Operation: Game Night
Travis Smith, Jared Erickson, and Clay Gable get together to discuss the latest and greatest in board games in this weekly podcast. What's hot, what's hitting the table, featured discussions about board games and the board gaming culture, and the primary mission objective- to play more board games!
Operation: Game Night
OGN Ep 19: Celebrating Our Favorite 2024 Gaming Moments
Welcome to the Operation Game Night Podcast, where the mission objective is to play more board games. Put your battle rattle on and mount up. Let's start the show. What is up, everybody? Welcome to the Operation Game Night podcast. I'm your host, Travis Smith, and this is episode 19. I am joined, as always, by my co-host, Clayton Gable. How are you doing, Clay?
Speaker 2:I'm doing great Travis. How about you?
Speaker 1:I'm doing just swell and we have our co-host, Jared Erickson, on for a couple minutes. Jared, how about you?
Speaker 3:I'm doing just swell and we have our co-host, jared Erickson, on for a couple minutes. Jared, how are you? I'm well. I went into the laundry room to try and get some better audio, but I misjudged how long the intro was, so you get the sounds of me running into the laundry room and you might hear swishes from the laundry um from vacation right yes, so you're.
Speaker 3:You're catching me live down here in savannah, georgia took a little jaunt over to the sea. By sea I mean the atlantic ocean. But yeah, we're here with our, our good friends at tavoyans high school. We met the wife in high school and then Dallin came on board in college and then we sunk up in Ohio and it turns out we all have a great passion for board games.
Speaker 1:So that's a little bit today, but he wouldn't be your friend Otherwise.
Speaker 3:I know it's like the box Do you fit this bill? No, okay, get the F out.
Speaker 2:So you're not you f out, so you're not, you're not. You're not what we're looking for right now I already got enough friends.
Speaker 1:You're good, um, okay. So we have a very special episode today. Today is our year in review. This will be our last podcast episode for 2024. We're going to take next week off to be with family and friends and then we'll be back in the new year better than ever. But today we have episode 19, which is our special year in review. We're going to debrief our weeks, we are going to fall in on the mission of objective, which is our year in review, and then we're going to go over the fence and outside the wire and talk about what we've been doing outside of board gaming.
Speaker 3:So, jared, Whoa whoa, whoa, whoa whoa. Before we begin, I do have a special presentation, if you would oblige me.
Speaker 1:Yes, special present.
Speaker 3:What we have here is the Silver Spurs Syndicate. I wanted to take this chance to deliver my holiday gifts to my homies. Deliver my holiday gifts to my homies and uh up first for for travis, I went on to fiverr and I found myself an artist who was interested in creating a little root character for me.
Speaker 3:Now this is ai generated, this is not. I did not pay for this. I um, I took five days, over the course of five days, because I have a you know chat gbt free, so I only get to you know, try to do this, you know, twice a day and then it cuts me off. But over the course of five days I was able to come up with the silver spurs syndicate.
Speaker 3:Okay okay action for root. Here is travis smith as the Silver Spurs syndicate. He's got a mic in his hand. He is here to help broadcast the good word of the other factions if they so need to do I see a little engineer tattoo peeking out from underneath his sleeve?
Speaker 1:yep.
Speaker 3:I got a little sneak peek in there he's a cowboy, obviously because the dude has a love for cowboys, lifted trucks and hunting. But the silver spurs syndicate, they, they don't, um, they don't skimp on getting their broadcasting out to the woodland. They get the critters information out. I mean it's a good pairing with, um, the woodland alliance, to help, you know, spread that descent across the woodland. But other people can use them too to, um, kind of like, launch their pieces into parts of the unknown, to, okay, send their message across the land. So I, I will send this to you. But, um, this is my, my gift, my holiday gift to travis what sort of uh, what sort of creature is this?
Speaker 1:this is like a weasel it is a weasel.
Speaker 3:Yes, I couldn't figure out what kind of um woodland creature to get you, but um, we went with a weasel I don't know what that says about me, but I like it. He's pretty cute I mean I was in the. I was a huge the weasel. I don't know what that says about me, but I like it. He's pretty cute. I mean I was a huge wild weasel back in the academy, but obviously you were not a huge wild weasel.
Speaker 1:I'm going to have to make this my character in the Root RPG. We need to get somebody to facilitate a campaign in the Root RPG for us.
Speaker 3:Yes.
Speaker 3:So I can play as this character yes, but I mean, um, fiverr was awesome, the guy who who helped me out was very professional, he was, he was really quick and I thought it was neat. It's on trend for the other, um, root, yes, I love factions and stuff. So, yeah, that's awesome, jared, thank you, but I love it well, I. So then I was like, okay, well, these two guys really love roots so I do have another presentation. So for clay, I want to do something a little different and not just make another faction. I have created a play mat for play a wolf oh gosh it.
Speaker 3:It is oddly similar to the the vagabond um play doesn't get his own, his own faction. But I tried to do a little, uh, get a little cutesy with his, his um faction board here obviously his natural habitat, is being at home. He loves relationships and AI also helped me down in that bottom right corner creates the three-character duo. I'm obviously the pug with a hammer and there's Travis with his mic mic-dub cowboy I love it.
Speaker 3:So thank you. Well, actually I would be remiss if I didn't thank Adri, because we had to do a lot of post-production on this one. This was all Adrie, me sitting behind Adrie's shoulder just whispering in her ear like, oh, we should do this, we should do that. But some of my highlights here, just real quick, is he battles his inner demons when the Steelers lose. Did they win last night? I can't remember. No, oh, they're for the Ravens, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they could have won the division, but they didn't. I am battling right now.
Speaker 3:As we speak, he's battling his inner demons. I did like down there repair or craft the ID4 again.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh.
Speaker 3:Pretty rough situation with his electric vehicles. So, anyways, that this was what we we threw together. I I mean, I kind of felt like, hey, I want to be and I will send these to you guys.
Speaker 2:Very, yes, please, I'm gonna print that sucker out for the wall. That's still in the game room, jared.
Speaker 3:That's awesome, but it's, like you know, not materialistic, but it's something that you could print it out if you want to. You can do anything you want with them. We own the rights to the Silver Spurs Syndicate, so you can do what you want with that bad boy. We can work on your player Clay, if you need. We are trying to get escape velocity in there.
Speaker 2:Oh, is that why mary was asking me about that?
Speaker 3:yeah, so adri did say she would touch it again one more time.
Speaker 2:If you need a little update and if you want to swap out something in your satchel, yeah, I love the the personal touches in there, my freaking special pictures and the battling my demons.
Speaker 3:Freaking Travis posted or I think it was Travis posted last night on the Instagram about how much he loves Root. I'm like it just solidified that I made the right decision to go Root themed.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's right From our episode with Vic to go root themed. That's right From our episode with Vic.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that was my special presentation.
Speaker 1:That's very kind of you, thank you.
Speaker 2:Yes, thank you, jared, I just love my voice. You're a good trio finisher here.
