I challenged my game group to come up with a rewrite of the Twelve Days of Christmas for a boardgamer. Anne's attempt was judged the best.
On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...
A Race for the Galaxy
On the second day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...
Two drawstring bags
And a Race for the Galaxy
On the third day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...
Three geek gold,
Two drawstring bags
And a Race for the Galaxy
On the fourth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...
Four game podcasts,
Three geek gold,
Two drawstring bags
And a Race for the Galaxy
On the fifth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...
Five railway games,
Four game podcasts,
Three geek gold,
Two drawstring bags
And a Race for the Galaxy
On the sixth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...
Six spinning fingers,
Five railway games,
Four game podcasts,
Three geek gold,
Two drawstring bags
And a Race for the Galaxy
On the seventh day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...
Seven game expansions,
Six spinning fingers,
Five railway games,
Four game podcasts,
Three geek gold,
Two drawstring bags
And a Race for the Galaxy
On the eighth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...
Eight days spent gaming,
Seven game expansions,
Six spinning fingers,
Five railway games,
Four game podcasts,
Three geek gold,
Two drawstring bags
And a Race for the Galaxy
On the ninth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...
Nine days in Essen,
Eight days spent gaming,
Seven game expansions,
Six spinning fingers,
Five railway games,
Four game podcasts,
Three geek gold,
Two drawstring bags
And a Race for the Galaxy
On the tenth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...
Ten days in Europe,
Nine days in Essen,
Eight days spent gaming,
Seven game expansions,
Six spinning fingers,
Five railway games,
Four game podcasts,
Three geek gold,
Two drawstring bags
And a Race for the Galaxy
On the eleventh day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...
Eleven annual leave days,
Ten days in Europe,
Nine days in Essen,
Eight days spent gaming,
Seven game expansions,
Six spinning fingers,
Five railway games,
Four game podcasts,
Three geek gold,
Two drawstring bags
And a Race for the Galaxy
On the twelfth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...
Twelve thousand air-points,
Eleven annual leave days,
Ten days in Europe,
Nine days in Essen,
Eight days spent gaming,
Seven game expansions,
Six spinning fingers,
Five railway games,
Four game podcasts,
Three geek gold,
Two drawstring bags
And a Race for the Galaxy
Showing posts with label Hobson St Games. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hobson St Games. Show all posts
Tuesday, 20 December 2011
Monday, 12 September 2011
Friday 9 September 2011
John arrived on time and keen to play Modern Art. But his wish was thrawted by other people arriving one by one. So we switched to Condottiere instead, with John explaining the rules three times as players arrived.
Condottiere
Condottiere is an even more unforgiving game than Taj Mahal. In both games you play cards one at a time, dropping out when you wish but losing all cards played regardless of reward. Unlike Taj Mahal there is only one reward in Condottiere, so the only incentive to drop out early in Condottiere is to cut your losses. Players are dealt 10 cards plus 2 for each province they own, leading to a run-away leader syndrome. I think this is a good thing as it tends to prevent the game dragging on too long.
I usually lose badly in this game but this time was an exception, I won three connected provinces before some people won their first. Most of the newbies didn't enjoy Condottiere and I don't blame them. I certainly didn't enjoy it the first few times I played it. Like most masochistic pursuits, its an acquired taste.
Mogul
Looking for a shortish six player game I suggested Mogul, which was new to Ceedee and Mark. I started off (as I did 2 years ago) with the classic mistake of selling off my first share (for 6 points). But it took quite awhile to build up the cash to buy a replacement share and then several more turns before I had the cash to do anything else. This game does tend to favour those who build up a portfolio and collect dividends for most of the game before selling off just before the crash and I should know this. Nigel made similar mistakes to me and we were both cash and share poor for most of the game.
After Mogel, Nigel and Mark left and we could teach Ceedee Modern Art. I started by putting up a Krypto for sale and Krypto turned out to be the only artist to sell for the first half of the game, making for a short game. Krypto even came in second in the third round! The fourth round saw four artist's paintings selling. It was a remarkably short and low scoring game.
We taught Ceedee this painful game to finish the evening. Andrew and John both had a handful of red cards which they gradually inflicted on us. I finished by taking two moderately negative piles to avoid getting one moderately negative pile followed by a very bad pile. The average score was -15, which is unusually bad.
Condottiere
Condottiere is an even more unforgiving game than Taj Mahal. In both games you play cards one at a time, dropping out when you wish but losing all cards played regardless of reward. Unlike Taj Mahal there is only one reward in Condottiere, so the only incentive to drop out early in Condottiere is to cut your losses. Players are dealt 10 cards plus 2 for each province they own, leading to a run-away leader syndrome. I think this is a good thing as it tends to prevent the game dragging on too long.
I usually lose badly in this game but this time was an exception, I won three connected provinces before some people won their first. Most of the newbies didn't enjoy Condottiere and I don't blame them. I certainly didn't enjoy it the first few times I played it. Like most masochistic pursuits, its an acquired taste.
Mogul
Looking for a shortish six player game I suggested Mogul, which was new to Ceedee and Mark. I started off (as I did 2 years ago) with the classic mistake of selling off my first share (for 6 points). But it took quite awhile to build up the cash to buy a replacement share and then several more turns before I had the cash to do anything else. This game does tend to favour those who build up a portfolio and collect dividends for most of the game before selling off just before the crash and I should know this. Nigel made similar mistakes to me and we were both cash and share poor for most of the game.
John B 24 Ceedee 17 Mark 16 Nigel 13 Andrew 11 (beating me on tie break) Ian 11Modern Art
After Mogel, Nigel and Mark left and we could teach Ceedee Modern Art. I started by putting up a Krypto for sale and Krypto turned out to be the only artist to sell for the first half of the game, making for a short game. Krypto even came in second in the third round! The fourth round saw four artist's paintings selling. It was a remarkably short and low scoring game.
Ian $369 Ceedee $361 Andrew $282 John B $259Hornochsen!
We taught Ceedee this painful game to finish the evening. Andrew and John both had a handful of red cards which they gradually inflicted on us. I finished by taking two moderately negative piles to avoid getting one moderately negative pile followed by a very bad pile. The average score was -15, which is unusually bad.
Ceedee 13 Ian 8 Andrew -8 John B -28
Saturday, 23 July 2011
Friday 22 July 2011
Age of Steam: Korea
My second play of the Korea board. There seemed to be plenty of goods to go around, though the planning is slow due to the need to take into account the changing destination colours as cubes are moved out of cities. Two important points about the Korea expansion are:
John, Anne and Andrew started around Seoul and that area emptied of cubes almost immediately. Nigel started to the south of the others and I started in Busan (in the south western corner). As John and I joined Nigel, the area south of Seoul also emptied out. Andrew built north and Anne west. The cube shortage was intermittent, until the last turn when most of the board was empty (except one blue and red in each city in the south west - damn US troops).
I led on the share track until I cut back on shares, track building and bidding for turn order (I still had plenty of cubes). I remained on the old 4 link train technology while others had moved onto 5 links (which cost me in the final turn). Nigel issued far fewer shares than anyone else. John and I were neck and neck on the income track but he had fewer shares. On the last turn I lost a point in track due to John's hint to Nigel and another 2 points due to Anne's Urbanisation.
Frank's Zoo
We finished the evening with a few hands of Frank's Zoo. Nigel claimed this was the first 4 player game he had played and certainly the number of triples around the table caught some of us by surprise. The hedgehogs loved John.
My second play of the Korea board. There seemed to be plenty of goods to go around, though the planning is slow due to the need to take into account the changing destination colours as cubes are moved out of cities. Two important points about the Korea expansion are:
- firstly cities have no colour (even New Cities), they are destinations for the cubes they contain,
- secondly New Cities arrive on the board pre-populated with 2 cubes from the Goods Display (which are immediately replaced).
John, Anne and Andrew started around Seoul and that area emptied of cubes almost immediately. Nigel started to the south of the others and I started in Busan (in the south western corner). As John and I joined Nigel, the area south of Seoul also emptied out. Andrew built north and Anne west. The cube shortage was intermittent, until the last turn when most of the board was empty (except one blue and red in each city in the south west - damn US troops).
I led on the share track until I cut back on shares, track building and bidding for turn order (I still had plenty of cubes). I remained on the old 4 link train technology while others had moved onto 5 links (which cost me in the final turn). Nigel issued far fewer shares than anyone else. John and I were neck and neck on the income track but he had fewer shares. On the last turn I lost a point in track due to John's hint to Nigel and another 2 points due to Anne's Urbanisation.
John B 66
Nigel 63
Ian 62
Anne 54
Andrew P 53
Frank's Zoo
We finished the evening with a few hands of Frank's Zoo. Nigel claimed this was the first 4 player game he had played and certainly the number of triples around the table caught some of us by surprise. The hedgehogs loved John.
Nigel 3 9 11 17
Anne -1 2 9 13
Ian 3 2 4 7
John B 5 7 6 5
Sunday, 17 July 2011
Friday 15 July 2011
Frank's Zoo
This week we managed to start while we waited for the late comers. In the second hand Carl took Andrew Parr's place. Each hand is scored separately below.
Glory to Rome
This time Anna came first, followed by Carl, then Andrew H and Nigel last. Meanwhile...
Traumfabrik
Sharon (mass producing B-movies) was starting on her 6th film before I finished my first film! But on the other hand I finished all of my movies by the penultimate party and cruised to the finish (to collect 35 points worth of awards).
Citadels
Carl had brought along a bag of games including this nasty little card game.
Patrician
I felt that I got stuck with too many purple cards and ended up in only 3 cities! I think we were all a bit tired and didn't concentrate enough to make the best of this game. It is also one of those games that you get more control with fewer players (so might be best with 3 players).
No Thanks!
There was a massive spread of scores in this game!! (Remember low score is good)
Modern Art
Nigel did OK despite some excessive bids, like paying more for a card than it could possibly be worth. At first glance it looks like you shouldn't pay more than 50% of the expected value of a piece of art but this isn't true (as explained here).
I did badly as usual.
Tichu
We couldn't finish the evening without the obligatory Tichu game. This time Carl and John versus Sharon and Anne. The boys clawed themselves back into the game.
This week we managed to start while we waited for the late comers. In the second hand Carl took Andrew Parr's place. Each hand is scored separately below.
Ian 6 8Once Nigel and John had arrived we abandoned Frank's Zoo and split into two groups.
Anna 4 3
Andrew H 1 2
Anne 3 -2
Sharon 1 3
Andrew P 7 -
Carl - 5
Glory to Rome
This time Anna came first, followed by Carl, then Andrew H and Nigel last. Meanwhile...
Traumfabrik
Sharon (mass producing B-movies) was starting on her 6th film before I finished my first film! But on the other hand I finished all of my movies by the penultimate party and cruised to the finish (to collect 35 points worth of awards).
Ian 86
Sharon 67
Andrew P 64
John B 56
Anne 52
Citadels
Carl had brought along a bag of games including this nasty little card game.
Andrew H 32
Carl 19
Anna 18
Nigel 15
Patrician
I felt that I got stuck with too many purple cards and ended up in only 3 cities! I think we were all a bit tired and didn't concentrate enough to make the best of this game. It is also one of those games that you get more control with fewer players (so might be best with 3 players).
John B 37 (played fewer bits which is the tie-breaker)
Andrew P 37
Ian 32
Sharon 29
Anne 15
No Thanks!
There was a massive spread of scores in this game!! (Remember low score is good)
Andrew H 3
Anna 18
Carl 47
Nigel 80
Modern Art
Nigel did OK despite some excessive bids, like paying more for a card than it could possibly be worth. At first glance it looks like you shouldn't pay more than 50% of the expected value of a piece of art but this isn't true (as explained here).
I did badly as usual.
Andrew P $384
Andrew H $370
Nigel $361
Anna $345
Ian $273
Tichu
We couldn't finish the evening without the obligatory Tichu game. This time Carl and John versus Sharon and Anne. The boys clawed themselves back into the game.
Hnd Cd+JB SH+AM
1. 0 300
2. 0 500
3. 150 550
4. 195 505
5. 295 505
6. 265 535
7. 335 565
8. 515 585
9. 715 585
10. 765 635
11. 840 760
12. 1000 700
Sunday, 10 July 2011
Friday 8 July 2011
Six of us were about to play Frank's Zoo, but before we could sit down Sharon turned up after catching red lights all the way down The Terrace, so we split up to play Tichu and Glory to Rome.
