It must be LoV

Tuesday evenings are our weekly helping of jollity and humour, but it's also a chance to show off our tactical nous and this week saw a number of devilish moves that any strategist would be proud of.

At the start, there were six of us. Joe the host, Sam, Martin, Katy, Matt and me. Ian was expected later. The presence of Matt W prompted a little discussion about what happened to the other two Matts and some other fleeting visitors, and we considered the possibility that perhaps we aren't as much fun to be with as we think we are.

But we pushed such negativity aside and set up a six player game to occupy us until Ian arrived. We chose Auf Teuful Komm Raus as a jolly push-your-luck game.

Instead it was luck that pushed us around. Devil after devil came out in round one, much to everyone's surprise. We had to keep assuring Matt (playing his first game) that it really wasn't like this usually. Round one ended with five of us occupying the lowest space on the score track. A shocking situation. The one player who wasn't stoney broke was Matt, whose inexperience actually helped, since he didn't bid absurdly high.

Early Devils

We slowly dragged ourselves up the score track, with a bit of luck and a lot of advice to people who looked as if they might be about to stick too soon. Only Joe stayed mired in the lower reaches of the score track. His propensity for bidding as high as possible and then drawing a ten tile followed by a devil was remarkable enough for me to write it down in my notes.

Joe did enough to regain a little respectability but at the business end of the scoring, it was the dark horse, Matt, who stole the win from a confident Martin in the final round.

Matt 1640
Martin 1620
Sam 1540
Joe 1380
Andrew 1150
Katy 910

Ian still hadn't arrived, so we started a game of Funf Gürken, with the agreement that we just stop when Ian gets here.

This trick-taking game is all about not winning the final trick. Sam played it well, and was able to poison the well in the final hand by playing a 1 card. This doubled the penalty for Katy who won that hand, leaving her with Veir Gürken, only one off being eliminated.

Ian arrived during the next round so we finished up. Matt lost that round, just for the record, picking up two gherkins.

Now we were seven, we split into two groups. Sam, Martin and Joe were keen to play The Quest For Eldorado. On the other side of the table, since it was Ian, Katy and I, Lords of Vegas was suggested. A bit late to start, but certainly possible. Matt joined us on Sunset Strip. Matt had played before, but not for a while. I gave him a brief rules refresher, sure that once he had begun, it would all come flooding back.

Katy's early tactic was to get lots of one-tile casinos in order to push herself up the score track. But, as the cards came out, the four of us were very close early on. Interestingly (if you were playing, otherwise probably not) three Strip cards came out very early on. The first was drawn before anyone had actually built on the Strip!

Perhaps the pivotal moment was when Katy remodelled her two-tile casino (with a six die) into a silver, thus joining my silver three tile casino (with no six dice) to Matt's two tile silver casino (also with no sixes). Thus she had control of a seven tile casino. Albeit one where she only had one die. She needed it to pay out before Matt reorganised.

Katy's audacious move

It didn't. And that seven-tile casino became a major point of contention between Matt and I with Katy always hopeful at every reorganisation. Always hopeful, but always disappointed. Matt had major analysis paralysis when thinking about whether to add a neighbouring one-tile casino to the melee before a re-roll or after. In the end, it became a nine-tile casino under Matt's control. Katy's lone die never posed a serious threat to the issue of ownership.

So, since I had shared the management of a large casino with Matt, we had pushed ahead, the two of us trading blows while Katy and Ian remained stuck.

Eldorado ended much closer than the previous game. Sam had clearly learnt from his last game when he slowed down in the middle of the board. He arrived first with Martin hot on his heels and Joe not far behind.

1. Sam
2. Martin
3. Joe

Since we were still knee deep in Vegas, they began a game of Azul. I know little about this game, except for Martin complimenting himself when he said “I made some really good piles.”

But it was, once again, Sam who made best use of Martin’s piles. His victory was large enough that Martin and Joe discussed where they went wrong. They decided it was when Martin tried to stop Joe and, instead of trying to stop Sam, Joe turned on Martin. This left Sam largely unaffected and able to do whatever he wanted to do. It looks like he wanted to humiliate his two opponents.

Sam 75
Martin 46
Joe 38

In Lords of Vegas, their was also a certain amount of spoiling tactics. Katy tried to sabotage me, with the logic that I wouldn’t be able to respond until three more cards had been turned over. Ian, by rights, should’ve been doing the same to Katy, but he had other plans.

Ian and his plans

He built up a healthy and unchallenged five-tile purple casino in one corner in only one turn and then he fought over a six-tile brown casino with Matt in the other corner. Suddenly, his fortunes turned. The brown casino paid out twice and then the Strip paid out for the final time. This sent Ian from grim third into a slim first place right at the end, despite Matt’s ownership of the nine-tile silver casino on the strip. Ian’s huge reserve of cash was the tie-breaker. An astonishing comeback.

Ian 32 + $64m
Matt 32 + $29m
Andrew 29
Katy 16

Katy’s distant last place was due to her green casino not paying out at all. In fact, once the game had ended, I looked through the remaining cards to find a lot of greens and a fair few silvers, too. The results could’ve been very different.

Now we were all together again and in the mood for a seven-player game to cap off the night. We chose a three-round game of Take It Easy. Thanks to Joe’s two copies of the basic game, all seven players were easily accommodated.

Sam began, choosing sitcoms as his topic for calling out the numbers. This showed his age as the younger (relatively speaking) players claimed no knowledge of sitcoms like “Robin’s Nest”. At the end of this first round, Sam found himself in a healthy first place. I languished in last, with less than half of Sam’s 205 points.

Martin took the second round with the topic “sub atomic particles”. I think it was during this round that the phrase “I’m still intact” was devised to describe a player mat where no lines had been broken. A very useful phrase, and one that was well used for the rest of the game.

I had a better second round, lifting myself out of last place. But it was a brief respite. Joe hosted the third round, with the topic of “Cartoonists”. There was a recurring theme of people needing a tile that had already been played. The English Language needs a word for this feeling.

What is Martin trying to say?

I had a terrible last round, leaving me nailed to the bottom of the results. Back in fourth, we had a rare example of a tie in Take It Easy. But Sam, on the other hand, had built upon his early lead.

Sam 622
Ian 483
Katy 473
Matt 429
Martin 429
Joe 403
Andrew 376

And so we were done. All that was left was for everyone to make Katy nervous because we’d all sorted out our Secret Santas and she hadn’t.

See you all next week for the Christmas Special!