Do You Like Games You Don't Understand?

I played Caylus for the first time today, and I was kind of meh. It's an interesting game, but there are too many things to think about and I'm not sure I'd ever do a good job with it. I like the building track, and if Caylus was simply an economic game trying to build the right sets of buildings so that my economy functions more efficiently than yours, I think I'd like that. I find that adding the castle and the royal favours makes Caylus so complicated I'll probably never do a good job with it. I can't grok the long-term consequences of my actions.

I think Princes of Florence is somewhat similar - there are just too many things going on. I'm all at sea when I play that, and consequently I don't enoy it so much. I suspect Goa and Louis XIV are a bit like that as well. Maybe just a bit too complicated. I like games that I can get my head around, even if it's only just, such as Tikal, Tigris and Euphrates, and Elfenland. They're the limit of complexity that I'm comfortable with and consequently a challenge to play. Easier games like San Juan, GIPF and Hare and Tortoise that I understand really well become old favourites that I can play to relax.

What I want to know is, do people often like games which confuse them? Are all the people who rate Caylus highly super-mega-smart? I have a Ph.D. and a genius IQ, but it confuses me. Are Caylus fans the absolute intellectual elite of the planet? If not, what's so good about a game that's confusingly hard? Do people like playing a game where they feel lost? Is there some different sort of intelligence that they have and I don't? I need feedback here, because it just doesn't make sense to me.

The Great Dimwitty

I took Scrabblette along to Book Realm on Wednesday night. We played Elfenland, then I narrowly avoided playing Ticket to Ride by suggesting The Great Dalmuti. For those who don't know, The Great Dalmuti is a simple shedding game (a card game where you're trying to get rid of your cards) with some very fun conventions regarding the behaviour of the players. The currently winning player is referred to as the Great Dalmuti, and the second place player is the Lesser Dalmuti. The last player is the Greater Peon and the second-last player is the Lesser Peon. The Great Dalmuti gets the best chair and is waited on hand and foot by the Greater Peon who sits on a box and has the added responsibility of gathering the cards, shuffling and dealing. A lot of the fun in the game is in the interaction between the Dalmutis and the Peons.

I started as the Lesser Dalmuti and got myself promoted. Justin became the Greater Peon so I bossed him around as much as I could - telling him to hurry up, abusing him for the bad cards he gave me, and generally giving him a hard time. Justin played along wonderfully, bowing humbly and tugging his forelock and apologising at every opportunity. I even got bored and told him to abuse himself for a while. I'm glad he interpreted that in the family-friendly way. I had a good run, and spent quite a few rounds as the Great Dalmuti, and eventually Scrabblette became the Greater Peon. What Great Dalmuti could resist? "Greater Peon, give me a kiss!" The Greater Peon obeyed, as she should. In fact, the Greater Peon had a fine time playing footsies with the Great Dalmuti. Until Justin became the Great Dalmuti, at which point I directed him that he wasn't to kiss the Greater Peon no matter how fine a Dalmuti he was.

I had a lot of fun playing that game - it's a bit of a party game, but it rewards skill and there's lots of opportunity for showing your personality. Since then Scrabblette has forgotten her station in life and continued calling me the Great Dimwitty. It's hard to get good peons these days.