Crisis? What crisis?

The third evening in GNN’s accidental games weekend took place at Joe’s and saw a rematch of Joe, Martin, Ian and myself over a hot game of Time of Crisis.

Storm clouds brewing

We began at 7.40, and decided to roll two dice to see who would go first. We all rolled eights. Clearly the omens for an evening of peculiar rolls were strong. Joe set off on his audacious new plan of trashing a card on his first go. It looked like being a mistake as his army-less Pallonia swiftly fell to an invasion from Ian and his early options were limited.

Martin began in Africa again, and clearly was making preparations for a pretender empire. I had a lot on my plate as I began in Syria again and the previously docile Sassanids were suddenly very active.

Of course, the benefit of barbarians is that, should you beat them, you get a lot of points. I had some luck with my dice, so I was able to keep knocking them back. But the real lucky dice belonged to Joe who became Emperor of Rome by getting three votes with just one die: a six, another six and then a four. People kept saying how audacious it was, but the audacity and historical importance seemed to be lost on Joe’s family who continued to drift in and out of the kitchen as if nothing had happened.

Ian fretted as he was now a firm last place with no clear path to victory. Or even to a respectable third.

The other notable event was the large number of notable events: that is to say we kept rolling sevens on the crises rolls, meaning that a new card was turned over from the event deck. We were worried that our game would be curtailed too soon because when that deck is exhausted, the game ends.

However, the sevens seemed to peter out and the game continued as normal. Joe, by now, had his feet firmly under the table at the Senate but he had to deal with mobs and his shrinking number of provinces. Martin set himself up as a Pretender in Egypt, thus robbing the Emperor of even more of the benefits.

But that ruined my plans, too, as I wanted to be Emperor and with a Pretender on the board, there isn’t much point. So I steamed across the Mediterranean and attacked him in return for Joe placating the hordes of barbarians in Syria with his Tribute card. This plan was carefully worked out between us while Martin was on the toilet. I reckon real politics is very similar.

Ian was now rock solid in Eastern Europe and had been picking up points by invading the barbarian regions when he revealed a hand containing nothing but fifteen red action points, with a card that allowed him to use them for electioneering purposes. He became Emperor of Rome and then had an epic battle against some barbarians whose exploding sixes whittled his four-legion army down to one wounded (but victorious) legion.

Martin’s game was very swingy. He went from Pretender to real Emperor and then fell right back to only having one province. As the game drew to an end, Martin had an eye on Rome and Spain and he had twelve dice to do it with. He needed six votes in both and, amazingly, he got five each time. Not a single six in any of the twelve dice he rolled. His hopes of a last minute boost up the score track were dashed.

By now Joe’s lead was insurmountable: he’d already passed the 60 point mark and all he had to do on his go was become Emperor and the game would end.

As it happened, Joe rolled a seven, turned over an event card and it was the Diocletian card and the game ended anyway. Joe had won, and in some style. He wasn’t convinced by his opening tactic despite it ending in victory. I might try it, though.

Joe 68
Ian 54
Martin 48
Andrew 42

All told, it took about four hours, as we ended at around half eleven. Totally worth it, and each one of us had at least one moment when our plans worked perfectly, along with the many moments when they didn’t.

But we hadn’t finished the whisky that Joe had generously poured us, so we ended on Kribbeln.

I rolled twenties early on, Ian picked up eleven points in round two alone but it was mostly Joe and Martin in their dice-rolling pomp. Das Exclusive deserves such displays of luck as the two locked horns. They couldn’t unlock them again by the end, though, and the tie-breaker couldn’t separate them.

Joe 26
Martin 26
Ian 17
Andrew 13

What a night, ending at 24 o’clock according to Joe’s oven. Cheers all.