Wien about it

I arrived bang on time this week and experienced the pre game chat that I'm usually absent for. 

Present were Ian, Joe (hosting), Martin, Gareth and Adam T followed by Sam. We were expecting Laura and tentatively began setting up a couple of games before we learnt she couldn't make it. 

This meant that Joe, Ian and Adam put away their potential four player game of La Corsa and instead had a three player game of Conspiracy, the game of espionage and bluffing. Under the sea. And it comes in a tin box which still doesn't fit well with us at GNN.

On my half of the table, Martin, Gareth, Sam and I played Free Ride. This game feels like someone wanted to play Ticket To Ride but wanted to get rid of the random card choices or building the longest track and concentrate solely on completing journeys.

It was nice. Very simple. Build track that allows you to get your train to a starting city, pick up the route cards and then try and get to the destination. Certainly basic enough for me to get my head round, apart from a bit of brain fog midway through. We’d all started at the edge and then slowly moved into the centre. As a consequence no one’s track was “nationalised” until near the end of round two. 

In the end, Gareth and I tied on points and then on the tie-breaker too. Gareth wondered if his incomplete railway counted against him, but apparently not.

Andrew 121

Gareth 121

Sam 115

Martin 95

Conspiracy ended 

Adam T 54

Joe 49

Ian 48

And with that, sad to say, I had to leave. Pity that my early arrival was matched by my early departure, but life won’t go away. I’ll hand over to Sam to finish off the evening…

*        *       *

Without Andrew's immense power of recall, casting my mind back to Tuesday now - on Friday - is like stumbling around in a fog of victory points. When I texted him the scores of our final games, I'd already forgotten that we'd played Ra. That was the same night we played them.

But play Ra we did - or Joe, Ian and I did - whilst Martin Adam and Gareth turned their minds to Mille Fiori. I'm not sure what occurred there other than Gareth winning: 

Gareth 217

Adam 199

Martin 165

Meanwhile in ancient Egypt Ian was taking short-term pummellings but building a hefty collection of monuments. Joe's last-out tactics worked well for him in the first epoch, but in the final one Ra decided enough was enough, and his bag-scraping resulted in nothing more than a red face, and his chance of snatching the wind was blown away in a sirocco. Ian beat me on some kind of stupid tie-breaker.

Ian 53

Sam 53

Joe 247

Then we negated the leaving noises emanating from Gareth and Adam by breaking out So Clover and tempting them to stay. 

We got off to an okay start, but my clue of Fairground for Wheel / Mirage foxed everyone because I was too distracted/drunk to remember that I'd written Safari for Lion / Attraction. They not-unreasonably assumed Fairground and Attraction went together whilst I tried to keep a poker face, and the disdain when I removed the card hung in the air unvoiced (except for Martin, who voiced it). However despite one or two other shaky moments we recovered to score a more than decent 30/36. I can't remember who wrote it but I particularly like Mr Blobby for Jelly / Father.

Gareth and Adam then did leave, and we were now a four. Joe's mooted LACORSA now made it to the table, and we faced off over a wooden track that, like Martin's Formula Motor Racing game, is solely there to establish positions relative to each other.

It's pretty simple - in each round the car at the back begins by challenging the one immediately in front of it. A challenge consists of both players choosing a card from their hand and revealing at the same time: if the car behind wins, they move up (and can challenge again if there's another car immediately in front of them). If the car in front wins, or it's a tie, positions remain as they are and it's now this player's turn to challenge the next car. You can do up to two challenges per turn - as long as you win the first one.

The cards are numbered 1-12 plus a Redline that can be played in combination with a number to boost it's value by two. The crappy-valued 1-3 cards can be played as extends: move into an empty space ahead of you. It's quite luck-driven in terms of what cards you get (my hand above contains more 4's and 5's than ideal) but as a beer-and-pretzels game it's pretty fun. And like Formula Motor Racing, it's probably at it's best experienced over a number of races...

Martin came home winner with Ian in second. Joe upheld Explainer's Curse by trailing in behind me. And that was that!

Garden of Delights

Last night's GNN coincided with Adam H's birthday, and what better way to celebrate than by playing some games and swearing gaily at each other? As the insane heat of the last two days slowly subsided, we gathered in Mel and Ben's back garden: as well as the hosts there was the birthday boy, Ian, Katy and Martin. I (Sam) was last to arrive, coming from a school gala (Stan played bass on Ain't No Mountain High Enough!) drenched in sweat and trying not to sit too close to anyone as a result. In fact my first ten minutes were pretty much recovering from getting there, as we kicked things off with Just One.

As there were seven of us we abandoned the game's suggested 13-card structure (and the scoring, in fact) to deduct - or attempt to - two cards each. There were duplications ahoy, with sine appearing twice for wave, waffles for potato and so on. Katy and Martin both seemed to feel we should be able to read each other's minds and avoid these situations, showering the culprits with disdain when it occurred. Just One remains as fun as it's always been.

