Test

Well, it's been a heck of a long time since I posted to this blog.  I've been planning, for years, actually, to get back here and get started again, and I think I finally have things mostly sorted out.  I'll just throw this on the wall and see if it sticks.

Gaming has changed a lot for me since I stopped updating this blog.  I moved, from a place with an amazing array of gaming opportunities, across the ocean to a place where chances to game have been extremely limited.  Add to this becoming a father twice over, and, well, I hope it's not to hard to see how I went from gaming 2 or 3 times a week to a handful of times a year (not counting my fairly steady playing of things like Snail's Pace Race, Animal Upon Animal, Go Away Monster, Rondo Vario, and Jungle Smart).

All the same, I've had some fun gaming opportunities.  I've gone to Essen several times now, and Nurnberg once.  I've managed to attend a small weekend gathering on each of the last three years, and I have contacts for a couple clubs in Oslo.  I'd like to widen my exposure to the gaming industry as a whole, so it really seems like a good time to get back to writing.

For some warm up posts, hopefully I'll get some writing in related to:
Starting gaming groups
Small conventions
Game teaching
Essen

Anyway, since I certainly shouldn't have any readers after several years away, this is really, as stated, a test.  And, hopefully, a reminder to myself to keep it up.

If for some reason, you've had a subscription to this blog running for all these years and you do see this post, well, bless you.  Bless you.

Gen Con, recent gaming, general rambling

Over the course of the past few months, increasing amounts of my time have been dedicated to manipulating my little electronic characters in the world of Azeroth... I think it's slowing down a bit, though, and hopefully my real life activities can get some more play (pun intended).

I've joined a couple of weekly boardgaming groups - DR GLASS in Chapel Hill, and DAGGER in Hillsborough. I still make it to a Triangle Games Meetup Group gathering from time to time. These are dedicated designer/Euro groups. Lacking the desire to go back and write full reports at this time, I'll just mention the games I've played: Tikal, Tigris & Euphrates, Notre Dame, Lost Valley, Reef Encounter, Thurn & Taxis, Samurai, Midgard (twice), Santiago, Herocard: Cyberspace, Circus Flohcati, Mara Cash, Acquire, Get to Work!, Condottieri, and at least two more games that I'm forgetting. I'm really enjoying these groups, and I'm looking forward to, hopefully, getting a lot of table time over the next few months.

One thing I'd like to address in a little more detail is the evolution of picking games in these groups. The Meetup Group still has some events where people just show up and put stuff on the table. Mostly, though, the events have moved to a sign-up sort of format, in which the host will state how much space there is (how many tables), and usually what game they want to play. Then, people will volunteer to "host" the other table(s), and people sign up on the table they want to play, until it's full. The other two groups use a rotating pick system - the groups are semi-private, invite-only groups, so picking the game(s) for the night just rotates through the member list. I like both of these systems a lot - they seem very handy as simple methods to correct the sometimes lengthy process of choosing a game for a group. I especially like that the rotating choice system guarantees that the participants will have a chance to definitely get something on the table. This really helps get games that others haven't heard of on the table - everyone is willing to try, as they know they'll get their turn, too. I'd recommend people try systems like this - and I'd like to hear from people who use other systems. I'm curious if there's anything that could be applied to longer game days - like the ones that Chris and Edie run in Iowa City (although things tend to move along pretty quickly there, for some reason).

I made it back to GenCon this year, and had a great time. It was odd to have to sit back and read other peoples' reports of the con last year - but it gave me a bit more perspective on the event - there's so much going on there, it's pretty easy to miss a lot. I've already discovered some stuff I missed this year from reading such a report!

For the last few years, Gen Con, for me, has been mostly about hanging out with old friend. I like to go through the dealer room a couple times - see what's new, what's hot, etc., and then spend the rest of the time with old gaming buddies. This year, I stayed with my old friend EOD, and we spent almost the entire con together. Other than Eric, it was great to run into folks I knew from Chicago, like Azrael, Berrianne, Ray, and Brandon. I saw only a couple QC guys - Dr. Dan and Dave W., and one Wisconsinite - Eric F.. The Iowa City crowd had an impressive delegation there - Nate (who won a suit of storm trooper armor playing SW Pocket Models TCG), Peter, Drew, Tim, and Teagle. Former Iowan Lucas was running events for FFG all weekend. Overall, it was great to see everyone, especially since it's such a rare occurance now that we live out East. I only wish I could have seen more people, including those who were there, and those that couldn't make it.

Eric and I played a lot of games, but mostly together or with the Iowa City guys. I really regret that I didn't get to play Alpha Magic with Ogre or Dave W.. I also wish I could have played demos of some games I want to try, but the demo tables were always SO crowded.

So, quick game rundown -

-Battle Line x2
-Tannhauser x2
-On the Edge CCG x2
-Magic "Special Limited" tournament (one pack of each set legal for Standard) 3 matches (I did not do well)
-Magic 10th Edition draft - 2 matches (Eric beat me in the semis)
-Alpha Magic - I would estimate we played approximately 36 games of this, from 1v1 to 4 player group games
-Other Magic - about 6 games? we 1 on 1 drafted some packs we had laying around a couple times, like all Coldsnap, and Portal/Fifth Dawn/German Rennaissance, and played a few games.

So, most of the gaming was Magic... which is ok by me. Still a game I love, even though I don't like amassing cards any more. I've only played twice since we moved down here, so it was nice to get to play, especially with the Alpha.

Speaking of Alpha, we actually got lucky this year and found a few cards. Here's what I picked up:

Demonic Hordes
Lord of the Pit
Cockatrice
Roc of Kher Ridges
Aspect of Wolf
Dragon Whelp
Icy Manipulator
Copper Tablet

A pretty good haul, really, I think it cost me approximately $78, although I traded a dealer for a pretty good chunk of that. Cockatrice for $4 might have been the best deal. Peter said he got a black vise for $7, which is pretty good, also.

It's pretty clear, after seeing Ogre's deck, that the best thing is to be able to go to events and trade... that guy has a massive pile of lightning bolts, sol rings, chaos orbs, and a couple wheels...

Tannhauser was the only new game I played. It's an FFG "boardgame", themed an an alternate history ww2 time era, that is basically a skirmish level miniatures game in a box. It's an expandible game that will certainly have new boards/characters/items/rules/etc. coming out soon. It plays pretty quickly - under an hour when you've got it down. There are two maps, and ten characters. You can choose to play one figure each, or more. It's a lot like an fps, in that you can play deathmatch, capture the flag, take and hold, or scanarios that you make up. The combat system, which relies on colored circles for range and los, rather than needing to check with a ruler, is quick and easy. Minimum ranges on the weapons make for some tactical decisions on the map - sometimea a hand-to-hand specialist can get holed up in a room where automatic and heavy weapons can't be brought to bear on them - thank goodness for grenades! We liked this pretty well, perhaps because both of us are former miniatures gamers (which is also how we met), who don't seem to have time to paint figs or set up big battles any more. I'm anxious to see the expansions.

Oh, and, I forgot, we also went bowling. We almost didn't go out, but, fortunately, we ran into the enthusiastic Berrianne on Saturday night, who's undeniable energy ensured our participation. Eric and I had a wonderful meal at the Fountain Diner, and then headed to the upstairs duckpin alley, where we were joined by Berri and three of her friends. As ever, we had a great time, and Berri was tops on our team with her amazing Granny-roll technique. If you're interested in future GenCon duck pin expeditions, let me know.

Well, now it's time to adjust back to "normal" life, and look forward to starting my job next week. Hopefully, I'll be able to afford to register for TBGT at some point, and do a bunch of boardgaming...

GG, GL,
JW

Friday at Rick's, Saturday at Snoozefest's: Vinci, Robo Rally, Winds of Plunder, Leaping Lemmings

Friday, May 18th

I made it over to Rick's a bit late, and the tables were all full with games going on. Munchkin, Carcassonne, and a Pulsipher Prototype were on the tables. It looked like the prototype would be done soon, so I sat around and watched a bit. Soon, three more gamers showed up, wanting to play Vinci. So, we pulled it out, started to set up, and were joined by Rick when his game ended.

