Bread

Anja and Steve were our hosts last night and Joe was kind enough to give me (Sam) and Martin a lift over.  Adam cycled from Easton and Louie greeted us on arrival. The first thing I noticed - after complaining that the lounge lighting didn't suit gaming - was Steve's lack of a front tooth, which prompted a fairly sorry tale of infections and operations, which Louie helpfully concluded "Then they yanked it out of his face". Steve nodded and maybe started thinking about pirates. With Anja upstairs settling Lennon, we kicked things off with the Allegedly Greatest Card Game Of All Time, Flip 7. 

I began a stolidly willing-to-stick journey towards 200 points whilst Steve regularly busted, and so did Martin despite being seemingly dealt a Second Chance card (or two) in every round. He unfortunately also drew several Flip 3 cards when he was the only player left in, forced to play them on himself. Joe pulled off an actual Flip 7: seven cards of different values, which instantly ends the round and gives him 15 bonus points. He was excited for a minute but I was a bit slow with the camera. 

This mini-spectacular was enough to push him past both Louie and Adam and over the finish line!

Joe 207
Louie 198
Adam 190
Sam 124
Steve 94
Martin 35

Steve was so upset he broke a chair. Around now the host's bread-making machine started some plaintive beeping that continued for a while as Steve wondered what it wanted, like a robot pet. I made a joke about it being needy that got mistaken for a pun about it being kneady, and we played Timeline.

As youngest player Louie kicked things off as Martin and I both pronounced ourselves happy with our cards - we just had one each we weren't sure about. Unfortunately we both got them wrong, and then their replacements wrong, and meantime Louie was bashing down the reliable combo of Emergence of the Dinosaurs and Extinction of the Dinosaurs. His young brain full of not only facts but retention, he wrapped up a joint win with Joe in pretty short order - Steve was second with one card left as Martin and I rejoiced in our shared misery.

We split into two groups. Louie was allowed one short game so he crewed up with Joe and Martin for Callisto, Knizia's iteration of Blokus, whilst the rest of us - now joined by bread-machine placater Anja, set about dicking each other over in the theme-devoid world of Inori. 

Callisto follows Blokus' rhythm up to a point - keep placing your pieces whilst you still can - but here they must be orthogonally adjacent, and you have up to three towers (two at the start) to build from. Leftover pieces score you points, and points are bad. 

In Inori, meanwhile, we are offering up sacrifices to <someone or other> and trying to be the most sacrificial, I guess. Mechanically it's a worker-placement game (the offerings) and you get rewards of various coloured tokens, and ways to score them: via one of the worker spots on a card, and/or if a card is fully populated at the end of the round, meaning there are temporary and reluctant alliances in order to score. I was too busy being screwed over to take pictures, but here's one from earlier:

On the left is the Sacred Tree, which also has worker offering spots for the juicy goodies there. Critical here is that the person in each spot gets to choose the colour assigned to it, which in turn will determine the worth of your tokens - if you have the most or second-most - at the end of the game. In the above example, blue and red tokens are valuable, and purple worthless. 

Adam cottoned on to things pretty quickly, but it was Steve who rattled away up the track with some tactical scoring. I suffered a little Explainer's Curse and we all came a cropper of the fact I forget when Anja joined to make it four-player we should have had one less offering each! Sorry all.

While the theme is about as tangible as yesterday's fart, the opportunities for dickishness could be felt and heard in our yelps of indignation. Callisto finished with a victory for Joe, Louie went to bed and as we hit our final round Joe and Martin played Marabunta, Knizia's roll-and-write knife-fight. I took no pictures again! Sorry. 

Inori wrapped up with a tragedy for Steve as he realised he'd blocked himself out of his own big move, and asked us why we didn't point it out to him. "I didn't notice!" I said.
"I didn't notice" Anja said.
"I didn't notice" Adam smiled evilly. 

I made a decent fist of some endgame scoring but Steve, who had specialised in the least valuable tokens, picked up just two points as Anja and Adam hurtled off down the track, eventually sharing a tightly-fought win!

Anja and Adam: 68 each

Sam 55

Steve 34

The bread machine began beeping again as Adam left for home and I got to see the frankly marvellous transformation of our hosts's front room. 

Then the three of us cracked through a quick round of Callisto: Anja and Steve got all their pieces down and I scored a disappointing 7 points. 

