Well we finally made it to Garry's for a whole days gaming. In attendance were Steve, Jo, Richard, Garry and myself. After everybody had arrived we had a load of games, many more than we could possibly play in one day. So, what to play first, Richard had purchased TTR Europe the day before and everybody wanted to give that a try first. Steve was the only one to have played before, but as we had all played TTR, we zoomed through the rules and off we went. We started at around 11.30. I had a bit of luck as 2 of my short routes branched off of my long route,nice! I concentrated on completing the long route first. A bit of a gamble as everybody can pretty well see where you are going. But most of it was double routes with only a couple of singles. And I always had the stations!! Anyway in the end I didn't need them and managed to complete it easily. You can see from the final pic that my routes were pretty much together, I am yellow. Whereas Steve's were fragmented quite a lot, and Richard's, Garry's and Jo's were all linked.
The tunnels and ferries give the game another dimension. Those tunnels especially, you have to have back-up cards or risk not completing it. Of course that gives the other players a chance to jump in and block you. I really enjoyed the game, better than vanilla TTR I think. Of course the result may have coloured my opinion. lol. I just pipped Richard to the win with the help of the longest route card. This took around 2 hours.
Final Scores
Colin 116, Richard 110, Jo 106, Steve 87, Garry 56
All in all we had a great day, thanks to Garry for hosting and Sally for putting up with some game geeks taking over her house.
Monday, May 2, 2005
Final board for TTR Europe
This is the final board position. The colours are yellow (Colin), Red (Richard), Black (Jo), Green (Garry) and Blue (Steve).
Everybody had sussed out that the rail system in England is rubbish as nobody went anywhere near it.
Everybody had sussed out that the rail system in England is rubbish as nobody went anywhere near it.
Oltremare mid game
Here you can see Richard saying this is the tiniest board I have ever seen! Or is making a dive for that packet of chocolate biscuits.
Garry and Steve contemplate Oltremare
Garry now produced some salad and quiche to keep us going into the afternoon. While we was eating we decided that Oltremare was to be our second game. This game had been produced for Essen 2004 in a limited edition and had sold out pretty quickly having had a good buzz from gamers in general. Winning Moves obviously had realised they had a winner and quickly reprinted it. We had two virgin copies, Garry's and Jo's. We made a start after I had run through the rules. This is really a card game, with the small board just to keep score and track your ship. The trading element is a bit like Settlers, aka, anybody got any wood, I have wheat sort of thing. This a brief description from BGG.
Each player is a Venetian merchant sailing along the Mediterranean sea. Everyone tryes to increase both his own wealth and prestige to become the Best Merchant of Venice
On his turn the player can to play some cards from the hand in order to perform some actions. Actions allow you to gain Ducati (the currency of Venice), to draw cards or to move your ship on the map (where you can collect bonus). There is also a pirate action that is really a bad one! Cards also represent Goods (corn, wine, spices, silk ...) that are loaded on the cargo of the ship. More cards of the same Good you group, more Ducati you will gain at the end of the game. The cards you are playing will also influence your next turn, so choose very well your strategy!
Because of you are a merchant you can trade Goods for other Goods or for Ducati points.
If you want to win you have to be a wise merchant in your trades, you have to choose your right cards to perform the best actions (in accord to your active bonus) and you have to achive the greater cargo on your ship!
I think that we all decided that the buzz from Essen had been justified. A good little game with some interesting mechanisms. I seemed to collecting an awful lot of pirate cards compared to the others. But I also had some good sets going into my cargo stack. Ah well, I can live with pirates. In the end the scores were pretty close, I managed to sneak the win (tricksy hobbit) from Richard again, pirates an all.
Final Scores
Colin 53, Richard 50, Garry 39, Steve 34, Jo 33
Each player is a Venetian merchant sailing along the Mediterranean sea. Everyone tryes to increase both his own wealth and prestige to become the Best Merchant of Venice
On his turn the player can to play some cards from the hand in order to perform some actions. Actions allow you to gain Ducati (the currency of Venice), to draw cards or to move your ship on the map (where you can collect bonus). There is also a pirate action that is really a bad one! Cards also represent Goods (corn, wine, spices, silk ...) that are loaded on the cargo of the ship. More cards of the same Good you group, more Ducati you will gain at the end of the game. The cards you are playing will also influence your next turn, so choose very well your strategy!
Because of you are a merchant you can trade Goods for other Goods or for Ducati points.
If you want to win you have to be a wise merchant in your trades, you have to choose your right cards to perform the best actions (in accord to your active bonus) and you have to achive the greater cargo on your ship!
