February 2007 Archives

Well, with beautiful weather out, it was hard to resist going out for a round of golf after work.

Well, the vine wall was briefly propped back up. But it fell back down. And now another section has come down. Sadly, it doesn't look like they are going to fix it. They are just leaving it alone currently. I'm sure the middle part will die off from lack of sunlight soon...

Mmm... a simpler pizza this time: chili topped with cheddar cheese. I was a little worried about the chili escaping and overflowing the sides onto the pizza stone. So when I stretched out the dough I made an effort to keep a 1/2 inch margin that I left alone. This puffed up enough to make a dam and kept the lake of chili and molten cheese at bay.

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Governor Schwarzenegger is quite clear that California is not simply another state. "We are the modern equivalent of the ancient city-states of Athens and Sparta" link via

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More photo tourism by Microsoft link via

Wow. Our biggest crowd yet, 10 people! We were big enough to split into two groups: a group of four playing singly and the rest of us as three teams of two. We played at Wilco. Which I consider to be a very challenging course. Trees everywhere and tight S-curvy tunnels. I am still not ready to go it alone. I need more control...

For lunch, John convinced us to play games and eat at Mesa Rosa instead of Chuys. He made the restaurant sit us in an isolated area which was nice and quiet and well lit. But we never played any games. How odd. Another amusing incident was the bill. Our waiter handed us one 100+ bill for the entire table. And then he offered to split it up for us which we took advantage of. Unfortunately, he did not know what to do with the appetizer that three of us ordered. So he split it up into 1/10 portions. Hehehe... seven people helped subsidize our appetizers...

John and I played disc golf today at Old Settler's park. I was a little worried when it was mist-raining earlier today. I was warm enough (high 70s) where I was prepared to play if it continued raining. So I donned my bathing suit and rubber sandals. But it turned out that the rain was done for the day and it only ended up being overcast.

A new person, Chris, joined us. He was more of a pro than us. He plays in 60 some events during the year and was even sponsored by a company. He was cool though. We showed him the winter course and he gave us some advice.

It seems that the construction is continuing near the course. Fortunately two of the tees were still there...

Zoff in Buffalo

Last week I convinced Doug to make me one of his versions of a Frappuchino. I called it a Dougachino. It was pretty tasty. Thanks, Doug!

John wanted to start off with this classic game. Sadly, I didn't print out the rules translation. So I explained the rules from memory with Jon helping out. We got most of them correct. Except for what happens at the end of the game. Oh well. I was even going to look up on the geek what happens. But Jon made a call as to what to do.

The Scepter of Zavandor

Next up on the table was the meaty game Scepter of Zavandor. I randomly picked the Druid as my character. It starts along the ruby path. So I was intently focused on getting my income up to switch over to rubies. Unfortunately, I could not do it in time before the game ended. I probably messed up somewhere along the line...

With five people in the game, this game really dragged! Two Grimms a-Grimming make for some downtime, let me tell you. So I wandered back and forth between the game table and where my computer was to keep my attention.

You know, nothing that I know of makes me aware of the inexorable progress of time like public speaking does. I hate public speaking for two reasons. I am not a verbose person by nature and when you give a speech, you need the ability to improvise among other things. However, the main reason why I hate it is Glossophobia. I have heard that more people are afraid of public speaking than dying.

I was told on Tuesday that I had to give a 5 minute speech for our area meeting. I thought I was lucky that I only had to dread this upcoming event for two days. But then it was postponed until the following Tuesday. Argh! A whole week of dreading is not a fun thing at all.

But I got through it! Woo woo!

One of the few things that I like out the IBM campus is that some of their high walls are covered by climbing vines. A wall of plant is much more pleasant to look at than a wall of pinkish concrete. So I was sad when I saw that a corner of it came down... I hope that they can fix it...

Through the Ages

Ahhh, I saw this game being played at BGG.con a lot. One of my friends, Jon, played it three or four times. Back-to-back plays even. So for a game that takes anywhere from three to five hours or more to play, thats a high recommendation. I kept an eye out on eBay for copies of this game. Unfortunately, the general buzz was too high and demand was great. Copies went for $150 or more. Also, there was news that the game was going to be reprinted, but in 2008. Sigh. So I was really happy when a version of this game fell off the back of a truck and into my lap.

After disc golf and lunch, four of us played this game. The first game took five hours to play. And the second (three player game) took three hours.

