Game: Power Grid - Italy/France

Thread: Re: Question - Italy/France & Power Plant Deck 2?

ChillusMaximus — 2008-09-27T00:03:30+00:00

Thanks guys for these excellent tips.

Thread: Re: Question - Italy/France & Power Plant Deck 2?

Eric Brosius — 2008-09-26T23:26:51+00:00

Barticus88 wrote:
BTW, if you use the new deck with France, ignore the rule about removing Plant 11. Just use the deck as is. It's a minor effect on the game, except with six players, where the rule as written (remove 11 and don't put anything special on top of the deck) is thoroughly broken.

If we play France with 6 players using the original deck, we take the #13 windmill and stick it on top of the #11 nuclear plant. This prevents anyone from getting the #11 windfall in Round 1.

Thread: Re: Question - Italy/France & Power Plant Deck 2?

Barticus88 — 2008-09-26T19:08:23+00:00

locusshifter wrote:
Actually the second deck is a nice variant. I think it's actually "easier" in many ways. It certainly gives the game a whole new edge.
A whole new dull edge. The fuel never seems to run out with the new deck. I prefer the old deck.

BTW, if you use the new deck with France, ignore the rule about removing Plant 11. Just use the deck as is. It's a minor effect on the game, except with six players, where the rule as written (remove 11 and don't put anything special on top of the deck) is thoroughly broken.

Thread: Re: Question - Italy/France & Power Plant Deck 2?

Quarashi — 2008-09-26T14:44:31+00:00

locusshifter wrote:
I will go on to say that you MUST have all the maps and the extra power plant deck

I will also add that everything fits in the original box very nicely. Just take out the box insert and it fits like a glove.

Thread: Re: Question - Italy/France & Power Plant Deck 2?

locusshifter — 2008-09-26T13:58:17+00:00

I will go on to say that you MUST have all the maps and the extra power plant deck

Actually the second deck is a nice variant. I think it's actually "easier" in many ways. It certainly gives the game a whole new edge.

Thread: Re: Question - Italy/France & Power Plant Deck 2?

ChillusMaximus — 2008-09-26T13:51:17+00:00

Thanks Dave!

Thread: Re: Question - Italy/France & Power Plant Deck 2?

locusshifter — 2008-09-26T13:47:30+00:00

Nope. Base game + extra maps = all you "need"

The maps are mutually exclusive from the decks, with the exception of China, which doesn't have official rules for the 2nd deck yet.

Thread: Question - Italy/France & Power Plant Deck 2?

ChillusMaximus — 2008-09-26T13:31:31+00:00

Hi,

I've got a quick question:
Do I need the new power plants in order to enjoy/play the Italy/France maps?

The thing is that my local boardgame store has the maps but not the power plant deck. If I have to get the deck in order to play the maps, I'm going to go ahead and order the whole thing online instead of getting it at my local store.

Thanks,
Ægir / ChillusMaximus

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Cornbread46 — 2008-06-25T15:01:33+00:00

Standing for the whole game can be tiring, but gives you a solid intimidation edge in the auction rounds.

Thread: Re: Question about Italy

ColtsFan76 — 2008-06-24T02:11:01+00:00

Zhab wrote:
So really, I don't see any good reason to desallow it.
Except that it was officially ruled that you can't. But feel free to house rule it!

Thread: Re: Question about Italy

Zhab — 2008-06-24T01:56:10+00:00

Well, the color zones are for changing the board somewhat and make the games you play a bit different. I belive the reason behind the zones rule is to keep the playing area whole and not create two seperated playing areas. In this case here, it is possible to build in red or green zone without having to go threw the yellow zone. This mean that removing yellow while keeping red and green would not create two seperated zones.

So why not ? Ok so there is only one path between red and green. But there is a similar scenario with Germany. If you remove the red and brown zones, there is only one path connecting the green and yellow zones. Yet no one is making a fuss about it. So really, I don't see any good reason to desallow it. Specialy in a map with less possible color combinasions than other maps.

Thread: Re: Fixes for 6-players on the map of France?

Zhab — 2008-06-24T01:36:33+00:00

I know I'm reviving a dead topic here, but I would like to make a suggestion for others who might read this in the future.

Instead of placing the 11 right on top. Why not, shuffle the deck, then put the 11 beside the deck instead of on top ? When the players buy a plant, draw a replacement from the deck as normal. Replace which ever plant the 6th player buy by the plant number 11 instead of drawing from the deck. This way, the 6th player wont get the 11 at base cost. He or she would be one step short. But everyone will get to bid on the 11 at the start of the next turn auction. The 6th player will still get the chance to possibly get a great plant at base cost if he is lucky. So it is not taking away the avantage of being the last to bid.

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mdu2boy — 2008-05-24T01:28:15+00:00

From Bobby Tweak's game night

Thread: Re: Question about Italy

ColtsFan76 — 2008-04-30T14:32:01+00:00

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/article/2276458#2276458

Thread: Re: Question about Italy

Barticus88 — 2008-04-28T03:47:22+00:00

ColtsFan76 wrote:
I play that only the region colors are counted for adjacent selection, not the cities (as the [English RGG] rules state "areas" have to be adjacent - nothing about cities being connected).
I've never played the Italy map with green in and yellow out, and I guess I always assumed that you can't.

However, now that I think about it, it would make sense to allow it (including a link from Livorno to Firenza for 5). That would give you two more map options at each number of players, on a map that is otherwise option poor.

Thread: Re: Question about Italy

ColtsFan76 — 2008-04-27T12:29:35+00:00

I play that only the region colors are counted for adjacent selection, not the cities (as the [English RGG] rules state "areas" have to be adjacent - nothing about cities being connected).

So Red and Green are NOT "connected" in my book as they are clearly not adjacent. If you do not play Yellow or Red in a 4-player game, then northern and southern Italy cannot be played together and you cannot play the game. In a 4-(or more)-player game, Red and Yellow always have to be selected. In a 3-(or less)-player game, Red OR Yellow always have to be selected.

If you selected Red (in a 2player game), then you have to choose either Purple or Yellow as a 2nd choice (and then Brown, Blue, or Green as your 3rd choice). With Yellow or Purple, Livorno is still in play. There is no combination of legal colors that prevents Livorno from being in play.

Thread: Re: Question about Italy

Orph — 2008-04-27T12:06:49+00:00

Yeah, I've always assumed that you needed to select regions where the shaded areas make contact, not just the cities, but I guess that probably doesn't apply to the other maps. But it seems that's what BSW is doing.

Thread: Re: Question about Italy

Karlsen — 2008-04-27T10:05:27+00:00

Looking at the connection between Ravenna and Venezia I would say that yes the Red and Green regions are connected.

Interesting, whilst it would appear that Livorno is in the Red region it is not actually connected to any Red region cities, thus is you chose blue, green and red you could not connect to 21 cities (and thus it seems fair for BSW to reject it as the game cannot technically end).

I would suggest find another player or four or choose some other regions

Thread: Question about Italy

toyakoyo — 2008-04-27T05:15:56+00:00

Are the red and green regions connected?

So can i use the blue, green, red, purple, brown regions in a 5-players game?

And can i use the blue, green, red regions in a 2-players game? But then we won't have any connection to Livorno!

I tried to set in BSW before, /option setmap 001011, but it say "invalid regions selected!". It seems that BSW does not consider that the red and green regions are connected.

Thread: Re: My 500th recorded game

russ — 2008-03-21T17:25:26+00:00

Damn, when I saw the title I thought you meant you'd played the Power Grid Italy/France map 500 times! I was thinking, "Whoa, that's hardcore...!"

Thread: Re: My 500th recorded game

DaveD — 2008-03-21T13:38:08+00:00

Sorp222 wrote:
Nice report. I look forward to reading the 1000th (and a few more in-between!).

Thanks for that. At current rate of progress I guess 1000 will be somewhere like 3 or 4 years away, so a bit to wait, but I'm sure I'll write a few more in-between.

Thread: Re: My 500th recorded game

Sorp222 — 2008-03-21T10:34:05+00:00

Nice report. I look forward to reading the 1000th (and a few more in-between!).

