Space Corp blimey - it's Decacon!

Thanks to the brains and logistical skills of Joe, our autumnal getaway happened right here in Bristol this year, in the 'Chocolate Factory' of Centrespace studios. It was about 9.30am as I sailed down the Gloucester Road and spotted Katy ahead of me at the lights, similarly insulated against the weather. We rode the last section together, being honked at by an asshat in a van for the crime of existing, before arriving at the venue to find Joe and Pete already setting up. I'm slightly ashamed to say the first thing I did was go and have a coffee, though - pre-caffeine I am useless. 

When I returned there were as yet, no games happening, but an impressive library of them were gathering in the North wing. After another coffee run, more people had arrived: Martin from Easton, and from Bath, game reviewer Matt Thrower, and Kniziaphile Mark with his pal Andrew (2), and Decocon was kicking in. There was a game of Tower Up, and Joe and Katy's prearranged Fields of Arle was in progress. 

Martin waved Cascadero at me and we sat down with Matt to play it. We'd all played before, but Matt not very much and not recently. I started by monopolising a herald, and I knew this was a good start by the levels of profanity directed at me by Martin. Meantime, Jo and then Andrew arrived and they began playing a game I didn't recognise. 

In Cascadero I was doing quite well. I wouldn't normally dwell quite so much on my performance, but it was Cascadero, and it was Martin. His yelps of dismay were a balm to an oft-crushed gaming soul. 

I triggered the end by connecting cities of all colours and going past 50 points. It was something like 52-38-24 I think. We changed gears with a quick game of Wanted Wombats, which Martin won by correctly predicting a $10k card. 

Jo and Andrew had now finished their mystery game's best-of-five (I believe Andrew won 3-2) and they joined us for a bash at Magical Athlete. 

We had a brain-melting fourth race where the combination of Gunk (every roll is minus one) and Scoocher (moves whenever a power is used) and the Hypnotist (moves racers to their spot) and the Heckler (moves two whenever a racer ends their turn on the same spot or one away from it) combined to make every turn a kind of Rube Goldbergian experiment in x triggers y which does z which triggers x again type of thing. Demented fun. I don't recall who won now - Martin? - but Andrew and I were last. 

Tower Up had now finished and there was quite a bit of table rejigging whereupon I now entirely lost track of what got played for the rest of the day (with apologies, this report will be here on in even more Sam-centric than it has been thus far) but I do know that Joe talked Mark, Pete and I through the rules of Free Ride: USA...

And as we were playing, more people turned up, starting with Adam and Arthur, and Sarah and Effie, and the numbers swelled further with a bunch of people I didn't recognise who started playing Anomia. I regularly looked over to see Arthur with his arms in the air, though whether in triumph or agony wasn't totally clear. 

In Free Ride, Mark (south) Pete (north) and Joe (east) all began dominating different parts of the map and my plan to get nationalised a lot was compromised by people building around me. In fact my strategy could be best summarised as one of incoherence; a return to form from my heady Cascadero openings. 

Speaking of which, Cascadero was getting played again:

I've no idea on the scores for this but Andrew (2) was dominating the scoretrack when I took the picture. Did he make it to the top of his colour track though? Going by what I was to witness later on, I'm going to assume he did. He is Good At Games. 

I think Tumblin' Dice was seeing some action here and other tables were busy too, but during our late lunch, Mark mentioned to me he'd be keen to try SpaceCorp, and after a chicken sandwich my wariness at starting an afternoon chunker dissipated and we set up a 3p game along with Andrew (2).

This was new to both of them but, outside of what all the bases do, the teach is pretty straightforward and the actions are limited: move, explore, build. After the first (Mariners) board was completed, we were all hovering around the same place on the cash track (which doubles as score track) and fully engaged, even if Arthur would drop by occasionally - perhaps sent by Martin - to yawn loudly and announce he was bored. 

Elsewhere, Tumblin' Dice was seeing more action...

And at around 3pm (I think) Steve and Anja arrived with Louie and Lennon! There was an outbreak of Just One, and one table was occupied by digital gamers. 

