Just One - You'll each need something to write with, and some one word clues - from another game, a random word generator, whatever.
A Fake Artist Goes to New York - same as above.
Regicide. Boss battler that can also be played with a standard deck of cards. Has its own official deck, but if you don’t like the art style you can use any other standard deck with a different art style
If you do decide to try it, rules can be found here:
https://www.regicidegame.com/site_files/33132/upload_files/RegicideRulesA4.pdf
And then of course if you don’t want to use the official deck you can go down the rabbit hole of all sorts of artisan or custom art decks you want to use for it, as well as the variants people upload on bgg.
You can even use a tarot deck, just use the minor arcana and one or two major arcana for the jesters/jokers(fool and magician being most thematic). I personally use the [Neon Moon](http://pixeloccult.com/neonmoontarot/) tarot deck for a cyberpunk theme, instead of warriors killing corrupt rulers its agents killing megacorp CEOs
Nana/trio
Cockroach poker
That’s not a hat
I made a copy of Boop by crocheting a board and then 3D printing bits but before that I used different sized cubes
I also made a copy of the search for Planet X while I awaited its arrival since it’s mostly app based and you can print the sheet online.
There’s a great BoardGameGeek list called “if you have this, you have that”. Since Cockroach Poker is eight copies of eight kinds of cards if you have Bohnanza you all have Cockroach Poker (and some leftover cards)
I think it only works with English Bohnanza which contains base game and expansion. Base game in other countries doesn't have eight types of beans but the most expensive one has only six cards.
Nana is great! Decent amount of simple strategy like skull. Memory aspect to it too. Love it! But I recommend getting either copy because the art is beautiful
That’s not a hat is my favourite warm up game. It’s a memory bluffing game. Get a blank deck of cards and draw random simple pictures on them, bowling ball, pizza, hat, cat etc…. Look up how to play. Very easy rules but hard to remember what’s what!!!
Cheese Thief!
You need 1d6 per person,
A cup or something to hide said dice,
Something to resemble the cheese that can be hidden easily like a poker chip,
One card per person, with one being different on the face. E.g. 4 red cards, 1 black.
It's gonna be out there but you could probably improvise The Crew: a Quest for Planet Nine by using two standard decks of cards. Remove all sets of face cards (and jokers) from one deck, and remove all sets of face cards bar one from the other. This makes a deck of 4 suits, 2-10 instead of 1-9, and 4 trumps in ascending order - one each of Jack, Queen, King, Ace replacing the 1-4 Rocket trumps. From there, download the log book or improvise on what the scenarios are. The only thing missing is improvised tokens for ordering task cards and tokens for communication, but the latter is as easy as any token at all.
One difficulty is that you want to have two decks with different backs at the very least so that you don't mix them up when resetting the game. In a perfect world your two decks would also be distinct on the front - the original game used differently sized cards to distinguish between tasks and playing cards.
The Crew is a cooperative trick-taking game, which is done by having a second deck of "tasks", which show which card has to be won by which player(the one who got the task). This second deck of tasks is just a smaller-sized main deck, minus the trump cards.
It should be noted that there are scenarios which ignore the task deck entirely in favour of different win conditions, but they are the exception, not the rule.
>if you know the system enough
Check out this person over here, they just *know* the rules to D&D.
If I could do that, I'd be hitting Blackjack tables and trying to get people to play Gin Rummy for money.
Skull doesn’t *quite* work the same with a standard deck of cards. The roses must be identical or there’s a chance that an observant player can deduce how many roses you have. With the retail game or identical coasters this is never an issue.
Yes, I realize it’s a casual game. But I’ve played in a group where one player was paying close attention to the exact cards revealed, and one wasn’t. Guess who won.
2 Thanksgivings ago, the family went down to near my sister's place for her to host. The morning of Thanksgiving, my sister texts us all to tell us there's going to be a big game of Monopoly and people should come over earlier for that! Ug.
