A very hot Sunday afternoon saw my friend Jamie and myself meeting up to play some board games.

We started off with a two player game of After Us. You can read a rather long winded not saying much post about it here. We had fun. Despite leading on the points front for the majority of the game, Jamie caught up and overtook me to get the win.

After my apes had their butt kicked it was time to start climbing in the Himalayas by playing Trek 12: Himalaya.

Obviously I like roll and writes. I do have a few in the collection (22 at the last count according the tags I’ve added to games in bgstat). So a while back when I saw a review for it on YouTube (and for the life of me I can’t remember which channel it was I saw it on) I was intrigued. Especially by the theme (we’ll come back to that in a mo). So when I saw it for sale at UKGE with the expansion I finally caved and bought both the base game and it’s expansion.

Now folks who know me longer than I have been blogging about board games will remember that originally this very blog was an outdoors blog! (The posts are no longer on here) I love being in the outdoors, backpacking, sleeping in the middle of nowhere with great views, being up high on the UK mountains. I’ve taken that love of hiking to holidays in the Swiss Alps and French Pyrenees.

Heck I got Strider from a family holiday to the Brecon Beacons, and picking him up when he was ready to leave his mum was my first wild camp.

I love the outdoors.

Why am I not doing this stuff now? Well life got in the way. As it does now. I don’t want the day to arrive when I can do multi day trips again, or go do my dream trip of visiting New Zealand. (I’m getting a bit emotional as I type this next bit) As that means mum is no longer with me.

So you can see the mountaineering theme of Trek 12: Himalaya really appealed to me.

We started off playing the trek mode for the game. This is basically picking one of the three included maps and playing the game using the core rules. As per the rule book suggestions we used the Dunai sheet (see photo below) for this first learning game.

Each round the two dice are rolled and each player chooses one of the following to do with the result:

• Use the higher of the two values
• Use the lower of the two values
• Use the difference between the two values
• Use the sum of the two values
• Use the product of the two values

However there is a catch. There’s always a catch. You can only do each of the above a max of four times during the game. So you have to really think about when you use each of the above.

You are also restricted on the max value you can write in a circle. A regular circle is considered to be normal terrain so the max value that can be written in it is 12. Difficult terrain (with a thicker boarder) can only have a max value of 6. If you have to write a value higher than the max the space can hold you draw a sad face instead! Each sad face at the end of the game is worth minus three points.

You start off being able to place the first number you have anywhere on the map. After that each number has to be added to an empty space adjacent to a space already containing a number.

In Trek 12: Himalaya you are scoring points based on chains of numbers (ie 3,4,5,6) and groups of numbers (ie a group of 2’s).

Any number not part of a chain or group at the end of the game is orphaned and gets a sad face.

We enjoyed our initial game so much we played the campaign or expedition mode as it is know.

This adds assist cards to the game that you can claim by having a group of 0’s,1’s, or 2’s. You are allowed a max of three of these at a time. Any you don’t use during a game can be traded for points at the end.

These assist cards are useful as they can give you an extra addition to perform, allow you to put a number anywhere on the map, plus other useful powers.

There are also challenge envelopes that get unlocked at the end of a game before starting the next one if the condition has been met to open it. From the two that I’ve opened so far they have added more assist cards, a fourth map pad, and guides (they increase the power of certain things).

Expedition games are played over three maps, and the victor is the player with the most reputation points. In our game that was Jamie right up to the last game. He had gotten points from both the first two maps whilst I had zero. Then I smashed the last, most difficult map and got a shed load of points to grab the win.

We really liked Trek 12: Himalaya. We played four games back to back.

On the roll and write difficulty level scale it is not even close to being as difficult as a Three Sisters or Hadrians Wall. The rules are very simple. It’s the decisions that you have to make that make it so enjoyable.

I was kind of reminded a bit of Rolling Japan/America when it came to placing the numbers on the sheet. I got that vibe from it.

However you are trying to get those chains and groups, and it gets more and more difficult as your options start to run out on how you get that number you need.

Having the three maps (or more once unlocked) makes the trek mode enjoyable as you can tailor the difficulty of the game you want to play. With the expedition mode that looks to have so much replay ability as you unlock the extras and try and beat previous scores. Plus it doesn’t wear out it’s welcome. The games were fairly quick, so you can do an expedition easily in an evening and not have it hanging around.

I don’t do solo modes of games. So I can’t comment on how it plays solo.

But I do love this game.

Our final game of the afternoon was Three Dragon Ante.

We used the Iron Clay poker chips that I picked up at UKGE for this instead of the cardboard chips that come with the game. They are nice. Feel really great in the hand.

Before I write lots about Three Dragon Ante I want to play this with more than two players.

But we had fun playing it despite an initial misplay. There are some interesting decisions to make during the game.

Plus I won.

I had a great afternoon gaming with Jamie. It was just what I needed on such a scorching weekend.