Wednesday 26 June 2013

Snow Exit

We had thought that Tuesday would be a wash-out, but at the last minute, Joe was able to attend. And Will said he thought he could make it, but in the end he had to cancel. That makes it official! Leaderboard, here we come!

We put current favourites, A Castle For All Seasons on the table, and talked Joe through the rules, even realising that we’d got a couple of rules wrong. When we started, Joe seemed to grasp the rules pretty quickly. Quicker than Sam, who suffered from Explainer’s Curse: the terrible affliction that means that the person who taught the rules always does badly.


I capitalised, putting my men in places that Sam was aiming for. He never got a chain of production going, and ended the game in a humble third.

Andrew 75
Joe 60
Sam 33

After this we tried another new game that Joe had brought along. Snow Tails looked like a fun card-based racing game where you guide your husky-powered sled along the unforgiving frozen track to the finish line. It was enjoyable, but the rule book was vague about “drifting” (the method used to go from one lane to the next). We muddled through in a way we thought was logical. And we couldn’t help but notice that the person who started first finished first, etc. We did wonder if that might be a flaw in the game: whoever starts, wins.


But it looks nice, and the modular nature of the tracks means that plenty of different routes are available. And at just £2.50 from a charity shop, I’d say Joe did well.

1st Joe
2nd Andrew
3rd Sam

By now, Sam was hurting from two last places in a row. He suggested a third game, San Juan. It was certainly not one of my strong suits, but Joe’s recent practice on his iPhone clearly paid off. While Sam dashed to the 12 building limit to cash in on his violet building multiplier, Joe had the Palace and a couple of monuments lying around, giving him another victory.

Joe 30
Sam 27
Andrew23


Sam thought we could squeeze in one more game, despite Joe’s better judgement. And so we played Biblios. Joe says he’s never won, and he managed to keep his spotless record intact. Meanwhile, my brief taste of glory at Biblios has not lasted. I got far too many dice cards early on, before I’d even begun picking up colours. Sam, meanwhile, was very much Mr Biblios. Seemingly having cards to spare during the auction round. How does he do it?

Sam 8
Joe 6
Andrew 0

Meanwhile, on the form table, Joe makes his bid for glory at just the right moment. Can he keep this up until the end of Thursday? The heat is on!







Points
Joe 2 1 1 2 1 7
Steve1 2 1 1 3 8
Anja2 3 1 13 10
Andrew3 3 2 1 2 11
Sam1 2 3 3 3 12
Jon2 1 2 3 513
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

3 comments:

  1. I really liked Castle, though it seems we may have mis-played another rule - when multiple people play the trader, everyone collects resources only once. Which makes sense, otherwise the first player would get a big advantage on the first turn. But it's brilliantly concise - very keen to play again.

    Not so sure about Snow Tails. Lets see what it does in the next maths trade.

    Lovely evening though, thanks guys.

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  2. I think A Castle for All Seasons might be a top ten game for me. And I say that after an absolute pasting at the hands of Messrs Berger and Endersby. Although I found the real rules slightly harder to manage than mine and Andrew's inadvertently invented ones, it's still a definite keeper. And I'm going to make a player aid that actually shows the card turn order AND what the cards do - the player aids I found on BGG, whilst very helpful, don't align card order with card function, but split em up...

    Anyways. Playing San Juan has made me want to play Puerto Rico again now, and Biblios - now The Most Played Game on GNN - is always a pleasure. Thank you gentlemen.

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  3. and it's less than a year since we first played Biblios! 22nd July it was, when Andrew was seemingly underwhelmed on a first play.

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