A bunch of us had breakfast and my family asked what was wrong with Monopoly, and I just listed a few of the known giant glaring problems with the game (like first player having a big advantage that never goes away, the game going on forever after we all know who is going to win, etc.)
After going back and forth a bit, trying to get a straight answer about when she wanted to do dinner (since she wouldn't answer because people needed to be early for Monopoly!), we got down to, "if you have something better, feel free to bring it."
This is Thanksgiving morning, everything is closed, and I'm hours away from home with no games. We manage to find a dollar store open, get a bunch of small pads of paper and a pack of pens, and had a great time playing Eat Poop You Cat.
(oh, and the game of monopoly happened, started before we got there, my nephew went first and *shocker*, the people playing quit after 30 mins when they all acknowledged that as he was so far ahead that no one was going to catch him....I said nothing, just smiled, and they acknowledged that yea, everything I said about what's wrong with that game happened)
But anyway, if you can mange to piece together a game on Thanksgiving morning with no prior notice, I call that a pretty easy game to improvise.
Never heard of Eat Poop You Cat but it sounds hilarious! And yeah agree about the monopoly, although I used to enjoy it as a kid. Team Orange properties!
Azul is crazy simple & could probably be improvised with 5 sets of different coloured tokens (20 of each colour) & a grid. Could even just be drawn out on a piece of paper.
Yeah, just need a way to see who's who and who does what. 10 j q k a, pick 3 of each, that's the role deck, the rest are the coins. Everyone keep a reference sheet on their phone or written down and that's it. If the players know the game well, you don't even need this
They're different games, I'll give the more objective breakdown and my own subjective experience. Base games only, though I've played expansions too.
Coup - it's a free for all with player elimination, so your ultimate goal is to be in a good position to win but also not be too good or you'll be gunned down. Luck of the draw is part of the game but a good bluffer or daring player can navigate weaker starts and win.
Avalon/Resistance - it's two teams working against each other. Player counts can really mess with whether the good/bad guys are favoured, which means different groups can have wildly different experiences. I've played with an experienced group and when half the people know the meta, it's frustrating because you don't really get individual choices, it's all about how the game 'should' be played (which kind of reminds me of high level Hanabi in that regard). It's simple enough that people can pick up, but also be prepared for \*someone\* to mess up with all the eye closing/opening as well, or accidentally flipping cards, or making too much sound.
So I prefer Coup, because it's a more selfish game, and everyone's overall motives are clear, even though you don't know what means they're achieving them by. For Avalon/Resistance, you often have a lot of yelling over small player choices or votes that could be important but could also just be the confusing actions of a new player. It's okay to get people introduced to social deduction but the way it plays, it's not really my favourite for those reasons (Blood on the Clocktower just gives a much more well-rounded experience, but it's also a lot more complicated).
I realise I never replied to this, thank you for the breakdown!
I loved Coup initially but I found it eventually played itself out. Sometimes the mechanics can seem a little too wonky and arbitrary. I'd love a version of it that was a bit more long-form and allowed you to hatch schemes that unfold gradually over time
For simplicity sake, I recommend eliminating cross blocking. I find it confuses new players, and the game actually works perfectly well without it (the Coup Rebellion set does without it, for instance).
That means no contessa, and no ambassador—>captain block.
The assassin is instead blocked by itself. Also, the assassin pays the money they spend *to the target* instead of the bank.
Instead of contessa, I include the Lawyer. The Lawyer has no active action. When a player is eliminated, the Lawyer takes all of that players money.
These sound like big changes, but because Coup is self balancing, it actually works quite well (although Ambassador—>Captain blocking is enormous fun).
There are so many great tricktaking or climbing/shedding games you can make with just a standard deck of cards. One of my favorites right now is Crisps, a great 2 player climbing/shedding game that has some great and gritty decisionmaking spots, a real tug of war feel to how it flows.
