Ludus

Tonight we played Unexploded Cow and Cineplexity.

• We played Unexploded Cow twice -- many cows died.
• We played Cineplexity three times:  Craig won twice, and John won the third game.

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Dave, Sallie, and Tony Montuori, Dana Leader, and John McMahon.

Tonight we played Betrayal at House on the Hill and San Juan:

• In Betrayal at House on the Hill, John betrayed us to assist Dracula and his bride.  Tony and Dave were quickly turned, Dave killed Eric, and after a brave fight, Craig was overwhelmed and turned, allowing the dark forces to win.
• In San Juan, Fuzz buried us with production buildings (35), beating Tony's monumental architecture (33), Dave's crammed chapel (28), and Craig's pitiful plantation (17).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Eric Kervina, Dave, Sallie, and Tony Montuori, and John McMahon.

Tonight we played TransAmerica, Unexploded Cow, Chronology, and Ticket To Ride.

• John won TransAmerica, Sallie didn't win, Craig didn't lose, and Tony lost it.
• Tony kicked cow butt at Unexploded Cow, Sallie and Craig beat the curve, and Helen and John got stampeded.
• Helen beat Tony, John, Sallie, and Craig at Chronology.
• Helen beat Sallie, Craig, and Dave at Ticket To Ride.

We all ate Key Lime Pie or Yellow Cake with Chocolate Frosting, to celebrate birthdays for John and Dave.

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Helen Powell, Dave, Sallie, and Tony Montuori, and John McMahon.

Tonight we played Settlers of Catan and On The Underground.

• Craig won Settlers of Catan with 10, followed by Sallie (9) and John (7).
• Dave won On The Underground, followed closely by John and Craig.  This game was notable for being very close -- only 4 points separated Dave and Craig at the end, and all of us managed to complete large loops, with most of our track built.

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

Tonight we played Ticket To Ride, Fluxx, Power Grid, Metro, and San Juan.

• Craig won Ticket To Ride, followed by Sallie, Tony, and John.
• Blaise discovered Carrie's evil Fluxx combo deck (one of every keeper, two of every action, and one of every rule or goal from several versions), and several hands were played.
• Sallie won Metro, followed by Blaise and Rachel.
• Craig won Power Grid on the France map with the new Power Plant Deck, followed by Helen, John, and Tony.
• Helen won San Juan, followed by Dave and Craig.

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

Tonight we played Power Grid using the "Green Power Grid" variant that we've been toying with.  With 4 players, the goal  was set at 20 cities.  We played on the Benelux map which sped things up a bit, and while things were cramped (we used 28 cities instead of the recommended 32), the play was pretty good, up until the end.  At the end only Dave and Craig could power 20 cities, John could power 18, and Tony was way behind.  Dave came out ahead on money, for the win.

During post game analysis, we concluded that we needed to add an additional 7-plant, and reduce the goal to 18 cities to make the variant fair -- given enough money, every player should be able to power all of the required cities, and maybe one or two more.

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

Tonight we played Vegas Showdown and San Juan.

• Tony dominated Vegas Showdown with 56, followed by Dave W. (47), Dave M. (45), and Craig (32).
• Dave W. won a close game of San Juan with 35, followed by Craig (33), Tony (32), and DaveM. (30).

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

Tonight we played Khronos and San Juan.

• First time player John schooled Tony and Craig at Khronos, 53 to 33 and 33.
• Sallie won San Juan with 33, over John (30), Craig (30), and Tony (24).

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Sallie and Tony Montuori, and John McMahon.

Tonight we played Cineplexity and Puerto Rico.

• Blaise won two games of Cineplexity; Craig won one.
• Craig won a fast (< 90 minutes) game of Puerto Rico at 54, followed by Blaise at 43, John and Dave at 40, and Tony at 36.  Craig and Blaise pursued Factory strategies, Dave was trying to build as many buildings as possible (University), Tony was running Corn, and John went for a Harbor/Wharf shipping strategy.

