Texas Lockdown

The rules of lockdown may have changed to allow six people to meet outside, but the six gamers meeting up this evening were still very much in virtual space.

I arrived at a regrettably late quarter past eight and watched as Sam, Ian, Andy, Katy and Martin play Cubirds. It was Katy's first game and she was mightily crestfallen to discover that she had misinterpreted slight differences in a type of bird as two different species. Meanwhile, Martin pondered that Cubirds doesn't scale up well to five players. Katy said she was enjoying it, and then promptly won.

Katy 1
Sam, Martin, Ian, Andy 0 each (or 0 shared between them if you prefer)

As a sextet we considered splitting into two groups but preferred to stay together for a swift For Sale. After a peculiar bidding round where most of the big cards came out in the last round, Martin said he had the kind of hand that meant he didn't have to make any decisions. 

Katy's internet connection vanished just as she was about to select her final card of the game. At least it gave the climax a little bit of a build up.

Andy 51
Katy 47
Ian 47
Martin 46
Andrew 39
Sam 39

Then Sam left and the four of us chose Texas Showdown. I played while cooking a late supper. Katy made pointed remarks about how well her side of the table were doing until the end of the second round when the score was 5-5-5-5-4.

Martin kept asking Andy to lead whenever he had the chance, even though it usually ended badly for him. I seemed to do well in my state of semi-distraction, but Katy was made to eat her boastful words when she was first to hit the game-ending score of 10 tricks.

Andrew 7
Martin 9
Ian 9
Katy 11
Andy 12

Then we rattled off two quick games of Vulture Culture…

Katy 18
Andy 10
Ian 9
Martin 4
Andrew -1

Ian 18
Andrew 16
Katy 10
Martin -1
Andy -5

Before I left the chat. I logged back into BGA to watch them play Marrakech, though. It was pretty even by the time I left them, so I guess Andy was able to put together a huge point-scoring carpet in the latter part of the game.

Andy 63
Katy 39
Mart 35
Ian 23

kthxbai!

Chips with everything

At eight o’clock I arrived, and saw that one game - Vulture Culture - had been completed with the scores looking a little curious:

Katy 7

Sam -1

Martin -2

Ian -99

Andy -99

It took a while to work out, but Ian and Andy had tied for first place with 18 each, but the rules of VC say that ties cancel each other out, I suppose, so they were sent packing with a somewhat unnecessarily high punishment.

Along with the above mentioned five and myself was also Joe. We all dove into a seven player game of 6nimmt because misery loves company. Most miserable at first were Sam and Katy who both reminisced about how good they used to be at this game. However, Sam put a halt to his free fall while Katy kept on plummeting, relying on Andy and Ian to have worse luck than her to avoid last place. 

Martin came first despite the rest of us talking up Joe's chances. 'Only six points behind!" we'd say, encouragingly. That's about as close as he got, though.

Martin 48

Joe 39

Sam 36

Andrew 30

Katy 11

Andy 7

Ian -16

Next up was a dose of analysis paralysis as we struggled over what to play next. Joe even went so far as to suggest a two player game. Three of us, Martin, Katy and I, went off to a new Google hangout and wait to see who joined us for some clever trick taking game. Then we realised we would have no idea if they'd decided to play a four player game. 

Then Andy popped in, while Ian, Sam and Joe played Ninety nine. The four of us played Chip It, which is not a golf-themed card game, but a game involving disposing of two distinct resources in your hand such that you run out of both before anyone else.

The theme chosen for this abstract card game concerns nachos, jalapenos of various values and cheese. Use them together to put down sets of cards of the same value, using the cheese to adjust values of cards upwards.

We had no idea what a winning strategy might be. Go big early on, get lots of cheese and then spend the rest of the whittling the cheese away? We played twice and Andy won both times. Still not entirely sure how.

Then Katy, Joe and Sam all left, with the game of Ninety-nine abandoned. The remaining four chose Marrakech. Once again Andy began by dropping off carpets and then sending Assam off in the other direction and once again he formed a big old mega carpet out of those pieces he'd left behind. I (once again) would have been on the receiving end of Andy’s evil cloth empire, so I kept sending Assam into the corner that was furthest away. Happily, I happened to have a fair bit of carpet down there, so that worked out fine for me.

