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There’s a First Time For Everything Learning to play online board games isn’t hard, but it can feel overwhelming when you don’t know where to start. This is a quick intro to playing a game on one of the biggest and best on-line board game sites, Board Game Arena (BGA). If you join a board gaming group (like our meetup), people often learn new board games every time they go to a meeting. Someone will suggest a game, and if you don’t know it already and would like to learn it, they will usually explain it while getting the game started. Some games are easy to explain – the 6 nimmt! game we’ll talk about here only takes a couple of minutes to explain – while other more complicated games take a while. ...

Don’t Panic About the Jargon Ever joined a game night and felt like everyone was speaking in code? “This is a great engine-builder with some worker placement, but watch out for analysis paralysis!” If just getting started and wondering what any of that meant, you’re definitely not alone. The good news? Board game terminology isn’t as intimidating as it sounds. Most of these terms developed naturally as players needed ways to describe the clever mechanics and experiences that make modern games so engaging. Think of it like learning the vocabulary for any hobby you care about – once you know the basics, everything starts making much more sense. ...

What If Game Night Was the Answer All Along? Suddenly, making friends seems harder than learning the rules to Twilight Imperium. If you’ve ever moved to a new city and then realized your closest adult relationship is with your barista, you’re definitely not alone. Er, sorry. You are alone, but you can do something about that. Here’s what nobody warns you about adulthood: making friends gets really hard after college. It’s genuinely difficult in ways that would make your teenage self laugh. But it’s not just you – it’s actually a widespread problem that researchers call the “friendship recession.” ...