Board Game Friday: My April, June, and July 2024 BGG Math Trade Hauls!

For the past several months, I've participated in boardgamegeek's monthly Math Trade for board games.  Today, I'm here to recap the past three successful math trades that I was part of beginning with April 2024.

April:

Giving:  Cascadia

Getting:  Amazon gift card

Cascadia is a wonderful game that I somehow ended up with a duplicate copy from a previous trade.  This particular swap was basically me clearing out a duplicate game (there was a time in Math Trades where I'd trade for anything, even games I already owned).  I've very quickly realized that "flipping" games isn't for me - I want to trade for stuff I want to try...and I want to trade away stuff that I no longer need or want.  That's fun.  Having to worry about values, reselling, etc. isn't fun for me.

June:

Trade 1:

Giving:  Burgle Bros.

Getting:  Amazon gift card

Burgle Bros. is a cooperative game that I traded for back in the February BGG Math Trade...and by June I was trading it away!  In all honesty, it's a perfectly fine and fun game.  I enjoyed my couple of plays of it on the day I got it to the table.  However, I don't think the game has much long-term replayability...it's very "same-y" even if the tile layout changes each time you play.  Fun game, would recommend playing it for sure, but it's not a keeper.  I was happy to trade this one for cash since it meant I cleared off a bit of room on my board game shelf without immediately refilling it with an incoming trade!  Of course, Burgle Bros. box is actually fairly small but still, every bit of space helps!

Trade 2:

Giving:  Gentes (Deluxe Edition)
Getting:  Tapestry

My second trade in the June Math Trade was a swap of bigger, more expensive games.  Gentes was a Kickstarter game that I backed and played a few times.  While I personally enjoyed the game, I didn't have anyone else to play with that also liked the game much!  Thus, if it's a game I'm certain I can't get to the table, there isn't much point in me holding on to it.  Of course, I say that but I ended up trading for Tapestry which is another game that I'm not sure exactly who I'll be able to convince to play it with me!

July:

Giving:  Explorers of the Woodlands

Getting:  Naga Raja and Dungeons, Dice, & Danger

Explorers of the Woodlands is another crowdfunded game that I backed.  It's also a cooperative game and I did get this one to the table a few times.  However, the game has one of the all-time worst rule books that I've seen.  So many questions popped up during gameplay and we couldn't easily find the answers in the rule book (and online searches weren't entirely helpful as the game itself doesn't seem to be all that popular or widespread).  

In return, I landed Naga Raja which came with Dungeons, Dice, & Danger as a "sweetener" (basically a free throw-in).  I know nothing about Naga Raja (the main part of the trade), it was actually the sweetener that I had heard of and had on my want list to try.  The only bad thing about this swap is that my goal was to make room on my board game shelves and instead I traded away one (small box) game and picked up two larger box games in return.  Whoops!

Overall, it was a solid few months of trading - and hopefully I can continue to make swaps as it keeps a steady flow of new games for me to try without me having to spend a lot of money acquiring said new games!