Our 5/29 session will feature both word and deduction games. Expect to play from among: Mysterium, Paint the Roses, Veiled Fate, Mind MGMT, Cryptid, Code 777, The Number, Captain SONAR, Sleuth, Paperback, Message From the Stars, Fiction, Big Boggle….and more

Camel Up (led by Tim) 2014 SdJ winner where players bet on five racing camels, trying to figure out which will place first and second in a quick race around a pyramid. The earlier you place your bet, the more you can win — should you guess correctly, of course. Camels don’t run neatly, however, sometimes landing on top of another one and being carried toward the finish line. Who’s going to run when? That all depends on how the dice come out of the pyramid dice shaker, which releases one die at a time when players pause from their bets long enough to see who’s actually moving!

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/153938/camel-up

Lacorsa: Grand Prix Game (led by Sean) 2018 abstraction of GP racing that simulates race cars overtaking each other by challenging the drivers ahead of them through clever card play and hand management. A single race takes 10-15 minutes but a series of races is the norm with placing points earned for each race added together to determine the winner. The game can be played individually for 4-6 players or as 3 teams of two cars.

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/157406/lacorsa-grand-prix-game

Powerships (led by Tim)  2018 revision of 2008’s Corne van Moorsel’s Powerboats, where players are spaceship pilots trying to maneuver their powership quickly, while rounding three space buoys and finally landing on the finish planet. As with Powerboats, players are trying to find and navigate that perfect path using 3-sided dice to control speed and inertia. Obstacles like planets, space dust and special spaces add some challenges and spice.

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/222821/powerships

Thunder Road: Vendetta (led by Sean) 2023 restored/revised version of the classic 1986 Milton Bradley game of mayhem on the asphalt. Players grab their crew, roll their dice, race their cars, shoot their guns, and try not to get wrecked. Players rocket their team of three cars and a helicopter down a stretch of post-apocalyptic highway and try to either wipe out the other teams or outdistance them and leave them in the dust. Each turn consists of a dice roll to determine car movement and a combat phase where you try to shoot or ram your opponents. The game board consists of two pieces of highway and when the lead car exits the front piece of highway, the back piece is placed in front (after dumping all the wrecks and slowpokes off of it) thus creating a never-ending game board. This new version features exciting new additions, including random hazard tokens, such as wrecks, oil slicks, and more. Damage isn’t merely one and done. Now, players draw damage tokens with exciting effects that can send their cars careening across the board. Players also have more choices on their turn, assigning one of their dice to their command board to repair damage, nitro boost, or send out their attack copter to fire away.

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/342070/thunder-road-vendetta

Ave Caesar (led by K-ban) 1989 classic game set in the Roman stadium Circus Maximus. Players use cards to move their chariots around a track that has several bottlenecks and lane-changing restrictions, which make the race interesting/nasty for the racers. Players are required to race three laps, and they must stop to ‘Hail Caesar’ before they can finish the race. The game is light, but tactical card play and taking the shortest path usually pays off handsomely. We played on the original Ravensburger edition. The game was reprinted with slight modifications in 2006 and 2022 and was also re-themed and revised for car racing in Ausgebremmst (1993) and spaceship racing in Q-Jet in 2004.

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/494/ave-caesar

Long Shot: Dice Game (led by Matt) 2022 roll & write revision to the Long Shot (2009) board game. Players strategize and push their luck as the action unfolds in a tense race of eight horses. During the game players buy horses, place bets, influence race movement, and utilize special abilities. The roll of the dice determines which horses move and the options available each turn, so plans need to be adapted on the fly. Once three horses cross the finish line, earnings are totaled. While there are many ways to earn money during a horse race, only the player that makes the most money will be declared the winner. 

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/295374/long-shot-the-dice-game

DownForce (led by K-ban) 2017 revision of Wolfgang Kramer’s Top Race (1996) (which revised Formel Eins/Nikki Lauda’s Formel Eins/Daytona 500/Detroit Cleveland Grand Prix – from the 1980’s and early 1990’s). In the entire series, players are dealt a hand of movement cards, purchase car ownership via auction to the highest bidder and prize money is earned for placing.  Top Race and DownForce added predicting the winners at 3 strategic points in the race to earn more prize money. The race courses have choke points and card play can be vicious. DownForce also adds driver abilities, but we played just the base game.

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/215311/downforce

Steve