Well maybe Gareth and
Neil were just unlucky, I’m sure Treason pays off sometimes... let us start with
Gareth.
Eclipse
Eclipse is our game of
the month for January 2013 and I was able to push 4 tables together and mostly
set it up before the others –Gareth, Michel, and Andy arrived. Michel hadn’t
played before so we all played humans.
Turn 1 saw Gareth
research Gauss Shield and everyone do some exploring, mostly finding unoccupied
sectors except for me, who ran into Ancients in my first two systems. Andy,
sitting on my right, found 2 planetless systems with Discovery Tiles worth 8
money, which funded him to keep exploring and cut me off.
In turn 2 I tried a
sector III hex, only to find more Ancients. So I discarded it. Meanwhile Gareth
had found a couple of Discovery tiles as well, one being Shard Hull, which he put
on his Star Bases, and the other Axion Computer which he put on his
Interceptor. My second explore of the same area of space found a double Ancient
tile which I reluctantly accepted and then passed out.
During turn 3 Andy and
Michel met up and formed Diplomatic Relations and me and Gareth set about
fighting the Ancients. Gareth was tooled up with Plasma Cannons on his
Interceptors while I built Cruisers with Gauss Shields. We were both
victorious, which left a single system between us- with an Ancient in it.
Gareth overspent a little and had to abandon a couple of nearly empty sectors-
Andy had already abandoned his with an influence action.
Turn 4 saw Gareth
defeat me in the sector between us, destroying the Ancients and one of my
Cruisers with his fast and accurate Interceptors. He was now adjacent to my
Homeworld and I gratefully accepted his offer of Diplomatic Relations.
In turn 5 I defeated
the Double Ancient system adjacent to me and then explored into what I knew to
be another single Ancient system (as that was the last Sector III hex and I had
already seen it when I discarded it earlier). Andy and Michel continued to
build their forces. Gareth took over the
Galactic Centre about this time, which was the only link between the side of
the board with me and him and the side of the board with Andy and Michel-
although Michel did control a system with a half-wormhole link to Gareth’s home
system...
In turn 6, as I was
fighting the Ancients Gareth struck at my home system, taking it and the
Traitor card in one fell swoop. Fortunately for me Gareth concentrated his
defences in the Galactic Centre against Andy and Michel, allowing me to
gradually retake my homeworld over the course of the next two turns. Gareth and
Michel had both researched Plasma Missiles and Gareth also had Antimatter
Cannon, so his position was quite strong.
Not strong enough
though as in turn 9 he found himself attacked by all three opponents- myself
against the systems adjacent to me, Michel using the Wormhole generator to
assault his homeworld and other systems nearby and Andy charging the Galactic
Centre. Gareth responded by attacking me, making for a large number of battles
on the final turn. The Plasma Missiles proved a mixed blessing, destroying my
fleet in one battle but in two battles failing to hit all of my ships- Gareth’s
fleet was then destroyed as it had nothing left to fire. The result was a
rather surprising victory for myself, mainly because I had many reputation
points from fighting Gareth whereas Andy and Michel had very few reputation
points as they hadn’t fought until the final turn.
Philip 31 Michel, Gareth, Andy, 20-something (Gareth less than
others).
From Space to
Robots...
FZZZT! (thanks Neil)
Tom dug this one out,
in its beautiful tin. The second Tony Boydell game of the night no less! I was
delighted to have a play as I bought this some years ago but never got my head
around the rules. And my version came in a standard cardboard box although I
did get a furry ‘mechanic’ with mine rather than passing round the tin to
designate ‘chief mechanic’ when auctions are decided following equal bids.
Tom’s explanation
helped no end; we were mechanics, there to build robots, coming off a factory
conveyor belt. Over five rounds of auctions we would be collecting cards with
varying components and victory points. Eight cards are auctioned each round,
mainly robots but additionally production units. The cards are paid for with
the power values in the top left hand corner of each card. The component parts
in the bottom left hand corner are allocated toward those production unit
cards, which paid good bonuses and could be completed multiple times. Simple as
that.
Round one looked good
for James and I was pleased with my purchase of a production unit. Tom
collected cards. In round two Jon and James invested well, I couldn’t afford
anything and Tom collected cards. Round three and everyone now had production
units started, some hefty bidding started towards the end of this round, James
seemed to win the bigger items, and Tom, yes you guessed it, he collected
cards. Then before you knew it the auctions were done, robots collected, units
assembled. You’ll see from the final scores below that collecting cards is a pretty
rewarding strategy. And despite learning the rules I think I need quite a bit
more practice on game play. And I’m also forgoing the opportunity to talk about
the ‘mechanics’ of the game… I’d only confuse myself you see. At least I’ve got
a furry one!
Scores; Tom 58, James 40, Jon 33, Neil 23
From Robots to
Engines...actually in a reversal of the space time continuum this is the first Tony Boydell played that evening...
Snowdonia (thanks David)
And was characterised
by Woody hoarding the 1st player marker and having the most turns with an extra
worker from the pub, but then getting himself into an awful muddle including
passing up 18 VP's just to deny James 6 VP. James pottered on regardless and
sneaked in a good few station tokens and completed 4 card bonuses for 31 of his
VP. Soren trumped that with 36 bonus VP's, primarily from a single card giving
21VP for 16 rubble cubes, which he acquired in a single double-doubled action.