In SpaceCorp I had a fairly disastrous second board (Planeteers) where Andrew (2) and Mark surged up the track whilst I dallied inconsequentially. Despite a mini recovery in Starfarers, I was never to catch them again: Mark had a production engine going that bought him about 20+ points and Andrew eschewed producing entirely but managed to build a SpaceCorp engine of the like never before seen (by me) as he almost lapped me and broke 100 points to take a convincing win. I now forget what Mark and I managed, I think Mark was on about 80 and I was back in the 60s, numerically and thematically. 

After this fun-yet-chastening experience, I looked blindingly around at reality again to discover Mel was now here. Mark, Anja and Adam joined her in a game of Trans Europa:

As the kids, possibly leery of the types who hang about in the lane, set up a customs office at the doorway, with Arthur happily finding this more fun than SpaceCorp. 

The day had flown by and I soon needed to leave, but ended on the memory game of Memoarr, with Joe, Steve and a wounded Lennon, who creatively used a packet of crisps to protect his bruised elbow. This was fun to revisit, with all of us at some point cursing our lack of retention. I think if I play this in ten years time I'll be even worse, but on this particular evening Joe was the man to beat - and we failed. 

As I approached my eleventh hour of Decocon, I also had to sign out and leave for football, missing the last couple of hours as the hardier gamers continued into the night. Which is where Joe, mastermind of the day, will now take over...

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Thanks Sam! My intention to arrive bang on 9am was hampered by the dog deciding today was a good day to shit all over the kitchen, and I didn't feel I could disappear for a day of indulgence without first clearing that up, whilst the rest of the house slept. In the event I wasn't much later, but Pete, having stayed over at Anja and Steve's, was there waiting when I arrived. Despite having to rest his leg, he gamely helped me set up, and Sam and Katy arrived shortly after, with Martin not far behind. 

Sam's documented what happened next for the most part, but my first games of the dyay were Fields of Arles with Katy, followed by Free Ride USA. Both were delightful, and I was pleased to play Free Ride again, as it hasn't made much headway on Tuesday nights, after a first flurry.

After those two substantial numbers, I was hailed by Matt and Andrew (2) for a go at Take Time. After an abortive first attempt, Andrew was out and Jo replaced him. We lost again, and Martin replaced Matt, and we were joined by Pete, the four of us endeavouring to give it a proper go. It's a cooperative venture which I've heard compared to The Game and The Mind, though it reminded us most strongly of Bomb Busters, though with a far swifter set-up and ease of explanation. Like that game it has many unlockable levels, and we all enjoyed it enough to want to revisit. 

Martin disappeared at that point, and Pete and I tried one of Jo's prototypes, an excellent crossword game that I can easily imagine will see print in the not too distant future - I'll be after a copy!

Adam's friends, after playing Anomia, broke out Coup, and raucous cheers and cries of dismay ensued. Arthur bested them all, apparently by having a combo which allowed him to tell the truth - I think the Captain was involved - making his dad very proud. 

Refreshed after some light lunch, and Just One, Martin, Katy, Pete and I broke out Pete's Surfosaurus MAX! A game of dinosaurs, surfboards and building poker hands. It was fun, and then Martin won.

Katy disappeared for her second meal rendezvous, and when she returned with her friend Becky in tow, we, along with Adam and Arthur, played Trans Europa. Great fun, and Arthur trounced us all, though he did step in after the first round had finished (that said, even if we'd given him a middle of the pack score from the first round he'd still have won). While we were doing that, Martin and Mark played Andrew (2) and Pete at team Zenith.

Martin and I then stepped out to grab a burger, whilst Steve, Katy and Becky had another game of TransEuropa (I think); and when we returned, there were ten of us remaining. We decided on a 4-4-2 split, as Mark fancied Oranienburger Kanal, and I was keen to give it an outing after quite a hiatus. Steve, Andrew (2) and Pete played Downfall of Pompeii, while Martin, Katy and Becky played Farm Hand and Sea, Salt and Paper.

Oranienburger was great to revisit - it's a stripped-back Uwe two-player number, with a resource system akin to Glass Road and Black Forest, and a puzzly 4x4 grid to fill for each player. It was close, in as much as Mark thought I was winning for much of the game and then he beat me handily. Great to revisit after far too long. 

