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Another Tuesday in lockdown, another bandwidth or seven taken up with the various GNN members logging on to Discord for another night's digital fun.

First up was 7 Wonders, with Ian, Martin, Adam T, Andy B and myself (Sam) managing to pass cards around at a rate of knots. Online gaming does have some benefits, and the speed of shuffling and dealing is a definite boon on this game. I confess I didn't really watch what anyone was doing apart from my immediate neighbours, who were Andy and Martin. Andy didn't bother with military, and Martin did but only to the point of scolding me for my aggression. I didn't take a screenshot of the placings, but I claimed a win off a tie-breaker with Andy, courtesy of my love of fist-waving and culture.

As we hit the 8pm mark, there was a flurry of new arrivals in the form of Joe, Andrew, Steve and Anja. Joe and Andrew immediately decamped to play The Crew with Adam and Martin, leaving the rest of us to bemoan the current shitshow that is the UK government for a little bit, before we spent almost as long choosing a game. After some debate we ended up playing Coloretto, the best chameleon set-collection game I know. Andy reappraised us of the rules and before long everyone was cursing their luck in classic GNN fashion.

Over the The Crew, Andrew was doing the same as he had to bow out due to illness. After Coloretto wrapped up...




I hopped over to take his place, playing 2 or 3 abortive missions and - I think - three successful ones. Then I retired to bed, drinking tea and swearing at the news. I'm aware Martin went on to thrash Adam and Joe at Race for the Galaxy before they played Love Letter, but I've no idea about scores or what anyone else ended up playing, making this a fairly erratic entry into the GNN logbook. Sorry about that.

Let the bean fight commence

Logging on at half past seven, I found a game of Quantum in full swing. Judging by the banter between Ian l, Martin and Sam I guessed that Martin's victory had just been avoided after some aggressive play by Ian.

I took the opportunity to put my supper on the plate and eat it while watching the game and seeing Joe and Adam H dawdle in. The three non-players decamped to Google Hangouts so we could chat without distracting the others. After a short while, they joined us reporting that Ian had won after some more aggressive play on his part.

Ian wins
Martin and Sam don’t

Next the six of us played Texas Showdown thanks to Martin’s very own handmade version on the internet. It worked well, and Martin seemed to be pleased with it, declaring “let the bean fight commence!” before a round before remembering it was “bun fight”. As for the game, I went clear in round one and then in round four I had four of the highest valued cards in their suit. Ian won again.

Ian 2
Sam 5
Martin 6
Andrew 8
Adam 9
Joe 10

It worked so well, we played again. In the first round Sam won with a black two which seems almost impossible. He never recovered and the game ended after only three rounds.

Martin 2
Andrew 4
Ian 4
Adam 5
Joe 5
Sam 10

These games were accompanied by a series of curious sounds as if one of us was underwater or making an ASMR video or some such. But anyway, at this point we left playingcards.io for boardgamearena and set up a game of 7 Wonders. Martin went for blue buildings while Sam overloaded on military cards. Adam and Ian went for science and Joe and I went for a bit of everything, but with me hoarding cash.

And it was the cash which got me the win, as I snuck past Sam in a very close game.

Andrew 55 + cash
Sam 55
Ian 53
Martin 52 + cash
Joe 52
Adam 51

At this point Sam leaves and Andy B is briefly seen on Discord and as a spectator on BGA. The remaining five of us play For Sale. I picked up the 1, since you know where you are with a 1, and then got the 2, since I would know where I’d be with that too. It did the trick somehow as I squeezed past on my second cash tie-breaker in a row.

Andrew 56 + cash
Martin 56
Adam 48
Joe 46
Ian 37

Then Joe left and the remaining four returned to playingcards to try Fight, Martin’s version of a new game that currency only existed as a print and play. Katy joined us, too, which meant we needed two rules explanations which was probably for the best. It was a little clumsy online, since the deck needed sorting, and the game itself wasn’t great: a co-op where everyone’s card had to add up to the value of a monster card in the middle of the table.

We wound it up after a while and Ian and Adam both left. Katy, Martin and I revisited Hanabi. Katy wasn’t keen, but she agreed. There was a moment of madness for her when, after fretting about me running out of time on my go, accidentally discarded a red three instead of playing it. A little frustrating, but never mind. We still got to our highest score.

22 out of 25

And so we were done. Thanks all.

