A Commanding Presence

This week's GNN saw numbers fall to an almost non existent level of just three. And, with Ian expected later, I rolled into Martin's house at eight to the sight of a couple of Japanese two player games on the table.

We started with The Throne And The Grail, one of the games I bought for Martin the last time I was in Japan. This is a strange kind of bidding game. Strange enough that I immediately regret calling it a bidding game. Each player has a hand of five and they take turns playing those cards into the centre. But, instead of playing a card, you may pick up the five most recently played cards. Those go on the table in front of you and will make up your final tableau. The trouble is, once you have picked up, you can't pick up again that round but you have to keep playing cards into the centre. This means your opponent can get whatever is left. This may be a good thing or not.

The end of game scoring is simple majority on the four suits gets you points, as do the numbered cards (some positive, some negative) that score their face value.

The other way to instantly win is to have all three pieces of the Grail. When I saw I'd been dealt the third when Martin already had two in his tableau, I put on my best poker face to keep him in the dark. Didn't work, but I still managed to avoid giving him the piece for the instawin. Still lost, though.

I forgot to take a photo of the game, but I did photograph the message in the fortune cookie that I gave to Martin in recognition of his win.

Martin 24
Andrew 12

Then we played Khmer. A cunning game of making sure that the overall value of the cards in your hand is the same or less than the communal cards on the table. Each player gets six cards in their hand, value one to six (in the pack there are two of each and six sixes). Each player takes turns in playing a card to the centre or taking a card from the centre (which is then put face up in front of them, as it's a definite part of their final score) or you can discard a six. Or, of course, you can knock if you think your total is close enough to win.

Martin wiped the floor with me, but I enjoyed it a lot and we kept playing until Ian arrived.

Martin 6
Andrew 1

With the three of us together, the games usually end up being the combative, strategic area control type of thing and tonight was no different. Welcome back to Impulse, the tiny space epic played out in less than an hour.

In Impulse, everything is a card. The map is made of cards, the bombs, minerals, your defences, goods for trade, etc are all represented by the cards. A remarkably efficient design, albeit one heavily laden with rules.

But once we'd had our rules refreshed, we were off. I lost a cruiser early on to Martin's sabotage card. In fact, he threatened to just hop back and forth between his Command and Sabotage cards, hoping to pick us off one by one. It certainly pushed him quickly up to seven points.

However, the next time he tried it, he failed, and Ian's fleet sailed impassively by. And when Ian attacked back, he won! Martin suddenly looked weak. I, at this time, was mostly hiding in the corner, trading cards for points. Before long Ian and I had caught Martin up, and the scores were 9-9-8, with Ian in last on the score track but looking strong on the map.

Martin was stuck by his bad luck on the map. His third of the map was either command cards to move or sabotage cards to attack adjacent ships. It was a limited range of options. Ian made a mega-move that sent him from eight to fifteen points, but left him with few cards. I used some Draw commands to fill out my hand and Martin tried to sabotage Ian and failed again.

At the end of one of my turns, Ian was on 18, and bound to hit the game-winning score of 20 on his next turn. I was on 17, about to hit 18, so I needed two more points to win. I attacked Ian. But, it was an optimistic gamble. I had no reinforcements, and Ian won easily. Which gave him two points, and the victory.

Ian 20
Andrew 17
Martin 11

Next we played Azul. This game of tile taking is such an old familiar, it's hard to believe it's barely a year old.

After a low scoring round one for everyone, I find myself with three unfinished rows. I play cautiously and I'm pleased to only get -1 in penalties, but also just 4 points overall for that round.

During round three, Martin suffers an existential crisis, repeatedly muttering "What am I doing?" He is later gripped by indecision over where to place three blue tiles he picked up. In this row? Or this row? This literally went on for a minute. Maybe a minute and a half.

Round four ended with Martin leading 37-29-29. Round five was a dream for him, as he completed colours and columns for bonus points, while Ian had a nightmare final round.

Martin 75
Andrew 64
Ian 54

By now I made noises about heading off, but I convinced myself to stay by suggesting Eggs Of Ostrich as our night cap.

And I'm glad I did, since I ended the winner, thanks to an uncontested amber in round three. Notable events were mostly confined to round two, where we all played our Two Bag cards on three separate occasions.

Andrew 27
Martin 24
Ian 21

And so, with a victory each (not including the two player games, of course) we disbanded for the night. Thanks to Martin for hosting. Here's hoping for more next week, but the grip of the summer holidays has been tighter this year than it's ever been.

