OGN Ep 39: Unpacking the Golden Geek Awards, Cities, and Rebirth

This week Clay and Jared lament the fact that OGN wasn't nominated for a golden geek award. However they put their hurt feelings aside to provide some color commentary the winners and runners up from the 2024 Golden Geek awards. Clay also talks about Cities, a new game by PWH and Steven Finn and Jared talks about one of the pods favorite new games Rebirth. 

00:00 Intro
04:00 Clay Debrief (Cities)
11:55 Jared Debrief (Rebirth)
26:10 Mission Objective (Golden Geek Winners and Runners Up)
01:06:30 Over the Fence

Transcript

Travis-less Intro and Goals

Speaker 1 0:20

Welcome to the Operation Game Night Podcast . I am your host . I don't know why they did this . They gave the reins over to the most chaotic member of the Operation Game Night podcast . Travis is never going to let me back on the podcast after this episode . But here I am , With me , as always , the fearless leader , Clayton David Gable . He is cutting down to 169 . He's got his sweatsuit on . How are you doing , Clay ?

Speaker 2 0:59

I'm doing great today , jared . You know , I don't think we even need Travis anymore with that bombastic intro you gave . And , by the way , I didn't hear Boo from him about our podcast episode .

Speaker 1 1:11

I don't think he's listening .

Speaker 2 1:12

Did he even listen ? I don't think he is either . Did he just drop this baby on our doorstep and say he's divorcing himself from Operation Game Night ?

Speaker 1 1:21

Actually I saw Rachel post that she's in the fjords of some foreign country , probably not even playing any board games . I bet you they didn't even take any small boxers . I bet you what are those little ones that they slip in their back pockets ?

Speaker 2 1:35

Oh , those button shies .

Speaker 1 1:37

How many button shies do you think they brought ?

Speaker 2 1:39

Zero .

Speaker 1 1:40

I bet you baby Gwen , I bet you baby Gwen was like , as they're heading out the door , she's , she was trying to clamor , she was trying to grab more for a board game and they're like , no , we need to hit the fjords . And uh , yeah , they probably . They're probably not listening to any operation game night , um , probably just enjoying themselves . It's again . It's again . It's again Clay and Jared time um episode 39 . Okay , we're going to hit you guys hard with the , the 19th annual golden geek winners for 20 , 24 . Um , clay did , did we ? Did we get nominated on the Golden Geek Awards this year ?

Speaker 2 2:29

No , we did not . Oh , I think some of our kind listeners might have put our names in the hat , but that only does so much . You need at least thousands of them to actually make the nominee list , and we didn't cut it this year , but I think we're on a good trajectory for 2025 . Crap .

Speaker 1 2:52

Clay , this is actually a live reaction . I legit thought that we were nominated . I thought we were on the list . I was legit thinking that we were supposed to be telling people to vote for us .

Speaker 2 3:06

Oh my God , no , nope , not at all .

Speaker 1 3:10

Clay , that's why I was trying to talk to you and Travis about how do we vote . Remember I was talking to you about it . It was like this is hella complicated yeah .

Speaker 2 3:23

I thought you were just patching it .

Speaker 1 3:24

As the host , I'm supposed to keep us on track . I'm already sidetracked . Sorry , travis I apologize , he's not gonna listen , he's not listening . He's not listening hey , clay , um what's up ? Let's uh , let's debrief our weeks okay okay , what let's do it ? Do

Weekly Game Debrief: Cities

Speaker 1 3:41

this week , or or am I supposed to go first ? I think I'll go first , clay . What did you do this week ?

Speaker 2 3:43

Or am I supposed to go first ?

Speaker 1 3:44

I think I'll go first Clay what did you debrief your week ?

Speaker 2 3:47

What did you do ? All right , let me debrief my week for you , jared . Yeah , what did you do ? So ? Played a lot of games , as is usual . Whoa , uh-oh , there we go , all right .

Speaker 2 3:59

So the one I want to talk about today is called Cities . Okay , and this is a new game by one of the podcasts favorite designers , phil Walker Harding , and co-designed by Steve Finn of Biblio's fame . So in cities , you're building out , as it says , a city . It comes with a bunch of different cities you can play in the in the game New York , sydney , some other cities , rio de Janeiro . It's as a city it comes with a bunch of different cities you can play in the game New York , sydney , some other cities , rio de Janeiro and essentially you're creating a little three-by-three grid of these city tiles and then making buildings on the tiles and you're also putting features in the parks and the waterways and the core mechanism of this game .

Speaker 2 4:54

It's a drafting game and I really like the drafting in this game . Like most Phil Walker Harding games , it's pretty simple . So you have four workers in a three to four player game and there are four rows of things that you can pick from . So the top row are going to be scoring cards and they're just ways to score points at the end of the game . The next row down is the actual pieces , puzzle pieces of your city that you can put out there . They have the water , they have the grass , they have the places you can put your buildings and start stacking them . Then the next row future tiles . So in that row you have the little they're like little one by one squares that you can put in your parks and rivers and essentially you're doing like a set collection game in those areas . So you're trying to get a bunch of different types of features in a specific park and then you score points for that .

Speaker 1 5:48

Is that like a little port right ?

Speaker 2 5:50

there too .

Speaker 1 5:52

A little port near the bottom here .

Speaker 2 5:54

Okay , yeah . So down there you have your actual building pieces and you can grab from there . So on your turn you take one of your four workers and you pick anything you want . I can pick a scoring card , I can pick a feature tile , I can pick the buildings , but once I pick something from a row I can no longer take from that row anymore . So on my next turn I can pick any of the other three rows to take from . So at the end of a round I'll have taken a scoring card , a piece of the city , some buildings and some feature tiles and it's just a matter of saying like okay , what do I want to grab first , what do other people want ?

Speaker 2 6:40

And it's just a really clean drafting system , super easy game . I mean , you're scoring points , like I said for collecting different features within the parks and riverways . You get your scoring cards . They'll say like oh , you get a point for every one story tall green building you have in your city and you score points for I think that might be it . Oh , there's public objectives . So each city has its own set of public objectives . They're kind of a race to see who can be the first one to make a seven square grid of park area . So really simple scoring , really simple gameplay .

Speaker 2 7:23

I found it a joy to play . I love the . I don't know why it's like so fascinating to me , but like being able to draft different things , it's like , oh , I get a card this turn and now I'm going to grab these three little building pieces to start stacking up on my city , and I just thought it was a nice time . It's like 30 minutes long . I think you could teach this to anybody . Super streamlined , fun game , as you would expect from a design team of Phil Walker , harding and Steve Finn .

Speaker 1 7:56

The old Phil Walker Harding is just , it gives it . Does it give you Kinetia vibes ?

Speaker 2 8:02

It's it brings you back a little bit , a little bit .

Speaker 1 8:04

You know , it's just distilled down it's .

Speaker 2 8:05

It brings you back a little bit , a little bit . You know it's just distilled down , it's just . You know , I'm grabbing four things on a turn and I put them in my city easy I feel like you , within the last three minutes , just taught me how to play the game .

