Not Your Average Joe

Joe and I arrived a little late to proceedings last night to find that, a quarter of an hour in, no games had been played. And such was our collective dithering that it was another fifteen minutes before we finally started a game. Everyone was distracted, to be fair - by Adam's hair:

And by Joe's new role as a latter-day emperor of Rome. Not only was he lolling horizontally sul letto, he was also (not pictured) eating a peach.

Having been rocked by these seismic changes, we rejected Joe's thematically-apt suggestion of Colosseum in favour of Texas Showdown. For those who've not played, or forgotten, or who just like reading stuff, this is a trick-taker where you don't want to win tricks. The suit led (eg yellow) must be followed if possible, but if someone can't follow they play a different suit (eg green) and now anyone still to play can lay yellow or green. The highest number of the commonest suit takes the trick.

I began badly, picking up five tricks on the first round - as soon as anyone hits twelve the current round will be the last - but staged a recovery of sorts, winning none at all in the next two rounds. Martin, Ian and Adam all cursed their cards at various stages, and Martin was first over the dozen line before I joined him. Adam tripped even further, leaving Ian and Emperor Berger with a shared win.

1 Joe/Ian 10

2 Martin/Sam 13

3 Adam 14

We moved on to feistier fare with the train/station-laying conundrum that is Northern Pacific: if the train goes to your station, it pays out. If it doesn't; it doesn't. But on your turn you can either build a station, or move the train - not both. So there's a dilemma and every station runs the risk of not paying when it ends up as a repurposed B+B instead. The simple rules are neat, but the protracted down-time meant I felt this one works better in the room. Waiting for turns was pronounced enough that non-players started fiddling with all the bits. This was one of the SFW versions:

Martin began well, but was swiftly overhauled by Joe, and then everyone else, as the mistake of leading after round one became clear. Despite leading after round 2, Joe seemed to escape a similar fate, and ran off with title of Railway Emperor:

Joe 21

Adam 20

Sam 19

Ian 18

Martin 17

With that, I was done. I think they were going to continue though, maybe long into the night? I'm sure we'll find out...

Five go mad in Butte

Games night without Joe and Sam is bound to be fallow. With Adam H and a string of other apologies this week and doubts about the fitness of my car, there was a time when it might have been just Martin and Katy. Instead we were five in total: the two aforementioned and Ian, Adam T and myself. Katy and I were late, and when we arrived we found a game of Eggs of Ostrich just ending.

Ian 7
Adam 6
Martin 3

Once we were all settled around the table we looked at the stack of games already laid out that would be good with five. We started with Northern Pacific. It was new to Adam but Martin insisted he could teach it in a minute. It began in a feisty mood. Katy began and placed a cube. Martin immediately moved the train past that cube, rendering it useless.

It was all very cagey stuff, apart from the fairly obvious jokes about putting things into Butte. Round three saw a lot of spread betting as everyone tried to put off moving the train for as long as possible. Katy spent a lot of time saying she was just happy being in third, so you can imagine how happy she was when she finished in second.

Ian 28
Katy 26 (wins on tie breaker)
Adam 26
Martin 23
Andrew 21

After this was Mamma Mia, chosen by Katy who was already in a state of high excitation at the possibility of being dealt the Mamma Mia card. She actually got it in round one and then theatrically dealt out the stack of cards in a broad Italianish accent. It was Adam’s first go at this game, too, and halfway through round one he said he’d worked out how you can play well. Ominous words and they preceded an amazing comeback in round three that had us checking the rules for a tie-breaker. I hoped it was “the quietest” who won, but instead it was “most cards left in hand” so Katy squeaked a win on one of her most loved games. Martin, meanwhile, insisted he used to be good at it.

Katy 5 (won on tie breaker)
Adam 5
Martin 3
Ian 3
Andrew 2

Then we played Nakanuki Paradise at my request. This game of guessing the highest value to bid without the total value exceeding the target is such a simple, clever game. Far too clever for me.

Martin 22
Adam 21
Katy 17
Ian 15
Andrew 13

Time was ticking on and for Adam’s last game before he departed, we chose a three-round game of Voodoo Prince. In round one Katy clearly had no trumps and was heading into a last-player-standing showdown with Ian, with only one trick to her name. Ian made things simple by showing her his remaining three cards: all trumps. She was out last and with only one point to her name.

I went out in similar fashion in round two and Adam in round three. But what of the other end of the scale? The winners? It was Ian versus Martin as we went into the last round, with Adam one point off the pace. Katy, buoyed up by her ten point haul in round two, kept asking if it was possible for her to win. Possible, but unlikely. Almost as unlikely as there being no trumps left in the game once there were only three players left. Katy did finish round three with most points, putting her in a respectable second, but Ian was third to last out for ten points while Martin was out first for five.