I like most things about Vinci. The Euro/abstract-historical/conflict without war kind of feel, play time, etc.. The lesson I felt I learned last time is that one doesn't want to be in front. I had no worries this time, as I grabbed a very modest, unthreatening starting civ. I can't remember the course of the game, but do know that the player to my right jumped out ahead, and then at various times the heat was diverted by players getting big vp jumps from mining, currency, and Rick's rapid expansion into a bunch of territory vacated when a couple players declined while his current civ had lots of dudes and weapons. Barbarian revolutionaries put the player to my right back in threatening position, and I was able to establish a fair-sized civ far away, in the South-west, and then move into the North with ports. I got slammed by the player to my left, who also triggered the game end, but he couldn't take me out entirely. Rick went through the various scenarios for the final turn, and we determined that nobody could prevent me from achieving the highest score. The way it worked out, I won with Rick only one point behind.

A few other games had broken up, and six of us sat down for Robo Rally, which is always a favorite at Rick's. My options were pretty unexciting - one gave me the ability to take damage to have some move options (I discarded this to prevent dmg), and another allowed me to bring back an archive at full health (I managed not to die in this game). Even though I didn't die, there was a lot of death, and most of us were moving pretty slow. I was third to the first flag, and then only two spaces away from the second, when Matt hit the third and won. A good, fun game, with lots of laughs.

Saturday, March 19th

I made the drive out to Snoozefest's looking forward to an afternoon of interesting gaming. I was hoping to play Midgard, as well as Colosseum, which I know he has a copy of. When I got there, though, Ravindra, Mary, Brian, and Sarah had all been playing Tichu, which they decided to finish. So, Rick, Bob, Greg, and myself sat down to Rick's copy of Winds of Plunder.

WoP is a GMT game with a pirate theme, which is really a Euro that fits pleasantly into their line, with it's nice looking world map. It has a hard cardboard board, which is not too common in my experience with their games. The components, in general, are very nice.

The game is aptly named. Each turn, players bid for wind direction. They then move, with the highest bidder determining who will go first. A player has three actions, which they may take before or after moving. When moving the players go from port to port, plundering items such as victory points, treasure maps, provisions, crew, and weapons. It's also possible to board and plunder the ship of an opponent who has fewer weapons than you. Having the most crew/weapons/provisions gives you a card with a special ability.

The game seemed quite well balanced. I decided to focus on weapon dominance, and boarding my opponents. This earned me few friends, and I had quite a few negative action cards played on me. I also scored smaller vp chips when moving into ports. However, I was able to achieve suppremacy in each type of resource, and hence had several bonuses. Despite the bonuses, the other players' grabbing of treasure maps and high vp ports kept me in the basement almost the whole game. I stayed close, though, and surged forward in the end-game scoring, to win the game, over Rick, by a point. This was a fun game, with a good group. I liked that it was really hard to tell who would win, until the very end. It was also nice that the leader-bashing mechanics keep the game close, and picking on someone with boarding (I boarded Greg several times) doesn't really take them out of the game.

We were done, but the other game was still going, so we agreed to play another game Rick had brought, his own Leaping Lemmings, which will soon go up on the GMT p500.

Leaping Lemmings is a fun sort of Euro-esque game that is themed after the legendary lemming tendency to follow each other, in a sort of herd, off cliffs, to their deaths. Each player has a group of little leapers that they try to navigate past the dangerous eagles, hovering over the landscape, to the edge of the cliff, which, once reached, they leap off of for vp. Players can also earn vp by grabbing food, which can have vp or special action abilities.

The game played pretty quickly. Fun and light, there are nice decisions about blocking opponents, pushing your luck, and strategies to maximize the chance for your lemmings to make it across the board. There's also a time factor, as the game has a definite end, so one has to rush a bit. We all managed to pick up some food, and get some lemmings off the cliff (although I think at least twice as many lemmings were eaten by eagles). In the end, we had a good time with this little filler game.

After that, I was hoping to still have time to play Midgard before I had to leave to come home and pick up Kristin to go to the Railhawks game. Unfortunately for me, Mary really wanted to run the "swap meet" portion of the afternoon. I hadn't brought anything to trade, as I wasn't sure whether I would be there when it happened, and I also didn't think anyone would want any of my games that I don't want. Consequently, my day was basically over. I talked to Sarah, Ravindra, and Rick for a while, and then took off for the drive back to Durham.

It was a pretty good weekend of gaming, and now I have lots of games to learn, as I acquired several new ones this week. I'll put in a good word here for the people at Thoughthammer.com - my order from them arrived quickly, and well packaged, with the games in very good shape. With a big discount and free shipping for my (17 lbs) order, it's tough for me to think about doing business with other online retailers (although they don't seem to have much in the way of real "imports").

GG, GL

JW

Games at Greg's: Marvel Heroes, Midgard, Power Grid

May 6th, 2007

At the Dune game the weekend before, we had discussed getting a group of Durhamites together for some gaming in town, hopefully running out Greg's copy of Mutant Chronicles: Seige of the Citadel. Unfortunately, we couldn't get the requisite five players together, with just myself, Chris, and Greg available. We decided to still get together, and just play some other games.

When I got there, Greg and Chris were looking at Marvel Heroes, an FFG big-big-box game, based on the Marvel comic book universe. We were all feeling pretty relaxed, and decided to make that our first game.

Marvel Heroes is pretty fiddly. It has a lot of different rules, decks of cards, things that happen every turn, rules exceptions, etc.. However, it plays just fine as a sort of diversion type game... I think more competitive gamers would be frustrated by the degree of randomness.

The basic theme is that each player has control of a group of superheroes. Each group combats evildoers by troubleshooting headlines around New York City. The bigger the headline, the nastier the potential villain your opponents can play against you, and the more victory points, representing your groups fame or notoreity, you get.

Chris had the X-Men, Greg had the Avengers, and I took the Fantastic Four, as the big headline for our game was Galactus. Avengers have some big combat hitters, X-Men have a great specialist in Jean Grey, and FF seem like a pretty well-rounded group, who can deal well with "danger" headlines.

Greg was beating up on the villains, and Chris had a couple good rolls reducing the "trouble level" of his headlines, so he didn't have to fight at all. I solved a headline, and then had a couple really high trouble rolls, from which I failed to triumph over the respective villain. I managed to finish one more headline on the last round, only to have the Thing ko'd by my arch-nemesis, Dr.Doom, right after finishing.

Chris ended up winning, with Greg in close second and myself in a pretty distant third. I thought the game was OK, although there's not much long-term planning, and there's a lot of randomness. I had fun. I think you fun level with this one would be enhanced/limited by your familiarity with Marvel comics. Of course, now, with all the movies, I think many people have at least some familiarity with this publisher.

After this, we decided to try out Midgard, a game I acquired recently as a gift from Snoozefest. This is a game that combines elements of card drafting and area control for points scoring over three rounds.

Each player drafts a set of six cards, from cards of three different types, each round. Then, cards are played in a succession of turns to move around vikings on the board, or onto the board from an off-board supply. After the various movement cards have been played, everything is scored. Players earn points for controlling provinces in the regions, as well as for controlling Asgard. They also earn tokens, of which they are trying to complete sets. After this, vikings in "doomed" areas are sent to Valhalla, earning their players even more points. Then, start a new turn, putting out new "doomed" tokens and dealing out new sets of cards from which to draft.

We exercised the "first game" option, keeping the first hand we were dealt, rather than drafting. I made some mistakes in my round planning, and Greg got off to a great start with lots of Jotunheim movement cards, taking complete control of the region for a big early lead on points. I sent a lot of guys, all of them in fact, to Valhalla every round. I would have done a bit better if I'd just left one or two on the table. After the first round, we started to make up ground on Greg. After the third scoring round, Greg and I were tied, and Chris was just a bit behind us. End-game scoring has a round for province token sets, though, and Greg had one more set than me, giving him the win by five. Even though he had lots of tokens, Chris's plans to get the right ones had been unintentionally scuppered by the regions that Greg and I chose to fight him over on the last turn, so he ended up in a pretty poor position at the end.

I enjoyed this game, and am actually pretty excited to play it again. It has a nice weight/time ratio, with a feeling that you are actually playing a game with some planning/strategic thinking, while still coming in at around 45 minutes or so in play time.

We didn't feel done yet. However, Chris and Greg weren't as anxious as myself to play Midgard again, so we settled on a good "gamers' game" - Power Grid.