Speaker 1 8:18

I want to . I want to be there with you , uh , and anytime I I can go vertical and also do my profession . Also shout out to travis , be a civil engineer , uh , go vertical . Yeah , um , in a game , I love it . Um , I'm here for it . I want to do it . I . I mean , you're a big fisherman too , I can . There's these little fishies , uh , parks and rec , uh , city planning , it's , it is definitely . It's making my tism , tism . Okay , I'm loving it .

Speaker 2 8:52

Yeah , it's good stuff . So , yeah , like I said , you do , you place four workers , get four things on a round . A normal game is eight rounds , so you do that eight different times . Um , in a two player game it's a little different . So you do that eight different times . In a two-player game it's a little different . You actually have eight workers that you start with and you only play four rounds . So each round you can take two things from each of the rows . So essentially , you're placing eight workers each round instead of four . So you end up with the same size city and you get the same amount of things , but you don't have that additional rounds to see new things . As often I've only played two players With Mary , I think . Yeah , she liked it . You get that turnover in things more often . You know eight rounds to see new tiles and new things and maybe make your move for that that feature tile that's missing from your your little water space . So , uh , going to be playing this a lot , I think . Um , yeah , great game , I like it .

Speaker 2 9:59

I yeah , I do so . I get this is a Barnes and Noble Good . I do so . This is a Barnes Noble Good little Barnes Noble find here Is there a Barnes Noble in Colorado Springs . There sure is Wow . Barnes Noble keeps it popping with their board game collection . They surprise me when I go in there . I mean they had Critter Kitchen , they had all types . They had that Kelp shark versus octopus . I didn't even know that was out anywhere .

Speaker 1 10:27

That's a little foreshadowing for our main objective . Wow , that is a little bit .

Speaker 2 10:33

Hey , whoa , whoa , whoa , hey , do you ?

Speaker 1 10:34

tell Cam that you go into .

Speaker 2 10:36

No no .

Speaker 1 10:38

Cam doesn't even listen to the podcast anyway .

Speaker 2 10:44

So come on .

Speaker 1 10:46

Cam , if Cam listens toes and he'll stop going to barnes and noble if you cam .

Speaker 2 10:51

if cam comes up and says hey , if you like and subscribe if you like and subscribe cam hit us up to be fair , I was there for another purpose . I was looking for a book and I just happened to stumble . Stumble through the uh board game section , as I'm wanting to do pwh is in barnes and noble oh yeah , he's a mainstay there .

Speaker 2 11:16

I mean his games are . You know if you're gonna mass market a game , you know we're talking Sushi Go Baron Park , all these pretty pretty entry level games that are great for families . I think he's a . He's a good one to have representing the hobby in Barnes and Noble . Well , speaking of designers that make streamlined games , I know you've been playing one of our our favorite games lately .

Speaker 1 11:45

Oh , yeah , Uh I I easily got one of the the most played of the last couple of months of operation game

Rebirth: Castle Rules and Gameplay

Speaker 1 11:57

night . I got rebirth to the table , so the last week . So I'm kind of in the nostalgic part of my school , my time here . The school is winding down . We have some extra time in the schedule so I brought board games to school and I got a couple people to come play Rebirth with me . Yeah , I got a couple people to come play Rebirth with me .

Speaker 1 12:26

Yeah and dude , like we've been saying all along , quick and easy , pick a tile , place a tile . You know what ? I was very naughty . I forgot to mention the very critical part about the castles are worth five points . Okay , like yeah we had already each placed like two tiles and I was like , oh , a critical point after I'd already like got two castles . I was like , guys , um , the castles are important because they're worth five points at the end of the game and everyone's like , oh , conveniently left that one out , like didn't you ?

Speaker 2 13:04

no , come on . You placed 30 tiles .

Speaker 1 13:06

You're only I know , I know , I know , but still like , as you know , I'm a blue in the true color . Um personality test , I don't know , yeah , you're a blue , of course I'm I'm a blue green green , I think I'm yeah I think I'm blue gold I . What do you think Travis is ?

Speaker 2 13:25

You give me gold . Vibes Travis is like red red gold . He's not very touchy-feely . I don't think Red gold yeah .

Speaker 1 13:33

I don't know . Anyways , hit us up on Instagram with your personality type Any other blue greens out there . Any other blue greens we're all blue here on operation game night um but , anyways , yeah , it was just .

Speaker 1 13:48

It was just fun , because you can just chit , chat and there's like it's all randomness , you know you just pull tile , place a tile and then you know you're getting these the , the cool . When you go get a cathedral , you get a cool , you know hidden objective , and you're like , oh , now I get to go try and chase after this hidden objective . And um , so last week I think , I talked about my good friend sarah . Um , she came over to play board games last week so she stuck around to play this game with me and she really liked it . Um , yeah , she's got , she's got a little Celtic , you know , I guess Scottish in her blood , and so this was right up her alley . She felt like she was back at home in the Highlands . She actually was like , oh , yeah , I've been to this castle and oh , I've traveled to Inverness and all this .

Speaker 2 14:44

I thought these were fake places . No , clayton , oh my god I thought this was a fantasy theme .

Speaker 1 14:50

No , this is the theme is on point , though I love , I love the idea of rebirth , like you're rebirthing this world after , I think it's like you know , nuclear holocaust or something like that , or , like you know , the world's kind of like ah , bad things have happened , but you know it's still technology . But the blimps , the , you know we still have these solar and wind farms and stuff you know like we're trying to rebirth this world after just kind of a postmodern re birthing , but anyways , love it . I just had a lot of fun .

Speaker 2 15:28

I I got a question for you Cause I found that when I play this game I maybe I'm a micromanager a little bit , but I feel it moves so fast and I noticed a lot of times people miss things that are supposed to happen when they place their tiles . You know , they either forget to score their points for a group , or they forget that they're next to a castle space to put their castle out , or they forget to do their cathedral and I find myself the whole time .

Speaker 1 15:58

You're trying to manage it .

Speaker 2 16:00

I'm trying to manage their stuff because I'm like oh no , no , no , you forgot . You forgot to get this and you forgot to get that . Have you found that people are pretty good in your group about making sure they Self-police ?

Speaker 1 16:12

I think that's kind of the way it went yesterday . That's kind of , when I think back of the other times I played this , we don't do the old oh look , my tile is here , I should get another , I should get another cathedral like wow , no , no , dude , you forgot , you forgot and wow , that's hardcore man that's not cool that's not cool .

Speaker 2 16:39

You don't think that's cool ? I know it's cool , it's , it's just not how I do it . You know , I think because those cards they don't affect anybody else . If it was something , I would have just grabbed it . But that's your rules , right ?

Speaker 1 16:55

Here's a little thing that helps the gameplay go a little quicker and puts a little self-accountability , a little ownership , on the individual . Just pick up the tile as soon as you place a tile . Pick up a tile , however many people you're playing with , don't wait until it's your turn to pick up a tile . Just kind of make that as a table rule .

Speaker 2 17:19

I think it says that in the rule book too .

