July 12, 2007 Session Report

Pleased to report that attendance held strong at 12 this week: Gabe, Paul S., Clayton, Neil, Sarah, Paul J., Stan, Nicole, Beth, Tucker, Bob and myself were in attendance. There were a total of nine different games played, and here are some of the highlights.

Gabe introduced RoboRally to several newcomers, and the game was played at least twice (first a two-player with Gabe and Paul S. and then later in a larger game that included Paul S, Gabe, Tucker, Clayton and Bob. Neil wanted to try out Yspahan and played a four-player with two new players and of course the newcomers (Sarah and Paul J.) finished one-two ahead of myself and Neil, the "teacher" in that game. I felt good about getting all six buildings but little in the way of camels or souks and only narrowly managed to fend off Neil for third spot.

By then Stan, Nicole and Beth had arrived, and the three of them squared off in a game of Ingenious which ended up in a very narrow win for Beth. Gabe, Paul S. and Clayton played Fist of Dragonstones, followed by Fairy Tale (and perhaps a third RoboRally game was worked in at some point as well). Beth introduced a recent TransAmerica variant (we needed to borrow some colored "roads" pieces from the Settlers game) where each player gets to play three sections of track each round where they have exclusive track rights; Stan and I joined Beth in this variant which gave TransAmerica a more "strategic" feel when played with this additional twist. Meanwhile, Nicole joined Neil, Paul J. and Sarah in a game which Sarah brought, called "Speed Scrabble"--a variant on the regular game where each player arranges his/her own tiles to make a series of words. It looked interesting and something worth trying again.

At Neil's urging, six of us (Beth, Nicole, Sarah, Paul J, Neil and myself) played Coyote and, following the pattern of the earlier Yspahan game, the two new players (Sarah and Paul) came home one-two. With 20 minutes to closing time, we started a game of Sticheln but only had time to complete one hand -- the game was a learning experience for most of the players who were playing the game for the first or second time.