Monday September 25, 2000

Guillotine, Ra
Present: Bill, Ron, Helen, Alex, Andy

Guillotine

An outing for Guillotine, courtesy of Andy’s games collection, complete with his own hand-made and bloodstained model of the eponymous instrument.

I have never played it before but this made a big hit with the group. Definitely in the party bracket, it is a card game which only requires a little thought, has an amusing take on its theme and can be played quickly.

Basically, each player represents an executioner, aiming to fill his basket with the most sought after heads during the French revolution. The game is played in three rounds, with a set of 12 of these potential victims lined up in front of the guillotine in each round. On his turn, a player can play an action card, and then must take the victim nearest the guillotine into his scoring pile. These victims are all numbered according to their value, from a whopping five points for King Louis, to –3 points to the hero of the people.

The action cards are the heart of the game and allow a variety of moves ranging from altering the order of the nobles in the line up to raiding other players’ scoring piles.
The game progresses at a reasonable clip, as each player tries to juggle the line in order to get the best heads for himself and force the other players to take the victims with low scoring or negative values.

There really is not much too it. It is pretty obvious which action cards you have to play to maximise your scoring and there is little you can do to protect yourself from the attentions of other players. Nevertheless, it is one of those games where winning really is not that important and it is much more fun just trying to stitch people up while lopping off as many heads as you can.

We managed to play two four-handed games in about forty minutes, with each game throwing up a three-way tie for the lead.

For me, the game is just too light, even for a filler, but it is a laugh, and, judging by everybody else’s ratings I doubt I will be able to escape playing it again.

Scores
Game 1
Helen 17; Alex 17; Andy 17; Bill 14
Game 2
Helen 15; Alex 16; Andy 16; Bill 16

Ratings: Helen 9; Alex 8; Andy 9; Bill 7

I had high hopes of getting this one imbedded in the group consciousness after a positive experience both Ron and I had had with an earlier three-player game. Unfortunately it just didn’t seem to hit the spot this time. For some reason the five-player game seemed to drag a bit and left me feeling curiously uninvolved.

This is a pity, because I suspect given another chance, or played with four, it would get a good response. Also, Ron seems to have mastered it much better than me, which has left her enthusiasm less dented.

Anyway, Ron flew away with the game. She made sure she didn’t get caught without civilisation counters and continued to score steadily each round without going for a massive tally in any one particular category. Alex went for a Nile strategy which scored well for him, although he lost out in other areas, while Helen and Andy went for a mixed approach but both fell a few tiles short of the big single category scores. I just ballsed it up completely.

Scores
Helen 32; Alex 32; Andy 32; Bill 30; Ron 45

Ratings: Helen 7.5; Alex 7; Andy 7.5; Bill 7.5; Ron 8

Will this be enough to get Ra back on the table? The Russian judge thinks not.

This is an interesting situation. With so many games to play, one poor showing for even a classic game could land it back into the recesses of the cupboard. We shall see…

Friday September 22

Present: Richard, Bill, Judith, Lyn, Sarah, Ron

A one-off session and an inuagural party of newbies, consisting largely of Ron’s work colleagues who had decided to investigate the strange obsession of her weird husband. So there I was, faced with the need to choose a six player game which could either introduce new faces to the realm of games, or cause the circulation of many whispers behind my wife’s back about her demented husband.

In the end I took the democratic (and somewhat cowardly) course by shunting most of the accessible six-player titles I owned on to the dinner table and decided to let them vote for it.

Out of a selection which included Vinci, Europa 1945 - 2030, Condottiere, Bohnanaza and 6 Nimmt, the crew went for a starter of Scotland Yard followed by a main course of Union Pacific (largely swayed by my description of the former as the simplest game of the lot, and the latter by my noting of its Game of the Year award – which it had not won).

Well, the whole evening was a hoot. With the exception of my wife, no-one had played anything resembling a diceless German-style game, but all seemed to take to it immediately.

We played Scotland Yard three times (and would probably have carried on playing had I not suggested a bit of variety).

I would agree with some opinions I have heard on this game that, with six people, it is extraordinarily difficult for Mr X to get away – particularly with random initial placement (perhaps Mr X should be able to choose where to start after the detectives have been placed on the board?). Certainly, none of our three villains managed to escape the long arm of the law, but it was fun to try and stay at liberty for as long as possible.

Then we turned to Union Pacific. I have never played it before, and I was a little worried that it might be a bit too dry as an introduction to the hobby. Certainly, it took a little while to get all of the key concepts over but after a couple of rounds of play everything fell into place. I enjoyed the game, although I would not put it up there amidst my favourites. But all fears of a stock and railway game being an ideal theme to put people off gaming for life were obviously unfounded. By the time the game ended (rounded off with a view of Britain's rowing success at the Olympics) the diaries were out and everyone was busy organising the next meeting.

Ratings: Richard 9; Bill 7.5; Judith 9; Lyn 9; Sarah 8; Ron 6.5

Monday September 18, 2000

Present: Bill, Ron, Helen, Alex, Andy

Our first new recruit, courtesy of Alex drumming up some support from behind the counter at Dice ‘n Duel. And no slouch either. A veteran of games conventions and other groups he seems likely to add a touch of professionalism to the proceedings.

