Flower Power

I logged on at 8 , just in time to interrupt the early stages of a game of Skull so they (Sam, Joe, Ian Martin and Adam H) simply abandoned the game and began anew with me on board.

There's a general consensus that bluffing games like this lose something when translated onto the internet. The opportunity to read people is gone and, since that's pretty much what this game is about, it's a kind of hollow experience.

Not that it wasn't fun. Adam never bid, so everyone assumed he always played a skull. Although, I seem to remember Ian ruining many attempts at guesses with a cheeky skull of his own. It took us twenty minutes for someone (Sam) to score a point and then ten minutes more for Martin to draw level.

In the end, Adam won after all.

Then we played Raj. Joe was in full dark mode, with only a faint grey light illuminating half his face. It seemed to help as he won a game where luck was mean to Sam who picked up negative points despite going high. Fun, but over too fast.

Joe 18

Ian 17

Andrew 6

Martin 3

Sam -4

Then we played For Sale, while Adam vanished for a while. It began with a lot of the most attractive cards coming out early. Martin made some comment about being prepared for "when the shit comes out", to which Joe remarked that you don't want your trousers down when the shit comes out. Slightly counterintuitive advice, there.

After a game where Ian seemed to be in pole position, Joe took his second victory in a row. His response was an airy, disinterested "oh, did I win?" Sam, at least, was comforted that he had the most accurate prediction of his final standing.

Joe 59

Ian 57

Andrew 54

Martin 44

Sam 35

Then came 6nimmt. Constantly frustrating but with always the hope that someone else will be less lucky than you. In Andy's absence, someone mentioned that professional variant, just to keep the tradition alive. I was first to dip into negative points, but then saw Sam whizz past me in a last round death spiral. In terms of actually playing well, it was Martin versus Joe, with Martin leading by four points in the last round, but Joe just couldn't close that gap, even with a hand as even distributed as this...

Martin 37

Joe 35

Adam 29

Ian -4

Andrew -10

Sam -18

I had to dash off, as culinary duties called and it looks like Sam and Joe left too. The remaining three played Conspiracy. It literally could not have been closer.

Martin 57

Joe 57

Ian 47

Thanks all, see you next week.

From six nimmt to nein danke

After last week's hiatus, six of us returned for another week of virtually having fun. Initially Sam, Martin, Ian and Andy were present for an opening game of Skull. I had arrived too but needed to dash off and buy tin foil so couldn't participate.

Andy 2
Ian 1
Martin 1
Sam 1

Joe arrived and I sorted myself out, kitchen-wise. Then we played Railroad Ink, new on the geek, and it's a neat implementation of the roll and write original. I found it quite relaxing, although Andy couldn't see where a potential score for a particular move would be displayed. "I guess you just have to work it out yourself," replied Martin. How very old school.

Andrew 49

Martin 47
Andy 43
Sam 38
Ian 37
Joe 37

Then we played For Sale. Sam went aggressive right from the start, saying he wouldn’t do his usual timid strategy and finish in fourth. I said I was fine with fourth, and picked up the first free card I could. In a sense, we both got exactly what we wanted.

Joe 59
Martin 49
Ian 48
Andrew 45
Sam 41
Andy 28

Next up was 6nimmt. Now, I didn’t make many notes but I think at this point Joe sung a bass line and invited people to guess. Only Sam tried before Joe admitted it was the middle eight from “Boys of summer” by Don Henley.

6nimmt was as 6nimmt does. I was cruising in first until I hit a death spiral. “It was pretty close in the middle of the pack,” observed Martin from the safe distance of a convincing win.

Martin 40
Andy 25
Sam 24
Andrew 23
Ian 23
Joe -4

Sam bowed out and the five of us knocked out a quick game of No Thanks, which Martin won thanks to the final card which wasn't 29 like I wanted and it certainly wasn't 18 and 19 as Joe needed.

Martin 23
Andrew 27
Ian 32
Joe 42
Andy 44

Then Ian  left and as a foursome we played Conspiracy. This has a similar card drafting mechanism to Abyss, but is simpler. Put your cards in a pyramid shape, and score points for collecting things, putting things next to other similar things and getting locations. I had very little idea about what was going on.

Joe 54

Andy 53
Martin 48
Andrew 44

And with that, we were done for another evening. Thanks and see you next Tuesday.

Sounds like it's time to make a selection (7)

 Six of us gathered last Tuesday online, and, shock-horror, we played games.

While waiting for the stragglers, Katy, Martin, Ian and I played Raj. I'd forgotten how to play, and kept bidding low for negative cards, ensuring I picked them up. However, due to the idiosyncractic nature of the game (well, it's kind of the only rule, I suppose), Katy and Martin tied for first place and were bumped to last, leaving Ian the winner and me in second place.

Ian 9

Joe 3

Katy -99

Martin -99

Sam then joined us, and we played again while waiting for Andy. Now that I remembered how to play, I came last.

Sam 14

Katy 12

Martin 12

Ian 6

Joe -4

After that, we were joined by Andy, and discussed 2 x 3 player options. I suggested 99, a perennial favourite, and Katy and others (Ian?) perked up. Then Martin suggested Scout on playing cards.io, and I perked up. Sam, Martin and I retired to another Hangout to play, with me feeling slightly guilty at how easily my head had been turned.

Scout is a fascinating climbing game, seemingly inspired by Krass Kariert - and I think Martin has called it the game he hoped KK would be. Any attempt by me to recall the rules here will be a) boring and b) full of errors, so I won't bother, suffice to say we felt it probably needed 4 or 5 to really shine. I'd definitely be up for playing again though. I had a very poor rounds 1 and 2, and was trailing the others significantly; I managed to redeem myself in last two rounds, overtaking Sam but unable to catch Martin.

If Sam or Martin can remember the actual scores, let me know and I'll edit them in:

Martin 1st

Joe 2nd 

Sam 3rd 

We noticed a bug in the implementation - when you're first dealt your hand, you can choose to keep it as is, or flip it for an entirely different set of numbers. In doing so, in our game at least, the cards re-arranged themselves, before settling into a stable pattern after a couple of flips, which is not supposed to happen.

It lead to a curious Shroedinger's Cat type of contemplation. Martin looked at his hand and decided to stick with it in case it changed when he examined it flipped - I chose to immediately flip mine a couple of times to settle it, without looking too closely at what I could have stuck with at first. Sort of like an unintended Team Play style variant.

Not sure what the other three played, but we reconvened after 4 rounds of Scout, and Sam bid us goodnight. I felt I had one more short game in me, and the remaining 5 of us opted for No Thanks.

I picked up the 34 right at the beginning of the game, with a healthy chunk of chips on it. This kept me going through the entire game, and I finished with a single card, a single chip and felt very smug. I came fourth.

Ian -4

Katy -20

Martin -31

Joe -33

Andy -41

I bailed after that, and will leave it to the comments to find out what else was played. A fun time, though like Sam, I find I'm rarely up for more than a couple of games when we ply online - and like all of us (I assume), I'm thoroughly looking forward to being able to sit round an actual table and play an actual game with actual people. Won't it be grand!

I'll leave you with some more cryptic clues, each lacking a literal definition for reasons that will become obvious...

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