Saturday 5 March 2011

On Saturday Babs and Carl were hosting games at their place partly in celebration of their birthdays and also as one of their new regular fortnightly Saturday games nights. We arrived as Craig and Sean and their kids were leaving. T and K had been given a couple of Chinese terracotta soldiers. But to make them more interesting they were each encased in a clay brick. Each brick came with little bamboo scraper and small brush to give the feel of archaeology. Judging how far the boys got in the first hour these bricks could keep them busy for days (if they don’t get bored and frustrated first). Overall a cute idea that I’d expect to see in gift shops at heritage sites around the world.

Expedition
We kicked the evening off with Expedition. The red route curled in tight loops around North America until we got bored with it. The blue route petered out very quickly in North Africa while the yellow route went around the world. I made a mistake of not going to a destination one link away from the one just got to, but luckily recovered to win.

Ian  18
Carl 17
Anne 10

Wyatt Earp
Carl then taught us Wyatt Earp, a Rummy game which in terms of its mechanics is part of the Mystery Rummy family of card games. Anne hadn't played Rummy before so the basic concept of pickup, optionally meld (create or add to a set of cards on the table) and then discard was new to her. In Mystery Rummy games the deck is divided into "normal" and "special" cards, with the special cards making up a quarter to a third of the deck. Each turn a player may meld or play one special card (in addition to melding normal cards). In Wyatt Earp most of the special cards relate to the scoring of sets, though the commonest special cards (the multi-use Wyatt Earp cards) can be, and often are, used to allow the player to draw more cards.

The theme of the game is hunting outlaws in the wild west. Each outlaw has a bounty which starts at $1,000. There are 7 suits (one per outlaw) with 7 identical cards in each suit. Melding 2+ cards in a suit increases the bounty on that outlaw by $1000 times the number of cards melded minus one. Some special cards can be added to melds of a particular outlaw that also increase the bounty. The cards played also indicate how much "knowledge" a player has of that outlaw (normal cards are worth 2 points). At the end of the hand the bounties may be paid out, but only if the total "knowledge" of all players is at least 8. If a player has at least 5 "knowledge" more than any other player they get the whole bounty otherwise it is share among the players. Unpaid bounties accumulate from hand to hand. I have been interested in this game for awhile as it has a sort of stock market idea.

At the end of the second hand I got to $24,000 but in next hand Carl prevented me from getting any more cash with a well timed Hideout card. Anne and I are keen to play Wyatt Earp again.

Carl  $27,000
Ian   $24,000
Anne  $24,000

Tichu
By this time the boys were in bed and Carl was keen for Babs to learn Tichu. As it was after 10pm I suggested that we just play a couple of hands, but it turned out that we played a whole game. I felt that I had consistently poor hands (I must learn how to make the best of such hands).

There were very few Tichu calls though plenty of 1-2s, and on two hands the points were shared 50-50. Babs and Carl were ahead through the mid-game but in the final two hands we scored 105 and 95 points.

Hnd IA+AM C+BdV
1.   200     0  1-2
2.   200   200  1-2
3.   215   385  Carl's Tichu
4.   265   435  50 points each
5.   315   485  ditto
6.   315   685  1-2
7.   515   585  our 1-2 & Carl fails Tichu
8.   560   640
9.   860   640  Anne's Tichu 1-2
10.  965   635
11. 1060   640

Carl and Bab's place - 12 May

Modern Art
When I arrived at Carl's place, Lance had almost finished explaining Reef Encounter to Carl, John and Travis (Matt was watching rugby again). But Reef Encounter is a four player game and they graciously switched to a five player game -- Modern Art. This is one of my favourite game though one I don't generally do well at it. All artists got some exposure, painting by at least three artists being sold each turn and by the end of the third round all artists were on the board and worth at least $30. In other words in the fourth round any artist that finished in the top three would be worth between $40 and $70 a painting. I bought a Gitter at the start of the fourth round for quite a lot of money but as that was the only Gitter sold that round I had thrown away my money. To make matters worse I had thrown it at John who won, Carl second, Lance then me with Travis being the only one not to have $300+ at the end.

