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Archive for Loofish
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Who's the more foolish? The fool or fool that plays after the fool?
United States
DURHAM
North Carolina
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Putting together my last blog post made me realize I had neglected the last game night summary, so a belated one from the end of April.
We gathered at Tom's for this evening of games, with his girlfriend Susanna joining us. She is new to the delights of these kind of games (she learned Ticket to Ride just before this night) but she was willing to learn and even cooked us a rather tasty lasagna to fortify us for the evening's entertainment.
We began with the gateway classic, Carcassonne. First game for Susanna but the battle was really Tom v J, with two aggressive moves key moments: Tom got a 2nd meeple on the road he and Susanna were building (a long one too as it turned out) and J maneuvered into my (cathedral) city with her big meeple. Tom completed his long road but J was 1 tile short - that I drew but didn't play as I wasn't getting the points. A lesson in a time for sharing in Carcassonne.
J: 107
Me: 77
Tom: 112
Susanna: 77
Next game of choice was Bohnanza. I am "in the process" of writing a review for the Voice of Experience contest so it was good to get this to the table. It did remind me quite well why I enjoy this game so much. Lots of wheeling and dealing, with Susanna getting into the game fast. I pushed for deals a lot, many not that beneficial for me but the karma worked in my favor as some of that good will came back to me later on. For some reason, green beans were especially good for me this game. In any case they helped propel me to a beany victory.
J: 12
Me: 18
Tom: 16
Susanna: 15
Mike joined us at this point and he was keen to play his beloved Bang!, with the Dodge City expansion. I played this a lot when it first came out, but Mike and Tom (who worked together) played it through the expansions and still love it.
Mike was the Sheriff and had a ton of stuff. I was to his left and an Outlaw but all I got was beer and whisky - and Tom stole that. So I got to watch most of the game. A lot of us thought J the other Outlaw as she was acting a little oddly looking at Mike's stuff, but it was a ruse - she was the Deputy and Tom my partner - we did quite a bit of damage to each other before the rest took us out. Susanna was the Renegade - a role that is somehow drawn to people playing for the first time. She did pretty well in an impossible situation, but both lawmen were still standing when the rest of us were down.
Mike aka Sheriff Sid Ketchum: Win
Me aka Outlaw Pat Brennan: Lose
Tom aka Outlaw Rose Doolan: Lose
Susanna aka Renegade Slab the Killer: Lose
J aka Deputy Molly Clark: Win
My friend Rick describes Bang! as everyone plays some cards and then someone wins. That was pretty much what happened here. Not that I am bitter about losing or anything.
Susanna had had 3 new games and wanted a break, so the 4 of us played our newest game, Qwirkle. I'd picked it up after reading Eric Martin's piece about Hidden Depths, but we are still in the shallows. It started slowly for me - I discarded tiles on my first turn - but I was also first to score a qwirkle. Tom made a good start and made the next qwirkle too, but I caught him and J scored steadily, with Mike a little behind. Then I had a sequence of turns with 4 qwirkles in 5 turns which threw me into the lead. Tom ended the game with no one able to catch me.
J: 94
Mike: 77
Me: 104
Tom: 81
At this point, it was quite late - funny how that happens. But a most satisfactory evening.
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Who's the more foolish? The fool or fool that plays after the fool?
United States
DURHAM
North Carolina
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May 12th:
With 5 of us, after a delicious grilled chicken dinner, I pull out Small World. First time for me with 5 players and first time at any number for Jess. It would get crowded quickly.