I had no trumps at all in round two

Ian 28
Katy 22
Martin 22
Adam 17
Andrew 13

After Adam left, we ended on a baffling round of QE. We bid for points, but those bids increased our chances of losing. Oh, the irony. Ian and I struggled to buy anything at first, and then Ian went on a spending spree that would make the Sultan of Brunei blush. He and I both tied for identical winning bids on one round: Katy had set the starting price at 20,000 and we both put in bids of 20,001. In the end, just like last time, Katy won by miles. A game she excels at, but might have difficulty finding people to play against in future.

Katy 37
Martin 29
Andrew 23
Ian OUT (but had 19)

And with that, we were done. All back homewards with more memories than we can plausibly keep except as a general warm glow of recollection.

Handsome beyond words

With mass absences ruling out Tuesday's gaming, we gathered together on a Thursday for our weekly fix. There were five of us around Joe's freshly cleaned kitchen table: Joe himself, Sam, Ian, Martin and me. Martin was itching to get started, having not played any games for ages and we began with some light hearted luck pushing with Push.

Deal yourself some cards, avoiding duplicates of colour or number, making up to three columns to help you avoid going bust. You choose which column to keep but, and here's the twist, your neighbours get the other two columns. Added to this is the little matter of the die which, when rolled, requires you to discard all of your cards of the colour showing on the die.

It's a fun game, where a lot of the fun is watching other people struggle with bad luck. Especially if the person in question is Martin. "Random nonsense!" he declared as the die sliced away another high scoring set of cards from his collection while leaving the rest of us relatively unscathed. He couldn't even take solace in his beer since his regular subscription ales were nasty sweet tasting novelty flavours.

Ian and I both banked cards to keep them safe and when Ian did suffer at the hands of the die, he was able to shrug off losing twelve points with a unconcerned "I can live with that." But it turned out to be pivotal.

Andrew 64
Ian 56
Joe 41
Sam 38
Martin 29

After this we played the Dixit / Face Cards type game of Belratti. We only had the rules in German, so Martin searched for the English version online.

In this, we are artists and collectors. We all have a hand of nine cards with pictures of objects and then two more picture cards are revealed, indicating the topics that the collectors want in their art works. But in among these hand picked cards are four randomly drawn pictures by Belratti, the famous painter of forgeries. Picking his cards instead of ours is a minus point and six of them will end the game in defeat.

We began optimistically by declaring that Sam and Ian (our two painters) could successfully chose six paintings to sell to me, Martin and Joe. To cut a long story short, they couldn't. Belratti snuck three of his paintings into the deal. He was already halfway to beating us and we never recovered. We had only nine pictures successfully identified when Belratti hit six which, according to the score sheet, is "a picture of misery."

Next up, we needed something more meaty to go with the just-opened crisps. Northern Pacific was introduced to me as a simple but mean train game set in the US. Put your cubes in the city where the train is going to be sometime in the future, but all the other players are doing the same. In doing so, alliances are forged and rivalries are cemented.

It was a difficult game to judge and we all struggled with the problem of trying to make a move that doesn't immediately make people move the train elsewhere. Joe stoutly defended himself against any accusations that he was taking a "Joe turn" pointing out we'd all had moments of excess pondering. It was a bit mean of us since he was in last at the time and needed a decent round to get back into contention, which he got.

In fact it ended very close. After leading for rounds one and two, Martin found himself caught by Sam right at the end, despite his great joke about dropping a big one in Butte.

Sam 21
Martin 20 (fewer wasted cubes)
Andrew 20 (more wasted cubes)
Joe 19
Ian 18

With the news that England were winning 3-0 against Norway in the Women's World Cup ringing in our ears, we played L. A. M. A. The fun game of picking up or putting down cards. So simple yet so amusing. I adopted the role of cock blocker for this game. I suggested that Martin should start and then, having checked his cards, he immediately had to pick up. Then I kept ruining Sam's plans with a sequence of moves that kept increasing the value of the cards past the one he wanted.

Joe played a clear round and got to put back a ten. He also went to the toilet and while he was away we complained about how long he was taking over his turn. Hilarious. But he had the last laugh with a decisive win.

Joe 11
Martin 32
Andrew 34
Ian 39
Sam 46

At this point, Ian set off home but we were still very much in the zone. We tried Kami, a very pretty Japanese themed game from France (I think) which was simple, although with a frustratingly opaque rule sheet that spent more time telling us the characters’ back story than how to play the game.