Reef Encounter
Matt returned and as we couldn't agree on a six player game, Carl and John played Aton while Lance taught the rest of us Reef Encounter. I have played this game once before but this is a tricky game and I feel you need to play several games in succession to get the hang of the consequences of the various actions. Travis got off to a good start followed by Lance, Matt saved lots of orange for a big finish (as did Lance to better effect) and I just bumbled along. Travis came second to Lance with Matt and I trailing well behind but third equal.

Meanwhile Carl and John played three games of Aton. John winning the second and Carl winning the other two. In the final game John was on 34 going into the second scoring round with Carl on less than 20. Carl played second and restricted John to 3 points while gaining well over 20 himself to win! They then played a game of Caesar and Cleopatra.

Light Speed
Light speed is a real-time Cheapass game where you place your spaceships (cards) on the table. The first to finish calls the end of the game. Then comes the scoring which takes much longer. Experience tells in this game as all the ships have different capacities. Where in the firing order they are. What lasers they have and what shields. I ended up on one point after shooting too many of my own ships. Carl won.

My games at Carl & Bab's place - 5 May

John, Sean and I arrived just as Matt, Carl and Babs were worried that no-one else was going to arrive. While Carl and Babs put the boys to bed we put games on the table. Oasis was chosen

Oasis
The first player token moved between Matt, Carl and Sean, while John concentrated on the green and yellow grass. Carl picked up a big pile of multipliers and built lots of stone. I seemed to get stuck with 3 cards or less and didn't get much of anything until I started to collect camels, and ended up with ten. Matt started off with a good camel herd before diversifying into just about everything. Sean got the biggest camel herd but like me not much of anything else.

John 120
Carl 108
Matt 103
Sean 69
Ian 63

California
Matt left to watch rugby and the remaining four chose California over Mexica merely because Carl hadn't played it before. John reversed his luck of comming last in his previous games by jumping out to a lead, and Sean followed both grabbing various bonuses. Sean kept the brown visitor for most of the game which meant a present each time he got a different visitor. John had a perpetual party with two or three visitors. Carl and I made much heavier work of it, both of us choosing to go after a bonus tile that John was two moves closer to winning with the obvious result. Unlike the rest of us Carl managed to stay out of debt.

Sean 21 + $3
John 21 + $1
Carl 13 + $2
Ian 13 + $1

Hornochsen
We finished California at half time and then looked for another 45 minute game to play during the second half. I suggested Hornochsen and Carl was enthusiastic. I made a slight omission when explaining the rules by not explaining that you could only put one +5 and one x2 on each pile. This game takes a couple of playings to appreciate the tactical options and I was at an advantage with three beginners. I ran out of cards first but made the mistake of keeping my +5 and x2 until the end so had to rid of them where other people could use them. Carl ended up picking up a fair bit of red stuff.

Sean 20 (4x5)
Ian 9
John 8
Carl -ve (I forget how much)

You're Bluffing
Sean left and the rest us wanted to play a short game. I suggested "You're Bluffing" which Carl and co. have been put off before by the children's picture book style artwork. This time I stress its similarity to "For Sale" (which might be dubious) and got it onto the table. We were all scared of the bluffing aspect and there was little trading before all the animals were auctioned. I only had three sets in front of me and kicked off the major trading by spending big to get a pair of donkeys from John. My next trade in dogs was unsuccesful and I lost my dog. I finally got the last pig to give me two sets and take me out of the game. At this point John had the most money and a pair of horses, with Carl holding the other pair. Gradually Matt worked up to two sets. Everyone had at least one goat and goats became the most traded commodity causing the fourth goat to rotate around the table with money moving from hand to hand in the opposite direction. No-one getting a significant money advantage over the others. Finally the sets sorted themselves out with the game taking considerably longer than advertised.

John won (Carl could provide the scores)

The three game session week - 24, 26, 28 April

I haven't written up any game sessions for awhile. But I think it is good practice for writing skills and game analysis skills.

This week we had three game sessions. Because Peter was sick last Wednesday we had games at our place. Peter was probably feeling under-gamed because he invited us to games on Monday night, Tuesday being a public holiday was another useful excuse for more gaming.