I think that we all decided that the buzz from Essen had been justified. A good little game with some interesting mechanisms. I seemed to collecting an awful lot of pirate cards compared to the others. But I also had some good sets going into my cargo stack. Ah well, I can live with pirates. In the end the scores were pretty close, I managed to sneak the win (tricksy hobbit) from Richard again, pirates an all.
Final Scores
Colin 53, Richard 50, Garry 39, Steve 34, Jo 33
Boomtown
Boomtown is another card game. The theme is Wild West Mines and Saloons and stuff. Here is the BGG description.
In Boomtown, you start as a gold digger and try to end as a tycoon.
To do this, you must first buy the best mining concessions, hoping to find gold veins. You can also try to become the Mayor of Whiskey River or San Narciso, in order to get a small cut on concessions sales, or build a saloon where lucky prospectors will spend their nuggets in moonshine whisky. If business is really bad, you can still rely on bank or stagecoach hold-ups to reestablish you. A well placed stick of dynamite can also solve some minor problems.
Boomtown is game with auctions, dice, and some fun and nasty action cards to play on your fellow gold diggers.
Not too taxing a game, but quite fun nonetheless, Jo wasn't particularly keen on this one. I thought it fun blowing up players mines though. Knowing when to bid high for the right card is crucial. The scores were pretty close, except for Richard. Obviously not cut out as a miner.
Final Scores
Garry 75, Colin 71, Steve 62, Jo 62, Richard 46
In Boomtown, you start as a gold digger and try to end as a tycoon.
To do this, you must first buy the best mining concessions, hoping to find gold veins. You can also try to become the Mayor of Whiskey River or San Narciso, in order to get a small cut on concessions sales, or build a saloon where lucky prospectors will spend their nuggets in moonshine whisky. If business is really bad, you can still rely on bank or stagecoach hold-ups to reestablish you. A well placed stick of dynamite can also solve some minor problems.
Boomtown is game with auctions, dice, and some fun and nasty action cards to play on your fellow gold diggers.
Not too taxing a game, but quite fun nonetheless, Jo wasn't particularly keen on this one. I thought it fun blowing up players mines though. Knowing when to bid high for the right card is crucial. The scores were pretty close, except for Richard. Obviously not cut out as a miner.
Final Scores
Garry 75, Colin 71, Steve 62, Jo 62, Richard 46
Steve explaining the rules to Boomtown
Steve ran through the rules quickly before we started. Garry, Steve and I had played before, Jo and Richard are virgin miners so to speak.
We finished of our day with a game of Geschenkt. This little card game is a nice one to finish off with. Jo in particular liked this more than Boomtown. Do you take the card or let it go round again and hope to get more chips? A quick little filler.
Final Scores
Richard 66, Colin 45, Garry 44, Steve 22, Jo 22
By the way, lowest wins!!!
We finished of our day with a game of Geschenkt. This little card game is a nice one to finish off with. Jo in particular liked this more than Boomtown. Do you take the card or let it go round again and hope to get more chips? A quick little filler.
Final Scores
Richard 66, Colin 45, Garry 44, Steve 22, Jo 22
By the way, lowest wins!!!
Wednesday, April 27, 2005
Saturday Games Day on the Cards!
No Billygames again last night, so I did’nt have to tape CSI and CSI Miami. I think that they have made them a bit too gory now, and I definitely don’t like the way they have split up the team and given Grissom a minor role now. Catherine is sucking up to the new boss, ugh!. Anyway the theme music is still great (the Who) So what has this to do with boardgames, well, nothing really.
But this Saturday we have a full days gaming to look forward to. Garry is kindly hosting, and Steve, Richard and myself will make four players. This enables us to play the slew of 4 player games that we normally don’t have a chance to play because we are normally more than four. I will take over a couple of my favourites, probably Goa and St. Petersburg. I think they will have strong competition for table time because Garry has just received a big parcel of games from Adam Spielt. I know he has Oltremare and China for a start. Oltremare has had some good reviews and I am looking forward to playing it. More of a card game than a boardgame, but hey, I like cardgames too. So you can be sure that I will have a full report with pictures of the days events, until then happy boardgaming!
But this Saturday we have a full days gaming to look forward to. Garry is kindly hosting, and Steve, Richard and myself will make four players. This enables us to play the slew of 4 player games that we normally don’t have a chance to play because we are normally more than four. I will take over a couple of my favourites, probably Goa and St. Petersburg. I think they will have strong competition for table time because Garry has just received a big parcel of games from Adam Spielt. I know he has Oltremare and China for a start. Oltremare has had some good reviews and I am looking forward to playing it. More of a card game than a boardgame, but hey, I like cardgames too. So you can be sure that I will have a full report with pictures of the days events, until then happy boardgaming!
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