I have so few people to play with that I will prefer to teach to every noobs than don't play.

For me: Root. Lovely game but it's like having to teach 4-6 people 4-6 different boardgames, each faction plays completely differently.

Playing Resistance with a bunch of newbies, the girl next to me decided she wouldn't be a very good spy. So the cards are dealt out, we all look at our roles, then she places her card face-down, slowly reaches over to my card, looks at it, then swaps her card with mine. I just stared in awe and said "Are you serious?" "It's fine, don't worry," she said. I then had to explain to her how integral to the game it is that we DO NOT know what those cards are and how doing what she did just screwed over that game. Thankfully, Resistance games are very quick and you can start again very easily, but I was just flabbergasted at how she just casually gave away her spy card and didn't think it would affect the game at all.

You guys were in rare form today! Kudos on the high energy, the comedic timing, and the positive outlook on a negative topic. I loved this.

Betrayal at House on the Hill is one where the whole experience can fall apart, particularly if the "noob" is the one who is affected by the Haunt. Not everyone wants to be presented with a rulebook and told to go away for 15 minutes to study.

I dont hate teaching any new players any of our games, but I hate their expectations. They seem to either think 1) I'm going to win, or compete. That simply learning the game on your first play is not enough. Then they get upset when they lose badly despite Improving as the game goes on. 2) Or they have this weird idea that if they win on their first play, or even come close, the game is garbage because an inexperienced player can win.

just wanted to say i love your shows. the chemistry between you guys is getting so good. keep it up, i'm learning a lot

The first 3-way crossover happening on #3?! THE END IS NIGH.

38:26 I had a similar, yet different scenario; a serious tournament player was to my right in a 8-player game. Seeing pity on me for how noob I was, he skipped me and eliminated every other player around the table. He finished killing the person to the right, leaving just me and him. It's my turn. I calculate if I attack with everything, and what he could block. Yes! I would have him at -3 and win! "I attack with everything...I think that's game." "No...wait...I block with THIS, then this." He was blocking in unexpected ways I hadn't planed for! "I'm at 1 life." "Oh...Onyx Goblet." (Artifact. Tap to deal 1 damage to a player) He looked at me, then the card and I chuckled. He looked back to me, slowly put back together his deck...put it back in his box...walked out to where everyone else was waiting...and started tO WALK OUT THE DOOR and the host had to stop him.

It would be nice to see a follow-up video to this where you could discuss how to learn some of these games. I feel like there are different takeaways - play Peurto Rico on the app to learn the strategy, learn hearts before trying Nyet, watch a game of Resistance before playing (I'm winging it now - you get the idea) :) Maybe it's even a whole other list(s) - the top 10 games you should learn to play with other noobs, or the top 10 games you should watch some youtube videos, then try playing...

I would actually say that Shadows Over Camelot is one of those games where you can’t teach and walk away. You have to teach it and play with them. Maybe a future top ten?

This was the most entertaining top 10 video I've seen you guys do. Loved it!

Great idea! This is one of my favorite Top 10's. Thanks guys!

This was my favorite top 10 ever. laughed out loud multiple times. I think you guys seriously were saying... if I want to enjoy playing a game, I'm not teaching this. I know if you were asked you would do it.

Just want to say I appreciate your guys' work. You all have a great dynamic and have created something useful with your channel. Thanks for getting me into the hobby. Cheers.

I hate teaching Android Netrunner to new people, cuz it takes me several days to get all the rules across :p

I for one cannot play 7 wonders with noobs. Because the people next to the noob are going to get fed science the whole freaking game.

Fun video. I find myself teaching games quite frequently, and Race for the Galaxy is a favorite to play, so I've taught it a lot. It's definitely not an easy one to teach!

I’m digging these old videos. I think one of my favorite things is how much Tom enjoys Zee. To be clear, Zee cracks me up, but when he makes Tom laugh it reminds me of being with my best friend. ❤

Betrayal at House on the Hill. Having a random event that determines who the traitor or enemy makes it super difficult to prepare people for the game.

Been away from the channel awhile. Tom became a leprechaun, and production has improved! Great job guys.

For our first few games of Hanabi as a group, we allowed hinting to each other at what a good clue would be, and we gradually took away the ability to speak.

There's a similar problem to Puerto Rico in drafting games where a newb can pass cards on that they really shouldn't pass on. So the person after them can benefit hugely.

