Last week in rainy Bracknell

Mammut was tabled this week after our inability to work out the rules last time. I had spent a few moments the day before playing myself and found that actually, it was quite simple and fast moving. For those that can't remember the premise from its last GNN entry, it is a stone-age themed game of the policy used in many households where one child cuts the cake and the other chooses which piece they want. Instead of cake though it is the spoils of a hunt which, somewhat incongruously, includes axes and fire. Each player makes a grab for a share of the haul and the other can either take whats left or snatch an opponents pickings. The grabbing can go on for some time until either equilibrium or apathy takes hold.

The game's scoring has a neat device that hauls back players in some categories so even though I gained an early lead on turn 4 I saw Paul's purple elephant barreling past me like it had seen a packet of peanuts on square 50. Then when it got there it proceeded to race away as if chased by an imaginary mouse, (Thats the elephant stereotypical imagery done away with then) as Paul made a connection with the ? tiles being an effective winning tool.

Paul - 107
Chris - 80

Then on to Thurn and Taxis, where I recorded a win based on getting the big two scoring positions first. These being Bayern province and all the exterior provinces. In a game of narrow margins it was a surprise to see the final totals thus:

Chris - 38
Paul - 27

We still had enough time for one more game and seeing as it was Paul's choices this week (apart from Mammut) Ticket to Ride got another airing. It seemed like we made an un-said pact before the game, as we both decided to take as many tickets as possible. As always Paul was the most adventurous but this became his downfall. In the final tot up his uncompleted tickets dragged him back to make the scores,

Chris - 93
Paul - 90

Also last week I took my games round to James' house and persuaded him to have a go at Mammut. Although James won, with me again racing ahead only to be pegged back, he didn't enjoy the experience. It raised an interesting preference on his part where he doesn't enjoy games that involve being mean to your opponent. Most Eurogames avoid this and the only interaction you get is by restricting your opponents options. Mummut has a slight confrontational element to it and goes against that Eurogame grain. For myself, I like games that create a bit of interaction, otherwise they become more like a game of solitaire with someone across the board from you doing the same. I made a note to leave such games at home in future.

We finished off with a game of Stone Age. James' massive field bonus won the day here and my final round choice of going for another hut multiplier instead of taking culture cards he needed proving decisive. Charlotte, James' wife and fellow Scrabbler, often pokes her head round the door to see what bonkers game we are playing each week made this observation of Stone Age. That is was another one of those games where you don't know the score until the end. "Whats the point in that?" she said, "How do you compete not knowing how much you have to get to win? (Paraphrasing here).

Good point!

Trans-Datum

Friday night Sally and I had Mark and Katie over, which meant I was allowed to raid the games cupboard. Sally has an interesting take on games, in that if you don't talk all the way through them you're not playing properly. Usually this talk will at some point hit upon the appalled realisation that the game is lasting 'ages'. But we chose a fairly speedy game so I was spared opprobrium.

The actual choosing of the game was a game in itself, inspired by my wonderful present from Katie, the delightful 70's piece Madame Planchette's Horoscope game, modelled coquettishly here by Sally:

Both of these women got paid for this

In what was either an inspired bit of improvised gaming or a deviously pre-planned scheme to play Trans-America, Mark laid out four crisps on the table and secretly assigned them a game: Alhambra, Ticket to Ride, Carcassone and the aforementioned railway game.

Where's Tinner's Trail?

Katie then chose a crisp (the big one) which turned out to be her favourite, Trans-America. There was talk of playing Madame Planchette herself, but nobody was in the mood for learning rules, even if the first line of them is the delightful "Before play begins, everyone makes a secret wish."

So off we went, railroading our way across America, only to tear up all our good work in disgust and start again whenever someone made their connections. The classic sensation of playing Trans-America is when you look at your cards and think "how in the wide world of sports am I going to link these up?" - and certainly that was pretty much how I felt throughout the game.

Hands across America

Staring forlornly at the board appears to make no difference, however, so I simply cursed the urban development of San Diego, Houston, Duluth etc and watched as Mark and Katie gallivanted their way to convincing 1-2 finish:

Mark  3
Katie  6
Sam   8
Sally 14

Sally's suggestion that we get Andrew to write up the night felt just a bit too presumptuous though, so here I am.

On Saturday we played games too; this time with Becky and Dan, who had come from Chesham for the night. I discovered that Becky loves games! Perhaps that was the moment when they became respectable in Sally's eyes. We'll see.

I didn't take any photos that night, so here are Stanley and Joe.