Speaker 1 17:21

I hope people do that , because I noticed people would do that and just be like , hey , just as soon as you place , just pick it up so you can start thinking about where you want to place it . And then that helps you be like , oh , I do want to place it here so that I can get this , this and this . So you're not just like off the cuff , like , oh , I think this is happening because I'll tell you what we were having to reread the tie-breaking rules for the castles . Quite a bit isn't ? I think we've talked about this a couple times on the podcast . Are you talking about for the the city , not for the cities , for the castles , so on a , how do you tie for the castle ? Okay , uh , because I've read it like four times yesterday .

Speaker 1 18:05

So when there is a tie for the castles , so the only thing that will the tiebreaker goes , the plant and energy ones break the tie . So if you have an even number of tiles for that surrounding , let's say whatever . The orange one that is like kind of off to the left here on the screen , whoa Jerry , what .

Speaker 2 18:40

Have you been playing this game wrong ? I thought the only thing I knew . I thought that you had to surpass the amount of tiles that somebody had around the castle .

Speaker 1 18:52

You do . But if there is a tie , the tie is broken by the no . You settle the score right away . As soon as the tile is placed , you settle it . So if I match somebody , yeah , if you match someone you settle the tie right away and you go . Really it's like there should be a . You know what they should do . They should do a decision tree Whoa they should do a decision tree .

Speaker 1 19:17

This is what you do . You decide , hey , who has the most ? What is it , thunderbolts or plants ? And then they say , okay , well , purple or a green , whatever orange has the most , um , thunderbolts or plants , then they would win . So the the houses do not break the tie , like so so that , whatever , if that's not a good example , because the orange one actually has more tiles than blue in that purple or in that orange example right there where your mouse is . Yeah , I can't see a different example .

Speaker 2 20:00

Wait . So you mean to tell me if I have two tiles already around the castle . Somebody else now places their second tile around that castle . You score it up right then , right away .

Speaker 1 20:15

Well , not score it up , right away .

Speaker 2 20:16

Well , not score it , but you change possession . Change possession right away . Wow , I never even I thought you had to have . If I had two tiles , you need to get three , otherwise that castle's part .

Speaker 1 20:29

No , no , no , no because , uh , what , you could technically take it away with two , two and two . Um , because I know this is weird , you should get get in the rule book a little bit after this and you'll blow your mind . Wow , because it also . Whoever just placed a oh , a good example is Edinburgh . Let's say , orange places a plant tile on that last empty spot for that blue castle empty spot for that blue castle , orange would take over Edinburgh because they are the last person to place . It is given precedence to the person who places last and the tiebreaker goes to whoever has the most plant or lightning bolt right , but everything's tied .

Speaker 2 21:24

The last placement is the final tiebreaker , but if Orange is able to place first , they would swap the ownership of that castle . I'm glad we talked about Rebirth for the fifth time , because now I might actually know how to play .

Speaker 1 21:42

You might need to get a lawyer to relook at that paragraph for ownership of castles , because , hell , maybe I'm wrong . That's the way I read it .

Speaker 2 21:54

You seem to have a more nuanced understanding than I did , so I think you probably are on to something .

Speaker 1 21:59

Most important is first tiles . And we also played if it was a blank tile it didn't count , we don't care about blank tiles , do not add towards ownership and there's only like two blank tiles per color , so that didn't matter too much . So tiles mattered most important . Next was so if those were tied , then it was whoever had most lightning bolts or plants , and then if that was also tied , it was whoever was just placing the last tile .

Speaker 1 22:40

So , it was tough . These guys are very strong , willed , very type . Willed , very type a very smart still had a blast . I love playing this game . So easy , I have little baggies , setup is so quick , they learned very quickly and , uh , it was a blast . Anyways , I didn't think we're going to talk about rebirth for that long , but well , I didn't know .

Speaker 2 23:05

I've been playing rebirth wrong this whole time , holy cow . But uh , any interest have you , since you're so into the rule book , have you ? Have you read the rules for the other side ? No , I'm too scared . I haven't . I don't think it's that intimidating . No , I just have such a good time on the front side in that imaginary land of what's it called .

Speaker 1 23:29

Ireland , yeah .

Speaker 2 23:31

Ireland , okay .

Speaker 1 23:32

How do you play for four players ? I only played at three , but at three players it fits perfectly . On the number of spaces available At four players do you have to remove tiles or you just play until there's nothing left .

Speaker 2 23:48

Yeah , you remove tiles . Yeah , I think everybody removes like three or four tiles of specific types , and then it just works .

Speaker 1 23:56

Yeah , okay , just like that , just like that Well dang .

Speaker 2 24:01

All right , that's a rebirth , huh .

Speaker 1 24:04

The only other one I was going to mention just real quick is I invited Clay to play Lost Ruins of Arnak with my boy , dallin , so I'm getting him in the mix on Board Game Arena with the Grand Master himself .

Speaker 2 24:21

Dallin , myself , dallin , double in oh , and the game we finished from last week . I don't know if you paid attention to what .

Speaker 1 24:30

I did . Did you beat me ?

Speaker 2 24:33

No , absolutely not . You had like 68 and I had like 40-something , but I went to the top row .

Speaker 1 24:41

Did you ?

Speaker 2 24:41

Before me All four times . I think I got all the four top row spots . Oh , yes , yes , yes , yes , yes , yes you .

Speaker 1 24:51

You paid the six compasses to get to the top rows . Then you killed , none of the guardians you you harnessed none of the guardians yeah , I went up there .

Speaker 2 25:02

I was like I knew I was down and out because I had an archaeologist . I left on the bench in round one so I was like you know what , what's gonna be the fun thing to do in this game ? And I was like I'm just gonna keep going to top row . I see what happens . And it was fun . I had a good time .

Speaker 1 25:20

That's what a 169 pounder does top row every time you know I couldn't .

Speaker 2 25:26

Uh , I'm intimidated being in this game with you and dallen , though I don't be intimidated sometimes .

Speaker 1 25:33

Hey , it's a luck it sometimes . That's why I like our neck . Sometimes they throw a little luck in there and then boom , something happens . Bada bing , bada , boom . Maybe you come out on top and next week you're going to tell this fantastic story how you took down

Golden Geek Award Categories Begin

Speaker 1 25:49

jerry and dallin could be a great story .

Speaker 2 25:55

Yeah , I will definitely let the podcast listeners know when that happens all right , did we debrief .

Speaker 1 26:05

I'm debriefed , debriefed . All right , let's fall in on the main objective the 19th annual Golden Geek winners for 2024 . Okay , we're talking the Board Game Geek winners , for these are the best of the best board games and board game adjacent um accoutrement . You know like , yeah , potentially podcasts that I thought we were in the running for apparently we weren't .

Speaker 1 26:40

Um a little that just gutted me live on the podcast . Um , we're gonna talk , print and play solos party games right up my alley . We will be talking about the podcast . Spoiler alert , it's not us Board game apps , so should we jump right in ?

Speaker 2 27:04

Let's jump in .

Speaker 1 27:05

Hit me with the first category , the first category is one that clay is always hitting hard . Two player games , and the runner-ups for this one was kelp shark versus octopus and a jester , a jest of robin hood . So okay , um , great ones , right , I think ? I think , uh , tra , I think Travis is all about .

