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.