King Arthur the Card Game

Well, thankfully, Jon had an emergency hosting of game night, since I was innundated with a work-related emergency. For the first game, we tried out a new game that I ordered from Adam Spielt. And that was a new Knizia game that was based on another of his board games. It is a quick game about completing adventures of the Knights of the Round Table. Doug and I got off to a quck start by completing easy adventures while Jon opted to gather large sets of Knights to complete the tougher adventures. When I finished the game, I found out that Doug pipped me by one point! I guess I tried to go for too many easy (and low point scoring) adventures… I was a good game that I would play again.

Coloretto Amazonas

For our second game, Doug’s roommate, Matt, joined us. And I brought out another new game that is the sequel of a popular game, Coloretto. In this game, each player has 4 spots to place cards based on color. During their turn, they have two choices: they can play a card on their own area, or they can give a card to their opponent (and hopefully remove a card from them). Unfortunately, Matt did not seem to understand this game and gave Doug several cards (instead of giving them to someone else to remove them). And this, I believe, helped Doug win the game. I think this game needs another playing to determine if it is as good as the original game. In the first playing, it did not seem like there was enough difficult decisions to make. And there was no feeling of pushing your luck either.

Maharaja: Palace Building in India

For the last game of the night, we play a relatively new game which unfortunately we do not play anymore for some reason (perhaps because there are too many new games now). I made one critical mistake during the game which put me out of the running to win the game. I had the build a palace for 9 guy with just enough money to perform my two actions. Jon went before me and accidently selected the “steal another player’s ability” action. He then decided to steal mine and then I could not perform my two actions. This allowed Doug to be the sole winner of one area (giving him a +5 bonus I think). Unfortunately, this game is brutal in that you cannot recover from such a mistake to get back into the running. Sigh.

Another thing that was not fun was that both Grimms were seriously grimming during this game. It seemed like it took forever to finish the game.

King Solomon’s Mine

I drove to South Oklahoma for another Saturday gaming day with Ed and Susan and arrived a little early. Marty was also there so I brought out Coloretto Amazonas and started explaining the rules. However, other people started arriving and everyone forgot about playing the game. Sigh. So we started with another new game, King Solomon’s Mine. In it you try and dig for artifacts by playing cards that describe a shape. You rearrange pieces on the board so that the pieces that fit the shape are all on the same level. You can then pick up the pieces. I had low numbered cards (but not as low as Ed’s). In the end, Doug pipped me in the scoring for magic items and pipped Adam and Mike in the scoring for cursed items. It was an not so bad game.

Shadows over Camelot

For the next game, we played Shadows over Camelot. In the last game that Susan played, she was the traitor and amusingly enough, she was the traitor in this game. Everyone is trying to beat the game and have good triumph. The traitor (if there is one) is trying to get evil to succeed. You perform a number of quests such as finding the Holy Grail, and defeating the Saxons, etc. If you succeed, then good swords come out and if you fail then bad swords come out. And when the round table fills up, hopefully good prevails. I started out by going for Lancelot’s Armour since Susan had mentioned that it was good for the traitor and I knew I was not the traitor. I also met the requirement of having a full house. I was successful and then went on to find the Holy Grail next! Because I got the Armour, people suspected me of being a traitor which was amusing. Susan was trying to hide by helping to search for the Grail. No one else was accussed and we ended the game by killing the Dragon!

Diamant

Another playing of this fun, push your luck game. And for this game, I pushed my luck too far! I only successfully predicted one mine and lost my fortune in the others…

Trump, Tricks, Game

Ed brought out this game for us to try since Mayfair gave it to him to review. My initial impression of this game was hopeful. After all, it is a trick taking card game. However, during the game play, my impression turned less than favorable. In each round, you can only take three tricks and you know what suit the trump card will be in for the next round. I was trying to take trump cards for the next round but my choices were very limited. I was forced to follow suit too often. And after my three tricks were captured, I could only possibly decide who would receive points or trumps if I didn’t have to follow suit. In the end, the scoring changes to a color based system. And because John kept the three highest trump cards and gave them all to Doug, Doug was able to claim all but three tricks which gave him the win. What a flawed game!

Niagara

Next was Niagara. Still a decent game to play. However, I made one mistake that allowed Ed to steal a gem from me and win the game. Had I been paying attention and card counting I might have been able to stop it. Not a biggie though… I don’t think that I want to play the game that way anyways…

Around the World in 80 Days

And another playing of Around the World. Still a decent game to play as well. In this game, people played some of the most time consuming travel cards that I have seen (like a 6 train and an 8 ship together). And another strange thing was that all trains came up one time.