Andrew 68

Andy 32

Martin 30 plus cash

Ian 30

And so that was that. We logged off and went to bed. I had a dream that I was gaming online again and Ian was cutting a shape out of a folded up piece of paper. When he was done, he opened it up for us to see - it was a snowman. So I’ll see you all, snowman or no snowman,  next week

My year of meets

I logged on at eight to find nine gamers in attendance or just joining. Such was the attraction of our two anniversaries: Katy's birthday and our year of gaming under lockdown rules. Before I'd arrived, five had already played a game of Vulture Culture, the new theme for Raj which loses any airs of Indian luxury in exchange for cartoony graphics of birds. I wasn't there but BGA lists the scores as...

Adam H 25

Ian 10

Sam 3

Katy 2

Martin 0

Once we were all together (Andy, Joe and Adam T were the other late arrivals) we played 6nimmt. Sam fell into a death spiral, and I pointed out that that’s the worst kind of spiral there is. Katy remarked that “6nimmt is like life - it all depends on what other people do.” With age comes wisdom, I suppose.

Andy 52

Adam H 38

Andrew 32

Katy 17

Adam T 16

Joe 16

Ian 11

Martin 9

Sam -3

After this, we split into two groups. Well, technically we split into three because Adam H left, becoming a little group all on his own, but for the purposes of playing games, we became two groups. Martin, Adam T, Joe and Katy sped off the playingcards.io for a game of Nokosu Dice.

We four (Andy, Sam, Ian and me) played Marrakech. Andy informed us that the day after I went bust, an identical fate befell him. I got anxious that history might repeat itself when Ian started off by rolling fours all the time, skipping past my carpets and leaving me without an income. Luckily everyone’s carpets were spread out across the board, with no real mega-carpets until Sam put together a six-square carpet in the last couple of rounds, so I managed to end the game with some money remaining.

Ian 46

Andy 41

Sam 40

Andrew 29

Next up was 7 Wonders. I chose my side of the board simply because the weather was nicer. I then proceeded to play an exemplary game of 7 Wonders, which is a shame because I’m not sure what I did right as opposed to all the other games I've played. Maybe the weather helped after all.

Andrew 64

Andy 45 + cash

Sam 45

Ian 41

Next Sam left and Ian, Andy and I played Vulture Culture. I was glad to see Raj on BGA but less so when I found out it only lasted one round.

Ian 20

Andy 12

Andrew 8

Then we played Cubirds, which ended 1-0-0 to Andy. The other group were still playing Nokosu Dice but said that Katy was so far ahead (she had 68 to Adam’s 9, Martin’s 6 and Joe’s 5) that they’d decided to end once round three was over. So the three of us banged out a quick game of Butterfly while we waited for them.

Andy 53

Ian 40

Andrew 19

But they saw that we had started a new game, so they ploughed on to end the game properly even if it was a foregone conclusion.

Katy 95

Adam 45

Martin 43

Joe 13

I went to bed as did Joe, and the remaining five saw out Katy’s birthday with a couple of rounds of Vulture Culture, ending with identical placings both times.

Martin 26

Andy 14

Adam T 10

Ian -2

Katy -8

Martin 16

Andy 14

Adam T 6

Ian 4

Katy 0

Thanks everyone. See you next week for another year of lockdown gaming!

The Gary Lineker of Marrakech

I arrived at 8 o'clock and watched Martin, Andy, Katy and Ian play No Thanks. I watched enough to see Ian try to send a 6 card around twice. "I'm tired," he sighed. He still came in second, though. Katy was stiffed by a last minute 35.

Andy -37

Ian -43

Martin -54

Katy -85

Next we played The Crew: Mission Deep Sea. This was on playingcards.io and it was very nicely designed. "You can tell it's not one if mine, can't you?" Said Martin. But it wasn't just a rethemed version of the original Crew, he went on to assure us. The missions are more interesting too.

Having said that, though, our very first mission was "win the first trick" which was so basic that we just assumed we'd completed it and went straight onto mission two. 

We sailed on pretty serenely, with the only hitch when I misremembered the rules and dubbed myself captain despite not having the four of trumps. It was Ian who did, but I must have been louder in my assertion and drowned him out. Ian's mike was muffled for much of the evening, which at least gave him an appropriate subnautical feel.