Thread: My 500th recorded game

DaveD — 2008-03-20T21:33:11+00:00

Played at Halesowen Boardgamers on 19 March 2008.

This game would be a small landmark for me as it would be my 500th recorded at the geek, although my total played over the years before records began would be far in excess of that. The players were myself, Mike, Steve Perkins,Paul and Mike's son Jonathan back again from Oxford. Being a little short on 5 player options, there was only one real choice, Power Grid. This one was played on the French map (South West region eliminated) with the Plant deck 2. Steve and Paul had never played with the new deck, while Jonathan was new to the game. Mike and I could not really claim much experience with the new deck as I'm not sure we've played more than one game using it on its own as opposed to some combination with the original deck.

On with the game. On the first turn I picked up plant 3, Jonathan 4, Mike 6, Paul 7 and Steve 8, so I was left to go first in the acquisition of raw materials and building. I don't like going first on the first turn as it seems that wherever I go someone contrives to block me in. I went in to one of the Paris locations while Jonathan went slightly South West, Paul slightly north west, Mike to the east. This left Steve with most of the board to choose from and he went down on the south coast. Everybody built to their capacity so the 1 & 2 plants remaining in the market disappeared right away.

Some good plants came down in the following turn, Mike picking up the number 30 (1 coal -> 4), while I waited until the end and was rewarded when the number 32 (green 4) dropped in my lap, the number 21 (3 trash -> 5) was also available but went un bought at this stage as the trash price was high and the operation of that plant would have resulted in at best it's stagnation or maybe more likely it's rise. The split of plants at that stage meant that all fuels with the exception of trash were very cheap and Mike was able to power his 30 for the price of 1 elektro.

Things now went quiet for a turn or two as we built up our cities to match our increased capacity, some players bought another plant, but I stood on what I had as I could power my five for next to nothing, as a result of this I remained on 5 cities while others went past me and I was therefore given first chance to build when step 2 arrived courtesy of Steve.

Just before the first step 2 building, we had the only major auction battle of the game, everyone had their eyes on increased capacity and the 31 plant (1 nuke->5) was up, by this time, the price of uranium had fallen to 2 and only stayed that high when Steve declined to use his 8 plant. Everyone bid on this plant and 3 fell by the wayside when the bidding reached 50 or so, leaving me and Steve, I eventually let him have it for 67. I knew that 29 (3 hybrid-> 5), which I also liked the look of was available, so I sat out the rest of the auctions, while no-one bid on that and actually the 34 (3 coal->6) dropped at the last and I picked that up at face value. It was at this point that Mike picked up the 21 plant, while the 27 (1 trash ->4) also went and the trash price started to edge up. This was also when the price of coal took off as I stocked up my 34 plant, knowing that my time of building and buying early was likely past. When the building phase came I built out to 10, picking up the rest of Paris and some other cheap connections, tied with Paul and the others were back on 8.

The game went on for 2 more turns, the following one I bid on the 29 and was a bit surprised to get it at face value, at which point all the remaining available plants were 4 capacity or less. I had 15 capacity but not quite enough money to end the game so I just bought connected 2 more cities to put me 1 behind Paul on 13.

The following turn there were still no plants more than 5 capacity available, so no one was able to match me and they had to fight for second. Step 3 turned up during phase 2, so it was too late to make a difference to the market and I was just able to pick up the 3 cities I needed.

At the end of the game Steve was well behind in capacity but had lots of money, he had been waiting for plants to appear, but was caught out because of the differences in the new plant deck as compared to the original which he apparently knows off by heart from many games on BSW.

Scores Dave 15, Paul 13++, Mike 13+, Jon 13, Steve 8

Thread: Re: Breaking Step 2 and Victory through Subtle Manipulation (Italy)

Blademaster777 — 2008-03-09T23:14:56+00:00

Good session report, sounds like it was a tough game to play in.

Thread: Breaking Step 2 and Victory through Subtle Manipulation (Italy)

Reish Galuta — 2008-03-09T21:48:36+00:00

Power Grid (Italy)

Players:
Hdar/Avri, Mory, Gavriel, Lorien, Ben

Hdar has been wanting to play Power Grid for a while now, and she specifically requested this during the week to plan for tonight. We decided to play it on the Italy board since the rules aren't different than the basic version, but it provides a bit of variation for the players who have played the game before. Ben and Hdar had the game explained to them and the caught on quickly and did really well.

Hdar had to leave right before she was about to break open step 2 and I took over for her. The situation at that point was that Mory, Gavriel, and Ben were all competing in the cheap North. Lorien was in the South-East, and Hdar was in the "Boot" (South-West). Hdar had been sitting back on 4 cities and powering them for free, and then as everybody expanded out to 6 and she would start to fall behind, we built 4 cities up the coast to break open step two before anybody else could stock up their cash and pull ahead. The good thing about being in the slightly more expensive area was that even though I broke step 2, I didn't really lose out on any of the step 2 building rush. In fact the 2 cities that I bought the next turn were still unoccupied entirely.

The main issue at this point was to pick up plants to supply the capacity to all these cities we were building. Lorien had the worst set of plants and wasn't able to have enough turns left to bring them up to snuff. The power plant stall was in full effect and with step 2 being broken open so fast, step 3 was a further off than we'd like. I don't remember the exact flow, but I got very lucky twice in that I was able to pick up the 29 plant (H -> 4) for 47 when I was first in turn order by having two other plants bid out from under me and having the 11 not fall.

The next turn I was in 2nd last and was able to wait on the market until Gavriel bought the 24 plant (GG -> 4) (which I may or may not have spent a little effort convincing him to do) so that the 31 plant (CCC -> 6) would fall and we could short the coal market. The 31 did fall as the Step 3 card was on top of the deck. This meant it was not going to be possible to block out people's ability to build to 15 on the turn.

Ben had the highest capacity (actually tied with Mory at that point) at 13, but the 31 plant gave me a capacity of 14, a clear lead. I also had the advantage of going second on the turn. Lorien bought up about 12 coal that turn to put a hurt on the market. I bought the rest of it, shorting Ben and taking away his ability to run the 20 plant.
Then I had enough money to buy 5 cities in Lorien's area and bring my total up to 15 to end the game. It was a sort of stealth victory, nobody thought I had the resources to end the game that turn.

Final Scores:
Hdar/Avri 14, Mory 13, Gavriel 12+, Lorien 12-, Ben 8

When I announced that I won, Meir was curious and asked,
"You won? How did you do it?"
"Manipulation!"
"I should have known." (or was it "Why am I not surprised?")

Hdar told me afterward that she really enjoyed Power Grid.

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WatchmanX2000 — 2008-03-09T02:59:28+00:00

Thread: Re: Pwned in Power Grid (Italy 5er)

indiana27 — 2008-02-29T04:10:44+00:00

I hadn't realized it had been over a year since I've played. This is one of my favorite games and it quite refreshing to play a different map! A great game as always.

It was close at the top with two of us powering 16 and two powering 15. I powered 16 plants with $12 left over.

I started out in far Northeast with two cities even though I could only power one(I did say it was a year since I last played right? ).

I remember being in a bidding war in the middle of the game with M__ and lost out. My last bid was around $85 for a nice 1 trash plant that powered 6 cities. It didn't seem like that bad of a deal since I was paying ~$30 for supplies at the time and trash was going for $1.

My turn order average out to 2nd to 3rd, which made my cost up slightly.

The 2nd to last round I was stuck. I had 11 cities and power for 13. I chose not to build since the closest city I could build into was several cities away(I'll say ~5, however I didn't count it). If Dave H hadn't trigger stage 3, that was it for me. In the final round, I bought a 1 nuke plant (6 power) for a reasonable $40 and had enough money to build into 5 more cities to end with 16 at the end. My other two plants at the end were: 2 hybrid coal/oil plant(4) and a 3 coal plant(6).

I hope it doesn't take another year to get this on the table for me again.

