Gameathon

Thursday night saw my (Chris) old board gaming world in Bracknell and beyond meet my new one in Chippenham. A long over due visit from Paul coincided with my semi regular Thursday games session here in my relocated home. Paul was here early this time so an afternoon of games beaconed after we got the perfunctory nuisance of lunch out of the way.

First up saw Jacquie join us in a couple of games of Heck Meck. This recent purchase of mine has seen a lot of activity in the household since I tentatively asked my understanding wife to indulge me in a game. Subsequently, it seems, I now never win a game and that vein continued for the two matches we managed before she had to rush off and collect the kids.

Jacquie 11
Paul 7
Chris 0

Jacquie 12
Chris 7
Paul 6

With the kitchen table to ourselves I then convinced Paul to take me on at 5 Tribes. Sam off loaded this to me a little while ago but I hadn't got to play it yet. As documented before in these fair pages its a simple enough game to learn but quite a brain burner to play. I didn't think too much about my strategy and picked up what ever looked good whereas Paul collected goods cards. Toward the end of the game I was nervously eying his colossal stack knowing how much they could score. Unfortunately due to a misunderstanding of how the multipliers worked he had collected a fair few of the same card and thus negated his advantage.

Chris 245
Paul 169

Then Paul was whisked away for Lego duties with the kids whilst dinner was being prepared and even though the general melee of kids bedtime then ensued we still manufactured enough time to play Nations the Dice Game. Again, possibly, a new title to Paul but this didn't hold him back squeezing in a very neat final round by scoring heavily on famine and war where I narrowly missed out.

Paul 27
Chris 23

Shortly after this was packed away my gaming buddies from Chippenham (Paul H and Stuart) arrived for an evening of laying cards, pushing cubes, making bids and pretending to be a medieval sheriff. After some introductions and quick laugh about there being two Pauls, we got down to it.

The general consensus was many quicker games rather than one big one. A kinda schedule was drawn up with Pairs getting its first airing for the collective. I'm not sure if the rules we play are actually the right ones but it doesn't seem to matter because the objective is met. A quick, light, fun jaunt to get the gaming muscles warmed up. In this bout Paul H calculated his winning position very well by sticking when he was assured of enough points.

Paul H 21
Stuart 16
Chris 16
Paul J 15

Next to the table was King of Tokyo. The remarkable part of Paul H's win in this game was the lack  of visits to Tokyo he made. This many have been instigated by the 5 damage whacking he got from me in his first foray to the bright lighted city. However, three strong rounds in a row which saw him collect 13 points was enough to see him slip in to first place with Paul J narrowly missing out on his turn.

Paul H 20
Paul J 19
Chris 12
Stuart 10

The bits had barely been stuffed back in to their box when 7 Wonders was being decanted and arranged. The first game of the night where nobody needed a rules refresher. Well nearly. This game still causes a memory black spot for Paul J even though he's been playing it on and off for 6 years!

Didn't prove to be much of a hinderance though as he squeaked past me and wrapped up first place. The game was notable for the lack of any cloth which I discovered late into the second era. This threw the proverbial spanner into the machinery of my careful devised plans and meant I couldn't build my last wonder. Shame.

Paul J 46
Chris 45
Paul H 42
Stuart 33

See...No cloth.

Then it was Kingdom Builders turn to be hastily arranged on the table. Stuart absorbed the quick rules explanation like a boss and was playing within 5 minutes. It was here that I managed to catch a bit of luck. My long and winding civilisation finally meeting up to make one large settlement area to take advantage of the citizen scoring card and score big

Chris 62
Paul H 50
Stuart 40
Paul J 37

By now the beers had been sampled to an appropriate level to bring out Sheriff of Nottingham. Nobody really stood out as a particularly good liar but with Paul J, the eventual winner, it was possible that his nursing of a single bottle of ale may have aided his decision making processes. Who knows?

Paul J 205
Stuart 153
Chris 138
Paul H 105

With the late hour approaching there was just enough time for a 13 point game of Push It. Paul J's 'technique' of blasting the pucks to the four corners of the table may need some work as his final score of minus 3 bares testament to a bit of jack abuse.

Chris 13
Paul H
Stuart 7
Paul J -3

And at that we called it a night. I'm not sure we could have squeezed any more games into the evening. What a corker.

Five out of Ten

Sunday night, and I (Sam) found myself facing off across the table against Andrew and Ian. We'd chosen Five Tribes, the game Ian suggests almost out of habit, and I was struggling. Mitigating factors were attempting to get the music working and two rapscallion children calling for the odd sortie upstairs. But mainly, the problem was Five Tribes.

