Seven wonders x 2

After last week’s cold snap played havoc with the fixture list, it was back to the usual Tuesday evening shenanigans for five regulars: Sam, Adam, Andrew, Joe and Quentin. Quentin asked for a couple of quick games as he hoped to push himself up the leaderboard before it ends for the year. As such, Seven Wonders was chosen as a swift gaming fix.

In game one, with Quentin new to the game, everyone chose side A of their wonder – the easy side. And while Adam, Quentin and Joe all had occasion to ask to redo their go, it was level-headed Sam and Andrew who streaked ahead. But despite Quentin being new to the game, he soon worked out where the easy points were and forced his way into third, ahead of the leaderboard high-fliers, Joe and Adam. Adam overloaded on military might having realised his wonder could never be built due to lack of resources, and Sam again proved that diversification, not specialisation, wins you the game as he fought off Andrew’s and Quentin’s impressive advances in the field of science with a canny mix of war, temples and guilds. Final score:

Sam 57
Andrew 53
Quentin 50
Adam 49
Joe 30

With everyone familiar with the rules once again, another game of Seven Wonders was recommended. This time everyone chose the B side of their wonder (less victory points, but more skills), except Andrew who thought the B side of the Temple at Ephesus looked a bit rubbish. Perhaps this cost him dear, as he played a listless game which lacked the focus of his earlier second place.

Meanwhile, Adam stopped building armies and tried his hand at religious blue buildings and Quentin invested heavily in guilds. However, again it was Sam who showed the way. His military might was enough to pick points off the hippy-ish non-confrontational Andrew and Joe, but his winning move was by completing his wonder so he could copy a guild from a neighbour, which nabbed him an extra six points for no outlay. Final score:

Sam 58
Adam 54
Joe 50
Quentin 42
Andrew 38

Seven Wonders is a great game for a quick battle, but if everyone knows the rules, there's very little interaction. You play your cards, pay the cost and move on to the next round which leaves it strangely unsatisfying, socially.

The Leaderboard

So now the leaderboard now looks very different as Sam picks up ten points and charges to the top. It also means he takes the highest points ratio from Steve, with 2.86 points per game. And he won five quid at Perudo as well! Is there no stopping this man?

	Played	Points
Sam	14	40
Adam	19	40
Joe	18	36
Andrew	22	27
Steve	6	16
Jonny	7	10
Quentin	4	7
Will	2	4
Hannah	1	1
Jon	1	1

Discussions are ongoing regarding the scoring system for the 2011 season. Rumours that Sepp Blatter wants a convoluted system of secret votes to decide each weeks' winner have been refuted by the Games Night regulars.