Thread: Re: Pwned in Power Grid (Italy 5er)

MrWeasely — 2008-02-28T20:26:46+00:00

Congrats on third.
I end up in fourth.
"I coulda been uh contenda."

Thread: Re: Pwned in Power Grid (Italy 5er)

Spaceman — 2008-02-28T19:04:01+00:00

This really was one of the best games of powergrid I have ever played. I was all by myself in the south of italy and grabbed the 2 southern provinces almost completely uncontested. I lost because I couldn't generate enough power for the win. I jumped out in front of everyone else on purpose to get us to stage 2 and again on what turned out to be the last turn of the game where I initiated stage 3. I had hoped to grab a better plant and keep on building and moving forward but both times the plant selection forced me to stall and not build additional cities allowing everyone else to catch up. nothing hurts more than seeing the plant you so desparatly want not coming down because a lousy lower number plant gets drawn instead. I felt like that was my plight all game long. So instead of leaping out in front and staying there since I had no obstruction to expansion I stalled hard. In the end I had 2 chances to get a plant that would have powered 7 cites that would have allowed me to win, unfortunelty The cost for then was so high (both over 100) I wasn't going to have enough money to buy resources and build the final 2-3 cities I would have needed for the win. As it was I guess ended coming in third (I had at least 50+ cash at the end of the game)

What made the game so good is that we were all right in it till the end. It came down to the final plant draws and bidding. I think if I had gotten lucky and another 7 plant had been drawn I would have been able to buy it cheap and would have had the funds to build to 17 cities for the win. As it was I just came up short.

Thread: Pwned in Power Grid (Italy 5er)

MrWeasely — 2008-02-27T06:03:28+00:00

I'm not really a fan of Power Grid, but tonight's game, I have to admit, was excellent.

We had five players, one of them new. Being bored to tears of Germany and the US, we decided on Italy. We blacked out the Easternmost region at the brim of the boot.

With the more costly hydrocarbons, I found I had no opening strategy besides the 4-coal plant. After some other players dinked around a while, I ended up with it as usual. I took the central city in the north, it might have been Bologna. Three other players took up position around me. The fifth player set up shop way down south of Rome.

Players expanded cautiously. Somehow I ended up with a 2-oil for 5-power plant way before it was time - I had something like 3 cities.

By the end of stage 1 I was hemmed in with 5 cities. No matter, it was only a turn of lost building.

In stage 2 I set my sights on a power-6 or power-7 plant for the endgame, but one never showed up. I had the 5-oil, and a 2-windmill and 3-garbageo. One turn with a 5-fission plant available, and a level-35 6 about to come down, I got greedy and let another player grab the 5. That cost me the game, as of course there was only a 30% chance (at best) of the 6 coming down, as of course it didn't.

Thus, I was the first player to put myself out of the running for the victory.

The newbie was the second. In Age II he'd bid $105 for a 6-garbage (in a vicious bidding war with me), and that'd done alright for him, since garbage was costing only $1. But in Stage III, he again went nuts and bought a 7-garbage for $115 (again versus me), which left him without even the pennies to fuel his hard won plant. Ah, newbies. He'd end the game with 17 power but only 10 cities.

R, who had more correctly handicapped the 5-fission I should have bid up, won the game with 16 powered cities. B also had quietely powered 16. D and myself fought for third with 15 cities and too much leftover money. (D: Which of us took third? I had about $35 left at the end).

Overall, this was the most competently executed Power Grid game in quite some time. (On the US map, my usual group is so bad that I often break away at the dawn of Stage II, and even with them drafting me all the rest of the game, they still can't catch up - they really, really undervalue the 4-coal). This game was much, much tighter, which made it more enjoyable. A three way battle for first really kept the hand-wringing maximized.

Why can't all games of Power Grid be this good?

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capt yid — 2008-02-26T23:27:00+00:00

Powering France, 2007 Euroquest, MD; note meeple earring

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kilroy_locke — 2008-02-21T23:09:13+00:00

Blocking off the central area - exactly what the rules say NOT to do.

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Schroinger — 2008-02-19T00:55:43+00:00

www.juegosdemesacr.com

Thread: Crónica en español de una partida

Schroinger — 2008-02-15T08:50:59+00:00

En esta ocasión se jugó un Power Grid en el mapa francés.

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Las principales diferencias de este juego con el original son la mayor disponibilidad de uranio al principio de la partida, que hace la energía nuclear más apetecible de entrada, y la presencia de una megalópolis como París, conformada por tres ciudades convencionales adyacentes.

Luego de algunos errores de comprensión de las reglas, y urgidos por el tiempo, el resultado fue el siguiente:

1er. lugar: Ernesto, con 13 puntos. Enganchado al juego luego de haberlo probado en una sesión previa, insistió en volverlo a jugar y, complacido en su deseo, no lo desaprovechó. Su desarrollo inicial estuvo centrado en el sur.

2o. lugar: Paúl y Roberto, con 12 puntos. El primero mantiene su supremacía, que ya es costumbre, sobre Jeffrey. El segundo, rompe por una vez su tradición de quedar último o primero.

4o. lugar: Jeffrey y Romi, con 11 puntos. El caballero inició en el oeste francés, y se expandió a costas de Jorge, que quedó muy encerrado durante toda la partida. La dama, convertida en una habitual, se desarrollo cerca de París, de la que no pudo obtener mayores réditos por una malinterpretación de las reglas que le impidió acrecentar su presencia en dicha ciudad.

6o. lugar: Jorge, con 9 puntos. Como es habitual, pagó su bautizo en el grupo de juegos con sangre, pues aquí nada se regala. Sin embargo, luego de un inicio incierto, tuvo un repunte final.

Thread: 4 players in France with a mixed plant deck

DaveD — 2008-02-08T18:35:04+00:00

This game played at Halesowen Boardgamers 6 February 2008.

Our major game for the evening was Power Grid, this one played on the French board using the mixed power plant deck variant with the expansion plants. Essentially you mix the two decks together, but only one of each number is permitted in the game, so when the first of a number comes up it is thrown out and the second of that number is used when it appears. There are still a number of plants to be removed depending on the number of players, so at the beginning the second plant of a number is also thrown out. This means that in this version of the game the missing plants are definitely known as opposed to secret as we would play using a single deck.

After some discussion we eliminated the two southern most regions and the game started. As a result of the variant played the game got off to a stuttering start as many power plants had to be turned up and discarded before a new plant found its way into the market, but this was largely eliminated after the first one or two and the game moved into its normal rhythm.

I started and bought the 4 plant from the new deck (1 hybrid powers 1), while Steve picked up the number 1. Mike ended up with the new number 6, which is a definite improvement on the old powering 2 cities for a trash rather than a single. Julian went with the 5 from the new deck which also powers two. Starting off the city building, Steve went for a central location in Orleans, while I took one of the Paris locations and Julian set up shop, I think in Le Mans and Tours. That all left Mike with a large choice of starting position and he went out in the east (I think Nancy and Besancon).

In the early stages of the game I got somewhat boxed in and managed to find just 4 10 value locations before step 2 arrived, Steve had managed to grab the first plant powering 5 cities (the old 20) and expanded North to my east, while Julian moved around to my west. I suppose I may have expanded quicker to grab the cities before others could but did not want to exceed my capacity to power them. I don't think I was in that bad a position because I had picked up a 3 capacity wind plant and could power those four for the cost of 1 a turn, such was the price of oil due to a lack of plants of that type, but as it turned out step 2 happened immediately.

In step 2 we came across a peculiar effect that may have been due to how the 2 decks mixed together, I think that often where a 5 plant corresponds to something lower in the other deck, that we often seemed to get the lower one in the game. Although a few 5 powering plants appeared of which we somehow allowed Steve to pick up 3 and I picked up the old 30 powering 6 for 3 trash, after that we ran into a situation where the maximum available plant capacity was 4 and having built up to a certain level, things really stalled with even the future plants not worth 5 (there's nearly always a mid range stall but this seemed different somehow).

