When the going gets turf

 This week GNN returned to Joe’s studio as a venue. When Joe let me in, we tried to remember the last time there’d been a games night here. Something to do with a birthday and going for pizza, maybe just after the lockdown.

But enough reminiscing - in Joe’s studio were Pete, Adam H, Ian and Martin mid-way through a game of Abluxxen. Joe ate while he played and I sat down to watch. I discovered,as I did, that I couldn’t remember the rules. Everyone seemed to have a lot of cards in their hands, but as the game neared its end, everyone started shedding. Martin played eight 3s and then seven 6s in two rounds. This was pivotal as the game ended soon after.

Martin 12

Adam9

Joe 4

Ian -1

Pete -2

Then we split into two groups. Joe, Ian and Adam played Azul while Martin, Pete and I played Samurai. This Knizia game appeared on GNN some years back (quick check, oh my god, 11 years ago) and it’s simple strategy found some favour. Now Martin has a copy, it’s back on the table.

The two games, side by side, meant the room was pervaded by thoughtful silences and frustrated sighing. Samurai, in particular, saw some hefty pauses for thoughts. My best move involved me putting down two tiles and clearing out the Edo area, picking up a rice bale and the other two removed from the board because of tied results. 

Before long, the struggle was to try to place your pieces without leaving an opportunity for another player to finish surrounding a piece and pick it up.

1= Pete

1= Andrew 

2. Martin 

I enjoyed it and Martin seemed happy with his acquisition, although he blamed his last place on the fact that his best tiles didn't come out until the end. 

Across the table, Azul went into a rare sixth round. After Martin commented he'd never seen that before, he was assured that this was Azul “on another level”. They didn't specify if this level was higher or lower.

Adam 91

Joe 80

Ian 78

Next was talk of another couple of 3 player games before Winner's Circle/Royal Turf but I was keen for a big 6-player finale before I left so Winner's Circle (the tiny Japanese edition) was brought out. In this game a die is rolled and that tells us which category we can use when moving a horse of our choice.

In order to best appreciate the die-rolling aspect, the dice arena or, if you will, dice stadium Das Exclusive was brought to the table and so we were given the rare treat of playing with a dice arena larger than the game itself. 

We played by the original Royal Turf rules, in which the horses are drawn randomly but each colour has certain characteristics. White, for example, starts in pole position and has one side that's  got one category that's over powered while the others are dismal, while Orange (starts at the back) was balanced on all categories. 

It didn't work quite as well as Winner's Circle style random horses since the horses at the back couldn’t move until the horses at the front did, giving those horses are distinct advantage.

After round one, I was in the lead with £550 from what I thought were some shrewd decisions. Then, after the discussion about how slanted the game seemed to be in favour of those at the head of the pack, the contrarian in me wanted to win by choosing a different path. In the third and final round, I chose horses further back and foud myself struggling to keep them out of last, while the usual suspects sped off to a quick win.

Pete won in the kind of rags-to-riches story that Hollywood would love. After round one, he’d done so badly that he was, technically, $100 pounds in debt.

In the final round, though, he demonstrated almost psychic form-reading abilities. He bet on the top three and pushed himself into first.

Pete $2000

Martin $1800

Joe $1450

Ian $1200

Adam $1150

Andrew $1150

He even magnanimously agreed to pay off the $100 he owed after round one - after he’d worked out he would still be in first.

At this point, I set off, happy and satisfied for another week.

Thanks all.

Mind Over Master

After a few fallow weeks, we were back up to a respectable six attendees gathered at Joe's house. Along with the host, we were: Martin, Katy, Andy, Ian and me.

After a brief bout of conversation, Martin suggested we play Insider, the new game from the company that gave us A Fake Artist Goes To New York and Deep Sea Adventure. The concept is simple, while the method of working out who won isn't.

It's basically 20 Questions. In each game, roles are dealt out and kept secret except for the Master, who declares him or herself immediately and will be the person who chooses the words to be guessed by the others and who answers their yes-no questions.

However, there is a spy in the group who also knows the word and has to get their group to guess correctly without anyone realising that they are the Insider.

I shall refrain from explaining how he winner(s) is/are decided. Instead I'll just explain what happened as best I can.

We played twice. In the first round, Joe was the master and fielded our questions. Towards the end, as we were pretty stumped, Martin asked "Is it wood?" And it was! We had succeeded! But who was the Insider?

