Board Games on Rachel Joi

Mind Games 2026 recap

Mon, 25 May 2026 10:19:00 +0000

In April, I attended American Mensa’s Mind Games for my tenth (10th!!!) time. It’s a fantastic weekend of playing so many board games with people I’ve known for a long time and people I’m just getting to know. It’s a very intense time for both my brain and for “peopling”. This year, it was in DC, and, as has become more common, it started on Thursday instead of Friday, which meant we had about 60 hours to play games instead of 36+.

new board games rundown

Fri, 09 Nov 2018 07:23:00 +0000

I spent the better part of five days last week playing the newest board games at a convention in Seattle. It was quite a change from the board game convention I usually go to, where players have about 40 hours to get through at least 30 games. This one was more relaxed time-wise, but the games were considerably more intense. I played a lot of “heavy” games, which took up to about five hours for one game. Altogether, I got through 27. The games were of a much higher caliber than my other convention too, so that made me happy. Here’s the rundown of the games I played:

essential board games

Thu, 29 Jun 2017 16:11:00 +0000

I know I talk a lot about board games, but I’ve never talked about which ones are actually good starter games for anyone interested in building a modern board game collection. So what games do you need? In no particular order, here’s my list:

board game extravaganza 2 (April)

Fri, 12 May 2017 14:00:58 +0000

I went to Mind Games in April, at which judges play at least 30 games and vote on their favorites. On Sunday morning, votes are tallied, and five games are heralded as winners with the right to put the Mensa Select seal on their game. This was my fourth year going, and it was a lot of fun to see old friends, meet new people, and play LOTS. OF. GAMES. The winners this year were Amalgam, Around the World in 80 Days, Clank!, Harry Potter Hogwarts Battle, and Imagine. I didn’t play Clank!, and I had played Hogwarts Battle at the other convention (and it wasn’t on my ballot this time), but I played so many other games. I promise I like more games than just those I win. I know you’re curious about my thoughts on the games, so here goes:

board game extravaganza 1 (March)

Sat, 18 Mar 2017 00:23:58 +0000

I went to a board game convention at the beginning of March, and I played lots of games! Here’s a list:

Scoville: This is similar to Pastiche, but with peppers. It’s a cute game where you plant peppers and try to harvest increasingly more expensive or strategic peppers. You get victory points by making salsa recipes and selling your peppers. It’s cute and fun, not too heavy, and I really enjoyed it.
Kodama: This is a sweet and pretty game that can be played with children if you want. You start with a trunk card that has one of six features on it. Each season (spring, summer, and fall), you place four cards on your tree, scoring points for features, and at the end of each season, you invite a kodama (tree spirit) to your tree, and it gives you additional points. There are kodama cards for children that give more basic points so they can be competitive with adults. It’s a very pretty game, with really nice art.
Lost Cities: This is a two-player game where you go build expeditions by going through a deck of cards and playing cards out of your hand in sequential order for each color. Some rounds can be devastatingly bad, going into negative points, but it’s a fun game for two, and it can be quite competitive over a few rounds. I ended up with two copies of this through the math trade, and I think we’re going to give the second copy to Carl’s parents, who like games too.
Viticulture: I was really excited about this game, because I love Scythe, and this was his earlier hit. I think this game would be best played with people you know really well, whom you can harass if they take too long, because a couple guys we played with were fairly dense and fairly oblivious. The mechanics are interesting, as you plant vineyards, harvest grapes, and make and sell wine, and it takes a reasonable balancing of resources. It was a fun game, and I’d like to play it again, though with people I know better. :)
Deadwood Studios: You’re filming a western movie, and you take roles and get paid and get fame for performing well. For each turn, you’re encouraged to perform your line expressively, but you ultimately roll a die to determine whether you succeed or not. It ended up being a lot of fun, with plenty of laughter.
Letter Tycoon: I entered a tournament for this game and ended up losing badly. It’s kind of like capitalist Scrabble. You have a hand of cards, build words, and buy patents on letters, which pay out when other people use your letters. I was a little disappointed about doing so poorly, but I love this game. I’d like to add it to my collection, if it weren’t so similar to other word games (that Carl won’t play with me).
Shadow Hunters: This game is best played with a large group of people. I think we played with eight. You’re assigned a role of hunter, shadow, or neutral. Hunters and shadows are trying to kill each other, and neutrals each have different win conditions. You can try to figure out who’s who, and you can cause damage to others. It’s a fun game that I’ve played before. It has pretty simple mechanics, and it’s just a good party game.
One Night Revolution: Based on Revolution, but happening faster, everyone has a faction, either rebel or informant, and a role, which include signaler and revealer and other things. Informants try to keep from being discovered, and rebels try to figure out who they are. It can be pretty quick, and it’s a fun puzzle game with lots of conversation. We played about eight rounds of it. Very fun.
Herbaceous: Very pretty game. You cultivate herbs and plant them in herb boxes for various levels of points. It has simple mechanics, plays quickly, and has beautiful art. It was fun and pretty, a good palate cleanser.
Elevenses: Another fairly simple game, it mimics morning tea. You have cards face-down and a few cards in your hand. You try to figure out where your high-value cards are and maximize your points, and each round ends when someone has three cards face-up and plays an elevenses card. It was sweet to play.
Biblios: I was interested in playing this game to check it out for a friend. It turned out to be not that cool. You’re trying to build your collection of types of books in a scriptorium. Each person takes a card for herself, a card for the auction, and as many cards for the public offering as there are other people playing, and you go through the deck that way. The auction phase comes with buying cards. People bid on cards to add to their collection. It’s… okay. Not awesome.
Harry Potter Hogwarts Battle: We only played two years of the game rather than all seven. Characters (Hermione, Ron, Harry, and Neville) try to fight villains and gain spells and items. It’s a cooperative deck-building game, and it was both fun and not too thrilling. I’m not sure I’ll play it again, but it was good enough as we went.
Hardback: This is the “prequel” to Paperback, similar to Paperback but with some different mechanisms. This is going on Kickstarter in April, and if you don’t have Paperback already, you should look at both and decide which to get. Hardback involves buying cards that are one of four different genres - mystery, adventure, horror, and romance - and those cards give special powers when used together. It’s fun but still needs to be polished. It’s similar enough to Paperback to not make me need to buy it, but it could be a good option if you are looking for a word game.
Sheriff of Nottingham: This is a bluffing game where you bring legal goods into the town and try to smuggle illegal goods in. Each person takes a turn as the sheriff, and as sheriff, you try to extract bribes from other players. It’s fun if you get into it and really live up your roles. I loved this game a year ago and enjoyed it this year too.
Captain Sonar: This is a game for 2-8 players, and we played with all eight, two teams of four. Each team has a captain, a radio operator, a first mate, and an engineer. I was the engineer for two games and the first mate for one. It’s basically real-time Battleship with additional complexity. It was a lot of fun, though the dry erase markers basically stopped working while we were playing. It worked really well with eight players. Not a game I need to own, because I’m not sure I could find seven other people to play with.
Broom Service: We played this with five players, and it was fun! This was my first time playing with more than two people, and it was quite enjoyable. It was tense trying to figure out if you should be cowardly or brave. The other people seemed to enjoy it too, one guy said it was his favorite game of the weekend.
Artemis (simulation): This was a Star Trek bridge simulation with a crew of six. Five of us did it, and a random person joined us for it. I was the captain (yay!). We helped some Romulans and destroyed basically an entire Klingon fleet, then flew through an asteroid field on our way back. It was fun, and I’d like to try it again (and maybe go rogue).

Stay tuned for another board game extravaganza in April!