Deep Fried Calimala

Thursday, and our occasional sorties into the wide wild world of euro-gaming continued apace. Apace? you say, eyebrow cocked. A euro? you say, a smirk playing at the corner of your mouth. Yes! Because tonight's euro-game was Calimala, thematically so euro-y as to be almost invisible to the eye, but mechanically rather more explosive.

We - myself, Andrew and Chris - are silk merchants in Florence, intent on being the silkiest merchant come the game end. We do this by delivering silk - obviously - to far-flung climes such as London by boat, or Hamburg by wagon. But the brick and wood we use to build trading houses or ships can also be used (as can marble!) to contribute to the building of the great cathedrals of our home city, where notoriety is just as good as silk.

Two things are unique to Calimala - one is the action selection, where if an action you've selected in a previous round gets chosen again, you get to do it again too. The second is the scoring rounds, which are triggered the third time this duplicate-choosing occurs. It's a hard one to explain in simple text, but pretty simple to pick up in practice, and the upshot is that after 20 minutes or so of euro-dawdling in an area-majority kind of way, suddenly Calimala wakes up and with the merest hesitation, torpedoes its way through the fifteen scoring rounds with nary a pause.

Each scoring round is for majorities in the various destinations and their attendant delivered or contributed goods - silk for the far-flung climes and wood, brick and marble here in Florence. But the triggering itself happens so fast you barely have time to say "Shit, I never delivered to Lisbon", before Lisbon scoring is done and dusted and you realise you never contributed any marble to the cathedrals either - and they're just about to score.

The only end-game scoring has a slight sting in the tail too - everyone has an area they know will score again (more rewardingly) but they will score for everyone, not just yourself. And this proved to be decisive as Andrew's storming tactical lead was pegged back by my more strategic silk-based shenanigans. At the final scoring we were delicately poised on 42 points each after our own end-game bonuses popped out, only for Chris' reveal to favour me in the most fortuitous fashion.

Sam 47
Andrew 43
Chris 26

Andrew and I really liked it, and the whole thing included rules-explanation took 80 minutes - so brief, we decided to play Azul, or, as I like to now call it, Andrew's Revenge.

I kept smiling to myself during the game as the tiles seemed to favour me reaching not one, but two completed colours in bathroom tiles and chewits. But at the end of every round my smile froze rictus-like as Andrew racked up point after point with his now classic clustering tactic, accumulating points like a rogue ball of pizza dough accumulates all the little bits of crap on our kitchen floor.

Chris and I kept looking at each other in despair as Andrew's mastery deflated our optimism. Even me making him pick up seven blue tiles made no difference.

Andrew 88
Sam 63
Chris 56

At Andrew's request we finished with a couple of games of Tsuro. He won the first as I sent Chris spiralling into the abyss, only to be pushed out to the edge of the board with no escape route:

Andrew
Sam
Chris

And Chris came storming back to claim a win in the second game - partly I might add due to my largesse, when I forewent killing him off to claim a guaranteed second as it also meant a guaranteed not-first. Rather than hand the game to Andrew, I kept Chris alive and went nobly hara-kiri. However after that the two old stalwarts circled each other warily in a dance as old as time, until Andrew fell over.

Chris
Andrew
Sam

Good stuff gentlemen! Have a great couple of weeks all and see you one Tuesday soon... ish.

Desperate Times

Summer continued its grip on our attendance figures, with a mere four gamers around Sam's kitchen table this Tuesday. Sam, Martin, Ian and me.

Both Martin and I were a little late, so Ian and Sam kicked off the fun with a game of Akrotiri. In this game you have to place temples on a modular and ever-expanding map, according to the placement of coloured cubes already on the map (ie, one red to the north, two blues to the east and a grey to the south).

I came in mid game and watched them play for a while. It all looked quite relaxing as they sailed around some islands, selling and buying cubes. Who knows the frantic machinations going on inside their heads, though?

When Martin arrived they ended the game. It was 2-2.

With all gamers present, we began with a little history lesson: Reiner Knizia's first published game, Deserados. How would this proto-Knizia be received?

The game is a team game, with colleagues sitting opposite each other, with six cards and a draw deck in the middle. The idea is to play a mine card (gold, silver or copper) and then between you, keep playing cards with the same element to that mine. The other team can try to grab it with a Desperado, which can then be fought off with other Desperados of a higher (combined) value. To stop this, you can close a mine and that's safely in the bank for points.

To be honest, none of us were massively taken. Martin reminded us that this was made years ago before anyone knew anything about games but, even so, it was a pretty drab exercise.

Martin and Ian 28
Sam and Andrew 9

After this, we all gazed at Sam's games wall, wondering what to play next. Quantum? Flamme Rouge? We could recreate that Welsh bloke winning in France, said Ian, demonstrating his in-depth knowledge of current affairs. Hit Z Road? More of a late night game, really.

