The Balance Of Trade

I arrived at Joe’s at the tail end of a game of Zero Down. It’s been a while since I’d seen it. So long, in fact, that I didn’t recognise it. I recognised everyone sitting around the table, though. Sam, Martin, Ian, Adam T, and Joe.

Martin 7

Ian 9

Joe 19

Adam 34

Sam 45

After this, Martin and Adam were keen on Impulse and I happily joined in, which Martin was relieved about since Impulse is not an easy game to teach. Adam sped off into an early lead, trading cards for big points. But it was too big a lead and he made himself a target. I happened to have a cruiser in striking distance and so, goaded by Martin and with Adam within easy reach of a win, I set off to vanquish him. I’m not a big fan of player elimination, but I didn’t have a huge amount of choice.

We went into battle and our initial card from our hand totalled up to the same amount. It was all o
n the draw of a card each from the deck. Adam drew a 1, I drew a 2. I won, and Adam rued his decision to hold back a card that would’ve tipped the war in his favour.

But then Martin went from 9 to 18 points in a single move, just two away from victory. I needed ten points, and I was certain of six. I had to rely on lucky draws from the deck for a tradeable card for those extra few points but, unlike Joe, I am not known for my lucky draws and I came up short.

Martin 20

Andrew 16

Adam out

Sheepy Time was coming to an end so we quickly sped through a game of Whale Riders: The Card Game.

Andrew 61

Martin 61

Adam 59

As for Sheepy Time, Ian won. Not bad for someone who, early on, noted that he was twenty points behind everyone else. A check of the rules told us that, officially, there are no second or third places.

Ian won

Sam and Joe lost

Now Adam made sort of going home noises, but was tempted to stay on for a game of So Clover. Adam impressed by writing “Dragula”, leading us to match “Camp” and “Myth”. Joe lowered the tone when he matched Shower with Golden. We were going okay until we slipped up on Ian’s clover, thinking Spartacus clued the word “alliance,” but it was just meant to be “old”

Score 34 out of 36

With Adam still making moves to go home, we tempted him with a rousing finale of Stinker. We all gave ourselves a rule-stretching 23 letter tiles and got cracking. Sam began with six ‘A’s in his pile of letters. Highlights were:

Real reason for world war two – Goebbels stole a razor (Martin)

Substitute for under pants - toasted gonads (Adam)

First thing to do on Jupiter – Radiate Smugnity (ian)

Title of a new Bond Film – Time to Strangle (Joe)

How to avoid the draft into the army – Run, dig a hole, scream (Sam)

My answer to "The road to Hell is paved with..."

By the end, our misspelling was very creative with Sam using a B on its back as an M and I had an A pointing right as a D.

Ian and Martin won with three cards each.

Adam and I left at this point while the other played High Score (but surely every game could be called High Score) using a collapsible dice arena.

Martin 13

Joe 12

Sam 11

Ian 6

And finally they played Cross Clues and got 19 out of 25.

Thanks all. See you next week.

Into it. Clover it.

I arrived at Sam’s and Katy answered the door, having only just arrived herself. In the kitchen, Sam, Martin and Ian were playing Whale Riders which is currently my most-watched, not-played game of the year. Still don’t know what’s going on but Sam went from “I’m feeling confident” to “I might be third” in the space of one round.

Ian 24

Sam 23

Martin 21

Then Laura arrived and, after the table was dragged from the wall to make more room, the six of us played So Clover – Laura’s introduction to the game. It was a mixed bag: Martin and Sam gave clues that netted six points, Katy and Laura got four points each with their clovers while Ian and I, last to finish writing our clues, only got three points each. My clue of “Casino” for “Luck” and “Patio” wasn’t a huge success.

26 out of 36

Next we split into two groups of three. Martin, Katy and Laura played Biblios while Sam, Ian and I once again crashed on an inhospitable alien planet in Cryo. Katy remarked that, after she’d played it, the game had given her nightmares, or at least some sort of fever dream in which she was playing it. A tleast, I think that’s what she meant: the mime she did to describe it involved plucking things out of the air. Also, she thinks she may have cheated the last time she played, but I don’t think anyone was that bothered except her.