In some ways it's so good - the moving and dropping off of workers takes that Mancala thing and does something more interesting with it than going in circles. The different coloured workers do different things which is neat. Taking ownership of a tile you empty is neat. But when you add the fact the tiles themselves have an action, and you can buy resources to sell or sacrifice elders for Djinns that add more rules to the game (a lá Alien Frontiers) it starts getting complicated - which I don't mind, except you can't plan your turn until it arrives, as the board is constantly changing complexion, and it feels like there are quite a few more tribes than you'd like. As the others seemed to pull off one shrewd move after another, I struggled with both the game itself and my plan - I didn't have one, until I decided to try and collect a shitload of resources to stay competitive.

The game closed out with Andrew winning reasonably handsomely, and me sneaking past Ian into second:

Andrew 137
Sam 121
Ian 118

Nice to play it again, but I think we might be done with Five Tribes. At least, I am!

We needed something comparatively light, so I taught Ian and Andrew the hit of my holiday in Wales - O Zoo le Mio, the game that crosses Carcassonne with blind-bidding. We all enjoyed this - it plays in less than half and hour but packs a lot into that time.

1 Sam
2 Ian
3 Andrew

With our gaming juices flowing again, we played a game designed for six-year-olds: Outfoxed. This pie thief-identification game can be tweaked to entertain grown-ups by simply speeding up the rate the fox runs back to his or her den, as your time to solve the mystery runs out.

We had no room for failure left when Andrew mooted that the culprit was in fact Gertrude: she had no top hat or umbrella, which is in the world of Outfoxed tantamount to smashing your bloodied/pastried hands on the desk and screaming "I did it!" There were still other foxes it could have been though. was it right to single out Gertrude like this?

It was.

Gertrude stole the pie!

Next up was Codinca, which Andrew and I had found reasonably entertaining as a two-player. You're shuffling tiles around trying to form patterns, and the first to complete all their (four) patterns wins. However, like Bullfrog (as Ian noted) before it, what was a sweet and canny two-player is transformed into a cognitive evisceration with three. At least, it was for us, with Five Tribes still fresh in our minds. We abandoned it after we realised our plaintive yelps were outweighing any snickers of delight.

Instead we played Knit Wit, flying from one end of the gaming spectrum to the other. Although I suppose their is some head-scratching in Knit Wit, it's of the creatively thoughtful variety. Andrew's silent, creepy and found inside was a slug in a flowerpot. Ian conjured up at least one apocalyptic vision involving people falling into crevasses. As far as I can recall the whole game only saw one call of Knit Wit, when Andrew and I contested something of Ian's. But what it was now escapes me.

Sam 45
Andrew 43
Ian 26

There was just time for one more game - Push It. We dived straight in without a single warm-up flick, and it proved to be a mistake, particularly for Ian. Whilst Andrew surged off into a healthy lead we lagged behind, with Ian unable to score at all for several rounds. More than once our discs limped feebly puck-wards only to fall despairingly short of anything that could be considered a threat. Despite Andrew's mid-game slump where Ian and I both feigned competitiveness, he walked away with the win:

Andrew 11
Sam 5
Ian 4

Emboldened and refreshed by the classic game of flicking bits of wood, we decided on one more game to really finish - Biblios. Or Extreme Biblios, as Andrew and I, lacking any sophistication worth the name, like to call it. In Extreme Biblios gold isn't a tie-breaker at the end, you don't shuffle the cards after the gift phase, and during the gift phase if you hand out a single gold tile you get to say "eat shit". There wasn't a lot of the brown stuff around though, and despite hopeful enquiries as to whether anyone ate their own it was a game with a dearth of frustration, though - as always with Biblios - there was plenty of tension and second-guessing. I'm not proud of our scatalogical humour, but at least I can say I'm Mr Biblios:

Sam 8
Andrew 5
Ian 4

Tribed and tested

This day may be better remembered for the positive results from N. Ireland, Scotland, and Republic of Ireland, but for us it will be remembered for the day that the Lords of Waterdeep expansion came to the table!

But first, a little background. There were six of us at Sam’s: the host, Ian, Martin ,Katy, Adam and myself, and we began with a little light introduction in the laid-back form of Take It Easy. A simple of where cruel fate twists the knife in your back in ever more amusing ways. Especially with our habit of calling out various words, bingo-style, of certain topics.

