Settler's Tums

There's been a slight drop-off in organised gaming in the last few weeks - probably due to Easter hols and all that jazz - but I have managed a fair amount of extra-curricular fun. Martin and I have had a spate of lunchtime Manoeuvre-ing; so glad to revisit this game, it's one of my all-time favourite two-player short 'war-games'. And this last weekend we Bergers went off to walk a bit of the South Downs Way from Eastbourne to Lewes, with our friends Henry and Rachel and their three girls.

Conscious of needing to pack lightly, but wanting to have games on hand should they be needed, I distilled a few games into a small box;

Manoeuvre, including all the terrain and the four best armies; Sticheln for up to 6; Race for the Galaxy inc. Alien Artifacts expansion; and Verrater. Another small box held Vegas, Incan Gold and Werewolves. In the event, Sticheln and Werewolves were the only games that didn't get played.

Henry and I managed a few late night games of Manoeuvre, all nail-biters, and trotted out Race at every available opportunity. My training from Martin gave me the edge in the latter, though Henry trounced me four-nil at Splendor back at their house after the weekend. We also managed one-and-a-half three player games of Verrater; I was really pleased to finally get to grips with this, and it proved a nigh-perfect portable big (ish) game experience. I expect four players is the sweet spot, and had we had more time I think we could have persuaded Charlotte to play, but even with three it was really interesting.

Like it's sibling Meuterer, the fun hinges on whether anyone has picked the traitor card in a Citadels-style character draw, and what that will entail for the ensuing showdown. It seemed obvious to me that one should always take the traitor if it's available, and I did win but it was close, and a couple of times what felt like a sure-fire win as the traitor disintegrated. I can see real potential for mind-games, convincing your opponents that you're the traitor, getting them to pile their precious supply cards in, and then revealing that you weren't at all and winning anyway. Could be a bit too vicious if played like that, but in any case very interesting.

We got back to Bristol on Tuesday, and last night (Wed) a couple of friends were coming round for food. They've played the odd game with us before, Pickomino, and I think Skull and Roses; last night  felt like the perfect opportunity to try something a little more involved. But what? I found myself weighing up the options during the day; perhaps Splendor? If I wanted to demonstrate how sleek and refined a game could be, maybe. But it's not that 'fun'. Lords of Vegas? That can drag a little, and you can get hosed if you're new to it.

You know that feeling, that there's the perfect game somewhere in your collection to introduce new gamers to, if only you could remember what it is? I went through a mental list of all the games I've recently acquired, that at some point or other I've been desperate to get to the table. None of them were right, but there was something at the back of my mind, I knew - a little voice saying "I'm the game you're looking for!". And then it hit me - and the answer was so obvious it was laughable - Settlers of Catan!

The venerable, the grand-daddy of eurogaming, the game we wouldn't dream of playing on a tuesday night; but it remains the perfect game to introduce new players to the hobby, as far as I'm concerned. So much of the fun is off the board, cajoling your opponents into trading with you, and if they won't, stealing it anyway. There is something unique and mysterious about the way it appeals to non-gamers. Oh and it's the only game Charlotte likes! It was the perfect choice.

I won, which is a rare thing for me, and it took nearly three hours. But it was super fun.
Ah, Settlers.

The Flow must go on

It may have been April Fool’s Day, but there were no jokers in this pack. Playing games is a serious business round here. Although, you might have been forgiven for thinking that one of the games brought by Martin was a practical joke. San Quentin Kings is a game where you have to put together the toughest gang in jail. The first reaction when we opened the box was “Did they actually make this game in jail?” The artwork was kind of amateur, and Joe studied the board (printed onto flimsy cardboard) with the words “You seem to actually have the original artwork.” But the game itself sounds like a lot of fun. Martin says there are three rounds and a riot. Can’t be all bad.

For our main games, the seven of us split into two groups. Will (the host for tonight), Sam, Gonz and myself went for Gonz’s new game Ice Flow. This game involves transporting three men across the Bering Straits, hopping from one chunk of ice to another, using a combination of fish and ropes. Ian, Joe and Martin went space-battling with Quantum.

Ice Flow started slowly, as you might expect. There were a fair amount of rules, and remembering all your options took a while. I was distracted by the early stages of Quantum, where empires seem to rise and fall every time I looked.

While all that history was being made, our band of guys defecting from the US to Russia tiptoed across the icy seas. Will found himself running out of fish and ropes, with no clear way to get any more. Polar bears, meanwhile, dominated half the board. This meant we had to all try and get through a limited space. Not easy with a two-man limit on each space.

But Sam got his trio across first. I came second, having got two guys across, and Gonz and Will had both managed one.

We then decided on a light game to keep us going until the other three finished Quantum. We chose Raj. I continued my recent run of good form and/or luck. Sam, meanwhile, achieved new heights of misfortune during round three: he lost four times on negative cards, thanks to other players tying. A remarkable achievement.

Andrew 77
Will 47
Gonz 26
Sam 24

While we were playing Raj, they’d finished Quantum and started on another new game, Splendor. This game is not one of those games that you can tell what’s going on just by looking. I had no idea what was going on, but they seemed to like it.

Joe 16
Martin 10
Ian 5

In fact, they liked it so much, they decided to play it again. Of course, by now, we’d finished Raj and had started Las Vegas as a light game to keep us going until the other three finished Splendor. As you can see, we were hopelessly out of sync. Las Vegas ended like this.

Sam $460,000
Gonz $330,000
Andrew $260,000
Will $210,000

And, of course, when we’d finished, they were still mid-way through Splendor. What else could we do except twist Gonz’s arm and play on round of Take It Easy! I chose the tiles, and they came out bad. Only six nine tiles in the whole game. It ended

Sam 162
Will 160
Andrew 113
Gonz 82

While the scores from the second Splendor game were

Martin 16
Ian 15
Joe 9

After this, we had all finished at more or less the same time. We relaxed and chatted for a few minutes, as if we hadn’t seen each other in weeks, before heading off into the night.

And Happy Birthday, Steve!

						Points
Sam	1	1	4	1	2	9
Andrew	3	3	1	2	1	10
Gonz	4	2	3	3	2	14
Martin	1	2	1	5	5	14
Will	2	4	2	3	5	16
Joe	3	1	2	5	5	16
Ian	2	3	3	5	5	18