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Hypermind BoardGame Night - May, 2008
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Games are my passion, but they aren't my whole life, and over the previous month or so, my life found new meaning through our new little blessing, Samantha... Of course, her addition to the family also played havoc with my life (somewhat akin to a gang of monkeys in a banana factory). Thankfully, after a few weeks at home in utter horror at the responsibility we've taken on, I've finally been able to put together the pieces of my former life and find a place for boardgames again. During my paternal absence, Chris Ingersoll and the rest of the Hypermind BoardGamers kept the ball rolling with our weekly game nights. Gwen, Samantha, and I made it out to the last week in April and came back for more as this month got started as well. Let's see how it goes...
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Posted On: 2008-05-12 13:37:52
Edited On: 2008-05-20 07:34:13
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As always, this is the place where you can catch up on all our previous gaming (16 months of it!) and see how we got where we are. |
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Posted On: 2008-05-12 12:35:26
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Our Game of the Month! for May is a long-time favorite of the group, China. It's been "first runner up" many, many times for GotM!, and finally gets its turn to shine! While short in length, what impresses me most about China is its depth and intricacy, and I expect it to have a very successful reign this month. |
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Posted On: 2008-05-12 12:47:47
Edited on: 2008-05-13 13:12:38
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May 6, 2008
Key Harvest
While I was out with the baby, I ordered a big shipment of games that Denise has had trouble getting in for Hypermind. The impetus was that Gwen really wanted to own Qwirkle, so much so that she told me to order it online if necessary (which was sort of like giving a fox the key to the henhouse). Anyway, this was what I ended up with:
If you'll notice, they're all either dedicated 2-player games or games that are good with 2 (which was intentional, by the way) as I wanted to play more games with Gwen while we were both off with Samantha. Anyway, I brought along a couple of the multiplayer ones to game night this week, and managed to get Chris and Mark to join me as we tried out Key Harvest.
To be honest, I don't really know much of what happened in the game (heck, or in any of the games this week) because Samantha was a bit fussy the whole time. Chris and I seemed to do our best to put together the two balanced fields (with limited success) while Mark went all will-nilly on getting as many of the workers onto his board as possible. In the end, Mark's strategery proved to be superior, and he won handily
Time: 71 minutes
Score: Mark 37, Chris 35, Me 27
Ratings: Mark 7, Chris 7.5, Me 7.5
Overall, I really liked the game. Other than being more than a little distracted, the game went pretty smoothly. I forgot the rule about workers not being next to each other, but we played it all correctly otherwise. Key Harvest is a bit thinky and a little dry, but it really has some cool and quirky mechanics that I like a lot. The best thing of all is definitely the auction-ish part, where you set aside field tiles along with goods markers that you have earned. Then, on a later turn, either you or other players can purchase them for the price that you set. If other players buy them, you get your goods back along with their payment. This makes some really nifty decisions as you decide how cheaply you can get something or, alternatively, how high you can set a price for something that others need. It seemed to be pretty well-received, and I hope to get it to the table again pretty soon.
China
We then dove head-first into the Game of the Month!. Since we had 6 available players, we split into two different groups and played two games each.
Group One
Chip, Chris, and Graham were at the other table, and Graham had never actually played China before. After rules explanation, Chip beat his two opponents mercilessly. Of course, Chip has played like a billion games of Web of Power on BSW and has lost precious few games of China here at Hypermind.
Time: 17 minutes, 20 minutes
Game 1: Chip 54, Graham 42, Chris 41
Game 2: Chip 45, Graham 36, Chris 35
Ratings: Chip 9.5, Chris 9, Graham 8.5
Group Two
Meanwhile, Gwen, Mark, and I were dealing with both the struggle over China as well as a fussy, discontented baby. I thought I was good at this game, but I didn't do very well in either play of it this week. We had all played before, but were clearly quite rusty as we tried to figure out strategy again.
Time: 27 minutes, 21 minutes
Game 1: Gwen 54, Me 35, Mark 34
Game 2: Mark 41, Me 39, Gwen 32
Ratings: Gwen 7, Mark 7.5, Me 9
We all made some boneheaded moves, and I hope that I clean up my play in the coming weeks.
