Well, we got the new Ebonwood Cribbage Wars board last night. It was delivered shortly after 8:00 p.m. We took it for a test spin this morning and our inaugural game went for well over 2 hours. By some miracle and partly because of the sadistically placed final Blue Penalty Box just outside the winning hole—I won! Sena had a comfortable lead most of the game until then. We both tripped over a couple of Blue Time Traps. Sena lucked up on the little Green Advance zone and I lucked up on landing in the first Red Skip zone.
We both were a little confused by the board because it lacked some key directional arrows in the lower left quadrant which we got used to on the little board. In fact, it’s a good thing we learned how to play by practicing on the little board. The Ebonwood board is 16 inches square and, while it was easier to peg because the holes were better spaced and bigger, the single blue streak across the exit from the Blue Time Traps also was misleading because it looks so much like the single line Blue Penalty Box.
Photos of the little board and the Ebonwood board side by side shows the differences between the two. The little one seems crowded with lettering which can be hard to read and the peg holes are tiny but the directional arrows are helpful. There’s a lot more real estate on the Ebonwood board, but it could have done with a couple more directional arrows to clarify the pegging paths. The special zones are made of different colored resin inlays.
And of course, there seems to be no way to shorten the time it takes to play a Cribbage Wars game. On the other hand, we tend to get absorbed by it and often hardly notice that we spend more than 2 hours playing a game. We did get through a game in a little over an hour a couple days ago, but that’s the exception to the rule.
An interesting side note was the answer to Sena’s question by one of the makers about the origin of the name Ebonwood:.
Sorry for the late reply on this. We used to be a strictly table top gaming accessories company (back when myself and the other cofounder started in my garage). Then we realized that if we wanted to sell cribbage boards, and other non ttrpg items our name “Deathroll Gaming” might not give the best impression. So we sat down and brainstormed up Ebonwood. Something a lot more elegant than a strictly TTRPG sounding name; but it also allowed us to keep with the TTRPG stuff as that name fit both worlds.
I think TTRPG stands for Table Top Role-Playing Game. The board ships with a deck of cards and pegs. It doesn’t come with a printed set of rules but they’re all over the internet anyway. It’ll set you back $210.
The length of the game is the main reason why we haven’t yet filmed one. Luck plays such a big part in every game that it’s almost impossible to predict how long one will last. We’ll film one eventually, but hopefully I can edit so that it doesn’t put people to sleep. Time traps are the main issue. During a game, I usually start remembering the chorus of one of the songs in the Rocky Horror Picture Show: Let’s Do the Time Warp Again.”
Let’s do the time trap again.
Go Retire Psychiatrist 