A funny thing happened on the way to the mausoleum

As the holiday season kicks in, this week's GNN was a sparse affair. Five of us revelled in the uncommon amount of space around Sam's kitchen table. Sam, of course, and Katy, Ian, Martin and myself.

Ian, Sam and I were the early birds. Usually when the three of us get together, it involves whiskey feuled games of Biblios. In deference to the early hour, we went for a barely tipsy game of Grabbell.

This is one of the games you can play with the Wibbell deck of cards. The game has each player picking up cards as fast as possible, as long as they match one of the letters or the border of the card you already have in your hand. There is an additional rule where you can bail out early for a ten point bonus, but the last player left automatically gets the remaining cards, worth one point each. It adds an element of brinkmanship to the proceedings.

Sam 28
Ian 21
Andrew 21

Then we played again, with a baffled Katy watching.

Sam 25
Ian 23
Andrew 20

Now there were four of us we decided to play Fuji Flush, reasoning that Martin was bound to turn up halfway through. In fact, he arrived while we were dealing so, without further ado, he was dealt in.

It was a feisty game, with plenty of occasions when a chain of low cards was quashed by a mean old high card or two. Ian played his hand well, using his twenty to full effect, and then jumping on a series of fives to push through to the win.

Ian 0
Katy 1
Martin 2
Andrew 4
Sam 5

So what was our main course going to be? It was between Beowulf and Taj Mahal and, using logic that I can no longer remember, Taj Mahal was chosen.

I've played this underrated favourite several times, but so infrequently that I listened in to Martin's expert rules explanation, given for the benefit of Ian and Katy.

I took an early lead as I built up a three-region link of mausoleums. But that fell away mid game as Katy sped ahead. The bonus cards were keenly fought over, especially the Princess who nets a cool two points every time you play her. So popular was she that Martin assured us that “everyone has a go on the princess” much to Katy’s disapproval.

Me (brown) in the lead!

Katy's strong tactics were somewhat undone by her own honesty. Ian withdrew from a bidding war, but forgot about winning the purple guy (or "the perp," as Katy called him) and so he could place a Taj Mahal. He did so in a place that would've got Katy six points if she’d gone there and, according to Martin's gloomy prognosis, would've been Katy’s game-winning move.

Katy (burgundy) in the lead!

Later on, she fell back and Martin took the lead despite (or because of?) his warnings that Sam's elephant-heavy strategy would definitely win if not stopped.

Martin 45
Sam 39
Katy 37
Andrew 36
Ian 25

Next up was Polterfass. This game of luck and betting always seems to have a whipping boy: one player who has clearly angered Lady Luck enough that she wants to see you humiliated in front of your friends.

This week it was Katy. Her, shall we say, unique strategy comprised of veering between very low and very high bids. She got hit by minus thirteen points on three separate occasions.

I played like a loose cannon. I deliberately ended a round early, just for fun and then in another round, after my first roll of the barrels, I immediately shook them again, and left the cup upside-downon my beer mat so that any bets would be made with the knowledge that another roll would definitely be revealed. What larks.

But the plaudits go to Ian who, despite Sam’s constant threat and a last minute bid from me, won the game when he was the Polterfass and simply gave out enough beer for him to win, confident that we would have all big high in an attempt to catch him.

He was right.

Ian 79
Sam 71
Andrew 69
Martin 54
Katy -1

Polterfass ended slightly too early to call it a night, so Sluff Off was chosen as a nightcap. Perhaps we'd forgotten how long it was, since five rounds was quickly truncated down to three.

Despite Martin trying to get us in the mood by reading the introduction to the rules explaining the whole ethos of Sluff Off, I didn’t really get into it. Perhaps because it’s not a end-of-evening party game. There was quite a lot of thinking which was a struggle this late in the day. Not for Katy, though.

Katy –6
Sam –8
Andrew –8
Martin –9
Ian –17

And so, a bit later than perhaps was ideal, we were done and released out into the wild. Thanks for hosting, Sam!

The Berger Interlewd

Seven hearty gamers descended on Joe's house to join him for this week's GNN - Martin, Matt (2), Katy, Chris, Laura, Ian, and myself, Sam. Katy met Laura for the first time and immediately apologised for "all that was to come", which meant she had plenty to live down to.

