Lords of Tigris

Various maladies kept Andrew and Adam from the table last night (best wishes guys) but there were still seven of us around the kitchen table when 7.30 arrived: Gareth, Ian, Katy, Joe, Adam T, Martin and myself. We inadvertently found ourselves having a conversation which took an unlikely turn when Ian mentioned the Lego version of Tigris and Euphrates he'd seen online. I don't recall how we got from there to vulvas, but Katy said she'd love to see a Lego version, and gestured something the size of an oval dinner plate. At this point we thought we should probably start playing something, and kicked things off with Cross Clues.

We did pretty well, although I let the side down a bit with a rushed guess and a rushed clue. 

Everyone: 21 out of 25

I forgot to take any photos, but you know what it looks like. 

Then it was time to move on to the evening's main courses. As agreed last week, a few of us dived back into the genius (Martin and Adam) or bewilderment (Gareth and I) of Tigris and Euphrates. Martin availed us of the rules whilst at the other end another type of bonkerness began to manifest in the form of Lords of Vegas.

I'd forgotten the intricacies of Tigris - as much as I ever knew them - but the sense of not having a clue what I was doing was present and correct. Players aren't colours but types. Leaders score points for matching-coloured tiles, except the black leader who can score on behalf of absent leaders. Internal conflict (someone arrives in your kingdom) versus external conflict (someone joins two kingdoms together) is enough to think about already, but on top of the initial opacity you've got the joy/frustration of how these things come to life on the board. "I've never seen you this angry playing a game!" Martin said, but my Sybil-esque mutterings were really about my own shortcomings - I find it hard to get my head around. 

Gareth, on his debut, got blue and green leaders mixed up but coped with the fallback with more grace than I would have. Meantime across the table from us, Adam and Martin had conversations we only half-understood. Halfway through, it felt like Martin was definitely leading (points come in four colours, and your final score is your lowest-colour haul) and after that, I wasn't sure what was happening. I started some wars to just to see what happened, and it wasn't good. 

As the game neared its conclusion, Adam at first ended it, but then decided not to, setting some kind of trap for Martin instead. Meanwhile, in Lords of Vegas, Joe announced that all his shitty luck from last week was balancing out now, as his score marker moved into the giddy heights of the sixties! There was a final big casino payout to come, but Katy and Ian where nowhere near him. 

In Tigris, Martin hadn't fallen into Adam's carefully-laid trap, much to his appalled disdain, and Gareth joined two kingdoms to end the game. As we anticipated, Martin was a clear winner, and Adam reflected that despite it being his favourite game for 15 years and counting, he was still rubbish at it.

Rubbish was all he needed for second place, though:

Martin 7

Adam 4 (wins on tiebreaker, or wins on Tuesday according to my autocorrect)

Gareth (third on Tuesday)

Sam (last on Tuesday) 

Martin made the very reasonable point that if we played it more regularly, that sense of grasping for understanding would drop away. I'm not sure Tigris calls my name for regular play, but I'd be up for going again soon. I'd like to play with a vague sense of agency, at least. As the finale to Lords of Vegas played out, the four of us blasted through a super-quick game of Yokai Septet, the partnership trick-taker where you're trying to claim 7's. 

Martin and I won round one, and were wrapping up round 2 (and the game) as Lords finally wrapped up. Joe's score was astonishing. 

Joe 79

Katy 36

Ian 14

Nobody has ever scored anything like that on a GNN night, as far as I'm aware? Then, like the high-rolling gambler he is, Joe sashayed out the door to the airport. I should probably add he was picking up his daughter, but why ruin the enigmatic illusion? 

We played So Clover. 

Katy finished her clues in rapid time but we found ourselves on a different wavelength and couldn't figure out that Mug went with Croc, as in crockery. Sorry Katy! It wasn't the triumph of last week, with only a couple of sixes in the mix, but a half-decent score all the same:

22/30

Again, no pics. As well as not having the brain for Knizia's classic, I also lack basic memory skills. I did remember to take one of Polterfass though: great to get this barrel-rolling, beer-ordering brinkmanship classic back on the table. I short-changed everyone on the very first turn to get some points on the board and backed it up with a big order on turn 2, but as Ian sank immediately to minus figures, Katy was close behind me. 

