Kweku Abraham
United States
Oakland
California
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Posting this for a friend who asked me to recommend him some games that have huge skill gaps -- like, if you play someone who is experienced or naturally talented at the game, you're going to get DESTROYED, no matter how lucky you get. Competitive, tournament-worthy games where there can be a clear and consistent "better player"
The ideal game would probably have a learning curve that does not plateau too early, where you're learning something new every time, and stands up to high-level play without becoming broken or scripted
Seems to me like most games that meet this criteria are going to be 2 player, which is fine so feel free to recommend those, but even more interested in examples of such games that can play more players
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For starters, games without any random elements.
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The learning curve of Go ends virtually never. But I guess you're looking for a modern board game here?
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Matt Bowles
Australia
Tatura
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+1 Tigris
Chess
500
what games does your friend like now?
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Hugo Olsson
Sweden
Karlstad
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Look no further: Advanced Squad Leader is the game you're after. Plenty of random elements, but still a competitive, tournament-worthy game where there are clear and consistent better players.
And with a learning curve like no other...
Edit: typo
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Brook Gentlestream
United States
Long Beach
California
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The most common method of achieving this is to have a board where the movement of multiple pieces and their relative positions to each other matter.
To use some family games as examples: Risk would be an obvious example of this, as would checkers, chess, or backgammon. Life, on the other hand, is not - you move along a linear track and don't have a lot of freedom of movement nor do your pawns relative position to each other matter very much.
Anytime you are choosing how to position pieces on a board, you will get a skill-gap situation. There may be other ways to do it, too, but this is the easiest way I can think of to identify such a game.
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Kweku Abraham
United States
Oakland
California
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radicalizard wrote: The learning curve of Go ends virtually never. But I guess you're looking for a modern board game here?
Yeah pretty much
balzi wrote: what games does your friend like now?
He's just getting into board games and is sort of in a honeymoon phase and in love with everything right now.
lordrahvin wrote: Anytime you are choosing how to position pieces on a board, you will get a skill-gap situation. There may be other ways to do it, too, but this is the easiest way I can think of to identify such a game.
Yeah that's a good point, something I was kind of noticing while pondering this question as well.
Thanks for all the suggestions so far, haven't played most of these. Games with learning curve/depth that are worthy or repeated plays are something that I'm very interested in as well, so I'm paying attention
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Brook Gentlestream
United States
Long Beach
California
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A forum search for "unforgiving" may turn up some interesting results. This is usually used to describe games where a single mistake could end up costing you the game.
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Bernd Caspers
Germany
Mönchengladbach
Unspecified
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I didn´t even know you could search for forum keywords, interesting indeed...
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Hugo Olsson
Sweden
Karlstad
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Another vaunted game is Diplomacy, a multiplayer game where the skill lies mostly in manipulating your fellow players into doing your bidding. Beginners are usually chewed up and destroyed during the opening moves. The downside is that it's only really enjoyable with exactly 7 players.
The most ruthless, sweet-tongued liar will usually win. 
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Dallas Tucker
United States
Garland
Texas
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Neuroshima Hex! has a lot of randomness, but skill really matters. I would say that a skilled player will easily beat a beginner more than 5 out of 6 times (which is not as big a difference as chess or go, but for a game with that amount of randomness in it, it is pretty good).
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Jeff Hinrickson
United States
St Paul
Minnesota
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Puerto Rico
Acquire
Troyes
Macao
1960: The Making of the President
This list can go on and on, as mentioned before - games with realitively little to no luck. Most "Euros" fit this criteria.
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Dennis Gadgaard
Denmark
Hvidovre
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Dungeon Twister
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Patiently waiting for the zombie apocalypse...
United States
Colorado Springs
Colorado
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This has been mentioned, but I second Twilight Struggle.
The experienced player has a large advantage in my opinion. Knowing the cards that will be played sooner or later is huge!
They drop the Berlin Blockade card on you and...... oops I don't have a 3 OPS card in my hand. Blasted Soviets!!!! 
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Matt Bowles
Australia
Tatura
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Re: Diplomacy
Ector wrote: The most ruthless, sweet-tongued liar will usually win.
unless you've played lots of times and your mates know you're a sweet-tongued liar and they never trust anything you say so you have to stay put. Maybe the odd double-bluff would work well still!
+1 to Puerto Rico too. can't believe I forgot that one.
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Matt Bowles
Australia
Tatura
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CM Randall wrote: This has been mentioned, but I second Twilight Struggle. The experienced player has a large advantage in my opinion. Knowing the cards that will be played sooner or later is huge! They drop the Berlin Blockade card on you and...... oops I don't have a 3 OPS card in my hand. Blasted Soviets!!!!
Haven't played this, but it sounds very similar to the brilliantly timed Catastrophe tile in a game of Tigris & Euphrates. You're beautiful empire gets cut down the middle leaving the leaders free for assassination before you get another turn.. ouch!!!
but of course, part of a good strategy is not leaving a position that's just begging to be catastrophied (I think I just made a word).
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David Debien
United States
Round Rock
Texas
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balzi wrote: CM Randall wrote: This has been mentioned, but I second Twilight Struggle. The experienced player has a large advantage in my opinion. Knowing the cards that will be played sooner or later is huge! They drop the Berlin Blockade card on you and...... oops I don't have a 3 OPS card in my hand. Blasted Soviets!!!! Haven't played this, but it sounds very similar to the brilliantly timed Catastrophe tile in a game of Tigris & Euphrates. You're beautiful empire gets cut down the middle leaving the leaders free for assassination before you get another turn.. ouch!!! but of course, part of a good strategy is not leaving a position that's just begging to be catastrophied (I think I just made a word).
