What to do with 2 players

[Waervyn]

Hi!

Small question. I recently played this at a friends place with a couple of players and had a blast. Was thinking whether it'd be worth it for me and my girlfriend as well, however, I can see one problem. If you have 2 players, and you have one person working on a complex task for a while..what does the bomb dismantler do? Normally you can be busy with the other players, but with two, I don't see how it would be much fun.

Am I missing something? Hope my question is clear!

Thanks!

[SteddyNCC78339]

I personally find it more fun with just a one-to-one relationship (as one defuser and one expert)... I find playing with multiple experts too much as there are too many voices trying to explain their parts. Whereas if you have just one expert, as long as you get the order of modules right, you can still defuse the bombs even in the more complicated multiple module and limited time setups...

[xstar960]

I find one defuser and one expert to work very well most of the time.

It's only really the ones later on that need more than 1 expert to defuse in time.

[Waervyn]

So there's not really many 'lulls' where the defuser isn't doing anything? At least I found that for example the puzzle with the Venn diagram would take quite some time to solve while the rest was doing other stuff.

[SteddyNCC78339]

I find there aren't but each to their own I guess... As I said as long as you get the order of modules right (as in do the ones that take the longest time first, then the ones take the next longest time and so on until you have defused all modules) any bomb can be defused by a defuser and an expert pair.

[Silly Slinky]

I spend any 'down time" familiarising myself with the rest of the bomb, deciding what module to do next, checking the serial number for vowels and what the last digit is, counting batteries, parallel ports, lit indicators, morse code etc.
Gives me something to do while waiting, and to save time, cause with that info in my head when we get to a relevant module I can reply straight away without looking for it.

[aieousavren]

Well, my answer depends on if you want to play the game the knowing way, or the intended way. If you play it the intended way, the defuser knows absolutely nothing about the bomb, and the entire game is just communication: the defuser is basically a robot. This is fun, but only to a degree.
However, if you play it the knowing way, the defuser is familiar with the manual and the puzzles, and knows what information is necessary for the expert. Then it becomes a game of teamwork. So, when you're idle, you can do things like solve the password puzzle, attend to needy modules, memorize info like serial number aspects, how many batteries on the bomb, etc. for when you need them.
The knowing way is more like real life, I'd think. The defuser is a professional, after all, even though he might not know everything, he at least knows what he's doing.

[MajorRichardSharpe]

I play it with my girlfriend and wrote some short macros in VBA to solve the puzzles according to my input. I guess that some people consider that cheating and I see what they mean.

But then again, with the computer doing the time consuming work, she is never waiting and it comes down to the bottleneck of communication, which is the most fun part in the game anyways in my opinion.