As you fine folks know, I’m a bit of a nerd loser. So I’m going to be doing a bit of yapping about my favourite board game of all time: the 1979 Avalon Hill Dune board game.

This game is like… actually wild. The process of playing this game feels your brain is constantly exploding. Because it’s so incredibly complicated — but so incredibly fun. That’s one of the tough things about it. The first time you play, it’s just the exploding brain and isn’t always a great experience. But after that, it feels like your brain is exploding and you’re using those explosions to control your direction… or something. Basically, it’s really fun.

So, in Dune you play as one of six factions from… well… Dune. Your faction is vying to control three of five strongholds on Arrakis. You maneuver troops around the planet as you out strategize (or out luck) the other factions.

Each faction has super freaking rad special abilities. One of the ‘rules’ of Dune is that every rule has an exception — mostly because of the rad special abilities each faction gets. I’ll go over them:

• The Emperor. The Emperor has maybe the simplest ability: you’re incredibly rich. Basically, each round, everyone bids on cards that give them a combat advantage. And you get ALL THE MONEY FROM THE BIDDING. So since six cards are bid on every round, you’re probably getting 10-20 moneys. Also, if you form an alliance with another faction, you can give that faction money to pay for cards… money which you then get back. The rich get richer.

• The Harkonen. Excel at treachery. Those cards I mentioned? They’re called treachery cards. Mostly weapons you can use in combat. Since the Harkonen excel at treachery, when you buy one, you get a second for free! And you can hold twice as many as anyone else.

• Atreides. Speaking of the treachery cards, the Atreides have limited prescience, so they can see what card is up for auction (it’s normally hidden to the rest of the players). You can also know one of the stats or weapons your opponent uses in a battle. You’re also the only one allowed to take nots about people’s cards. Atreides is such big brain.

• The Spacing Guild. So a fun fact about space is that if you have soldiers in space, you need to get them onto the planet. The spacing guild takes care of that. When you ship troops in, the spacing guild gets the money. It’s also way cheaper for them to ship in, so they can drop like 12 troops into a stronghold and absolutely decimate them. The spacing guild can also ignore turn order and go whenever they want.

• Bene Gesserit. They have maybe the coolest ability, which is that before the game starts, you make a prediction about who is going to win the game and on what turn. If your prediction comes true, you win instead of whoever you predicted. Also, whenever other people ship troops in from off-planet, you send along a ✨spiritual advisor ✨ who is just along to advise, spiritually. Your spiritual advisors just stockpile throughout the game…. until you flip them over! You can also use The Voice to tell other players what to do when you fight them. Atreides is big brain, but Bene Gesserit is way more big brain. It’s so much. Cause you can’t win with brute force, you have to manipulate everyone else on the battle field. It’s crazy. And so fun. I love it.

• The Fremen. “Your main handicap is poverty.” I don’t think I’ve actually played the Fremen, but my partner has. They are kinda crazy because they know Arrakis so well, so they can move super quick. And they don’t have to pay to ship onto the planet. Since they live there. And they fight way better without having to spend money on their shoulders. And if there are two sand worms in a row, the Fremen can ride the worm to wherever they want. Oh, and they can predict where the killer storm is going to go which is a thing I haven’t mentioned yet and won’t elaborate on.

Anyways, this game is wild. It’s so fun. There’s so much more random bullshit. Like if both a lasgun and a shield are used in a combat everyone is killed. And you can blow up a shield wall (oh my god it’s just like in Dune :0000).

I’m not even a massive Dune enjoyer (I read the first and second book like four years ago. I haven’t even seen the movies). But this game is so fun. I feel like I haven’t done a great job of pitching it, but in my defence, Mission Impossible is playing in the background and it’s a really bad movie (they absolutely smash you over the head with plot in terribly boring scenes).

Anyways, if you get the chance to play Dune, I super recommend it. It’s really really fun :D. And I’m not saying that because I have the best win rate of our entire group. (Ignoring Nathan [probably shouldn’t dox last name because I haven’t even met this person, but I’m pretty sure that a handful of people on this newsletter know this Nathan], who only played a single game.)

Dune is good y’all. :D. This is the video that got me hooked. I just… I love this game so much y’all. And I can’t wait to Dune again. It’s such a high.

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That’s All!

Yada yada. Still on vacation. Have podcast scripts I should be writing (sorry). Mission Impossible has been playing while I’ve been writing this and it’s. Like… how is the dialog and plot so bad. It’s entirely dependent on Tom Cruise stunts. Maybe that’s because I haven’t seen any other ones and it’s reference central. But their dumb planning scenes beat me over the head with everything that happens so much. They really don’t trust their audience. It’s all super text. Also I don’t like the fight scenes because I’m scared of blood.

Until Sunday at 10:03 pm, buzz on, my busy bees!

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