Anyway, Becky, Dan and I managed a 13-all draw in Mord Im Arosa as Sally was collared for the murders with 15 points. Then Becky won Tsuro, with Dan second and Sally third as I crashed out first, giving me a weekend wide 3-1-4 spread. This is all non-leaderboard though, right?

All the News... Addendum

In light of the acclaim* heaped upon me since my All The News You Didn't Know You Didn't Need breakdown of the GNN results from inception to the end of the last season, I thought I'd follow up quickly with the results of those who didn't make it into my calculations - not a deliberate snub, merely because they had played so few games it was hard to really get something like an average out of them.

But not doing so felt a little bit exclusive, which is obviously contrary to the whole ethos of GNN, so in the spirit of community here's the results for everyone else:

Player	Games	Wins
Andy Mosse	4	0
Anja	14	1
Chris	9	1
Dan Clamp	2	1
Jon Burgess	1	0
Matilda	1	0
Paul	6	0
Sally	2	0
Will	1	0

*updated* I have gone through all the games to work out average positions, and though this is only up til the end of the last season - I think Anja has won more games since then - clearly Dan Clamp's average is looking stratospheric - but then he only played against myself and Andrew, so is yet to be tested by the likes of Quent, Hannah, and the Saffron Savage.

click to view

                     

*manifest mostly in shocked looks.

And it was all yellow

Tonight we had it all planned. Steve, Sam and Anja would play Wallenstein again – this time they'd be able to leap in without relearning the rules, and finally get to work on finishing off Magdeburg good and proper. Meanwhile, Joe, Adam and I decided beforehand to play Maria. With one half of the table German and the other half Austrian, we were in for a Teutonic treat.

Except that Steve couldn't make it. So instead we chose Hansa Teutonica as a suitable five-player replacement.

But first, before Anja arrived, the four of us decided on a game of Incan Gold to warm us up. This game of luck-defying greed is always entertaining. We begin each temple as honest, decent gentlemen who do not turn and flee at the slightest sign of misfortune. Before long, however, we became cautious, panicking at spiders and zombie ladies and scrabbling for the exit with our dignity in tatters.

Joe 42
Adam 41
Andrew 38
Sam 34

Then we set up Hansa Teutonica. Anja arrived, Sam was given a refresher of the rules, and we were ready to start. Except that only one of us was paying attention: Adam. He swiftly picked up a bonus marker that everyone else ignored, which he converted into an extra action before anyone else could claim theirs. As such, even after the second turn, the four of us were trying to catch him up.

I had a frustrating game, feeling duty-bound to try and stop Adam since no one else wanted to, but then unsure of how this could benefit me. Joe seemed to have an equally aimless game, as he ended the game with no cubes on the map at all. Unsurprisingly, the two of us came last.

Anja played a better game, rising above any petty name-calling at the creeping custard, and instead played her own game. Sam controlled cities near privileges which gave him a healthy amount of points and stopped the game before Adam could increase his lead any more.

Adam 50
Anja 35
Sam 34
Joe 24
Andrew 24

Finally we ended with a game of Poison. A simple game which, for whatever reason, prompted some extremely geeky conversations. Mostly from Joe. First, he noted that the height of liquid in the bottles on the cards was related to the number on the card. But Sam regretfully pointed out that the volume of the liquid in the bottles wasn't related.

Then Joe wondered if you could really buy the design of poison bottles on the cards, causing Adam and I to check our cards to see what he meant, thus giving away that we were the only ones left with poison.

Then Joe wondered if there was a reason why the cauldron's weren't colour co-ordinated. Three colours, three cauldrons. Why not have a red cauldron, a green one and a blue one? It would certainly change the balance of power when someone was putting a poison into an empty cauldron, he explained while I wished he'd just play his card.

In the end, Sam played a solid game, seeing off the rampant rubber gloves, who had to settle for second. Anja was stung by a bad second round, leaving her in last, while Joe and I took up third and fourth.

Sam 3
Adam 10
Joe 19
Andrew 23
Anja 31

With a first and two second places, Adam increases his lead at the top. I fall back down faster than Icarus, and Sam sneaks into second.

						Points
Adam	2	1	2	1	2	8
Sam	1	3	4	2	1	11
Steve	1	5	2	3	1	12
Joe	3	4	1	3	1	12
Hannah	1	1	3	5	5	15
Andrew	4	4	3	3	3	17
Anja	5	2	2	4	4	17
Jonny	2	2	5	5	5	19

Interesting that Adam's return to form has come at the same time as his beloved Tottenham's run of bad results. A bit of karma? Perhaps Adam should try losing a few games, see if Spurs improve.

