Welcome back from a busy Valentine’s day weekend. I hope you all treated each other with love! My wife was out of town most of the day Saturday so I took part in a local Math Trade (where I received a Dixit expansion, Splendor, and Cinque Terre). Then we grabbed a pie from a local diner as a gift for my wife. Then some friends came over and we played Deus, which is inspiring me to build a deck-based engine builder game utilizing similar but unique mechanics.

Then yesterday I had the privilege of demoing Scoville at a local game store. A 13 year old loved Scoville and his grandpa ended up buying it for him. I hope it inspires him to become a gamer!

But you aren’t here to read about my weekend. You’re here to see what awesome Boards & Barley I’ve been enjoying! So let’s begin with the Barley…

The Barley:

Dubbel-y delicious… compared to my previous homebrews, at least.

BARLEY SPOTLIGHT:
Homebrew Belgian Dubbel

Despite having several new beers this past week I had to make my homebrew the spotlight this week. It is by far my best homebrew yet and finally one that I’m not at least mildly gun-shy about offering to people. It is really excellent. My colleague requested the recipe after I gave him a six-pack. And my friends actually enjoy it.

• Guinness Draught
• Boddington’s
• NEW! Weltenburger Barock Dunkel
• Tripel Karmeliet
• Deschutes Black Butte
• Flight: North Coast Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stout
• NEW! Flight: Wisconsin Brewing Betray Ale
• NEW! Flight: 3 Sheeps Cashmere Hammer
• NEW! Flight: Abita Andygator
• Flight: Blue Moon White
• NEW! Flight: Port Huron Hefeweizen

NEW BEER COUNT FOR 2015: 13

The Boards:

Sort of fun.

BOARDS SPOTLIGHT:
NEW! Madame Ching

There is a neat and interesting card mechanic where you utilize the cards in your hand to move your ship across the sea. Using a similar color as your previous card moves you straight across. Using a different colored card moves you diagonal down and across. The goal is to earn points, which is done most regularly by completing objectives, which are earned based on how far your expedition traveled across the sea.

I thought the artwork was nice and colorful. But the gameplay seemed really dependent on the cards you were able to procure. I found it difficult to put together a nice expedition. But I’d like to play it again to see if it was just a case of bad luck.

• Scoville x2
• NEW! Hacienda
• NEW! Province
• Viticulture
• Dungeon Roll
• Deus
• NEW! Bullfrogs

NEW BOARD GAME COUNT FOR 2015: 8

So what Boards & Barley have you been enjoying? Are there any games or brews you would like me to try? Just let me know!