As a person who tends to teach folks who are new to board games, while teaching them, I would play in a way where I go out of my way to make the new player 'Take that' by drawing cards, blocking certain actions they might want etc. and not counting points/working towards victory conditions. When I explain what I just did, they're like 'ohhhh' and then they want to use that sort of technique on me or try a variation of it. Plus, at the end, when counting points, the 'Take that' style tends to make the points end up pretty close. If the noob losses, they feel like they could have gotten over the hump with more familiarity and want to play again. If the noob wins, they get so hyped by beating the experienced player that they want to play again. As the experienced player, you enjoy yourself because you don't have to handicap yourself much and you can also practice different strategies/plays/setups while teaching. Win win situation all around.

The cover of Twilight Imperium just screams "Try me out!" What a great collage of artworks

A game of thrones - the board game. It combines length of rules explanation and length of playtime with the fact that 1 uncareful order can make your neighbour overwhelm you and win almost for sure. You need several matches of experience or you are crushed by your neighbour leaving all other houses behind in frustration.

Before even watching this video, I have a feeling TI3 will be high on Sam's list.

Best episode EVER! You guys are f..... hilarious.

To teach Magic, I've actually built some basic, cheap decks to play with so I don't outright steamroll people, cause if I use one of my built decks, while they're not crazy powerful, they're way too much for a new player to handle.

I feel they really should have called this Top 10 Games We Hate to Teach.

One of your best top 10s ever, thanks guys.

To me the most enervating kind of "playing with new players"-experience is, when the game played is designed around the concept of all players playing to prevent the leading player(s) from winning ... and then you have some new player who starts holding a grudge and instead of preventing the leading player from winning he/she starts ignoring everything and mindlessly retaliating towards a single player for some action taken against him. Well, basically and don't like games of that type very much anymore. Munchkin would be one popular example which I might enjoy once every two years, but it's not something I'd bring to the table myself.

One of the best lists from you guys, I agree with most your picks, especially your top 3. I only missed Alchemists up there. A huge ordeal to teach that game, it's not only a Deduction game (ala Zee's 2 pick) but a pretty hefty Worker Placement game on top of it. And then the last round enters play and minds are blown. Such a great game though...

Cool. I love the music in the end!

Great to watch the team together !

Sam's comments about Shadows reminds me of the "Tales of" story where the traitor was the sweet little grandma.

This is such a great video. All you guys are hilarious

Yeah, when Tom said "Well, I could say this of all Level 99 games..." my first thought was Millennium Blades. While it's still fun with a new player, you pretty much have to play the introductory tournament, which limits the number of strategies experienced players can pull out with a third deck building phase. Plus it is rather rules heavy. That said, I do like how they have rules variants that specifically help newer people learn (like giving them an awesome accessory a the start.)

Great list...one of the best even! The only game I've ever been turned down to play because I was a noob was Battlestar Galactica. I still want to try it out to this day but if you don't have the game, nobody will teach it it seems.

Do the opposite list: Games Not to Play with Pros You'd have to disqualify any kind of collectible card game, but after that: -Dominion: People who can predict with Chessmaster like precision how many moves exactly it will take for them to win -Any social deduction mafia game: Look, Mafia started out as a quick game to play at a large party for people who didn't want to bother with learning a structured party game. Since then they've tried to add more and more game to them (Werewolf, Resistance, etc) but it always runs into the same problem. There's always one or two people on the good team who can remember everything, lay out the exact optimal moves, and instantly deduce who the mafia are in X votes. At that point you either go along with everything they say and essentially let them play the game for you and everyone else, or you're the mafia/traitor and are voted out. A lot of deduction games try to get around this by adding arbitrary false positive mechanics (Dead of Winter) but those end up muddying the game up so much that it reaches a point where deduction is nearly impossible and you're just making blind guesses. I flat out refuse to play any social deduction game anymore because of this, with the only exception being Battlestar Galactica because the destiny deck does a decent job of masking Cylons, and at least there's something to do after you're discovered to be a Cylon. Holy crap is it painful though because EVERY casual group CONSTANTLY wants to play Secret Hitler right now. That game I like even less than Resistance. It's the social deduction game for "wacky quirky" people who have just moved on from playing Cards Against Humanity constantly.

Top 10 list idea: "Games we love that definitely are not for everyone" This is a similar vibe to top ten underrated games, only this is for games where you are not only aware that it isn't popular, but completely understand why.

