Friday 30 September 2016

Feld of Dreams

Thursday rolled around with seven-day inevitability, like the next phase of the moon. And Andrew and I debated what to play... we both felt a bit Euro-y, so straight-up combat was out. I suggested La Granja, but Andrew didn't bite. Maybe that's too Euro-y... instead we went for our perennial two-player favourite, Macao.

Many Feld fans seem to think this is his dud, but I like the fact that - unlike Castles of Burgundy, say - the theme is tangible. I like the way it combines that dry engine-building stuff with the chance-based dice wheel - which admittedly isn't remotely thematic, but I suppose you could argue it represents fate - the best-laid plans, and all that...

In this instance I didn't really have a plan. As usual I played by the seat of my pants, especially at the start where Andrew was choosing his cards before me. I took cards that were easy to activate - specfically, cards that allowed me to trade in violet, green and grey cubes for gold. But the seat of my pants wore pretty thin as for the second half of the game I was picking up mostly blue and red cubes, meaning my activated cards did nothing except stand around and watch me flail.


thanks to As a Board Gamer

In contrast Andrew had built some kind of Heath-Robinson Macao machine, where cards triggered cards and he seemed awash in cubes and money. Despite my nabbing the first player spot and, at one point, building a 12 point lead, Andrew surged past me during the 11th round, and surged again in end-game scoring, courtesy of a long chain of ownership in the city. I didn't jot down the scores, but it was something like

Andrew 85
Sam 65

We didn't debate the next game for long - Take It Easy is another fave and, abandoning the recent meme of calling themes, we returned to the rhyming couplets of old. Andrew was far more creative in this regard, although I can't recall too many specific calls Bertie Mee was definitely involved. I found myself unable to break away from the fact that 'four' rhymes with 'door' so a third of my calls involved visitors knocking or pressing bells.

I began with a decent 167 and followed it up with 154 to give me a solid score, but Andrew's first round deficit was obliterated by his best round ever of 204 (I think) and he claimed the win:

Andrew 356
Sam 321

And as Finn was finally dislodged from Andrew's lap, we called it a night.

1 comment:

  1. Macao was great, as Macao usually is. I started by copying Sam's previous winning tactic, and picking up cards that were hard to fulfill but useful instead of cheap office cards. It was a bit touch and go, but it worked in the end.

    No idea how I did so well on Take It Easy, though. I just did what I always do.

    ReplyDelete