Peter’s place - Monday 24 April

Ticket to Ride - Märklin Edition

The passenger rule makes this game more interesting than the original Ticket to Ride. There are passenger cards in the deck, a little pile of tokens on most of the stations and everyone has 3 plastic passengers. When you play a set cards and claim a section of track you can optionally put down one of your passengers on one of the two stations. On a future turn you can (instead of the normal actions) move your passenger along your track as far as you like picking up the station tokens as you go. You can also play passenger cards to allow you to use other peoples track sections. The tokens have decreasing values (like the bonus tiles in Thurn und Taxis). Most of the stations have tokens ranging between 1 and 4 points but Berlin starts at 7 points. Your passenger is discarded after it moved.

Even though Peter warned us of the importance of getting ones passengers down on the board and then moving them most of us didn’t make much effort to do so until the middle of the game. The passengers mean it is important to decide where to place your early track so that your first passengers get a good run through the best stations. This is often at conflict with securing the important choke points to score your tickets. I enjoyed this game a lot more than the original, though still think it take a bit long for a game of its weight.

There are other differences from the original game: 2 separate decks of tickets (long & short), 2 types of wild card, a ten point bonus for most tickets completed rather than longest route and bigger cards. But the passengers are the most important difference.

Note: Ticket to Ride - Europe also has big cards and separate long and short ticket decks (players start with 1 long and 3 short), players may need 0-3 extra cards to build a section with a tunnel., some sections need 1 or more wild cards to complete (ferry routes), each player has 3 stations which cost 1-3 cards to lay and cost 4 points if not laid, each station allows the use of another players section when scoring a ticket.

Thurm und Taxis

Lance and I introduced Jarratt to 'Thurm und Taxis'. I was half expecting Jarratt to win but he didn't. The scores make it look like Lance ran away with the game but the game didn't feel like that.

Lance 29
Jarratt 16
Ian 14

Peter’s place - Wednesday 26 April

Die Handler

Kate, Luke, Peter and I played this game while the other eight people played on the other two tables. For most of us this was our second playing of this game but it had been many months and many other new games in between playings and we all needed a rules refresh.

This is a game of buying, transporting and selling goods coupled with an increasingly expensive status ladder, which must be climbed to win. There is reasonable scope for shafting when it comes to loading the wagons, moving the wagons and manipulating the prices. There is also a shortage of cash caused by the increasing expenses on higher rungs of the status ladder we all must climb to win, and the increasing cost of moving up the ladder as the game progresses. Experience should speed this game up and should also make us ready for the advanced version of the game.

Everyone enjoyed the game and I beat Peter by 400 guilders on the tie break.

Medici

Peter, Kate, Luke, John B and I played this purest of auction games. It turned out to be one of the most brutal games of Medici we have played, including the most nasty accidental shaft we have seen when John after thinking carefully for awhile bid 16 without noticing that this was exactly the number of points that Luke had (Luke being the other person interested in the cards on offer).

Carl’s place - Friday 28 April

Aton

This was the first time anyone had played my new two player game about vying for power in the temples of Egypt. The components are straight forward: two identical decks of numbered cards, 2 sets of counters and a pretty board containing four 12 square temples, an eight square city of the dead, a score track and 4 cartouches each. But the rules are more complex. Basically each player draws four cards from their deck and places them face down against the 4 cartouches, then all cards are turned up. The cartouches determine how the number on each card is evaluated: turn order, how many counters you get to take off, how many you get to put on and which temples can you do this in. The game is about controlling the temples and scoring points in various ways. There are four different game-end/win conditions and seven ways to score points so there is plenty to keep track of.

I ignored the first cartouche (which scores someone up to six points per turn) to my cost and concentrated on going for a green victory (placing counters in all the green squares). Carl played for points and won on about turn 7 or 8. We both enjoyed this game.

Oltre Mare

Sharon’s liked this game so much last week that I brought it again, this time Carl and Matt were also keen so Oltre Mare edged out California and Great Wall of China as the game to play. It was Carl’s first game but he caught on quickly. In the first half Matt, John and I dominated the trading but the half way scoring saw Carl, Matt and John clustered around the thirty mark while Sharon and I trailed ten points behind, but I had more pirate cards than all the others put together. In the second half Matt, Carl and Sharon dominated the trading. Matt and I did the most sailing while the other three spent much of the game sitting on pirate free ports. Sharon did her usual thing with sticking on "hand limit 6, play 1" cards and planning up to three moves in advance.