J pays down the line for Berserk Ratmen and rampages around, while my Forest Orcs are more restricted in the rampaging but do find a few trees which makes them happy. Tom gets the Stout Tritons and makes for the lake. Mike comes in from the top with Bivouacking Skeletons and Jess from the bottom with the Commando Wizards. Tom suffers first - squashed from top and bottom by Mike and Jess, while J also gets some pain from the Skeletons. I mostly remain to myself, but start to pick on both J and Jess as we begin to run into each other (and I see too many points for pointy hats and goofy teeth). In fact the Rats are first to decline, giving way to Heroic Giants, who take up positions in the northern mountains (checking the expansions of the skeletons), but they are themselves checked by Tom's Dragonmaster Trolls, who in the process of gaining a little payback at the expense of Mike's skeletons hem in the giants' access to good places to invade (troll lairs don't count as good places to invade). Jess and I are last to turn over a new race, she takes the Seafaring Sorcerers (best said with a lisp) and I pay a buck or two to get the Flying Amazons, who attempt to stem the tide of points that the magic combo of races is giving Jess. I can't avoid leaving a few vulnerable spots though and Mike, who had taken Diplomatic Elves, picks on me, as does Jess who steals away some Amazons and teaches them dark magic. Both Tom and J run out of steam again and Tom takes the Mounted Humans for a ride (a great combination by the way), while J takes on the last turn the race no one wants - the Dwarves. Merchant Dwarves too, meaning the lowest possible number of counters, but for one turn, it works very well. In the final accounting, I was surprised to see that Tom had come up on the rails though i just held him off, but J had jumped ahead with the inspired dwarven pick. But it was Jess who had worked her first timer magic for the clear victory.
J: 79
Me: 75
Tom: 74
Mike: 65
Jess: 88
After that epic tale we wanted something a little lighter and quicker. I'm looking around my shelves and spy High Society, a game I got in trade and have not played much at all. In logging the game, I realized I have not played it in SIX YEARS and no one else at the table had played it at all. Let's give it a try, think I.
A brief rules recap, though for this that is brief enough: 10 items to bid upon, with each of us holding an identical set of cash cards. No change can be made, so if you use your $10M, it is gone. In addition to the goodies are 3 x2 tiles (which double the value of your acquisitions and 3 bad tiles: a thief steals one, the gambling debts are a -5 tile and the tax evasion halves your total. Game ends as soon as the 4th multiplier tile is revealed (including the x 1/2). The important extra wrinkle is that the player holding the least money in hand at the end can't win, so spend but not more than everyone else!
In our game, Jess gets hit with the Tax (x 1/2) early on, though the rest of us did spend to avoid it. Mike and Tom battle Jess for the x2 tiles, Mike gets the 9 as well. Tom is sitting with just the x2 for a long time, while J and I hold a few low items but with cash reserves in hand. Tom finally gets something to double - the 8 right before the end of the game and then the game is down to Tom and Mike and their cash reserves. Mike has 2 more points - but also $2M less, making him the poorest and out of the running. Tom is left standing with $20M and J and I, especially, reflecting on our unspent millions.
Tom: 16
Mike: 18 (lowest $)
Jess: 7
J: 4 (but at least she got the red sports car)
Me: 7
This got an immediate request for a 2nd play. We did correct a slight misplay (though it affected the play quite a lot) as we had just bid then paid afterwards, whereas you are supposed to lay down cards for your bid and can only use what is in your hand to add to your bid. We did it correctly this time. Determined not to be left holding my wallet this time, I bid hard for the castle (9) and get it, but the next 2 that come out are the island (10) and the 8 tile. So Mike and Tom have also got good tiles. Mike actually gets the 6 as well, putting him in a cash short but otherwise strong position. This time Tom and Jess get the x2 (which also leaves Tom low on cash). But when the Thief comes round, Tom puts down his $25M, forcing Mike to take the hit, costing him his 6 tile. J is having a little trouble with the numbers she needs to match bids and her gains are set back by the gambling debt, while Jess gets the 7 tile to double. The game ends with 3 of us scoring 16, with Tom 8x2, me 9+4+3 and Jess with (7+1)x2. Tom is out as he has but $13M left. Tie-breaker is highest single tile - I also won on ready cash left in hand. Whew!
Tom: 16 (lowest $)
Mike: 10
Jess 16 (7 high)
J: 2
Me: 16 (9 high)
We had a lot of fun but particularly gratifying is seeing the reaction of the table to High Society - it really struck a chord with the table. There will be further requests for this one and it definitely won't be 6 years till I play it again!
