can't rotate on blogger
This is a space exploration game that calls for Vangelis on the soundtrack. It uses action selection much like Yspahan - dice are rolled, and the dice you take dictate what actions you can do on a given turn. The actions themselves are relatively simple - you can use dice to move your ship around the board discovering planets or setting up gynodynes (:get points), advance your technologies a la Ascending Empires, or set up transmitters that boost you up the score track or give some other canapé-like-advantage.
double six: expensive
But when you take a die, the die you take affects your position on one of two tracks that affect the rather crucial turn order and income - the higher the die you take, the more likely it is you're falling back on one (or both) of the tracks. Low dice aren't useless, but if your strategy involves moving a lot around the board you don't really want to be picking up ones and twos.
The game comes with individual player boards for the advanced game, and maybe we'll use them next time: the rules explanation and game itself were both over in just over an hour! And that included us eating a lot of crisps, as well. However we were both playing with a freewheeling attitude and noted the potential for AP even without the player boards. Certainly a very accessible game though for when you have that Eclipse yearning but don't have three hours to play it in.
Sam - 100 and something
Andrew 90 something
Next up was another new game to Andrew: Tokyo Highway. I've so far lost to Stanley and Matt and I was determined to win this time, but the tactics still elude me, and Andrew collected a debut win when he got his last car down before me. Such a mad-looking confection though, and the only game I know that comes with tweezers.
tarmac
I thought Andrew might not want to take on any more new rules, but he was mad for it so we busted through Fields of Green, a cross between 7 Wonders and Carcassonne. Designed by someone called Vangelis. Like 7 Wonders you take a card each turn; like Carcassonne you add it to an expanding world (a farm, in this case) in front of you. Water feeds crops, crops feed livestock, livestock make money. It's SO REAL.
Except Buildings score points.
water!
I don't imagine will be bumping 7 Wonders from the pantheon any time, but it's a sweet enough game. Despite Andrew outscoring my previous two games v Stan, I managed to dig for victory:
Sam: 52
Andrew: 46
And with our farms happily established, highways built and epic silver die tumbling across deep space... we were done.