Seven into two does go

A rainy Monday evening alone. What's a fellow to do? Gaze out the window at the rain, cup of tea in hand, wistfully recalling past regrets, perhaps while a saxophone plays the blues in the distance?

No! Let's play games!

I left life-drawing early in order to meet up with Sam for a pre-games-night games night. Once there we considered something new, but at the same time we didn't feel like learning any rules. We then realised we'd never played Seven Wonders as a two player game. We brought it to the table, and worked our way through the handful of variants for the two-player version.

The main change is that our imaginary friend Dirk gets to play! He acts as a third player, and the two players take turns in choosing his cards for him. Each go the player who has the Free City card draws an extra card and then from his (now expanded) hand, he chooses two cards – one for himself and one for Dirk.

This means that, as well as working out what's best for you, you have to work out what you can give to Dirk that benefits you, but doesn't benefit your opponent. Dirk can buy things from you if he must (assuming he has enough cash), so it's a useful way of getting money, and you can buy things from him so it's a useful way of getting materials.

I enjoyed this new twist to the game. Having the chance to chose two cards every other go felt like a real opportunity not to be missed, so there were a lot of pauses as the AP kicked in. As each player quickly gains a knowledge of both hands being handed back and forth, the random element of a new card introduced each time kept the game fresh and interesting.

As for the game, Dirk started off as a dumping ground for blue cards and he even had a military card, so after round one he was in a commanding position. But soon Sam and I overtook him. I thought it was quite close in the end, with my wide variety of sciences, but it turned out that Sam was a clear winner.

Sam 73
Andrew 52
Dirk 30something

We then played Contract Whist for old times' sake. It ended 62-62 and I went home rejoicing in our shared victory!

Ur.... ur... hmmmm

Like stumbling upon a idyllic glade with an ice cream van in it after several days hacking through the jungle, three gamers found the beautiful vista of an empty table before them on a Wednesday evening. What to play? We decided upon UR, the civilisation-development game of ancient Mesopotamia. This has been sitting in my cupboard for about a year now, biding it's time, waiting for us to declare it one of the great underrated gems of gaming.

However it's wait may go on a little, as the jury is currently out.

It's a game of contrasts. The rules are brief, yes, but they are badly written and fail to make clear at least two aspects of the game that we had to decide on ourselves. The game is - relatively - brief too, but it contains plentiful opportunities for AP. And the mechanics are actually very good - but they lie beneath a theme so flimsy that you can see the cogs turning beneath it. The rules may say you're developing politics or culture but when the upshot of it is moving the same cubes around the board as when you develop agriculture or go to war, what tends to happen is Adam says "I'll do purple" and Andrew says "I'll do green".

The board is made up of 6x6 tiles that you deal out randomly. The tiles are double-sided and each side contains an 'action'. You also have a tile in your hand, and on your turn you can either 'action' both sides of your tile, or just one of them (and add a cube to your presence on the board) or neither (and add two cubes to your presence on the board, or occupy a new tile with one cube). These actions are the four mentioned above, plus politics. All of them amount to cube movement. A final option is sacrificing both actions to build a 'ziggurat' on a tile you occupy, which guarantees you the tile it sits on and gets you points at the game's end.

After your turn you swap your tile with any unoccupied tile on the board, and someone else says "I'll do blue". And when the game ends you score the tiles you own: like the monuments in Ra, you score sets; and the ziggurats can either function as jokers or sneakily allow you to claim a set of six, even though there are only five colours.

After a first play we very much stroking our chins, and still coming to terms with all the ins and outs of the strategy:

Sam 28

Adam 24

Andrew 21

So we gave it another go. This time we expanded a lot more on the board, and got our heads around the advantages of the different actions. It was hard to say who was going to win, and as we went through a slightly protracted endgame, and at one stage Andrew looked very strong, with almost half the board to himself. But he was thinly spread, so both Adam and I nabbed tiles off him; and he didn't have a war action to claim them back.

I was hopeful of a second victory, but I should have known better:

Adam 43

Sam 39

Andrew 30

We all made significant improvements in our scores from the previous game, but none more so than the Curdled Whey, who begins his march up the leaderboard.

And Ur? Well, we're still scratching our chins on that one. It really wears it's mechanics on it's sleeve, and so is perhaps a little abstract for our group. But it has some neat things about it, like the changing board of tiles, and the fact you can guess what you're opponent is planning by which tile they pick up. I can see why it gets some love on the geek. If it doesn't get repeated plays from us, I can imagine keeping it as a very good two-player.