Tue May 15, 2012 12:00 am
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Who's the more foolish? The fool or fool that plays after the fool?
United States
DURHAM
North Carolina
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Game night at my house and it had been a little while. We have a semi-established tradition of having the host pick the game or at least a short-list. Two of the group were coming straight from an after-work drink, celebrating the achievements of their project - or is it commiserating its end? So I made a joke that we should play a complex resource management economic game with arcane rules for interconversion of resources. This hid my latent indecision about what we should play.
There would be five of us, if everyone showed (which they did, but last minute emergencies happen). Our last session at my house featured Hansa Teutonica, plus one of our group had not played it, so that was a strong possible - except one of our group had disliked it. I had the fall back position of Agricola, which at least 3 of us need to play more. Or there was the choice that I took, echoing the joke I'd made, which was repeated when they actually arrived. But in my defence, I was very keen on finding out how it played with 5.
So we played The Scepter of Zavandor. In hindsight, perhaps the wrong choice for this particular Friday night. Some of my previous experience in learning this game myself was painful and the game ran way too long but with a good teacher who could cut through the airy explanation of what enchanting the gems really meant (it's money, invest in gems to build an income, spend it on stuff to get more income). I gave the briefest overview and then taught by showing rather than saying, which most of the table prefers: make mistakes and learn from that.
Which is not to say the choices were a little overwhelming for some. Progress was made and the game was developing towards its conclusion. But one thing we found was that there was too much down time meaning attention wandered; there was more chatter than usual, possibly as a result of work events - as, I mentioned, the last day of a project for two of our merry band, which led to speculation as to what was going to happen next. So, despite my best intentions, the game ran long and it began to defeat us by attrition. Mike, the most into economics at the table, was able to put the money down for a sentinel first (at, I might add, the four and a half hour mark) and we as a group decided he was the winner. A shame we could not complete it as I thought it was developing to a good finale. Mike was ahead on the back of his regular income and mass of diamonds. J had a mixed diamond/emerald spread, building up her gems still, but with a mass of artifacts (she took the cheaper artifacts knowledge first). Tom was moving up, having mortgaged the druid's hut to get the first ruby, he was building back up with emeralds and slowly adding more rubies. I went with sapphires and lots of them, pushing the knowledge and acquiring both belt and wand to maximize my space. Rick was working sapphires too, but got the chalice of fire. To be fair, he seemed most affected by the down time factor, as well as the after work drinks factor.
I'd have liked to have seen the true end. Would my sapphire capacity enabled me to get the sentinel points I needed? Would Tom's late move power him to victory? Would Mike just power away from us?
Not the right choice in hindsight and I doubt they will let me inflict it on them again. First impressions count for a lot with games.
Mon Apr 16, 2012 11:43 pm
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Who's the more foolish? The fool or fool that plays after the fool?
United States
DURHAM
North Carolina
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March 20th:
A return to a beloved classic. Puerto Rico was the game that brought me to BGG. I read a bunch of the strategy articles and encouraged the rest of my group to do so as well. I recall winning a game with much abuse of the Factory and Harbor and then people didn't want to play it so much.
However, it does still get the occasional outing. The time required is part of the barrier, but this year we have moved away from our lunch time sessions and into evening ones, so the 90 minute games are back on the table - in both senses of that phrase.