Speaker 2 27:29

Shark vs Octopus . Yeah , he talked about that many , many moons ago , but it sounded like a lot of fun . I've never played it . I did see it at Barnes Noble , though Maybe now that I know it's a runner-up for the Golden Geek Award , I might check it out . But what's the winner ?

Speaker 1 27:48

Winner is Lord of the Rings Duel for Middle Earth .

Speaker 2 27:53

Can't argue there , Jared .

Speaker 1 27:54

You were talking about this one big time right .

Speaker 2 27:58

Yeah , I said some crazy stuff . When we went through the hotness I said that is the best two-player game I have in my collection right now and I mean it . It is so good . We played it last night , I'll have you know , requested by Mary and that's she loves that game and it just made seven seven wonders duel so much better in my opinion , and it was already a great game . So I mean just just cleaned up a few things through a theme on that I think a lot of people can appreciate . I personally enjoy grabbing those little Gollum cards and moving up the ring track . You know the civilization old-timey theme that was in the original Seven Wonders Duel was whatever . But you know the Lord of the Rings theme and the the cleanup they did on some of the mechanisms . This game is a freaking rock star in the two player genre . Love it Nice .

Speaker 1 28:58

And it's head to head right . I'm going to say no .

Speaker 2 29:00

Oh , it's head to head , it's just . I mean , no , we're not . We'll get to that later , but I won last night on a collecting favor from all the six different races . So yeah , three end game conditions , I think three Having presence in all seven regions of Middle Earth , collecting the favor of all six of the races , your green cards or getting to the end of the ring track . Those are the ways you can win on the spot . Nice , and I think almost every game I've played of it . Somebody has won on one of those three things and it's usually in the third round and it comes down to just a crazy play . You can see the card , they can see the card and it's like , how can I maneuver myself to try and get that card ? So it's such a tense , good two player game over in like 30 minutes .

Speaker 1 29:56

I love it . I feel like I want to be in the same room while I watch you play Cole . Can I do that ?

Speaker 2 30:08

Yeah , that can happen this summer .

Speaker 1 30:10

Nice , nice . I feel like this is a good one for cole . Yeah , um what's well I'm gonna come . If you're following along on the script clay , I'll be . I'll come back . I'm gonna jump down because we just mentioned it let's go down to cooperative game of the

Lord of the Rings Games Dominate

Speaker 1 30:28

year . Um , the runner-ups were slay the spire , the board game and yep , bomb busters those ones I haven't heard of um , yeah , I mean I have not heard of bomb busters .

Speaker 2 30:43

Slay the spire the board game definitely heard of that's been making huge waves . Slay the Spire the board game definitely heard of that's been making huge waves . Slay the Spire is obviously a hugely popular digital game and from everything I've heard , they made the deck building version of the board game . It's amazing . I thought when I saw the nominees that Slay the Spire the board game was going to take this category . But you know the winner .

Speaker 1 31:11

Jared the Fellowship of the Ring trick-taking game .

Speaker 2 31:17

Can't be denied . How is Again ?

Speaker 1 31:20

What is happening ? Is this like a rebirth of Lord of the Rings ? They're coming in hard .

Speaker 2 31:27

What is this If you can pop a popular intellectual property on some of these games ? I mean , it was already working with a really solid formula , right ? The Crew is one of the most popular games of the past five to ten years and that just has some random-ass space and deep sea theme . So they took that , they put on the lord of the rings theme and they made it a little more curated of an experience because each chapter it tells you like the specific cards you're supposed to play with , whereas in the crew you're you just kind of draw random mission cards and , um , hope to carry it out . So it's more curated , targeted at your lord of the rings fans and it's a great game . I've been playing this with the headens and mary and it is a lot of fun , happy to see this one win keeping trick , taking on the map .

Speaker 1 32:21

So cooperative game not necessarily just like one one and one like , because sometimes in my head when I think co-op , I think like halo cooperative , where it's like one and one oh like you can have like a lot of people playing this one yeah , yeah , um , I think it was one .

Speaker 2 32:41

One to five . That's awesome , the fellowship of the ring . So yeah , you should if you . I heard your guy tan Tam man . He liked playing Skull King with you , yeah , so if you don't have the crew , I don't have the crew . I would suggest it's like 15 bucks . Jared , I know you're tight with the money , but I think you guys would have a good time getting into some of these cooperative trick takers , because it is a really cool genre .

Speaker 1 33:08

Okay , all right , well , well , that one , and that's again . That's a great stocking stuffer right under underneath 20 bucks . That's , that's getting me somewhere . Okay , I will have to write that one down .

Speaker 1 33:23

All right , now I'm gonna switch gears into artwork presentation . Okay , I have played a few of these ones so I might be able to join in on this conversation . Runner-ups for this one harmonies and arcs . Okay , uh , arcs I'm all about . Okay , I love space themes and I love a trick taker . So , like all the suits in this one , each one felt very unique and very beautiful in my hand , um , and then coming around on the board like it was , it felt very unique . It wasn't like just dumb space , it was like I felt like I was traveling to another part of the galaxy . So I can easily see why it was voted upon by the geeks or the golden geeks .

Speaker 2 34:17

Oh yeah , yes , Geeks big into ARCs . Arcs is going to be talked about quite a bit in this year's Golden Geeks , but Harmonies too . Don't sleep on Harmonies . This game has amazing artwork . I can't even put a finger on it . It's like nothing I've really seen art-wise . I wish I was more eloquently able to speak about art styles , but it's a great-looking game . You should check it out . I've had a lot of fun playing it , and not in any small part due to the fact that it looks so good to play um , would you mind pulling up the winner for this one ?

Speaker 1 34:54

uh , unconscious minds . So I was wondering if you could just pull up the artwork , just so I could see it as well . I know you said you have not played this .

Speaker 2 35:04

You said you haven't played this one no , no , so this got sent to me on accident .

Speaker 1 35:10

On accident .

Speaker 2 35:10

Travis had backed this . Yeah , travis had backed this on Kickstarter . It came to my house he said go ahead and give it a try . I was excited . Everybody's talking about it . This game was going to be awesome . I spent hours and hours learning the rules and Mary and I sat down and played like two turns . I was like no , mary and I sat down and played like two turns .

Speaker 2 35:31

I was like no , we're not doing this , but there's no denying that the art is amazing . You have art from Vincent Dutre and Andrew Bosley , so two titans in the board game art industry collabing on this game . So I think Andrew Bosley does like the dreamy type art up here . So this game's all about being a psychiatrist and like dealing with people's dreams , and then vince trait does like the artwork of the rest of the game . So yeah , this guy down here . So great looking game I I had I had more fun punching it out and just rifling through the components than anything else .

Speaker 2 36:15

But yeah , so there's some Andrew Bosley's dream art , and so you're looking at these , and then there's Vincent Dutre with his realistic people that you're playing .

Speaker 1 36:26

Look at those meeples .

Speaker 2 36:29

Yeah , the presentation on this thing .

Speaker 1 36:31

Holy smokes .

