Hive mind....

So the partner and I played tons of Hive last week on vacation.  It's portable and can be set up anywhere so it was perfect for the beach, the cafe, the bar, whatever.  But near the end of the week, Vince decided to ruin the game for me.  He observed that whoever places their queen bee first always seems to win as they can move their pieces first.  Sigh.  A few more rounds and we had confirmed that he was pretty much right.  At least for two fairly evenly balanced players (us) it was true.

After scouring the Geek, I found one variant suggested which balances out the players a little better.  The suggestion, which has been approved by the designer John Yianni, is to not allow either player to place the queen bee on their first move.  We'll have to try this as I'd hate to see this lovely game become a relic...

I hate bugs and I hate Chess...

...but I LOVE Hive!  Imagine if Chess were much shorter, more intuitive, and far more dynamic (the pieces make up the board).  I've played 7 games of it this weekend alone which says a lot as I tend to avoid games of pure strategy.  Abalone was the last great abstract strategy game that I fell in love with but this one is much quicker and way more portable.

I imagine it's going to go really well with the mojitos next week on the beach...