Diamant

Well, the Adam Spielt order showed up on Tuesday and Diamant was in it and we started the night by playing it. This is a fun and quick filler game where you try to push your luck. Initially both myself and Ed were rather bold and ultimately unsuccessful at recovering the gold. However as the mines started closing up, the other learned from our example to leave early. On the other hand, Ed and I had to keep trying to strike it rich and catch up in the score. Fortunately, we were quite successful in the last two mines which gave us the win.

Tower of Babel

One group went off to play Palazzo so we started up Tower of Babel to compete. Unfortunately, my strategy was off tonight and I built poorly. Still a good game that I want to play more of though.

Mu

Adam suggested this game and Jon and I quickly agreed. Peter and Francesca finished out the 5 needed. They were also newbies to this game. And what was surprising was the fact that Francesca was bidding rather aggressively (showing 5 cards). I don’t think that her cards were that good, but at least she wasn’t timid. I was out in the early lead. However, Adam got some good cards towards the end which gave him the win.

Medici

When I got back in from helping Ed load some extra chairs and a table for Saturday gaming, I found that the group opened up Medici (which was surprising because the lunch time gamers played it on Wednesday). John, Peter and Francesca were new to the game and the usual advice of muddying a load was told to them when a particularly good load for me was about to be auctioned. For the first round I didnt buy anything until the end and as a result I got cards for really cheap prices. For the second and third rounds, I concentrated soley on getting more cards in the two colors that I had established to the exclusion of having the least total. I knew that this hurt me when Adam pipped me by one point for the win! Still a good game and one that I seem to have a strong inner merchant.

When I can home, I was greeted by the following mana from heaven. Mike and I were good acolytes and prayed daily. And Wilson! answered our prayers.

Saboteur

We started out the night with all seven people playing one game. Ed brought out a rerealease of an older game called Saboteur. In this game there are dwarves trying to find gold in a mine. However, some dwarves are trying to sabotage the mission. We played three rounds and in each one I was the good dwarf. I was successful twice and was stoped once. And I also proved to be the best dwarf there!

The key to this game is to be the person who connects our route to the gold. If you do that then you get the best pick of the victory points and you will also get another victory point card if there are extras. I was unable to do that but at least I was sitting next to the person who did.

Pickomino

Doug completely ruined this game for me. He was quiet when I had rolled exactly his number (but I was trying to get a higher number). However, when Roxana was rolling he shouted that she had rolled my number. He also made sure to emphasise that point and convice her to stop rolling and take my number. Gah! I should have just gotten up and let them finish the game without me.

Palazzo

Another game of Palazzo where I sucked badly. Sigh! Still willing to play it though…

Flea Circus

We noticed that the Rio Grand version had slightly different rules, so we used the their version for a change. In this game, I was really lucky. I kept turning up sevens! What hurt me though was I only was able to put out one set. I needed to turn up a 2 or a 3 for another set.

Exxtra

While we were waiting for Jon to show up, we chose this quick game as a filler. And, indeed, Jon showed up after the first round. So, he just joined in the game essentially one turn behind. I haven’t played this game in a while since it is played at Russcon a lot and I was burned out on it. The dice loved me tonight and I easily won the game.

In the Shadow of the Emperor

Mike brought two new Shadow games tonight and we chose this one to play. I had played this game once before so I knew a little of what to do for the strategy. After a fustrating rules explination, we started the game. I chose to go after a district that Mike controlled but, unfortunately, Mike decided to defend it. Mike soon learned later on in the game that you need to go after new districts for points rather than defending old districts for no points. What was fustrating was the end of the game. Jon was in last place and he controlled who was going to win the Papal election. I needed the extra point for going with Jon’s decision. But he chose randomly and I had to chose randomly as well by fliping my card. Unfortunately, the card fell on the wrong outcome. I lost that point and was tied for second with Mike. Gah!

Vampire

To end the night, we resurrected an old but good game. The first game went rather poorly for me.

Vampire

But the second game went much better!

Can’t Stop

Jon didn’t arrive early enough so we played this quick filler. My dice luck was bad tonight. It was a sign of my foreboding future.

Evo

It has been a while since we played this game. I started off between Mike and Jon. Unfortunately, the climate was not kind to my Brontosaurus and evolution did not see fit to give them more than one leg to use. So, only one animal could escape the freezing or baking temperatures. Sadly the rest died.

