Austin has a local board game Meetup group that's shifted entirely to Tabletop Simulator during this time. It's great and definitely maintains the best feeling of playing a physical board game.
I'm surprised that the author didn't mention the hundreds of games that you can download for free in the Steam Workshop as mods. Not all of them work flawlessly, so you have to test things out beforehand. However, the almost unlimited array of options is what makes TTS stand out.
We've found that games without hand management tend to work best. Over the past 4 weeks, we've run games like Arkham Horror, Great Western Trail, Terra Mystica, Blood Rage, Caverna, Puerto Rico, Hansa Teutonica, Concordia, Lords of Waterdeep, and Quacks of Quedlinburg.
This is awesome and gave me a lot of ideas! I'd love it if you checked out this app we're building to play social/board games over video chat. There aren't as many options as Tabletop Simulator but it may still be a good fit for your meetups: https://www.cyberspaces.app
One feature in tabletop simulator is that it is literally a simulator of a tabletop - which means that the simulated tabletop can be flipped over. At least, I think that’s supposed to be feature!
I've been looking at moving to Austin and love board games. Unfortunately with everything canceled I can't currently use Meetup to check out the scene. Would you mind talking a little bit about what the board game scene is normally like in the area?
Sure thing! I'm caveating this with the fact that I've only been in the area for 2 years now. After I found some good groups, I haven't actively looked as often.
Meetups
- Austin is pretty heavily split between North/South of Town Lake (Lady Bird Lake). A lot of people don't "cross the line".
- North Austin has a lot more gaming groups than the South Austin region, at an estimated ratio of 3:1.
- A majority of groups meet at local game stores, but there are a few that meet at restaurants and breweries (which I prefer the vibe of).
- Most groups meet in the evenings on weekdays. I haven't seen many weekend groups, unfortunately.
- Most groups play a wide variety of modern games, so you'll always be learning new games. There are very few groups if you like the "classics" (Monopoly, Life, Sorry, Catan, etc.)
- Most groups are decently sized, with anywhere from 10-30 folks showing up on a weekly basis.
Locations
- Austin has a small, but high-quality selection of Board Game cafes. Favorites are Vigilante and Emerald Tavern.
- Austin has a lot of local game stores. One of the more heavily trafficked ones is Dragon's Lair.
Conventions
- Austin has a yearly board game convention with a great group of regulars (https://www.boardgamebash.com/)
- You're only 3 hours away from the Dallas/Fort Worth area which holds BGG.con in both the Spring and Fall (https://boardgamegeek.com/wiki/page/BGGCON). Biggest board game convention in the US next to GenCon.
- You also have PAX South in January held in San Antonio, only 1.5 hours away.
Other Notes
- There's a really welcoming community of 20-30 folks that meets once per month to help board game designers get feedback and playtest their games. One of my favorite recent finds.
- There used to be a REALLY popular weekly meetup that was specifically for heavy games (2+ hours) that pulled in a crowd of 30-40 folks, but it got dissolved and never really had a replacement. I'm not sure what happened, but there is more of a demand for that here.
- It's an unfortunate truth that the board game hobby can sometimes cater to some...interesting characters. From my experience, there's MUCH LESS of that in Austin and everyone has been super friendly and welcoming.
I hope that helps! If you're interested in more info, feel free to reach out to me. Email is just my username@gmail.com.
Awesome thank you! I'm up near the twin cities; the saint paul board game meetup goes to a lot of breweries and I prefer that vibe too. I like the game aspect but I think the social part is important too. I'm hoping to move this year, but a lot of that depends on how long the pandemic lasts unfortunately. I'm happy to hear there's some good groups. I don't mind traveling a little bit to meet up, but I'll check out the north side a bit more if it's nerdier.
I skipped mentioning the workshop mods because of the huge variation in quality. A follow up post could go through a bunch of mods and recommend some good ones, though!
Yeah, that's a pretty meaty topic on its own. If you choose a mod with bad scripting, you're in for a rough ride. I always try to test a game out by myself to make sure everything functions as expected.
On the bright side, if anything messes up, you can usually press undo and just manually move the pieces around. :)
I'm surprised that the author didn't mention the hundreds of games that you can download for free in the Steam Workshop as mods. Not all of them work flawlessly, so you have to test things out beforehand. However, the almost unlimited array of options is what makes TTS stand out.
We've found that games without hand management tend to work best. Over the past 4 weeks, we've run games like Arkham Horror, Great Western Trail, Terra Mystica, Blood Rage, Caverna, Puerto Rico, Hansa Teutonica, Concordia, Lords of Waterdeep, and Quacks of Quedlinburg.