board game review: Scythe

Fri, 24 Feb 2017 19:34:00 +0000

We brought Scythe home a few weeks ago, and we’ve played it a few times. We’ve played one 2-player and two 4-player games, and Carl played the automa version once. I think I can give a decent review of it now. There are some good tutorials on Scythe (see the Watch It Played video and errata here ), so I won’t talk in depth about how to play the game. But briefly, there are five factions and five player mats, for 25 combinations of play. Each faction has a special ability and slightly different powers, and each player mat has a different combination of basic and more expensive actions, and different costs for things. You gain stars (achievements) by gaining power or popularity, building, deploying mechs, winning combats, and other things. Everything–territories, resources, stars, building locations–is converted to coins at the end of the game, and the player with the most coins wins. For our first game, we were a little confused about the rules, and we did a few things wrong, particularly with workers (allowing workers to have encounters, letting workers do the special mech/character actions), but we got the gist of it, and our next games were more correct. In our last game, I won without building any buildings, and I almost broke 100 coins, but I think I bribed too many people. I felt like it was a pretty nice victory. There’s an achievement sheet that lets you write down your name next to winning scenarios, which makes victory even sweeter. The first few rounds are a little slow and offer little interaction with the other players, as you try to gather enough resources to do something useful, but once you get out of your little area, there is the potential for more interaction as it becomes a land grab and race to the factory. Combats are not as frequent as you might think, even with four players, and bribery is fun (and effective if done right). Carl says that the automa version needs more explicit instructions. While he was playing, he called me over a few times to find out what I thought was reasonable. I haven’t tried the automa version myself yet, but I will say so when I do. I LOVE this game. It’s complex enough to have many different winning scenarios, there’s a little bit of luck involved, and it speeds up as the game goes on. It’s not a simple game, and you have to play with people who REALLY like games, but it’s pretty great.

December gaming edition

Fri, 02 Dec 2016 08:00:00 +0000

I’ve been playing a number of games over the past few months, some new ones and some not-so-new ones.

Canalis: We played this game with 4 players a couple times over the weekend. It’s part of the Tempest universe (which includes Love Letter, Courtier, and a number of other games). In Canalis, you’re trying to build buildings that require connections to resources, labor, and the harbor. There are public and secret missions, and there’s a drafting element for cards in each round of play. The board is a grid, and you place tiles (buildings, canals, or gardens for bonus points) on the grid. We played with two people who have played it a lot, so they were both (a little) helpful and sometimes skeptical of why we were doing things. It was a fun game, though maybe not one we need to own.
Paperback: Absolutely must own this one, and as quickly as possible. This was my chance to introduce Carl to it, and he liked it a lot, in spite of not really being a word games person. I think I’ve talked about this game before, but in case I haven’t: it’s kind of like Dominion meets Scrabble. It’s a deck-building game with words, so you have a hand of cards each round, with different values, and your goal is to create the best word you can that will enable you to buy additional letters (some with special powers) or straight-up victory points that also act as wild cards. This is just a wonderful game, and the guy who created it lives in Utah!
Guillotine: This is a card game where you try to rearrange the order of execution to acquire the highest value executed noble you can. It’s played over three days, and the noble cards range in value from 5 (Marie Antoinette and others) to negative points for martyrs and innocent bystanders. It’s a lot of luck, or maybe I just wasn’t playing very well. It’s a cute, quick game that seems like a good filler or palate cleanser.
Sushi Go: Another cute, quick game, and possibly one I’ve discussed, players collect different kinds of food (tempura, sashimi, nigiri, maki rolls, dumplings, and puddings) for different values of points. It’s played over three rounds, and it’s another drafting game. I think I need to figure out a new strategy for that one, because I tend to focus on one food item for a game instead of just a round. It’s a nicely balanced game, where each kind of food can be successful… sometimes.
Archer Love Letter: We don’t really go in for licensed games very much, but Carl surprised me with this one, and it turned out to be very good. It’s themed well, and it follows the mechanics of Love Letter, but it adds more interaction with the hidden card, which was fun. I’m not sure we’ll disregard the original game, because it fits so nicely in my purse, but this was a good complement.
Tiny Epic Westerns: Can you tell we like the Tiny Epic games? This is their new one, and it’s kind of worker placement meets poker. There are six locations that make up the board, and players can place their meeples at five of them. Duels ensue for control of spots, and then bonuses are acquired by having the best three-card poker hand. There’s competition for control of cards with special powers, resources similar to the other Tiny Epic games, and a way to build your own empire, for lack of a better word. It’s a fun game, better if you wear cowboy hats to play it.
World’s Fair 1893: We’ve now played this game about four times, and I’m less certain about it being an awesome game now. Except for some rare circumstances, there’s usually one obvious move at a time. It happens pretty much every turn that if you try to plan a move ahead, the person before you will take what you want. It’s almost inevitable. And that makes the game feel a little more pre-determined than I would like. Strategy is fluid and can change from turn to turn. I still like this game, but I’m less enthusiastic about it now that I’ve played it a few times.
Five Tribes with Artisans of Naqala expansion: Man, Five Tribes is just great. It’s been one of my favorites for well over a year, and it remains so. The expansion adds a sixth tribe (sacrilege!) and new corresponding items and tiles. It also adds mountains and a chasm that bar some paths for meeples. It’s a great game with plenty of strategy, and the balance is really great. You can’t really win if you go all in on just one thing, but if you focus on one thing while not neglecting others, that gives a player a good chance of winning.

