I find that it often helps to invent my own terms for things if the official ones are either confusing or dry (which is harder to remember than something exciting). So, for example, when I had to explain Tigris and Euphrates to my group I called an external conflict a "war" and an internal conflict a "coup".

Funny Friends is another fine example of this. The little cell phone token is refered to in the english rules as an offer and on the counter sheet as a caller. The translation of the German rules refers to it as a complaint. The only one that fits its purpose in the game is a call, so thats how we refer to it.

I always do a thorough inventory prior to reading the rules. Even a single missing part might throw the game balance off, giving a false impression of the game's true worth.

Well I tend to leave out stuff that i can add in "as it occurs", but I clearly say that this is what I am doing.

Agreed, if I gave a full explanation to my gaming group, I would lose them in a few minutes. I limit my explanations to 1.) turn sequence 2.) Overview of victory conditions 3.) Basic mechanics of movement, combat & scoring 4.) General overall strategies.

This has come back to bite me occasionally. For example when playing History of the World, for those of you who haven’t played History of the World, naval combat occurs in smaller bodies of water (Mediterranean Sea, Black Sea, North Sea etc…) but not in large oceans (Atlantic, Pacific, Indian etc…)

A player moved a ship unit into the Atlantic Ocean to attack my ship. When I told him that combat was not allow in oceans, he asked what rule was, I couldn’t remember off hand were it was in the rules. So I said it was the swallow water rule, boy they were all over me. The game immediately stopped and they did a comprehensive search of the rules. I was right, but they never forgot that.

From that day, in any game we play, if a player doesn’t believe me they always say “Is this another swallow water rule.”

My problem is, the guys in my group don't have the patience for a full explanation, but when an unexplained rule comes up on the course of the game, they accuse me of overlooking the rule just to get an advantage. They sometimes even call for a re-start at that point. Since they assume I know the rules best, my friends always gang up on me in every game.

They tried this as well with me - accusing me of leaving things out - but we were younger then. The last time this happened was when we played a poker game and I accidentally won 20% of a newbie's chips

One of the more experienced players started to complain on how I was abusing the situation; after all he was new to the game... What I always say in those situations, whether it be poker or a board game: don't complain; you have internet to look up games yourself; you can call me to get the rules in advance and we are all grown-ups here, do your homework.

This is a great point and very often helps connect the theme with the mechanics in the game for me. It helps me understand the 'why' in a game.

It not only helps people understand what's going on, it also helps keep their attention focused during the usually boring procedure of learning the rules.

I prefer to show the background before beginning rules explanation, but often I cannot for the point you did write just before this one.

Are you sure it was "In the year 1940, Franz von Taxis was given the rights to deliver the mail in Brussels"?

Shouldnt that be 1490?

What? You've never heard of "ex postal facto"?

It's an ongoing joke when I explain games that I say, "The object of this game is to win." *pause for the groans* "The way you win is..."

Michel, you don't get a point for your plantations with a point on them unless you add a fifth plantation to your board and push one of those point plantations off.

Ryan, that is incorrect. You get a point for the "point" plantations no matter where they end up at the end of the game.

It is a reward for using a less efficient plantation piece.

I always make sure to emphasize the goal when explaining a game. Then I set about explaining how the various aspects of the game relate to that goal.

For example, I taught my group Puerto-Rico pretty quickly and easily by telling them, "The Goal is to get VPs. There are 2 ways to get them: Build building, or the most important way: by shipping goods." Then I explained how each role related to the production and shipping of the goods.

Within about 5 minutes everybody knew what they were doing and the indigo players were already jealous of the corn players.

"The winning team is the first team ... that wins."

I also try to adhere to this rule - but when there are other players at the table who have previously played the game it sometimes breaks down as they try to interject points within the game that they found important to note.

Sometimes the instructions end up getting waylaid... but my iron fist usually brings things back into perspective!

AMEN!!! I *DREAD* explaining a game to a new player when there are other people there who know how to play.

I've got a lot of teaching experience and know how important it is to present things simply, logically and with a clear flow to them, but no sooner do I say, "Now, in order to build a road, you need to have 1 wood and 1 brick..." than somebody interupts with, "...or you can have 1 of them, then 4 of anything else so you can trade them, or 3 if you've got a 3:1 port..." at which point the next person says "...or a 2:1 port if you've got the matching cards..." then "...or you can trade with somebody else..." then "...but don't trade with anybody who already has 8 or more points!" etc... etc... etc...

I can also attest to this: I'm the explainer myself. But I always invite the interrupter to continue with the explanation of the full game. Sometimes I will even stand up to get a beer or coffee without saying another word. Most of the times they excuse themselves to me, and sometimes I'm done explaining. Either way is okay with me.

Furthermore about data flow: I like to follow the pages of the rule book as much as possible, leaving all exceptions out at first and discussing them later when I've gone trough the book for the first time. This gives all players a good idea at first how things work and then they get the context of the exceptions better.

So true, I often have to jump in and say, "I will get to that in a second" since the interjections really ruin the flow.

I also find that writing your own cheat sheets is helpful. In addition to having full control of the content and layout, the act of writing them is a great way to learn the rules yourself.

This is probably the hardest sort of rule for me to teach. Assuming I remember it, do I break up the flow of my discussion for this digression? Do I say "there's an exception to this, which I'll say later"?
I usually introduce the exception and add the caveat "I'll say this again later."

These are most prevalent in games that have "rule bending" cards: in this case spreading the cards out and giving examples of the rule bending can help.

"There are cards that can allow you to do A, even though you normally can't. There are cards that allow you to do B as well, if these conditions are met."

You don't have to explain the fine details here, just enough that nobody is floored by a card capabilty they couldn't envision.

In this situation a gamer playing says: "Damn! If I had known this rule before I would have made this choice..." and usually I think: "Thanx guy for your friendly support..."

Great assignments demand great responsibilities!

Yeah. "Let's play poker!" and then you decide which of the multiple variants you want to play. From five card stud to Battle Line.

One other note: If you use house/variant rules when teaching a new player (especially when someone joins a group with favorite rules), be sure you identify those rules as variations. Otherwise, they'll run into trouble when playing with other groups. The best case response then would be "If you wanted to play with variant rules, you should have said so before we started" or "Are there any other house rules I should know about?", depending on who owns the set.

For example, once when I was teaching Settlers of Catan to some new people, there was a spectator who thought that the Largest Army bonus was based strictly on unplayed Soldier cards.

This is a critical step, especially if the game didn't go over well. Being honest about the rules error is important so people will approach another play understanding that the last time it didn't work it *might* not be the game itself.

Of course, sometimes the corrected rule doesn't make it any more fun, and in a few cases we have stuck with our house variant because we didn't care for the "official" rule as much as our accidental reading.