David ended up with 7 grey cubes after the first round so decided to go on a
building strategy and took 40VP's from station buildings with just enough 1st
player time to irritate Woody sat to his right.
Overall, the game
started with a rain and fog, but then endless sunny weather and white cubes
that arrived in large bursts that added some big chunks of time-pressure. Only
James bothered with the surveyor, and then only for 2 spaces and neither David
nor Soren had a train at any point in the game. Good fun in general, and I'd
like to see this hit the table again (preferably with a bigger cube bag
though!)
Soren: 63 Woody: 37 David: 65 James: 57
And another “Train
Game”...
Ticket to Ride: Heart
of Africa (thanks Jon)
Jon had received this
new map for Christmas, and found very willing compatriots in James II and Alex.
And fairly willing compatriots in Neil and Tom. This map introduces an extra
method of scoring points - each colored route is designated to one of three
terrain types, which are represented on a deck of cards which are placed next
to the main deck of train cards. On a player’s turn, he can choose to take
terrain or train cards, or a mixture of both. When he scores a route, he can
play these terrain cards to double his points for that route – a nice little
(or big) bonus! The map is also quite individual, with all the double routes
around the coastal regions, and only single routes across the centre.
It didn’t take long
for routes to be claimed, with Jon and James tying up much of the West coast.
Alex started down South, whilst Tom eventually started to lay down trains in
Madagascar. Neil laid a single route in the north-east, and then also turned
his attention to the South.
The full value of the
bonus terrain cards was realized when Tom built a 6-train route for a whopping
30 points – certainly good value. Alex was gradually creeping northwards, but as he was sitting in a
distant last place, no-one bothered to block his journey (which could have been
easily done with a single white card). On the scoretrack, Tom was stretching
out ahead, scoring the longer routes and getting some nice double-bonuses into
the bargain. Neil was doing his best to catch him, now that he had started to
convert his huge fistful of cards into routes on the board. Jon and James were
chugging along nicely, if unspectacularly in their own little world.
The game was well into
its second half when Alex decided to pick up new tickets (twice). His unbridled
cheers of joy indicated that he may well have struck lucky.
Jon finished the game
by laying his last trains, and the count-up began. Neil had completed several
good tickets, and shot ahead of Tom. Jon had completed a couple of long
tickets, but this was only enough to bring him within 4 points of Tom. James
had somehow failed to score very well at all, leaving Alex as the only player
left to tot up his points. He was at least 85 points behind at this stage –
surely he couldn’t have completed that many tickets could he? Well, he had exactly
80 points worth of tickets, and combined with the 10-point Globetrotter bonus
for completing the most tickets, Alex took the win. A well-deserved (if you
consider picking up tickets that match your current routes as deserved)
victory, that Alex himself puts down to Jon’s “magic fingers.” Don’t ask…..
Alex 144; Neil 141;
Tom 124; Jon 120; James II 92
A trip back in time to
the court of King Arthur next...
Shadows over Camelot:
The Card Game (thanks Jon)
Dan had arrived by
now, and it did not take much persuading from Tom for him to join in with this
card game version of the popular co-op board game. As with the board game,
there may or may not be a traitor present, and there is even an opportunity for
players to ‘switch sides’ mid-game. It is basically a co-op memory game, with a
traitor element thrown in for good measure.
The first game went
fairly smoothly, after some initial hiccups as the players figured out the best
way to play. There was no traitor present (although Jon had had the opportunity
to switch to the dark side halfway through) and the gallant knights won the day
by 7 white swords to 2.
The second game was a
little trickier. Several Morgan cards played havoc with the rumours deck, and
Tom seemed to suffer from an unexplained loss of memory (inviting more than one
suspicious glance). However, 7 white swords were eventually revealed – which
quickly became 6 as Neil revealed himself to have been the traitor. Although he
had not been able to affect the game much before, he now had the power to
choose one of the top 2 rumour cards to add to the pile and discard the other.
Suddenly the game became tense again, as he successfully foiled the knights’
next quest. It was only an unfortunate (for Neil) run of cards in the final
quest that allowed the good guys to succeed in their quest for Excalibur, and
once again triumph, by the narrow margin of 8-6.
This is a fun little
co-op filler, which plays in about 20 mins and will definitely be brought along
again.
Next a “real-time game,
I always hate those, good job I wasn’t playing!
I may not have the right image here- games called "Escape" are a dime a dozen....
Escape (thanks Jon)
James brought along
this real-time, dice-rolling, dungeon-exploring, jewel-collecting fun game. It
contains a 10 minute ‘soundtrack’, which is quite tricky to hear on an iPad
when there’s background music and stuff going on at other tables. The goal of
the game is to explore the temple to collect enough jewels, then find the exit
and get out before the temple collapses. It’s a crazy free-for-all of
dice-rolling, for which the strategy seems to be “stick with a partner” – as
you can easily find yourself frozen out otherwise.
My memory is already a
bit hazy, but I think that we got shut out in one run-through, succeeded in 6
minutes in the next, and then succeeded again when we introduced the curses
(which weren’t actually that hard to overcome).
Great fun with a set
time-length for each game. Probably most tricky with 3 players, as someone will
invariably be left on their own. Definitely worth 10 minutes of anyone’s life.
Quote is from Tudor historian Jon Harrington. Rest of Quote saved for some more appropriate juncture!
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