Stumble Brothers

This Sunday I had a rare chance to meet up with Sam for some weekend gaming. I got there a little late and Sam had already lay out a game ready to begin. It was Clank in Space, which is basically the game Clank, except set in space instead of a castle. Hence the name. Otherwise it’s much the same: a hand-builder where you have to move around a spaceship stealing things while a monster tries to stop you.

I preferred it to the original, at least what I recall. Clank in Space requires a little mini-quest (hacking the ship’s computer) to be achieved before the second half of the ship is available, which means there’s no tactic of get-in-grab-it-get-out any more. Plus there seemed to be more ways of healing. I say this in hindsight, since I didn’t avail myself of enough of these options until it was too late while Sam skipped to the end with health to spare.

Sam out and alive

Andrew dead and buried

After this we tried A Little Wordy. Sam described it on the blog recently, and I can say I enjoyed it. Each round is only ten minutes but there seem to be plenty of options for variation, with a stack of rule cards randomly dealt out. Oh, and the entire English language (no proper nouns) to choose from. My strategy, if you can call it that, was to go for words with common letters (ie, LIFTED) and hope that Sam would overthink it. Guessing Sam’s word of BOUT after three clues (four letters or less, two vowels, ends in T) meant I won the decider.

Andrew 2

Sam 1

Then we played Wavelength. It was my first time playing a two-player, and I clarified that I was supposed to externalise my thoughts rather than sitting in silence, contemplating. We then played the worst game of Wavelength ever. We miscommunicated on topics such as Damien Hirst’s cultural relevance, the pointyness of The Gerkhin and how much a crater on the moon resembled a person, among others. We did agree, marginally, on where cricket lay on the sport-game spectrum.

I think we got five points.

And with that, and having finished Sam’s beer and eaten his milk-free milk chocolate (complete with allergy warning that it might contain milk) I set off home, glad to have finally got some gaming done. Thanks Sam, and hope to see everyone soon.

Competition on the High Street

With several absentees due tonight, I (Sam) suggested an impromptu GNN last night (a Monday!) at my place, and Adam H and Katy joined me. As we were just a trio, and euro-sympathetic trio at that, we debated some lesser-seen titles (Rajas of the Ganges) before Katy alighted on IKI. I said it was a bit more complex than Rajas, and nobody batted an eyelid. We opened up the box and coos were heard at the various bits, so without further ado we set up and I did my best to cover the rules.

In IKI, players wander their Oyakata (big pieces) around the High Street, visiting the various shops. But they also populate those shops with their kobun (little pieces) who gain experience whenever someone other than their owner takes what they offer: food, wood, cash, and so on. They also get experience whenever the Oyakata completes a circuit of the street: when they can gain no more experience, they 'retire' and sit under your player board with their feet up. Your kobun can now be used as another character! 

What you're trying to do in IKI is a melange of euro-y things: build buildings, gather sets (fish/pipes/tobacco/character types) and occasionally get in each others' way as you jostle for position. Critical to everything are your firefighting skills: not only do they protect you from a fire that's predictable in its timing (but not it's direction) but they also establish turn order. 

Katy was bitten by the fire when two of her characters went up in flames. Then another starved. "They're all dying!" she cried. 
"I can't help feeling you're negligent" Adam remarked.

Whilst my characters inched me up the scoretrack, both of them were gathering the bits they needed to build the points-hauling buildings. Katy snuck ahead of Adam just as he was about to build. "Because I'm a bitch!" she trilled happily. As shopping trips go, it was an increasingly feisty affair. Although I built nothing at all, my swathe of point-scoring characters kept me competitive:

Sam 88 

Adam 88

Katy 74

I nabbed the win from Adam on a tiebreaker: my firefighting skills were better than his! 

We moved swiftly on to Biblios, combining some 'extreme' rules (swearing) with the basic (actual rules, including shuffling the auction pile! Sorry Andrew). I decided early on not to get involved in brown or blue and serially dumped cards, much to Katy's appalled disdain. Everyone seemed intent on devaluing the dice whenever they could. 