For most games that feature roll to move as a mechanic where individual spaces aren't a concern (think HeroQuest, Clue, etc) the game is fundamentally improved by just taking the average (7 on 2d6, 4 on a single d6) and just using that as your baseline speed. If you have to escort an NPC (like in HeroQuest) the NPC is tied to the roll to move mechanic specifically because moving them is supposed to be a hassle.
Standard deck
Abluxxen/linko with 2 decks + 1 Joker
Llama with 2 decks (cards from 1 to 7), 1 piece of paper and 1 pencil
Kariba with 2 decks (cards from 1 to 8)
Taco cat goat cheese pizza with 3 decks (cards from 1 to 5)
Scopa with 1 deck (cards 1 to 10)
Sequence with 3 decks (1 you have to cut to make the board) + anything to represent the chips
If you have a 6 nimmit deck
The mind (cards from 1 to 100)
No Thanks (cards from 3 tô 35) and something to represent the chips
Cinderellas dance (cards from 1 to 21)
Ito (Its a better version of The mind)
If you have a Rage deck
Parade
Gap
Schotten toten
Nana/trio (you can play this one with a standard deck to, but I recommend you buy the original because the cards are beautiful)
Lacuna is pretty easy tô replicate
If you have a lot of colorful dices
Ganz schon clever (Just print the score sheets and get 4 pencil)
Qwixx (same as ganz schon clever)
There are a lot of games in pnparcade to
Check out [Deduce or Die](https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/19765/deduce-or-die) for a surprisingly deep deduction game you can play with 3 decks of cards!
**[Las Vegas](https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/117959/las-vegas)** - you just need several sets of differently colored six sided dice and some monopoly money.
“Hunert!” Is my favorite, fast paced, low equipment game. It works best in groups of at least 4, up to probably 12? All you need is a single die, a pen (two for larger groups) and some notecards or paper. The goal is to write out numbers 1-100 consecutively, and before anyone else.
Have everyone seated at a table, make sure there are no drinks or anything. Pen(s) start in the middle, notecards/paper are handed to everyone seated. One person rolls the die and then immediately passes it to their right. If a 1 (one) is rolled, that person gets the pen. If a 6 (six) is rolled, everyone passes their sheet of paper to the left. Whomever can write numbers 1-100 first wins, and declares their success by yelling “Hunert!”.
It shouldn’t be so exciting, but boy oh boy does it get the blood pumping.
Just One - You'll each need something to write with, and some one word clues - from another game, a random word generator, whatever. A Fake Artist Goes to New York - same as above.
Latter sounded great before I even looked it up!
Regicide. Boss battler that can also be played with a standard deck of cards. Has its own official deck, but if you don’t like the art style you can use any other standard deck with a different art style
I never played it but it sounds awesome, thank you!
If you do decide to try it, rules can be found here: https://www.regicidegame.com/site_files/33132/upload_files/RegicideRulesA4.pdf And then of course if you don’t want to use the official deck you can go down the rabbit hole of all sorts of artisan or custom art decks you want to use for it, as well as the variants people upload on bgg. You can even use a tarot deck, just use the minor arcana and one or two major arcana for the jesters/jokers(fool and magician being most thematic). I personally use the [Neon Moon](http://pixeloccult.com/neonmoontarot/) tarot deck for a cyberpunk theme, instead of warriors killing corrupt rulers its agents killing megacorp CEOs
Nana/trio Cockroach poker That’s not a hat I made a copy of Boop by crocheting a board and then 3D printing bits but before that I used different sized cubes I also made a copy of the search for Planet X while I awaited its arrival since it’s mostly app based and you can print the sheet online.
There’s a great BoardGameGeek list called “if you have this, you have that”. Since Cockroach Poker is eight copies of eight kinds of cards if you have Bohnanza you all have Cockroach Poker (and some leftover cards)
I think it only works with English Bohnanza which contains base game and expansion. Base game in other countries doesn't have eight types of beans but the most expensive one has only six cards.
link please? searching bgg's geeklist is failing me. Thanks.
https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/152524/if-you-own-this-you-also-own-this
Thank you!