Speaker 2 36:35

Those are the .

Speaker 1 36:35

Gucci meeples right there . That's definitely the type that Travis would get .

Speaker 2 36:40

Yeah , oh , for sure . But yeah , well-deserved win for unconscious mind and artwork and presentation .

Speaker 1 36:47

Okay , it's easy to see why they would pull off the W here . Yeah , geeks are all about that . One Golden geeks , perfect , all right . Next one we're pulling up . Expansion of the year . Runner ups heat , heavy rain and forest shuffle , alpine Heat Love .

Speaker 2 37:13

Heat Heavy .

Speaker 1 37:13

Rain , have you played Heavy Rain ?

Speaker 2 37:15

Yeah , I've got Heavy Rain . It adds a couple new maps and , as the name suggests , it adds some Heavy .

Speaker 2 37:23

Rain , you're going to slip out , yeah , so basically , there's puddles around some of the corners and it does something with the way you can shift gears and you take more heat . It's fine , I could do without it . It added more cards and you know another player , I think . So that's the main draw , but having a new map to play on is fun . So that's the main draw , but having a new map to play on is fun . But I couldn't care less about adding more things to think about in terms of the rain being on the track . I'm not looking for more ways to complicate my game , so that didn't appeal to me necessarily , but I did like the new tracks .

Speaker 1 38:06

They were different and interesting . You can pull logan sergeant and slide off the track , just just like that . Huh , heck , yeah , why not ? Sorry ? Uh , sorry to logan sergeant . If you're a podcast listener , if you're a operation game night , uh , subscriber , um , and the winner arcs again the blighted reach expansion . Talk to me about this one . Yeah , do you got this one ?

Speaker 2 38:31

I don't have this , but do

Arcs: Multi-Award Winner Analysis

Speaker 2 38:33

you know ? I ? I know , I mean , I know it just adds . It adds like a campaign version to the game , so essentially you're able to keep playing with the same people over the course . I think they're like a mini campaign , though , where it it's a lot more manageable , so it's like a three game campaign potentially . Don't hold me to that . I'm digging back in my memories to when this was coming out and trying to recall . Some people love it . I mean , some people say that the obviously the golden geeks are saying that this expansion just takes arcs up a notch and I can't imagine why it wouldn't . You know who doesn't want to just live in that world ? Yeah , I know , I would this thing .

Speaker 1 39:16

It's uh on bgg . The campaign contains 24 fate seeds , each with tons of branches , twists and turns , I mean .

Speaker 1 39:28

I have a good feeling about that one . I mean , it's probably not the vibes that I got from Dead , reckoning that expansion where you me and Cole were , you know , continuing to build our fleet and blast each other and then , sadly , you got rid of it and I'm never going to let you down . I'm never going to let that down . I'm never going to let that down . A piece of my heart is gone . It's fine . No , it's fine .

Speaker 2 39:56

No , hey , listen , it's just time for something new , jared .

Speaker 1 40:00

I can't move on .

Speaker 2 40:02

Maybe we'll get the Bladed Reach expansion and we'll play through it me , you and Cole and it'll be , like you know , a new fun experience and I can get rid of that , wow , yeah yeah , maybe it's just .

Speaker 1 40:17

You know the feeling that I got when we got to dress up as pirates . Now I know cole likes to dress up , as you know , a space warrior . You know he's got his space mohawk and stuff . He can dress up like that . We got another award here . Innovative we got an innovative award . Some beautiful names on this one Runner-ups , formage and SETI , search for extraterrestrial intelligence Ones that we have talked about many times on the pod .

Speaker 2 40:57

Yeah , I think I'm not . I guess SETI's innovative You're still just so , you're just a naysayer . I'm not a naysayer , I love SETI . I just don't know that innovative is what I would call it . I guess maybe the aliens the rotating tableau . Maybe , but You've seen that . Yeah , it's just like a hodgepodge of different mechanisms all kind of thrown into one game . So maybe that's innovative . So maybe that is innovative . The winner is , and this company is innovative , so it's hard to argue .

Speaker 1 41:57

I just , I'm a huge fan of Formage because I can get my BGA on and play with my friends around the world . I like the idea of investing in my cheese and you know , maybe I want to .

Speaker 1 42:10

I'm going to go three cheese on this one and it's going to come back to me in three turns . I can just plan for that to be doing its thing for three cheeses . Maybe I'll just get my cows working for me to give me an extra cheese . It's kind of almost like an investing game for me too . I like it . The winner , arx . I think I'm going to just keep saying ARX .

Speaker 2 42:38

I might be done , saying ARX .

Speaker 1 42:40

No , I think I'm going to keep saying it . Oh crap polarizing , polarizing .

Speaker 2 42:44

You know ARX definitely has it's haters , but I don't even think it's haters could argue with it . Its innovation and taking that trick-taking card play mechanic to kind of immerse yourself in this space , battle-y , 4x-y game Super cool the way that works . People cry about getting dealt bad cards but I say just deal with it , figure it out . Pivot , take the initiative . It's all about picking your moment and when to go . I really like the battle system in ARKS . I don't know if it's the innovative part of it , but the fact that you just can pick any number of colored . I have four ships . I can pick four dice . They can be the big bad red dice . They're probably going to hurt me . Play it safe with the blue dice , you know . Go with the rating dice . I like that . It's simple . I grab them , I roll them , I sign the damage . Battle's done . It's a good game . It is good .

Speaker 1 43:45

Yeah , all right . I yeah , all right . I'm going to keep this party rolling . Yep , we're going to go down to party games , runner-ups , the Gang and Things in Rings . Which one's the Gang ?

Speaker 2 44:00

Party games . The Gang is the co-op poker style game , so you're kind of playing texas hold'em cooperatively . We're trying to make sure you're trying .

Speaker 1 44:13

You talk about your hands .

Speaker 2 44:14

Yeah , I did , yeah yeah , party games for me are interesting . Um , I feel like party games I I get excited about but I need to refresh my party game stash frequently because they get played out so quick , get a little stale , like you know , yeah , you know , like I played just one so many times , it's like I don't want to play just one anymore . So then I got so clover . I was like , so clover is amazing , but then you play it so many times because everybody loves it and it's fun . But I'm just always looking for that new fun twist that's going to bring me to a party game . And Things in Rings definitely played it . It's awesome . It will get old , for sure .

Speaker 1 44:57

That's a word game .

Speaker 2 44:59

Yeah , that's where you got like the Venn diagrams and you're trying to know where the cup . Everybody's loved it . I played it with so great one , the Gang . I played it a bunch when I first got it , but again it's kind of like it's gimmicky . Once you've seen it it's like , yeah sure , I'd probably play it and have fun . But you know , any game in this category is kind of fleeting to me uh , this the winner .

Speaker 1 45:23

I love playing this one with emptiness . Board game . Mama flip seven . Yeah , oh fun , push your luck . Um , yeah , except for the problem is I don't know when to stop . I just keep pushing my luck . I just just hit me , I keep hitting myself . So wait , remind me again , because this is critical , because I don't maybe understand the rules . Um , how many cards are there of each number ?