The ending was quite nuts, with all of us poised to win if we could only grab the red die - but nobody had a single card. In Extreme Biblios Adam would have won (brown die beats others) but we were playing mostly-correctly, and I was the one with gold in my hand!

Sam 4 (Mr Biblios)
Adam 4
Katy 3

Tectonic stuff. There was just time for some cheese pie and a blast at Cross Clues before we called it a night. Cross Clues was excellent as always, with some vague and frankly bad clues (many mine) somehow being correctly identified, and a last-minute-push dragged us to a half-decent score of 18. A delightful night: mildly-shit-stirring puzzling in IKI, Biblios as opaque as ever and Cross Clues just good solid word-associating silliness. Thanks both!

 

Sol Solutions

Saturday was Chris' birthday and to celebrate five of us converged on his house to let loose on a game of Twilight Imperium. My clever plan was to get there at 2pm for a refresher before we kicked off at 3pm. When I arrived at 2.15 I discovered my clever plan was actually a shit plan, though, as everyone was already present and raring to go. Thus, thanks to my cognitive confusion over simple timekeeping, I sat down to a game with high mental demands having last played it over 2 years ago. 

Late game TI4

What's more, Chris had since then added an expansion. As well as asymmetric factions with asymmetric ships and abilities, there were now several characters to either start with or unlock, and additional shenanigans on the board. Fighting down the urge to run back to the car, I took the most straightforward faction - Sol, with a dude who looked a bit like James Cordon - and set up in a corner of the galaxy nestled between Jon (black) and Aiden (pink). Opposite us were Paul (red) and Chris (yellow), with Stuart (orange) parked at the far end of the table. They all had faction names and strengths, and probably objectives as well, but at the start my main goal was not holding anyone up any more than I already had. Fortunately both Chris and Aiden coached me through the early turns, which followed a pattern for most of us of expanding out across the board, and in Jon's case, threatening anyone who came near his ships. 

My starting hex

TI has an intriguing political system, with players all choosing roles at the start of each round and - at some point - activating them for the primary ability. When this happens, everyone else can - potentially - activate the secondary ability, if they have a strategy token. But timing is critical, and you might want to delay your role by taking a tactical action instead - shuffling across the board, finding things, maybe starting a bit of aggro. Being able to take a place-holder type turn is helpful, and TI's multiple currencies of strategy tokens, tactical tokens and roles is further appended by both commodities and the numerous trading options: Chris got stuff off Jon simply for not firing at him. 

At the end of each round there's also a new law or directive that comes into play - or not. Players use influence they have in the galaxy (by controlling planets) to sway votes in the way they'd like them to go. Stuart had a leg up here as his faction often seemed to have a controlling voice in the room when motions were proposed: his ability was +6 influence on every vote. Chris' additions to the game even included a whiteboard they kept track of various things - turn order, points-scored etc - and any passed laws were added to this. 

But while Stuart was having his say in the corridors of power, out in the militarized zone of the board it was all about Jon and Aiden. Jon had powered and threatened his way to the centre of the galaxy (Mecatol Rex) to establish an early lead, but mid-game Aiden's patient fleet-building suddenly exploded its way across the board, riding over Jon in Mecatol Rex and trampling Chris' yellow fleet underfoot. Paul, Stu and I - the relative newbies, with a couple of plays each - all watched as Aiden spotted his potential competitors and put them to the sword. 

The calm before the storm

It had taken me a couple of hours to fully almost comprehend what was going on around me, but as we entered the endgame phase in the evening (after Chris' delicious chilli) things finally swam into focus. Curiously, as the parameters of the game began to make sense, I began making stupid mistakes. On the last round I activated my remove all tokens dude too early, and sent my flagship off in the wrong direction to score a public objective. I wouldn't have won, but sticking to the plan I'd made might have snuck me into joint second.

