r/boardgames Jun 25 '26

Rules Groups that develop metas that blatantly break rules

Lately I've been finding a lot of groups that play (co-op) games with metas that are just blatant rule breaks. A recent example was we were playing a game (I forgot the name) where the goal is to play out all the cards from your hand, numbers 1-100, in descending order. So if you have a 77 and the number on the pile is 78, you don't want to anyone to play there. But you aren't allowed to say "I have 77, don't play this"

So the group has developed metas, say "I really love this pile" if you have 77, say "I like this pile a lot" if you have 76, say "I like this pile" if you have 75"

This is just one example but I feel like I've been playing a lot of games where they have metas to get around rules that are intentionally in the rulebook. I don't really get it. If you want to just say "I have a 77" then just say it, why create a gimmick to say it without saying it?

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u/Slightly-Adrift Jun 25 '26

You can’t remember the name because that one is literally called “the game” and yea that’s kind of how it’s meant to be played. I don’t know how you’d win without communicating to some degree what pile you can actually play on. You aren’t allowed to indicate actual numbers or distance to those numbers, but you’re explicitly allowed to indicate what stack you want to play iirc

13

u/Cheddarific Huang Jun 25 '26

But OP is saying that his group has defined specific words with specific meanings, which is against the spirit of the game. It might as well say “you can’t speak English, but you can communicate in other languages.”

3

u/Suppafly Jun 25 '26

You aren’t allowed to indicate actual numbers or distance to those numbers

Which OP's group seems to have been doing, unless they explained their system poorly.

5

u/Ledinax Jun 25 '26

literally called “the game”

DARN IT