Sometimes I think I watch you all because, Zee, you absolutely crack me up! Thank you! Oh, and by the way, played Hanabi for the first time a few days ago...I get what you mean. I frustrated my kids so much (they have only played once)...we were all laughing so hard!

Levels of MTG play: 1. Learning the rules. 2. Learning the keywords. 3. Learning how to play a deck. 4. Learning a strategy to play. 5. Learning a meta. 6. Learning how to counter a meta. 7. Learning ALL the metas. 8. Learning how to counter ALL the metas. 9. Learning how to make a side deck so you can counter the meta of whatever is your metas counter. 10. Learning when to give up and just use some the pre made meta pro deck that 95% of everyone else is also using that season.

I love that as soon as I saw the topic, I thought of like half the games they put on their lists.

I'm in a very weird position when it comes to Hanabi. Partly I completely agree that it's extremely frustrating when someone new makes a mistake, but on the other hand I LOVE to experience the moment when the game just clicks for them and they suddenly understand the clues thier co-players are giving each other. That final part totally accounts for the annoying bit and makes me actively want to teach this to new people, that I think will get it, that is.

Great list. It got me thinking that I feel this way about almost every game I own. As the "designated collector" in my group I almost always have to teach any game we play. I don't mind, but I really want to play 7 wonders with people who know the game. Just once.

Similar to Twilight Struggle, War of the Ring (my favorite game because I’m a huge Tolkien fan) has several cards that if your opponent doesn’t know they exist, they can totally up-end their whole strategy. I kind of addressed this by making a cheat sheet for all the super powerful cards so anyone can reference it to see what pitfalls might be ahead of them.

This is such a great top 10 list. Great job, guys. Tom: Any chance of you doing a top 10 Battlecon characters video?

Main reason why I got rid of BattleCON(and Argent as well) are for the same reasons Tom, and now I pretty much avoid Level 99 Games, cause they tend to have this "too much game and over-complications" mentality for all their games, which I can grasp, but just don't want to teach. Five Tribes and Elysium(two of my favorite games) are also games I hate teaching Agreed with Zee's number 6 as well. Tides of Time/Race For the Galaxy/Abyss give me that same feel too.

About Resistance: if you have trouble explaining Resistance to someone, just ask them to set their game prices down and hand them some crayons. All of the stories I've read in these comments, like wow. Just wow.

I have always been happy to teach Magic and play with Noobs, there is so much variety that I think it's rewarding to see someone Get It. Deck Choice can eliminate the kind of issues you were talking about.

I got to play Twilight Imperium 4 for the first time yesterday at 6 players. We had 4 new players and 2 people who have played TI3 before but never TI4. We played a short game of 10 points - we've all read up on the rules beforehand, it only took 7 and a quarter hours. Much shorter than the 12 hours I was expecting. Fantastic game and experience. It just skyrocketed into my top 3 games. The rules felt quite easy to grasp actually.

I'd add ARHKAHM HORROR to the list. I've played this a couple of times and I still have trouble with monster movement. Now try teaching that to new players and things get rough quite fast.

I have taken to making teaching-aides/cheat-sheets for a lot of the games in my collection to alleviate my hesitation to bring them to the table; when it has been (perhaps) months or years since a game has been played, even if you were an expert at it at one time, you'll be rusty at fine elements of the rules. These cheats ensure that I don't miss points when I'm teaching it.

Through the Ages: I played my 1st game with 2 experienced players, and I won. They did not hold back. But I hated it. It is one of 11 games on my do not play list, despite me winning!

Great top 10 list!

51:21 "Nice." Made me laugh. So relatable, not just with Puerto Rico.

I agree, I love cosmic and I enjoy teaching it. But I'm also slightly disappointed when there is a new player because I love playing with more fun/complex variants.

It's funny that Zee mentioned The Resistance, because I just happened to finish a series of three encounters with grade school kids (9-10 years old) and we taught them how to play various games and they just loved to play Avalon and The Resistance a lot.

A good top 10. I am surprised by the variety of different reasoning (even though the difference is sometimes subtle) that you came up with for this list. At the beginning I thought the games would all be "heavier strategies with complex rules in which newbs would lose anyway".

