Lake Life Likes
DOMINION
It is the game that started a new genre: Deckbuilding. Rio Grande Games came up with this game back in 2008, and since, they have added countless expansion packs. The thing about this game, you may say it has A LOT of rules. But really there is just the knowledge of how to win which is to deplete the providence pile or 3 supply piles and have the most victory points at that time, and then cards tell you how to play the rest. I do have one house rule...don't let Brad, my husband win. I guess this is a rule for any game. Team up on the guy! We have a score sheet that was started during the pandemic, and if you tally it up, I am sure, Brad has the most wins by a lot. My philosophy is, if you become his ally, in the end you just helped him win. The chances to win are better to get everyone against him. Anyway...Back to the actual game.
In the box of Dominion, there are 25 different supply decks. Each game you only use 10. You can see here how every game would then have a different strategy with a different combination of cards on how you acquire enough coins and supply cards to buy the victory points. Every round you purchase cards. Anything from action cards, treasure cards or a victory point. Every round your deck gets larger and larger all in the goal to get the most victory points at the end.
My sister gifted us the First Edition Dominion game. We played and played that game until the cards now feel a bit warn and sticky. During the pandemic, our family started buying an expansion pack a month. It was like the incentive to staying healthy and make quarantine worth it. Survived another month, order me up an expansion. Every time we did this, we added another 25 supply cards to our supply, which was then mixed in with the rest. Instead of having 6-7-8 boxes of expansions to hunt through we unloaded Brad's baseball cards and used those sleeves and binders to hold our Dominion cards. I also downloaded a Dominion mixer app where you check the boxes you have and it pulls 10 cards out for you at random. We grab the cards and the game begins.
They recommend kids to be 13 years and up. I believe my girls started at 10 or 11. They just need to be able to read the cards and do what they say.
This is my go-to game. At night sometimes while I am cooking the Dominion binders appear. You can get one game done in about 30 minutes or sometimes less. Which makes the game addicting. I was so close! Let's just do one more game, is heard a lot when the count is over and the trophy awarded. It is one to have in your closet for the real gamers. And if you would not consider yourself a gamer, try this game and you will change your mind.
DUTCH BLITZ
Fast paced, card game for the whole family! No really, this one is good for everyone! But beware, if you have some competitive people in your family it might start some feuds. This card game is Solitaire on steroids. Matching colors, going in numerical order, clearing out your "post pile." This game is for 2-4 people, can go up to 8 if you get the expansion pack. The more the merrier..and the more intense. When playing this with groups of friends, you may want to discard your chairs, you won't be sitting anyway. You may also want to make sure that the surface you play on is sturdy, sometimes when you have to reach across to add your card to the table you may bump if not land on the table itself, not that I am speaking from experience or anything, speed is essential when it comes to playing your card! And if you have some neighbors close by you might want to warn them there will be yelling. You do have the few that try and cheat their way to a win because they cant stand loosing and watch out for those that create their own rules! This is one that you will start and not want to stop, we have played for hours on end.