Both she and Martin wracked up huge amounts of beer, Katy at one point reeling something like 48 on a single turn. Martin rerolled four barrels several times and somehow didn't go bust. As greedy as the rest of us had been on these big beer hauls, Katy was unstoppable and sailed to a convincing victory:

Katy 89

Sam 57

Ian 38

Martin 30

We wanted to finish with Push It, but I realised having leant it to my brother we couldn't. Martin and I pushed for Crokinole, but we settled on Spicy. What a little gem this thing is. As I made challenge after challenge, and Martin and Ian periodically joined in, Katy simply racked up points by telling truths and successful half-truths. "I'm not even doing anything!" she said, as we frantically challenged each other, usually to little avail. She and Martin both managed to empty their hand of cards (+10 points), but Katy was uncatchable - although Martin gave it a good go.

Katy 28

Martin 25

Sam 18

Ian 12

I was too embroiled to take a picture. Another excellent evening, thanks all. And apologies for my grumbling through T+E. 

Elk! I need somebody!

 This week I arrived at 8 o’clock, my pace towards Sam’s house quickened by a text telling me that Railways of the World was already set up and waiting for me. Laura, Sam, Martin, Ian, Adam T, Adam H and Joe had already finished Cross Clues and now the table was crammed with two map-based games.

At the far end, Martin, Joe and Adam T were playing Brian Boru. This was the first time that no one needed a rules explanation, I think, and Laura noted that it was playing a lot quicker this time. This was despite Joe’s deviations into ruminations concerning the similarities between pistachios and mussels. There was also confusion when a phantom hand of four cards suddenly appeared on the table during the drafting phase. They finally worked out that Adam had put his two cards for Laura on top of Laura’s two cards for Martin.

The game ended at the same time as RotW finished and the scores (once I’d finally persuaded someone to tell me) were

Martin 41

Joe 29

Laura 26

Adam T 21

As for RotW, with four people on the Mexico map, it was bound to be a bit of a bun fight. Adam H started fast, picking up the Railway Executive card in the first round (two turns in a row) and immediately completed a delivery bonus and a service bonus. He and Ian tussled over the south of the country, turning it into a cyberpunk nightmare of twisted metal with barely enough space to walk.

I started very slow, which I blame on my lack of preparation: I only saw the board after I’d sat down at the table. Sam seemed to be distracted by the game’s use of the word “round” to describe what he’d consider a “turn”. There is probably a burning multi-page thread on BGG about this very topic.

But as for the game, Adam was unstoppable. By the end he had the upper half of the scoretrack all to himself and Ian’s reliance on bonds left him with what might be a lowest ever score.

Adam H 53

Sam 36

Andrew 23

Ian 12

Now we had all finished at the same time, there was a little rearranging and we all ended up playing what initially looked like two very similar games, Fjords and Cascadia. Both set in wild open countryside (Norway and Canada) and both involved tile placing, and they had artwork of landscapes that could’ve been done by the same artist.

I know little about Fjords apart from the occasional word drifting across the table (“Oh, poo,” said Martin and later “No!” said Sam) and at the end they agreed they’d all been too fast to put down tents.

Adam H 15

Sam 13

Adam T 12

Martin 10

Cascadia involves taking a terrain tile and an animal counter from a selection of four pairs available. Place the tiles to make large areas (like Kingdomino) but the different types of terrain don’t have to match. On top of that, place animals in certain formations to earn points: hawks not next to hawks, elks in a straight line etc. You can collect pine cones and then use them to change the available animals or chose tile/counter combinations that aren’t part of a pair.

Despite the random nature of drawing animal counters from a bag, there seemed to be a certain pattern emerging: elks were keen to come out in force while salmon barely made an appearance. And when they did, Ian was quick to pounce on them. 