Tichu
Sharon and Anne got off to a good start with a snappy Tichu 1-2. But in the next hand I called Grand Tichu on a Dragon, Phoenix and an Ace. I picked up another Ace and Andrew kindly gave me a third and then backed me up to make it a 1-2 as well. In the third hand Anne and I both called Tichu -- I made it. With the score on 525 to 275 the Boys were half way home, but that was as good as it got. We failed Tichu in the next 3 hands while they made Tichu over 4 consecutive hands. In the 8th hand no-one called Tichu but Sharon and Anne made 100 points to win 1005 to 395.
Glory to Rome
I was too busy getting thrashed in Tichu to pay much attention to what was happening during the rebuilding of Rome, but I have it on good authority that Andrew won, Nigel was second and Anna third.
While we were playing Ceedee and Rob turned up and played a game of Jaipur on the coffee table before joining Anna, Andrew and Nigel to play...
Rheinlander
Which was another new game for Ceedee and Rob.
John B arrived in time to play one hand of Coloretto before we reconfigured to play Taj Mahal at one end of the table and Vegas Showdown at the other.
Vegas Showdown
From what I could see Andrew P had a significant lead for most of the game so I was surprised to learn that Sharon won. Unfortunately no scores were recorded.
Taj Mahal
Ceedee's first game and she led from start to finish, playing an opportunistic strategy, having the Princess card for a few rounds and mostly avoiding big fights. Andrew went after the King and connections, while the rest of us (Anne most of all) went after the elephants, leading to some bruising fights. Ceedee demonstrated yet again why we shouldn't teach her new games.
Tichu
Sharon and Anne got off to a good start with a snappy Tichu 1-2. But in the next hand I called Grand Tichu on a Dragon, Phoenix and an Ace. I picked up another Ace and Andrew kindly gave me a third and then backed me up to make it a 1-2 as well. In the third hand Anne and I both called Tichu -- I made it. With the score on 525 to 275 the Boys were half way home, but that was as good as it got. We failed Tichu in the next 3 hands while they made Tichu over 4 consecutive hands. In the 8th hand no-one called Tichu but Sharon and Anne made 100 points to win 1005 to 395.
Hnd IA+AP SH+AM
1. 0 300 Sharon's Tichu 1-2
2. 400 300 Ian's GT 1-2
3. 525 275 Ian's Tichu, Anne fails
4. 465 435 Anne's Tichu, Andrew fails
5. 420 580 Sharon's Tichu, Andrew fails
6. 365 735 Sharon's Tichu, Ian fails
7. 395 905 Sharon's Tichu
8. 395 1005 Sharon & Anne make 100 points
Glory to Rome
I was too busy getting thrashed in Tichu to pay much attention to what was happening during the rebuilding of Rome, but I have it on good authority that Andrew won, Nigel was second and Anna third.
While we were playing Ceedee and Rob turned up and played a game of Jaipur on the coffee table before joining Anna, Andrew and Nigel to play...
Rheinlander
Which was another new game for Ceedee and Rob.
Anna 41
Ceedee 38
Rob 37
Andrew H 33
Nigel 30
John B arrived in time to play one hand of Coloretto before we reconfigured to play Taj Mahal at one end of the table and Vegas Showdown at the other.
Vegas Showdown
From what I could see Andrew P had a significant lead for most of the game so I was surprised to learn that Sharon won. Unfortunately no scores were recorded.
Taj Mahal
Ceedee's first game and she led from start to finish, playing an opportunistic strategy, having the Princess card for a few rounds and mostly avoiding big fights. Andrew went after the King and connections, while the rest of us (Anne most of all) went after the elephants, leading to some bruising fights. Ceedee demonstrated yet again why we shouldn't teach her new games.
Ceedee 53
Andrew H 50
Anne 44
Ian 34
Anna 22
Saturday, 2 July 2011
Friday 1 July 2011
Carl came to dinner and afterwards I taught him Jaipur (a 2 player trading game).
Jaipur
Jaipur is a largely tactical card game where taking advantage of your opponent's proximity to the hand limit and situations where all the cards in the market are camels is the name of the game. There is also a game of chicken over holding out long enough to get a set of 5 in order to get the 8-10 point bonus tokens.
I won the first round, but Carl came back in the second round with a score of 85 (70-5 is more normal). I took out the third round, to win 2-1.
7 Wonders
Ceedee and Rob arrived with a stack of games including: First Train to Nuremberg, a shrink wrapped Hansa Teutonica and 7 Wonders (which Carl hadn't played). Ceedee taught Carl while Rob and I set up the pieces during it which felt like the start of a Tolkien novel as people arrived in ones and twos until there were ten of us. Andrew, Anna, Sharon and Anne decided to play Tichu, leaving 6 of us to play 7 Wonders. I sat between Rob and John. I decided to go after green and military cards. I thought I had enough access to resources but by the third era I found myself often unable to build. and I also allowed Rob to out build me in military a couple of times.
I don't have the final score sheet but I think Carl won.
Tichu
Sharon and Anna proved too good for Andrew and Anne winning two games of Tichu: 1180 to 520 (in 9 hands) and 1015 to 95 (in 8 hands). I suspect Anna's creative scoring penalized Anne and Andrew 190 points in the second game!
Princes of the Renaissance
Instead of doing the sensible thing and splitting into 2 threes, people started suggesting 6 player games. Princes caught Rob's imagination and Ceedee was happy to give it a go. I taught the game in a somewhat chaotic fashion, though roughly working backwards from the main sources of victory points through to the actions, what the various tiles are and the details of fighting battles. With the game under way Carl, John and I possibly handed out more advice than was welcome. Then again Ceedee's strategy of doing the opposite of the advice offered stood her in good stead.
Andrew had first pick of the family tiles and choose Baglioni (the warmonger), Rob chose d'Este (the gunner), Carl chose Bentivogli (the treacherous) as a self imposed challenge, I chose Montefeltro (the art collectors), Ceedee chose Gonzaga (the other art collector) and John was left with Malatesta (the treacherous). The Cavalry were snapped up quickly by the first few players (though Rob was persuaded to invest in Artillery instead). I followed my usual practice of auctioning off popular city tiles to entice people to spend cash and commit to cities. Wars broke out early on and Venice (red) gained in status while Naples (yellow) dropped to the bottom. There was plenty of treachery, for instance in one war Carl bribed my only troops to go home so that neither of my bonus tiles (which would have given me +3 on defense) were valid.
Ceedee was attracted to merchants particularly the yellow/Naples ones, and also to the Pope. Carl despite not having a discount on bidding for attack or defense was winning wars all over Italy. Andrew despite having a discount didn't win any wars but astutely bought into Venice. I bought art and initially invested in Naples and Milan. The first decade ended with everyone short of cash, no-one rushed the event tiles so each decade had its full complement of wars and gave everyone plenty of time to buy city tiles. The final decade saw Venice in an untouchable position on the status chart with Naples rising fast. Other than Venice the cities were close together but I tipped the balance in favour of Florence (green) because I thought I could get some Florence tiles (there were no Naples left).
At the end of three decades of war, investment and treachery Ceedee showed us how the merchant strategy plus good choice of city tiles works wonders (53 is a very good score).
Jaipur
Jaipur is a largely tactical card game where taking advantage of your opponent's proximity to the hand limit and situations where all the cards in the market are camels is the name of the game. There is also a game of chicken over holding out long enough to get a set of 5 in order to get the 8-10 point bonus tokens.
I won the first round, but Carl came back in the second round with a score of 85 (70-5 is more normal). I took out the third round, to win 2-1.
7 Wonders
Ceedee and Rob arrived with a stack of games including: First Train to Nuremberg, a shrink wrapped Hansa Teutonica and 7 Wonders (which Carl hadn't played). Ceedee taught Carl while Rob and I set up the pieces during it which felt like the start of a Tolkien novel as people arrived in ones and twos until there were ten of us. Andrew, Anna, Sharon and Anne decided to play Tichu, leaving 6 of us to play 7 Wonders. I sat between Rob and John. I decided to go after green and military cards. I thought I had enough access to resources but by the third era I found myself often unable to build. and I also allowed Rob to out build me in military a couple of times.
I don't have the final score sheet but I think Carl won.
Tichu
Sharon and Anna proved too good for Andrew and Anne winning two games of Tichu: 1180 to 520 (in 9 hands) and 1015 to 95 (in 8 hands). I suspect Anna's creative scoring penalized Anne and Andrew 190 points in the second game!
Princes of the Renaissance
Instead of doing the sensible thing and splitting into 2 threes, people started suggesting 6 player games. Princes caught Rob's imagination and Ceedee was happy to give it a go. I taught the game in a somewhat chaotic fashion, though roughly working backwards from the main sources of victory points through to the actions, what the various tiles are and the details of fighting battles. With the game under way Carl, John and I possibly handed out more advice than was welcome. Then again Ceedee's strategy of doing the opposite of the advice offered stood her in good stead.
Andrew had first pick of the family tiles and choose Baglioni (the warmonger), Rob chose d'Este (the gunner), Carl chose Bentivogli (the treacherous) as a self imposed challenge, I chose Montefeltro (the art collectors), Ceedee chose Gonzaga (the other art collector) and John was left with Malatesta (the treacherous). The Cavalry were snapped up quickly by the first few players (though Rob was persuaded to invest in Artillery instead). I followed my usual practice of auctioning off popular city tiles to entice people to spend cash and commit to cities. Wars broke out early on and Venice (red) gained in status while Naples (yellow) dropped to the bottom. There was plenty of treachery, for instance in one war Carl bribed my only troops to go home so that neither of my bonus tiles (which would have given me +3 on defense) were valid.
Ceedee was attracted to merchants particularly the yellow/Naples ones, and also to the Pope. Carl despite not having a discount on bidding for attack or defense was winning wars all over Italy. Andrew despite having a discount didn't win any wars but astutely bought into Venice. I bought art and initially invested in Naples and Milan. The first decade ended with everyone short of cash, no-one rushed the event tiles so each decade had its full complement of wars and gave everyone plenty of time to buy city tiles. The final decade saw Venice in an untouchable position on the status chart with Naples rising fast. Other than Venice the cities were close together but I tipped the balance in favour of Florence (green) because I thought I could get some Florence tiles (there were no Naples left).
At the end of three decades of war, investment and treachery Ceedee showed us how the merchant strategy plus good choice of city tiles works wonders (53 is a very good score).
Ceedee 39(Cities) + 8(Merchants) + 6(money) = 53
Ian 21(Cities) + 14(Artists) + 4(influence) = 39
Andrew P 36(Cities) + 3(Pope) = 39
Carl 14(Cities) + 21(Laurels) + 3(money) = 38
John B 29(Cities) + 6(Laurels) = 35
Rob 13(Cities) + 6(Laurels) = 19
Sunday, 17 April 2011
Friday 15 April 2011
After a couple of weeks of low numbers (just Andrew and I on 1 April and 3 of us on 8 April) it was nice to fill the dinning room table with 8 people on a Friday night.
Coloretto
I picked a simple game to teach Natalia for whom English is a second language. It was new to Ceedee too. Coloretto has simple rules but you have to always keep an eye on the effect of your decisions on other people and there are long term strategies to learn.
Frank's Zoo
Anna decided that Frank's Zoo was just as easy to teach. The rules are much longer than Coloretto but the basic ideas are pretty easy. It seems that Anna taught Ceedee and Natalia too well!
Louis XIV
At the other end of the table the old hands got on with sucking up to the luminaries in the court of the Sun King. It was a rich game with plenty of cash to spend. In the first round Andrew screwed up and though he won two rewards he could not complete any of his mission cards and so had to discard a hard earned reward. In round two Travis failed to complete any missions and everyone except Anne earned 5 on #7. Andrew started his come back. By round three Sharon had the power to place 4 influence tokens with one card. Anne didn't have cards for #1..4 in rounds 2 or 4. In the final round Anne went after shields but she could not catch Andrew.
No Thanks!
Andrew easily won this game of avoiding taking cards
Expedition
We swapped around with an accidental gender split. Anne taught Expedition and Natalia taught how to pronounce Russian place names. In the first game 13 was a popular score. In the second game the scores were spread wider.
Metropolys
We taught Travis rather badly - he didn't understand what bridges were until the game was half over. Andrew continued his love of the ladies taking at least 5.
Battle Line
While the second Expedition was finishing at the other end and after Travis had gone home I challenged Andrew to a game of Battle Line. It was a close game but finally I won 5-4 once we had emptied the draw deck. It was a game without Tactics cards. Ending Andrew's winning streak.
Coloretto
I picked a simple game to teach Natalia for whom English is a second language. It was new to Ceedee too. Coloretto has simple rules but you have to always keep an eye on the effect of your decisions on other people and there are long term strategies to learn.
