• Chris bested Rachel, Carrie, and Shaune at Button Concentration.
• Craig won Dominion with 46, followed by John (30), Jim (25), and Dave (18).
• John won Dominion with 26, followed by Shaune (21), Tony (20), and Chris (17).

Attendees:  Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg, Dave and Tony Montuori, Shaune Lee, Chris Hom, and John "Fuzzface" McMahon.

• Tony won Spy Trackdown with John, Shaune, and Sallie.
• Brian won Dominion with 38, followed by Craig (33), and Chris (26).
• Chris won Dominion with 36, followed by Brian (26), Craig (22), and Tim (18).
• Tim won Dominion with 36, followed by Brian (30), Chris (18), and Craig (12).
• Richard won Race for the Galaxy with 37, followed by Dave (34), and Jamie/Tim (18).
• Shaune won Race for the Galaxy with 48, followed by Tony (38), and Richard (16).

Attendees:  Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Sallie, Dave, and Tony Montuori, Shaune and Tim Lee, Richard Butler, Jamie Reese, Brian Carpenter, Kris Trader, Chris Hom, and John "Fuzzface" McMahon.

On our way home, Carrie and I decided to have dinner in Chantilly, and swung past Game Parlor, where I was stunned to find both Dominion and Race for the Galaxy: The Gathering Storm, sitting on the shelves, waiting to be bought ... but not so stunned that I didn't immediately scoop them up.

Brian Carpenter brought Race for the Galaxy: The Gathering Storm by Ludus a couple of weeks ago (and left his Lockheed jacket), so I'm not going to talk about it, other than to mention that I read through the solitaire rules, and they look interesting.

Dominion is the hottest new game from Rio Grande, and currently ranked 30th 23rd at Board Game Geek.  You can also play it on Brett Spiel Welt.  You start with a deck of 10 cards (7 copper, and 3 VPs).  Each turn you can play 1 (maybe more) actions from your hand, buy 1 (maybe more) cards from the supply, discard what's left of your hand, and then draw back up to 5 cards.  Every time your deck runs out of cards, you reshuffle your discard pile and complete your draw.  The goal is to purchase a balanced mix of money, action, and victory cards such that you have the most victory points at game end (either you run out of province cards in the supply, or you run out of 3 types of card in the supply).

What makes it interesting is that while you only play with 10 types of action cards in any given game, there are 25 types of action cards to choose from.  What makes it hard is that you're not allowed to review the cards in your deck or discard pile.

I'm looking forward to playing this at Ludus...

• Carrie won Monty Python Fluxx against Sallie, Jim, Rachel, Richard, and John.
• Shaune won Settlers of Catan with 10, followed by Sallie (8), Tim (6), and Jim (5).
• Richard and Dave tied for the win On the Underground with 36, followed by John (33), Tony (29), and Chris (26).
• Chris won Race for the Galaxy with 45, beating Craig (42) and Richard (35).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Sallie, Dave, and Tony Montuori, Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg, Shaune and Tim Lee, Chris Hom, Richard Butler, and John "Fuzzface" McMahon.

• Richard (with the assistance of Brian) won San Juan with 41, followed by John (25), Sallie (21), and Craig (20).
• Craig won Ticket to Ride: USA 1910 with 142, followed by Sallie (135), Brian (116), Richard (104), and John (88).
• Dave won Race for the Galaxy with 40/2, followed by Richard (40/1), Brian (34), and Craig (31).

Attendees:  Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Richard Butler, Dave and Sallie Montuori, Brian Carpenter, and John "Fuzzface" McMahon.

• Richard won Masons with 112, followed by Jim (106), Dave (104), and Craig (104).
• John won Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries with 98, follwed by Rachel (95), and Sallie (92).
• Richard won ((game Puerto Rico) with 59, followed by Shaune (58), Tim (52), Tony (47), and John (40).