However the winner always looked like Jon or Aiden. And in the penultimate round, despite Aiden's huge presence across the board - and verbal brinkmanship! - Jon scored three points to catapult him to a point from the 12 he needed to win. 

Jon's ships, thanks to yellow and pink incursions from Chris and Aiden, were now blockaded in to a single hex, albeit there appeared to be about hundred of them there. If we were playing to 14 points it was clear the game would be Aiden's, but as we'd agreed on a dozen, there was the mystery of whether Jon had it about him to score the single point he needed, from a secret objective, perhaps, or getting the last trade good to 'buy' a point from the public objectives. Despite the misdirection, Jon had the trade good and wrapped up the win - aided by me, as I'd naively agreed to 'Support the Throne' (get a point each) with him in the preceding round...

Jon 12 / Aiden 11 / Chris-Sam 9 each / Paul 8 / Stuart 7

It hadn't felt like it, but eight hours had passed since we'd begun! So we wrapped up the evening with sillier fare in the form of Say Anything, a party game where the active player picks a question that doesn't have a categorical answer (eg What would I call my pet lion/ How do I remember the 90s/What's the best toy for an adult etc) and all the other players write potential answers. The active player then chooses one of these answers, but before revealing their choice, the other players all vote on which one they think was chosen (you can vote for yourself). 

not Paul's ideal dinner guest

The answers varied from mildly smutty to wildly inaccurate, with Aiden not choosing 'inflatable Jon' from Jon as his favourite toy. I did badly with Say Anything; I think Aiden won. It was fun - the type of game where scoring is almost irrelevant. But it was now about midnight and with galaxies won and party games partied, everyone headed off into the night.

Except Chris and I who played his birthday present from me, So Clover. It's better with more than two (officially it doesn't even play two!) but it was a nice way to put a second wrapping on the evening. Time for bed!

Real Life Trolling

We briefly threatened to be a six last night but as soon as Laura joined, Andrew dropped out, and a quintet it was. The sparsely-populated GNN evenings continue! Maybe Mel should host again, we had to turn people away that night. 

Anyway Joe was hosting and Ian, Laura and I were early enough to try a team crack at the officially-two-player A Little Wordy to kick us off. Each team draws vowel tiles (4) and consonant tiles (7) and from the available eleven letters, makes their own secret word: it can be any length, from one to eleven. Then the teams swap tiles, and try to work out what the other's word is. 

The deduction is done via cards that request X information from the other team. It might be the first or last letter, the amount of vowels, word length et cetera: but each card has a cost - when the other team gives information they are rewarded with a certain amount of berries, and when the words are finally guessed most berries wins. Asking if a particular tile is in the secret word is relatively economical: one berry. But asking the first letter is costly: 4 berries! Despite this Laura and Ian won the first game when they paid for the first letter and worked out our secret word was GIZMO (wrong guesses = two berries). Although Joe and I could have forced a tie (you keep playing, if necessary, until it's clear one team is berry winner, so despite us having more berries when they guessed right, we were forced to keep awarding them berries... ) we failed to do so.

Steve was yet to arrive, so we went again. This time Joe and I, after paying to establish the first letter was V, worked out the word was VERANDA and our secret word (AUNTIE) remained safely undetected as they made a vain, final tie-salvaging guess of UNTIED. One win each. Watching on for the final throes of the second game was Steve, looking somewhat windswept. With the classically tricky number of five to entertain, Joe suggested introducing Laura and Steve to Ethnos, and embarked on a wonderfully protracted and meandering teach - assisted/sabotaged by me - of a game that is very simple but manages to be extremely opaque in the learning. 