September gaming edition

Fri, 16 Sep 2016 16:00:00 +0000

It’s been a long time since I’ve posted something on a Friday, and there have been a number of games I’ve played recently. I’ve been to two board game conventions and have played a lot of games with friends. This is a long post, but here goes (in alphabetical order):

weekly roundup - February 19th

Fri, 19 Feb 2016 10:02:00 +0000

Maybe not strictly weekly, but here’s this week’s edition of what I’ve been reading, playing, and thinking! The New Yorker had an interesting piece last spring on police shootings in Albuquerque . The violence directed at civilians by cops is far beyond what other areas experience, and the city turned a blind eye to it over and over again. The DOJ launched an investigation and found a pattern of unnecessarily aggressive responses to crises. The most egregious violence has been directed at people who are homeless or have a mental illness. It is a depressing read, and the protection by the city and within the department makes it even worse. I could feel the hopelessness of the parents in the story. This short opinion piece (caution: language) on the Huffington Post’s refusal to pay its writers got me thinking about how I choose to spend my time and energy. It’s also an analog to paying artists, like I believe so firmly in with ArtsFuse . I’m not sure I can completely stop reading HuffPo, but is it worth it to make an effort? Games:

weekly roundup - February 5th

Fri, 05 Feb 2016 08:41:00 +0000

This will be a short one. In the last couple weeks, I’ve been focusing on other things and haven’t read many articles or played many games. I’m still a week or two behind in Bloomberg Businessweek, but I found this article about a man who has donated millions to Ted Cruz’s campaign to be very interesting. Robert Mercer is a very wealthy programmer and hedge fund manager who donates to political campaigns and summits and movements that push for the gold standard and deny climate change. He and I basically have nothing in common, but it would be interesting to have a conversation with him (though he is also fairly reticent about his personal beliefs, so it might be difficult). The story is light on formative background for Mercer, and I would want to know why on earth… just… why. My Facebook feed has been dominated by a few outspoken Sanders supporters, and it made me start thinking that everyone was like that. I’ve taken measures to lessen that exposure and talk to Clinton supporters more. And then I came across this piece this morning, and it seemed like perfect timing. Clinton has been in the national spotlight for 25 years. She has incredible perseverance, and she has had to deal with so much mud-slinging for pretty much the entire time. The GOP is encouraging Sanders supporters to spew the same vitriol the right has been spewing for years. It’s frustrating and worrisome.

weekly roundup - January 22nd (game edition)

Fri, 22 Jan 2016 07:45:00 +0000

I didn’t get much reading done this week, but I have plenty of games to talk about, so this is going to be all about games. If you were hoping for more reading suggestions, check in next week! I spent last weekend at a game convention at Bryce Canyon. It was great! We got there Friday evening and played games through Sunday evening. On Monday, we went on a sleigh ride to the edge of the canyon, and then we spent a couple hours exploring the national park. It’s been a long time since I’ve been to a national park - some views were breathtaking. We need to go back and do some hiking and camping there (and at the other, what, five? national parks in Utah). We played thirteen games over the course of forty-eight hours (a slower pace than some other cons, but more serious games than other cons too). Here they are in no particular order:

weekly roundup - January 8th

Fri, 08 Jan 2016 16:32:00 +0000

I started my week by reading an article in Bloomberg about Disney’s princess business switching from Mattel to Hasbro. Mattel had a series of missteps with its treatment of Disney princess products, and Disney finally took its business elsewhere. Last year, two-thirds of the Mattel senior staff resigned or was fired (Mattel lost the Disney princesses in late 2014). Hasbro has reworked the princesses to be more true to their animated characters, including painting on faces, making the waistlines (very slightly) different, and taking the dresses back to what they were meant to be. A couple things stood out to me in this article. First, it’s very important to know your market. Disney didn’t understand that kids (and their parents) wanted princess stuff until an executive went to a Disney on Ice show and saw little girls in handmade princess dresses. Second, it’s important to pay attention to your client and make them feel heard and valued. The article is full of cringing moments where I found myself wishing that Mattel had done anything else. Excellent read. Speaking of Disney and Hasbro, the #WheresRey debacle has been fascinating. Hasbro may be doing right by princesses, but their treatment of the female protagonist in Star Wars is just terrible, and their excuses feeble and hollow. This post discusses how Rey is a role model as much for boys as she is for girls. Something else Disney is doing is building a Star Wars franchise to last the ages. Wired wrote about how the last Star Wars movie won’t come in our lifetime. Star Wars is following the comic book style of universe-building, with lots of options for side stories and having characters develop independently and together. (Also, I learned a new word - paracosm - so that’s exciting.) It’s the same thing that the big studios are doing with Marvel and DC, intertwining stories and building franchises to explore characters and ages and lands. It’s an exciting thing, but at the same time, I like being able to just ingest single stories or movies without needing to know a lot of external information. On a side note, I may get more into Star Wars. Carl certainly wants me to, and he has a list of books for me to read if I’m interested. So there’s that. Getting away from Disney entirely, I also read about environmental activists that went after a ship that was egregiously and illegally fishing. The article was a fascinating look into a world of very determined people (on both sides). The environmentalists pursued the fishing boat for over 100 days and 10,000 nautical miles. I care about the environment, but their level of caring is so beyond what I can comprehend. Games! This week, I played Bang the dice game, Aton, Roll for the Galaxy, and Five Tribes solo:

weekly roundup - first ever!

Fri, 01 Jan 2016 22:19:00 +0000

Welcome to my first weekly roundup, where I write about things I’ve read, games I’ve played, and things I’ve been thinking about that don’t merit their own blog posts. I’ve read a few interesting articles this week. I discovered the Wait But Why site, and the archives are full of interesting things. I read a two-part post on AI and the timeline for the future of it, which was both really interesting and fairly terrifying. The idea that we could be so close to immortality or extinction left me reeling. It’s a very long read, but I highly recommend reading all of it. Another interesting post I read was about procrastination . I spend a lot of my time on unimportant things, and though I’m starting to get better about doing things that will move me forward, some days are better than others. The post really resonated with me, and it reframed things in a way that may put me in more control in the future. I’ve read a couple of art-related articles this week as well, both ending rather negatively about their subjects. One was about Peter Lik, the photographer, the other about an art collector who patronizes young artists. The article about Peter Lik talks about his business plan (prices increase based on how many prints sell, and stores in high-traffic tourist areas), and about the criticism he has received from the art world (lack of shadows and darkness in his art, little resale value). We nearly bought a Peter Lik a few years ago, and I still like what he does. I’m not sure what that says about my taste in art (it probably means I’m not very sophisticated). I didn’t like the sales tactics they used, somewhat akin to car sales, but it nearly worked. The other article dealt with a man who patronizes artists as an investment strategy. It made me think more about what I’m doing with my business and how easily artists are taken advantage of. This post about Hillary Clinton was eye-opening. I had to reconsider why I feel the way I do about her. It’s a defense of her in a way, pointing out that she’s in an impossible situation. I dislike her corporate connections, but at the same time, she’s doing what she needs to to survive, and she’s immensely strong. I cannot imagine anyone I know putting up with what she’s had to endure for the last twenty years. Another site I’ve discovered is Inverse , which is full of articles that make my geeky heart sing. If you get excited about science or nerdy shows or movies, this is the place to poke around. I don’t want to point to any specific articles, because they’re all good. On to games! Recently, I’ve played Morels, Smash Up, Stone Age, Eldritch Horror, Red Dragon Inn, and Exploding Kittens. It’s been a nice vacation. :)