Martin was flushed with a classic four octopus win in SS&P, and I felt that whilst I could have played on, I needed to attend to some clearing up, and wanted to do that while there were some stragglers to help. We bade farewell to the Bath contingent, and Steve, Katy, Martin and Becky helped me shift games back to my studio and try to remember where tables went.  With their excellent help we were done and out just after 10pm, after a marathon 13 hours of great fun. Thanks everyone!

Chieftain o' the Pudding Race

Games was back at Joe's house this week, with a fresh tablecloth ready for the hot breath of avid gamers, intent on fun. I confess I was super-tired before the fun could commence, but having missed last week I forced myself to attend - for a bit, anyway. 

When I descended the stairs, Martin and Adam T were already at the table, and Ian just removing his coat. With only Adam H now in the offing, we discussed what we could play, Someone mentioned we could just wait instead, but Joe pointed out that if we did that, Adam wouldn't arrive. And sure enough one round of Sushi Go was all it took to make him materialise, like Marley's meeple-loving ghost, out of the cool night air. 

Martin was already happily reminiscing about how shit the game is at this point, but Adam H was happy to be dealt in with seven random cards to score. There were quite a few jokes about how it was basically 7 Wonders without all the icons, but I don't remember them now. I dodged the competitive rolls of rice and concentrated on Nigiri, and an excess of puddings. It seemed to work. 

Sam 41
Joe 35
Adam T 33

Ian 31
Martin 27
Adam H 23

I was pleasantly surprised by my victory, but I have to concur that the game is pretty bland. "I could name a thousand better games for non-gamers!" Martin harrumphed. Then he thought for a moment and changed the number to a hundred, before anyone could challenge him. 

We split into two threes, with Joe, Ian and Adam H capering off around the globe in Expeditions and Martin, Adam T and I capering with marginally less frivolity towards Mordor in the Fellowship of the Ring: Trick-Taking game.

What happened in Expeditions I am unsure, as I was busy being confounded by the sneaky chapter 14 in LotR: tFotR, where we make our way through Moria, confront the Balrog and curse Boromir's feeble heart once more (discarding the Mithril shirt to make up for his shortcomings). It was a 'Long' chapter, meaning there are multiple characters that need completing, across multiple rounds, and officially the ruling is that any mis-step means you restart the entire round. But the game also does allow you to just restart from where you had got to previously, and that's what we did. The rounds are interesting, but not for the first time I felt that the long chapters feel attritional and the 'doing characters twice' option detracts from an-already flimsy sense of narrative. But at least we completed it - sort of. Our initial triumph did involve leaving Pippin behind. "I don't give a shit about him" Martin confessed. Adam and I were more of a mind to bring him along though, so we played one last round, failed, and then announced we'd won anyway. Almost as though Gandalf has his own Truth Social feed. 

Expeditions finished now too: 

Adam H 22
Ian 20
Joe 15

With apologies I missed any late drama, as I was now wrapped up in the shenanigans of Martin's latest addition, Pumafiosi, a mini-Reiner with quite nice production and a lot of dickishness. The rhythm of it is sort-of trick-taking, but instead of the winner it's the second-strongest card that gets added to a hierarchy of points cards in the middle of the table. During around, these can get bumped down the ladder (minus points for being bumped) and you've some one-use special abilities to take advantage of. 

After ten tricks are played the rungs on the ladder score, and Adam T gets lots of points. My catastrophic middle round and Martin's feeble third round meant there was only ever one winner. 

Adam T 45
Martin 31
Sam 30

They'd now finished Expeditions and were playing Ra. 

And I was feeling the pace of all this fun and threatened to leave, so Martin coaxed a game of Jungo out of me. Adam took to this very quickly as well, winning the first round in no time before Martin took the second. Then Adam added the third and hit the two-rounds-wins victory objective! I do like Jungo. Any game where you get to say the word 'invoke' can't be all bad. 

Martin and Adam began setting up Agent Avenue as I headed for home, which is where Joe takes over the story...