However, for a while, it looked as if there may not be a game at all. But Sam’s artistic skills came to the fore and he fashioned a remarkably faithful copy, allowing the game to progress unhindered.

But perhaps the most amazing part of the evening was that Martin realised the missing tile was 5-2-8 at exactly 7.55 (ie, five to eight). Amazeballs!

The first round (with Sam as caller, and the topic was “clothes”) was close: only 77 points separated first and last. But the second round (Ian as caller, topic: punk, rock and grindcore bands) had people grinding their teeth and cursing the heavens in frustration. Not Adam, though, who came first in that round, as he had in the first. In the last round (caller: Adam, topic: condiments and sauces) he was second after Martin, but by then, the win was sown up.

Adam 527
Sam 452
Andrew 421
Martin 419
Ian 334
Katy 330

After all that, we split into two. Adam, Martin and I went for the cluster of analysis paralysis that is Five Tribes, while Ian, Sam and Katy chose Lords of Waterdeep with the new expansion. Of course, this expansion allows six players, but Martin would not be shaken from his belief that anything D&D related is as much fun as shaving with a cheese grater, so we had to split into two groups of three.

We set up, and Adam was told the rules. We played and we pondered. Adam noted that this game has pauses long enough for a comfortable toilet break. Martin said that was a weakness of the game just as I was saying that it was a positive part of the game. Despite our contrary opinions on the game, Adam cruised serenely (if a little baffled) to a win, having got a multiplier for his yellow meeples, and plenty of goods. Martin went for djinns, and I didn’t specialise in anything much.

Adam 191
Martin 160
Andrew 136

The game ended with Martin deciding that, after several attempts, he really didn’t like it. Adam admitted himself bemused by the whole process, while I thought I’d like to give it another go or two before I decide if I like it or not.

Lords of Waterdeep Plus was still winding up, so we played Love Letter as a nice little filler. Adam said he wasn’t a fan since he didn’t understand the strengths of each card and how to play them. Nevertheless, he and I raced into a 2-2-0 lead over Martin in the first four rounds. Then Martin declared he’d win three in a row and take the win, and he came close. The score was 2-2-2 when Martin foolishly decided to compare hands with me when I had the Princess. Victory!

Andrew 3
Adam 2
Martin 2

And so LoW+ ended. I’ll leave it to them to describe how the expansion changed things. The only difference I noticed was hearing the occasional reference to “dirty skulls”.

San 173
Katy 149
Ian 131

Then, since we were six, we decided on a final game of Tsuro. Martin claims that Tsuro is all luck, but that’s just a bluff. Everyone knows it’s a game of skill and bluff. I had no chance, stuck between Adam and Martin, so I was out first. Katy followed soon after and then Ian, Sam and Adam all converged on the same square with Ian doing the decent thing and killing them all off at once. This left Martin as the winner.

1. Martin
2= Sam
2= Ian
2= Adam
3. Katy
4. Andrew

Sam claims top spot on the form table, with Adam in second.

						Points
Sam	2	1	2	1	1	7
Adam	2	2	1	1	3	9
Martin	1	2	2	4	2	11
Andrew	4	1	3	3	2	13
Katie	3	2	6	1	3	15
Joe	3	3	1	3	5	15
Ian	2	3	5	4	2	16
Matt	1	3	2	5	5	16
Stanley	4	1	5	5	5	20
Hannah	2	5	5	5	5	22

And on the Lords of Waterdeep division, Sam sees himself on top on points and the medal table. Gonz takes points ratio with a record that probably won't be broken for some time. Steve lurks menacingly on the division, threatening to overtake me, despite having only played half as many games.

Wait! I almost forgot: we have a Tsuro division, too. And what a cosy love-in it is. Adam wins the medal table, Sam wins on points and we have joint winners on points ration: Quentin and Anja.

Tribes and Tribulations

Tonight we congregated at Joe’s. In attendance were six regulars: Joe, myself, Martin, Ian, Matt and Sam, along with newcomer to the group (and to board games) Jim, and old friend of Sam’s and sometime acquaintance of me and Joe’s.

Jim spoke of experience with Agricola and Settlers, and so he, Sam, Ian and Matt embarked on a four-player game of Macao. Martin had requested that Sam bring Five Tribes so he could try it again, so he, me and Joe set up on the rickety card table.