Speaker 3:This is a strong team and I want to continue this adventure. Yes, while we have you, do I?
Speaker 1:want to continue this, this adventure. So, yes, do you, while we have you. Do you want to talk about playing lost ruins of arnak in person for the first time, bro?
Speaker 3:yes, so so dalin, my boy here, we've been the one that I keep talking about that I play on and on on board game arena lost ruins of arnak. We know when a card up, like what's going on with that card if it's a throwaway card. So it's almost like a. It's like a chess match at this point on BGA. But we slung out the expansion. The is the, is it the explorers expansion? I can't expedition Leaders. I believe Expedition Leaders, and so we've tried out a few different ones. It's just awesome being in the same room as him and then playing a game that we both love. So he has been fully immersed into the leaders and I eked out a couple wins, but I think you give him one more day and I'm going to be way behind. Um, I played with the the captain. Uh, really cool. You get an extra instead of just two workers.
Speaker 3:You get a third and you can move your, your worker and take a available assistant. It has a whole bunch of new awesome cards, items and artifacts that you have different abilities and they're and they're unique. Uh, like you can, you can move your, your worker, but only on the same row, like. That's a new one that I really like. There's one that um is like a crowbar that lets you buy an item or an artifact for one less gold or compass. I thought that was awesome. So, anyways, we're just spoiling ourselves with the, uh, the expansion, and we'll have to go back to the bga, but that's okay. That's okay. It'll just make it all that sweeter when we get back together to to hit the hit the table together. So I really like the, the. I thought it was like it felt the same. I don't know if anyone's quite overpowered yet. We're still working out the bugs and stuff and playing with it, but it's tons of fun, just a new way to interact with the board and I love it.
Speaker 2:What's that? One leader that wants fear cards. Isn't there one that yes? It's like the the mystic, yeah, the mystic.
Speaker 3:So, like you take, you can take four fear cards and turn that into like overcoming a guardian, or take three fear cards and, and, yeah, this, these awesome like benefits and bonuses, and we, we both were up into the the high 90s without even really going hard. So, like the, the points are a little bit higher. Um, based off of the boards that you're using, yeah, and there's two new research tracks too, which is, oh, really like that. So I mean, I'm not a huge fan of the um which one, the snake the snake one on the original board game, yeah, I always play the bird the bird track, the bird, uh research track. I like it to see the base more basic one.
Speaker 3:Maybe I'll get more into snaking um here because of the, because of the expansion. So it was a blast, had a lot of fun. And our girls we have, like these three amazing beautiful blonde girls that are running around jemma's, yeah, two and a half and then the girls they just turned six. So they are having a blast like just playing together, running around, squealing, and hence why I'm in the, uh, the laundry room and you can probably just hear the laundry going, every swoosh that it goes.
Speaker 2:So all good hey, jared, was that the? Was that the first? I know it's the first time you guys played together in person, but had dallin ever played in person before, or was he only on bga?
Speaker 3:he's only ever been on bga, so this was a big one. I considered getting him the game for christmas, but I'm not sure Hayley, his wife, would really be into it. Yeah, we do like playing it on BGA. It's way easier. The setup's simple. I did end up getting him Sky Team Hashtag Sky Team for his gift for Christmas.
Speaker 2:Freaking gift guy. Did you guys play that?
Speaker 3:Not yet. We will be playing it before we leave. We're here for a couple more days.
Speaker 2:Have you introduced him to any other games? I know you guys played Dune, right we?
Speaker 3:played Dune, which was awesome. He kicked my butt big time, 12 to 9. Not only did he trigger end game, then he whipped out a an intrigue card on me and and just really throttled me near the end.
Speaker 2:there has he played that one before never.
Speaker 3:Yeah, he picked it up like that the first time he ever played. He was dominating. So, wow, that's cool, he's a smart cookie. He's uh, he's a smart cookie, he's a PhD. He's actually doing some COVID research down in he's at University of Arizona in Tucson. Super smart dude. It's easy for him to pick up any kind of strategy game and stuff. We also played Quacks of Quedlinbog Is it Quedlinburg or Bog? Quedlinburg of Quedlinburg, is it Quedlinburg or Bog? Quedlinburg Quedlinburg? Doesn't Rodney say Bog?
Speaker 2:He's Canadian yeah.
Speaker 3:Okay, yeah, that's true. That's why he's so nice Okay. Makes sense Makes sense.
Speaker 2:All right, I'm glad you're getting some freaking games in man.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, I mean the Tesla. The front trunk was full of games. There was no room for anything else. Adrian's like hey, I think we need to bring this for Gemma. I'm like no room for it.
Speaker 1:The frunk is reserved for games.
Speaker 3:The frunk is only for games.
Speaker 1:Oh, love it, Excellent. I'm going to skip ahead on my debrief for a second, because last night we had game night and I busted out camel up and I showed our game group camel up and it was a huge hit and I was channeling my inner jared and I ended up winning. But it was because I bet super early like maybe second second leg, early second leg. I was betting on winner and loser and then it went like this head and flow the camels are up, they're back, they're like doing all sorts of crazy stuff. We ended up with like a six stack crossing the finish line together no uh, yeah, maybe not a six stack, but it was definitely.
Speaker 1:How many camels are there? Total five, six, seven there was definitely. Yeah, there's five colored and yeah two crazies, but yeah, so I had a stack of six across the finish line together, because there was one more that was hanging out at the back, and I got them all correct and I brought home a huge win, so that gave.
Speaker 3:That's probably gotta be. Your heart was probably racing. It's like sports betting. It's like a real life sports bet and you're like, yeah, I need patrick at homes to throw two more touchdowns.
Speaker 1:I think I think the only like rival to that experience was when we set up a ready set bet on the big screen in clay's house we had like the table of, like the betting table all laid out and we're like watching the horses race and betting on the table. That was awesome. That was such a cool experience, oh yeah.
Speaker 2:Board games can just give you so many fun experiences. It's amazing.
Speaker 1:Anyways, jared, for you, we played some Camel Up and it was great.
Speaker 3:Dallin, my boy Dallin here, told me there's an expansion to Camel Up. He said it kills. I might have to be looking into the expansion of Camel Up.
Speaker 2:I have Camel Up the card game. It is actually really good.
Speaker 1:It's a good portable way to take that game on the go. It's more of like you have your finger on the scales a little bit, yes. You can play the cards to the leg stack. So, yeah, it involves a little more strategy. It's actually more complex than the base game. Yeah, anyways, we played Camel Up. It was a hit we played Camel.
Speaker 1:Up the card game last weekend with Rachel's brother. That was a hit. And then we also played verdant this past weekend or yesterday and uh, I had played that before. I played it at my german game night that I went to. Yeah, and I really I enjoy that puzzle. I think it's fun to like make the best guess on what will work out for your house in the long run. So in verd you're drafting rooms and plants and the plants match up with the light in the rooms. You're trying to kind of color code them so that the plants match the type of room. They're like the same color. And then you have these items that you can draft that can give you bonuses to grow your plants or to go into the rooms and give you color bonuses at the end.