Joe here, thanks Sam. Ra weaved its relentless way towards the end of the ancient Egyptian era, and it was, as it always is, gloriously tense. Ian was on course for the win, but a generous final epoch plus winning sun tiles gave me the late running. "I'm rubbish at Ra", sighed Adam H, in a similar intonation with which he'd announced "I love this game" after beating us at Expeditions earlier. 

Joe 60

Ian 44

Adam 27

By now Sam had gone, and both Adams made noises about leaving. In the end only AH did;  AT stayed, coaxed by the promise of So Clover. Martin threw a cardboard spanner into the works, brandishing Llama Llama, but as he began the rules, Adam wrinkled his nose and said "Shall we just play So Clover?" And so we did. 

We acquitted ourselves decently, with a score of 22/24, only undone by Ian's perfectly reasonable paring of coil with wind, which we all read to rhyme with binned, not bind. Doh! 

I was pleased with my clue of magazine to go with ammo and life. And with that, the bell tolled, and the lights faded on another Tuesday night. Earlier than is perhaps usual, but with a full Sunday of gaming in the offing, in the form of Decacon, we all needed to get some rest.

 

ChameleAnja

Please welcome Pete to blogging duties! This is last week's report, 25th November) 

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Tuesday approached as it usually does, and Steve enquired if anyone would be up for Fishponds games.

He emphasised games based *in* Fishponds, and not based *on* Fishponds, so I (Pete) was relieved to find that plenty of other gamers weren't put off by this, and eventually by confirmation  that wellies were not required.

Joe, Martin, Sam, Adam and Katy began by playing Mü, only briefly pausing to debate whether the title was a cat-noise or a cow-noise.

Joe advises Martin was leading, but they called it early after two rounds with Sam feeling increasingly exhausted/unwell and kindly dropped home by Joe. Perhaps there will be a rematch this week? (and it might even be reported more promptly! 😆)

At the other end Steve, Anja, Louis and I deliberated a little more. I was tempted by Broom Service but we decided it would probably be a bit long. Steve suggested Magic Maze, but expressed concern that Anja would not take to a silent co-op. Anja was speechless. Whether this was indignation, practice or demonstration, we elected to play Chameleon instead.

For a rulebook of two A6 pages Steve & I found this surprisingly unintuitive at first, though he had the excuse of being without glasses and well and truly blocked into a corner by the throng of gamers.

Once these were obtained we got into it quickly- all but one player (the titular Chameleon) are let in on a secret word from a list, then all have to give a clue to it, before voting on who the Chameleon is. The Chameleon has to either conceal their identity fully, or has an out if they are caught but can guess the secret word (hence those in the know can't be too precise).

Pretty tough on the Chameleon if they are going first and have no clue whatsoever, but it seems with a bit of luck, vagueness and sowing doubt the Chameleons did pretty well. When I say Chameleons, I mostly mean Anja! Even when caught once she escaped.

From being unsure if it would work, I enjoyed this, I think having that bit more structure makes it a bit less fragile than more freeform similar games like Spyfall and something else I've forgotten. I even escaped once, mainly because I could frame Steve as his chosen word turned out to be suspiciously similar to mine...

We elected to wrap up at the same time as the others, with Anja leading on 3, myself on 2 and Louie and Steve tied on 0.

Thinking about it, I don't believe we successfully captured a single Chameleon- interesting! Would be good to go a few more rounds and see how common that is, and how it would turn out with everyone getting a go.

While Joe was gone and with Sam and Louie departed for the evening the rest of us all played Martin's Bluffit.

This prompted Steve to enquire just how many games Martin owns that consist largely of decks of cards with numbers on them. It certainly seems to be a rich design space - I suspect it would take us quite some time to play through them all. Guesses in the comments? 😜

In this one we were starting with identical hands to bid for a row of cards in the middle, or perhaps to secretly compare with another player to try and steal their claim. And then repeating again to compete for the cards we'd just bid with.

I can't remember if Joe returned in time to witness a dramatic finale with Martin stealing a card to sneak ahead of Anja, only to discover that Steve was still slightly ahead.

We then split again to create a Doppelkniziatisch.