The basic jist is that one player plays an attack card and the next player has to play the same card (or an empress) to counter it and then they can play an attack card of their own. Winning team (you play in pairs) is decided by the first person to play all eight cards in their hand. It seemed simple and a bit random. The winning total is supposed to be fifteen but when Joe and I ran into a 9-0 lead after two rounds, the game was ended.

After this we played Handsome, An Elegant Word Game. This game comes in a tiny pack and it concerns making words from the five communal cards in the middle (one supplied by each player and one drawn randomly at the start) and the two cards in each players’ hand. Only consonants are supplied, so you have to come up with the longest word using whatever vowels you choose. In the “party variant” consonants can be repeated. These people party hard.

Sam was in his element, winning on QUASHED. I just checked and we owe Joe an apology since HELIXES is a valid plural of HELIX, which would have got him an extra point for longest word that round. Martin was all musical, starting with VOGUED and JIVE while I was channeling my inner fisherman with WHELKS and an underwhelming (and non-scoring) BOX.

Sam 11
Joe 8
Martin 7
Andrew 4

Finally, we had another go at Belratti. This time we stuck to low numbers of paintings to match to our topics, and we made sure to use those useful special action cards. With this, we did far better. I clearly thought that either familiarity or a smaller player count had improved matters but what I said was “This is so much better without Ian!” Then they insisted I blog that, so here I am. Sorry, Ian. Didn’t mean it.

Joe, Sam, Andrew and Martin 16
Belratti 3

A marvelous way to end the evening and set off into the hot June night. See you all soon, I hope.

The First Flush of Spring

It was a momentous occasion at Hannah and Adam's house - perhaps Arthur sensed something in the air, as he was unable to get to sleep - with long-time absentee Katy returning from her year-long cycle across America and even-longer absentee Quentin returning from his enigmatic doings in the UK. Andrew was still away in Japan, but joining our hosts and regulars Joe, Martin, Ian and myself was also fellow Eastonite Steve, doubling down on last week's appearance.

We began with cake, courtesy of Katy. In classic Katy style she pulled the rug from under the confectionary by saying what she learned from her trip was that "all gaming groups are the same", leaving us emotionally on the ropes before the evening had even begun. She's back, ladies and gentlemen! Katy floundered to justify this seeming broadside at our interchangeability before Joe came gallantly to her rescue with some sanguine philosophical reflections, and then Martin proved the truth of the statement by lifting the lid on the first game of the night: The Chameleon. It'd not been seen for a good while either, but the fact there were eight of us (at this point Hannah was still trying to get Arthur settled) made it a good fit.

In the first round, the word was Soup and Quentin was the chameleon. I can't remember who was accused, but Quentin got away with the word "tray" despite Ian pointing out you can carry many things on a tray, not just soup. Quent also guessed the word, courtesy of Joe and Steve's clues "Kitchen" and "Pea".

In the second round the word was Risk, and Ian was the chameleon, covering his back by saying the word "Strategy". Many of us thought Katy was the chameleon, with the word 'gray' that I'm still not clear on the reasoning of. Then we had one more round where the word was Insects. Joe did his best to incriminate himself by clueing the word "Startled" in reference to a Bristol band no-one had heard of; even his reading of the entire wikipedia entry not convincing us that it was a non-suspicious clue. But Katy's clue of 'Black' didn't convince enough people for her to get away with being the chameleon; though to be fair she did have to go first.

Hannah now swapped bedtime roles with Adam and we split into two groups. On the big table Hannah, Martin, Katy and Joe took on the evil-doing that is Northern Pacific. On the coffee table in the front room Ian, Steve, Quentin and myself collaborated beautifically on reconstructing the ancient temple of Menara.

Or at least we did until I knocked it over. Then we started again, determined to succeed, as the room rang to the soundtrack of the other table. At first there was much mirth, delighted cackling and verdant swearing coming from the direction of Northern Pacific. Then: silence. I'm not sure when exactly it happened, but clearly the fun of track-laying and station-investing had been superseded by the fun of revenge fantasies conjured and in some cases realised.

They later blamed Adam, who had returned to restart the game and tie for a three-way win:

Adam/Martin/Katy 23 (tied on tie-breaker!)
Joe/Hannah 18 (tied on tie-breaker!!)

Whilst they blasted out a game of Gold Fever...

...we came to the end of Menara in the front room, with Steve and I putting together the last Temple Floor. Quentin, ever the strategist, didn't want us to place it at all, reasoning we didn't need to to secure the victory. But we decided a glorious failure was better than a clinical win. Fortunately, it was neither: a glorious victory instead. We all took photos.

