Thursday 27 June 2013

Brand New Worlds

Due to Jon’s new job taking away his reason to visit Bristol, this games night was to be the last featuring our forest friend for a while. And it began in a slightly awkward manner, with everyone bringing four-player games for a five-player evening. In the end, we plumped for the only workable option: a three-player and a two-player game.

Anja, Jon and I went for Village. Steve and Sam chose A Castle For All Seasons, both designed by Inka and Markus Brand. Jon explained the rules to Anja in his rich, baritone voice that rang out across the room and caused Steve to complain, since he couldn’t hear Sam’s less theatrical explanation of their game.

Once we got started, I decided to go for the very option that Jon had highlighted as being a bad idea: travelling. It meant I was behind on the Town Hall and the Church, but I got all cities and I managed to get five meeples into the history books, for the maximum bonus, so I thought maybe I was in with a shout.

Anja and Jon went for very similar tactics, filling up the church and town hall and going to the market. Despite it being Anja’s first game, and having to deal with a baby, she seemed to take to it very quickly. Jon, the most experienced played of the three of us, played quickly and efficiently, complete with a gleeful running commentary whenever he killed someone off.


In the end, it was close. It could hardly have been closer. Anja thought she’d won by a single point, but Jon’s one gold coin was enough to force a draw. And my travelling tactic wasn’t far behind.

Anja 53
Jon 53
Andrew 51

An exciting game, and good to get it onto the table again.

Meanwhile, elsewhere in the room, Sam and Steve played half of an aborted game of Castle For All Seasons, and then one which they saw through to the end.


Sam 95
Steve 86

Then, since Village was still in full flow, Steve organised some dessert for us all, consisting of fruits, jelly, ice cream and cream. A lovely touch. And then they played Biblios (not designed by Inka and Marcus Brand). Sam explained the rules to Steve, and then took him to the cleaners.

Sam 10
Steve 3

And all that’s left is to tot up the final scores. The Form Table isn’t much different from when we last saw it, which gives Joe the title for this season!







Points
Joe 2 1 1 2 1 7
Steve1 2 1 1 3 8
Anja1 2 3 1 1 8
Jon1 2 1 2 3 9
Andrew2 3 3 2 1 11
Sam1 2 3 3 3 12
Adam 2 2 1 5 3 13
Quentin2 23 5518
Hannah3 4 4 5 2 18
Martha1 5 5 5521
Will3 3 5 5 5 21
Bea4 5 5 5524

On the division, we see the honours shared around in a very open and friendly way. Sam takes most Points, Anja wins comfortably on Points Ratio, while Adam’s win on the Olympic style leaderboard is a commanding one. Meanwhile, Paul takes the Bracknell crown, just squeezing past Chris on points and Points Ratio. There is the small matter of the two-player leaderboard still to be calculated, but I’ll put that up later. I think Sam’s won it, though.


EDIT: And the scores from the two-player division are in! I said I thought Sam had won, and he did, but it was much closer than I'd expected. Thanks to Chris being good at Agricola, he boosted his Points Ratio and almost stole the Points title, too. I've also added Dirk to the table, just to celebrate his unlikely win and, anyway, he's practically part of the gang, isn't he?


And with that, we bring this season to a close. We wish Jon all the best in his new job, and hope he can find his way back soon. In the meantime, let’s all rejoice in our shared victory of a love of board games. God Bless The Queen! Huzzah!

9 comments:

  1. Hooray!
    Sad to have missed this lovely-sounding evening, and good luck with your new job Jon - we'll have to organise another weekend away soon.

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  2. Thanks to our generous hosts! Strawberries and ice cream as a filler between games is a winner.

    Congratulations to Anja - Queen of the Ratio - and Adam - King of the Olympico. Can we get that 2-player leaderboard done so I can (possibly) congratulate myself?

    Thanks especially to Andrew for the write-ups and maths. Roll on next season!

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  3. The Two-player division is up. Well done Sam and Chris! Nice to see another name on the list of triumph. It's my dream that one season we end up with more winners than losers.

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  4. Dirk never brings snacks.
    Can i log my 2 player sessions with Henry from now on? The shame of not appearing on a leaderboard when there are fictitious proxies on it is too much to bear.
    Mind you I don't think Dirk's ever beaten me - there's that at least.
    Well done Sam and Chris, and as ever, huge props to Andrew for all his write-ups and leaderboard compiling.

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  5. Dirk is a jerk. I can't understand how in the main table I was down one win to Paul but much better seconds and his ratio is better than mine!

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  6. It all depends on the length of the game. You win a longer game (according to BGG) then you get more points.

    The system is:

    The player who comes first gets a point, and the person who comes last gets zero. Then anyone in the middle gets a decimal, according to how well they did. E.g., If it's close at the top, it could be 1 pt, 0.8 pts, 0.7 pts, 0 pts. This was Adam's idea, and he knows all about spreadsheets.

    Then, these numbers are multiplied by the number of players, and also by the length (in hours) according to board game geek.

    Then, every gets one point added on. This way, whoever came last wins one point.

    So, using the examples above, those four players playing a ninety minute game would get: 7 pts, 5.8 pts, 5.2 pts, 1 point.

    This gives us a system where big wins on long games is very important. Paul's win on Tikal was enough to edge him past you.

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  7. And I'd welcome the Joe/Henry axis onto the Two-player leaderboard.

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  8. A perfect explanation! Cheers :)

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  9. That system - which I don't pretend to understand completely - at least makes sense of the fact that despite winning ELEVEN out of THIRTEEN games, I'm still second on points ratio behind Ker-ris. What the hell!? I'm not doing this for fun, ya know

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