October 15, 2015 Session Report

An even dozen for this week: John B, Mike, Rouslan, Doug, Greg, Alex, Lina, Rembert, Eugene, Arnold (back for a second time), Tim and myself were the attendees. Six different games got played during the course of the session: Portal, Between Two Cities, Shakespeare, Lords of Waterdeep, Machi Koro and Valley of the Kings.

Portal was a new game that Mike had brought that supposedly mimics a computer game that I have never played. The four players were Mike, Rouslan, John B and myself -- the first four early arrivals. By the time we have played a few rounds, more people had showed so we broke the game up. Not sure who was ahead or even what you needed to do to win.

I was in a group of four that played a new game, an Essen release called Shakespeare that had just arrived the day before. It's about putting together a play, getting actors, seamstresses, set builders, building sets, designing costumes, keeping the morale and quality of your performers high to score VPs. Greg did the best, winning with 15, followed by Doug and myself at 13, Lina with 12. (Doug took second on the money tiebreaker.) With the rulebook stating that 22 is a good score with four players, looks like we all have some ways to go to improve.

Between Two Cities was another new game that had just come out. Mike and I had played a prototype last year, and one of the co-designers (Ben Rosset) has been to the club and was the designer of Mars Needs Mechanics and one of my favorites, BrewCrafters. The game was a six-player, won by Tim (58). John B, Alex, Rembert, Rouslan and Tim were the other players.

Eugene arrived and set up a four-player Lords of Waterdeep. This game was won by Tim (143), with Eugene (139) second, Arnold (117) third, Rembert (79) fourth.

Meanwhile, at the other table, Mike won a really close game of Machi Koro, played with the Millonaires Row expansion. John B, Alex and Rouslan were the other players.

Finally, John B and Rouslan played Valley of the Kings. Believe it was a two-player as Mike and Alex may have left early. Sorry, no scores available, I was focused on wrapping up the Shakespeare game, which ran until the 9 PM closing time.