Martin, Joe and Anja made coloured glass in Mille Fiori, which I don't know and only caught a few glimpses of. It appeared Martin had the corner of the board nearest him tiled / glazed / whatevered pretty much entirely green. This appears to have been quite successful:

Martin 225

Anja 204

Joe 192

Meanwhile Adam, Katy, Steve and I launched cats into space by rolling dice in M:LEM, while Molly investigated the box for spaceship potential.

We didn't necessarily get that far into space- Katy definitely dominated the first planet; other cats did make it further, but none to deep space.

I think I got the ship closest, but then I was following a previously trodden path in a new game; take risks early on while figuring out how it works, then take more risks to try and catch up. I was relieved that cats lost to space return to your pool of possible recruits, though feeling thematically a little perplexed. I was glad Molly was much more interested in the box than the fate of spacefaring cats.

Adam's cats fared much better, and I think he surprised us (well, at least Katy and I) a little with how fast he had all his cats successfully disembarked to triggered the game end. However, Steve had again scored slightly higher.

Steve 26

Adam 22

Katy 21

Pete 12

Despite some muttering about heading home we elected to sneak one round of So Clover! We flew out of the blocks with Joe's clover solved correctly in about 30 seconds. The group did a good job with mine as well, but from a start of 12/12 we then came a bit unstuck, despite a willing feline helper.

Birdshit for pigeon/award was inspired, and I very much liked Rapunzel for hair/building. Boxing/landscape was indeed a tricky one though..

I don't think the overall score was that bad that we should have deliberately forgotten it, but it seems possible- can anyone dredge it up from their memory?

Thanks again all and especially our hosts for another great evening of gaming 🙂

I couldn't Cairo less

 This Tuesday we all converged on Joe’s house for the weekly dose of games. When I arrived, Joe, Sam, Martin, Pete, Ian and Katy were all waiting for me and Adam H. Since Adam was a few minutes away yet, we playing a quick game of In Vino Morte. In this game, a player deals out cards that either have wine or poison on them, but only the dealer knows who is poisoned. Each player can swap their card without looking at it or “drink” (ie, turn it over to reveal its true nature).

In round one, only Katy and Joe swapped and when they showed their cards at the end of the round, they had the only two poison cards that had been dealt out. There was, as Joe commented, “a certain poetry in it.”

In the end, as we slowly eliminated players, it was down to me against Martin and I was dealing. 

I won! Martin drank the poison.

I remember people saying that I display some poker skills in the last round but I don’t recall what my strategy was.

Next we split into two groups. Tables were moved and beer was spilt as we rearranged the room so that both games had their own table.

Katy suggested Lords of Vegas, and it was early enough in the evening so that it was accepted. Pete, Ian and Joe joined Katy.

Adam, Sam, Martin and I went for something that may be described as less-luck-based but, knowing our history with flicking games, could be anything but. The game was Cairo and the idea is to roll a dice and move your boat up and down the Nile, and when it stops, you’re able to flick some of your (limited) supply of blocks from your ship and into scoring areas. 

It’s a simple majority wins rule with points for first and second place, but with the proviso that if you flick into an area and there are enough cubes already there, you can build a pyramid. You would do this because cubes at the top of the pyramid are worth more than those underneath.

I started badly, sending most of my cubes out of bounds (and out of the game) and this was, mostly, how my game played out. Martin, meanwhile, managed to knock his boat over twice losing him a cube each time as a forfeit. And this was after he’d explained that to do so was actually pretty difficult.

I did enjoy the new layout though. Having the opportunity to walk between tables gave Joe’s kitchen something of the air of a casino.

Talking of which, Lords of Vegas seemed to be a very swingy game. Joe began well, picking up points with his gold casino while two casino - green and brown - didn’t pay out at all, defying all odds. Then Ian went from having nothing to owning a 5-tile and 3-tile casino in one turn.

As for Cairo, despite me having lost 5 cubes, Sam ran out of cubes first. And when it came to adding up the final scores, Adam was a clear winner. He was first in 5 different scoring areas, a testimony to his flicking skills. He went further than the scoretrack allowed, while Martin only picked up points in one solitary area.

Adam 72

Andrew 36

Sam 34

Martin 14

As for LoV, I heard the phrase “Five 6s?! That’s mental Katy” float across the room, but otherwise they were still far from ending. We played two more games: Invaluable. 

