Wednesday 9 October 2013

Nexus Oops.

Hovering over the game bags (Yes thats right, game bags) the three Bracknellites (Honorary in Paul's case) were unable to make a decision or push forward a preference for the evenings main game. I floated the idea of three player Nexus with the hard sell of three being regarded as the optimum number by blogs and forums alike. Paul, unable to hide his skepticism, graciously accepted and we proceeded to unpack the mutli-various pieces that come with it.

Configured in its three player format the board looked instantly tight and set for conflict. Resources for exploration were randomly placed on the board and after the first few rounds Paul and I looked enviously over at James' industrial heartland churning out a whopping 14 Rubium per turn to our 9. I made early headway to the centre of the board hoping to poach some refineries, the games lifeblood, from James with Paul adopting the same ploy on his flank. Very quickly we began to see why this game is heralded for 3 players. The balance is perfect. In the game I played with four ended up with almost two separate battles on the same map. Downtime was noticeable and it was too slow paced. With three you always feel you are involved in the game even when it isn't your turn because there nearly always is a battle to be fought.


As the war raged on James' early advances had reaped a healthy collection of victory points and was ahead by 5. Then, he found himself fighting hefty battles on two fronts as exchanges between Paul and myself resulted in a stalemate defended weakly by disinterested troops. And anyway, since the winning margin was 12 points James had to be stopped at all costs! Even though we pushed him back and pinched his best refineries James had staged managed his final push to perfection. Breaking out from his home territories with a miner task force and parachuting into a poorly defended hex of mine he vanquished the troops and satisfied several secret mission cards to reach the required 12.

It was a close run thing. I was left wanting to know how the war would've ended even though the battle had been won. In fact James and I did play out one final conflict - Just for the fun of doing it! I was really impressed with how well this game played with 3 and look forward to the net bout.

James - 12
Chris - 7
Paul - 5

We then tried to squeeze in a game of Trans Europa. Everything was going swimmingly until James realised that he had two cards which were meant to be taken out. And we ran out of time. It was decided that this wouldn't contribute to the table. (Although for the record I was winning!)

4 comments:

  1. I'm quite intrigued by this now (Nexus Ops that is) - I usually don't go in for direct combat stuff as a rule, but there are exceptions (Wallenstein for one). The three player thing makes it more intriguing.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Was Paul converted by the end?

    ReplyDelete
  3. It's utterly superb. You just have to remember that you're not in it for the war, just to snatch at those victory points. That's the mindset you have to have. Though you are left wondering how it would pan out sometimes, beyond the 12-point shut-off.

    I think Paul did say he was a convert by the end.

    ...James

    ReplyDelete
  4. Yes Paul said that he enjoyed it. Paul was one of the people in the 4 player game I mentioned and in fact he won it. James is absolutely correct in that the game rewards getting stuck in and not drawing up impressive entrenched positions. You might not lose any battles but you won't win any either!

    ReplyDelete