Unfortunately for Martin, his blurting out the answer made him suspect number one. After a unanimous vote to accuse him, he admitted his crime.

Martin lost!
Everyone else won.

We played again, but this time the result was quite different. The cold, calculating manipulation on show is quite chilling to recall.

Martin was the Master and we started the usual guessing. It was small and not found in cities. A toy made of wood, but had no wheels. Then Joe asked if it was from a particular part of the world. It was. We kept guessing. Katy guessed Frisbee but then, dejected, remembered that they aren't made of wood. At this point, Joe asked "Is it a boomerang?" And it was! With only a few grains of sand left in the timer, we had succeeded again.

But who was the Insider? With Joe's insightful questions and conveniently timed correct guess, he was very suspicious. Joe insisted he'd got the right answer "Because I'm smart," but even he admitted, the more he defended himself, the more guilty he looked. We voted for him and we were wrong! It was Katy!

Katy wins!
Everyone else loses.

She explained that her guess about a wooden Frisbee was supposed to make people think about boomerangs, which was exactly what Joe did. But what of Joe's question about parts of the world? Katy explained that, actually, Joe had finished her sentence for her. She'd said "Is it from -" and then Joe jumped in with "a particular part of the world?" She'd played Joe like a puppet. Such subtle manipulation was both amazing and worrying in equal measure.

I really enjoyed it, since it's a Resistance-esque game of subterfuge which is over in ten minutes and still works with fewer players. I guess five would be the minimum. Andy was not convinced.

After that was the small matter of the evening's main attraction. Six players without Sam usually means I'm The Boss, but Martin mentioned that he had Winner's Circle, and I was keen to play it again. Katy was quick to tell everyone how bad she was at it. Another attempt at the power of suggestion.

We set off on the first race, which was notable for Andy always rolling a horse's head on the die and then moving the same horse, we all did okay ish except Ian. Joe and Katy ended up placing their bets in exactly the same way.

In race two, we had a horse called Colin. He was a steady horse with average values across the board, but he was starting near the front of the pack so definitely worth a shot. In the end, we all bet on him because who can resist a horse called Colin. He came second or third and everyone was happy.

Two slow starters?

No! One horse is about to be lapped!

Also in round two, I got stuffed by Joe repeatedly moving a horse who'd been doing well, despite only me having a bet on it, the fewest possible spaces. I regretted bringing crisps when I saw that shameless gamesmanshipness.

So, I was screwed. Ian got screwed in race one and in the third race, in a crazy bout of optimism, Joe put three of his four bets on the three horses right at the back. A foolish move.

Katy, Andy and Martin were a league apart. Such was the gulf between us, they may as have well have been playing on a different board.

Katy 2500
Andy 2450
Martin 2050
Joe 1150
Andrew 1050
Ian 1050

We ended with a handful of lighter games.

First we played For Sale. Katy insisted that she had a new tactic she was going to use, and began by confidently bidding two chips. Towards the end of the first round, though, she admitted she hadn't followed it at all.

After the first phase had ended, I had nothing too high or too low, which meant I needed to bid well in the second half of the game. I did okay but, just like Winner's Circle, it ended with a final score with a huge divide halfway down, separating the consummate professionals from the eager amateurs.

Ian 50
Andy 48
Martin 47
Andrew 40
Joe 39
Katy 34

Next up was Perudo. Katy's newest favourite game and, as usual, it was a roller coaster of lies and deceit.

Most shocking was the news that, after about ten years, we'd been playing a rule wrong! On a person's first pallathiko, aces are not wild and so the value of the bid can't be changed, only the quantity.

In the midst of all this controversy, I obviously couldn't concentrate. I was out first on an optimistic bid that no one (i.e., not Martin) believed. However, later on, I jokingly predicted that Katy had 2,3 and 4 based on her hesitation before bidding, and I turned out to be right. Shame it's not leaderboard.

But let's not forget to mention Ian's amazing bid when he was down to one die. He called 4 twos. Joe said Dudo, and every dice was a two or wild. At least, that's what I've written down in a drunken haze. It might not have been every dice, but most of them. Either way, it was amazing. Ian was still out next, though.

Finally, it was down to Katy vs. Joe, both with three dice. Joe was first to pallathiko when we discovered ANOTHER rule we'd been playing wrong: there's no pallathiko when there's only two players left. Joe couldn't recover from the shock of this discovery and Katy won.