So we just sat there with Steve sitting pretty on 15 capacity, which he couldn't improve, but the rest of us were stuck below that figure and either couldn't improve or could only improve so slightly that the only reason to buy a plant was to nudge the market along, which would of course have meant taking a hit to everybody else’s advantage. So the money just accumulated until Steve had enough to end the game, which I was, maybe able to delay by a turn by buying up enough trash to stop him firing a plant at one point. Step 3 did actually happen when the lowest power plant was discarded when nobody bought in the last turn, but of course that meant no one got a chance to buy in the newly expanded markets.

Final scores were Steve 15, Dave 13, Julian 12+, Mike 12

Mike lost out to Julian in the tie break by 219 to 218, every one having a load of money on hand except Steve who had paid to end the game, but no power plants to spend it on.

Thread: Wondering why there is extra garbage on the Italy map?

Barticus88 — 2008-01-31T18:26:26+00:00

In case you have ever wondered why the Italy map starts with so much , here is the explanation:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080131/ap_on_re_eu/eu_dirty_nap...

BRUSSELS, Belgium - The EU ordered Italy on Thursday to clean up Naples within a month — or face legal action.

Talks this week with Italian authorities failed to show they were adhering to EU waste management laws to resolve a festering garbage collection crisis in the southern Italian city, EU spokeswoman Barbara Helfferich said.

Full article at: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080131/ap_on_re_eu/eu_dirty_nap...

Thread: Four players with poor plants

MerricB — 2008-01-31T05:14:43+00:00

I really don't get to play Power Grid enough. It's an exceptional game, which though it often looks like an exercise in arithmetic can also lead to bluffing, brinkmanship, and bafflement.

I bought the Italy/France expansion just before Christmas, which gives two new boards to play the game on. This was my first chance to play with these boards, and I gleefully selected the board of France for this game, if only to see what effect Paris and cheaper nuclear fuel would have on the game.

Paris is interesting: it's implemented as three close-together cities with no additional connection cost between them. However, around it are more expensive connections, so it's worth an early lead, but perhaps not a long-term one.

In the event, I took one part of Paris and Randy took two. Randy and I spent a lot of the game competing for similar connections; Craig was outdoing both of us for connections for, while he was choosing those that were slightly more expensive, he was in an area that Rich, Randy and I weren't competing for.

However, it was in the power plants that this game was being won. I took plant #11 (the nuclear plant that replaces the ecological plant #13 in the France game), but after that we all began to stall as there was a complete lack of good upgradable plants. Randy managed to get the only capacity 5 plant to turn up in the first step, and Craig was having fun with ecological power (albeit of low capacity).

In the middle game, Randy's plant remained the best capacity one on the table. Any thought of my coming from behind was being hampered by this lack of plants. I was keeping my connected cities down so I would be in the prime position, but I really wasn't getting enough money in.

It was only in the late game that good plants began to hit the table, and we descended upon them. We still weren't really ready to bid them up too much - I think we need more experience - but I was very interested in keeping Randy's capacity down. I was the first to hit 17 capacity, but I just couldn't get close to the required connections on the table. Craig was worse off - he had the connections, but his capacity was terrible.

As a result, the game went one more turn. (After the final auction, there were only a couple of plants left for bid on the table!) Randy was able to reach his full capacity of 17, and easily connected his last couple of cities for the win.

Final scores:
Randy: 17 connected, 17 powered, $51.
Craig: 16 connected, 16 powered, $73
Merric: 16 connected, 16 powered (17 capacity) $16
Rich: 13 connected, 13 powered, $16

Rich had not had a good game, but I don't think he's played PG more than once before... he'll improve.

As a note, the plants removed from the game before play began: #14, #15, #36, #46)

Thread: 2P Italy, casual players

jgrundy — 2008-01-25T12:55:15+00:00

Forgive my casual-player memory of the flow, but hopefully I can hit the high points, being the opening, a couple of gambits during the game, and the finale.

My wife and I have played Power Grid only a handful of times, and mostly 2P against each other. I picked up the Italy/France expansion quite some time ago and finally we got it out for a play.

We chose Italy to see how it felt competing down the narrow ankle of the famous Italian boot. (It felt pretty good.) We elected the three Southern regions of Italy, giving us a game on the narrow part of the board.

(Edit: Another bonus... there's room on the Italy board for the resource supply, the power plant market, draw and discard piles, and the bank. There's much more room on the table for the players' own stuff.)

I went first and bought #5 plant (hybrid, 2 coal/oil to power 1 city).
She bought #7 (3 oil, 2 cities). This put her building cities first, and she started at San Marino and Rimini, looking for an angle on the cheap-ish and seemingly more open North without cutting herself off from the South. After a little chin scratching I decided to try to cut her off anyway, and started out with Ancona and Pescara.

In the second round she bought the infamous #6 (1 garbage, 1 city). I think I bought #8.

Seeing she was about to be cut off, she lept South to Foggia. I belatedly closed the stable door at Perucia.

For the next few rounds, we continued uncontested power plant purchases most turns, me upgrading my coal capability and remaining uncontested there, she going green with #13 and improving her oil efficiency. Meanwhile she fairly effectively blocked off the South in a turnaround from the original plan, giving her network access at both ends of the board and leaving me with barely enough choice to get by. (Yet somehow in Step 1 I ended up occupying all the Northern cities apart from her opening claim.)

Seeing I was going to get stuck at 9 cities or pay a big connection cost, I built choice plant capacity in favour of network expansion, and as a result could always power my cities if I chose. She was busy hemming me in so couldn't afford all the upgrades she might have wanted, so her generation capacity was usually lagging a little behind her city count. Even so, "1st place" seemed to get equal share between us.

As expected, I hit 9 cities and lingered for a couple of turns, while she cashed up, improved her capacity, and built to 12 cities in a turn.

Step 2 began.

At the start of step 2 I still had more plant capacity than she did, but fewer cities. Among other things, she'd swapped the #6 garbage for the #24 garbage (2 garbage, 4 cities) and pretty much abandoned oil for coal, so the resource market had got pretty tight. I had the #23 (1 uranium, 3 cities) and had let uranium get pretty cheap before I started to use it.

I snuck in purchase of #30 (3 garbage, 6 cities) and used my lagging city count to buy out the resource market in both garbage AND coal. That still left her powering for another turn, but the available plants were pretty useless and on the second round of no real upgrade options with me emptying the resources before she could get any she dwindled to powering only 6 (?) cities, giving me an opportunity to catch up some cash for two rounds.

Step 2 only lasted a few rounds. We turned up Step 3 during the Auction phase.

Two turns later, call it turn X, my plant capacity was 18 and hers was 13. We both had 15 cities. She took an upgrade to bring her capacity to 15, and had oodles of cash coming out her ears... maybe 200 electros left after all purchases that round. Her position was unconstestable for the next turn when she would be able to buy whatever 7-city plant was available and connect all remaining cities.

BUT...

Also in turn X I declined any plant upgrade. I bought exactly minimum resources to power my plants, connected 6 (!) more cities to fill out 21, and had 3 electro left over.

Final result:
Me: 21 cities, 18 capacity, 3 electro
She: 15 cities, 15 capacity, fort knox.

My final plants:
#21: 2 coal/oil, 4 cities
#23: 1 uranium, 3 cities (a mainstay of my power production)
#25: 2 coal, 5 cities
#30: 3 garbage, 6 cities (bought to buy out garbage, but handy at the end)

Her final plants:
#11: 2 uranium, 2 cities (bought to break my uranium monopoly)
#26: 2 oil, 5 cities
#27: wind power, 3 cities (a late-ish upgrade from poor choices)
#34: 1 uranium, 5 cities

The overall feel of 2P on South Italy was thought provoking and had just the right amount of tension from start to finish. We each managed moments of triumph, and we each got pegged at various points. We were jockying for leverage on all three of board, plants, and resources where normally the board play on USA or Germany has seemed less interesting.

I'm sure some of the above is not 100% accurate, but it's the right feel. We might make Italy our map of choice for our 2P games in the future.

Thread: Five in France

RicochetRita — 2008-01-22T16:57:12+00:00

We played this game during our regular Saturday GCoM Session, at Illusions Games & Comics in Salisbury, Maryland.
(For a listing for other games played there, see my ongoing Journal.)

