Hold your breath...

...it's Underwater Cities! But Underwater Cities played at such a rate of knots you almost could have held your breath. Andrew and I played a rapid-fire two-player game this evening - so quick we were finished at 9.05pm. It's much quicker a. when you know what you're doing b. with 2 players and c. knowing Adam is not there to make you feel like every turn was a wasted opportunity should you fail to optimise.

Andrew built pleasurable, diverse cities with a lot of upgraded tunnels. He coined in the cash in production and, what's more, grabbed two of the government contracts. My cities by contrast looked a bit Little Englander early doors, focusing on only one or two types of building but then upgrading the biomatter out of them for big returns in production.

My metropolis also rewarded upgrades, and in the final count-up, these sent me into a convincing win:

Sam 100
Andrew 76

Brief though it was - accompanied by a visit and advice from Stan - we needed something silly afterwards, so played Tomatomato. Officially it plays 3-6 but it's been such a hit in the house we already have a two-player variant devised.

The game is just flipping tiles that say tomato, to, ma, or mato. As a row of syllables get longer, you take turns attempting to pronounce it - stumble or pause, and it's a tile to your opponent. It's very silly, especially when the rogue Potato tile pops up, and Andrew's familiarity with the Japanese language - I like to think - gave him a convincing victory:

Andrew 4
Sam 2

After that we tried our hand at a recent gift in the form of an educational/dialogue-provoking game in Less is Max, a Spanish publication aimed, it seems, at classes. Players win by developing the nine parts of their personality, and do so by bidding on cards that allow you to add your tokens on the board, where each constituent part is laid out. Some cards have bad effects though that remove tokens, and there's also a shared element in the common good, which fills up with suns to reward everyone with more cash, or poison to take it away.

Our game, thanks to an odd falling of cards, took about 15 minutes, after I grabbed the card that let me do sport once a week to tick off the leisure box. Both of us got very excited by the option of theatre, and I tried not to use plastic bags. It's not a gamer's game, but it was an interesting experience and very pertinent.

Sam - most rounded personality
Andrew - Loser!!! nyah nyah nyah-nyah-nyah

We ended the night with Push It, and what a masterpiece of gaming this was, including flicks of brilliance and - more often - flicks of pathetic mental collapse. Andrew surged into the lead; I pulled him back. He surged again; I pulled back again! Then he was poised to win at 20-19 but got the yips and I picked up double points to grab the victory:

Sam 21
Andrew 20

Although writing this now it occurs to me that the official rule, I believe, is someone has to be two clear points ahead to win! So Andrew - to be continued...

Punch, Kick, It's All In The Mind

This week's games night saw a steadily shifting number of players around Sam's kitchen table, all vying to be the best.

We (Martin, Katy, Joe, Stanley, Sam & Joe, Ian, Adam and I) began with a recent Knizia. What new ideas would he bring to the table this time? Well... ones that vaguely resemble his old ideas, truth be told. The game was Karate Tomate and is a trick taking game whose defining features are (a) a general lack of cards unless you drop out of a round early so you can pick some up and (b) player with least kitchen knives automatically loses.

It was pretty smart. Trying to judge when to not bet was interesting because if too many drop out at the same time, then those remaining can pick up trophies and knives for next to nothing.

The theme, though, barely made any sense. Something to do with tomatoes and needing knives to see off your opponents' vegetables? It kind of reminded me of Parappa the Rapper, the old PS1 game with an onion that sang martial arts advice to you (which explains the blog title), but otherwise it was pretty tenuous. I’m a little surprised they didn’t go for a Karate/Carrot-e pun, but maybe that had already been done.

Joe 13
Adam 12
Sam and Joe 9
Martin 8
Andrew 7
Ian 5
Katy and Stanley had joint fewest knives.

Then Joe junior went to bed and the rest of us split into two groups. Martin, Adam and Katy played Res Arcana, an engine building game with a kind of fantasy theme. (Why on earth was Martin playing it?) The rest of us (Stanley, Ian, Sam, Joe and me) played Down Force, the exciting game of betting and racing.

Stanley picked up two cars in the opening round. Would this be his undoing? The rest of us had one car each. Also, Stanley kept getting distracted by Res Arcana being played next to him. He even gave Katy some helpful advice.

On Down Force, Joe played a clever but frustrating game whereby he was twice able to put his car at the start of a chicane so the rest of us had to begrudgingly move it in order to get past. It was hardly in the spirit of F1, but was probably how the game is meant to be played: hitting those sweet spots to make everyone else move you along.

But Stanley's orange car sped off into the lead in the second half of the race, knocking Joe's blue car into second. My yellow came in third. Sam was slightly embarrassed by his betting choices pushing his score into negative numbers while Joe showed an admirable sense of confidence by betting only on himself. Meanwhile, Res Arcana hadn't been as much of a distraction for Stanley as we might have wanted.

Stanley 23
Joe 17
Andrew 7
Ian 5
Sam -1

Res Arcana was still ongoing so Joe introduced us to Nyet. This trick taking card game is a strange beast, with a slightly different set of rules each round and teams that are decided at the start of each round. Intriguing and a bit baffling as we got hung up on the definition of Super Trumps.

We only had time to play one round and it was much more straightforward once you started playing it. The teams were Ian and me against Sam and Joe and thanks to a flurry of loot cards in our tricks, Ian and I won.