It is definitely worth the buzz. It feels like a meaty version of a civilization building game. This game has a couple of different levels to it. You can play a simple version of it. Or you can play a three era game with the option to attack people. Or you can play a four era game with full blown wars. There are different leaders with special powers during each era. And, as time passes, your technology also improves. For example, you start out with warriors, move to knights, and then to tanks.

The war aspect to this game is more of an incentive to stay in the pack with everyone else in relative strength. The stronger people can cause bad things to happen to the weaker in this game. So, while it may take resources away from your strategy to win the game, it behooves you to spend some of those resources to maintaining your national defense.

This game has definitely moved to my must-buy list. Unfortunately, it is not coming out quick enough. In the meantime, the current copy will have to do...

The group went to Bart (short for Bartholomew) to play disc golf. The last time we went there was back in December of '05. The course was under construction back then and it is still under construction today! What is up with that?

I like how they need to use four different colors of spray paint to mark the ground. I guess one of the workers must be a math major and knew that four colors is the most you will need to color a map... or the earth, in this case.

John and I played on the normal course at Old Settlers Park today. Its amazing how "out of shape" we were. We were not used to the ultra-long throws required for the two 1000+ foot holes. And, if there is a small stream, we will find it.

One of my throws wandered off to the left into a pasture. So I took the time to explore for the source of the tiny stream that now flows on hole 7. And I found a small pond. Its obvious that there was a stream long ago based on the contours. But they must have blocked it off or rerouted it years ago. Well, now it seems it back for the moment.

Ugh, they are starting more construction around here. I don't like change! Especially if it will impact the course.

Genesis

Once again, Gravitt seemed to be hosing me. I wanted to play a new (to me) Knizia game. But John had described it in a negative manner. So people were bowing out. Jon went to play another game. Fortunately, Doug was willing to give it one try.

This is an area control game. But the areas are created by placing one of four colored tiles of your tribe (man, tigers, reptiles, dinosaurs) on the board. The board is a simple 14x10 grid with some of the spots being unplayable. On your turn, you either roll two dice and play the colors that were shown (2 of the six sides are wild). Or you can place one tile of any color on the board. When three or more of the same colored tiles are connected orthogonally, then it will be scored at the end of the game: 4 points for who ever owns the majority of the tiles in the group and 2 for the second place player. It is possible to score both 1st and 2nd place if you are the only person in the area. And the single largest group will score triple.

Pretty simple. Perhaps people don't like the fact that dice are used in this game. But there are a couple of mitigating factors. Two of the pips are wild. So, if you really need to be able to place at least one tile of a color, then you have a 22% chance of not being able to place it because that color, or one of the wild faces, was not rolled. If you do not want to take that risk, then just place one of that color instead.

Goldbräu

Next up was Goldbräu. Fortunately, no one had a complaint about playing this game. It has been a while since I have played it last. So I was wanting to play this game again. And I am glad that we played it again. We only got one thing wrong. I had read in the rules about needing two or more tokens in a spot to continue staying in the spot when all six tokens are played there. Well, that was for a four player game and we had three. We removed a share of each spot but forgot to adjust to remove single tokens when the fifth token came out. Oh well...

Medici vs. Srozzi

John had to leave and the other were still playing a game. So Doug and I played this new Knizia game. It is essentially a modified Medici game. Instead of one set of goods that you are trying to get majority in, there are three sets. And instead of one ship used to store those goods, you have three of different sizes. When you reveal goods to the auction, that part remains the same. However, since there are only two players in this game, you need to name a price. The other person either takes it for that price or you do.

I kept the bidding close to the value of the goods unless there was a set that I needed to take. On the other hand, Doug seemed to overbid on goods. We only played two of the three rounds. There was some major Grimming going on in this game. But I was ahead by 41 points after the 2nd round. So I have no doubt of my eventual win.

I think that this is a good two player variant of the great classic game of Medici.

I went to Ventana with Nick for lunch today and walked by this sight: the demolition of the IBM buildings on the West side of Burnett Road. How sad. These buildings were built rather differently than most. For siding, they used untreated steel. Which rusted of course. But, once rusted, that rust protected them from the environment. One of the unpleasant effects of this was that the sidewalks around the building were stained with rust.

I could have sworn that they had planted a small tree with a plaque to mark some anniversary. But I cant see it through the fencing. I wonder what happened to it...

I know there is construction going on, but which way do I go now?

