How To Play The Gang

The Gang is a cooperative Texas Hold’em style poker game where instead of bidding on how strong your hand is, you are trying to get the hands of all the players in order after the river. But you work off of the knowledge from how strong people think their hands are prior to the river. If you get it correct three times you win, if you get it wrong three times, you lose.

The Texas Hold’em

The Gang follows Texas Hold’em style poker when you are building up your best hand of cards. For those who aren’t familiar, I’ll cover it briefly before we get into the rest of the game. You get a two card hand. Then more cards are played out into a communal pool. They are the flop, the turn, and the river. The flop is going to add three cards and the turn and river one card each. The player with the best hand between their cards and the communal cards wins the hand.

Getting the Order Right

So let’s talk about how you get the order right. In The Gang, let’s say for a six player game, you want the player with the best hand to have the poker chip worth six when you rank hands after the river and the player with the worst had having the one.

You are allowed to discuss how strong you feel your hand is. But you are not able to say specifics about your hand. An example might be: “My hand got better with the flop.” Or another example would be “I have a scoring hand now.” You are not allowed to specify how it got better or how it is scoring just that it is.

So after the initial hand of two cards is dealt, the flop, the turn, and the river, players take chips as to how they think their hand is. This is all after the discussion. But it is just the ranking of the hand on the final round that is going to determine if your order is right.

Tie-Breaking

I thought about putting this up in the Texas Hold’em section, but let’s talk about tie breaking. When you think of a scoring hand, for example two pair, you think of that being your hand. But it is possible to have the same thing as someone else. So you use standard tie-breakers like in poker. The higher pair of the two pair is compared, if one person has higher than the other, they are ahead. If they are the same, you check the next pair.

Now let’s use the example of a single pair. If you have a single pair and someone else has that pair, how do you decide the tie-breaker? Well, in that case you look at the kicker. That is that you look at the highest single card that you use to make your hand. If those are the same, often the case if they are in the communal cards, you keep comparing until you get through your hand of five scoring cards. If it is still a tie, the order doesn’t matter because they are the same.

Increasing the Challenge

So it is possible that you’ll find it gets too easy over time. So the game offers ways to make it more challenging or easier. One being positive and negative modifier cards. So if you win one round you flip a negative modifier card, such as a single player must take the one for the first three rounds of discussion. Or it might give you an extra card for your hand if you lost the previous time. This is going to add just a little twist to what the game is already doing.

What Doesn’t Work

The game can skew a bit easy at times. This is something that you can control with how much communication you allow. If you keep that to very general terms it is going to be more difficult. If you reference previous hands or things like that, it is going to be a bit easier. Also player count is going to make it harder or easier depending on how many players you have, the more the harder.

The other thing, and this more of a to be aware of, some knowledge of poker and Texas Hold’em does help. In particular with knowing how strong a hand is in Texas Hold’em can be important. A good pair might be the best overall hand. The game does give you a cheat sheet to know the ranks of hands but if you are a poker novice, this is going to be a notable learning curve.

What Works

The game is fast to set-up and play. While the discussion at times can take a bit, it isn’t generally that long. Because you care about getting it right at the end, only after the river is the discussion highly important. But for getting the game to the table, it is shuffle up and deal cards and that’s about it to get it to work. Especially if the players have played the game before, it is going to instantly get to the table.

The cooperative nature of the game works as well. That was my big concern going into the game. But I like how it works and the challenge of ranking the hands is good. We got better at it as we played. It is common, though, to end the game with a discussion around how strong you feel a hand is and for two players to have extremely close hands. That challenge works well for the game.

I also like the benefits if you fail or the negatives if you pass. And I think I could see even making that more challenging by playing on some of the harder modes. But they offer just a little twist or variety to what is happening in the game. Is it needed for the game, probably not if you don’t play too many times in one sitting. As the group changes, the dynamic is going to change. But with a group playing a few times in a row, it adds in some good variety.

Who is The Gang For?

I think The Gang is a good game for a mixed group of board gamers and maybe poker players or cards players. If you play a lot of cards, you probably have dabbled with poker of some variety. The trickiest part is going to be if you play with someone who doesn’t play poker. And by that I mean more hasn’t played poker. I don’t play poker often, but I know how it works as I’ve played some. But if it is completely new, maybe play a couple of hands of real poker first to get them familiarized.

Final Thoughts and Grade on The Gang

This one is interesting for me. Firstly, I want to say that I really like what it does for a cooperative poker game. And you will find that I rate it highly. However, on the flip side, I think it is a game that I want to play only so often and with varying groups. If I play it with one group over and over again, I suspect I will want to play it on the hardest difficulty. But I want to play it again, so there is that.

The other thing is that I think people who like The Gang are going to like it a lot. The people who doesn’t like The Gang, it is going to be a strong dislike of the game. Mainly because it is cooperative, limited communication, and poker. Somewhere in that combination there is a chance for a lot of players to dislike it. You might dislike cooperative games. Or you might dislike games where it limits what you can say. Or you might dislike the luck of poker. But if you are cool with all of those things, then it is a very good game.