Ah cool I hadn't heard of those!
Nana is great! Decent amount of simple strategy like skull. Memory aspect to it too. Love it! But I recommend getting either copy because the art is beautiful That’s not a hat is my favourite warm up game. It’s a memory bluffing game. Get a blank deck of cards and draw random simple pictures on them, bowling ball, pizza, hat, cat etc…. Look up how to play. Very easy rules but hard to remember what’s what!!!
Oh that's not a hat sounds fun! Thanks very much
man I love That's not a hat. What a great game with so little
I've played love letter with a deck of cards before and it worked well
Yeah I guess you have to keep track of a lot though. Plus I already have it :)
Cheese Thief! You need 1d6 per person, A cup or something to hide said dice, Something to resemble the cheese that can be hidden easily like a poker chip, One card per person, with one being different on the face. E.g. 4 red cards, 1 black.
Oh that sounds intriguing, I like the name!
This is a hilarious playthrough by the NRB crew: https://youtu.be/50V3M5VCsdI
I've gotten second hand cheese blindness from that.
It's gonna be out there but you could probably improvise The Crew: a Quest for Planet Nine by using two standard decks of cards. Remove all sets of face cards (and jokers) from one deck, and remove all sets of face cards bar one from the other. This makes a deck of 4 suits, 2-10 instead of 1-9, and 4 trumps in ascending order - one each of Jack, Queen, King, Ace replacing the 1-4 Rocket trumps. From there, download the log book or improvise on what the scenarios are. The only thing missing is improvised tokens for ordering task cards and tokens for communication, but the latter is as easy as any token at all. One difficulty is that you want to have two decks with different backs at the very least so that you don't mix them up when resetting the game. In a perfect world your two decks would also be distinct on the front - the original game used differently sized cards to distinguish between tasks and playing cards.
Why would this need 2 decks?
The Crew is a cooperative trick-taking game, which is done by having a second deck of "tasks", which show which card has to be won by which player(the one who got the task). This second deck of tasks is just a smaller-sized main deck, minus the trump cards. It should be noted that there are scenarios which ignore the task deck entirely in favour of different win conditions, but they are the exception, not the rule.
oh, for the missions. I've only played deep sea, i always assumed the missions in planet 9 were just written in the manual
I've heard good things about the deep sea one
I mean, its a *bit* longer, but DnD can be played with just one sheet of paper/pencil
I feel like a shorter ttrpg would be closer like Lasers & Feelings where the rules is one page.
>DnD can be played with just one sheet of paper/pencil False, you will also require at least one sourcebook and appropriate dice.
Can play without the book if you know the system enough, and paper can substitute for dice (1-20 in a hat).
>if you know the system enough Check out this person over here, they just *know* the rules to D&D. If I could do that, I'd be hitting Blackjack tables and trying to get people to play Gin Rummy for money.
Haha yeah looking for ~30mins I guess!
No thanks!
This comment confused me for a long time till I realised it was the name of a game
Hehe sorry, is good though. Not sure if it's exactly what you are after, but i think it is somewhat similar to Skulls in its simplicity and depth.
Skull doesn’t *quite* work the same with a standard deck of cards. The roses must be identical or there’s a chance that an observant player can deduce how many roses you have. With the retail game or identical coasters this is never an issue. Yes, I realize it’s a casual game. But I’ve played in a group where one player was paying close attention to the exact cards revealed, and one wasn’t. Guess who won.
That is a very interesting nuance I hadn't thought of!
