Playing Boardgames Online

[Prof. Amy Lupin]

I much prefer playing boardgames in person, but I've started exploring the idea of playing boardgames online.

A fellow HOLer mentioned a good site for Dominion, which I found was a great way to explore the expansions rather inexpensively. A few months back, I played against the bots quite regularly, although where possible I played against human players. While the bots were great, I was able to figure out some of their patterns and adapt my strategy accordingly (I also noticed that there was one particular combo that the bots didn't use when they had the necessary cards in their hand, so those games ended up being rather one-sided).

Steam currently has a sale on their digital boardgames (ending 6 August), which I'm very tempted to take advantage of. There's some great titles on offer, including Race for the Galaxy, Scythe, Splendor - as well as Tabletop Simulator, which in turn has additional discounted titles associated with it that can be bought.

I've also been looking into accessible options for playing boardgames online (apart from HOL's Gathering and Games, that is ), which I'm looking forward to testing out.

Do any of you play boardgames online?

[Silas Hipolito Crist]

I love to play chess online and on different sites (there are really many of them), because each chess bot has its own tactics and after time you can get to know it. It is also interesting when playing with other people online, but I prefer bots.
Then I have also been playing some rounds of Monopoly, but it is not such a fun as with real people.

[Zen McGregor]

If they were multiplayer that could be a solution for us not being able to gather around.

[Shiloh Adlar]

I also play online board games from time to time. Chess is a favorite as it requires me to develop strategy which keeps my brain happy. I also play checkers and monopoly, but the latter is rare. I do like playing against bots in order to give myself time to develop strategies, but playing against real people forces me to adapt, so I almost prefer that because it becomes a different learning experience.

[Prof. Amy Lupin]

Lately I've gotten into playing Through the Ages on mobile. I've largely been playing against the AIs, but this morning marked the start of my first game against real players, notably ones from the local boardgaming community. One thing I like particularly about this digital implementation is that it makes an otherwise heavy-weight strategy boardgame more accessible to someone like me who prefers medium-weight games. I'm also enjoying light banter with one of the players in particular, so, in some ways, it still feels like we're playing in person.

Another thing I like about the Through the Ages app, is that during initial setup, one can choose whether to play it live or allow for 24 hours (if not longer) for each person to take their turn, enabling a group to play during the course of the day amongst all their other commitments.

[Uath Blautraum]

Tabletop Simulator is very effective actually. Most of the games can be found as legal Steam Workshop mods. Connection usually does not need to be perfect because most of the games are played per turns. I can help with arranging if people want to try it!

[Phobia Meddlstone]

I for one love to play board games online. There is a app I have on my phone where I can play The game of life online. Me and all my freinds love playing this so much

[Hiya Debnath]

I, too, love to play board games online. Some of my favorites would include online chess, online ludo, snakes abd ladders, monopoly online, and the board game Cluedo Online.

[Prof. Will Lestrange]

I've been playing some board games online over these past few years; one game I got a kick out of was called "Martian Dice" just because of how ridiculous the premise was!

[Galena May]

I love to play board games traditionally, but since it is really difficult to gather people round for a physical game, I play online board games nowadays for the sake of convenience. The last I remember playing was Monopoly (not the version with the popular old man in it, I actually forgot the name of the app that I used) with some friends, it was a blast and I won the game.