My strategy in Power Grid is to try for cheap connections, and make sure that I'm able to be the leader, or with the leader, in the number of cities that could be powered. With the random nature of the plants that come up, you never know if you're going to get a big one at the right time, so you have to make sure you get one, slightly ahead of time, even if you have to pay a bit much or take a plant that is a little sub-optimal on resources. I also like to buy resources first early, to make others pay more, and then move into the lead when I feel pretty set up.

I ended up the the four plant, and had the first buying position for the first several turns. I added a 2 for 2 oil plant, and a 2 power wind plant. I went for my first five plant a little early, taking the 3 coal for five plant While I could only power 6 cities that turn. I did this because it had come up while there were still lots of low value plants (probably) left in the deck, and Chris had gotten a very lucky pull with a two oil for five plant very early.

From there, I went into the lead on my second five plant, and then came back down. We were all heavily into coal early, and then people started to diversify. Greg failed to get into the bidding for a five plant early, and got punished for a few turns as neither Chris nor I wanted to buy anything, and he was stuck with a tableau of small (3 or less power) plants. T this time, I was certainly quite happy to have bought my five a little early...

I pushed straight into phase two, as Greg and Chris had cornered me a bit, and it was either make phase 2 or be cornered on six cities until someone else did it. In a couple more turns, I was up to twelve cities, all powered. After a turn of doing nothing, and getting the first buying position back, I payed a lot for the six wind plant, and then built up to seventeen, giving me the win with 16 powered cities. Chris came in second, but we didn't bother to finish his or Greg's turns, as neither of them had the cash (in Chris's case), or the power plants (in Greg's case) to catch up.

This was a fun game. I have always enjoyed Power Grid, and it's nice to put up a W. Interestingly, we turned out even on the day, with each gamer having a 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place finish. I look forward to doing it again.

GG, GL,
JW

Dune, Saturday, April 28th

Dan F. sent out some e-mails, as he is wont to do every few months, and put a Dune game together. It ended up being myself, Dan, Chris C., Lori, Keith, and Greg.

I had only played once before, with five players. As luck would have it, I ended up being dealt the Bene Gesserit (sp?), the faction that we'd played without the last time. We also played with "advanced spice rules," which we hadn't used on my previous play.

I spent quite a bit of the game just remembering what to do and trying to get the hang of the new faction. It seems the BG are sort of a "late game" opportunity group. Alliances happened early, triggered, I think, by Lori and Greg grouping Harkonnen with Fremen. I threw in with Dan's Atredes.

We had powerful combat abilities, but failed to take full advantage of them by not acquiring the full set of defenses. We also lacked any sort of long-term plan, which was hard to develop, as I had no idea how to play my faction. I do think we could have been much more effective if we would have stepped away from the table to hash things out a little earlier.

As it was, we played mainly in a reactive fashion, moving only when it seemed we needed to, against Chris and Keith. In this turn, about two thirds of the way through the game, we came pretty close to having what we needed to win. I think we needed to have that last defense, and gamble a little bit there, to have had a chance.

As it was, the game ran long, and I had to take off with about 45 minutes of play left. From what I hear, Chris stalled it out for the win. I really enjoy the combat system of Dune, and the way the long game allows for negotiation, alliance, and long-term planning. I'm just hoping I get to play it enough times to become familiar enough with the system that I can actually make effective long-term plans...

GG, GL,

JW

Games with Rune, St. Petersburg, Odin's Ravens, Streetsoccer

Thursday, March 22nd

Rune made the decision to leave his job here in the 'States, and return to Norway. We decided to get together again before he left, to play some games.

I picked him up, and after dinner we headed to a nearby Caribou Coffee to borrow a table.

We got in a game each of St. Petersburg, Odin's Ravens, and Streetsoccer. I think we messed up the rules on Streetsoccer again, forgetting to move the ball out of the goalmouth when it ends there.

I don't remember a lot of detail about the games... I know that I won St. Pete with a lot of Aristocrats, and a few extra "trading" cards from the observatory. I got really good draws in Odin's Ravens, and won that handily, as well. I felt a little sad to send Rune off in such a way, but, you know, I don't believe in throwing games...

We had a good time, but Caribou closes pretty early on Thursdays, so we called it a night.

GG, GL,

JW

Gaming at Snoozefest's: Through the Ages

March 17th

I got out to Snoozefest's a little late due to morning commitments. When I arrived, they had a five player game of Leonardo DaVinci going. I sat and watched a while. When they were finished, two of the players had to leave. The rest of us decided to play Kevin's homemade Through the Ages set.

Through the Ages is a currently hard to find card game of civilization building. It's a new game, that sold through it's initial printing quickly. Kevin has a copy, but decided to upgrade it a bit by making the cards and components bigger. It said a lot to me that he liked the game enough to put that much time into it.

This game uses an interesting card drafting mechanic, taking cards from a changing tableau made from different decks, to simulate the progress of years. I grabbed a victory point machine that Mary pointed out to me as being very powerful, and spent the next several turns ramping it up. As a result, I was making a lot more points than the others early on. I shifted gears a bit, trying to build up military strength, as it seemed that I would otherwise become a target for aggression, being so far out in front. However, this distracted me from progress, and the others caught up with me in vp production. I was still in the lead when the end of the game came, but, having not paid attention to the endgame bonus scoring, I faired poorly at the end, and Mary was able to pass me up for the victory.

I thought this game was a pretty interesting implementation of the civilization theme. However, it seems very long - 4.5 hours just for the simple game, and it also seemed a bit solitaire to me - it didn't feel like we really interacted too much. It may be, though, that since it was my first play, and there was a lot going on, I was just too busy trying to figure out how my own civilization worked to pay attention to what anyone else was doing. I'd like to try it again, in the odd circumstance that I have 5 hours free and a copy of the game sitting around...

GG, GL,
JW

Friday at Rick's: Streetsoccer, Taj Mahal, Yspahan

March 16th

I hadn't been doing a lot of boardgaming, with WoW taking over my life. However, I was able to clear some room to head over to Rick's for the monthly game night. I ran out to Raleigh and picked up Rune, who was visiting from Norway.

When we got to Rick's several games were already going. We arranged to play Taj Mahal with David when his San Juan game was over. In the mean time, we settled in for a game of Streetsoccer.

I got Streetsoccer for Christmas, and since then, I 've had a few games with Kristin. Rune and I had a great game, with me jumping out in front, and then him tying it up. We had a lot of laughs, as players, particularly Rune's goalkeeper, ended up way out of position. The dice provided us with some nail-biting moments, as the game was very close. I honestly can't remember much of what happened in the game at this point, but I think Rune won.

We got Taj Mahal going. It was the first time for Rune and I, a four-player, with David and Dave. Again, It's been so long since I've been writing in the blog, I don't remember so much of what happened in the game. Taj is a Reiner Knizia game that involves card drafting and hand management to facilitate bidding with different kinds of currency (cards). The players are trying to establish networks of palaces on the board, as well as scoring through collection of objects. I was forced into overbidding early. It seems that once you've commited to a bid, since your going to lose cards, you want to continue to try to get something out of it. So, I got behind a little when I ran out of cards, then came back a little to finish, I think, in second. I think David won.

After Taj, we stayed in the same group, and David and Dave taught us Yspahan. This game involves chosing actions in order, with the actions available determined by a set of die rolls at the beginning of the turn. You can build, move, or occupy part of the city. I did a lot of building, and tried to get in on the trading caravan. I scored some points, but it was, I think, David who won again. I think I might have been second again. Anyway, I know I finished second in one of these games, and didn't win either.

Rune and I had a pretty good time, but after Yspahan it was time to take off, since I had to drop him back off in Raleigh.

Sorry about the lame report - I'm just trying to get caught up and get back in the habit, as I'm going to try to make a concerted effort to make it to some more game meetups in the near future.

GG, GL
JW

Games at David's: Hollywood Blockbuster

January , 2007

I had to take last month's edition of this game night off, but was happy to be able to make it for the first event of the new year. I was a little late due to wrestling practice obligations, but kept myself away from the computer and made it down to Dave's in decent time.

When I got there, Scepter of Zavandor was running with, I think, six players. Larry was teaching Tigris & Euphrates to two other gamers, and David had Taj Mahal on his table. I watched the T&E game for a while, but found I didn't want to think hard enough to actually analyze what was happening, and instead settled in to see if I could get a bit of the flavor of Taj Mahal, another RK game, which I haven't played.