On the Leaderboard Andrew's brief sojourn at the summit is over, though he remains camped close by. They do say the cream rises to the top, don't they? Or is that custard?

						Points
Adam	1	2	1	3	2	9
Andrew	3	3	2	2	1	11
Steve	1	5	2	3	1	12
Sam	2	1	2	6	3	14
Joe	3	1	1	4	5	14
Hannah	1	1	3	5	5	15
Anja	2	4	4	2	5	17
Jonny	2	2	5	5	5	19

Last one to (destroy) Magdeburg is a rotten egg

When I write this blog, sometimes it's easier than others. But perhaps the hardest time is not when you've come last, but when you've had a chance at first, but threw it away thanks to your own greed. But I'll speak more of this sorrowful tale later.

We began the evening with the three of us – myself, Joe, and Sam – playing Mord im Arosa. We also played Adam's goes for him, as we were expecting him at any second. As it happened, we played quite well on his behalf so when he did arrive, he was in a comfortable first place. Of course, this unconventional way of playing meant the game wasn't leaderboard, but for the record: I was left in last, especially when Sam found three of my guilty cubes in one go, pushing me over the ten-cube limit. Joe and Adam ended as joint winners, with Sam in second.

There was a brief moment afterwards when we were waiting for Steve and Anja when we discussed squeezing in a quick game or if we should actually talk to each other. In the end, we compromised and talked about games until they arrived.

Once they were here, we played new favourite Incan Gold. As a game that works well (perhaps best) with many players, it's quickly gained a special place in our hearts. It was a tense affair, especially for Steve who would confidently place his card down and then, seconds later, pick it back up and reconsider. In the end Joe won it by a whisker, and by sheer fluke as he realised he put down the wrong card. But it was too late to take it back, so he regretfully left the temple and took what treasure he had. The next card finished the game completely, so he got out just in time.

Joe 32
Andrew 31
Adam 30
Anja 28
Steve 13
Sam 9

We then split into two groups of three. Steve, Anja and Sam played Wallenstein, a game whose pronunciation has gone from genteel middle England “Wallensteen” to full blooded Gothic “Vollenschtine” since we last played it. I shall leave it for them to clear up the story of what Gustav Adolph did next. The results ended...

Steve 28
Anja 25
Sam 25

Joe, Adam and I went for the bright lights and white lines of Sunset Strip as we chose Lords of Vegas. And I did feel a bit like I was living the high life, with one half of the table hunched over a map of Germany with cardboard squares and wooden blocks, while we had dice and poker chips and bad American accents. If only board games could be played in a convertible Chevy with the top down while speeding down Route 66, the image would be complete.

Adam scared us all with some remarkable luck regarding which plots of land he could build on and before long, we were looking at his brand new seven-square brown casino. (I should stress now that “brown casino” is not a euphemism for his bottom.) Joe and I started panicking. Joe used the last of the brown squares to stop Adam from expanding, and I went for silver.

Before long, I was suddenly in pole position. Adam's brown casino had completely seized up! And his dice skills had deserted him. Meanwhile, I was getting a steady income from my unused land and some lucky pay-outs from my casinos. But like some village idiot in a folk tale who inherits lots of money and gets greedy and ruins everything, I decided to go gambling.

There was a casino with five dice, only one of which belonged to Adam, the other four split evenly between me and Joe. I decided to re-organise – roll all of the five dice to make a new boss – thinking that if I didn't win then third-placed Joe would. As it turned out Adam defied the odds and won. To make things worse, the next card meant that that casino paid out, giving him Adam points which later were to prove instrumental.

Joe's tale, meanwhile, was a typical rags to riches story. He was the original boss of Adam's casino, but soon found himself reorganised out of his position. This happened to him a lot and towards the end, he had an unmatched collection of dice showing ones, which barely helped him when the casinos paid out.

When the final scores were added up, Adam was only one section ahead of me, and I think I would've beaten him on money, so that reorganising I'd done by accident gave him the game. I cursed my foolishness. Joe came in third, but with only a couple more goes, he would've been in a much stronger position. Possibly still third, though.

Adam 49
Andrew 44
Joe 32


The form table shows a new face on top of the pile. Yes, finally, your faithful reporter gets his day in the sun. Ooh, I feel a bit dizzy so far up.

						Points
Andrew	2	2	1	1	3	9
Steve	1	5	2	3	1	12
Joe	3	1	1	4	5	14
Hannah	1	1	3	5	5	15
Adam	1	3	2	5	5	16
Sam	2	6	3	3	2	16
Anja	2	4	4	2	5	17
Jonny	2	2	5	5	5	19