Five go mad in Stockport

Friday
Imagine unfolding a board game, and it doesn't stop. It covers the whole table, then the floor, then finally a whole conference hall of a medium sized hotel! This would not be dissimilar to Stabcon. Games which usually sit in a cupboard only to be allowed occasional visits to the kitchen table are suddenly given free reign to run around and do what they like. Now the players are not sat at the edge but are suddenly surrounded.

This environment seemed to affect some of the attendees. At Stabcon they were no longer geeks on the margins of society but were now in their element – they had status, walking around with all the confidence of a meeple who knows exactly what his next move will be. Some of them also dressed with confidence, albeit misplaced, with a wide selection of figure-hugging t-shirts, low-slung jeans and hats that were a couple of sizes too small for the wearer's head.

It was Steve's first Stabcon and as we pulled into the hotel car park, his first impressions can't have been good as the first identifiable gamer we saw was a guy with long greying hair and beard. Meanwhile, after only thirty seconds in the Stabcon hall, I heard someone cry out "Panic not!" and I wondered if it was going to be even geekier than last year. We signed in at the hotel, registered at Stabcon and grabbed a table.

Our first game was Wallenstein, a strategy game which involves moving coloured cubes around a map and in times of warfare, pouring the conflicting armies of small coloured cubes into a tower, hoping that yours will come out of the bottom while your enemy's cubes get stuck. It's a nice mechanic, and kind of random but not bad random, like dice. Plus, if you lost one battle, you could console yourself that your stuck cubes may be dislodged by your next battle, giving you an advantage.

We played quite happily, with a little help from a passing gamer who watched for a while and pointed out whenever we got a rule wrong. Joe also tried to count the number of women present since his wife was curious as to how many women turned up to these things. But on his first attempt, someone asked him what he was counting and he was too embarrassed to finish, and then on his second go he gave up saying "It's too difficult to tell!"

After Wallenstein (all results on the image at the end of the day's report), Joe suggested High Society. Reiner Knizia's cunning twist on bidding games. In this each player bids for cards numbered 1-10 or for a card that'll double your score. They also bid to not pick up bad cards such as –5, lose a card, or halve your score. The twist is that the person who has the least money remaining automatically loses, so there's no point in throwing your cash around like Mr Moneybags. It got a good response from me, but Steve admitted to not being sure what was going on. This was to become a recurring theme of the weekend.

We went to a nearby carvery for our dinner, just as we had done last year. They didn't remember us, though. Steve had the vegetarian option – a Wensleydale Bake which turned out to be mostly onions under it's thick layer of cheese.

rapt attendees

When we got back, we split up for a bit. Joe and Sam played another new game: Mr Jack. A cleverly devised game where one player has to guess which of the eight characters is Jack The Ripper, while the other player has to help Jack escape or evade detection. At the end of every round the detecting player asks if Jack is in the light or in the dark (ie, if he is next to a street light or next to another character then he is in the light) and thus the culprit is slowly revealed. There are eight rounds for Jack to escape/be caught. This is a very nice game and for once a proper detective board game. Although it's only for two players.

They then played Inka, which Joe wasn't too keen on, since there were simply too many variables to keep track of. Sam won this tile-sliding/rotating game too.

Meanwhile, me, Steve and Adam played Ascending Empires for some flicking fun. This Subbuteo in space got a few comments from people passing by who were interested in the game (and perhaps curious as to why Steve and Adam had large piles of victory points in front of them, whereas I seemed to have none). I was behind almost from the first flick, as Adam and Steve built up on techs. Eventually, I picked up three victory points after an exciting space battle with Steve. A battle which, according to Steve, cost him the game. Oopsie.

Then Area 51 regular Big Mike arrived asking if he could join a game. Joe and Sam were in the shop, and Adam, Steve and I were unsure what their plans were, but we agreed to a quick game of Tsuro. Easy to explain and fun to play and quick to finish – it was the perfect option. After we finished Big Mike seemed amazed that I was writing down the scores for future reference. "Live for the moment!" he exclaimed, which in any context other than a board games convention may have been life-affirming and exciting. As it was, he said it just before suggesting a game of Notre Dame.

After that there was a quick reshuffling of competitors. We chose Tinners' Trail but Big Mike was put off by the idea of a Martin Wallace game, so he went to teach Joe and Steve Priests of Ra.

Meanwhile, Sam, Adam and myself were joined by Simon (another Area 51 gamer) for his first ever tin-mining based game. He picked up the rules fairly quickly, and he kept up a commentary on his thought processes, perhaps hoping for us to jump in and offer a better option. Which we did... sometimes. Our game ended just before Joe and Steve's Priests of Ra, which they did not seem keen on. In fact, they walked out of the hall with all the relief of a half-drowned man crawling onto a river bank.

By now it was nearing one o'clock in the morning and so we ended our first day.

Saturday

Saturday is the day when most people attend Stabcon, and by the afternoon, every table was taken. At one point we left our table clear at lunch and lost it to another band of gamers. This relegated us to the wobbly table at the side. Nearest the bar, though, so not all bad.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. In the morning, after breakfast, we chose another new game, the eternally mispronounced La Cittá. I never really pressed people on the proper way to say it (Chi-TA, rhymes with pitta) and I'm glad I didn't because I doubt I'll ever hear it mentioned again. This game did not go down well, although we knew we weren't playing it in optimal circumstances: Five players, none of who had played it before.