Katy
Joe
Andy
Ian
Martin
Andrew

We considered Dead Man's Chest to finish, but it was too similar to Perudo. Team Play, too, was passed over.

Instead, we played two games of Fuji Flush. Andy won the first one so quickly (Martin was still on five cards) that we played a second.

Andy 0
Katy 1
Joe 2
Andrew 3
Ian 4
Martin 5

In game two, I got a bit of luck with my cards, being able to piggyback onto other winning rounds, which is how I got rid of my last card to win the game.

Andrew 0
Martin 2
Katy 3
Ian 3
Joe 3
Andy 3

And I won on dick points, too. I had eight, while my nearest rivals Katy and Martin (of course) only had four. Joe didn't have any at all. What a genial host.

After that, we stumbled out into the evening air, our game-thirst fully sated.

Below Zero

Tuesday at Joe’s. Six gamers sat around his kitchen table: Joe, Andy, Martin, Katy, Matt and myself.

With six at the table, with Sam absent, there was talk of giving I’m The Boss an airing. But first, we decided to bring back an old favourite: Midnight Party. Strictly speaking, this game is banned for being too rowdy, but Joe figured it’d be okay at the start of an evening.

It was almost too sedate, in fact, with Hugo hardly moving at all. This lead to a bit of a bottleneck near the top of the stairs.

But, despite all this tension, round one was quite peaceful with only three guests being eaten. Hugo woke up a bit in the next two rounds, but not enough to outwit Katy who managed to clock up a non-negative score in this most unforgiving of games.

Katy 0
Joe –19
Martin –22
Matt –23
Andrew –28
Andy –44

Then we played team Push It, despite Andy’s protestations that he was terrible at it. Katy assured him that she was bad at it too. Perhaps she didn’t expect Andy to go for the puck so aggressively. Perhaps it was a strategy to get the puck nearer to Katy, making it an easier target. Or perhaps he didn’t know his own strength. Unfortunately it lead to a couple of occasions when the puck went clean off the table for –2 points.

Matt and Martin made the early running, and after six rounds it was 4, 0, 0. Then Joe and I clawed back into contention and after round eleven the scores were 4, 4, -1. Then, a few rounds after that, a mis-flick from Andy meant that Joe and I scored two points in one round to steal the win! Poor old Katy got that negative score that she’d worked so hard to avoid.

Joe and Andrew 7
Matt and Martin 6
Katy and Andy –1

Once again, I’m The Boss was discussed, along with a chance to play Winner’s Cirlce. But Martin steered us towards his new card game Mai Star (舞星 – Mai meaning “dancing”). The aim of the game is to be the best Geisha. The theme of the game did not sit well with Katy, especially after last week’s pure capitalism of Marracash.

Nevertheless, the game was simple enough. You have to discard cards in your hand to win the round. You can use a card as an advertisement (in which case it is replaced) which increases your reputation. And you can use a card as a guest (if you have enough reputation to attract him) which you don’t replace. Almost every guests allows you to do an action against another player, such as forcing them to lose a guest or advertisement, or pick up some cards.

It was fun. Nothing amazing, but each geisha in the game (there are six) has their own back story so, you know, they’re more than just cards in a game.

Martin 26
Andrew 19
Katy 15
Joe 8
Andy 8
Matt 7

Andy had started Mai Star strongly, but then scored minus points in rounds two and three. Put this together with his performance of the evening, and six sevenths of his game time so far had been spent scoring below zero.

Luckily, there would be no minus points in our final game: Winner’s Circle. I was too tired for the high tension wheeler dealing of I’m The Boss, and so the high tension betting and fixing of Winner’s Circle was chosen instead.

Katy noted that she wasn’t keen on horse racing either, but even she couldn’t resist the attraction of hand painted model horses. This attraction didn't last long as she failed to back a winner in the first two rounds and should’ve lost money for backing the last place, but there’s no negative points in this game so she stayed on zero.

No such trouble for Andy who finally showed what he was capable of, with one successful bet after another. I kept trying to appeal to everyone’s sense of romanticism by betting on the horse that starts last but no one joined me. Except Katy did, in round one, but my bet on that horse was a bluff, so the horse never stood a chance. Sorry, Katy.

