Becky  0:26  
 Welcome to Whose turn is it anyway, a podcast all about our gaming group and of course board games. I'm Becky, your current first player. I'm joined by the other players, JP.

JP  0:34  
 Hello,

Becky  0:35  
 Adrian.

Adrian  0:35  
 Hello

Becky  0:36  
And Ian

Ian  0:36  
Hello 

Becky  0:37  
And this week we're going to talk about the tricky subject of teaching new board games to other players. Learning games is something that I find particularly unpleasant and really have to make myself do, which has been a barrier to playing new games in the past. Maybe I'll pick up some tips. How is everyone doing today?

JP  0:51  
Yeah, I'm pretty much crawling because I played squash this morning. So yeah, like an idiot. 

Becky  0:57  
Exercise is not good for you.

JP  0:58  
 Well, me and Chris. Yeah. Chris on the pod. We are played a game this morning. Yeah. knackered, absolutely knackered so if Ifall asleep, it'll be business as usual. Yeah, shut him up.

Ian  1:11  
Which bodes well because we're playing next week. So hopefully, he'll still be tired then, I'll still might have some sort of advantage.

JP  1:18  
But we're all good. 

Becky  1:19  
Good.

So let's talk about hex where we chat about the games we've played recently. JP Do you want to start?

JP  1:34  
I can start Yeah, had a pretty much a brilliant weekend of gaming, mainly Chip Theory games. So I'm happy boy. Got a good Too Many Bones game in, which is fantastic to get Chris P playing the game for his first time, but I'm not gonna talk about that because, let's face it, there's been an episode on it. So let's not keep talking about it.

Ian  1:55  
He can see us all glaring. Stop talking about Too many bones. It's not the time

JP  1:58  
It's not the Too many bones podcast!

Adrian  2:00  
It's getting embarassing at this point!

JP  2:02  
So we're actually going to talk about the game I played last night, which was Istanbul, which is quite an old game, I think I don't know when it came out. It's 20 something, early 2014. Somewhere, around that mark.

Ian  2:15  
We should have talked about it in our Games that stand the test of time episode

JP  2:18  
Yeah, I forgot to be honest, I forgot this game even existed. I played it for the first time about five years ago. And I played it in a lunch hour. And that's pretty much how quick you can play this game, you can play in an hour. And that's one of its strengths, actually. But for those that don't know what the hell I'm talking about, Istanbul is essentially a very kind of lightweight Euro game, again set in Istanbul, which is represented by 16 tiles, or maybe 25 if you've got the expansion. And you've got these kind of rectangular tiles that you set up on the board, all got numbers on there, all have different of areas of the city that you can go and visit, whether it's markets, whether it's the tea house, which is a personal favourite of mine, I like the house, like yeah, although we probably should have been a bit more varied with the numbers that we started off with there

7!!

Becky  3:11  
7 works well, I think.

JP  3:13  
And yeah, so you got all these different areas, different abilities that you can kind of go and the whole premise of the games that you need to get the first to pretty much five gemstones ends the game. And obviously the most gemstones wins. And then there's tie break conditions in that. But the whole kind of mechanic of the game is, it's pretty much like if Snake met a Euro board games, you kind of have this stack of assistants and your merchant sits on top. And the whole thing is you're moving around this city and everywhere you move, you have to deposit one of your assistants. And you're kind of leaving a trail of your assistants all over the city. And then by the end of it, when you kind of left most of them across the board, you get quite restricted about where you can go, so you can either go back on yourself to pick them back up, or if you can get to the fountain which is kind of in the middle, you can kind of you know, like 'Avengers Assemble' and everyone comes together and you can kind of go off and do different things. But it's lightweight, it's quick. It's very quick turns,it flies around and before you know it at you know, 45 minutes, 50 minutes, and someone's won the game. Oh, God, Jesus, that was fast.

Becky  4:15  
Yeah, it seems to be that. You know, I was sat on 2 gems for ages and then suddenly you had 5, it was like, 'oh, Hello'

Ian  4:24  
Yeah, so JP was cheating. Was he in charge of the Gem bank?

Becky  4:28  
No, The Gems are all on the board. So it was okay. It was my first game of this as well. And I actually really enjoyed it. I managed to watch a quick video while I was at work,

Ian  4:38  
 you didn't know you're playing

Becky  4:40  
 But yeah, I originally wasn't and then was, so had to sort of gen up on how it works. And actually it was really, really easy to learn. But yeah, fun. I really enjoyed it.

JP  4:52  
I think for me, because I've been playing so much heavy games lately, like my brain has been going through the mincer, and then just to kind of play a game where you have to think but it's, you know, it's kind of clear cut what your plan is and strategies and just go for it. You don't have to worry about all this complexity and rules and things like that. It was just quite nice just to play. So yeah, I enjoyedit, for what it was

Becky  5:14  
Not for much female representation on the tiles, I have to say. Beautiful artwork really nice. I really like it. I mean, well... 

JP  5:22  
A sexist game

Becky  5:23  
Perhaps, it's maybe representative of Istanbul? I don't know, maybe even now, I don't know. Or probably in the past, but, you know, surely have a woman in the spice market or sitting by the fountain or something. There's not one picture

Ian  5:38  
Not even like a brothel or something? Standard thin end of the wedge?

Becky  5:42  
No, Nothing

Adrian  5:43  
Shut Up and Sit down did a bit on it on their video of like, 'Come on, you've re-published. this aswell?!'

JP  5:50  
Yeah, we had the big box edition. Yeah. So literally the latest edition. Yeah, you're right. It's just dudes everywhere.

Becky  5:55  
You don't even have to have people in it. People aren't useful. You're not interacting with them or whatever. Anyway, there's just artwork on the board. It doesn't really, you know, you're not having to go somewhere to talk to a particular person or whatever. So you don't need anybody really?

Ian  6:10  
Is it cheaper to get an artist who could only draw blokes?

Becky  6:12  
Maybe, but stick some eyelashes on one or a pretty scarf or something? Anything!

JP  6:19  
Put on a wig from Turkey. Yeah, but it's fun. 

Becky  6:24  
I enjoyed it 

JP  6:25  
Yeah,

Becky  6:26  
Adrian how about you?

Adrian  6:28  
Yeah, so just to quickly mention a game with chips involved that I played, which was Marvel splendour. So quite enjoyed that, played the base one, I think once, maybe a long, long time ago, in a galaxy far away. But got the Marvel version. Great. Find it adds a little bit more to it. Yeah, it was on sale, so I nabbed it. And played that at the weekend, pretty good. But the one I really wanted to talk about was Carnegie. So JP, you've brought this to the table. And I wasn't expecting what turned up at the table. I'll be honest, I've kind of tried to watch a few videos of how to play, normally, like, I'm religious.... I always try to make sure I watch a video beforehand. For some reason, it just wasn't holding my interest when I was watching the video. The game was good, just not what I was expecting. And it really threw me like said at the end of the game, didn't I? Like, I'm just not sure about this. It's... 

JP  7:16  
He won by the way. 

Adrian  7:17  
Yeah, I did. Yeah, that's not necessarily the deciding factor on whether I like a game or not. So yeah. You know, so ultimately, what you're doing is you're kind of building an industry, you've got a little sort of building in front of you that you're putting various departments in. And then you've got a map of America. And you are building out an infrastructure almost like power grid-esque out, you know, you're putting all your infrastructures in different cities, and you're trying to link them all up. And then there's, like a set number of turns where you move, like the action, someone picks an action, it moves along, and then it sort of activates an area and everything you've got in that area then gives you income or something like that. And it's a very complex, it's not a very complex, but it is a heavy game for sure. I wasn't going in expecting the level I had to keep track of everyone else and what they were doing, because you can really, if you look at the next couple of players, it's one of those things where you can really see what they're going to go after, you can say, well, they're only going to pick one of these two things, if I pick that first, they'll pick it second, I can line up for it. And I was expecting kind of just be able to build my own little engine it looked like one of those games where you could, you know, watch other people a little bit, but really build your own engine. And it's not at all you really have to keep a very close eye on all your opponents. And so it kind of threw me, in that respect. So I kind of came out going 'that was a lot of effort for, for what sort of game it is' you know, it's heavy, it's not massively heavy, but I would sort of put it Brass: Birmingham level, I think I said at the time, it's maybe a little bit off of that a little bit below that. But it's around that weight of game. It's a fairly heavy game. But it really is watching absolutely everyone, because if you're not set up for it, you just waste a turn, everyone gets to activate, you get to watch everyone doing all their wonderful stuff. And you just sit there and go, I'll move one person to that department. There's my 10 done, like, and I think that's what really threw me, was there's a couple of turns I had where I hadn't figured out quite what was going on, because it was first game, learning game. And there was just this like, Oh, I've got to do one thing because I wasn't paying attention to the next person along. Just kind of gave me that feel bad, that I think that was the bit that got me and I'd like having thought about it afterwards. I was like, Yeah, that's the bit that I didn't like. Yeah, I didn't like not having a good turn on somebody else's turn. 

JP  9:38  
It's out of you control. 