Carl won and I think this game will get played again.

Great Wall of China

This new game was also a big hit last week and this time we played five player, with Sharon being the new player. Last week we had decided that conflict would mainly benefit the non-competing players and we were very peaceable about dividing the spoils. This meant that no-one was in danger of playing all the cards much before the others and also that we all had plenty of good cards left at the end to squabble over the last few tokens. The 7 and 8 point tokens all came out in the first half of the game and those last tokens we fought over were mainly 1s, 2s and 3s! The scores were very close this week and I think we all have more to learn about this game.

Matt 31
Carl & Sharon 30
Ian 29
John 27

Games at Carl and Bab's - 27 January

Power Grid
We decided on the French board as we had never played it before. We randomly chose 2 of the edge regions, which turned out to be the western provinces. Carl was first to build and started in Paris, Matt joined him but intended to also use the north east, Leonie took the southern region with its seven cities close together, leaving me to start in the centre (an area of 6 cities separated from the north and south by expensive connections). Leonie went nuclear not just once but twice.

Carl made the first power play by jumping to seven cities well before anyone else. I grabbed the first 5 city power station and Matt the second. Matt soon had two finishing power stations but I moved north east into what he thought was his area and grabbed the cheap cities in that corner. Leonie also came north and grabbed some of the cities I was saving until later. She also went clean and green with some wind power.

Carl made his second power play and jumped to twelve cities and threatening to finish the game well before the rest of us were ready. Matt was now short of cities and running short of cash. But Carl couldn't quite get to seventeen before we all got our final power stations and it was a very close game in the end.

For the whole game I felt like I was chasing someone; first Leonie, then Carl, then Matt, then Carl again. Only in the last turn did I feel like I might have the lead.

Ian 18 (win on tie break by about $29)
Carl 18
Leonie 17 (third on tie break)
Matt 17

Palazzo
Matt and I chose the route of perfection while Carl tried to build as fast as he could.

Matt E 33
Ian 29
Leonie 25
Qarl 21


Trias
Even though I had played this game once before it was a long time ago and I wasn't really on the ball with my strategy. Carl went for the early points making lots of islands and scoring frequently. He also had a good end game being in powerful positions on the final islands. It payed off for a crushing victory.

Qarl 37
Matt E 25
Ian 21

Gaming at Carl and Bab's - 20 January

Carl's words:

10 DAYS IN AFRICA
Matt and Susan brought around this lightish game. It was a hit, and was played six times in the evening. Each of the four players has two racks on which to place tiles that they are trying to build a ten day trip though Africa on. There is a board, which shows a map of Africa. The boards only purpose is to let you know which counties are next to each other. A valid trip consists of a line of ten countries, with the second next to the first and the third next to the second etc. There are a couple of different kind of wild cards that make it a bit easier. There are two parts to the game. First each player draws ten tiles one at a time. They have to decide which slot on their rack they place a tile before drawing another one. There is a lot of good work you can do here towards building a legal finished trip. After each player has a rack to work with they take turns drawing a tile, from a face down stack or one of three face up discard piles, and replacing with a tile on you rack. When someone has a complete trip, they win. Matt Morris showed himself to be very good at this game winning all four of the games he played. Interestingly he is also very good at Elfenland, also a node to node trip game.
Matt M won versus Matt E, Qarl and Sharon
Matt M won versus Matt E, Qarl and Sharon
Matt E won versus Qarl, Sharon and Susan
Qarl won versus Babs, Matt E and Sharon
Matt M won versus Babs, Matt E and Sharon
Matt M won versus Ian, Sharon and Susan

ELASUND
This is the latest game based on Settlers of Catan. The players are building up the first city of Catan, and place buildings in the city. They can place buildings that replace the buildings of other players, so its a development game where you can end up going backwards. This made for quite along game apparently. I watched it for a few minutes, but it is one of those games where the look of the game gives you no clues as to what is happening if you aren't familiar with it. Susan defeated Sharon, Ian and Matt M