Joe beat Martin 12-10 at Marabunta, and announced he'd won everything he'd played so far. The five of us came together for a post-10pm bash at Bomb Busters. We got off to an underwhelming start as both Steve and I made imperfect guesses, losing two lives before we'd even completed round one. 

But we rallied, and never lost another thanks to our collective bomb-busting skills. But it wore Steve out, and after mulling over sawing off his leg to complete his Modern Pirate look, he actually went to bed. Is that a first for GNN? I know children have done it before. Anja stayed up with us to play So Clover, a game notable for its propensity to make everyone complain just by looking at some words. 

We all had our doubts that our combos were clue-able, with Martin and I in particular castigating our fate. But in fairness we did quite well! Our first three clovers were all maximum sixers, and on Martin's we just had a mini-stumble and picked up 4 points instead. 

Joe reviewed the latter part of the evening and decided that Bomb Busters and So Clover also counted as wins for him, giving him six <somewhat dubious> 'victories in a row. I think we perhaps refer this to Andrew, as Holder of the Spreadsheet, and see what he says. But either way, it was time to go home, before the bread maker started beeping again. 

Old Friends

T'was the games night before Christmas...  an intimate affair, with various regulars absent for a variety of reasons, including flying to the US, landmark family birthdays and gigs. And so just Adam H, Ian and I (Joe) convened at Steve and Anja's at 7.45pm for a night of classic GNN frolics.

While Anja did a bit of  last-minute adulting elsewhere, the rest of us plus Louie played Timeline. It was fun to revisit this old friend (a theme that would recur this evening), and we mostly got things right, until Louie and Adam finished the round with no cards each, forcing a chronological head to head. They both failed this, which meant they had to do it again, and Adam thought he was a shoo-in with the invention of GPS. His swagger turned to dismay as he discovered that it was invented before the launch of the first Space Shuttle (though with hindsight that seems reasonable) and Louie rejoiced in his unshared victory. 

Louie WIN!

Everyone else LOSE!

Anja arrived on the scene at this point, and we debated the merits of a 6 player versus two 3-ers. The 6-ers on offer didn't satisfy Louie's criteria for a 'proper' game - I've never heard the word 'Kites' uttered with such deep disdain - and thus we split into two 3s. Ian, Steve and Anja set up Mille Fiori at one end, whilst Adam, Louie and I reacquainted ourselves with another old friend, Dominion.

We played the 'Big Money' variant, and it didn't disappoint - Louie utilised several Adventurers to explore his deck for coins, whilst Adam used several Laboratories (pronounced 'Bloboratories' for reasons forgotten) to chain some big moves. I set to Mining, and it worked quite well in conjunction with my Throneroom; we launched into the points-harvesting phase of the game with all in contention.

It was close, but Adam took the win with 33 points. I had 30, and Louie 29.

Mille Fiori was drawing to a close, and Ian seemed to have discovered an overlooked rule - that the offer gets restocked at the end of the round not only with players' discards but also one card per player from the deck. I'm not sure I've played that way before, but I could be wrong. Martin will tell us in the comments.

The final scores were Ian winning with 198, Anja a close second with 192, and Steve elbowing various delicate glass objets onto the workshop floor with 162.

Whilst they finished up and Louie retired, Adam and I debated what next for us five. Adam, as noted by Ian, attempted a bit of Derren Brown-style subliminal influencing by asking me aloud what game we should 'railroad' the others into playing.

Perhaps it worked. I'd brought 20th Anniversary Ticket to Ride Europe, and as we got the bits out to admire its sumptuous stylings, positive noises from the other end of the table suggested it might fit the bill. So while the others packed MF away, we tried to understand the implications of the various route tickets, which can be combined for all sorts of variants. In the end we used all the base and 1912 tickets, plus Big Cities. Lots of tickets.

Steve made the excellent suggestion of using the Team Asia card holders; being able to see your destinations all at once really helps, it turns out! We started off all clustered around Paris, for some reason; apart from Steve, who built Roma to Brindisi on his very first go. And then ignored this little branch line for much of the game. Adam adammed, meaning top-decked like a mofo, and Ian followed suit. As did Anja. Ok ok, I did too a bit - what can you do?

The board gradually spidered out from Paris - it was feisty and tense (though I felt relatively un-messed-with), and there were various agonised noises coming from Steve, who seemed to feel unfit for the role of early 20th Century rail magnate.