Laura needed salmon as the game neared it’s end, but they just wouldn’t come out. Joe checked and there were four left after her last turn, but she hadn’t drawn any of them. As for me, I went big on elks and my Kingdomino instincts meant I couldn’t bring myself to not match up terrain types. This turned out to be a winning tactic as I just squeezed into first thanks to a single pine cone that I had left over for a bonus point.

Andrew 92

Joe 91

Ian 89

Laura 79

Then Adam T and Laura left. I didn’t have work the next day so I was able to stay until the end for a change. And, boy, am I glad I did. We played So Clover and ended the evening with a legendary perfect score! The first since Novocon, four months ago.

It wasn’t easy. I almost vetoed our guess of “Bite” for “Polar/mosquito” since I didn’t see how it related to Polar, but then someone reasoned: what else would you write? And it was a good call, as Sam, Martin and myself all got 6 points for our clovers.

So next Joe was up. And he’d been complaining that he had a pair of words that couldn’t be linked by one word. But it turned out Joe is smarter than he thought. His clue was “Rosa” which lead us to link “Forbidden/bus” for a very satisying 6. 

Ian’s was pretty straightforward. His clue of “Gallagher” for “Oasis/pair” was very nice. Another 6. Just one more to go.

Five down, one to go

“Don’t fuck it up, Adam,” we said supportively before we revealed his clover – the one that had taken longest to complete. We paused for thought over Adam’s spelling of “kids” as “kidz” and also “Eurgh!” as a clue. We considered and debated at length, causing Adam to lose his poker face and laugh. We couldn’t tell if that was a good sign or not. Afterwards he explained it was because Martin said the exact answer to a clue: “Sticky Salad? Eurgh!” but then hadn’t put the words in place.

But we finally got it and, thanks to Adam’s sticky salad, we clocked up another 6.

36 out of 36!

We all congratulated each other, people took photos and Joe added our names to the game’s Hall of Fame. Honestly, I don’t think the first people to climb Everest made as much of a fuss as we did.

But then, they didn’t get a full score on So Clover. A great way to end the evening. Thanks all, see you all soon.

Viva Las Vegan Cake

I (Ian) arrived at Hannah and Adam’s at 7.30pm for a rare Easton-based games night, where not only were we there to play games but to wish Katy a Very Happy Birthday.  As well as the hosts and Katy, Joe and Martin had arrived before me. The table was bare of any games, instead the space being used for tasty vegan and gluten free cake.

Whilst waiting for Mel and either Steven or Anja (exactly who would be attending hadn’t been specified, meaning Anja/Steve existed in a quantum superstate until one of them arrived) we set up 3 Wise Words.

The game is a variation on the tried-and-tested “guess the word from the clues” formula. The twist here is that the players are in teams, and whilst you want to make your clue words obvious enough for your partner to get the secret word, the other team can try to guess what clue words you’ve written to score points. As such, it plays a little like an anti-Just One.

We initially started playing as teams of 2 vs. 3, but Mel arrived shortly after starting so we regrouped into 3 teams of two and restarted – Katy and Mel, Adam and Joe and Martin and me.

Whilst explaining how to play 3 Wise Words to Mel, an example in the rulebook was read out where it suggested somebody might clue “Sponge” by writing ‘Bob’, ‘square’ and ‘pants’, so it was with some amusement when ‘Sponge’ came up in the live game as the word I had to clue to Martin. Trying to avoid the obvious I instead went for ‘Sea’, ‘Absorb’, and ‘Dishwasher’ which unfortunately wasn’t gotten.

The less said about Katy’s unintentionally(?) smutty clues of ‘Ball’, ‘Face’ and ‘Hide’ for ‘Mask’ the better.

As Steve arrived (observing his arrival collapsing the quantum field) we only played 3 rounds of 3 Wise Words, the final scores being:

Adam and Joe – 8

Katy and Mel – 5

Martin and Ian – 4

3 Wise Words was an interesting enough variation on the word-clueing and guessing formula but I’m not sure I’d choose it over Just One or So Clover.

