Board Games Blog

Best way to take note at the game of Clue

2023-03-18T12:26:00.002-04:00

There are a few ways to take notes in the game of Clue that can help you keep track of the information you have gathered and make better deductions:

1. Keep a list of the cards you have: Make a list of the cards you have been dealt and cross off the ones that have been shown to you or suggested by other players. This can help you keep track of which cards are still in play and which ones are part of the solution.

2. Make a chart: Create a chart with the names of the suspects, weapons, and rooms on it. As you gather information, mark off the ones that have been eliminated. This can help you narrow down the possibilities and make better deductions.

3. Take notes on a separate sheet of paper: You can also take notes on a separate sheet of paper, jotting down any information that you think might be useful. This can include the cards you have, the cards shown to you, and any deductions you have made.

4. Use an app or digital tool: There are also apps and digital tools that you can use to keep track of your notes and make deductions. These can be especially helpful if you are playing the game online.

It is important to find a note-taking method that works best for you and helps you keep track of the information you have gathered. The more organized your notes are, the easier it will be for you to make deductions and solve the mystery.

What are the best strategies at the game of Clue?

2023-03-05T14:49:00.002-05:00

There are a few strategies that can be helpful in the game of Clue:

1. Pay attention to the cards you have: Keeping track of the cards you have can help you make better deductions and accusations. For example, if you have a card that matches a suggestion made by another player, you know that the weapon, suspect, or location suggested is not part of the solution.

2. Make strategic suggestions: When you make a suggestion, try to choose a weapon, suspect, and location that you think other players are less likely to have. For example, if you have a card for the lead pipe, you might want to suggest the lead pipe as the weapon, because it is less likely that other players will have it.

3. Don't reveal too much: While it is important to share information with other players, you don't want to give away too much. If you reveal all of your cards, you won't have any information left to use to make deductions or accusations.

4. Pay attention to the board: The game board can be a valuable source of information. If a player suggests a weapon, suspect, or location that is not in a room that they are currently in, you know that they do not have the corresponding card.

5. Make strategic accusations: When you are confident that you have solved the mystery, you can make an accusation. Make sure to choose a weapon, suspect, and location that you think are most likely to be part of the solution. It is generally a good idea to wait until you have gathered as much information as possible before making an accusation, as incorrect accusations can eliminate you from the game.

What is Clue (Cluedo)?

2023-03-01T13:14:00.004-05:00

Clue, also known as Cluedo, is a board game in which players try to solve a mystery by deducing the location of a hidden weapon, the identity of the suspect who committed a crime, and the location of the crime. The game is set in a fictional mansion, and players must move around the mansion and gather clues from the various rooms to help them make their deductions.

The game is played with a game board, playing pieces, and cards. The game board is a representation of the mansion, with each room represented by a space on the board. Each player chooses a playing piece and moves it around the board according to the roll of a dice. There are six suspects in the game, each with their own playing piece and corresponding card. There are also six weapons, each with its own card, and nine rooms in the mansion, each with its own card. One card from each group is randomly chosen and placed in a envelope, which represents the "solution" to the mystery. The remaining cards are shuffled and dealt to the players. During the game, players take turns rolling the dice and moving their playing piece around the board. When a player lands on a room space, they may make a suggestion about the weapon, suspect, and location of the crime. For example, a player might suggest that "Miss Scarlett did it in the library with the rope."

Other players must then show the player any cards they have that match the suggestion. If a player has one of the suggested cards, they must show it to the suggesting player. The suggesting player can then use this information to help make further deductions. The object of the game is to be the first player to correctly deduce the solution to the mystery by using clues gathered from the other players and from the game board. Players can also make accusations, in which they name their solution and try to prove it by showing the corresponding cards. If the accusation is correct, the player wins the game. If the accusation is incorrect, the player is eliminated from the game.

Rumble In The House

2014-12-11T09:25:00.001-05:00

A very fun, short, easy to understand, quality built game with some flaws.

This game's main force resides in how easy it is to understand how we play the game. There is basically two rules you need to understand to play Rumble in the House. Kids will find it very appealing, the characters are fun to look, resistant and very colorful. You can unpack it and start playing in less than 5 minutes.

This game will develop you sense of observation by looking at your opponent's move and will also require some strategy when you are moving the characters on the board.

SETTING UP THE BOARD

You can create your own board every game if you want. You use a set of tiles you can place on the table to form what would look like a house floor plan. They must be placed so that the doors align between two room to look something like this.

When this is done, we randomly put one character in each room at this is how the Rumble In the house board game will look like at the beginning of the game.

The next step consist of distributing the character tokens to the players and those will represent the ones you need to protect during the big rumble in the house!

RUMBLE IN THE HOUSE TOKENS, RULES AND SCORING

There is twelve character tokens in the game and each player have two of them. We put them face down so that other player can't see what they are. During the rumble, so characters will be took off the board after a fight and you don't want yours to go out first since the last one out makes the more points.

5ToClose

2009-09-11T21:27:00.003-04:00

If you already read some post on this blog, you already know how much I like board games. I recently received an email from another board game lover who decided to build a brand new one for us game lovers. To make a short story, it’s a mix of Scrabble, Rummy and Boggle played in team or not.

Like Scrabble, you need to build words to score points, but this time, you use cards that you lay down on the table. The deck of card will include special cards to increase the value of words but also to slow down your opponent trying to build this gigantic word. The game will be a lot faster than a game of Scrabble and I think a lot more dynamic.

I didn’t try the game yet (will do soon) but if you want to learn more, visit the 5ToClose board game website for more detail. You will find all the details and game rules. Don’t miss my next post, I will describe my experience with this new Waterhole company board game.

Monopoly Junior Strategy

2009-04-28T18:35:00.034-04:00

Ok, you are wondering why I’m talking strategy in a monopoly kid board game. More than that, you are asking yourself what kind of strategy there could be in Monopoly Junior… I have to agree that there isn’t a lot of trick and twist but like the rest of the element in this board game, there is a few strategy and they are simple. They simplified them in a way that kids playing this board game will slowly assimilate what a board game strategy is.

If we take a look at the Monopoly Junior chance cards,
we can see: Free purple booth card, free light blue booth card, free pink booth card, free orange booth card, free red booth card, free yellow booth card and finally, free blue booth card.

Monopoly Junior Free Ticket Booth Cards

The Special Monopoly Junior Card Strategy

There’s also “special” card (my daughter like to say that), where the player is asked to move on the monopoly junior game board to a “special” location. These special spot on the board are the ones you want to pick when you draw a free ticket booth chance card. The list is “Roller Coaster”, “Haunted House”, “Miniature Golf”, “Ferris Wheel” and “Merry Go Round”.