Joe started, and immediately left Martin with a move that got him the fifteen point tile. I sighed and grimly started wondering how I was going to make up that deficit. I went for resource cards, Martin built up his stock of viziers and djinns while Joe relied on his djinn’s special power to get him out of a tight spot. He was able to put three random meeples on an empty square. Unfortunately, twice near the end, the meeples he drew were the wrong colour for what he wanted and they ended up being wasted moves.

The defining characteristic of the game, it seemed to us, was that it’s not enough to maximise your points, you also have to leave nothing behind for the next player. We were all guilty of accidentally leaving the board in a state that another player could exploit for profit.

Martin 188
Andrew 164
Joe 143

A discussion about Five Tribes amongst everyone later that evening prompted Sam to suggest that a timer would make things better, but Martin thought that this would just mean that players made mistake more frequently. Perhaps, he said, the only way for the game to improve was if we all got better at it.

By the time we’d finished, Macao was still about halfway through, so we thought about what to play next. Joe insisted on Wizard. Martin wasn’t keen, and I didn’t know it, but Joe was so excited about the idea that we agreed.

Wizard is, basically, Contract Whist with eight extra cards: four Wizards that allow you to win any hand, and four Jester that allow you to lose any hand. Now you might think, looking at my performance, that what I’m about to say is sour grapes but I’ve never liked card games that are merely tweaked versions of games that already exist. The new cards don’t seem to add anything except an element of unpredictability. Especially if you don’t have any in your hand. While it was fun while it lasted, there really is no reason for this variant to exist and it certainly shouldn’t be pretending it’s a completely different game.

Joe 200
Martin 180
Andrew 0 (yes, zero)

We ended our game of Wizard to coincide with the end of the epic game of Macao. They told me the scores, and Jim made sure to tell me that, while he came last, he enjoyed it.

Matt 65
Sam 64
Ian 52
Jim 39

Since we were all ready for a new game together, we chose 6nimmt. Jim sat it out, saying he’d prefer to watch. We explained the rules to him anyway, so he could at least understand what was going on.

It was a typical game of 6nimmt, with people dodging cruel fate or, more often, running straight into it just as it's looking for a fight. In the first round, Joe picked up 40 points, and in the second round Sam did the same. As we entered the last round (the 66 point rule dropped due to time constaints) it was between Martin on 13 and Ian on 14 points. But this time, the hands on the clock of doom were pointing to Ian o'clock, and he picked up 31 points while Martin escaped with a clear round (as did Joe, by the way).

Martin 13
Andrew 41
Ian 43
Matt 53
Sam 58
Joe 61

On the form table with barely two weeks to go until the end of the season, Martin replaces Joe at the top.

						Points
Martin	1	2	1	3	1	8
Andrew	2	3	2	1	2	10
Chris	1	2	1	3	5	12
Adam	1	1	4	3	4	13
Sam	5	2	3	1	2	13
Joe	6	1	3	1	2	13
Matt	4	1	4	3	2	14
Ian	3	3	2	3	4	15
Hannah	3	4	5	2	2	16
Paul	2	2	5	5	5	19
Steve	1	5	5	5	5	21
Katie	3	3	5	5	5	21
Jim	4	5	5	5	5	24

But hey, I hear you all cry out, isn't there a division for 6nimmt we can all gawp at? Sure there is. Sam comes first on the medal table and is top on points, with "Silver Specialist" Steve taking points ratio. Well done, all.

Love Ys...

Saturday saw a gap in the clouds, a break in the traffic, a window in the schedule. Sam sent out the call for any available gamers and Ian and I arrived at his just after eight.

When I arrived, I was fully expecting Five Tribes to be the night’s choice. Imagine my surprise when I saw that Ys had been chosen. This game was new to Ian and it was so long since we’d played, it was as good as new to Sam and myself, so we went through the badly written rule book to refresh our memories.

Once we’d got over that ordeal, the game itself is pretty straightforward. Your bidding for control of areas, with the proviso that each area gives a different bonus and it can be hard to remember what gets you what, especially the market. We also pondered the historical accuracy of using a queen to lock an area, unless this particular queen spoke like Ray Winstone, yelling "This 'ere area's locked daaahn, you slags!"

Ian went for black gems and cards mostly, getting a couple of decent super-powers such as placing all meeples face down or always winning ties. I went for points on the board early on, and then a late investment in yellow gems, pushing it from last into third. Sam pushed his blue gems up into first place while complaining that the cards he’d got weren’t as good as he’d thought. Still, they and a handful of black gems seemed to do the trick.

Sam 91
Andrew 89
Ian 85

A nice game once you get going, and a close result meant that everyone was satisfied.