Speaker 2 45:48

as as many as the number is there's 14 , 14s , 12 , 12s , two , twos . Yeah , well , there's no 14s , but there are 12 , 12s , 12 is the highest card , so there's lots of 12s .

Speaker 2 46:01

So I should be worried if I see a 12 . Yeah , so yeah , if you have a 12 in front of you and you decide to hit , yeah , if you have a 12 in front of you and you decide to hit , you're making a pretty big risk probably . But I mean , you could really get an 11 and now you're cruising man and then there's extra .

Speaker 1 46:16

There's other , like special cards that are like yeah , double the next card that you pull , or like force someone to draw three , which I ironically gave to myself , and then I busted . So yeah , that's a risk um I mean , I could have it , could have paid , it could have been awesome .

Speaker 2 46:36

But yeah , I know flip seven is great . I this is one that I haven't gotten sick of yet . I just pushing your luck is always fun for me . Um word games as party games they always get old , but pushing your luck is always fun for me . Um word games as part of games they always get old , but pushing your luck is something I always have a good time doing . So flip seven I'm glad to see that one Got the W greatest card game of all time .

Speaker 1 46:59

So they say tell Mary , I got to get a flip seven game going with her , Cause me and her always pushing our luck .

Speaker 2 47:06

Yeah , you guys will just sit there .

Speaker 1 47:11

You'll never finish the game because somebody has to get to 200 points . All right , Print in place . We got Rome , Fate of an Empire and Formage , a nine-card solitaire game .

Speaker 2 47:24

It's a forage .

Speaker 1 47:27

I don't know why we put me in charge of reading , because I'm an engineer . I can't read words well .

Speaker 2 47:34

You're still in school , man .

Speaker 1 47:35

Well , you should be I can read quietly without saying them out loud .

Speaker 2 47:40

Okay , well , I think , print and play . I'm sorry to the print and play designers , I have no expertise . I've never printed and played . I haven't either . I don't know anything about this category . So congratulations to the runners-up and to the winner . And the winner 52 Realms Adventures .

Speaker 1 48:01

You know what ? Maybe that's a good stretch goal for us . Maybe we should try . Maybe that's a good podcast . Maybe we should try and play 52 Realms Adventures .

Speaker 2 48:13

It won an award . It did . It's more than we can say .

Speaker 1 48:17

That's true . Okay , solo game of the year Runner-ups Imperium , horizons and Gloomhaven . Buttons and Bugs . Gloomhaven's a big one , that's a big one ?

Speaker 2 48:33

Yeah , it is , but Buttons and Bugs is a small boy . Small boy , buttons and Bugs is like Gloomhaven Honey . I shrunk my Gloomhaven . It's tiny . I've played it . I've made no mistake about it on this podcast that I'm not a big solo gamer and I sure know jared isn't , so can't really give a great opinion or commentary here . But I do know that the winner is probably a well-deserved slay .

Speaker 2 49:03

The spire the board game yeah , I mean it was going to have to win one of these categories . This game has been so hot , so has Travis played that one ? No , surprisingly , this seems right up his alley .

Speaker 1 49:19

So that is also a cooperative one , huh .

Speaker 2 49:22

Yeah , most cooperative games work well , solo yeah .

Speaker 1 49:27

Because you were also saying that that other one , the fellowship of the ring trick-taking game , was a solo one too , weren't you ?

Speaker 2 49:38

yeah , you can . You can play it solo . I I wouldn't , but yeah , I know people do okay well , I'll have to give that one a go .

Speaker 1 49:48

Yeah , all right , is that thematic , thematic , james . Yes that is the word Remind me thematic , it's just like .

Speaker 2 50:00

It kind of immerses you in the world . The mechanisms tie closely to what you're doing in the game . Yes , yes , yes .

Speaker 1 50:07

Okay , runner-ups , let's go to Japanapan and the lord of the rings . Duel for middle earth . Duel for middle earth , that's different from no wait .

Speaker 2 50:18

That is the , the , um that's the one that won two player game two player one yeah , I don't know , I to me the runners up here the .

Speaker 1 50:32

You can't see yourself dressing up like gollum and eating like a , like a freshly caught fish just I like that .

Speaker 2 50:40

It's that theme , but at the end of the day they just threw the theme on there .

Speaker 1 50:44

It's not like they were , because seven wonders was already there . It was already just yeah yeah .

Speaker 2 50:50

So it's like how sure you you made it work . But when I think of a thematic game , I think of somebody like um freshwater fly . They clearly wanted to design the game about fly fishing and they started from that idea . This is is okay . We have a theme , we have a game that we know is good . Let's go ahead and figure out a way to make that work . And let's go to Japan . I'm sure if you're into Japan , like it's cool to see those places , but the gameplay itself it's a drafting game , Like it could have been anything . You know , it's SETI . I will say oh sorry , I jumped to the winner ?

Speaker 1 51:32

Go ahead , Tell us the winner . Seti search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence .

Speaker 2 51:38

If you recall my excitement about SETI , it was all theme-related , because these type of heavy games usually put me off and I really felt like the theme was integrated well in that game Sending your probes out to different planets , finding traces of aliens . When you find enough traces , the alien gets revealed . It gives a different feel to the game . So I thought SETI is a good winner , especially compared to the runners-up here .

Speaker 1 52:06

Weren't you just saying maybe just Add a mini or something like that , or maybe that was Travis .

Speaker 2 52:12

Yeah , he's a big mini guy . I won't cry about it either . More plastic right , all about it .

Speaker 1 52:21

War game of the year . We got runner up Dune War for Arrakis and a jest Of Robin Hood Dune . Have I played Dune War for Arrakis and A Jest of Robin Hood Dune ? Have I played Dune War for Arrakis ?

Speaker 2 52:35

No .

Speaker 1 52:37

Not in theorem right . Is this giving off Risk vibes ?

Speaker 2 52:45

This is a big , big boy game . This exceeds anything I've ever played . A big . This is a big , big boy game . This exceeds anything I've ever played . Um , it's . It's a re-implementation of war of the ring . Okay , Um , which is a huge thematic game about Lord of the rings , and it's a bucket list game for me . I really want to play this at some point . It's a two player game . One person is I don't know One person's to play this at some point . It's a two-player game . One person is I don't know One person's playing as Paul and company trying to lead the Fremen . The other person's I'm assuming the Harkonnens . And yeah , yeah , big , big time game . I would love to play it , but I can't speak too much on it . I have no , I know nothing about , just of Robin hood .

Speaker 1 53:32

Yeah , so . So Dune war for Iraq , it sounds like a good one for the board game ranch . Uh , operation game night meetup should be in person war meetup , kind of like a what do you call that in military terms where we converge , you know , culminate at a single point . I think that maybe put that on the calendar . Uh , and the winner , okay , of the war game section is arcs again what has there ?

Speaker 1 54:07

it goes head to head . Yeah , I just remember uh , blasting or no , I was getting blasted by cole . Yep , I was not blasting cole , cole was definitely grabbing the red die and doing all the blast . Yeah , when I played arcs . Definitely want to play that one again .