Speaker 1:If you want to listen to more about Verdant, talk, go back to that episode, because it was pretty great. But that puzzle is hard to play smartly over the long run I always get to the very end. In the few times that I've played it, I get to the very end and it's like I have no clue what my score is going to be. I have no idea how any of this is going to shake out and it's always a surprise who ends up winning, because, like, it's not a game where you can, like keep an eye on someone, like oh they're, they're in the lead, or whatever, like it's always a surprise, so I don't know. I I love for not. I think it's cozy, I think it's a great like date night game. Rachel did not enjoy it. It's not her type of puzzle, so not a date with rachel?
Speaker 2:who else are you taking on a date?
Speaker 1:I don't know, I'll probably, uh, only bring this out on select occasions, but the family that we were gaming with, they loved it. We got the kids involved in both games camel up and verdant and they borrowed both of those games so that they could. Oh wow.
Speaker 2:Hey, love it Spreading the joy of gaming that away. Travis, Does Rachel, like you know, Verdant's like made by FlatOut right, and they also did Calico and Cascadia. Does she like either of those two or does she not just not like those puzzly type games?
Speaker 1:I don't think she's played either of those, but we played Fit to Print and she really she liked that one well enough. I mean, that's a much faster game though, yeah, and it like keeps you moving and you're always doing stuff, I think. Well, she was also like holding the baby half the time that we were playing, and so she was like kind of focusing, not focused on the game. So maybe we'll get another shot and it'll stick this time, but she likes fit to print, so maybe interesting. The one other thing that I have to brief is that I got my new copy of rebirth whoa 2024, production by reiner kinesia, published by mighty boards. Signed copy. Signed copy by reiner.
Speaker 2:Oh, no, big deal, it's a big deal, it's a big deal by the doctor, by the good doctor.
Speaker 1:So, uh, reiner goes through these like phases where he has this similar theme or mechanic in his games and right now he's in his like area control era. He's had his like his betting era, he's had his trick-taking era. He's in like his area control era right now.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, you know how many I I have this saved like 15 different copies of this saved on ebay because I am having huge FOMO about the the latest kanitsa game and the the initial. The reviews I've been listening to are pretty positive about it. So, yeah, I am very interested in. I'm a little.
Speaker 1:I'm a little confused why this one is getting more publicity and better reviews than like the cascadero cascadito, because it's kind of the same mechanic really. Like you're scoring points based on your like groupings of different areas that you control on the map. So the map is this big hexagon map of Scotland and England, I believe is the other one there's two different versions on either side of this board and what you're doing is, on your turn, you just pick up one of these chits that have houses on them and you put them on the board. Okay, where you put those chits on the board, score you points based on the groups, based on what type of suit of land that you're putting it on, and if you put it next to these abbeys or castles, you can like take control of the abbey or castle, and so what you're really trying to do is like this area control type thing, where you're putting these down in a way to make the largest groups and to strategically take control of the castles and abbeys. There's a version that has ports and if you control the port then you get an extra point or whatever. But that's the whole mechanic and there's different rules on where you can and cannot put and how they score and stuff.
Speaker 1:But the mechanic is super simple. You take your big pile of chits and, like right next to your player board, you take two of them, you put them back in the box and those are just kind of like to randomize the selection that you have. And then on your turn you just pick up one of those chits, you look at it secretly and then on it's on your turn, you just put it on a hexagon and once all the hexagons are filled, the game's over and you score points based on your groupings. And who controls what?
Speaker 2:so I love that simplicity one tile you have one tile, look at and decide where to place it.
Speaker 1:Those are the games I crave yeah, it says it's got a weight of two, 2.03 on board game. Geek and honestly, like that's not based on the mechanics or anything it's based on like the rules on where you can and cannot put and how the different castles and Abbey's and stuff score, but like your mechanic, the mechanic itself and the decision that you're making is I pick up a chit where which of these hexagons? So I put this chit on and that's it. That's your whole decision. And so play time is listed as 45 to 60. I think. On the box it says 60 minutes. This game, if you're playing like two player, three player could fly by in like half an hour if you were really cooking and people were like thinking between their turns. So yeah, it's a pretty, it's a deceptively simple game, but Ryan Reiner is definitely in his area control era right now.
Speaker 2:So, whatever the area is he's in, I'm always there for it, you got to try it at a different toe at least a little bit.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, that's, that's rebirth. I'm looking forward to getting that played here soon. I just unboxed it yesterday, nice. Oh. One more shout-out is BoardGameGeekSecretSantacom. Oh, my secret santa went all out and I have three big boxes underneath the christmas tree right now and she, whoa, she's from seattle. I wish I could like shout out her username right now, but she wrapped them all nice and like left me like a little postcard from seattle in there that says I santa said I've been a good boy and so I have these three board games that are just dying for me to unwrap underneath the christmas tree, and I'm looking forward to seeing what those are.
Speaker 1:How do you stop?
Speaker 2:yourself.
Speaker 1:It's challenging. It's challenging, but yeah.
Speaker 3:Did you like input your games that you have so that she knows not to get you when you already own.
Speaker 1:So this one. When you sign up, you can type in like oh, I'm looking at this game this year, or here's my wish list, or whatever. Yeah, but when they do the matching, it just gives your santa access to your board game geek wish list. And so if you're? Wish listing games throughout the year. Then they can read through all those and select which games to uh to select from. So, um, that's cool, very cool yeah, that was a thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've done this the past couple of years and I have never been disappointed. Either it's a game that I know or it's or they're looking at my wishlist and picking a game that they love that's based on my wishlist. So I've gotten some surprises, ones that I was not expecting to get. But so who was your? Who were?
Speaker 3:you a Santa for.
Speaker 1:I was a Santa for somebody in Columbia, actually, who has a PO box in Miami. So at the top of his wishlist were Sky Team and Small World and I love both of those games, so I sent him both. Yeah, so excited for him to get those and give those a play, cause I love me some Small World and I love me some sky team. That's fun, sky team, man, it's, it's a hit. And they have their new expansion, so I'll have to give that a try sometime. Did it win the Spiel des Jahres? Yeah, I did, uh, last year, okay.
Speaker 2:Clayton, debrief your week for me. Oh, huge week this week. So on the on the heels of Jared's boards and boards night, our group here really decided that would be a fun thing to do. So we fired one up on Friday night. Everybody brought their charcuterie boards. Just by happenstance I've had that charcuterie board game on my amazon wishlist for some time and mary's sister sent it to me for christmas, so I got it like two days before our boards and boards night. I was like obviously we're playing this so charcuterie.