For the uninitiated, the isle of Ethnos (both curiously named and shaped, as it closely resembles Slovakia) is populated by various fantasy creatures, working in 'bands' that jostle for area control in the six regions. There's a slightly Ticket-to-Ride-y feel to proceedings as you either pick up cards or play them: cards of a matching race or colour form a 'band', allowing you to (probably) add a token to the board and also (probably) activate the power of the chosen 'leader'. The catch is when you play cards the rest of your hands go to the table, restocking the tableau for others to snatch up. Additionally, bands score at the end of each round - there are three - for their size, so you can compensate for underwhelming map presence by having 'big bands' and/or vice versa. 

Although the game explaining involved much laughter and Steve at one point sinking his head into his hands, one of the great things about Ethnos is the almost out-of-control speed it plays at, with turns coming around in literally seconds - unless it was Ian's turn, which was oft accompanied with Steve eventually saying "Sorry, is it me?" before Ian apologised and picked up a card. On the map, I got off to a good start and Laura was hampered by trolls not doing what she thought they did. This troll-related shenaniganery gave her a bad start she was to never fully recover from. Meanwhile, Joe's motley bands were bigger than everyone else's and he established an early lead.

We had one other way to score which was Orcs: when you played a band with an Orc leader, you could add a token to your Orc board, symbolising who knows what. These orc board tokens could be cashed in for points, something I took advantage of in round two when I kept picking up (and playing) orcs for not much kop on the map, but garnering me 20 points at the end of the round. Joe still led, however, and in round three he was first to lap the scoretrack, and proved ultimately uncatchable despite a late surge from Ian:

Joe 86 / Sam 75 / Ian 62 / Steve 53 / Laura 39

We all liked Ethnos and agreed Katy would too if we could ever get her to try it again. Next up was Raj, although we only actually played a single round as Laura and Steve, as if called by the night itself, suddenly upped and left. For what it's worth, I won (or was leading) the aborted game, aided no end by picking up the 7 tile with a bid of two...

The remaining trio played a trio of So Clover, pushing our scores slowly up (13-15-16) but never hitting the perfect (for three players) 18. I confess my clues were the smuttiest we've ever seen at GNN Towers, but in fairness with combinations like SEWER/KISS I was hard-pushed to keep them clean. Fortunately Joe and Ian were competently gutter-minded enough to decode them. I quite liked my romantic clue of 'lovemaking' for EVENING/SAFARI as well... despite some confusion over whether Godzilla resembles a bear or not (a long story, involving King Kong, who is "also not a bear" as Joe pointed out) we managed to decode enough to feel, if not triumphant, at least competent. And smutty. 

The evening had flown by and although Joe was up for a fourth crack at So Clover, Ian and I decided to hit the road. Lovely to revisit Ethnos, and a fun night once again. 

In space, no-one can hear you eating too many chipsticks

Long-mooted and anticipated, yesterday at the early hour of 3pm Ian, Chris and I sat down to play Xia: Embers of a Drift System (unofficial tagline: it rhymes with higher). Ian was new to it, so we spent about ten minutes going through the basics, before embarking on an odyssean journey through space, time, and shitloads of dice. 

In this sandbox game, everyone starts out as 'unknown' but, like needy D-list celebrities, have a yearning for notoriety, and seek it through a variety of ways: exploring, trading, completing missions, mining for relics, blowing stuff up, upgrading their ship, helping others, buying their fame, or even just being lucky: a roll of 20 on a d20 instantly pushes you up the Fame track. Whenever the points leader hits certain junctures on said track, events or titles are triggered: the former as you might imagine (things happen/parameters change) and the latter offer faming opportunities for whosoever completes the criteria: first to do three blind jumps (exploring without looking) on a single turn, say. 

Everyone's ship has room for outfits (engines/weapons/shields/etc)  and any un-outfitted ship sections are basically room for carrying cargo. The ships are varied, and each come with special powers options: Chris, for instance, could never be stopped by planetary shields (although he could take damage from them, as he was repeatedly reminded by fate) 

I thought I was off to a good start in my Puddle Jumper ship until I blind-jumped into a star at the end of my first turn and died. Chris and Ian began with more caution, and were rewarded with life. But Ian's Numerator ship attempted to mine and failed, taking on a huge amount of damage. Xia does not ease you in lightly...