As it had been a considerable while since we last played this, a full refresher was needed. Tom got a (large) Indigo Plant right away, while Kristi and Rick (in the corn spots) both got Small Markets. I got a Small indigo Plant, then a Small Warehouse, with my eye on a Coffee Roaster as I was the only one with that plantation. Kristi got tobacco and the first trade which enabled her to get the Tobacco Storage she needed. Rick was playing the diversified game, with his first 5 plantations 1 of each type, he got sugar first though. My indigo got me the cash for the coffee roaster and that in turn got me the Factory, and so my game was set, with 3 goods (with corn) then 4 with sugar. I got the Harbor and Wharf later on, fueling my late run on delivery VPs. Rick had made the early running there, with Tom often blocked out as he hadn't acquired a warehouse, that was costly. Both he and Kristi had the Construction Hut though and his Hacienda as well meant he filled his plantation and had 4 quarries by the end (Kristi had 3), so Tom bought the first and last big building (Residence and Guild Hall), though Kristi did best with her City Hall. I had delayed getting my big building, which meant I was left with Fortress, while Rick's early VP chips meant he was keen on the Customs House - though he later saw it wasn't getting him as many points as he thought as his deliveries slowed in late game competition. He did achieve his 5 good Factory though. Game end triggered by the last of the colonists on the ship and it was close - despite me getting the 3 prime buildings (Kristi acquired her own wharf late on too) I won by a single point. To be honest, I had not realized Kristi was so close behind and had an opportunity to deny her boat space at the end, but I didn't analyze the situation too much, I was already late to meet my wife. Still, that was the only mistake I can clearly see I made - other than providing helpful advice to my opponents. 
Me: 23 + 22VP + 5(Fortress) = 50
Tom: 19 + 14VP + 6+6(Guild Hall/Residence) = 45
Kristi: 20 + 22VP + 7(City Hall) = 49
Rick: 19 + 19VP + 4(Custom Hse) = 42
As my 'first love' on BGG, Puerto Rico was my first 10, but I do feel like I don't love it as much as I used to. It has been somewhat eclipsed by Race for the Galaxy, which has greater variety while providing a similar feel of building something. And of course, I have played a lot more games since. Is it inevitable that our love fades?
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Who's the more foolish? The fool or fool that plays after the fool?
United States
DURHAM
North Carolina
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Some good games over this weekend.
My two boys had played a session of HeroQuest with me but the first quest was incomplete. We remedied that on Friday night. Lucky Colin the Wizard held his fire well, waiting for the confrontation with the gargoyle. Quili the Dwarf was quite an effective orc and goblin slayer and celebrated each victory by grabbing the figures involved and charging round the room with the room, re-enacting the battle. The quest completed, we remembered something about our old games of Heroquest: the Saving Up for Better Stuff.
My wife and I played a couple games on Saturday as well. Two old favorites came out, the first being Small World. This game will forever be known as "Why Didn't I Take the Flying Amazons?!"
She started slow with Fortified Trolls, difficult to remove and gaining momentum. I took the Alchemist Ghouls for a nice first turn, then declined and took Pillaging Sorcerors - a ready antidote to Trolls hiding in their fortified lairs. That caused a quick transition into Wealthy Ratmen for her, who swept across the world, reducing the Sorcerors to a token amount in fairly short order. End game approaching, we both declined into our final picks. I saw possibility in Underworld Humans (without having to attack my few remaining Sorcs) while my wife opted for Hill Wizards, who blitzed across a nice 4 regions with bonus points in every one, but was left asking herself at the end, when she fell short by 2 points ... well, I think you can guess.
In the category of new games, I produced Discworld: Ankh-Morpork. We were both Lords and so an interesting battle of control developed, with my wife gaining the initial upper hand and me taking it back slowly with minions from Dimwell and Dolly Sisters. But for a simple game, it seems there are still a few fiddly rules and and unexpected wrinkles. She did not fully understand that Trouble and Control do not overlap (she thought that you could not control a region with Trouble) and had been playing with this false supposition in mind. Neither of us had won when it was cleared up but it soured the whole game for her. In an ill-temper, she commented on the excessive luck and swings of the game, so I wonder if she will even give it another chance, which would be a shame as I thought it was turning out rather well.
I saved the best for last though. Race for the Galaxy has crept up to the top of the heap for me over the last while - a game I liked from early on, but it has taken time to grow on me, surpassing other contenders with its replayability and quick but deep play. This game may have been the best of all worlds.