It was cold out, for sure, but I didn't think that it was cold enough to freeze water. So when I saw this ice sickle hanging down from the fire hydrant, I was amused. What better way to fight fire than with ice!

Wow. I think that this constitutes a new record of "Most one-sided distribution, evar!" I know that I have complained before about one team having all of the cards. Well, now the granularity of that statement has increased to one person having all of the cards -- Adam. I now have proof that Jon is a pretty bad person to team up with in Tichu...

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I was curious on how the whipped pizza dough would turn out. But I was not in the mood for pizza. So I just threw the dough on the pizza stone with nothing else on top. And when I returned after 4 minutes, I was surprised! The thing had puffed up like a ball. I took it off, let it cool down, and cut it open.

I had made pita bread! The steam was intense enough to split the dough in half. I just had to butter it up and try it out. And it was pretty good. I bet I could make a Texas-sized pita pocket sandwich.

It seemed that there was no difference between using the dough attachment and the whisk attachment for the wet kneading. So on the next day I tried a pizza out. A Philly Cheese Steak Pizza. Which was not bad at all. Hrm. I think I will stick with the dough attachment in the future though. A whisk is just too strange.

I did buy the Magic Mill DLX 2000. And I used it to make the next batch of dough. It is quite different from the Kitchen-aid. And will take some getting used to. It is essentially a big bowl that spins around. On one side of the bowl is a loosely pressed scraper. And on the other side is a rolling pin like device which is secured by an adjustable swinging arm. This is what the wet knead dough looks like after an initial mixing of the flour and water.

After waiting for twenty minutes, the next step is to mix for five minutes. Which turns out like this. A little more mixed but not perfectly smooth.

You then add the flour in small spoonfuls waiting for it to incorporate before adding the next. Which turns out like this. We shall see how it turns out.

The group went out to the Rivery today. I came a little bit early to practice and was surprised with this sight. It looks like a race was going on! So I turned around and parked at Wendy's and walked down to the park. The finish of the race was not 50 feet away from tee 1. But it looked like we were safe and could play a round of golf.

I like to practice here. There are two short holes that are parallel to each other. Both holes are very tight throws with little clearance. So it was cool that three of my practice throws on one hole and two of my practice throws on the other were birdieable.

What kind of a-hole tags a cactus plant?

It started off cold and windy (at least to me in my T-shirt). But the day ended up warming nicely.

Another round at Old Settler's Park (Winter course) for us. And it looks like they are continuing with the tree trimming/clearing. Which kind of goes against the point of disc golfing. You are supposed to knock them down with your discs and not with power equipment!

Imperial

Imperial was the first game that we played. And, this time, we played with a no investor card. This option makes the following changes: only landing on the investor space on the roundel causes a payout; when you skip past the investor space, nothing happens; at the end of a nation's turn, everyone gets a chance to buy/upgrade a share; if someone does not control a country, then they can invest in any country.

I like this variant much better. You do not spend a lot of the time waiting for your chance to invest. Your money is invested much quicker than before. You have more chances to invest in a country before it pays out its bonds or take control over in a country that might be able to tax.

Surprisingly, I was able to control both Austria and Italy with the 3 level share throughout the game. No one bothered to take control away from me. Perhaps because I did not transform them into powerhouses like I have in the past.

Early on in the game, I could see that Adam was trying an interesting strategy. After gaining control of the three sea areas surrounding England, he concentrated on building factories, taxing, and investing. This is not something that I have seen others do before in this game. And, now that I think about it, I wonder why more people don't do that. Factories are worth the same as two neutral countries. And they are much easier to hold. No one ever invades other people's countries in this game. Plus, England is more isolated than other countries in this game. As long as she controls the seas around her, England is safe.

So, I made sure to start investing heavily in England. It also helped that John would upgrade his England shares and I was able to buy them before Adam could. Adam would pay out his England shares and I would pay out my Austria/Italy shares. So I was rolling in money. Which was nice.

But there came a point where I had a dilemma. England was close to ending the game with another taxation. This would get its shares into the x5 multiplier. I had enough money to upgrade my share and purchase the 8 level share. But I would not have enough money to get to the taxation space on the roundel. I was 1 dollar short! (How many times in this game have I been 1 dollar short from buying something or doing something?). Of course, France would have a turn before England and she could attack enough areas to stop England from getting to the 25 spot. Eventually, I just decided that more shares would be a good thing.

