Let's Play CODENAMES

**Let's Play CODENAMES** is the first video in the Board Game Club series.

"*We're all having fun, but...*"
―Adam
## Notable moments

* The first rule of Board Game Club is "please do talk about Board Game Club, we'd love this series to hit the ground running".
* Even for the first episode, our core BGC elements are already here, it's lovely to see. We have the instructions at the top, the swearing, the throwing of insults left, right and centre and - most importantly - we have a clear statement that this is about the experience of playing a game with friends.
* We're deep in COVID restrictions, of course - so this is our Zoom era.
* We have a trophy! How long will that last? Apparently we *have* to have a winner.
* First team red is "Wrestletalk" - Luke, Oli, Laurie, Tom. The wrestling is leaking.
* First team blue is "Team of People Who Used to Work for Draughts Board Game Cafe (Or Still Do)" - so that's our origin story for Blair, Elliott and Isaac. Adam's not their boss anymore, so he can't fire them.
* Oli tries to build up his intro, but Adam's not letting that happen.
* Adam's attempting to play Ringmaster. Nobody's a shrinking violet though - so good luck with that.
* They haven't quite worked out how to have enough people visible at the same time as the board.
* Laurie is trying to put the other team off. So is Elliott, but *they're* being explicit about it.
* Luke: "A ghost is a major part of the body!" Laurie says it's entirely the opposite.
* Tom: "A big part of my choice was I did not see the word 'spine'".
* Adam's trying to sabotage now.
* Luke is trying to link everything to the same word - it's creative, but it's not... useful.
* Oli: "You just gotta sit here while people are idiots".
* Actors, gamers and actor-adjacent types don't know a lot about business. Is Oli the only grown up in the group?
* Tom: "Business ghost definitely feels like a sitcom."
* Tom: "Ghosts can be fresh - they can be very recent". Adam: "That sounds like a threat!"
* Tom is trying to meta Oli's body language.
* Adam: "You don't put gravel in a bassoon".
* Laurie: "Oli, could I just ask - what the fuck were you thinking with 'olden'?"
* Apparently nobody's up on their classical mythology. Apart from Laurie. Tom gets relatively cross. As much as he ever does.
* The wrestling leaks a lot in this episode.
* Adam: "Do it, coward!"
* Elliott goes for 1 Country, when there are 2 clearly on the board and somehow it works out.
* Adam: "If Tom could, he would live in the woods, cooking everything over a log fire".
* The team selection pits the two front runners directly against one another.
* For almost 10 years Adam would get Tom a Cliff Richard calendar for Christmas. It was not funny for Tom. Adam still seems giggly about it.
* Apparently we're all here for Oli to beat Tom. Oli: "I'm fucking coming for you Tom ... I'm going to bring you down, you son of a bitch!"
* Adam's cross, Laurie's blaming the clues. Their dance begins. A tale as old as time.
* Laurie: "I've seen some pretty graceful olives!"
* Oli: "That's abstract!" Adam: "You're abstract!"
* Isaac is our first Board Game Club Champion

## Scores

* Oli 0
* Adam 1
* Laurie 1
* Tom 1
* Blair 2
* Elliott 2
* Luke 2
* Isaac 3

## Trivia

* Game introduction and rules by Adam.
* This episode predates the name change, so the channel is referred to as Phenoma-nerds.
* Adam's hat is related to shaving his head for charity on Quizzlemania X8, now on partsFUNknown. If you don't know the other channels in the group (also WrestleTalk and WrestleTalk Podcast) you should check them out - even if you're not interested in wrestling. Smart, funny people talking about things they love - it's fabulous.
* This episode is the channel debut of Oli Davis.
* This is the BGC debut of everyone - Adam, Blair, Elliott, Isaac, Laurie, Luke, Oli, Tom.
* We haven't got our sign off sorted.