Five Players, competing in France, using the Expanded Plant Deck, where-in I outstripped my plants' capacity in cities early on, and barely caught up through late-game plant replacements, in time for the win!

This was a very risky strategy, which left me far out in front, throughout most of the game, paying way too much for coal.

R³

Disclaimer: this, rather one-sided, account is all from memory. I may have gotten some of the Plant data wrong, but the strategy & events are essentially correct. Next time I'll take notes.

___________________

Five in France

The game opened with my opponents haggling over Plants #4, #5, #6, & #8, while I picked up the #1 at its face cost. This put me last after the rearrangement, but first for resources. So, I proceeded to buy up the 6 cheapest coal blocks, all for 10 Electros. And when it came time to place initial cities, I chose in Angers, located in the moderately priced Western region.

Here, I was lucky, as my opponents settled to the North & East of Paris and in the deep South-East. (The Mediterranean region was off-limits). This left me relatively alone, with expansion room to my West & South and in a good position, to reach Paris in Stage Two.

Why did I choose the #1? IMO, this Plant (1 city for 3 coal) is the Deck 2 equivalent of the original #4 Plant (1 city for 2 coal). It's less efficient than the #4, but it costs less and absolutely guarantees going last, which (when coupled with a greater capacity) ensures that its owner can always use it to hoard a lot of coal, early in the game (similar to the #11). This makes it my prime choice for any game using Deck 2. Also, going last in the auctions also put me in a position to seize the #23 plant (4 cities for 2 coal)--at face--as my second purchase, when it just managed to drop into the first row around turn 3.

The #23 is very efficient during Stage One and even though I quickly reached & exceeded its 4 city capacity, I has able to rely on this efficiency, plus a lot of hoarded coal from the now-disused #1 plant. On the down-side, this put me out in front--a disadvantage which my opponents used to drive up the price of coal. It quickly became clear that my plant capacity would never 'catch up' to my cities until the Stage Three plants re-appeared.

By this point, initial strategies had begun to develop. The player who had cornered trash, posed me no immediate threat--ditto for the uranium player. But the other two with their combined hybrid/oil & hybrid/coal plants would both be able to manipulate the price of coal, out from under me.

So, I concentrated on building, while keeping a watch on the auction for any gems. I followed this strategy, rapidly breaking into Stage Two (which only served to open more building opportunities) & eventually managed to pick the #26 green plant (3 for free), paying about 35 for it. This brought my effective capacity to 7 cities (all for 2 coal). Although, iirc, I had expanded to 8 cities by this point.

As the "Stage Two Stall" set in, with no attractive plants on the horizon, I repeatedly passed as first auctioneer & concentrated on building cities in the relatively cheap west & the untapped south. I even managed to snap up one of the mid-range sections of Paris.

The only reason this worked was that, I didn't feel the need (read: "have any way") to power them all, meaning I could save Electros by purchasing only two or three prohibitively priced coal blocks.

Compare this to the hybrid/oil player on my right. His three plants required 3 coal &/or oil, apiece, just to fire them (more for hoarding) and even though he purchased resources ahead of me for nearly the whole game, I still came out ahead in Electros each turn.

I repeated this process of expanding, while powering only 7 cities cheaply, until I'd expanded to 11 (four away from goal). I did eventually replace the #1 with the #22 (4 cities for 2 oil) for face value, once its efficiency had become unattractive to everyone else. This put my capacity at 11 (briefly higher than my cities), all for 2 coal & 2 oil. Coal was still very expensive, but oil was moderately priced.

I then sat back & collected the revenue from powering 11, until the Stage Three card appeared, just as two of my opponents caught up to my city count. Due to their plant purchases, I'd go third on the next turn, buying resources after the uranium & one of the hybrid players, which meant cheaper coal for a change.

By this point, I'd amassed well over 100 Electros, but I realized I'd probably have to to make two more plant replacements to exceed the goal. So, I used half my cash to outbid everyone for the #35 (5 cities for 1 coal). This plant was swapped in for the #22, losing 2 stored oil, but raising my capacity to 12. So, of course, I built to 13 cities (two from the goal), cutting off a couple of players in the process, who only managed to reach 12 cities that turn.

When the next (& unbeknownst, final) turn began, I had over 150 Electros from powering 12 to over-bid the uranium player for the newly-emerged #50 (8 cities for 2 uranium). This cost me nearly double its face value and replaced the #26. My capacity now stood at a game-ending 17.

When it came time to expand, the trash player went first & reached the goal of 15, signaling endgame. On my build, I had exactly enough cash on hand to move into three more cities for a total of 16, leaving me with 0 Electros and only the uranium player to worry about. He had also reached 13 last turn, but now his initial placement to the North-East of Paris worked against him. He was only able to build to 15, making me the winner.

Final Powered Cities
16 your humble narrator
15 Trash, 15 Uranium
14 Hybrid/Coal
13 Hybrid/Oil

Thread: Re: Same Game, New Life

game_boy — 2008-01-18T02:26:57+00:00

Good review; I bought this expansion today and look forward to playing it.
friedricetheman wrote:
Most people I know are put off by the box art (really ugly box)

Maybe it's because my degree is in electrical engineering, but I happen to love it! It's sort of cartoony art deco.

Image

WatchmanX2000 — 2007-12-31T16:11:58+00:00

Powergrid Italy at CABS

Image

snoozefest — 2007-12-07T03:12:08+00:00

Screenshot of a BSW game in progress. Shows the very handy Calculator tool, which lets you try different options. Also shows the payment table and raw materials resupply.

Thread: Session Report

Shade_Jon — 2007-10-28T15:38:45+00:00

Jon 16+, Nadine 16-, David 13

End scores in Power Grid give you little information about how the game went.

This was our group's first time on an extension board. Nadine and David spent some time picking which country and provinces in which to play, finally settling on Western France. We played with the correct France rules which tossed out the 13 plant, put the 11 in its place, and added more nukes to the initial setup.

Both of them had the opportunity to place cities on the board before me, and both chose not to take Paris fearing imminent enclosure. Instead they both placed right outside of Paris. I took Paris.

And after my fourth city build, I was enclosed. Despite this, I was earning more cash than either of them, which allowed me to jump across the board to mid-France, and then all the way down to the south coast.

Resources were in short supply. Coal went first. Nadine and I were sitting in Phase 3 with 13 cities each, to David's 10. He had plant capacity to power 15 cities, Nadine 13, and me 10.

All of us were able to take a 6 power plant, giving David 17 capacity, me 13, and Nadine 17. Except Nadine couldn't really power 17, since I kept running out the garbage fuel she needed.

In the last round, we finished all the big power plants, netting me a maximum power capacity of 16. There were no more plants I could get, so I was bound to lose if David could build the cities. Nadine tossed her 7 garbage plant, since she could never fuel it, and instead took the 50. So she was also now limited to 16 capacity.

The game had to end that round for me to win; otherwise David would just build 3 cities this turn, 4 the next, and power all 17. Luckily he wasn't able to get even to 16 cities in this turn, so I built to 17, being able to power 16 of them. Nadine could also build to 16, but had far less cash, even having to build one less city.

If you followed all that, you're a genius.

Thread: Re: France without the center section?

Barticus88 — 2007-10-20T17:40:06+00:00

Malachi wrote:
Has anyone tried France without the center section?

I haven't played the ring, because we usually have four players. We played a horseshoe, leaving out the center and the Riviera, and I vaguely think we played some other horseshoe. We've also played other long stringy boards, like the Canada map without the white and the blue, and Central Europe without east Poland and Slovakia. In my experience, it's easier to get screwed really bad on the map. On such a map, the initial plant auction is crucial, yet befuddling. If you buy the 03 plant just for turn order, you might find later players start near you on both sides. If you have to jump over someone to build your forth city, you may never catch up. My preference is to go third on such a map, and my second choice is to go second, so I go for the 05 plant.