Ian and me 48
Sam and Joe 36

Res Arcana finished after all that mucking about with Calm and Elan

Martin 10
Adam 7
Katy 3

Martin credited his victory with filling up the Catacombs of the Dead. Whatever that means.

At this point, Adam left too. A very early departure for someone who was generous enough to bring two different snacks and so early that he missed the BBQ Beef Hula Hoops. Now we were down to six so seats were swapped and groups reformed. Katy, Ian and Joe played Hit Z Road and Martin, Sam and I went back in time to the Roman Empire in a game of Senators.

We played with the support cards this time, little game breaking things that offer you an advantage but can be embezzled away by your opponents.

We played twice. In game one, Martin raced into an early lead and looked good for a strong game when a fourth war occurred and we were suddenly done. Not to be dissuaded, we cheekily shuffled that fourth war card back into the pack and kept playing. But Lady Luck will not be fooled and after barely a couple of turns, the fourth war card popped up again. This time we took the hint.

Martin 8
Sam 5
Andrew 4

We set up again for another try. This time we seeded one of the five war cards in the second half of the deck. Hopefully this would give us a decent amount of time.

Meanwhile, in post zombie apocalypse America, Ian was already down to his last two survivors.

In Senators Mark II, Sam had a support card that gave an extorter an additional five coins before extorting for the other players. So, obviously, Sam was a little Roman mafioso, taking full advantage of his power. Meanwhile Martin also extorted every round, trying to get the card off Sam. I didn't, since I needed resources (I even sung “dwindling resources” to the tune of “Waltzing Matilda”) so I could cash in but never got much luck.

And, yet again, the fourth war seemed to come round sooner than we were expecting. Martin was happy because he'd just cashed in and used a consul card to steal a senator from Sam, pushing him into first, when the game ended.

Martin 8
Sam 6
Andrew 5

With Katy, Joe and Ian still staggering through the landscape of the undead, we fired off a quick two round game of Maskmen. Finally a game I won, but I made no notes at all. I do remember Sam saying he knew he'd lost round one when he had a hand of mostly two colours and those were both played by Martin and I first, effectively making them the weakest suits.

Andrew 2
Martin 1
Sam 1

In Hit Z Road, Ian's valiant last stand against zombies ended as you might expect in a zombie film with another twenty minutes to run. Joe, on the other hand, had all of his survivors intact. Katy's last two survivors died and then she too ended up as nothing but a name in the final credits. This meant Joe, with his gang of zombie-proof friends, won instantly.

Joe, alive and kicking
Katy and Ian, kicked the bucket

It was late but enough time for a big friendly game for all of us. Perudo or Just One? Those were the choices. The voting went to two rounds before Just One was eliminated and old favourite Perudo was chosen.

Ian followed up his Hit Z Road storyline of dying young with a repeat performance in Perudo. After him, I was next to Palafiko (spelling? Still not sure) but didn’t go out. Instead I clung on while first Martin then Joe went out. Then finally I was vanquished so that the real battle could commence: Sam versus Katy, three dice each.

Katy lost two quickly but when it came to palafiko her bid of “one six” won: Sam had rolled himself three fives! Then Sam went down to one die but there’s not palafiko on 1 vs 1, so when Katy bid One Six, he knew he was doomed with his one five.

Katy wins!
Sam next,
Andrew next,
Joe next,
Martin next,
Ian last.

By now it was eleven and as we were packing up, Texas Jim came in from the next room. This old stalwart of pre-GNN poker nights was visiting and had come in to see what all the laughter and jollity was. Alas, the laughter was ending and I felt a pang of regret that we didn’t have enough in us for one last game.

But we really didn’t. Thanks to Sam for hosting and thanks to all for attending.

The Power of Ten

On Friday Martin and I faced off across the spotty blue plastic-coated tablecloth of destiny with a bunch of two-player games at our disposal. I'd long wanted to try Iron Curtain, Martin had a similar curiosity about Res Arcana - so naturally we began with a completely different game, Omiga.

This is a real-time game of pattern recognition and tile placement. Each player starts with one tile on the playing area, and must add more tiles that (background colour aside) match its neighbours: blue half-circle to blue half-circle, say, or positive arrow to negative arrow. The goal is to get around the back of your opponents' tiles - the first one to do so wins. It's fast, frenetic and just right length: our contest took about 53 seconds.

Martin - wins
Sam - doesn't

Next up was Iron Curtain. I've long been both interested in these two-player face-offs over control (13 Minutes, Cousin's War, Fort Sumter) but always felt the actual play - with the exception of the brilliant Twilight Struggle - was too abstract. I don't think Iron Curtain totally breaks that paradigm for me personally, but it's certainly a big improvement on the cube-pushing perception of the games mentioned above.

Here players add area cards to an expanding tableau, and can take an action or add influence cubes  depending on who the card 'belongs to' (despite being a superpower, you are often playing cards that belong to your opponent) Points are scored for card control and area control.

It was close, but no cigar for me.

Martin - superpower!
Sam - supermarket

Now it was Martin's turn to learn a game - Res Arcana. I've been playing this a lot with Stan, who likes the similarity to Magic - mechanically it's quite different, but players are facing off against each other in a race: in Res Arcana, first to ten victory points wins.

Each player only has one Mage (special ability) and eight Artefact cards to play over the entire game, and the goal is to combine them into an engine builder that rewards you with bundles of resources - and in turn, buy Monuments or Places of Power with them; both of which score points. The Places of Power are only five in total, which lends Res Arcana an air of tension. Another neat twist is that passing scores you a (temporary) point. I wheedled my way past Martin to snatch the win, thanks to my cards providing bounteous resources.

