As you know, I joined a board gamers meetup group this week. As it turned out, they had a gathering in Mountain View the very next day, so I went. The venue was a place called GameKastle… the former Daiso location inside a strip mall shopping center very close to my home. Let’s just say, I turned up and immediately, I knew this was not the crowd I was expecting.

So here’s the thing about me. I have this bizarre naivete aka lack of pop culture awareness. In my head when I joined a board game group, I was picturing like my friends and people who came to the Game Nights that I used to host– and I was expecting to play games like UNO, Taboo, or Cranium. Maybe like Scrabble or Pictionary. Nope, I was waaaaay off.

The venue, while a very cool idea, was cold… a huge space with just blue walls. The left side of the store had games for sale and on the right side, the place was set up with a bunch of long tables, like a cafeteria or a hackathon. Separating the two areas was long shelves of games.

Of course I showed up at the start of the meetup, punctually at 6pm. There were only a handful of people there, and well, they were all dudes and they were like Dungeons & Dragons type dudes. Throughout the store on the walls were plastered banners of fantasy art and looking at the games these guys brought, I had never even heard of them before. Um, hello. Total intimidation. Great.

So then I headed over to the shelves and shelves of games. There was maybe one pack of dominoes and other than that, NOTHING recognizable to me. Absolutely zippo. Oh shit, what the fuck am I gonna do for like four hours???

An Asian dude walked in and I started asking him some questions, explaining it was my first time at this meetup. When I mentioned the kind of games I wanted to play, he kinda said, yeah those games are pretty light. We focus on strategy games. The thing is, I like games, but I’m a slow learner and even though I have no issue reading directions/instructions on how to assemble furniture or set up computers, I HATE reading game instructions. For some reason, games are something I absorb better being taught in person… so I stood there by the games, with my stress levels going up. Would these hardcore gamers be keen on a newbie joining at their table? Do I pick a random game and try to figure it out myself? Argh!!! Honestly, I almost went home, but something inside told me to try harder.

So I went up to a random table (there were three groups set up by now) with three geeky guys– one dude was young, had a crazy white dude fro, glasses, and a big Google badge around his neck. The other two were guys in their 50s. The game was Favor the Pharaoh and the setup looked super complicated with a gabillion dice, cards, tokens, plus cutout pyramids. Oh god. So I pulled up a chair and offered to just observe as it appeared fro dude was already explaining the rules… he was the only one familiar with the game. Well a minute later, one of the older gents gets up and offers me his spot. Um, what? No, I just want to watch. But he doesn’t want to play. He wants to play the Mars game at the next table. So now Fro dude is irritated and he’s kinda Aspergery… he asks impatiently, do you want to play or not. Ok, sure. I’ll try it out.

So I mean, he was very nice with having to start over and explain the different aspects of the game. Honestly, my head started to hurt and I seriously felt like I was in over my head. But shit man, I was already there… no choice but to continue. Let me just say: it was a humbling experience. Why? Bc I’m retarded about certain things. Like seriously, a dumb dumb. Anything that involves strategy/theory, my brain just cannot grasp. I mean, even in Seattle, when we played games with G&J. We played three new games, and I was the ONLY one of the group who played each round super slowly and I often had to ask them to re-explain a rule that they had just read. I mean, it’s ok. I know everyone has their strengths and weaknesses, but I dunno: sometimes, I still can’t help but feel a little vulnerable or inadequate or not good enough…

But whatever. I’m playing games in a social setting and I just have to get over myself, you know? Try my best and suck it up and just go with the flow even if I’m slowing it down… So I thought back to Seattle. This scenario was a bit different bc I was with strangers and who knows what tolerance they have for slow-bos… I just tried my best to get through each of my turns. At some point, another older gent showed up and just observed. He had never played this game before but holy shit, homeboy like picked up on it immediately. To the point where he was coaching me and the other dude on what to do. And this game involved all kinds of like strategy and manipulation: basically, you roll a bunch of dice and then you try to earn cards based on your dice combination: triple, two doubles, whatever. In turn, the cards give you powers to manipulate your dice or roll more dice in subsequent turns. The end goal is to get 7 of a kind. So based on the cards you have, there are a bunch of different combos you can apply to optimize your hand. So this new dude shows up and immediately within like 3 sec of me rolling my dice, has already figured out the optimal approach. Anyway, we finish the first game and the host wins. The second game, the new guy joins and he gives the host a run for his money.

By the end of the second game, the new guy was basically like, these are the best tactics for this game: optimize your tokens early on, earn cards that give you extra dice, and then use your extra rolls sooner than later… Seriously, he had the whole thing figured out in what felt like a matter of minutes. Meanwhile, the host was like, so do you guys think you understand how to play now? Bc I felt like I had to keep explaining the same things over and over again…

I mean, the game was super complicated, I said. But he corrected me, saying, “Actually, this game is one of the more simplistic ones here…” Oh diss! What could I do but chuckle, right? I mean, when you’re in the presence of someone way smarter, you just have to concede. But shit, his comment made me think of how I interact with my mother, you know? She gets so confused. Then you have to explain shit over and over again… the experience was an interesting role reversal. He then asked us what games we typically play. I named my usual and basically, all of them laughed in my face. I mean, in my defense, maybe the meetup shouldn’t be called a board game meetup, bc are my games NOT considered board games? WTF? If you only do strategy games, then I think that’s how you should market yourself! Whatever. I’m not going to be shamed for liking my games.

Obviously, from the networking perspective, this event was a dud. I mean, we hardly even introduced ourselves until the very end. SMH. That said, I’m going to go to one more of these board gaming sessions and bring Bubbey. It has the potential to be a fun shared activity… and maybe having to learn new games every time will build my mental muscles. 🙂 As for the other meetups, I found another board gamers one where the participants appear more diverse and fuddyduddy: they also incorporate bowling and potlucks and other activities. I was also very excited to find a rollerblading one, a ukulele one, and a skateboarding for adults (!!!) one. We’ll see how they all check out. Hee, hee. Now I’ve opened a can of worms!