Bad Tibiria! Naughty Tibiria!

Saturday games at Sam’s. Ian and I arrived at 7 for a quick run through some games with Sam’s kids. Spyfall, Cardline and Riff Riff were squeezed into something like half an hour. Cardline is the only game that needs an introduction: it’s basically Timeline but with Marvel super heroes and instead of years, you have to place the cards on the table according to statistics: either intelligence, strength or something else.

I did badly, not recognising anyone on the cards and, for some reason, Joe didn't do well either. Ian won the game, showing just how much of his youth he spent immersed in the world of super heroes.

Stanley won Riff Riff thanks to his technique of calmly putting things on the boat without really thinking about it.

After this, the boys went to bed and we decided what to play. We knew Chris was en route and I mentioned he’d be keen to play Caverna. Sam wanted something a little shorter, so we considered others. But when Chris turned up, the ill-disguised excitement he displayed when Caverna was mentioned meant we couldn’t turn him down.

We unpacked as quickly as possible and got Cavernaing. I got off to a flier, being the first to get a new family member. But Sam soon overtook me in the baby business, eventually ending the game with a family of six. He also got some choice bonuses, as did I. Ian went ruby mining in a big way while Chris went down the vegetable route.

We all ran into trouble early on as one harvest followed another and we struggled to feed our families while trying to plan for the future.

The game was notable for me getting in people’s way. It seemed no matter what I did, I had ruined someone else’s plan. I apologised but secretly I was quite happy about it.

Chris complained about too many inefficient moves and Ian was last to expand his family. As such, despite some high scoring bonus rooms, they came third and fourth. And everyone completed their farms and caves, which I was impressed by. I didn’t note the scores, but it was something like:

Sam 80something
Andrew 70something
Ian 65
Chris 63

Then we packed it away. After Thursday’s debacle with leaving an essential part of Railways of the World unpacked, Sam was keen to double check. And, indeed, the lid came off and went back on again twice as we found stray parts of the game (including, shamefully, part of the playing board!). Finally, we got it all away, and Sam picked the box up to take it into the next room.

And in doing so, uncovered yet another counter from the game!

Well, with Caverna finally packed away, we moved on to lighter fare: Tsuro. And what a game it was. All four of us were still alive and fighting with only five spaces left on the board. Impressive. Then, like dominoes, we all died one by one as our last tile inevitably finished us off.

Andrew
Ian
Sam
Chris

Finally, Sam dug out Sumeria, the game of meeple placement and movement that effects a city’s standing. Move into an area, that area shuffles up on the list, with only the top three cities scoring any rewards per round. It’s a short game. At least Sam thought it was. Then he saw that the rules suggested six rounds. We played three.

I think Sam won. Then Ian, then me. I know Chris came last, because he commented on his evening of fourth places as we packed up to leave. Than made it easy to remember, at least.

Cracking Skulls

Six gamers at seven for Sam’s house. We began this early to give Sam’s boys, Stanley and Joe, a chance to play a game before they went to bed. We chose Midnight Party which had recently been a big hit with the family on Sam’s holiday. We began before GNN regulars Joe and Matt arrived, but since Joe arrived soon after we’d begun, he was dropped into a couple of random positions on the corridor. Meanwhile, little Joe decided he wanted to be on a team with Sam.

This time we played a variant where Hugo speeds up each time he goes around the board so that in the fourth and final round Hugo was moving six squares at a time! Oh what fun! Ian started well, getting no points at all (in this version, points are bad and you start at 10) in the first two rounds. But then Hugo got the better of him, and Joe was able to sneak a win at the last minute. Martin often found his plan ruined as people ducked into rooms immediately ahead of him and Stanley went on a bit of a suicide mission in the last round, starting at the top of the stairs when Hugo was moving five squares at a time.

Joe 26
Ian 27
Martin 33
Andrew 34
Sam (and little Joe) 37
Stanley 50

Matt arrived towards the end of Midnight Party so when Sam took his boys to bed, the rest of us played a couple of rounds of For Sale. It was Ian’s (and maybe also Matt’s) first game, so Joe explained the rules. He must’ve slipped some strategising in there too, because I got stuffed both times we played.