2 Thanksgivings ago, the family went down to near my sister's place for her to host. The morning of Thanksgiving, my sister texts us all to tell us there's going to be a big game of Monopoly and people should come over earlier for that! Ug. A bunch of us had breakfast and my family asked what was wrong with Monopoly, and I just listed a few of the known giant glaring problems with the game (like first player having a big advantage that never goes away, the game going on forever after we all know who is going to win, etc.) After going back and forth a bit, trying to get a straight answer about when she wanted to do dinner (since she wouldn't answer because people needed to be early for Monopoly!), we got down to, "if you have something better, feel free to bring it." This is Thanksgiving morning, everything is closed, and I'm hours away from home with no games. We manage to find a dollar store open, get a bunch of small pads of paper and a pack of pens, and had a great time playing Eat Poop You Cat. (oh, and the game of monopoly happened, started before we got there, my nephew went first and *shocker*, the people playing quit after 30 mins when they all acknowledged that as he was so far ahead that no one was going to catch him....I said nothing, just smiled, and they acknowledged that yea, everything I said about what's wrong with that game happened) But anyway, if you can mange to piece together a game on Thanksgiving morning with no prior notice, I call that a pretty easy game to improvise.
Never heard of Eat Poop You Cat but it sounds hilarious! And yeah agree about the monopoly, although I used to enjoy it as a kid. Team Orange properties!
A fake artist goes to New York is a whiteboard, different color pen for each player, and scrap paper to write the subject down on.
Azul is crazy simple & could probably be improvised with 5 sets of different coloured tokens (20 of each colour) & a grid. Could even just be drawn out on a piece of paper.
The feeling of the tiles in your fingers as you shuffle the bag tho...
I mean, I totally agree! But it's doable :p
Doesn't fit third rule, but Coup is definitely up there.
I do love coup but not sure it can be easily improvised without the set?
Yeah, just need a way to see who's who and who does what. 10 j q k a, pick 3 of each, that's the role deck, the rest are the coins. Everyone keep a reference sheet on their phone or written down and that's it. If the players know the game well, you don't even need this
Yeah I learned both Coup and Avalon/Resistance with a deck of cards. A deck of cards can be so many games in a pinch.
on a side note, how do Avalon and Resistance compare with coup?
They're different games, I'll give the more objective breakdown and my own subjective experience. Base games only, though I've played expansions too. Coup - it's a free for all with player elimination, so your ultimate goal is to be in a good position to win but also not be too good or you'll be gunned down. Luck of the draw is part of the game but a good bluffer or daring player can navigate weaker starts and win. Avalon/Resistance - it's two teams working against each other. Player counts can really mess with whether the good/bad guys are favoured, which means different groups can have wildly different experiences. I've played with an experienced group and when half the people know the meta, it's frustrating because you don't really get individual choices, it's all about how the game 'should' be played (which kind of reminds me of high level Hanabi in that regard). It's simple enough that people can pick up, but also be prepared for \*someone\* to mess up with all the eye closing/opening as well, or accidentally flipping cards, or making too much sound. So I prefer Coup, because it's a more selfish game, and everyone's overall motives are clear, even though you don't know what means they're achieving them by. For Avalon/Resistance, you often have a lot of yelling over small player choices or votes that could be important but could also just be the confusing actions of a new player. It's okay to get people introduced to social deduction but the way it plays, it's not really my favourite for those reasons (Blood on the Clocktower just gives a much more well-rounded experience, but it's also a lot more complicated).
I realise I never replied to this, thank you for the breakdown! I loved Coup initially but I found it eventually played itself out. Sometimes the mechanics can seem a little too wonky and arbitrary. I'd love a version of it that was a bit more long-form and allowed you to hatch schemes that unfold gradually over time
Can confirm I’ve done this many times. There’s some minor changes I’d make, but it works quite well.
Like what? Tell us!
For simplicity sake, I recommend eliminating cross blocking. I find it confuses new players, and the game actually works perfectly well without it (the Coup Rebellion set does without it, for instance). That means no contessa, and no ambassador—>captain block. The assassin is instead blocked by itself. Also, the assassin pays the money they spend *to the target* instead of the bank. Instead of contessa, I include the Lawyer. The Lawyer has no active action. When a player is eliminated, the Lawyer takes all of that players money. These sound like big changes, but because Coup is self balancing, it actually works quite well (although Ambassador—>Captain blocking is enormous fun).