Ian 28 + 35 + 35 = 98
Anna 27 + 39 + 25 = 91
Ceedee 24 + 30 + 23 = 77
Natalia 18 + 29 + 22 = 69
Frank's Zoo
Anna decided that Frank's Zoo was just as easy to teach. The rules are much longer than Coloretto but the basic ideas are pretty easy. It seems that Anna taught Ceedee and Natalia too well!
Ceedee 7 14 22 25
Natalia 2 6 9 11
Anna 1 2 4 10
Ian 2 2 1 1
Louis XIV
At the other end of the table the old hands got on with sucking up to the luminaries in the court of the Sun King. It was a rich game with plenty of cash to spend. In the first round Andrew screwed up and though he won two rewards he could not complete any of his mission cards and so had to discard a hard earned reward. In round two Travis failed to complete any missions and everyone except Anne earned 5 on #7. Andrew started his come back. By round three Sharon had the power to place 4 influence tokens with one card. Anne didn't have cards for #1..4 in rounds 2 or 4. In the final round Anne went after shields but she could not catch Andrew.
Andrew H 47
Anne 45
Sharon 44
Travis 40
No Thanks!
Andrew easily won this game of avoiding taking cards
Andrew H -16
Travis -38
Anne -39
Sharon -41
Expedition
We swapped around with an accidental gender split. Anne taught Expedition and Natalia taught how to pronounce Russian place names. In the first game 13 was a popular score. In the second game the scores were spread wider.
Anne 13 16
Natalia 13 14
Anna 13 13
Sharon 13 13?
Ceedee 10 7
Metropolys
We taught Travis rather badly - he didn't understand what bridges were until the game was half over. Andrew continued his love of the ladies taking at least 5.
Andrew H 36
Ian 34
Travis 16
Battle Line
While the second Expedition was finishing at the other end and after Travis had gone home I challenged Andrew to a game of Battle Line. It was a close game but finally I won 5-4 once we had emptied the draw deck. It was a game without Tactics cards. Ending Andrew's winning streak.
Saturday, 12 March 2011
Friday 11 March 2011
Six players, six games, six winners.
Frank's Zoo
I got off to a good start and unusually Nigel didn't show up in time for the second hand. Anna cornered the market in elephants on one turn but it didn't do her much good. Andrew P looked like he was going to come second until Andrew H made his run from the back. I seemed to spend a lot of the second half of the game with one card in hand while other people went out.
Glory to Rome
We split into two groups of three. At one end of the table Rome was rebuilt with Andrew H winning (probably by embezzling the most building materials).
Traders of Carthage
This is one of those games where cards have multiple uses. Cards in hand are mostly used as money (though they can also be used to protect goods from pirates). Cards on the table are goods to be bought and sent to Carthage. Cards face down are VP. We played one badly phrased rule slightly wrong. Anne won the first game and Andrew P won the second with an amazing improvement.
Attika
Carl got all his buildings down with a last flourish to beat Anna and Andrew.
Expedition
That left Anna to visit all her destinations first to win the last game of the evening. When Andrew was doing badly, Anne rashly declared that someone who does very badly has to do a down trou!
Frank's Zoo
I got off to a good start and unusually Nigel didn't show up in time for the second hand. Anna cornered the market in elephants on one turn but it didn't do her much good. Andrew P looked like he was going to come second until Andrew H made his run from the back. I seemed to spend a lot of the second half of the game with one card in hand while other people went out.
Ian 9 14 18 21 24
Andrew P 3 9 13 17 16
Anne -1 4 7 6 8
Anna 5 7 6 11 13
Carl 1 2 7 11 16
Andrew H 3 5 8 14 22
Glory to Rome
We split into two groups of three. At one end of the table Rome was rebuilt with Andrew H winning (probably by embezzling the most building materials).
Andrew H 42
Anna 29
Carl 29
Traders of Carthage
This is one of those games where cards have multiple uses. Cards in hand are mostly used as money (though they can also be used to protect goods from pirates). Cards on the table are goods to be bought and sent to Carthage. Cards face down are VP. We played one badly phrased rule slightly wrong. Anne won the first game and Andrew P won the second with an amazing improvement.
Game #1 #2
Andrew P 6 15
Anne 12 12
Ian 9 6
Attika
Carl got all his buildings down with a last flourish to beat Anna and Andrew.
Expedition
That left Anna to visit all her destinations first to win the last game of the evening. When Andrew was doing badly, Anne rashly declared that someone who does very badly has to do a down trou!
Anna 13
Ian 11
Carl 8
Andrew H 5
Andrew P 5
Anne -1
Monday, 7 March 2011
Friday 4 March 2011
Tichu
On Wednesday night, Jarratt was keen on playing Tichu again, so I taught Andrew. We played with Anne and I versus Jarratt and Andrew. They got off to a good start with a Tichu 1-2. This was a portent of how the game was to go as we spent much of the time with a negative score. Finally we had a success but it was too little, too late. All very embarrassing.
Tichu
On Friday night, Jarratt and Andrew were both keen on playing Tichu again. Anne and I agreed (we had to avenge defeat on Wednesday) on the understanding that we would stop if Nigel (or someone else) showed up.
We got off to a good start with a Tichu 1-2 but then things went into a holding patten on our side of the score sheet while Jarratt practiced his Tichu 1-2s. Then Andrew got in on the act. It was an evening of freaky hands. Including a hand where I had 6 consecutive pairs (which Jarratt bombed).
Louis XIV
There are far more 4 player games in my collection than games for any other number and that number is swelled by the 5 and 6 player games that are better for 4 than for 5 or 6. After a lot of suggestions we settled on Louis XIV.
Anne tried my usual pro-shield strategy while I tried the more orthodox get-lots-of-missions strategy. Anne did better than I did, while Jarratt did better than anyone. Anne and I got 6 missions, Andrew got 7 and Jarratt got 8. There were an unusual number of draws for most shields of a type.
10 Days in Europe
Looking for something quick to finish the evening we encouraged Jarratt to play this frustrating game. I won the first 2 games (though Andrew was very close in game 2) and Anne won the third game.
On Wednesday night, Jarratt was keen on playing Tichu again, so I taught Andrew. We played with Anne and I versus Jarratt and Andrew. They got off to a good start with a Tichu 1-2. This was a portent of how the game was to go as we spent much of the time with a negative score. Finally we had a success but it was too little, too late. All very embarrassing.
Hnd IA+AM AP+JG
1. 0 300 Jarratt's Tichu 1-2
2. -90 390 Anne fails Tichu
3. -55 455
4. 15 485
5. -60 560 Anne fails Tichu
6. 50 650 Ian's low scoring Tichu
7. 55 745
8. 55 945 Andrew & Jarratt 1-2 again
9. 180 1020 Anne's Tichu
Tichu
On Friday night, Jarratt and Andrew were both keen on playing Tichu again. Anne and I agreed (we had to avenge defeat on Wednesday) on the understanding that we would stop if Nigel (or someone else) showed up.
We got off to a good start with a Tichu 1-2 but then things went into a holding patten on our side of the score sheet while Jarratt practiced his Tichu 1-2s. Then Andrew got in on the act. It was an evening of freaky hands. Including a hand where I had 6 consecutive pairs (which Jarratt bombed).
Hnd IA+AM AP+JG
1. 300 0 Anne's Tichu 1-2
2. 375 25
3. 375 325 Jarratt's Tichu 1-2
4. 375 625 ditto
5. 285 715 Ian fails Tichu
6. 365 635 Andrew fails Tichu
7. 365 935 Andrew's Tichu 1-2
8. 460 940
9. 460 1140 Andrew & Jarratt 1-2
Louis XIV
There are far more 4 player games in my collection than games for any other number and that number is swelled by the 5 and 6 player games that are better for 4 than for 5 or 6. After a lot of suggestions we settled on Louis XIV.
Anne tried my usual pro-shield strategy while I tried the more orthodox get-lots-of-missions strategy. Anne did better than I did, while Jarratt did better than anyone. Anne and I got 6 missions, Andrew got 7 and Jarratt got 8. There were an unusual number of draws for most shields of a type.
Jarratt 54
Anne 49
Andrew 45
Ian 42
10 Days in Europe
Looking for something quick to finish the evening we encouraged Jarratt to play this frustrating game. I won the first 2 games (though Andrew was very close in game 2) and Anne won the third game.
Sunday, 19 December 2010
Friday 18 December 2010
Frank's Zoo
As has become traditional we started a game of Frank's Zoo while we waited for Nigel.
We deliberately split Anna and Andrew and made them sit opposite each other. Anne was on form, jumping out to a lead of 8 by the second round. A lead which she never looked like loosing. While Nigel, as he often does when he arrives late and joins in, did very well scoring 8 a couple of times to come second. Playing to Anne's left didn't do me much good.
Balderdash
Anne convinced everyone else to learn and play Balderdash. Anna was initially keen to play, but on the first turn she discovered just how tricky it is to come up with a convincing definition and changed her mind! Andrew H was always first to finish his definition while Andrew P had a fixation for Morocco. For some reason Anna liked my definitions better than the correct ones. Nigel was the only person to write down the correct definition for a work. Anne led and I chased, but I burst passed her on the last turn.
This was the first time we played a party game on a Friday night. Experience counted as far as scoring was concerned.
Ra
Anne had forgotten much of this game. But with plenty of advice from me and Andrew, she thrashed us. The tiles may not have been mixed well. The first epoch went on and on, while the third finished very quickly with a bunch of Sun tiles coming out together.
The uncertainty of tile drawing, the fixed bids and the penalties built into the scoring system and the disaster tiles make Ra one of the tensest auction games.
Master's Gallery
Andrew is quite keen on this auctionless version of Modern Art. It turned out to be quite a close game compared with previous ones.
Glory to Rome
At the other end of the table Nigel, Andrew H and Anna played Glory to Rome. I was too busy with Ra and Master's Gallery to take notice of what was happening, though I think I heard that Nigel didn't embezzle enough building materials. I suspect Andrew won.
This was the last Friday night games for 2010.
As has become traditional we started a game of Frank's Zoo while we waited for Nigel.
We deliberately split Anna and Andrew and made them sit opposite each other. Anne was on form, jumping out to a lead of 8 by the second round. A lead which she never looked like loosing. While Nigel, as he often does when he arrives late and joins in, did very well scoring 8 a couple of times to come second. Playing to Anne's left didn't do me much good.
Andrew P 2 6 11 13 18 18
Anna 4 6 8 14 13 14
Anne 6 14 18 23 25 28
Ian -1 0 3 6 9 13
Andrew H 5 4 3 8 17 22
Nigel - 4 12 13 15 23
Balderdash
Anne convinced everyone else to learn and play Balderdash. Anna was initially keen to play, but on the first turn she discovered just how tricky it is to come up with a convincing definition and changed her mind! Andrew H was always first to finish his definition while Andrew P had a fixation for Morocco. For some reason Anna liked my definitions better than the correct ones. Nigel was the only person to write down the correct definition for a work. Anne led and I chased, but I burst passed her on the last turn.
This was the first time we played a party game on a Friday night. Experience counted as far as scoring was concerned.
Ian 30
Anne 27
Andrew H 15
Nigel 12
Anna 9
Andrew P 5
Ra
Anne had forgotten much of this game. But with plenty of advice from me and Andrew, she thrashed us. The tiles may not have been mixed well. The first epoch went on and on, while the third finished very quickly with a bunch of Sun tiles coming out together.
The uncertainty of tile drawing, the fixed bids and the penalties built into the scoring system and the disaster tiles make Ra one of the tensest auction games.
Anne 68
Ian 41
Andrew P 21
Master's Gallery
Andrew is quite keen on this auctionless version of Modern Art. It turned out to be quite a close game compared with previous ones.
Anne 16 34 73 139
Andrew P 18 39 80 133
Ian 14 31 73 130
Glory to Rome
At the other end of the table Nigel, Andrew H and Anna played Glory to Rome. I was too busy with Ra and Master's Gallery to take notice of what was happening, though I think I heard that Nigel didn't embezzle enough building materials. I suspect Andrew won.
This was the last Friday night games for 2010.
Saturday, 4 December 2010
Friday 3 December (House of Cards)
Frank's Zoo
While we waited for Nigel we started a game of Frank's Zoo. Anna sat on Andrew's left rather than on his right - a fact which the rest of us claimed contributed to her unusually poor score (and to Andrew's). Nigel arrived and joined in the the second hand. Everyone except Anna made 7 or 8 at some point in the game. But Nigel and I were the most consistent.
Masters' Gallery
In my hasty recap of the rules (mostly for Nigel's benefit) I forgot the rule about adding cards from your hand during the scoring phase. Andrew P remembered the missing rule just after the first scoring, but this wasn't much of an issue as there is little benefit in taking advantage of that rule early in the game. On average we scored 6 in the first round, 21 in the second, 22 in the third and 18 in the final round.
