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April 2025 OBG Meetups

3/17/2025

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Starting in April, our meetups at Oakland United Beerworks are switching to Sundays since the taproom is getting busier with the warmer weather. We are so grateful for our partnership! Hope to see you at one of these game days:
  • Saturday, April 5 @ Faction Brewing (Alameda): Secrets & Shadows: Deduction & Hidden Movement Games: From investigative thrillers to cosmic discoveries, each game offers a unique puzzle to solve or a hidden agenda to pursue. Will you outwit your opponents, stay one step ahead, or uncover the truth before it’s too late? Featured games include:
    • Detective: City of Angels – A noir-style investigative game where players take on the roles of detectives (or the cunning Chisel) solving crimes in 1940s Los Angeles through interrogation and clever deduction.
    • Veiled Fate – A game of hidden influence where players secretly control demigods, guiding them through challenges while trying to mask their true identity.
    • Mind MGMT – A tense hidden movement game where a rogue psychic spy tries to evade a team of relentless agents in a world of espionage and mind control.
    • Mission: Red Planet – A game of area control and secret agendas, where players send astronauts to Mars to mine resources while bluffing and outmaneuvering rivals.
    • Tobago – A treasure-hunting adventure where players use logical deduction and clever card play to narrow down the location of buried riches.
    • The Search for Planet X – A deduction game where players act as astronomers, using logic and scientific research to pinpoint the location of a hidden celestial body.
  • Sunday, April 13 @ Oakland United Beerworks: Tricky Card Games: Love a good hand of cards? This meetup is all about playing and learning unique and exciting card games. No experience necessary. Featured games include:
    • Dokitto Ice – A fast and fun trick-taking challenge
    • Inflation – A dynamic twist on classic trick-taking
    • Fishing – Reel in tricks and outplay your opponents
    • Tichu – A clever ladder-climbing game for teams …and more!
  • Sunday, April 20 @ Oakland United Beerworks: Cozy Co-ops: Work together to prevail over the Great Old Ones, defend against invading spirits, pull off daring heists, and battle iconic villains in a variety of thrilling games where collaboration is the key to victory. Featured games include
    • Cthulhu: Death May Die – A fast-paced, action-driven cooperative game where players take on the role of investigators battling cultists and trying to take down the Great Old Ones before they lose their sanity.
    • Spirit Island – A deep, strategic co-op game where players become powerful spirits defending their island from invading colonizers, using unique abilities to drive them away.
    • The Gang – A cooperative heist game where players work together to pull off a daring robbery while managing timing, and teamwork.
    • Ito – A quirky party game that blends cooperation and creativity, where players must rank words according to a hidden number and try to sync their thinking.
    • Marvel Dice Throne Champions – A dice-driven combat game where players take on the roles of iconic Marvel heroes, using unique abilities and strategic dice rolls to battle villains or each other.
    • Legendary – A deck-building game where players recruit Marvel heroes to form a powerful team and work together to defeat infamous villains and masterminds before they unleash chaos.
  • Sunday, April 27 @ Oakland United Beerworks: Empires of the Sun - Latin and Spanish themed games: From building magnificent cities to wielding political influence, these games immerse you in the rich history and cultures of Spain and Mesoamerica. Featured games include:
    • El Grande – A classic area control game set in medieval Spain, where players act as powerful lords vying for dominance over different regions through strategic influence and clever maneuvering.
    • Mexica – A game of city-building and area control in the Aztec Empire, where players construct canals, establish districts, and compete to leave the most lasting mark on Tenochtitlán.
    • Tzolk’in: The Mayan Calendar – A unique worker placement game featuring a rotating gear system that represents the passage of time, challenging players to plan their actions wisely as they honor the gods and develop their civilization.
    • Teotihuacan: City of Gods – A deep, strategic game where players manage a growing civilization, advance technology, and build the iconic Pyramid of the Sun in the ancient city of Teotihuacan.
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Mega Hegemony Game Day: 27 players, 7 tables

3/17/2025

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The Oaklandish Board Gamers recently hosted a 27-player, 7-table simultaneous mega game day of Hegemony: Lead Your Class to Victory with players from a 50-mile radius in the San Francisco Bay Area. It was such an awesome community gathering!

We started planning in January and offered training games and tutorials to those who had never played it. The list of players was 50+ and on the game day, 27 with beginner to expert experience showed up and play commenced all at once. We had each 4-player group sitting side by side so that we could have peer classes commiserating across nation-state lines.  (Girl Scouts sold us cookies at the brewery and we traded cookies across the free trade zones.)