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

Tonight we played Railroad Tycoon. Fuzz won, followed closely by Dave and Craig, and then by Tony and Justin. The game took a little over 3 hours, mostly because we were very rusty on the rules. I suspect that with more frequent play we could get it lower.

Attendees: Craig Trader, Tony, Sallie and Dave Montuori, Justin Clapp, and John McMahon.

Karl Musser runs the more-or-less monthly annual Brunswick Games Day. BGD is what I would call a self-organizing event. Karl has a sweet deal with the town of Brunswick, MD whereby he gets the use of function space for free once a month year, as long the event is non-commercial, and he advertises that it's sponsored by the town. The space is roughly 100x40 feet, with fold-up tables and chairs. He has a game library that he brings, and then people just show up. People show up, bring out a table and chairs if needed, and start playing games. Towards the end of the day, people start putting away extra tables and chairs, and policing the area. Karl's nominally in charge, but has such a deft touch that everything 'just happens' without appearing to need his direction.

A lot of the Ludans have been going to BGD for a long time; today was my first time. I got there somewhat after noon, and things were already in swing. Grayhawk, B, and F were there, as were Brian and Lije. A couple of people were running a snacks table as a 'please donate' for a kid who's doing an exchange trip to Europe next year. There was a square of tables set up for an RPG, with more than a dozen people playing. Everyone there was involved in a game, and the tables were all full, so I setup another table and sat down. While I was doing that, Bruce and Cheryl appeared. Within moments, it seemed, I was teaching Cheryl and two other people to play Ticket To Ride. I didn't win, but everyone had fun, so I count it a success.

After a short break I pulled out Power Grid and ended up playing a 4-player game on the USA map with Grayhawk and two new players: Ethan and Mary Ann. After a slow start (4 plant the first turn, but nothing worth bidding on for turns 2 and 3), I acquired the 15, 25 and 30 plants, and eventually added the 40 plant. I won by powering 17 cities, when no one else could power more than 16.

Somewhere in there, Tony and Dana appeared, followed by Sallie and Dave. Brian and Lije had recently purchased Khronos so we sat down and learned to play with Tony and Dana. I ended up going first, and everyone else learned from my mistakes ... <grin> Still, it was an interesting game and I'll probably buy it.

Brian spent a lot of time teaching people to play Race for the Galaxy, and we played two games. I did better in the first game than in the second, but still lost both games -- not unexpected. I'll probably buy this one as well.

By this point, it was getting late so we helped strike tables and clean up. While we were playing Khronos, some folks borrowed my Power Grid set. They ended up being the last game, and it ended around 11:30, so there was a mad rush to clean that up before the Brunswick Police kicked us out. I'll probably keep going back, schedule permitting.

I got a lot of comments about the Flying Buffalo Box Bands that I use on some of my games to keep them from opening up at inconvenient times. They're available in small, medium, and large, and they're reasonably priced: 6 for $5. If you haven't seen them, they're 4-way rubber bands that slip over all 4 edges of a game box at once.

EDIT: Corrected -- The full up BGD is annual, not monthly.

This year Ludus is up against Christmas Eve and New Years Eve.  Unsurprisingly, gaming is not what people have on their minds, so we will not be hosting Ludus for the next two weeks.  Spend the time with your families and friends.  We'll see everyone on January 7th, 2008.

Happy Holidays!

Tonight we played Chronology and Power Grid.

• Dana won Chronology.
• Dave won Power Grid against Dana, Tony, John, and Craig -- we played with the new Power Plants on the Benelux map.

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

Tonight we played Chronology and Puerto Rico.

• Dave won Chronology, beating Eric, Dana, Tony, Craig, John, and Sallie.
• Carrie won Puerto Rico with 49 points, taking over a corn strategy that Tony set in motion.  John ended with 48 points, followed by Craig at 47, Dave at 42, and Eric at 34.

