Weekend Gaming: Away from Home

We were away visiting my parents this weekend so I could attend a Warhammer 40k tournament on Saturday.  I’ll have pictures of that event up a little later this week.

On Friday night, we met up with Nick and Laura and played some Settlers of Catan.  I put all my eggs in too few baskets, and came up short.  I had Ore and Sheep ports, and needed 5’s and 8’s to get those rolling.  8’s were relatively plentiful, but 5 only was rolled three times, and one of those times one was covered by the Thief.  So I wasn’t able to get anything going, while Laura was able to build up a nice road system and a big army.  Nick eventually broke the road to take the longest, but he wasn’t able to finish it up.  Laura stole it back in the end to win.

Saturday night, after the tournament, Ryan, Gina and I all headed over to Nick and Laura’s again for games.  We started the night off with Puerto Rico.  I was pushing a fast building strategy with three Quarries, and a Coffee Roaster getting me a single coffee each time someone produced.  Ryan was sitting to my left and he was shipping sugar and indigo, so it worked out that my coffee never got shipped and I was able to trade it away nearly every turn.  I was able to buy up three of the large buildings by the end of the game, and I eventually ended the game by filling in my city.

I was concerned with the pile of points that Ryan had, that I didn’t even notice Gina.  She was shipping right along with Ryan, and she had the big building that provided bonus points for shipping points.  When it was all over, I had 39 points from my buildings, but only 4 shipping points for a final score of 43.  Ryan had mirrored me with 39 shipping points and 7 building points for 46, and Gina had a nice mix for a total of 49 and the win.  I had thought I was doing well with three large buildings, but I wasn’t able to finish fast enough or with enough balance to take the game.

My board

Ryan’s on the left, Gina’s up top

Next up was 7 Wonders.  I was trying to go heavy into Science, but I’ve never really figured that strategy out for some reason and ended up struggling.  Things were pretty even going into Age 3, but then I pretty much handed Ryan the game.  I ended up passing him the guild that rewards you for your neighbor’s Science and the one that rewards military victories.  Since Gina and I were both in Science and Ryan had maxed out his military points, those two guilds were worth a whopping 23 points.  I really couldn’t do anything about it other than pitch those guilds for money, which would have had no benefit to me.  Ryan ended up winning with 69 points.

We finished the night with Phase 10 and Monty Python Fluxx.  Phase 10 came down to a race between Ryan and Nick.  Nick managed to edge Ryan out and score the last phase.  Monty Python Fluxx got quite ridiculous when Laura was able to draw about 15 cards in a single turn and play most of them.  The game ended with the Cheese Shop goal and her playing a card that allowed everyone to discard their hand, Keepers and Creepers.  Everyone discarded everything and we all took a shared win with nothing.

Until next time, happy gaming.

 

 

 

Weekend Gaming: Games Away From Home

Between being of town all weekend visiting relatives and our new camera needing to be sent off for repairs, there are no pictures of the games this week.

We did play a bunch of them, though.

On Friday, we headed over to visit Nick and Laura and played Puerto Rico, 7 Wonders and Sentinels of the Multiverse.  I managed to win Puerto Rico with a very strong trade/building strategy.  I was able to monopolize coffee early, and with an Office and both Markets I was buying the large buildings at full price.  I ended the game with only 7 shipping points and 39 points from my city.  Nick was a close second with 38 points and the two large buildings that I didn’t buy.

7 Wonders was a close one.  I was playing Giza, but didn’t have any access to paper, so I couldn’t finish the wonder.  I also ended up with no access to Ore, so the last Age was rough.  Laura ended up dominating all of us for the win.

It was the first time for all of us playing a borrowed copy of Sentinels of the Multiverse.  I was playing as the big robot Bunker, Nick was Absolute Zero, Gina had Fanatic and Laura had Visionary.  We were fighting against The Matriarch in Rook City.  We started off alright, but then we hit a card that brought all of her birds back as the last card in the deck, causing us to face every single bird in the deck.  Between that and her ravens killing of Nick’s and my equipment, the game went downhill quickly.  It’s a fun game, but definitely needs some good luck to have a chance.

