Saturday, January 12, 2008

Damascus 01/11/08

A good night for gaming, we had 20 people in attendance...

  • David, Noreen, & Corwin Fair
  • Jason Cheng
  • John Stup
  • Raphael Lehrer
  • Howard Wagner
  • Ruben & Melinda Carbonell
  • Rose Byington
  • David & Martha Briggs
  • Bill Trac
  • Rick & Linda Pasquale
  • Luke Conte
  • Ben, Rachel, Carol, and Bob Jones
  • Bryan Snyder
First up was a quick 3-player game of Race for the Galaxy, in which Jason was able to out-consume my settling/developing. Final Scores were Jason 43, David 39, Marshall 25.

Ruben and John joined Marshall and I for a game of Carcassonne with the River, River II, Mini, and Abbey & Mayor expansions. It was a good game, with some interesting twists added by the new expansion. Final scores: John67, Dave 110, Marshall 111, Ruben 137.

Bryan joined Raphael and Jason for a game of Conquest of Paradise. This is a new title from GMT Games that I know little about. Would one of the players leave some comments to let us know what you thought? Final scores: Raphael 27, Jason 21, Bryan 10.

A six-player game of Alhambra can be a bit chaotic, but we gave it a shot. Bob had an impressive wall early on, but only managed 6th place with 61 points. I had almost no wall the entire game, and got 5th place with 67 points. Ruben had a nice lead in two colors, but in the end got 4th with 69 points. Marshall snagged 3rd with 71 points. Luke, in his first game, managed to tie for the win with Carol, both with 74 points.

Ticket to Ride was played by the quartet of Rick, Linda, Rose, and Noreen. They played the standard game, with the USA 1910 expansion. This was Linda's first playing of the game, and she came away with 74 points. Noreen took third with 113, Rick had second with 139, and Rose scored an impressive 169 for the win.

The same foursome then played, what else, Tichu. Noreen and Rose won over Rick & Linda 1065 to 335.

Another game with the same 4 players was Qwirkle. Again, this was Linda's first play of the game. Rick came in fourth with 92, Rose third with 97, Linda second with 109, and Noreen won with 115.

Setting off to explore ancient ruins is the theme of Thebes, a fun and light family game. this time we had 4 players, and Bill claims it was exceptional luck that led him to his 57-point victory. He was followed by David with 52, Howard with 41, and Martha with 31.

After conquering Paradise, they set about building in Arkadia, or so the legends go... Rapahel proved adept at building the king's castle, managing a win with 124 points, followed by Jason with 84 and Bryan with 76. This is a game I am eager to play soon.

Caylus was next up, and Howard said he has been studying the game like a university exam... It showed as he won with 50 points to Carol's 46, newcomer Luke's 43, and David's 33.

Bob taught Medieval Merchant to several new players, and it appears they got almost all of the rules right. Maybe next time we can make it 100%... Either way, Bill managed the win with 56 points, followed by Bob with 45, Martha with 40, David with 35, and Marshall with 34.

Jason and Raphael were left to their own devices while the above games were finishing up, and so they played a trio of 2-player games: Agricola (Raphael won, 50 points to Jason's 36), and 2 games of Race for the Galaxy (both wins for Jason, 47 to 39 and 44 to 26).

Rose & Marshall paired off against Bill & Noreen in Tichu, and lost 770 to 1030.

Finally, Bob taught Union Pacific, a classic stock collecting game with tense action choices throughout. Final scores were Raphael 109, Bob 106, Jason 101, Carol 98, Howard 91.

An excellent game session, hope to see you all next week.

1 comment:

Ipecac said...

For the record, we got "B" below wrong. Only half points are awarded if you have a majority in a city, but not an absolute majority. This encourages other people to build a branch to close out your city and deprive you of victory points.


5. Assign influence points

The player moves any buildings he has placed in the center of a city to the next free space in
clockwise order in the ring around the number. If it is the first branch in a city, place it on the
space with the arrow. When placing buildings after the first, they must be placed in clockwise
order to keep track of the order they were placed. This may be important for scoring influence.

The player now checks to see if the he has the absolute majority of branches which can be
built in a city or if he has just built the last possible branch in the city.

A. The player has the absolute majority in a city; i.e. more than half of the possible branches in the city. The player removes the city marker from the board, moving the buildings to respective
positions on the city. The player places the city marker face up before him on the table. If he
still has unplayed city markers, he should be careful to keep them separate.

The player then moves his influence marker on the scoring track. He moves it forward a
number of spaces equal to the number on the city marker just removed.


B. The player did not achieve the absolute majority, but did place the last possible branch in the city. The players count to see which player has the most branches in the city. This player removes
the city marker as above, placing it face up before him. He moves his influence marker a
number of spaces equal to half the number, rounded down, on the city marker just removed.

If two or more players tie for most branches in the city, the player who first opened a branch
there (among those tied, check clockwise order from the arrow), receives the city marker and
the points of influence (one half the number on the city).


C. If the player did not achieve the absolute majority and the city was not filled, no influence
points are assigned.