What is sad is that, at this point, I was looking to raid the treasuries of Austria and/or Italy. But their coffers were dry. Sigh. That does bring to mind a future strategy: use another nation as a blocker nation. Attack countries that threaten your primary nation. Or, use it for a source of money when you need it.

In the end, I was able to end the game with England. And win it by 5 points. But it was close! I was able to get Austria and Italy's multipliers into the x3 category.

Midgard

Next up, John brought yet another new game for us to play. It is an area majority game that uses card drafting to deal cards out. There are three large areas. Each area is sub-divided into three or four sections. Each section can hold from three to six people. There are three scoring rounds where you score points for the number of sections that you control in an area (3, 7, 12, 20), 5 points for majority in Asgard. You also get one corresponding token per person on the board. At the end of the game, each set of tokens (one for each area) count as five points.

I was not pleased with the card drafting part of it. If you are dealt some good cards, you only get one and pass the rest away. And if you are passed cards that you don't want, then oh well. You are screwed. I would rather pick one from a number of face up cards and have that continue around the table. Also, the map is rather small and you have a limited number of actions. So, if you choose a strategy, then there is no guarantee that you will be let alone to implement it. Spots are fought after often. And this has the effect of nullifying your move.

In our game, John leaped up into the lead. He was able to score an area twice. And he scored a lot for going into the doomed areas. Something that the rest of us were avoiding. Because, while you score points for people placed into those areas. You remove those people and put them back into your boat. We had thought that it was better to have them stick around and score for later rounds. But we learned that leaving them on the board was not that important in the long run.

I don't know. I wasn't too enamored with the game.

Tichu

To round out the night, we played Tichu. Our team started off at a disadvantage after the first two hands. On the next hand, Adam calls Tichu, wishes for a two and leads a 1-5 straight with the Phoenix for the two. Now, the first reason to wish for a two would be for the possible bomb. However, there was another reason for that wish. And it would be that, if Adam leads again, he is not going to fulfill the wish. So, the wish would be still in effect. And, if the opposing team wins a trick, then they will have to lead a three. Adam hoped that the single three would be led and he would play his single 5 on top of that three.

I made one mistake during the play. Adam leads a pair and has one card left. I have a pair of kings and a two. I play on top of it and led my two hopping that Adam does not have a two. I also know that my Kings are now honors as all of the Aces, Dragon, and Phoenix have been played. I should have let John get control. For, as long as he plays a single or pair, then I would go out.

You can't fault Doug's third Tichu call. He had a Dragon, all four Aces, trip tens, trip twos, and 4 5 Jack. Both Adam and I were able to set him. So you should always remember that having really good cards is not always a guarantee of making your Tichu call.

During this game, there was a battle between John and Adam. John over Tichued Adam not once, but twice! Way to be aggressive John!

I am beginning to hate this new toll road. There are huge tie-ups on both ends of my commute. Now that Mopac is connected to IH-35, there are a lot more people dumping onto Mopac. And the breaking point has been reached. This backup started well north of the Parmer offramp. You are looking at the Duvall exit. All three lanes of the frontage road is sold, bumper to bumper traffic. This really screws people trying to make a right turn onto Duvall. Fortunately, I am not one of them. I am so close to my destination, though! The IBM buildings are just behind those buildings on the left!

When Adam went into his Grand-Tichu death spiral, Ed first passed him an Ace instead of the Phoenix. What was amusing was the second Grand-Tichu call. This time Ed passed Adam the Phoenix instead of the Ace. So when I played my King-high straight, Ed could have gone over it if he would have kept that Phoenix. This allowed me to set Adam. My dilemma during the pass was: should I pass Jon an Ace or a 9? I decided that my hand was not so great otherwise, so I passed him that Ace on the top of my straight.

Sigh, my truck is advancing through the years. Another milestone has been reached...

This weekend I tried wet kneading with my whisk attachment. We shall see if there is any difference. I am guessing that it will be worse. I am really tempted to buy a Magic Mill DLX 2000.

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My pizza loving readers have called out for more. And who am I to deny them? I have a friend, Norbet, that says over a good beer: "I like to think with my stomach." Well, my stomach gave me a burst of inspiration. Or was it acid-reflux? Anyways, I decided that the next pizza would be Swedish meatballs! So I diced up some new potatoes and browned them in the oven. I made the Gräddsås sauce with some extra cornstarch to thicken it up.

Of course, I had to try some Lingonberry jelly on top! Mmm... not bad at all. I am telling you that the pizza is a food delivery system.