Speaker 2:The board game is an I split, you choose board game where you're trying to make a charcuterie board with the right combinations of dips, meats, cheeses, breads and fruits and so on, your turn. Well, everybody kind of takes a turn at the same time but one person's a host and they get x amount of items out of the bag and they split them up into stacks equal to the amount of players and then the stacks get sent around the table and the person that's the host gets last choice of the stacks they made. So it's just I split, you choose the, the theme, the, the weight, the theme, the weight. The approachability of it was all great. I love that there is this game in the world to be somebody's over and they're like oh, you like board games, and, yeah, I like board games. Here's an interesting one that might be appealing to you. It's about charcuterie. I know most people are appreciative of meats and cheeses these days. So, yeah, just a welcoming game that people will be interested in playing, just based on the theme and how it's presented.
Speaker 2:I personally had some issues with the and not me personally but I noticed in our group of six players the scoring seemed to be holding some people up mainly the difference between groups and what's adjacent. Yeah, so, and what's a pair? It made sense to me, but I read the rule book and watched a video and I tried to explain it to them. But essentially, like groups are like all touching together. As big as you want it to be, adjacent just means it's touching. A pair can be anywhere on your board. And people just had a hard time internalizing the different scoring objectives and like, oh, I need a group of cheese, that is all different. That is all different. I you know. It just didn't seem to be as clean as it could be, especially given the target audience is probably going to be people that are not as familiar with board gaming. So I wish there was a simpler set of like that was the base set of scoring objectives that we use. So I wish there was something.
Speaker 3:There's a hidden objective too, and, yeah, people seem to throw people off too.
Speaker 2:I think, yeah, yeah, cause then they can't even ask about it, cause I feel like they're, they're giving up that.
Speaker 2:I don't think anybody had trouble with their hidden objectives too much. Mine was like the vegetarian, so I didn't want to have any, any meat on my charcuterie board, which was fun anyway. It was like 30 minutes, I think. In general, I split you choose.
Speaker 2:It's a mechanism I like, but I don't know that I like it at six players because it feels like you want to make an interesting, interesting decision as the host as to what you put in these stacks. But I think it's six players. Ultimately it doesn't really matter. Like you were making stacks of two and you could try and put a stack on there that you really wanted, but the odds of it coming around back to you are so slim and it's yeah, I just don't know that that's a player count. That I split you choose shines at because and I think making that the drafting mechanism probably just slows the game down versus just saying, pull out six stacks of two tiles and pass it around, you're just giving someone a choice that's not really a choice and you watch people like stewing over making these piles and it's like it really, it really doesn't matter yeah.
Speaker 2:So I don't know. I I've liked I split you choose in other games, but I just think it at six players. It's just, it's adding play time by making people think they have to do these clever things with these stacks when in all reality you're just playing a 30-minute drafting game where you're trying to get the right meats and cheeses on your board. So yeah, maybe a lower player count.
Speaker 3:I was going to say it's funny that we had similar experiences. Player count. I was gonna say it's funny that we had similar experiences. I I didn't debrief it on the podcast, so I probably should have to warn you about some of those same things. Not saying that wasn't fun, it was it was fun, but I I could see it being fun at two, because at two I think you get to make even more piles and you take multiple turns drafting from there. At six, it's like yeah, there's so many of them and it's like one person was taking like eight minutes to make these little piles and I was kind of distracted because there's a lot of stuff going on and I'm like, guys, it doesn't really matter nothing, none of this matters like just make little piles.
Speaker 3:we'll go around and like, yeah, each type of like veggie, fruit, meat, cheese, like each one has like five or six different kinds too. So it's like, yeah, there's so many options. It gets like yeah, people are like hmm, do I should I put this or this, or should I do that, and maybe like, at five or six, you should just like just randomize the piles, like yeah, go, yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I really don't. I really like yeah, go, yeah, I don't know. Yeah, I really don't. I really don't think that mechanism added much to the game experience like it was. It would have been just as fun just to draft the food items off the tray without knowing somebody split them up in some specific pattern. So but anyway, I mean I'm glad, I'm glad to have it just because of the theme and it's something I feel like I could, you know, introduce to people. But I don't know that I would do six players again, maybe four or less. I would try, but it probably just took a little too long for what it was. And it didn't take that long. But again, it's a silly drafting game where you're making our charcuterie board. It doesn't have to be rocket science, so. So we played that.
Speaker 2:And then the spanglers recently got into wingspan and carlin has been dying for alana to play wingspan with her and she has so far been giving her the stiff arm. So carlin used this opportunity of this boards and boards night to pitch a six player game of wingspan which, without the flock mode introduced in wingspan asia, would have been an unmitigated disaster. But I I wouldn't on a normal day, play wings. I wouldn't play most games above three players really, because they just take too long. Playing Wingspan at two players is like an hour, maybe Three players 90 minutes. If you're getting much longer than two hours on Wingspan, forget about it. But fortunately in the latest expansion they introduced a flock mode so that you can play with six players without incurring all the debt of additional play time. So how they do that is in wingspan asia you got a extra die and you got like a little place to play out bird cards, so you have everything in wingspan asia to play the game. It's just like a slimmed down version. So essentially, you take your regular Wingspan with the bird feeder and everything, and you take your Wingspan Asia bird feeder and die and you make two supplies of bird feeder, cards and resources. And then there's this little dial in the middle that has all the player colors around it and on each turn there's a dial pointing to one player at the one end of the table, one player at the other end of the table, and so they both. They both take their turns simultaneously from their own supply. So it's like you're playing a three-player game, but it's six players and I was shocked at how well it went because I mean, we had we had one person alana hadn't played it before, but she picked it up really quick and it was kind of fun, like we were.
Speaker 2:We we made it like this whole thing where, oh, it's our pod, it's your pod, like hey, what's going on your pod? Why are you guys taking so long down there? And so, like mary and I would always be taking our turn at the same time and we would like race to be who's done quicker. You know my turn's done, and then everybody's like ready to go. Okay, red and orange, your turn, all right, and then it just moved really nice, and everybody was stayed engaged throughout the whole thing. So I thought it was a very clever way to up the amount of players that can play wingspan without taking for freaking ever, because it's a good game, but it's not good enough for me to want to play it for three or four hours, like I will be. I will be sick of those freaking birds at the end of four hours. But it probably took us just under two hours to get it done with six players. So yeah, and we took a break to put my kids to bed at one point.
Speaker 3:So yeah, flock mode was awesome for six players, or is there other players?
Speaker 2:You can also use flock mode for seven players.
Speaker 2:It adds yeah, but for five, I don't know, I don't. I think you have to just play the regular game. Okay, nice, yeah, great experience, awesome time. And it just highlighted to me the fun sometimes of just playing a game that everybody knows. Yeah, because it's so often that I have all these games that I want to play and when I get the opportunity to play with people, I want to play one of those games that I haven to play and I don't. I, when I get the opportunity to play with people, I want to play one of those games that I haven't gotten to play yet. But it ends up being a cumbersome experience A lot of times trying to teach people and, you know, get into that experience and sometimes it's just fun to play a game that everybody knows.