Here's a distinctly unsophisticated time-lapse of the game...

Eventually Adam blew the final whistle, and on my final turn I gambled on a six link tunnel from Budapest to Kyiv, which paid off. Steve, Ian and Adam had nothing to do on their last turns, and all weighed up the option of taking more tickets, but balked. We turned over the top three to see if they should have taken the plunge, and there was a collective sigh of relief - except from Anja, who it turned out could have made all three!

Anja did take the longest route bonus, however; and then we started the final scoring from Steve, who was in last place. In the final tally, Adam held on to his crown as master of TTR in style, with over 30 point separating him from me in second place.

Adam 160

Joe 129

Anja 120

Ian 111

Steve 73

The final board state in all it's sumptuosity

It was quarter to midnight, shockingly, so we hastily packed away and tootled off (so hastily I forgot my jumper). Thanks S&A - it was a lovely final games night before Christmas, and great to play some old favourites.

Chippencon!

Friday

With Paul J the quiet instigator of the idea, the old London branch of GNN coalesced this weekend at Chris's house in Chippenham: as well as the host, Paul J and myself there was Paul H for the duration, Stuart on Friday night and then Andrew on Saturday. 

But all this was ahead of us as I arrived at midday on Friday and after catching up with Jacquie and the kids, Chris and I shot off to collect Paul J from the station. Then after a second-wave newsbeat, we started gaming! We kicked things off with Babylonia, new to both Paul and Chris but a relatively easy teach. 

We played slightly too open, having the full board instead of the slightly condensed one for three, but that made it an easier learning game:

Sam 149

Chris 147

Paul 99

And now familiar with it, both were enthusiastic for another crack.

My long and arduous master-and-apprentice defeats at the hands of Martin stood me in good stead once more:

Sam 123

Paul 99

Chris 96

Lovely to find two more converts! We moved on to Sushi Go, the game of card-drafting Japanese foodstuffs. Owing to a misunderstanding over chopsticks, I ruled myself out of contention after round one, but it's not exactly a grind.

Paul 72

Chris 59

Sam 46

 Paul began a four-game winning run here, following his Sushi Go triumph with victories in Alhambra:

Kingdomino...

And Kingdom Builder.

Chris was appalled to finish third in every instance, voicing aloud his regret at the very idea of Chippencon. Things didn't improve immediately for him when Paul H arrived, as we kicked off with Tournament Raj and despite a huge last-round haul, he still finished last. Paul J and I slugged it out for first place, but he shrugged me off to claim a fifth victory in a row!

Paul J 60

Sam 51

Paul 45

Chris 33

With tea consumed - thank you Chris and Jacquie - and Stuart freshly arrived, we fancied something a bit feistier now, and so I talked them through the rules of Hansa Teutonica. 

Despite my encouragements to get sabotaging. everyone was very polite at the start and the first couple of rounds were slightly after-you-sir. But soon enough we were getting in each other's way and the cussing ramped up slightly. The initial sense of being hobbled by two actions fell away as we proliferated across the board and engines kicked into gear. 

After an hour of cross-postal interference, Stuart leapt from an innocuous fourth place into joint first with Chris, and I couldn't quite catch them. We checked the rules for a tie-breaker and Chris' fewer actions-per-turn won him the game!

Chris 38 wins tiebreaker 

Stuart 38

Sam 37

Paul H 29

Paul J 25

Now into the meat of the evening, we debated our five-player options. Paul J was understandably reluctant to learn another set of rules at this point, so we alighted on Istanbul, needing a mostly-fringe-area refreshment on rules. I forgot to take any photos at this point, but suffice to say Paul H was now warmed-up and moved through the gears to wrap up a relatively straightforward win, grabbing his fifth gem with the rest of us at least two turns away from doing likewise:

Paul H five gems!!!!

Sam  4 gems 31 cash 

Paul J 4 gems 6 cash

Stuart 4 gems 1 cash 

Chris 3 gems 13 cash 

The hour was getting late so with the request for something 'silly' I suggested Block Party.

Although this meant another set of rules, the fact they only take about 45 seconds to explain meant we were off and running quickly. And Chris made a banana. 