We split into two groups for two chunky games – Martin, Joe and I joined Katy for her birthday choice of Lords of Vegas, and Mel and Steve joined Adam for a host’s choice of Railways of the World (Mexico map).

Lord’s of Vegas was an interesting, if unusual game. After the set up phase there were four Silver Casino Cards already dealt, which in a sensible, statistically normal game it would be a poor choice as it wouldn’t pay out often. This meant everyone shunned the Silver Casino.

How wrong we were. Time and again the Silver Casino Cards were drawn, simultaneously scoring nobody any points and making the Silver Casino’s less alluring for future investment, yet still the Silver Casino cards showed their face.

Whilst the Silver Casino defied all expectations, we slowly built our other coloured casinos on the board, with virtually every tile except Silver being used. Katy saw no Birthday kindness as her casinos were all taken over by opponents.  Joe built up two mammoth Brown Casinos, which surely had to pay out soon as only two brown cards were drawn in the set up. But somehow Brown was the inverse to Silver, never appearing – quite literally; 7 brown cards and all but one of the Strip cards were in the last quarter of the draw deck, underneath the Game Over card.

The unusual card distribution meant there were a few late rounds where players had very few options, either due to no cash or ample cash but nothing worth doing!

The final scores saw Katy scraping a third place:

Martin – 49

Ian – 40

Katy – 23

Joe -20

Railways of the World as just coming to its conclusion, so we played Ghosts of Christmas, the new version of Time Palatrix. It’s a slightly mind-bending game where three tricks are played simultaneously to the past, present and future. Scoring is based on correctly predicting how many tricks you think you’ll win, and I failed on both rounds we played, first time underbidding and second time overbidding. The final scores were

Martin - 4

Joe – 3

Katy – 3

Ian – 0

Railways finished up with Adam (perhaps predictably) winning, but I was assured that everyone had a good time. I didn’t gather much information unfortunately, but understand Adam managed to complete most of the Major Line bonuses.

The results were:

Adam – 63

Mel – 50

Steve – 43

Steve and Mel departed, leaving Katy, Martin, Adam and I to play a quick round of Crossclues. My main memory of the game was Joe misreading “Snow” as “Mons” in the setup, but we performed very well, only dropping 1 point!

Crossclues – 23 points.

And with that we departed. Hopefully we can see those who were unable to attend soon!

Root’s Revival

 At around 8 o'clock I arrived at Sam's to find Ian, Sam, Martin and Adam T playing a game apparently based on Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, except instead of themes of redemption and charity, it was a trick taking game. 

In this crazy game players have three areas in front of them (past, present and future) which they can play to whenever they please, following suit as in a typical trick taking game, except that they are resolved in chronological order. This means a win in the past makes you leader in the present which may well change which cards are powerful and which aren't.

It looked nuts. And, from the same author as Maskmen, it clearly was. In a shortened version of the game, Ian leapt into the lead right at the end.

Ian 10

Martin 9

Sam 7

Adam 6

Then Steve arrived and we split into two groups of three. Adam slyly suggested Root and Sam was amenable even if "I doubt we'll find a third." Steve at this point was still in the living room taking about grown up things to Sally but he indicated his assent without actually coming into the kitchen.

Ian, Martin and I chose Azul, with Martin keen to see if we'd finish it before the end of Steve's rules refresher. We didn't, mostly because we played a slow thinky game. Martin started out well, perhaps because of his penchant for the starting player tile. I got bogged down with a board that I struggled to finish, so I started taking the starting player tile in the hope that it would improve my position. It didn't, but when Ian took the tile in the final round it seemed like the winning move.

Except when he came to count up his score for the round, we discovered he had two black tiles on one row. We moved one black tile to its proper place and put the other in the rack of negative tiles along the bottom, quickly adjusting his score as we did so. Not ideal but, as we said at the time, no one had noticed. And if we had, then Ian would've had other options he could've chosen. In the end it was a win for Ian but, as Martin said, a win with an asterisk.