Matt started by always choosing the option that would benefit his own horses but at some point during the game he switched to hindering his opponents. Joe, meanwhile, admitted to not understanding some of the finer details of the game.

But I loved it, and Joe’s wooden money made it that little bit more special.

Andy 2150
Matt 1200
Martin 1150
Andrew 1100
Joe 700
Katy 500

And so we left another games night, weary but satisfied.

On the Division, Katy edges up one spot, but otherwise it's all about Martin as he tries to win as much as possible before the baby arrives.

Take the Fifth!

The last day of the season was a hot and sultry evening. Joe gave me a lift to Martin’s place where Katy, Ian and Andy were also present. Martin had already wrapped up the points and medal table, and all that was left was for Katy to try and push her points ratio up by more than 0.01 and beat Adam to the title.

We began with Deep Sea Adventure, the game I’d brought back from Japan but still hadn’t played. I’d been a bit jealous of all the wails of anguish and hilarity, so I was keen to try it. It was also Ian’s first go, and he found himself in a number of difficult situations, dragged far too deep by a pair of suddenly generous dice and running out of air with only a space or two left before safety.

As for the rest, Katy began by saying she had a new strategy which is, apparently, rolling nothing but double ones. She got going after a while, though. Andy tried a mean tactic in round two has he loitered just below the surface, laden with cheap treasures, using up all our oxygen. Alas, all that treasure was too heavy and he was unable to get to the boat himself before the air ran out.

Joe 47
Katy 43
Martin 40
Andrew 35
Andy 33
Ian 10

After this, we decided to try Hornochsen, the sequel to 6 nimmt. In this game, instead of four rows of endlessly regenerating cards, there are a number of rows in a circle. Instead of the sixth card taking the previous five, this time the fifth card takes the whole row. Add to this two bonus cards of x2 and +5 which can influence your score. The aim is to collect the scarce green cards (plus points) and avoid picking up the evil red cards (minus points).

It’s a nice game. A bit shitty and underhand, as your opponents invariably pick up the row of green cards that you have your eye on. Fun, but it’s no 6nimmt.

Martin 12
Katy 12
Andrew 12
Ian 8
Andy 0
Joe -16

Next up, for some unaccountable reason, I felt the need for some Winner’s Circle. Last time I wasn’t impressed, but something inside me said that this was the right game for revisiting it.

Martin explained the rules for the newbies, and we began. First, though, he had to sort out the music. He asked for suggestions while admitting he’d only had the chance to unpack A-D of his CD collection. At first we went for Lexicon of Love by ABC, but Joe was being distracted by too many flashbacks to the eighties, so it was changed for The Band instead.

As for the game, twice I struggled to try and get a horse around having been the only person to bet on it (and I can’t believe there wasn’t more love for a horse called Colin) but I mostly did okay with other people moving horses that I’d bet on. Not as good as Martin, though, who must’ve had some insider knowledge of the form book (or whatever horse betting people say).

Martin $2,500
Andy $2,150
Andrew $1,850
Ian $1,750
Joe $1,350
Katy $1,150

Finally, there was time for just one more game: the eternal crowd pleaser: Midnight Party! Poor old Andy was an early target of Hugo, and he picked up –36 by end of the second round. Katy, though, managed a plus score in her second round and, by sensibly avoiding risks she ended a pretty successful evening with another win.

Katy –13
Ian –14
Joe –19
Andrew –19
Martin –42
Andy –49

With that, it was eleven o’clock and not even the offer of a final game of Pairs could keep us awake. We set off to our various homes, with Joe showing me some very steep back streets on our way back to my place.

Now all that’s left is the Division! Martin, as expected, won the medal table and points category. Ian, who led for much of the season, will have to be content with a creditable second place. Sam is runner up on medals. Katy’s haul of points in the final evening took her into first place on points ratio! Andy takes second place on that measure. Congratulations everyone!

Martin Scores Hazy

Ha ha! The title sounds a bit like “Martin Scorsese”! Either I’m a genius, or I can’t think of a proper title for this week’s GNN because, frankly, Martin didn’t score that hazily if I’m being honest. Hey, it’s almost one o’clock in the morning. Cut me some slack.

This week’s GNN meeting took place under Joe’s roof. There were seven of us: Joe, Sam, me, Adam, Martin, Gonz and not-quite newcomer Matt.