Sam - Res Arcana!
Martin - Low res

Martin kicked himself for some of his decision-making, but I wouldn't want to play him now he knows what he's doing - I only beat him by a single point.

Throne and the Grail was less close. This is a neat set-collection game with a twist. Players add cards from their hand to a tableau and only once per round may collect 5 of the cards for their own sets, which - one hopes - score for the most-of something, plus 5 points for runs across each of the numbered cards. There are also plus and minus point cards with which to season/poison the well... the twist however is the three grail cards: if a player manages to collect all of them, they win instantly.

I gambled when Martin had two of them already and swooped in - leaving him free to play the third grail card to the table, and then pick it up!

Martin - Throne and Grail!

That was our fourth game, and we were just getting started! I liked Throne and Grail so much I asked we play again, and managed to beat him by a meagre 3 points...

Sam - Long live the king etc

Martin wanted to try Maskmen with two as he had heard it was good. It was fun, but halfway through he predicted we'd win two rounds each, and that's exactly how it panned out.

Martin/Sam - best uncertain wrestling promoters

Then another new game for me - Khmer. It's a game of simple rules that provides tension, brinkmanship and a bit of bluff - players are dealt cards numbering between 1 and 6, and on their turn have four options: dump a card from the game (this is only allowed with a 6, though) play a card to the table, claim a card from the table for yourself (this stays visible but is considered part of your hand) or knock. You knock when you think the cards in your hand collectively score the same (or just under, but must be closer than your opponent!) as the cards on the table. Martin wiped the floor with me, and the game is so quick I demanded we play again.

He won again. I stopped demanding.

Instead, as Sally returned from her night out, we embarked on The Fox in the Forest, a two-player trick-taker where the odd-numbered cards in the three suits each have special powers. Utilising these is really how you win the game, and I think my lack of familiarity with them didn't help. But at this point I was on my fourth glass of wine so who knows. The scoring for FitF is clever too: win 0-3 tricks of the available thirteen for 6 points. Or win 7-10 tricks for the same reward. Middling trick wins award dribbling points though - and 11-13 trick wins get you no points at all, but instead labelled Greedy by the score sheet.

Martin - Fox!
Sam - Hen

The evening was coming to a close but as we still had our sobering tea to drink we bashed out a final game of Khmer. I painted a silver lining around my evening of mostly-defeats by grabbing an unlikely win!

Sam - Khmer!
Martin - come again?

A great night of two-player battles - ten in all. I liked Iron Curtain and the Fox in the Forest, liked Khmer a lot, and loved Throne and the Grail. Thanks Martin!

Whatever is the Biomatter

Today's post is named after Adam's insistence that we identify the exact nature of biomatter.

The games began early when Stan and I nearly played chess, but then abruptly changed tack to Flipships. We blithely obliterated the oncoming mass of tiny attackers but realised we had a single round to hit the mothership 6 times. Still, we had 24 attempts to do it with. And every missed attempt would just made the final hit that much more glorious... except we hit the Mothership exactly once, and sent our other pilots careering uselessly around the kitchen table and into the salad dressing.

Alien Invaders: win
Sam and Stan: lose

With Andrew and Adam still half an hour from arrival Stan wanted a crack at The Mind. Without making any kind of verbal pact, we started playing at a much brisker pace than normal, and barrelled our way up to the eighth round before expiring. But round five was a Mind Classic: I got down three low cards and Stanley two, before I sat back with my cards face down on the table. Stan scrutinised my face for ten seconds, then played his 95. I played my 96 and 97, and he slapped down 98/99 for a clear round. Genius!

The Mind - wins
Sam and Stan: lose

Stan vacated the kitchen for the front room as Andrew and then Adam arrived to find Underwater Cities set up and ready to go.

very similar to last week

Last week's play gives a more in-depth run down of the rules, but suffice to say in Underwater Cities, you're building underwater cities. Actions are paid for by cards, and if the card colour matches the action colour: bingo! You get the action on the card too. This simple twist on worker-placement is genius when everything combines neatly, and annoying when you regularly end up with a hand of like-coloured cards. I got the rule sweats - not only is there a fair amount to get through, I was also conscious of Sally in hearing-distance as I said things like "An upgraded desalination plant gets you biomatter"

"So that's shit, essentially?" asked Adam
Andrew and I protested that biomatter could take many forms, but for the rest of the evening Adam referred to his desalination plants as 'piss factories'. Is this what Vladimir Suchy worked so hard for?

piss factories not shown

Andrew and I knew Adam would win, but by how much? There have been times in the past where his debut attempts at games we already know have been embarrassing for us, so it was up to us to keep the pressure on, which we did with lots of sarcasm about how long he took to take his turns. It didn't work - Adam had come with pyschological ploys of his own, which included pointing out my schoolboy error in round two (I coulda built a symbiotic city! Instead I'm a bum) and waving sugared peanuts in Andrew's face. Andrew hates nuts, sugared or not.

Other snacks featured, including the rowdy salt and vinegar twirls that attracted Sally's attention ("What are you eating? It's so loud") which Andrew rationalised as the acoustic properties of the twirl over our table manners. Back in the game, Adam's natural inclination to hoard, even in a world where resources can be hard to come by, became evident as we hit the final straight and his nose was just visible behind a pile of 'science'. I grabbed the first two government contracts. Andrew grabbed the next one. Adam looked unconcerned. We snapped up Special Cards with end-game bonuses. Adam shrugged. After round ten we counted up and found I had won! - If you exclude Adam, that is.