We had the perfect number of players for Captain Sonar, but Joe rejected the idea on the grounds his table was the wrong shape and size - more of a rubber ring than a submarine, and therefore not worthy. Instead we began with a rousing game of Fuji Flush. I didn't keep a tally of the dick points, but there were plenty to go around. Most of them were handed out by Matt, who seemed to have an inexhaustible supply of high cards:

Matt - out!
Chris/Sam: one card
Martin/Laura/Joe: two cards
Katy/Ian: three cards

After this, we split into two groups, with Martin leading the Flamme Rouge splinter - himself, Ian, Joe and Matt - and the rest of us left to stare in awe at Joe's rejigged games alcove, which he had arranged as most-desired: most-accessible. I asked if the ones out of reach were never to be played, but these were actually in another building. We settled on Castle Crush, as Katy said the rules were simple. Joe still had to explain them though, which may have affected his performance in Flamme Rouge...

I'd not played Castle Crush before but often wanted to. Apparently the original rules are ludicrously complicated and Joe had found a replacement set, which was pretty simple: build your castle, hope nobody knocks it over. Particularly your King and General. Your king needs to be high up, but on the other hand, he can lie down, whereas the General must stand. Having negotiated building, we then try and knock each other's castles down... Chris led the early running, but made himself a target by doing so. Before we knew it, it was over!

Laura 65
Sam 61
Chris 56
Katy 48

So we played again. And again Chris led early, and found himself targeted. I jumped into the lead as we entered the final round, but we neglected to pay attention to Katy's sneaky 2 and 3 level castle (more levels: more points) and she grabbed the slenderest of wins:

Katy 62
Sam 61
Chris 52
Laura 51

On the other half of the table, Flamme Rouge was still being contested, so we bashed out a game of Top Secret Spies, where you move whichever agent you like around the board, and score their positions whenever any of the agents reach the safe. You're trying not to give away which spy you are, as that would mean you get moved onto the shitty spots, but we almost disguised ourselves too well: I was convinced Laura was green when she scored loads of points for it, but then Katy moved it back into contention after it was subsequently ignored... hmmm. The one thing I was sure of was that green wasn't Chris. Except it was, and all my who-is-which-colour guesses at game end were utterly wrong. Katy fell foul of the same inaccuracy, whereas Laura got a couple right - and Chris every single one! He still lost, though:

Laura 48
Sam 42
Chris 41
Katy 39
Rogue Spy 38

And Flamme Rouge had come to an end!

1. Martin
2. Matt
3. Ian
4. Joe

There was now time for Joe's 'interlewd', whereupon he told a smutty joke he'd seen on TV. Katy did not approve, but the politics of it all is probably too complicated to cover in detail here. But after the joke, and the post-joke analysis, and Martin saying he knew another joke that was also about an elephant having sex with a lion, the hour was still early. So we split into two new fours, with Martin and Chris effectively swapping places. Chris, Joe, Ian and Matt went for Mamma Mia, while the rest of us played the trick-taking shenaniganiser that is Sluff Off: win tricks to lose minus points!

This was described in more detail in the last post, but suffice to say, fun was had, even though we couldn't quite work out why the third re-theme of this old game had taken a turn for the sluffy.

Sam -3
Martin -12
Katy - 15
Laura -26

Mamma Mia, meanwhile, had had a couple of restarts due to the disappearance of Joe, a misunderstanding of the rules, then the reappearance of Joe. Eventually though, Matt won:

Matt 6
Joe 5
Chris 4
Ian 2

I was out of the room when Joe jotted down the scores, so he'll have to explain why he added the note 'tactical pepperoni' in the comments.

Laura called it a night at this point, so down to a bare seven, we broke out Midnight Party and explained the rules to Matt. Hugo was a busy boy in the first round, snaffling up the guests like nobody's business, before having a quieter second round then a mixed third. Charlotte - who had banned the game previously - returned towards the end, but it was a mostly tense pessimism rather than the uproarious despair of yore, and we were able to continue. Katy and I rejoiced in our shared victory:

Katy/Sam -11
Joe -12
Martin - 14
Ian - 22
Chris -29
Matt -37

Chris now made for home too, which left the six of us to end the evening with Dead Man's Chest. For once, we didn't have to explain the rules - apart from what happens when you get handed Dead Man, which curiously enough, happened several times this evening! It was a game of a lot of high rolls, and one or two extravagant bluffs. We even had two Dead Mans in a row, causing much mirth for Martin, who Joe noted is blessed with the ability to find great humour in probability. Plus the immortal line "Who do you like to screw over the most?"