Coloretto
Next we played a blast from the past, where Nigel's greedy strategy paid off. While my "strategy" of collecting 6 or 7 colours and at least two in most of them did not.
Hornochsen!
Anne came home so we looked for a six player game. This was Andrew Par's first game and I gave him the briefest of rules explanations, so don't take his score too seriously.
We played again and there was more red on the table this time.
Overall it was a good evening for Nigel with two wins and two seconds. It was entirely accidental that we only played card games.
While we waited for Nigel we started a game of Frank's Zoo. Anna sat on Andrew's left rather than on his right - a fact which the rest of us claimed contributed to her unusually poor score (and to Andrew's). Nigel arrived and joined in the the second hand. Everyone except Anna made 7 or 8 at some point in the game. But Nigel and I were the most consistent.
Andrew H 2 3 4 12 11 14
Anna 1 0 5 3 8 9
Andrew P 0 7 10 14 17 16
Ian 8 12 15 17 22 27
Nigel - 3 7 9 12 20
Masters' Gallery
In my hasty recap of the rules (mostly for Nigel's benefit) I forgot the rule about adding cards from your hand during the scoring phase. Andrew P remembered the missing rule just after the first scoring, but this wasn't much of an issue as there is little benefit in taking advantage of that rule early in the game. On average we scored 6 in the first round, 21 in the second, 22 in the third and 18 in the final round.
Andrew H 5 30 50 63
Anna 7 34 56 66
Andrew P 3 20 42 59
Ian 7 19 53 74
Nigel 9 32 45 75
Coloretto
Next we played a blast from the past, where Nigel's greedy strategy paid off. While my "strategy" of collecting 6 or 7 colours and at least two in most of them did not.
Andrew H 19 42 69 91
Anna 28 46 67 85
Andrew P 23 47 70 93
Ian 23 48 57 81
Nigel 25 54 77 97
Hornochsen!
Anne came home so we looked for a six player game. This was Andrew Par's first game and I gave him the briefest of rules explanations, so don't take his score too seriously.
Andrew H 3
Anna 28
Anne 36
Andrew P -16
Ian 44
Nigel 5
We played again and there was more red on the table this time.
Andrew H 64
Anna -6
Anne 6
Andrew P 0
Ian -8
Nigel 10
Overall it was a good evening for Nigel with two wins and two seconds. It was entirely accidental that we only played card games.
Wednesday, 1 December 2010
Giganten revisited
(Played: 20 November at home)
Gigenten is a game with nice bits and a reputation (in Peter's group) of being too long. I suspect that the cuprit for this reputation is that most times we've played it we have misunderstood one of the rules. I was keen to play it with the correct rules and knowing that this was highly unlikely to happen at Peter's place due to its reputation I borrowed it from Peter.
The game is about drilling for oil in Texas and more importantly selling the oil for a decent profit. Most of the board is the oil field, a grid of mostly dull brown squares, with the occasional green hill or grey mountain. Scattered around the desert are some face down tiles with 1, 2 or 3 drilling rigs on the back. Along one side of the board are some parallel train tracks (one per player and one for the "black train"). At one end of the board there are oil tanks for three oil companies each with their own price chart. The oil prices vary randomly and by player actions.
Drilling for oil is a simple process of driving a cute little truck around the board and turning over tile, paying for a drilling rig and finding out from the number on the hidden side of the tile how much oil you will be getting. Transporting the oil to the tanks is also trivial, whereas selling the oil depends on winning auctions. Each turn only one player will get to sell oil to each oil company. The players bid against each other using oil certificates, the highest bidder gets to sell oil at that companies current oil price and if anyone else has more than a couple of barrels of oil they must sell the excess at the rock bottom price of $1000 per barrel.
There are elements of managing both your money and your oil production (there is no point in paying to drill for oil, possibly paying to transport it if you are then forced to sell it at below cost price).
Each turn there are a number of cards to choose from which determine your actions for the turn (except selling which is determined by the aforementioned auctions). There is one red card plus a number of brown cards equal to the number of players. The rule we have gotten wrong in the past is that the red card determines how far the black train moves regardless of whether someone chooses the red card or not. Previously we have only moved the black train if some chose the red card. Given that the game ends when the black train reaches the end of the track, not moving it on some turns stretches the game beyond its design length.
Perhaps with three players we were playing too conservatively but there was no competition for drill sites, no trouble shipping oil back on ones own train and little competition to sell oil (at least in the first half of the game). This made things seem too easy. Perhaps we were playing too nicely and were not ruthless enough to choose the action to send other peoples trains backwards as often as we should have. Compared with previous plays (which were with four players) the game was too tame with three players.
There are plenty of games around building efficient production mechanisms, but very few around the competition to sell things (Automobile and Planet Steam are the other games that springs to mind on this subject - and Gigenten is short and simpler than either).
Gigenten is a game with nice bits and a reputation (in Peter's group) of being too long. I suspect that the cuprit for this reputation is that most times we've played it we have misunderstood one of the rules. I was keen to play it with the correct rules and knowing that this was highly unlikely to happen at Peter's place due to its reputation I borrowed it from Peter.
The game is about drilling for oil in Texas and more importantly selling the oil for a decent profit. Most of the board is the oil field, a grid of mostly dull brown squares, with the occasional green hill or grey mountain. Scattered around the desert are some face down tiles with 1, 2 or 3 drilling rigs on the back. Along one side of the board are some parallel train tracks (one per player and one for the "black train"). At one end of the board there are oil tanks for three oil companies each with their own price chart. The oil prices vary randomly and by player actions.
Drilling for oil is a simple process of driving a cute little truck around the board and turning over tile, paying for a drilling rig and finding out from the number on the hidden side of the tile how much oil you will be getting. Transporting the oil to the tanks is also trivial, whereas selling the oil depends on winning auctions. Each turn only one player will get to sell oil to each oil company. The players bid against each other using oil certificates, the highest bidder gets to sell oil at that companies current oil price and if anyone else has more than a couple of barrels of oil they must sell the excess at the rock bottom price of $1000 per barrel.
There are elements of managing both your money and your oil production (there is no point in paying to drill for oil, possibly paying to transport it if you are then forced to sell it at below cost price).
Each turn there are a number of cards to choose from which determine your actions for the turn (except selling which is determined by the aforementioned auctions). There is one red card plus a number of brown cards equal to the number of players. The rule we have gotten wrong in the past is that the red card determines how far the black train moves regardless of whether someone chooses the red card or not. Previously we have only moved the black train if some chose the red card. Given that the game ends when the black train reaches the end of the track, not moving it on some turns stretches the game beyond its design length.
Perhaps with three players we were playing too conservatively but there was no competition for drill sites, no trouble shipping oil back on ones own train and little competition to sell oil (at least in the first half of the game). This made things seem too easy. Perhaps we were playing too nicely and were not ruthless enough to choose the action to send other peoples trains backwards as often as we should have. Compared with previous plays (which were with four players) the game was too tame with three players.
There are plenty of games around building efficient production mechanisms, but very few around the competition to sell things (Automobile and Planet Steam are the other games that springs to mind on this subject - and Gigenten is short and simpler than either).
Tuesday, 30 November 2010
First Impressions of Gravediggers, Jaipur, Age of Steam Expansion: Beer & Pretzels and Endeavor (European Powers)
Some thoughts and opinions about some more games I played for the first time in November.
Gravediggers
(Played: 14 & 17 November at home and at Peter's place)
When Anne bought this game I had never heard of it and so I surprised when I looked it up on BGG to see it on my wishlist! It turns out to be a renaming and re-theming of Banküberfall from bank fraud to grave robbing. I had read about the earlier version a few years ago and thought that sounds like fun.
This is a very simple game of memory, bidding, guessing, bluff and greed. Even simpler than High Society. There is a deck of cards, which is mostly money but also characters and multipliers. Everyone starts with a hand of 5 cards and there are 5 graveyards to rob, each starts with a face down card. People add cards to the graveyards during the game and at various points in the game the graveyards are robbed.
Robbing a graveyard consists of everyone secretly bidding an amout of money. The cards are turned up and if any of the cards are people, they take effect in a predetermined order. This sometimes means the grave robbers go home empty handed. But if they are lucky there is some money. Then starting with the players who bid the least, the players are payed out on an all or nothing basis. Be too greedy and you might end up with nothing.
It takes about 2 minutes to learn and about 20 minutes to play. This is fortunate because your action each turn is dictated by turning over the top tile of a small stack of tiles, which removes a lot of decision making. And sometimes when you do have a decision it is not a particularly meaningful one. It pays to regard this as a filler. And maybe replace the Graverdigger card with a pawn or meeple.
Jaipur
(Played: 20 November at home)
Jaipur was my impulse buy, designed by Sébastien Pauchon (who also designed Metropolys, Yspahan and Jamaica). It is a two player card game.
Jaipur, like Yspahan, uses camels as a form of currency. It is a competition between two traders to be the best. The players don't trade directly with each other, but with the same market, which provides most of the tension in the game. Each turn a player either sells cards for points or buys cards. Players "buy" cards in one of three ways. Either they take all the camel cards that are face up in the market and add them to their pile of camel cards (the empty spaces in the market are refilled from the draw deck). Or they take one goods card into their hand from the market and it is replaced from the draw deck. Or they swap 2 or more cards with the market (the cards they take must be goods cards, they cards they put back can be a mixture of goods cards and camel cards). Because both players are buying from the same market any buy action provides opportunities for the opponent. Selling provides tension between speed and quantity. The victory point tokens for sales descend in value so early sales give you more points, but there are also bonus points for selling 3, 4 or 5 goods of a type at once encouraging players to put off selling.
The game is played for the best of three hands (an idea that could be used in Lost Cities as well). Anne won the first game two-nil, winning 78-72 and 65-50. By the time she won the first hand of our second game 78-69, I was considering how much I could make by selling this stupid game on TradeMe. But then I won the next hand 84-74 and it was all on for the final hand.
From a strategy point of view one has to decide which types of goods to concentrate on, whether to go for quick points or to save up and collect sets of 3 or more. These decisions will probably be influenced by what you see your opponents doing. Tactically it is important to watch the hand limit - six is so much more flexible than seven.
Age of Steam: Beer and Pretzels
(Play tested: 21 November at home)
When I read about Ted Alspach's "Beer and Pretzels" variant for Age of Steam I was intrigued. Most game variants change or add rules to games. This one mostly takes rules away. By taking away the share track, income track, expenses and income reduction and by giving money directly for moving goods do you still have a viable game?
Anne and I ran 4 player play-test playing 2 players each, rather than use Ted's official board we used the standard "Rust Belt" Age of Steam board.
On the "Rust Belt" board it becomes too easy to make money and there is not enough money in Age of Steam to pay everyone. Ted's official Beer & Pretzels board includes several mountain ranges and a number of rivers. Many of the cities are quite a long way apart. Overall it looks like a more expensive map to build on than "Rust Belt". Anne also mentioned that perhaps we didn't compete enough with each other in the auctions.
My conclusion is: yes this is a viable (and simpler) game. Though you need a more expensive board to consume excess cash. Playing this on the “Rust Belt” board at $5 per cube per link is too easy. It may be worth considering shortening the game by a turn or two.
Endeavor (European Powers)
(Play tested: 24 November at Peter's)
Jarratt brought along an Endeavor play test board which I have called "European Powers" for want of a better name.
It is a substantial redesign of the board plus some extra rules, but the cards, tokens, buildings and other pieces are the same as the original game.
Europe is represented by five main colonizing powers (Portugal, Spain, France, England and the Netherlands). Each Power has a couple of city spaces. Before the game starts each player places a piece in one of these Power cities that no-one else has chosen. Each Power has special advantages. France has defensive advantages (attacking French tokens in Europe costs an extra piece). The Netherlands gets access to special shipping spots that function more like cities. There are no normal shipping routes for the Americas. Each of the 3 America card decks are open to specific European Powers.
The shipping routes to Africa, India etc cross region boundaries with pieces counting for influence depending on which side of the boundary they are (which makes the building that allows a joint shipping and colonizing action to be more useful). Some places have multiple routes and some routes only become available once other regions have opened up. The Slave deck has been moved to Africa.
The changes add a bit more complexity to Endeavor, and make it seem less abstract and more historic.
I tried to get as many cities as possible. Though Jarratt managed to almost eliminate me from Europe. I enjoyed it more than previous plays of the standard game.
Gravediggers
(Played: 14 & 17 November at home and at Peter's place)
When Anne bought this game I had never heard of it and so I surprised when I looked it up on BGG to see it on my wishlist! It turns out to be a renaming and re-theming of Banküberfall from bank fraud to grave robbing. I had read about the earlier version a few years ago and thought that sounds like fun.
