Entry #15: LEST WE FORGET...

        This entry is not about games or a gaming related topic. This entry is about a day that is now known as Memorial Day. A day to honor the fallen soldiers who died for protecting a cause they believed in. 

        Most of the content of this post is coming from a History.com article (Memorial Day 2021: Facts, Meaning & Traditions - HISTORY). Some in summary, some copied. 

HISTORY OF REMEMBRANCE DAY 

        Memorial Day began after the U.S Civil War as a way to honor those who died during the war. The exact start of the holiday is not confirmed but here is a piece that is accepted as truth: 

"On May 5, 1868, General John A. Logan, leader of an organization for Northern Civil War veterans, called for a nationwide day of remembrance later that month. “The 30th of May, 1868, is designated for the purpose of strewing with flowers, or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country during the late rebellion, and whose bodies now lie in almost every city, village and hamlet churchyard in the land,” he proclaimed. 

The date of Decoration Day, as he called it, was chosen because it wasn’t the anniversary of any particular battle." 

        The states that made up the Union during war continued the tradition and each made it an official state holiday (by 1890) whereas the Southern states celebrated on different days. Because of the United States involvement during “The Great War,” the meaning of the holiday had changed to honor the fallen from all the conflicts since the Civil War. 

        The change of date was done via an Act of Congress in 1968 which took effect in 1971 so that Remembrance Day is changed to Memorial Day and that it would be celebrated on the last Monday in the month of May (thus creating a three day weekend for Federal employees). 

RED POPPY 

        Another part of the traditions of Memorial Day is the wearing of the Red Poppy. This was done to remember those who had fallen in “The Great War” and the poppy icon came from a poem written by a Canadian Lieutenant Colonel in 1915 who served during the war. Here is that peom… 

“In Flanders Fields” by John McCrae 

In Flanders fields the poppies blow 

Between the crosses, row on row, 

That mark our place; and in the sky 

The larks, still bravely singing, fly 

Scarce heard amid the guns below. 

We are the Dead. Short days ago 

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, 

Loved and were loved, and now we lie 

In Flanders fields. 

Take up our quarrel with the foe: 

To you from failing hands we throw 

The torch; be yours to hold it high. 

If ye break faith with us who die 

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow 

In Flanders fields. 

Each year on Memorial Day a national moment of remembrance takes place at 3:00 p.m. local time. 

Lest we forget...

Entry 14: Gaming & Toddlers

      

 

        Tomorrow marks the day that my precious, intelligent, beautiful, tiny, angel, baby girl turns two years old. People may be wondering how in the heck do we still have time to play games everyday so far this year. I can honestly tell you that at times it has been rough getting in a game or two with having our energetic child around. Often, we are getting play in while she takes an afternoon nap (if she does take one and we don’t take one too) or after we put her down for bed at night. The important part is that my wife and I make the time to spend together and do things for ourselves. 

        When we have friends and family over for game days, we do allow our child to socialize as much as possible with everyone. Often, she would just sit with us and “help” whoever she is with to take a turn in the game. As mentioned in previous entries, she has her own cards and dice that she plays with on her own while we play our games. If our daughter is wide awake when we play, we automatically anticipate the game to take twice as long as the maximum estimated length of time noted on the box. Yes, it would be nice to play at “regular speed” so we can get multiple games in but for us, one game is better than leaving a game unfinished (we never leave a game unfinished). 

        That is how we deal with our daughter when we play; so how do we get her to play games? Well, we have slowly introduced her to some basic games and have a handful of HABA games too. When we play with some of her toys, like a wooden fishing pole with a magnet on the end to “catch” sea creatures, we end up making a game out of it that she wants to play over and over. Because she recognizes and can point to different colors, the game you see in the following picture is one that we play that gets her participating more in the hobby. 

         At one point in the past few months I did come across another blog that caught my eye that was written in 2019 which discusses what the author and her husband do to help their younger children play and learn games (according to their about us they have five kids). I normally would not share a direct link to another site but I feel this one is definitely worth sharing… Tips for Gaming with Toddlers - The Tabletop Family. I do plan to look more in what Adam and Kelsey have written on their site since my initial scan has shown that we have some of the same games. 

        To conclude this short article (so I can go and enjoy my daughter’s birthday party today), for me the key in dealing with board gaming and toddlers and/or young children is that you should never, ever, just put them “out to pasture” while you play. Let them be a part of the action and help in whatever little way they can. Sometimes they will stay longer to be with the group but more often than not, they will be on their merry way and do their own thing after spending a little time with you. And as for teaching them new games, just have patience, let them try their best and encourage them throughout the learning process. And trust me, you will be amazed with how quickly young children pick up on new concepts.

Entry 13: Gaming Tables & Family Unity

        

        For me, a validation of my love of the board game hobby is having our own gaming table to play all of our games on. To prevent a massive a cabin-fever effect from happening during the “2020 Great Pandemic” shutdown, as a family project we had built our first gaming table. The play area is 4’x6’ and with the arm rests it measures just under 5’x7’. The table is the one you see above. As my father would say, “we over-engineered” it because we wanted to make sure it was something strong, durable, and “safe” for our daughter to play on. Our next table of that size will be done a bit different but will be just as “fancy” to play on. 

