Ludocracy Now

Annie and I played a pair of games of Castles of Burgundy.  We paired the pair of games with our unofficial sponsor: Redbreast whiskey.

Super necessary board game day yesterday.

Summoner Wars — Sera and I take down Jake and Tundle in a bloody and close match.

Innovation — I finally remember to score special achievements when I qualify for them and I avenge my loss from last time.  Also kind of fun to use the Soap technology to create an achievement out of thin air.

The Castles of Burgundy — Spielbox boards, I take 10d to Jake’s 10a.  10a does not forgive Jake’s misguided initial placement and he plays catch-up the entire game.  Same board that stymied me last time.  What are its strengths?  Does it have any?

Android: Netrunner — I’m up 4-2 but get snared and Private Security Force/Neural EMP’d.  Flatlined ignominiously.

Eclipse — Erik joined us for a Triple Terran Tussle.  Jake thinks he has the game won with his superior military but my one monolith and full on research strategy nets me a win 30-28-20.  Erik didn’t attack anyone until the very final turn.  V. Strange.

Pretty much got all my favorite games to the table today.  I’m really hoping there’s another day or two of gaming in the offing this week.  Until next time.

Last night I got together with Annie who had been interested in trying out this Burgundy game I keep going on about.  Even in the face of an offer to play a game of Netrunner she was determined to play the game that I had said was “better than Agricola.”

Well, after one game, she is sure that this is one of her new favorites, too.

We both played board 1 and I just eked out a win 186-179.  I was surprised at the small margin considering how smooth I thought my play went (big props to my knowledge tiles who made the game considerably more flexible).  But 1) I should just be happy to win for the first time in four games and 2) I should just be happy I got to play AND convert a new Ludocrat to the Burgundy cause.

Thankfully a mine showed up in the black market in Phase A since Annie got the first mine at depot 5.  That, coupled with the +2/-2 worker tile set me up for a comfortable game.  I never got in the shipping business seriously so Annie had turn order for most of it and sold a helluva lot of goods (and she had the 1 pt per good sold tile).

During this game I actually felt like Castles were exceedingly unimportant.  Annie didn’t place a 2nd castle until the very final round.  I actually felt like I’d rather have a decent city tile than bother to play a castle.  Obviously this is a symptom of board 1 and is certainly not true in boards 10a-10d.

No other insights, really, except I don’t think I did a very good job of blocking Annie’s necessary tiles (the 1pt per good knowledge tile, her 4pts per animal knowledge tile, the big pig tiles she needed, etc) and I don’t even think it was because I was being nice.  Considering how fluid I felt I was managing the board I should have made an extra effort to block.

Until next time which should be soon—as Annie said, “I am overwhelmed by all these great games that I want to play!  You’ve really found some great games, Joe.”  Why thank you Annie, it only took me buying 150 and selling or trading 90 to get the collection I’ve always wanted.

I am certainly blessed—not necessarily with good luck or skill… but with friends who game.  Whenever possible the actual people involved in the following have helped reconstruct the events as they happened.

The Castles of… I don’t want to talk about it.

Ben, pictured looking like a younger version of Jake, perhaps sharing some sort of genes due to having the same mother and father, said he was up for playing Burgundy due to his brother’s recommendation.  “Finally,” I thought, “a respite from my losing streak.”  Apparently I didn’t think hard enough.  We both worked the #1 beginner board and I lost 183-181.  I could have tied points-wise if I hadn’t profligately spent two silver on a worthless black market tile (would have lost anyway to the tie breaker).  I let Ben get three mines in three rounds.  That has been a HUGE indicator of loss for me.

ConHex

Jake and Ben have played Ketchup and Hex before so I knew Ben would be up for an abstract like ConHex.  This game is so great.  I prefer it to Hex (well, at least at my skill level) in that I think it’s more prone to changes in momentum—I can come back from three miserable moves to still win (maybe this has less to do with the game than people’s collective experience, I don’t know).  I won both very close games and needed something mindless to follow.

Crokinole

Yeah so I lost the first three games I played against Ben to 100 points.  Keep in mind I have logged over 70 Crokinole games to his zero.  Some people just get it.  I did win the fourth and I was saved more losses by Jake and Jeff showing up.  Jake and I teamed up to win a team battle against Jeff and Ben.

Hansa Teutonica

We didn’t have a whole lot of time before I needed to yell at a television screen so we played one of my favorite three-player games that I can’t seem to win (obviously Jeff was not interested).  My 24 points on the Coellen table did (finally) give me the six-point win.  (I say “finally” because I always focus on Coellen and it never seems to work.  Perhaps sibling rivalry was working in my favor this time).  Because I love the game so much I wasn’t empathetic enough to know how much the others enjoyed it at the time, but I did just text Ben what he thought and he replied that he gives it a “four out of five” and says it was “better than a law seminar.”

Let’s get some more games in—specifically Eclipse! Or Summoner Wars!  Or seriously more Burgundy so I can break my losing streak!  Until next time, folks.