"I tried to bend it" he cried, but it mattered not: Stuart identified it. I guessed Paul H's spider and he saw the fire engine in my creation. We all ran the highs and lows of emotions - my milk bottle was alleged to be a snowman, a mountain, and an igloo - but ultimately the last game of the night saw Chris triumph:

Chris 11

Sam 10

Paul and Paul 8

Stuart 7

Saturday

I surfaced at around 8.15 to an extremely muggy day. We threw opens doors and windows to try and get some air into the house. Chester enjoyed having all these access points to the house. 

As well as the visiting articles to investigate. 

After breakfast, Jacquie liked the idea of trying out Block Party, so we did. Despite some creative performance anxiety, her debut creation was this beautiful pineapple:

However despite a frankly shambolic attempt at a door (in dubious colour choices of grey and pink) Chris triumphed again. I lost track of where Jacquie, Paul J and I finished.

Apart from that intense Block Party workout it was a fairly lazy morning. Paul H returned at 11am and while Chris prepped the chilli for later, he talked Paul J and I through the workings of Imhotep.

I think I played this about eight years ago, and I found it's piece-of-string machinations just as opaque this time, as players choose whether to add cubes to boats, or sail a full-enough boat to one of several possible destinations. It's fun, but I am really awful at judging anything being a good decision, and my focus on building a massive Burial Chamber didn't match up to the canny shenanigans of the Pauls, with Paul J claiming a debut victory!

Paul J 49

Paul H 41

Sam 39

Then with Chris back at the table, we returned to Babylonia. 

This was a corker, as leads between the Pauls and Chris ebbed and flowed whilst I languished back on a measly five points, hoping to draw enough farmers to use my ziggurat power. They didn't arrive and I had to focus my efforts building a central network that Chris spotted was going to haul me in some juicy points when they started paying out. I agreed, but I didn't think I'd close the now huge gap between Paul J (at this point) on something like 110 while I was back in the 30's somewhere. But as it turned out, it was damn close!

Chris 138

Sam 136

Paul J 130

Paul H 107

A baptism of fire for Paul H, then, but the next game - after our classic Lunch of Beige - was one he knew intimately: Eclipse! 

This was Chris's second-edition version, with some minor rules modifications (and one less round) and some faction asymmetry, but largely the same narrative: early rounds are developing tech and kitting out ships, building towards a massive bunfight at the end. Except here the bunfight never really materialised: Paul H and I established an alliance, and Chris and Paul J did the same.  Chris considered attacking Paul H, but decided against it because it looked like a death wish.

My dreams of peaceful expansion were undone by poor planning and ill fortune and I spent a few rounds only doing two actions and then passing early. The others expanded more successfully and built monstrously-violent death machines of the cosmos in a sort of cardboard cold war.

Then at the death Chris attacked the central hex and quickly reenforced his dominance there. He tried to take some hexes off me but didn't roll what he needed and we all eyed him warily. Oddly, his aggression went unrewarded in the sense of point-scoring, with Paul H's 'In Bed With the Ancients' faction grabbing victory:

Paul H 33

Paul J and Sam 32 each

Chris 30

Though it was certainly not a damp squib, I didn't enjoy Eclipse as much as I used to. It's a long haul to get to the more-exciting finale (caveat: my adjacency to that was more my fault than the games') and at times it feels a bit like a slightly protracted drum-roll. There's a lot to consider as well, and if it's a more elegant construction than Xia's everything-by-dice, it doesn't feel as stupidly fun. 

Speaking of dice, though, next up - after the very delicious chilli, and a quick sortie to the shops - was Las Vegas. It's not a game that supplies quite the epic narrative Eclipse does, but it was a nice pallet-cleanser:

Sam $510k

Paul J $470

Chris $380

Paul H $280

We knew Andrew was imminent, but just had enough time for another four-hander in the little-seen (by me at least) Timeline! I couldn't help but notice a seam of dark comedy in the images, with a number of characters looking vaguely psychotic.

Paul H won this. I discovered the refrigerator was invented much earlier than I'd anticipated, but now with crushing inevitability the exact year escapes me.

Paul H wins

Sam and Paul J 1 card

Chris 2 cards 

Andrew arrived just as we finished and after the briefest of catch-ups the discussion of what to play as a five began. Dominant Species? A bit long. Twilight Imperium? Very long. Istanbul? A bit short. We settled on Lords of Waterdeep. With no Martin or Ian present I elected to play green, so the colour/game combo made it feel a bit like 2010, as Prince used to sing.