I didn't read the rules, and I didn't get that full of an impression of TM. It seemed to me that the players were accumulating card sets, then expending those cards in built-up groups in an effort to win bids for choice of actions in the round. Those actions would score a player points, generally based on previous choices, but sometimes just straight up bonus points. These actions also seemed to involve the placement of a palace, which could score points based on connections. I, like Dave, own and enjoy many RK games, and TM certainly looked worth a shot. Hopefully, I'll be around at some future event when this gets off the shelf.

The T&E game ended, and the groups mixed a little. I sat down with David, Julia, Keith, and Sy for Hollywood Blockbuster. Larry, Carli, and someone else pulled out Puerto Rico.

HB is yet another RK game, this one with a theme of producing movies, built around a fairly straight auction mechanic. The action takes place over three rounds, during which there are several bidding phases and a couple "parties", in which players simply pick items. Each player has several films they are trying to complete. Each one requires different elements - stars, sound, special effects, a director, etc. Some require several of one and none of others. Once you've completed a film, you can take another. There are a limited number of films that can be completed, so it's to ones advantage to get them done (unfinished films don't score). Points are awarded for the first film of each of the three types to be completed, as well as the strongest film each round. At the end of the game, the films are worth points based on the quality of the elements - how good the director/stars/effects/ etc. are. Additional points are awarded for the best film of each type, as well as the overall best and worst films.

I wanted to complete at least one film every round, which I did. I managed to score one of the first completed bonuses, as well as one of the strongest of the round bonuses. In the end, I had completed, I think, five films, and I managed to grab one of the "best of" awards. I had finished more films than anyone else, and managed a victory, with David in second.

I liked this game. The auction was almost too straightforward - just a plain progressive bid. The game provides you with relatively light but important decisions about what you need to acquire, but there is a little added element of keeping track of what other people need and trying to block them. The game also has a decent social element, as you interact in trying to influence people to spend money, and joke about the actors (who's names are parodies of the names of real actors) have been put in which films. Another nice offering from Mr. Knizia, and a welcome reprint. This would be a nice Euro-intro for people who like movies and party games.

It seemed weird to only play one game, but it was getting a little late, and, being a weeknight and having work in the morning, I called it quits. The PR game had ended, and Scepter broke up while I was getting ready to go, with Dan emerging victorious.


GG, GL
JW

Games at Snoozefest's: Ligretto, Snapchen Jagd (I'm pretty sure I spelled them both wrong, but I'm too late, and too lazy, to check)

Saturday, January 13th

After a long day of coaching wrestling at the DSA Duals, I managed to keep myself from logging on to World of Warcraft, and made my way through the woods to Snoozefest's house. Note - If I can, I'm going to start trying to refer to people by their BGG screenname, just to keep things sort of private.

Gaming was well underway by the time I got there, with the six players present involved in Havoc: The Hundred Years War. I haven't played this, so I took a look at the rules and tried to absorb a bit of the game.

This game involves card selection and set building, picking blind from a deck and choosing from a set of face-up cards. Basically, you are trying to build a six card poker hand, with six poker suits numbered 1-18 (I think). There are also a few "dogs", which are zero value cards that act as a wild card for the purpose of suiting. There are a series of battles of the Hundred Years war to be fought (8,iirc). Each battle commences when a player decides to start it, on their turn. Players elect to withdraw from the battle or start a hand. In the end, the player with the best hand wins, and gets the victory points. In most cases, there are points for people who finish in some of the other places. Once all the battles have been fought, the war is over and vps are calculated. This was actually a fairly fun game to watch. I think Sarah won, and I'm not sure of the placings after that.

We took a bit of a break for people to get food and drink, and divide into a couple of groups. Mary had some games she was hoping to play and review, so one table sat down with her new copy of Drive. Ravindra and Sarah and I broke out the Ligretto decks for some frenetic card-slapping.

I've played this a couple times before, and its really the kind of game I'm not that good at - requires constant attention and good memory, combined with lightning reflexes. It's also the kind of game that Sarah, someone who seems constantly focused and full of energy, should be dominant in, and that she was. The game ended Sarah-Ravindra-me, with me being pretty far behind. Although I don't feel I'm going to be really competitive at this game, I actually like it a lot as a sort of warm-up, or maybe something to get you going after a long heavy game - gets the mental juices and the blood flowing, so to speak.

After Ligretto, we were looking for another not so heavy or lengthy game, to keep us on time with the other group. Ravindra pulled out Snapchen Jagd, a trick taking game with six suits. Maybe playing Havoc reminded him of this. I've played several interesting variants on trick taking games over the last year, and this is another that I've enjoyed quite a bit. In SJ, you pick an initial number to be your "good number". Each card you take that matches goes in the good pile, which scores you positive points. All other cards you take go in the negative pile, counting against your score at the end. After each round, you are allowed to discard one number of which you have at least 3 cards. If you have more than 3, you can put the excess in your good pile, and that number becomes your new good number. After the final round, you can do this twice. It was fun trying to get my head around a strategy for taking cards - at first I just tried to avoid every trick, but you can't win without taking something! Finally I got a mental list of the numbers I was trying to build, and started acquiring tricks to work on scoring. In the last round, I got very lucky, taking several tricks with aces, scoring me a lot of points. In the end it was Me-Ravindra-Sarah.

It was fairly late, and I was a little tired, so I decided to call it a night and head home. It was a nice, relaxing evening of gaming, and reminded me that I have to start trying to pick up some of these unique trick-taking games.

GG, GL
JW

Holiday Gaming: Lost Cities, Hey! That's My Fish, San Juan, Gulo Gulo, Citadels

So, WoW has really eaten up a lot of my ambition to leave the house and game, as of late. We'll see if that changes tonight, as it's third Friday of the month, and timt to head for Rick's.

The first couple weeks of the holidays I was sick/recovering, and Kristin and I were in full on stay-at-home mode, induced by the cancellation of our planned trip to Norway. We played a few games of Lost Cities, and she stomped me. Mainly, I remember that I was just a little too willing to start expeditions that I didn't have enough cards to make profitable - and then I never drew them. A fun game, as ever, theme and ease of play ensure that it hits the table over it's strategically deeper cousin, Battle Line, at least in our house.

We made it back to my parents' place in Illinois in early January. I received a couple games as Christmas presents: Lost Valley and Streetsoccer. Unfortunately, neither, as yet, have been played. I managed a quick trip out to the Leupold's shop in Coralville, which was great. It's nice to see that they've been successful, and it was a real pleasure to see old friends like Jerod, Jeff, Cam, etc.. I also traded in some Game of Thrones CCG cards (useless to me now as nobody plays here), and picked up a couple things, including a Power Grid expansion map and Hey! That's My Fish.

Saturday we sat around during the day with my family, and ended up playing four games of H!TMF. Interestingly, my mother won them all. Not normally a strategy game player, she excelled in keeping her penguins going, and picking up higher value ice floes. It says a lot to me, about a game, when my dad will play it three times, back to back. I'm very happy to have acquired this. H!TMF is a light abstract strategy game for 2-4 players, in which you lay down ice floe tiles, each of which has a value (in fish) of 1-3. You take turns moving a penguin, capturing the tile that you leave. You can move as far as you want, in any direction, in a straight line, but can't move over/onto missing tiles or other players' penguins. Once nobody can move anymore, the player with the most fish wins. It plays very quickly, and has a good level of thinking for people in the mood for something light, but not empty. There's a lot to plan for, to try to keep your penguins active, while trying to get small areas cordoned off that only you can move into and score.

Sunday, some old friends from Riverdale stopped by for chatting and gaming. Grahm showed up first, toting a Christmas present his daughter had received, Gulo Gulo, which I had never played. We ran through a round, with me snatching victory (pun intended). Gulo Gulo is a great little kids game, that involves movement down a path which is performed by picking the right colored egg out of a bowl. It has some light strategic decision making elements, a fun dexterity component, and good colors. It's apparently a big hit with Anna, and I'd love to pick up a copy for my sister's kids.

Dave showed up, and we ran through Gulo Gulo again, with Grahm winning. Dave has large hands, which proved to be a bit of a disadvantage, although his aggressive "flick" technique did work out well.

