Ikusa (
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/221/ikusa) takes a more time but is a much better game. Try to get this done in 3 or 4 sessions, not all at once.
Axis and Allies takes a
LOT more time than both Risk and Ikusa, but is probably one of the best wargames. Though at 20+ hour games in practice, this is well into the "Leave the board out and come back 5+ times" kind of game.
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My favorite "long" board game is 1830. Which is around ~12 hours long last time I played it, but doable in 3 or 4 sessions. But I don't think people should start with 1830.
Acquire is a game playable in ~2 hours and is perhaps the simplest good "economic game". There are a few stock-trading rules and very little randomization... instead its chaos from all the decisions all your opponents make rather than chaos caused by dice or luck. The name of the game is only to make more money than everyone else by buying stock and selling during rare "acquisition" times.
1830 is like Acquire, except every other turn you also are playing Ticket to Ride / train-building game as well. 1830 is very complex, and I suggest people to start with Acquire to see if you like economic / stock trading games to begin with.
1830 starts with stock-trading. The largest shareholder becomes the President of those companies, and then the
COMPANIES take turns. Due to the quirk of rules, company presidents should be cutthroat: lying, stealing, and cheating your own companies (and your opponent's shares) to get ahead.
Acquire is more "peaceful" where alliances are formed and everyone feels like they're working together. Its a great game.
1830 is the opposite: its a cutthroat game where you try to screw people over by making well-placed trades or selling trains or changing the tracks up in unexpected ways. Everyone feels back when you make a good move, but... that's fun too. Just in a very different way. Play 1830 against people who you enjoy screwing over (and... of course... feel good about getting screwed over yourself. Because everyone will be messing with each other the whole game).
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You can see the two parts of the board. The "north part" is the stock-trading part of the board, keeping track of all the companies in play and how much their stock is worth.
The "south" part of the board is the railroads, which determine how much the companies make every turn. Building tracks often increases the amount of money companies make, but also... buying trains advances the year (often making older trains "obsolete" / "rust away", meaning a bunch of trains may disappear off the board). So you could be making a ton of money from 2-Trains , but when they go obsolete you might be on the road to bankruptcy just one turn later (!!!!).
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The 8 public companies take a turn during "operating phases". Not the players, the
companies take a turn, which means the player in control of the company takes a turn. If you become the President of 4 companies, you take 4-turns during the operating phase. If you have 0-companies, then you don't have any power during the operating phase.
Be sure to buy enough stock to at least control one company, otherwise you might find yourself falling behind. However, there are "stock only" strategies where you can in fact win even without any company control... but it requires you to play exceptionally well during the stock-trading (Acquire-like) portion of the game.
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When your companies make money / dividends, you give the dividends out to all shareholders. Yes, that means you give a bit of money out to your opponents (!!!) if they own some shares. So the game becomes exceptionally complex. Making companies make more money isn't necessarily the way to win. You need to really focus on moves that screw your opponents over.
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But really, Acquire is good fun and actually short enough for "typical normies" (between 1 and 2 hours). The stock trading is very simplified (buy upto 3 shares per turn, and you can
only sell during mergers / acquisitions. Its a private equity market, not a public one). Companies grow the moe tiles they touch, and when two companies touch, the larger company acquires the smaller one.
Very simple, but exceptionally fun. One of the best simple board games with deep strategy. Well balanced between cooperation with impromptu allies and "screwing" opponents (ie: the ones who don't have any shared stock) with you. Shares provide rivalries (majority owner gets a bonus), but also alliances (+1 tile improves all shareholders on that company), so balancing the company's growth is mostly about trusting in the tiles your impromptu allies have received.