Monopoly Junior "Special" Cards

The "Take it from the rich" strategy

Monopoly Junior doesn't end the same way the classic Monopoly board game ends. Since the kids are a little impatient when a game is too long, Hasbro made the rule simple. When someone is without money, the game ends and the richest player wins. This rule might help you choose your free ticket booth the next time you pick a Monopoly Junior Chance card. If you are not the richest player yet, you want to make sure that the game won't end soon. To do that, you want to prevent a monopoly player from making too much money by taking one of is ticket booth. If you are the richest player, you will try to get more booth of the same color. Stepping on a ticket booth that is own by a monopoly player that have all booth of the same color cost twice the price.

Like I said, no big Monopoly strategy here, but this junior board game of monopoly sure is a start in the right direction to learn the basics of our economy!

Monopoly Junior

2009-04-18T14:01:00.009-04:00

Since Easter, I've been playing Monopoly Junior every day with my daughter. She's almost four years old and she's already into one of my favorite board game of all time, Monopoly (well, a kid version of it). I'm always fascinated by my kids and the speed at with they can get the grasp on something new. After three or four game, she knew all the main attraction on the board and was hoping to put a kiosk on it. The notion of money is a little bit more difficult to assimilate at this age but I think its better this way for the moment!

What matters at this age is more the color of things Following that rule, she will always prefer purple instead of yellow and if I land on the unoccupied balloon stand, she will try to trade her helicopter stand for my balloon stand immediately!

The reason why this kid version of monopoly is so easy to play with my daughter is because they removed a lot of decision taking (which is difficult at this age believe me). For example, if you land on a spot that don’t belong to anyone, you have to buy it.

Also, if you land on the modified version of the jail of the classic monopoly game, you don’t have to pass your turn. Monopoly Junior railroads are simply a “Throw the dice again” instead of a more complicated calculation based on how many railroad you own.

When you land on someone else monopoly property, you simply pay the price written on the board. If you own all property of the same color, then you multiply the price by two. So, it’s simple mathematics and simple rules really.

The Junior Monopoly I played is based on the theme of an amusement park. All properties are related to that theme. For example, you have the monopoly junior Haunted House, the Roller Coaster, the Balloon Stand, the Water Slides, the Ferris Wheel… The game board of monopoly junior has a lot of attractive drawings to represent the various monopoly properties.

You can play with three other kid (or adult) , everybody uses a different color to identify their self and the property they own on the monopoly board (another good simplification in Monopoly Junior).

In my next post, I will talk a little bit more on the monopoly junior Chance card and explain how kids can learn a little monopoly strategy.

More Blokus Strategies

2009-02-24T20:21:00.013-05:00

"Small blocking goods"

Let me explain the reasons why I said that "It's not always the right move to put the biggest Blokus piece remaining in your tray", in my previous Blokus strategy's post. Blokus board game is like building the tallest walls to prevent people from playing inside your backyard. So, if putting a larger block on the grid will exposed your self to a possible enemy intrusion inside your protected territory, than it's not a good idea to lay down the big Blokus block.You always need to keep in mind that your primary goal should be to trap your opponents inside a small portion of the board, leaving some free space to put a mximum of pieces on it.

To do so,you need to apply some of my previous Blokus strategies and keep in mind that you should prefer to block other Blokus player, even with smaller pieces, than let them in. Look at the picture on the right and you will understand what I mean. The red player is about to play and could possibly place another five square block but instead he chooses to use a three square blokus part to block the blue player from progressing inside his territory (#1). With that move, the opponent will be forced to place is next piece higher leaving plenty of room to the red player (#2.

"Take a Peek"

This strategy is probably for expert Blokus player but nonetheless it could help improve everybody's overall winning stats even if they don't apply it constantly. It consist of taking a look once in a while at the remaining Blokus pieces of your opponent. I don't think it's cheating, it's simply trying to see the future! The goal of doing that is to plan ahead your next move.

Blokus basic strategy
Learn how to play the board game Blokus.
Start to play with good basic strategies.

Blokus strategy inside
A race to the center, a strategy that will give you an edge. The Blokus block strategy, keep your opponent away!

Blokus strategies

2009-02-22T13:41:00.013-05:00

My first strategy at Blokus is the "Get rid of the bigger pieces at the begining" strategy, but that, I already mentioned it in my previous Blokus blog post about Blokus strategy. This approach is probably your safest way to get rid of a maximum of Blokus squares but you also need to know where to lay them down on the Blokus board.

So, my second strategy at the game of Blokus would be "Race for Blokus board center" wich consist of moving towards the center and my opponent has fast as possible. Why is that? Well, you want to be in a situation where you will have plenty of room to place you pieces later on. Let me illustrate what I'm writing about. In this picture, you can see the Blokus board with two opponents. The red one decided to go straight south while the blue Blokus opponent went straight to the center of the grid. It's early in the game but still, I can see a clear advantage for the blue player. The green curve shows where I would lay down my next blokus squares and that lead me to my third blokus strategy, the "blokus block strategy".

The "Blokus block strategy" consist of making sure your opponent wont be able to go through your walls. In the previous strategy, the green curve kind of represent where I would build my Blokus walls next. Let's check out a small portion of the Blokus's board grid to setup a good and a bad way to place the pieces to prevent an opponent's intrusion through your walls.

So if you look at the picture, I've shown two ways to place a five square piece that look like a "U". In the first situation on the right, you can see that the red player is trying to much to go around the blue player and he places it in a way that is opponent won't have any difficulty running trough the red player's barricades! On the left side of the Blokus game board, you see a much better way of protecting your ground. With this setup, the blue player would need a one square piece to go through. There's only one blokus piece that would let you in with this way of laying down the squares. On the other hand (the example on the left), any Blokus piece could be place to go through the red wall. So, if you manage to reproduce this Blokus block strategy at two, three or more places on the board, your opponent will soon be trapped and confined on his side of the fence! This blokus tactic with the "Race for Blokus board center" strategy should improve your overall score at Blokus.

In my next post, I will share more Blokus strategy. To give you an idea of it, think about this: Is it always the good choice to put all five square Blokus pieces first? The answer... NO!

Blokus basic strategy
Learn how to play the board game Blokus.
Start to play with good basic strategies.

Blokus Strategy

2009-02-21T20:49:00.000-05:00

A Blokus strategy post!

Two years ago, I discoveredd this very fun board game. The main reason why I liked Blokus so much, is that the random factor is completly out of it. It's all up to the player to build a good strategy and to adapt to your opponent's move. For those who didn't play Blokus board game yet, let me do a short introduction to it...

I bought the four player version of the game (a two player Blokus also exist, the board is smaller) and played it with one, two and three other persons. You play Blokus on a board that consist of a 20 x 20 grid (400 squares).