We played a couple games of H!TMF, both of which I won. I managed a big solo area in one of these games, basically because Dave was nice and didn't strand my penguin someplace else, first.

We played, I think, two games of San Juan. I can't remember who won. I think Dave won one, and then maybe I won one.

The finale of the night was Citadels. We all played with two characters. The game ran fine, but bogged down a little bit with people trying to remember the abilities and taking some time drafting. Dave also got the shaft pretty hard over the first three turns, souring him to the game a bit.

Overall, not too much to report here. Looking forward to game night tonight, when I'll take along, I think, Torres and Union Pacific.

GG, GL
JW

Games Day at Dave's: Robo Rally, Samurai, El Grande

December 2nd

I've settled into a couple of regular, monthly gaming events since I came down to NC, and Dave's is one of them. I really look forward to gaming with this group. It's a nice size (7-10), and everyone is generally friendly and interested in strategy games. I'd like to get in the habit of visiting a local gaming store, but All Fun N Games just seems a little too far away on a Thursday night, and I haven't been too tempted to return to Sci Fi Genre Mondays. Even though my Monday night soccer practice has ended, I guess coaching wrestling has lessened my ability to game on weeknights. I had really hoped that, by now, I'd have settled into a regular schedule of gaming.

Games are important to me. I really enjoy the mental activity, as well as the socialization. However, somehow, the hobby still maintains an aura of triviality when I'm trying to prioritize activities. It would certainly be different if Kristin played. With her rigorous grading responsibilities, we really have to take advantage of the time she's able to relax a little. If she gamed, well, that would move gaming up the scale considerably. Since she doesn't, It really limits my availability. Of course, work gets in the way too! With this in mind, I'd really like to get into a weekly groove that both of us could expect. The way things have gone here, with me travelling to people's game nights, which are usually monthly, I presume it would look like this: One week at Rick's, one week at Dave's, one week at AFnG, and one week at Larry's. Possibly, an event of my own, either at home or at Broad Street Cafe, would replace one of the last two. I'd like to run a monthly invitational day for a lot of the classic/longer play games that I own, that don't see the table much. I'm sure I've expressed that before...

On to the day at Dave's:

Robo Rally

I was late to arrive. I'm still getting used to the area, and some construction forced me into an alternate route. With my mind on other things, I took some wrong-turns executing my new plan, and ended up quite late. Thankfully, I got there just as Rick was entering the final part of his explanation of the Robo Rally rules, and I'm pretty familiar with the game. It's funny, to me - this game, that I consider a classic, had only been played by 3/7 (I think) of our group of gamers. I guess it's just a testament to the number and variety of great board games on the market.

I sarted off with the "revive without damage" add-on, which I joked would be worthless to me, as I wouldn't die. Chris had the valuable "crab-walk" add-on, and Shanthi had the cool big gun, the recoil of which can give you extra "back-up" moves. We played four flags on two boards. It ended up being a little crowded with seven. In particular, the second flag proved a sticking point, surrounded by a pit, with multiple nearby conveyers, pushers, and flamers. I was in good position to hit the flag first to third, but then Keith pushed me off the conveyor and messed up my program. I also got shot up pretty bad, and decided to power down carrying four damage. Unfortunately, my program got messed up again, and I ended up powered down IN a flamer, which hit me for four on my down turn. I crawled out and PD'd again, this time to worse results - pushed into a pit! So, my add-on came in handy after all.

After revival, I got bashed around and shot up and killed again, as I tried to approach the flag from the wrong direction. On the third try I finally got the second flag, while the leaders were hitting the third. I decided to race it out instead of going after the leaders. I might have done the latter, except that we had several new players and the game was really running a bit long for my taste, and I wanted it to end. I made my way toward flag three, as several others were shot-up badly and/or killed. Keith, the first to hit flag two, was in a bad way, on his last life, stalled in PD and getting shot up en route to flag 3. Chris had managed to stay clear of the action, and made it out of flag 3 in style. Leaving us in a cloud of exhaust and fragmented laser crossfire, he got good cards and raced to flag 4 essentially uncontested and claimed a deserved win in a well-played (by him) game.

Nobody was ready for another seven-player marathon, so we split into groups of three and four. The four group consisted of people who wanted to play Lowenhertz. I wouldn't have minded playing again, but since they already had three who were very interested, and Chris needed to teach, I sat out. Lori and Rick and I went through the available games, and decided on Samurai.

Samurai

I've played this game several times, to mixed results (regarding my personal success, not enjoyment). Lori had played before, but Rick hadn't, so we went over the rules quickly and got going. We used random tile draw, which I prefer, especially with new players. I drew a few things early that I'd prefer to draw late, including my tile switch, my ronin, my recycling tile, and my 2 strength navy. This resulted in me jumping out to an early lead, with six trophies compared to two each for my opponents. However, using the tiles for bigger moves in the North had resulted in me not developing presence in the South. At that point, almost any move I would make in a developed area would result in an easy capture for either of my opponents. On the other hand, the game was far enough along that any placement on the third island, which contained only religion and politics, might be wasted as the game would probably end on agriculture. I went with placing my samurai on the island, alone, where they never captured me a piece. Lori and Rick caught up and passed me, and, when the game ended, although I had more pieces than Rick, I didn't have a single majority and finished in third, with Lori winning on a strong rice majority and the largest number of pieces tiebreaker. Good, fun, medium-weight thinking, and still one of my favorites. Lesson learnedv - be certain to get spread out, and save those free tiles for really big moves!

El Grande

There were a bunch of games on the table from before, and when someone suggested El Grande, I certainly didn't hesitate to agree. I haven't played this in a while, and have been wanting to run it. I've never played with three, so this was new to me. I was suspicious it might not work, wondering that there might be too much space on the board.

I shouldn't have worried. The game played out very well, everyone vying for influence on as many fronts as possible. I got myself spread out early, content to get a caballero in every available province. Lori and Rick were pipelining caballeros to the table, upping their presence on the board. I was slower, opting to take an intrigue card on the second turn, to set up scoring opportunities. I moved some of Lori's men out of her home territory, and put mine in, then, as I was going last, I guaranteed myself first chance at the King in the next (last before scoring) round. That let me move the King away before anyone could move in, locking the territory (as well as my home territory) for me, and dealing a pretty big blow to Lori, from which I never recovered. I think I messed up a little doing this. It biased Lori against me for the rest of the game, and my execution of the maneuver kept me from doing the same thing to Rick later - I moved Lori's pieces into Rick's home space, trying to start an escalation battle between them (it was the most valuable start space - 7 to Lori's 6 and my 5). This ended up backfiring as I couldn't take the space by moving Rick's caballeros out and mine in - Lori would still have a lot. Also, it made it one of the most populated spaces when that scoring card came around.

In the second round, I played essentially the same, using an intrigue card to set up scoring opportunities, and then working to grab the King on the last turn. Unfortunately, Rick played his 13 for first, but he didn't take the king, preferring, I think, as scoring opportunity. This let me make some decent scores with relatively small presence, again. At this point, I had pulled a pretty sizeable lead of 16 points or so over Rick, and maybe an additional 8-10 over Lori.

The superior numbers they had on the board started to pay off in the third round, as I was unable for contest for several of the bonus scoring cards that came up, including the 6/7, which gave them both points, as well as the most caballeros in region(s), which gave them both a pile. Rick caught up with, and passed me, on the second bonus score. Fortunately, in the final scoring round, my positioning and constant pre-scoring possession of the King paid off again, and I managed to overtake Rick ftw.

I really enjoyed both of these games, and had a fun afternoon. It was great to be able to play long games, for several hours, with no worries about getting up for work the next day. I would have stayed, and played a couple more games, but it seemed like a good night to head home early and get some dinner out with Kristin. After some nice chatting about games and life, I did just that, and had a great, relaxing evening to cap off a full day.

GG, GL,
JW

Saturday at Ravindra's: Antiquity, Das Zepter Von Zavendor

November 18th

I'm going to start out by thanking Chris, who is one of few people who has really responded to my efforts here. It really is nice to get some actual feedback. Maybe someday, there will actually be some game-related discussion here... Recently, I was very excited, noting that there were five responses (a new record!) to one of my posts (the one about online gaming). Unfortunately, only one post (Chris's) was genuine, with three others being solicitations for some sort of money making scheme, and one being a greeting from an individual who shares my name. Sigh. Back to gaming...