This is a very simple game of memory, bidding, guessing, bluff and greed. Even simpler than High Society. There is a deck of cards, which is mostly money but also characters and multipliers. Everyone starts with a hand of 5 cards and there are 5 graveyards to rob, each starts with a face down card. People add cards to the graveyards during the game and at various points in the game the graveyards are robbed.
Robbing a graveyard consists of everyone secretly bidding an amout of money. The cards are turned up and if any of the cards are people, they take effect in a predetermined order. This sometimes means the grave robbers go home empty handed. But if they are lucky there is some money. Then starting with the players who bid the least, the players are payed out on an all or nothing basis. Be too greedy and you might end up with nothing.
It takes about 2 minutes to learn and about 20 minutes to play. This is fortunate because your action each turn is dictated by turning over the top tile of a small stack of tiles, which removes a lot of decision making. And sometimes when you do have a decision it is not a particularly meaningful one. It pays to regard this as a filler. And maybe replace the Graverdigger card with a pawn or meeple.
Jaipur
(Played: 20 November at home)
Jaipur was my impulse buy, designed by Sébastien Pauchon (who also designed Metropolys, Yspahan and Jamaica). It is a two player card game.
Jaipur, like Yspahan, uses camels as a form of currency. It is a competition between two traders to be the best. The players don't trade directly with each other, but with the same market, which provides most of the tension in the game. Each turn a player either sells cards for points or buys cards. Players "buy" cards in one of three ways. Either they take all the camel cards that are face up in the market and add them to their pile of camel cards (the empty spaces in the market are refilled from the draw deck). Or they take one goods card into their hand from the market and it is replaced from the draw deck. Or they swap 2 or more cards with the market (the cards they take must be goods cards, they cards they put back can be a mixture of goods cards and camel cards). Because both players are buying from the same market any buy action provides opportunities for the opponent. Selling provides tension between speed and quantity. The victory point tokens for sales descend in value so early sales give you more points, but there are also bonus points for selling 3, 4 or 5 goods of a type at once encouraging players to put off selling.
The game is played for the best of three hands (an idea that could be used in Lost Cities as well). Anne won the first game two-nil, winning 78-72 and 65-50. By the time she won the first hand of our second game 78-69, I was considering how much I could make by selling this stupid game on TradeMe. But then I won the next hand 84-74 and it was all on for the final hand.
From a strategy point of view one has to decide which types of goods to concentrate on, whether to go for quick points or to save up and collect sets of 3 or more. These decisions will probably be influenced by what you see your opponents doing. Tactically it is important to watch the hand limit - six is so much more flexible than seven.
Age of Steam: Beer and Pretzels
(Play tested: 21 November at home)
When I read about Ted Alspach's "Beer and Pretzels" variant for Age of Steam I was intrigued. Most game variants change or add rules to games. This one mostly takes rules away. By taking away the share track, income track, expenses and income reduction and by giving money directly for moving goods do you still have a viable game?
Anne and I ran 4 player play-test playing 2 players each, rather than use Ted's official board we used the standard "Rust Belt" Age of Steam board.
On the "Rust Belt" board it becomes too easy to make money and there is not enough money in Age of Steam to pay everyone. Ted's official Beer & Pretzels board includes several mountain ranges and a number of rivers. Many of the cities are quite a long way apart. Overall it looks like a more expensive map to build on than "Rust Belt". Anne also mentioned that perhaps we didn't compete enough with each other in the auctions.
My conclusion is: yes this is a viable (and simpler) game. Though you need a more expensive board to consume excess cash. Playing this on the “Rust Belt” board at $5 per cube per link is too easy. It may be worth considering shortening the game by a turn or two.
Endeavor (European Powers)
(Play tested: 24 November at Peter's)
Jarratt brought along an Endeavor play test board which I have called "European Powers" for want of a better name.
It is a substantial redesign of the board plus some extra rules, but the cards, tokens, buildings and other pieces are the same as the original game.
Europe is represented by five main colonizing powers (Portugal, Spain, France, England and the Netherlands). Each Power has a couple of city spaces. Before the game starts each player places a piece in one of these Power cities that no-one else has chosen. Each Power has special advantages. France has defensive advantages (attacking French tokens in Europe costs an extra piece). The Netherlands gets access to special shipping spots that function more like cities. There are no normal shipping routes for the Americas. Each of the 3 America card decks are open to specific European Powers.
The shipping routes to Africa, India etc cross region boundaries with pieces counting for influence depending on which side of the boundary they are (which makes the building that allows a joint shipping and colonizing action to be more useful). Some places have multiple routes and some routes only become available once other regions have opened up. The Slave deck has been moved to Africa.
The changes add a bit more complexity to Endeavor, and make it seem less abstract and more historic.
I tried to get as many cities as possible. Though Jarratt managed to almost eliminate me from Europe. I enjoyed it more than previous plays of the standard game.
Monday, 22 November 2010
First Impressions of Wizard's Quest, Glory to Rome and The Speicherstadt (November 2010)
This is something slightly different to my normal session reports. It is more of summary of thoughts and opinions about some of the games I've played for the first time in November.
Wizard's Quest
(Played: Wednesday 3 November at Peter's place)
Wizard's Quest is a 1979 Avalon Hill game that has been sitting on Peter's shelf for years. He has mentioned it once or twice as a simple dice-battler, but hasn't made any serious effort to get it played. Lately I have been thinking about "dice-battlers" and I found a re-write of the Avalon Hill rules into plain English. So I got it on the table and got Peter and Nigel to play it with me.
Wizard's Quest turns out to be a step sideways from the usual Risk inspired conquer-the-world dice battler games. Firstly each player is aiming to be the first to recover their three treasures which the opposing players have put in awkward places on the board. Secondly there are orcs and a dragon which are hostile to everyone (and orcs seem to breed faster than humans!). Thirdly even though armies vary in size and battles can last several rounds of dice throwing, in each round each player only throws one die. Each time they throw the die they calculate what "die-range" to use. If you throw a number in the range (1..N) you kill that many enemy units. Throw a number that is too big and you kill no-one - unless both players throw too high and then they both loose one unit (this final part was a rule we overlooked). Basically N is the number of soldiers or orcs in the army if there less than 4 otherwise N is 4 (though there are modifiers for terrain etc). What may not be immediately obvious is that an army of 2 is about three times as powerful as an army of 1, and an army of 3 is about six times as powerful as an army of 1.
Each round of the game starts with the non-player forces (the orcs, the dragon and the wizard). These act randomly. This is assisted by having the board divided into 6 numbered regions and each region divided into 6 numbered spaces. So two die rolls will identify any space on the board (well not quite as there are 8 castles in addition to the 36 numbered spaces). Orcs fill up empty spaces and castles and breed and then go on the rampage once they reach their maximum army size of 4. The dragon flies around the board eating orcs and humans though once he has eaten humans he stops. The wizard causes peace (which is a mixed blessing) in the region he visits and has a deck of card which are mostly helpful.
The orcs tended to frenzy in my direction, while Peter and Nigel got their first two treasures quite easily (Peter carved his way through my main force to get to one of them). Somehow I managed to get to my second treasure before Nigel got to his third to win the game in about 90 minutes if I remember right. As I eluded to earlier we overlooked one rule.
There are huge amounts of luck due to the non-player forces and the cards. The orcs and dragon can set you back so much that it can take 2 or 3 turns to recover. Hence the game could drag on for a long time if everyone suffered this fate. The quantity of luck can reduce the feeling of skill and reduce the opportunity for long term strategic planning. On the plus side despite the long sequence of actions in a round, the game flows quite smoothly and each battle is quick and simple.
Overall I'd class this as a refreshing, though more random and slightly silly alternative to Nexus Ops as a quick "dice-battler" when you don't have hours to spare on one of the longer games of this type.
Glory to Rome
(Played: Friday 5 November at home)
Anna and Andrew brought back a new card game from Brisbane, which Anna tried to entice me to play by telling me that I "might not like it"! After a couple of weeks of this I called her bluff and we played it with Nigel one Friday night (while Sharon, Anne and John B played On the Underground at the other end of the table).
The theme of the game is that the players are dodgy property developers rebuilding Rome after the fire in 64AD. Points are gained by completing buildings and by hording building materials.
Like Race for the Galaxy and Puerto Rico where someone chooses an action and everyone gets to do it, the current start player decides the action that everyone will do. Unlike Race and Puerto Rico this is not done by choosing from a special set of cards or tiles but by playing a card from one's hand. The cards are multi purposed (they are building materials, buildings made of those materials and specific actions). The other players can either play a card with same action (colour) or pick up. Those that play can also do the action. This can be mitigated by getting clientele cards in your display. These can get you actions when they match the card the start player played regardless of whether you played a card or picked up. Completed buildings also give you extra powers.
Why play Glory to Rome when you can play Race for the Galaxy? Because it is more interactive than Race for the Galaxy, which has a multi-player solitaire feel to it. Not only can the start player (or "Leader" in Glory to Rome terminology) can choose actions that are more beneficial to themselves than their opponents. Some action affect other people directly and some actions affect the pool of cards to draw from. So if you like that style of game where you choose action for yourself and other players but you want more interaction than you get with Race for the Galaxy then try Glory to Rome.
The Speicherstadt
(Played: Wednesday 10 November at Peter's place)
In The Speicherstadt by Stefan Feld, you are an importer in the Speicherstadt (warehouse district) in Hamburg, buying ship-lots of goods to try and fulfill specific contracts for victory points. You can also sell, trade, save goods and also firemen to protect your warehouses. Most of this is done by acquiring cards. Each round a number of cards are available and the players bid for the cards. Nothing unusual as Euro games go.
But the point of difference with The Speicherstadt (apart from its name) is the bidding mechanism. This is an interesting (and often frustrating) hybrid of "worker placement" and auction. Each player has 3 meeples and over 3 rounds place these above the cards they wish to bid on. The first meeple placed above a card gives its owner first "dibs" on the card, the second and subsequent meeples give their owners second and third "dibs" etc. After all the meeples are placed then the cards are evaluated left to right. The player owning the first meeple above a card decides whether to buy the card at a price equal to the total number of meeples above it or remove his/her meeple (hence dropping the price) and letting the owner of the next meeple decide whether to buy or not.
People use the cards they buy to fullfill contracts etc. If someone ends up not buying a card they get a consolation coin. There isn't much money in the game. Knowledge of the distribution of cards is very important. There are only limited numbers of each type of card and the deck is built up of 4 sub-decks (called seasons) each with their own characteristic (e.g. ships are rare at the beginning of the game and common at the end)
There are elements here of "worker placement" as players claim dibs on cards, bidding the price up as players stack their meeples above a popular card and dutch auction as players remove their meeples dropping the price for remaining players. This bidding mechanic is both clever and frustrating. Being first player gives you full choice of "first dibs" spots but little control over prices. Being last give you the opposite situation.
This game seems to be a straight forward and slightly boring do stuff to get points game driven by a very clever bidding mechanic. I would like to see this bidding mechanism used in an otherwise more interesting game. If you like trading games there are the nastier games like Before The Wind and Die Händler, or more negotiation oriented games like Settlers of Catan and Bohnanza.
Wizard's Quest
(Played: Wednesday 3 November at Peter's place)
Wizard's Quest is a 1979 Avalon Hill game that has been sitting on Peter's shelf for years. He has mentioned it once or twice as a simple dice-battler, but hasn't made any serious effort to get it played. Lately I have been thinking about "dice-battlers" and I found a re-write of the Avalon Hill rules into plain English. So I got it on the table and got Peter and Nigel to play it with me.
Wizard's Quest turns out to be a step sideways from the usual Risk inspired conquer-the-world dice battler games. Firstly each player is aiming to be the first to recover their three treasures which the opposing players have put in awkward places on the board. Secondly there are orcs and a dragon which are hostile to everyone (and orcs seem to breed faster than humans!). Thirdly even though armies vary in size and battles can last several rounds of dice throwing, in each round each player only throws one die. Each time they throw the die they calculate what "die-range" to use. If you throw a number in the range (1..N) you kill that many enemy units. Throw a number that is too big and you kill no-one - unless both players throw too high and then they both loose one unit (this final part was a rule we overlooked). Basically N is the number of soldiers or orcs in the army if there less than 4 otherwise N is 4 (though there are modifiers for terrain etc). What may not be immediately obvious is that an army of 2 is about three times as powerful as an army of 1, and an army of 3 is about six times as powerful as an army of 1.