Adrian  9:39  
Yeah, it's totally out of your control. You know, I haven't set up for it. Maybe I missed the signs of what was going on or whatever. And yes, kind of kind of within my power. But yeah, it just kind of, there was some bits in there I really wasn't sure on, there was some bits that I really did like. I liked building the department. I liked the idea of setting up that power grid-esque infrastructure on the board. It was just how How much it took out of ... I felt like I spent, like I had to be eagle eyed the whole time, switched on the entire game, there's no chance to just have two minutes of brain down. 

JP  10:09  
Not a relaxing game like Istanbul

Becky  10:14  
Would you play it again? 

Adrian  10:15  
Yeah, I would play it again. Absolutely, as I said at the time, and I still think it fits, is that I'd probably for the amount of energy and the complexity of it I'd probably still prefer to play Brass: Birmingham. But I wouldn't, if someone said let's get Carnegie to the table again, I wouldn't say no, or anything like that. It's just, it.... There's, I've got other preferred games of that weight. 

JP  10:36  
It's one of those games, like you get 20 actions in the whole game, right? There's only 20 actions that can happen. In a four player game, you pick five of them shared across all four.

Becky  10:48  
And then does everyone else get to do those actions that you've picked. 

JP  10:50  
And that's the stick of it, right? So if I pick  HR, which is the action allows me to move all my workers to the different departments to get them set up. And I could do that, and an Adrian has to do it. And then you have to do it and and Becky has to do it. And it might not be optimal. You might be like, I don't want to do HR, it's crap. I've got them where I want them to be

Ian  11:09  
You're trying to string together actions that other people have selected, 

JP  11:13  
Which is why you need to pay attention 

Ian  11:14  
You need to have a plan. So that then the thing you've selected actually is useful. Yeah.

JP  11:19  
So it takes a lot of if... you're just used to do multiplayer solitaire game, yeah. And there's nothing wrong with that, by the way, I love them. Then you, you just worry about what you're doing. Maybe there's I need to check that board space, because I want to go there before you and that's the level of interaction in this game. But Carnegie has a lot more because you're having to try and work out what your person to the left is doing person at the right, maybe less so the one opposite is... like directly opposite. It still matters. And yeah, if you like that, great if you don't, you know, don't get it, it's not gonna win you over.

Adrian  11:49  
I think you've even done it sort of injustice there. Because not only is it pick an action, so I've got to keep an eye on what action, it has a region that goes with it. So yes, trackers can all move down. So you're looking at the next four spots. So maybe two of them activate the Midwest America, one of them's the South, one of them's the east, or whatever it is. And so you're kind of trying to back where your incomes coming from at the same time as well. If they do that action, then I've got to be set up for income in this area. If they do that action, I've got to be set up to do that, but also having come from that area, and there's a lot of like, overlapping bits you really have to have a handle on in that game. Like it is great. It's I think I've completely glossed over the theme, bad teacher, Adrian, but it's essentially... But essentially, you know, is just it's a it's a guy building his empire. And then you get donations spots, which basically how you earn VP and very little else otherwise, I mean, the theme is loose, yeah, and so it's about him then sort of taking that wealth and donating it to local areas and stuff like that. But the donations are basically here, like have your victory points almost, of sort of put down what you think you'll be getting victory points for. But yeah, it's good. It's, it's not at the top of my list by any shot, but I certainly would play again,

JP  13:06  
I mean, I'll be honest with you the... because you compared it to Brass, probably on its weight and kind of similar thinkiness, but obviously for me they're completely different games, I actually prefer Brass out of the two, just no point in buying it, because there's at least two people in the group who've got it

Becky  13:24  
Well, mine is literally the other end of the spectrum, although not as much as I thought. So I actually finally received my copy of Zuuli, which is just an amazing little box game by Unfringed, really simple premise of card drafting. So I've only played it two player. So you start with nine cards each, you pick one, you give the other eight to the other, you swap card, pick another one, swap cards. And then basically you fit what you've chosen into your zoo, following like, really easy to understand parameters. Like if you've got an enclosure that is a size six, you can't put animals that total a size seven in there, you know, simple things. And is this animal okay to live in Plains or jungle or whatever? 

Ian  14:04  
So puzzley....

Becky  14:08  
Yeah. And also, some of the animals can go in encosures together. So they're either friendly or fierce. So like, you can't put a lion with a tree frog. I mean, you actually in real life you probably could, but that's not the point. But you can't in this game, 

JP  14:20  
They will muller the tree frog

Becky  14:21  
Yes. So and you can score sort of more points depending on the multiplier of the enclosure, like vivariums gives you times two or whatever. So it's really simple. So you're basically just kind of trying to min max, the animals you've got into the enclosures. The designer Chris Priscott seems really, really friendly. And he's really active on social media, and I really wish I'd gone to the store at the UKGE because it would have been really nice to kind of see, you know, the the person behind it all

Ian  14:45  
One to put on the list for next year? 

Becky  14:47  
Yeah, definitely. Well, yeah, I hope that... I think they're reprinting the game. So I don't know that you can buy it currently. Or maybe they had a couple of couple of boxes left. But a reprint is imminent with an expansion, I would say that don't make the mistake that just because the artwork is quite child friendly, that this game is just for children, because I don't think it is. I have got a reminder on my phone to back the expansion, because that comes out on Gamefound and a couple of days. But when they reprint the expansion is going to be released with the base game so...

Ian  15:19  
So that people that bought the original game don't feel like they're missing out.

Becky  15:23  
Yeah. And Chris was quite vocal on on the Gamfound site saying, you know, you guys are the ones that bought it, are the ones that made this actuall.

Ian  15:33  
I think that's really good. You can't do any more than that. Except give it to people who bought the original game free. And that's only clearly not practical.

Becky  15:40  
No, it's only a few cards. But that will just add a little bit more variation, I think. Each game only lasts about 15 minutes. So it's perfect to play... just you know, while your dinners cooking, or maybe as a break between like a big old game like Twilight Imperium or something like that.

JP  15:56  
Half time: Zuuli everyone. 

Becky  15:58  
It's just quick. It's really, really....

Ian  15:59  
You could play it between turns in Twilight Imperium. He's sorting something out. Let's have a quick game.

JP  16:05  
Just trade negotiations going for 20 minutes. Zuuli everyone?

Becky  16:09  
Kerley has obviously beaten me every single time. Although it was very close one game. So you know, I'm taking that as a moral victory

JP  16:18  
When you made your comment about the the artwork looking child friendly, was it in reference to Kerley's reaction to the game?

Becky  16:26  
Yes. He saw the artwork and was like 'Errrrrr'. And I think he was assuming it's a game for children. And I'll be honest, I assumed that too, when I saw the stall the UKGE because it's very bright, colourful, friendly looking animals. You know, even the grizzly bears smiling. Right. You know, so it's, it's nice little picture.

Ian  16:47  
cartoony? Yes.

Becky  16:49  
Yeah. But it's, yeah, it's a really good game, would recommend. Ian, how about you

Ian  16:55  
So little peek behind the curtain for listeners, We're recording this episode pretty soon after the last episode that I was on, which is my roundabout way of making the excuse for the fact that I haven't played any new games since the last...

JP  17:06  
Still hasn't shown up for any

Ian  17:07  
I still haven't shown up for anything. I'm trying to, it was literally a few days ago that we recorded last so... 

Becky  17:14  
Strike 2 Ian! Well, I've played lots of games since then. 

Ian  17:15  
So has JP and Adrian  I'm sure, which is why I'm the imposter here. Just a fake board gamer. I'll talk about later some of the things I'm looking forward to though, because I am looking to get into a few games that are coming up soon. But in slightly non board gaming related stuff. I've been watching Westworld, which I don't know if anyone else here has watched

JP  17:37  
Stopped at season two

Ian  17:38  
And yeah, so I did as well. I actually only watched season one. And then a colleague at work encouraged me and said, Look, season fours just finished and season five is coming and it gets really good. And I was like, Okay, well, I really enjoyed the first season. And just in case anyone's worried I'm not gonna give any spoilers for Westworld, because there's lots of twists along the way, 

Becky  17:57  
I haven't seen it

Ian  17:58  
It's very, very good sci fi, you know, Android robots, the nature of reality, all that good stuff. And the TV shows incredibly well done like massively high budget, great cast, including the likes of Anthony Hopkins. It's just absolutely stellar. So I'm currently working my way through the fourth season. Now I've managed to get almost up to date. And knowingly I bought a NOW TV pass to watch it. And they promptly removed it from NOW TV, so I had to buy it off Prime. So I feel like I have to get my money's worth. So I'm working through that at the moment. But yeah, it's very good in the latest seasons Aaron Paul, of Breaking Bad fame does join the cast and is quite major character, and is really good actually. Although, in the fourth season, he seems to be doing his best job of cosplaying as David Tennant. I would say anyone who's seen season four will understand why. There's a number of times where I've seen him come on screen and gone.' Oh', and had to remind myself Oh, that's Aaron Paul. That's not David Tennant because he looks very much like him. Which is weird because they don't really look alike.

Adrian  19:07  
Is it just a suit and converses?

Ian  19:09  
It's a suit and beard and floppy hair style combined, and a kind of serious dour expression. And I think well that's  where it falls apart.

