Im familiar enough with board games to know that I’m asking a lot here. My goal is to have a game that I can carry around with me, walk up to people I meet in public, and ask them to play.

The most obvious path here I thought of would be some type of game played with a standard deck of cards. While I’m not opposed to this, I fear the randomness that comes with that might not be what I’m looking for. I want the game to be strategic with minimal luck but simple enough that a first time player could reasonably win against someone experienced.

Something like Hive comes to mind, as it has the pocket variation and seems like it could be easy enough to teach, but I have yet to play it so I fear it might be daunting to newcomers in ways similar to chess.

Thank you in advance for any and all answers, and if you would like further clarification I’d be happy to elaborate!

  • homoludens@feddit.orgEnglish
    15·
    10 days ago

    My goal is to have a game that I can carry around with me, walk up to people I meet in public, and ask them to play.

    Is it just about portability or do you also need a small playing area?

    I want the game to be strategic with minimal luck but simple enough that a first time player could reasonably win against someone experienced.

    Those goals are at odds. If there’s minimal luck, there’s little room for the new player to win in a strategic game.

    That being said:

    • Azul can be quite portable (if you dump the box), but needs some playing space. It’s vicious with two players, the more experienced player will usually win, but the rules are simple enough for a first time player to at least understand what happens.
    • Onitama is chess-like, with simple rules and some randomization that prevents the need to memorize start sequences and the like.
    • Arboretum is a tight battle with two players. You constantly need to worry which cards to play in order to gain points, which cards to keep in order to even be eligible for scoring and which useless cards not to drop, because they might be useful for your opponent.
    • Kahuna is a bit older, with simple rules but some strategy.
    • The Fox in the Forest is a two player trick taking game I found rather enjoyable (and I don’t even like trick taking games).
    • umean2me@discuss.onlineOPEnglish
      1·
      4 days ago

      Ideally it wouldn’t require a large playing area, but I am open to all options as long as it’s portable.

      Also, you have reminded me of Onitama which somehow didn’t come to mind while thinking of games to match my description. It seems to be the perfect game in terms of strategic content, since the randomization provides minimal edge to an experienced player but it maintains all the strategy and perfect information.

      Fox in the Forest is definitely a good option, and I’m interested in Arboretum but from what I’ve gathered it can be a lot to take in at first. I have yet to play it but from videos it seems like the rules are quite simple but the scoring (which is what you play to optimize) can be a bit to wrap your head around. It’s been a while so I might be misremembering, do you think it would be easy enough to explain quickly?

      • homoludens@feddit.orgEnglish
        1·
        5 hours ago

        The only thing in Arboretun’s scoring that might be difficult at first is that you need to have the most points for a tree type in hand in order to score that tree type at all. And at the same time you need to have played some cards of this tree type, so you actually have something to score ;)

        The details of scoring can be (and probably should be) shown in a player aid:

        • “8” in hand counts as 0 if the other player has the “1”
        • 1 point for each card in a path (2 if it’s all the same color and at least 4 cards long)
        • +1 point if the path starts with the “1”
        • +1 point if the path ends with the “8”