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.