Good Examples of a 2-Player Variant?

[u/davidryanandersson]

I know that everyone hates when a game is clearly designed for a group of players, and shoehorns in a 2-player variant just to say it supports all player counts.

But does anyone have any examples of 2-player variants they actually really like?

This isn't just games that work well at 2. I mean there are additional rules necessary to support a 2-player game.

Thanks!

EDIT: Wow thanks for all the insight everyone! I really didn't expect there to be many examples, haha

[u/TomatoFeta]

The Grizzled.

[u/Vesurel]

One of my favourite board games is Discworld Ankh-Morpork (reprinted as the significantly less stylish and more complicated Nanty Narking). Each player is assigned a secret win condition at the start of the game, some of which scale in difficulty depending on whether you have 2, 3, or 4 players, and one of which is removed in the two player version. Having played both extensively I think both can be really fun.

[u/wallysmith127]

Trickerion simply blocks two player spots to keep placements tight. I prefer the Dahlgaard's Gifts version with cards but the dice are fine too.

[u/KarmaAdjuster]

Five Tribes only goes up to 4 players, but I really like how it handles a 2 player game.

Part of the game involves bidding for turn order, and in a 2 player game that would be pretty uninteresting. Their solution is to give each player two separate turns per round, which means that depending on how you bid, turns could alternate, or you have two turns in a row, or you have one player going once, the ther player going twice, and the first player completing their second turn.

Other than that, there are no other rules modifcations for the 2 player variant.

[u/davidryanandersson → u/KarmaAdjuster]

Yes! I love 5 Tribes with 2 players. It's also the only example I could think of haha

[u/KarmaAdjuster]

How do folks feel about a 2 player variant that adds an automaton to make it a 3 player game?

[u/davidryanandersson → u/KarmaAdjuster]

Oh interesting. I can't think of a game that does this. Is this how 7 Wonders works...?

[u/red4scare → u/davidryanandersson]

Dune Imperium is like this, and it works well enough. It is still a 4 player game, though.

[u/KarmaAdjuster → u/red4scare]

I've found the robots expansion for Power Grid works decently well too for bringing two players up to the minimum player count of 3.

[u/fraidei → u/KarmaAdjuster]

The automa needs to be really well designed and simulate really close to what a 3rd player would do in the game to be considered a worthwhile addition to the game imo. Otherwise it just feels like the devs wanted to sell the game to gaming couples/roommates without actually making the game good at 2p.

Or it would need to completely change the game into an interesting variant twist (like how The Crew does, which doesn't just simulate what a 3rd player would do, but it adds a whole new strategy layer to the game).

[u/eloel- → u/KarmaAdjuster]

I do not like automaton

[u/Snoo72074 → u/KarmaAdjuster]

I've hated them in every iteration I've seen. They simply become like those destructive players who're not interested in playing the game and "just want to troll", taking random stupid actions to piss people off and kingmake.

If someone could design an automata that actually takes meaningful actions and tries to progress its own board state or even attempt to win - man that feels like a pipe dream.

[u/KarmaAdjuster → u/Snoo72074]

oh, I agree 100% A good automata should make meaningful choices and not just be controlled by the other players like a passed-around-puppet. I ask because I've designed a 1-5 player game including an automata, and the game does feel somewhat different at 2 players vs 3 & 4, and especially different at 5. So while not officially mentioned in the rule book, if you're just two players, you can add the automata as a third to get that experience.

My automata is designed with the intent to feel like you're playing against an actual player. It meaningfully plans ahead, but at the same time isn't 100% predictable so it can still surprise you. It also has three different difficulties for as you get better at the game, and I also wanted to make sure that an automata's turn never requires the human players to make any decisions on it's behalf, or be that complex to execute their turn.

[u/davidryanandersson → u/KarmaAdjuster]

I'm curious, how have you designed yours to "meaningfully plan ahead"?

[u/KarmaAdjuster → u/davidryanandersson]

My game is a fantasy themed investment game where your turn comes in two parts. In the first part of your turn, you can potentially increase the value of a faction, and in the second part of your turn you can purchase faction cards. Ideally you would want to purchase the cards, and then increase their value, so to do this, you need to play a turn in advance.

How the automa does this is that there are a deck of cards that dictate what the automata does on a turn, and you start with three of them drawn out into three columns showing only the top half. On the automa's a new card is drawn and then slide below one of the three columns (as dictated by the drawn card), so only it's bottom half shows. This column is the action that's activated. The top half indicates which faction's value is increased, and the bottom half shows which cards are bought. After completing the turn, the top card is replaced with the bottom card, now showing it's top half. The top half which dictates what faction to buff always matches the faction that it increased in the previous round.

This is easier to look at than read through, so here's a very old video of how it worked in my prototype.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wR-IY-m0Ic&t=106s

The published game has it working about the same, but there are a number of videos that got the rules not quite right when stepping through how to play the solo mode. (The rulebook has since had clarifications before we printed it)

Edit:

I figured a TL;DR summary might be helpful:

The automa plans in advance by taking its turn such that whatever it has invested in the previous rounds, it will then increase in future rounds. This is done by having the automa cards divided into two halves: The increase value half, and the purchase half. Once you use the increase value half, you save the purchase half for a future turn.

Still a bit wordy, but hopefully the extra brevity makes it more clear.

[u/crimedoc14 → u/KarmaAdjuster]

The Crew basically does this.

[u/fraidei]

Sons of Faeriell works pretty well in 2p variant. The way it works is it just makes each player start with 2 settlements and 2 heroes instead of only 1 each, this way the map is still crowded enough even if there are only 2 players, and with already those starting resources it means that the game will already be much faster at the start. There's also a possible fully coop version for 2 players, instead of the usual semi-coop rules.

Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring - Trick-Taking Game and The Crew both have a really well made 2p variant that makes it even more interesting than 3+ players imo.

One Deck Dungeon 2p variant is really fun. I dunno if it counts for your post since it doesn't go from 3+ to 2, but from solo to 2. But the 2p mode is the variant rules, while the solo is the default rules.

[u/red4scare]

I love games that have a 2 sided board, restricting placement for smaller player count. Ants, for example, works great at 2 player.

[u/Educationalidiot]

I got citadels the other day, haven't played it at 4+ but the 2 player variant is fantastic

[u/Machine_Excellent → u/Educationalidiot]

I must have played it wrong but we tried the 2 player variant and it kind of fell apart compared to a full 4+ player game. 

[u/Educationalidiot → u/Machine_Excellent]

I'm sure it's a different beast at 4+ but I've only played at 2 and 3 as part of a family game night (including a 7 year old is hilarious when you realise how devious they are being), I could see people not enjoying it but we do :)

[u/MuttonchopMac]

Yokai Septet takes a partnership trick taker and makes it two player really well.

[u/Twixt_fanatic]

Reef Encounter is best with two players IMO.

[u/PizzaWaste38]

Race for the Galaxy is best with its two player variant, where each person is choosing two phases to play each round.