Ian 64

Martin 62

Andrew 48

Root was still ongoing and we entered what could be called a period of overlapping games. We began a game of Spy Communication, they finished Root, we began a second game of Spy Communication, they played Full Throttle. Eventually we synced up again and ended on So Clover.

Root ended with a decisive win for Adam. Perhaps we should have seen that coming right at the start when Martin commented on how long it will last and Adam airily said "oh, not really." Steve was close to becoming dominant, which maybe I understood once but now haven’t the foggiest, and Sam was probably about to pounce on a game winning move too. And all in under ninety minutes.

Adam (Marquis de Cat) 32

Sam (the Vagabond) 20

Steve 14 (Eyrie Dynasties) 14

Spy Communication was so simple that for most of the first game I was sure we were playing it wrong. In this game we guided our spies around Europe using little counters as stepping stones, visiting cities to complete certain bonus cards. Sounds simple, but those stepping stones are in short supply and if you want to travel down a pathway already claimed by an opponent, you have to pay double. I squeaked a win by triggering the game end by completing seven (low scoring) cards.

Andrew 30 (won tie breaker based on turn order)

Ian 30

Martin 29

We finished our first game using the beginner's side and then decided to try the on advanced side, where cards are more expensive unless you have none in which case the next card is free and Martin used this to excellent effect, but Ian won with some high scoring cards. The only asterisks on this victory were to disguise the swearwords I was trying to suppress.

Ian 31

Martin 28

Andrew 22

Full Throttle sped by without catching my attention apart from constant amazement at red's lack of movement. Black won, with orange second and yellow completing almost and entire lap to finish third. Sam’s trust in red was sorely misplaced.

Adam 23

Steve 21

Sam 7

Finally, So Clover was tough. Not a single six among us. Our successes included guessing Vampire/Shed were linked to “Coffin” and Prison/Delivery was “Convicts.” I was kicking myself as I clued Roof/Distribution with "Satellite" when I later realised that "Santa" would've been better. Ian had to cope with us pyschoanalysing him when one of his clues was "treat" and we had to guess which of the available words Ian might consider to be a treat.

We scored 23.

And with that we were done. A lovely evening.

Nemesises

With loose talk of a Saturday night GNN in the air to experience the relentless doom that is Nemesis, I thought it worth running through the facets of the game as enticement/warning. Like the film Alien, you're on a spaceship - component parts unknown - and lurking within the bowels of the ship are the baddies - Nemesis calls them Intruders. Everyone begins with two secret objectives, which can be as straightforward as making sure you and one other survive, or as dickish as making sure player 3 is dead. I think for our first play we'll filter out the nastier ones, because Nemesis throws plenty at you without them, and co-operation is extremely helpful. Not everyone will survive. 

Whew! The ship is headed for Earth, with an alien race onboard

Players have different roles in the crew - captain, scout, mechanic and so on - and everyone plays with a bespoke deck of ten cards. It's not a deckbuilder, more a deckfucker: the only cards you might add are contagion cards, which may mean you're infected. Or they may just get in your way, if you're lucky. In each round you can expend cards to do basic actions, shown on the Scientist's board here:

standard actions

Or you can use the action on the room you're in, or you can use the action on the card itself, which is where the bespokeness comes in. The mechanic can repair things easily and move through the vents (technical corridors, to give them their technical name). The Captain can always reload his weapon. The Scout can move without making any noise - possibly the best ability there is, as like a nightmare version of Clank in Space, everyone is stepping, grunting, rattling and loudly whispering their way through the story, which keeps drawing the attention of the intruders. 

noise is yellow, obviously

Those yellow things in the corridors are noise markers, which steadily fill up the ship. If any corridor gets a second noise marker, it triggers an encounter. Encounters usually go badly. In the room itself there's a fire, which means if the Soldier ends his turn there, he'll pick up a light wound. Light wounds lead to serious wounds. Serious wounds first encumber you, then they kill you. Oof. 

