Favorite Board Games

[Eijolend]

I play a wide variety of board games since I finally found some people, who are willing to invest time in them!

There are many interesting concepts out there, but the one that really sees regular play and also works well with the not quite as fanatic people in our group, is SmallWorld (published by DaysOfWonder).
Basically it's like risk but (nearly) without dice. You choose a race/special ability combination, which are different every game. But since you only get limited forces at some point you have to go into decline, basically giving your race up and choosing a new one to conquer the board with. After every turn you get points based on how many areas on the board you control (+abilites if applicable), and after a certain amount of rounds the player with the most points wins.
I like that there is no strategy that works every game, since the combinations of race + special ability are different every game (if you get an expansion or two the variations get really strong). It doesn't work very well with 2 players, since you really need to work together to take someone down that gets to pick a overpowered combination - but 3-5 players all play very well.
I'd definitely recommend this one to everyone interested in board games.

If you're not bored by now, maybe I share some thoughts on other games in the future.

(Also don't let me get started on Monopoly...)