HAZIENDA
This is the latest big box Hans Im Gluck game, and the latest Wolfgang Kramer game. Lance brought it along (with Elasund, and a few other new games). You play Argentinean ranchers trying to build up the best holdings. The players play tiles onto a board of two types, land tiles on the highlands, and animal tiles on the plains. Victory points for carious achievements are earned at two scoring rounds, one in the middle of the game, and one at the end. There is money to managed, as well as card drafting, as cards are used to buy cards. There are a lot of mechanics, so I won't describe it intricately, but despite all the rules it plays quite quickly and intuitively.
Positional play on the bard is very important, which makes for some strong tactical play. The many paths to victory and the balance between earning money and victory points makes for good strategies elements too. I thought it was a very good game and enjoyed it a great deal. One of the scoring elements grew geometrically and I based my game going for those points, this worked very well. Matt E noticed that everything you score in the first scoring round remains and will score in the second scoring round, so went for quick early points. Both strategies worked well. A tactical blunder I made (that Matt had to point out to me) cost em the game. The other players played a more balanced game, which didn't seem as successful as a more extreme strategy. Lance and John immediately competed in the same are of the board, which seems to be a very bad idea.
The board is two sided. We played on the symmetrical side recommended for new players. The other side looked very interesting. There is also a program available for printing out random maps, which can be useful for a game where positional play is so important.
Matt E 104
Qarl 103
Leonie 97
Lance 82
John 58

HAZIENDA
Lance 122
Sharon 117
Ian 78

PALAZZO
A Reiner Knizia auction game about building tall buildings with lots of windows. Its theme is a bit thin at times, but that never stops Knizia from making a good game. At first blush it has a lot in common with Alhambra. There are a few currencies you use to buy parts of buildings. You either take money, or buy something, or reorganise your buildings in some way. However, when you take money, everyone else gets some too, and when you want to buy something it is usually in an auction, so someone else might get it instead. Building tiles are numbered from 1 to 5, are in a variety of building materials and have a number of windows. Building floors must be put i na building immediately, and to add to a building the floor mist have a higher number than the last. So if you get a 3 building and start a new building with it, it can at most be three high (without rearranging).. Height is the most important element in assessing a buildings score, so this makes for a very interesting part of the game. This time I got to pip Matt E, winning of the tie break. Again we had very different strategies, I was going for lots of buildings thrown together as they came. Matt had just two tall building with all the same building materials (worth a bonus) and lots of windows (also worth more points). Leonie and John were very close behind, making it a very pleasingly close finish.
Qarl 35 (winning tie break with 13 money of one type)
Matt 35 (6 money of one type)
Leonie 34
John 30

DON
Ian likes to collect odd little light bidding card games. This one is one of the odder ones. Players bid for cards in 6 suits. Having multiple in one suit is worth geometrically more the more you own. Suits have five cars, and also have a number from 0 to 9. When you own a card of a number, you may not make a bid ending with that number. So if I owned a 0 a 5, a 6 and a 7, I cannot bid $5, $6, $7, $10, $15, $16 etc. This can get quite limiting when you own a spread of numbers. Additionally when a card is won, the money is split between the players who own the most of the numeral of the ones of the bid. So if the bid is $15, and I am the only player with a 5, I get all $15. The card are drawn and auctioned in varying amounts, first one card, then two, and then three, then back to one card again. It is a weird game, only Ian seems to have a handle on how to play it, but it was a lot closer the second time.

Strictly speaking I didn't collect this game so much as constructed it, from descriptions and a review using cards from Sticheln and what ever counters are handy for money.