        We, especially our daughter, loves that table not only for the gaming experiences we have by using the table for what it is meant for but because of how it brought our whole family together united in purpose during a time where everyone’s sense of self was being taken over by a world-wide virus attack. Each member of the family had a say in how the table was built and/or how it looked. With our big table my wife and I initially decided that it was not going to have lights but then my mother looked at the progress and said that the table would look really cool if we had lights on it. The rest of us looked at each other and then said “okay,” so I ordered the lights and we made it work. When we finished the table, all of us stood around it and beamed with pride knowing that we, as a family, had created something wonderful. 

        Since the title of this entry is Game TABLES and not Game Table, let me be the first to tell you that as I am writing this entry, we are in progress of building our second game table for our home. This one is not a giant one like the first but is a smaller one for our upstairs living area (a 3’x 3’ play area) that when not in use, we can move it out of the way and store it. At first, we were not planning on having a second table for our home but due to certain events that have happened over the past six months in our home, having a table in our upstairs where we spend most of our time works out best for our family. My wife and I typically play our games in the evening after we put our daughter down for bed (sometimes during the day if she takes a nap) and we got tired of having to play some elaborate games on the floor leaning over, reaching, and bending for things such as cards and meeples have become troublesome on our tired bodies. 

        This new table (I will share pictures when it is 100% completed) is designed for us to sit on the floor and have a raised play area so we are not putting extra wear-and-tear on our bodies. Due to the limited space we have in our living room we took measurements and determined that a 3’x 3’ table would be perfect for what we needed… until we played a new game that my wife now loves and decided that we needed to add an extra feature to the new table that would make this game playable on the new table. Again, this table has become a family affair in which each person has had a say in the design of it.  

        Not only do I stress that board games can bring families together but also gaming accessories do the same as well. The bottom line is that you should go out and find things that will help you strengthen your family bonds. In our family, gaming has done that and we are a much closer family now than we were decades ago.

Entry 12: Social Learning Theory (and gaming)

          

        Time to get back to my roots as a social-psychologist and talk about something that I have noticed with my precious nearly two year old daughter and the way she picks up on doing things. From the time she was crawling and moving around on her own she has always wanted to be near mommy and daddy and participate in the things we were doing. If we were playing a card game, she wanted her own cards; if we were playing a dice game, she wanted to roll her own dice. She would observe and mimic what we were doing and would smile and laugh about it even though she doesn’t understand everything that was going on. The key thing is that she was watching and learning. If her daddy was playing on the computer, she wanted to use her learning computer and play on it too. 

        Not reaching far into my head that is full of “useless knowledge” I realized that Albert Bandura’s social learning theory is in action. Bandura stated in his book Social Learning Theory "most human behavior is learned observationally through modeling: from observing others one forms an idea of how new behaviors are performed, and on later occasions, this coded information serves as a guide for action."

        Joan Crusicm in a 1992 piece, pulled five key tenets to the theory which state the following: 

1. Learning is not purely behavioral; rather, it is a cognitive process that takes place in a social context. 

2. Learning can occur by observing a behavior and by observing the consequences of the behavior (vicarious reinforcement). 

3. Learning involves observation, extraction of information from those observations, and making decisions about the performance of the behavior (observational learning or modeling). Thus, learning can occur without an observable change in behavior. 

4. Reinforcement plays a role in learning but is not entirely responsible for learning. 

5. The learner is not a passive recipient of information. Cognition, environment, and behavior all mutually influence each other (reciprocal determinism). 

        You may be saying this is fine and dandy when it comes to kids learning new things but how does that apply to us? Have you ever been introduced to a new game in which someone else swears that it is the best game in the world and easy to play but the moment you sit down to play you are like a deer staring into headlights of an oncoming vehicle? Then, later after playing a game or two, things start to get easier and you begin to understand various strategies. After a little more game play you are able to begin explaining the game to others and even are at the point you become the teacher. Well that, my friends, is a demonstration of social learning theory in a nutshell. 

        Another thing to mention about my wonderful daughter, she would always want to play on our phones and watch her Curious George episodes and movies; so, my sister, gave my daughter her first cell phone. We loaded the PBS app and some learning apps and she would navigate and do everything herself (even getting mad if we try to help her with it). Our daughter is now at the point that even if we are not playing any board/dice/card games and she wants to play, she will grab her dice and cards and play on her own. 

        As a parent of a young child, it is fun to see how my daughter learns, adapts and grows. Seeing all these social psychology theories in action with someone at such a young age further fuels my inner “geekdom.” So remember that if you are introduced to a new game, it is okay to feel overwhelmed at first but once the feeling subsides, let the learning process take full effect and soon you will become a gaming “master” (without using the force).

Entry 11: Arrgh!!! (Pirates)

        One thing I had noticed from last year is that my wife and I (when deciding on games to back on Kickstarter or games to purchase from retail) end up getting games in a particular theme. In the case from last year, it was more space themed games. So this made me think of other games we have and what themes we tend to lean towards more and the group that won is nautical (ship) and more specific, Pirates!!! 