Martin 52
Ian 51
Joe 47
Matt 43
Andrew 37


Joe 58
Martin 44
Ian 44
Matt 40
Andrew 38

Then Sam came back and we split into two groups: Joe and Martin tried Baseball Highlights 2045. Meanwhile, Matt, Ian, Sam and I considered playing Lords of Vegas. However, we couldn’t be that cruel to Joe to play his favourite right under his nose. So we went for Tinners’ Trail, the classic evergreen of boardgaming. And what a damp game it was. I feel like we say this every time, but there were a lot of areas with the maximum amount of water.

So we got mining. The most notable feature of the game (apart from the collapse in prices in round four) was adit-stealing, as Ian and Matt built adits into neighbouring unclaimed regions, only to be outbid for them by Sam and me. Ian cut a particularly morose figure, as he surveyed the damp county with a sigh of despair. He’d have made a great 19th century tin mine owner.

Sam 113
Andrew 102
Matt 65
Ian 63

Martin and Joe were still deep into their game of baseball so we played Sumeria, a simple game of area control. Too simple for me, since I had little idea of what the best strategy would be. No worries for Ian or Sam, though. I guess Ian must have taken great pride in my downfall after I stole half his adit.

Ian 23
Sam 20
Andrew 6
Matt 5

By now Baseball Highlights ended and Martin won the world series 4-3 from 3-1 down. I know little about the game, bit apparently it all changed when Joe went for a piss.

Since we were now all six again (in number, not in age) we decided to play a rousing game of pairs. I found myself in the unusual position of being in first place with 20 points, just one short of ending the game. Martin had 18 as we went into the last round. I cautiously decided to stick on just one card, meaning Martin had to push his luck. Alas, he didn’t have any and got out on his second blueberry. In fact, a lot of people got out that round, which meant my lone card came in second and got me five points.

Andrew 25
Ian 20
Martin 18
Joe 15
Matt 12
Sam 11

Finally, we ended on Skull & Roses. And what an odd game it was. A flurry of skulls early one meant that no one could make any predictions at all. Joe and Martin were first out, with Matt taking out Martin twice in two rounds by putting down a skull which Martin foolishly flipped. Matt and Sam finally managed to make one correct guess as to the number of roses everyone had put out. But Matt’s luck didn’t last.

In the end there was me, Ian and Sam, and I only had on tile left: a rose. And it was my turn. And I played rather well, even if I do say so myself. I guessed that neither Ian nor Sam would want to give me any leeway in my guesses so they would both put down a skull. I bid “one rose,” and I was right. Neither of them could outbid me without losing a tile (which might have been the right thing to do, Sam later pondered). So I got one prediction right.

Next, I figured that Ian would want to be able to make a bid, so he’d put down a rose. But Sam was last in turn order and unlikely to be in a position to influence things, so he’d probably put down a skull. I guessed “two roses.” Ian must’ve thought the same thing, since he didn’t try to outbid me, and nor did Sam. And I was right! My second correct prediction, and my first win on Skull and Roses (I think)! What a way to end.

Andrew 2
Sam 1
Ian 3 tiles left
Matt out with 1
Martin out
Joe out

12 Games of Christmas

This Christmas was the first Yuletide under our roof where it felt like actual activities substantially outweighed behavior-management. Stanley and (Little) Joe continue to have their moments of course, but their evolution from meeple-scattering tots to brow-furrowing AP merchants has taken a giant step forward.

As well as the savage violence of the allegedly infant-friendly The Hobbit we've managed to get several other games on the table. During the Morrison Christmas (23rd) Stanley, my mum and I played Love Letter. My mum displayed an impressive range of table manipulation, and though as much of it was directed at a 6-year-old to be fair she did enough to win. It's always the quiet ones, isn't it?