Hannah now retired to bed and Steve too, with an early morning looming, hit the road. The rest of us settled around the big table for the returnee's debuts at Just One. It was a hilariously catastrophic attempt with a number of clues overlapping and cancelling each other out. Including clues for 'shower' which I won't reproduce here, and poor Joe being left trying to guess the word Buffy from Giles and resurrection and Quentin trying to glean the word Shower from 'psycho' and 'power'. We failed, failed, and failed again, just hitting the disappointing 'average' score.

We wrapped up the evening with the return of another absentee - Fuji Flush, which remains a slightly tricky game to explain despite the simple rules. Quentin was already looking marginally baffled when Ian mentioned dick points. "Don't confuse him with dick points" Martin said, adding another aphorism to the GNN canon. Katy threatened to go out first but kept getting busted. Martin picked up a whole bunch of rubbish throughout the game, giving up all confidentiality to show me his cards.

And I won, going out on a 17 when nobody had the cards to collaborate with - essentially, they were collectively dickless.

Sam 0
Katy 1
Adam 2
Ian and Joe 3
Quentin 4
Martin 5

A fun end to a fun night. Thanks to our hosts in particular, and welcome back strangers!

A Trick of the Rail

With Andrew off in Japan and Katy not yet returned to the fold, stalwarts Martin, Ian and myself (Sam) were joined at Joe's house by Steve, who made the trek from Easton through the skirts of Storm Freya. Because Ian wasn't arriving until later, the quartet began without him with a game of Byzanz. But before that happened Joe, Martin and I bashed out a quick game of Good Little Tricks, the trick-taker where winning a trick can be harmless, or can be terrible if said trick contains the final card of a suit - the trick winner collects all the cards of that suit and turns them into points.

Points are bad.

Joe 13
Sam 18
Martin 23

Steve rocked up as we wrapped up the second round, so it was Byzanz time. Martin ran Steve through the rules (see Andrew's previous post) and we were off!

Steve seemed perplexed but also seemed to be scoring a lot of fours. Martin scored a bunch of threes, but also traders. Joe tried the tactic that failed me last week and made it work. I bid high and failed again. I didn't even fail better.

Martin 26
Joe 24
Steve 23
Sam 21

Ian watched the last two rounds play out as he sank his first beer so fast he surprised everyone, including himself. Maybe it was Steve's exceedingly hot bombay mix, which had everyone sweating except Joe, who remained curiously unperturbed.

Then it was time for Martin's new game, Northern Pacific. This takes Mini-Rails' simplicity and aligns it with the brinkmanship of Medina: everyone collaborates on building a railroad across America, but can only take one of two options on their turn - build track, or invest in a station. The stations pay out when - if - the track reaches them, and up to three investments can be made in a single station, leading to agonising decisions as to when and where you lead the track, because taking it to Glasgow, say, will eliminate the possibility the train ever arrives in Butte. So if you've invested in Butte - bad luck.

When the train reaches the west coast the whole thing starts over, and after the route is built a third time the game ends with the richest player the winner. Despite some leader-targeting in the mid and late stages, the leader was Martin. I pipped Joe for second on the tie-breaker.

Martin 24
Sam 21
Joe 21
Steve 19
Ian 18

After a quick conflab we moved onto Las Vegas, with one of Joe's expansions mixed in: the big die that represents two dice when placed in a casino. This simple rule was slightly complicated by the spoiler dice (white) also having a big die that didn't represent two, and my big die for purple actually being blue. Echoes of the hostility from Northern Pacific were felt in the game, particularly when Steve disparaged statisticians.

But Joe mellowed the mood by getting us to imagine a beach where "all the pebbles are dice". To really picture the moment you also need to imagine Joe dreamily smiling, with both hands holding lots of dice. He was so immersed in the moment he didn't realise he'd won, until Martin pointed it out.

Joe $380k
Martin $370k
Sam $260k
Ian $210k
Steve $110k

At this point Steve bowed out, so now a quartet again we played a game of partnership trick-taker Yokai Septet, with Joe and Ian taking on me and Martin. This is a neat trick-taker where players are trying to win the '7' cards from seven suits which each have a 7 in, but in the lowest numbered suit the 7 is the highest card and in the highest numbered suit it's the lowest. Win four '7's to win the round, or win seven tricks (without winning four 7s) to lose it.

We didn't play more than a couple of rounds, but won one each, with mine and Martin's tricks proving slightly more valuable:

Martin and Sam 4
Joe and Ian 3

With the storm blowing lustily outside and the hour now past 11pm the curtains drew on another marvellous GNN night.