Each player have a set of 21 different pieces that will need to be placed strategicly on the grid eventually.

The goal of the game is to place has many Blokus pieces on the grid. Each player will try to empty is collection of Blokus pieces on the grid by placing one when it's turn arrive. Some pieces will cover five, four, three, two and one square on the grid. You will understand that it's easier to place a "one" square piece on the grid than a "five" square. So, the more basic Blokus strategy, is to get rid of the biggest Blokus pieces at the beginning!

Before I start giving away my favorite Blokus strategy, let's keep explaining how this board game is played to better understand the Blokus tricks I will explain later. You can't place the pieces of blokus in a way that one side will completly touch another piece's side. They need to touch each other only by a corner. Check out this picture to better understand. When you start the game, you need to place your first piece in the corner of the Blokus grid assigned to you (the NO YES picture is a good example). So, from here you are good to go to play the game. It's time to build a good strategy now, so keep looking for my next post!

Z-Rox

2008-10-22T10:58:00.009-04:00

A very cool game made by a friend of mine. I know it's not a board game but I thought it might interest some of you. It's a 1D game!!

How do you play a 1 dimension game? Well that's a good question. ZRox is showing you a small flash video sequence where you can see a black horizontal line streching, shrinking or splitting in parts. It's like the green light of a scanner hovering over an image. The line is black only when there's something under. Look at this video to understand everything.

There is a bunch of difficulty level to keep you addicted. There is more than letter to find, it can also be objects like a spade or a diamond (oops, sorry for the spoiler).

Enough said, try it by your self!

Carcassonne strategy summary

2008-06-04T20:45:00.019-04:00

After two game of Carcassonne I have already learn a lot. The reason why is that we played two completely different type of game. The first game I was alone with another player on the board and in the second game I was there with five other Carcassonne player. The game dynamic was a lot different and it was nearly impossible to find a strategy that would I’ve work good in the two games. So let’s find out in details what best worked in building the city of Carcassonne in both games.

Farms

In game one, farmers were still strangers to me so I didn’t make a good use of it. If I take a look back at the game, Carcassonne was shaping in a way that would have make it fairly easy to me to compete with my brother and get my fair share of the points for farmers. Since you draw a new tile every two turns, you can manage to put a tile with some land that will later on connect to the rest of the lands. Trying to do the same thing in game two was a lot more challenging since you were competing against more people and the Carcassonne tile placed on the table were more often not under your control. I could easily end up waiting many turn to get a good tile to accomplish my plan. And when I was not picking a good tile I was trying to put it in some other places to get another access to the main battlefield and wasting another meeple has a farmer.

Cloister

I found out that this game element was one of the few that worked good in both game. They gave me good point in game one and in game two, the only difference is the time it took to get back my meeple from it.

In game one, it stayed there for a longer time; my brother was not giving away “free tile” to help me finish it.

In game two, more players were involved and they cared less if they were indirectly helping me. In a multiplayer game, you can’t always take an action that will not benefit another Carcassonne builder. In general, cloisters gave me 8 points or more in the two game.

City

Building big city was not a good plan for me in game one. I started late and missed a few tile to completed it. Another thing I’ve learned from game two about cities is how dangerous it is to let an open city on the board. My sister-in-law got stuck with an unfinished city (and abandoned meeples) because of the four side city tile.

In game two, building small or medium city was the good way to go. You don’t let another player put meeple in it and you close it has soon as possible. In game one, if you start right from the beginning, you can manage to build larger city, especially if the killer tile is already out (there’s only one if you don’t play the expansions).

Roads

Like the cloisters, roads were always good to score some points in both games. They are probably the most strategic tiles in a 1 vs 1 type of game. You can make good use of them to short circuit your opponent trying to farm everywhere. If your Carcassonne opponent is showing his cards right from the beginning by dropping two or more meeples has farmer, then you should think of a plan to build roads that will trap him in small pieces of land.

In game two, my mother dropped a pawn in almost every new road built and scored a lot since other player were not caring about letting some point go in a hope to build their own individual project (i.e. a city or a cloister).

Cathedrals and Inns

No player scored big with Cathedrals. In fact, I didn’t see anybody finish a city with a cathedral in it. But it is worth mentioning that they were a great weapon to handicap the other Carcassonne player. In the multiplayer game, the number of open city was high, so when this tile was drawn, it was almost always used against someone and not for their own good. There’s two of them in the pile of tiles so you need to remember of their existence!

Inns were always a very good way to score points. In both game, leaving a meeple on such road had a positive result. So if you have the chance to take a Carcassonne road with one on it, don’t miss it. But remember one thing, you need to completely finish it before the end of the game otherwise you won’t score point. So don’t think to big for those in a multiplayer game.

Strategy summary ( 1 vs 1)

Build bigger if in early stages of the game. Watch your opponent farmer strategy and use roads to prevent him from accessing the universe (put a meeple on that road). Cloisters are good for point but you might loose a meeple for a while.

Strategy summary (3 or more players)

Try to score fast by controlling roads and building small or medium cities. Cloisters are your friend. Don’t waste farmer meeple if there is already a war for controlling the lands of Carcassonne. Don’t build to big road with inns on it, you might end up with an unfinished one at the end of the game.

General strategy

Use the cathedrals or the four side city tile, in a multiplayer game, to slow down your opponents.

My other post about Carcassonne board game

Carcassonne strategy
My first game of this great board game, heads up with my brother. Find out what strategy came out of this game

More Carcassonne strategies
Other strategy for other type of Carcassonne board games. In this post, I revealed my experience with this game when playing with more than two opponent.

Carcassonne more strategy

2008-06-03T18:32:00.029-04:00

Before I start analizing this second board game of Carcassonne, let me describe the setup. Instead of playing heads-up with my brother like in Carcassone strategy game 1, we are now playing with the entire family. So six player playing Carcassonne with the expansion “Inns and Cathedrals”. My sample of game is still very low, so I’m still a green player (so are my meeples this time) and I don’t really have a good strategy.

What I’ve learn from the first game was to take care of farms to make sure someone else will not control everything. Try not to build to big in late stages of the game. So from there, here’s how my second game of Carcassonne went.

Carcassonne strategy in game #2

Right from the start of the game I put one meeple has a farmer on the game board. I don’t want to repeat my mistake from the previous game. Now I need to wait my turn to come and watch Carcassonne building up in ways that I don’t really like. Other players are trying to put some farmer here and there on pieces of land that don’t connect yet. Trouble is at the horizon, everybody seems to want a little control there.

(Carcassonne player rushing to put farmer)

Finally it’s my turn and like the other Carcassonne players I want to increase my presence in the fields, so I took my big green meeple and put it down on a tile that is not yet connected to the rest of what I call “the main battlefield” (see picture above). Turns are passing by and I still don’t have a direct connection to the rest of the world. In fact, I need to get one of those tile with a cloister and a single road to it. You probably guessed right that I didn’t get this tile, that someone else did and he didn’t put it where I was planning to!