My wife had the Damaged Alien Factory and went into produce mode quickly. I had Doomed World and held the Imperium Blaster Gem Consortium in my hand. Goals included most consume and most military, along with first to 3 Alien and Uplift. She assembled a mighty military - the Imperium Invasion Fleet made an early appearance. I was Developing - Investment Credits led into Galactic Power Brokers - before swapping my Doomed World for a less doomed one. I briefly had added the Rebel Refinery as well, when the Imperium Planet Buster came online and blew it away. I had some of my own military - Drop Ships - and more in hand. So having Uplift Code out, I Searched for a Chromosome world, getting Clandestine Uplift Lab. It needed defending though, which I accomplished through a Mercenary Fleet and then the Hidden Fortress. There was a moment here when there was a chance she could try her luck destroying the Uplift Lab (likely forcing me to discard to defend it) but she instead used her double Settle to play both Alien Monolith and Alien Guardian. She intended it as a demoralizing move and it largely worked, but I kept going and drawing into New Galactic Order certainly raised the spirits. She got into a late game stall, working on playing some Consume powered worlds (Gambling World?!) but her one use of Gambling World's gamble ability gave her the Rebel Stronghold - she ended the game with the 7/8/9 Rebel worlds in play. Meanwhile I ran into a string of Uplift worlds, settling 2 on her last turn double Settle. That boosted my military to 13 (higher than her's) - giving me that goal. But she had tied me on the Consume goal. I had also played Galactic Genome Project and my wife had no 6-devs in play at all, but when she added up the score of just her cards alone (never mind the pile of PPs she had), it was galling - a score I would have been very happy with. In the end, I got my highest score ever playing RftG - and was comfortably in 2nd place.
Her: 64(!)(for cards) + 9VP + 9PP + 12(goals) = 94
Me: 23(for cards) + 11VP + 2PP + 14(goals) + 6(GalGenProj) + 13(NGO) + 17(Uplift Code) = 86
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Who's the more foolish? The fool or fool that plays after the fool?
United States
DURHAM
North Carolina
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March 9th:
An opener while we finish up pizza, time for mighty monsters to battle over Japanese cities to determine the King of Tokyo. Cyberbunny moves in to Tokyo first and holds out after a battering round to go into the early lead, but then retreats quickly when Gigasaur hits her. Gigasaur holds out for a round too, as well as rolling 6 3s at one point, these two are the early leaders. Kraken gets an Extra Head, building up slowly, while Alienoid gets peeks ahead with the Made in the Lab ability and then some extra turns with Freeze Time (it worked twice too!). Alienoid and Kraken stay behind though (helped by Kraken's Underdog ability) and Alienoid attempts to peg back the front runners with a Fire Blast, but no one dies - it is close. The Bunny then rolls the 3s she needs to get to 20 and that is game.
J aka Cyberbunny: 20
Tom aka Gigasaur: 17
Mike aka Kraken: 12
Me aka Alienoid: 12
King of Tokyo hasn't had as many requests to play of late, but I love it as a light game in this role. Despite the fact that I am so far really bad at it.
Time for the main event. I pulled out Hansa Teutonica, first time for Mike and Tom, first time multi-player for J and I. I had been looking forward to trying this game out properly.
There was immediately a fight over the extra action routes (and some comedy as the "veterans" suddenly realized there were TWO ways into that town!). J took the early lead by getting that extra action and also claiming some key offices - she would score well off people getting extra actions or keys and of extra income and office upgrades. All 3 of us got the 3rd action in fairly short order but I then looked to score the Coellen bonuses (with the office upgrade and extra merchants) and that got me so far, while J scored off her established offices, Mike and Tom boosted their actions to the top and, Tom especially made it count as he built up a network of offices across the board. He was never quite going to link the red cities - J's rapid point gaining meant time was running out - but he got 5 cities linked and worked on boosting his keys too. We didn't really do enough to stop him and with the end game scoring he leaped from third to first on the back of towns and network.
Me: 35
J: 33
Tom: 42
Mike: 25
Mike muttered darkly as the scores were tallied, as his plans never really came together, but I knew this was more of a learning game for all of us. Tom cheerfully acknowledged his own surprise at his victory. My mind has been buzzing at its intricacies and subtleties since last night, truly a game that needs a few plays to get into the swing of it. It certainly plays quickly enough for that to happen, we were done with a shade over 90 minutes with explanation and an evening session could easily include another couple of games. Mike's mutters might put him against it, but I do think he would like it more with a play or two more. Not sure if it has grabbed everyone else enough yet to make it though.