Occasionally, discussion on one of the game-related mailing lists I subscribe to actually culminates in some game-playing. So far, both times have been trips out to Ravindra's place, which is always a treat. Ravindra has an excellent collection that never ceases to provide quite a conundrum - what to play? Several recent acquisitions were offered to the table, and, since all present were strategy gamers who don't mind a long play, we grabbed the chance to engage in a game of that variety, and chose Antiquity.

Antiquity

This is another offering from the designers of Roads & Boats, put out by the same Dutch company, Splotter Spiele. This is a sort of mini-civ building game, involving constructing cities, gathering and managing resources, and damage control. It's a "big" game, with a modular, changeable board, and tons of chits. It looks, honestly, like a bit of a monster. And it is.

In Antiquity, you start with one city. You use your workers to go out and get resources: food/fish, stone/wood, luxury goods, that sort of thing. In turn, you use these items to build new stuff: more resource gathering, inns to expand your control area, new cities. New cities give you more space to build more stuff. The whole time, you produce pollution, ruining the land in your control area. At some point, you need to start working toward victory. You build a chapel, dedicated to one of four saints, each of which gives a different special power, and dictates a different victory condition. When you satisfy that condition, you win.

Most of this game seems to be played solitaire. You start off pretty isolated, and it seems it should take a while to really run into someone. We spent most of the early game just worrying about staying alive, playing almost cooperatively. We shared information about what buildings we thought we should build, ways of dealing with polution and famine, and wondered if we shouldn't have all went out exploring right away (immediately increasing the famine level).

We kept referencing the rules, and generally had things figured out, and kept playing. I didn't really feel like victory was really in sight for anyone, and it didn't seem that all the victory conditions were even really viable. Maybe I just need to play more. I certainly learned one important lesson: DON'T RUN OUT OF WOOD. The game suggestions mention this. And I even read them, aloud. Yet, I did it. I just flat out forgot. This basically stranded me, barely holding on, until Greg took pity on me, built a market, and traded me some wood. Ravindra had to go out for a while, so we decided to just solitaire through the last few turns. Brian was the only one who looked like he could realistically win in a few turns, especially with Ravindra out of the picture. I just wanted to see if I could find a way to stabilize my position and move forward. Brian just called it quits. Well, to make the story end more quickly, Greg found his way to victory, and I figured out how the alchemist worked, and the game, well, ended.

Brian had to go, but Ravindra returned, and the three of us were up for another one. We didn't want to play anything too heavy (Antiquity is a bit of a thinker), or too long (it was getting late). Ravindra pulled down Das Zepter Von Zavandor, which he claimed would "definitely probably finish in around two hours" (which did much to encourage Greg and I...).

The Scepter of Zavandor is a game about accumulating fairy dust and magic gems, to buy more magic gems, to get more magic artifacts, to get more gems, and advance your knowledge of certain things, which gets you more gems, all of which gets you some victory points. At a certain point, you use your fairy dust to buy yourself some sentinels, which give you more victory points, and when enough of them have been purchased, the game ends. There's a lot of game here, and a fair amount of theme. Resource management, auction for artifacts/sentinels, and a sort of tech tree. THis game realy didn't grab me, though. We had a pretty good time playing, and took turns running in the lead. There's a payment penalty for being in first, less for second, so later players get to "draft" off the leader, and judge the best time to surge forward. Ravindra did this, made a ton of money from monopolizing diamonds, and then went #1 with a bullet, repeatedly, consecutively, buying big sentinels.

Scepter is, for me, perhaps prone to a runaway leader problem, despite the handicapping mechanism. If someone makes a lot more money, you really can't stop them from getting what they want, which directly prohibits you from getting it. I'd heard good things about this game, but after this play I haven't found anything to encourage me to seek it out again any time soon.

GG, GL
JW

Game Night at Rick and Marnee's: Robo Rally, Antike, For Sale

November 17th

People were a little slow to arrive at this edition of the monthly gamefest at Rick's. We stood around a while and talked games, while another few people sat in the basement and discussed, I think, nitting. After about half an hour, we finally got enough people to get Robo Rally going, and we hit the factory floor.

Robo Rally

We had six for this: Rick, myself, and four new players. We explained the game and got to racing. We were playing the first edition, using expansion boards. I don't know if I've discussed this game before or not. It's a Richard Garfield (MtG) classic, which involves drawing cards which have movement options on them, and using them to program a robot who's racing through a factory with elements that will effect movement - conveyor belts, pushers, crushers, spinners, pits, etc.. It generally involves a lot of humorous interaction, as people mess up their own or others' programs. The game got off to a good start, with almost everyone taking advantage of board elements to enhance their movement. Many of us capitalized on a long oil slick. About two thirds of the way to the first flag, things got interesting, with some miss-moves and collisions resulting in pushes. Rick made it to the flag very efficiantly, while I got stuck moving back and forth facing another player, shooting each other at each phase. This was, as RR usually is, lots of fun. However, at this point in the game, Ravindra and Chris were starting up Antike, which I really wanted to try, so I bailed out. I usually won't (almost never) abandon a game. However, RR is a game you can get out of without really affecting other players' enjoyment/position, so I didn't feel too bad about it. I don't know who won, but I know they had so much fun they played another round, with more players.

Antike

There is a newish Rio Grande reprint of this German game, for which Ravindra owns the original. I don't know the designer off the top of my head. This is a sort of civ building game, with a very small tech tree. It uses an interesting rondel (sp?) for action selection - you get one power/action type per turn, and you can choose any with in three spaces of you, or you can pay to move further around the circle (something I should have done, at least once, but didn't). You can harvest different raw materials, build different things (temples/units), or move/attack. You score points from accomplishing a variety of different goals over the turns, and play until someone hits nine points.

There was a lot of solitaire play in this, as each player is pretty isolated. It really seemed to me that you spend most of the game just doing what's best for you. There is a race element, for different victory points/tech powers that drives some consideration of opponents, but there's not too much negotiation/direct conflict. Ravindra jumped out to an early lead, and pretty much stayed there. I made a huge mistake in the last round, when I could have paid to take a victory point that would have moved me out of my tie for last, and kept him from winning that turn. However, I knew I was going to score something else, and didn't see his impending victory. The pacing of this game is important - it's hard to score, and especially hard to score multiple points in a turn, so you really have to keep up. Ravindra was first, Scott was two behind in second, and Chris and I were a point behind him, in third/fourth. This was pretty fun, and came in at about two hours. I'd play again, although it won't be near the top of my list.

For Sale

Chris and Ravindra and I sat around chatting about games for a while, waffling on playing another game. Chris was ready to go all night, but Ravindra and I were feeling the call our respective beds. We decided on a quick filler, while Chris waited for the second RR game to finish.

For sale is a game of investing in real estate properties. Each round, a number of houses equal to the number of players are put up for big. Each has a unique value, which will determine, to some extent, how much it's worth at the end. There is an auction phase, in which the first to pass takes the lowest, the high bidder gets the highest, and the second to pass pays half his bid, rounded up, and takes the second highest card. After all the houses have been auctioned, there are several rounds in which checks are turned up. Each player makes a hidden bid of one of his properties. Highest value property gets the high check, second high value gets second high check, and so forth. After all the checks have been handed out, you count them up, add them to remaining starting cash, and the person with the most money wins. Chris had $81, and Ravindra and I tied at $86. Ravindra won the tie breaker of having the most starting cash left. A fun little filler. This is a type of game I think my collection is a little weak on, so I might try to pick it up.

With that, I made my way out the door, a little jealous of Chris, Rick, and some others who were setting up Power Grid.

GG, GL
JW

Game Night at Dave's: Maharaja (PBiI), Winner's Circle

November 7th

Again, I'm lagging behind. It seems that my first impulse on sitting down at the computer is to open WoW. No, it hasn't worn itself out yet, although I can see my interest waning a little bit.

So, back to boardgaming... The all-too-infrequent game night at David's place rolled around on the calendar, and I was happy to work my way down to the South side of town for some pawn pushing.

This is usually an event for strategy games, so I brought some relatively new acquisitions I'm hoping to get on the table: Union Pacific and Volldampf. I brought one other game, but I can't remember what it was. In the end, we decided on Dan's copy of Maharaja. I'm always happy to play another Kramer/Kiesling game.


