Friday Power

I had a long day of teaching phys ed today. I'm not a big fan of running kids through hours of rollerblading... I got a call from Dan today, and he wanted to meet at the store for some Power Grid tonight. Kristin wanted to work on writing tonight, so I ran down to Critical Hit for a game.

Dan, Ziggy, Jerod, and myself sat down at the power plant controls, and prepared to start networking. I was first player and got the 4 cost coal plant without a fight. From there, I jockeyed to stay in last position the whole game. Unfortunately, it didn't really pay off, as I ended up just not being able to buy a big power plant at the turning point when I needed it. I think that, so far, this has been the most limiting thing in the decision making area for this game; that I haven't made the best choices in managing the turns I have to upgrade plants. Ziggy led early, and then we stabilized briefly before Dan pushed us into stage 2. Maybe it's just the way we play this game, but it seems like stage 3 comes up quickly, and the game end follows very shortly after that. We stayed pretty tight until the last turn, when Ziggy exploded to the end game. Jerod could only power 12 plants, I could only get 11, and Dan could only get 10. Oh well, third place...

The store got really busy with Magic players, and Jerod had to step away. Eric showed up looking for a game, and, facing the alternatives of Puerto Rico or Ticket to Ride, Dan decided to initiate another game of Power Grid, this time with the USA board. Everyone was fine with this, so we hit it again. I ended up 2nd player, got the 4 cost coal plant again, and built on the East Coast in Philly. Dan built down in the SE, Ziggy went up in the NW, and Eric took the SW, pretty much making a circle. I thought I had a good handle on this one, but it got away from me. Eric decieded to bid me way up on a plant, and after I had to let it go, there was no good plant to replace it, which put me behind a turn, probably. Later, I failed to keep track of the plant that Ziggy discarded when he built, which led to me choosing the wrong plant to bid on, which in turn led to me falling further behind. Dan powered us into Stage 2 quickly, and kept pushing. I stayed close, and, a few turns later, it was I that initiated the endgame, building to 14 cities, all of which I could power. I thought Dan had more money, and that it was basically me guaranteeing myself second place. On his building turn, Dan revealed that he only had $60. We painfully watched him fail to see the one way he could win with exactly $60 for a couple minutes, as he agonized over it, until Ziggy leaned forward and pointed it out to him. For a minute, I thought I might actually win. It was a little funny to realize that I could have gotten first just by making him spend one more dollar somewhere...

So, don't underestimate the big plants. DOn't buy plants you're going to have to upgrade tooo soon. Don't not buy resources when you might need to power something if someone else pushes to 7 when you are just assuming they won't...

GG