Attendees:  Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Richard Butler, Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg, Dave, Sallie, and Tony Montuori, Shaune and Tim Lee, and John "Fuzzface" McMahon.

• Craig won Power Grid on the Korea map with 17 cities powered, followed by Dave (16) and John (15).
• Tony won Race for the Galaxy with 42 and 16 cards, followed by John (42/1), Craig (35/7), and Chris (35/3).
• Chris won Race for the Galaxy with 36, followed by Craig (28), Tony (17), and John (12).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Sallie, Dave, and Tony Montuori, Shaune Lee, Chris Hom, and John "Fuzzface" McMahon.

The Korea map represents both North and South Korea, which are given separate resource markets to reflect the differences in cultures. Each market has different refresh rates, and different capacities. During the resource purchase phase, any player can choose to buy resources from either the North or the South, but they must buy all of their resources for the turn from the same market. During the bureaucracy phase, the North market refreshes first, followed by the South. Both markets combined are the same as any other Power Grid map, but the North market (12 coal, 8 oil, 8 trash) is smaller than the South (12 coal, 16 oil, 16 trash, 12 uranium).

The China map reflects the state-managed economy with a rigidly controlled power plant market. The Power Plant deck is stacked -- all plants up to the 30-plant arrive in ascending order, with no future market. In the first round there will be one plant available for each player; in subsequent rounds in Steps 1 and 2 there will be always be one fewer plants available than the number of players. In Step 3 there will always be 4 plants available, regardless of the number of players. The power plants only refresh in the Bureaucracy phase and there's no difference between Step 1 and 2 except in the number of players who can connect to each city. To make matters worse, the map starts resource-poor (coal and oil start at 5, trash starts at 7, and there is no uranium at the start), and some of the more useful plants are eliminated.

We decided to play the China map, and Carrie consented to join us to make the game more interesting. It took some time to really understand the nuances of the map, but after a while we got the hang of it. Through careful bidding I succeeded in being able to connect and power more cities than either Carrie or Fuzz, but that meant that I was paying more for my resources. I balanced that out by being the only player with Trash plants. Fuzz focused on Nuclear and Wind plants, and Carrie carefully stayed at the back of the pack, hoarding coal and oil. Eventually I built up a lead on connected cities, but I misjudged the timing on a build-out and by the time we were in the mid-20s on plants I had connected 15 cities, Fuzz 14, and Carrie 13 ... leaving us unable to connect more cities while we waited for Step 3. One poorly executed bidding war later, I was left with the 30-plant ... and not enough money to fuel it -- oops. That mistake put me out of the running, and when Step 3 arrived, Carrie was able leverage her fuel monopoly and overtake Fuzz for the win.

The China map is the least random of all of the Power Grid variants ... and the most brutal. It will be interesting to play it again with 4 or 5 players. I'm also looking forward to playing the Korea map.

• Richard won Nottingham with 73, followed by Sallie (67), John (67), and Craig (61).
• Craig won Nottingham with 110, followed by John (80), Richard (67), and Sallie (52).
• Tony won Race for the Galaxy with 49, followed by Shaune (37), Tim (32), and Chris (24).
• Tony won Race for the Galaxy with 53, followed by Shaune (39), Tim (39), and Chris (31).
• Tony won Chronology with 10, followed by Shaune (9), Tim (9), Dave (8), and Chris (6).
• Craig won Race for the Galaxy with 39, followed by Richard (37).

Attendees:  Carrie Hafer and Craig Trader, Sallie, Dave, and Tony Monturori, Shaune and Tim Lee, Richard Butler, Chris Hom, and John "Fuzzface" McMahon.

• Blaise won RoboRally followed by Richard, Sallie, Rachel, Dave, John, and Craig.
• Craig won Race for the Galaxy with 33, followed by John (27), Richard (21), and Dave (20).

Attendees:  Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg, Dave and Sallie Montuori, Richard Butler, and John "Fuzzface" McMahon.