Laura was given a rules explanation and she seemed to get the gist pretty quickly, judging by Katy’s wail of “Are you yanking my chain?” midway through the game. Also, everyone seemed keen on the brown die as it soon rose to six in value with everyone putting it up. I think Katy got it in the end, but it must’ve gone down by the end.

Martin 11

Katy 4

Laura 2

We were still halfway through Cryo, with Ian schooling us on how to max out a super power, rescuing an extra man each time while also spending less. I kept running out of resources and scrapped three ships to get me out of a tight spot. As we still had a way to go, Martin, Katy and Laura played Biblios again.

This time was much closer with it all being decided on the final red dice, which people had been ignoring or discarding for the whole game. In the end, Laura picked it up for 3 reds.

Laura 5

Katy 4

Martin 4

Finally, we finish Cryo when Ian cuts his turn short by returning the only drone he’d used, thus triggering the end of the game with Sam and I still with unfinished plans in progress.

Ian 36

Andrew 28

Sam 28

We’d finished at the same time as the second Biblios so, after Laura left, we played Ten. This is basically a simple push-your-luck game with a few slightly confusing rules regarding money and the circulation thereof. Halfway through, Martin was still unsure we were doing it right while Katy said she liked how it worked. Honestly, will those two ever agree?

Sam 20

Ian 16

Martin 16

Katy 16

Andrew 13

Then I left, but the night was far from over. According to the late night text from Sam they played Spicy.

Sam 21

Ian and Katy 18

Martin 1

Then Ian must have left, unless he was just happy to watch them play Whale Riders the card game.

Sam 78

Martin 70

Katy 48

And then again…

Katy 50

Martin 49

Sam 40

Finally with a win under her belt, Katy left and then Martin ended the evening by beating Sam 21-12 in Letter Press.

Thanks all. Do it again soon please.

Shangri-la-la-land

Despite Joe's place being closest to my house of all GNN venues, I still arrived at a shoddily late time of ten past eight. Six gamers were already settled around a table; Joe, Sam, Katy, Martin, Ian and Mel. They were playing Kartenmeck (sp?) Heckmeck, which is like Heckmeck, except you’re playing cards from your hand and not rolling dice. Get the highest possible total to win the best possible tile from the available selection. And, like Heckmeck, you can steal tiles from opponents if you match the value exactly. This  happened occasionally, usually with apologies that they had no choice.

Mel ended with two of the three zero tiles, which is clearly unfortunate. Almost as unfortunate as Sam who was sitting nearest Sybil the dog when she decided to do a few bottom pops.

Katy 30

Sam 27

Martin 26

Ian 22

Joe 18

Mel 12

 

Next we split into two groups. After its successful appearance on Saturday, Cryo was brought back to the table. Katy and Joe joined old hands Sam and Ian for a game of resource management and survival. A constant theme of the game was the use of the term “to pull off” meaning to rescue people. “I’m going to pull off this guy here,” someone would announce to a reaction of stifled giggles. Sam tried to come up with other phrases, finally settling on “rescue” as a sensible, family-friendly option but not before Joe expressed his delight at finding a move that allowed him to pull off three guys at once.

The game went on so long and I went so early that I don’t actually know the scores.

Martin, Mel and I played Bridges of Shangri-La. Far more cerebral and less smutty, this game involves students crossing bridges to spread their learning from village to village and then blowing up the bridges they just crossed. Mel focused on the side of the board nearest her while I kept getting my symbols mixed up, confusing Yeti-whispers with Priests. What a faux pas.

Mel 25

Martin 21

Andrew 21

After this we played Whale Riders, the card game. A wafer-thin game with confusingly similar illustrations on the cards. It had a Fuji Flush-like mechanic in that once enough of a certain type of card was showing, they scored: being turned face down in front of you, while everything else on the table was discarded. We played twice, once with the base game, and then the advanced version with extra rules. It was okay.

Basic: 

Martin 74

Mel 44

Andrew 37

Advanced:

Mel 76

Martin 59

Andrew 35

And with that, Mel and I left while the rest played on. Possibly my shortest attendance at a games night. Getting old, you see. Thanks all. See  you next week.

Smug Too Soon

Another Tuesday, and yet rather than gathered around screens, six of the GNN brethren came together at my (Sam's) house for the still-slightly-surreal act of gaming face to face, around a shared table, touching wooden pieces, testing our wits and numeracy and - in this case - fondling Adam Hillmann's nuts. Thanks Adam. 