If the noise and the intruders and the fires weren't enough, a number of other things can go wrong: including malfunctions. As we move about the ship we discover what each room does (including the room that used to do something but is now the intruder nest, and the room that was once something else but is now covered in slime) which are varied and helpful things like navigation, surgery, engines and so on. The first person to arrive flips an exploration token which gives you some circumstantial information about the room. Maybe a door closes behind you as you enter. Maybe you've been slimed. Maybe there's a malfunction. Malfunctions stop the room from - you guessed it - functioning, although players are usually able to get it working again if they want to. But their presence also signifies the integrity of the ship is compromised: if you're asked to add a malfunction marker and they're all on the board, the ship has disintegrated and you're all dead (unless you've evacuated!) It's a similar story with fire. You can never make too much noise, though...

disco death

You might have noticed earlier you can pick up a heavy object as an action. Fortunately most objects aren't that heavy, but your weapon is, and a dead player or intruder is, and so is an egg. Some of the objectives ask players to discover some science about the Intruders, which means dragging these heavy items to the lab and testing them. But meantime time is running out, Intruders are either attacking or moving, something might trigger the self-destruct and everyone has contagion cards. So much is going wrong!

But there are number of things in the players' favour. You can search for stuff: stuff is always handy to have. You can contain aliens by closing doors. You can 'control' where the noise is made by spending two cards (instead of one) for careful movement. and avoid triggering an encounter. can stick together: moving into an occupied room never adds any noise. You can pass: the danger escalates from constantly moving, so late-game especially (if you've completed your objective) it might make sense to sit pat. But mainly - unless those treacherous objectives are mixed in - you can work together. Co-ordinating efforts, from my four exploratory plays so far, seem to make a big difference. 

good stuff!

The game end arrives either with the aforementioned collapse of the ship, or when time is up, or when everyone's dead. Assuming you made it into an Evacuation pod, or hibernation, or you're on the ship but the ship is intact, you may have won (multiple players can win) as long as you're not contagious and the ship doesn't explode now, which it will do if more than one engine is malfunctioning. Also, it must be headed for Earth, otherwise it's assumed you're going to die shortly. If it's not you can only still win by being both alive and evacuated, but you still need to make sure you're not contagious: if you are, there's a finger-crossing shuffle-and-draw of cards to establish whether your immune system saw off the infection, or you got John Hurted. Assuming you - anyone, really, gets past all of that, there's now a grand reveal of objective cards. 

For transparency's sake I should say in my first three games nobody survived. In my fourth, two characters won, but this was aided by some spectacular dice-rolling for combat, a last-minute fluke of drawing a larva instead of an adult intruder, and accidentally skipping an event in the very first round. Had I played correctly, and/or had a little less luck, it could have been very different...

8pm Vikings

After our previous attempt of the four player/two teams undertaking that is 878 Vikings: Invasions of England we were keen to go again, and last night suggested itself as a window. With Steve unable to don his bloodied Nordic tunic, Chris stepped in for him. But with Andrew due at 8pm, he, Ian and I convened a littler earlier to avail ourselves of the rules, and also play Azul.

Not that I was ever that great at Azul, but it's been a while since I played it and I was tactically somewhat inert - it became obvious from early on (I scored 2 points in the opening round) that it was a battle between Ian and Chris, with Chris doing his level best to sabotage Ian's mosaic-building. But it was to little avail, as Ian triggered the endgame and snagged a win:

Ian 47
Chris 43
Sam 33

We started setting up Vikings 878 and Andrew arrived in time for a rules refresh. Everything is pretty straightforward: except that movement thing about Leaders, who move before armies, and armies, who move after leaders, except that Leaders take armies with them and we - unlike last time - repeatedly tied ourselves in knots over whether we were playing it right. In the spirit of the Vikings however, we fudged it. 

