board games & card games for all ages

Monday 5th March 2007

Another miserable night out, but it was nice and warm in the pub!

Players:

David F-F, Faye, Jason, Jen, Jo, Mark H, Mark L, Martin, Nick, Rich, Rob, Russ, Sue, Tracey

Games Played:

Loot (Korsar)

With Loot being a relatively new arrival in the shop, we all thought we'd have a bash at its predecessor (same game, different art) ...

Russ:    27
Jen:    26
Mark L:    19
Nick:    19
Sue:    9

This was an interesting game with five players, although we all got the impression that it might play a lot better with an even number, and then it plays in teams of two, with a lot more ganging-up likely to happen. A close battle between Russ and Jen in the end, although we were all pretty convinced we'd let Jen sail unchallenged too many times for our own good, and so Russ' 1-point victory was a bit of a surprise!

Metro

While we were finishing up our piracy, a quick game of this tile-layer was happening on the table next door.

Rich:    69
Jo:    69
Mark H:    58

This looks like it was a pretty tight game. When I looked across, Rich had a fairly healthy lead, but had scored more of his routes, so I can only assume that Jo had a few longer tracks up her sleeve to help her catch him by the end of the game.

Urland

Another outing for this excellent game of lizards swimming to shore ....

Jen:    32
Nick:    28
Mark L:    26
Russ:    24
David:    19

This time we added in the extra genes from the expansion pack, although it took a while for them to appear on the table. I had a lead most of the way, but due to the clever scoring a lead in this game is never secure. Jen made excellent use of her hard-shelled eggs and started breeding like crazy (not literally, obviously), which drained us all of our resources, while filling the land with little purple lizards. Jen raced past the line, and - despite being the most photogenic dinosaur in the land - I couldn't stop her claiming her second win of the night.

Hermagor

While we were landing our lizards, another five player game was going on next door, and it was another Shire Gamers favourite ...

Mark H:    153
Jo:    128
Sue:    127
Rich:    105
Faye:    103

The scores in this one are huge, which I think means that everyone was raising the prices of the goods whenever they got the chance. Mark seems to have destroyed his opposition in this one, as a 25-point margin is pretty impressive in a game where the scores normally cover about 25 points from first to last!

Ice Cream

The Urland guys were done first, and we started on this fun little filler while we waited for the others to catch up ...

Mark L:    21
Jen:    20
Russ:    16
David:    15
Nick:    14

This is always a bit of fun, and there was a fair amount of "screwage" going on in this game, as everyone did their best to ruin the ice creams so that no-one could benefit from a full four-pointer. Jen and Mark were locked in a fairly tight ice cream turf-war, with Mark just edging it at the end.

Portobello Market

Four late arrivals showed up as the games were in full swing, so they grabbed a copy of this excellent new game and took it for a spin ...

Rob:    Winner of game 1

Tracey:    Winner of the game 2

Martin:
Jason:    Didn't win either game!

Sadly, that is all I know about this one, as we forgot to take the scores down before the game was put away!

Through the Desert

The two groups of five became two group of four, and played a couple of 45-minute game to fill the time we had left ...

Rich:    64
David:    59
Faye:    54
Russ:    51

A good win for Rich in this game, which looked like it was very close. This is a classic which always goes down well ... We really should play it more often that we do!

Trapper

And finally on the other table, the first Shire Gamers outing for this new Kramer/Kiesling title:

Sue:    75
Nick:    67
Mark L:    54
Jen:    39

This was the first play for Mark and Jen, although Sue and I had only ever played it with two players before, and it is a very different game with four than it is with two (rather like Portobello Market above). Sue managed to secure the most valuable canoe in a game where only four canoes managed to sell for more than 16 coins. We played the rules as they are in the book, without introducing the tactical variant, although that might well be the way to play it when there are four players.

And that was all for another Monday. Thanks to all for coming along and playing a game or two ... we hope to see you next week.