Adam!!!!

Adam 94
Sam 84
Andrew 81

We'd bashed out three submerged conurbations in rapid speed, taking a little over 2 hours. "It felt longer" Adam admitted, but that's just because he thought about it more than we did. Anyway, there was still time for a little closer which was Spy Tricks. Andrew accidentally broke the game in round two when he revealed the hidden card with what he realised was a drunken decision. I capitalised with a winning bet, and wrapped things up in round three:

Sam 27
Adam 22
Andrew 10

This morning when I mentioned my win to Stan, he archly compared the 'deep strategy' of Spy Tricks to the 'luckfest' of Underwater Cities. Pithy cynicism from an 11-year-old - this is the world we're living in now...

We couldn't persuade Adam to stay any longer, but Andrew and I finished the evening with an old favourite in Love Letter, where Andrew shot into a 3-0 lead in a matter of seconds, guessing my cards and baroning me into submission. I surged back to 3-2, in a princess-missive-mission-recreation of the recent Man City-Spurs game. I was helped a lot by my handmaid, as Andrew found himself forced to discard his own princess. But Andrew took the win when he guessed I had a shitty Baron, giving everyone a victory on the night... a delightful night too, considering the amount of biomatter involved.

Santiago to Rome is a little under one metre

Only a couple of days after Martin had hosted Time Of Crisis, he was the genial MC of another games night: our regular weekly get together. Tonight there were seven of us. Martin, his friend and GNN debutant Adam, Sam, Joe, Ian, Anja and me.

We began as a six and to fill time until Anja arrived, we showed Adam how badly Just One can be played. In the first three rounds we passed and Sam was the first to get us any points at all (he guessed "white" from Christmas, blancmange and Spurs). We struggled to get going, but hats off to whoever wrote "sex offender" as a clue for "register" - Martin got it easily. We finished with our worst score on six, with the ever patronising score sheet rating us as "a good start."

But by now, Anja had arrived and it was time to play something we might be good at. Joe was keen to try Senators while Adam touted Santiago de Cuba. Sam and Anja went to Cuba while the Time Of Crisis cohort returned to the ancient empire of Rome once again. The table hummed to the sound of simultaneous rules explanations.

Cuba on the left, Italy on the right.

I know little about Santiago de Cuba except there are dice on boats and the players all ride around in the same car. Rather sweet, really. There was mild consternation from Sam that he'd been given too many points but for the record it ended

Sam 40
Adam 33
Anja 27

In Rome Joe was having a terrible time of it on his first game. Having just paid for a governor, the next event removed all governors from the game. This hobbled Martin, too, as he explained later that his senator was about to help him strike it rich.

Instead, Joe saw himself going backwards along the score track as he sold Senators to make ends meet while Martin struggled with cash for most of the game.

I got lucky (is it luck, though?) by getting a couple of cheap senators in bidding rounds and when Ian and I were first to cash out, buying three senators each, I was in a considerable early lead which I held on to. Martin clawed his way back to second place but then the fourth war broke out while Ian was on the toilet and the game ended.

Andrew 11
Martin 9
Ian 7
Joe 5

After this, while Santiago De Cuba was ending, we played a couple of rounds of Maskmen. Just like in Senators, Joe began by getting negative points but he redeemed himself with a first place in the second of only two rounds.

Andrew 2
Joe 1
Martin 0
Ian -1

Then we rearranged seats and groups. Joe, Adam and Sam played Spirits Of The Forest. Sam had undersold this by admitting that even he wasn't sure if he wanted to play it after his underwhelming first game, but this was enough to capture the interest of two of us.

Sam 23 wins on a tie breaker
Adam 23
Joe 16

They squeezed in a little one round game of Good Little Tricks, which ended

Sam 7
Adam 9
Joe 11

The rest of us chose Polterfass, a wholesome family game about beer and gambling. There were some huge points on offer as well as moments of real penny-pinching cruelty as some bartenders limited their stock just to annoy everyone else.

I put the cup on top of some barrels on the table and when I picked up the cup the barrels were wedged into the rim of the cup. Should've been worth points.

In the end, it was another shockingly high total that gave Martin the win. When he decided to roll again after an unremarkable opening amount of beer, he can have envisaged the luck he was about to receive. We all got our bets fulfilled but Martin picked up thirty one points in the final round.

Martin 87
Ian 73
Andrew 68
Anja 64

At this point Adam left so we joined together for a six-player nightcap, Texas Showdown. This game is as funny as it is evil and most of us had our share of bad luck. There was a serious discussion in round one about whether to keep your tricks face up on the table or face down. The trouble with face up is the extra information from the visible card, but if you keep them face down then there's the risk of picking them up by accident if you put your cards down.

We decided on face down and to refrain from putting our cards down. We also thought that the game should come with little ceramic animals ("ceranimals" (c) Joe) that you could put on your tricks to distinguish them from your hand.

But as for the game, it was very close unless you were Ian, in which case you had a decent lead. After round three it was 2-5-5-6-6-6 and I was bemoaning how difficult it was to target someone in this game.

This is what Ian looks like in a commanding lead

My bad karma flew back in my face as I entered a death spiral of 6nimmt-ish proportions, picking up five tricks in the second half of round four. Ian had another clear round to seal a comfortable win, and so did Sam which saw him go from joint last into second.