Gwen and I were pretty worn out with Samantha being all fussy, so we decided to call it a night. I'll hand over the rest of the report to Chris, but I'll also point out that there was quite a bit of other boardgaming going on in the store this week that didn't seem to know about the report sheets or our BoardGame reward program. I would have talked to them more if it weren't for the baby, so I hope that I get the chance to see them all again soon.
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Posted On: 2008-05-12 13:26:33
Edited on: 2008-05-13 13:12:12
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May 6, 2008 (continued)
Like I said, here's Chris (vyolynce) Ingersoll's report of what happened after Gwen and I had to leave:
Masons
Time: 52 minutes (post-rules)
Final Scores: Chip 119, Chris 115, Graham 116, Mark 126
Game Ratings: Chip 8, Chris 8, Graham 8, Mark 8
Following Week One of Chinafest (this is seriously the quickest game we've ever picked for GotM, and I expect it to get multiple plays every week) and your departure, the rest of us started eyeing Chip's brand-spanking-new Masons box. Intrigued, we all decided to take our first dive into it. After stumbling through the rules, we headed in; this is definitely one of those games where it's easier to play than explain!
I rocketed off to an early lead, but this game features a nice catch-up feature (which reminded several of us of Mario Kart's item-distribution scheme, since Mario Kart Wii was just released last week) that soon saw everyone just about even. Mark made a huge play toward the end that put him in the lead, and the rest of us couldn't get any decent scoring cards to catch him.
You'll notice that this was the third game in a row in which I finished in last place exactly one point behind my fellow Snackbar Games reviewer Graham. Who the heck invited that guy, anyway?! 
Race for the Galaxy
Group one -- "The Pros"
Game one: Mark 35, Chris 34; 13 minutes
Game two: Mark 23, Chris 28; 12 minutes
Game three: Mark 50, Chris 46; 18 minutes
Game Ratings: Mark 10, Chris 10
Of course, a week at Hypermind's BGN apparently wouldn't be complete without Race for the Galaxy, which is definitely earning its "10" ratings from those of us dishing them out. Since James and Brett arrived while we were finishing Masons and Graham had to return home so he could eat sometime before midnight (presumably you shouldn't get him wet or expose him to sunlight either), we opted to break up into two groups, with Mark and I resuming our friendly rivalry from last month.
Without getting into the gory details, in Game One Mark's New Sparta took a detour into Rare Elements production, which got in the way of my similar strategy from Alpha Centauri; I got Mining League down very early and hit a bunch of x2 Consumes, but he was able to draw cards off my Production phases (thanks to both Comet Zone and Mining World, although I pretty much kept his Mining Conglomerate from paying off too much) to keep pace. We both hit a x2 consume to end the game, generating a total of 32 VP out of the starting pool of 24. In the end, Alpha Centauri's worthlessness once again rared its ugly head, as I lost by one stinking point.
Game two saw me eventually pursuing a somewhat ALIEN approach from my ALIEN Tech Institute (based on Old Earth), despite Mark's settling of the ALIEN Rosetta Stone World early on. A series of Trades and Exploration allowed me to dig deep and play some high-point worlds while Mark's efforts from Earth's Lost Colony didn't quite bear the fruit he had hoped for.
The rubber match almost turned the tables on the usual dynamic, as this time it was Mark who received Alpha Centauri to a Rare Elements path while I turned Epsilon Erandi into a Rebel-smashing military powerhouse, including a second-turn conquering of the Rebel Homeworld thanks to New Military Tactics and Drop Ships. I was able to find Galactic Imperium along the way and on my last turn discovered the Rebel Base with a deep Exploration for a last-minute conquering, but I still fell short. While I was going all Death Star on Luke and his pals, Mark was able to assemble Trade League, New Economy, and I think Galactic Federation to rack up huge points.
Interestingly, if you add up our scores across all three games, we come out dead even at 108 apiece!
Group Two -- "The Novices"
Game 1: James 40, Chip 35, Brett 27; Time ?
Game 2: James 23, Chip 37, Brett 31; Time ?