Becky  19:20  
Could you make a board game of it?

Ian  19:22  
Oh you could make a Westworld board game. I'm surprised there isn't one. In fact, I don't know that there isn't one. We'll have to check on Board Game Geek.

JP  19:29  
There's not a good one I know of.

Ian  19:32  
Yeah. There's probably like a really terrible one from the 90s or something. No, definitely. It's got all that you could have. Yeah, you could have a lot of stuff you could do Battlestar type hidden-roll things like Oh, are they a host? Are they not a host do they know they're a host? You know, there's there's lots of interesting things and yeah, all the different parks you can imagine geographically and yeah, actually would... There's a lot of good flavour there for a game. So any developers out there who want wanna spend millions on the Westworld IP? Go for it

Becky  20:03  
Or, you heard it here first and maybe.... maybe it's happening right now and we're gonna look really kind of

Ian  20:07  
Yeah, like just prescient. Yeah, exactly. But yeah, so I've been enjoying that. And not playing any board games. So sorry. Sorry. Sorry. Don't kick me out. I promised before the next time on the podcast, I will have at least played one board game

JP  20:24  
Ian joins in Episode 36.

Ian  20:29  
It's gonna be embarrassing if...

Adrian  20:30  
It gets to 36 episodes? That's good to know.

Ian  20:33  
It's gonna be embarrassing if I end up being first player. And it's like, yeah, I still haven't played any games.

JP  20:38  
We're not giving you first player until you've played some games

Ian  20:40  
No, I'm aware

JP  20:42  
That's the rule

Becky  20:42  
Well with that, then I guess we better make our way onto the main event.

Ian  20:45  
Let's do that.

Becky  20:55  
So our main topic then, some people seem naturally gifted the teach. And we've got a couple of those around the table today, looking at you, Adrian and JP. And I think Ian sits firmly in the camp of 'this is something I just have to endure as the price of admission to hopefully finding a new game to love'.

Ian  21:10  
Yeah, I think me and you were in the same boat, where we quite openly hate learning games.

Becky  21:16  
That's not to say you're not a good teacher. But like I say, it's nice to have a fellow 'I don't like to be told' person with me on this side of the table

JP  21:23  
Stop teling me what to do.

Ian  21:25  
The thing is I like being told what to do. 

Becky  21:27  
Oooh, hello!

Ian  21:28  
Hey, easy!

Adrian  21:31  
Noted!

Ian  21:33  
Being told what you can do, and having no idea what you should do, is the bit that I find frustrating. I'm sure we'll get into that more.

Becky  21:40  
So I guess this is where I throw it to you guys to sort of talk about what you.... what you think about the teach? Yeah, whats good about it. And....

JP  21:48  
I think it's, it's quite good we've got a yin and yang kind of situation here. Because

Ian  21:54  
We're even sat on opposing ends of the table. The Jedi Masters and the young padawan.

JP  21:59  
I was going with Sith

Ian  22:02  
If that's who you align with.

JP  22:07  
Until Adrian sticks a knife in my neck and takes over. But no, I mean, for me the teach.... I love the whole process of it, right from, you know, purchasing the game. And knowing that you're gonna have to dive in that box of goodies and learn the damn thing, for me, is probably one of the most favourite parts of playing board games, to be honest, hence why I keep buying them because that's the fix

Ian  22:32  
Do you also love the bit where you message in the WhatsApp group giving everyone very clear links to videos they could watch to learn a bit about the game, and them turning up and no one having watched it. Yeah. Is that another favourite of yours? 

Becky  22:43  
That's funny, because that is a big point of what I wanted to kind of bring on  really. Is the onus on the learner to do the homework, to watch the game? I mean, whose responsibility is it?

JP  22:52  
Yeah, we had a chat about this very briefly the other day

Becky  22:53  
We did yeah

Ian  22:54  
It's interesting. You can see it a number of ways can't you? I think that if the teacher has taken the time to point you in some materials beforehand, and they're not super onerous, like ...if you're like, Oh, we're gonna play T.I. for the first time on the weekend. Here's a four hour playthrough video that will get you some of the way started.... Yeah, if it's only a two player game.

JP  23:18  
Yeah, it was a time lapse video.

Ian  23:21  
It was at 20x. But

Becky  23:23  
We did chat about this yesterday, didn't we? And we had kind of differing opinions, which I think is really interesting. 

JP  23:28  
I mean, my opinion, for what it's worth is, if you've bought the game, obviously, for me if I'm excited, and this is because I'm very excited about getting the game, and learning the game. But I think if you're hosting, then there's definitely an onus on the host to make sure that everybody's experience at the table is good. And that the host has prepared, which is for me, the most important thing, I've been to many a game night where the host hasn't prepared. Rule books are being handed out...

Ian  23:59  
Yeah. Go on... throw some shade. 

JP  24:02  
But it has happened. And and it's fine, but it kind of... you think 'Ughhh'. And suddenly you're like, you're coming to a game night, and now I've got to learn while reading the rulebook at the time, and trying...

Ian  24:12  
It makes everything drag doesn't it?

JP  24:14  
It does mate

Ian  24:14  
It slows everything down and you have a bad time. 

JP  24:17  
So for me if the host is uber prepared and has done all the homework, and we can go through some of the kind of topics and points of that in a bit, then they've got everything in their toolkit to prepare everybody at the table of varying different degrees of being arsed to learn,

Ian  24:33  
I think, to be honest, from my experience of playing games that you've hosted, that's one of the things you're really really good at, is you are always so well prepared. Not necessarily know the rules inside out. But you know how to resolve the questions that are going to come up very quickly, even if it still needs a look in the book. It's a case of well, we'll ask JP and then if JP needs to look in the book, he'll look and you'll probably know where to look as well. You'll have some, you know, you you just helping everyone else smooth out their experience.

JP  25:02  
For me? I think that's the hosts responsibility. So if you came to my game night, and I was hosting, and you go actually, I'm not sure how this is resolved, and if I don't know the answer, I'll find out, or, we'll work it out and go 'right'. And we've had instances like' You Sure? Can I have a look at the rule book?'. Sometimes you get 'Oh well I haven't interpreted it that way' and all that. But that's, that's just rules. 

Ian  25:21  
And that's fine. You're never going to, it's never going to be black and white

JP  25:24  
So you end up making the decision and get on with life.  But...

Adrian  25:27  
I think there's one for me, There's one caveat for that. And it's one of my very first like full on board game days was planned to... like, 'this game takes two hours, we'll put a two an hour, 10 minute slot in for it' sort of thing. It was planned down to that level. Everyone who turned up to that day had agreed to learn the rules in advance, because you've only got a nine hour day, 10 hour day, whatever you're budgeting for. And you want to make the most of being around loads of friends who've got all these games, and we're going to play them all. And let's ignore the teach and just crack through as many games as we can in that time. If you're signing up for that kind of contract, which to some extent, if someone says, look, please watch this, is part of that contract is, yeah, the onus isn't on them to have learned it fully. But if I've posted a video, it's probably for a good reason. Either it's complicated. Or it's like a four hour game, we've got a four hour slot, like I want you to know, in, you know, anything like that where someone posts a video or says this is the contract we've signed up for, basically, is to say, if we're playing this game, we come knowledgeable

Ian  26:27  
That's kind of that's kind of what I was getting at was Yeah, I think if the host has taken the effort to provide you with some guidance, it may be it's not your responsibility or your duty, but I think it's polite. But you know, it would be rude not to, is how I would see it to turn up to a game go. I haven't got a clue what's going on, tell me everything. And it's like, well, I posted a video a week ago, did you it was a 20 minute video, did you not watch it? Like if I was the host? I feel a bit knarked off if someone did that. So I try to not do that myself.

JP  27:00  
No I agree with you, Adrian, I think it's a great point. You know, I don't kind of sit on that end of the spectrum and say, I'm the host, and I will teach you everything you ever need to know you don't need to do anything, because that's just crap, right? And I agree where time is precious, and you're trying to crank through loads of games, then you just want to play games. You don't want to be teaching all the time because it's tiring. And it's knackering. And I do that with some games, I think, I'm not going to put a video on because I'm do the teach in 10 minutes. It's fairly straightforward. And then there's games like Trickerion, where I'm putting the video up, and least if you have that primer, you come in with something. Yeah. And like I say, in that game, you just get like the, the one core concept of that game, I can get you the rest of the way there. Like it's cool. Just learn that bit. 

Ian  27:47  
Do you feel like the heavier the game, the more likely it is that you need that kind of prep in advance? Right? Like, you know, again, taking an extreme example, like T.I. When we were at the 24 hour board game marathon, there was a group playing T.I. And they had two players who have never played before

Adrian  28:02  
They did the teach beforehand. And you think 'ooof'

Ian  28:04  
Yeah, they did the teach right before playing with completely new players. I, I'm pretty sure when did, when did that start? It was like a 9am tart?

Adrian  28:12  
I think we totaled it was 11 hours from start to finish. Yeah.