Carcassonne map (waiting for cloister tile)

I’m currently without my big Carcassonne meeple and there’s absolutely no way to get it back. If I count the number of meeple controlling the big battlefield, I can already figure out that I will not score points with my farmer. I have one meeple on a cloister that will not be completed before the end of the game. I have my big one and two other meeple in the field trying to farm for nothing, so all I have left is a few Carcassonne pawns to help me score on building city and roads. I didn’t really pay attention to cities since I was trying to save some resources to farm, so no big points there. I made a couple of points after the construction of a road (without an inn).

The game is over, I finished in last position. My two brothers and I tried the same strategy. We all went for the farms and ended up splitting almost all the points. My sister-in-law got stuck building large cities (another player strategically put a cathedral in two of her city, hehe) and my father tried a mix of road and city leading him to second place. The big winner was my mother. From beginning to end, she focused on roads and cloister. She scored double points for finished road and plenty more for uncompleted ones.

My other post on Carcassonne

Carcassonne strategy
My first game of this great board game, heads up with my brother. Find out what strategy came out of this game

Carcassonne round-up
Post containing a summary of all my Carcassonne strategy.

Carcassonne strategy

2008-06-01T13:18:00.029-04:00

What a great board game! I tried Carcassonne for the first time this weekend. It took me a game or two to fully understand the rules and start building some strategies. We played Carcassonne: Inns and Cathedrals. For those who never played this game, the goal is to get control of cities, roads, cloisters and farms. To do that, you need to put your pawns in strategic locations to make sure you will have control on the game elements. The added game element in the Carcassonne expansion "Inns and Cathedrals" are the Inns near a lake that makes a road counts double points. The Cathedrals also gives more points when you finish building a city containing one. The major difference in the expansion is that you need to finish the road or the city containing the new elements to score the points.

What I would like to do in this first post about Carcassonne board game strategy, is to show you how I played the game the first time. In other post, I will try to improve my game strategy and tell you what was worth trying and what was not. So here's a description of my first game of Carcassonne.

Carcassonne strategy in game #1

In this first game I was always impatient to score some points and put some meeple in play. Almost every time I was drawing a new Carcassonne tile I wanted to add something on it. So my first few tile (yellow Carcassonne meeples) looked like this.

So at this point in the game, I already feel like I'm losing some ground, but hey, it's my first game and I want to score big on that road. My brother (red meeples) already have a Carcassonne farmer and one city under control (for now). While the game was progressing, my brother was still putting some farmer here and there making sure to control the entire map. The way the roads were shaping up in the city of Carcassonne, there where no place to put more farmer, so I decided to focus on making large city. I've learned the hard way that trying to build big in this board game could lead to a bad scenario. Here's what I'm talking about.

In the picture above, you can see my meeples trying to control this "big" city. The tile numbered 1, 2 and 3 are mine and the tile number 4 was the last tile placed by my brother. This last Carcassonne tile was forcing me to add at least three other city tile (if lucky) to close this city. I think only ten tiles were left on the pile when he made that move. First mistake, trying to build a big Carcassonne city is not a smart move when there's few tile left, especially that killer tile filled with city dirt. Second mistake, put too many meeple for nothing, my brother was not going to fight for this city.

Strategy results

If I make a very quick overview of my first game, I would say that I should have pay more attention to the farmer. My lack of experience cost me a lot of point by not controlling any city with my Carcassonne farmers. I was playing heads up with my brother, so I'm guessing that farmers are very important when there's only one opponent. Time will tell me if I was right. Another thing I noticed about my play, was my rush to put meeples on the map. When I saw my brother taking over all the grounds with farmer, I was short on Carcassonne pawns to try fighting for some ground. And like I wrote above, trying to build too big is a risky business.

This is the tile that starts it all and I can't wait to play some more great games with the board of Carcassonne. In fact, I already played more than one game this last week-end and in my next post, I will explain how my second game went, so don't miss Carcassonne strategy game 2. This time, we were six player trying to fight the roads, inns, cathedral, cloister and farms ob rge land of Carcassonne!

My other post on Carcassonne

More Carcassonne strategies
Other strategy for other type of Carcassonne board games. In this post, I revealed my experience with this game when playing with more than two opponent.

Carcassonne round-up
Post containing a summary of all my Carcassonne strategy.

scrabble cheat

2008-05-21T20:45:00.018-04:00

Today I was thinking about Scrabble and a comment left after my previous post find a word for scrabble saying that Scrabble is kind of boring game. I was wondering if this game was getting old and needed some fresh new ideas to extend the life of the game (even though I think this board game will never die). So just for the fun of it, I started listing a few new game element they could add to the board game.

The first thing I came up with is kind of a scrabble cheat, that would let you reuse a word a bit like we do with hooks but instead of adding letters a the end or at the beginning of the word, you would add a scrabble letter on top of another one to form a new scrabble word.

The scrabble word cheat

Ok the name is not that hot, but images will show my idea better. So let's say we have the word "MUG". You could transform this scrabble word into "BUG". This

(This word worth 6 points)

(This new word would also worth 6 points)

This example above is only the most basic case of using the scrabble word cheat. You could do something better like the following scrabble word example where we replace two letter of the same word. Replacing scrabble letter "M" by a "B" and letter "G" by a "Y".

(This new word would worth 8 points)

But even better, you would replace a letter to form a new word, but you would put a completly new word on the scrabble board at the same time.

(The total point scored here would be 10 points)

Stay tuned for more ideas, I have more on my list but time is missing a little.

Check out my other post on Scrabble

Scrabble word finder
Nice little tools that are very handy when you need to find word in a very specific context or simply to make sure your opponent is not trying to invent new words.

find a word for scrabble

2008-05-19T16:58:00.029-04:00

Find a word and a strategy

The main thing you do when playing a Scrabble is to find a word that will give you the highest amount of point. Well, I don't fully agree with my last sentence. When I play Scrabble, yes I try to find THE word that will empty my tray but most of the time, this is just impossible. So we need a little Scrabble strategy to prevent other players from scoring big. When you look at the Scrabble game board you can see the "special" square that gives more points when used. When it's your turn and you don't have anything good to put on the board, you need to play in a way that you will steal some precious spaces. So when you try to find a word for scrabble, always keep in mind that you might score big, but your opponent might score bigger if you don't think in advance.

Don't let another player put an easy hook on a bonus square. What that means is if you're about to make a word that ends up one bonus square short and that it is easy for another player to add a single letter on that bonus square to form a new word with your, that maybe you shouldn't play that word!

