Thursday, July 31, 2008

July 31, 2008 Session Report

Attendance this week dropped to six, as Nick was back, along with Greg, Ben, Eric S., Clayton and myself. We played a total of five games: Can't Stop, Modern Art, Ticket to Ride-Switzerland, Mission Command -- Land Game, and Vegas Showdown.

Only have some details on a couple of the games. Three of us (Nick, Greg and myself) started out with Can't Stop which we abandoned when others arrived. Then we split into two groups of three; Greg, Eric and Ben played Modern Art, while Nick, Clayton and I played Ticket to Ride-Switzerland. Nick won the game by completing 10 (!) tickets.

Then Nick and Ben tried the two-player Mission Command game, which saw Ben do quite well in the opening game while Nick did better in the second game (and they may have played more than these two). The rest of us were engrossed in a four-player Vegas Showdown, which wound up with the two newcomers to the game (Eric and Greg) finishing 1-2 over Clayton and myself.

Next week, I will be at the WBC so I hope someone who is there will send me the results so I can post them here.

Friday, July 25, 2008

July 24, 2008 Session Report

For this week's session, we had nine gamers in attendance, including one newcomer to the club (Brent), Paul, Doug, Clayton, Eric S., Greg, Sarah, Ben and myself.

Here's some details on who played what.

Doug and Paul arrived first and played a two-player Qwirkle.

I introduced another new acquisition, the Catan Dice Game, to the group. Clayton came from behind, scoring 33 points in the last three turns, to take the win with 73 to 68 for Brent 67 for me and 62 for Doug.

Greg, Eric, Ben and Paul played Power Grid using the Central Europe map with the new deck. The game ran smoothly, taking around two hours, and Ben won on the tiebreaker (most money).

Clayton, Doug, Brent and I played a game which Doug had brought, called Chronology. It came down a close contest between Doug and myself and I got lucky with some easy sports questions while Doug got some toughies at the wrong time. Interesting game.

Sarah arrived and four of us played one of her favorites, Ingenious. The game was a real close finish between Doug and Sarah, with Doug winning. Brent and I rounded out the game.

Ben, Paul, Eric and Greg played For Sale after finishing their Power Grid game. No word on who won this one.

Final game of the evening was Cloud 9, which barely finished on time. It had an exciting ending, though. I was leading and jumped out at the first chance when I got to 50. Then Brent bailed when he saw he could collect 15 points and pass me, getting to 51. But Doug stayed in the balloon, along with Clayton, and took it up another level, passing all of us. Sarah also got to the 50-point level.

Saturday, July 19, 2008

July 17, 2008 Session Report

Once again, there were nine gamers for tonight's session: Doug, Gabe, Paul, Clayton, Ashley, Nick, Ben, Sarah and myself. We played a total of five different games, two games were played twice.

When I arrived Gabe, Paul, Doug, Ashley and Clayton were contesting a five-player Tribune game. No word on who came out on top on that one.

Ben was next to arrive and he and I played a quick two-player game, Hive, which he had brought and he proceeded to trounce me.

Then Sarah and Nick had arrived so we played a new game that I had brought, Surf's Up Dude, which went well except when we got to the endgame and I couldn't remember the right rules (had left them at home). Anyway, Nick won a really close game, with 71 points to 68 for Sarah and 67 for Ben with me firmly entrenched in last.

After that, we mixed up the groups and Doug and Paul joined Nick and me for another game of Surf's Up Dude with Clayton sort of watching/playing as my teammate. After a slow start, Doug's surfers pulled out the victory with 56 points to 50 for Nick.

The other group of Ashley, Gabe, Sarah and Ben played Toledo; I have in my notes that Ben won but no other details on the game.

Finally, we wrapped up the evening with two simultaneous games of Cloud Nine. No report on the results, except that Ben was showing off by playing in both games at once and trying not to get too confused.

Friday, July 11, 2008

July 10, 2008 Session Report

Another good turnout last night with nine gamers in attendance: Nick, Paul, Gabe, Greg, Ben, Sarah, Val, Clayton joined me and, once again, we had two games going on for most of the session. Games played: For Sale, St. Petersburg, Toledo, Turn the Tide, Bohnanza and Sticheln.

We opened with a six-player For Sale game, which was won by Paul (52,000) with Val not far behind in second (48,000); Nick, Greg, Gabe and I also participated. By this time everyone else had arrived and we split into two groups: one playing St. Petersburg, and another trying a new game, Toledo, which Gabe had brought. St. Petersburg wound up with another win for Paul, who was the only one who had played before. Greg finished second, ahead of the Ben/Clayton duo with Val in fourth. The Toledo game was a close three-player contest, won by Nick (19) ahead of Sarah (18) and Gabe (17). I was fourth and last, but hey -- I was only five points back of the winner!

These games didn't end at the same time, so the Paul-Clayton-Val-Ben-Greg group wound up playing Turn the Tide, which was a shared win for Paul and Val and Bohnanza, which had to be picked up at the 9 PM close time with Ben winning that one. The other table of Nick, Gabe, Sarah and myself got in three hands of Sticheln before the witching hour, with Sarah winning by a wide margin to make up for the narrow loss in the Toledo game.

Sunday, July 6, 2008

July 3, 2008 Session Report

We had fairly good attendance this week, as the three-day weekend enabled some folks we haven't seen for awhile to attend given Friday was a Holiday instead of a workday. Therefore, we welcomed back Neil and Val to the club, joining Sarah, Nick, Ben, Clayton, Paul, Greg (for his third session in a row) and myself for a total of nine in attendance. We played a total of seven different games, with two tables going at just about all times throughout the evening.

I had brought my brand new copy of Tribune, which I taught to Neil, Val, Sarah and we played a five-player along with Paul, who had played before with my hand-made copy. I managed to pull out the win after four turns, although Sarah did quite well and was close to achieving the victory conditions as well. It was a long wait for the English edition of this fine Essen game from last fall to come out, and I'm glad I got it.

The other four attendees (Greg, Clayton, Nick and Ben) played San Juan, the scores show a very high-scoring, competitive game, won by Greg with 47 followed by Ben with 42. Then the same group played Ra, and this turned out to be a really close game requiring a check of the rules to look up the tiebreaker (which as I recall, is the highest sun total). Final scores on the Ra game were Nick 35 Clayton 35 Ben 34 Greg 25, with Nick prevailing over Clayton on the tiebreaker.

The Ra and Tribune games finished at roughly the same time, so I moved to the other table to play another favorite, Hollywood Blockbuster (the remake of Traumfabrik), with Greg, Nick and Ben. I managed to do something I have rarely done, complete the highest possible value movie (a 22) and went on to win with Greg in second. Well-played game by Greg, who was playing it for the first time.

The other group of Paul, Val, Sarah, Clayton and Neil opted for the regular Ticket to Ride game (a break from the newer 1910 and Swiss versions we have played in recent weeks) -- Val was the winner with Paul in second. The final two games of the evening were Wits and Wagers, won by Ben, and an abbreviated version of Cloud 9 which had Clayton winning until the final balloon trip where he gambled on Greg's piloting skills after the rest of us had bailed out.

Hope to see everyone back for an exciting session next week. I just obtained a copy of a rare out-of-print game that I hope to have on hand.