• Carrie won Cineplexity.
• Sallie won Settlers of Catan with 11, followed by John (7), Chris (6), and Rachel (6).
• Craig won Power Grid on the France map with 14 cities powered, followed by Dave (13), Richard (12), and Blaise (11).
• John won Chronology with 10 questions, followed by Rachel (8), Sallie (7), and Chris (6).
• Craig won Race for the Galaxy with 49, followed by Blaise (27), and Richard (20).

Attendees:  Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg, Dave and Sallie Montuori, Richard Butler, Chris Hom, and John "Fuzzface" McMahon.

• Craig won Vegas Showdown with 72, followed by Sallie (62), Richard (62), Dave (51), and John (48).
• John won On the Underground with 50, followed by Richard (39), Dave (39), and Craig (37).

Attendees:  Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Richard Butler, Dave and Sallie Montuori, and John "Fuzzface" McMahon.

• Tony won Race for the Galaxy with 39, followed by Craig (38), Chris (28), and Tim (21).
• Tony won Race for the Galaxy with 53, followed by Tim (38), Chris (32), and Craig (20).
• Dave won On the Underground with 40, followed by Shaune (37), John (36), and Larry (36).

Attendees:  Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Tim and Shaune Lee, Chris Hom, Larry Timson, Dave, Sallie, and Tony Montuori, and John "Fuzzface" McMahon.

We hope to see you at TCEP, but if not, have a good (and safe) holiday weekend!

• Tony won On the Underground with 48, followed by Shaune (46), Tim (32), and Chris (31).
• Blaise won Race for the Galaxy with 37 against Craig (33).
• Blaise won Race for the Galaxy with 40 against Craig (32).
• Blaise won Race for the Galaxy with 40 against Craig (33).
• Chris won Race for the Galaxy with 23 against Craig (22).

Attendees:  Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg, Tim and Shaune Lee, Chris Hom, and Tony Montuori.

• Carrie, Sallie, and Rachel played Fluxx.  Rachel won the first game, and forced Carrie to win the second game.
• Craig won Race for the Galaxy with 26 and 9 cards, followed by Blaise (26 and 2 cards), and Tony (24).
• Blaise won Race for the Galaxy with 42, followed by Craig (34) and Tony (20).
• Tony won Race for the Galaxy with 35, followed by Craig (33) and Blaise (32).
• Blaise won Race for the Galaxy with 34, followed by Craig (33).

Attendees:  Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg, and Tony and Sallie Montuori.

• Lije won Agricola with 31, followed by Brian (30), Craig (27), and Dave (26).
• Brian won Race for the Galaxy with 34, followed by Craig (30), Tony (20), and Shaune (16).
• Shaune won Race for the Galaxy with 65, followed by Brian (46), Craig (44), and Tony (28).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Brian Carpenter and Lije Bailey, Shaune Lee, and Tony and Dave Montuori.

• 9am, RoboRally (RRY) Finals, I washed out attempting to escape the third flag, but I had a lot of fun getting there.
  The RoboRally tournament had a strict 2-minute time limit on programs. On the first turn I picked up the Recompile option (discard and redraw your entire hand, then take a point of damage), but using it meant that I would have to evaluate my current hand (30-60 seconds) and then have to do it again for the new hand. I actually used it successfully 4 or 5 times, including once when I already had 3 locked registers. Sadly, even the recompile couldn't save me from a robot backing up (and pushing me) after I pushed him. The resulting mess killed both our bots, and neither of us were able to recover momentum after that.
• 9am, Ticket To Ride (TTR) Heat 3, skipped in favor of RoboRally Finals.

After that was the drive back to Sterling, which was tedious, but uneventful.

All in all, I had a great time this year (better than last year) and I'm already making plans to be there in 2009.

After playing Puerto Rico, Eric, Cathy, and I made a pilgrimage to the Wilbur Chocolate Factory in Lititz, PA. What we didn't know was that the entire town of Lititz was shut down for some sort of craft festival. We eventually made it to the Wilbur factory store, where we stocked up on chocolate and sweets, but it was cutting things close.