I tried to teach Keyflower yesterday and it was an absolute nightmare. The rulebook is very confusing and there is just so much going on in the game that newbies think it makes no sense and have no idea where to start. I know this because that's exactly what i thought the first time I played it.

Dominant Species. There are so many things in that game that can screw over new people who don't know about them. The OP cards. The constant depletion of resources. And even if they get that there is the end game scoring which ends up being worth more then the rest of the game. Combine that with such a long playing time and you have a pretty decent perfect storm.

I know this isn't exactly the same thing, bit there is one game I never want to play with people who are new to games in general. That game is "Betrayal at House on the Hill." At one point in every game, one player is handed a rulebook and told to essentially teach herself or himself basically the entire game (everything before the haunt is really just setup). More often than not, the person who is the "traitor" is a person who has never played a board game in their life, or at the very least, never acquired the skill of learning a game from a rulebook.

Alchemists is a nightmare with new people. Some ppl just dont understand the logic of the game.

Tom's evil RFTG snob laugh at 41:38. Made my whole day. Haha

6:58 I tried to introduce my best friend to board gaming through BattleCON, since it's one of my favorites and we both play fighting games pretty often. However, I beat him (I had little experience and assumed he would pick it up quickly) and he hasn't wanted to try it again since, because losing in BattleCON often feels like a total stomp. For example, we did Karin vs. Sarafina, and that's a positioning character vs. a very tricky mobile character, so it got frustrating for him when I kept evading his setups with my UA. However, the next game we tried was Above and Below, followed by Scythe, and that was more his speed. Moral of the story is please go easy on your friends when you play them competitively

I still haven't figured out how to teach Kemet in under 30 minutes. There are always a bunch of questions about movement, battles, and the power tiles. Especially those power tiles! Rarely is the group content with just looking over the reference sheet while we play. I feel weird about turning on "Watch It Played" and just letting Rodney explain everything, but he gets it done so much quicker than I can.

Another game I found difficult to teach was Dune (well or any asymmetric strategy game) because not only you have to teach basics actions and their faction but you also need to explain what other factions can do... Also with Dune you also have an alliance phase where choosing an ally is half way through the game, its temporary and every faction gives different benefits which means some combinations are better than others...

My 5 5) Mr. Jack 4) 7 Wonders 3) Throught the Ages 2) Imperial Assault 1) Twilight Struggle

Would love to see an updated version of this list including Mike and Chris. My top game would be Root

Hanabi would be my number one as well and I feel that may be pretty common among many players. Especially online like on boardgamearena. You'll see people on there sometimes freak out about people making "wrong" moves or giving bad clues or not understanding a clue

This vid is a classic I’ve watched several times

Man im from Brazil and i love to see all of yours top 10!! Zee, youre the best! Tom, you are the heart of Dice tower! And Sam, im a huge fan and ive become a fan of Memoir 44 tanks to you my friend. In fact, of TI3 too!! It would be awsome if YOU sam, would make a huge review about this Big Boy thats TI3, i would really apreciate you, in a series of videos, talk about it, its rules and components. Keep doing all theese great Stuff! Zee, i agree with you, i have Ghost Stories, and it also bothers me teaching to noobs!!

I would not have thought of Hanabi, but that is a great choice for all the reasons that Zee gives. Man, I am not good at hiding my anguish in reaction to moves people make. Have to be careful.

Yes, yes, a thousand times yes for Fury. It's one of my favorite games with experienced players but I've NEVER had a good game with more than one new player.

Alchemists is my number 1 because the whole deduction part just seems to melt people's brains which is a shame because it's such a great game. I have found that with games like that I have to give people homework to read the rules or watch a video first before playing the game.

I play BSG almost religiously -- every time we have a new player, we play a very barebones setup: 5 players, 2 cylon cards. No Sympathizers, no treachery characters, no cylon leaders, no mutineer, no sympathizer. We use the base board, pegasus ship + cylon fleet boards and that's it. We also make them pick their character first and take their turn first. It's much easier to explain the game and THEN explain the sixth man half-traitor cards and weird optional rules than it would be otherwise

Surprised to not see Netrunner

Somebody in Mystery of the Abbey eliminated Galbraith because I made a vow of silence. That destroyed the game, two people eliminated every single suspect.

I played Dead Of Winter for the first time with a friend. Took us about 10 minutes to understand the rules (and I saw a few videos beforehand) and we had a blast. The hidden agenda was just a fun thing to see who the "winner" was at the end. :D

Playing "Ghost Stories" ends up with one person actually playing instructing all others what to do :)

When I heard the name I though Lewis & Clark would be a superman game. The picture was so confusing!