Ian 2
Sam 6
Anja 7
Martin 7
Joe 7
Andrew 11

And with that it was back home thanks to taxi Sam. Thanks to Martin for hosting and hello to another Adam. We should do this again soon.

Expanding Empires

After a period of time so long that history books could not contain it, so long that folk stories had forgotten it, so long that I wasn’t sure of the rules any more, the monthly Time Of Crisis group finally convened again.

This time we were using the new expansion cards, which have new actions for each level of two, three, four of red, blue, yellow cards. These were shuffled into the regular cards.

We also reapplied the new Emperor rules, meaning that our emperor need not sit in Rome but may base themselves in another corner of the world or join an army and wreak havoc by bringing bloody death to the provinces.

So many new choices. How would it play out?

I was starting player and I began in Gallia, Martin in Pannonia, Ian in Macedonia and Joe in Hispania.

My opening hand was 3B 2Y, I won a vote in Britannia and boosted support and bought a 2Y card. Britannia was entirely untroubled by the conflict in Europe for the entire game and will barely be mentioned again. As such, this was perhaps my best move.

Martin’s crisis roll revealed Bad Augeries, reducing the chances of a hit for Roman armies in battle. He used 3B 2R to be voted into Thracia with a new army, and without an available Tribute card he bought a 2R (cavalry) instead. Ian used 3B 2R to get voted into Africa with an army, and bought 2B. Joe used 3B 2R to get voted into Aegyptus with an army and he bought a 2B.

In round two, I used 3Y 3R to build a Basilica in Gallia and then I hired a general, built a new army in Gallia and moved it into Italia. I was ambitious, if nothing else. Martin’s crisis roll sent an Allamani barbarian into his own Thracia, and Bad Augeries meant killing them off would be tough. He had 3Y 2R and avoided conflict, preferring to get a 2 general and boosting support in Thracia so he didn’t lose it.

Ian’s crisis roll sent two more Allamani onto the map, this time into Martin’s Pannonia! Martin was distraught, which is always entertaining to watch. With his 3Y 1R 2B he builds a Limes in Macedonia and bought a 2Y.

Joe’s crisis roll was 6-6. Pax Deorum! An extra card for everyone and Martin was saved! Joe’s hand was 3Y 2R 2B, allowing him a chance to hire a level 2 general and governor and build a Basilica in Hispania.

At the start of round three, I now had 5B 2Y. Support in Rome was high, but I had a Basilica and an army in Italia so I needed seven votes from six dice. I rolled with all my might but only got six votes. Not a single six, nor any ones either. But, I later noticed that I’d forgotten that I didn’t have a governor to put on the board if I’d won, so a bit of a wasted turn. Except for boosting support in Gallia.

Martin had 3R 5B. He loses against the Allamani in Pannonia which means it is destined to be lost since he Tributes the other Allamani in Thracia. To make up for losing one province, he hired a level 3 governor and is voted into Galatia.

Ian had 2Y 2R 3B, boosted support in Macedonia to two, bought a level 2 general and governor and, using the new card Ambitus (one free vote) he is voted into Asia.

Joe (3R 3B) didn’t want to weaken the neutral emperor any further so he built an army in Aegyptus, moved into Africa and attacked Ian. Neither rolled any hits, but Joe’s use of the Cavalry card meant he won ties, so he ousted Ian from the capital. He was then voted into Africa.

As round four began, the scores were Joe 11 Ian 9 Andrew 8 Martin 6.

I roll Good Augeries as my crisis roll and suddenly those barbarians go from looking fearsome to looking like fun. I (3Y 3R) boosted support in Britannia, bought a 2 general and built an army in Gallia.

Martin (2R 3Y), newly encouraged by Good Augeries, killed the Allamani in Thracia. He built a Basilica and an army in Galatia. Ian rolled 1-1 for a crisis roll, adding one barbarian to every region around the edge of the board. He had 2B 1R 3Y: he was voted into Syria, built an army there and then boosted support in Asia.

Joe’s crisis roll sent five Franks onto the board. Three into my Gallia, 2 onwards to his own Hispania. He had 3Y 2R. He attacked the Franks in Hispania but he rolled his signature two ones. The Franks replied with a hit and the battle was lost. Joe boosted support in Hispania rather than lose it and then attacked and beat Ian’s army that was still hanging around in Africa.

Joe 17, Ian 13, Martin 12, Andrew 11.

Round five and I had 5B and 2R. I hired a 2 gov and got voted into Rome. But instead of being a boring old senate emperor, I base myself in Britannia with it’s high levels of support for lots of points. And just to make sure, I move my spare army from Gallia to Britannia. I’m able to buy two cards this round!

Martin (5R 2B 2Y) adds a third legion in Pannonia and moves the army into Italia, beating my sitting one-legion army there 3 hits to nil. He then becomes emperor. A boring old senate emperor. Lastly, he boosted support in Galatia.

Ian’s crisis roll sent the Priest King of Emesa into his own Syria. Bad news for both Ian and also Martin, as this stops any more emperor turns being added to the score track. Ian (5B 6Y) used the mystical (well, I didn’t understand it) power of the new Mobile Vulgaris card to use two yellow points to make Martin’s Thracia turn neutral. Ian then got voted into Pannonia, and boosted support both there and in Syria.