The Manifest Destiny heat was pretty miserable -- I was stuck playing with people who bitched, moaned, threatened, and cajoled about every single decision someone made. The leader frequently whined about being targeted by the other players. This dragged out a 3 hour game to being only 2/3 done at the 4 hour mark. Shudder!

Finally, and 9pm, there were the RoboRally semi-finals, which were the highlight of the day. The game was close and hard-fought, with lots of robot interaction. Three of the players from my board advanced to the finals, including myself.

• 10am, Race for the Galaxy (RFG) Heat 3, I took 4th in a 4-player game.
• 11am, Puerto Rico (PRO) Heat 3, I took 4th in a 4-player game.
• 3pm, Manifest Destiny (MFD) Heat 3, I took 5th in a 5-player game.
• 4pm, RoboRally (RRY) Heat 2, skipped -- already qualified.
• 4pm, Ticket To Ride (TTR) Heat 2, skipped in favor of Manifest Destiny.
• 4pm, Race for the Galaxy (RFG) Heat 4, skipped in favor of Manifest Destiny.
• 9pm, RoboRally (RRY) Semi-Finals, qualified for finals! I took 2nd out of 5 at my board, missing the victory by 2 turns.

I spent a lot of time with Eric and Cathy Raymond, and Ken Burnside, playing Race for the Galaxy and commiserating about how badly we were losing games that we should have been winning.

• 11am, Power Grid (PGD) Semi-Finals, I took 5th in a 5-player game on the Italy map.
• 2pm, Ticket To Ride (TTR) Heat 1, I took 4th in a 4-player game on the USA: 1910 board.
• 4pm, Puerto Rico (PRO) Heat 2, I took 4th in a 4-player game.
• 7pm, Race for the Galaxy (RFG) Heat 2, I took 4th in a 4-player game.

We ended up playing more Race for the Galaxy, followed by a trip to Starbucks for hot chocolate.

• 12pm, Power Grid (PGD) Heat 3, I took 3rd in a 5-player game on the Benelux map. I don't think I made any mistakes, but I got squeezed early on, and had some poor luck with power plants early on, which left me a day late and a dollar short for the rest of the game. I may still make the semi-finals; tomorrow will tell.
• 1pm, Race for the Galaxy (RFG) Heat 1, skipped in favor of Power Grid.
• 7pm, Puerto Rico (PRO) Heat 1, I took third in a 4-player game. At one point I bought the Harbor when I should have bought a wharf, and I didn't make good use of my factory.
• 7pm, Manifest Destiny (MFD) Heat 2, skipped in favor of Puerto Rico.

• 10am, Empire Builder (EPB) Heat 2, took second in a 4-player game. This wasn't good enough to make it to the semi-finals (no surprise) and I decided that I'd rather play something else instead.
• 2pm, Power Grid (PGD) Heat 2, skipped, in favor of Manifest Destiny.
• 2pm, Manifest Destiny (MFD) Heat 1, took third in a 4-player game.
• 2pm, Empire Builder (EPB) Heat 3, skipped, in favor of Manifest Destiny.
• 6pm, dinner with Eric and Cathy Raymond.
• 7pm, RoboRally (RRY) Heat 1, won! This qualifies me for the semi-finals. I actually made it through 3 flags on 2 boards, against 5 other players.
  This game was funny -- all of the players were laughing and having a good time. The funniest bit for me was where I had taken enough damage (5 points) to call a shutdown. Another player was behind me, and he did more damage to my bot, including pushing me along. I 'woke up' with 5 points of damage and a locked register. I drew 4 cards and declared another shutdown. I ran away (and got shot for 4 more points of damage), but when I was done, I had traveled a full board length (in the right direction) and was fully repaired. This is probably what allowed me to win.
• 10pm, Vegas Showdown (VSD) Heat 2, I took third in a 5-player game. Not good enough to make the semi-finals.