Instead we chose The Quest For Eldorado. Not played since Adam used the twin trash card spaces to hone his hand into an unstoppable machine of speed, we were keen to try it again with a gentleman's agreement not to copy Adam's strategy.

Instead, we all went a bit cave crazy, with me even going backwards to grab a useful treat. We took great pleasure in pronouncing the names of the cards in the most obscene way possible. Ian, Martin and I all seemed to have the idea of using a Trash Three Cards space on the penultimate tile to make our hands lean and efficient. We all arrived at the same time, though, meaning we had to wait patiently as we each took a turn to use it. Sam, meanwhile sped through undergrowth. Definitely the long way round but, with no one in his way, he made it count.

In the end, it was between Martin and Sam. Martin couldn't reach the temple but was in a promising position. Sam fell just one space short. Could Martin take advantage with his next, surely final, turn?

But wait! Who's this charging up from behind like Wile E. Coyote with a fully functioning Acme jet pack on his back? It's Ian, whose final turn made a mockery of Sam and Martin's slow progress as he cleared the entire last tile and arrived at the temple. I could only just reach the final tile to make my last place look respectable. And could Martin join Ian at the temple and win on a tie breaker? He showed us his final hand: all money. He couldn't move at all.

The game before Ian's final move...

... and after.

1. Ian
2. Sam
3. Martin
4. Andrew

After this we succumbed to the temptation of Decrypto. Martin and Sam teamed up again to try and avenge some previous defeat that, I admit, couldn't bring to mind. We named our teams after our favourite single entendres from Eldorado, so that Sam and Martin were The Kundschafters, while Ian and I were The Urine Whiners.

In round two, Sam over-thought a clue and actually changed his mind from the correct answer. An early mistake!

But by round four, it looked increasingly like the words had been deduced, as both interceptions were only one word out. "We need cat poo levels of ingenuity here," declared Martin, referring to Joe's stroke of genius when defining the word "message".

Today's themed clues were Martin's very short clues in round two (only used ten letters in total), and Sam's filmic round six which prompted Martin to inform Sam that he doesn't know much about films. Sam also had a short story "Watch / Ugly / Luke"* while my final clues resembled a Marillion album title: "Childhood watches / Puberty become / Death."**

In the end, Ian and I got two interceptions (in rounds six and seven) to win the game. To cap it all, we correctly guessed all their words!

Ian and Andrew gracious winners.
Sam and Martin plucky losers.

Now with a party feel in the air, we couldn't go back to a Euro. Instead Martin brought Polterfass and The Mind in from Sam's living room.

Polterfass has been absent for a while, but tonight's game had everything that reminded us how good it was. We had clever bids that left the bier meister with barely anything. We had a player (Sam) fall back into minus points after an extravagant bid went wrong. But mostly, we had a three way tussle for the lead. After the seventh round the scores were 42, 41, 41, 16 which left us all (except Sam, perhaps) fully invested in the game.

But in round eight, Ian drew ahead and then only needed two points to win when he was the bier meister. There was nothing anyone could do to stop him, except Lady Fate, and she was probably next door partying with all the cool young things next door, singing along to "Africa" by Toto.

What I mean is Ian won.

Ian 83
Martin 69
Andrew 63
Sam 7

Finally we ended on The Mind. It was a fraught affair. Despite collaborating with team games like Desperados and Decrypto, we were horribly out of sync. In the first two rounds we lost lives in the 30s. We didn't improve and were dead by round five.

We reset and tried again. Early signs weren't good when we lost a life to 58/75. We lose a life in round three (11/12) but otherwise seemed pretty solid. Then, in round four Ian was very slow in putting down the 8 and then slower still following it up with the 10. Maybe this unnerved us since we lost a life later on. We had a clear round five thanks to a shuriken getting us through the treacherous thirties. But we lost two lives and failed in round six with 11/12 (again!) and 15/16 providing our downfall.

A lovely evening. Interesting to play a bad game by The Knizia, and the rest were all top notch entertainment. Here's hoping for a venue next week. Damn these summer holidays.


* Time, fruit, cage
** Rainbow, revolution, torpedo

Fire in the Hole

Whilst civilisations rose and fell at Martin's house, Chris, Adam and I were occupied with the rather less epic business of wood-cutting in Lignum.

As previously explained, over two years we spend spring summer and fall gathering equipment and hiring workers, before cutting, bearing, milling and selling or drying. Or putting aside for burning in winter - wherever Lignum takes place, clearly the winters are harsh and unforgiving.