Game Ratings: James 9, Chip 8, Brett 9
Couldn't tell you what actually happened here other than the very last turn of their second game, which saw Chip's powerhouse Novelty engine crank out an astounding 12 VP (plus four cards) for the win.
Of special note is James rating for the game. Long considered our "meanest dude" when it comes to rating games, his score for RftG shot up from previous weeks thanks to finally "getting it," a phenomenon we have observed many times among the group. |
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Posted On: 2008-05-12 13:37:24
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May 13, 2008
Vegas Showdown
This was my first week back at work since Samantha was born, so I was able to head straight to Game Night when my workday was done, arriving a little before 5pm. Some of the younger guys were already there, and asked me if I wanted to jump into a game of Vegas Showdown.
Apparently, some of them had been playing a lot of this lately, and had some pretty solid ideas about strategy. Starting in the first round when I was repeatedly outbid for the slots that I wanted, I felt behind all game long. Brett jumped out to an early lead due to picking up a Night Club ridiculously cheap, but James and Tommy were running strong all game with each having like 6-7 slots rooms each and therefore raking in money. I made a late surge and picked up the Theater for a lot of fame points, but was unable to pick up the Buffet I needed to fill my hotel section. In the end, Brett held off everybody to claim the win in a very close game.
Time: 70 minutes
Scoe: Brett 45, James 44, Me 38, Tommy 37, Thomas 36
Ratings: Brett 7, James 8, Me 7, Tommy 10, Thomas 9
Vegas Showdown is a really solid introductory-level eurogame. There is a nice mix of mechanics, with a solid ladder-auction as the core of the game. I particularly like the way that the special events are tied to the replacement of the prestige tiles. Personally, it’s a little on the long (and slightly boring) side for me, but it can definitely help to expand people’s horizons to see how much more they can expect from more modern board games.
Race for the Galaxy
Mark and Chris came in just as we were getting started with Vegas Showdown, so they just continued their ongoing “Race for the Galaxy Grudge Match” in the meantime. After an incredibly close match to start off where Chris won on the second tie-breaker, Mark took charge and ended up laying down the smack-down in the third game.
Time: 15, 16, and 13 minutes
Game 1: Chris 29 (10 cards in hand), Mark 29 (10 cards in hand) – Chris had more goods on worlds
Game 2: Mark 31, Chris 28
Game 3: Mark 52, Chris 31
Ratings: Mark 10, Chris 10
China
It was then time for the Game of the Month! We split into two groups again, and Chris joined newbies Brett, James, and Tommy for their first play of China. They actually played two games, as I expect will happen every time that it’s played.
Time: 25 and 19 minutes
Game 1: Chris 38, James 32, Tommy 27, Brett 25
Game 2: Chris 35, Tommy 32, James 24, Brett 16
Ratings: Chris 8.5, Tommy 9, James 2?, Brett 8
Web of Power
Instead of actually playing the Game of the Month! this week, Chip, Mark, and I tried out the original game that became China, Web of Power. Chip has played a lot of this (online mainly) while it was Mark’s and my first try. In the end, the real competition was for second in both games, which Mark and I split amongst our 2 games.
Time: 20 minutes each
Game 1: Chip 74, Me 53, Mark 51
Game 2: Chip 55, Mark 43, Me 41
Ratings: Chip 9.5, Mark 7.5, Me 8
Overall, I think that I still like China better. The map itself may be a little more interesting in Web of Power, but I also felt like the more limited/random card draw screwed me over more than I ever feel when playing China. As far as the interim “house scoring”, I don’t really know that the game is better or worse with it, but it definitely changes early strategy when all the early houses will score twice. I really like the core game here, though, and would gladly play either if given the chance.
Other Early Games
While we were doing the GotM! thing, there was also a large number of new people in the store playing some other games. I don’t know much about what happened, but here’s the stats that they reported.