On Saturday evening we again joined Nick and Laura.  Joe and Jaime had also come to town for some shopping and Nick’s sister Anna paid a visit as well.  Nick, Joe and I started with a quick game of Agricola with the K deck.  Joe was pushing for a heavy enhancement + rooms game, since a lot of his cards made for easier room building.  I was trying to get animals because of the Tanner, Pelts and Loom, but Nick was making it difficult by grabbing animals too.  We didn’t let Joe get easy access to the wood he needed, but Clay and Stone were undesired for most of the game.  He did get to a six room house, but the rest of his farm was empty.  I did get enough Boars to make the good use of my Pelts and Tanner.  Cows and Sheep were secondary and helped with my Organic Farmer points.  The biggest impact was that Joe lost 9 points for unused space, while I only lost two.  That combined with my end game bonuses propelled me into the lead.

Next up was 7 Wonder with everyone.  I was playing as Rhodes and was able to make the most of my military in ages 2 and 3 for some good points.  I also played a bunch of the yellow cards that allowed me to not worry about resources as much.  I ended up with a pretty balanced score, and even managed to grab a set of the sciences.  The game was close, but I was able to pull of the win by a single point.

Joe and Jaime left for home at this point, and so Gina, Anna, Nick, Laura and I played Ticket to Ride.  My opening two routes were to connect Vancouver and Seattle to Montreal and New York.  I quickly connected Vancouver to Seattle and Montreal to New York, and then spent the rest of the game working to connect the two.  I had to fight with Anna and Gina for a couple spots in the North, but otherwise I was pretty well left alone.  I was able to complete the three 6-train connections and the 5-train connection in the North, which really helped my score.  I did add another route from New York to Nashville late, but the majority of my points were from the long connections and my two initial routes.  I ended the game while everyone else had quite a few trains left, which earned me some dirty looks.  Nick and I shared the Longest Route, but I had him by about 30 points at the end of the game.

Nick, Gina and I finished the night with Castles of Burgundy.  Gina and Nick were grabbing points throughout the game, while I was focusing more on end game points with Shipping and buildings.  Nick had a big field of chickens, scoring himself a bunch of points, while Gina was filling everything else.  She just missed out on finishing her large city area, which hindered her score quite a bit.  They were both about 50 points ahead of me when the game ended, but neither of them had any significant end game bonuses, though, so I knew it would be close.  I was able to pass Gina, but I finished just behind Nick, ending my winning streak.

Until next time, happy gaming!

Weekend Gaming: Father’s Day

I hope all the dads out there had a great Father’s Day weekend.  I know I did.

Gina and I started things off on Friday with Eminent Domain, followed by Le Havre and Carcassonne: Hunters and Gatherers.  In Eminent Domain, I had a couple of advanced planets with Trade symbols on them.  I was pushing to produce resources with Advanced Production actions and then trade them away quickly.  While doing that, Gina was racking up planets with Survey and Colonization.  She had bought a couple Advanced Colonization cards and was using them to colonize at least one planet per turn.  At the end, her planets outpaced my trading and she picked up the win.

Gina – 41, Andy – 36

Le Havre was next, and wasn’t terribly interesting.  She was having a tough time feeding her workers, while I was able to get a wharf and some early boats.  Nothing real spectacular about the game.

Andy – 289, Gina – 174

In Carcassonne, we ended up dueling for a large hunting area early, but while I was able to get an early lead with two hunters, she was able to sneak one of her own in to split the points.  I wasn’t able to pick up another substantial area, spending more time on the rivers.  She was able to grab another area, plus some good forests as well.  The game ended up being quite high scoring, and she managed to edge me out for the win.

Gina – 188, Andy – 173

On Saturday, Louis, Joe, Jaime, and Kevin joined us and we started things off with a game of Shadows over Camelot.  I was playing as Sir Bedivere, Joe was King Arthur, and I forget who the others were.  I started the game with two pairs in my hand, so I went over to the Black Knight tournament quest, but wasn’t able to get my cards out fast enough to win.  Joe was making good progress with the Grail, and Kevin and Louis were helping with Excalibur.  Gina was trying to help, but was drawing terrible movement cards and couldn’t get anywhere.  After failing to defeat the Black Knight, I went over to help with Excalibur.

At this point, we received a black card that prevented us from using Merlin cards, and then shortly thereafter we got hit with a card that damaged everyone.  Kevin was only at one life and we couldn’t save him.  Joe had a stockpile of cards, and was trading them with Gina, but she wasn’t playing them all that well, so Louis accused her as soon as he could.  She was loyal, though.