Joe’s crisis roll put a Sassanid into Syria to go with the Priest King already there. Joe had 4R 5B and he paid tribute to the Franks in Hispania. Then he foederatied a nomad from Africa and attacked the Franks. He lost the battle but did enough damage to kill them off. He then took back his tribute, and used it instead on the barbarians in Pannonia. I was a bit taken aback by this do-over of a move but, since it was all part of Joe’s go, no one else minded. To think a man so cheap with his words of tribute should aspire to become emperor! People in Pannonia didn’t seem to mind, since they happily voted for his governor.

Joe 26, Martin 21, Andrew 21, Ian 18.

My crisis roll at the start of round six sent more barbarians over the border. This time it was the Goths: three went to Martin’s Galatia and one kept going, ending up in Ian’s Syria to stand alongside the Sassanid and the Priest King already there.

I had 4B 2Y 3R. I put a new legion in my army in Gallia, foederatied a Frank into it as well and then attacked the remaining two Franks there, winning the battle and wiping them out! There was some discussion about where I should use my blue points, weaken Emperor Martin or Point Leader Joe? In the end, I let greed be my guide and got myself voted into Joe’s Hispania, nabbing an extra point for that Basilica there.

Martin rolled another event for his crisis roll and barbarian leader Ardashir arrived in the Sassanid homeland, obviously keen to join the party that was kicking off next door in Syria.

Martin had only 2R and 3Y. He heals armies in Thracia and Italia and boosted support in Galatia. He may have still been Emperor but with only two provinces, he couldn’t even buy a level three card, so he trashed a 1Y in disgust.

Ian also had a fallow round (2Y 3R) so he boosted support in Asia and then moved the wounded army from Joe’s Africa into Asia where he healed it.

Joe (6Y 1R) boosted support in Pannonia, built a Limes in Africa since there was a rank of four or five Nomads amassing on the border. He then used witchcraft (ie, Mobile Vulgaris) to neutralize my Hispania. Finally he takes a long time choosing his cards, which can’t have been helped by us constantly mentioning how long he was taking. “It’s been five minutes,” said Martin, aghast.

Joe 30 Andrew 30 Martin 25 Ian 22

Round seven and my crisis roll was 6-6, Pax Deorum! I was almost disappointed to see it because, just as Joe had finally put his cards down, he had to pick them up again and ponder what extra card to add to his hand.

I had the “balanced hand” of 3B 3R 3Y. I built an army in Gallia, moved it to Hispania where it lost to Joe despite having a Flanking Manoeuvre. I was voted in anyway, and then I had to boost support there or lose it immediately. I started to wonder if Hispania was really worth all this effort or whether Joe and I were fighting over it for the sake of pride. And the Basilica.

Martin, rolled 1-1. Ira Deorum! More barbarians everywhere! He was still only a two-province Emperor, hanging on to power thanks to his huge army stationed in Italia. He had a hand of 3Y 5B 2R, and he got voted into Thracia, bought a governor, and got voted into Pannonia. His support in Italia went up by two! Then he sent his Galatian army into Syria where it killed the Priest King, allowing him to pick up an Emperor turn. Then he boosted support in Pannonia and paid tribute to the Goths in Galatia. Finally he buys two (two!!) level four cards. A good move.

Ian’s crisis roll revealed inflation to huge amounts of disinterest: clearly no one was planning on building anything other than armies. He had 3B 6R 2Y. He added a legion to his Syrian army, used it to kill the Goth there and then, thanks to the new Forced March card, the Syrian army attacked again, wiping out that Sassanid. He added a legion in Asia and got voted into Martin’s Pannonia, boosting support there once he was in. An eleven point turn, putting him right back in the running.

Joe’s crisis roll sent two sassanids and sassanid leader Adashir into Ian’s newly barbarian-free Syria, with another one continuing until Aegyptus. With his hand of 7R 3Y 3B he got himself voted back into Hispania, and then used the Pretorian Guard to become Emperor! Finally he killed me in Hispania, then boosted support in Hispania in a clear message telling me leave it alone.

Joe 46, Martin 35, Andrew 35, Ian 33

Round eight, and my crisis roll sees our old favourite Zenobia arrive in Aegyptus. My hand is 4B 6R and, although it may seem tedious, I tried to take back Hispania again. After all, it would have me a Basilica and weakened Emperor Joe. It seemed worth it. I built an army in Gallia, foederatied a Frank from his homeland, moved into Hispania and beat Joe. However, the second part of my plan failed: I needed two votes with four dice and rolled 5-1-1-1. However, Martin seemed more upset about then I was, thinking this could hand Joe the win.

He rolled Shapur onto the map with his crisis roll and then agonized over how much to spend on becoming Emperor. His hand was 3B 3R 2Y and he began by healing his army in Syria, going to Aegyptus and killing Joe’s army there. He then used two blue points to get voted into Aegyptus (he rolled 6-6 and said “that’s how you roll, Andrew.”) Finally he used 1 blue and a Basilica to get over that remarkable low bar of one vote to be Emperor. He became a military emperor, and just for good measure foederatied a barbarian into his Italian army.

Ian rolled an event on his crisis roll: Palmyra Allies. This allowed him to remove some Sassanids from the map. Usually, this comes as a relief but this time Ian wanted to kill them for points. He had 1R 5Y 3B. He did win against the last Sassanid for three points. He boosted support in Pannonia and ummed and ahhed over what to do with his remaining 3Y 3B. He used Mobile Vulgaris against Martin’s Thracia, turning it neutral. His last three blue points were largely useless. He couldn’t even buy his next governor, since it was level four, so he ended there.

