1415: Return to Normality

Whew. There we go. That was, as I previously mentioned, a bit of an ordeal to write. Perhaps not my best piece of creative writing, but certainly one of the more therapeutic ones. Now I can get back to posting about random crap only I care about. Something something Hyperdimension Neptunia.

So, what to write about this evening? It is late in the day but I’m not all that tired just yet, thanks largely to the vast amounts of coffee I inevitably consume whenever I go over to my friend Tim’s for a board game evening. And this evening I went over to my friend Tim’s for a board game evening.

My local friends and I have been playing board games together for quite some time now, and our tastes have gradually evolved over time. Our tastes haven’t always necessarily evolved in the same directions, however, which isn’t always easy to deal with, but we’re currently trialling a new system whereby we 1) get to play regularly rather than semi-regularly and 2) pick games in such a way that no-one is ever waiting for too many sessions before they get to play something that would be high up on their list of personal preferences.

One of the issues we have is that two of our number (two out of five) are big into fairly hardcore strategy games that require a degree of mathematical, analytical thinking that, as a largely creative, artistic person, I’m ill-equipped to deal with as well as them. I would love to get better at this sort of game, but I’m just not very good at being able to look several moves ahead or have contingency plans if the things I want to do suddenly become unavailable. Perhaps I should start playing with a notepad to hand so I can scribble things down and work them out as I go. (Actually, that’s not a terrible idea. I may try that at some point in the near future.)

Another two out of our group — including me — tend to prefer cooperative games, particularly those that enjoy either dungeon crawling or battling eldritch horrors from beyond time and space. These games tend to have a longer run time, be more heavily thematic and, in many cases, have a stronger element of luck involved. I love them, at least in part due to the fact that they have a much stronger sense of “narrative” than the often drier world of Euro-style strategy games.

Ultimately I just like the opportunity to get some boards, cards and chits onto the table, really, so I don’t mind all that much what I play despite my regular protestations against Agricola. I’m grateful to have a group of friends I can share that with on a regular basis, and if you’re looking for something fun, enjoyable and highly social to do with your friends, I can’t recommend the wonderful world of board gaming enough.