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Who's the more foolish? The fool or fool that plays after the fool?
United States
DURHAM
North Carolina
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We've been catching up on some older TV shows and the one we are currently watching is the one and only season of Freaks and Geeks, a show focusing on the less popular kids in a high school in Detroit. It is often the kind of cringe-inducing comedy that I've enjoyed (masochistically) in the Office, but with Geeks involved, I expected a super-sized order of masochism as the poor geeks got their dreams crushed, though that makes their small victories all the more enjoyable.
So I expected to feel empathy for Sam and the geeks, but one I didn't see coming was for his father Harold Weir. He picks up the game Pit, a game he played with his family, and wants his kids to play it with him. Uh oh, that sounds familiar. The fuller quote that the title of the blog post comes from:
Harold Weir wrote: I'm not swinging an axe, I just want them to play Pit with me. Is that so horrible?
It got me thinking about me forcing my hobbies on the boys. I don't think I do, well not too much. But if you never suggest things then they will never know they exist. So I do suggest. And there was the "play one game then you can watch TV" scam I pulled a few times. But it is for their own good. Too much TV rots the brain.
Perhaps it is better to have them suggest things? That has given me the chance to play War with my youngest quite a few times. But then, he did bring out Ninjato because he is into ninja right now (thanks to Lego Ninjago!). He kicked my butt at it too. Apparently if you clear houses when your opponent doesn't, you win pretty handily.
One other story: the book at bedtime right now is Diary of the Wimpy Kid. Well, it was, but after the first they insisted on the second and now we are on the third one. In one part, the Wimpy Kid is playing a game with his friends called "Magic and Monsters". His Mom is worried about them playing this game, so comes along. She ends up playing too, then gets him to play it with his brother which ends in disaster. But the kids were quite interested in this game. We talked about the original game of Dungeons and Dragons, though I don't have that. We do have some of the Fighting Fantasy solo game books, but then I remembered I had a copy of HeroQuest. I hadn't played it in quite a few years - since before we had kids. My eldest wanted to be the Wizard (naturally enough after reading Harry Potter) and the youngest went with the dwarf, which he named Quili, his own name made into a character from the Hobbit. I took the bad guy role but played the Barbarian as well, to give them a little support. Suffice it to say, my dice rolling technique has not diminished and it was mostly left to my son's dwarf to do the actual goblin slaying. I think I did eventually kill an orc, while the wizard wandered around in a rather care-free manner, pausing only to cast Sleep on a Fimir.
Bed time came too soon that night.
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Who's the more foolish? The fool or fool that plays after the fool?
United States
DURHAM
North Carolina
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Blogging has been lax lately, not really due to lack of content but lack of typing. Though one of the things that kept me regular (apart from the high fiber) was our regular Working Lunch games and those have gone on hiatus due to, well, pressures of work.
The new plan is to meet for an evening session every other week or so and that could work out if we can find the right time. The first Working Dinner was this past Wednesday.
There were five of us at Rick's place, but we were not all ready for the main event, so Rick brought out his Crokinole board for a warm up game while the baby was put to bed. Writing this up, I was shocked to find i haven't played this since 2006! Tom had played since then but it was a first time for Mike, so the old hand and the newbie were partnered up, while Tom and I formed a British alliance.
It started so well for Tom and I as we dominated the first round with a 50 point win. It was poetry in a small wooden puck. All our shots came off. But that was where the dream ended, for Mike found his range and Rick's experience told and our opening game mojo was kidnapped and dumped in the river, as they won round after round, completing a come from behind first-to-100 game then white-washing us in another. Humbling.
