Hard words for Alias — abstract ideas

Abstractions with nothing physical to lean on. For groups bored of easy rounds.

A set for players who stopped finding easy words a challenge. Almost no objects here — feelings, qualities and ideas you cannot point at or describe by their looks.

Why these are hard

A concrete word yields to appearance or action: "round, it rolls" and the team has already said ball. Abstractions refuse that. You have to build the situation the idea lives in and hope the team recognises it from two sentences. That is why these rounds are either disasters or the best moments of the evening.

• The fastest route into an abstraction is its opposite: "when you are not scared at all" beats listing the traits of courage.
• Describe a situation, not a definition: "what you feel after breaking someone's mug and saying nothing".
• Skip without guilt: on a hard set one point beats half a round of silence.

melancholy, paradox, nostalgia, symmetry, hypothesis, illusion, compromise, stereotype, authority, ambition, indifference, gratitude, endurance, dignity, dilemma, evolution, experiment, enthusiasm, betrayal, intuition, irony, remorse, hypocrisy, logic, metaphor, courage, hope, inspiration, duty, delusion, premonition, pessimism, subconscious, progress, proportion, reputation, risk, loneliness, consciousness, scepticism, temptation, justice, resilience, doubt, tolerance, tradition, anxiety, prejudice, charisma, generosity

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