Quantum States

On Thursday the London Old Farts chapter of GNN (Andrew, Chris, Paul J and myself) met up - online of course - for our fortnightly battle of wits/luck/distractions as lockdown continues. Chris had mentioned Keyflower as a possibility, but despite its reputation as a euro of high-level interaction and fuckery, I had to damp squib that away with warnings of falling asleep during a vastly simpler game only a few nights before. So instead, with Andrew not quite ready to go, we started with a three-player Battle Sheep.

This is a very Hey That's My Fish style game of grabbing territory - albeit here you occupy the tile, rather than remove it - of moving your stack of sheep tiles in a straight line from their starting hexagon. You must start the game at the edge of the board, and you must move as far as you can along your chosen path. Then, you choose how to split your stack, leaving some (at least one) behind and others (at least one) where you arrive.

Chris red, Paul blue, Sam white

It's an aggressive-feeling passive-aggressive game, where after the first couple of turns people are making blocking moves and giving you a multi-directional conundrum of where you might go, and what you might sacrifice. We - or I - thought Paul looked to have things wrapped up, but it was Chris who proved to be the most tactically astute shepherd, claiming the win.

1 Chris
2 Paul
3 Sam

With Andrew now moving from intrigued  spectator to active participant, we moved on to the meat of the evening with Quantum. This needs no introduction, and with an additional player to the game of two weeks before it was a more combative game from the early turns. I managed to get into the lead with the help of being Curious, but then got into a muddle as found the bonus move this gives you can't be applied to the same ship unless all ships have moved. Although that's as complicated as it got, it kept stumping me.

Andrew caught me up as Chris and Paul seemed to be caught in their own tete-a-tete on the western (if there can be such a thing in space) side of the board. He had his dice in place for a win, so I spent a turn going on the attack and headed this off. I also got my penultimate cube down and, with classic Morrison oversight, missed an opportunity for the easiest of wins if I'd just increased research: given a six, taking aggression, and hitting 6 dominance too. Instead I foolishly bemoaned my mistake out loud and unsurprisingly found myself under attack to get said dominance down.

It still looked like a two-way battle for the win with Andrew and I poised, but then Paul suddenly placed two cubes in one go. I think. I'm still not sure how it happened, but one moment I was puzzling out my next move, and the next I was looking at Paul J Wins and Everyone Else Loses. Awesome work by Paul, however he did it.

Paul: wins
Everyone else: loses

It was now 9.30 though and I had to put Joe to bed, so I left them to start this occasionally protracted business as they moved onto Kingdomino. I can't speak to the drama of these games but maybe the scores can:

Andrew 60
Paul 34
Chris 31

and then

Chris 69
Andrew 60
Paul 57

Amazing consistency from Andrew. After that Chris' friend Stuart joined them for a game of Incan Gold that Andrew won - again, with 60 points! After that Andrew also left, and the remaining trip still had enough in the tank for a crack at Stone Age - won by Stuart. Phenomenal commitment.

*                   *                   *

With apologies for indulgence (I know this is not the place, but I need to tell someone) one thing lockdown has done this end is help us get the garden sorted. Here is before and after..

   

I look forward to the day where we can sit on the deck on a Tuesday night and shout obscenities at one another in person...

Kingdamnino

I "arrived" at this week's games night a little late, but had earlier popped into the group chat long enough to learn that Martin, Ian, Katy and Sam were playing a game of Love Letter. I even watched a hand or two which was pretty entertaining. Once I'd returned, the game was over and I saw that Martin had gone from joint last on 2-2-0-0 to outright winner.

Martin 4
Ian 3
Sam 3
Katy 2

For my first game, Martin introduced us to a website that allowed you to recreate your favourite card games (or even your own creation) online. He had put together a game of Voodoo Prince. It lacked the artwork of the original but the game itself remained intact. Having everyone's cursor visible on screen as a smallish coloured circle was odd since it felt like I was playing against four little Tinkerbells, all drifting around mischievously. Also dealing cards was impossible, so instead it was necessary for everyone to take the required number of cards from the stack in a flurry of Hungry Hippos type activity.

We played a three round game, and Joe joined us midway through the game as a spectator.

Katy had a commanding lead after two rounds but that didn't stop her complaining when she went out third in round three. She cheered herself up by picking up the token we were using to signify the trump suit and waving it around, much to Martin's annoyance.

Katy 29
Martin 21
Sam 18
Andrew 17
Ian 17

After this, Joe joined us for a game of Fuji Flush, again devised by Martin on this new website. The only drawback was how difficult it was to keep track of how many cards people had left. I was first to get down to my last card, but Martin was soon after me and he was able to seal the deal. Don't know how anyone else did.