My Grade: B+
Gamer Grade: C+
Casual Grade: B-
Strategy (out of 10): 0
Luck (out of 10): 2

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10 Played Games for My Gaming Day

10. Pirates of Marcaibo

I love this one on BGA. I want to play it in person and see how that goes. It’s a bit more of a rules teach, but it shouldn’t be too bad to get played. And I think once the game gets going it moves fast. Plus fun theme and easy sell.

9. Lost Ruins of Arnak

Lost Ruins of Arnak is a game I love. I own everything for it. So I want to get it in the big box and try out the new tracks in the game and see how everything works together.

8. Mistborn

Another one where I really like the game and it’s been a while since I’ve played it. That is going to be the case for a lot of the games. I think the people who are invited thus far are going to enjoy a game like this as well.

7. The Great Split

See above, really. But after playing New York Slice for the first time it made me realize that I just want to play The Great Split because that game is a brilliant I split and you choose game.

6. Terraforming Mars: Ares Expedition

Yet another one where I just want to play it again. Terraforming Mars: Ares Expedition is a great engine building game and good for a longer game day. Like Lost Ruins of Arnak, though, I need to get it sorted out.

5. Strike

I play this one a lot. It’s on the list because it’d be a great group game there. Plus it’s a good filler/take a break from bigger games game.

4. Can’t Stop

The same can be said for Can’t Stop. Though Can’t Stop can’t support as many people. But it works well and it’s an easy one to teach and play. A good filler for when maybe one group finished before another.

3. Trekking Through Time

I’ve played this one two players and I really enjoy it two players. I want to try it with more because it’s just a fun game. It’s also a simple one to learn and play.

2. Skyrockets

You might not even know I played this game. And it is kind of a cheat to be on this part of the list. Played it two years ago at Gen Con when it was still a prototype at the Floodgate Games event. But it’s a fun real time game, so I want to play it again.

1. Heat: Pedal to the Metal

I love this game. It isn’t the easiest I think to learn. But once you wrap your head around it, it’s pretty simple to play. And it is a good game because it plays a lot.

10 Un-Played Games for My Gaming Day

10. The Gang

Now we’re in the new games. This is a cooperative poker game, so I want to give it a whirl. Plus I know it plays at higher player counts so a good one for the list.

9. Critter Kitchen

Critter Kitchen has just been sitting there waiting to get played. I want to take it a lot and see if I can get it played, but I need to open and sort it for that to happen. And it is one I probably need to learn to take along.

8. Maple Valley

Maple Valley is the follow-up to Creature Comforts. I like Creature Comforts as a good simple worker placement game. I am curious to see what Maple Valley does. They are very different games, but same great artwork and in the “same world”.

7. Ruins

Ruins is one that people were talking about going into Gen Con. It is a reworking of Custom Heroes. It is a card shedding game where you upgrade cards throughout the rounds. So I am curious to know how that system is going to work.

6. Ito

Ito is going to be one of the bigger games or party games on the list. I want to learn this one and it seem easy to play. From what I know of it, it is a good ice breaker game as well. Or maybe more of an ice breaker than an actual game.

5. Emberleaf

Emberleaf is the card dancing game. Basically a game where you play cards into a grid and then you activate the grid. The cards then move in that grid, some dropping out, others activating various affects. I like the sound of the game and great cute artwork.

4. Ghosts of Christmas

First of three trick taking games. Ghosts of Christmas sounds like a brain burner of a trick taking game where you play three tricks at once. And depending on how the previous trick goes that determines the led suit for the next one. With a Christmas Carol theme, how will it work for the past, present, and future tricks.

3. The Six of VIII

The Six of VIII is going to be a fun one to try as well. It’s about the six wives of Henry the VIII. And each trick the trump suit is going to be one of the wives. But it is more than that because how long a wife was alive is going to impact how many rounds that suit is trump. I like how thematic they managed to make a trick taking game.

2. Tricky Kids

Now, Tricky Kids is a new game as well. I would have put both Tricky Kids and Cat in the Box on the list, but I’m playing Cat in the Box on BGA right now. It is very possible that Cat in the Box will come along as well. But Tricky Kids is trick taking game where the cards don’t have a value on them. So you need to set the value, but you only have 21 points to allocate over 7 cards.

1. Expeditions

Finally, let’s go with something different and big with Expeditions from Stonemaier games. I like the idea of trying this one in a bigger group, or maybe not with everyone but with some. And I believe that one person in the group owns it and has played it before. It is nice to bring along games like that so that I don’t need to learn the rules. Or more so, so that no one needs to learn the rules because I’m not going to learn them all.

Final Thoughts

Now that is a lot of games to bring along. And I know that all of them won’t make it, but I plan on bringing a big mess of games. There are other smaller games too that are going to be stuck in because they are smaller games. So stuff like Flip 7 or Push are really likely to come along. New games like First-Class Letters and Trinket Trove (as I want to play that one with more) will come along. But this is a good list for me to start planning on what to bring. But it sounds like a good gaming day to me.

If you were to do a full gaming day, what games are you going to take off of the shelf?