At one point during the day, I was able to purchase a copy of Race for the Galaxy. Hooray!

• 6pm, Power Grid (PGD) Heat 1, won!
  I finished my board (France) with 16 cities powered and 17 cash, in spite of the headache.  Second place had 16 cities, 8 cash, third place had 15 cities, fourth had 14 cities, and fifth had 13 cities.  Going into the last round, I was leading with 14 cities, but with only (3) 5-plants, so I wanted to buy a 7-plant to be able to power 17 cities.  All three of the 7-plants came up for auction, and all of them went to other players (eventual 2nd, 3rd, and 4th placers) -- for much more than they were worth to me.  I eventually bought the 39 (nuclear 6-plant) at cost, leaving me able to power 16 cities.  After the other players had built their connections, only one player had connected (and could power) 16 cities -- the others had either overbuilt cities or plants.  I decided to connect 3 cities (all of Paris) and end the game, for the win.
• 6pm, Empire Builder (EPB) Heat 1, skipped in favor of Power Grid.
• 10pm, Vegas Showdown (VSD) Heat 1, skipped because of the migraine.

Went back to the hotel and crashed.

The World Boardgaming Championships is a gaming convention, held yearly since 1999 by the Boardgame Players Association. This convention replaced AvalonCon which had been run from 1991 to 1998 by Avalon Hill.

Last year I showed up without much pre-planning, and without any goals beyond (1) play games, (2) have fun.  This year I decided in advance which tournaments I wanted to try to win, and actively practiced those games at Ludus and other gaming opportunities. Noteably, I decided to skip Age of Renaissance, which I like to play, but (1) takes too much time, and (2) is not one of my strongest games.

Most of the tournaments are structured with several qualifying heats (enter as many times as you like, must win one or more), followed by single-elimination semi-finals and finals.  Others are strictly single-elimination rounds, played until there's a single winner.  Since there are 100+ tournaments running over the course of 6 days, there's a lot of overlap.  Consequently, my performance in some of the early heats will dictate my schedule for the following days.  In particular, Sunday morning there are 4 different final rounds that I might be eligible for, depending upon how well I do throughout the week.

More or less in order, I'll be participating in these tournaments:

1. Power Grid (PGD)
2. Puerto Rico (PRO)
3. Vegas Showdown (VSD)
4. Manifest Destiny (MFD)
5. Empire Builder (EPB)
6. Race for the Galaxy (RFG)
7. Ticket To Ride (TTR)
8. RoboRally (RRY)

• Craig won the first game of Cineplexity.
• Carrie won the second game of Cineplexity.
• Shaune won Vegas Showdown with 67, followed by Craig (61), Tim (60), Blaise (56), and Tony (54).

Attendees:  Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg, Shaune and Tim Lee, and Tony Montuori.

• Tony won Puerto Rico with 58, followed by Blaise (47), Shaune (46), Craig (45), and Dave (43).
• Craig won Ticket To Ride: The Card Game with 185, followed by Dave (155).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Dave, Sallie, and Tony Montuori, Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg, and Shaune Lee.

• John won Ticket To Ride with 135, followed by Craig (126) and Carrie (113).
• Carrie won Ticket To Ride with 145, followed by Craig (97) and John (83).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, and John "Fuzzface" McMahon.

• Craig won Ticket To Ride with 124, followed by Dave (119), Tony (85), and Shaune (76).
• Craig won Puerto Rico with 49, followed by Shaune (48), Dave (47), and Tony (30).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Dave and Tony Montuori, and Shaune Lee.

Attendees:  Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, and Dave and Sallie Montuori.

Games: Pandemic, TransAmerica, Puerto Rico, Race for the Galaxy, Ticket to Ride, Take the A Train, [added] Power Grid.