Here's a hook example where the Scrabble strategy would be to not put this word. Your word is "CODE" and the easy hook would be to add "X" to form "CODEX".

You would get 8 points for "CODE" (O is doubled) and the other Scrabble player, just by putting an extra letter would score 31 points. That 23 points more than you!

Word finder

When I play Scrabble with my girlfriend, we always end up arguing about the existence of a word, the spelling of it or what better word we could have made with what we had on our scrabble tray. So, if like me you want to save some time doing all that, I suggest you take a look at this website every time you are trying to find a word for Scrabble. They have a Scrabble word finder that takes the letter in your tray and try to build a word with some other letter from the board (specified by you). They also have a word verification tool that you can use to proof the existence of your exotic word.

My other Scrabble post

Scrabble cheat
Look out my scrabble ideas to help give this classic board game new twists. You will find some illustration of the board and how you can use existing letters to form new words but in a new way.

board games list

2008-05-18T21:12:00.035-04:00

Maybe I should have started this blog with this post, but hey, it's never too late to give out my personal board games list containing all my favorite classic games. Before I give out this list, I wanted to share a very cool video about a guy with a pretty big board games list to! Their names are Andrew Zilch (the movie maker) and Rich Sommer (the board game nerd, coming out of the closet).

A video featuring a big board games list

Back to my personal list, which is way smaller than this Rich guy. The games are not in a specific order in the list, the important thing is to put them in.

My personal list of board games

Monopoly

Using strategy to buy the best property, improve them at the right time in the game. Deal with the other player to trade or buy. Stay in jail and wait for other players to land on your Boardwalk, ah, this game is so much fun. I made a couple of post on this one, so don't miss my monopoly strategy and my alternative monopoly rules .
Clue

Learn how to remember all little details, find the best clue strategy, make the right accusation, play with other clue player's suspect to slow them down, walk the shortest path to access the clue rooms, pretend to hold the true on clue weapon and clue suspect. Put your opponent on false trail in the clue game arena. This game is still a mystery and a lot of fun.
Risk

I spend so many hours playing this game that it would be the biggest crime not to put it in my list of board games. North America, Australia, Kamchatka, Madagascar, all good risk strategies to try. Don't be to greedy, don't build to big defenses, don't lose Middle East!
Trivial Pursuit

Try me, I know everything! Humm, not really, but who really care about this little prehistoric little insect name...
The game of life

I was a kid when I first played this game, so it's bringing back so many good memories that just looking at the box makes me feel a little bit better! For a flashback in the 80s, check out this game of life board game video.
Electronic Stratego ( or was it Admiral)

I'm not sure about this one. I remember playing an electronic game where you needed to protect a flag. You had like 20 unit with a different military (or naval) rank, where the admiral was the strongest. The goal was to bring the flag unit on the other side of the game board. To attack the enemy, you had to move a unit on the same spot has your opponent unit and then each player would place their unit on some kind of electronic judge on the side of the board who would tell who's the winner, the loser or if it was equal. I don't remember using bombs, so maybe it was a Stratego clone.
Pay day

I loved the big colorful cards!
Scrabble

I'm still playing this board game every month or so. Always good to develop your vocabulary (by watching other player's word!).
Mastermind

Always a good game to challenge your brother after a couple glass of red wine. I'll have to write something about this one. There must be a Mastermind strategy to beat this game in three try all the time!
Othello

Black and White.
Simon

The reason why I can write down 126 number after 3.14...
Mille Bornes

Pretty simple game that was always with us when we were traveling long distances.

Monopoly Strategy

2008-05-17T20:37:00.037-04:00

This post is not about odds and probabilities. If you look out for monopoly strategies based on numbers, you will find great analysis on the subject. If I may suggest, you should take a look at How to Win at Monopoky - a Surefire Strategy and at Probabilities in the Game of Monopoly. They both describe how long it will take to get a return on your investment, expected incomes, probability of landing on a square... you get the picture. Both article are based on numbers, so what I would like to do here, is to take a different approach. Instead of using numbers to drive my strategy, I will focus on the element of the game, more precisely the monopoly chance card and use them to my advantages. And, if you would like to play this game and you are without friends, you can now play Monopoly Online.

Just for the fun of it, the next time you go to the bathroom, bring the monopoly chance card with you to take a deeper look at them. Some cards are more interesting than the other. For example, the "Advance To Illinois Ave." chance card. Imagine if you already had the red set of property in your possession and that the Illinois avenue property is improved with houses or hotel... If you count the amount of chance card in the deck, you will find out that there's 16 of them. So every 16 chance card drawing, a monopoly player will end up on the Illinois Ave! If you're still sitting in the bathroom and looking at the chance card, you will soon find out that there is eight other chance card that will give a little bonus like the Illinois Avenue card. So let's go through the whole deck of card to illustrate my monopoly strategy based on the chance card.

"Advance to Illinois Ave."

Ok, we already saw this one, so the next time you have a chance to buy this property don't miss your chance. Even if "Kentucky" and "Indiana" are in someone else hand, the Illinois avenue will worth a lot more when trading and selling time will come. Keep it like a good old bottle of red wine. With the jail very close to it, the number of time monopoly players will land on it is higher than some other property.

"Advance to St. Charles Place"

Like the Illinois avenue card, St. Charles Place is a sure buy. The price to improve the property on the purple set is cheaper than the red set, so you will make money faster.

"Advance token to the nearest Railroad and pay owner Twice the Rental to which he/she is otherwise entitled. If Railroad is UNOWNED, you may buy it from the bank"

You need to know that there is two chance card like this one, so this card will come up every eight card. The more railroad you have, the more money you'll make.

"Take a ride on the reading, IF YOU PASS GO COLLECT $200"

Railroads are definitely my favorite. They let you make money as soon has you buy one and the rent increase when you have more. This chance card will bring even more traffic if you bought the Reading Railroad. With the previous chance card description (move to the nearest railroad...), the Reading railroad property is even more interesting.

"ADVANCE TOKEN TO NEAREST UTILITY, If UNOWNED, you may buy it from the bank. If OWNED, throw dice and pay owner a total ten times the amount thrown.

The reasons to buy the monopoly "Electric company" and "Water Works" properties is obvious. Like the railroads you start making money right away (no need to improve them) and if you have both, the total paid by other player is increased. Add to that the fact that every 16 chance card draw, someone will pay you ten times the amount!

"Take a walk on the boardwalk ADVANCE TOKEN TO BOARDWALK"

Like the "Illinois avenue" and "St. Charles place" property, the boardwalk square is another property you should keep your eyes on. It is more expensive, but if you already have Park Place in your hand and that you know that this chance card haven't been draw yet, you should consider buying it and improving it as fast has possible. You will have a return on investment real fast (if you don't draw the card yourself of course).