Maharaja

Maharaja is an area influence game, in which you build/earn in different cities each turn, scoring points in the city currently being visited by the Maharaja. Which city he will visit can be manipulated a little, but, in general, he follows a specific path.

I focused on building central palaces (worth the most points for the $) in as many cities as possible, and tried to develop those cities for scoring. If I did anything important, it was changing the order of the Maharaja a little earlier than people expected, which disrupted other peoples' ability to get money, and left me with a fat pile of cash in the mid-game. After this, though, it was a question of me using my money to play catch-up, and getting myself into a position where I could win. I had all these clever moves in my head... but then there just wasn't time for them. Most of your moves in this game have to be geared toward getting those palaces on the table, and you can't affor too many moves that just mess with other people or set up your position, so you have to make them count. In the end, it was a close finish between myself, Dan, and Keith (who triggered the game end, if I remember correctly), and I pulled out the W. Fun.

Winner's Circle

After this, we had just a little time, so David pulled out Winner's Circle, which was also new to me. This is a Reiner Knizia game of betting on horse racing. We played one race, which was enough to grasp the basics of the game. Each race, you place secret bets on three horses, one of which is a null bet. Multiple people can bet on the same horse. There's an element of bluffing, using your null bet to get people to believe you'll help them move a horse. Also, there's the realistic cooperation - multiple people on one horse they want to move together to guarantee a share of the spoils. Each turn, you roll a die, and choose a horse to move. Different horses move different distances for each type of die roll. Top three finishers place and pay off. I don't remember anything outstanding as far as strategy in this game, just that I ended up third, in the middle of the pack. One thing that really struck me about this game is that it could easily fit right into the comfort area of traditional American family games. It's nice and light, with an engaging theme, and features the obligatory dice rolling. However, it does involve decision making, planning, and negotiation (to a certain extent), making it enjoyable on a somewhat deeper level.

GG, GL
JW

Online Gaming

The weather is getting colder. My friend Paul contacted me the other day, and in conversation he noted that in the winter he often has strong desire to bunker up and spend hours playing computer rpgs. I'm not sure if it's seasonal or not, but I know I go through cycles of computer gaming desire/repulsion. Recently, I felt the urge again.

Spielbyweb.com

I've been using sbw for a while, but I've been in a real frenzy lately. A lot of my games have just ended, so if anyone's up for some gaming, let me know. I really like being able to just take a quick move whenever my turn comes up on e-mail. It's so convenient.

So far, I'm really enjoying Reef Encounter and Hacienda. The turns play pretty quickly, and the game moves along at a good pace. I'm not as happy with Santiago and Amun-Re, in which there are a great number of stopping points that hold up the game progress, and make it extra-frustrating when you have a slow player. I haven't tried Tikal yet.

The game of Hacienda I just finished reinforced the idea that going for as many market connections as possible is good. I started with a corner water opening, and then moved to the middle, connecting to all but one market ftw. In the game I have still going on, players are being more confrontational, with one player spending his opening moves completely isolating one of the side markets. It will be interesting to see how this develops.

The Amun-Re game that also just ended saw a three way tie for 2nd, as Thies pulled a huge second round ftw, and I made the second most second round points, to go from the basement into the second place tie. I think I failed to make enough money in the first round, and got unlucky card draws, with something like 10 free farmers and 9 master builders(you can only play one per turn, for 6 turns) over the course of the game. I do like the way this game makes you think about the future, and I'd like to own a copy irl.

World of Warcraft

Lots of my friends have been deeply involved in mmorpgs over the years. I've mostly resisted, although I've tried my hand at Ultima Online and Runescape. Recently, WoW went on sale and, when Sean picked it up, I decided I'd give it a go at the same time.

I've spent the expected (way too many) hours on the game since purchasing it a week or so ago. I'm pretty happy with it, though. I think they've done a fine job of designing game content that can be satisfactorily played as an individual or with a group. One caveat, though, is that few of the quests really involve critical decision making, and are fairly repetitive. I doubt the game will hold my interest for more than four months, although I guess that's a pretty long time...

I've played mostly on my own, but have enjoyed grouping with old friends from NH (Sean), and CA (Chris). I've grouped with people I didn't know when it was clear we were finishing up the same quest. I'm interested to see how enjoyable it will be to form groups with people I don't know. I'll probably wait until I understand the game a little better - I don't want to really frustrate anyone. While I'm mostly interested in the game as a way to keep in touch with old friends, in a recent conversation with my friend Bob (I'll take this moment to publicly congratulate Bob on being voted into the Magic: the Gathering Hall of Fame), he stated that he was mainly interested in playing with people he was not previously acquainted with. Bob is also pretty serious about pursuing the most competitive way to do things, so he probably gets the most out of it this way.

So, if you play WoW, and you're interested in gaming together, drop me a note and I'll let you know which server I'm playing on, and I'm sure you can get a character to my level pretty quickly, as I only recently started. I'm at the point where I'm trying to get friendly people together for Ragefire Chasm.

GG, GL
JW

Games at David's: Tikal, Saboteur, Black Vienna

October 24th

First, I apologize (for anyone who actually reads this regularly) for this post being out of order, as well as for having gotten so far behind. I'll be pretty much caught up, though, at the end of today.

It's always nice to drive down to David's place for some friendly gaming. Tonight's gaming was to focus on Santiago, one of my favorites. However, we had eight people. Santiago really shines with five, so David and the people who really wanted to try it played that, while Larry, Dan, and myself played Tikal, another game that I'm happy to play pretty much any time, and works fairly well with three.

Tikal

Larry got a big start, moving just far enough into an area that Dan and I hadn't committed workers to, and building up a temple. Larry, sitting to my left, also kept drawing the treasure tiles, meaning I wasn't getting too many of them. Dan and I were stuck fighting over some smaller stuff waiting for the board to develop. When the first scoring round hit, Larry was well in the lead, with me bringing up the rear. The middle of the board started to fill out. Unfortunately, I didn't draw any tiles that would allow a big move, such as a big temple, or a blank tile to get access to one at the right time. I did make modest gains, though, as Dan and I were more successful spreading into the middle of the table than Larry. Things continued in this way. I got on the wrong side of the board, although I was pretty much by myself with a couple temples, as I had not placed a camp until after Dan and Larry had placed both of theirs. On the right side of the board, Larry had put the last treasures and a good sized temple where he and Dan would fight over them. Dan was stronger, though, and took the lion's share of the points. This gave him the lead, with me pulling into second, and Larry ending up in third. It was a fairly tight finish, though, to a dynamic game. A good play of Tikal, which made me feel that it's important, in a three player game, to get pieces on the table and spread out, in the early game, with an eye on espansion potential in the midgame, while working to create personal scoring areas for the later game. It's dangerous to let this turn into a fight between two players, who are ignoring a third.

Larry had brought one of his favorites, Saboteur, which we decided to try next. We joined the remaining players from the other table for this.

Saboteur

This is a light group cooperation/hidden traitor card game. The players have the role of dwarves, who are trying to mine for gold. However, 2-3 of the dwarves are working toward their own agendas, and are trying to keep the other dwarves from reaching the gold. There are three face down cards, 2 coals, and one gold, that are six card lengths away from the start. Players can play tunnel cards onto the table, or sabotage another dwarf's equipment, or play cave in cards on the tunnels that have been built. There's a really interesting conversational dynamic in the mid game, as players try to figure out who's on their side. Some of our players took some delight in making this harder for people. In the first game, I was a saboteur, and we won. In the second game, I was part of the regular group, and lost.

Black Vienna

This is a deduction card game with note-taking, similar in some ways to Sleuth. It's out of print, but apparently there's a version available as a free download. David had used this online resource to make his own set.

In this game, there is a deck of cards with each letter of the alphabet, plus an o with an umlaut (sp?). All the cards are dealt out secretly, except three, and each player notes what they get. The object is to be the first to correctly guess the three that have been removed. Of course, if you guess and are wrong, you can't win.

There are three cards face up, which each have three letters. On your turn, you can give a card to someone, and they have to say how many of those letters they have. They put a suitable number of markers on the card, and it stays in front of them. Later, players have the option to move cards that have no markers on them to other players.