I am sure a ring has far different dynamics than a horseshoe. Each person wants to maximize their own space, so there's no pressure to place close to someone.

Thread: Re: Same Game, New Life

edytwinky — 2007-09-22T02:44:18+00:00

Just bought the expansion today. Can't wait to try it out.

Thread: Italy expansion quite good for four!

viktor_haag — 2007-09-17T20:29:16+00:00

None of our group had tried out this board, so the four of us put it on the table. The game lasted longer than it should, because we were collectively getting more and more tired. Also, the end-game was a bit un-satisfying as the last two turns were pretty much a formality. In order to catch the winner, the other players would have to engage in position-destroying activity to cripple the winner's chances.

However, the Italy board is interesting. Resource and connection costs are high, and therefore money is tight. The board still responds well to the tactic of developing infrastructure in bursts, rather than slow and steady growth.

In the early game, I pinned a position in Southern Italy, to rope off several cities in Sicily for my own later (inexpensive) use. On the Italy board, this strategy seems even more attractive than usual: because connection costs are so high, I think initial placement choice is very important because it's very costly to leap past someone's infrastructure. I also notice that both players that started with ostensibly expensive, southern positions place first and second.

Also, unlike my standard strategies, I spent most of the early and part of the middle game with really weak plants. Until the end game started, I was consistently behind in capacity. My second and third plant purchases were the two lowest capacity green plants. I gambled that the increased resource costs would increase the value of the green plants to the point where they were viable and it was far more important to be thrifty on plant infrastructure costs as a consequence of the resource costs.

In the end, some lucky power plant card draws helped me out, so I'm not sure if my strategic choices were all that strong, or just strong enough to capitalize on the lucky card draws. However, I am fairly certain that managing my turn position in this game was absolutely key. There were two turns in the mid game that I sucked up a short term lag behind on purpose, in order to preserve tempo. On two turns I sprung out for massive infrastructure upgrades: from six cities to nine in one go, and then from 10 to 15 cities in one go.

I think the Italian board is very well suited to four players, and might be well suited to five. The North is very rich, but good board positions are very hard to secure as a result. The Southern provinces are sparse and costly, but good board positions are easy to rope out, so there's much less worry about getting into knife fights with your neighbours. In our game, the two Southern players managed to leak north (because they had to), while the Northern players spent most of the midgame filling up their own region. This left both of the Southern players in an excellent position to make moves in the end game that bottled up the Northern players: the only open spots left to them came with sizeable connection costs, whereas the Southern players were getting away with much smaller connection costs. In the long run, I think the Northern players should have realized this would happen and accelerated their infrastructure in the early game, but with the expensive resources this was not at all easy to see.

Another interesting board for Power Grid, and one well worth playing!

Thread: Shunning the Environment in France

Reish Galuta — 2007-09-07T09:36:38+00:00

Players: Avri, Gavriel, Daniel, Lorien

We decided to try out the France board where the nuclear power is cheap and the cities are mispelled and unpronouncable. We played with the north and the east blocked off, severly limiting Paris' expansion capabilities. This game was all about polluting as not a single green plant was bought.

The game opened up with me buying the 4 plant for 8, Gavriel bought the 5 plant for 9, Daniel bought the 8 plant, and Lorien bought the 9. Daniel loaded up on 6 coal in the first round and left himself unable to buy two cities so ended up buying nothing. I placed my cities first, but decided to stay away from the triple-city of Paris for fear of being blocked off and I started in the South where I was able to section off a cheap 6-city block for myself by buying 2 cities. Lorien started with one city in Paris, and Gavriel started in Tours and Angers poised to block Paris off.

In the second round I actually ended up purchasing the 7 plant after losing the 11 plant to Gavriel for 15. I should have pushed the price on the 11 up a little higher, nuclear power was very good this game. Daniel bought the 10 plant preventing him from having enough money to buy two cities again and stifling his growth. Lorien ended up with the 19 plant the next round, which may have been a mistake. She never managed to land a high capacity plant the entire game until the last turn, which ruined her chances to place well. I was staying in first for a few turns as I wasn't in competition for cities very much, resources were still very cheap, and I was happy to be out-earning the other players. I was able to grab the 21 plant at cost since nobody could afford to fight me for it. Daniel got lucky getting the 25 plant (and later the 26) to drop when he was last and getting them at cost. When we had all built to 6 cities, I was able to fuel them the cheapest so I had no incentive to break step two. Nobody else broke it either and this gave Daniel a turn to catch up in cities.

The next turn Daniel broke step two and built to 8 cities. Gavriel followed suit. Lorien and I held back on 6 cities. The next turn I used my saved up money, and advantageous position in buying cities before Gavriel to "shut the door" on him, as I unexpectedly jumped up and bought all three cities in paris, and one expensive city on the way. That's when the plant market dried up and we had to wait a turn or two for better plants. I fought Gavriel for the 31 (CCC->6) as we were unsure if the 32 (OOO->6) would fall. I took the 31 for $47, and Gavriel got the 32 (which did fall) at cost. I was still happy with the 31 though as coal was cheaper. The next turn step 3 started and I fought tooth and nail for the (CCC->7) plant. This turn was one of the few turns I wasn't in first, and I was able to buy resources second. I bought up all the coal I could so I'd be able to fuel fully for two turns, knowing the game would end by then.

Then it was a race to the finish, and nobody could top my capacity or money advantage. In the last round Daniel could have bought an extra coal to short out Gavriel and come in 3rd instead, but chose not too. He ended up paying too much for the 46 plant (HHH->7) and was unable to build past 14 cities despite his 17 capacity. Lorien ended up with 15 capacity and expanded that far. Gavriel managed to get to 17 cities and power them, but my income advantage at being in first most of the game was too much to overcome. I built my last city in Brest (which is best) and won. It's possible if everybody had ganged up on me and bought up enough places such that I wouldn't have been able to build to 17 cities, but I'm not sure they had enough money to do that.

Final scores:
Avri 17+62, Gavriel 17+19, Lorien 15, Daniel 14

I really liked the France board. The regions were fairly well balanced and it made for interesting choices. I can't wait to try the other PG boards too.

Thread: Re: Big power in France

buckazoid — 2007-08-29T16:15:35+00:00

Drmange wrote:
plervik wrote:

However, I think Paris is too good on this map. If it was situated more in a corner I would understand it better, but it is also in the middle of the map!

I agree completely! Paris should be moved to the coast, where it belongs .

We definitely need to play this map at least one more time. The "interesting" power plant market did its share. I don't think anyone could have hindered the evil coal & nuclear powered Mr Red from taking the victory, but had I known that the game would end that quickly I (Mr Yellow) would have outbid Mrs Purple for the last power plant she bought and probably finished second.

Thread: Re: Big power in France

Drmange — 2007-08-29T15:12:35+00:00

plervik wrote:

However, I think Paris is too good on this map. If it was situated more in a corner I would understand it better, but it is also in the middle of the map!

I agree completely! Paris should be moved to the coast, where it belongs .

Thread: Re: Big power in France

plervik — 2007-08-29T10:46:05+00:00

Some comments from Mr Red.
I started by getting the 4 elektro plant 1st round. No one got the cheapest 3 elektro plant so I got to build first. Great!
Of course I took all 3 parts of Paris, and for only 30 coins that was cheap. (Paris is very powerful on this map.) So while everyone else only bought 1 or 2 cities I had 3 which meant I was then in 1st place for at least the next 2 rounds to come. But instead the others had to fight where to build their 2nd and 3rd cities, and pay for the transport between the cities, while I only focused on buying a cheap 2nd plant that produced electricity for 2 cities. This was really a great start according to me.
So I just sat back (I had to buy expensive raw materials being 1st), and let the money roll in. Buy raw materials, get money from 3 cities. No hurry to expand. Soon the others had more cities than I had. I slowly expanded 2 more cities before the map was full in my area. When phase 2 occurred I got to build cities 1st again! And I quickly took 5 more cities, up to 10!
I really like to use this mechanic in this game. Not building a lot of cities and falling last, only to then get to build a lot when new towns open up for expansion.
So suddenly I got 5 cities in one turn and all of them with minimal transport costs between them. And I also had gotten 2 plants producing elctricity for 5 cities each. So now I really just had to start collecting money and wait for phase 3 (the map quickly got full again) and a 3rd big plant. When phase 3 occurred I had loads of money, a 4 producing plant came up for bid and no one else could produce power for 14. And I was once again in last place, building first!
So buy the power plant up to 14 capacity, build 5 cities in the last city spaces that cost 20 each, and kill the game.
Wonderful game. I got to build first in the beginning of all 3 phases. And I was lucky that the big plants came up when I needed them.