"GO BACK 3 SPACES"

Ok, this one is less obvious but still give a chance to land on your property if you buy the right ones. Take a look at the monopoly gameboard and pay attention to the chance squares. Now, go back three spaces from there and check the property. There is three monopoly chance square on the board but only one of them is interesting. The chance spot inside the red set of property. The one beside "Park Place" brings you back on a community chest square and the one inside the light blue set is even worse since it brings you back on the "INCOME TAX" square. The only interesting chance square in my monopoly strategy is the one besides Kentucky avenue. If you draw this chance card when standing there, it will bring you back on the New York Avenue property. This one won't give a lot of extra incomes but buying New York is not a lost case since it's not expensive and player will land there more often because of the jail.

To exploit this strategy, you need to pay attention to these properties

Reading Railroad, Pennsylvania Railroad, B&Q railroad and Short Line

Illinois Avenue

St. Charles place

Electric Company and Water Works

Boardwalk

New York Avenue

My other post on Monopoly board game

Monopoly alternative rules part 1
Board changes, railroad tracks to short-circuit some part of the planchette, new monopoly chance cards.

Monopoly alternative rules part 2
New game element like the toll and the taxi, new uses of the monopoly free parking and GO spots.

Monopoly alternative rules final part
Auction revisited, new token to add more strategy, new powers to the owners of the electric company and water works properties.

Monopoly rules

Find out why you should always read the monopoly rules before playing this board game. A list of links to the monopoly rules in various language.

scary ouija board stories

2008-05-17T09:46:00.019-04:00

Yesterday I was watching a movie called "Ouija". If you like scary ouija board stories, you will love this one. I spent a lot of time reading very scary ouija stories but to actually see it is way better! Seeing that Ouija movie made me think about other film where ouija scene are present and I was really surprised to find out so many. So for all "scary ouija stories" lovers, here's a list of film showing ouija board scenes. Also, for those Ouija lovers experiencing "things", here's a good site to understand your experiences.

The most recent ouija board stories in movies

First, my yesterday's movie, "Ouija". It was made in 2007, a Filipino movie directed by Topel Lee. To make it short, a couple of person are playing ouija and before they end questioning the board, it's destroyed by fire, leaving a spirit outside. Those ouija terror stories should remind all user that play the real ouija board of the ouija boards dangers that could happen. An interesting fact about that movie is that it was not using the same title in other countries. They use the name "Sceance"

Watch Ouija movie part 1 and Ouija movie part 2.

Second, another recent ouija board story was developed by Khaled Youssef in 2006. The plot of the story was also around the ouija board even though there was only one scene with it. However this one moment with Ouija changed their life forever. The movie illustrated how fragile the human mind can be. The movie is also named Ouija and is from Egypt. Again, this movie is showing some of the ouija boards dangers.

Older scary ouija board stories in movies

Everybody will remember the first one. This little girl talking about is imaginary friend Captain Howdy, the voice that tells the answers when she question ouija board. She dangerously played with the board and now the evil spirit is out and controlling her. She was unaware of the ouija boards dangers and now an exorcist will be necessary to fight the bad spirit in her. Don't miss The Exorcist!

The next one if full of ouija terror stories and is one of the very best film featuring the ouija board. The horror movie, the Witchboard, made in 1985. You can see this girl getting completely absorbed by the power of contacting spirit of the other world. Unaware of the ouija boards dangers, she's getting controlled by a spirit with bad intentions. If you watch it and like it, then you'll be probably happy to know that there is a Witchboard 2 and 3.

More recent ouija board stories can be seen in this next movie "What lies beneath". The main actress is Michelle Pfeiffer, playing the role of a woman with deep questionning about her life. She will use the ouija board to try answering those question. You can see a weird place to play ouija, the bathroom.

My list of film with scary ouija board stories could go a little bit longer, but while searching the net, I found a very good place where the author made a very good job at listing film where people play the real ouija board. So for more very scary ouija stories check out this list featuring ouija board movies. And if you are more of a reader than a movie watcher, you can still check out these scary ouija board stories.

My other post about OUIJA

Places to play Ouija
Ever wonder where you could play this board game to get maximum chills? Find out a nice list of places where you and your friend could use the Ouija board.

Very scary ouija stories
Read stories from people around the world that shares their best experience with this classic board game.

Alternative Monopoly rules and game elements (final part)

2008-05-13T19:44:00.020-04:00

More monopoly rules and game elements!

I hope you're not tired yet of those alternative monopoly rules and game elements because I have some more for you readers! In general what I found is lacking in the monopoly game board is the power you get when you purchase something. Except for making more bucks, buying a property and putting buildings won't give you much more power. Same thing goes when you buy a railroad or a service like the Electric Company or the Water Works. The new monopoly toll token described in a previous post is a good example of an extra power you get when you have all monopoly property of the same color. In that way of thinking, I would give extra power when you buy the Electric Company or the Water Works monopoly properties. My last game design idea is for auction when players are trying to buy a property that a monopoly player didn't want to buy during is turn. I don't really like the way it's suppose to be done and I'm proposing a new one here.

Monopoly Electric Company

Every time the owner of the electric company land on it, he can roll the dice to get the right to shut down the electricity on one, two or three property anywhere on the monopoly board. So if the electric company owner rolls a double-one, double-two or double-three he can shut down one, two or three property. What that means is that the shut down properties won't be able to ask the rent of an improved properties but only the basic rent without improvement. We put the monopoly hotel and houses on the side of the game board until the owner of those properties land on it to repair it or he uses the monopoly chance card that gives immediate electric problem repairs. Instead of putting houses and hotel aside, we could have a nice token looking a big like this (picture on the right).

Monopoly Water Works

In real life, when the water pipe system is broken, the street is closed to make some repair and you need to make some detours. To give a little more power to the owner of water works, I propose that like the Electric Company alternate monopoly rule, when the owner land on the Water Works property, he rolls the dice and if he gets double-1, double-2 or double-3, he can block the route (except for him) to other player on different property of the monopoly game board. He can strategically put road blocks on his improved property to force someone to stop on it and make some extra monopoly cash! There could be three road block on the game board depending on what the player rolled. On the picture you can see that the player put one road block on the boardwalk property. A player cannot cross this block even if the dice score was higher. Once a player bumped into the block, the block is removed. A block could also be removed by a player using is community check card.

Monopoly property auction

If you read the monopoly rules, you can see that when a player land on a property that doesn't belong to any other player and that he refuses to buy it, that other monopoly player can buy it from the bank. The way rules are written, a verbal auction is taking place and the biggest offer wins the property. What I'm proposing has an alternative to this monopoly rule is that every player takes is "monopoly envelope" and put the money he's willing to pay for this property. The monopoly player that puts the biggest amount of money wins the auction.This way of doing the auction creates a bigger suspense in my opinion and his more fun. Imagine buying the boardwalk for 10$ !

