Episode 393 – Board Game Terms: Asymmetric, Auction, Bidding

March 17, 2025 Anitra Smith Podcast Episodes, The Family Gamers Podcast

It’s been a long time since we defined some board game terms. Let’s do that again!

0:00 Fact for 393

The TV show Star Trek: Voyager uses the phrase “some kind of” 393 times over the seven seasons. There’s a fan-made video that documents them ALL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwZiezIxCVU

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04:00 What We’ve Been Playing

Medieval Academy (both the 2014 version and the 2023 version)
Power Plants – inspired to play after last episode!
Royal Visit
Project L
Mezen – review coming soon
Anitra’s solo plays: Mezen, Strato, A Gentle Rain, A Nice Cuppa)
more Floristry (our review) – Anitra predicts this will be TFG’s top game of 2025.
Obelus (our review) – love the table presence on this tiny game.
S’mores Galore – “exactly what I’ve been hoping for in a s’mores themed game”

17:00 The Family Gamers Community

Even Alex Trebek is glad you’re here! Stop in and say hi.

18:20 SNAP Review – Strato

Learn more about this solo or cooperative game of controlling the weather.

Watch the video or read the transcript of our Strato review.

What Does That Word Mean?

24:35 Asymmetric (and Asymmetric Player Powers)

What’s asymmetry? Well, it’s the lack of symmetry, which would be when two halves (or two items) are identical. You’re probably played both symmetric and asymmetric games, without realizing it.

Asymmetric games means that players DON’T have the same actions or the same goals. This goes beyond the luck of the draw or making different choices: in asymmetric games, players literally CANNOT do exactly the same things as other players.

What’s good about them?

They’re more interesting. It feels really powerful and special if you have a power that breaks the rules that everyone else has to follow.
Can have better replayability. Because of different powers, playing it again can feel both familiar and new – exploring new ways that characters interact.

And the bad?

Asymmetric games are harder to TEACH (especially to kids) because everyone can do slightly different things.
Can feel unfair (“why do you get to do that and I don’t?”)
Some asymmetric games feel very unbalanced or require a specific character to be played to work at all.

Let’s talk examples!

Some of our favorites are 2 player asymmetric games like Skulk Hollow / Maul Peak, The Hunt, Watergate, Jekyll vs. Hyde

One-vs-many games: one person has a very different role (like villain or clue-giver) and everyone else is working together (kind of). Examples: Scotland Yard, Pyramid of Pengqueen, Visitor in Blackwood Grove (three roles, two of which cooperate). We argue that most clue-giving games fit into the one-vs-many asymmetric style. You can make them feel more symmetrical by taking turns being the clue-giver. Hidden identity / hidden traitor games (Spyfall) fit into this idea as well.

When we think of asymmetric games, we immediately think of these character-based options: Dice Throne, Unmatched, Pocket Paragons, or Disney Villainous.

CCGs and constructed-deck games are obviously asymmetric – everyone has a different idea of what makes a “good” deck. Examples: Magic: The Gathering, Pokemon, Compile, Windup War)

Asymmetric games are as old as board games themselves. Anitra thinks of Fox and Hounds or Fox and Geese (find out more), an old checkers-like game.

Cosmic Encounter is often held up as one of the earliest many-player asymmetric games.

Asymmetric player powers show up in our favorite coop games! (Pandemic, Endangered, Disney Animated. Even Sherlock Solitaire)

37:00 Auction Games (and/or Bidding)

What is an auction game?

An auction is a system where one or more players may offer up something in exchange for something else (basically purchasing it)
Not the same as trading – you’re trying to outdo other players in this offer.
Auctions always have “winning” AND “losing” bidders; sometimes the losing bidders may receive some kind of compensation
Bidding does not necessarily mean an auction. (eg. in Wits & Wagers, you’re bidding, but not to win a specific thing in exchange)
Auctions USUALLY offer players a chance to go back and forth

There are so many different kinds of auction mechanics!

Usually we’re talking about Blind bidding or sealed bidding – everyone comes up with an amount secretly, then they are all revealed. But there’s also open information auctions – you know how much other people are willing to pay, and make a decision to outbid them or not.

In a closed economy auction, the money/resources spent in the auction are directly given to auction participants. In Ra, your resource is a disk with a number on it, and you trade it to the person you “won” the turn from. Big Top is a mostly-closed economy: the money goes to the “auctioneer” – unless THEY win the auction, in which case the money goes to the bank.

Auction games like Ra only go around once – you get one chance to make the high bid; other games (with open information) may go around many times until all but one bidder have given up.

One of our favorite types of bidding, that’s not exactly an auction, is bidding on turn order (Nidavellir, Gutenberg, ShipShape, and Filler)

The way that bidding works in ShipShape is specifically called sealed bid with cancellation. This is a type of blind auction that often has ties – highest non-duplicated bid wins.

Dutch auction is a waiting game, where the price of a resource goes down over time. Floristry does this through an app. But this is also related to a type of open drafting where items slide down a track & get cheaper (think Century: Spice Road). In the real world, Amazon uses a type of this to contract drivers for a specific route on a specific day.

47:20 Backtalk

Listeners share their favorite flowers. See responses on Discord and Facebook.

We like the name “Phlox Larkspur” for a D&D character – and those flowers smell lovely, too.

New Question

What are board game terms you’d like us to talk about? What terms should we explore next?

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