The next pizza that I cooked was a dessert pizza. Cooked Granny Smith apples with home-made caramel sauce. Next time, I should put a strudel topping on it.

Space Dealer

John was definitely wanting to hose me tonight. I had wanted to play H2olland for a while now. And yet when I suggested it for a game, John instead recommended Tara, Seat of Kings. Doug was accommodating and was willing to play either. So we settled on a game that all of us had played before: Space Dealer. This time we played with the Gizi cards (victory points for the neutral planets). As I play this game more, I loose the sense of being rushed for time. Next time, I want to play with the advanced cards. Or even with eight people...

H2olland

Peter and Francesca helped me out by playing H2olland. And I was glad I did play it. Not only was it an interesting and thematic game. But, based on the comments I was hearing from the other table, Tara was sounding suspicious.

H2olland is ultimately about planting tulips and then scoring them. But, before that is done, land must be reclaimed from the sea with windmills. There are six species of tulips with victory points ranging from 1 to 6. The level of tulips that you can buy is determined by how many windmills that you have on the board. You get tulips either by purchasing them by trading supplies at the co-op. Or as a reward for reclaiming land from the sea. Tulips are planted much like crops. However, they don't really do anything during this phase of the game. You do get a worker that is placed on top of the field. These workers tend the tulip fields and will get you victory points during the second half of the game.

You start out with one of each type of resource: beans, carrots, corn, cows, and potatoes. These are placed out on the board during spring time next to your farm houses or your windmills. The crops are harvested during autumn. A weather card is revealed that determines what crops are harvested and other events that may happen (floods, droughts, disease, shortages, or surpluses). If a crop is touched by at least one of your windmills or farm houses, then you get one of the matching tiles from the co-op. So players will want to either touch other's crops or try and block other player's from touching their crops. You can buy more farm houses, windmills, dikes, or tulip fields from the co-op during this phase. And you can only store 5 crops/tulips through to spring.

During summertime, the land is reclaimed from the sea. One windmill can only pump out one tile of sea. If there are more tiles of sea than there are windmills, then nothing happens. So, players will place dikes out in order to cut off the excess sea tiles and to allow the windmills to pump out the water. One interesting aspect of this is that there can be more windmills that can pump out a tile than are needed. Only one is used and ties are broken by the start player. So it is possible to steal the glory of pumping out a tile and getting the tulip tile reward for yourself.

The game enters its second phase after the lake has been fully drained or six years. First, we remove all of the crop fields that are connected by at least two or more players. Next, players are allowed to place any remaining farm houses, windmills, or tulip fields. Then, all of the workers are removed from the tulip fields.

Now, the race is on to claim tulip fields. In player order, you are allowed to place one worker on a field that is next to either your farm house, your windmill, or another field that is already claimed by you. So, your goal is to claim the most expensive fields and also to cut off other players from being able to claim fields.

All in all it was an interesting game. And it is one that I should have played sooner.

Another day of disc golf. And one that I thought that I was going to be playing alone. It started off cold and windy. When Jon canceled, I thought that I was going to be the only one out there. So I started playing. I figured that if no one showed, then I would just continue playing alone. But at 10:01, I saw Gravitt drive up to the parking with Nick and Stephanie trailing.

It seems that they are building out into the lake. I wonder why. A fishing pier, perhaps? And there are now stakes running down the valley. Hrm.... keep away from the disc golf course, dammit!

I did have a good throw on hole 8.

Of course, we still managed to throw discs in the new stream. And get one caught in the tree...

Adam, Rehana, and I went to Cat Hollow today for disc golf. Unfortunately, another group of golfers started out just before us. As we were waiting and watching, we thought that they were good (and therefore quick) based on their throws. But we caught up to them on hole two even when one of us went into the woods (the leaves are all dead so the disc was easy to find). This continued for a number of holes. We would wait for a while for them to finish up before we threw. Finally, we just decided to skip hole 4 and go ahead of them to hole five. So I was a little surprised when all three of them started yelling at us and calling us rude. Of course, isn't starting a confrontation with someone else is itself a rude thing to do? I don't know what they expected our other option to be besides waiting. Go back home?

But, once we threw at hole 5, they never saw us again. They didn't catch back up and wait on us...

I did have one good throw on 17. Usually I try and throw through a gap between a very large tree and a Juniper bush. But, instead, my disc went to the right of the bush and curved back towards the basket.