Billabong Boardgamers - 21st March, 2000

Present: Janet, David, Craig, Alan, Debbie, Tina

Previous session report

Janet Ford writes:

We played the following games throughout the evening:
Show Manager
Modern Art
Tikal
6 Nimmt
Apples to Apples
Was Sticht?

We started off with a 6 player Show Manager, waiting to see whether anybody else was turning up a bit later. Alan David and Craig had fun clearing the cards on numerous occasions early on. Tina and I tended to just take the freebies. I don't think Debbie had too many freebies at all. I was quite lucky as most times the freebies were what I wanted. While you should not really collect what the player immediately before you collects, I tended not to have that problem, putting on a couple of shows the same as Tina, who sat on my right. Alan said this worked ok for me because Tina wasn't clearing the cards as she wanted the same kind as me.

We then split into 2 groups; Debbie, Alan and Craig who played Tikal, while Tina, David and I played Modern Art and 6 Nimmt. Tina won Modern Art, but as she'd never played it before, I think has conned Debbie into writing that report:). David won 6 Nimmt. I have my doubts about 6 Nimmt as a 3 player game, as I thought it would be predictable, but not so. Still, it was just as much fun as playing with more players.

We finished 6 Nimmt just as the others finished Tikal, so decided to get together for another 6 player. Debbie and Tina were considering leaving a bit early, but when they found out we were thinking about playing Apples To Apples, it was decided they'd stay and we'd play that. Alan, David and Debbie were the main contenders with David winning his 6 green Apples before anyone else. I believe he knows he's writing that report also.

Debbie and Tina left after that and Alan, Craig, David and myself finished the evening with a Was Sticht? We agreed to finish by 11.00, regardless of the score. The final result there was David and Craig on 4 with one goal to go, Janet on 3, with 2 to go, and Alan, surprisingly, on 2 with 3 goals to go.

Craig Macbride writes:

SHOW MANAGER

What a game of no confidence (maybe deserved) in the shows being put on! This was the first time I'd ever seen New York not used. Early on, most people seemed to be trying to put on Queenie or King Lear. As the good cards appeared for Wolf, they were ruthlessly cleared away by various players and therefore didn't appear again until very late in the game, so most players' last show was Wolf. That competition for the good Wolf cards at the end was interesting, and I was certainly glad I'd grabbed a 9 early on and kept it for most of the game while putting on other shows. It helped me that David, on my right, cleared cards away at times that were usually quite good for me, while I had the impression that David and my clearing didn't help Alan at all.

Scores:
Craig 56
David 43
Debbie 38
Janet 38
Tina 28
Alan 15

WAS STICHT

I like this game. We decided to play to 5 goals or 10:55pm, whichever came first. This really wasn't Alan's night, with even a trick-taking game not going his way!

Scores:
Craig 4 (about 27 points)
David 4 (about 14 points)
Janet 3
Alan 2

Debbie Pickett writes:

MODERN ART

If you're wondering just why I'm writing this report when I wasn't even in on the game, it has to do with a pact I made with Tina some while ago: I get to write the game reports, and Tina lets me cook meals. We both agree this is quite fair.

In fact, I've never played this game, so I'll simply describe it as how it looked from the other table where I was playing Tikal:

Tina, who was sitting on the far side of the table, was playing with the "Boston" player shield card. David, who was on the near side, had a bunch of little tokens behind his shield. David was very much into the auction spirit - almost as much as Julian in a game of Wrott and Swindlers - and Tina sounded particularly unenthused about one or two of her auctions. However, she managed to end up ahead, not bad for a first play.

Final scores: Tina 531, David 507, Janet 428

My rating: I give this one a rating of 5i, with the possibility of it becoming more real after I have played it.

TIKAL

(Craig, Debbie, Alan)

This was definitely not Alan's night. We played the draw-a-random-tile version of the game rather than the auction version, and the fates made sure that Alan got exactly the wrong tile every single time. As a result, he was pretty much out of the game from the second scoring onwards, though he did make a courageous recovery towards the end.

I got a large head-start with some cheaply gained small-value pyramids, which were gradually taken off of me throughout the game. Craig ended up getting most of them. Coming after poor unfortunate Alan helped a lot as I was able to cash in on his unlucky tile draw and place my tile exactly as I wanted.

A vast collection of treasures gave Craig a big boost at the end allowing him to equal my score in two different ways. I got to write the report anyway, even though I have no kitchen-rights agreements with Craig.

Final scores: Debbie 113, Craig 113, Alan 104.

My rating: Still a solid game, though this was the first time I noticed the instability in the basic game from bad tile draws. I give this game a 7.

David Coutts writes:

6 NIMMT

David, Tina, Janet.

We'd all played before, though Tina was the least familiar (or the most rusty...). With Tina having a disasterous first hand she was in for an uphill struggle. Janet had more modest disasters in a couple of rounds. Both Tina and Janet had at least one round each when the high card they played was just too high for the row they'd intended, resulting in picking up 5 cards... its the same old story, really, nothing much else to report. Is there skill involved? Yes and no, and after a great deal of analysis that's the final verdict.

David 6 + 0 + 7 + 10 + 10 = 33
Tina 29 + 3 + 6 + 19 + 12 = 69
Janet 4 + 15 + 12 + 5 + 19 = 55

APPLES TO APPLES

David, Janet, Tina, Alan, Debbie, Craig

With half an hour to go before Debbie and Tina had to leave for Buffy The Vampire Slayer, the popular vote was for Apples To Apples. I'm not particulary keen on the game myself, though it does cause a few laughs. Its basically a party game, and not a games club game, as far as I'm concerned. Apart from abstract games, party games are my least favourite type of game. Anyway, enough whinging...
As the scores show, it was a 3 horse race between myself, Alan and Debbie. I guess it would help if I could remember which silly words won me the game, but I've forgotten and don't care to strain my brain. I think what gave me the edge was my technique of holding my free hand scant millimeters above my hand of cards and the lightning speed with which my semi-random card hit the table. This, combined with my razor-sharp perception of the arcane inner workings of other people's brains, and the mesmerising brilliance of... oh, something else...

Did I mention I'm not keen...?