I ended up getting killed by another black card that we couldn’t stop, and things were looking bad as the table was filling up with black swords.  The game ended after another failed quest and seven traitor swords.  It turned out that Joe had been the traitor all along, and we were just playing so terribly that all he had to do was sit back and watch us fail.

We followed that up with a crazy game of Puerto Rico.  I started with indigo and intended to ship that and then got into coffee for money.  Louis was the only person picking up quarries, and Kevin ended up getting a factory because I was sitting before him and would block him out o selling his coffee.  Kevin also picked up a harbor, and since he was making every kind of good, he could ship them for quite a few points.

All big buildings were bought, two quarries were still available.

The craziest thing about the game, though, was that everyone was making quite a bit of money.  There was four gold on the prospectors a few times, Kevin was getting rich from his factory and I was selling coffee.  Everyone except Louis (the one with the quarries) was able to buy a big building, while I bought two.  The third row of buildings was also completely empty by the end of the game.  All of this was done while there was still two quarries left in the supply.

In the end, Kevin had been able to ship for something like 40 points, and then picked up a bit more with his buildings.  Gina shipped a bunch two and ended up in second.  I was close, though, with 25 points from shipping and two big buildings.

Kevin – 66, Gina – 56, Andy – 55, Jaime – 53, Louis – 44

We finished up the night with Louis, Kevin, Joe and I playing Eminent Domain.  I borrowed Gina’s strategy from the night before and went straight for surveying and colonizing.  Joe was using military to conquer planets and then research new technologies.  He managed to get the technologies that let him trade fighters as resources and use research cards as any type of card, and made quite a few points trading those off.  Louis was producing and trading quite a bit, while Kevin was using military to settle a bunch of planets.  I had intended to produce and trade along with my colonization, but it never quite worked out.  I did end up with the most points at the end, which surprised me.  I had thought that Joe picked up more points from shipping, even though he only had a couple of planets.

Andy – 30, Joe – 26, Louis – 22, Kevin – 21

Finally, on Sunday, Joe came over and he, Gina and I played a game of Le Havre.  This one went much better for Gina, as she was able to get a bunch of cows to ship on my shipping lines.  She had the boats to feed her people and a few industrial buildings that I kept using and paying her money.  The bad thing for me, was that I had intended to do a lot of the same things as Gina, and she managed to get them just ahead of me.  Joe, though, had his own thing going.  He was gathering all kinds of resources and then using the Business Office to convert them to steel.  This allowed him to build three Steel Ships by the end of the game.  He also built two of the high point buildings, which contributed to over 50 points for him.  Those last two builds are what bumped him into the lead, followed by Gina and them me.

Joe – 230, Gina – 201, Andy 195

It was a wonderful weekend, filled with games.  And I’m looking forward to many more with some new games as well.

Until next time, happy gaming.

Weekend Gaming: Agricola

Joe, Phil and Kevin joined us on Saturday night and brought Agricola with them.  I started the game and the first thing I noticed in my hand was that I had three occupations and two minor improvements that would help in building to stone rooms.  So that was my plan going in.  My mistake, though, was that I didn’t have a good idea on how I was going to get food for my family.  I ended up getting a cooking fire and cooking some animals for food.  As for my house plans, I had discounts to renovating to stone and I could go straight from wood to stone.  I ended up building two rooms and then renovating, but I should have built a lot more, since I had a tough time getting the stone to build any more rooms.  I ended up in third place, mostly due to bonuses and my house, but it also helped that I had an occupation that prevented me from losing a bunch of points for things I didn’t have at the end.  It was a better game that I’ve had in the past, but my plan was definitely flawed.

The second game of the night was Puerto Rico.  I was heading for a strong builder strategy, but I started out with very little to sell.  It took me a few turns to get coffee production going, but I did alright selling indigo for the first few turns.  Eventually I was able to fill the bottom part of my island and get four quarries for the discounts.  I picked up two of the large buildings, and finished the game with 10 shipping points and another 35 from my buildings for 45 points and first place.

We finished up the night with a couple games of Dominion Intrigue.  The first set had both the Swindler and the Sabateur and it ended pretty badly for everyone.  I had a whopping zero points, and Joe won with 15 or so.  Phil and Kevin took off at that point and so Joe, Gina and I played another round.  I was able to use Scouts and Wishing Wells to setup a pretty strong engine, though it was interrupted periodically by Gina’s Masquerades.  I was able to pull in the last Province to end the game, which was good because up to that point Joe and I were tied.  Had I not picked up that Province he would have.

