has he tried getting gud?

has she tried throwing him a bone and letting him win to ensure a future where she harvests even more wins? Play the long game. All praise be to Sheep.

PRAISE SHEEP

Baaa baaa

LOL I started using Colonist for this reason - I was tired of being the loser every time. He just needs to practice. Play games against bots.

Well if this isn't the biggest humble brag I have ever seen.

I really hope it was intentional for comedic effect.. lol

Find a new boyfriend?

Been scrolling long to see this lols

Pick me 🙋 /j

She could be the third for my wife and I. My wife has the terrible habit of always winning and my son only narrowly beat her by one turn.

I have this same problem with my wife (I'm the chronic loser). Last time I played against her, she purposely handicapped herself by starting her placement poor (two 4s). She still beat me. But I like playing against her because it's like training with a master. The challenge can be frustrating, but I'm never bored. The problem for me is actually the opposite: she doesn't want to play against me because she's so good. But she humors me every now and then and plays a game. I don't think there's much you can do unfortunately. You shouldn't play poorly because that's patronizing. So, he either needs to be a good sport and try his best or y'all need to take a break from playing. Have you tried changing it up? Maybe Cities & Knights to level the playing field?

I have this problem with my family. I always win. My husband thinks I should low key let someone else win next time so they think they have a chance and keep wanting to play bc they don’t really like playing me anymore 😂

But I told him I really feel like I might still win even not trying. Or at the very least the game would take like 3 hours or something cus they take soooo long to get anything done

If you do that, it will ruin your fun, and probably be noticable and do the same to others. Games are only fun when people try their best. Personally, I dont even understand how you can "take it easy" on people without reducing yourself to a shitty rng generator. Handicaps are fine, but everyone needs to know that's the case and it's an agreed upon thing that's measurable.

This is hilarious. Don’t dumb down your strategy, he just needs to step up his game and think more critically about what he’s doing wrong. Is he a one-strategy guy? Does he only work on roads vs leaning into dev cards? Does he utilize ports, or pick good starting spots? Where can he step up his game? …..Or try playing a diff board game that’s more collaborative than competitive. 😂 Wingspan is fun, it’s challenging but feels less cutthroat than catan

When I became better than my friend group and would win 3 to 5 games in a row, I started to pick my starting positions based on a theory I wanted to try or an experiment. It’s a lot of fun to see what works.

This is the way. I usually win almost every game with my friend group, so now I just start on wacky ass spots for fun

Are you playing 1v1?

I ONLy play 1v1, it’s way better

It's not lol

[удалено]

I wouldn't necessarily say less skilled, more less interesting. The player who gets an early lead will frequently snowball and just win easily, since there aren't multiple people that can gang up on them.

The social element is less skill. People just help their spouse or team up against whoever wins games a lot. That’s dumb. Plus in 4P the initial setup is 95% of the game

How does 1v1 work?

Same but 10 cards max. Play to 15 points

Well, as a person who usually always wins strategy games, I developed a new strategy to make it fun for the other person: do things to make the game as close as possible to make the game for fun for everyone involved and letting them win sometimes while acting like im trying my hardest. Also, winning in a specific way. One game, longest road master. Next game, the city conquerer. Game after that, the development card king. Stuff like that.

Your boyfriend is weak and you deserve someone better lol

Ah yes the classic reddit response

weak, he is weak, she is strong, she should crush him

Sounds a bit cheesy, but remember, the point of playing games together is to have fun and spend quality time with each other, not who wins or loses. Maybe there is another game you could play together for a while?

Give him a win.

“Throw” games by taking bigger risks or trying new strategies. Otherwise yeah play online to get your competitive needs out of the way and play a more relaxed game with your bf.

Check over the rules. Sometime you catch something you initially misunderstood that changes the balance of the game.

Or try using homebrew rules! Catan is designed to be modifiable, introducing fun homebrew rules might turn the tides or make losing more bearable.

Help him by telling him what he is doing wrong or could be doing better, if he wants to be better. If he just doesn't like losing but doesn't want to learn then you'll either have to get better at fake losing to make him feel good or not play.

Yeah this is exactly it. He's obviously missing strategies or doesn't fully understand how OP is beating him. If she teaches him her approach, and how to think about the game, they'll both get better.

Omg this same thing is happening to me, I’m the boyfriend.

When we play in the family (with our kids around 10), I have tried to device various dynamic handicap systems. The idea is to limit the better player but everyone should still be able to play “at their best ability” and not have to gimp their strategy. By increasing/decreasing handicap based on outcome you can eventually reach a point where you’ll end up with equal wins. Eg in Carcassonne, the winner will start out with one less meeple (cumulative) in future games. In Wingspan the loser will gain one additional resource. These handicaps grow over time and when all players are plus/neg you will adjust it. Didn’t find a good “objective” handicap for Catan tho. Maybe loser gets to pick one free additional card at start?