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Sallie, Dave and Tony Montuori, Dana Leader, John McMahon and Eric Kervina.

Tonight we played Power Grid and Transamerica.

• For Power Grid we tried Power Grid: Power Plant Deck 2 Variant 1 -- John won, followed by Dave and Craig.
• For Transamerica, Dave won, followed by Sallie, Craig, and John.

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

John was kind enough to give me Power Grid: Power Plant Deck 2, so we spent some time playing around with the possibilities.

The first concept we played around with was "Green Power Grid" -- only renewable resources allowed, no Coal plants, no Oil plants. So we took all of the Wind, Garbage, Nuclear, and Fusion plants from both decks. We calculated that with 2 players, we could easily support building to 24 cities, so we used the Variant 3 table for the Step milestones. Finally we worked out a quick table for refreshing resources (Step 1: 5 trash, 2 uranium; Step 2: 6 trash, 3 uranium; Step 3: 7 trash, 4 uranium). The game started off slowly, and it felt like there were too many 1-2 city plants, and not enough 3-4 city plants, but that's not uncommon in a 2-player game. Things got more even as the game progressed, but at the end, I could power 24 cities and John could only power 23, giving me the game.

At this point we went out for dinner with friends.

For our second game, we decided to try Variant 2 (mix both decks). As the rules suggest, discarding the unused power plants is somewhat time consuming initially, but by turn 2 or 3 everything was running smoothly. I ended up with a slightly better mix of initial plants than John and I was able, over time, to turn that into a significant money lead (more than 100 elektro). Towards the end of the game I used that cash to intimidate John into letting me have the new 50 plant (2 uranium -> 8 cities) -- my opening bid was 150. That was almost my undoing, but it saved time. John bought himself a big hybrid plant and starved me out of coal for the turn, so instead of building I sat still for the turn (so that next turn he would be leading and I would get first pick of resources). At the end, we both connected and powered 21 cities, and I beat him by 3 elektro.

The new plants generally deliver more bang for the buck, either being cheaper to purchase, or cheaper to operate than their original counterparts. This results in more money available throughout the game.  The top end plants can power 8 or 9 cities, allowing for games to reach to 20 or more cities.  There are roughly the same numbers of each type of plant, but fewer plants that power 2-3 cities, and more plants that power 4-5 cities.  This changes the dynamics of when to upgrade a power plant, and it will take some experimentation to find the best mix.  With the original deck, a player could buy 2-3 early plants (power 1-3 cities), and then start buying end-game plants (power 5-7 cities) -- 4 city plants would have to be replaced too soon.  With this deck you can survive having a couple of 4-city plants, if you can get an 8 or 9 plant at the end game.

All in all, I think the new power plant deck will result in more variation, and thus more reasons to play Power Grid.

Tonight we played Ticket to Ride: USA 1910.

• Game 1 (The Mega Game), Dave won, followed by Sallie, John, and Craig.
• Game 2 (The Mega Game), Dave won, followed by Sallie, John, and Craig.

The first game had Dave and Sallie only a point apart, and John and Craig only a point apart (with about 30 points between the two groups).  The second game had a much wider point spread, with no bunching.

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

Tonight we played On The Underground and Castle Merchants.

• Dave kicked ass in On The Underground easily beating Craig, John, and Tony.
• Craig won Castle Merchants, followed by John and Dave.

Attendees: Craig Trader and Carrie Hafer, Sallie, Dave and Tony Montuori, Dana Leader, and John McMahon.

There was a nice article in the Baltimore Sun last week; I happened across the AP version and thought I'd mention it. It's about a Maryland gamer, John Goon, who's setting up gaming clubs in the region.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tonight we played Castle Merchants.

• Craig, Blaise, and Rachel played the 3-player variant, with Carrie sub'ing for Rachel, and Dave sub'ing for Blaise.  Rachel/Carrie won.
• Craig, Dave, Sallie, and Carrie played the 4-player variant, with Carrie winning.

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