Happily it didn't matter in this instance who was commander. In fact, if anything, we'd made it harder for ourselves.

We finished after mission five and Katy signed off, explaining that her internet was showing signs of imminent collapse. We began playing Cubirds. This set collecting game involves putting birds on wires that match other birds on the same wire in order to pick up the birds in-between the two matching birds. Once you have enough birds of a certain type in your hand you can fly away as a flock, keeping one or two cards as a means of scoring.

It was nice. Quite genteel, really.

Andy 1

Andrew 0

Ian 0

Martin 0

Finally, Ian said he was amenable to one more before he hit the sack, so we played Marrakech. And what a historical game it was. Andy started with a curious strategy of scattering his carpets far and wide. This paid dividends as later on he was able to join them together to make one huge carpet. One that I kept landing on. You see, Martin, in his attempt at getting points, kept steering Assam/Andy back to his carpet which was next to Andy’s carpet thus leaving Assam/me in an impossible situation. This has happened before, but not to such a devastating effect. I was knocked out of the game (player elimination? At GNN?!) and watched the rest of them have fun without me, eventually covering over my last piece of carpet ensuring I scored no points at all.

Andy 64

Ian 40

Martin 38

Andrew 0

I refused to give Andy any credit, though, insisting it was all Martin’s doing. This gave rise to the blog title and my claim that Andy was the Gary Lineker of Marrakech - tapping in from six yards after someone else had done all the hard work. I should have been more gracious in defeat, but if I’d been like that, I wouldn’t have a blog title.

At this point, Ian had to go to bed and I needed a lie down too. Next week is the one year anniversary of GNN going into lockdown. I don’t think anything is planned, though since that would clash with Katy’s birthday. Either way, see you all then.

Formula Bum

I arrived online to find a gallery of faces on Discord, intent and serious, so I assumed that they had already started a game. It turns out they hadn't, and no doubt I'd arrived in a lull in the hilarious conversation. Either way, Ian, Martin, Sam, Joe and I began a quick game of For Sale while we waited for Andy.

At the time I was still preparing food for my girlfriend and, besides, my audio connection seemed very quiet so I made little attempt at banter. The bidding round ended in a frustrating manner, with the 29 and 30 coming out in the final round, long after I'd spent most of my money.

I remember little about the second half of the game, except for picking up a zero dollar card with a 21. It ended in a deal heat.

Sam 54 (same cash as Martin)
Martin 54 (same cash as Sam)
Andrew 52
Joe 47
Ian 44

With Andy on board the six of us chose Downforce (odds betting, no superpowers). I never really had any form in this game and that continued. My sole successful bet was due to someone else helpfully pushing my black car over the line. 

Joe was of the opinion that it would be perfectly possible to give this game a colonic retheme. To which Martin added that you wouldn't even need to change the name. There then followed a few punning names for Formula One drivers (Ayrton Senokot, Michael Poomacher) and after this did I imagine things or did the anal puns continue? People complained about being rammed from behind or shunted in the slow lane. Probably my imagination.

Sam won in a tight race of bottlenecks and frustration.

Sam 19
Ian 18
Joe 15
Andrew 7
Martin 1
Andy -4

Then Sam left and, after disappearing to answer the front door for a few minutes, Joe signed off too. The remaining four went for Love Letter. Since we were unable to change the winning criteria to three points, we knew it might be a bit of an undertaking, but we crashed on regardless.

The highlight for me was whenever Andy (screen name Baron Frog) was accused of being a baron. If the guess was right, that was funny because it's so obvious and if it was wrong then BGA would add a note to the commentary down the side of the screen saying "Baron Frog is NOT a baron" as if it were appalled at the presence of an imposter in our midst.

Midway through the game, Andy gave up on Discord and communicated with us on the BGA chat, which Martin used to see which swear words got an automated warning message. Bum did, but Poo didn't, if I recall correctly.

Anyway, the game began by looking like it'd be over soon. Ian won the first two rounds and then Martin got to three points. Andy and I got back into contention until the score was 3-3-3-2. Improbably, Ian hadn't scored since his opening flurry. But then he won the next two rounds to take the victory. It was almost as if he'd just been toying with us.

Ian 4
Andy 3
Martin 3
Andrew 3

And so we were spent and we went our separate ways. Thanks all. See you next Tuesday.