First game:
Ian 21
Matt E 17
Qarl 8
Sharon 6
Lance 2

Second game:
Ian 13
Sharon 10
Matt E 10
Qarl 10
Lance 8

Games at Carl and Bab's - 13 January (the accidental Western theme)

Way out West
Carl's assessment:
Ian brought along this older Martin Wallace game. The players develop cattle herds, and build key buildings in six western towns. After things start to get crowded, then the players can turn their cowboys to less honest work, rustling cattle and strong arming buildings away. These things are much easier to do if you control the towns sheriff. As well the stores make money from cattle, the hotels make money from cowboys, stage coaches make money from cowboys when they move, banks make money form other buildings, and trains make cattle much more valuable. It has a lot of interesting ideas, and some great mechanics, but seems ultimately falls a little flat. There are several different limited actions, but only a few seem to matter at any given moment. Placing buildings and cattle is all that really matters at the beginning, then there is only fighting that will get you anything in the middle, and there is not much of anything to do in the end game. Once a player is shut out of the action, there is not effective way to get back into contention. An odd mix of development and risk really. The two experienced players fared best.

In Way out West you spend the first part of the game getting your cattle, buildings and coyboys onto the board and then there is a second phase of gaining control by sending your cowboys out to take over businesses and rustle cattle. In our previous games the game ends at that point but in this game there was a third phase where some people still had the ability to vie for control but other players couldn't do anything useful.

John 45
Ian 34
Leonie 33
Matt E 31
Oliver 2

This was the third game of Way out West and the first five player game. John and I were surprised and disappointed at the way it turned out. I don't think we experienced the lack of actions to anywhere near the same extent in the previous games. Though obviously the two building restriction forces you to move to gun fights regardless of the number of players. The first game was a three player game and we all made early mistakes but it wasn't clear until we added up the points who was winning, but the winner was Luke who concentrated more on buildings than cattle or gunfights. In the second game John tried an extreme strategy of not placing any cattle and concentrating on building and taking over building and rustling cattle, but ultimately it was too exteme and he didn't do well. But in those games nobody ended with nothing to do like Leonie or being totally wiped out like Oliver.

We didn't seem to get to that third phase in either of the first two games. Getting your cowboys into the right place at the right time is very important if you want to make the most of phase two.

Like Dutch Revolution there are lots of holes in the rules. e.g. what if both sides get wiped out simulateously? Or can you try to take over building and cattle if you don't have the replacement tiles yourself? There are lots of complaints on the geek about the rules and also about the unusual weaker side shoots first rule (which Leonie might have been able to use to her advantage if she was willing to take the risk).

Like a lot of multiplayer war games it will suffer from the temptation to pick on the weakest player, who will have little or no come back and have a miserable game. (The "slow death" phenomenom I call it.) I don't think Way out West should be played too seriously.

In John's view there are 28 corral spaces, more than 9 per player in a 3 player game, and 7 per player in a 4 player game but only 5.6 per player in 5 player game. Similarly there are 23 building spots, 7.6 per player in a 3 player game, 5.75 per player in a 4 player game and 4.6 per player in a 5 player game. Hence there is no crowding in a 3 player game, a little crowding in a 4 player game and much more in the 5 player game.

My thought was that:

• The 3 player game is 3 * 12 * 2 = 72 actions
• The 4 player game is 4 * 9 * 2 = 72 actions
• The 5 player game is 5 * 9 * 2 = 90 actions

Perhaps the 5 player game should only be 7 turns long (70 actions), with payouts after turns 2, 4 and 7.

Boomtown
Carl's assessment:
Back to the old west for the gold rush. This game is a great light game, that can also be played fairly analytically by looking at probabilities and payoffs. I enthusiastically pointed out it is quite a skillful game early on, but as my score became apparent it was all due to luck, of course :-). Matt locked the game in fairly early, and went on to a convincing win.

In my view Boomtown is a very chaotic game, cash can fluctuate wildly. Carl ran out of cash at one point and I was down to my last dollar at another.

Matt E 109
Ian 83
Leonie 76
Qarl 75

Mogul
Carl's assessment:
A little after the wild west (or the later part of the era), and little more to the east, we were now investing in the great early railroads. This is the first time I'd played three player. Its also the first time I've seen a lot of loans taken out. Matt E was taking out loans every turn and going for big investments to win. It made for an interesting game. Without any loans only $18 would circulate between the players. By the end all $45 that are in the game were in play. Matt did pretty well, and making a big come back. My slower building up a couple of companies had two big payoff towards the end giving me the win.
Qarl 43
Matt E 32
Ian 29