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Karl Musser, Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg, Tony, Dave, and Sallie Montuori, Shaune Lee, Chris Aumiller, Bridget and Frank "Grayhawk" Huminski, John "Fuzzface" McMahon, India, Jamie, and Shawn (sp? last names?), and Brian Carpenter.

• Jim won Vegas Showdown with 53, followed by Craig (50), John (40), Sallie (39), and Shaune (36).
• Sallie won TransAmerica with 7, followed by John (8), Dave (16), and Craig (20).  We scored this using tournament rules (one round per player, total all rounds, low score wins).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg, Dana Leader, Dave, Sallie, and Tony Montuori, Shaune Lee, and John "Fuzzface" McMahon.

• Shaune won Puerto Rico with 47, followed by Dave (42), Craig (39), and Tony (33).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Shaune Lee, and Dave and Tony Montuori.

Attendees:  Craig Trader, Carrie Hafer, Dana Leader, Dave Montuori, and Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg.

• Carrie and John played Ricochet Robots.
• Brian won Puerto Rico with 51, followed by Dave (50), Shaune (40), Tony (39), and Craig (32).
• Brian, Dave, and Shaune played Pandemic, with one loss and one win.
• Craig won Race for the Galaxy with 32 (on a tie-breaker), followed by John (32) and Tony (24).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Brian Carpenter, Shaune Lee, Dave and Tony Montuori, and John McMahon.

1. Power Grid (PGD)
2. Puerto Rico (PRO)
3. Vegas Showdown (VSD)
4. Empire Builder (EPB)
5. Manifest Destiny (MFD)
6. Race for the Galaxy (RFG)
7. Ticket To Ride (TTR)
8. RoboRally (RRY)

There's some scheduling overlap between these tournaments, so if I'm good/lucky enough to get to the semi-finals/finals, I might have to drop one in favor of another.  Last year I wasn't that lucky, but I've improved with Power Grid (some) and Puerto Rico (significantly), and stand a strong chance of being competitive.

One consequence of this is that I need to play these games frequently over the next two months, particularly the more strategic games.  I also need to play a wider variety of opponents, so that I can cope with different strategies.  Towards that end, I'm going to try to schedule some all-day-Saturday gaming sessions before August.

• Craig won Puerto Rico with 64, followed by Jim (55), Tony (52), Dave (51), and Shaune (44).  Craig was using the Frosted Flakes strategy (ship corn and sugar).  Tony and Jim had the factories, Craig and Jim had harbors and wharves.  In the next-to-last Mayor phase, there were exactly enough colonists to fill the colony ship.  The game ended due to (1) running out of colonists, and (2) running out of VP chits.

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg, Shaune Lee, Sallie, Dave, and Tony Montuori.

• Craig won Power Grid on the Central Europe map (powering 15 cities with $70), followed by Blaise (13/$131), Chris (13/$25), Shaune (13/$21), and Tony (13/$12).
• Tony won San Juan with 41, followed by Craig (31) and Shaune (29).
• Craig won 2 games of Cineplexity against Tony, Shaune, Liska, and Carrie.

Attendees:  Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Rachel and Jim "Blaise" Trigg, Lisa "Liska" Niemczyk, Chris Aumiller, Shaune Lee, and Tony Montuori.

Edit:  3:00pm gaming is a GO!

• Craig won the first game with 70, followed by Dave (41), John (36), and Dana (28).
• Craig won the second game with 74, followed by Carrie (59), and John (52).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Dave Willmes, Dana Leader, and John McMahon.

• Carrie won the first game with 36, followed by Craig (27) and John (23).
• Craig won the second game with 34, followed by Carrie (24) and John (20).
• Carrie won the third game with 45, followed by Craig (32) and John (22).

We all ate too much birthday cake.

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, and John McMahon.