For the main event, Rick selected Vegas Showdown. First plays of this mix and match game of casino-hotel development for both Tom and Mike, while I have played it but so long ago it was before I was logging plays. In any case, rules were explained and we began. Rick and Tom both developed their hotel end first, Kristi and I both started with the slots, while Mike pursued a more guarded strategy, building up his supply carefully. After Kristi declared that the Sports Book approach had failed for her, I perversely went with it (having decided that a room called Space Age Sports Book had to be acquired for my place). Tom leaped out in front with several point buildings, notably the Night Club, while Rick sought to fill both casino and hotel areas. I did acquire my Space Age room, smugly feeling I was managing the funds at my disposal well when I made a big error, for while everyone else was saving up, I plumped down for the High Rollers table, blithely forgetting that I needed the prerequisite Table Games first. I thought I was done for, as Mike already had one of them, but when push came to shove, Tom was unwilling to pony up the money to outbid me for it when it came up. Turned out Tom had a plan, for though I had caught up a lot with my own night club, he was saving for the Theater and that 12 points would surely see him home. However, Luck would not be a lady for him and the last large room went down too quickly, triggering the immediate game end. I was behind Tom prior to end game scoring and we both had filled casinos and connections, but my superior revenue meant I jumped passed him to take the win.
Kristi: 39
Rick: 47
Me: 54
Mike: 37
Tom: 51
Vegas Showdown is an odd mix of mechanics that somehow all works together. A bit auction bidding Amun-Re style, fitting stuff together efficiently (Princes of Florence?) with some oddball events mechanic every time a new room became available. Though I got the win largely due to it, I wasn't too sure about the end game timing mechanic, as it ended things immediately, not at the end of a round and you could easily get caught short or not, depending on whether the right or wrong card turned over. Still, I enjoyed the game and this first of hopefully a series of regular evening excursions (not least because it gives us a bit more freedom in our game selection).
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Who's the more foolish? The fool or fool that plays after the fool?
United States
DURHAM
North Carolina
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Things are somewhat amiss in the land of our Working Lunch. Our happy band has been hit by a lay-off of one member and some pressure from two others, so the usual working lunch crew have been absent and look like they will be absent for a little while. Plans are afoot for after work gathering (actually extending the potential scope of the games we play), but for this week, J and I keep the flag flying with some Biblios.
For those unfamiliar, it is a game in 2 parts with the ultimate goal of having the most points in each of 5 categories - Quills, Pigments, Books, Scrolls and Forbidden Tomes (some of those are not the given name in the rules but that gives the idea and reflects the symbols). Each category starts out being worth 3 points, but this can fluctuate due to the Church cards. Most of the cards are in the 5 categories (the numbers on the cards reflect their value, with 2 categories going from 2 to 4 and the other 3 going from 1 to 2. The rest of the cards are Gold, which you use to buy cards in the auction phase.
The auction is the second part of the game, first comes the Gift phase, which is a sort of draft. Each player takes it in turns drawing a number of cards equal to the number of players plus 1. At the end of all this, each player will have a card and the remaining card is in the pile to be auctioned in the second part. A lot of the thought for the game goes in deciding whether to keep, auction or pass the card drawn, with the possibility that if you keep it, something better might come up next, but then if you pass it, you may have given away the best card of the set. Once the pile is gifted out, the auction pile is auctioned off one at a time. Then the value of the cards are compared in each category (with ties broken by a unique letter on the cards - the best tie breakers are found on the lowest value cards). Winner in each category gets the points indicated for that category (as adjusted by church cards).
We only just got the game (and the rest of the group have not played it yet), but still, this was a strange game in which several church cards come out early, all boosting their categories. I had only seen gold and church cards for the first few, so instead of influencing a color I already had, it gave me goals. I knew J had a headstart in the books, so I pushed her bid up a little and then left her to it, looking at the forbidden tomes and scrolls as my main point scorers. I had little of the pigments and a decent amount in the quills , with only small numbers coming out there, it looked like J was not fighting me in quills and I had little chance of overtaking her in pigments (and both of the suppositions was somewhat faulty!), but the real battle was in the Forbidden Tomes, which I knew she had the lead but it was boosted to 5 and so very important. I got the 2 and the 1B, but right after that, the 1A came out and I was by now short on cash, so J grabbed it. The tie-breaker did indeed come into effect, so while I won the two lowest scorers and J took the 3 best, if I had the Forbidden Tomes on my side, I would have won.