Speaker 2 54:25

Um , yeah ,

Party Games and Print-and-Play Winners

Speaker 2 54:26

uh , what were you gonna say ? Yeah , we've said we've , no , we've said enough about arcs .

Speaker 1 54:30

That's what else you have to say about it best board game app clank and code names runner-ups , code names got got its own app , wow , apparently . So . Do you think it's like a different adaptation , like like a heads up type thing ?

Speaker 2 54:49

I have no idea .

Speaker 1 54:52

Well , it's definitely got to be like maybe iPad version , where it's like just on the table .

Speaker 2 54:58

I think maybe it's like a dispersed version , I don't know .

Speaker 1 55:03

I'm actually a huge fan of code names . I like trying to get words , combined words , into one . That's why I really like that song Clover . Yeah , interesting , I'll have to check it out . You know me not a huge fan of spending money , so apps , maybe Christmas money , I don't know . But the winner which I'm really interested in , the winner of the board game app , dune Imperium . Also , this is on Steam as well , very well adapted , but it's on the World Series of . Isn't this a World Series of board gaming , dune ?

Speaker 2 55:52

Uprising .

Speaker 1 55:53

They don't have the Uprising , I don't think , as a Steam app yet . So I'm interested in if they're going to do that , Hopefully soon . But yeah , the Dune Imperium . The app looks super clean . It's like 10 bucks . Still haven't bought it because I'm a cheap ass .

Speaker 2 56:14

Um we need to . Let's just , let's just pony up the money , let's each get it and let's start a game . It's do that for me . It's such a good game for me , I would do that for you . Okay , I'll demo'll Venmo you $10 right after this . No , I'll Venmo Travis too . Actually , I'm kind of done with Travis until he tells us how good we did on the podcast last week .

Speaker 1 56:37

Come on .

Speaker 2 56:39

You know what ?

Speaker 1 56:40

I bet you man , I'm done with him . Oh , he just messaged us . Oh my gosh , yeah , he literally just did . I just got his ears were tingling . He literally just did .

Speaker 2 56:55

That's wild . He wants to record with us tomorrow , oh , my gosh , that ship is sailed , buddy .

Speaker 1 57:03

We just cut him off , all right . Well , I already hinted at this fact . Uh , best podcast of the year , not operation game night . Maybe next year when we do this podcast runner-ups , space biff , space cast , have you ?

Speaker 2 57:22

have you heard ?

Speaker 1 57:22

that one . No , uh , board game hot takes .

Speaker 2 57:25

You have talked about them yeah , I like , I like board game hot takes they're . They're one of my favorites out there , so good for them getting the runner-up with they have witty banter their banter is witty nice , yeah do you think they would do .

Speaker 1 57:42

They want to do a mash with us . How many of them ?

Speaker 2 57:46

are there . There's four and three .

Speaker 1 57:50

I think there's three yeah , if you get six of us in the room , that's , oh my gosh , yeah , that's how many witty banters will ?

Speaker 2 57:57

there's too many witty banters to be had they take it seriously , though they don't like to get off topic too much . They their . Their thing is they get right into it . They . They get into their mission objective right out the hop . Yeah , they . They don't talk about your genitalia and they and in any way , it's just all business there's , there's , there's no skull king kinks no , no , no so .

Speaker 1 58:26

Oh man .

Speaker 2 58:27

Okay .

Speaker 1 58:31

And the winner .

Speaker 2 58:32

Beyond Solitaire . My God , hey , I downloaded it . I'm starting to listen .

Speaker 1 58:38

Hey , congrats to Beyond Solitaire . We are going to have to shoot her a little note . I did look her up on Instagram right before we started the recording . Congrats , there's only one of her , I think . Yeah , I think that's a good collab that would be easy to do witty banter with one .

Speaker 2 59:02

I haven't listened so maybe she is also very straight to the point .

Speaker 1 59:04

I don't listened , so maybe she is also very straight to the point . I don't know .

Speaker 2 59:11

No , she seems from the half episode I listened to that . She could go on a tangent with you if you wanted .

Speaker 1 59:18

All right , I love it . Okay , I saved the last three . I think it's G-O-T-Y Game of the Year .

Speaker 2 59:25

Okay , yeah , you nailed it , jared , I saved the best for last , I think , is G O T Y game of the year . Okay , yeah , well , you've nailed it .

Speaker 1 59:30

I saved the best for last , I think , uh , the light game of the year runner ups captain , flip and flip seven Love them .

Speaker 2 59:44

Lots of flipping seven . 10 minutes before this podcast , 10 minutes before this podcast , I was playing Captain Flip with the kids .

Speaker 1 59:50

Mate Mace is all about Captain Flip . I'm afraid to play with him because he's going to kick my butt . He was talking trash to me when I was there for spring break .

Speaker 2 1:00:00

He would , does he ?

Speaker 1 1:00:01

have a BGA .

Speaker 2 1:00:03

He does .

Speaker 1 1:00:04

Oh , no , okay , he definitely is going to kick my butt .

Speaker 2 1:00:06

I'm going to send him for you . No , Does he play Flip 7 ? Oh yeah , he plays Flip 7 .

Speaker 1 1:00:14

Well , I might have to send him an invite to that one too . And the winner of the light game of the year , castle Combo . Never played Castle Combo .

Speaker 2 1:00:24

I have played Castle Combo . It's on Bga , jared . It's a lot of fun . It's one of those type of games I I want to play it again . I've played a couple times on bga and I've played it in person more it looks very wind , but essentially .

Speaker 2 1:00:38

Yeah , you're making a , not a three by three grid and you're drafting cards to fill out your grid . Each card has a scoring criteria , so I score three points If you have two cards with this tag on it . You know it's just . It's that type of game super quick , fun . You know , you play nine turns , you get nine cards and you're done and over with . So it's . I think it's a good , good choice . I do want to play it some more .

Speaker 1 1:01:05

Medium game of the year , runner up Lord of the Rings duel for Middle Earth and Endeavor Deep Sea , which .

Speaker 2 1:01:14

I know a little about . I've not . I know next to nothing about Endeavor Deep Sea . It's kind of a blind spot for me here Weight 2.89 . Okay .

Speaker 1 1:01:27

It's got a lot of little chittens , a lot of cars . It does look maybe on the medium to heavy side , but it looks like you are going deep .

Speaker 2 1:01:44

Yeah , and the other runner-up , lord of the Rings 2 for Middle Earth , I think great game , so I had no , no complaints about it being nominated for medium game of the year from me . My only complaint is that it didn't win well , the winner harmonies that one's on bga harmonies . Well yeah , harmonies is great . You gotony is great .

Speaker 1 1:02:07

You got that one live .

Speaker 2 1:02:10

I got that one live . It's brain-burning though . It's a lot of spatial reasoning trying to figure out how to set up your little environment so that you create the right space for the different animals . Then you can put the animal cubes on top of it , and it's a lot of spatial reasoning and puzzling which burns my brain , um , but it's great to look at . It's quick . Rules are pretty simple , so a great choice . I think it's gonna bring a lot of people into the hobby , so I I won't cry too much about lord of the rings duel for middle earth not winning I .

