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.