Games for Two

It's time for something completely different on the Genuine Faux Farm blog for a Saturday.  This time around, I thought I would share the games Tammy and I enjoyed during the Holiday Season this year.  The last you probably heard from us, we were still playing Wingspan nearly every day, at the exclusion of practically any other board game.

We still love Wingspan, of course.  And we still play it regularly.  It's a comforting game for us because it is now so familiar.  We tend to leave it out so set up is pretty quick.  But, we will both also admit that it is not the most portable game we have.  So, when we found ourselves planning to go on a trip - we had to consider what we could successfully pack.

Arboretum

Here is a game that can be reduced to just a deck of cards if you already know the rules and don't feel a need for an "official" score pad.  Since we did NOT know the rules prior to our trip, we had to take them - and we brought the score pad.  But, it was still an easy thing to pack.

Arboretum could be played with as many as four players, but we found it plays pretty well with two.  I suspect the game plays VERY differently with three or four because it would be much harder to track where cards might be.  The suits are essentially different types of trees and you play with more suits when you have more players.  The two person game plays with six suits.

In our case, we stuck with the trees in the deck that we know a bit better.  So, there are Oaks, Maples, Spruces and Willows (which we refer to as Maurices, of course).   Cherry Blossom and Dogwood round it all out for the deck we use.  The cards are beautiful and do nothing to change our natural affinity for trees.

The affinity for certain trees can actually be a detriment when we are playing.  There is a certain amount of consternation when one considers throwing away a "Maurice," for example.

Initially, we were a little uncertain about the mechanics of the game, but it actually ended up being fairly easy, taking a couple of plays to get it figured out.  I suspect we would have picked it up even faster if someone who already knew the game taught us.

The game requires a little table space to play cards in your "arboretum" so it doesn't work if you are short on table top.  But, it is quite compact in transit.

Hive

Here is a game that is meant for two and only two players AND the pocket version is extremely easy to pack and take with you wherever you might go.

Even better, as far as we are concerned, is the fact that the game pieces are heavy, hexagonal tiles.  If you are outside, these will not blow away.  And, you don't need much flat surface to make it work either.  There is no board, so any surface will do.

Each insect in the hive moves a certain way and the goal is to encircle your opponents Queen Bee.  The pieces consist of various critters, including grasshoppers, spiders, ants, ladybugs and more.  

There are similarities to games like chess in that each organism has its own movement and its weaknesses and strengths as far as game play is concerned.  And, like checkers, chess, go and other similar games, there is no luck involved - no randomness other than determining who starts.

So, if you prefer to be able to blame your losses on luck, then this one may not be for you.  Otherwise, once you learn the pieces, it can be a good game to play.

Parks

We can thank our good friend, Mark, for introducing us to Parks - a game that will work for anywhere from 2 to 5 players.  I guess it could also be played solitaire as it includes rules and extra cards to allow for solo play.

This game actually has a lot of pieces, so it wouldn't normally qualify as being easily portable.  However, the box is packaged cleverly and no space is wasted - unlike many games where the box is two to four times larger than it needs to be.

This is another beautiful game that features another topic Tammy and I enjoy - US National Parks.  You can visit parks, take pictures and purchase gear for your hike.  

Unlike the first two games, set up time is longer and the complexity of the rules is greater.  It definitely helped to have someone walk us through it once before we tried it ourselves.  However, the rules are extremely well written, so we would not have had to climb a terrible learning curve to play.  Now remember, we have played a number of different games by now, so we can rely on the experience of those games to help us learn new ones.

The only criticism is that the rules for the camera and taking pictures are a little confusing - but we've got it figured.

Lost Cities

If two-person and portable are the necessary requirements, then Lost Cities is an excellent choice.  Like Arboretum, Lost Cities only requires that you bring a deck of cards with you.  And, yes, it would be good to have a piece of paper and pencil to keep score.

Our Lost Cities deck is beginning to show its wear after many years of use.  It does come with a board for the discard piles, but that board isn't really necessary and we no longer pull it out when we play.

We've played Lost Cities in restaurants while waiting for our food.  We've played Lost Cities on airplanes.  Like most of these games, it is not terribly hard to learn, but there's always some small feature that is a bit confusing.  The hardest thing to remember for us is that you play a card BEFORE you draw a replacement.  If you have played any card game, you are probably more used to the reverse on that order.

This is a good counterpart to Hive.  If one person likes strategy games with no luck and another likes shuffled cards that add the luck of randomization to the game - both people can be happy.

Splendor

And, to close things out, we played another game introduced to us by Mark.  This game can be played with up to 4 players and is fairly quick to set up and put away.

The box is actually far bigger than it needs to be and surprisingly enough, we can fit what we needed for travel into the Arboretum box along WITH the deck of Arboretum cards.  Full disclosure, we only brought as many of the pieces as we need for two person play.  Any additional pieces stayed home.  It would not have fit if we needed all of the pieces/cards for both games.

This game was very quick to pick up and I am not sure it would have been any harder to figure out if we hadn't had a chance to play with someone else who already knew the game.  Again, I am certain part of the ease of learning has to do with our experience with other modern board games.

This is a game that definitely plays very differently in 2 player than it does with three or four players.  With two players, there is plenty of "room" to play without necessarily competing for the same cards or resources.  Yes, you can certainly play a little defense and try to prevent your opponent from doing everything they want.  But, there are usually plenty of options so the most you can do is slow them down by one or maybe two plays.  This will come at the cost of one (or maybe two) plays of your own - so the incentive to play defense seems pretty low. 

Still, it's an entertaining game, it's fairly portable if you don't rely on their box, and it has simple set up and tear down.

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There you are, a completely different blog from the farmer!  While we may be making it sound as if we have lots and lots of board games and tons of experience with them - don't let that fool you.  We just enjoy a subset of board games out there and are happy to share what we've experienced.  Don't expect me to do much more than this as it isn't likely to happen.  But, maybe in another six months to a year...  who knows?

I hope this was interesting to some of you and have a great remainder of your day!