Each round of the game starts with the non-player forces (the orcs, the dragon and the wizard). These act randomly. This is assisted by having the board divided into 6 numbered regions and each region divided into 6 numbered spaces. So two die rolls will identify any space on the board (well not quite as there are 8 castles in addition to the 36 numbered spaces). Orcs fill up empty spaces and castles and breed and then go on the rampage once they reach their maximum army size of 4. The dragon flies around the board eating orcs and humans though once he has eaten humans he stops. The wizard causes peace (which is a mixed blessing) in the region he visits and has a deck of card which are mostly helpful.
The orcs tended to frenzy in my direction, while Peter and Nigel got their first two treasures quite easily (Peter carved his way through my main force to get to one of them). Somehow I managed to get to my second treasure before Nigel got to his third to win the game in about 90 minutes if I remember right. As I eluded to earlier we overlooked one rule.
There are huge amounts of luck due to the non-player forces and the cards. The orcs and dragon can set you back so much that it can take 2 or 3 turns to recover. Hence the game could drag on for a long time if everyone suffered this fate. The quantity of luck can reduce the feeling of skill and reduce the opportunity for long term strategic planning. On the plus side despite the long sequence of actions in a round, the game flows quite smoothly and each battle is quick and simple.
Overall I'd class this as a refreshing, though more random and slightly silly alternative to Nexus Ops as a quick "dice-battler" when you don't have hours to spare on one of the longer games of this type.
Glory to Rome
(Played: Friday 5 November at home)
Anna and Andrew brought back a new card game from Brisbane, which Anna tried to entice me to play by telling me that I "might not like it"! After a couple of weeks of this I called her bluff and we played it with Nigel one Friday night (while Sharon, Anne and John B played On the Underground at the other end of the table).
The theme of the game is that the players are dodgy property developers rebuilding Rome after the fire in 64AD. Points are gained by completing buildings and by hording building materials.
Like Race for the Galaxy and Puerto Rico where someone chooses an action and everyone gets to do it, the current start player decides the action that everyone will do. Unlike Race and Puerto Rico this is not done by choosing from a special set of cards or tiles but by playing a card from one's hand. The cards are multi purposed (they are building materials, buildings made of those materials and specific actions). The other players can either play a card with same action (colour) or pick up. Those that play can also do the action. This can be mitigated by getting clientele cards in your display. These can get you actions when they match the card the start player played regardless of whether you played a card or picked up. Completed buildings also give you extra powers.
Why play Glory to Rome when you can play Race for the Galaxy? Because it is more interactive than Race for the Galaxy, which has a multi-player solitaire feel to it. Not only can the start player (or "Leader" in Glory to Rome terminology) can choose actions that are more beneficial to themselves than their opponents. Some action affect other people directly and some actions affect the pool of cards to draw from. So if you like that style of game where you choose action for yourself and other players but you want more interaction than you get with Race for the Galaxy then try Glory to Rome.
The Speicherstadt
(Played: Wednesday 10 November at Peter's place)
In The Speicherstadt by Stefan Feld, you are an importer in the Speicherstadt (warehouse district) in Hamburg, buying ship-lots of goods to try and fulfill specific contracts for victory points. You can also sell, trade, save goods and also firemen to protect your warehouses. Most of this is done by acquiring cards. Each round a number of cards are available and the players bid for the cards. Nothing unusual as Euro games go.
But the point of difference with The Speicherstadt (apart from its name) is the bidding mechanism. This is an interesting (and often frustrating) hybrid of "worker placement" and auction. Each player has 3 meeples and over 3 rounds place these above the cards they wish to bid on. The first meeple placed above a card gives its owner first "dibs" on the card, the second and subsequent meeples give their owners second and third "dibs" etc. After all the meeples are placed then the cards are evaluated left to right. The player owning the first meeple above a card decides whether to buy the card at a price equal to the total number of meeples above it or remove his/her meeple (hence dropping the price) and letting the owner of the next meeple decide whether to buy or not.
People use the cards they buy to fullfill contracts etc. If someone ends up not buying a card they get a consolation coin. There isn't much money in the game. Knowledge of the distribution of cards is very important. There are only limited numbers of each type of card and the deck is built up of 4 sub-decks (called seasons) each with their own characteristic (e.g. ships are rare at the beginning of the game and common at the end)
There are elements here of "worker placement" as players claim dibs on cards, bidding the price up as players stack their meeples above a popular card and dutch auction as players remove their meeples dropping the price for remaining players. This bidding mechanic is both clever and frustrating. Being first player gives you full choice of "first dibs" spots but little control over prices. Being last give you the opposite situation.
This game seems to be a straight forward and slightly boring do stuff to get points game driven by a very clever bidding mechanic. I would like to see this bidding mechanism used in an otherwise more interesting game. If you like trading games there are the nastier games like Before The Wind and Die Händler, or more negotiation oriented games like Settlers of Catan and Bohnanza.
Sunday, 24 October 2010
Labour Weekend Gaming
Friday Night - Around the World
Anne challenged me to a game of Expedition which I won 25-16. She then demanded a rematch which was a closer event. This time I finished all my cards scoring 22, but I had started the game so Anne got the final turn, finishing her last card and an extra card to beat me 23-22. In our final game I got my lowest score of the evening -- winning 19-15.
Saturday - Indian Summer
Jarratt and Lance organised a game of 1853 at Lance's house. It was the first time for all of us, so none of us were familiar with the map, companies and the opening bidding procedure. 1853 is an older design than 1830 and owes its design more to railway pioneering 1829 than the Robber Baron 1830. The stock market works in a simple way and is not susceptible to manipulation. In other 18XX games there are private companies which need to be bought before the players can buy shares in the main companies. These private companies are usually on sold to the majors mid-game for a profit. This serves a dual purpose, reducing the players' initial capital by varying amounts and providing a reward for company directors. In 1853 there are no private companies, instead the players' initial capital is reduced by a simultaneous bid which determines the initial seating order and first player. The bid amount is held in escrow until the towns you nominate in second part of the process are linked up. The amount you bid limits which towns you undertake to link up. These towns limit which shares you can initially buy. As in the other 18XX games, the amount you have left over determines which of the major companies you can capitalize in the first turn. Once the towns you nominated are linked to each other by railway then you get your escrowed money back.
At beginning at least three of us had the same idea about with towns to nominate and which initial shares to buy. We also all bid pretty low (Anne bid £85, I bid £82 and Lance and Jarratt bid £80). None us took into account that bidding less than £90 means you can't nominate a £50 city. Anne took a share of the North Western Railway and it was clear that she had the same idea that Jarratt and I had, so we had to rethink our ideas. I took Bombay, Baroda and Central India (BBCI) share and Jarratt took an East Coast Railway (ECR) share. Lance hadn't formulated a plan when bidding and after a bit of thinking bought a Bengal Nagpur Railway share.
Another point of difference with 1853 is that there are two types of track (and engines): broad gauge and narrow gauge. This adds an extra level of decision making. Jarratt built his ECR as a narrow gauge railway, which is cheaper to build but the trains have a shorter "reach". Anne's initial planning and highest bid paid off as she got an early lead in making income. I found myself stymied initially by the tile options. There are no yellow city tiles with a straight piece of track (cities are all on curves) and later on by the territorial limitations. Each company has a territory and it can't upgrade track outside its area, hence I couldn't link up to the BNR network and join Delhi to Calcutta.
Like the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad which failed to build to Santa Fe, the Bombay, Baroda and Central India Railway never built to Bombay, preferring to stay near Delhi. There was a bit of selling off of stock (especially in Anne's NWR) as players started second rail companies (but unlike 1830 and 1856 selling stock doesn't necessarily lead to a share price drop). Near the end of the game I switched three shares to a better performing stock but otherwise people kept the shares they bought.
Lance's shareholdings in the best performing companies and Jarratt's southern narrow gauge loop propelled them past Anne. In the end we called the game early and faked two operating rounds to give the final result.
1853 is a game which had a large number of suggested rule changes over the years to fix its original faults. Lance owns the latest version which has quite a number of changes to the original rules, map etc.
Saturday night - Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes
After a quick stop in J'ville to pick up some KFC and in Thorndon to drop of Anne, I was off to Nigel's place to play Mare Nostrum.
I was keen to try Greece, so while John was getting his fish and chips, Travis chose Rome, Andrew took Babylon and Nigel grabbed Egypt, leaving John with Carthage. I made more mistakes than last week. Initially by letting Rome convert one of my provinces. Later when I was military leader I intended to move last so I could leave my North African safely empty while I raided some Carthaginian caravans. But I forgot to give Egypt his turn and he took back the province.
Egypt got the first hero, then Rome and Carthage got a couple of heroes/wonders each threatening to win, prompting Babylon and Greece into a military strategy which merely prolonged the game. Greece in particular was too busy attacking to build up its own resources. Babylon played a more balanced strategy of attacking sometimes and developing other times.
Egypt finally got a third and fourth hero/wonder to win.
We made one mistake with the rules. When someone conquers a province they can only sack one caravan, city, temple or market.
I would be interested to see how the game would play with the "Advanced Setup" where players get to choose what they start with. They get 36 "build points" to spend on initial stuff. Three points for each: influence marker, city, caravan or military unit and 6 points for each temple or market. Buying a country's own hero is optional and costs 9 points. It is unclear from the rules whether players choose their setup in some turn order or if it is simultaneous.
Reading the expansion rules and the various variants it seems that Mare Nostrum is a flexible game that handles modifications well. Most of the modifications involve strengthening Greece. For instance the expansion gives Greece a temple, a trireme and an extra caravan (but also gives other countries extra stuff). A few strengthen Carthage and weaken Rome (my suggestion for that is to swap their heroes). The expansion gives reduces Julius Caesar to cheap legions only. Some people play without Helen.
Anne challenged me to a game of Expedition which I won 25-16. She then demanded a rematch which was a closer event. This time I finished all my cards scoring 22, but I had started the game so Anne got the final turn, finishing her last card and an extra card to beat me 23-22. In our final game I got my lowest score of the evening -- winning 19-15.
Saturday - Indian Summer
Jarratt and Lance organised a game of 1853 at Lance's house. It was the first time for all of us, so none of us were familiar with the map, companies and the opening bidding procedure. 1853 is an older design than 1830 and owes its design more to railway pioneering 1829 than the Robber Baron 1830. The stock market works in a simple way and is not susceptible to manipulation. In other 18XX games there are private companies which need to be bought before the players can buy shares in the main companies. These private companies are usually on sold to the majors mid-game for a profit. This serves a dual purpose, reducing the players' initial capital by varying amounts and providing a reward for company directors. In 1853 there are no private companies, instead the players' initial capital is reduced by a simultaneous bid which determines the initial seating order and first player. The bid amount is held in escrow until the towns you nominate in second part of the process are linked up. The amount you bid limits which towns you undertake to link up. These towns limit which shares you can initially buy. As in the other 18XX games, the amount you have left over determines which of the major companies you can capitalize in the first turn. Once the towns you nominated are linked to each other by railway then you get your escrowed money back.
At beginning at least three of us had the same idea about with towns to nominate and which initial shares to buy. We also all bid pretty low (Anne bid £85, I bid £82 and Lance and Jarratt bid £80). None us took into account that bidding less than £90 means you can't nominate a £50 city. Anne took a share of the North Western Railway and it was clear that she had the same idea that Jarratt and I had, so we had to rethink our ideas. I took Bombay, Baroda and Central India (BBCI) share and Jarratt took an East Coast Railway (ECR) share. Lance hadn't formulated a plan when bidding and after a bit of thinking bought a Bengal Nagpur Railway share.
Another point of difference with 1853 is that there are two types of track (and engines): broad gauge and narrow gauge. This adds an extra level of decision making. Jarratt built his ECR as a narrow gauge railway, which is cheaper to build but the trains have a shorter "reach". Anne's initial planning and highest bid paid off as she got an early lead in making income. I found myself stymied initially by the tile options. There are no yellow city tiles with a straight piece of track (cities are all on curves) and later on by the territorial limitations. Each company has a territory and it can't upgrade track outside its area, hence I couldn't link up to the BNR network and join Delhi to Calcutta.
Like the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad which failed to build to Santa Fe, the Bombay, Baroda and Central India Railway never built to Bombay, preferring to stay near Delhi. There was a bit of selling off of stock (especially in Anne's NWR) as players started second rail companies (but unlike 1830 and 1856 selling stock doesn't necessarily lead to a share price drop). Near the end of the game I switched three shares to a better performing stock but otherwise people kept the shares they bought.
Lance's shareholdings in the best performing companies and Jarratt's southern narrow gauge loop propelled them past Anne. In the end we called the game early and faked two operating rounds to give the final result.
