Topic: Table Top: web series about board games with Wil Wheaton

[idolminds]

Awesome

Last summer, Felicia Day asked me if I wanted to develop a show together for her new premium YouTube channel, Geek and Sundry.

Spoiler alert: I said yes.

She asked me if I wanted to do a show about gaming, maybe a review show or something like that.

"I think it would be more fun do something where we play games," I said. Then, the light bulb went off.

"Oh my god," I said, "What if we did something that was like Celebrity Poker meets Dinner for Five, where we got interesting people we know together for tabletop games?!"

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In season one of the show, we play games like Settlers of Catan, The Last Night on Earth, Munchkin, Small World, and Alhambra. Some of the players include Grant Imahara, Sean Plott (better known as Day[9]), Dodger Leigh, Ryan Higa, Beth Riesgraf, Phil Lamarr, Morgan Webb, Garfunkle and Oats, Veronica Belmont, and Colin Ferguson.

Sounds like it could be very entertaining.

[idolminds]

First episode is up.

Wil Wheaton and guests, Sean Plott (host of "Day9TV", a Starcraft II dedicated webcast on how to be a better gamer), Grant Imahara (host of Discovery Channel's "Mythbusters"), and Jenna Busch (geek blogger, writer and host) play Small World!

[idolminds]

Got around to watching this and I gotta say I liked it. Made me want to play Small World.

So the list so far for this season seems to be: Small World, Alhambra, Elder Sign, Settlers of Catan, The Last Night on Earth, Dixit, Munchkin, Star Fluxx, Say Anything, Fiasco, Dragon Age RPG...possibly more. There are some games they wanted to do but couldn't for various reasons, like Dominion and Ascension didn't work well in a "TV" format because all the fun in those games are whats going on in your head. He also said they wanted to do Arkham Horror but the games are long so hard to trim down to the 30 minutes the shows run without losing a lot, plus the board is huge so its harder to film properly. Thats why they went with Elder Sign instead.

[K-man]

I would love to own that table and have friends interested in board games to sit around it with me and play stuff.

[Cools!]

I'd be happy with just having friends.

[Quemaqua]

I would love to own that table and have friends interested in board games to sit around it with me and play stuff.

You and me both, brother.

[idolminds]

Episode 2: Settlers of Catan

Interesting, I've read a lot about the game but haven't seen it played before. Its interesting.

Next episode looks like they are playing several smaller games: Zombie Dice, Get Bit, and Tsuro.

[idolminds]

Episode 3: Zombie Dice, Get Bit!, and Tsuro. Tsuro looks really cool and Zombie Dice would be more fun if someone didn't get a runaway lead on their first turn like that...

Episode 4: Ticket To Ride. I love TTR despite never playing the physical version. Theres a pretty hilarious moment starting at the 23 minute mark, so at least see that.

Next episode is going to be Munchkin!

[Pugnate]

hahah gosh!

[idolminds]

Munchkin, and they are playing with Steve Jackson himself!

[idolminds]

This time they play Gloom! We were looking at this one at the meet, so now you can see how it plays. Sadly our game would probably have fewer cute chicks playing.

[idolminds]

Elder Sign!

[Quemaqua]

I still haven't watched one of these.

[Cools!]

Neither have I.

[idolminds]

Bumping because this game looks pretty fun: Unspeakable Words

And since apparently no one watches these anyway (sigh) I'll explain this one. Also because its simple.

Imagine Scrabble but played with cards. Each letter has a point value, but the value is based on how many "angles" make up the letter. "O" is worth no points, "H" is worth 4 (it has 4 right angles in it). You spell words to earn points. So far its pretty typical.

But this one is Cthulhu themed! You have 5 sanity points that you kinda sorta want to hang on to. When you play a word you must roll a 20 sided die. You must match or beat the word score or you will lose one sanity. So that 15 point word is totally awesome but also going to be difficult to play without losing sanity. When you lose all your sanity you are out of the game. BUT...when you are down to a single sanity point you are insane and the rules of spelling no longer apply to you. You can throw down anything you want for points but still have to cling to your sanity to win.

The Tabletop episode kinda sucked because 3 of the 4 players lost all their sanity in a single round so they didnt really get to play in the crazy phase for long. But it still looked rather fun.