In addition to this, make sure you know the rules before you teach the game!!
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Fair point.
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Perhaps these are the same people from your first point who just have to get their word in 
I particularly like this suggestion.
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I think there is also something to be said about being a good learner! I try not to ask too many questions but will chip in with confirmations (i.e. so you’re saying if i do x, the effect is y, yes?) for particularly difficult to grasp bits. Otherwise, i prefer to just head straight in. I expect in any learning game im going to get spanked.
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That’s why I did say that a supplemental input from others is “fine or even welcome.”
It’s really annoying when you’re trying to explain something and someone pipes in with “what about this?” or “Don’t forget about…” and interrupting your flow. Most of the time, it was something you were going to mention but some was trying to be “helpful” and instead makes things more confusing.
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This annoys me often. Interrupting my flow and sequencing just makes the teach longer. I’d not forgotten it, it just wasn’t that rules turn yet and now the whole thing is more confusing for everyone now 
If it’s brand new to me I used to practice beforehand. Otherwise it’s most of the things said here. Some key things such as don’t worry about the minutae until the overall picture is clear, and keep it less than 10 minutes. There’s not a boardgame which can’t be taught in person with a good audience in under 10 minutes. I game with a lovely chap who unfortunately can take up to an hour teaching a game, and has loads of interesting games I just don’t play unless I already know the rules.
How would you go about teaching something like Root in 10 minutes? I could do with some tips!
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Never played it! (It’s owned by the person who does long teaches).
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I could do with some Root teaching tips as well.
So far I’ve managed to convince my partner to play a couple of games with me…
Then I had one boardgame night–what feels like decades ago–for which I had proposed Root. One guy, who knew it, said he wouldn’t play if there had to be a teach because it cost half the night. Since one person who was invited didn’t know the game… there was no game of Root and we played something else.
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My girlfriend is very competitive, and not very familiar with modern boardgames. Playing half a game (or a full quick game) open-handed is the best way for her - it’s not a real game so there’s no “winner” and she can concentrate on the rules, and it’s exciting when the explanations finish and she can have a go with a real hidden deck.
This also helps if one person is familiar with the strategies for winning in a game and would smash a new player: they can say “so here it’s best to do X” during the open-hand teach. I’m a big believer in running a dummy round before starting for real.
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Another question, this thread covers teaching a game you know.
What mostly happens in our house is that we open a new box together and learn to play at the table with no prior knowledge. How do you handle that?
In our case, either one of us learns the rules in advance, or we watch a rules video (Watch it Played, Gaming Rules, etc.) together.
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I really dislike ‘all learning a game together’. It takes much longer than one person learning and then teaching others. Particularly if you add in punching and organising at the same time.
That being said your @Captbnut’s situation is different. I could imagine it being a jolly time to spend as a family where time feels different.
Also the one friend who doesn’t learn rules and buys games I will charitably describe as having a different taste to me. Consequently it’s an experience that invariably leads to a game I won’t enjoy being played. So make of that what you will…
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For me that’s for a special occasion: we’ve been at the games convention all day, one of us has just bought something, and we want to try it out right now. Which is really much more a social thing than a game thing.
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It depends on how much effort the one person puts into learning the game and putting themselves at the point where they feel they can teach it well. I’ve written a few teaching scripts/outlines to help me teach a game. These take a while to create.
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This is true but if you’re with a (small) group who are excited about exploring a new game then sometimes the time it takes to punch/organise, read rules together can be worth it. There’s nothing quite like someone reading out a rule, unsure of what they’re saying, and then the whole table going “ohh, that’s clever”, whereas if one person is teaching it then it’s a less organic experience.
I have a couple of groups that I play games with. One of them is larger and has more casual players, and I make sure to learn the game beforehand and have it organised to go whenever possible*. The other is happy to unbox a game together and learn as we go, it’s part of the fun! It’s not something I’d recommend for anything that’s too heavy but we usually have a good time.
* I did not build Colt Express beforehand because building a tiny 3d train is whimsical fun. Building the pieces together was probably a better time than playing the actual game.
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Exactly.
When we were all at uni and much richer in time than money, it might make sense to discover a game together. These days I want to be prepared. The only person I ever consider doing a learning together experience with is my partner and with him it’s more of a “start on equal footing” thing.
A couple years ago we had a big game night with friends, and the host really wanted to finally play Junta which he had played once before years earlier but he didn’t know the rules anymore and so he began reading and teaching as we set it up. We played a couple turns with rules still unclear and at some point his wife said “Enough.” and we played something else everyone knew.
I’m thinking of taking notes for games I don’t play all that often but really want to get to the table (see above, Root).
In most cases, I try to read the rules, play a two-handed game, play a game with my long-suffering partner, play the solo-mode if it exists and then play one more of any of these, before I try to bring it to a larger audience. But even then sometimes I am having a hard time. BGG has rules summary documents for a lot of games, I guess these would be helpful as a start with.
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Root must be up there with the hardest teach because it’s essentially 4 teaches that everyone has to listen to. The 2 turn playthrough is very good though.
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I’ve never managed to convince anyone to learn the game using the teaching turns. They always want go know all the rules upfront!
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