Then we split into two groups with Martin leading Adam and Ian on a sortie to Babylonia whilst Katy and I introduced Ben and Mel to Llamaland. But first we sang Adam happy birthday and were all treated to cookies and ice cream!

Katy ambitiously thought we'd get Llamaland and Whale Riders both played whilst Babylonia ran its course, but the former, even without objective cards, proved to be something of an epic. Mid-game Ben appeared to have manoeuvred himself into a strong position, with more llamas than anyone and a heap of coins to go with them. Katy took the tile I needed and I called her a dick.

"A dick, but not a cunt? Smash the patriarchy!" she cried.

I reassured her I was happy to insult her in whatever way felt appropriate.

The llama-ing, meantime, had passed peak-Ben as we hit the the last couple of rounds: he ran out of land and we caught him up in llamas. It was close, but on this occasion I was Llamafarmer Supremo:

Sam 71

Katy 70

Mel 68

Ben 64

At the other end of the table they'd completed Babylonia, with Adam threatening Martin's now-alarming run of consecutive victories without quite pulling it off.

Martin 162

Adam 151

Ian 122

And they'd also bashed through a three-player game of Overstocked. 

Locking furry swords with Katy at this point, I missed the ins and outs. Adam's first play of this had seen him finish with minus points. He did better this time, but has yet to properly channel his inner toy investor:

Martin 28

Ian 22

Adam 2

Not only that, they'd played Eggs of Ostrich so quickly I didn't even get a photo (Martin won that too, edging out Adam 12-11, with Ian back on 8points). I did manage to snap a picture of Mel and Ben's frog though, who was rustling about in the bushes, probably wondering what all the noise was about. 

It was suddenly dark, so we heaved the table inside, got confused counting chairs and then shook up the groups a bit. I was keen to play Kiitos, and Martin and Ben joined me. Katy cajoled the others into the Knizian delights of Whale Riding. 

Kiitos is a word game where you're trying to get your own word spelled. Whomever starts a round lays announces the word they'd like to spell and lays down the opening letter from their hand. If the next player can play the next letter, they must do so, and we keep spelling the word. If they can't, they can announce a new word as they lay the next letter (with the caveat that you can't announce a word and finish it on the same turn). 

If you can't see an option on how to proceed (eg in the above, you don't have an n for locating or an o for location, and you don't see a way to make a new word) you get the cards as minus points. If anyone's word gets completed, the cards are taken as plus points by the player who announced it. The game gets more interesting when you mix in the Super Kiitos (add a letter at either end of the word) and Squeeze (add a letter anywhere!) rules. We agreed it would be best with two, but I love the scoring system and how it suggests you can play defence: Ben won despite never getting a single positive point!

Ben -11

Sam -12

Martin 16

There was more talk at that end of the table, but I missed most of it, as I was cursing letters, or sometimes Ben, who was sat to my right. But whilst we were ruminating, Adam was getting a birthday victory under his belt in Whale Riders. It was tight, though:

Adam 22

Katy 21

Ian 19

Mel 18

Ian then bowed out, feeling the fatigue of an early morning catch up with him. Could the rest of us do one last game? We felt we could, and cracked into So Clover. Instantly cries of dismay echoed around the room as everyone felt they'd been dealt impossible word combos. I was looking at crap like quilt / Switzerland and soap / ray. It sounded like others had similar issues. "I used the write the first word that came into my head" Katy explained to Mel, "But now I write the second. Or sometimes even the third!" 

We took a long time to figure our linking words - so long, in fact, that Ben migrated from the room. In the circumstances, though, we did pretty well, getting everyone's clues with just a few initial missteps. Martin was apoplectic that we didn't get assassination / region from his clue of Dallas first time, however, going into a sweary rant about Kennedy like a history teacher berating a bunch of talented but stubbornly unapplied pupils. I was more disappointed we didn't see the pet / cemetary link sooner.

So Clover: 22/30 - not bad considering our initial chagrin. And with that, another delightful, if foul-mouthed, chapter in GNN history felt the whispered breath of the curtains falling. The visitors stepped out into the night to feel the blessed relief of an air that didn't feel like hot cardboard on your skin, and we made our various ways home. Until next time!

Plain or assaulted

 I went to Sam’s this Sunday to try out Plains Indian Wars. This game is based around a period when settlers and the US cavalry were trying to build an infrastructure across some land held by Native Americians. The board has a (non-accurate) map of the mid west, and it is across this theatre that the dice-based battles will take place. The basics are pretty easy. Play a card, do what it says, resolve any battle. There are often moments where we weren’t sure of the official rules (such as where to retreat to) but we never let ourselves get bogged down with unnecessary details.

