That Boardgaming Thing (TBGT) Day 1

I needed to work today, so I couldn't hit the convention any earlier than seven. I got down there, and scoped things out. Rob showed me what was up, and got me my badge. There's a pirate theme, with an ongoing, group game of Pirates' Dice, as well as a Crew (team) game of puzzles. Everyones' name tags sport randomly generated pirate names, and mine was Poop Deck Bryant. I didn't realize until now that I should be trying to keep track of these names, as it could possibly make these reports much less dry... At the same time, some of the names are full of innuendo, and I try to keep it PG here... Anyway, after the intro I walked around, said hi to the three people I knew, and brought in some games. I had, unfortunately, gotten there just after games were starting, and so had to settle for watching Christopher's game of Canal Mania (there was also another game of this going on) develop.

It wasn't too long before Brian and Sarah, a couple that I'd played some games with at Rick and Marnee's last game night, showed up. We chatted about starting a game and I pulled out... Canal Mania. Here it was, the opening game of the evening, and I might get in the three player game I was hoping for... They were up for it, so we found a table and sat down. The three player game was not to be, though, as we were quickly joined by Thomas, another attendee. It was a little funny to see three games of CM being played at three adjacent tables... Maybe we should have had a tournament?

The teaching was a little faster than Tuesday, and everyone was attentive and interested. We got off to a quick start, breezing through the first couple turns, with people only really pausing to consider the contracts. These opening turns will go really fast with experienced players, as they will know the opening contracts. I ended up grabbing both of the same first two contracts as last time. There was a huge difference in this game (compared to Tuesday's - see last entry), as Thomas built a decent network out of Gloucester, and Sarah out of Birmingham, both pretty early in the game. This meant that I was seldom moving goods from either of these termini, keeping my points down.

I did get to an early lead, which encouraged them to cut into my ability to move goods. It's nice that there's a little bit of screw the leader potential in the game. Nobody that I've played with yet has tried to ignore shipping goods and just build lots of contracts with extra points pieces. I suppose this might work out all right, keeping you out of the lead in the beginning, and letting you develop into something more on the long term, while people fight the leader. I kind of doubt it, though, as you can potentially make so much from moving goods and, sometimes, by not moving them, you give others points. Nobody ever passed me, though, although I think Sarah tied me at one point, and was not far behind after the last turn.

So, things were a little less solitaire in the goods sharing department in this play. Also, Sarah and Brian succeeded in building fairly large networks, so there were some goods being moved for decent points all over. Thomas had a bit of a rough time in this area, as he missed running his network through a town that would have given him a five stop network. Consequently, he was stuck with four, and even got that somewhat late.

It was a nice, scrappy game, which I ended up winning. We all moved a fairly equivalent amount in the final goods movement, although I think I had an edge of 2-4 points there. I got most prolific builder, winning a tie breaker with, I think, Sarah, who finished second. Thomas lost his tie breaker to finish last.

We packed up, and Thomas and I sat to talk a bit. We talked about online games, which somehow led to Tikal (via sbw discussion). Thomas pulled out his copy to look at the rules for the auction version, and this drew David across the room, hoping that we were starting a game. It was past eleven, a little late to get going on Tikal, but, we said, what the heck?

I like Tikal quite a bit. I think I've played two or three times before, with two and four players, but never with three. I had expected this would be a nice number for the game, and I wasn't disappointed. One thing I was disappointed with was tile drawing. I just kept failing to draw tiles that I could really create big scoring opportunities off of - for instance, I did not draw a treasure tile until, I think, the fourth or fifth one, and I drew the first two volcanoes (which can be nice, but, also kind of hurt, as you can't use them to score). I drew none of the temples above a cost of four, and only one of the fours and one of the threes. In general, it just seemed that things came at the wrong time for me.

David built up treasures early, with Thomas developing a fairly quick set as well. David kept having good luck here, developing three sets with not too much work. I got stuck with two of a kind in three types, and it turned out that the two I needed to complete two of my sets were the last two drawn, which ended up on the last tile played in the game, which I couldn't really take advantage of. This was a bit of a bummer and, as it turned out, the game was certainly close enough that drawing different treasures would have made the difference. What really made the difference, though, was some inefficient action point distribution on my part. I really didn't want to think too much or bog down the game late in the night, but, as I thought about it on the way home, I think I probably could have safely spent about ten AP's differently, which probably would have scored me several more points. Again, I think I was a little loathe to think too much at that time, and I was also a little too worried about things that probably weren't going to happen. Example: capping two temples that were pretty hard to get to, just because David could have come in to tie me, and I didn't want to worry about the points. On the other hand, it would have taken him a lot of AP to do it, which he couldn't really afford as we were both a ways behind Thomas.

Thomas drew two good temples and placed them very well, and David and I failed to put much pressure on him to compete for control. Consequently, he was able to build up and guard them, fairly early, giving him the nine and the ten. This seemed like game, but Thomas really fell off on the treasures in the mid game. He also placed a second base camp, a little out of the way, which gave him some good points, but allowed me to effectively cut him off and make it very difficult for him to really play the far corner of the board. Thomas's scoring really slowed down, there, though he already had a lot on the board. David's treasures, as mentioned, developed very well. He didn't do as much with the temples on the board, but the treasures gave him a fair lead over me by the second to last scoring phase.

In the last scoring phase, Thomas got a decent number to put him at 111. I was second, and could make a lot of points, but not quite enough to catch up. I was only able to put up 107. David was lamenting that he didn't think he could match that, be he was forgetting that he was pretty well ahead of me before the round. He ended up getting to 110, just one point off the pace. It was a nice close game, and I think I learned some things about tactics for the game, including tile placement for area advantage, worker movement for potential future competition (a sort of deterrent - I think I did OK with this in this game, but could be quite a bit better - this also extends to movement of pieces that get stuck in out of the way places - although sometimes you need to leave them there in case you draw a one - gate temple or something...), and the need to calculate what other people can afford to/will do and how that effects the AP you need to spend. Sometimes a bit of a gamble, especially if you don't know the tiles and another player has a base camp left, but still necessary. All in all, this was a fun game, with two really nice guys who are good gamers.

I look forward to heading back, right now, by the way! Off to RTP!

GG, GL
JW