started again the next day if you want to keep sessions shorter.

Rudy had some nice suggestions for some family co-ops, but I'll add Flash Point: Fire Rescue as a nice family co-op as well.

[japes]

Originally Posted by Hahma

Great answer Rudy. My girls played when they were 9 (they're twins), and it wasn't difficult for them at all. But one of them is not into games that much but will humor me on occasion with Love Letter, Splendor, Coloretto, Hey That's My Fish, or some other lighter/quicker games. The other one will still play M&M on occasion (we just played a couple weeks ago), but she's not always dying to play it.

So it depends on the kids and their interests, but as Rudy said, it also really depends on their attention span, because M&M a couple hour commitment per chapter, give or take. However, if you have the extra table space and can leave it setup for a couple days, it can be stopped mid-game and started again the next day if you want to keep sessions shorter.

Rudy had some nice suggestions for some family co-ops, but I'll add Flash Point: Fire Rescue as a nice family co-op as well.

Thanks guys...He liked the preview videos and we do have a table in the playroom where we keep heroscape maps built so shorter sessions would always be possible. Flash Point has been brought up several times so that may be one we stat looking into more.

[quozl]

To me, there's wasn't much difference between Mice & Mystics and short Heroscape scenarios.

[Johngee]

Hmmm, while we're on the topic of Mice & Mystics ... (btw: I do not own it and currently have no intentions of acquiring it any time soon, but I'm just curious after heading the above comments) ... How adaptable is M&M to a HeroScape format: i.e. using HS terrain in particular the FotA to create a 3D castle exploration experience, and creating custom stat cards for each of the characters in the story line???

[quozl]

There'd be quite a bit of work adapting them. They're quite different systems; they just have a similar feel to me.

[Agent Minivann]

I believe Grungebob mentioned somewhere that he was going to post Heroscape stats for them, but I don't know if or where.

[A3n]

Originally Posted by NecroBlade

I know some if not all the figures exist from the Star Wars minis line. There were a crap ton at GenCon one year.

Originally Posted by heroscaper2010

All of them do exist in the SW minis line. I just printed off little circles with the name, move, attack, and defense numbers on them.

Just order a set of them. I will give the game a try when I get the figures & after I make something for the board.

[IAmBatman]

Got in some Saturday gaming. Two games of Dead of Winter. In the first, a lot of tooth rolls by the guy who hadn't played before tanked the colony. In the second, I was the traitor, and we exiled another player on turn one (a third player suggested we do so, so I figured, why not?). But we still just had too many mouths to feed and the colony ran out of morale before I got everything I needed to win as a traitor.

Then four games of Coup, which is quick and fun, followed by a game of Sheriff of Nottingham, which I liked. Lots of "lying" games and lots of beer!

[Hahma]

Originally Posted by IAmBatman

Got in some Saturday gaming. Two games of Dead of Winter. In the first, a lot of tooth rolls by the guy who hadn't played before tanked the colony. In the second, I was the traitor, and we exiled another player on turn one (a third player suggested we do so, so I figured, why not?). But we still just had too many mouths to feed and the colony ran out of morale before I got everything I needed to win as a traitor.

Then four games of Coup, which is quick and fun, followed by a game of Sheriff of Nottingham, which I liked. Lots of "lying" games and lots of beer!

Liar liar pants on fire.

[rudyvalentine]

I'm a little late in posting my April plays, but this is what I got to play last month:

Sheriff of Nottingham x5 - family loves this one and it gets the most requests for plays right now. I really like how playing it honest or going for big contraband scores are both viable ways of winning. Honest is the safer route, but you can blow people out with lots of contraband.
X-Wing x5 - local tournaments every month have been a lot of fun and given me a chance to try out lots of ships and builds.
Carcassonne
DC Deck-Building Game x2
Dixit
King of Tokyo
Sushi Go!
Love Letter Batman Edition x3 - I was wrong about not really needing another Love Letter. This IS the Love Letter I needed.
Love Letter - introduced the Tempest version to the kids after Batman. They like Batman better.
Specter Ops x3 - really like this game. I like playing as the agent and as the hunter. It feels balanced on both sides to me but player skill can make it feel very lopsided, which I don't believe is a bad thing.
Smash Up - need to play this more but the kids aren't quite ready. Pretty Pretty Smash Up is on its way to me. I've heard good things.