Friday 21 October 2011

We started the evening with the obligatory game of Frank's Zoo. We only managed one hand before too many others arrived to continue. Anne was leading with 6, Andrew H on 5, Anna 3, Ian 1, Andrew P on -1.

We split into two groups to play games of building palaces in China and India.

In the Year of the Dragon
We played pretty fast with Andrew R buying an double privilege and leading pretty much from start to finish on both the person track and the VP track. I tried vainly to keep up but ended up restricting myself to 4 people for most of the game. While Andrew P tried an unorthodox strategy of playing a long way behind on the person track.

Andrew R  105
Ian        86
Andrew P   68

Taj Mahal
Anne and John divided the market tiles between them while the pachydermophobes (Anna and Andrew H) avoided conflict generally and built connecting palaces. The game was closely fought for second place.

Anne     53
John B   45
Andrew H 44
Anna     44

Attika
After building palaces in India the Taj Mahal players went on to build ancient Greek cities. Andrew nearly build between two shrines, but was stymied. They played for places with Andrew H finishing first followed by John B, Anna and then Anne.

They then finished with a couple of hands of Frank's Zoo.

John B   3 8
Anna     1 7
Andrew H 4 6
Anne     3 5

Steel Driver
Andrew R and I were keen to play. So I taught Andrew P and refreshed Andrew R's knowledge of the game. The game is one of two halves. In the first (and longer) half the players build the American rail network. There are five rounds; each round starts by auctioning the right build the six companies. Then the six companies build one segment at a time trying to reach as many different coloured cities as possibly (and make money for their controllers by reaching lucrative cities and finishing the connection between New York and San Francisco). In the second half the companies pick up cubes from cities, aiming to collect sets of cubes. A set of 5 different is worth $150 per share, 4 different is worth $100 per share etc. More money is made in the second half of the game than the first.

We weren't far apart at the end of the first half of the game but the differences were more pronounced in the second half.

Andrew R $640 + $1310 = $1950
Ian      $550 + $1120 = $1670
Andrew P $670 +  $820 = $1490

On the Underground
John built the circle line to give himself a strong lead (about 12 points) over Anne but she clawed her way back due to her better track layout which not only criss-crossed the centre of London but dominated the Western, Northern and Eastern suburbs.

Anne   83
John B 82

With so many Andrews in the house I think I should start using nick-names.