Martin 45

Adam 43

Andrew 42

Sam 34

And then Llama Llama, which was over so quick, I didn't take any photos. Martin thrashed us, reaching the winning target of 100 in just two rounds.

Then we played a single round of Jungo- a game of playing increasingly powerful hands, which I won.

And on the other table, I heard Katy begging for the next card to be the Game End card. It was, and her very close victory was assured.

Katy 36

Joe 32

Ian 29

Pete 12

And with that, I set off. Thanks to all for another great evening.

*

After Andrew and Adam left us, we realised Pete had very little time before his train. But So Clover was out on the table so we hit upon the ruse of Pete leaving a Mystery Clover for us to solve, and taking a picture of it for cross-examination later. With myself, Katy Ian and Martin all providing sixes to start with, how would we fare with Pete's clues? 

Unfortunately, rather badly. Feline and animal both went with lion, animal also went with slug, and there were some portobello vibes to the extra card as well as our own confusion. We gave it a shot but when Martin referenced the photo Pete had sent, we'd only managed to place a single card correctly! But without Pete here to give us the second chance, we swiftly disregarded this and moved onto Joe's final clover, scoring another six to give us 30/30, or 31/36 if you want to be completist about it. We didn't. 

I forgot to take pics of everything but here are Joe and Ian's clovers - we particularly enjoyed Ian's downpour for drink/weather. 

It was nearing 11 and Katy announced she had to go, even getting as far as putting a coat on. But when Martin waved Jungo around she was tempted to stay. I was feeling like I should really head home too, but I was too tired to haul myself out of the chair so having announced I might go, I then said I was staying. Joe said he was tired and maybe he would ask us to leave, and then we played Jungo. 

tired

This is a simpler take on SCOUT - a card-shedder where you can't rearrange your cards, but can play sets of the same number (no runs) if they're sitting adjacent in your hand. What's more, when you beat something you can either discard the beaten cards or pick them up - so for example, if your two 3s beat two 2s, you can add the 2s to a solitary 2 in your mitts and make it into three 2s instead. Easy!

I enjoy this, but we did find in practice it sometimes led to two players flipping back and forth between progressively larger sets as everyone else picked up cards - when you can't or choose not to play - and found themselves spectators for periods. Still, fun though. Joe and Katy won a round each and we realised that with five, the game might run all the way past various bedtimes and called it there. 

Outside the car I'd seen dangling over the precipice on my way to Joe's earlier was now gone. Or maybe I just rode past it in a daze. 

Something borrowed

After a few weeks away, Adam T arrived at my house (Sam's) early enough last night for a catch-up and a best-of-three face off over Toy Battle. I won the first, but he took the next two as Katy ducked out of the rain in time to witness the finale, and remarked that if she hadn't played it already, she'd like to.

Ian and Martin followed, and we had a one-round blast of Jam (or JamSumo) whilst we waited for Joe. This was notable for the serial yipping of Martin and I and the slightly less tentative blasting habits of Ian. Joe came in time to see Katy take the laurels, with Adam T's jam all full of unwanted pips.

Katy 0

Martin 3

Ian 4

Sam 9

Adam T 18

Martin waved one of his new games, Bluffit, around saying it would be good for five (or just good, I can't remember now) and everyone was amenable. In this game, everyone has a hand of cards numbered 1-10 and we are bidding with them for one of a bunch of cards on the table, each taking one of the face-up cards for ourselves. 

The catch is that the bids are face-down, so it can be a bit of a gamble: and if you think you've got a higher bid than someone else, you can take the face-up card they took from them instead. This triggers a Love Letter style secret comparison of values (challenger wins ties) and whoever loses gets nothing that round. After ten rounds, all your previously-won cards are now both your score and your bidding hand:  there's an eleventh round where whatever you get with your last bid will become points. 

Both Adam and Martin forewent easy points in favour of stealing from someone - or trying to. Katy was in feisty mode and when Big T said he'd been up since six she pooh-poohed the concept of sympathy in favour of scathing indifference. I tried an extravagant last round bluff and failed. Martin was best Bluffiter.