Also present was Adam T, Katy, myself and a slightly bewildered-looking Martin, appearing as though stumbling in from the mountains halfway through a Beckett play. It was kind of strange, but not so strange that we couldn't squeeze in a quick (new) game before Joe rocked up - as he rocked up, in fact, but he charitably let us continue - which was Whale Riders: The card game. 

This was a slightly Fuji Flush-esque undertaking of collecting cards in sets, and whenever a set was claimed (four 4's, six 6's and so on) by the collective owners, any other active sets imploded. There were a couple of other wrinkles, but it was very simple, and only took ten minutes to bash through:

Martin 42

Katy 35

Sam 31

Adam T 25

Adam H 16

Then with Joe present and happily amenable, we moved directly to another new game: Scape Goat, in which everyone is told (by the game) who the scape goat is, but it's lying to someone and nobody knows who. The air is thick with paranoia and the sound of pistachio shells cracking already, then Joe began talking about Steve Coogan's balls, which feature in a film he'd recently watched. We spent a good few minutes integrated the relevant testicles into the ongoing game, then I walked outside and realised the neighbour's doors were wide open. When I came back inside I decided I should warn everyone about the possible audience before the current goat impersonations really took hold. 

Scape Goat is simple on the rules, but trickier on working out what you should actually do. Definitely working out the scape goat isn't you is a good idea, but I failed miserably in game one, panicking and running to the cops when I suspected I was about to be framed. 

As it turned out, I wasn't:

Adam T (the scapegoat) wins!

Then we played again and Adam H worked out he was the scape goat before we could frame him. He - correctly - ran to the cops as well, and saved himself. 

Adam H (the scape goat) wins!

We then played Whale Riders: Not the card game, which comes with a board and little wooden whales.

 

It bore very little relation to the card game, with the only cards being contracts to fulfill as we - riding whales, naturally - swim around grabbing what we could to do so, in most Knizian fashion; all decisions tantalising and options designed to recede from sight like the tide going out before a tsunami. 

The big wave in this case was Adam H, who halfway through the game completed fifteen thousand contracts and scored a million pearls. That's what it felt like anyway, although it was much closer than we realised. 

Adam 18

Joe / Adam T 16 each

Sam 15

Martin 13

Katy 10

We split into two groups, with Joe, Katy and Martin playing new game #4 Renature, and myself and the Adams breaking out new game #5, Luzon Rails. I didn't pick up much of what was happening in Renature apart from some talk about neutral bushes and Katy's early-game confidence giving way to late-game doubt.

I was experiencing a similar narrative arc in Luzon Rails, in part because with both Adams assuring me I was winning, I let my iron grip on the isle of Luzon loosen like a railroad builder who got lucky with a first swing of the hammer and then spent the rest of the day admiring a single sleeper. 

As we build track we also control companies by owning shares in them. At the end of each round every company pays dividends so you're all trying to push their dividend value up by building track to prosperous places on the board. But companies can only build track with monies paid from auctioning shares, and there is the considerable rub, because you win the game by having the most personal cash. I shoulda bid for that last yellow share...

Adam H 109

Adam T 103

Sam 99

With Renature still puzzling the other end of the table, Adam T took his leave and vanished into the night. I tempted Adam H to stay by flinging all the luscious pieces of Project L (not a new game; we played it last week) onto the table. 

It's very easy to pick up and play, but you still want to win, right? And I thought I'd triumphed, but I may have been just a bit innumerate by this point.

Adam 22

Sam 17

As we packed that away, Katy reminded me that we should never invite Adam for this very reason. Renature concluded with Katy saying "I might have been smug too soon".

 Going by the scores, she was right.

Martin 78

Katy 72

Joe 50-something

The jury seemed to be out - but enjoying the debate, with all of them surprised how thinky it was for an alleged 'family' game, but perhaps impressed all the same. "It was long" Katy pointed out. Martin said he wouldn't even attempt it with four. Joe looked slightly rueful, whether at his performance or the purchase itself, he'll have to explain. I tried to get them to stay longer, but with 11 o'clock now past, it was time to wrap up another delightful evening. Lovely to be back!