It also doesn't offer enormous amounts of luck mitigation. Over a long game, it balances out to some degree - or one would expect it to - but Chris' ability to repeatedly roll low numbers for everything he attempted was something to behold. Even when he rolled high, Xia laughed in his face: 

"I get a fame point if I roll a 20?" he clarified.

"Yes" I said, before he rolled a 19. 

That said, Chris was first to upgrade his ship (The Krembler, which Ian referred to as the crème brûlée) and Ian swiftly followed with his new Skimmer. Whilst they pimped up their rides, I was taking a more opportunistic approach, zipping around the outskirts of space, picking up points for exploring and doing the occasional but of mining on the side. I was managing to keep a slender lead on Ian in the Fame stakes while Chris, aided by his relentlessly bad rolling, was still dawdling back at the start points-wise. 

After an hour of pootling around picking up the odd point, players (and the three non-player characters: trader, outlaw and law enforcement dude) start to get a bit busy. Titles are available to claim, Missions are being completed, and people feel confident enough to kill each other (and claim both points and bounty for doing so). 

I nurdled my way to the 15point winning condition, but we were all enjoying ourselves so much we agreed to play on to 20, which was when things got really political. Ian killed Chris. Chris respawned and killed Ian. He upgraded his engine and killed the trader by ramming into it at high speed. I ran away, and by exploring and being the first player to do X (eg use the space-jumping gates) pushed myself within reach of the win. But Ian and now Chris were both hot on my tail, and when I failed to successfully mine for victory Ian nearly grabbed the win by looking for Signs of Life on a dead world, but he didn't find it. I saw there was a way to triumph, but I needed to grab the final two exploration tokens on the board, and thanks to some fortuitous rolling, I grabbed the 20th point and victory with it!

But stop-press because as I write there's a stewards' enquiry: I realised last night (at 2am obviously) that I might have (literally) cheated death on my penultimate turn when a comet moved handily out of my way. I'll have to clarify that on the rules, but either way a rematch feels most welcome. 

Plus, it was extremely early in GNN time, so we had the evening stretching before us to dispose of, and dispose of it we did. Whilst I read a story to Joe, Ian thrashed Chris at Pickonimo:

Ian 15 / Chris 4

Not as shaming as my historic 18-0 drubbing at the hands of my brother-in-law, but clearly Chris' rolling hadn't improved on land. Then we played a new Ticket to Ride-style game of spies: Spy Connection. 

In Spy Connection you're completing missions by getting your spy (big meeple) to visit them. But your spy can only visit them if they're on your network, which is established by your agents (little discs). It's easy rules-wise: you either take another mission from the available four, or expand your network: when you expand you can move your spy before and after doing so. The catch is your only have fifteen agents, and they have to do a lot of work: as well as making your connections (which can cost two agents per connection if another player is already there) they also keep tabs on where your spy has been on your mission cards, and might also be needed to pay for taking a mission card in the first place.

Fortunately, you can drag as many agents back off the board as you need at any time on your turn. Unfortunately, doing so breaks up your network, arrgh! It's quite a nice combo of simple-rules and head-scratchy decisions that doesn't take too long. Ian completed the game-ending 7 mission target before anyone else, and Chris and I couldn't catch him with our last turns:

Ian 32 / Chris 29 / Sam 24

It was about 9pm now so we felt, with Andrew due at the unseasonable hour of 10.20, we had time to squeeze in a game of Quantum. We put together a tight, claustrophic board and were very quickly in each other's ways and faces.

 Ian was roaming around beating people up and pushing up his dominance. I established and early lead, and became Furious enough to hold off several Hickman-driven attacks. Chris seemed to be in neutral, but suddenly got a fourth ship out and a power than gave him four actions if any two of his ships had the same number. He powered past Ian and I for a win so fast we were packing away about 27 minutes after we'd started!

