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Jbrown's Aggravation (Other)
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| [February 9, 2014 09:54:29 PM]
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Game Summary:
This is a Milton Bradley board game for 2-6 players ages 6 and up. The object of the game is to get all of your marbles around the board back to home before the other players can. You can all play nice or play dirty. If you land on another player's marble you get to send it back to base. The game ends whenever the first player gets all 4 marbles home and that player wins.
Game Pieces:
Game board with holes to hold the marbles
5 Marbles of 6 colors (Only 4 marbles of each color are used in the game)
One six-sided dice
Terminology:
Base – These are the 4 starter locations for your marbles.
Home – These are the 4 locations you need to get your marbles to win.
Aggravation – When a player lands on another players marble and sends it back home.
Star Hole Shortcut – Around the center of the board are 6 holes that if you land in them you can get around the board more quickly.
Center Hole Shortcut – This is a special shortcut in the center of the board. If you roll an exact number you can land here and skip to any star hole if you exit it. To leave the center you must roll a 1.
Gameplay:
Each player starts with their four marbles in their base. Each player rolls to see who goes first. High roll wins and play goes clockwise. To get out of the base you must roll either a 1 or 6 and your marble goes to the start position. If you roll a 6 you can roll again. Your marbles can jump over or land on top of enemy marbles but you cannot go jump passed your own marbles. You also cannot get another marble out of the base if another one of your marbles is in the start spot. If you land on top of an enemy marble you will send them back to their base. To get into the Star Hole Shortcut or Center Hole Shortcut you have to roll an exact number to move into those spots. If you are in the Star Hole Shortcut you can go around to the different stars until you get back to your row. If you don't land on one of the shortcuts exactly you have to go around the home of each of the opponents bases. To exit the Center Hole Shortcut you must roll a 1 but you can go to any of the Star Holes. Once your marbles get close to being Home you have to roll exact numbers to fill up the home slots. If you roll a higher number than moves available then you are blocked and have to pass the turn. Once a player has all their marbles into Home they win the game.
In House Rule:
If you roll 3 6's in a row you have to send a ball back home. This is just a rule we've always had in case someone gets “too lucky”.
Affordances:
You have the Star Circle in the middle which you can use as a shortcut.
You can use your power to send another player's marbles back home.
You get a free roll if you roll a 6.
Limitations:
You cannot jump over your own marbles.
You cannot leave your base without a roll of a 1 or 6.
First Play Session:
I was playing with 3 family members who all had played before but it had just been a long time since we played. It was my mother, aunt, step-dad and myself. We decided we were going to play two games. One that we would play nice and one more dirty. This game is very luck based with the dice. It took a couple turns for anyone to get out and the other three players including me were stuck. The first player to get out was my step-dad. He nearly had a marble home before I got out. My step-dad got a marble into the center star. My aunt was stuck for a long time with bad rolls and couldn't get started. We all had several opportunities to send each other's marbles back but noone wanted to do it this game unless we had no other option. This game was not that close because my step-dad got most of his marbles home before others could get out. The game can be very luck dependent but players can choose to team up to intentionally take out the leader's marbles to bring him back down. My step-dad did get stuck for a while trying to get his last ball home. He needed to roll a 1 and took several turns to get it. Another observation is that it is usually best to land in the normal Star Hole Shortcut because you don't have to rely on rolling a 1 to get out. Many times someone would get stuck in the center shortcut and took a long time to get out.
Second Play Session:
The second game started much like the first. My mother got out first and got to a big lead before anyone else could get a marble out of the base. This game we played more aggressive. My aunt got her first ball stuck in the center and couldn't roll a 1 or a 6 and was stuck there for a long time. We sent my step-dad back to base several times trying to make sure he didn't win twice in a row. There were two times in this game where I rolled 6's three times in a row and by our rule I had to return a ball back to base. The finish to the game ended up very close. Every player had 3 of the 4 balls back in the base and were looking for specific rolls to get home and win. My mother needed a 4 to get in for several turns. She got a couple 1's and then finally a 2 to win the game.
Thoughts About the Game:
The game generally works well but it does hurt the fun for some players when they get stuck and have trouble even getting out of their base. The game is very simple to learn and is very easy to explain for the first time. It is fun to have the choice of playing nice or dirty and sending the other players' marbles back to base. With the way the game is setup, no 2 games will be alike. If there was one thing I'd like to change would be that maybe each player could start with a ball in the start position instead so they have something to do in the early game. Overall it was a fun experience for all the players and we'd like to play more games like this one.
This entry has been edited 2 times. It was last edited on Feb 10th, 2014 at 12:25:38.
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Jbrown's Aggravation (Other)
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Current Status: Playing
GameLog started on: Sunday 9 February, 2014
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