I looked around and saw that there was no TableTop Day thread, so I figured I'd create a quick one and give those who were unaware of when it is (or even that it exists) a heads up.

WHAT IS INTERNATIONAL TABLETOP DAY?
International TableTop Day is a day created to celebrate tabletop gaming, support the stores people game at, and spend time playing games with your friends or meeting new people who play board games. It was created by the Geek & Sundry Youtube Channel/Production Company (which hosts the Wil Weaton-fronted board game series Tabletop) in 2013. Game stores around the world host events on TableTop Day and invite seasoned gamers and noobs alike to come in partake in some board gaming. Geek & Sundry livestreams games throughout the day, but they also assist with promoting events on their website and distribute kits to retailers which contain promotional items to be given away, won in tournaments, etc (kits usually contain things like promo cards, exclusive playmats, TableTop-exclusive versions of games, and more). Online game stores typically have big sales (Amazon's was on Monday, with their idea being that your newly-purchased games would have arrived in time for you to play them in TT Day).

WHO PARTICIPATES IN TABLETOP DAY?
The TableTop Day site hosts a list of game stores and game groups who have registered their events. You can find the search tool at the top of the page here: https://www.tabletopday.com. Just an FYI: There doesn't seem to be a way to extend the search out by a wider amount of miles than whatever the default is, so if you don't have any game stores close to you but want to find the nearest event in say, the next city over, you may need to search that city. I chose my zip code and it couldn't find the event that I am going to attend at a game store an hour away in Columbia.

Here is the TableTop Day site: https://www.tabletopday.com
They have an FAQ, their own better worded "What is TableTop Day" statement, and more there.



I've only been to one TT Day event and that was back in 2014, four months after I had gotten into board games. I went to a game store for the first time, the same one I will go to tomorrow, with the intention to look around, see what was going on, and maybe buy something. I am not the most social person, not very outgoing at all (board games have gotten me out of my shell a bit, mainly only when playing or talking about games though). I saw that some people arrived early and were about to start playing Smash Up with the intention of winning a prize relating to the game. I had played it a few times before and liked it quite a bit. I hovered around for a few minutes watching them set up before someone said "Would you like to grab a chain and join in?" I said "Sure." 15 hours later I was leaving the store, having played over a dozen games and met some really friendly/cool people. I didn't even realize until I was leaving at 3AM that I hadn't eaten that day! I didn't realize I was hungry because I was having so much fun. I played a few games that went on to become favorites of mine; one I was introduced to that day is tied for my favorite of all-time, the worker placement game Alien Frontiers. I've been part of a local Star Wars: X-Wing Miniatures game group since May and just started playing the Star Wars: Armada miniatures game, and will be taking all of my minis with me and playing matches of both of those games all day.

So my TT Day experience is pretty limited but I've been to more than a few games stores since then and have joined a game group this year that meets weekly. If you don't know how to play any games, or think you might want to get into the hobby but don't know where to start, or are intimidated and think 'I don't know anything about it and I won't know anyone there,' don't worry about it! People want to play games at these things and "other people to play with" are a requirement for most games. If you look even the slightest bit interested, someone will volunteer to teach you the game so you can play it together. There may also be people there who showed up with the sole intention of demoing games to people and not even really playing themselves; I know the event I'm going to will have someone demoing games all day, as well as someone who will be demoing some RPGs, and the Columbia GO Club will be there teaching Go to people as well. If you don't have any plans for tomorrow, why don't you look up a store or group in your area, check out the it FB page real quick, and then go have a good time playing some board games?


If you can't make it out tomorrow but are still interested in tabletop gaming, check out the community thread we have here: New Board Gaming |OT2| On Tables, Off Topic . There is also a Warhammer 40K thread, a generic miniatures gaming thread, several DnD/RPG threads, n X-Wing thread on Gaming Side, and more. Feel free to pop into any of them. The Board Gaming thread is pretty great about giving recommendations for all kinds of play counts, play styles, interests, etc. If anyone from BoardGameGAF thinks I've forgotten something important or missed something, please bring it to my attention and I'll update this post.

Congrats on finding a hobby you enjoy! I've enjoyed getting into board games in the past year and a half. Still too introverted to play with strangers, but love playing with the fiancee.

Oh shit it is. (Though you mean Sat 29th)

Better organise something for tonight. I've just recently picked up the second edition of Portal's "Robinson Crusoe: Adventures on the Cursed Island". Played it twice so far and loved it so another round would be great.

Mr_Appleby said:

Oh shit it is. (Though you mean Sat 29th)

Better organise something for tonight. I've just recently picked up the second edition of Portal's "Robinson Crusoe: Adventures on the Cursed Island". Played it twice so far and loved it so another round would be great.

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D'oh! I'll PM a mod and ask for a title update.
Good grab though, getting the Portal edition of Crusoe. I got it in a little while ago but my group hasn't gotten it to the table yet (Scythe is probably the game we have played the most recently).

EYEL1NER said:

D'oh! I'll PM a mod and ask for a title update.
Good grab though, getting the Portal edition of Crusoe. I got it in a little while ago but my group hasn't gotten it to the table yet (Scythe is probably the game we have played the most recently).

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i've gotten the portal version of crusoe to the table a few times...

lost most of the times, and while I won the second scenario did figure out we were cheating so have to try again lol.

gonna likely play some pathfinder card game tomorrow.

EYEL1NER said:

D'oh! I'll PM a mod and ask for a title update.
Good grab though, getting the Portal edition of Crusoe. I got it in a little while ago but my group hasn't gotten it to the table yet (Scythe is probably the game we have played the most recently).