Ian  28:16  
I think, I think we were about three hours into the 24 hour board game marathon. And I was speaking to one of the players outside they said, Yeah, We've almost finished the teach now. It's like, wow, it's taken you longer to do the teach than most games take to play. So I think, okay, it was a 24 hour board game marathon, so they had as much time as they wanted. I guess that's the time to do a complete run through, but, yeah, under normal circumstances, games like that, just watch... and for T.I. it probably will be at least an hour of video that you'll need to watch, or several 20 minute video

JP  28:46  
Not really, that particular game... Again, if you come with the core concepts of, you know, like tactical actions, or you know what strategic actions are, you know, this, then we can get you the rest of the way

Ian  28:58  
And you can refer to the, like flowcharts and stuff. Can't you? Here's how a turn works or ...

JP  29:02  
The difference is, it depends on what type of player you are 

Becky  29:05  
I was just about to say that....

JP  29:06  
If you're the type of player that wants to have their most efficient game on game one, and we have a few of those in our group by the way, then...

Ian  29:15  
They might need to do a bit more.

JP  29:18  
Oh 100% but if you've got the top player whos kind of happy just to... like me, like push buttons. You're not gonna win in the first game. It doesn't matter I'm here to play the game and just, you know, chaos theory it through until the end.

Ian  29:33  
See I find for me personally, I do still benefit from doing the homework but not because I necessarily want to have you know, perfect game one, or definitely not because I think I'm gonna win anything. But for me, it's more about having that comfort of familiarity and kind of, okay, even if I don't fully appreciate how everything in this game hangs together. I know what these things are that you're talking about, so that when you're reminding... more that the teachers are a reminder, refresher, rather than learning for the first time, because, and I know, Becky, you probably feel the same way that when you're playing a game for the first time, the thing that I don't like about it, is not knowing whether what I'm doing is good or not, or why I should be doing things or why I shouldn't be doing things. And so if I've kind of, you know, boned up on the mechanics beforehand, so I've got some idea of what can happen, it frees up a bit of, you know, a bit of mind space to think about, well, what should I be trying to do?

Becky  30:32  
Yeah, I think it depends whether the player is an experienced board game player. I mean, maybe some people could handle reading the rulebook. And that might be useful to them, if they're already aware of what certain terms are, like, I can't think of any off the top of my head. But if you already understand the premise of turn order, and this equals that, then I think, that's going to be helpful

Ian  30:55  
We all learn different ways, right? Yeah, I've seen plenty of people that you know, like, again, I bring things back to Netrunner a lot. But you know, things like the structure of a run in  Netrunner, a lot of people will look at the way that's codified in the official rules, and just kind of glaze over, because it's a lot of steps. And it's a lot of complexity. But then you show them a flowchart. And suddenly, it's really simple. Or you show them a five minute video that shows how a run works. So it's just horses for courses as well, to an extent I think,

Becky  31:22  
Yeah, I think for me, now I understand board games a bit more, maybe I could cope with reading a game, because I would understand some of the major terms. But if you're fairly new, and you're trying to teach someone a fairly complex game, which is totally fine. I'm not saying you have to start with a really, really basic game. But I think a knowledge of other games definitely builds up your understanding. 

Ian  31:44  
There's a lot of crossover in mechanics. Yeah,

Adrian  31:47  
I've got I think I've got an example that kind of sums this up to some extent, is that I've played board games for a long time, I've played a lot of war games, a lot of the manuals read the same and all that kind of stuff. But I've never, as far as I'm aware played a trick taking game. So someone said, we might play The Crew, it's a trick taking game. And I was like, I don't know what that is. As I say, I've played like worker placement, action, like anything involving like to hit and wound modifiers. And that from war games, I've got all that in my head, I can normally read a rulebook and go, that's what that means. I've never played a trick taking game, I don't even know where to start, someone would have to teach me trick taking from the bases. And I would consider myself a relatively experienced gamer, if you think you've got that first person walking through the door. And sitting down at your table, if you have to explain the basics of right Okay, so we're going to take turn after turn, which a lot of people will forget in the teach, I've done it plenty of times, okay, it's one at a time, we take each a turn or whatever, and you sometimes forget to add that in, you've got to do all of that for a brand new player, a more experienced player can sort of like put the... put the... sort of the gaps... fill in the gaps and, like read between the lines of what you're saying, definitely

Ian  32:57  
Someone more experienced, you tell them oh, this is a worer placement game, they already know what to expect. They'll project that onto what they see, they know that they're going to have some resources that they're going to place out there that are going to do things.

Becky  33:11  
I think it can be quite sort of off-putting for say a new player, this kind of... it might not be intentional, but that kind of gatekeeping of well I need to actually explain all these terms to you. 

Ian  33:22  
There's a lot of Jargon 

Becky  33:23  
Yeah, there is and I think you know, if you were fairly new to a group, just thinking actually I don't know what trick taking is for example, and actually I am one of them. I don't know what trick taking is either

JP  33:34  
I've got The Crew

Ian  33:36  
It's quite an old term right? More of an old card game term?

Becky  33:41  
And I'm happy holding my hands up going 'no idea what's happening don't I'm no nothing right now' and that's fine. I don't mind that but I know a lot of people would be very very uncomfortable doing that and I think that's what makes a really good teacher for me is someone that does take time to check the person's understanding already, and not just like well this equals this , dah dah dah dah,  there you go it's a 'oh, do get what the point of that is?. Do you see why I'm...'

Ian  34:07  
And thats's the other thing about the teacher is that it goes beyond the..., you know, you can't think of the teach as being the first X minutes of the game where you explain it, it carries on throughout the game as well. And way before, but way after, you know you could be halfway through the game and, again, I'd say a JP is very good at this, He's always making sure that everyone understands what's going on, that no one is sat there going Hmm What what did he just do?

JP  34:33  
It's purely selfish because I want the game to end at some point.

Ian  34:37  
No, I don't know. I think he's altruistic. I think you want everyone to have a good time

Becky  34:41  
That's it, that is your prime directive, for board gaming. You want to make sure that people are having a nice time and that's what makes you such a good host and such a good teacher. I think, not, I don't know if Adrian's ever taught me a game yet, only basic ones, but I think his special kind of ability is it making sure that you see right to the heart of it really quickly, and explaining the minutiae of a game but in a way that doesn't make you feel like your head's about to explode.

JP  35:09  
And Adrian makes board game resources, laminates them and then brings them.

Adrian  35:14  
That was the Great Wall. So that was, like, talk about prepping. I prepped that game hard because I was genuinely terrified to teach it. I think I said it on a previous episode. Is, for me, I need to, I can teach the game much better when I'm prepared for it, even games I've played before two or three times, if I've, if I get 20 minutes even, beforehand to think about a game and how I'm going to teach it, I can just structure it in my head. And I can do those things like I did earlier. You know, I can say right, remember: theme first. So we're going to talk about the theme then we're going to talk about the scoring points, then we're going to talk about... like I taught Quacks. And I... my brain just went 'right what am I saying first?' Okay, so we're at this alchemists festival or whatever, blah, blah. And then I immediately went off on something, had to pull myself back because I hadn't planned for it. And I think having a plan in your head certainly helps me, and this is why I laminate the resources off, I got the board out, put it on a table, I played a three handed game for two turns just to try and get in my head as to exactly what I did. I watched several how to play videos. And I've done that for other things as well, quite often, if I've not played it before I just put it up, even if I just put the board on the table and get the cards out. And then kind of go right. Okay, I can now read through this and see what everything does.

Ian  36:26  
Yeah, even just leafing through components, like you say if there's cards involved, just having a look at some of the cards and go 'Oh, yeah. Okay, so these will be good ones to use as an example'. There's nothing worse during the teach than the person trying to teach you some things like oh, I'll show you an example of this. And then they're leafing through 100 card deck, trying to find a good example. You know, having little bits of prep like that can make a big difference. I think

JP  36:47  
This is why the the teach starts when you get the game, and when it's delivered to you, that's when for me the teach starts. Because like, like Adrian was saying, you're getting the game, you unboxing it, you're popping it unless it's your husband, you're popping on his behalf, you're popping it and even organising the game, right, and not going into the other episode about printing off your own organisers, leaving that alone, but you just organise it into baggies or whatever, you need to have an understanding of how to group the components, 

Ian  37:18  
You have to tie yourself before we can teach anyone else, right? 

JP  37:21  
So you know, whether that's I'm going to group the components or player colour in one thing, I'm going to do this, whatever it is, then you kind of have to at least thumb through the rules at that point, so you can store it properly. So that's kind of in my head. But yeah, I do that Adrian, I do a, like a multi handed play, Pre-run. And then it clicks. Okay, got it, got the turn structure in my head. I know how this works. I might not know every intricate rule. That's fine. But at least I get the flow. Yeah, I get the flow of the game. And I kind of feel ready.

Becky  37:49  
So do you feel that playing like a learning game with with new... so you're playing like a learning game for yourself? Like a one person solo? Playing multiple hands as a thing? Do you think that playing a learning game with like, say, a couple of dummy rounds or something? With all the cards exposed, or everything open air? Do you think that helps? Or is it something you try and avoid? 

JP  38:09  
It can help. But again,  it's time as a resource, isn't it. So if you've got the luxury of time, and you can do like a round, and maybe, let's say there's eight rounds in the game, maybe you play one round, like 'we're just gonna play one round, and then we're going to reset back to round one and go again

Adrian  38:25  
Or just ask if people want to reset, sometimes people have done what they've done, and you're going 'do you want to want to reset?' and they're looking each other and go 'no, let's keep going'.

