board games & card games for all ages
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Thursday 12th February 2009
The day before Friday 13th, and we get thirteen people. Creepy. Not all of them, obviously.
Players:
Alex, Darren, Dave F, David H, Gordon, Mark P, Mel, Nick, Rachel, Rich, Simone, Sue, Tim
Games Played:
Rather than muck about getting games out of boxes only for more people to turn up, the first five decided to selfishly play Ra and not give a monkey's about anyone else ....
Darren:
46
Alex:
30
Nick: 27
Gordon: 20
Rachel:
19
This was a weird game. The first epoch was full of disasters and Ra tiles, to the point where Darren was the only one who ended it with more points than he started it with! One Pharaoh gave him a 7-point swing of the rest of us, as we all had none! Alex had a nightmare first two epochs, but somehow managed to haul herself up to second place by the end of a fun game.
In the meantime, four more appeared and - surprise surprise - Dominion got a play!
Simone:
25
Dave
F: 12
David H: 12
Rich:
-2
I don't think anyone tries against Simone any more ..... ;-)
I think all thirteen were in by now, so we split into three groups ....
Nick:
$1,020,000
Gordon:
$950,000 (15 tiles)
Rich: $950,000 (14)
Darren: $910,000
Sue:
$700,000
This was the first game of this for everyone (apart from Gordon many many years ago), but we all grasped it pretty quickly. To be honest, it's simplicity is what makes it so enjoyable .... A game that we all (except maybe Sue) really liked. Darren managed a full 6-building business by about halfway through the game, although my 4- and 5-sized businesses made sure I was earning at least as much as he was each round. Rich and Gordon weren't pulling in the same income from businesses as we were, but they were making a lot more cash deals and stacking up fairly decent hands full of (almost identical) notes. in the ending count, it was all pretty close, but luckily I edged it by $70,000.
Another four were off to the farm ....
(Fields + Pastures + Grain +Veg + Sheep + Pigs + Cows - Unused Spaces + Stables + House + Family + Cards + Bonuses)
Tim:
(3 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 3 + 1 + 1 - 0 + 0 + 0 + 12 + 1 + 3) 33
Rachel:
(2 + 3 + 3 - 1 + 1 + 4 + 1 - 0 + 0 + 2 + 9 + 3 + 0) 27
Mark P: (2 + 3 + 4 - 1 + 1 + 2 + 3 - 1 + 0 + 0 + 9 + 3 +
0) 25
Alex:
(2 + 1 + 1 + 4 + 3 + 3 + 1 - 4 + 0 + 2 + 9 + 1) 23
Now this is a little odd, scoring-wise. After looking at the score sheet, I actually had to try and make sure that they played it right, as the scores/upgrades seem a little on the low side. There is a grand total of 4 points between them all for their houses. No one managed to get 5 family members, and there are very few points for the cards (including no one building the well). This must have been a very unusual game, although it looks like everyone followed the farming route, with most points being scored for grain, veg and animals. Interesting ... I wish I'd seen it. Alex is excused, of course, as she'd never played before.
And the final four were off ghost busting ....
Dave
F:
David H:
Mel:
Simone: All won, all still alive, five
cards to spare.
An "easy" win of this tricky little co-operative game for these four. So we all immediately assumed they were playing this wrong as well :)
In an effort to do something vaguely Darwinian, we were off to prehistoric times for some dino-breeding and mutating ....
Darren:
31
Rich:
30
Nick: 28
Gordon: 24
Sue:
18
This was a lot of fun, as always, and possibly the longest game of this one we'd had for a long time, as we were well into the third epoch when Rich finally moved onto the "30" spot and triggered the end of the game. Unfortunately (for Rich, anyway), Darren had spent the whole second half of the game with all his ichtos on the board, and therefore grabbed the three bonus points, jumping him over Rich. I beat Gordon by a single ichto for "most on land", which gave me a couple of points and kept me in third.
The ghost hunters had finished, and went off to the Bronze Age (well ... vaguely):
David
H: 35
Simone:
32
Dave F: 28
Mel:
25
There's no mention of this one on the score sheet, so I'm guessing the scores a little by using my memory. David had seven cities, and also the development that got him 7 bonus points for doing exactly that, which helped tremendously towards his victory!
And we were down to seven players by the last game of the night ....
Dave
F: 6
Darren: 6
Nick: 6
Sue:
4
David H: 3
Alex: 2
Rachel:
0
A three-way tie at the top! I was a Saboteur every time, and successful on the last two attempts (when there were three of us). The first round, it was juts Rachel and I, and we failed miserably. Darren grabbed the most gold as an honest dwarf in the first round, which meant that he was a target for the rest of the game!
And that was it for another week. Thanks to those who came along.