This was our first play on the France map and the map is great. A lot of nuclear power meant the nuclear plants really sold off as soon as they appeared -> More variation in raw material needs. However, I think Paris is too good on this map. If it was situated more in a corner I would understand it better, but it is also in the middle of the map!

Thread: Big power in France

Drmange — 2007-08-29T06:40:46+00:00

A normal Friday, and after a few beers at Herman's microbrewery we decided to test this map, and it turned into the strangest Power grid game ever. And no, it was not because of the brew! The strangest thing happened with the power plants. After everyone bought their first small 1-2 city power plants all the big ones started to appear.

We were all amazed when the power plants we could by were for 5-6 cities, and it was only turn two! This really made the game different since buying a poor 2-city version when there was a perfectly good 6-city plant next to it just felt wrong. So everyone bought one, and yes, everyone could get one.

I (mr black) was only able to build two cities to the north of Paris since I was so poor after buying a 6-city power plant in turn two. Mr red captured Paris, and a 5-city plant. Mrs purple was down in the south and had a good plant (as everyone else also had) and was left pretty much alone in the south. She was only pestered by mr yellow (6-city plant) who started moving to the north. Mr blue (5-city plant) was in the east.

Came turn three, and the big plants just kept coming. I couldn't believe that this could continue, and that the small plants had to come sooner or later, so I bought a 4-city wind power plant. This was very risky since I didn't get too much income with only two cities. But it was also a hazard that I would get built into a corner by mr red, blue and yellow. Had I known now easy the resources were to get I might not have bought it, and no one else bought a big one this turn.

Everyone was expanding, except me. And when turn four came I was on a secure last position with huge power plants but only two cities. I was poor too. I was lucky, though, and my gambling started to pay off. No more large power plants were for sale anymore and all others started to get problems with support. Since I was on the last spot, I got to build first. So I grabbed the three last free ones in the north and started to catch up with the others.

Then came stage two, and still being on the last spot I got the opportunity to grab Paris. Mr red was richer than Rockefeller and got loads of citys. His power plants were not quite up to a full scale expansion so he helf back a little. Mrs Purple was in a good position down in the south and had a good expansion. She was the one who suffered most of the poor power plants that were for sale at this stage. Mr blue and yellow worked well and expanded their realms.

Stage three arrived and it was again possible to buy some better power plants. This was when mr red decided to charge. The problem was that no one, except me (mr black) with my strange tactics in the beginning, was able to provide power for all the needed 15 cities. Mrs purple was in a tough spot here because she could only provide power for 12 citys. Mr red charged to 15 cities and the game ended. The final score was:

Mr Red: 14
Mr Black: 13
Mrs Purple: 12
Mr Yellow: 12
Mr Blue: 12

A good map! And definitely no larger problems with getting resources. In my opinion it was almost too easy. But then again the power plants were out of the ordinary this time. It is very rare that anyone can get a 6-city plant in the second round, not to speak of the probability for everyone to even get a large one that early in the game. One of the best maps I've played so far, but the Paris region might just be too powerful if you get it from the start. A map to be recommended!

Thread: A great game gets even better!

rantinronrevue — 2007-08-10T13:43:31+00:00

Even though my name is not Einstein, it took me less than one full game to understand why Power Grid is so highly rated. I’ve had this game for just over a month now, and with each play I appreciate this game more and more. Power Grid is, IMHO, a masterful game– it’s easy to learn AND deeply strategic.

What I couldn’t understand is why there would need to be expansion boards that tinkered with a very successful formula. Yet my wife expressed a desire to try the France/Italy map, so I broke down and bought it. What a great investment!!! Not only do you get another beautiful two-sided map, but the rules are tweaked just enough to give a completely different feel to the game.

We decided to try France first, as the layout looked a lot friendlier than Italy. The ‘tweaking’ they made for France is that they made Nuclear power a much more available and affordable option. Initially, the uranium is stocked from spaces 5 through 16 (instead of only 14 and 16 in the original game). Also, plant #13 is removed from the game, and plant number 11 (nuclear) is put as the top card of the draw pile.

This method really does make nuclear a much more attractive option. On a recent five-player game, we decided to try it out. Usually, the number 11 plant was very unpopular, and the higher numbered ones usually didn’t sell until the uranium price came down to at least seven. But when playing the France map/rules, every nuclear plant was a gobbled up pretty quickly. By the end of step 1, we were able to pick up uranium for one or two elektros per unit.

Two other features kind of jumped out at us. The first one is the ‘three cities’ of Paris. (Paris is divided into three separate city circles). You can build on all three of the circles with NO connection costs. These are the only connections on this map without that cost, so it’s is very enticing early in the game. But beware! There are only a couple of inexpensive links out of Paris, but most of them lead to higher priced links within the next move or two.

The other notable feature is that the connection costs as a whole seemed to be more expensive than on the US/Germany map. We didn’t take the time to compare the boards, but it took us a long time to reach step2. It’s true that we built very cautiously and strategically, but by the end of a turn, we’d find that we didn’t have much cash left over.

I bought more heavily into nuclear than did the others in the first (abridged) game, and was rewarded for my efforts with a win. In a full game, more people bought into nuclear, sending the prices a bit higher, but still fairly reasonable. Garbage also proved to be a good deal because many of the players who usually use garbage as part of their strategy simply substituted nuclear for garbage, which at one point got down to 1 dollar for a trash can!

In conclusion, France proved to be a map worthy of many replays. I’m sure that this map will prove to be very popular in our group.

When we finally decided to try Italy, we weren’t disappointed. The twist here is that the raw materials are rarer than in the basic game – most notably on coal and oil. The board itself is pretty challenging. Many of the cities in Northern Italy are very inexpensive to link to, and the area appears pretty friendly. However, as you proceed down the ‘shin’ of the boot-shaped country, links are more expensive and your options are fewer.

For our four-player game, wouldn’t you know that we didn’t play the northernmost two areas on our first Italian match. The coal and oil prices began taking their toll around the second or third turn. Almost everyone was hooked up to coal and oil by then. This led to building at a slower pace in the early game, even for those of us who started in the cheap-connection northern area. But one person began hoarding wind power (and even the fusion plant late in the game), and I was first to get into nuclear power when the price hit $7, and used trash pretty cheaply throughout most of the game. That left only two people who were most dependent on oil and coal, so while it was a bit more expensive than in the base game, the cost never became prohibitive. I imagine that might change with a 5- or 6-player game.

Step two was amazingly short (1 turn), and it didn’t take long to finish up the power plant deck in step 3. This left us with excess funds to buy more fuel and build more cities, which led to a quick and exciting finish. My wife built up 17 cities and powered them all. My niece made it up to 18 cities, but could only power 16 of them. I had 16 and powered them all, while my buddy only had 15 cities to power, even though he could have handled up to 18.

To sum up Italy, it is a very challenging game because of the odd geography of the long, narrow country and because of tight resources. It can be made easier by utilizing the northern portion of the map, but I really liked the difficulty of the southern sections. Ideally, I’d love to play this map with 5 or even 6 players.

All in all, I have to give a big two-thumbs-up recommendation to this expansion. While it doesn’t really ‘improve’ the game per se, it does provide some nice variety from the original board. The changes are very minor, yet they pave the way for new strategies that may not have been at home in the base game.

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Legomancer — 2007-07-09T21:23:22+00:00

Marking off the unused area

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theo home — 2007-06-26T07:35:43+00:00

Frankreich!