Your hand is only ever three cards at most

The rhythm of 878 is a kind of seesawing effect of the invaders - Ian and Chris - arriving in Britain and ploughing their way across the country like a violent, out of control bachelor party. Then the Saxon defenders - Andrew and I - would serve them ripostes. There's a simple system abetted by event cards and powered by dice, of which Chris repeatedly rolled badly, and I even worse. His Beserkers were doing their best to appear level-headed, offering tactical retreats. My Thegn defenders simply ran away. Andrew and I could call on the Fyrd to help defend cities, but as the farmers, clerks and deliverypeople of yore, they often ran away as well, faced by the well-drilled Danes, and in particular, Ian's dice-rolling. Outside of a few late commands (optional retreat) and a smattering of flees (fleeing) he rolled hit after hit, battering my Thegn and Andrew's Housecarl into the ground. 

Traditional viking snacks

We rallied as best we could, and at one point in the mid-game held what looked fleetingly like a strong position, as we cut the heart from the Viking territory and reestablished ourselves around the oft-contested Birmingham area. But in every round - there's at least 5, and possibly 7 - a new Viking leader arrived on the coast, and there was a very literal sensation of fighting back the tide. Or trying to.

Oh no

If the Vikings ever control 14 city shires at the end of a round, they win. Otherwise The Treaty of Wedmore comes into play: when both sides have played at least one Treaty card in round five or later, the victory is down to whether they control 9 city shires - if they don't, the Saxons win. The problem with the treaty is, like so many treaties, you may be forced to sign it: a situation I found myself in (Andrew had had to dash off at 10pm) when my final movement card was effectively signing my own death warrant. I retook the ninth city shire, but with Chris still to play in round 6 I couldn't realistically take a tenth. Instead I tried to defend what I had, hoping Chris' card would restrict his movement. As it happened, the odds were long on me holding anywhere, but longest of all around Gloucester, where he marched (past all my military units) to kick aside the solitary Thegn there and wrap up a Viking win. Argh, as both sides may have said.

It was pretty early - only 10.30 - but I was quite tired so we wrapped it up there. Good fun chaps, thank you!

Ethnos forgiven

 Having missed my Tuesday gaming fix for two weeks, I was determined to attend, even if I ended up running later than ever at 8.20. Joe (the host), Adam H, Katy, Gareth and Sam were all patiently for me, with Ethnos already set up on the table they were sitting around. They'd already played A Little Wordy, if I remember right, and had a chat. Sorry to be so late.

Ethnos has almost legendary status in GNN history, with Katy holding a special dislike for it, based on one game way back in the midst of time. Since then she's enjoyed far more unforgiving games than Ethnos so after a five year gap, she was reintroduced to the game. It's a simple game at heart. At least, it was for Adam who focused on the merfolk cards, giving an extra counter on the board and bonus points. Sam struggled, despite correctly predicting his next card would be a "shitty green halfling". Joe tried to flip the bonus token for giants like a beer mat and sent it across the board, dislodging a couple of counters from the score track. Sam was in the toilet at the time but I'm pretty sure we put his back in the right place.

By the end it seemed that Katy's long held aversion to this game was over. I suggested she could try Chocolatl again and she told me where I could stick it.

Adam 82

Katy 73

Gareth 65

Joe 57

Sam 56

Andrew 55

I wonder what other games people might be prepared to try again after years of avoidance. Would I play Quartermaster General again? I doubt it.

Then we played So Clover a couple of times. If you've ever played, then you know how it went. Lots of anguished moans followed by sighs of resignation as each player placed their clover face down. Except for Katy who has no issues at all.

After the first two or three were guessed first time, we started to become unstuck. Gareth had CHANNEL and TATTOO to link up and he went for TUNNEL which surprisingly we got with no trouble, but we stumbled on his clue FOGGY which should have been SMOKE and GRATE.

Joe finished last and was least confident. We went through several configurations and got to a place where we were happy but then got the jitters and changed our mind. Joe blurted out that we'd got it and then changed our minds, putting the squares back in their correct places. Against the rules but oh well. 

The correct result...now you see it...

Now you don't

I left at this point, leaving them to bang out one last game of So Clover. According to a late night text, they got 27/30.

Well done all. See you soon.