Much like the spinning wheels of Lignum itself, where each season is a miniature puzzle of cog-joining. Chris said a flow chart of how the system works at the end of each season would be really helpful. So I did a Star Wars themed one over breakfast today:

Feel free to print it out, Chris.

As well as Lignum's how-far-should-I-go dilemma of travelling the path along the forest, there's also the dilemma of where to go cutting in the forest. As players simultaneously reveal their decisions, there's always the possibility that you'll double up with someone else, as Chris did with both Adam and I on separate occasions. Adam said it was the one part of the game he didn't like.

As the seasons turned, we hatched schemes for the future with the catchily-titled Planned Work, took Tasks to complete and were regaled with Chris' seemingly endless supply of dad jokes. "I'm a dad" he told Stan. "It's allowed".

When winter came we were all able to eat and keep warm. Nobody did much logging though - we didn't have any sleds. All of us completed two tasks each, and I thought Chris might have nabbed a win when thanks to his planned work he milled up no less than six tree trunks on the final round and sold the lot. But his tasks were less valuable than mine, monetarily speaking, and Adam had only completed one- wait a minute! There's Adam, completing his second task on the last turn of the game. Adam!!!

Adam 66
Sam 60
Chris 48

Whew! It was over, and hadn't taken an age. But had we enjoyed it? Adam seemed to still be making up his mind. Chris said it scratched a similar itch as many other games, without outshining them. So far it's only me who seems to really like Lignum. Maybe I can convince someone else to give it a whirl...

At Adam's suggestion we followed up with an old favourite in Tsuro.

It's been ages since this game of confused dragons hit the table, and it was nice to revisit it. But it didn't last long - Chris and I (with some help from Adam) expired at the same time as we reeled off the board. Adam still had tiles to spend and space to spend them in...

Adam wins
Sam/Chris die simultaneously

And we finished with another game of agonising decisions in NMBR9, which has also been lesser-seen albeit for a shorter expanse of time. As with previous plays, the agonising was audible. I placed too much emphasis on getting a four, and waited too long to change plans. Adam stared at the table accusingly, like an angry owl. Chris sailed to victory.

Chris 99
Adam 79
Sam 75

It was so breezy after all the wood-carrying and pattern-forming that we breezed through again, and this time the agonising was mostly coming from Chris' direction, as he had a hole on level zero that compromised everything he built above it. I was hoping for a victory, but my much-improved score wasn't as much-improved as Adams:

Adam 99
Sam 97
Chris 71

And with that, we were done!

Tales from the Tepidarium

After a week in which Bristol staggered along, confused and angry, under a relentless sun like a deserter from the Foreign Legion fleeing across the Sahara, the regular Time Of Crisis cohort gathered this Friday (a year and a week since our first ever game!) with the promise of storms in the offing. If not in the sky, then surely on the table.

We began swiftly and almost silently, with Martin’s daughter still stirring upstairs. Joe started in his beloved Pannonia, me in Gallia, Martin in Macedonia and Ian in Africa.

Everyone except me (with three blue, two yellow) went for the classic opening of three blue, two red. Joe expanded into Thracia, me into Hispania, Martin into Asia and Ian leapt across the board and arrived in Britannia.

After this, Joe reinforced Thracia and built a Limes. I boosted support in Hispania (“Tapas for everyone!”) and built an army in Gallia. Martin and Ian both built a Basilica and hired a general.

A nomad wandered into Egypt, and Joe – with a hand of cards that was “somewhat blue-heavy,” as he put it – hired a governor, got voted into Egypt and paid tribute the nomad there. I boosted support in Gallia and hired a governor. I did not try to take another neutral province, deciding that would weaken the neutral Emperor in Rome and I’d just be leaving the door to the Senate open for someone else. This turned out to be a good move.

Martin was also blue-heavy, but was unsure of his chances against the neutral Emperor. He didn’t want to take a neutral province for the same reasons I didn’t, so he got himself voted into Joe’s Egypt instead. In all the excitement about Martin’s attack, we completely overlooked his decision to build an army there: the Legio XXII Primigenia. In many ways, this minor event was the defining move of Martin’s game, as shall become clear later.

Ian also postponed his attempt at becoming Emperor, instead he bought a new governor and got himself voted into neutral Galatia. The Emperor was now weakened! Could Joe capitalise?

But Joe had no blues in his hand. Martin was slightly incredulous. “Those are the cards you picked? Interesting,” he said in a tone of voice usually reserved for people who’ve decided to wear a suit with the jacket sleeves rolled up. Instead, Joe went to war. He built a brand new army and sent it into battle against a lone Frank. Alas, they (ie, Martin) rolled 6-6-3, rendering his Flanking Manoeuvre useless since his centurions were all dead anyway. We remarked that this must be the shortest lived army in Time Of Crisis history. Not so much “Veni, vedi, vici,” more “built, fought, died.”