Martin 61

Katy 55

Ian 43

Sam 42

Joe 41

Adam 36

As things concluded we got a phone call and a - related - late addition! Adam H could suddenly join us after all. Martin proffered another recent addition in boat-moving cube-flicking Cairo, and Katy and Ian joined him. We decided Adam H would probably rather join the non-flicking group and went to peruse the Alcove of Joy, settling on Istanbul. With impeccable timing, Adam H arrived just as I finished teaching the rules to Big T. Fortunately most of it was fresh in his memory, and it was more fun - I think - than the story these baffled expressions tell. 

Cairo has a lowly rating on our favourite website, but you wouldn't have guessed it from the shrieking and laughter. In comparison our fun was slightly more inscrutable, as we ducked and dived around the titular city and struck deals with the governor and smuggler. Big T pointed out that as all the smuggler is doing is trading the same goods with you as you get at the markets, you could argue he's just another trader, maybe trying to shake off an unmerited reputation. Meantime in the other ancient city, Martin had triumphed by replicating Katy's score in Bluffit. Katy had got Ian's Bluffit score and, perhaps wanting to be different, Ian scored half of Adam's:

Martin 55

Katy 43

Ian 18

They broke out Biblios. I missed most of this action but I did hear some shit-eating going on, and it wasn't making Katy grin.

Ian at one point seemed on the verge of fury, but he clearly recovered from whatever had enraged him - sitting with Katy and Martin, it could have been anything - to snag a tied second place. Katy was now Ms Doctor Biblios:

Katy 5

Martin and Ian 4

Was there a tie-breaker? I'm not sure. They began playing Farm Hand, and the air continued to be thick with insults and the uproarious guffawing of Martin, who loves a trick-taker anyway, so if you add manure he's only going to like it more.

As Istanbul got tense, with Adam and I poised on 4 gems and Joe and Big T on three. Adam couldn't remember if he'd bought a bit of jewellery or not. Joe - who was very tired - and I thought he had, and Adam admitted he'd been drinking before he came here. Who to trust? The exhausted guy, the drunk guy, or the one who remembers everything incorrectly, if at all? Speaking of which I don't actually recall what we decided now. I went to the Black Market, had an extremely spawny roll and ended the game:

Sam 5 gems

Adam H 4 gems

Adam T 3 gems, lots of cash

Joe 3 gems, not much cash at all

Farm Hand ended around the same time, with Martin back on top:

Martin 11

Katy 8

Ian 0

Big T was mumbling about leaving so we tempted him to stay with chocolate - which he turned down - and Wriggle Roulette. It was Katy's turn to be angry now, about not being offered chocolate. Sorry Katy. 

This was as stupidly fun as previous plays, with people accidentally busting themselves - too many eels/snakes - or cashing out when there were still eels to be had. Adam H ended the game with 26 eels, but Martin and I stayed in and pushed our luck. I banked at 27, with Martin back on 22. One by one, he kept drawing eels, despite being as I pointed out "the least deserving person in the room". 

Martin 28

Sam 27

Adam H 26

Ian 17

Adam T 11

Katy and Joe 7 each

We now did lose Adam T, and with Other Adam also ruminating on his bedtime quickly set up So Clover. This was a near-triumph, with Adam H's clover semi-portobelloed when the word alcohol appeared on the red herring card. With one of his clues as 'drink' we plumped for it (it was mouth instead). 

Adam and Joe now went home but, fortified by whisky, the remaining trio played Martin's third new game of the night: Jungo. This is a Scout-esque card-shedder where first to empty their hand wins a round, and winning two rounds win you the game. 

As with Scout, you can't rearrange your hand at all and can play escalating sets - although only matching numbers, no runs. If you can't or don't want to play, you can draw from the deck and either discard or slot it anywhere into your hand. If you do play, you can either discard the set (or single) you just beat, or add that to your hand. There's a fair bit of luck in what good stuff/crap you begin with, but enough manipulation involved that it's not devoid of decisions. 

I won the first game in two rounds, and then Ian took the second in the same manner if I recall correctly. We downed the last of our whiskies and called it a night. A nice mix of old and new games, one borrowed (JamSumo) and all the players supplying the blue.