The early moves were mostly a lot of research, as if scientists knew the existence of fuel but couldn't yet calculate how much they needed. Then: Andrew flew to the moon, and I made my way to Mars. We were off! Stars of the Lid were playing on the stereo. The atmosphere was thin. Not even Little Joe coming in to pilfer crisps could break the spell.
As on Friday I surged into a reasonably substantial lead early on, reassuring Andrew - even as I inwardly swore victory - that I was catchable. I hit several business contracts whilst Andrew prepared his infra for the times ahead, and the Mariners board ended at the astonishingly early hour of 8.15, with children still roaming the house.
The second board (Planeteers) saw Andrew fall foul of the dreaded radiation, something my Radiation Resistant status helped me avoid. All his transiting and building kept hitting him with penalties for being unshielded and costing him cash - punishment perhaps for a high staff turnover and insurance payouts. We raced to discover water and life and Andrew won that battle. But I still took more Business Contract rewards as Andrew's income focused more on production.
Little over an hour had passed when Planeteers came to a close and Andrew was keen to continue, at least until he saw the (final) Starfarers board - it's a bit like playing Ludo and flipping it over to reveal Hansa Teutonica. Rules change, colonies can be built, more options abound. For the first time Andrew havered, but his havering was swiftly overcome by his sense of adventure - Let's go! he cried.
With the correct rules (see Friday for the wrong ones) Starfarers now played at a reassuringly logical pace, the sense of points-collection still present but not overwhelming the theme this time. Exploring my first destination only to find grumpy aliens there (the Introvs) I focused on a couple of contracts but also decided to get all my teams out to Orion before Andrew did - and I succeeded, scoring 15 points in the process. I also built more Colonies than Andrew, snaffling me five points during play and 8 at the end.
But my decision to basically remove teams from play (once in Orion, they can't return to the board) backfired, as Andrew made his way around the stars exploring for lots of little juicy rewards, beat me to a business contract I thought I was nailed-on for, and produced with his last turn to churn out six points - enough for a debut win!
Andrew 83 - Explorer Supreme
Sam 80 - Explorer's Curse
A lovely game, and done and dusted in under three hours. It wasn't even half past ten, and we'd conquered the planets (apart from the Introvs Aliens, who remained resolutely independent)
After reading about the five hour saga recently, I had put a time limit on the game to end at eleven. However, when the first board ended in less than an hour I began to think we may get to the end after all.
ReplyDeleteIt was a lot of fun. I think that building spaceports was useful, as being able to ping your team around quickly was a huge benefit. And for such a long, thinky game, very few rules. Nice stuff.