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Was lucky to find a copy. I think maybe 10 copies came to this country lol. At least, everywhere is out of stock or listed as preorder.

zulux21 said:

i've gotten the portal version of crusoe to the table a few times...

lost most of the times, and while I won the second scenario did figure out we were cheating so have to try again lol.

gonna likely play some pathfinder card game tomorrow.

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Haha we lost first game and won the second (castaways scenario). We forgot one rule but that actually worked against our favour - instead of checking the type of mystery card to draw we just drew the top one and both times it wound up being a beast, instead of the treasure we should have been drawing.

I should just go ahead and try Robinson Crusoe solo, but I was holding off because two people in the group have played it and know the rules. I did a lot of reading, watched some videos, was pointed towards great player aides, but these two people were like "Naw, stop re-reading the rules. We got you." And that was in February? Maybe March? Whenever MM got the reprint anyway, that's how long I've been waiting.

Spent a lot of money but didn't buy any friends 🤔

Shoutout to boardgamegaf for getting me into some fun games. Haven't posted much recently but I'm still lurking! Have fun bros!

Got the group together and made a day of it somewhat, didn't grab any photos along the way even though I should have.

Started off with a few rounds of Machi Koro, moved onto Eldritch Horror, where we just got completely boned by event after event after event. We ended up being unable to close gates thanks to a mythos effect, when we needed to close a gate to solve the mystery. All this after a number of monster surges. We failed spectacularly after burning through the mythos deck without even solving the first mystery. We ended up with 2 investigator's devoured and 3 dead.

Played a few rounds of Power Grid after EH, tried playing it with 5 people but it seems to get a way too chaotic and it lost a lot of it's polish and tight play that we usually find when playing with 3-4 people.

Lastly, we finally got around to playing Dead of Winter, played 2 short scenarios and failed both before even making progress on the main objective. During the second game one of the players with a betrayal card made a mistake and added a food card from a location that only he'd been to and outed himself. The table dynamic that went around in the next players turn was fantastic, we spent 5 minutes debating whether or not it'd be a good idea to exile them now or down the track. We ended up exiling them then and there but seriously regretting it when we failed to resolve crisis's one after the other. It got to the point where the exiled was actively trying to help us so that he prolong the game and actually fulfil his own win conditions.

My group had a Chinese auction of donated games, with the proceeds going to AbleGamers. I had a lot of fun, played Millennium Blades, Hero Realms, and Timeline Challenge. I also taught Yokohama but ended up not being able to play due to time constraints. The event is still going on now, but I came home to help my wife put the kids to bed.

Here's a pic of the game day in action. In the red shirt in front is board game designer Geoff Englestein, who also donated some games to the auction.

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We managed one game of Crusoe. Played the second scenario (the cursed island) and had a last minute clutch win. Thought we were a goner going in to the second-last round as I had only 2hp left and my friend 3hp, probably would not have survived to the next but after a string of bad luck the event deck decided to dump on us enough wood to build the last two crosses we needed to win the game (and promptly die two nights later I imagine but hey we exorcised an island!)

I really like Crusoe. Feels like a good balance of luck vs strategy, plays relatively quickly and we usually have good discussion about how to spend each turn rather than some other co-op's where it can feel a bit like you are playing independently.

I wanted to do this... but my schedule was fucked today. I'm hoping it went well?

I had a decent time. I got to play two games of Armada (was absolutely crushed, but I still learned a lot; I feel like I'm pretty well-spun up on the rules at this point and have pretty much learned the game now) and this take quite a while to play. After that was a game of X-Wing but I recieved some messages from home at the beginning that really out a damper on that match and the rest of the evening, so I left after that. It was already late at that point anyway.
The turnout was very large; there weren't many tables unused. The volume level was off the charts as well. It didn't help that some very heated games of Resistance were happening nearby the X-Wing and Armada tables, because those games lend to a lot of yelling with certain groups. I didn't see anyone with Food Chain Magnate (the store had a copy available for $140 though... Pass) and I didn't get to try Champions of Midgard (showed up late for the demo and the Armada guys were already there ready to play). I really enjoyed playing Armada though and was thankful that one of the guys in the local group was willing to play some introductory matches with me and explain some things. Overall I'm glad I went. I'm looking forward to digging even further deeper into Armada

Had a huge party at my house. Tons of food and drink all day. I had hoped to get people more into "boardgame" boardgames. But when there was already trouble with King of Tokyo , I decided to let it go.. so it became tons of telestrations, secret hitler ( a hit at the table) and joking hazard. We had a good time though. Eventually people spied and were interested in mysterious which would have been a nice change , but it got too late.

I just want someone to play lords of water deep, burgle bro's, plague inc and pandemic with me dammit!!. ( and a few others)

rSpooky said:

Had a huge party at my house. Tons of food and drink all day. I had hoped to get people more into "boardgame" boardgames. But when there was already trouble with King of Tokyo , I decided to let it go.. so it became tons of telestrations, secret hitler ( a hit at the table) and joking hazard. We had a good time though. Eventually people spied and were interested in mysterious which would have been a nice change , but it got too late.

I just want someone to play lords of water deep, burgle bro's, plague inc and pandemic with me dammit!!. ( and a few others)

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Eh, hope you find a game group who likes to dig into meatier games than party games. I would love to play Waterdeep and Burgle Bros with someone as well. I take Burgle Bros to my game group every single week, along with the assembled High Rise tower, but it just hasn't hit the table.