Early on it was fairly even - I shot off on the scoretrack to 32 but had a bunch of skulls that made my actual score a current 14. Paul H pulled ahead and played some dastardly intrigue that balanced out revealing his Lord with the fact we couldn't target him all game. That was a bummer. Meanwhile I pulled ahead again, and Chris targeted me with one of those bastard mandatory quests that I'm definitely not still sore about. Andrew mostly chuckled at the names of the quests.

Incredible scenes at the end as Paul H pulled so far ahead it was almost embarrassing. My late game recovery wasn't enough to catch a resurgent Chris, and a briefly-dominant Paul J found Andrew had enough to sneak past him in the final count.

Paul H 166

Chris 148

Sam 144

Andrew 134

Paul J 131

After twelve hours of gaming I suddenly got hit by an ocular migraine, and had to play my final game (Incan Gold) with my eyes largely closed and Chris communicating events to me ("Zombie Lady!"). Paul J and Chris lacked our frugal conservatism and, falling behind, risked life and limb - and ultimately lost life and limbs - in wild attempts to recover.

In the end, however, it was Paul H who took yet another win!

PH 34

Andrew 32

Sam 26

Chris 20

PJ 0

And at this point, with my vision no better, I had to take myself to a dark room. It was a bit of a underwhelming way to end Chippencon and I was gutted to miss Chris and Andrew take on the Pauls in Decrypto! The Pauls won, though what the words and dramas were maybe we'll learn in the comments.

Thanks to Chris Jacquie and kids for putting up with us all, and everyone attending for making it fun.  

Beta Testing

Thursday: after early-evening Timeline and The Mind (we crashed and burned on level 8) with the boys, Adam and Ian and I (Sam) regarded the alcove of joy deciding what to play. Adam suggested Caverna, which made Ian and I both nervous. Even his pointing to the box playtime (half an hour per player) didn't entirely convince us that this was 8.30 start-time fare. Plus of course we'd be fighting for second place from the get-go: far better to make Adam play a new game in the hope he wouldn't instantly master it and comprehensively beat us.

You can probably guess where this is going...

We settled on Beta Colony, the curiously-produced (looks very 1980s) puzzle in space. Round and round the central rondel we circled, choosing which pods to build where and when, as we collectively constructed the game's three colonies. We discovered that blue pods were water and pink pods were habitations. Adam asked why they had an apple on them. I said that's what they eat in space.

The game does offer a classic push/pull between points now or points later. Points now was the route Ian took, as he forewent the majority scoring in the colonies and focused on objectives at the end of the three cycles. He even (more than once!) sacrificed artefacts in order to use them as resources: this is like burning down the Acropolis to keep the chill off.

I started out trying to go big on colony majorities but kept getting distracted. Partly by Adam's ruthless efficiency, as he steered a clinical line between my route and Ian's: scoring enough points to keep him on Ian's tail, whilst also building a presence in one colony (the one I'd neglected) that bordered on over-population.

We all stood at various times: it was one of those games. Ian even put his foot on the chair like he was on the verge of dashing off on some great adventure.

I thought I had a devastating (or effective, at least) last couple of rounds planned out, when I'd get the statue that rewarded resources and then do some decent harbouring of said resources - but I hadn't realised we were actually on the final round already; and even a do-over suggested by Ian and Adam couldn't save my score. This is why they don't give astronauts Merlot:

Adam 86
Ian 71
Sam 64

The victor cycled off into the night whilst Ian and I nursed our wounds over a quick game of Railroad Ink. Turns out drunkenness isn't a route-planner thing either, as we both scored pretty low. I pipped Ian by the narrowest of margins!

Sam 41
Ian 40

A very nice night of puzzles. Thanks chaps!

The Discovery of Fingers

... by Europeans

Today Sam hosted a number of gamers (Joe, me, Katy, Ian and, making his leaderboard debut of the season, Chris) this week and, as you may have guessed the first game we played was Timeline (The Discovery of Fingers was Joe’s alternative title for the card that illustrated The Invention of Sign Language.)

This was the choice of Sam’s son, Little Joe, as a quick game for him before he went to bed. Despite his young years, he managed to win the game with only sneaking a peek (apparently) at a couple of the dates. He probably thought he had to after the first round when his father gave him the wrong advice about where to put a card.