I was the invading settlers and, from the start, I concentrated on building the railroad. The wagons seemed to look after themselves and I didn’t need to pay them a great deal of mind. Sam got some tough rolls during combat and I was able to wipe out the North Plains Indian tribe by the end of the game, except for a couple in the far north-west who’d been diligently beating up enemy Indians for points.

And, in fact, I almost didn’t win because I went for a thematic victory (ie, complete the railroad) and paid scant attention to the actual business of gaining points. I didn't note the exact results but it was something like 25-21, with the wagons helping to push me into the winning position.

A very nice game, very fast moving. A little bit of brain burn as ideal strategies are formed on the fly, but not too much to slow things down. Those wagons seem a bit overpowered, though.

After this, I requested Bandu. Rare to see it as a two player game, but I was just in the mood. It was much the same as the last time we played. I went unconventional early on, and it almost worked too. But I was too ambitious with my plans of a new flat platform held up by a rickety x-shaped block and the peak of a cone. It gave way beneath the second piece I put on it.

Sam, meanwhile, played an excellent game. I thought my choices for him were pretty mean with one curved surface after another, but he piled them up with aplomb. Additionally, once he'd won, he started stacking up extra pieces with gay abandon, as they used to say. This lap of honour lasted four or five pieces before his edifice finally collapsed.

And with that, I was done. Thanks Sam, nice to get some gaming done before the heatwave hit the following day.

Overstocked and Underllama-ed

This week was Laura's turn to host, but perhaps because of the heat (and Joe's being in France) we were down to five when the allotted hour arrived - as well as Laura, there were Ian, Adam H, Martin and myself (Sam). Mostly the introductory talk was about Laura and Lucy's fridge, being as it was enormous and semi-sentient, with a screen on it that could play music and order shopping. We all liked the fridge. 

But there were games to be played too, and with Katy coming later we kicked things off with Martin's new card game of 1980's toy crazes, Overstocked. There are super-simple rules here, but tricky decisions: over six rounds everyone plays one of six cards from their hand before revealing simultaneously, and they're then resolved in number order. On your turn you have a choice - add the card to your tableau, which will (hopefully) get you points, or add it to a shared tableau, which defines how much: when all cards have been played, you multiple your largest group of x on your tableau by the largest matching group in the central one.

The catch - of course there's a catch - is that the largest group on that shared tableau at game-end scores minus points, having blown it's popularity out on a wave of oversaturation. So Overstocked contains a wide seam of dickery as everyone tries to devalue each other's wares, a fact that made me encourage everyone to screw over Martin's teddies. 

Sadly, they didn't listen. 

Martin 26
Laura 25
Sam 12
Ian 10
Adam H -10

Then we had a quick blast through Cross Clues whilst Laura generously plied me with spaghetti bolognese. Fortunately I had a combo (Firefighter/Salad) which I had no idea what to do with, so I made the most of our ten minutes by eating. There were some tricky words out there, but I'm glad to say it wasn't a shocking repeat of mine Joe and Katy's four out of 25. 

I canvassed for Powerships next, hoping to break my staccato run of last-place finishes, and everyone was amenable. We went through the standard bewilderment over assembling the board, then Martin explained the rules to Laura, and we were away. 

Ian and Martin sped off early with Laura and I tailing at a little distance. Would my plan to take all the marker planets wide prove a foolish one? At the moment, it was Adam lagging at the back, and seemed to be shaping up a two horse race between Hickman and Griffiths. While Adam was first to crash, around the second marker the rest of us sped, although I - needing to roll a 2 or a 3 - rolled a 1 and my plans turned to cosmic sand: I crashed as well, and watched Adam speed by me. 

Martin made a miscalculation over the final planet and shot past it, allowing Ian in for the win. Martin recovered for second and Adam swept in third. It only remained for Laura to nab 4th with me still trying to get out of second gear on the other side of the solar system. 

Then disaster! She missed the planet (above, Laura pink) and had to turn a wide circle in mitigation. Sensing an opportunity, I (blue, above, in the distance) swept home and celebrated my fourth place like I'd just destroyed the Death Star. 

1 Ian

2 Martin

3 Adam

4 Sam

5 Laura

Katy had arrived in time to see the dramatic finale play out, and now - whilst Laura and I aired our misgivings about the idea - she joined Martin and Ian in pushing for Wandering Towers. 

In fairness, even though it was chaotic and frustrating in equal measure, it was also hilarious. I think it took us about an hour of complaining, agonising, cursing and wondering in equal measure. I was first to get a wizard in the Raven Tower, but after that spent a lot of time with visible wizards miles away from reaching it. Martin forgot where his wizards were, and Katy made the mistake of having a conversation with Lucy and returning to the table to ask where her wizards had gone. How we laughed at the idea of charity. Ian triggered the finale whilst I was away in the loo and by the time I returned I had no more turns, and Adam had already won and it was a contest for second. "I just need to roll an eight!" Martin said hopefully.