My evening of first and second places imploded as I was first out, followed by Ian, Matt and Katy, leaving Joe and Martin to face off for the win.

Joe handed over what he called 'double sixes' - Martin challenged, and then revealed: Dead Man! Which Martin pointed out Joe should have called himself, rather than undercutting, as Martin could have handed them back, successfully calling them Dead Man. But - it worked.

Joe - two gems!
Martin
Katy
Matt
Ian
Sam

A nice collection of games and people. Thanks all!

Choose your demise!

Chippenham, April. Paul Jefferies had made the long journey from Croydon to Chris' house, so I came the other way from Bristol, armed with a small selection of shortish games.

When I had arrived, they'd just finished playing Carcassonne, which Chris had won by a narrow margin:

Chris 120
Paul 117

And they were in the mood for something reasonably short, reasonably luck-driven, with a side-helping of watery death. So Deep Sea Adventure it was, which Chris roped Jacqui into playing. She liked so much, we played it twice!

 what a dive

first game:
Sam 16
Paul 6
Chris 4
Jacqui 3

second game:
Chris 34
Jacqui 31
Paul 16
Sam 10

After that, Jacqui retired from gaming for the evening to rustle the kids to bed, and the three of us played Sluff Off. This is a trick-taking game where it's all but impossible to finish with zero points - you'll usually have less. At the start of each round players take tokens (minus 2 points) showing how many and which colour tricks they think they'll win. Win the trick, and you get rid of the token. But win a trick you don't have a matching token for, and you pick up a -3 token.

what a card

But - one person can also play the Sluffer, who doesn't care how many tricks they do or don't win. Their role is to be Loki - making mischief, and trying to get the other players to pick up the -3 tokens. The Sluffer scores -4 points at worst at the end of the round - every -3 token the others pick up improves their play by a point.

Paul/Sam -7
Chris -10

Chris's old pal from the Reading Board Game Club, Laura, arrived, as we finished up; so we quickly explained the rules, and played again.

Sam -7
Laura -10
Chris -12
Paul -14

There was no plan for an epic game this evening, so we kept with reasonably lighter fare, setting up Flamme Rouge next. We went with one of the game's suggested tracks, only flipping the final stretch to give exhausted riders a nice downhill finish. I played a cagey game, never attempting to get into the lead, but my careful hedge-betting counted for nothing when I realised that Paul's exhausted roullier was about to freewheel over the line, and I was miles behind!

Laura leads, but Paul is in pursuit

Paul: triumphantly puffy
Chris and Laura: consolatorarily breathless
Sam: knackered and last

what Paul's winning rider had left in the tank

Chris bought in a selection of games but the general feeling seemed to be erring toward HitZRoad, the game of zombie fight or flight. I made the same mistake I made before by not bidding, and only broke this rule when I bid eight resources in order to pick up five. Not very good apocalyptic economising, and I was out first, eaten before we even reached the final third of the game. 

Laura made it a lot further, but couldn't quite reach California before being turned into a zombie pudding. Only Chris and Paul survived the trip alive...

Paul 10
Chris 8
Laura dead last
Sam dead first

rotten luck

We finished our four-player adventures with some Fuji Flush, in which your demise is more frequent, but less grisly.  Everyone professed not to understand it. But you don't need to understand Fuji Flush in order to win it...

Laura
Paul
Chris
Sam

Everyone enjoyed not knowing what was going on so much, we played it again:

Sam
Laura
Paul
Chris

Laura made for the hills - or Bristol - with the time now past eleven. But with nowhere to drive to, us boys were up for one last game or so, so after not much debate we ended up playing 6Nimmt. It might not have the utter chaos of an eight-player 6Nimmt, but it was still entertainly replete with wails of despair. My strong start disintegrated into a final two rounds of terribleness:

Chris 52
Paul 59
Sam 69

There was just enough space left before bed for Push It. So we pushed! Paul pushed rather hard, even flicking the jack off the table at one point, and it became a two-way fight between Chris and I, which I managed to finagle at the death:

Sam 11
Chris 10
Paul 2

With midnight approaching, the evening came to a close. Thanks all!