Lance £8424
Jarratt £7744
Anne £7004
Ian £6785
1853 is a game which had a large number of suggested rule changes over the years to fix its original faults. Lance owns the latest version which has quite a number of changes to the original rules, map etc.
Saturday night - Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes
After a quick stop in J'ville to pick up some KFC and in Thorndon to drop of Anne, I was off to Nigel's place to play Mare Nostrum.
I was keen to try Greece, so while John was getting his fish and chips, Travis chose Rome, Andrew took Babylon and Nigel grabbed Egypt, leaving John with Carthage. I made more mistakes than last week. Initially by letting Rome convert one of my provinces. Later when I was military leader I intended to move last so I could leave my North African safely empty while I raided some Carthaginian caravans. But I forgot to give Egypt his turn and he took back the province.
Egypt got the first hero, then Rome and Carthage got a couple of heroes/wonders each threatening to win, prompting Babylon and Greece into a military strategy which merely prolonged the game. Greece in particular was too busy attacking to build up its own resources. Babylon played a more balanced strategy of attacking sometimes and developing other times.
Egypt finally got a third and fourth hero/wonder to win.
We made one mistake with the rules. When someone conquers a province they can only sack one caravan, city, temple or market.
I would be interested to see how the game would play with the "Advanced Setup" where players get to choose what they start with. They get 36 "build points" to spend on initial stuff. Three points for each: influence marker, city, caravan or military unit and 6 points for each temple or market. Buying a country's own hero is optional and costs 9 points. It is unclear from the rules whether players choose their setup in some turn order or if it is simultaneous.
Reading the expansion rules and the various variants it seems that Mare Nostrum is a flexible game that handles modifications well. Most of the modifications involve strengthening Greece. For instance the expansion gives Greece a temple, a trireme and an extra caravan (but also gives other countries extra stuff). A few strengthen Carthage and weaken Rome (my suggestion for that is to swap their heroes). The expansion gives reduces Julius Caesar to cheap legions only. Some people play without Helen.
Saturday, 9 October 2010
Friday 8 October
Drakon
While we waited to see if anyone else would show up John pulled out Drakon as a filler. This is a game we went mad on in March 2008 (11 plays in one month). There were two good areas but Anne made the best of it and I ended up trapped in an empty maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
On the Underground
We were all pretty close for most of the game with Anne jumping ahead a couple of times (including with her 6 point loop). Then I pulled ahead when I managed to get my grey line to join two pairs of symbols and then started to score a bunch of red end points.
Patrician
We play this simple game so infrequently that I had to teach it again. This is a short Michael Schacht board game about building the majority of floors in towers. You start with a pile of stackable tower pieces and a hand of three cards. Each turn you play a card, place a tower piece (or two) and pick up a card. The card indicates which city you are to build in, whether you are building one tower piece or two, a special action or a portrait. Each city has two building spaces and two victory point tokens and a face up card which will be the one you refill your hand with. Once a the number of tower pieces in a city equals the number on the larger victory point token that city scores and the tokens are given to the players with the majority control of each tower. The game ends when the last city is scored (which is also when the cards run out). There are also 6 VP for each set of 3 matching portraits on the cards you've played.
Thinking about the game afterwards I was struck by some similarities and contrasts with China (or Web of Power / Kardinal und König). Both games are primarily about scoring majorities. Patrician is a bit shorter. In both games you have a hand of three cards. Each turn you play a card (or cards), put one or two pieces on the board in a place indicated by the card(s) and then pickup card(s). When an area is filled it is scored. There is also end game scoring in both games. In China everyone in a region scores. In Patrician only the person with the majority control of a tower scores - which probably leads to bigger swings in the scores. In China there are two types of pieces (houses and emissaries) and three types of scoring and all the cards of a particular colour are the same which means the cards are means to an end. Whereas in Patrician the cards tell you how many pieces you play, may give you a special action or a portrait to score with, so the cards are more important. Also each card you play in Patrician determines which card you pick up, so you are often thinking through a chain of possible moves. In China the first player to play in a region can only play one house, which often discourages players from starting new regions. Whereas in Patrician ties are broken by player nearest the top of the tower so player often want to hold back so that they can play the final pieces in a city.
Hornochsen!
With three players only 45 out of 98 cards are in play which makes for big surprises. Unusually this is a game where more players makes the game less random. The first game was low scoring.
In game two there were plenty of nice piles and a few stinkers. I ended up with fewer cards than the others which is usually bad news as it gives you fewer choices, but it wasn't as bad as it could have been.
While we waited to see if anyone else would show up John pulled out Drakon as a filler. This is a game we went mad on in March 2008 (11 plays in one month). There were two good areas but Anne made the best of it and I ended up trapped in an empty maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
Anne 10
John B 6
Ian 2
On the Underground
We were all pretty close for most of the game with Anne jumping ahead a couple of times (including with her 6 point loop). Then I pulled ahead when I managed to get my grey line to join two pairs of symbols and then started to score a bunch of red end points.
Ian 59
John B 49
Anne 47
Patrician
We play this simple game so infrequently that I had to teach it again. This is a short Michael Schacht board game about building the majority of floors in towers. You start with a pile of stackable tower pieces and a hand of three cards. Each turn you play a card, place a tower piece (or two) and pick up a card. The card indicates which city you are to build in, whether you are building one tower piece or two, a special action or a portrait. Each city has two building spaces and two victory point tokens and a face up card which will be the one you refill your hand with. Once a the number of tower pieces in a city equals the number on the larger victory point token that city scores and the tokens are given to the players with the majority control of each tower. The game ends when the last city is scored (which is also when the cards run out). There are also 6 VP for each set of 3 matching portraits on the cards you've played.
Ian 62
John B 48
Anne 31
Thinking about the game afterwards I was struck by some similarities and contrasts with China (or Web of Power / Kardinal und König). Both games are primarily about scoring majorities. Patrician is a bit shorter. In both games you have a hand of three cards. Each turn you play a card (or cards), put one or two pieces on the board in a place indicated by the card(s) and then pickup card(s). When an area is filled it is scored. There is also end game scoring in both games. In China everyone in a region scores. In Patrician only the person with the majority control of a tower scores - which probably leads to bigger swings in the scores. In China there are two types of pieces (houses and emissaries) and three types of scoring and all the cards of a particular colour are the same which means the cards are means to an end. Whereas in Patrician the cards tell you how many pieces you play, may give you a special action or a portrait to score with, so the cards are more important. Also each card you play in Patrician determines which card you pick up, so you are often thinking through a chain of possible moves. In China the first player to play in a region can only play one house, which often discourages players from starting new regions. Whereas in Patrician ties are broken by player nearest the top of the tower so player often want to hold back so that they can play the final pieces in a city.
Hornochsen!
With three players only 45 out of 98 cards are in play which makes for big surprises. Unusually this is a game where more players makes the game less random. The first game was low scoring.
Ian 6
Anne 2
John -8
In game two there were plenty of nice piles and a few stinkers. I ended up with fewer cards than the others which is usually bad news as it gives you fewer choices, but it wasn't as bad as it could have been.
John 26
Anne 14
Ian 10
Saturday, 25 September 2010
Friday 24 September 2010
TransAmerica
The way to make people show up is to start a game. With this aim in mind I put TransAmerica on the table, and before I could start explaining the rules John and Nigel arrived. TransAmerica is a quick, light game with a good dose of luck, but also a game of judgement where you want to cooperate with others in ways that benefit you slightly more than them.
The game ended when I made a very bad choice of start position assuming wrongly that other people would be as interested in the north east as I was and ignoring the cardinal rule of starting near the centre of the board. The newbies came first and second.
Power Grid
After TransAmerica we were looking for a 6 player game that would take no more than two and half hours. For some reason we not only thought that 6-player Power Grid would be quicker than Age of Steam, but we also thought it would take two and half hours! (Our last game of Power Grid took 3 hours with 5 players)
We played the German board, but we forgot to use only 5 regions, so there was plenty of room especially for Margo and myself. She had the cheap north while I had the more expensive south. Jim, Nigel and John shared the centre with Nigel in the cheapest area (which acted like a magnet for the others).
I got a lucky break and got the #35 power station (1 oil powers 5 cities) as my second station, which allowed me to ignore the power station market for the next few turns. Nigel kept the pressure on the price of coal by stock piling it every turn. Jim started off green but didn't keep up his green credentials. Anne started in the east and John did the big leap over Nigel to get to the North.
In the final turn we were all trying to calculate if we could get to 16 cities and power them, but only Margo had the necessary funds.
The way to make people show up is to start a game. With this aim in mind I put TransAmerica on the table, and before I could start explaining the rules John and Nigel arrived. TransAmerica is a quick, light game with a good dose of luck, but also a game of judgement where you want to cooperate with others in ways that benefit you slightly more than them.
The game ended when I made a very bad choice of start position assuming wrongly that other people would be as interested in the north east as I was and ignoring the cardinal rule of starting near the centre of the board. The newbies came first and second.
Jim 10
Margo 9
Nigel 7
Anne 4
John B 4
Ian 0
Power Grid
After TransAmerica we were looking for a 6 player game that would take no more than two and half hours. For some reason we not only thought that 6-player Power Grid would be quicker than Age of Steam, but we also thought it would take two and half hours! (Our last game of Power Grid took 3 hours with 5 players)
We played the German board, but we forgot to use only 5 regions, so there was plenty of room especially for Margo and myself. She had the cheap north while I had the more expensive south. Jim, Nigel and John shared the centre with Nigel in the cheapest area (which acted like a magnet for the others).
I got a lucky break and got the #35 power station (1 oil powers 5 cities) as my second station, which allowed me to ignore the power station market for the next few turns. Nigel kept the pressure on the price of coal by stock piling it every turn. Jim started off green but didn't keep up his green credentials. Anne started in the east and John did the big leap over Nigel to get to the North.
In the final turn we were all trying to calculate if we could get to 16 cities and power them, but only Margo had the necessary funds.
Margo 16
John 15 + $158
Nigel 15 + $145
Ian 15 + $145
Jim 14 + $167
Anne 14 + $151
Sunday, 19 September 2010
Friday 17 September 2010
Carl showed up first, followed by Anna and Andrew. We had decided to play Frank's Zoo when Jarratt rang the door bell, so we dealt him in while he came upstairs. We gave him the fastest rules explanation we could and got underway. But we only managed one round before John and Nigel showed up.
Frank's Zoo
Nigel joined Anna, Anne and Jarratt to restart Frank's Zoo. Jarratt wanted to stop playing after the first round, and perhaps he should have. Nasia joined in at the third hand and challenged Jarratt for third place. No surprises about who won.
Clans
I've been keen to play this game again since I noticed the similarity between this and Metropolys. Both being essentially abstract games with secret missions. It's been a couple of years since I last played this, and longer since Carl, John or I last played it regularly. It was Andrew's first time. Unfortunately for Andrew and I, in the last third of the game we got into the rhythm of he and I being forced to set up situations where John and Carl could make villages (which they did). This was partially due to the seating order, which was: John, me, Carl, Andrew.
The early part of both games is the least important and the initial moves are not obvious. The mid-game starts as board position becomes interesting, and the end game is where choices become more limited and more critical. The obvious difference between the two is that in Metropolys the end game is about keeping the initiative whereas in Clans it is about giving away as few opportunities to your opponents (in particular the player following you) as possible.
Andrew Rae arrived in time for the next set of game choosing. We had ten people and lots of indecision. We probably should have split into two five player groups as there are plenty of good five player games available. But we didn't.
Tichu
Carl hasn't played for awhile and was initially worried that we weren't strong enough for Anna and Andrew and the first two hands suggested he was right. But then Carl and Anna went head to head for the first of three times. The seventh hand turned up an interesting situation I called Tichu but Carl also had a good hand and ended up in a position to go out before me, controversially he choose to go out, leaving me to finish second for 200 minus 100 points. If he had not gone out, his final card would have been something like a 3 ruling out a 1-2. A Tichu would have given us more points but also have given Anna and Andrew points.
Grand Tichu calls are rare in our games, but on turn 9 Andrew called Grand Tichu and made it! But while Anna and Andrew were making a come back it was too late.
Nuns on the Run
Engrossed in Tichu I didn't pay much attention to what was happening at the other end of the room.
Nasia taught this deduction game that she had brought with her. It is like Scotland Yard in reverse, instead of one player being hunted by everyone else, one player hunts everyone else. She said it went OK, but none of the novices managed to get their secret wish and return to their cells. So Abbess Nasia won.
Pompeii
Rumors from Pompeii talk of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. Amid destruction and disaster Nasia had fun, Andrew went crazy and found time went quickly.
