Parental Advisory

Ben brought games down to the Ribs for the first time ever. And against NoBog custom his game, Dominion, hit the table. This is not right. There is an unspoken rule that you have to bring a game down for at least 12 weeks in a row before it even has a chance of being played. Actually, it’s not an unspoken rule, as Crocker reminded us how he brought Leonardo Da Vinci along for two years straight and we refused to play it. Anyway, Ben played Dominion with Lovely Rich, Luke, Tash and New Pete. Ben won. Nobody was surprised, as he’d looked at a strategy guide prior to teaching it to the rest of the table. Nobody was surprised that he didn’t buy a drink either. Again. Tight git.

On the other table Mr Crocker, Old Pete, New Andy and myself played a game of Brass, which is an economic/efficiency game set in the better half of the North of England during the Industrial Revolution. This was the third time I’d played Brass and I enjoyed it more than my previous sessions as it has a rather steep learning curve and it takes a while to get into the flow. I hit the ground running this time, as I’d vaguely remembered how to play. I set a decent pace in the first era, only to be reeled in by the outstanding Crocker, who beat me by one point in the finally tally. Curse him!

Have to say a big welcome to twin brothers Andy and Pete, who attended their first proper session (having sussed us out the week before last). Hopefully they both enjoyed themselves and weren’t put off by Crocker’s potty mouth, who shouted every profanity under the sun in the course of the three hours. The cunt. And if you’re wondering how to tell Andy and Pete apart – Andy wears a scarf and Pete sits at the other table by the door.

Beer: I was on the Wherry. The old standard. Lack of guest ales at the Ribs recently.

We are still here.

If a stranger wanders in off the street and mentions that your blog hasn't been updated for a while, then it's probably a sign that the blog needs a bit of updating.* So here we are 75 days since the last update. Let me fill you in with what's been going on with the Norwich Board Gamers...

O.K so I wrote the entry before seeing Luke's latest entry. Damn him!

Slight recap, not including last week. We had Christmas and New Year and then met back in a rather empty Ribs of Beef, which suffered from the post Christmas lull throughout January. Rich Harding made a welcome return. Rachael and Adam chose to break their legs rather than venture into Norwich in the dark (does Chris give them extra x-rays for free?). Most of the other faces you'd expect to see have shown up at some point as well.

We've played Carson City, Tobago, Puerto Rico, Endeavour, Glory to Rome, Small World, Lost Valley, King of Siam, Turn the Tide, Citadels, The Adventurers, Power Grid, Last Train to Wensleydale, Primordial Soup and Chaos in the Old World (which got to the table three weeks in a row and is still being requested).

There has been a pork scratching crisis and we suffered a number of scratching free weeks before a new supplier of the pigulous snacks was found. Neither of the alternative brands have lived up to the high standard set by Blackcountry Snacks' Q Pork Crackling and poor Luke has resorted to keeping a salt shaker in his pocket in order to add extra salt to his pork snacks. This mostly brings you up to date.

Tonight we had seven. Rich Harding led a game of Evo which was played by Tash and Ben. I got the impression that Tash loved it and Ben hated it. I can only assume that Ben lost. On my table we played a game of In the Year of the Dragon. It was a close run thing with Luke coming from nowhere to grab victory in the final count up. He just pipped me, Pete came third and Jimmy trailed in last. We used another one of the Rio Grande expansions which Crocker mentioned last week. This one added the Great Wall of China to the game, which scores extra points if successfully built by the time the Mongols invade. It added an extra option and a bit of variation, but I'd hardly say it was essential.

Beer: I had some Ruby Ale, which was completely average. Luke can probably tell us which brewery it's from. I'd compare it to Amyitis - so completely average that I'll have forgotten it existed by tomorrow.

* That stranger was Andy. Not War-Lovin' Andy, but some new-comer, hoping to wrestle the mantle of "Andy" off of one of the stalwart few. He even had a beard. Welcome Andy - hope we see you next week.

Where are all the Richards????

Is Richard the new bus? we had three the other week and none last Tuesday night!

Seven gamers in total so we played a 3 and a 4. Matt led and won Medina with Ben and Lukes girlfriend (sorry cant remember her name right now). Whilst Jimmy wiped the floor with the two Lukes and Kat at Notre Dame. A game I had only played when it was a new release two or was it even three years ago. Jimmy had got an expansion pack that added extra elements to various rio grande games, in this case some extra cards. Notre Dame is played over 3 rounds (A,B,C) each round consisting of 3 turns (containing 2 actions) and each turn sees 2 regular cards from a deck of 6 (each round you see all the cards) and 1 card from a deck marked either A, B or C depending on the round (certain cards balanced for early or late game). There used to be a pool of 9 cards for this meaning every card would come out. Now there are additional cards adding variety and varying certain tactics players may opt for.

Jimmy stuck to and won the game using a 'cleanliness' strategy. This is where you try and limit your exposeure to the rats (a mechanic at the end of each turn which cripples naive players). The two Lukes went VP heavy in the first round due to the presence of a new card and as a result at the end of the first round they had a commanding lead of Jimmy. However experience told and through the subsiquent rounds Jimmy clawed it back for an eventual comfortable win. Kat set up a VP engine and did very well, I believe she was second but all the 'runner ups' suffered from not having played the game before and making silly mistakes.

Seating order has a big impact on this game and whilst I liked the mechanic of passing action cards to your left for the next player to use, I felt this limited the game immensly. Clearly you needed to think about what your oppenents might pass you, or what you should not pass others but ultimately Im not a fan of games that prevent or curtaile me planing and implimenting a goal as dramaticaly as this game does. The random nature of drawing from your own deck meant I frequently got 3 cards I needed in one draw and none in another and as Jimmy was a strong player and sitting to my right I found that I would fail to make any progress during a 2 turns in a round. Bad draws are something you can live with in a game like dominion when there are multiple draws and having a duff turn has little impact but in a game with only 3 rounds a duff draw effects one third of the game. A possible interesting, although slightly more complex method, might be to pass cards in a variety of patterns, first to you left, then to your right and finally to your diagonal neighbour, ala the card game hearts ( the later turn could see you getting back your 3 pick card) this way each player needs to think about a different oppenent for each turn and seating position matters less. An additional or alternative approach would be to draw 4/5 of your cards from your pool of 9 and choose the cards with which to play, discarding the extras. this would lead to your deck being cycled through faster and would still limit your actions based on what other players sent you.

I really like the notion of player interaction in Notre Dame where you get to impact what actions other players get to do. But the number of rounds and the medium weight of the game dont quiet gel with this mechanic. As ever a second play in a reasonable timescale may change my mind or cement my findings.

Please feel free to keep this blog alive by adding your own gaming thoughts and impressions of the nights events down at the ribs.