Joe (2R 3Y) had “quite a simple turn for me,” as he added a legion in Africa and boosted support in Africa.

Joe 50, Martin 42, Ian 41, Andrew 40

At the start of round nine, I had a strong feeling this would be my last move, so I front loaded my hand drastically leaving only dregs left in my available pile of cards. I, with 2Y 5R 5B got voted into Hispania, added a legion in Gallia and moved that to Pannonia to kill an Allamani. I bought my level 3 governor and was voted into Ian’s Pannonia. It felt wrong to attack the guy in third, but I was just after cheap points at this point.

Martin (7B 9R) and his Imperial Army moved from Italia across the seas to Galatia where he attacked the goths there. First he used his Spiculum card, which did damage at a distance, killing two. And then in the attack on the final goth, he rolled 6-6-6 for his three legions. But this lone Goth managed to inflict one hit despite this barrage of hate from Martin. Was this fatal blow against the emperor himself. A roll of the dice (a five or six) would tell. It was a five. The emperor was dead. No triumphant return to Rome for him as the senate went neutral.

But then Martin took his governor and got voted back as Emperor, a normal senate emperor. Next Martin foederatied a Nomad into his Egyptian army and attacked Zenobia. She died but wiped out Martin’s army in the process.

Then he sent his army from Thracia into the Allamani homeland and killed two of them with his other Spiculum card. He passed 60 points and was Emperor, thus ending the game. I was actually quite pleased about this, since my next hand of 1R 1B 3Y would not have done me any favours.

Ian (9R 2B) rolled another nomad for his crisis roll but, despite there being five of them, they still wouldn’t move. He used his red points with a Pretorian Guard to become Emperor. He used nine dice (all white ones, “let’s do this properly”) and succeeded.

Joe (3R 9B) had only 1 province on the board. He used his 2 blue to become emperor, unseating Ian in double quick time. He became a military emperor, joining his best army in Africa. He feoderatied a Nomad and then moved across the border to attack them. If they won’t come to him, he’ll go to them.

It was four against four. But the four nomads rolled 4-4-4-4. Four deadly hits. Would any of them kill the emperor? We had to roll four dice to see if any were a five or a six. The result was 6-6-6-4. Emperor Joe died of multiple stab wounds and we end the game with the curious sight of a neutral Emperor in Rome.

Martin 77
Joe 58
Ian 56
Andrew 55

What a game. The new cards really added to the experience and put some new life into the game. We were getting to the point where we knew what was going on and had fallen into a rut but this time we didn’t. Even after round one, we’d all bought different cards. It was much harder to guess what was about to happen.

But on the journey home, Joe got a text from Martin. He had checked the rules and his move of becoming emperor again was against the rules. On the drive back, me, Joe and Ian tried to work out if that would have made a difference and we couldn’t. All we knew is that it would have certainly added another round to the game, pushing it past midnight and perhaps making it outstay its welcome.

Lords of Deepwater

At the optimistic time of 8.45pm Andrew, Ian and I sat down to play Underwater Cities, undertaking the (futuristic) building of said cities, under the water. Not literally under the water, although it did feel a bit like that at times. Ian, last to arrive, surveyed the board and said it looked a bit mad. Then I explained the rules and he said it sounded pretty straightforward. Smell wasn't mentioned, but I'd guess it was salt, with a whiff of solder.

ready to dive

It is pretty straightforward too: long-time players won't be surprised to hear that before building anything, you need to harvest the appropriate resources. In Underwater Cities that's credits, science, steelplast, biomatter, and kelp. There's never enough kelp. The harvesting is where Underwater Cities gets more interesting; aligning the standard worker-placement fare with card 'payment' for the action. Each action on the board has a colour (green/red/orange) and if you pay with a card of the matching colour, you get to activate the action on the card as well.

Turn order is important. Although there's a way to take an occupied action space, it costs credits, and credits are needed for construction of cities and the perennial board game favourite: desalination plants. Other buildings are farms and labs. Tunnels also need to be built to connect your cities together - if you don't link back to your starting city, your cities and buildings are devoid of population and production, like a watery Barrett estate waiting for young families to arrive. After rounds 4, 7 and 10 (the last round) your network runs production: Farms produce food, Labs science, Desalination and Tunnels give you credit income. Upgraded buildings and tunnels produce more, including victory points as society recognises your growing success. Symbiotic cities, if you manage to build them (Andrew and I didn't) also provide points, as they represent a more harmonic existence within the environs of the ocean.

Ian's cities (white/red) farms (green) and desalination plants (yellow)

Ian began tentatively by playing lots of cards with if this-then that type effects and muttered that he didn't know how to use them. Andrew expanded quickly. I built and upgraded Farms, mindful that when Stanley beat me earlier in the week, I'd been crying for Kelp. Andrew and I eyed Ian's growing engine and voiced our concerns. The first production arrived reasonably quickly and we all relaxed as our buildings paid out like fruit machines... only to find that our expanding networks swallowed it all up rather quickly.

As Andrew and I hit the government contracts (meet the requirements: grab the rewards) Ian's plethora of cards were starting to combine in worrisome ways. Even when he paid for an action with a non-matching card he hoovered up compensatory steel and credits, and after the second production phase our concerns looked justified.