1 Adam

2 Ian

3 Everyone else, although Katy wanted it noted she had four full potions and was therefore more 3rd.

We split into two groups of three, with Adam and I introducing Katy to Llamaland (without objectives) and Laura, Martin and Ian trying their hands at High Score. 

Katy loved the llamas, especially as we weren't eating them. I loved tesselating. Adam loved winning. Although I set the pace llama-wise, Adam's cunning guile somewhat incongruously suited llama farming and even the arrival of Chai, who walked across the board, couldn't disrupt his chain of thought. 

Adam shrugged off the interruption, and I snagged another llama. Whilst Katy was concerned at my ungulate overwhelm, I ran out of options on the last two turns just as Adam's strategizing came to fruition:

Adam 66

Sam 53

Katy 49 

Whilst Ian had ousted Martin and Laura at High Score (15-13-12) and Martin had his revenge in a three-player rematch of Overstocked: 

Martin 54

Ian 20

Laura 10

Then Adam and Ian left, bound for Easton, and the four of us settled on Laura's Ebay find of Marrakech to finish. Martin was keen on the dickish version, but this was vetoed. Marrakech has plenty of inadvertent (and occasionally vertent) dickery anyway. Omens looked good for Laura as while the three of us squabbled over territory, she built an enormous, sprawling carpet across a third of the board. It was so big that we kept running away from it until there was no option but to embrace the peril. However despite a couple of hauls, we got away with relatively little taxation and struck back, carpet-wise.

Martin and Katy were soon cash-poor and complained about being oppressed. Laura and I agreed oppression was fun from our perspective. However, thanks to some spawny rolling it was me taking the honours at the end of the day!

Sam 55

Laura 50

Katy 39

Martin 19

Another GNNight concluded, then, with much fun had in the July heat. Until next week!

Sumatra enchanted evening

 I arrived at Sam's just as Sam, Joe and Ian were in the final stages of a game of Llama Land. I watched them voice their regrets at previous decisions and lack of future opportunities. Joe even said he thought the game was designed specifically so he couldn't do anything. But despite all this, once they'd finished, they all said and they liked it and would happily play it again.

Sam 62

Ian 57

Joe 56

Next, to fill the time before Katy arrived, we played Schnipp & Weg. This game of flicking dexterity is simpler than its brethren, Flick Fleet, Cube Quest etc. Despite the simplicity, we still overcomplicated matters by missing simple shots at crucial moments.

We paired up, Joe and Ian against Sam and I. I started brilliantly, taking out most of the opposing counters and for the rest of the game I sent my shots skimming harmlessly off the board. Joe, despite his reputation for the yips, did well, clearing one round single handedly.

Ian and Joe won

Then Katy arrived, back at games night for the first time in a month. She found herself recruited into a new game: Sumatra. It's from Reiner Knizia and we were keen to play it before Martin did, hoping a head start would improve our chances when we finally play against him.

The devilish detail here is knowing when to abandon a particular area and move onto the next. This means you leave stuff behind but you also get first choice of whatever tiles are drawn for the new area.

It was fun. Joe confused backpacks and volcanoes (understandable considering our earlier conversation about how bad our eyesight was getting), Katy went big on crafts while I ignored people almost completely. I did, however, score in every other category. It was very close.

Katy 45

Andrew 44

Sam 43

Ian 43

Joe 42

Then we broke out an old favourite: Bandu - the dexterity game whose name you have to say in an Australian accent. It had been at Sam's brother's house for two years so it at least deserved a welcome home.

I went unconventional right from the start, laying down curved surfaces because I'd noticed they were all the same height and could work as a potential surface.

Everyone else built upwards, trying to keep as much of the base as free as possible. All except Ian whose sculpture was even shorter than mine. But too many curves, it seems and he was out first. Katy fell next and then Joe. He nudged the table while picking up a piece off the floor, sending mine and Sam's structures toppling. We quickly rebuilt them and continued, though. 

Sam ran out as the eventual winner. Once my building fell down he then started showboating, adding new pieces to his creation at breakneck speed until, after four, it finally crumbled to his foundations.

Sam

Andrew

Katy

Joe

Ian

And with that, Ian and I left. According to Sam's texts, Joe Katy and Sam played Ninety Nine, which Katy won. Then they played Cross Clues and scored an astonishing 6 (six) points. I asked Sam what the words were, unable to imagine what they could be. 

He texted back...

Costume trailer chocolate spider fast 

And...

Shark mushroom goat tall blue

I can see their problem. Combinations like "fast mushroom" and "blue chocolate" don't suggest any obvious solutions to me either. Suggestions in the comments please.

But anyway, thanks for the evening. See you all soon.