Ian  38:34  
Does it also not probably depend a lot on the game itself, right? Like there are going to be some games that lean towards being suitable for that kind of, you know, dummy round. And there's others where, you know, again, a T.I., we're not going to do a dummy round of T.I. before we start 

JP  38:49  
We're not rebuilding that map. Exactly

Becky  38:53  
Kerley makes a good point, he wanted me to add at this point, because he is my primary teacher, I guess. And he thinks that doing dummy rounds and stuff is really helpful. Because it makes people actually interact with the tokens and each other, but primarily with the game. So it kind of learning by doing Yeah, I mean, I think everyone he was saying yesterday, everyone learns by doing to a degree, but I think actually keeping people's interest and touching the card and doing that sort of thing.

Adrian  39:20  
I think that's important part of the teach. I've seen a lot of people not do it, turn over the cards show people what are on the cards, number of people, I've seen teach a game and they've not turned over a single card to show you what's on the other side. Or just turn it over, right? Okay, this is the structure of the card. Here's where your purchase points are. Here's where... I'm just gonna use It's a Wonderful World because it's in my head, which is here's what you build. Here's what you recycle. Here's the bonus you get from it. You can literally put them on a table, put each a copy of each of the type of cards out and go right. This is what all of these cards look like rather than trying to explain it to someone without turning the card over. It seems like such a simple thing, but I've seen it forgotten. 

JP  39:57  
I've forgotten to do it. Yeah, at times. Yeah.

Ian  40:00  
I know when I've taught people Netrunner in the past, which is my main exposure to teaching people getting outside of Crokinole, which... That's a very lightweight teach. You just start playing, and teach as you go, yeah, 

Becky  40:12  
There's like three rules... 

Ian  40:13  
Keep your bum on the chair, you flick it, go. 

Becky  40:16  
Not flick your bum, don't flick that. 

Ian  40:17  
Don't flick your bum, well I mean, you can flick your bum, it's not... it's not going to help you with Crokinole. Or maybe it will. Anyway, teaching Netrunner, I mean, obviously, that's a niche case, because it's a card game. So I mean, to try to teach Netrunner without turning over any cards would be just insane. But I found that is one of the most valuable parts of that teach, is when you do exactly that, you go, right, this is an agenda. This is an asset, this is a piece of ice. This is your identity, that you get the different types out and maybe a few of each different types, they can see the similarities, they can see the differences. And like you said, you and you go through, right, this is the cost. This is the this this is that. And that seems to be the point where it clicks for a lot of people, almost to the point where I've had teaching games before where I'll have another deck separate to the ones we're playing with. And we can leave them out so people can refer back to it and remind themselves Oh, yeah, that, you know, on this, which is the res cost, and which is that, so they don't have to like in the middle of their game, show me their hand and ask the question, they can just be like, Okay, so on this card, how does this work? 

JP  41:18  
That's a great point, actually, for competitive games where you've got hidden information, because you got a lot of players who really want to ask the question, but they don't want to give away their secrets. Yeah, so yeah, I like that answer. Good. Good tip.

Adrian  41:30  
That is the point of the host, especially in a co op game, you know, if you want to have all the information open, you can do, but if you've got a co op game, you're teaching to a lot of new people at the same time, you've got to have it in your head where everything is you can explain it, even if it's not a co op game. If something's about to get flipped, that people might not have seen the symbols. Asking people is everyone happy with the iconography, it goes more than just, as we sort of said from that start of the game. And it can be, I'm just as guilty as anyone else, you get kind of caught up in the heat of battle a little bit. And once the game started, you can kind of forget that you're teaching. But it's important to keep reminding it, and if anyone's got questions, then it's your responsibility to step in and answer those question.

You can and I've done this so many times, when you're teaching, end up sacrificing your own game of your first play. Because you're invested in trying to get everyone else around the table to have a great time. And you get to the end of the game. Usually everyone's kicked your ass. And you're like, oh shit.

Ian  42:28  
Sounds a lot like an excuse.

JP  42:31  
It's not the only excuse, but sometimes I've had games... I think Perseverance Episode 2 was one...

Adrian  42:36  
Well, I thought, Episode Hone you were so busy trying to teach the game and I remember thinking 'Has he remembered he's supposed to be playing too',

JP  42:43  
'Why is he making suboptimal moves?',  I'm like 'Is everyone alright?' But yeah, it can happen a lot. And, but for me, I don't kind of care, it's like, again, if everyone goes away from the table going 'Thumbs up, had a great time'. Regardless, wherever you kind of love the game or not love the game. We enjoy this the play. This is the job done in my book,

I think in this group, despite, you know, we've got plenty of players who are very competitive and who like to win, I don't think we've got anyone in this group who plays because they want to win. 

Becky  43:08  
Errrrrrrrrrr......

Ian  43:11  
Like don't get me wrong, but there's... and there's nothing wrong with being competitive and wanting to win. But I think, I think we've got a set of personalities in the group whereby even if they never won, like I do, they would still enjoy playing. And that's that's kind of the point, isn't it? That's what you're saying JP is that you sort of don't mind if you've sacrificed your play, as long as everyone's enjoyed it.

JP  43:39  
I think that's more my personality than anything

Adrian  43:41  
If you want a good version of ... there's two good versions of how to let go of games, Paul Grogan, I'm going to bring him up because he is literally 'right, shall we get on I'm not gonna explain all the iconography or what everything does, put your work on a spot and we'll tell you as you go', that will loosen you up a little bit. But John Gets Games, he plays three handed or two handed quite often, and one of them is always just random stuff to show you what everything does, but it does kind of put you in that mindset of yeah, just pull those levers and all that kind of stuff. And then you're in that mindset for being taught a game. And it being a teaching game, rather than like the super competitive game. They're my two people who I quite often watch them and think, yeah, this is how you should probably approach your first game.

Becky  44:27  
So coming on to that, what are people's favourite kinds of resources then? So YouTube is a massive one for me personally. Yeah, John Gets Games is one of one of my favourites as well, and Watch It Played.  I really like those sort of channels, they are brief, which for me is really important. If the of the length of the video is more than about 15 minutes... I kind of...

Ian  44:48  
15 - 20 minutes is about my cut-off as well.

Becky  44:50  
I'm happy to then watch another one which may delve into a different...

Ian  44:53  
That's what's wild, isn't it? Oh, I'll watch two 10 minute videos, but I see a 20 minute video, I'm like 'ughhhh'.

JP  44:59  
I'm the same, I think John Gets Games is really good. I think it's probably really good if I wanted to buy the game and see how it worked and it's played. If I wanted to learn it ready for a game night that, again, I don't own and I say it's an hour and 10 minutes. I'm like *blows raspberry*. Personally, and honestly, I just need enough of a primer to get you to show up and actually not be rude

Adrian  45:22  
I think Rodney Smith is probably most people's pinnacle of how to teach your game. He has the structure of how you teach a game correct, for me. I think the way most people probably would want it doing, so here's my normal, if he hasn't got a video out, then I say, not just if he hasn't got a video, quite often I'll then do John Gets Games, and Paul as well, yeah, on Gaming Rules, but I'm not too put-off by the length, if I know it's a heavyweight game. So there's like, there's like Heavy Cardboard. And there's another one who I always forget who does like Axis and Allies, War of the Ring, does really heavy games. And he quite often splits them into two or three 15- 20 minute parts. And you're like 

JP  45:44  
I prefer that, it feels a bit more bite sized

Ian  46:05  
I can see myself watching that

Adrian  46:05  
This is like an hour long teach to see it. But I know that he's gonna go through everything, I can watch bits again, if I'm teaching out to someone, those are the resources where I don't mind like put a little rewind in. But okay, I didn't get that, I've got the board in front of me, I still didn't get it, let's have a look and see.

Becky  46:23  
Do we think sending like PDFs of the rulebook to people is helpful, or? anyone

JP  46:27  
I don't think anyone will read them, unless it's your game, personally.

Adrian  46:30  
Some rule books are written terribly. So that doesn't help in the first place. You're there for the teach, I know I'm gonna teach you

Ian  46:38  
Those things you can have ther o,n on the day of the event, like you know, you don't need to give someone the iconography glossary or the turn structure in advance. It just needs to be there to refer to when they're playing. I think

JP  46:53  
I enjoy reading rule books. But when it's my game, 

Ian  46:56  
Wow, rock and roll! 

JP  46:58  
But when it's my game, and I'm learning it, then I'm loving life. 

Ian  47:04  
It's contributing towards your prime direct. 

JP  47:05  
Absolutely. 

Ian  47:06  
Because you know that by learning the rules, you're going to help everyone have a better time, but when it's someone else's game, you learning the rules isn't gonna help people have a better time. So you're not bothered about it, because you're happy to just pull the lever.

Becky  47:19  
And yeah, I think Rob is really good at just kind of letting go the first game, because he's just like 'Yeah, it's a teaching game, I'm not bothered'. And I wish I could be more like that. Have you guys got any tips on how to make people just accept that the first game is just...