Speaker 2:So, like five of the six of us knew wingspan well and you know very little teaching, teaching just everybody's doing their thing, like you didn't have to watch and make sure. Hey, oh, remember that you have the end around goal that you can get, like you know, just like all these little things that you normally have to do when you're teaching people a game for the first time. That's something I want to do more of is play games that everybody already knows. Yeah, but I always but, but I always still want to get those other games played. So I don't know, it's a freaking tough situation to be in, because it was a lot of fun just playing Wingspan and everybody knew it, everybody was having a good time, everybody was doing their thing, it was great. But I got a whole wall of games back there that are itching to get off the shelf.
Speaker 1:It's a gamer's dilemma. Yeah, that's my debrief. That sounds great glad you got a good game night in some boards and boards. Did you hand out board awards?
Speaker 2:no, no, we didn't go board awards, but I would not have won the board award because we contributed very little. At the gable household. The olives and the stranglers really brought the heat with their boards and, uh, I think mary made a margarita board so, and we had a candy board, which was nice. But, yeah, we had some good stuff. The boards were, the boards were packed, the games were fun. It was a successful night inspired by the Ericsons.
Speaker 1:Excellent. Are we ready to fall in on the mission objective? Let's fall. Jared says press. So mission objective this week is our year in review. We're going to talk about some highlights. We're going to talk about maybe some lowlights, some favorite games, and then we are going to talk about what we want to get out of next year in our board game hobby. So Clayton opening thoughts.
Speaker 2:It's obviously been a monumental year for the three of us. I mean, we started a podcast a few months ago, so that's of note. Other than that, I've played a lot of good games and I've enjoyed that.
Speaker 1:Jared any opening thoughts before we dive in.
Speaker 3:I mean, my overview is very simple. I was internationally separated from my family but I did enjoy some good gaming in Korea with my team over there in Korea with my team over there, and then reunited and then unfortunately ripped from clay from the OVR and went to Alabama. But I have tried to establish my new game group and I think I got some good dudes. They might not be into the biggest of the big boys games but they're still good, good contenders but a lot to look forward to next year. So I'm excited to to get into our, our main objectives today yeah, I think, uh, I think.
Speaker 1:For me this has been a much slower year game wise. You know it's going to be hard to top ovr life where we are just jamming out games. We have hopeful weekends dedicated to just playing games on a schedule like a marathon um big boy game nights every.
Speaker 1:Thursday big boy game nights. Every Thursday. We're watching videos throughout the week, we're preparing, we know the ins and outs and then we show up to the table ready to throw down. Uh, it's gonna be hard to beat, but a slower year game wise for me. But a highlight this year was definitely the creation of this podcast. We had been kicking around the idea for a while and I just texted these guys out of the blue and said I want to start a board game podcast and maybe two weeks later we had this up and running with our first episode. So, yeah, it's been a learning process and, uh, it's been fun, because I love getting together with you guys once a week and just bsing about board games, because I miss you guys this podcast.
Speaker 3:I miss you too, and I love this group. Honestly, you've made me stretch quite a bit travis um. You know I'm terrible at texting both of you and uh, yeah before I knew it, the text went out about operation game night and, uh, before it, like before I actually like really read them and gave it. You know my time and space and energy. I was like holy, I think we're recording tomorrow and I appreciate them being okay with my chaotic personality, but hopefully I bring a good vibe to the podcast. We need you there.
Speaker 1:Clayton, give me one of your highlights this year.
Speaker 2:So the first thing I want to talk about are my stats.
Speaker 3:I want to do a review.
Speaker 2:I religiously record my stats on the bg stats app and also integrate my four game arena plays into that app, and only for moments like this when I can spout off some numbers with some confidence here. So in total, I had 520 game plays this year, which I don't know if that's a lot. It seems like a lot to me, but 180 different games I played this year, which is pretty good.
Speaker 2:I feel pretty good about that yeah, I've logged a lot of different games 97 games I played more than one time, which that was probably the most shocking statistic of all to me, because I feel like most of the time I play a game once and move on. If I get a second play, that's good. So for 97 times I played a game twice. I'm pretty happy with that. 18 games I played more than five times, with the most surprising of those 18 being arcs. I wouldn't say surprising, it's just that's a pretty big game to get five plays of, in, I feel like. So I feel lucky that I got that one made the five-time list Excellent. And then seven games I played more than 10 times, with Castles of Burgundy leading the way with 42.
Speaker 2:Sky Team at 15, 15, captain flip at 13 that's not a hat. With 12. I see heat pedal to the metal 11, sea salt and paper 11, distilled 10 and mountain goats 10. So nice, that's a great list of games to be playing 10 more times. I mean there's a reason they've all been hitting the table and the digital table.
Speaker 3:All great games how do you, how do you, reconcile your bga and your, your other guns? You, you have to physically add them all.
Speaker 2:No, no, there's. The BG stats app integrates with with a board game arena, so you just hit import and it pulls in all your plays from BGA. It's beautiful. Yeah, yeah. So those are. Those are my stat highlights for the year. I, I feel, accomplished. I've done a lot. I've talked a lot.
Speaker 1:I've also done now 19 podcast episodes actually 18.
Speaker 2:That's the only stat that matters. Yeah, 18 because travis did one by himself, but 19 if you count being on gamesy moss with vick that's also.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I think we're tied clay. I think we're both tied for 19 episodes because I took a week off when my daughter was born and you took a week off when I did my solo episode. So I think we're tied for perfect attendance.
Speaker 2:We'll see who comes out on top?
Speaker 1:yeah jared don't ask me about my stats welcome to your fifth episode, jared, that's right. Uh, so, clay, you have all these stats you have. Yeah, give me the total number again 500, and what 520 plays. Okay, are you gonna like do 520 burpees to like celebrate or 520 push-ups, or like? I don't think so oh, I'll take 520 steps 520 Ritz bits.
Speaker 2:Oh, I probably could, I was. I was into some Ritz bits last night. Were you bitten? I was bitten.
Speaker 1:All right. So, jared, give me some highlights from this year, besides the podcast, Besides the podcast.
Speaker 3:I was going to say I hate bringing up all the time but being in Korea and I had this like bag this Korea reuse, this Korea Costco reusable bag that I would keep all my games in and I'd run to the, to the squadron bar, carry my sweet little bag, you know, and we'd hit some games on Saturday night, some games on saturday night. We're all very lonely without our families, but we found, you know, some comfort and fun, uh, at the bar, just playing some wholesome board games, got to like play other games that I didn't own myself, um, like munchkin and uh, yeah, just good people and finding I don't know some more sense of a community there. Because I'll honest, if you rewind like a year and a half when I first got to Korea, it's just crazy. It's a show. I don't know what I'm doing in my job. I still don't know what I'm doing in my job, but there's a lot of like.