So this is where this series of alternative monopoly rules and new game element ends for now. If you missed part 1 and part 2, you can find them here:

Find out why you should always read the monopoly rules before playing this board game. A list of links to the monopoly rules in various language.

Monopoly strategies
Forget about the odds, think about how to buy the best monopoly property. An analysis of all monopoly chance and community chest cards to help you choose the best property to buy.

Alternative Monopoly rules and game elements (part 2)

2008-05-10T20:17:00.023-04:00

Following my first set of alternative rules and game elements, here's some more...

The Toll (monopoly game element)

A new token called "the toll". This new monopoly token would be another way of financing some project on your property. There would be only one monopoly toll in the game and it would be controlled by only one player at a time. To get control of it you need to stop on the "GO" spot and roll a double at your next turn. You could also get control of it by drawing the monopoly community chest card that gives control of "The toll". The alternative monopoly rules are the following.

You need a complete set of property (all monopoly property of the same color)
You can't put a toll if some of those property are already improved.
Every time a player passes through the toll he needs to pay is right to pass and that even if
he doesn't stop on it. See the legend on the right to find the price.
The toll must be set on the last property of a set.
The player still need to pay the rent when stopping on the property where the toll is placed.

The Taxi (monopoly game element)

Like the toll, the new monopoly token called "the taxi" is unique and can be controlled by only one player at a time. The taxi token is placed on the free parking spot when the game starts. To make use of the taxi, you must land on the same spot as the taxi. When it's your turn to play, instead of rolling the dice, you can "take the cab" anywhere on the monopoly game board. Every spot traveled will cost you ten monopoly dollar (10$). The alternative monopoly rules for the new taxi token are the following.

The ride will cost 10$ per monopoly spot traveled
You can't reuse the taxi the next turn
The starting position of the taxi is the monopoly free parking spot

Parking spot (Alternative monopoly rule)

You just found some money on the ground! To get this money, you need to roll a double. The money you win is the money paid by monopoly player when drawing community chest card or chance card that says something like: "You need to pay the bank...". So all the money paid normaly to the bank is put on the parking lot space instead of the bank chest. Every player landing on the monopoly parking spot will have a chance to make some extra money. See the images to find out examples of what monopoly cards will have you put some money there.

GO spot (alternative monopoly rule)

When a player stop exactly on the monopoly GO spot he have the choice to send the traffic counter-clockwise (or clockwise) if he wants. To do so, he must roll the dice and get a double. If he succeed, the monopoly game board will now be a one way in the direction indicated by this player. We could probably add a new monopoly token in the shape of an arrow to indicate the current traffic direction to make sure no one goes in the wrong direction.

My other post on Monopoly board game

Monopoly alternative rules part 1
Board changes, railroad tracks to short-circuit some part of the planchette, new monopoly chance cards.

Monopoly alternative rules final part
Auction revisited, new token to add more strategy, new powers to the owners of the electric company and water works properties.

Monopoly rules

Find out why you should always read the monopoly rules before playing this board game. A list of links to the monopoly rules in various language.

Monopoly strategies
Forget about the odds, think about how to buy the best monopoly property. An analysis of all monopoly chance and community chest cards to help you choose the best property to buy.

Alternative Monopoly rules and game elements

2008-05-09T10:26:00.030-04:00

Greatest classic board game of all time, Monopoly is on the top of my favorite game list. I like this game so much, that sometimes I'm dreaming of a Monopoly sequel. I would love to see something like "Monopoly 2 coming this summer" somewhere on the net. While waiting for this (if it ever happens) I have come up with a list of alternative monopoly rules and game element just for the fun of it.

Changes to the monopoly game board

1- Railroad routes from one railroad to all the other. The player owning more than one railroad, can go freely from one station to the other if he owns both ends of it. Otherwise, if he owns only one, he'll have to pay the destination railroad's owner a fee to stand there. If you don't own any railroad, you can still use the railroad routes but you'll have to pay the rent for both of them. Note that you cannot use a railroad route if one of the two ends are not own by a monopoly player. Sorry about the art in this picture, I definitely need some drawing skills.

Alternative Monopoly chance card

Forest Fire destroyed houses and hotels on some properties, roll the dice to find out where. The player with the highest score decide what property color got the fire disaster. The owner must remove 1 hotel or 3 houses from any of the property of that color.

Property has too much pollution on it. You lose possession of it and need to return houses and hotel to the bank.

A bank goes bankrupt and loses track of one of your mortgage. You can chose the mortgaged property of your choice.

Alternative Monopoly Community Chest card

Train collision on one of your railroad track, accident will be repaired the next time you step on it. If you don't have a railroad property you choose the one of another player.

Some land are getting values, price of rent is doubled the next time someone step on it. Place the card in front of one of your monopoly in until someone step on it.

My other post on Monopoly board game

Monopoly alternative rules part 2
New game element like the toll and the taxi, new uses of the monopoly free parking and GO spots.

Monopoly alternative rules final part
Auction revisited, new token to add more strategy, new powers to the owners of the electric company and water works properties.

Monopoly rules

Find out why you should always read the monopoly rules before playing this board game. A list of links to the monopoly rules in various language.

Monopoly strategies
Forget about the odds, think about how to buy the best monopoly property. An analysis of all monopoly chance and community chest cards to help you choose the best property to buy.

ticket to ride strategy

2008-05-08T14:31:00.015-04:00

When playing the Ticket To Ride board game you sure need some luck to get an edge on the other TTR player. But apart from luck, you'll need a strategy to be able to ride on all those routes without making to much detours. A good ticket to ride strategy will always be to try reading other player's mind. What I mean by that is trying to figure out the ticket to ride destination card that are on their hands. An image worth thousand words, so here's an explanation of what I'm writing about.

Ticket to ride strategy 1 - Route stealing

If you click the ticket to ride map on the right, you will see that the green player first took the route between "Seattle" and "Helena". the second ticket to ride route he took was "Duluth - Chicago". It's fairly easy to assume that this ticket to ride player will later try to connect those two route by taking the route connecting the city "Helena" and "Duluth". So what you should do at this point is try to take possession of this route for yourself, but not at all costs. Take a good look at your TTR destination cards and try to find one that need that route. If none of your destination card needs it, then you should forget about taking it unless only a few train card are needed. That last ticket to ride tip lead me to my next strategy.