I, however, did have some blues. I reinforced my spare army in Gallia, moved it into Rome and easily got voted in. I was the first Emperor at 8.43pm!

The heat of the kitchen was enough that Martin had had to go and get a fan from another room, which was enough to circulate the sticky air and give us a little respite. Which was more than the game was doing.

Martin had 6 blue and 3 red cards, but still looked doubtful about his chances in Rome. He was distracted by the potential points salad in Syria, currently home to three Sassanid hordes. And if that wasn’t enough, there was my very popular but undefended Hispania. He moved his XXIInd Legion across the Mediterranean and put them in Madrid. He needed four votes to unseat me and he used three blues. He failed, luckily for me.

Three more Sassanid hordes piled into Egypt, from where Martin had just moved his army. How we chuckled.

Ian beat Nomads in Egypt and built an army in Galatia before the next Crisis Roll brought yet more Sassanids into the game. “We’re going to run out at this rate,” exclaimed Martin.

Joe unseated Martin in Egypt and built an army there, tributing the Sassanids in the process.

I got a stroke of luck: I’d been dreading a rival leader being drawn from the event deck, and one happened right now. But it was Postumus who appeared rather foolishly in my heartland, Gallia. I killed him easily and then boosted support in Hispania up to 4, even though it fell right back down to 3 again thanks to the presence of Martin’s XXIInd Legion there. I figured it would still be strong enough to win an election. Martin insisted to Ian and Joe that I had to be stopped.

Now a Priest King arrived in Syria, along with its three Sassanid hordes and lone remaining neutral governor. This meant no one could chalk up any Emperor Turns on the scoretrack, which I wasn’t hugely bothered about since I already had two while everyone else had none.

Martin had two blue, two red and one yellow. He sent his XXIInd from Hispania into Gallia to attack me, but we drew with one hit each, so he failed. Ian, meanwhile, had three red and three blue. He had kind of an unproductive move and ended his turn with the complaint that he had “governors coming out of my arse.”

Joe beat the Sassanids in Egpyt, and hovered indecisively over whether or not to use a Flanking Manouevre to win by a greater margin for more points. “Are you going to bottle it?” Martin taunted. Joe would not be goaded and played safe. Then he tried to get voted into my very popular Hispania, but failed.

I foederatied a Frank and popped over the Channel to beat Ian’s army there and become governor too. Ian entered a slough of despond at this, but it was the right thing to do. I now had four provinces and was still Emperor. Martin insisted that I really needed to be stopped, like, right now.

He did his bit by taking his XXIInd Legion from Gallia, sending them South to Africa, picking up a Nomad, going back to Hispania and, using five dice, he successfully got four votes to become governor there.

More Sassanid hordes flooded into Egypt, obviously looking for their friends who’d gone there earlier.

Ian, in an understandable act of spite, put a mob in Britannia and boosted support and put a militia in Galatia.

Martin insisted I must be attacked, but Joe had troubles of his own. He attacked those newly arrived Sassanids, but lost 1-3. “Martin! I didn’t ask you to roll the dice!” he exclaimed, since this was now the second time he’d been on the wrong end of Martin’s capricious luck.

I cleared the mob in Britannia, hired a new general and, with nothing better to do with a spare blue point, I tried to get voted into Asia. I failed.

Martin and Joe bickered over whether I should be attacked in Britannia or Gallia. In the end, Martin chose Britannia and the XXIInd Legion had to move out again and head to new lands. They couldn’t defeat me (another 1-1 draw), though, and they were getting a bit of a reputation as a much-travelled but largely-useless band of soldiers. Martin got voted into Britannia, even though he lost it immediately, just to weaken me.

Despite the presence of the Priest King in (the still untouched) Syria, Ian had his eyes on the prize! He sent his army from Africa into Rome and defeated me, 3 hits to nil. He then just scraped into Rome, needing to avoid a double one, he rolled 5-1. A new emperor!

Martin was delighted at this result as I finally fell from grace, although he almost immediately expressed regret that I hadn’t done at least some damage to Ian’s army: A remarkably swift change in his loyalties.

Joe took Hispania from me and built an army there. He then beat the Sassanids in Egpyt 3-0. A good move, only slightly spoilt by the next Crisis Roll putting Zenobia into Egypt, clearly looking for the two previous bands of Sassanids who’d last been seen going this way and hadn’t been heard from since.

I got voted into Britannia but couldn’t win an election in Hispania. Then I repaired my armies and left Italia, retreating back into Gallia.