Until next time, happy gaming.

Weekend Gaming: Puerto Rico

This weekend we were again staying with my parents, and we met up with Nick and Laura Saturday evening for some drinks and games.  Nick had recently bought Puerto Rico, and I wanted to try it without Joe, since he’s usually the one pushing the game.  It was definitely a bit different without Joe’s typical tactics and playing with people who were less experienced with the game.  I was able to get a good tobacco and corn production system going, and spent most of the game selling tobacco and shipping corn.  Nick and Laura were both working with coffee and Gina was making a bit of everything and using her Factory.  I was able to pick up 24 points with shipping and then added another 37 with buildings, including two of the big buildings.   That 61 points was enough to pull off a solid win.

Just one game for the weekend, but we did pick up vintage copies of Acquire and Diplomacy.  They are missing a few pieces, but they are still in great condition an d are just fun to own.

Until next time, happy gaming.

Weekend Gaming: Football Weekend!

Pretty fun weekend around here.  On Friday we spent the afternoon over at our friends’ house where we celebrated their daughter’s first birthday and watch the NDSU Bison football team win the FCS championship.  It was a blast.

That evening, Louis, Kevin, Ryan and Joe joined us for games.  First up was Acquire.  I started one of the smaller companies, and then it immediately grew to the point where it wasn’t going away until the end of the game.  Because of this, I wasn’t able to get into any other companies.  I barely had enough money to get into a tie for the most shares in my company.  In the end, Joe and I tied for that one, and he had controlled enough of the smaller mergers to easily take the win.

Next up was Railways of the Western U.S.  My baron required that I connect and industrialize Dodge City and Santa Fe.  Because of this I was doing a lot of shipping in and around Denver.  Sadly, because I went last on the first turn, I wasn’t able to snag the Hotel for Denver.  Louis go that card, so I was feeding him a bunch of points even while I was making points for myself.  Kevin and Gina had control of the West coast and were making some deliveries there, while Ryan had decided to go for the Golden Spike bonus and built all the way from Omaha to San Fransisco.  Joe was all alone in the lower Midwest, and Louis had a solid grip on the Salt Lake City region.  Louis was making consistent 3-4 point deliveries and with the bonus points I was providing him, he easily won the game.  Over all, though, it was a pretty low scoring game, with all of us sitting at just over 20 points (Louis had about 30).

We followed that up with a quick game of 7 Wonders.  I was playing Rhodes, and focused pretty heavily on military.  I was having difficulties, though, as I wasn’t able to get Stone until the end of Age 2, so I wasn’t able to start on my Wonder.  Then I forgot about Iron and wasn’t able to build the second stage of my Wonder.  Regardless, I still did alright with maximum military points and two very strong Guilds.  It wasn’t enough, though, as Ryan had pulled off 38 points worth of Science and edged me out by 3 points.

The last game of the night was Puerto Rico, with Ryan sitting out.  I went heavily into a Trading/Building strategy.  I was able to grab both Markets, and was routinely selling Coffee and Tobacco for big money.  I was able to build three of the big buildings.  Louis was doing a very strong shipping strategy, while Kevin and Gina were more balanced.  Joe was also doing a lot of Trading and Buying.  In the end, I was able to put up 43 points, which just barely beat out Louis’ 41 points.

Sunday was spent watching more football, while I worked on painting some Razorbacks for my Space Wolves army.  I am nearly done with one, which just needs detailing and weathering.  Here is a work-in-progress picture:

Overall a great first weekend of 2012.  Happy gaming!

Weekend Gaming and the Deathly Hallows

Friday night, Joe offered to watch the kids so Jaime Gina and I could go see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.  The movie was great.  I loved every minute of it, and it was definitely the best of the Harry Potter movies, and even better than the book in my opinion.  When we got back home, we were too wired to go to bed, so we played a quick game of Puerto Rico.  I was able to make a killing selling coffee and was able to buy a couple big buildings, taking the game.

After that we still had time for one more, so since we had 4 people we were able to break out Thurn and Taxis.  Joe was able to grab the big points for the center of the board, but I grabbed the points for one in each zone and was able to speed to the biggest cart.  Gina and Jaime both cam close and in the end the game was only won by a couple points.

