Animal Night Rate

Andrew wended his way to my door on Sunday with A Feast for Odin set up and ready to go. We have both been intrigued by this game - me after a solo play-through that left me initially bemused, followed by several plays of experimentation - whereas Andrew won his first game convincingly. We were eager to play again, and sat down just after half seven to play the 'long' game of seven rounds.

Viking water-cooler

As previously posted, Odin sees you place workers (Agricola), while also juggling tile placement  (Patchwork). Andrew seemed intent on trying new things this time, and even explored - a first in any of the games I've played, as it give you more spaces to fill and hence the risk of more negative points.

Andrew in Iceland, again

I took a leaf out of Andrew's book in the previous game and went whaling, whilst also nodding to Steve's tactic of shearing sheep and turning wool into blue stuff. In fact both of us embarked on animal business that set something of a pattern for the evening... We both emigrated near the end of the game, too, but come the count-up Andrews experimentation counted against him somewhat (though he still improved on his previous score):

Sam 103
Andrew  77

And the time was only 9pm!!!

There was still time to bash out three short games, so we did. First I introduced Andrew to Hounded, which Stanley and I like a lot, but has yet to win over anyone else. The fox (Andrew's) task was to skip around the board, avoiding the attentions of the Master of Hounds and his dogs (all me). He can win by outlasting the hunters: either turning over the three time tiles, or 42 tiles in total. I can win by catching him. My previous experience told as Andrew found himself blockaded into a corner...

Sam (hunter) wins
Andrew (fox) dies

me, with my dogs

Sticking with the animal theme, we bashed out an old-timer from GNN in Hey That's My Fish, which Andrew took the win at:

Andrew 52
Sam 46

It was only 9.30 so, with a bit of taunting, I managed to get Andrew to stay for long enough to play one of our favourites - Take It Easy. Andrew called books he read as a boy, whereas I called footballers I have played with and interesting/uninteresting facts about them. Andrew kindly suggested I could open a bespoke bingo hall, as yet another nugget of near-forgotten info from the late nineties about people he never knew assailed his brain. It didn't put him off his game though:

Andrew 318
Sam 315

A fun evening came to a close. I'm eager to play Odin again too. It still grows on me...