Then we broke out Five Tribes. It’s been played as a four-player, and as a two-player. Tonight was its debut as a three hander. No need for the rule book this time, and we set about reuniting the five tribes of wherever it is. Sam looked good at the start as he went for a djinn-heavy tactic. I went after resource cards and Ian... well, Ian had a trick up his sleeve.

During the game, Sam thoughtfully mused,

“We should have a games night...”

“Every night!” I gleefully suggested.

“... Cheese board.” Sam finished. And true to his word, he brought out some crackers and cheese for us.

As the game neared its end, my position looked good. I had lots of Viziers and the djinn to make them three points each, plus plenty of camels on the board, PLUS lots of resource cards. Sam had an entire army of djinns lined up alongside him. I thought it was between me and Sam, but you ignore Ian at your peril.

When it came to counting up, Ian started very strongly, having a cool seventy points in money. Sam and I hardly had any, effectively giving Ian a huge lead. No one saw that coming at all (according to Ian, not even him, but we don’t believe that for a second). I got 44 points for my viziers and Sam’s djinns scored 38.

Andrew 147
Ian 140
Sam 127

What an ending to the game, and to the evening. Full of excitement and woe, and we didn’t even break out the whiskey!

Maybe next time.

						Points
Joe	1	2	1	2	1	7
Andrew	1	2	2	1	3	9
Martin	3	1	1	3	1	9
Chris	1	2	1	3	5	12
Adam	1	1	4	3	4	13
Sam	3	1	2	4	3	13
Ian	2	3	4	3	2	14
Hannah	3	4	5	2	2	16
Matt	4	3	2	3	5	17
Paul	2	2	5	5	5	19
Steve	1	5	5	5	5	21
Katie	3	3	5	5	5	21

Ten Tribes

After last night's bewilderment I was eager to have another crack at Five Tribes whilst I still remembered it. Andrew was curious enough to join me and we tried it as a two-player tonight.

It's very much the same game (I suppose it would be) only with two each player has two turns in a round: two sets of bids for turn order, and the possibility to either get two turns in a row - potentially very rewarding - or stop your opponent from doing so.

We began fairly quickly with the comments from yesterday fresh in Andrew's mind. One thing we - or I, anyway - missed last night was that some Djinns need paying for to activate them. We probably did this and I missed it in my befuddlement. A look at BGG confirmed that Djinns can only be activated once per turn. Now you know.

We blasted pretty quickly through the first game with both of us playing with a certain experimental air. But my experiences of last night (and the fact the Viziers are less powerful in a two-player game) saw me ride away on my various camels to a decent win:

Sam 186
Andrew 137

Andrew now familiarised with the game, we reset and went again. This time a little slower, as we pondered moves a bit more and had an extended break courtesy of the kids upstairs. Andrew started well, claiming some tiles early on, and I felt I had my work cut out to keep the pace. Every time I did a decent move I left something behind, but on the other hand I got a decent set of Djinns that meant I could get more Djinns, place a camel on a populated tile and do something or other else which I now forget.

But although I got a bit of an engine going it wasn't enough to catch Andrew, who was going great guns on the resources and picked up a Djinn that let him turn slaves into resources too (see BGG for the ongoing debate about slaves in this game). In fact even nabbing the vizier lead from him at the death wasn't enough, as he sailed to a serene victory:

Andrew 208
Sam 187

We both liked it, and the two-turns thing for two players was intriguing. There *is* the downside I think, as highlighted by Martin already, of analysis paralysis. At one point in the second game my brain started to melt at the number of options and their various consequences, and I pretty much gave up, making what was a sub-optimal move (not that I could have caught Andrew).

But I think it's a bit of a good 'un - maybe it just needs a timer.

The Never Ending (Railway) Journey

One games night, eight hungry gamers. Sam was hosting, and Adam, Martin, Ian, Matt and Roll For The Soul regular (but new to Tuesdays) Katie were first to arrive. While they waited for the last two attendees, the old favourite Timeline was brought out to fill the, ahem, time.

Adam played his hands like an expert, such that his final two cards to place in order of occurrence were The Formation of the Earth and The Extinction of the Dinosaurs. He successfully put these down, and was out first. But Martin managed to place his card: The painting of The Raft of The Medusa just after Adam to share first place. Ian didn’t know that The Times was first published in 1785, and so could only manage second.