        Now I can go through our complete list of games that have some form of nautical theme to it but that may take a while to complete. So instead I want to talk about our Top 4 games in this grouping. 

 

Dread Pirate by Front Porch Classics 

        Dread Pirate is a fun game in which you have a ship you sail around to different ports gaining gems and once you meet requirements, you can go to Dread Island to earn more doubloons. If you are first becoming the Dread Pirate, you earn an extra die to roll and other bonuses. Movement is controlled by dice rolls and once crossing over certain points on the map, “fate” cards take effect that can be either good or bad. But why limit yourself to just moving from port to port? This game is all about going after your fellow captains to skirmish, sink, and plunder too. The winner is the pirate with the most “booty” after all the gems are collected from the four ports. 

We really enjoy this game because of how simple the gameplay actually is. The cloth board, glass bead gems, and clanking metal doubloons make it feel more like an authentic treasure hunt. If you are able to get the Signature Edition of the game, the wooden treasure chest nice to display for all to see.

Libertalia by Asmodee 

         Libertalia is a game which takes place in 3 campaigns (weeks) consisting of six days of looting and one day of rest. Each of the six days is broken up into four phases (sunrise, day, dusk, & night) which you choose a character to play (sunrise) and put them into rank, resolve any day actions on the card by ascending rank order (low to high rank), loot the ship during the dusk hours in descending order (high to low rank), the resolve any night actions (simultaneously). Everyone begins with the same nine cards to choose from. 

        The seventh day you use any end of campaign actions on cards you played and then score for the week based on what loot you have taken. The next step is to prepare for the new campaign of play in which six new cards are drawn. These six new cards (just like the first round) will be the same cards for everyone. 

        What gives this game more variety is the three leftover cards from the first week might be different for everyone. If an opponent did not play a certain card you did in the first week, they have the opportunity to play it in the second and third weeks. 

        Who doesn’t like to try to outwit your opponent and take the most booty. The cards are beautiful, the board design is great, and the lowest ranked card just happens to be a parrot; “Polly want a cracker?”

Pirate Den by Crash Games 

        I will be the first to say this game is a fast paced (less than 30 minute game time), quick and easy card bluffing game. We picked this one up and a few copies as gifts from the quarterly game swap that no longer is going on (due to the Covid crisis) for less than $10 each. 

        This is an easy game young and old can pick up on quickly. Just like Libertalia, everyone has the same cards to play with. Game play is simple, you will play a card that selects a different color or colors of jewels to take from the main stash or to loot from player who has the most in their stash. When you have five jewels of the same color you can “bury” them for a gold nugget on the next turn if you want (plus getting previous cards back to select from). First player to get five gold nuggets wins the game.

        Sounds easy? Well, it is. 

        Also, from what I understand from many people, is this game was originally a Kickstarter game. It was to be published by another company but went out of business, so Crash Games took over and saved the game for the backers (which is now also a defunct company). So we are grateful Crash Games did publish this game and trust me when I say this… it is a hidden gem of a pirate game. 

Pirate’s Cove by Days of Wonder 

        Pirate’s Cove is now considered a “classic” because it is nearly 20 years old. It is, in my humble opinion, one of the best pirate games to play. It is also one of the first Days of Wonder games that I played (along with Ticket to Ride) when they were just a fledgling company. 

        Anyways, let’s sail into why this is great game. In a nutshell… the game is played over 12 rounds. With each round players will secretly select where on the map they want to move to after seeing what treasure cards are turned over at each location. After moving to the location selected, if there are multiple ships there, combat ensues; then plundering and upgrading ships. After that, the black ship(s) move clockwise to the next location. The game is actually simple and easy to play (it has a 2.01/5 weight).

        Upgrading your ship is important because it allows you to carry more treasure (the hull), roll more dice in combat (cannons and crew), and determine who is first in combat (sails). In combat, these areas can and will get damaged, so it is important to keep your ship seaworthy. 

Arrgh… you ready to set sail and fight the legendary pirates of Pirate’s Cove? 

Other Pirate Games… 

        I just want to list a some of the other pirate games we have that you can check out on your own to see if they may itch your peg-leg: 

            • A Tale of Pirates (Asmodee) 

            • British vs Pirates (Exocrate Games) 

            • Loot (Gamewright) 

            • Pirates! (Ravensberger) 

            • Scheming and Skulking (Grandpa Beck’s) 

            • Skull King (Grandpa Beck’s) 

            • Skull Tales: Full Sail (Eclipse) 

            • The Dutch East Indies (Keep Exploring) 

            • Tiny Epic Pirates (Gamelyn) 

        Tiny Epic Pirates was a Kickstarter the just came in so have not played it yet or my list would have been 5 games instead of 4. 

        We do have even more but I feel this would be a great start to look at. Of course, if you search other lists of pirate games you will find the major ones that we do not currently own. Maybe soon we will pick them up and add them to our to-play list. 

 Let’s end this post with a Pirate gaming joke: 

            Why couldn’t the pirate play cards? 

            Because he was sitting on the deck!