Overall, we had 3 Working, 2 State, and 2 Capitalist Class wins.
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Reflections on Dice Tower West 2025

3/14/2025

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GenCon has always set a high standard for me when it comes to board gaming conventions. During my first-ever GenCon, I met Matt Mercer (before he got uber-famous), solved elven riddles in True Dungeon, and got first dibs on new releases in the exhibition hall. Plus, with nerdy burlesque, 60,000 attendees, and an electric atmosphere, it's quite a scene.

Over the years, I’ve been interested in exploring non-GenCon events, and so this year, my partner and I decided to check out Dice Tower West (DTW), held in Las Vegas, Nevada, in early March.

The friendliest board game convention
DTW is touted as the friendliest board game convention, and true to its promise, every day, I felt at home. I either ran into people from my gaming circle in the San Francisco Bay Area or connected with OBG (Oaklandish Board Gamers) I don’t get to game with frequently. The warm and welcoming vibe made it easy to strike up conversation and fill seats for a game.

How late can you game?
My endurance was put to the test. Because I was so excited, I barely slept on Tuesday night, and on the first night, I started a game of Galactic Cruise (which I had fortunately learned the previous week) at 10 PM. On top of that, I had signed up for the World Series of Board Gaming tournaments on Thursday and Friday (10 AM starts for Castles of Burgundy and Brass: Birmingham), really pushing my limits. Despite the exhaustion, the sheer fun of playing and competing kept me going.
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The inner circle
In addition to gaming with local friends and acquaintances, I was honored to play games with influencers I’ve been following on Instagram and YouTube, including Kenan of the Punchboard Cathedral podcast, Reggie of Rolling Reggie, Taylor Reiner of Taylor’s Trick-Taking Table, and the Brothers Murph from BoardGameGeek. It was such a treat to sit down at a table with people whose content I’ve admired from afar and enjoy silly games like Dro Polter and the Downfall of Pompeii together.

On Thursday and Saturday, Taylor hosted the Vegas Game Market, showcasing self-published games. I snagged copies of Mike DiLisio's On the Clock, Taylor Reiner's Sound Wavelength Monikers card game, and 30 to Go by Ben Kearns.
Highlights of the convention
  • Daitoishi (Dani Garcia) – A clever euro with an innovative movement mechanism set in the Bitoku universe.
  • SETI (Czech Games Edition) – A space-themed game where players scan the skies, launch probes, and analyze data in the quest for finding extraterrestrial life.
  • Galactic Cruise (Kinson Key Games) – A fantastic economic game where players build luxury space cruises for interstellar travelers.
  • Shackleton Base – A tight survival and resource management game featuring the colonization of the moon.
  • Planet Unknown (with the Supermoon expansion) – A fun polyomino game that combines puzzle efficiency with player interaction, made even better with the new expansion.
Other games I played
  • Critter Kitchen – A charming set collection and recipe-fulfilling game featuring adorable animal chefs.
  • Floresta – A beautiful nature-themed game with mini games including area control and set collection. 
  • Fishing (Friedmann Friese) – A quirky, deck building tricktaker that always makes us laugh. 
  • Bora Bora (Stefan Feld) – A classic Feldian point salad with dice placement.
  • Balconia – An interesting 2-player Castle Combo-like game focused on designing the perfect apartment facade.
  • Marvel Dice Throne – A fast-paced, dice-rolling combat 2v2 game with Marvel heroes battling it out for supremacy.
  • Fresh Fish (Friedmann Friese) – A quirky Friedmann Friese game whose art reminded me of Word Art from Microsoft Word 1994. 
  • Castle Combo – A quick and tactical card drafting game where players play characters into their feudums to score the most points. 
  • Fromage – A cheese-making game featuring simultaneous action and four mini games.
  • Dro Polter – An Oink dexterity game of ghostly mischief and fast hands.
  • Rajas of the Ganges: Cards and Karma – A streamlined, card-based version of the beloved dice-and-tile placement game.
  • We Need to Talk – A charming tricktaking and shedding game by our very own Brendon Fong.
  • Downfall of Pompeii – A thematic and chaotic game where players race to escape an erupting volcano while ensuring their rivals don’t make it out.
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Final thoughts
Dice Tower West was everything I hoped it would be—an inviting, community-driven convention filled with amazing games and people. The experience reaffirmed why I love board gaming so much: the connections, the thrill of competition, and the joy of discovering new favorites. If you’re looking for a convention with a welcoming atmosphere, a fantastic library, and non-stop gaming, DTW should absolutely be on your list.
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Until next year, happy gaming!
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