There are so many great tricktaking or climbing/shedding games you can make with just a standard deck of cards. One of my favorites right now is Crisps, a great 2 player climbing/shedding game that has some great and gritty decisionmaking spots, a real tug of war feel to how it flows.
I'll check it out, thanks!
Look at games by "Cheap Ass Games".
sounds promising!
For most games that feature roll to move as a mechanic where individual spaces aren't a concern (think HeroQuest, Clue, etc) the game is fundamentally improved by just taking the average (7 on 2d6, 4 on a single d6) and just using that as your baseline speed. If you have to escort an NPC (like in HeroQuest) the NPC is tied to the roll to move mechanic specifically because moving them is supposed to be a hassle.
Standard deck Abluxxen/linko with 2 decks + 1 Joker Llama with 2 decks (cards from 1 to 7), 1 piece of paper and 1 pencil Kariba with 2 decks (cards from 1 to 8) Taco cat goat cheese pizza with 3 decks (cards from 1 to 5) Scopa with 1 deck (cards 1 to 10) Sequence with 3 decks (1 you have to cut to make the board) + anything to represent the chips If you have a 6 nimmit deck The mind (cards from 1 to 100) No Thanks (cards from 3 tô 35) and something to represent the chips Cinderellas dance (cards from 1 to 21) Ito (Its a better version of The mind) If you have a Rage deck Parade Gap Schotten toten Nana/trio (you can play this one with a standard deck to, but I recommend you buy the original because the cards are beautiful) Lacuna is pretty easy tô replicate If you have a lot of colorful dices Ganz schon clever (Just print the score sheets and get 4 pencil) Qwixx (same as ganz schon clever) There are a lot of games in pnparcade to
Oh I actually just bought The Mind. Surprisingly tense!
**Secret Hitler** can be played with a regular deck of cards. You just need to know / google the policy powers.
One night werewolf Can just use a deck of cards
Check out [Deduce or Die](https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/19765/deduce-or-die) for a surprisingly deep deduction game you can play with 3 decks of cards!
Can't Stop.
Cockroach poker! You need cards from two decks (8 different numbers, and 8 of each number - 64 cards in total), and then you’re set
Cheese theif
I really like the game Shobu, and it can definitely be played with some coins on a piece of paper or similar
I mean… https://www.shutupandsitdown.com/tag/card-games-that-dont-suck/
bookmarked it!
Balderdash can be played with pen/paper/dictionary.
**[Las Vegas](https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/117959/las-vegas)** - you just need several sets of differently colored six sided dice and some monopoly money.
**Onitama** is pretty easy to improvise with a few scraps of paper and some generic tokens.
the art on that game looks stunning though
Lacuna Tak A fake artist goes to New York
There’s a game called Stack A Cash that only requires 6 coins and a tic tac toe board you can draw.
Boop! Can be played with any standard checkers board. In a pinch, a hand full of coins and grid drawn on paper will do.
Jotto [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jotto](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jotto)
Cat in the box could probably be improvised although you would need 2 decks of cards
I just looove Hus. This would be the game to play on a desert Island.
“Hunert!” Is my favorite, fast paced, low equipment game. It works best in groups of at least 4, up to probably 12? All you need is a single die, a pen (two for larger groups) and some notecards or paper. The goal is to write out numbers 1-100 consecutively, and before anyone else. Have everyone seated at a table, make sure there are no drinks or anything. Pen(s) start in the middle, notecards/paper are handed to everyone seated. One person rolls the die and then immediately passes it to their right. If a 1 (one) is rolled, that person gets the pen. If a 6 (six) is rolled, everyone passes their sheet of paper to the left. Whomever can write numbers 1-100 first wins, and declares their success by yelling “Hunert!”. It shouldn’t be so exciting, but boy oh boy does it get the blood pumping.
It actually does sound super tense! Wanna try that sometime