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★ BECOME A HOST

Your lounge,
our regulars.

A games night needs a room and a kettle. Everything else is just twenty blokes and some boards. we’ll bring the rest.

★ WHY YOU’D DO IT

A pitch,
briefly.

The best nights happen in lounge rooms, not function halls. We’ve been running out of one address for a while — it works, but one address is one address, and the club is bigger than that now.

Hosting is the cheapest, kindest version of generosity we’ve found: you open a door, you put the kettle on, twenty people you mostly already like turn up and play games. You don’t have to be on. You just have to be in.

We do the heavy lifting — the RSVPs, the comms, the awkward first-timers, the “is there a step at the door” questions. You do the door, the loo location, and the music volume.

That’s the whole gig.

★ WHAT’S EXPECTED

The short list.

A room
One that fits a few card tables and twelve-to-twenty humans.
A vibe
Relaxed. Lamps on. Music low or off. You answer the door, you point at the loo, you do not perform.
Some snacks
A bowl of chips and something to drink. People bring more. Catering this is not.
A clean-ish floor
Vacuum the rug, wipe the bench, hide the laundry. Hospital corners are aggressively unnecessary.
A few games
Three or four off your own shelf is plenty. Regulars bring the rest in tote bags.
A heads-up
Tell us a fortnight out so we can promote it and you're not refreshing RSVPs alone at 5pm.
★ THE LONGER, MORE IMPORTANT LIST

What you don’t need.

Most reasons people talk themselves out of hosting live in this column. Read it. Talk yourself back in.

  • A collection

    Owning Gloomhaven is not a prerequisite. Owning a coffee table is closer to one.

  • A performance

    You are not a maître d'. You don't have to greet every arrival. Someone else will pick up the slack — that's the deal.

  • A spotless flat

    Lived-in is fine. Aim for "a mate is coming over", not "the in-laws are inspecting".

  • Rules expertise

    You do not need to teach a single game. Regulars handle teaches. You handle the front door.

  • A bar

    BYO is the default. A jug of water and a kettle covers your end.

  • Forever

    Host once. Host twice. Host never again. All fine. There is no contract, just a calendar.

★ TWO WAYS IN

Pick your scale.

One night, or one city. Both are useful. Neither is a commitment past the next time.

Brisbane · one night, your place

Open your lounge

You've got the room, we've got the regulars. We bring the crowd, the comms, the RSVP wrangling and a couple of teach-friendly veterans. You bring the address and the kettle. We'll walk you through what a Flophouse night looks like before anyone knocks on your door.

Suits you if
You've been once or twice, liked it, and reckon your lounge could pull it off.
Doesn’t if
You want full control of the guest list. We're a public-ish thing; we vet, but we don't gate-keep your couch by name.
Not-Brisbane · a chapter, eventually

Start one in your city

We are unreasonably keen on this. If you're somewhere we're not — Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, Auckland, anywhere with cubs and cardboard — and you'd run a regular night, we'll hand over the playbook: the code of conduct, the RSVP setup, the email templates, the lessons learned. Branding's negotiable. Encouragement is not.

Suits you if
You've run a thing before, or you're stubborn enough to start.
Doesn’t if
You want a franchise with KPIs. This is a club, not a chain.
put your hand up.

Tell us you’re
thinking about it.

No pitch deck. A sentence is plenty: which city, roughly what your room looks like, when you might be free. We’ll write back like humans and work the rest out over a cuppa.

★ EXPRESS INTEREST

Email the hosts See a night first The house rules

hosts@cubsandcardboard.com