For Sale
Time: 17 minutes
Score: Nancy 64, Iesha 58, Thomas 56, Chris A. 54
Ratings: Nancy 8, Iesha 8, Thomas 8, Chris A. 7
Betrayal at House on the Hill
Time: 45 minutes
Score: Rodney 10, Bobby 9, Wendy 9
Ratings: Rodney 10, Bobby 10, Wendy 10
Apples to Apples
Time: 29 minutes
Score: Thomas 6, Iesha 3, Chris A. 3, Nancy 2
Ratings: Thomas 9, Iesha 6, Chris A. 9, Nancy 5
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Posted On: 2008-05-19 11:23:14
Edited on: 2008-05-20 07:33:19
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May 13, 2008 (continued)
King of Siam
I picked this game up after being intrigued by how each player has only 8 actions for the whole game. Mark and Chip let me try it out on them this week, and it went pretty well. None of us knew exactly how to approach strategy, but Mark and I jumped in early playing actions while Chip held back. I didn’t want to spend as many actions as I did in the early game, but Mark kept fighting against me from the get-go, obviously trying to bring about British control. I decided to push for red and blue to do well, and ended up with four cubes of each. In the end, Mark’s last action was unplayable and Chip was able to do as he wanted in the last 3 turns. He ended up completing Mark’s British-control strategy, but won the tiebreaker because he was the one who took the last action.
Time: 29 minutes
Score: Chip WIN (3 sets, last action), Mark (3 sets), Me (2 sets)
Ratings: Chip 7, Mark 7, Me 7.5
This game is a lot different than most anything else I’ve ever played. At its core, of course, it’s just an area-control game, but on top of this there are layers and layers of twisty innovations. First of all, it’s actually a double-layer area-control game, because while three different factions are fighting for control of Siam, the players are fighting for control of the three factions. On top of that, there’s a way (clearly, based on our game) that the British can control the country which changes the victory conditions. But like I mentioned earlier, the thing that really sets this game apart is the extremely limited number of actions that the players have.
We were a little overwhelmed in our first play in trying to figure out what to do, but the more I think about it the cooler it seems. The overall saving grace of the game is that it is over in 30 minutes or so, because it is so much of a brain-burner that any longer would cause the players’ heads to spontaneously combust. I see so much potential for this, and I hope that the rest of the group will continue to give it a chance!
Age of Gods
Ever since I introduced it a few months ago, Age of Gods has been a big hit with our group. Chris therefore continued his evening by introducing it to the rest of the guys he had played China with. Age of Gods is a very chaotic game with rather subtle strategy, and from what I heard and from their ratings, the new guys didn’t quite grasp all that was going on.
Time: 78 minutes
Score: Chris (God of Death) 20, Brett (God of War) 11, James (God of Protectors) 7, Tommy (God of Luck) 4 (not so lucky after all!)
Ratings: Chris 7.5, Brett 6.5, James 5, Tommy 7
Café International
After King of Siam, my little subgroup considered several games but then finally decided on 1989’s SdJ-winner Café International. I admit, I wasn’t terribly excited by this choice, but it had made one previous appearance at game night and had been well received, so I was fine with giving it a try myself. In the end, I was very pleasantly surprised by how it went. There’s not much in the way of report to give, because it’s a very tactical tile-laying game where you can’t have a heck of a lot of strategy. Part of my positive attitude may be because I actually won, which either means that I was able to quickly pick up on the game or that it is really just a random luck-fest (I will choose to believe the former, by the way).
Time: 28 minutes
Score: Me 98, Chip 90, Mark 78
Ratings: Me 7.5, Chip 8, Mark 7.5
Overall, Café International seemed to be a solid (and completely abstract) tile-laying game. It was fun and challenging in my first play, but I could see it getting a bit old after repeated plays. Still, its simple play and café theme could make it a pretty good gateway game.
Giro Galoppo
My evening finished with a triple-play of another of Chip’s children’s games, Giro Galoppo. I never managed to make it to the winner’s circle, but had a lot of fun anyway.
Time: 7, 7, and 5 minutes
Game 1 Mark 1st, Chip 2nd, Me 3rd
Game 2: Chip 1st, Me 2nd, Mark 3rd
Game 3: Mark 1st, Me 2nd, Chip 3rd
Ratings: Mark 8 | |
Posted On: 2008-05-19 14:51:44