Twilight Struggle is a mine field of "Catastrophe Tile" type of maneuvers.
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Greg Jones
United States
Washington
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I like games like that. Some of my favorites:
Tongiaki: Yes, if you are new, I will get all the islands and you will have no boats on the board. Maybe one.
Plays best, in the way you are asking, with two players. With more players you can't really avoid if a noob sometimes gives the game away (even to another noob).
I would say Tongiaki has a cliff and a plateau. It takes several games to even have a clue what you're supposed to do (for me at least). After you get a clue, you can be fairly competitive with players with more experience than you, but there is a gradual ongoing improvement.
A word of warning: Tongiaki by the default rules has a strong 1st-player advantage. There are some alternative two-player rules; I haven't actually tried them. Between two players on the plateau, the first player will usually win. Players at the base of the cliff still don't have a chance. It's a problem if you let it be, but if you accept it, it's fine. I really consider the standard of success in Tongiaki to win a two player game from playing second. A win when playing first can be considered almost a draw.
I mean, even Go has a strong first player advantage.
Attika: You won't feel quite so trounced, because probably I won't insist on beating you by shrine connection in the first few turns. More likely you will complete at least 2/3 of your buildings. But you really have no chance against an experienced player. There is luck, but skill almost always prevails unless the it's a close battle.
Some people say Attika should only be played by two players. I don't agree, but it is most intense that way.
Attika's learning curve is a long, steep slope followed by a plateau. There are a lot of different little tactics you have to figure out - if you're unaware of one, it will be exploited and you will lose. But after you figure out the basic set of tactical best practices, you can hold your own. Still, there are people I pretty much cannot beat, even though most people cannot beat me. The plateau isn't really a plateau, it's an almost imperceptible slope. Like how it seems flat from the Mississippi River to Colorado but all of a sudden Denver's a mile high. How'd that happen?
Imperial: Here is one that is really best played with three or more players. Two players can play it, but whereas I think the aggressive play in Attika is really interesting, the aggression in Imperial is for the most part obvious. It gets more interesting when you have to at least most of the time play productively, but know when is the appropriate time to use your resources for attack.
The learning curve of Imperial has no cliff or plateau, it's just linear or smoothly curving, and moderately steep. I might have now stopped getting better at it, but I didn't for a lot of games, and in any case there are people who can consistently beat me. Apparently at least they went farther without stopping getting better at it.
It's possible to give a noob a clear trouncing, by say taking over 4 out of 6 countries, and pushing one of them, which you own most of the shares in, to a quick win. But actually the most skilled players will win while the noob thinks he's winning! No need to fight for the win if no one even knows you're a threat.
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David Boeren
United States
Marietta
Georgia
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I'm glad someone else thinks Attika is like that. I used to play with a friend of mine and my win percentage was huge against him, it was pretty clear that I had the better understanding of the game and he was going to need some good luck in the tile draws to have a shot.
Besides abstracts, I would suggest that a lot of miniatures games have this characteristic as well. I've known Warmachine players who've played for many months to a year before getting their first win against a veteran player. Yeah, there's dice for every attack but that's not going to save you. A strong player will mop the floor with a newbie over and over, and he can probably do it with an army list drawn up at random too.
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Allison dlr
United States
Belmont
California
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Project GIPF - a series of abstract games along the lines of Go.
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Mike Fox
United States
Fort Worth
Texas
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The first game that pops into my mind is Chess. Chess is the ultimate strategy game. The more you play, the better you get, and an experienced Chess player will annihilate a noob, even a really smart noob.
A much simpler game where the more experienced player will pound the noob is The Battle for Hill 218. The more you play, the more light bulbs come on. It's all about knowing your deck well and visualizing card combinations.
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Jeff Forbes
New Hampshire
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Age of Steam doesn't have as long a learning curve as something like go, but a new player is going to get smacked around in an instant. Add in some of the tougher expansion maps and it gets even harder. I prefer Steam because I can play it with normal people.
Twilight Struggle has been mentioned before and will be mentioned again, for the noted reason that you are forced to play stuff that hurts you. Learning the intricacies of the deck is also paramount; I've got only a handful of plays of the game, but each time I play, new concepts open up. This has a long learning curve. It's worth noting that the game is not balanced - the USSR has a strong advantage. There is a solution for it in tournaments though (players bid to play the USSR)
Through the Ages: A Story of Civilization is a nice concise civ game that will play 2 people in a bit over 2 hours, 3 in 3, and 4 in 4. And it is brutal. Playing an utterly superior player will result in your evisceration. A lack of understanding of the economic system in the game will result in you shooting your foot for turn after turn after turn, all while the other players beat you to a pulp and make things even worse.
Le Havre, and probably Ora et Labora might not give 500-0 score results, but let's put it this way. My solo Le Havre record is maybe 225 and I've played it a number of times, and other players can manage close to 400 with some frequency. Agricola also works, but scores can be closer on account of the way the scoring system works.
Vinhos is a brutal game. In a group of three people with ten plays and one with none, the one is going to have a very, very hard time with this.
You might also consider games based on logistics. I haven't played Logistico or Neuland, but I've looked at the rules of the latter, and it looks like a new player is going to be facing a significant learning curve in a game like this.
18xx games are something else that the newbie is going to be hopeless in.
I will note that abstract games will tend to be the strongest when it comes to the superior player winning. Chess, Go, GIPF, Arimaa - anything of the sort is likely to be significantly deeper than most euros. Most modern board games have something resembling a catch-up mechanism, or don't last long enough for one to be "necessary".
And it's a stupid flash game, but have your friend try QWOPping. I can make it 100 meters... can he? 
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Derry Salewski
United States
Augusta
Maine
. . . give a ship.
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Axis & Allies Revised. (+1 TS)
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