Speaker 3:You know, it's tough being out there on your own, but then finding the community with my game group, my game group and um holding each other up, it was good. Yeah, that was probably. I would say that was probably my highlight. But also the all the the online games would be. Also a huge highlight would be staying connected with my, my friends and my family. That I don't get the pleasure of being around as much as I want to be, but I still get to throw a couple dice or play some cards or whatever, uh on on any of these online platforms. Um, I mean, I'll leave that at that for my highlights, for sure, but I'm grateful for board games. That's what the end of it is.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that's always so cool is, every time you go on deployment or go overseas or go on these trips, there's always someone that's willing to play cards or play a game. Or you go to the squadron bar or I was at IUD there was a crew that was always there playing board games all the time in the in the bar. So, yeah, you find these little niche groups that always want to like just connect and you tend to form tighter groups. That way. I like it. Yep, uh, my Travis. So this is I. It feels like it was within the year, but it because it's our first like end of year podcast.
Speaker 1:I want to say that Essen was like a huge highlight for me. I know that it's like a little over a year it was last October or whatever but Essen Spiel was amazing and I definitely want to go the three of us to a couple of board game conventions in the future, because Dice Tower West, I thought was cool, like, got a lot of games played in the future. Because Dice Tower West, I thought was cool, got a lot of games played. We got to experience some new stuff. Essen was a whole other level, so we need to go to PAX U or Gen Con or something together, or BGG Con in Dallas or BGG Con or whatever. We got to make it out to one of these conventions because it was unreal experience and I definitely want to make it to more of those in the future. Clayton, hit me with your next one.
Speaker 2:The next thing I wanted to talk about are my notable games that were new to me this year. So now I don't play enough games to have like a top 10 that came out in 2024 list. I think that would just be the 10 games that I played that came out in 2024. So it wouldn't be that interesting, but I have played a lot of games that were new to me in 2024. So I want to just do a quick 10 to one of the games that I had never played before but played this year and how I ranked them.
Speaker 2:So number 10 shocking, I had never played it up into this point but that was love letter, which Scott and Britt. Scott and Brittany introduced me to that Such a fun little game in this little stack that you can just play with a group of people and be done in 15 minutes. Play another round. It's just one of those games. It's a beer and pretzels game trying to deduce what other people have in their hand. Super simple to teach, but yeah, that has been a fun game that I discovered this year. That's my number 10. Number nine is harmonies, the abstract place. I guess you're placing these little uh, habitat tiles or blocks there. Whether have you played harmonies travis.
Speaker 1:How would you describe the I did the tutorial on. But yeah, they're like little tiny hexagon cubes that you're putting on the other hexagon spaces. It's. It is very abstract and kind of strange, but yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:So anyway, there's a. You're placing these cubes out but forming these habitats for these animals, so then you can put the animal cubes on the habitats and it's just this brain burning puzzle. But it plays pretty quick and it's a joy to look at and I've enjoyed playing that with Mary. Number eight is Architects of the West Kingdom, which I talked about last week. That's one that just stays in my head as that was a lot of fun. I just really enjoyed how quickly the turns went and how it just kept moving along at such a nice pace. I'm really looking forward to playing that again sometime soon, hopefully.
Speaker 2:Number seven is Planet Unknown, one of the first games I talked about in the podcast, but it's that Tetris-y polyomino game where you've got the lazy Susan in the middle and you're taking a tile off and playing it on your planet and then moving up tracks and unlocking benefits. Yeah, that game is fun. Simultaneous play so it moves, quick, approachable, so on bga, you guys should try it out if you haven't. Number six, another simultaneous play game fromage. Oh, nice, recent recent hotness. Played a few times now and yeah, it's just a fun game that gives you a lot for a 30 to 45 minute game and I again. It's another one that I just keep thinking. I I can't wait to play that one again. Sky rise is number five. That one was also one that I talked about early on in the podcast, which gives you like raw vibes with the bidding mechanism but you're spreading out over this map trying to collect these little tokens to score points. At the end it's just a fun game where the rules are super simple and there's plenty of interaction with the other players trying to figure out what to do. Number four is ironwood. That game was freaking awesome. I I have not convinced anybody to play it with me since. I've played it three times with mckenzie who introduced it to me. Um, but yeah, that asymmetric battle over the woodlands totally got root vibes. But it's a little quicker design for two players and it is probably deserves a lot more plays than I've given it. So I'm definitely looking forward to hopefully playing that some more next year.
Speaker 2:Number three is Duel for Middle Earth. So I just think this game took Seven Wonders Duel and just made it better period. So, and that was already a good game and I love the theme. I love the drafting they've come up with for the Seven Wonders, duel and, yeah, the, only using one coin to pay the difference in what you need for resources makes it so much smoother. The fact that there's no endgame scoring just again makes everything. It smooths it out and makes it this tense battle where you have to keep an eye on all three fronts. Are they getting to the end of the ring track? Do they have supremacy over the board? Are they about to get their sixth alliance? Do they have supremacy over the board? Are they about to get their sixth alliance? It's just a tense battle throughout all three of the eras and it is a great game.
Speaker 2:Number two Arx Freaking. Love playing Arx. I mean it's going to be a game that's going to be tough to play. It's not as hard to teach as Ro root because everybody is doing the same thing and I think their player aids are amazing. They have like a full pamphlet for it. But I love trick taking games and, like the, the fact that you're using trick taking as that mechanism that determines the actions you can take. My gosh, every decision, decision just feels so important and tense in that game, like, you always are on alert because somebody can just sweep in and battle you with a bunch of red dye and knock out all your stuff. It is a great game and it's not for the faint of heart. It's going to be random, it's going to be crazy, it's going to be in your face, but that's what cole worley does and it is awesome. And number one new to me game this year battlestar galactica.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah I said it I said it when I talked about in the episode it might have been one of my favorite game experience of all time. It was definitely my favorite game experience of the year. It was a blast to play. The theme just shines in this game and I didn't want it to be over. So if I can get that played once a year, I'll be a happy man. And that's my top 10 rundown of the games that were new to me that I played this year. That sounds awesome. This was a banger year for two-player games. My, that's my top 10 rundown of the games that were new to me that I played this year.
Speaker 1:That sounds awesome. This was a banger year for two-player games, specifically two-player games. You got ironwood, kelp shark versus octopus sky team got a whole new life this year. You had, like a king of tokyo duel come out, lord of the rings duel. You had all sorts of two-player games. The new I know it's not specifically, it is specifically two-player the new Star Wars deck building, clone Wars expansion standalone Everdell.
Speaker 2:Duo.
Speaker 1:Everdell Duo. It was a good year for two-player games.
Speaker 3:Heck, yeah the world's getting a little more cozy yeah maybe You're tearing up. I mean, the world's not having as many kids, but you know, get a little closer with your spouse, I guess.
Speaker 1:They're trying to cater to millennials that just live with their significant others. That's right, Jared. Any other highlights from this year?
Speaker 3:I mean, I wasn't going to start spouting off a 10 board game list. If you want, I can try and scratch something together, but I would just say arcs was pretty, pretty bad-ass. We got Cole to the table on that one too Right and he showed up all cyber punked out. He's got like fricking hair and a Mohawk and boots and his chest is showing. So I was excited. I was was that was a pretty good one.