Speaker 1 1:02:46

It's always good to have animal vibes with hexagons . Yeah , bringing in good harmony vibes with your animals . So congratulations , harmonies , and then big boys , big boy , game nights . For the end , bring out the heavyweights Sivolution and Arx runner-ups .

Speaker 2 1:03:12

Sivolution , someone debriefed this one for sure , right ? I think I mentioned it with Tara because she was talking about it's a Steppenfeld game , so designer of Castles of Burgundy , and this is a game where apparently you roll dice to take actions , but it's just way heavier . I have not had the urge to try it . Oh my gosh , it looks thick . Yeah , it sounds like it's a lot . But Arx I love Arx sounds like it's a lot , um , but arcs I love arcs . That's a , that's a great . I don't even arcs does not feel that heavy to me . Honestly , it's like I talked about a couple weeks ago . I think it's the easiest of the leader games to kind of explain and wrap your head around , but just to run her up here , but the winner and Operation Game Night frenemy Bad boy , I don't know , seti Big boy winner .

Speaker 1 1:04:24

Heavy winner . Game of the year SETI Search for extraterrestrial intelligence . Heavy winner . Game of the year SETI search for extraterrestrial intelligence it's a big boy .

Speaker 2 1:04:34

It's a big boy but , like I said before , the theme tied it all together for me and it just made sense . So for a heavy game it has my vote . I don't think ARX is in the same category weight-wise . Maybe I'm just that far off . But to me ARX feels a lot easier to teach and play than SETI . But you know it won't .

Speaker 1 1:05:06

I do like the vibes of like you're , you are traveling around the sun , right , so like you can time your orbit and like hop on and off and stuff oh yeah , yeah it's .

Speaker 2 1:05:18

There's a lot to think about and resources are tight and uh , but it's . It's a good game . And you got those multi-use cards where you can trash them just to get a benefit . You can play them to your income slot so that every round you get bonuses from them , or you can just play them for their powerful abilities . The cards have so many uses , so much to think about , and it's well-integrated with its theme . I think it's well-y , it's just well . I think it's well integrated .

Speaker 1 1:05:54

Oh yeah you're right .

Speaker 2 1:05:55

I think , jeez , we better shut her down , jared .

Speaker 1 1:06:00

You've been cutting too much weight . You got a trash bag underneath that sweatsuit . It's going to take a couple more laps to get down to 169 . Yeah , did we do it . I think that's what Travis says .

Speaker 2 1:06:21

Yeah , oh man we missed him .

Speaker 1 1:06:25

Can we have him back next week ? Please come back . I think it's time to go over

Reflecting on Biking Misadventures

Speaker 1 1:06:32

the fence . What a great , what a great week . What did you do outside of board gaming this week , clay ?

Speaker 2 1:06:45

What did I do outside of board gaming this week ? I went mountain biking with Spanky yesterday , which was a good time .

Speaker 1 1:06:53

No one broke an arm or had to get light flighted . I always get scared when you two go biking .

Speaker 2 1:07:01

Yeah , he's taking lessons and he's a lot better . Yeah , he's been taking lessons , but we rode up the Blodgett ride . We're talking like 900 feet of elevation gain in like a mile , just miserable . And I was thinking about how I took you on that ride with your not even real mountain bike and you were just falling off into the bushes and I that was that was a poor decision I was . I was actually going to bring it up if you weren't so uh no , actually I wasn't so for the listener .

Speaker 1 1:07:41

Uh , this was like I mean , I just moved to colorado springs as 21 and , yeah , clay's like , yeah , you can come on up here . I haven't even acclimated to the , to the uh altitude yet and let's just go on this like triple diamond um bike ride . I don't know if that's even a thing . Um , we start hauling ass down this downhill . Uh , my bike is like I don't't know like eight years old by this time and , uh , no shocks in the back and clay is already , like you know , 100 , maybe 200 yards in front of me and doesn't , like you know , give me an indication that there's like a three foot drop on one of these locations . We're probably going 20 miles an hour maybe , and I slam on my brakes because I'm a little scaredy cat . Well , you're supposed to go maybe fast off of those so that you can kind of like boom .

Speaker 1 1:08:37

Yeah , I was not pre-briefed and well , I slowed down and nosedived Bike went into the barbed wire fence , I was cut up . Well , clay was , he was on his way and so I had to handle myself and I was many minutes behind him . Um , and uh , I think Adrian Mary were not pleased with us , but I , I think , I , I think I went again Um , can't remember what happened yeah , that's on you .

Speaker 1 1:09:11

The second , the second time something else happened . I think I went .

Speaker 2 1:09:14

I did go ahead head over again oh I , I think I remember you falling off going uphill yeah , I went backwards , yeah yeah , we were going up a , really it was it was like a slow fall backwards , yeah . I was watching it and you just slowly fell off the side . I used that bike .

Speaker 1 1:09:34

But now I attached like a trailer for Gemma and I just go around the neighborhood now no jumping or doing anything crazy . I'm glad that you guys got out and saw nature and breathed some fresh air .

Speaker 2 1:09:51

Getting my last few rides out here in Colorado . Yeah , and be different biking out there , lots of roots and just a different vibe .

Speaker 1 1:10:02

They got mountains in Pennsylvania .

Speaker 2 1:10:06

Oh , come on , Jared , they're hills man . Yeah , we're out here in the Rocky Mountains , right Live at the base of Pike's freaking peak .

Speaker 1 1:10:14

I love it . Yeah , I miss it .

Speaker 2 1:10:17

So what have you been doing ?

Speaker 1 1:10:19

I think I mentioned wrapping up school , but I was going to do a quick shout out to our alma mater . They're wrapping up their school over there at the Air Force Academy . I got hit up my students when I was teaching math at the Air Force Academy prep school my students when I was teaching math the first year . They're about to find out their AFSCs , their jobs in the air force . I feel like that's really really like they're not even seniors yet , like your brother is not even graduated yet and he and uh . So I got reached out , um to , I provided a video , um for some support for one of my old students . Give them a shout out . I just think it's really neat seeing these young rock stars grow up and they're about to be seniors next year . It's wild . And your brother is about to graduate in the next couple weeks , yep , just a huge shout-out to everybody at the Air Force Academy . Big changes coming up this summer , you know , classes moving on and moving up . It's beautiful , it's really cool .

Speaker 1 1:11:50

Shout out to all my preppies about to be seniors . Keep doing big things .

Speaker 2 1:11:59

I'm going to take a picture of us on here for Travis .

Speaker 1 1:12:05

Just to be like yo .

Speaker 2 1:12:08

Yeah , we're doing it right now . I'm going to respond to his message . He just wants to F off for a couple weeks and then expect to just hop in at the last minute .

Speaker 1 1:12:21

Here , man , as the host , how do I end it ?

Speaker 2 1:12:33

You did it last week . Um , it's something about , oh yeah , yeah , I've been .

Speaker 1 1:12:35

Yeah , I have been jared , he has been . Clay travis has been hanging out in the fjords . We'll see you next week . Thanks for watching .