The Board Games

All three of these games are roll and write games in a series, connected by some basic mechanics, designed by Wolfgang Warsch. The base mechanics of the games, like I said, are similar across the board, but the games each offer their own twist.

The basic mechanic in the game is that you roll your dice, pick one to use, get rid, to a common pool, all the numbers lower than it, and repeat the process until you’ve used three dice, or fewer. Then the other players use a die from the common pool. Then the next player rolls and you repeat that process. Your goal, get as many points as you can.

There are two other things that are always true. The white die is a wild. And if you use the blue die or the white die in the blue section, it’s always the combined total of the white and blue dice. But the white ie you can use anywhere that you want. I guess a third thing, which is could be an afterthought when teaching is the foxes. If you get a fox, at the end of the game, multiply the number of foxes times your lowest scoring section.

Ganz Schon Clever – Doppelt So Clever – Clever Hoch Drei

Let’s talk real quick about each of them. Mainly compare how they work and actually maybe a slight change in my opinion after last nights play.

Ganz Schon Clever

Ganz Schon Clever is maybe the most basic of the games. Which makes sense being the original one that came out. That isn’t to say that it doesn’t have combos, it has a lot of them. But Ganz Schon Clever, doesn’t have the more complex sections like some others do. It is basically always simple on how to use the dice. It’s the one that I started with and it’s the one I’d use to teach, even if you like others better in the series.

Doppelt So Clever

Doppelt So Clever has always been the toughest for me and been the lowest of the three for me. Now, I’m not sure that’s the case anymore. Mainly, I think I’m seeing the puzzle better now, and I have some ideas of how I want to handle the game as I play. It definitely ramps up the complexity in the game with basically every section. While some, pink and blue might not be too complex, they offer more to think about.

Clever Hoch Drei

Finally we have Clever Hoch Drei, probably the one that clicked with my fastest and the one that I get the highest score on. A lot of the things just make sense to me as I play them. I didn’t do a great job comboing as I could have last night in the game. Mainly not using the yellow section as effectively as sometimes. But you fill in a whole lot more and get many more combos, it feels like in Clever Hoch Drei.

I think that Doppelt So Clever went up in my estimation last night and Clever Hoch Drei went down. Mainly you can do so much in Clever Hoch Drei that decisions matter a little less. Where as Doppelt So Clever being a tighter game, what you do matters more.

Upcoming Streams

On Monday I am streaming my Top 100 Games (of all time) 2022 Edition – 50 through 41. The video down below. So join me on that journey, then the following Monday, the 31st, I might take off for Halloween. I suspect it’d be cutting it close with podcast, Trick or Treating, and getting a kid into bed.

As for my Wednesday stream, next week my hope is to get Chronicles of Drunagor to the table at least for an unboxing. And I know a I have a few other boxes coming in as well. So I might play Final Girl, or we’ll see what my mystery package coming in might be. But soon I will get Chronicles of Drunagor to the table. And next week might be an unboxing of the game and picking out of characters, actually.

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So what are these games, we have three different roll and write games all from the same series of game and all with some similar mechanics. In all of the games you are rolling six dice and then using them to fill in areas on your sheet in classic roll and write style. Also in all of them you are picking one die, and using it in it’s color, except for white which is wild, then getting rid of all the dice lower, rolling again, and doing that until you have used three dice. Then on your opponents turn, of the three dice they didn’t use, you get to use one of those, and if you can’t, you get to use any die they ended with. In all the games there are also plus ones which allow you to use an extra die after any round, or rerolls which allow you to reroll all the dice on your turn.

Ganz Schon Clever

The older of the three siblings, this game is pretty straight forward. You are basically crossing off spots based off of a number, or filling in numbers that then score points for you. Where this game shines is that it is pretty combo focused which is great because as you fill in spots, it then allows you to fill in other spots and you can potentially chain it pretty long. The rules are pretty straight forward with the most complicated thing being that you need to remember to add the blue and white die together whenever looking at the blue section, and that the purple section counts up so you always need to be greater but a six resets it. It’s not complex stuff, but those two rules compared to filling in everything else are the most complex.

Doppelt So Clever

The second one in the line is probably the most complex of them. It has a section with grey where if you fill in the grey section you take all the lower rolled dice and fill them in as well, so having a high grey can be good, but also can mean that you lose too many dice. So it adds in an ability to get dice back. That is something additional to keep track of, but not that complex, you just have a few things to pay attention to. The yellow section is also tricky, using a yellow die once means that you circle the spot which can help you get bonuses, but you have to cross off spots in yellow, using that same spot a second time, which will give you points but not a bonus again. Overall, everything is just a bit more complex to think about. The blue section still has you adding blue and white together, but it is always decreasing or equal to with no resetting, so you need to plan that out carefully. Green is all about getting a high die and then a low die as you score the difference between the two spots you fill in, and pink gives you points for the number you put down, but rewards if you put down numbers that meet the criteria. Definitely much more to think about.

Clever Hoch Drei

This one I find a bit easier than Doppelt So Clever, but closer to it, in it’s complexity, than Ganz Schon Clever. This one you have a green section that is filled in by looking at how many dice you have used of the same number, plus that die, and filling in the column with that number. There is a brown section that allows you to go as far to the right on it as you want to fill in a number, but you can never go back. There blue section has you either building up or down from a central number and resetting it on a seven, but it always has to go up or down by one. And the pink section either gives you a bonus, or you can multiply your number for the dice when scoring it. This one adds in a mechanic where instead of getting a die back, you can unlock numbers to change the die face to when you are putting it on the player board, but you don’t actually flip the die.

The Fight

Normally I’d do some comparison, but I’ve kind of already done that at the top and talking about each I’m talking about the differences for them. I think the biggest thing with all of these games, besides them being similar in how they work is that they all are roll and writes that focus on getting combos. I love to be able to use a plus one to fill in a spot that will then fill in another spot and then hopefully chain even one further.

This fight itself is seeing a lot of mirror moves from Ganz Schon Clever, Doppelt So Clever, and Clever Hoch Drei. They really are doing the same thing, but Ganz Schon Clever gets knocked down and out of the ring as Doppelt So Clever and Clever Hoch Drei are just faster and showing off more complex variations. Those two go at it with Clever Hoch Drei getting ahead by pulling off more combos faster and chaining together more moves, Doppelt So Clever on the other hand seems to be trying to get some really complex moves in there. They both are wearing each other down and Ganz Schon Clever comes back from where they’ve been lying outside by the ring and pushes Doppelt So Clever out of the ring. It hits the late game combos on Clever Hock Drei, and goes for the pin…

And the Winner is

Ganz Schon Clever

I will say that I really like all of these. I think that they are interesting and creative games that keep something similar throughout but still offer up great challenges. Ganz Schon Clever is just a little bit simpler, and I think that works well for all groups where as something like Doppelt So Clever feels like it’s two steps beyond that and for some people might not work as well. I also think that Ganz Schon Clever has a slight advantage for me because it should play faster since there is less going on. I really do love them all, I think they are really clever and interesting games.

Which is your favorite of the three?

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