On Saturday, Joe was running late, so Gina, Kevin, Ryan and I played some Nightfall.  I had draft Vulko (a big defensive monster) and a card that let me change the target of other players’ cards.  My deck ended up with Vulko, the target changer and another card that directly damaged all opponents.  Things were going well at first.  I was able to prevent all damage to myself, while still damaging the rest.  Sadly I ended up leaving myself very vulnerable one turn and took a real beating.  I ended up in last place with 13 wounds, while Kevin had 6.  I’m really liking the game, and there really seems to be quite some depth.

 

Once Joe and Jaime showed up, we broke out 7 Wonders.  We played two quick games of this.  The first game was won with a very balanced strategy by everyone.  Ryan, though, had a stronger science position and took the game by a few points.  The second game was a lot more lopsided.  Ryan and I both started off with some weak resource positions, but luckily our neighbors were able to help us out.  Ryan and I took strong military positions, Joe had a ton of Civilian structures and Kevin had a bunch of Science.  I was also able to snag 3 different guilds that really pushed my score up.  In the end, Ryan had 20 points from the Giza wonder, Kevin had 30+ points of Science, Joe had 32 points of Civilian, and I had 35 points from my Guilds.  After the final tally, I was able to squeak by Ryan by three points for the victory.

Ryan took off and we finished the night with another game of Puerto Rico.  I made the mistake of grabbing a Large Market right away thinking that I would be able to sell everything for good money.  Sadly, I wasn’t able to produce anything for the first few turns.  Joe ended up making tons of cash and bought three of the large buildings and took the lead easily.

Sunday was crazy hot out, but I still played in a disc golf tournament that was put on by Ryan.  I played in the recreational division and ended up tied for second place.  It was a really nice day, and luckily we finished before the big storm hit.  I played with some great local guys and had a ton of fun.

Until next time, happy gaming!

Weekend Update: St. Patty’s Day

With the St. Patrick’s Day festivities going on here in town, we had some friends pay us a visit for the weekend.  It was pretty crazy, and many games were played.

We started off Friday night with a game of Forbidden Island.  We played on the easiest difficulty, since it was only my second time playing it, and nobody else had played it.  We were easily able to grab all four treasures and get off the island before the water rose too high.  We’ll definitely bump up the difficulty next time.

That was followed by a quick game of Dominion, that was pretty unmemorable.

Saturday held the majority of the festivities in town, but we had pretty much decided to stay home.  The wives all got together at Phil’s house, so Joe came over and he, Nick, and I played through a game of Railways of the World.  I got pretty lucky with the way the bonus points were showing up, and I was able to get a couple service bounties and major lines without leaving my area on the lower east coast.  I was able to pull out to a good lead early, and held it while Nick was making his way from the upper east coast to the Midwest and Joe spent his time completely in the Midwest.  In the end, none of us had racked up a ton of debt, and I was able to hold on for a sizable win.

Image used from Board Game Geek

We then played a game of Puerto Rico.  I hadn’t played in quite a while, and I had never played with only three people, so it was a different experience.  I was trying to make use of my usual trading/building strategy, but Joe was able to get a much more balanced game going.  At the end, I was able to pull back into the game, but I was still a point short of Joe.

After dinner, we traded Joe away to get the wives back.  The four of us started the evening battling the evil forces in Castle Ravenloft.   We took on the Dracolich with a team consisting of a Cleric (me), a Rogue (Laura), a Warrior (my wife) and a Wizard (Nick).  It looked pretty hairy early on, when I hit a streak of bad luck on encounters and was forced to use a healing surge.  We did find the Dracolich, though, and after a few turns of struggling to get things under control, we managed to get a rhythm going and took him down.  It was a pretty epic fight.

After that, we played another game of Puerto Rico.  This time I took on the strategy of shipping tons of stuff.  I was able to produce a bunch of corn, and I had no competition for boats.  I was easily able to rack up a bunch of points early and take the win.

We finished out the night with a couple games of Dominion.  The first game had a bunch of cards for extra buys and special victory cards.  I ended up going with Mints and Harems and getting quite a few points that way.  My wife was pulling in cash pretty easily too, but my Harems were just too much in the end.  The second game had a ton of extra actions, but card draw was limited to a Witch.  I was able to get a little going, but never a smooth progression.  I ended the game with 18 points, while my wife had 25.  Nick hadn’t been able to get anything rolling and was stuck with only 3 points.

Overall, it was a great weekend full of games, both new and old.

Until next time, happy gaming!