Thread: France - land of cheap fuel (in this case)

DaveD — 2007-04-19T16:50:25+00:00

This game was played on 18 April at Halesowen Boardgamers, the report is also available (together with others) at http://halesowenboardgamers.blogspot.com

This was played on the French map using the 3 areas running from left to right across the middle from Brest in the west to Chamonix in the east. Power plants ended up as me with 3, Mike with 4 and Steve with 5, leaving me with first buying rights in the following phases, after buying raw materials I started in Le Mans, Mike put himself next to me in Orleans and Steve sat on his own in Lyons.

As step 1 unfolded Steve built to 6 cities, while Mike and I intertwined ourselves splitting 5/5 amongst the cities in the north (including the 3 in Paris) with relatively cheap connection costs. It was round this time that I got in a bit of a mess with the power plants. Mike had picked up the dirty coal burning no. 20 and I then let Steve have no.29 without much of a fight being a bit reluctant to take a plant that would only power 4 and would therefore need replacement. I hoped to see something better drop, unfortunately I was left with the option of no.24, the trash price was way too high and with only 3 players not coming down fast.

So I sat on my total 3 capacity hoping for an improvement or at least for the trash price to fall. It didn't happen and I eventually decided in the end to pick up plant 12, which had the advantage that it was cheap, the fuel was cheap and it allowed me to power my cities, if some what uneconomically. I was fortunate, I think that no one pushed earlier into Step 2.

Things broke eventually of course and I was able to pick up plant 26 at the same time as Steve grabbed 34 and he then pushed the game into step 2. The following turn as things turned out, I was last to pick a plant through having delayed building cities and 30 dropped into my lap triggering step 3 with the replacement, Steve had picked up plant 28 giving him 13 capacity (5-4-4), I had 13 (6-5-2), Mike had now fallen behind. In the building phase I increased my total to 11 by filling up the '15' spaces where Mike had taken the '10's. This left me to bid first and build last in the next turn.

Now step 3 had been reached there were plenty of good plants to buy, I got no.50, Steve had 36 and Mike had 32, I now had 17 capacity but not enough cash to trigger a finish so I did not build further, knowing I would be first to build the following turn as the others had moved past me in cities.

On that final turn, I did not buy a plant and neither did Steve, hoping that neither Mike nor I could end the game, Mike had bought a plant, enabling him to match my 17 capacity. Following raw materials purchases, I built to 17 cities, grabbing the '15' sites in the south where, Steve had started. Steve built to his 16 capacity and Mike was able to match my 17, but as he built last he was left with mostly 20 cost sites and ended up losing the money tie break.

Scores: Dave D 17+, Mike 17, Steve 16

We always enjoy a game of Power Grid, but I'm not sure any of us covered ourselves in glory this time out, I managed to get my self in an early mess, while the other two, I think, let me off and ended up snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Another unusual thing was that there was not at any time in the game, any appreciable fuel shortage problem, this may have been due to only 3 players, but even so I don't recall such as friendly game in that respect, even with three.

Thread: Re: Struggle in Italy

7ofAnn — 2007-04-14T17:19:46+00:00

Yeah, we had nice plants early - some 30 plants, and they were nicely divided, some radioactivity and then garbage and coal and oil, what more could we wish... I was behind almost the whole game, so I had access to almost everything for a cheap price (and I had hybrid plant).

I so love this game, it's really clever. Of course I'd rather play Goa if anyone wanted to play with me

Thread: Re: Struggle in Italy

Werbaer — 2007-04-14T09:34:52+00:00

7ofAnn wrote:
Before step 2, some really nice plants came out, and I could power 13 cities before step 2. [...]The map of Italy can result in scarse fuel, but all the fuel use was spread out rather evenly, so that did not happen in this game (or we were really nice to each other).
The reason was likely that you hade quite effective plants early. A good plant reduces the total fuel consuption by about two units per turn, and if there's several good plants, that really adds up in a short time.

Thread: Re: Struggle in Italy

Karlsen — 2007-04-14T03:42:19+00:00

Ann, you must have had a nice mix of plants, or being extra nice to each other. In my last game of the Italian map I remember I ended up with two big plants and had to buy another five city plant that used different fuel and throw out a perfect good five city power plant because the was so expensive or there just wasn't enough of it some turns!

I think it is the first time I have thrown out a plant that big without replacing it with something better, simply because it was so costly to run.

Thread: Struggle in Italy

7ofAnn — 2007-04-13T11:29:58+00:00

Players

Ageeth
Maren
Tjalling
Ann

Monday evening (normally basketball training evening, but since it was second easter day, there was no training, and I took the opportunity to play a game), we had Maren and Tjalling over for a game. They _really_ love Power Grid, and they have a game crew that rarely wants to play anything else than Catan, so when they come here, we almost always play Power Grid. SInce they had not played Italy yet, we took Italy.

Italy starts with less coal and oil, and a little bit more garbage. Ageeth and I had played the map before, but we did not play close attention and let Maren grab the 6 plant for 6. Garbage was only 5, so she was good to go straight to the victory - that's what we thought anyway. It's good to have a low plant (cheap coal) in the beginning, but nowadays, I don't like being forced to build first, it's easy to get surrounded by others - what happened to me in this game, after the 5th city, there was nowhere to go for me. At least I could power all 5 cities, so I generated some income.

Before step 2, some really nice plants came out, and I could power 13 cities before step 2. After that, the plants were really bad, so a few rounds passed without any buying of plants. I was still behind, but crawling closer. The map of Italy can result in scarse fuel, but all the fuel use was spread out rather evenly, so that did not happen in this game (or we were really nice to each other).

When the last turn came (after the auctions), I knew the game was mine. Maren was in the lead with 16 cities - could only power 11. She was certainly not going to build to 17. I had 14 cities, and after I replaced a 3 plant with a 4 plant, 78 electron left. Step 3 came up during the auction phase, which meant we could built into the 3rd space, which was good for me. I had bought enough fuel the previous round, so all I had to do was build to 17, no-one else was going to do it. First I forced some 6 plants to be auctioned for a high price (and even then Ageeth could only power 13 cities - I knew all along that the 29 plant would be mine), and then I finished it.

The end
Ann 14 (17 cities)
Ageeth 13 (16 cities)
Tjalling 12 (14 cities)
Maren 11 (16 cities)

Italy is (opposed to Benelux) a really slow map. We struggle with the connection costs, with the chocking points, and with the scarse fuel. It's hard work, but we like it nevertheless. We always enjoy a game of Power Grid, regardless of the outcome (uhm maybe not )

Thread: Power Grid - Session Report

gschloesser — 2007-03-27T13:15:44+00:00

This was my first experience with the France map, and, boy, was it a tight and unforgiving country! Leonard was the first to build, and he quickly grabbed Paris, allowing him inexpensive expansions into two neighboring cities. Jim, Alison and I concentrated on the south and southwest, with Bill and Steve opting to begin in the west and north.

As we expected, the south quickly became congested. I opted to forego building two turns in a row, waiting for the game to enter the second phase, which allows for two plants to be constructed per city. As soon as this occurred, I immediately constructed four more cities. I felt I had positioned myself well, as I really only needed one more power plant and was flush with cash. Sadly, I had to depart, so Kevin took my spot in the game. Before I departed, I explained my plans to him, and later heard that he was able to fulfill those plans. He later informed me that he was able to acquire a 3 coal / 6 city plant, and managed to construct two cities per turn, powering every city for the remainder of the game. This kept us barely ahead of Jim, who did not have to purchase any more plants, but he had fewer cities on the board.

In the final round, Jim built six cities to reach 16, but Kevin kept pace by constructing three to also reach 16. Both players powered all of their cities, but the team of Kevin and I won by virtue of having ten more dollars than Jim.

Finals:

Greg / Kevin: 16 / $159
Jim: 16 / $149
Bill: 15 / $165
Alison: 14 / $137
Steve: 12 / $258
Leonard: 11 / $138

Ratings: Leonard 10, Steve 9, Alison 9, Kevin 9, Greg 9, Jim 8, Bill 8