Fury of Dracula. First thing I thought of when I saw the title. Couldn't agree more.

The underlying outake of this top 10 is simply... if you have the opportunity, it is best to learn a game at the same time as the other players. I just did this with Clank! with myself and 3 other players. It was super fun to be discovering the game at the same time. Really in this day and age all it takes is for one person to watch a Playthrough video online and that's it.

I couldn't disagree more with Resistance and Inish. I brought Resistance to the table with seven people (three couples and myself), my game, we were all noobs to THIS game. The rules were clearly explained and as play began I commented, "Wouldn't it be funny if Chris were a traitor because he's so quiet and unassuming." Everyone looked at me as if to say,"Why would you say that? " To wit I responded,"Oh, did I forget to tell you? This game is ALL about table talk." Hilarity ensued and we played two games in a row! Two experienced fellows from my gaming club introduced me to Inis and my first game I rather grokked the whole thing well AND was in striking distance of victory. I think it depends on the faculties of the noob.

One of my favorite games that is one my least favorite to teach is Tigris and Euphrates. New players tend to difficulty wrapping their heads around how internal and external conflicts work. Which leads to them getting upset when their kingdoms implode, not realizing that kingdoms in the games aren't really "theirs".

To Teach MtG I have 2 Basic Decks Made with Flying, First Strike, a Few Instant and Sorcery Spells, One Decks White Weeney, other is 2 Color. I start them with the white and swap them after to get use to more colors before we get anything to Difficult.

is this a true Catch 22? you have to have gaming experience to play the game but you can only get gaming experience by playing the game?

totally agree with Sam on Shadows. I have an 11 year old nephew that love games and the first 2 games on this one he is terrified of losing lives and will just draw cards from the start. Throws red flags over the place. So much so that the 3rd game he played the same way and was actually the traitor, but at that point we didn't suspect. UGH

Love the Stranger in a Strange Land reference from Sam on Dead of Winter.

Firefly is one of my all time favorite games, but you have to play it with people who know what they are doing or it will take forever to play. 6+ experienced players can tear through a game and have a lot of fun in a couple hours. Trying to teach the game to new players can add upwards of an hour or so per new player. They have to stop and read each card from the movement deck and from the supply piles before deciding where they want to go and what they want to do.

GWT, I find this game so difficult to teach to new players. All the actions are linked, I just find that when I answer one question it makes three more questions. "What does this mean" "Well it means for every conductor you have, you get to push your train forward that many spaces" "What's a conductor? How do I get one? Why do I need to push the train forward" "Well let's explain all the buildings first, I'll get to that." It's not fun to teach.

Could you do a top 10 for games that port well into apps?

killer bunnies ... particularly with all the expansions I put on it and the way all the cards work you can spend sooo long explaining EVERYTHING! I've paired my game right down recently to the base game ready to teach a new group of people and hopefully we can get some good games happening again. The problem is some of the fun doesn't come in until you know the game a bit more and you really do try out some of the crazy weapons and you just do silly things because you can! I've started a games night once a month ish with my friends for this exact reason. So that hopefully most of the games in our collections will get played once every 6 months or so and we will start having GOOD games with some fun strategies happening.

In these types of games, I typically just try some crazy strategy that I'd never try when playing competitively. It's fun to try something new, and handicaps me at the same time.

@Zee I agree with your number 4. I love when new people come into the game but I hate teaching it from the bottom up. I usually advise people to play Magic Duels which is the free version because it has a great tutorial

Zee's questionnaire to play "Race for the Galaxy" had me laughing.

one game I find so hard to teach is Mistfall. there's a lot goin on and a bunch of extra rules in the game; also a lot of the cards use multiple different symbols to explain things making it really hard to teach.

My exact experience with Fury of Dracula (me in the role of the noob). Two hours of searching for Dracula followed by thorough ass-handing each time we found him. Best gaming night ever.

Also agree with Tom on Stronghold and Twilight Struggle. Both are probably in my top 3 of 2-player games, but they can be brutal on new players. For Twilight Struggle, there is no way to tell a new player the possibilities of cards entirely that can happen. In Stronghold, there are soooooooooooooooo many rules that teaching it can be an absolute chore.