Magenta Devine Reflected in the Back of a Spoon

Despite his monthly Time of Crisis battle looming, Andrew was good enough to join me Friday night and bash out some two-player games on the spotty tablecloth of destiny.

First out of the blocks was Transatlantic. This is the game Mac Gerdts designed using his card system in Concordia but replacing the generic Mediterranean Trading theme with a marginally more specific Age of Steam vibe, as you manufacture steam ships from 1870 onwards (including the Titanic!) until the game ends with the arrival of the combustion engine ship (or something) around 1915.

Just like Concordia, you have a hand of cards to play and each played card is out of your reach until you play the specific card (the Director, in this case) that returns all previously-played cards to you. The cards are used to purchase ships, load them with coal, transport their freight (for cash and points!) and invest in various companies - these investments will define how much you score for your ships when they get too old to be competitive any more, and are bumped from the seas like yesterday's iron-riveted dreams...

We both preferred it to Concordia, because despite the underwhelming appearance - Concordia's ugly sibling, one might say - it plays faster and despite lots of interactive possibilities with ship-bumping and trade-house-building, doesn't stall with Concordia's potential for analysis paralysis. Not for two anyway. Andrew surged into a lead despite doing very little trade, instead focusing on building ships as often as possible and cashing in on his aged fleet when the opportunity arose. But as the game entered its final stages, he found his ships coalless and I sailed past him for a narrow-ish win:

Sam about 170
Andrew about 150

Next up was Wordsy, the rapid fire word game of thinking of words. Andrew again began the stronger as I snatched up the timer, thinking of the word fastest, only to have him outscore me and claim a bonus for doing so. But I came back into contention near the end and just about snatched a win.

goes too fast for photos

Then I introduced Andrew to the two-player delights of Kami. We tried this as a 2v2 a couple of weeks back and were underwhelmed, but the two player version is more engaging. Each player has eight cards and it's a race to be rid of them, scoring the points of your last-played card. Each turn has a defensive play - negating the attack of your opponent by playing a matching card - and an attacking one. With two players the sixteen spare cards become 'mercenaries' - at your disposal to use as defence or attack - the caveat being, of course, that doing so isn't making your hand any smaller.
Andrew took this one:

Andrew: Lord of the Spirit World
Sam: not

Before at Andrew's suggestion we broke out Knit Wit, which has no been played for many a moon. You create a venn diagram of overlapping loops, each representing a word. Inside the loops are spools - maybe in one loop, maybe in two or more.

Then you write a definition for each spool: for instance, a spool might be Electrical, Bitter and Curved or Narrow and Funny. I wasn't sure it would really work with two players, but it was hilarious. We played twice. I can't remember who won - I think it was me but only by dint of being faster. Andrew's definitions were funnier.

Sam: Knit?
Andrew: Wit

We'd drunk our fill of wine, delighted in padron peppers and stuffed our faces with cheap crisps, so it was time to say goodnight. Shortly after Andrew left though Sally arrived home, so we had a quick game of Wordsy too. A fine Friday night.