• Craig and Blaise dominated Cineplexity, with 3 wins for Craig and 2 wins for Blaise.
• Craig won Puerto Rico with 73 points, followed by Tony (62), Dave (53), and Shaune (38). All three possible end-game conditions were met in the last round: Tony exhausted the victory points, Shaune exhausted the colonists, and Dave and Craig each filled their cities with buildings. Craig and Dave built Factories, Tony and Craig built Harbors. Dave and Craig each built two large buildings. Tony started pursuing a Factory strategy, but switched to a Corn strategy when he was shut out of buying a factory.

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Rachel and Jim “Blaise” Trigg, Shaune Lee, and Dave and Tony Montuori.

• Craig won Unexploded Cow with 2750, followed by Dave (2100), Shaune (2000), and Tony (2250).
• Craig won Castle Merchants with 19, followed by Shaune (15), Tony (15), and Dave (14).
• Craig won San Juan with 32, followed by Tony (31), Dave (31), and Shaune (25).
• We played Dead Money until Shaune gave up and let Dave win.

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Shaune Lee, and Dave and Tony Montuori.

• Dave and Tony tied for first at On The Underground followed by a tie between Craig and John, with Blaise bringing up the rear.
• Tony kicked ass at Apples to Apples.

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Rachel and Jim “Blaise” Trigg, Dave, Sallie, and Tony Montuori, and John McMahon.

• Craig won Vegas Showdown, followed by Helen, Shaune, Dave, and Tony.

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Shaune Lee, Dave, Sallie, and Tony Montuori, and Helen Powell.

• Carrie and Blaise were winning Set while we waited for everyone else to arrive.
• Dave won Ticket To Ride at 154, followed by John (121), Jenne (92) and Sallie (91).
• Craig won Power Grid on the Benelux map, followed by Blaise, Tony, and Shaune.
• Tony won San Juan at 40, followed by Craig (32), and Shaune (25).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Rachel and Jim “Blaise” Trigg, Shaune Lee, Jenne Heise, Dave, Sallie, and Tony Montuori, and John McMahon.

• Craig won with 31 points, followed by Tony (28) and Dave (27).

This was Craig's first time teaching Manifest Destiny, and so we didn't really get started until after 9pm, and we didn't finish up until around 2am. Given how close the scores were, Dave and Tony picked up on the strategy: pound on Craig, early and often.

Craig started with Pennsylvania, Dave started in Louisiana, and Tony started in Virginia. In the first turn, Tony played Spy to steal Craig's destiny card, and Dave used Supreme Court to cancel Craig's play of Congress. Careful card play and some good rolls for Breakthroughs (Turnpike and Mechanization) allowed Craig to recapture momentum and the lead. Eventually Craig was slowed down by hitting the token wall: all but two of his tokens were holding territories, breakthroughs or pioneers. This allowed Tony and Dave time to catch up on income and territories. Eventually there were a number of big payoffs in a single turn, following a Manifest Destiny play, allowing everyone to buy enough advances to kick into end game.

Attendees: Carrie Hafer and Craig Trader, and Tony and Dave Montuori.

• Everyone joined into Cineplexity as people were eating and socializing.
• Dave won Puerto Rico with 55 points, followed by John (54), Craig (53), Tony (52), and Grayhawk (43).  At one point in the game, we exhausted all of the resources.  At the end, Tony built all of his buildings, and then we ran out of VPs.
• Blaise won Ticket To Ride with 104 points, followed by Rachel (94), and Monica (90).
• Carrie won TransAmerica, followed by Blaise, and Monica.
• John won San Juan with 38 points, followed by Grayhawk (33), Craig (33), and Tony (21).
• Carrie taught Monica how to play Set.

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Monica and Frank "Grayhawk" Huminski, Rachel and Jim “Blaise” Trigg, Dave, Sallie, and Tony Montuori, and John McMahon.

• Craig won the first game with 62, followed by Dave (56), and Tony (45) .
• Craig won the second game with 55, followed by Dave (45), and Tony (38).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, and Dave and Tony Montuori.