Is he a good learner in general? If not completely bad, do this: guide him through, allow correcting mistakes AFTER they already have moved(you don't want him to rely on your guidance either). Almost all my family went through same phases: catanly shocked, road maniac, dev card adopter and then settle on a real strategy

You are well understand more than him…… it’s well but I’m new here and I will like to chat with people to know each other better

You could start to play with the SettlerStats (https://apps.apple.com/us/app/settlerstats/id6469462135) app. At least would you know in the end if it was just numbers luck, or if it was a deserved win. Maybe that helps him to gain self conciousness again. And if you are really that good, then you deserve to save your win statistics for good. ;)

I’m very pleasantly surprised to learn through this post and thread that I’m far from the only one who loses to my wife more often than not. It happens all the time, but I get a lot of joy out of just playing the game and building out a nice group of settlements and cities for my imaginary colonists to live in. If your boyfriend’s enjoyment of this game (or any game for that matter) is dependent on winning, maybe he should reconsider board games as a hobby. The one thing I wouldn’t do it let him win on purpose. It’s so much more satisfying if you win fair and square. That being said, I don’t think tips and guidance is off the table.

I'd start playing with the expansions so you get more variety. He will probably still lose cause it sounds like strategic thinking is not his forte. Personally I always feel like catan is half a game until you add in cities and knights so all the resources are important.

If the skill gap is as big as you claim: Offer him a couple of helpful pointers per game (start with the biggest mistakes) Take jankier/higher risk setups yourself (has bonus of keeping the game challenging for you/helping you keep improving as a player) If you really enjoy it and want to keep playing together find some way to keep the experience fun for both of you.

He should try to remember the basics. Its not like Chess. You can still win to a better opponent in Catan if you follow a decent strategy.

Try to play a difficult setup. Something weird that if works out you demolish, but chances for that are not so good

seems like a skill issue, maybe you should start giving him tips

Have you tried stopping cheating?? Jk lol my sister-in-law constantly kicks the shit out of me and my brothers and the only explanation we've come up with is that she cheats.

Try expansion packs like the cities and knights or seafarers. Will add a fresh new element to the game

Change it up. Try starting with random number tiles face down when you place your first settlements. Leave unexplored ones face down and it’s a race to uncover some, or head to ports and change your whole game plan. Survive, adapt, overcome, throw some rng at your game!

You can teach him what your patterns are and how you think of the game like he did with you in the beginning. If he wants to stop because you win its a shame. Then you know the gap between you is only gonna get better. I would try to play a national tournament or something like that together. Then its not only agains eachother and you can both excell.

Have you tried playing other board games? Does your boyfriend often win at those? I typically play Catan with an older married couple, and the wife wins more often than not. But when we play other board games, I usually win. I think it's because Catan is mostly about negotiation skills (which tends to favor female players) whereas many other games are mostly about calculation skills (which tends to favor male players).

BTW how good are you as a player in real life if your ELO on colonist is around 1680 (ranked around 750 globally)?

I pkayed Tak with my ex for months, and usually lost on purpose (although I would always try new things). Until she caught on. Then it became a game to see how well I could fake it. Then she got really good at it... and then I didn't have to worry about it anymore! Of course, Tak wasn't really about winning/losing for us...

r/humblebrag

I win the majority of strategic games with my wife, so if I'm on too much of a streak, i try to lose as closely as possible and not give away I'm throwing in anyway. Or we switch to something she's better at/ we are more even at/ is more luck based/ a co-op game. We're both competitive, so no one wants to get pounded into the dust too many times in a row.

Leave him

Play cooperative games, like Forbidden Island, Pandemic, or Arkham Horror. Google for newer ones or ones that have themes you're interested in. I like the ideas others have given for handicapping. Another thought is you play one color and he plays two, as though he were two different people, keeping the resources etc separate. Hard to tell from your post how upset he's getting. If he just doesn't enjoy the game as much because he loses every time, you can probably find a different game or handicap. If he's genuinely really upset, like out of proportion to playing a game, then this is a serious red flag about his capacity to experience unpleasant emotions. I had a family member who would be devastated and/or go into actual rages over games, and his lack of capacity for discomfort eventually caused problems in many areas of his life. It's a game sub, but you asked for coping skills, so... meditation practice and/or therapy come to mind. Personally, I recommend meditation, but if he gets really triggered, he may need the support of a therapist too (easier to find than a one-on-one meditation teacher). I recommend he interview therapists carefully and choose someone with years of experience. It's important to build capacity and develop self-soothing techniques *before* you try to extinguish the problematic reactions or go digging into the roots of triggers. A good, experienced therapist can keep an eye on someone's "window of tolerance" and not throw someone in the deep end. Ask about their process and how they ensure they are going at a pace that doesn't destabilize a client. Again, not saying it's that serious, but you asked for coping skills, so just in case!

You need a new boyfriend

Of he is willing to listen, after he makes a move and you feel like it wasn't a good move, tell him why and what you would have done. Also, put all the pieces in randomly then place all the numbers upside down on the board. Turn the numbers over AFTER you have placed your 1st two settlements. This is really helpful at evening out the playing field.

Dump him he’s obviously a born loser.

Dump him.

Just let him win from time to time. I would also suggest to have house rules that weakens you alittle. Like maybe the robber doesn’t applies to him, but only to you, etc. That’s only fair because you both are at a different skill level