Martin 0 cards left
Andrew 1
Everyone else… more than that, I suppose

After the game ended the table descended into anarchy with people moving cards around willy nilly and everyone getting a new rude name. I for one will be very disappointed if this behaviour doesn't continue once we're back in the real world.

After this, we all decamped to another site to play Fake Artist Goes To New York. This has the advantage of no one being the clue-giver, so we were all involved all the time. Joe was the first fake but couldn’t guess “bike”, then Katy was next and was able to guess “hunting” (while disputing that it should be in the ‘recreation’ category) then I was last fake and unable to guess “dish rack”.

Katy struggled with the site on her tablet, saying she had difficulty getting to things in corners. Thus her tablet was dubbed the Samsung Round, a rare circular tablet that couldn’t even scroll, apparently.

Then Katy went to see a gig online for half an hour or so while the rest of us played Just One. Not the old fashioned version with webcams and pen and paper, but a slick web-based version. It worked well, except for not eliminating a duplicate due to a spelling error. We got a few amazing correct guesses with only two clues by Ian and Martin and we finished with 10 out of 13 and the traditional snide remark: “huh, colour me impressed. Was it a fluke?”

Then Sam left and the four of us played the world’s most controversial game of Kingdomino. It was all going smoothly until the last move when Martin had first choice and a prize 3-crown tile which would fit nicely onto his board but instead when he chose it, the website selected a different and completely useless tile which probably cost him the win. He was furious, as you can imagine.

Martin (green) had chosen the lowest tile, but been given the second one

Andrew 52
Ian 47
Joe 41
Martin 37 and fuming

Katy had come back by now, but Ian and Joe left so the three of us played two games of Hanabi to finish off. It works well online, although we were able to do our usual trick of giving clues in a happy or sad tone of voice. Both times, I was the first to ruin the game by discarding a pair of values. In game two poor old Martin only got one clue for most of the game, since his hand was all threes and fours - either couldn’t be used or weren’t worth protecting.

Game one: 20 out of 25
Game two 19 out of 25

Well, it looked like we were getting worse, so we finished up there and left the internet to look after itself. Thanks all!

Can't Stop/Can Stop

I (Sam) was late to GNN last night, and had the unique experience of listening to the end of a game of Can't Stop where the only available numbers left were 2,3,4 and 5. Ian, Katy, Martin and Adam H were all going repeatedly bust and the swear-meter was up at eleven. Eventually Katy won - not sure what the other positions were.

Katy - can stop!

8pm was nearly upon us and duly Adam T, Anja and Steve appeared. Joe remained, for now, mysteriously absent. We embarked on a game of Codenames with Ian clueing for Steve, Anja and Adam T. I was spymaster for Martin, Katy, and the enigmatic Adam H. Both teams began with a solid 2 correct guesses each, then we (Blue) pulled slightly into the lead when Ian's clue of Mount Rushmore led to an incorrect guess of Washington.

Both Ian and I were slightly bamboozled by the amount of water-related words on the grid with me trying to clue sink/pirate/stream and Ian well. Fortunately we ticked off horn and swing thanks to jazz - it's not often I say thanks to jazz - and then Ian's clue of shaft gave us a single word to finish the game off:

Martin/Katy/Adam H/Sam - Masters of Cold War

Around this point Joe materialised, but barely had time to say hello before he was led off for a game of Tichu with Ian, Katy and Martin. No idea what happened there - the rest of us, after another bout of elusiveness from Adam H, went off to play Taluva. This hasn't been seen on a GNN Tuesday night since the olden days, before so many things that happened, that I needed a refresher that amounted to a first-teach.

Fortunately Adam T, Steve and Anja had all played recently, and the only person who'd never played before was Adam H, who - inevitably? - won anyway. I'm blaming distractions of two roaming children, and the moon out the window.

I have to apologise because I struggled to get what any kind of strategy was and halfway through the game began to fall asleep, to the point where I asked if it was feasible to bail, and put enough social pressure on Steve as a result that he rushed his final few turns. Who knows what might have been had I kept my mouth shut? Sorry Steve. I remembered Taluva as a fairly dainty game but I now suspect I only ever played it 2-player with Joe. Five was a different beast.

Adam H - wins
Everyone else - loses, thanks to Sam

At this point I fell into bed and therefore missed whatever drama was about to unfold... I hope the comments will tell a better story than mine, which was Sally waking me at 3am because I was snoring so loudly.