Wednesday 20 December 2017

As always, Azul ways

Tuesday. The most frequent blog writers being unavailable I asked the question "Who is
blogging tonight?" and thus it fell to me, Ian, to cast some words to page to record the
events in perpetuity. They say pictures are worth a thousand words, but as I didn't take any
this will have to do.

Seven of us convened at Hannah and Adam's. After some discussion regarding Christmas
travel plans we split into two groups. Katy, Adam and Joe were to play Yokohama. Hannah,
Andy, Martin and I opted for Flamme Rouge, with the Peloton expansion that Andy had
picked up earlier in the day.

The Peloton expansion seems to add a couple of new terrain types - cobblestones and a
refreshment area. Cobblestones act in a similar way to mountains as they prevents slip
streaming. Unlike mountains they don't have a speed penalty, but they create a possible
choke point as they are only one space wide in places. The refreshment areas acts in a
similar way to a downhill section, every card being worth four in speed.
Despite Martin attempting an early break away, it was ultimately Hannah who crossed the
line first and claimed victory.

Hannah Wins
Martin, Ian and Andy do not.


We then played Squirrel Or Die. Hannah received this game as part of the secret Santa last
week. It's a realistic approximation of the struggles a squirrel faces in it’s existence.
Essentially, there are a series of cards that either have FOOD or DEATH on them. We
spend the first half of the game placing the cards face down in a grid, trying to remember
where we placed the FOOD or DEATH. The second half we pick up the cards and receive
either FOOD or DEATH. Pick up three DEATH cards and your squirrel dies.
Of course, I forgot what card I placed where almost instantly, and so picked up cards semi-
randomly.

One by one we squirrels succumbed to the DEATH cards. In this game, as in the
Christopher Lambert-starring film Highlander, there can be only one (winner). And that
winner was Hannah.

Hannah wins
Martin, Ian and Andy do not.


Yokohama was still in full swing, so we four set up Azul. Whilst the game was being set up
Katy responded to a sentence I can't quite recall with the innocuous phrase "As always!" I
queried if this was some sort of pun based on "Azul ways". I can't recall if Katy claimed this
as a witty intentional pun or not, but either way it gave me a blog title.

I think Azul has been documented before on this blog by better writers than I, so I won't
describe the tricksy wall-tiling game, but it was a close outcome. I steadily scored points throughout, but Martin scored more points from bonuses at the end and won. Final scores
were:

Martin 78
Ian 76
Andy 62
Hannah 45


By this point Yokohama had finished. Despite Katy's certainty that Adam would win it proved
not to be the case, but there was a notion bandied about that Adam had let Katy win to
ensure that she would play again. Joe didn't seem convinced by this idea, and described
Katy's performance as a "masterclass". However they came about, the final scores were:

Katy - 144
Adam - 122
Joe - 89


Hannah retired for the evening, and the rest of us joined together for a final game, a bit like
how those robot lions in Voltron join together to form a giant robot for a climactic battle. And
that game was Auf Teufel Komm Raus. Some disastrous bids saw Katy and Myself lose all
our money in the very first round.

Alas; my notes for this game are even more scant than for the previous games of the
evening so detail is entirely lacking, but I do recall Katy, after going bust, turning over coals
to see how many devil's remained, despite Martin still waiting for his turn, leading to a cry of
"No Katy!"

The game ended early, with Andy's break for victory falling just short, but we decided it was
close enough, and late enough, for it to be a victory.

Andy - 1580
Ian - 1480
Martin - 950
Joe - 950
Adam - 650
Katy - 650


And thus ended the final Tuesday Games Night before Christmas 2017.
Thanks to Hannah and Adam for hosting this evening. As it's the last Tuesday games I'll
make this year I'd like to say thanks to everyone for the all the fun over the past year. Let's
do it again next year!

No comments:

Post a Comment