JP  47:39  
No. I've been trying five years.

Adrian  47:42  
People either have it in them to some ability, and you can kind of crank that ability up and remind them or let's like, don't forget that you can do this. And you can do that and kind of try and suggest that they pull all the levers of the game because some games are, I've got the one thing I'm doing, I'm gonna do it over and over again, or, you know, I'm gonna do two or three things, getting them to kind of interact with every, like deck of cards, or whatever can be quite good. Or they're just not on that scale at all. And they are going to play it hell for leather, like straight first game, and in which case, there's not much you can do to say, Don't do that.

JP  48:16  
Like everyone's reason for gaming. And, I mean most of the people in our group are there for the social interactions, probably primary. But you know, we're there to talk and have a good time. But when you're in the puzzle, and you're in your mind palace, and you're trying to work out what the hell are you doing and that people can't help it. Because they just want to min max everything all the time. 

Ian  48:39  
My mind palace is such a mess. I need to get a cleaner for my mind palace. There's just... there's meeples everywhere.

Becky  48:47  
Something we haven't really brought up yet is the whole quarterbacking/ playing someone else's game for them as the teacher, you guys are both really good at not doing that. But that can be something that has been very detrimental to definitely my experience and learn of a new game.

Ian  49:02  
So kind of like our alpha gaming. Yeah, kind of taking over a new players turn for them. Because you think you're trying to help them. But...

JP  49:09  
We had a situation actually that happened in Trickerion with Jay. And we was all playing the game. And Jay was doing something. It's his first game, and it's Trickerion, it's heavy, right. And I thought, 'well, I'm teaching him' so I was offering like, 'you could absolutely do what you've just done. But just so you know, there are these other things that you can do that... not that they're.... but definitely more efficient', but actually just to kind of help him in his game. And he didn't spot it

Ian  49:38  
Just a prompt 

JP  49:39  
And it didn't.... and actually it was at the detriment to me, as the other player

Ian  49:42  
So you screwed yourself

JP  49:44  
I should have shut up and gone 'Ha Ha'. 

Ian  49:46  
That's not the JP way, though

JP  49:48  
I thought, it's his first game. And I thught I'd helped him out a little bit if he wanted it. So I asked him 'Do you want to want some advice?' If he's like, 'No, no, I'll do my own game', like good, because I can...

Ian  49:59  
I'm gonna crush you!

JP  49:59  
I'll ruin you. But no, he said, 'Yeah, go for it'. Yeah. So it is quite weird when you're trying to play a game. And you're offering advice to people, your opponents, to screw you.

Becky  50:10  
At your own detriment

Adrian  50:12  
Especially when someones playing the first game I don't like, yeah, in the nicest sense, like, whether you win or not in the first game was kind of irrelevant, but I'd rather someone didn't lose four turns of the game because they accidentally gave away all their wood to some part of the space where they didn't need to, that's the key thing that they try to go over for something that's gonna give them victory points. Well, just so you're aware, that kind of might do this, totally up to you. But just to make you aware that you do need to hold on to six bits of wood to achieve your objective. Giving it all away might be hard to get back later, and just kind of giving them that prompt, and there's levels, you can do that you can be a bit pusher and you get right up to the 'this is your turn, just to let you know'. And then you can do it all the way back to 'Oh, okay, fair enough. Have you thought of this?' And there's kind of all those scales in between that, you know, you can kind of call on depending upon

Ian  51:03  
I've done it. I've literally turned around and said 'guys, what should... what would you do if you were me now, and what should I do, because I'm completely stumped'.

Adrian  51:09  
But if you've asked for it, and that's I think, that's the point of, you know, about talking about quarterbacking stuff like that, is people who ask for it fine. Yeah, give them whatever level of information you want to, that you're happy giving. If they don't ask for it, ask the question first, or give them the vaguest of nudges in the right direction and kind of then leave them to the rest of the game. Until they ask again.

JP  51:30  
You have to wear those multiple hats as the teacher, which is right, I need my player hat off for the moment, and put my teacher hat back on, and then kind of go 'Right. I'm with you'. 

Ian  51:39  
You put your player your hat back on and go, ''Oh, what have I done?'

JP  51:43  
Why did I do that? S'all for the greater good, isn't it?

Ian  51:48  
Yeah, that's what you keep telling yourself. That's how you sleep at night.

Becky  51:51  
Is it more helpful if you've got a lot of new learners, because then you can be very generic with your advice, like in your example, earlier Adrian, you could say, 'Don't forget everybody, that we need to keep an eye on how much of one resource we have', rather than making perhaps some one person feel like you are playing their game? Is it easier having lots of newbies or?

JP  52:12  
Depends who it is in all fairness. I dunno if it's easier or harder, I think it's actually on the reverse. So as being the player, that's the only new player coming into play a game that everyone else knows, it's quite daunting, 

Becky  52:25  
Yeah, I have felt that personally a lot of times 

JP  52:28  
I don't want to slow the game down. I don't want to be that person. And you've got to kind of put them at rest and say, Look, don't worry about it. And usually everyone's pretty cool. Yeah, and get on with it. But I think the teach, you know, you're teaching one person or you're teaching three, you might just get more questions from people, it's still kind of the same process, really.

Adrian  52:44  
If people are worried about it, or whatever, you can suggest a solo teach, turn up 10 minutes early. You've done that a few times for myself, because like, again, when I first turned up to the group, my knowledge of the games you guys played was quite different from the games I've played before. And so every game was like, right, everyone else has played it but me. JP was like 'Turn up 10 minutes early, and I'll teach you' that. And then you can kind of go into it feeling a bit more level playing field. You're not holding the game up kind of...

Becky  53:11  
It's kind of like a dummy run, then, isn't it again? You've had that pre primer? What do you think is the most annoying thing, as a teacher? I think I'm guilty of doing this where if someone else is teaching, I can't help but chip in with some irritating little 'Oh, yes. And...' I'm trying to pull the words back out of my mouth, because I know how annoying it is...

Ian  53:33  
I know I do this is as well...

Becky  53:34  
When someone is teaching 

Ian  53:35  
It's a terrible habit. I know,

Becky  53:36  
When someone's teaching, it's like, let them get on with it, they will probably come to that point in a minute,

Ian  53:40  
Part of it in my mind is because I'm trying to reinforce my own understanding. So I'm kind of chipping in to sort of say, 'and that means this doesn't it??' kind of thing. But actually what I'm probably doing most of the time is detracting from what that person is trying to teach the other person.

JP  53:54  
So I think like Adrian was saying earlier, there's a there's a methodical process that I know I go through and I know you go through in terms of how you teach a game, you know, starting with setting the scene, like what the friggin hell's the theme of this game. Why? Why is this game even a game? You know...

Ian  54:11  
So for Azul,  What's the... what's the

JP  54:12  
For Azul? Portuguese tiling? That's about as far as it goes.

Ian  54:18  
And how does that tie to the game mechanics?

Adrian  54:20  
I've done that before. 'The theme is, in 'It's a wonderful World', the theme is you're building an empire' and  that's about as good as the theme gets, right? You can look at all the nice pretty pictures. Now let's move on to...

Azul,  the theme is you want to eat the pieces

The story, or what the ultimate point is. But it can go from that, all the way up to like Quacks of Quedlinburg. And I was like, 'right, so we're all alchemists. There's a nine day fayre. What we're trying to do is make the best potion, and I proper was just like, let's like layer it on and really give... but you can choose anywhere in that, depending on what you've got

JP  54:49  
Some people like that, and some people just go 'just get into the mechanics we know' so it just depends again,

Adrian  54:54  
Normally it's what, a minute max? that you're setting the scene, like people can get over a minute, normally, I find.

JP  55:00  
The point is, it's good, to answer your question, is because we've got a methodical process, and hopefully, not always, because we forget stuff, right? Hopefully, we'll  cover all the aspects that we're going to cover. But we have a methodical processes because we, in our heads, we know where we're going to get to. And someone goes, 'How's that work?, what's this icon mean?' I'm gonna get there, like, you know, and it's just, it can be quite jarring, and then you end up losing your place.

Adrian  55:25  
If you've prepped it, you've put it in a certain order, because that's the order that probably makes sense, at least to me to teach it in, so I can teach it in bits and pieces. I'll be honest, the 'what does that do? Point at the board' is much less annoying than someone who is spending their time on their phone, talking to their mate, eating their dinner at the table as the teach is going on, and then spends the next three turns going, 'what does that do?', or even worse, and I've done this because I did this with Champions of Midgard... I zoned out for a solid five minutes during the scoring of the teach, couldn't tell you where I was or what was happening. But I totally missed the scoring. And then at the end of it went 'You didn't tell me about this!'. Everyone else went 'Yeah, they did'. And I was like, 'Okay, fine, I'll put my hands up, clearly'. I'd clearly zoned out for a solid five minutes of the teach

JP  56:18  
Your voice is so boring JP.

Adrian  56:21  
But that's my pet hate is when someone spends their time on their phone, or completely distracted from the game during the teach. And then we'll spend the next three turns asking,  'what does that do? What does this do?' If you've paid attention, you asking those questions fine, but if you've paid attention, you've probably genuinely forgotten or there was a lot to learn. If you've not even paid attention, I'm just gonna make the assumption that you would have learned it if you were paying attention. And now everything is just annoying.

