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.