

In Silicon Valley, Settlers is the New Golf - andrewpbrett
http://blog.summation.net/2009/11/in-silicon-valley-settlers-is-the-new-golf.html

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albertsun
Other things that can and have been traded in Settlers of Catan when I play
with my friends:

Future production. Your next resource, next specific resource, all resources
for next X rolls of the die, resources from a specific tile, or
settlement/city.

Future rights. Right to trade at a certain rate in the future. Right to choose
robber placement in future.

"Equity" in a settlement. Contribute resources to another player building a
settlement in exchange for some fraction of the resources it will produce in
the future.

And I'm sure as we keep playing more things will be added to this list.

For a slightly silly but still fun variant. Settlers with Nuclear Weapons!
<http://albertsun.info/misc/nuclear-settlers.pdf>

~~~
andrewpbrett
these are all great - very creative! I suspect a few of them will work their
way into any future games I'm a part of.

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marcusbooster
In golf there's a lot of downtime built in which gives you time to talk, build
a relationship, etc.

If you try to do this over a board game you'll just hold up gameplay. And
depending on the game it can be rude to have other conversations while someone
is making a move.

~~~
hazzen
Settlers is light enough (and hopefully the group you play with as well) to
allow for constant conversation. While you do need to use your mind, it is not
close to the level required by Chess/Go/etc.

Settlers is also reliant upon trading and player interaction, which helps to
at least get you comfortable with the other players in the game, if not
conversing with them.

~~~
msluyter
This really depends on the group in question. Talking about a lot of
extraneous stuff in the middle of a game would probably be frowned upon in my
particular group. In particular, in Settlers, people are often yelling out
general trade offers, "anyone need wool? Wool for wood at 2 for 1! etc..."
such that I think any added conversation would be problematic.

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mdemare
Settlers isn't just last year, it's last century (1995). It did however spawn
an entire new genre of boardgames with less emphasis on money and conquest,
and more on game balance, allowing trailing players to catch up, and creating
a variety of different strategies to win (TMTOWTDI).

I'm just back from the Dutch gaming convention, and picked up Powergrid and
Pandemic - highly recommended. Other favorites are Race For The Galaxy and
Agricola.

~~~
eru
Yes, Settlers is an old hat for people who living in or next to Germany. (It's
not the new "Monopoly", yet, but comes close for some circles of gamers.)

Caylus is worth a look, too. For a medium-light and fun game, take a look at
St. Petersburg. Tongiaki has very elegant game mechanisms (and you can do a
nasty things to your fellow players).

If you are only playing with your spouse, Roma and Lost Cities are worth a
look. The latter being a very nice gateway drug for non-gamers.

(I could talk all day about games.)

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baguasquirrel
Settler's is great, but a lot of people will complain it leaves too much to
chance. That's actually partly why it remains fun for beginners, and the law
of averages usually works out for the experienced folks in the end anyway.

For those looking for a less random experience, there's Puerto Rico, which is
almost entirely deterministic. Agricola showed up on the scene recently and
everyone's been raving about it.

~~~
dminor
>Settler's is great, but a lot of people will complain it leaves too much to
chance.

I've noticed this quite a bit in the board game community, which I think is
unfortunate. Chess is a great game, but Poker is too.

The element of chance not only makes the game more entertaining against a
better player, but also disguises the winning strategies so that the game
requires deeper thinking to master.

~~~
jacobolus
Poker isn’t really a game of chance, in even remotely the same way that
Settlers is.

Settlers doesn’t really require much deep thinking to master, or allow
particularly hidden strategies.

~~~
dminor
On the contrary, both games have hidden information and an unknowable optimal
strategy. Poker is more challenging because more is hidden, but there are
similar underpinnings.

~~~
jacobolus
Okay, but that’s true for any game that isn’t completely deterministic, for
instance, Yahtzee or Guess Who. Poker and settlers are worlds apart in any
reasonable comparison though: one is a light-hearted family game in which any
player has a reasonable chance of success, and the rules are set up to keep
games relatively close feeling, and the other is a ruthless betting game, in
which superior players quickly and consistently trounce less experienced
opponents (and take all their money), with chance generally only entering
substantially in games between players of similar skill.

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sosuke
Golf always seemed to me as a way to do networking. If you go alone you are
usually grouped with 3 others for foursome groups which gives you a chance to
meet other people. If you go to the right courses you stand a good chance of
making useful connections that you may not have been able to get otherwise.
Settlers seems like a great board game but I don't see it as a networking tool
the way golf or other competition card games can be like poker. Unless we
start hearing that business deals are formed over a game of Settlers I don't
see it as taking the place in business that golf currently holds.

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neilk
I was at a geek gathering once where another person observed that the startup
people were all playing poker (bluffing, gambling), and employees of the big
companies were playing Settlers (resource management, slow and steady gains).

Anyway, "X is the new Y" articles are always garbage.

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dpcan
Whatever happened to Hearts? During the dot-com boom, developers would gather
and play Hearts at lunch. When I was interviewing back then, over and over
again I'd get asked, "oh, and do you play hearts?" Ended up working for a
company where we played everyday.