Ticket to ride strategy 2 - Cheap route buying

If you look at the ticket to ride map, you will notice some route junctions that requires very few TTR train card to buy. The strategy here is to buy some route for "nothing". What I mean by that is that you kind of waste some resources just to prevent another Ticket To Ride player from getting the shortest path to his destination city, forcing him to make detours that will cost him in the long run. In the US map of ticket to ride, you can find many strategic routes that you can take to acheive this strategy. For example, if you take possession of the route between the cities of "Houston" and "New Orleand", you will force you opponent to go around this route and lose a lot of train card and turns. This is only one part of the cheap route buying strategy, the other part consist of taking the route that will pay the most.

My previous example shows how to capture cheap route but might not help that much since most of the route can probably go through the center of the map. My suggestion to improve this ticket to ride strategy would be to try taking the cheap center route. Routes between cities of "Kansas City" and "Saint Louis" (both blue or pink one), the route between "Toronto" and "Pittsburgh", the TTR route between "Nashville" and "Atlanta" and finally (even if it's more expensive) the routes between "Salt Lake City" and "Denver" (both red or yellow). I took the last route because it's one of the few chocking points on the west coast. Key routes are identified by a green check mark.

Ticket to ride strategy 3 - Selecting destination cards

Has mentioned in the ticket to ride rule book, at the beginning of the game you have the choice to keep all destination card or to discard one. When I play ticket to ride strategically, I won't keep three destination card if they don't share common routes at all unless they are all very short distance cards. So try to keep destination card offering the best alternatives when choosing paths. That means to try not keeping destination that only have one or two long route to get there. "Calgary - Montreal" is a good example here. Always keep in mind "ticket to ride strategy 2" because someone else might just use the same strategy.

Good luck and feel free to share your best Ticket To Ride Strategy!

My other Ticket To Ride post

Ticket To Ride introduction
An introduction to what you will find if you play this "soon to be a classic" board game. A general description of the game play and elements.

Ticket To Ride Maps and Rules
The reason why this board game is great is in good part related to the fact that the rules are different for each version of the game. You play the american version for a while then you buy the European version to play an all new set of rules. And for the map lovers, check them out here!

Ticket To Ride rules and maps

2008-05-06T21:05:00.028-04:00

For map and train lovers, here's a collection of what I've found around the net. First you need to know that Ticket To Ride is published in many languages and have very distinct version for each countries. The rules are slightly different and of course the maps and the cities. Ticket To Ride board game have been made for: North America, Europe, Germany, Switzerland and Nordic Countries of Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland.

Ticket To Ride board game covers

Ticket To Ride rules around the world

So like I mention above, not only the box cover is different, but also the rules. If you take the Ticket To Ride Europe rules, you will find that you can build train station, that some routes are ferries and tunnels, that your final score is based on the train station you built and the European express bonus. But in the Ticket To Ride North American rules, there's no such thing as a train station, tunnel, ferries and express bonus, but instead points for the longest route. The Switzerland version is also very different. From the start, this game was intended to be played by two or three players. The Ticket To Ride cards representing locomotives can only be used in areas that are tunnel routes. Each player has a limit of forty trains. Some Ticket To Ride destination cards lead you to surrounding countries instead of cities. See the Ticket To Ride Switzerland rules for more details. The German version of Ticket To Ride also offers some variety. This version of the board game includes a +4 locomotive card and a passenger card. The +4 locomotive card is a wild card that can only be used to claim a route that is four spaces or longer.

The passenger card was introduced to let a player use the route of another Ticket To Ride player.

See the picture for detailed explanation of the passenger card and look at the Ticket To Ride German rules for a more complete description.

Ticket To Ride Maps

(TTR North American map)

(TTR Europe map)

(TTR Switzerland map)

(TTR Germany map)

(TTR Nordic map)

For those who missed my introduction to the board game Ticket To Ride can read my first post about it and for those who are still waiting for a Ticket To Ride strategy, don't miss my next post on the subject. I will explain in details how I manage to win at TTR.

My other Ticket To Ride post

Ticket To Ride introduction
An introduction to what you will find if you play this "soon to be a classic" board game. A general description of the game play and elements.

Ticket To Ride Strategies
My secret strategies revealed! You thought this game was to easy to have elaborated strategies... then read this post.

Ticket To Ride board game

2008-05-06T14:04:00.026-04:00

Ticket to ride is not a classic board game yet, but I'm sure it won't take long to become one. Everyone that likes train, map and game should try playing this great board game. The goal in this game of Ticket to ride is to find the best strategies to build railroad path across the land between major cities. This land can be USA, Europe, Germany, Switzerland and the Nordic countries of Europe. For the map lovers out there I have gathered a bunch of Ticket To Ride maps from different countries and will make them available in my next post.

So let's check how this train game works. We have the Ticket To Ride board game showing North American cities, railroad path of different color between them, numbers around the TTR board and a legend showing Ticket To Ride wagons and points (see picture - Ticket To Ride game board). And then we have Ticket To Ride wagon cards, Ticket To Ride destination cards and all the little Ticket To Ride plastic train.

(Ticket To Ride - Game board)

(Ticket To Ride - Wagon cards)

(Ticket To Ride - Destination card)

(Ticket To Ride - Plastic trains)

The game consist of occupying the railroad path between the cities on your TTR destination cards. You start with a fixed limit of wagon card and destination card (ticket card). I won't go in too much game details here, but you need to use different strategies to win the game of Ticket To Ride. Since there's a limited number of path your train can take to go from city to another, you'll have to make sure no other Ticket to ride player will occupy them before you do. Otherwise, you might end up taking long detour to build your path. In a future post I will give my own Ticket To Ride strategies to help you play this game like a pro.

Everytime you make a succefull connection between two linked city you score some points (indicated on your ticket to ride game board legend). For example, if you connect the city of Washington and New York, you would score 2pts. Miami and New Orleand railroad path would give you 13pts.

In addition to those points, if you succeed to connect the two cities on your ticket to ride destination card, you score the points indicated on it. For example, if you connect Winnipeg and Little Rock (picture on the right), you would score and additional 11 points.

In the end, the player with the most points win the game. The points are indicated by moving your icon around the Ticket To Ride board game on the numbers representing your current score.

(Ticket To Ride - Score on game board)

This post was just an introduction to this wonderful board game. I hope you'll get the chance to play ticket to ride soon so we could share some strategy and tip about it. The next post about this train game will feature some other country maps of Ticket To Ride and also some strategies to win this game. And if you really like trains like I do, you can visit this nice train website or train blog, both made by my brother. He talks about old train buildings and tracks and there's a lot of nice pictures.

My other Ticket To Ride post

Ticket To Ride Maps and Rules
The reason why this board game is great is in good part related to the fact that the rules are different for each version of the game. You play the american version for a while then you buy the European version to play an all new set of rules. And for the map lovers, check them out here!

Ticket To Ride Strategies
My secret strategies revealed! You thought this game was to easy to have elaborated strategies... then read this post.