His addition also took us up to the magic number five. Although this closes off a few four-player only titles such as the last two we have played, it opens up a lot more. It is the most that La Città can bear and, I suspect, its optimum number.

Despite the game’s size I found it easier to explain than either Stephensons Rocket or Euphrat & Tigris. It has a pretty linear turn structure, which helps, the player aids are clear and the mechanics fit nicely with the theme. The only tricky concepts are the ‘voice of the people’ and citizen migration and even these are not too bad.

After about twenty minutes of summarising we were off.

It was a cracking game. The time flew past and it did not seem long before we were approaching the end game and calculating whether we would be able to feed all of our citizens in that crucial final turn.

In getting to this point several strategies had emerged. I had concentrated on building one mega city while allowing another to become an agricultural outpost, something like an Amish community, which produced plenty of food on the upside, but would be regularly depopulated each turn as the younger generation went off in search of the bright lights. Others developed both cities equally, hoping to take advantage of the voice whenever it fell in their favour. Andy, meanwhile, went for a final turn rush of new city building in an attempt to create new citizens on the cheap. He would have won the game if only he could have fed them all!

Much to everyone’s surprise, the final result was pretty tight, with the winner decided by the hunger calculation.

Bill 26; Alex 24; Helen 23; Ron 22; Andy 22.

No disappointment here, with high ratings from all concerned. Despite the length, I am sure this will be out on the table again soon.

Ratings: Helen 7.5; Alex 10 (!); Andy 8.5; Ron 8.5; Bill 8

Present: Bill, Ron, Helen, Alex

Appetites for the heavier end of the German game market were obviously whetted by the previous week’s experience and everyone was keen to try Knizia’s classic on the development of ancient civilisations. Despite the presence on the shelf of the much trumpeted new arrival La Città.

I am not the greatest rules summariser at the best of times and I have to admit to finding E&T even more tricky than usual to explain. I got a bit worried as eyes began to glaze over as I was going through the different types of conflict in the game. At least, unusually for a Knizia game, the scoring mechanism is relatively straightforward. Eventually, I found that by setting up a few examples on the board proved much more worthwhile than reading out the rules. Anyway, after about half an hour were on our way.

Alex got hit in the early game through a lack of temple tiles as he failed to fight off opposing leaders after his nice little position on the river. Unlike Helen, who always seemed to have just enough tiles of the right kind to hang on to her position, usually at Ron’s expense. My original scatter tactic for the leaders gradually changed as each leader’s territory began to coalesce.

A wave of monument building left me in a strong position in red and black, but weak in blue and green. It was difficult to tell how everyone else was doing. As the end of the game approached, my master plan to grab a huge wedge of fishing and merchant tiles through a well-timed battle between two large kingdoms got stuffed by an even better-timed catastrophe tile laid by Alex.

When the dust settled:

Helen 12; Bill 8; Ron 6; Alex 4

Helen’s aggressive defence in the early game had persuaded everyone else to leave her alone and she used this time of peace wisely, developing a balanced hand and protecting her leaders. Alex got stuffed by his slow start and Ron had also been stymied by her failures to get the edge over Helen in a couple of crucial conflicts. I had fallen into the obvious trap of being so taken by my massive collection of red and black cubes that I failed to work hard enough at the other areas.

Again, like SR, once we had started the game it took about 90 minutes. When we have a few more games under our collective belts we will be able to start thinking about replaying some these titles. Without having to learn the rules it would be easy to play two in an evening rather than the one game per session we seem to be managing at the moment.

Ratings: Helen 9; Bill 8.5; Alex 8; Ron 8 (Obviously a good game then!)

Present: Bill, Ron, Helen, Alex

The inaugural meeting of the group. Four present – from little acorns…

Anyway, I provided a selection of titles ranging in complexity from Ra to Stephensons Rocket (sic), and, a little surprisingly, it was the latter title which won the vote. I had mixed feelings about the choice. I had played it once before with Ron in a two handed game and, though I certainly liked it, I was a little afraid that it might put off newcomers with its complex scoring techniques and the relative opacity of its tactics.

I need not have worried. A twenty minute rules summary and a few sample turns and soon everyone was in the swing of it, appreciating the tough choices they were facing and doing their best to prosper.

A variety of approaches emerged, although most relied on the mixed strategy of collecting commodities and concentrating investment efforts on only one or two lines.

Helen’s efforts on the yellow line were soon wrecked by a few aggressive moves by Alex which forced it into a dead end, Alex, in turn, eventually saw his grey line disadvantageously merged, while Ron’s red line did not quite make it into the heavy hitter league. These honours went to the blue line, which I dominated in both shares and stations as it snaked its way up the middle of the board. More through luck than judgement I managed to pull off a late game railway town connection and merger, which netted me a stack of cash and an unassailable lead by the time the game ended when the tiles ran out.

Final scores: Bill 84,000; Ron 59,000; Alex 56,000; Helen 53,000

It should be noted that the top two positions went to the players who had some experience of the game. While it is true for most games that some experience is better than none, I suspect this is magnified in SR where the big scoring tactics are not immediately apparent.

Once we had started, the game came in at the ninety minutes stated on the box.

The game went down well and I suspect will come out again.

Ratings (out of 10): Bill 8; Ron 7; Alex 8; Helen 6