Ooh, I played Pandemic recently. We only played the simplest variation because several of us (including me) hadn't played before and learning on the fly was a bit of a challenge, but it was fun. I think we actually won one game.

DQ, wow, what a dick. Too bad Dominion doesn't have a board and pieces that you could've flipped over dramatically as you exited.

I like Carcassone, kinda. I love the tactile aspect of it; the tiles and the meeple feel nice. I've been teaching Mal to play it, and of course he's more focused on building a nice map than on getting points, but I can't say that's wrong.

I'll have to try Race for the Galaxy again. Even after a fair amount of Puerto Rico experience, R4tG seemed confusing and odd and like multi-player solitaire.

I do however expect that it'll be great for when Ryan has become interested in games but is maybe still coming to terms with losing.

Thankfully we've just gotten out of this phase with Mal. The "sore loser" phase was initially hysterical (because he was a walking cliche) and then tiresome. But it didn't last too long, honestly.

A Mal story I don't think I've shared here: the DH and I were sitting in the game room, doing inter-session busy work for D&D (levelling up characters, etc). Mal came in, looked at us, grabbed a marker for the white board, and said "OK. I'll draw where you guys are. (draws a square, starts putting smaller squares inside it) This is a village, and these are the houses. But it was attacked by zombies. Wolves. Zombie wolves. So you guys are right here, and you have to rescue the people."

DH and I melted at our 5yo DM. So we played out the scene, with Mal even telling us to "roll to hit."

I'll have to try Dominion again, then; maybe I'll ask for a one-on-one session with another friend of mine. I can't remember if it can only be 2 players, but maybe just for teaching purposes it would be fine.

Weird thing about that player who was so overbearing... I think I just can't play board games with him. Oddly, he's one of my players in D&D (Pathfinder, actually) and he's fine--doesn't overbear anybody, doesn't tell anyone what to do (though certainly he discusses tactics, but the whole group does that and they do so amicably), and doesn't give me a hard time (but I am the DM). And he's a fantastic roleplayer to boot. Not sure what the difference in atmosphere... maybe he's trying to GM gmless games, I don't know.

Race for the Galaxy is fun--I've only played it once, but I really did enjoy that.

Pandemic was... interesting. The concept is very interesting but the game seemed very hard to win.

Story about 5 yo GM: Priceless. And I bet he was a fantastic GM too.

I have a story that is nowhere near as cute, but I was at a friend's house, where apparently one of my dice had fallen out of the bag into their yard. Their 4 year old daughter found the die and shouted, "Daddy, daddy a twelve sided die!"

I am so proud of my geek friends for teaching their children the important things (also: great counting tools, dice).

I'll have to try Race for the Galaxy again. Even after a fair amount of Puerto Rico experience, R4tG seemed confusing and odd and like multi-player solitaire.

There's a learning curve getting used to the meanings of the symbols. Once you get the hang of it, they're really a very efficient system, but different people have different affinities for them. The multi-player solitaire feel is in part another hurdle - once you have the hang of what you're doing, you can spare more attention for how your choices benefit the others (and vice versa). It'll never be as interactive as a game like BSG, though.

(The second expansion includes rules that allow you to steal planets from other players' layouts; that introduces some more interaction. I think the third expansion does too, but I haven't bought that yet. I apparently have a decent tax return coming, I'll get it then.)

Mal came in, looked at us, grabbed a marker for the white board, and said "OK. I'll draw where you guys are. (draws a square, starts putting smaller squares inside it) This is a village, and these are the houses. But it was attacked by zombies. Wolves. Zombie wolves. So you guys are right here, and you have to rescue the people."

That is just awesome.

BSG

While we're waiting for the President to check in, Chief, are you all set for your turn? Anyone want to tout for an XO?

(I'm not much use for one, the most useful thing I can do is try to get out of the Brig. I'll ask on my turn if the crew's ok supporting my release, but I don't think it's worth chewing up extra actions before then.)

R4tG seemed confusing and odd and like multi-player solitaire.

Dominion seems like multi-player solitaire to me. That's why it's a bit funny that someone would get so invested in someone else's cards.

I'll have to try Dominion again, then; maybe I'll ask for a one-on-one session with another friend of mine. I can't remember if it can only be 2 players, but maybe just for teaching purposes it would be fine.

I think I've only played it with two so far.

BSG

Well, I had a pretty good draw on my last XO. At this point, more yellow doesn't really make sense. And I now have nine cards.

An XO for me would only make sense if we wanted me to move somewhere else and 1) do an action there, or 2) draw skill cards of a color we need.

Dominion seems like multi-player solitaire to me.

This I think is totally based on the setup you use. The introductory setup, yeah, very much. We played the one called "Interactive" last night, with three players, and I could see a lot more way to figure out what other people had, and what route they were going, and how to mess with them.

I couldn't DO it, effectively, and did not win, but I could see how.

Pandemic was... interesting. The concept is very interesting but the game seemed very hard to win.

We played two games, both at the average difficulty setting. In the first game, the four of us got crushed because we didn't react to cities hitting level 2 fast enough and of course then level 3, then an outbreak isn't far away. We lost to outbreaks in less than 30 minutes.

In the second game, we focused more heavily on getting players where they needed to be fast and trading cards at appropriate locations to find cures. We managed to get the cures for all four diseases and won the game.

What this showed to us was that the game really hung on how well the team could work together and optimize their teammates' special abilities.

Sorry, I should have made it more clear I was fine with failing the check.

BSG

I play no cards.