My note taking skills were not good, and at least once I recorded responses under the wrong player (David's responses in Dan's column). This meant that I spent a fair amount of the midgame trying to check my notes while the game was progressing around me. Apparently, my system for note-taking was fairly poor, as I was quite far from figuring it out when Dan won the game. This was fun, though, and I'm sure I'll get more chances to play this, and it's cousin Sleuth, at David's.

With that, it was time to end the night and get some sleep before work.

GG, GL
JW

Eurorails with Chris

October 30th

Chris and I hadn't gamed for a while, so, Sunday, while playing Dune, we discussed getting together to play some games on my day off (a teacher workday for DPS). I ran some errands in the morning, and Chris came over in the later afternoon. We had a few hours, and could play something a little heavier. I received Eurorails through ebay a while back, and Chris was very familiar with playing it 2-player, so we decided to give it a go.

This is one of Mayfair's crayon-rail games. A pickup and deliver game, on a map of Europe, that involves making connections by drawing in crayon on the board as you build track. You build based on contracts that you get, which require you to bring goods of one type to specific places. The individual goods are only produced in certain areas, so you build, based on your contracts, to do more building. Later in the game, you try to build to harder to get goods, in order to satisfy higher value contracts. The game ends when someone has connected to seven cities and has 250 million in money.

I expected Chris to win, and he did. I didn't do too poorly, though, and would have met the victory conditions in two turns. The big turning point in the game, I think, was when I had a set of not very desirable contracts, which I flushed (wasting a whole turn) only to replace them with even less valuable cards. The only way I could see making these cards valuable was going up into Scandinavia, which seemed like a poor proposition. I didn't want to waste another turn, so I kept them, and built up North. This slowed my expansion West into more desirable territory. It did pay off for over 100 million in big contracts on my second to last turn, and provided me with all the resources needed to finish the game. I just didn't have enough time. I guess that's the whole point, though. There was a little bit of a feeling that the game was playing me, though, as, often, it seemed I just had obvious choices to make with the contracts/building. At least they were choices, though.

This was pretty fun, a nice way to spend my day off, and I'm happy I own it. I'm sure I'll get to play some more, and knowing the crayon rails system will certainly be helpful.

GG, GL
JW

Dune, with five players

October 29th

I was fortunate enough to get an invite over to David's for a game of Dune. This is something I've wanted to try for a long time, as the comments on BGG are intriguing. I'm not a big fan of the story - I never finished the book (only one attempt to read - when I was about 12), but now I'd like to at least see the movie again.

Dune is an old Avalon Hill classic, out of print since the early eighties, aside from a reprint in French, by Descartes, which I believe is also now out of print and somewhat hard to find. The old AH copies that come up on eby generally go for 40-80 dollars. I've managed to pick up a very slightly incomplete set for $35. This is a quite complicated game, and I don't think I'll explain much of it here. Doing a search for one of the Dune fan sites would give you the best background, if interested.

Today's game was Dan (who brought and explained the game), David (the host), Chris, Lori, and myself. We were one player short, so we left out the Bene Gesserit (sp?). I was the Guild. Basically, the players are trying to control four of the strongholds to win the game. The Fremen have an alternative victory condition, and, if nobody else wins by the end of the 16th turn, the Guild does. Each group has special powers and advantages, and the game has a unique combat system based on commiting and expending forces and leaders of various strengths, using a cool combat wheel.

A worm card, which signals an opportunity to form binding alliances, came up quite early. Since I was the only new player, and only needed to keep others from winning, I sat out of the alliances, hoping the other players would fight between themselves and basically ignore me. This worked, for the most part, although it didn't make for a very exciting game for me. The alliances were Dan (fremen) with Lori (emperor), and David (Harkonnen) with Chris (Paul Muad Dib). I made a few poor decisions in the early game, and then basically sat out and watched for a while. Near the end of the game, I started commiting troups to the board. In the last couple turns, I tried to tie up battles in key spaces to keep people from winning. In the end, neither alliance was able to break through, so I got the game.

This is a long game, and took us almost six hours. I really enjoyed it though, as it presents a lot of different opportunities for decision making, and is thick with theme. I look forward to playing again, with six players, and trying different factions. I think we could certainly make it faster by enforcing the time limit on bidding, and just getting people to play a little quicker. As it was, it was a fine way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

GG, GL
JW

Halloween Party at the Prasad's: Ligretto, Liar's Dice, Hart an der Grenze, Nacht der Magier
Saturday, October 28th

Halloween was coming around and we were lucky enough to be invited to a party out at the Prasad castle. I'm thankful we've been able to make friends quickly enough to have social opportunities like this.

The costume theme was medieval. Unfortunately, the various costume elements I utilized during my six summers as a character at the Bristol Rennaissance Faire are languishing in a cardboard box someplace in a barn in Western Illinois. Since Kristin and I have been so busy, and, well, neither of us is handy enough with sewing to come up with anything suitably "medieval," we ran out to the party store on Saturday morning. Thankfully, we were early enough to beat the majority of the crowd. I grabbed the fairly appropriate and simple medieval monk costume, complete with ridiculous monk-hair wig. Kristin didn't really like any of the costumes, and settled for a simple nun get-up, that looked like it could be re-used as a part to other costumes.

Late in the afternoon, we jumped in the car and made the drive out into the countryside. This is a beautiful drive, at a wonderful time of year, and put us in a pretty good mood.

Upon our arrival, there was a game of Ursuppe going on, and several people sitting around. There were a bunch of cards sitting on the table where we were sitting, and, in turns, Brian and Ravindra variously explained the game, Ligretto, to us, as well as to Greg and Michelle.

Ligretto

This is a simple card game. There are several (I think four) colors, with numbers 1-9. You have four face up cards, and a table deck of ten from which replacements for them will be drawn. The rest of your share of the cards (all of them are delt out) is in your hand. The object is to work through the ten cards in the table deck. You do this by playing cards, in order from one on up, on top of each other in sequential order, out on the table. The first to empty their deck has a score of 0 plus the number of cards they've played. Everyone else has negative points for each card remaining in their deck.

We played two rounds, getting various rules wrong, and not really keeping score. This was a hectic, intense game, not really my cup of tea for a relaxed game evening, but a fun exercise for a party mindset. We all enjoyed it.

Liar's Dice


We were joined by two more people, who's names I've forgotten (sorry). There was some sort of contest going on, playing LD for chocolate coins. We didn't stay until the end of the evening, so I don't know if anything ever came of it. The first game was a learning game, and I won, without losing any dice (my first real victory at this game). The second game I also won. We played a third round, which Kristin won (her first group game victory, of any kind, in NC). I sat out the fourth round, which had a thrilling conclusion with admirable bluffing by Michelle.

After this, we were read a scary story by Sarah, and ate dinner, which was a splendid affair involving sausage, chicken, tasty potatoes, and green beens. There was a brief media interlude to watch the "Hush" episode of Buffy, and then we had a play-dough sculpting contest. After that, there was more gaming.

Hart an der Grenze

Mary wanted to get a game of Hart an der Grenze going, so Kristin and I jumped in on that, along with the couple from Liar's Dice who's names my brain is inadequate to remember. I had a huge first round, with tons of contraband, putting me well in the lead and putting a big target on my back. I still had a good round the second round, guessing and bribing fairly well, and getting some good stuff through. However, the final round was terrible for me. I was dealt nothing big, and was searched about every time, with nobody accepting bribes. I only took a few points through. Mary won, and Kristin also passed me handily, especially with Mary managing to hide three big idols under her case.

Nacht Der Magier

Mary wanted us to get a chance to play another one of her new acquisitions before we left. NDM is a neat game that is played in the dark. The board is raised off the table and has several dark disks on it, which are surrounding several cylindrical pieces, which each have a glow in the dark symbol on the top, which in turn are surrounding a hole in the board, which is covered. Players each have a pushing piece, and are trying to get one of the cylinders with their symbol on it into the hole. Your turn consists of edging your pushing piece onto the board, stopping when you hear something fall off the edge of the board and hit the table. This is a very quick, fun little game that is perfect for Halloween parties. I'm glad we got a chance to play it. I don't remember who won, except that it wasn't Kristin or I.

After this, it was time to head home, as it was getting fairly late. I'm sure the gaming went on well into the night, though.

GG, GL
JW