Ian  56:44  
That for me falls into the same bucket as like, if the host has shared a video, it's polite to watch that video and to try and at least absorb some of it. If a host is going to take the time to teach you the game, like have the decency to listen to what they're saying. 

JP  57:00  
There are the people that don't need to. They can come, and they get games. They just...

Ian  57:06  
We know who they are

JP  57:08  
 They've had the hodgepodge of all of the things, and they can get there. Like 'Yeah, we know'.

Ian  57:12  
He says through gritted teeth

Adrian  57:14  
Even those people often will need at least a bit of steering. And they may be able to zone out for the bits of 'Oh, yeah, this bit is where you draw four cards and put through the bottom' or whatever, because they can see the symbols. And yeah, that clearly says four draw cards, but they will still need a basic understanding. So yeah, that's my annoyance with teaching.

Becky  57:35  
Yeah, I think that pretty much wraps it up, that I can think of, yeah,

Adrian  57:38  
I was gonna say unless we go from through the steps, but, like, go on YouTube. And there's, there's a video from Paul Grogan, about how to do that. There's a video from Quinn's

JP  57:51  
Shut up and Sit Down's is good 

Adrian  57:52  
Which helps on how to do that. And that was really good. I really found that helpful. And there was a video from someone else I want to say Man versus Meeples. Jeremy, I think, yeah, but don't don't quote me on that. But I'm sure someone on that channel did a really good sort of teach as well. Just watch those, they'll tell you more about the structure than they will sort of, than we can probably go into detail about here.

Becky  58:15  
Cool. So that's kind of point people in the right direction if they want to get better at teaching, or they've got that pesky person in the group like me who doesn't like to learn new things. Well, no that's not true. I like to learn, doesn't like to have to learn.

JP  58:27  
Youre doing  a pretty good job of it!

Becky  58:38  
So on to our questions. This week, it comes from our own James Davey again, and he asks, Is box art important? And what is more important, aesthetics versus core gameplay? If you would like to ask us a question that we can answer in the podcast contact us and we'll shout out all our socials at the end of the episode. So guys, Box art: is it important?

JP  58:58  
I think I was gonna say we definitely need more questions if we're getting our own podcast players to be putting questions...

Ian  59:04  
If we're scraping the barrel with Davey's questions!

JP  59:08  
But anyway, yeah, so box art: is it important? No.

Becky  59:12  
Oh, couldn't disagree more, couldn't disagree more

JP  59:16  
I look past it. I play games like Gaia project, shocking box!

Ian  59:19  
It's all about, it's all about whether you can look past isn't it?

JP  59:22  
I can

Ian  59:22  
As if you're browsing through games on an online retailer, or you're in a physical shop,, or you're on BoardGameGeek or whatever. What you're going to see first is the box right here, right? And it's that kind of judging a book by its cover. You're right, it shouldn't matter. But I'm kind of with Becky I think it would, the box art is going to tell me a lot about what that game is. Even though I should be able to look past it

JP  59:48  
So this is more about what's your kind of first touch point with new games, than, than anything else for me, because my first touch point is I hear about games not by looking at box covers. I hear about games because they're mentioned in like the the new hotness for Essen releases, or they're mentioned by content creators or whatever. So my first experience is probably a video, or nice artwork off the board or played then

Or an article where you're getting way more context than just the box.

So that's why it's not important to me. Because I don't walk into shops and go, that looks pretty, I'm going to pick it up and have a look, that's just my opinion,

Becky  1:00:27  
I think the board game market is so saturated, though, if you know you're going to put people off straightaway buy something rubbish on the box. Why do it yourself? So...

Like Gaia Project

Well, I haven't seen the box art to which you are refering.

Adrian  1:00:43  
It's not the worst, but it's also far from good.

Ian  1:00:46  
I'm gonna have to look it up. Because I've never seen this bax art

JP  1:00:49  
I have a problem with the art in Gaia Project full stop, let alone just the box art.

Becky  1:00:54  
So I've got the perfect example of how I couldn't have been more wrong. So I'd been looking at Lords of Waterdeep on our shelf, on the kallax for ages. And I just thought 'No, that game is not for me, couldn't have less interested in it at all'. And you know, it's the kind of things that I'm vaguely interested in. But that... the artwork Oh, my Lord. Awful. Couldn't.... This is not, I mean, the pictures are fine. I'm not, you know, saying that the art is crap... 

Ian  1:01:22  
Becky's about to have a bunch of artists with pitchforks...

Becky  1:01:26  
The pictures are fine. They are just so unrepresentative of what the game is about. Yeah. Couldn't be less relevant.

JP  1:01:34  
Should have cubes on the box.

Becky  1:01:38  
It just, it looks like it's full of fighty action. It is not... the game is not full of figty action.

Adrian  1:01:44  
Like Scythe and the big stompy robots. I had the exact same experience with Scythe where I thought it was all about big stompy robots and storytelling narrative. And it's not. I think you're right, though. A box can be influential. Yeah. In your opinion of it. I'm kind of along the same same lines as JP in the fact that I get a lot of what I want to buy next from the likes of BoardGameGeek. And watching YouTube, listening to... I listen to a lot of podcasts. So I get a lot of my information without having any visual aspects at all. 

Becky  1:02:16  
That's helpful isn't it? That stops it being influential. 

Ian  1:02:19  
Wait a minute... there's other podcasts? 

Adrian  1:02:21  
There are other podcasts. 

Ian  1:02:24  
Don't think so, you've made a mistake mate

Becky  1:02:26  
Moving on from box art then, do we think the aesthetics of a game versus the core gameplay are like 100% important or not important at all?

JP  1:02:33  
They have an importance. Definitely. Because otherwise you just be playing on white paper.

Becky  1:02:39  
I think we all know my ...

JP  1:02:40  
And it still could be fun, though. Yeah,

Adrian  1:02:41  
That's Food Chain Magnate, isn't it? Playing on a bit of paper with a grid on it?

JP  1:02:46  
A little bit. Yeah. Brings back horrible memories.

Adrian  1:02:52  
Again, it seemed like such a shame because I felt like I liked the this the sort of toned back aesthetic that's in Food Chain Magnate, it's functional. But just little flourishes would have bought that game up a little bit more for me. Rather than just, you know, literally squares on a bit of white paper.

Ian  1:03:14  
So the thing is, it's really easy to think of examples of great games with great art, let's say like, Wingspan, is a good recent example. It's really easy to think of great games with bad aesthetics. Because we remember them being great games.

Becky  1:03:28  
I think it doesn't have to be a beautiful game. So you know, the games I really like often have got very beautiful, beautiful artwork, but it's not just about the artwork. For me, it's about does this stuff makes sense? Is the user interface obvious like have you got lots of things that are all the same colour that shouldn't be the same colour? I remember Adrian brought that up as a as a real detriment of one of the games. I can't think which one it was now. 

Adrian  1:03:54  
It was probably Dune: Imperium.

Becky  1:03:55  
Yes, it was Dune: Imperium. But I think if it's been well designed... that's what annoys me the most: it doesn't have to be beautiful. It doesn't have to be shiny, it doesn't have to have cute little animals or whatever, those things are all good but has somebody thought about this? But I find it almost as annoying if the... you know the inserts are badly designed because you think 'Oh it's so good to design inserts, speaking as a type of a person that likes to design inserts, that that should have been easily done. You've got all the...

Ian  1:04:24  
You see something go wrong that you feel like should have been so easy to get right. That's what starts to make you worry Well, where else have they cut corners? Yeah,

Becky  1:04:32  
That's what makes me.... You know, that's what I find off putting about games, is it doesn't have to have the best artwork, like you know, one could argue that Zuuli, Alright, the artwork is cute. But you could have photos of the animals for example, which might be more appealing to some people, but everything makes sense. All the icons make sense. Yeah, everything is very you know, obvious.

Ian  1:04:52  
 Coherent, yeah,

JP  1:04:54  
I think you know, aesthetics is what gets you to play the game first time, and the gameplay is what makes you return to it. Is how I see it.

Ian  1:05:01  
Because that's the thing. You can't really sell the gameplay until you play. And you can't play until you've bought the game. So how do they get you to buy the game? Make it look good.

Becky  1:05:09  
So we've decided it's kind of a mix then? Is our answer

JP  1:05:12  
I think they're both important, but if you ask me which one's more, it's gameplay.

Becky  1:05:15  
Yeah, like you said, that is what was gonna bring you back, isn't it? 

JP  1:05:18  
Yeah, absolutely.

Becky  1:05:27  
For our penultimate turn, then what events do we have coming up in the calendar that we're excited for? I'm gonna just bring out there: GRIDCON. Because it's not that far away.

JP  1:05:36  
From when this is released

Becky  1:05:37  
From when this is released. It's not that far away from now. And I was just thinking the other day, I can't wait to be back in another little, little convention, so it's on November the 11th, to the 13th. And it's a convention run by Paul Grogan from Gaming Rules who we've mentioned earlier, this year with holding Taunton, which is...