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10 Small Board Games I Want To Play

10. Tasso Banana

This looks like a silly little game, and I like silly little games. In Tasso Banana you stack bananas onto cards. You can’t stack it on a banana leaf. And if you stack your banana balancing it on two other bananas you take an extra turn. First to get rid of all your bananas and you win the game. That just sounds like a silly good time. And I am always here for a silly good time. It’s also one that I think I my kid might like too, so it could be a family game afternoon sometime and make it easier than some to get played.

9. Circus Flohcati

Who doesn’t love a game with the theme of a flea circus? Firstly, it is a great silly theme and the new 25th Century/Playte version of the game doesn’t look horrifying like some of the older versions do. In this game you are trying to collect cards. You score points for collecting sets of three and then the highest value cad you have of each color. It sounds like a nice simple game but one that could be a very fun puzzle to play.

8. Sequoia

I like a lot of Allplay’s little box games. And I hope the same will be true with Sequoia. This one is supposed to be a very fast game where you are trying to grow the tallest trees in a few different areas. But you roll dice to determine which forests you are going to place on. And you need to determine when to stop fighting over a forest and pivot to another because only first and second get the points for that forest. And if you tie, you are going to need to be fighting some more to end the game. The tie rules are the only part where I wonder if I’m going to enjoy this game.

7. Vampire Queen

This is a card shedding game. By that I mean that you want to empty your hand or deck of cards faster than other people. To do that, you are trying to beat the cards that were played before you. So if someone plays two threes you might play two fours, for example. Plus there are Vampire Slayers in the mix and Vampire Queens. The Vampire Queen is the number of whatever cards you play. So once someone gets rid of all their cards, you tally up the points for the other players and play five times. It sounds again simple, which I expect from a small game and easy to teach and play.

6. Pioneer Rails

A roll and write game, and not the last on the list. Though all of them on the list are technically flip and write games. This one is about building our a railway system in the old west. You are trying to build out poker hands and then using the poker cards flipped to build out your train routes and connect different locations. The more you can connect the more bonusses you get and end game scoring that you get. This is one that can be played solo so it is one that I should probably play on stream. I like the sound of it a lot and I enjoy a good roll and write style game.

5. Schadenfreude

Do you expect to see trick taking games on the list, you should. This one I got intrigued by when someone on the Dice Tower talked about it. It sounds like a pretty straightforward trick taking game. You want to win as many tricks as you can. But the twist is that might not be quite true. You want to win as many as you can without going over a point total. So it is a closest without going over that is going to be the challenge. How close can you get to that total and take home the win, or will you fly to close to the sun and get burned?

4. The Gang

This one I know has gotten some mixed reviews but it sounds unique. This is a cooperative poker hand building game. The first of two games about poker coming in a row here. For it to be a cooperative game is very cool and that is part of why I picked it up. I like the poker theme as well for the game. And I think the idea of poker hands is something that people in my game group are going to catch onto pretty quickly. So I want to get this one played and see if it’s a game for me or not.

3. Fliptown

This is an old west themed roll and write game. Though, it’s done using a deck of cards versus rolling some dice. So I’m very intrigued by it. You flip three cards and each card gets used for something different. With one card you determine which part of the board to activate, based on the suit of that card. Then for another one you keep it and are creating a poker hand. And the final one is the one that you use to fill in a spot in that part of the board you chose to activate. That just sounds like a very interesting thing.

2. Welcome to the Moon

I think that I need to play this one on stream. This is a roll and write game that kind of uses the Welcome To… system for it. But it’s its own unique game which is fun. And it’s a campaign game as well. For that reason alone I should play it on stream and see how well I can do. You play over a number of maps and see how well you can do. I’m not sure if you need to hit a certain target to advance, or how it works kind of as you advance. Though, as I write this, I suspect it is going to be a campaign game like Paper Dungeons is a campaign game.

1. Cat in the Box

This is a trick taking game and it’s one that I really should get played because it sounds so unique. In Cat in a Box there is a twist on your standard trick taking. Your cards don’t have a suit on them. You pick the suit of the card when you play it. And you decide when you are going to be short suited. Of course, this might mean that you have a four in your hand and have declared you are out of a suit and now can’t play that four, and thus you create a paradox.

Plus there is another element to the game. You get points for tricks, but you also get points for creating areas on the board. Basically, there is a board to track what cards have been played. And if you can get your cards played in the right way you will score additional points as well. Another element that is really unique about the game.

Final Thoughts

I know I could have made a list of twenty or thirty small games. It is so easy to pick them up and just add them to a collection. Do I want a game that I can get for cheap and see if I like it? Why yes, I always want to find more games like that because I don’t know when I’ll find a game. Plus it is easy for me to take these games to play with family or friends wherever because they don’t take up much room.

Obviously I put these in an order. But kind of like I did with that list of five games, I think it was, that I wanted to play, which is most likely to get played? As much as I want to play Cat in the Box, I think the some others, like Circus Flohcati, Sequoia, and the roll and writes Welcome to the Moon, Pioneer Rails and Fliptown are more likely to be played. And I want to play all of them, so it’s not like it’s a bad thing. What is a small game you want to play?

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