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smiler
I love this game, in 2 player games with my wife, I think it's about 18-2 to
her, I'm not so good at the strategy!

The only bad thing is when in a 4 player game, depending on your placement of
settlements and what happens right at the start of the game with road
building, you can immediately find youself in for a very hard long slog and be
stuck on 3-4 points knowing that you have no realistic chance of winning and
are just waiting for one of the other players to get 10 points.

3 players is the optimum I find.

~~~
LogicHoleFlaw
One nice thing about a game of Settlers is that even if you get locked out
early, you'll only be losing for 45 minutes at most. The game is downright
quick to play. Around here we go from opening the box to packing it up in
about 30 minutes usually.

~~~
tom
Also, just because you have no chance of winning, doesn't mean you can't have
a very large impact on the outcome of the game ...

Here's a hint, don't sink your wife - even if she totally deserved it. :)

~~~
smiler
tom - she sinks me!

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mattmaroon
That game is like Euchre. It seems like it has a lot of strategy, but then you
get into it and learn that optimum play is fairly simple. With a group of
experienced players it's mainly just die rolling.

I greatly prefer Dominion.

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teuobk
Wait... I thought that cycling was the new golf in Silicon Valley. Something
about how it's easier for good cyclists to accommodate not-so-good cyclists
than it is for good golfers to not completely upstage bad golfers.

Cycling is great for doing business. Pretty much everybody around there has a
bike. The roads and trails around there are amazing. It's easy enough to carry
on a conversation if you take a relaxed pace. Also, the weekend warriors get
to show off their $3000 carbon-fiber rides that have only 150 miles on them.
(Sort of like gearheads in golf, in a way.)

~~~
smanek
The whole point is to talk during the activity. Holding a conversation while
biking would be difficult. Between more than 2 people it would be all but
impossible.

~~~
fhars
Well, then use a conference bike
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conference_Bike>

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matthew-wegner
Another fantastic social/trading game is the card game Bohnanza. I prefer it
to Catan because Catan feels too chance-driven:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bohnanza>

The briefest explanation is you have a randomly drawn hand that you can see
_but not rearrange_ , so you try to enact trades/changes that support your
future cards.

~~~
eru
I like Bohnanza, too. You can do some pretty fancy three or four-way trades,
if you play the game mechanics right.

(If only we hadn't played it as often as we did, it would still hit the
table.)

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nostrademons
Settlers is so last year. Dominion is the new Settlers.

~~~
jedediah
Settlers is last /decade/. Dominion is just last year.

~~~
eru
Dominion is Magic The Gathering light. (I still enjoy it and bought a copy.)

~~~
nostrademons
That's kinda the point though. It can take a few days to a few weeks to put
together a good M:tG deck, and then games run from minutes to an hour. It
takes a few hours to play Settlers. With Dominion, you put together the deck
_as you play_ , and if people are reasonably familiar with the cards, a game
lasts 20-30 minutes. That's quite a fast pace for what's still a fairly
interesting strategy game.

~~~
eru
You should try the format of Magic, where everyone gets a basic deck and two
booster decks a few minutes before the game and gets to build a deck with it.
(You can `synthesize' booster decks, too.)

For me, Dominion could use some more interaction.

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Tichy
If it is available in the US: try the Settlers of Catan card game. It is
actually much better than the board game, but it is for 2 players only.

Personally I prefer Carcassonne to Catan.

The Catan _Dice_ game is actually also pretty funny. A clever variation of
another famous game principle that does not require too much thinking. I like
how they milk the trademark but still come up with quality ideas.

~~~
ajtaylor
My wife and I love Carcassonne! One of it's big points is that we can play
with only 2 players. Plus the infinite possible arrangements of the board
means no two games are ever alike. :-)

The worst feeling in the world is when someone finagles a second hunter or hut
onto an area/river you previously controlled. 'Course, that's one of my
strategies...

~~~
Tichy
I also like the 2 player game. And it is somehow aesthetically pleasing to the
brain when the complex shapes snap together :-)

My mistake was to play online a lot, so I can't play with my friends anymore
because I have too much practice.

~~~
eru
Just play with a handicap of one meeple less (or something like that).

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JCThoughtscream
Man, Settlers. I remember playing until 4 a.m. during a trip to Vegas once
(don't ask). Kept on losing because of my reputation, of all things - after
two wins, everybody got paranoid about making deals with me.

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nathanwdavis
I love that game!! It's a perfect amount of strategy, but not so much that it
is not a relaxing diversion.

Another fun game in the same genre is Stone Age.

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eru
Be sure to get a set with wooden figures (like the old German version). The
plastic stuff is just not nice too look at and handle.

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adamhowell
Well that's too bad, b/c I can actually beat my wife at golf. Seafarers of
Catan? Not so much.

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buckler
Wasn't WoW supposed to be the new golf amongst the Silicon Valley lot?

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aaronblohowiak
anyone wanna play settlers in palo alto?

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bruin4tw
i'd rather play golf than a board game.

