How to Beat Your Kids at Board Games

In this episode HTBYKABG crafts creative and killer strategies for the EUro-Style Board Game Carcassone. Brought into being by Klaus Jürgen Wrede and Hans im Glück, Carcassonne is the second of the “Big Four” Eurogames. Relatively quick to play, Carcassonne offers plenty of catharsis, from the satisfaction of completing a project of your own to the schadenfreude of sabotaging your opponents’ plans. Learn how to build effective roads and cities, snake onto your opponents’ projects, and utilize the throughput mindset to maximize your Meeple.

After a rough quarter at school, the HTBYKABG duo is back at it this Holiday season! In "Getting a Clue," An ostensibly simple game, Clue has much more to offer than meets the eye. Dan and John run through how to optimize your information processing with the Sherlock Sheet, as well as some more dastardly tactics to mislead, block, and even teleport your opponents. These principles will get you closer to dominating the deductive domain that is Clue!

Sources:

Rulebook - https://www.fgbradleys.com/rules/Clue.pdf

How not to play - https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/149708/day-i-murdered-clue-why-ill-never-play-again

How TO play - https://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/19573

Dan and John open an exciting new series called Family Game Night. We invite three of our favorite family members on the show to talk about one of our favorite family games: Cards Against Humanity. Learn about different styles of play, how to deny points to your strongest opponents, and whether it pays to care!

Sources:

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cards_Against_Humanity

In this exciting episode, Dan and John teach you how to sail across the sea and build a thriving settlement up from the dust...minus the sailing part. We could fill a hundred podcasts’ worth with analysis of this amazing game (many have...see our sources below!), but here we cover the essentials of settlement positioning, trading strategy, resource management, and victory conditions, along with some key tactics and helpful maxims to aid you in gaining the edge on your opponents!

Find Dayton's Better Bread on Instagram:

https://www.instagram.com/daytons_better_bread_company/

Sources:

Board Game Geek:

https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/402618/settlers-catan-strategy-tips

Strategy Guide (with Pictures!):

https://www.instructables.com/id/Catan-strategy-guide/

DyLighted - Catan (YouTube channel):

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUsKNYO4po7rXrKJ2K8v42g

Treeckosaurus (YouTube channel):

https://www.youtube.com/user/Treeckosaurus

In this episode, John and Dan share their knowledge on the award-winning cooperative game Pandemic in the middle of a real pandemic (Luckily, we don’t all have to be in the same city to share this knowledge!). Learn how to prevent outbreaks, maximize the efficiency of your scourge-stomping machine, and save humanity from not one but FOUR deadly diseases.

Sources

Origin:

Pretty extensive article: https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2016-05-04-the-making-of-pandemic-the-board-game-that-went-viral

Rules:

https://www.zmangames.com/en/products/pandemic/

Strategy:

Strategy Discussion Forum: https://boardgamegeek.com/forum/4634/pandemic/strategy

Take a look around and you'll find tons of resources here!

Quick Strategy - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=la5VS-9mldU

Strategy Primer - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9q9jTNz0Adg

Ranking the Characters - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMR6xQKDpVY

Basic Tips (Mostly qualitative): https://www.ultraboardgames.com/pandemic/tips.php

In this episode, John and Dan run through everyone’s America’s most colorful card game. Learn about point play, how to determine which cards to shed and which to hold, and even discover some intriguing house rules.

Sources:

Originsof UNO:

https://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/leisure/brain-games/uno.htm

Rules of UNO:

https://www.unorules.com/

https://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/leisure/brain-games/uno1.htm

https://www.letsplayuno.com/news/guide/20181213/30092_732567.html

Strategy of UNO:

https://boardgames.stackexchange.com/questions/13162/what-specific-strategies-have-the-highest-winloss-ratio-in-uno

https://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/leisure/brain-games/uno2.htm

For Fun:

http://www.unotips.org/

All featured music written and produced by George Shenusay.

The HTBYKABG crew sails through the classic naval combat game, Battleship. We go over sound principles for placing place your ships and. Even more exciting, we discuss the best ways to seek out and destroy your opponent from the carrier down to the patrol boat. Finally, we dig up some juicy rule variants and their effects on game play. Like a properly placed round, this episode packs a punch.

Resources:

Origins:

Hinebaugh, Jeffrey P. (2009). A Board Game Education. R&L Education

"Salvo Is New Game With a Nautical Air". The Milwaukee Journal. 1 July 1931. Retrieved 18 February 2013.

Rules:

Milton Bradley: https://www.cs.nmsu.edu/~bdu/TA/487/brules.htm

Hasbro (Salvo included): https://www.hasbro.com/common/instruct/Battleship.PDF

Strategy:

Paper with search algorithm - http://www.datagenetics.com/blog/december32011/

Other tips –

https://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/leisure/brain-games/battleship-game2.htm

https://www.ultraboardgames.com/battleship/tips.php

All music produced by George Shenusay and used by permission.

In this episode, Dan and John switch it up with a game you probably first heard of through your grandparents. Backgammon Basics covers a repertoire of useful backgammon terms and concepts, including anchors, builders, primes, blots, and more. Along the way, you might even figure out what a pip is.

Resources:

CheckerPlay website: http://www.checkerplay.com/

Backgammon history: https://board-games-galore.fandom.com/wiki/Backgammon

Rules: https://www.bkgm.com/rules.html

All featured music produced by George Shenusay and used by permission.

In this installment, Dan and John teach you how to conquer the world! Discussion topics abound as the HTBYKABG duo tackles their most complex game yet. Learn how to judge your opening position, efficiently manage your troops, make (and break) alliances, and, last but not least, how to finish off your opponents. Like a good game of Risk, this episode is jam-packed with twists and turns that will leave you ready to tackle your next reinforcement phase.

Resources:

The Strategy of Risk – Paper by Garrett Robinson: https://web.mit.edu/sp.268/www/risk.pdf

Rule Book: https://www.hasbro.com/common/instruct/risk.pdf

All featured music produced by George Shenusay and used by permission.

Dan and John walk through the mechanics and strategy of Parcheesi, The Classic Game of India. After touching on some common misunderstandings of the rules, we roll a couple 5’s and enter into the tactics regarding blockades, captures, safe spaces, and more, all the while doing the math for you.

Sources

Rules:

https://www.fgbradleys.com/rules/Parcheesi.pdf

Strategy:

https://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/leisure/brain-games/parcheesi2.htm

Origins:

https://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/leisure/brain-games/parcheesi3.htm

All featured music produced by George Shenusay and used by permission.