Little Joe 0
Andrew 1
Katy 1
Ian 2
Joe 2
Sam 2

With Joe off to bed and Sam’s other son back from Ju Jitsu, so Sam went and did the dad thing and put them both to bed. The rest of us (now with late arrival Chris) played For Sale. Chris was given a quick precis of the rules and we were away. Among the usual banter (“You know where you are with a one”) were some new comments (“You’ve no idea where you are with a fifteen”) and, just like last week, Joe dealt out the wrong number of cards in the first auction round and no one noticed until half way through.

In the final reckoning, Katy came top.

Katy 58
Chris 54
Ian 51
Andrew 44
Joe 43

Then, with Sam back, we split into two groups of three. Joe, Chris and I went for the point-salady Euro-goodness of Gold West, while Katy, Ian and Sam went for Martin Wallace’s least Wallace-like game, Hit Z Road.

The hum of simultaneous rules explanations filled the air. When Joe explained how you get points for chaining your camps in a group, I wanted to say “It’s a bit Kingdom Builder-y,” but instead it came out “It’s a bit Killdem Bingery” and Chris looked at me as if I’d lost my mind.

The game itself was fine. A bit odd on first play and not very intuitive, with the mancala-like method of activating your pieces on your go, and also there's a wide variety of options available to confuse a newbie. Joe sped off into a massive early lead, leaving Chris and I feeling like we’d just been suckered into a game chosen by Joe just so he could win. He kept insisting that’d it would all be much closer in the final count but Chris and I were sceptical. And, it turned out, we were wrong to be. To be exact, Chris was wrong to be sceptical. I was bang on the money.

The worst episode of Wacky Races ever

Chris 98 plus most camps
Joe 98
Andrew 79

On the other half of the table, with it’s nightmarish vision of America gone crazy (insert political joke here) Sam, Katy and Ian seemed to be having a whale of a time. I noticed that Katy was a hoarder, keeping a healthy stash of resources in front of her. Sam, meanwhile, looked far less prepared and before long, he was a lone survivor, making his way through the landscape twitching at every shadow.

He almost made it, too. In one round he was attacked by twelve zombies, and had killed off eleven when the last one got past his valiant defence and killed him. The cry of anguish at that last roll was genuine and heart breaking. It could’ve been one of those stories you tell your grandkids. Instead, it got him last place as Ian and Katy both survived.

Ian 20
Katy 16
Sam 0

We actually ended at about the same time, so we ended the evening with two six-player games. Verflixxt/That’s Life was first, with some questions about whether Katy’s copy had any bits missing since there seemed to be only six clover tiles and we thought maybe there should be eight. Still, it was the same for everyone.

We were still baffled by the illustrations and we came up with the theory that maybe they illustrated German proverbs, for example “It’s like when you get a package in the post and it’s a live dog.” As for the game, Chris did splendidly picking up more than his fair share of clover tiles.

Chris 25
Sam 15
Katy 6
Ian 0
Joe –2
Andrew –11

Next up was Fuji Flush and what a game it was. For a start, we began by all playing a “2” and pushing through together, which would never be allowed to happen if Martin was here. As we chuckled happily in our moment of solidarity, I wondered out loud why we even bothered dealing out six cards.

Dick points were spread out pretty evenly, and soon four of us were on one card. Katy managed to push through her 19 just before Sam’s 20, giving her the win.

Or did it? That night, in a fitful sleep beset by doubts, Katy realised that Sam’s 20 should’ve wiped out her 19 (or 5, see comments) but she’d forgotten to discard. No one else noticed. But her guilt was too overwhelming, so she emailed us the next morning to explain her mistake and give the win to Sam. What a nice gesture and I hope Katy didn’t feel too bad about her honest mistake. After all, as they say in Germany, Es ist wie wenn du ein Paket in der Post bekommst und es ist ein Live-Hund.

Sam 0
Katy 1
Ian 1
Andrew 1
Joe 2
Chris 3

Thanks for hosting, Sam. And thanks to me, Katy and Joe for bringing snacks which were pretty much hoovered up the moment they hit the table.

It’s the penultimate week of the season, so no shenanigans for the Division. Just cold, hard numbers. Ian hangs onto the lead, with Katy and Joe within striking distance and Martin still with an outside chance. Adam's hold on Points Ratio is a bit slim, too.