5 ms·
Forbidden Desert is one of my favorites for groups of mixed skills. It's a teamwork exercise hidden in a game; you don't necessarily have to know anything esote
by sdrothrock 8y ago
Forbidden Desert is one of my favorites for groups of mixed skills. It's a teamwork exercise hidden in a game; you don't necessarily have to know anything esoteric to win the game, but you do have to work together. It does a lot better job of preventing one player from dominating the game than its predecessor, Forbidden Island.
The randomness of the tiles/parts and also the player jobs keeps things fresh.
I personally like Dominion a lot, though it's a card game, not a board game. Deck-building games like that push all the right buttons in me: memorization, statistics, strategy-building, and sheer competitiveness.
For two players, I also really like Jaipur because it pushes a lot of the same buttons and is incredibly simple and a quick play. It's so much simpler and general than Dominion that I feel ok introducing it to people who haven't played card games before (that is, I feel much less like a fox in a chicken coop).
- jdpigeon 8y ago+1 for Forbidden Sky as well, which I think is the sequel to Forbidden Desert. I don't play many board games but had a fantastic time with it recently. It does a good job of making everybody feel included and engaged until the end, whereas most competitive games I feel like it can become clear within the first couple minutes who's going to run away with it.
- saluki 8y agoI just don't like the Forbidden series, I'd try it at a friend's house before you buy.
- amerine 8y agoI agree with you so much. Forbidden Desert is one of my go-to first games to the table and I don’t even ask experience. We just begin.
- kej 8y agoI have Forbidden Island but haven't tried Desert yet. What is it about Desert that keeps one player from dominating it?
- sdrothrock 8y ago> What is it about Desert that keeps one player from dominating it? In my experience with Forbidden Island, having the treasures linked to explicit tiles leads to a lot of quarterbacking with some players backing up arguments with "facts" like "you're X tiles away, so you can get there, but we can't, so you need to go there first." In Forbidden Desert, the airship parts are all hidden in random locations indicated by an intersection of two tiles, which are also hidden. So while a potential quarterback can still say "hey, turn over that tile and move there and do that too," there's much less incentive to give or follow orders because it's randomized. This changes as game and player states (through hands) become more visible to everyone, but it's enough of a difference that I've noticed a definite decreasing in the "mood" of the game and quarterbacking behaviors. For example, in Forbidden Island, I sometimes suggest a house rule where you could ONLY initiate a conversation with someone if it was your own turn -- that is, nobody could actually jump in and tell you what to do in your turn. I've never found that necessary in Forbidden Desert.