At the start of the evening, five of us were waiting for the final arrivals, and we decided that instead of watching Adam eat chips, we could be playing a game. We decided on a quick fix of Take It Easy: just one round until the final two players get here.

Take It Easy is still a giddy mess of opportunities offered in a way that is more about regrets and hoping that fate will smile upon your absurdly ambitious dreams. A little microcosm of life, in other words. This time Joe was the big winner, and I am getting tired of finishing one point behind Martin in this game.

Joe 200
Martin 178
Andrew 177
Adam 163
Sam 134

Then, once Gonz and Matt had arrived, we split into two groups. One suggestion was a game of Sentinels of the Multiverse: a co-operative game, which meant Adam immediately counted himself out. Instead, he, Martin and me looked over Joe’s collection to see what we could play instead.

Martin suggested Chicago Express, saying it barely took an hour to play. Adam and I both turned it down, knowing that it would last a lot longer in our hands. I mentioned Pergamon, and happily both Adam and Martin were happy to play.

So we set up our little archaeological expedition, and started tapping away at the ancient soil. I was the first to put up an exhibition and, against Martin and Adam, I was worried that I’d peaked too soon. Luckily (for me and Adam, that is) Martin found himself screwed by a lack of money. Twice he put himself at the far end of the queue for funding, hoping that he’d pick up a large surplus. But both times, the cards showed barely enough money that round to cover mine and Adam’s expenses, leaving him out of pocket.

I got a nice big exhibition on the board fairly early, and I scored a few bonuses for older artifact too. Included one that Martin thought he had sown up. I played well, even if I do say so myself.

Andrew 29
Adam 27
Martin 21

During this game, we were distracted by a variety of absurd sentences as Joe, Sam, Gonz and Matt tried to defeat the evil Omnitron. Sounds like a type of vacuum cleaner, but apparently it was threatening the world. In between discussing whether or not they should punch a veloceraptor, or if it was safe ofr Gonz to levitate, they did finally wear Omnitron down and the world was saved. It seemed to wear Sam down, too since he left after that game, looking quite exhausted.

Meanwhile, as we waited for them to finish their game, the three of us rattled off a round of No Thanks. Since I’d just seen this played out on Korean TV, I was in the mood to play it again. Isn’t it funny how wrong moods can be. My whole game was plagued by me thinking “I’ll just wait one more round before picking this up” and then Adam or Martin would pick it up.

Adam played a masterful (if lucky) game, as he chained the thirties together.

Adam 19
Martin 42
Andrew 81

By now Omnitron was defeated, so we (minus Sam) were all together. What game could we all play? Gonz kept mentioning 7 Wonders, as if it were fun with more than five players which we all know it isn’t. Instead we went for a Riener Knizia game, Winner’s Circle. The fun game of betting on a horse race and then watching the horse race.

It was kind of amusing, trying to influence the horses so that your favoured bet does well, while trying to make sure others failed. But ultimately, there was too much dice rolling and passive watching. We only played two rounds out of the officially recommended three, and as we walked from Joe’s house, Martin did say that the game isn’t supposed to last as long as we played it. Even so, I can see myself voting this one down the next time it gets mentioned. Long Shot (the other horse betting game) is longer, but there’s more interaction and opportunity to bet. This is too much like real horse racing, and I just don’t care for horse racing.

Gonz £1,100
Martin £1,000
Adam £700
Andrew £550
Matt £450
Joe £100

And so finally we stumbled into the night air, leaving behind a stack of empty bottles and a skittish dog who’d seen something in the garden and couldn’t get settled all evening. A good evening. Omnitron lay dead, and a bunch of other stuff happened too. Not bad for a Tuesday.

On the form table, Martin holds on to top spot despite not having a great evening. Gonz climbs to second and Steve rises to third without even turning up!

						Points
Martin	2	2	3	2	1	10
Gonz	1	2	6	1	2	12
Steve	1	3	3	1	5	13
Adam	3	1	2	4	3	13
Andrew	4	3	1	3	2	13
Sam	5	4	2	3	1	15
Joe	6	1	5	1	2	15
Anja	3	2	4	5	5	19
Hannah	5	2	3	5	5	20
Will	3	2	5	5	5	20
Matt	5	5	5	5	5	25

As far as The Division goes, it’s close but I lead the pack in terms of Points, Martin just edges ahead on the Medal Table, while Steve has a comfortable lead on Points Ratio.