Martin looked fretful, with everywhere well defended. He decided to take on that rogue state, Syria. He moved his army from Asia, got voted in, and then killed the Priest King for a support boost there.

Now that Asia was undefended Emperor Ian got himself voted in. He killed a Goth horde in Galatia and then built an army in Africa and moved it into Egypt to attack Zenobia. But she hit back with a bunch of sixes while Ian couldn’t land a single hit. He didn’t care about the fate of his army, he just wanted her dead for the Emperor Turn on the scoretrack. She’s made of sterner stuff and we all remarked how she was our favourite rival leader in the game.

Ian pondered his next hand for a while, maintaining an anguished monologue while Joe discussed his next move. At this point the scores were Ian 44, Andrew 41, Joe 35, Martin 30.

Joe abandoned Egypt, not wanting to kill Zenobia since that would only help Ian. Instead he invaded Africa and beat Ian’s army there 3-2. Finally he boosted support in Egypt on the off chance it’d still be his when it was his next turn.

I reinforced an army on Gallia with it’s third legion and then foederatied another Frank before moving and attacking Ian in Rome. I lost 3-2. So I took the blue points that I was saving for the election in Rome and used them to get a governor into Asia. Not a happy move.

Martin took his XXIInd legion and sent them to Rome, picking up a Frank along the way. He attacked Ian and finally they came good! Thanks to me weakening them, I expect.

Martin became the evening’s third Emperor at 10.47pm. He was then voted into Egypt and moved an army from Syria into Egypt to attack Zenobia. Like Ian, he just needed her dead, just one hit: he rolled a one. He flinched visibly. He blamed the fold in the board for changing what was certainly going to be a three. However, instead of a glorious new Empire, he immediately lost Egpyt and got no Emperor Turn.

Ian attacked Sassanids in Syria, and then got voted in there. He also won an election in Asia, a region that seemed to change hands pretty frequently.

The scores were Ian 51, Andrew 45, Joe 42, Martin 38 when Joe went on a rampage. He beat Franks in Pannonia (four points!) and Nomads in Africa (three points!) and deposed Ian in Africa. He was on 55 points and took a long time choosing his next hand.

If I could score fifteen points, though, all that deliberation would be for nought, since the game would end with Ian and Joe wouldn’t get another turn. I attacked and killed Franks in Gallia, then killed Martin’s (by now) beloved XXIInd legion in Rome, although it was close. A noble end to a remarkable story. I become Emperor, and was voted into Asia, too.

However, the presence of Zenobia on the board knocked one point off my score for the round and I could only get fourteen points! I stalled at 59. Joe would have his chance. I looked at him and he took a sip of beer like someone already toasting his victory.

At this point, both Ian and Martin had three governors off the board. Martin only had Macedonia to his name and an army in Egypt. With 4 red, 3 blue and 1 useless yellow, he got voted into Egypt, and then into Asia (obviously). He simply had to kill Zenobia and finally did so, although she got in three hits as she fell, leaving Martin with just one legion in Egpyt.

Ian had been mumbling about his shit hand since he’d picked them and revealed 3 blue and 3 yellow. He got voted into Asia, because why not, and then boosted support in Syria. Now it was Joe’s turn.

Joe, who’d been suspiciously silent since I’d failed to end the game, now showed his hand of 8 red and 8 blue, including a Damnatio Memoriae and two (two!) Pretorian Guards. He moved his army from Pannonia into Rome and beat me 5-2. He became Emperor with a support level of five, so he damned my memory to the tune of five points. And that was just the start. He fought Nomads and Allamani and, all the while, sixes fell from his hands like pine needles from an aging Christmas tree. It was a move that, in total, got him 28 points, triggering the end of the game.

I had but little hope. I reinforced my army in Gallia with two more legions and then fought Joe in Rome. I won 5-1, but I still needed 7 votes with 5 blue points to become Emperor. I failed. I’m on 58, actually one point worse than I had when I ended my previous turn.

Martin, in distant last, had 6 red, 6 blue and another useless single yellow. “What can I do that’s fun,” he pondered. He took his previously immobile army from Macedonia, picked up a couple of barbarians along the way, and beat me in Rome. He then beat Joe in Egypt. With a Basilica, he had seven dice for seven votes to become Emperor. He did it! Finally, he got his Emperor Turn.

Ian had a formidable 11 red, 4 blue and 3 yellow selection of cards to end with. He was voted into Africa for the basilica there and we started to wonder if there was a way he could actually overtake Joe. Ian thought about his options and, in the end, went for the lass-safe but more-rewarding path. “Go big or go home,” said Martin. Considering the late hour, Ian replied that he’d go big and then go home.