This meant there was a lot of thinking in silence, and Adam quietly played Angry Birds on his phone between his goes. After a little under three hours, we decided to stop the game after the fourth round. Obviously the slow pace and unfamiliar rules can't have helped. I felt I had a fairly good grasp of it before too long, and perhaps as a three-player it'd be more interesting. Sam didn't seem keen on hanging onto it, so perhaps we'll never know. His quote, as we put it away, was a plaintive "Oh God, it's hideous!"

La Chitta (translation: 'the shitter')

After our lunch of sandwiches, Joe played Last Will with some other gamers, Sam and I played Mr Jack while Adam and Steve decided to tackle Twilight Struggle. I thoroughly enjoyed Mr Jack and I think it may be my favourite game of the weekend – short and simple, but very cunning. I lost both times, though.

Considering that Steve had already struggled with the rules of several games so far, I thought his choice to try and recreate the entire latter half of the twentieth century was a bold one. Especially against arch-tactician Adam. At one point I heard him ask Steve "Are you sure you don't want to invade Pakistan?" and I felt very grateful that he never joined the army or went into politics.

Despite Adam's warmongering, the game played out almost in real time and was abandoned after three hours, with no sign of Glasnost happening any time soon.

Meanwhile Sam and I chose a game of Alhambra. Perhaps he wanted to avenge his recent collapse in form. Dirk, once again, joined us and, once again, made the early running. But this time, Sam played a solid game, running out a clear winner.

Joe came back from his game of Last Will, declaring his affection for the game and the silliness of its theme. We played Ticket to Ride Switzerland – a map especially for three players. I really enjoyed this. It puts more emphasis on picking up more routes (which I did three times) which gives it an aspect of gambling, and the wild cards are only useful for tunnels. Of which there are a lot. Despite being the same game, TtR Switzerland has quite a different feel to the regular version. Meanwhile, Adam had got caught up in a short game with some other people, which he won.

Frequently during the weekend, between games, I'd wander around to see what other games where being played. I'd pause at each table to take in a little of the atmosphere and see if it looked interesting. At one table, I saw people sitting around a table without a board between them, and I wondered what game they were playing. It took me all of five seconds to work out that they were just chatting.

The five of us reconvened for a game of Joe's new game Mammut. Sam sat it out, happy to just watch. This game is a cleverly devised game of acceptable greed. Each game begins with a collection of Stone Age goodies (food, fire, animals, furs) from which each player may take as much as they like. But if they take too much, the next player is allowed to take their stash, returning one item to the centre. So each player needs to judge what is advantageous, but still doesn't look so great that someone else will take it. Added to this part of the game is a scoring system that confused Steve a bit, but we played on quite happily.

After our second visit to the carvery for dinner, we set up a game of Navegador on our wobbly table. Area 51 stalwart, Cuz walked past and said "I love this game. It's totally busted", meaning there's a sure-fire way to win the game. Since it was new to all five of us, it was slow going at first and Cuz's words hung heavily over the table. But as we got the hang of it, we started to enjoy it. I was black, and I was keen to recreate the historical arrival of the Black Ships from Portugal and their arrival in Nagasaki. But Steve beat me to it, and he was blue. Whoever heard of the Blue Ships from Portugal?!

By now, it was getting late. We played two games of High Society and then Sam and I called it a day at around half past eleven. But Joe, Steve and Adam weren't so easily satisfied. They hung on for one more game of Mammut.

Sunday

attendees playing Roads and Boats — a sunday Stabcon stalwart 

Me, Adam and Joe were the early risers and, after breakfast, we got ourselves a decent table. Steve arrived before long, and we discussed what to play while waiting for Sam. In the end we decided on Reiner Knizia's Decathlon because it's easy to learn and you can just stop when you want.

This game – a ten-event collection of dice games loosely themed on the events of a decathalon – was certainly easy to learn. Adam didn't like the lack of strategy, but it was certainly popular with other gamers. It was the only time in the whole weekend that we had spectators watching, Up to five people at one point.

Adam considered joining in with a game of Eclipse that was just setting up, and asked if any of us were interested. Eclipse was the top game of the convention, with as many as six games going on at the same time. It looked like an over-complicated monstrosity to me and the wide variety of plastic bits on the table didn't inspire confidence. Steve said he may try it next year if people are still playing it after all the hype had died down.

the ubiquitous Eclipse

Sam arrived, and we gave Navegador another try. As we played, I felt my gaming legs giving way. I was disadvantaged early and seemed unable to do anything about it. Two new tactics came into play, as Sam kept his boats near colonies allowing him to quickly claim them if anyone came close, while Adam sat on the advantageous Navegador card until it really helped him a lot.

Steve had trouble telling the difference between selling and processing goods, and I always wanted to do the action that I had just gone past. At the end, I thought Adam was the clear winner, but that turned out to be wrong! Sam won, with Joe in second. Then, as we were packing away, Joe realised he'd put a vital multiplier token on the wrong part of his playing board, costing him four points and first place!

Finally, we started to pack away and take things to the car, but there was time for two last games of Tsuro with a passing gamer from Sheffield. This was her first Stabcon but not her first gaming meeting, and we learnt that it wasn't very well publicised compared to the other board game conventions. After hearing this we wondered if we'd somehow stumbled upon a hardcore clique of gamers. And, if so, is it bad that we felt quite at home?

Sam and Joe finally got to chat with board game designer Martin Wallace, which must've been nice for them. As we drove away from Stockport, Joe surprised me by asking us if we thought Stabcon could last another day? I don't know about Stabcon, but I don't think I could have.

The final leaderboard puts Adam at the top of the pile for this year's visit to Stabcon! Congratulations.

	Gold	Silver	Bronze
Adam	8	7	2
Sam	8	3	4
Andrew	3	8	3
Joe	2	4	7
Steve	1	4	4