Quill(2) Pigment(4) Book(4) Scroll(3) Tome(5)
J: 3 5 4 2 5A = 13
me: 4 3 0 5 5B = 5
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Who's the more foolish? The fool or fool that plays after the fool?
United States
DURHAM
North Carolina
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It is already nearly February and I haven't made any resolutions yet, gaming or otherwise. Well, I don't plan to make any non-gaming ones but making gaming ones was fun last year, so I am going to do it again.
However, I didn't want to set my self a goal of a number of games. It is about the quality and I want to be able to explore a variety of games - longer ones too - without feeling like I am not meeting some self-imposed goal. I want to play of course, but time spent is more important than precisely how many individual games are played in a session.
So I decided to structure my goals in 2 halves. First, I will explore the new-to-me games I pick up in 2012 and second, I will explore a list of games I already own but that I haven't explored as fully as I'd like. Some of that is carry over from last year. 
First the new. I think I already bought all the new games I am likely to get in 2012. I put them in a geek list and it was quite a thrill to get it all together. Consumerism at its finest! But, barring some small game for Christmas perhaps, I think I have more than enough to keep me busy for the foreseeable future.
I'll blog more on that later, but ideally I'll see at least 10 plays of that lot. I should make it easier on myself and let myself off with a nickel for the longer games.
But the looking back at my collection games, I find quite afew I need to get to the table again.
1. Sid Meier's Civilization: The Board Game - one of the inspirations for this idea really. I got it very early last year but after 2 plays it has sat, waiting for me. Now this was partly due to my wife and I having an odd schedule, especially in the spring when she was working crazy hours and she worked weekends a lot too. So the time for a longer game was sparse. There was also some inertia due to all the glorious bits. Well, I have sorted the bits into a box and my wife no longer works the weekends. And this is a game I wish to explore - the recent run of sessions and reviews from people playing with the expansion only add to the fire.
2. Hansa Teutonica is another that inspired this list. I got it last summer and I did play it some, but only 2 player and that was lacking. So I need to get with my friends and play it. My "work group" which is people I used to work with and increasingly less of us work together any more has met regularly for a while over lunch but there is interest in the odd longer game (and that may become the main way we meet if the work situation for some of them continues as it has been). HT - with its deceptively simple game play - should be a good fit for this group. And the comments I see on here make it anxious to see for myself.
3. - La Città . My wife calls this game "Cary", as she can never remember its real name. Cary is a joke for the Triangle folks, the city with all those amenities that sucks people in to settle there, which is one of the neat mechanics of La Citta. It has languished for a while and is creeping up the suggested games list when I look at my friendless stats page. I'm not sure if I ever played this with more than two either. I should rectify that.
4. - Goa. I have a decent number of plays of this, but the most recent was 2 years ago. So it is about time to knock some dust off the box. And then we were talking recently and I realized that the only game of this we played with my friend Rick was half a teaching game - and then we never revisited it. I owe it to him to finish that lesson (and I will neglect to mention that he was giving me a pretty good lesson in it at that time back then too).
5. - I will round out the list with The Scepter of Zavandor. One of my goals last year was to play some older games and this, among others, was on that list. There has always been a barrier before, that we didn't quite understand how to play (the rulebook is difficult) but in fact, once we stripped away the confusing terminology and just changed it to $$, it became a lot clearer and the play time on last year's games were much more satisfactory. I liked it well enough as a 2 player, though the BGG-approved sweet spot is 4 and I can see that. So exploring this a bit further in terms of strategic approach and in terms of player count should be a goal.
Hmm and I noticed another part of my gaming resolutions for the year: play more multi-player or in other words get together with folks a bit more - which is surely a good goal and helped a lot by my friend Rick moving into town instead of the deep wilds where he had been living.
Fri Jan 27, 2012 11:45 pm
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