1. Adam - clear
1. Martin - clear
2. Ian – one card left
3. Sam – three cards left
3. Katie – three cards left
3. Matt – three cards left

By now I had arrived. Sam had a new game: Five Tribes, which he, Martin and the as yet absent Joe wanted to play. The remaining five had to choose what the other game would be. Adam and I were keen on Railways of the World and Katie likes trains, so it was chosen. Ian decided he wanted to play a new game instead of play RotW again, so Matt was left to learn the delicate intricacies of RotW.

It was a packed table, with the eastern seaboard of America sharing space with the tiles of Five Tribes. What a bustling games room it was, with two sets of rules explanation taking up the air space.

I have no idea what Five Tribes was about. There were a lot of meeples, a lot of cards being drawn and Sam crying out “Bollocks, Martin!” halfway through. I’ll leave it up to them to tell us what happened.

What happened on Railways? Well, a lot. Adam and I both missed a Railway Executive card as one of the opening cards on offer and neither Matt nor Katie knew how awesomely powerful it was to have two turns immediately. Adam only noticed it after he took his second go. He asked if he could take his go back, and I said “sure,” because, at that time, I still hadn’t seen it. So he did. How annoying.

Then, to pour salt on our wounds, Adam tried to warn Matt off a particular move, saying he could take it again if he wanted. Matt said he’d decided, so he’d stick with it. It was a free industrialise, so Matt turned a grey city into a vibrant new city full of cubes. And then Adam built a link to it, ruining Matt’s plan. Adam said “I tried to tell him not to build it!”

In Adam’s defence, he did notice a new rule that we’d never noticed before: that the Kansas to New York link only gets you points once you’ve paid the $30,000 to activate the Western Link.

Meanwhile, I took over the New York area, moving cubes around. By using other people’s links, I got the “four colour cubes” and “three-link delivery” bonuses on the same turn, and I continued to use other people’s links (mostly Katie’s) throughout the game. Possibly a mistake, but at the time, there always seemed to be some better way to spend my go.

It was an epic. Katie complained that we were halfway through and she’d already had two gins. She also texted home to let them know she’d be late. On the other half of the table, Five Tribes ended with the scores at:

Martin 165
Joe 120
Ian 109
Sam 96

And they began Ra, the game of Egyptian-style bidding. And it must’ve been a ding-dong battle listening to their reactions as tiles were drawn from the bag. We were still ploughing through our game, and this prompted Katie to comment that she wished she were playing a game with swearing in it, too.

But we had no swearing. Just long thoughtful pauses which could comfortably fit a visit to the toilet between turns. But time ticked on, and soon we had triggered the end of the game. Phew. And I made a foolish move: choosing to upgrade and move a cube for six points instead of moving two cubes for three points each. Why was this foolish? Well, just look at the scores...

Adam 80 (plus $7000)
Andrew 80 (plus $6000)
Katie 59
Matt 55

Matt’s last minute sprint up the scoreboard was not enough to close the gap on third, but I’m willing to bet he’d be a formidable opponent next go. Especially now that Adam’s taught him how harsh the game can be.

As for me, If I’d gone for the cheap option and not upgraded, I could have won. If I’d built a link instead of giving Katie about ten points during the game, I could’ve won. On the other hand, if Adam hadn’t been honest and discovered that new rule, he could have won by a mile.

By now Ra had finished, and Joe and Martin bade us goodbye and went home. The scores for Ra were

Joe 49
Sam 44
Martin 37
Ian 21

This left Sam and Ian with enough time for a quick two-player Ponte del Diavolo to fill the time while we finished. Sam won, but it was Ian’s first game. In fact, it had been Ian's first game at anything for almost the whole evening.

And this leaves us with a brand new name on the GNN form table. Welcome Katie, to a new world! Meanwhile, Joe heads the pack.

						Points
Joe	1	2	1	2	1	7
Martin	3	1	1	3	1	9
Andrew	2	1	3	2	2	10
Sam	2	4	3	2	1	12
Chris	1	2	1	3	5	12
Adam	1	1	4	3	4	13
Ian	4	3	2	3	2	14
Hannah	3	4	5	2	2	16
Matt	4	3	2	3	5	17
Paul	2	2	5	5	5	19
Steve	1	5	5	5	5	21
Katie	3	3	5	5	5	21

I said there’d be more divisions for our favourite games, and we played two this week. The division for Railways of the World is a pretty one-sided affair. Adam leads the pack in his favourite game by any measure you care to mention.

Ra is slightly more generous in sharing out its honours. Sam is top on points, with Joe the leader on points ratio and on the medal table.