He beat Sassanids for five points, but lost to Goths in Galatia. He did become Emperor for that all important Emperor Turn, putting him joint second with Martin and Joe. And, as a last delightful touch, he damned ex-Emperor Martin’s memory, knocking him even further back into last.

Joe 85
Ian 76
Andrew 68
Martin 52

Another astonishing game. My early promise dissipated, while Ian dug himself out of a hole mid-game. Joe’s quiet planning culminated in two blistering final turns that got him 43 points and a record high score. Only Martin never got a grip on the game, but at least he has the tale of the XXIInd legion to tell his grandchildren.

No thunderstorms outside, but inside we had a tempest big enough to tear a continent into four. Thanks all. It was special, as always.

Don't blame it on the sunshine

This week's GNN was a sparse affair, with neither the two planet system of Joe and Andrew present nor the orbiting moons of other, lesser-spotted gamers. It was so sparse we moved it to Wednesday to avoid it not happening at all, and come 7.30 there was just Martin, Ian and myself (Sam) sat at the table. Martin asked Stan if he was joining us, but he was happy wrestling a cushion by himself in the front room. I blame Fortnite.

After some brief rumination, and some scathing disdain from Martin over Lignum, we paradoxically started the evening with another tree-related game: Photosynthesis.

Rules-wise it's rather simple. Plant your seeds, grow them into saplings, then mature trees, then grand old redwood-style giants, before completing the cycle of life by degrading them into points. Each tree on the board potentially gets you light points, which are your currency to be spent doing the botanical doings you want to do. But there are a couple of catches - the first being that all your green-fingered activity doesn't actually get you any points - only ending a tree's life does, and doing so sacrifices your biggest light-earner. The other catch is that each tree casts shade - depending on what other trees are around you, and the position of the sun, even the biggest tree may collect no light points at all - something we all found to our chagrin at one point or another: no light points, no photosynthesis.

So whilst the rules are light, the implementation gave plenty of pause for thought, and Martin regularly cajoled Ian into taking his turn. I also cajoled Martin, but then it transpired it was my turn, so I had to cajole myself instead. Martin realised he'd spread his seed too much, and Ian and I managed to keep relatively straight faces.

After three cycles of the sun moving around the board, the game is over. My decision to recycle my big trees faster, but in the lower-return outside edges of the forest, worked out nicely. Martin blamed his defeat on buying "too many fucking seeds" and "this stupid tree".

Sam 80
Ian 70
Martin 69

The verdict was broadly positive, though we all agreed a second play would hopefully bring the play-time down, as we had sailed a little past 90 minutes.

Next up was the Shipwreck Arcana, the co-operative game of working out how to play the rules best so as to give out the most information. Andrew explained it better than I ever could here.

We began by forgetting some rules and restarted, but then sailed to victory in a reasonable degree of time, mostly thanks to Martin's unflappable cognitive power - for every card Ian and I scrutinised, he was computing at least three. In fact in the final round Martin did everything to identify Ian's fate, whilst I tried to figure out how to quieten the incessant buzzing of my fridge, which was becoming more interactive than Dirk. Turning it off and on again only worked for five minutes.

Shipwreck Arcana - we win! Mostly thanks to Martin.

My shipwreck arcana tiles, thematically scavenged from elsewhere

What next? The night was comparatively late, but not so late that we couldn't agree on a 45-minuter before finishing off with The Mind. With little debate, we settled on Azul, reasoning that we should mark its Spiel Des Jahres success with a play.

I began terribly, deciding to go for a twin strategy of columns and all-chewits. Neither worked - despite not being sat to the left of Martin, he still found ways to screw me over, and trying to fill the tricky bottom row early on in the rounds quickly proved a misguided notion. Martin and I both made a column quickly, but Martin had done it scoring more points, and placing two extra tiles. Ian bemoaned his "lack of a column" but was scoring more than me on the board, and held something of an ace up his sleeve.

In what proved to be the final round, both Martin and I were going for the black Axminster tiles and Ian picked two of them up, meaning not only did he trigger the end of the game, he'd also filled all his black tile spaces. Oh, and he got columns as well. Could he catch up with Martin? It couldn't have been closer!

Martin/Ian 69
Sam 46

A quick check of the rules left Martin appalled, as Ian won on the tie-breaker. I can't remember what it was now.

Ian 69
Martin 69
Sam 46

It could have been closer!