Chris - wins / Sam 2 cubes left / Ian 3 cubes left

With time on the clock we broke out (to my mind, the underrated) Menara, a co-operative tower-builder where you place columns to add levels and try not to make the whole thing collapse. Unfortunately, the levels were coming out at us in fairly unhelpful order, with a series of little ones followed by a series of big ones: it was like trying to construct an inverted pyramid, and we should have taken the option of expanding our base (if I'd thought to suggest it). Things were looking sort of navigable, if not easily-so, when I caused the entire thing to collapse right after Chris said "That should be fine". 

Everyone loses. 

We had a fairly average (15 points) crack at Cross Clues, and then Andrew arrived! Straight from work, I offered him a cup of tea but he said he would prefer whisky. Ian and I joined him as we played Cross Clues again, this time with an assemblage of words that seemed more fluid and the mind of Endersby to pitch in, strutting our stuff with an almost-entirely non-cheating 25!!!

Although Andrew had only just arrived, he was already making noises about going home, but we squeezed two more games out of him and ourselves. I managed a win at a fairly low-scoring NMBR9:

Sam 66 / Andrew 47 / Chris and Ian 42 each

Before we wrapped up an epic session with High Society. Chris came back from the dead here having spent the vast majority of the game with the "Minus one card" card in front of him. I was points-leader but spend too much. Ian compiled a decent score but then took the minus 5. Andrew sailed to victory through a stormy sea:

Andrew 18 / Chris 8 / Ian 5 / Sam BUST

And eight hours after we started, we were done!

Shear Heart Attack

On a mild February evening, I rang on Sam’s doorbell a couple of times and then, seeing that his son Stan was sitting down to watch Netflix, I knocked on the door and he let me in.

I walked into the kitchen to find Sam, Joe, Ian and Laura finishing a game of So Clover. There then followed a discussion about what to play with five, when Laura decided she wanted to play Orbit. We were setting up when Adam H called, saying his prior appointment had been cancelled and could he join. We said yes and, deciding that six-player Orbit would be too long, split into two groups. Laura, Sam and Ian continued to recreate the space race while Joe and I set up Sheepy Time in expectation of Adam’s imminent arrival.

Both groups started perilously. Ian said he’d regretted his decision, even after his first turn. We in Sheepy land discovered that the last people to play the game hadn’t separated the nightmare cards from the pack. We spent almost a minute getting the cards in order. How upsetting.

The game itself was very tense. Joe decided his strategy was to get scared as soon as possible in order to exploit some scared-reliant tiles for points. In round two he placed his sheep firmly in front of the nightmare and waited impatiently for it to move and scare him. My strategy was to pile up Zees on one tile which, if I landed on it, I could cash in for two points each. I triggered this bonus and put myself in a winning position. All I had to do was pass the fence and I had exactly the card to do it. Alas, now was the time when the nightmare hitched up its skirts and sped around the track, jumping the fence and waking us all up. My point-scoring zees were all gone and I was not confident of a win.

In the next round Joe passed his pillow by a decent ten-point margin and ended his game. Adam and I had to keep going and I was pleased with my final score of thirteen points past my pillow, but Adam won decisively. Despite having a pillow furthest along, he used a series of tiles to spin him around the track several times, ending up as the eventual winner.

Adam 15 spaces past his pillow

Andrew 13

Joe 10

At this moment, with uncanny synchronicity, Orbit was also finishing. Whatever Ian’s initial doubts were, they must have been overcome as he won a close game.

Ian 26 + tiebreaker

Laura 26

Sam 23

There was then a pretty extensive conversation about being sick while Ian and Sam perused the games wall. Since Laura had decided to go home, they were looking for a five-player option, and they selected Texas Showdown.

And what game it is. Each hand rich with betrayal and self-destruction, almost in equal measure. Adam was faced with a choice of making Sam take the trick or Joe and both of them had played the highest card in the hand, meaning they'd chose who would lead next. Adam said that since Sam would probably chose him to lead, then he’d make Joe pick up the trick. Unimpressed, Joe immediately nominated Adam to lead the next hand anyway.

