Monday 28 February 2011

Report from the Popular Front

Andrew and I managed to sit across a table from each other on Friday and play a game of Popular Front, my impulse buy from StabCom based somewhat erroneously on the lovely graphics. One good thing about Fascism, it does inspire the artist within.

Anyway having spent much of Friday bigging the game up to Joe - who was unconvinced - I was hoping it would live up to my optimistic billing. I took on the role of socialists and anarchists trying to unseat Andrew's Franco-supporting Carlists and company as we reenacted Spain's bloody civil war using little wooden discs and the aforementioned pretty cards.

The first part of the game is placement of military units across the cities of Spain, a canny affair as we tried to make sure none of our troops were isolated and we occupied some of the larger cities - one way to win being total occupation of the six largest cities, the other being a slow war of attrition and political manoevering. Then the fun really began - the fun in this case being a sequence of card-playing to strengthen your cities, attack your opponents', and play for political strength. Still new to the game, were only just coming to terms with how it all worked when the game ended, as I stormed Vitoria to free the Iberian peninsula from Andrew's heartless grip, gaining control of the six cities.

So a rather short version of the game and there's probably more to it. Upsides I think were the surprisingly tense army-placement section at the start, and quick game-play. Downsides were the feeling that the card-playing section - the main body of the game - might end up feeling repetitive in a longer game, and that military battles often seemed to end in a stalemate. We both felt there was enough evidence there for another crack, perhaps with four or six players (as two teams) as the game seemed designed with that in mind.

One final thing, would it be too much to design a board that lies flat instead of popping up all over the place like a restless concertina?

Thursday 24 February 2011

The Pink Lizard Face-off

A five-header tonight, comprising Johnny (a welcome back from paternity duties), Adam, Andrew and Joe, with Sam hosting. Since Popular Front and Mikerinos, Sam's two as yet unplayed games, could only do 4 or 6 players, we plumped for Ra as a non-evening-filling game. And a fairly tense Ra at that — two of the three epoch's ending in a bust, first for Joe, third for Adam.
In the end it was a tie between Adam and Andrew with 29 each, Sam a close second (third?) with 27. Had I not asked what the rules said about ties it would have stayed that way, but I did, and Andrew reluctantly announced that, according to the good Dr Knizia, ties are settled in favour of the player with the highest sun. Which was Adam. So final placings were Adam first, Andrew second, then Sam, Joe and Johnny (very big drop-off after Sam).

It wasn't even 10pm, so we moved on to Coloretto, a decent little card game with some push-your- luck similarities to Ra, but no bidding. Andrew, Sam and I had all played two-player games before, but 5 player was new to all of us. First game was the scene of the pink lizard face-off between Johnny and Andrew (I think), but in the end was a tie between Adam and Sam with 25 — Andrew (chief rule-checker) checked the rules, which contained no specifics for tie-breaking.
We played again, and Johnny, who'd placed fifth in the first game, came first with a storming 27 points. Sam came second with 25 points again, and I didn't write down the rest of the scores. But I think I might have lost.
I like Coloretto — I've had it for ages and it's grown on me. I don't love the artwork, and given that it has no theme, playing a regular card game with normal playing cards would feel that little bit more serious and grown-up somehow. But it's very clever, a good balance of luck vs strategy. A nice way to round off the evening, that little bit quieter than Perudo. And that's important when you're in your forties, as three of us are now.
The leaderboard...

PlayedPointsRatio
Adam842.55.31
Joe935.53.94
Andrew10333.3
Sam5244.8
Quentin5204
Hannah311.53.8
Johnny122

Wednesday 16 February 2011

Caylus Whispers

After last week’s no show due to illness or other engagements, this week saw just two gamers huddled for companionship around a table. Caylus was chosen since it works best as a two-player game, and the stinky dog added an authentic medieval open-sewer atmosphere to the proceedings later in the game. I was still feeling the last lingering effects of my flu, so I forsook my usual beer and crisps in favour of hot sake and jaffa cakes.

I made the early running, but Joe was never too far behind, preferring to bide his time before his coup de grace: in the closing stages he moved the provost forwards so as to bring an abrupt end to the game, like slamming the piano lid down on the fingers of the still-playing pianist. And then he built Jesus for 25 victory points. The game ended Joe 101, Andrew 92

We then ended on Forbidden Island, which is basically Pandemic for kids. Grab the treasure from the slowly flooding island and get back to the helicopter pad to escape. Nice and short and quite tense towards the end.

The leaderboard...

PlayedPointsRatio
Adam736.55.22
Joe832.54.06
Andrew9283.11
Sam4205
Quentin5204
Hannah311.53.8

Wednesday 2 February 2011

Return to Stockport

Last night, Sam was designated host at his new house. However, at just past 7pm, unforeseen circumstances and general needing-a-rest lead him to cry off, and games night was hastily relocated to Joe's — a triumvirate of Adam, Andrew and me.
Despite my best efforts to force Thunderstone on them (Adam balked at the words "Attack +4" on one of the cards, and to be sure, it is a shameless uber-nerdy dungeon-crawler), there was really only one option for the three of us — a return to 19th century Lancashire in the company of Mr Wallace. But only after we'd got Age of Steam out of the box, and gazed at the Ireland map for a couple of minutes.
I always have a bit of anxiety when choosing a long game —its a whole evening committed, and there's always the sneaking feeling that the choice might be a poor one. A few moments into Brass, though, and it fit us like a comfortable pair of slippers; slippers with sleepy scorpions curled up in the toes.
Adam has been honing his skills online, and was clearly focussed from the start, taking a couple of loans back-to-back, and instantaneously catapulting himself back into profit. Andrew and I were a bit rusty, and feeling our way, but the canal phase ended closely, with Andrew and Adam tied, me lagging a couple of points behind.
The rail phase seemed fairly evenly contested, but Adam came out streets ahead in the end, with something like 190 points, me in second with 160 odd, Andrew 140-ish; something like that, anyway. Andrew and I might have been closer together actually . . .
It was an unusual game in that there was almost no coal and iron on the map throughout — we all tended to build to refill the demand track, rather than taking free resources. And it wasn't too brutal; there was a little tit-for-tat overbuilding, but as is often the case with three, there was enough room for everybody to stretch out, though as Adam noted, the fact that no-one touched their shipyards made the centre of the board quite congested. There was a tense moment for Andrew when he had to take a chance on the distant market; it had bottomed out on me in the canal phase, but he just managed it.
It was a good three and a half hours from start to finish, but lots of fun. Brass is a good 'un — I don't enjoy long-term planning in games, and it does allow for quick-thinking on the fly.
Most pleasant. And we must induct Sam into the Brass experience — four-player is definitely the way to do it.

The leaderboard...

PlayedPointsRatio
Adam736.55.22
Joe7284
Andrew824.53.06
Sam4205
Quentin5204
Hannah311.53.8