More on the 12 Games of Christmas

The 12 Games of Christmas has been going strong (much to the delight of my cat Thomasina, who loves games). Here are some of the games we've been playing:

Oz Fluxx and Cthulhu Fluxx

We played a couple of hands of Oz Fluxx with my brothers. They each won one. My wife gave her brother a copy of the Cthulhu version. I did not play with them (Dragon Age called) bu they tried it out.

Downton Abbey

A board game about the show. Players are servants at Downton Abbey. They are assigned tasks and must race around the house to complete them, upon which they earn "bells." The player who earns the most bells wins the game.

My wife called it a "baby game" (a term she learned from Felicia Day, one of the producers of Tabletop). By this, she means that there is not a lot of thought required. You have 3 tasks assigned to you so you can optimize your route, but that's about it. You are pretty much at the mercy of the dice and cards. Nevertheless, it was a fun diversion.

Twelve Days

A Christmas-themed trick-taking card game. Cards are the gifts from the song Twelve Days of Christmas so the deck has one partridge in a pear tree card, 2 turtle dove cards, etc. You play 12 tricks representing the 12 days. The point values increase per day (the first day is worth 1 point and the twelfth night is 12 points). First, each player must give a card to the player on their left, then players bid for the trick. The player who bids the lowest gets the trick. High cards have value, too. At the end of the game you earn bonus points for having the most of a numbered card. For example, if you had the most drummers drumming (12-point cards) you would get 12 bonus points.

This was a neat little card game. There is an interesting tension trying to decide what to give your neighboring player. Giving them low cards could help them win tricks but high cards could lead to bonus points. Also, it pays to conserve some of your low cards for the later tricks. It's an entertaining holiday game.

Courtier
By the same people and set in the same world as Love Letter, You are an influence peddler at the royal court of the kingdom. You gain points by fulfilling petitions, which you complete by influencing powerful members of court. It is essentially a resource management game with an intrigue at court theme.

This was a bit more difficult and longer than our usual games. Halfway through my wife commented that she liked it but it dragged a bit toward the end. It seems that this was partially due us only having 2 players. I think it would go quicker with 3-4. Another factor was that the end of game card was at the very bottom of the pile. A different shuffle could have ended the game earlier. Nevertheless, it was a more enjoyable challenge than Downton Abbey.

Dixit
My brothers visited Saturday night and we played Downton Abbey (which was a gift from one of my brothers). The hit of the night, though, was Dixit, which I described in an earlier post. After we finished one game, my brother wanted to play it again!

We finished the weekend with some more Cthulhu Fluxx last night. By my count, we actually played 14 games!