Sam and Ian started with clear rounds and Ian was last to pick up any trick at all, and he did so with a bemused “what’s going on?” It was close and we entered round four with Joe leading 6, 7, 7, 8, 8. It’s a shame that you don’t get points for accurately evaluating your hand, because Sam perfectly predicted his own downfall. Joe, meanwhile, went clear just when it mattered.

Joe 6

Ian 7

Andrew 10

Adam 11

Sam 13

And with that, I left. The others stayed for a round or two of So Clover, scoring 12 and 14.

Thanks all, see you next Tuesday.

Land of the setting sun

Late as usual, I arrived at Joe’s to find the last moments of Colorful being played out by Joe, Sam, Ian,. Adam T and Katy. Later I asked for a brief summary for the blog and was told by Katy and Adam that Katy had lost first, Sam had then lost twice before Adam lost, so the winners were Ian and Joe who made no mistakes at all. Special mention was made of Adam’s mistake which was on his own round. His clue “go outside” prompted everyone else to choose green while he chose black (apparently a reference to the outdoor goods shop Blacks).

But with six players and few six-player games, we split into two. Joe, Sam and Ian played Shinkansen Zero Kei while Katy and I were drawn to the relaxing aura surrounding a new game Sunset Over Water. In this game, artists play cards from their hands to move around a 5x5 grid of lovely landscapes. 

The card tells them what direction, how far and how many landscapes they can pick up. Once they “paint” these landscapes they can “sell” them for points, assuming the icons in the top left corner match the icons listed on one of the cards laid out across the top of the playing area. Once a card has been painted, it’s removed from the area, potentially blocking in other artists since you can’t move across a space.

It may look very soothing, but the opportunities for ruining your opponents’ plans make it somewhat stressful. It took me a while to get the hang of things and I was by far the latest to actually sell anything. Katy and Adam tied and Adam had to check the rules for a tie-breaker which happened to rule in his favour.

Adam30 + tie breaker

Katy 30

Andrew 21

We asked about the progress of Shinkansen Zero Kei (“We’re building a monorail,” explained Joe) and since it had a long way to go we three played Crash Octopus, the silly game of scavenging on the seas while occasionally you can try to bounce a die off an octopus’s head such that it knocks things of your opponents’ boats. Or, in Katy’s case, you bounce a die off an octopus’s head knocking things off your own boat.

Katy's perilous route ended in tragedy

Katy and Adam set off into an early lead but with Katy’s self-destruction and Adam’s remarkable attack of the yips, shuffling his boat across the table in ever decreasing increments, I was able to catch up and then overtake for the win!

Andrew 5

Adam 3

Katy 1

By now Shinkansen Zero Kei was finished, with Ian apparently making a late comeback and Sam saying “I knew my train would let me down.”

Joe 64

Ian 56

Sam 51

Then, at Adam’s request, we played So Clover. After reading about it so often on the blog, he was keen to try it for himself. We didn’t start well. We should’ve realised that Katy’s clue of “nuclear” went with the words “Giant, Danger”. On the other end of the scale, Adam’s clue of “Bunny” for “Currency” (because bunny sounded like money) needed a couple of attempts. I think that’s our first rhyming clue.

Katy’s by-now-legendary clue of “the” during a game of Just One was brought up again in conversation so you can imagine our surprise when she turned over her clover to reveal one of the clues as being “I”. This time the clue was considerably more apt since it linked to the words “Top, Phone.” I think the quickest to be solved was Ian’s one, with the clues/words: Jacket/Envelope and Potato; Knight/Queen amd Champion; Pirate/Water and radio; Caw/Crow and grate.

We played twice and got 31 and then 28 out of 36.

And then we were done. Thanks as usual for a lovely Tuesday evening.