On Christmas Day Stanley and I played Lords of Waterdeep for the first time. And while some of the subtler tactics (or screwage) were beyond him, he clicked into the quest-fulfilling immediately and whilst I stagnated at the start, shot off along the score track. I never recovered:

Stanley 104

Sam 99

Then whilst Stan was off playing his drum kit Joe and I played a round of Galaxy Trucker. Joe beat me (though I did help him build his ship, so, y'know) and then we set about building the ideal third-round ship together:

only thing is should there be lasers pointing sideways on those horizontal sevens?

On the 27th Sally's family arrived en masse and what brother-in-law Matt and I have christened "The Chatothon" commenced. As relative light-weights in that department we managed to sneak in a couple of games of Biblios. Despite having never played it before Matt wiped the floor with me, chalking up what I think is a maximum win at 15-3 in his favour. Obviously I wasn't going to let that stand, and beat him in the return 9-5.

And several times Joe has requested Sumeria. We're playing it more or less correctly; on everyone's turn they add a trader to the land of Sumer, boosting that particular region; which means it moves to the left (or "up") in that row of region cards you see beneath the board. So throughout these regions are jostling for position. At certain stages of the game the top three regions reward those with a presence in them with some goods. And at the end of the game players score the amount of goods they have (any particular colour is squared, so 3 blue goods tiles gets you 9 points whereas 1 goods cube of green, blue and yellow would only get you three points)

Joe and I have played together; we've played with Stanley, and we've played with Stanley and Sally. I've won all these games, but losing doesn't affect Joe - he just announces that he won anyway. 

It's good fun - and as with Waterdeep, Stan has cottoned on to it - when all four of us played last night, the scores were:

Sam 32

Stan 22

Joe 1

Sally 1

We've also played Old MacDonald Lotto, Plop Trumps (don't ask) and a number of games of Pitch Car, which Joe has a bit of a knack for, beating me and Stan. Occasionally I think 'Oh I'll start taking this seriously' and promptly flick my car off the track...

Every whist way but loose

Sam had some free time this Saturday and, with Everton drawing 0-0 with Crystal Palace, he wasn’t about to waste it on reading and re-reading football reports on the internet. SO we met up for a quick game or two. At first we had a look at Sumeria, a new game picked up for cheap second-hand, but the cardboard bits still hadn’t been un-popped. That’s as close to pristine as a board game gets.

It wasn’t designed for two, but we had a go, anyway. It’s like a mini-Taj Mahal. Winning iin the top three areas gives you the chance to pick up tokens. Collect sets of these to win. But by entering an area, you can push it up the list, so that it may become one of the top three areas, displacing others as it does.

It’s okay. Very hard to tell. It clearly isn’t for two, since the order of areas doesn’t move around enough. But it showed promise. Sam won by 50 something to 30 something.

After this was Lords of Waterdeep. An old favourite, and one that I did terribly at last time. And I got that sinking feeling early on again, as Sam immediately picked up the Lieutenant, effectively giving him an extra go each round.

I went into panic mode which, it turns out, is the correct mode to play LoW in. I pretty much ignored my bonuses and instead went for more quests than Bilbo Baggins on crack. I was helped by completing the quest that allowed me to use an area already used by opponent, somewhat lessening the Sam’s numerical advantage.

Sam obviously had the lord that gave him a bonus for each building, so I was even more keen to put a distance between him and me on the score-track, since I’d been paying no attention to my own bonuses. I managed to pick up 50 points in round seven, and then I breathed a huge sigh of relief as the new quests in the last round all needed money: something Sam had none of. In the end, it was close, but I kept my nose in front.

Andrew 181
Sam 170

Then we had a little under half an hour. An akward amount of time, especially with the few games we had to chose from, so we went for Contract Whist. Sam decided to make it more interesting with a pound stake.

It was a lot of fun. There’s a reason why these old games haven’t disappeared, and I think I appreciate the clever balance of risk and reward in Whist even more now that I’ve played some Eurogames.

Especially since I won, 73-43. Or, in other words, £2- £0. Oh ho ho ho.

And so the evening ended, and as Sam set off, I still had the tune in my mind of that eighties power ballad that we changed the words so it was a little more... about anal sex. I'm not proud of it, but that’s what board games, beer and Saturday nights will do to a man.