Andrew only had cards for unplayed areas and John just kept on playing the same card after him for more relatives. John had 22 on the board to Andrew's 14. Driving Andrew crazy. Still it was to his advantage because he didn't have to worry about so many guys and got them all but three out. Andrew won, Nasia lost, with John in the middle.
Nexus Ops
Jarratt loves Nexus Ops but Nigel hasn't had enjoyed his previous experiences, while Anne hasn't played often. Jarratt did the rules refresher but forgot the easily forgotten rule that you can sell unwanted cards. Jarratt followed the standard strategy getting early control of the Monolith and fighting many battles. Nexus Ops is a game of winning battles but not wasting too many troops defending territory.
The experience didn't improve Nigel's attitude towards the game, but Anne wants to play again.
California
John suggested we try this two player but neither of us checked the rules differences for two players until I had filled my house. Then Jarratt read that we should have finished much earlier, so we stopped at that point when I was one point ahead. If we had played by the real two player rules we wouldn't have scored as many present points (which would have hurt me more than John) and the game would have ended earlier with John probably winning.
Frank's Zoo
Nigel joined Anna, Anne and Jarratt to restart Frank's Zoo. Jarratt wanted to stop playing after the first round, and perhaps he should have. Nasia joined in at the third hand and challenged Jarratt for third place. No surprises about who won.
Anna 2 8 15 24
Anne 4 7 8 11
Jarratt 7 7 9 8
Nasia - - 5 7
Nigel 0 2 1 3
Clans
I've been keen to play this game again since I noticed the similarity between this and Metropolys. Both being essentially abstract games with secret missions. It's been a couple of years since I last played this, and longer since Carl, John or I last played it regularly. It was Andrew's first time. Unfortunately for Andrew and I, in the last third of the game we got into the rhythm of he and I being forced to set up situations where John and Carl could make villages (which they did). This was partially due to the seating order, which was: John, me, Carl, Andrew.
The early part of both games is the least important and the initial moves are not obvious. The mid-game starts as board position becomes interesting, and the end game is where choices become more limited and more critical. The obvious difference between the two is that in Metropolys the end game is about keeping the initiative whereas in Clans it is about giving away as few opportunities to your opponents (in particular the player following you) as possible.
John B 49
Carl 47
Andrew H 43
Ian 43
Andrew Rae arrived in time for the next set of game choosing. We had ten people and lots of indecision. We probably should have split into two five player groups as there are plenty of good five player games available. But we didn't.
Tichu
Carl hasn't played for awhile and was initially worried that we weren't strong enough for Anna and Andrew and the first two hands suggested he was right. But then Carl and Anna went head to head for the first of three times. The seventh hand turned up an interesting situation I called Tichu but Carl also had a good hand and ended up in a position to go out before me, controversially he choose to go out, leaving me to finish second for 200 minus 100 points. If he had not gone out, his final card would have been something like a 3 ruling out a 1-2. A Tichu would have given us more points but also have given Anna and Andrew points.
Grand Tichu calls are rare in our games, but on turn 9 Andrew called Grand Tichu and made it! But while Anna and Andrew were making a come back it was too late.
Hnd IA+Ql AJ+AH
1. 25 75
2. 85 215 Andrew's Tichu
3. 280 120 Carl makes Tichu, Anna fails
4. 345 55 Andrew fails
5. 450 150 Carl makes Tichu
6. 600 100 Carl makes Tichu, Anna fails
7. 700 100 I fail, but Carl and I make a 1-2
8. 875 25 I make Tichu, Anna fails
9. 800 300 I fail, while Andrew makes a Grand Tichu
10. 810 390
11. 830 570 Andrew makes Tichu
12. 1030 470 Carl makes Tichu, Anna fails
Nuns on the Run
Engrossed in Tichu I didn't pay much attention to what was happening at the other end of the room.
Nasia taught this deduction game that she had brought with her. It is like Scotland Yard in reverse, instead of one player being hunted by everyone else, one player hunts everyone else. She said it went OK, but none of the novices managed to get their secret wish and return to their cells. So Abbess Nasia won.
Pompeii
Rumors from Pompeii talk of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. Amid destruction and disaster Nasia had fun, Andrew went crazy and found time went quickly.
Andrew only had cards for unplayed areas and John just kept on playing the same card after him for more relatives. John had 22 on the board to Andrew's 14. Driving Andrew crazy. Still it was to his advantage because he didn't have to worry about so many guys and got them all but three out. Andrew won, Nasia lost, with John in the middle.
Nexus Ops
Jarratt loves Nexus Ops but Nigel hasn't had enjoyed his previous experiences, while Anne hasn't played often. Jarratt did the rules refresher but forgot the easily forgotten rule that you can sell unwanted cards. Jarratt followed the standard strategy getting early control of the Monolith and fighting many battles. Nexus Ops is a game of winning battles but not wasting too many troops defending territory.
The experience didn't improve Nigel's attitude towards the game, but Anne wants to play again.
Jarratt 15
Anne 8
Nigel 6
California
John suggested we try this two player but neither of us checked the rules differences for two players until I had filled my house. Then Jarratt read that we should have finished much earlier, so we stopped at that point when I was one point ahead. If we had played by the real two player rules we wouldn't have scored as many present points (which would have hurt me more than John) and the game would have ended earlier with John probably winning.
Ian 36
John B 35
Sunday, 12 September 2010
Friday 10 September 2010
Traders of Genoa
Andrew and Anna mentioned on Wednesday that Andrew's father has bought Genoa on an impulse and wants them to teach it. Problem is that neither Andrew nor Anna have played it before. So to give them an idea of the game I offered to teach them, and borrowed Peter's copy. From what Anna said about Settlers of Catan, I had an idea she would like (and be good at) trading games.
I've never taught the game or read the rules, so I wasn't entirely sure how to begin. The rules start with the movement rules, move onto the trading, then the buildings, cards and special actions, finishing with ownership markers. I think it is important to tie the rules explanation to the aim, in this case to make the most money. So I felt it was important early on to show how money enters the game (orders, messages and other people's use of buildings you own) and how it moves between players (negotiating for actions). From there I had to jump around to explain everything else: movement, buildings, ownership, cards etc. John added a useful set of hints on approximate values, given that the values of things are not obvious the first time you play Traders.
From early on it was clear that John and Andrew were after Privileges. Anna was after Large Orders while I concentrated on Small Orders. John and Anna got ownership markers down very early and I felt duty bound to restore the natural order of things by getting the Cathedral back into male ownership. I traded away my Privilege early on.
At one point John and I were involved in a deal, which on reflection was probably illegal. I had negotiated a string of deals, but half way through executing them I realised that I had planned on using a goods cube the action before I got from John. John gave it to me, one building/action before he should have.
About three rounds from the end I thought I was doing quite well though Anna was also in a good position. But I was about to run out of both goods and orders and the last two rounds didn't give me as much income as Anna was getting. I did much better (in absolute terms) than I usually do but still a long way from winning. John got a significant portion of his final score from his hand of Privilege cards to come second. Anna won and declared that she really enjoyed the game.
Hornochsen!
After finishing Traders we wanted a light filler. John turned his nose up at No Thanks! So we played Hornochsen! I played my cards out too early and was forced to take a bad pile with a x2. Andrew kept his cards and ended up making the best of the ending.
Hornochsen tends to favor either the first players to finish or the last -- this time it was the last players.
Andrew and Anna mentioned on Wednesday that Andrew's father has bought Genoa on an impulse and wants them to teach it. Problem is that neither Andrew nor Anna have played it before. So to give them an idea of the game I offered to teach them, and borrowed Peter's copy. From what Anna said about Settlers of Catan, I had an idea she would like (and be good at) trading games.
I've never taught the game or read the rules, so I wasn't entirely sure how to begin. The rules start with the movement rules, move onto the trading, then the buildings, cards and special actions, finishing with ownership markers. I think it is important to tie the rules explanation to the aim, in this case to make the most money. So I felt it was important early on to show how money enters the game (orders, messages and other people's use of buildings you own) and how it moves between players (negotiating for actions). From there I had to jump around to explain everything else: movement, buildings, ownership, cards etc. John added a useful set of hints on approximate values, given that the values of things are not obvious the first time you play Traders.
From early on it was clear that John and Andrew were after Privileges. Anna was after Large Orders while I concentrated on Small Orders. John and Anna got ownership markers down very early and I felt duty bound to restore the natural order of things by getting the Cathedral back into male ownership. I traded away my Privilege early on.
At one point John and I were involved in a deal, which on reflection was probably illegal. I had negotiated a string of deals, but half way through executing them I realised that I had planned on using a goods cube the action before I got from John. John gave it to me, one building/action before he should have.
About three rounds from the end I thought I was doing quite well though Anna was also in a good position. But I was about to run out of both goods and orders and the last two rounds didn't give me as much income as Anna was getting. I did much better (in absolute terms) than I usually do but still a long way from winning. John got a significant portion of his final score from his hand of Privilege cards to come second. Anna won and declared that she really enjoyed the game.
Anna 1035
John B 950
Andrew 830
Ian 820
Anne 595
Hornochsen!
After finishing Traders we wanted a light filler. John turned his nose up at No Thanks! So we played Hornochsen! I played my cards out too early and was forced to take a bad pile with a x2. Andrew kept his cards and ended up making the best of the ending.
Hornochsen tends to favor either the first players to finish or the last -- this time it was the last players.
Andrew 16
John B 14
Anne 6
Anna 2
Ian -10
Sunday, 5 September 2010
Friday 3 September
Anna and Andrew showed up first and we started with
Frank's Zoo
Nigel showed up in time for the second hand and John in time to join in the third. Previously we played until two players reached 18 but this time we played by the rules which are that the game ends when two players reach 19. Only Nigel avoided going backwards at least once.
Attika
Anne says she romped away to beat Nigel and Anna. She says it was because she got half a dozen carrots.
Great Wall of China
I haven't played for years and I taught from memory, as I have mis-placed my English translation. My memory was vague on the end game rules. John and I wasted about 30% of our cards on one battle! No wonder Andrew won.
We played a second time. This time I tried to grab things cheaply and became the target of both John and Andrew's attempts to block me.
Tigris and Euphrates
Anna and Nigel had both played once before but needed a rules refresher. Nigel was working up to building a blue momument when Anne started a conflict with him which saw his blue tiles evaporate. Anna created a big civilisation in the centre of the board and Nigel tried to encroach on it. Anne created a black temple while Anna created more temples elsewhere. Anna did the final civilization join that ended the game.
Everyone agreed that they needed to play again soon while the rules were fresh in their minds.
Beowulf: The Legend
While mesopotamian civilizations were battling it out at the other end of the table, John suggested playing Beowulf. Gvien how popular Beowulf is around here, strangely Andrew hasn't played before, on the other hand it was my third game this week. I did my normal cowardly strategy, but I also ran pretty short of cards and victory points. Andrew and I didn't do well. John says he like this game because it prompts more talking between players than most other games.
Frank's Zoo
Nigel showed up in time for the second hand and John in time to join in the third. Previously we played until two players reached 18 but this time we played by the rules which are that the game ends when two players reach 19. Only Nigel avoided going backwards at least once.
Anna 3 7 10 19 18 20
Andrew 3 5 7 11 15 12
Anne -1 3 1 5 10 15
Ian 4 3 12 14 15 19
Nigel - 6 10 12 21 26
John B - - 2 1 3 7
Attika
Anne says she romped away to beat Nigel and Anna. She says it was because she got half a dozen carrots.
Great Wall of China
I haven't played for years and I taught from memory, as I have mis-placed my English translation. My memory was vague on the end game rules. John and I wasted about 30% of our cards on one battle! No wonder Andrew won.
Andrew 40
Ian 26
John B 20
We played a second time. This time I tried to grab things cheaply and became the target of both John and Andrew's attempts to block me.
Ian 36
John B 31
Andrew 25
Tigris and Euphrates
Anna and Nigel had both played once before but needed a rules refresher. Nigel was working up to building a blue momument when Anne started a conflict with him which saw his blue tiles evaporate. Anna created a big civilisation in the centre of the board and Nigel tried to encroach on it. Anne created a black temple while Anna created more temples elsewhere. Anna did the final civilization join that ended the game.
Everyone agreed that they needed to play again soon while the rules were fresh in their minds.
Anna 9
Anne 8
Nigel 3
Beowulf: The Legend
While mesopotamian civilizations were battling it out at the other end of the table, John suggested playing Beowulf. Gvien how popular Beowulf is around here, strangely Andrew hasn't played before, on the other hand it was my third game this week. I did my normal cowardly strategy, but I also ran pretty short of cards and victory points. Andrew and I didn't do well. John says he like this game because it prompts more talking between players than most other games.
John B 43
Ian 17
Andrew 16
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