Lynx: the Freebie for Men

Adam H was first to arrive at my house last night, followed by Adam T and Ian. Having caught up a little on Big T's new life pattern and even discussed Tom Stoppard, we realised we might as well game whilst waiting for Martin and Pete. We played Qork. 

Maybe the less said about Qork the better? It's one of them that seems to raise laughs whilst playing and a happy groan when it's over. But I like it anyway - and it was over pretty fast because our stragglers arrived and we could now play 'proper' games. For what it's worth I was in the lead, and I remarked that this would probably be my last chance of winning tonight. It was meant ironically at the time.

With the full six in situ we kicked off with Meister Makatsu, Knizia's weird deck-dwindling trick-avoider. I remarked that having won my first game, I'd do really badly now. That was meant to be ironic too. 

gamers, with passer-by

Reiner delights in interaction and this is one of his dastardlier affairs, where winning tricks is minus points and winning them late in the game makes everything worse. Points are bad:

Martin 4
Pete 6
Adam 9
Big T 16
Sam 18

We nearly split into two groups but Big T suggested Challengers instead, so we set about building our decks looking for synergies that would harpoon the opposition in a mini-game of war. As he was in the middle of the table against the wall, we gave Big T the static spot in the chair-switching and at one stage he asked Martin to get him a beer for the fridge as he was kind of stuck. 

"I'd get you a beer anyway" Martin said.

"I didn't bring any beer" Adam quipped. 

Maybe you had to be there. 

I do have an excuse for this shit pic

I began as badly as always and continued in that vein as an ocular migraine hit and I had to squint at everything to try and read it properly. Weirdly - or maybe not that weirdly - I won two matches that way, as if the power of comprehension was getting in my way. But the guys to beat were Martin, Ian and the Big T, as Ian's just missed out on the final:

Martin 39

Big T 33

Sam and Adam H 17 each

Pete 2

Pete was nonplussed by his score of 2 until Martin told him to flip the trophy over to reveal the actual points, but it was 2 on the other side as well. Scenes!

With my vision now back to normal I got to watch the final showdown. Sadly it was a bit one-sided as Martin had constructed some kind of bonkers combo that regularly gave him a power of 15, causing opponents to scuttle their deck each time they wanted the flag!

look how much Adam is enjoying Martin's triumph

Now we did split into trios, with Martin successfully Shanghai-ing a reluctant Adam into playing Lynx with he and Ian by repeating the offer to go trapping over and over. "Is this a Knizia you got in a trade?" Adam asked him. Martin replied no before adding it was a game he got sent free with a Knizia he got in a trade. 

Gearing up to trap

The rest of us set up Hanami, the bizarrely reskinned Samurai with vicious picnicking theme. I warned Big T that Pete had won this with ease last time we'd played, but didn't listen to - or probably even understand - my own advice. Adam T began building a big presence around Tokyo whilst Pete and I skittered around Japan, laying our hexagonal blankets in the most rewarding spots. If you've not played Samurai (or Hanami) you're basically trying to have the most influence on picnic spots/cities when they're surrounded, to claim the 'celebration' tokens there.

late game 

Having the most of a particular token scores you a whopping single point, so the game often goes to tie-breakers. Allegedly anyway - as with the last time we played, Pete triumphed with two points, ousting Adam into second place. I was nowhere - I had something like 6 out of the available 30 tokens. Great game though!

Pete - most savage picknicker

Adam T - fiesty sandwiches 

Sam - squashed packet of supermarket crisps 

Lynx was still ongoing at this point with the only thing I could glean being that for a game with a grizzly wilderness hunting theme they seemed to be doing a lot of bidding. Big T suggested we embark on a trek of our own with the next in the trick-taking Lord of the Rings series, the Two Towers. I was happy to try it - I have fond memories of the first game even if the lustre wore off before we ever finished the 18 chapters. Things have hotted up in the new edition: the orcs have arrived. 

fuckers

The Crew-esque mechanics and narrative structure remain, but the towers themselves take the form of cards and automatically win tricks they're played in (unless both are played to the same trick). The three Orc cards automatically lose. In the first chapter Aragorn (Adam) must win the most tricks in conjunction with whomever has the black tower. Boromir (Pete) must win two tricks before the towers appear and Legolas (me) just needs lots of forest cards, as though distracted from the quest in hand by botany. 

the road goes ever on and on

We nailed chapter one first time, then moved on to chapter two. Big T made an excellent Aragorn and we saw off a nail-biting distribution of forestry to claim another first-time victory! Well done us. 

Lynx wrapped up now as well, with a series of noises that suggested it may not return to the table any time soon. "Fine" is not a lofty recommendation in these game-rich times for a 90 minute game of bids and Martin reflected again on how it came free, as though looking at a bang average pizza crust left on a paper plate. He and I were up for some Alibis but it was fairly late and people were tiring so we pivoted to our classic of So Clover. 

If you look at the right-hand side of this photo you get a glimpse of what an ocular migraine is like. 

"This is going to be a 36 straight out of the gate" Martin announced, employing irony more successfully than I did earlier. There were some excellent clues here, with Adam H's Showcase for trophy/cinema and Martin's plumber for common/apprentice, but we came unstuck with Pete's clover, failing to perceive more than one association we should have spotted. As always though, a fine way to end. 

30/36

Thanks all.