Speaker 2:Um, that was highlight that was crazy, though, you guys. I mean, it was a school night and we played arcs, and it went a couple hours and we ended at like 11 and you and cole are let's play it again, and I was like you mean, right now, like tonight I got work, tomorrow I don't need no sleep.
Speaker 3:That's kind of. Also, a motto of mine is that I'll sleep when I'm dead. Well, the thing was that was like the two weeks that I had in Colorado between Korea and Alabama. So I'm like, of course I'm going to spend it with my friends.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So we stayed up late on a school night and played it again and it was awesome. That's how good the game was. After two hours of being in each other's faces, we're like let's do it again, and this time let's use the leaders and lower cards. Oh my God.
Speaker 3:You guys are machines. That's why I think that might be one of the photos on your on your player board. Maybe Is the night, so you take a look at it.
Speaker 2:That sucker's getting framed. Travis, you got any highlights?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's been fun to kind of stretch my gaming limits this year. Um, it's been kind of a weird year, both with moving overseas and trying to find a new game group and and having a kid. So, uh, gaming habits have changed a bit and it's definitely like pushed me to reconsider all of my hobbies not just gaming and how they fit into my life and how can you continue to partake in a hobby that takes as much time as board gaming when you're stretched for time like this? People always talk about their worked-out. Routines change when they have kids or they move and they find a new gym. People have to adjust their habits or their hobbies to their current life situations. I'm not getting paid to play board games not yet.
Speaker 2:Not yet yeah, but uh, let's know yeah, if, uh.
Speaker 1:So I've had to really consider how it fits in and and the answer is you kind of have to get it in where you can and and like clay.
Speaker 1:My habits have changed a lot this year. I've kind of gone for the lighter games, the quicker games, the games that can fit in a backpack. I got a whole bunch of, like you know, pocket games that I played this year, to include all the button shy ones and the and the sea salt and papers and the scouts and like these ones that can fit in the backpack have been great to just pull out in a hurry, play a game in 30 minutes or whatever, and then on to the next thing. So yeah, it's kind of made me question what this looks like going forward, and I think my habits have definitely changed and hopefully I get to a point where I have big crunchy game nights once a week on Thursdays. But you know that's that, that's like a, that's a tall mountain to shoot for. So it'll probably be a while before I get to that point and until then I'm just enjoying games where I can, when I can now. So what are you?
Speaker 3:trying to scavenge for clayton. What are you looking so?
Speaker 2:I was going to say about. You know, I mean it's. I've certainly been in this hobby since I had my kids and now, as we alluded to in our one episode dedicated to it, I'm at the point where my kids are also my gaming buddies. So I've got. I was trying to see how many games I've played with Mason. I've played 90 games with Mason this year. Whoa yeah. So I mean mean eventually, if you and they're not.
Speaker 3:These like little like uh, what's that one bird in the in the fruit games like these are like some serious games you guys are playing yeah, 91 with isaac.
Speaker 2:Isaac actually likes playing games a little more than mason. But eventually, you know, the kids get old enough, they start enjoying it and you can start to introduce them in the games too. Then your hobby gets even better, because you can enjoy it with the people that mean the most to you.
Speaker 1:Jared, how many games of Hungry, Hungry, hippo did you get in with Gemma?
Speaker 3:I don't know if you count when she grabs the balls and throws them on the floor. I think that counts as a play. You become every morning.
Speaker 1:I think that counts as a play. You become every morning.
Speaker 3:I'd log it. Then we try to make sure we have all 20 of them, because there's this little holder that has a little curve and a little spot for each one. We have to find all 20. She can count to 20. She can do it. Excellent. I got count to 20. So she, she can do it, but excellent.
Speaker 2:I got one more reflection, oh yeah. Now that I pulled this, these stats up, I just wanted to give a shout out to some of my high potency gamers out there. They have logged a lot of hours with me. So obviously, mason Isaac Mary I've got her down here as 263 plays between Board Game Arena and in real life. She's putting the work. I appreciate her. She's not always happy about it, but I think we enjoy that time together.
Speaker 3:from my opinion, it's pretty close to two games a day.
Speaker 2:Two games a day 500-something divided by three, I three. I mean yeah, not for me, oh yeah for me you total, like you're gonna get a lot of these games in yeah, then my mom I played 55 games with her.
Speaker 2:So she comes out a couple times a year and she loves playing games and we will probably play like 20 games in the week that she's out here, just because she she likes to experience them all. And she's on bga and we play games on there too. So my mom's a big one. And then spanky, he's coming in there with 31 games played. Actually it's way more than that because I have him on here, sp Spankalicious from BGA2. So he's up in the 80s for me. So Spanky's been holding it down since you guys left. And then a final shout out Again I've lost some of the crew this year Jared and Cole taking off, but anyway, with them leaving, scott and Brittany just moved down here from Denver.
Speaker 2:And those two have been an amazing power gaming couple. They love doing it.
Speaker 3:They bring a lot of energy.
Speaker 2:They bring a lot of energy and they're excited to learn new games. Looking forward to playing more with them in the upcoming six months before I leave.
Speaker 3:Can we just retire already and all move to the same spot? I'm sick of this, like you know, being in a, having a career and stuff, I'm done with it, you know me too.
Speaker 2:Well, that was a great.
Speaker 1:That was a great oscar speech. That was like.
Speaker 3:I'd like to thank all the gamers out there I was about to start playing the music um dang guys play, gets into the top 25 um things he likes to do before he plays board games geez, okay, uh, jared, what are you looking forward to in the new year for board gaming?
Speaker 3:this is. I mean, this is probably, no, not really the best part I mean looking forward to. I have a week-long war gaming um exercise going on in, uh, in may I think it's may. Yeah, we are playing next war um. I think it's like purpose built for professional military uh, schools and stuff, but there's like 500 of us and we're all going to be playing a war game at the exact same time, where there's resources that have to be spread across the entire 500 of us and we're all going to be essentially doing a world war. It's very, it's going to be very, interesting. There's lots of little tiles. I bought little tongs to grab the cardboard pieces. There's a lot of uh uh. What do you call cynicism? People don't like it. I'm trying to have a good attitude, but that is something to look forward to. I mean, we're building our skills, we can, we. It's insane. You, you can Google next war and it is so in depth, like there's land components, air components, sea components.
Speaker 2:Space components.
Speaker 3:We'll get all into it next year. They actually group space and cyber into one little weird thing. Oh, come on, there's a 10-sided die. You got to roll and I kind of like it a little bit. No, it's a good time, but that's something to look forward to in gaming.
Speaker 1:Clay, what are your things you're looking forward to in gaming this year?
Speaker 2:Made a quick list, before we got on, of some games on my shelf of opportunity and some games that I am expecting to get delivered in Kickstarter, that I'm looking forward to. So Star Wars Rebellion.