Action slots around the edge of the board; contracts and special cards in the middle

However (#1) the game seemed to to turn in my direction when I played a special card that would reward me for my insatiable farm-building. Ian was convinced I'd won, seeing as a metropolis on my board - everyone has three - also rewarded upgraded buildings. As we surged - if you can call anything in Underwater Cities surging - through the final three rounds, Ian felt it was a fight for second between he and Andrew. In turn we were worried about his mahoosive pile of resources: at the end of the game players score for their network of cities (the more diverse the buildings in them the better) their end-game cards and metropolises, and their resources. Ian had tonnes - far more than anyone else. But I still had my bonza rewards for the aforementioned insatiable farm-building...

However (#2) I'd slightly misunderstood the scoring for my Metropolis tile, and got precisely zero points for it.

However (#3) Ian's score was so advanced up the track anyway, even if my interpretation had been correct, I'd still have been back in second! Scores were something like:

Ian 84
Sam 72
Andrew 69

As we surfaced for air we reflected on the game which Ian likened to Lords of Waterdeep and Andrew Terraforming Mars. It was long - I wouldn't even attempt it with four - and that simple nub of action-taking, abetted by cards, slows down considerably when any player builds a tableau with as much choice as Ian did. Unlike Terraforming Mars, however, the hand-size limit is three cards, which goes some way to confining the AP moments. We all had do-overs. But playing it again - which I would like to - I do think that would drop considerably. I felt despite one or two cards it avoided the sinking-into-abstraction of many long games, and it isn't a point salad either. One for the Euro-lovers no doubt - we all agreed that Adam would enjoy it, and probably show us that Ian is catchable after all...

Markers Aurelius

This week's games night began with eight people sat around Sam's kitchen table: Sam, Stanley, Joe, other Joe, Martin, Quentin, Katy, and me. We needed a short game we could all play before one of the Joes had to go to bed. We chose Insider and dealt Quentin in despite him never having played before.

Regular gamer Joe was the master and he handled our questions dutifully until Martin blurted out "Is it a volcano?" which was the correct word.

We discussed whether or not Martin was the Insider, but we had very little to go on. In the end, only Joe voted against him and it went to another round of voting, with Quentin's questions "Is it geological?" and "Is it a mountain?" bringing suspicion upon him, but he wasn't the Insider either. It was Stanley!

We played again, after Martin explained the finer details of the rules to Quentin, and this time it was the smaller of the two Joes who was the master. I guessed correctly ("baseball") but only Katy voted against me. Maybe there's something about him, but we chose Quentin again and we were wrong again because it was Stanley again.

One Joe went to bed and we split into two groups and played a couple of short games until Ian was due to arrive. Joe, Katy and Martin played Maskmen. Katy won with a whole round still to play but was a little put out to see her magnificent lead shorn down to a narrow victory by the end.

Katy 4
Joe 3
Martin 1

Sam, Stanley, Quentin and I chose Spy Tricks, a game I had no recollection of despite having played only a few days before. Sam won big in the final round, putting his double bet onto the correct card, and just squeezed past his son into first place.

Sam 25
Stanley 24
Quentin 20
Andrew 11

Now Stanley went to bed and Ian arrived. We rearranged the groups into me, Martin, Sam and Ian playing Senators while Joe, Katy and Quentin played Let's Make A Bus Route. That game ended

Joe 60
Katy 47
Quentin 47

And then they moved on to Good Little Tricks, a devilish card game whose basic premise escapes me at the moment. There was a fair amount of people claiming they were going to "shoot the moon," though.

Joe -21
Katy -26
Quentin -34

We were still playing Senators when they were done, so they bashed out a quick single round of Little Tricks:

Quentin 0
Joe -7
Katy -20

Meanwhile, over in Ancient Rome, we'd seen all kinds of history flash before our eyes. After Sam had the rules explained to him, our first game was over in minutes as the fourth War card game after only five or six rounds.

Sam 8
Andrew 7
Ian 6
Martin 6

We set up to play again and this time it was more of an epic, with the fourth War card not coming out until the very end. But before then all manner of events unfolded. I was hit by Civil Unrest and a lack of cash during some extortion, meaning I lost two senators but I was then able to cash in two high scoring sets of cards for 51 in cash which I used to buy my way into first place. Other players took turns being in last place, first Ian then Martin and finally Sam. But that fourth War never seemed to arrive and Ian ran out of cash, meaning he slipped further back while my frugal final rounds got me first on a tie-breaker.

Andrew 11 + 8)
Martin 11 (+2)
Sam 10
Ian 9

Finally we were all together for a game of Just One. We started well, but soon duplicates started to creep in. Sam did well to get 'cocoon' with only 'chrysalis' and 'enclosed' to guide him. Joe was less fortunate, having the impossible task of getting 'panda' from the two remaining clues (after four bamboos wiped themselves out) which were 'diplomacy' and 'eyes'. Once again we were "wow, not bad" according to the score sheet.

There was one more game in us thanks to generous offers of lifts from Joe and Quentin, and it was Fuji Flush. I was first to one card but just couldn't push through. Mid-game, Katy was doing so badly that she claimed she had more cards than when she started. But it was Quentin who was able to join his last card to another already on the table and push through for victory.

Joe's best Godfather face during Fuji Flush.

Quentin 0 cards left
Andrew 1
Martin 1
Sam 2
Katy 2
Ian 3
Joe 4

And that was all. As we set off, I somehow managed to lose my phone so at the moment I have no photos from the evening, but hopefully I'll put them on later (EDIT: done it!). Thanks to everyone for a splendid time.