Another mistake I made was to spend too much victory points on horns. I figured that I would have to fight for my survival. However, my neighbor Mike had the same number of horns as myself. And Jon was too far away to attack.

Andromeda

Another classic game that we don’t play anymore because we buy too many new games. In this game, it all boiled down to luck. For my final turns I had two chances to establish a station. If I would have gotten either of them, it would have given me the win. Unfortunately, the puck was not with me. Another thing that I should have done was to keep more joker cards. Mike kept quite a number of them which gave him second place.

Ars Mysteriorum

This is a return on investment game with a bunch of blind bidding. A lot of it! And therefore you can get hosed a lot in this game. Especially if you are towards the end of the turn order since that is one tie breaker. This game also has a lot of special cards that gives you power and these are played a lot. Which brings us to another hosage factor. At the beginning of the game you can buy one spell (all spells generate income based on a row/column/stack factor). Unfortunately, the two spells that I could choose from were both too expensive and I think that I suffered because it (other people did buy one).

It was an interesting game by, Alan Ernstein, the maker of Tahuantinsuyu. I would give it another chance.

McMulti

Ahh… another game of McMulti… with Adam. This time we played with a different house rule that helped even out the market swings. But those random number generating dice still were able to hose the entire group. Four double ones were rolled (3 back to back) early and this led to four news events happening. And all of them were horrible taxes. After selling off almost all of our equipment to pay for them, we were ready to start on the road to recovery. Adam was lucky and he was able to build up six gas stations and start selling gas for lots of money. Unfortunately, he was 10 dollars away from calling the end of the game. And my luck increased enough to give me the win (1487 to 1345)!

Call My Bluff

Gah! Dice are flawed. With three stars showing and Tim saying that there were ten of them out there, I had to call. Much to my regret since there were more and I was out of the game. At least Tim won the game by rolling three stars again and knocked out the remaining two players.

Call My Bluff

Three people had arrived and that was enought to start a light quick filler game. In this game, we had only 7 plays and each of them were exact! Gah! That was enought to knock out both myself and Jon which gave the win to Adam.

Santiago

We have not played this game in a while which is sad. It is a good game. I initially guessed wrong in the first two turns so I was off to a bad start. And strangely, for some reason, the group and Ed just did not get along together. Ed was always ended up the odd man out. I paid some high prices to get some valuable plots but it was not enough to win me the game. I came in second.

Torres

Torres is another good game that I have not played enough (but it is a bit of a brain burner or analysis paralysis game). I was a little afraid at the start because I was playing with Ed. And Ed loves this game (and I am sure has played it more recently than I). However, I was able to critically hose him in one instance and maintain control of the highest tower and that gave me the win. Some things that led to it were I was able to go last in 3 of the 4 times and Ed did not have the card he needed at the last play.

Fredericus

Ed and Susan brought a new game for us to play and they needing some playings in order to write a review. So, we played Fredericus. In this game, you “hunt” cards with your falcons in the middle. If clouds are the neighboring cards to an animal card and your big falcon is sitting in that column, then you can take the card. If a cloud and a ground surround an animal card, then your small falcon can take the card. If two ground cards surround opponent’s falcons, you can “hood” them. Being “hooded” is hard to recover from. Your falcon looses its turn, so it cannot escape it for the next time. And only one person needs to spend an action point to hood your falcon again.

The other part of this game is betting that an animal is going to be caught in a column before it becomes your turn again. And I could not predict people’s actions. The game seemed to play too long for what it was worth.

Hispaniola

We finaly got around to playing the Michael Schacht trick taking game that uses a board. It comes in a large box as well, and to be honest, you can easily replace the board with some cards and use a small box. In this game, trump is decided by spending cards. The highest, non-tied, card will determine trump. If there is no unique number, then players pick another card and try again. You must follow suite, but the highest card will win if no trump is played (like Sticheln). The winner of a trick gets to place a pawn on the corresponding ship (neutral if 3 or more colors were played, otherwise the led color). The pawn can displace a previous pawn which will fall onto islands (which count as negative points). As more pawns are displaced, the previous pawns work their way onto more negative islands until they finally go back into your supply.

This was an interesting game that I would like to play again…

Geschenkt

We ended the night with another light card game. I have learned not to take on too many card groups and not to try and force the other players to chip in more tokens. Eventually they will just grab that card.

Lord of the Rings – The Confrontation

And then it was just me and Adam. Adam suggested that we play The Confrontation. Unfortunately, I was not able to grok a strategy. Adam decimated me and made me his tool. I called each match as hopeless early on.