However a promise was all it remained, as having been to Plymouth and back on a job-hunting mission, I was too tired to take on, let alone learn, a Wallace epic. So apologies to Joe and Adam for being a bit of a damp squib in that department. The saga continues... not a par with the Forsythes perhaps, or the Ross/Rachel odyssey of Friends, but I do what I can.
Nonetheless there was still drama to be had. Joe and Adam were interested in trying The League of Six, so that's what we started with. Joe's eagle eye for mechanics spotted that we'd played something slightly wrong last week - not a game-changer, but the player turn re-ordering is decided according to the amount of guards used, rather than horses gathered (the horses still determine turn order on delivering goods). Having been burnt by a multiplier-strategy last week, I was much more cautious in my choice of where to deliver goods. But after a crazy opening where three of the best tiles were flipped over on the towns of Lusatia, Joe remembered that he had several of the tiles in his bag as I'd somehow left them here last week. They were shuffled into the pack and the subsequent 5 rounds were much tighter.
Real tax collectors eat Pringles
Joe 79
Sam 70
Adam 68
I once again enjoyed this game. It is fairly abstract, but it has lots of canny little things about bidding and player order that I like. Adam seemed less enamoured, saying he wasn't sure he understood it. Phew! Imagine if he had.
Next up was Airlines Europe, making it's second bow in Bristol after a debut some months ago now, so long back we needed a heavy rules refresher. For those unfamiliar with it, players buy shares in different airlines (in Europe) and spend money developing those airlines. Nobody runs any of the companies though, so there's an element of suspense as you often don't know if your shares in a particular airline are about to become the minority share, an action that led to a fair amount of cursing and name-calling on this occasion, though it was all allegedly in good heart.
You can't play it without doing this
It's a fun game, but as we noted last night, very different to it's perceived predecessor Ticket to Ride in terms of mechanic and scoring, despite other visual and card-managing similarities. Despite some little bursts of AP, it moved along fairly swiftly and turned out to be a game of fine margins. Adam's decision to keep pace with me on the Abacus Airlines turning out to be oh-so-Hillmannesque and decisive, as the four points he took for sharing first place in shares on them pushed him into first place over all. My four point 'loss' shunted me back behind Joe, who had regrets of his own about how he could have won.
Adam 87
Joe 83
Sam 82
It's a curious game, clever, and nice to look at, but a little dry and distant at the same time. I'm keen to play it again but I'm not sure it's going to be one of my favourites.
On the form table it's as you were positionally, though Adam tightens his grip on top spot. Joe remains in 5th, but he's poised to leap higher next week with a couple of half-decent results, as that irksome 5 will drop off the table (and potentially the 4 too). It's an interesting quirk of the form table that picking up a leaden 5 (as Joe, Anja and myself have all done early in the season) means you need a couple of weeks to shake it off. But having done so you can make a formidable leap upwards...
| Points | ||||||
| Adam | 1 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 9 |
| Sam | 3 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 10 |
| Andrew | 2 | 4 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 12 |
| Anja | 5 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 2 | 12 |
| Joe | 2 | 1 | 4 | 5 | 1 | 13 |
| Steve | 3 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 18 |
Lots of fun, thanks chaps.
You turned down a game of Brass? For shame! And how could you tease me with that opening paragraph? I was all set to read your first experiences with Wallace and his magic iron. But kudos for fitting two (as I recall) fairly heavyweight games into one evening.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the report Sam. I wasn't keen on League of Six - it seemed like a collection of mechanics searching for a theme. Maybe a little less complexity would make it flow better.
ReplyDeleteI liked Airlines Europe more this time than last. But the winning margin seemed very small and all very dependent on when the final scoring card came out of the deck. One card later and Joe or Sam could have swung the score back their way.
I think I prefer to know when the end is coming (in this and in Alhambra) as stress is a very real problem in this day and age.
I agree Adam it's not the most fluent of games. But I think you'd enjoy it more second time around... I'm not the best articulator of rules so you were sort of learning in-game as it were. And I think it's a more interesting game with four players as well.
ReplyDeleteSorry about Brass Andrew. At seven I felt exhausted, though I picked up later in the day. On the bright side, I got the job, and hopefully you'll be there when I finally succumb to Brass.
(on the down side, the job may prevent me from attending games night.... meh. Will have to do what I can about that.)
ReplyDeleteCongrats on the job Sam!
ReplyDeleteThat lesson Joe taught you in the first game is quite a classic!
I've got a report from Monday to type up. I left the scores at home, so it will have to wait until tonight.
It's one of his best, along with 'tailoring your family and farm developments to be in starting player order and with the right resources to take advantages of the final rounds in Agricola'
ReplyDeleteThanks for the write-up Sam. I'll keep this brief because I'm on my phone and it may not upload, which would be annoying.
ReplyDeleteI liked League, though it was confusing enough with three; can't imagine how you would plan ahead with five. It does seem unnecessarily complex, what with the horses, the hex tiles and the places to put goods that change each round. A solid 6, maybe?
Airlines was good with three, I thought. It feels slow, though - the final scorecard seems unnecessary I agree - surely just playing to the end of the deck would be better.
It also feels like the money doesn't quite work - very often you run out just as you need a particular card, which will inevitably be gone before you get the chance again. In lots of games that tension is part of the fun, in Airlines it feels frustrating.
I think the comparison to Alhambra is good - though Alhambra flows a lot more smoothly. I remain intrigued by stock manipulation games, and so would like to play this again. Perhaps it will speed up with more play - it did seem to get quicker as we went along, as you observed, Sam.
I'm sure when you do eventually play Brass you'll be pleasantly surprised, Sam; complexity-wise it's a notch or two above Tinners, but each turn is very straightforward, no phases. It's a game of spotting opportunities, which may make it daunting to the new player, but there's no grand strategising. Perhaps you and I should book in a friendly two-player for you to get the rules down...
Not that brief, in the end!
ReplyDeleteHa! Well I think Anja enjoyed League of Six, so maybe it'll get played at some stage again. I agree it's not particularly intuitive, but there are some really nice things about it.
ReplyDeleteIf the final scorecard in Airlines was the last card I would definitely have played the last few rounds differently. I dunno if it would have helped my position but it would definitely have helped my score. I was too nervous of the scorecard arriving to commit to any moves that took more than one or two turns.
Brass: let's play it next time we're three or four then. I can't go on like this any longer!
League of Six scoring about 5 or 6 feels about right - I didn't hate it, but there are a lot of games I'd rather play...
ReplyDeleteWe'll hold you to that Brass promise Sam. Some day.
It came sooner rather than later, didn't it?
ReplyDelete