A month or two back at the regular thursday night session I attend, we decided to play my new Paranoia card game. If you've never played the original Paranoia RPG in the 80's then this game will not mean much to you.

Lets get this out right away, this game should only be played with the right group of people. Whats the right group you ask? Well not the other 3 people I played with that evening.

This game is about screwing the other player, and that is all it is about. Through the use of cards you perform various actions on other players. the goal is to get the highest security level by the end of the game. A lot of board game geeks call this a "munchkin game", fortunately I'm not that much of a nerd so I can use the "double quote" thing to reference it here.

So if you have the "If i lose a game sucks" type player or someone who is not very interested in trying this game, stay away from them playing.

Ok so the game itself, well there is not much too it. You're all troubleshooters for the computer and everyone starts out at the lowest security level. One person is choosen to be team leader, they are 1 level higher then you. Your security level determines your hand size. The team leader also rules on actions that need to be settled (I'm not going to go into specific cards here)

Each player has 6 clones, or lives. When one dies, you lose your security level and when one person has lost all their clones the game is over. It is very easy to lose your clone, either by combat with other players, or having the most distrust from the computer by round / missions end.

One thing we did wrong is when the Team leader dies, another one is immediately choosen and they go up a security level. By not doing this we really didn't play the game it was meant to be played. would it make a big difference in the outcome, there is no questioning that. Would it have helped this group of players enjoy themselves, no chance in hell.

Keep in mind these thoughts are off of a game I played once about 2 months ago, so I'm not being real specific on rules etc, you can find all that at BGG.

So what am I saying about this game, well its more a rambiling post then anything. But the bottom line if you have the right group of players (ie don't take themsleves too seriously) and have a history with the old RPG there is a chance you would enjoy this game as a filler (geek term - A filler is a game that can be played quickly, usually 30 - 60 minutes, that is used to fill time between bigger games) otherwise Paranoia is going to put a damper on your evening.