JP  1:05:56  
I'm so excited. 

Adrian  1:05:57  
Walking distance, 

Becky  1:05:58  
Which is great for us. Yeah,

JP  1:05:59  
It's when he said 'right, I'm moving it to Taunton'. It's like 'Result!' 

Becky  1:06:05  
It's within a few miles of all of us so that is really good. So yeah, just looking forward to being in a space surrounded by like minded people, like we had at the UKGE. It's just really, it's a really lovely feeling, isn't it? When you're passionate about something knowing you stood in a queue, even for like something random, like a drink or something, you know that the person in front of you and behind you has that same passion. And it's it's really nice.

JP  1:06:25  
I went last year, it's great. It's my first convention just for kind of open gaming. But I think Paul does a cracking job. And with me and you Adrian, we talked to Paul about it on the expansion pack episode we did with him. So if you want to learn more about the GRIDCON from the man himself, go check that episode out. There's a little call back. But no, it's just, it's just fun, you get to meet loads of new people, and I encourage that. I think from all of us in the group that are going, the temptation would be for us to stick together for the whole weekend. And actually would say, don't do that. If you're a bit afraid of that go with a mate. But split up and all play games,

Becky  1:07:03  
I'll talk to anyone that will talk back

Adrian  1:07:05  
I'm definitely on the mates side, I might drag someone along, share a game with me sort of thing. But you know,

Becky  1:07:10  
But that's the joy of it, isn't it? You know that everyone is in a similar supportive kind of... 

Adrian  1:07:14  
Yes, absolutely. 

Becky  1:07:15  
Which is really... so I think that barrier of 'Oh, actually, I'm a bit reluctant to go out there and put myself out there'. I think in safe spaces like that. It's really good. On that note, can anyone recommend any games bags or something equivalent to transport lots of games in?

Adrian  1:07:29  
I've got one, Board game tables do one, they've just announced some behemoth that you can store one of their gaming, collapsible gaming tables. It's massive. I couldn't work out if it was a joke or not. It must be, but then I saw in a couple of places and I thought maybe it's not. But they do a premium bag. It's padded. I've carted it around. Like some really heavy games, like filled it to the brim with heavy games, put the backpack straps on, carried it across Taunton, which is not small. It's not massive. It's not London, but it's not small either. And the straps are still holding up, all the zips hold up. It's padded enough for me. And I'm quite precious about the state of me board games. And so that's... that'd be my recommended..

The state of your shoulders, less passionate about.

Becky  1:08:16  
If anyone out there who's listening can send some recommendations in I have actually seen some people recommend Cajon drum bags, which is like a....

Ian  1:08:24  
Oh that would work. It's like a kind of square. Yeah, yeah.

Becky  1:08:27  
What I'm looking for is a Kallax cube or two that I can put...

Ian  1:08:31  
With straps

Becky  1:08:31  
Yeah, that I can put over my shoulders. Yeah. If anyone else can recommend some non Cajon drum bags or anything else, then please get typing and let us know. What are you looking forward to Ian?

Ian  1:08:43  
So I have got myself signed up for a game night. It's Netrunner 

JP  1:08:49  
Oh yeah, the one you asked me to play

Ian  1:08:50  
Exactly. No, I do want to get signed up for Ark Nova at some point as well. We'll have to get that. But yeah, we've got a Netrunner night in the calendar, which is very exciting. I can't say that I literally haven't played Netrunner for two years, but I almost haven't played Netrunner for two years, maybe even three years. It's been a long time since I've played in person. And so I'm really excited for that. And there's lots of new cards that I am not even aware of that I've bought and have been gathering dust in the corner of my office. So yeah, we've managed to get four people together as well. So I'm gonna have two games. Yeah, two should be good. I look forward to getting my ass whupped

Oh I doubt it mate, I can't hardly remember the game, let alone being good at it

Ditto. Yeah. 

JP  1:09:35  
Equally shit.

Ian  1:09:36  
But yeah, then in addition to that, yeah, absolutely. Getting Ark Nova on the go. I've heard nothing but good things. So I'm excited for that.

JP  1:09:44  
Cool. I want to talk about Riffle.

Becky  1:09:47  
Riffle? I do not know what this is.

Ian  1:09:50  
Is this your new Gearloc?

JP  1:09:52  
I'm so excited right, that this new Gearloc has appeared out of nowhere, literally nowhere and is basically going to be the last Gearloc... I say the last Gearloc, is their planned last Gearloc that they're gonna do, and he was unlocked by a puzzle, for those that don't know, Too Many Bones games comes with a riddle, every one of the base game expansions has a riddle, that you've got to kind of find an entrance to a website URL and once you in, there is a series of questions and puzzles and you have to kind of figure out, they're very good. And me talking about them probably means I'm gonna get shot by Chip Theory games because they're very, very secretive. When you unlock them, you get promos, and you get some...

Becky  1:10:33  
Oooh,  Easter eggs basically?

JP  1:10:35  
 You get loads of cool stuff. So basically, in the latest pop up book, sounds mental as I'm talking about this. The pop up book that they've done called The Automaton of Shale, there's a puzzle in that, and when 500 people have cracked that puzzle, they've unlocked this Gearloc to basically be purchased. 

Ian  1:10:51  
Nice. 

JP  1:10:51  
And that just literally happened, well when this podcast goes out about seven months ago, I don't know. And Riffle is basically a new Gearloc. Normally Gearloc's, come with 16 dice, this new character comes with 10. But he has a deck of 52 cards like a standard playing card deck. And his whole thing is about basically playing these cards like poker suits, four of a kind, royal flushes, all that kind of stuff. And doing abilities with the game. I've just, I'm all over it. Yeah, I'm sold

Ian  1:11:20  
Yeah I'm sold, get me all on this.

JP  1:11:22  
Yeah. Yeah,

Becky  1:11:24  
I like the... that kind of 'thrill of the hunt'. That sounds very interesting. I like that.

JP  1:11:28  
Yeah, it's just cool. I'm just really Yeah, I thought I was done by getting the Unbreakable expansion.

Hahahaha, You thought you were done?

Which I havent got what, because it's on the way. And then they released this new one. I'm like, yeah, I gotta do it. I'm already in.

Ian  1:11:41  
I can't wait for when we get to like episode 300 and JP's like, well, obviously, it's the last Gearloc coming out now. I thought I was done with Too Many Bones. But we've reached the 40th expansion, and they're saying this is the last one. My bank balance really hopes that it is

JP  1:12:00  
I'll be living in the Trove chest which is now a house

Ian  1:12:04  
Your garage will just be a huge trove test. Yeah,

JP  1:12:07  
That's that's what I'm excited for.

Becky  1:12:09  
Adrian, How about you?

Adrian  1:12:10  
Well, I'm looking forward to playing with JP under his new alias now he's got to go under witness protection for sharing Chip Theories secrets. That's what I'm looking forward to

Becky  1:12:18  
We'll call him PJ

Adrian  1:12:20  
No, I've bought Tuscany expansion for Viticulture recently. Yeah, I've not I've not played it with the Tuscany expansion before I've been told it's like a must-have upgrade. I've played through Viticulture about three or four times. So I bought Tuscany and I bought Visit to the Rhine land or...

JP  1:12:39  
Yeah it's the Visit from the Rhine Valley

Adrian  1:12:41  
Something like that. Yeah. And it's basically, it makes the game more about producing wine than it does giving people tours of your cellar with just one bottle of wine. 

Becky  1:12:51  
Kris is gonna be upset then, because that's his favourite way of winning, isn't it?

Ian  1:12:53  
Yeah he does like to give a tour , doesn't he? What about the cheese expansion though, is that not seen as being as good?

JP  1:12:59  
It's an older... Well, the weird thing with Viticulture is that the original version before Essential Edition came the Tuscany expansion. Added all the cheese, loads of stuff. So they're now just print and plays. So the essential... Tuscany Essential version just has the three basic, probably the best the modules

Adrian  1:12:59  
It's got a new board that divides it into four seasons instead of two, read the rules on that, very excited that looks really good. And the wake up sequence changes slightly, which also looks really strong. You've got special worker meeples, which you deal two cards out of the deck. So it changes what's special workers are available. And then the third one, is the buildings that you can add in, which again, like just adds another spot you kind of have access to yourself. And so really looking forward to getting that to the table. Really enjoy Viticulture and really excited to be playing with the the kind of expansion that I've been told is an essential add on once you've got a few games in sort of thing, so so that's what's on my up and coming.

Becky  1:13:58  
And with that our final turn is wrapping up, we've played the dummy round, and think we've worked out the most efficient way to score victory points. So basically thanks for everyone for listening. If you've enjoyed the show, please like subscribe and review on your podcast player of choice. And if you want to get in contact with a show on our socials to give us feedback, suggest episode topics you'd like to hear, or ask us questions. You can email us on players@whoseturn.co.uk , check out our Facebook page on Whose Turn Is It Anyway Podcast, our Instagram page is @whoseturnpodcast , and Tiktok is @whoseturnisitanyway. We'll be back in two weeks with another episode. So until then, Whose turn is it?

Adrian  1:14:37  
Please ask us some questions, we're desperate!

Transcribed by https://otter.ai