Ian's outrageous tile grab, round five

So, onto The Mind. By now the whisky and gin were flowing, and we were scattergun enough to crash on burn on level 2. Level two!! Pathetic. We dealt the cards again, and focused. This time things improved dramatically, with all of us seemingly reaching a point of near-telepathic communication. Ian seemed to be living two lives at the same time, staring intently at his cards with his id whilst his more trivial consciousness said aloud, apropos nothing, "Mmmmmmmm.... Thursday tomorrow" He remarked at one point that the buzzing of the fridge seemed to add to the tension. It did sound like some Aronofsky soundtrack.

We hit level 12 with two lives remaining. We lost a life on level 12. We completed level 12!

With a single life remaining, we turned to the Dark Mind - could we take our synchronicity and turn it into something bigger, greater as a sum than its component parts? No we could not. We crashed and burned on level one. Then we cheated and started again. Failed again. Then we cheated and started again. We did it! Then we failed on level 2, and by now even The Mind's greatest champions and most blatant cheaters had to take the hint.

Light Mind Level 12 - passed!
Dark Mind Level 1 - Failed!

A great night. Ian and Martin made their way home as I returned my attention to the fridge. Until next week!

Logging a Play

Monday. Unable to cajole any gamers to the house, and with Stan off to pastures new (music? pah) I decided to play through Lignum - the game of wood-drying!

Okay it's not just drying wood. There's loads of other stuff going on too, like chopping wood, carrying wood, selling wood, and finding a saw in the forest, with which you can saw wood.

The rather complex game was complexified still further by the fact the woodcarriers in the rulebook are green and the ones in the box were purple. The purple was very similar to the brown woodcutters, meaning it was easy to confuse them - especially in a forest as dark as this.

Your objective is to be the richest logger at the end of the game, and there are only two ways to make money - selling wood from your shop, and completing tasks, which could be thought of as orders from a remote customer. You can sell any wood you like, but you'll make more money off hardwood and you'll make more money if you hire a sawyer to mill it. And of course, you'll make more money if your wood is dry - the dryer the better.

The game plays rather like Wallenstein, only without the fighting/card reveals/cube tower. Over two years you head out into the forest and have three seasons to maximise your returns, before the onset of winter. When the snows arrive, not only are wood returns minimal at best, you also need to burn wood to stay warm (and eat food. But you don't worry about food in the other seasons, when I guess you're grazing the shrubs as you make your way through the forest)

In the forest then there's a path that all players make their way along. There are specific locations where you can hire the aforementioned cutters, carriers, and sawyers, and also places to claim a task for yourself, or do planned work, which will give you a juicy benefit in the future.

The reason you might skip over the planned work (and other spots) however is that you can go as far as you like along the path, and you might want to grab something further ahead. Taking your time can work, hoovering up what others have left behind, but it's less likely to prove successful than the 'strolling' tactic in Heaven and Ale, where you feel the pressure lift as everyone races off ahead of you and abandon the point-scoring opportunities in favour of triggering shed rewards. Why? Because Lignum is all about the planning. After everyone reaches the end of the path, all the woody stuff you collected can be activated - cutters cut, carriers carry, sawyers saw and your millworker - you only have one! - can do any one of these things, but only one. Your strolling along picking up leftovers might well blow up in your face at this point, as you find you have sawyers with no saws, carriers with no mode of transport (they can still carry, but far less effectively) or even cutters with nothing to cut!

The cutting is where Lignum gets a bit feisty. The forest that the path snakes around contains six cutting areas which grow a little more foresty over each season. At the start of each season players choose secretly which cutting area they're taking their woodcutters to, and if players choose the same area then turn order decides who cuts first - and that's another reason why strolling up the path could backfire, as if you're last to a cutting area you might find all that's left is some crappy pine.

You can pay a dollar to move your cutters to another area, but money in Lignum is exceedingly tight - as well as being the victory condition it's also - inevitably - required to hire workers and buy equipment during the game. And if winter comes and you're short of food or firewood, there are rather debilitating punishments as you're forced to pay top dollar to make up the shortfall.

The potential saviour in such a tight economy is the existence of crafts. In what is a bit of a thematic stretch, developing three crafts allows you to turn them into huts, which can function, essentially, as extra workers or speedy drying techniques. Because crafts are free to develop and workers are paid, this can be a boon - but on the other hand while you're casually picking up craft tokens in the forest, others might be grabbing other stuff you need!

I liked Lignum. It's maybe not a Tuesday night game - Martin would rather have needles in his eyes - but I'd be keen to revisit it some other night, perhaps with all of us wearing plaid. Outside of one or two thematic idiosyncrasies, it all makes sense and I found it less complicated to learn and play than its BGG rating. An initially dry-Euro impression gave way to a tension on the board that I can imagine would only increase with more players - watching wood dry was more fun than it sounded.