Speaker 2:Got that recently. It's from fantasy flight and if it's anything like the battlestar galactica experience, uh, thematic, which it seems like it will be, um, I am really looking forward to trying that out. Rising sun got that at the Petri Swap. Haven't got to play it yet but hope to in the new year. Mobile Markets, smartphone Inc a standalone game Want to play that. I really like Smartphone Inc and I picked up the Mobile Markets at that same Petri Swap and haven't got a chance to play it yet. I got a Magic Beginner Box. Magic got a magic beginner box. Magic foundations beginner box and I know I oh no, I want to give it a try.
Speaker 2:I mean, it is money spent on card and board game in the world. I'm sure magic is the tops. I don't have any stats to back it up, but there are so many people that are obsessed with this game, there's gotta be something to it. So I want to give that a try. And I would also like to turn that into a, a clay's CCG review where I go through and play all the CCGs I have, again just from a novice perspective, because I've played one piece. I've played star Wars rebellion. I've played Lorcan. I've played Pokemon. I've played what does CCG?
Speaker 2:stand for I mean star Wars unlimited collectible card game. Wow, and I want to play magic, so I'd like to round out my experience on that.
Speaker 3:Don't let it consume you or change your personality. Okay, that's what I this is. I warn you.
Speaker 2:I'm going to do it, I'm going to be fine, I'll be fine, I'll be fine, okay. And then Kickstarter is coming to from bite wing, the sci-fi, epic, kinesia trilogy. And then there's a two-player kickstarter they did earlier than that one. It's got like iliad and ikor ikor. Yeah, two, two like two player only games. That uh looked really fun, yes. So that's hopefully coming this year. Super excited about those two.
Speaker 2:And then merchant's cove I probably backed that years ago and, god willing, it comes this year. It's merchants cove, like with an expansion. I forget what it's even called, it's been so long. But what I'm most excited about is the big box that comes with it to store all the different factions in there, because there's a lot of different pieces for the different factions and I think that will really help with the organization. But hopefully the rest of that comes this year. I'm excited about that.
Speaker 2:And then travis sent me a box of games, just like he sent you jared, and there are two. I'm very interested in little trick-taking games from all play lunar and mori. I have just have not trick taking got me into games as a kid and I love playing trick taking games. I just have not been playing my trick taking games lately and I want to make a point to start playing some more trick taking games in the new year, starting with those two, because I've read the rules and they seem super innovative and fun and I just need to get the right people together to give those a try. But that's it for me. That's what I'm looking forward to next year.
Speaker 1:And for me I did my whole episode on like solo games that I want to get played. That's a lot of the games that I want to try this year. No shortage of Kickstarters that will continue to roll in for years to come, so I'm going to be sustained by that. A couple of highlights the new Wonderland's War Madcala there's a new thematic story-driven game in the Western Legends universe that is coming out here soon. Looking forward to that one. I think it's called Western Stories or something. The name is not great, but looking forward to that one because think it's called like western stories or something. The name is not great, but looking forward to that one because I love me some western legends. I definitely want to get some more batman gotham city chronicles played, because that season three just dropped and then they're going to launch a rpg campaign if you want to swing around as batman or create your own bat character and partake in some rpg stuff.
Speaker 1:New root faction I want to give that a try. I've not had the opportunity to do so. The two new factions in the new expansion so looking forward to those. Yeah, the sky's the limit. And, most importantly, I just want to continue to like, get better at this podcast because we are learning something every week. I like doing this and I enjoy talking to you guys, and we hope to keep putting out good content for our listeners. So podcast is at the top of my list of things to look forward to this next year and I promise I'll get better at sharing my screen.
Speaker 3:I apologize about that, guys all right, we're using.
Speaker 1:We're using new tools every week, so I don't know if we've had two weeks where we've done it the exact same way. We've, like, changed something every single week, whether it's mics or headphones or recording or editing software, or it's been something new every week. So we're doing it on the fly. Yeah, I love it. Let's go over the fence very quickly. Rapid fire, clayton, what else have you been doing outside of board gaming?
Speaker 2:I tried to get Carlin to watch Hamilton because I'm passionate about Hamilton. She made it halfway through, not happy about that Carlin has never seen Alexander Hamilton.
Speaker 3:No, had a torrent affair right there.
Speaker 2:No, she quit halfway.
Speaker 3:Okay, I'm gonna I'm calling her right after this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it came up, uh, on friday when we had our boards and board night that I had not seen godfather and she's like you need to watch godfather. And I was like I will watch godfather if you finish freaking, hamilton.
Speaker 3:So anyway.
Speaker 2:I watched Godfather last night Good movie. I'm eager to see the next one. I guess it makes the top of best movies of all time list for a reason. Pretty darn good. I should have expected it, but my expectations were low for it and it surpassed them. So looking forward to, uh, checking out Godfather two here soon arguably better than the first one, so you'll yeah, that's my over the fence.
Speaker 1:Awesome Jared over the fence. What else have you been doing?
Speaker 3:So, uh, the biggest thing right now is, um, potty training. Uh, right now is potty training. Gemma just hit two and a half years, so we do need to ratchet it down, but she is doing very well. But we have this little travel potty. That is a little time-consuming and she sometimes has a little to-ed with me attitude with Dad, because he's always like, hey, you got to go potty, let's go sit on the potty, and she's like on the potty, no, dad, no, but that's, I mean, that's jemma in a nutshell. But, um, no, that's, that's one of my big things going on outside of board gaming, for sure that sounds exciting travis, what do you got?
Speaker 1:I have a couple audio books to shout out. Uh, we've been driving around a lot to these different christmas markets and traveling a little bit, so I've been listening to stephen fry's like greek trilogy. He's got his hero and troy mythos heroes and troy is the trilogy and he narrates the books on audible and they're they're so good. You can like take any Greek classical mythology story and he makes it relatable and personable and he adds in a little bit of dialogue that is true to story but also gives a little personality. It's so good. I listen to Mythos first, which is like the creation of the Greek pantheon, and then Heroes is about specific Greek heroes of legend, so Io and Hercules or all those heroes and stuff, and then Troy is about the Trojan War and all that stuff. I'm really enjoying those and I would recommend those to anybody who enjoys audiobooks or the Greek pantheon of legends and he has a great accent.
Speaker 3:Cm Fred's awesome dude Turns out legends and he has a great accent. Cm Fred's an awesome dude.
Speaker 1:Turns out, one of the best British actors is also good at reading books. So there you go. You can listen to those, and those are always entertaining, did we do it? Is this the final episode for 2024?
Speaker 3:Wow, can we just do a group hug, just lean in Good job team.
Speaker 1:Episode 19 in the books. 2024 in the books. We'll post a bonus episode next week while we enjoy time with our families and we will be back in the new year better than ever More board games, more guest hosts, more features, more discussions, more friendship, better all around. So this has been episode 19 of Operation Canine and I have been Travis, he has been Clay, he's been Jared, dismissed and we'll see you in the new year. Stay, ya.
Speaker 3:Outro Music.