Garry has decided to carry on writing up the reports for their games...carrying on the Billygames torch. He's called it Greendobbers and you can find it at....
http://greendobbers.blogspot.com/
I have also put a link on this blog so you can find it as well.
Happy Gaming!!!
Thursday, November 22, 2007
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
News update
Well, this is not so much about games now as what I am up to regarding our move to Austria. We have moved out now and are living with the mother-in-law in Tunbridge Wells for the time being. We have some friends in St. Wolfgang in Austria and one of them has a brother who has a 2 bedroomed flat for rent. We are flying out next week to have a look at it. Apparently they have had quite a bit of snow out there so warm jumpers look a necessity, looks pretty though.
That's all for now......I'll keep you posted.
That's all for now......I'll keep you posted.
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
My last Billygames Post - Antler Island
Well, here it is, my last post as a member of Billygames.....choke. Steve couldn't make it because of work commitments, but Richard and Garry were in attendance. As it was the last session they let me choose and I chose Antler Island. Mainly because my wife wanted to see the cute stags. As it turned out the game was pretty good as well.
The board layout for Antler Island
Each player is a stag on Antler Island, the island is populated with does just waiting to be....er, serviced. In the 3 player game you have to have serviced 10 does and won a fight against another stag to win. You have 4 possible actions available to you, move, feed, rut or grow an antler. Feed and rut are pretty obvious, but feeding also helps you grow antlers and improves your fighting capabilities. When you land on the same space as another stag you have a fight, the attacker declares how many food tokens they are commiting to the fight, if any, the defender then has the chance to retreat or stay and fight. When you lock antlers you add together your antlers and any food tokens committed, whoever has the higher number wins.
The player board
Actually this is a really fun game, of course lots of double entres during play, and the game plays quickly. We got in 3 games during the evening. In the first 2 games I was pretty good at the rutting, but useless at the fighting. In the last game I won my fight but only rutted with 2 does. Garry seemed to have got the balance just right, good at fighting and rutting.
Final Scores
Game 1 - Richard 15, Garry 11, Colin 7 but didn't win a fight
Game 2 - Garry 12, Richard 13 but didn't win a fight, Colin 8 but didn't win a fight
Game 3 - Garry 14, Richard 7 but didn't win a fight, Colin 3
Antler Island
A stag sizing up the attractiveness of a doe
And finally a real surprise the guys had bought me a copy of Fagin's Gang as a going away present, I must say I have really enjoyed my years gaming with Richard, Garry and Steve, it's been a real pleasure and I will really miss our tuesday night sessions .
Thanks for reading!! Happy Gaming!!!
The board layout for Antler Island
Each player is a stag on Antler Island, the island is populated with does just waiting to be....er, serviced. In the 3 player game you have to have serviced 10 does and won a fight against another stag to win. You have 4 possible actions available to you, move, feed, rut or grow an antler. Feed and rut are pretty obvious, but feeding also helps you grow antlers and improves your fighting capabilities. When you land on the same space as another stag you have a fight, the attacker declares how many food tokens they are commiting to the fight, if any, the defender then has the chance to retreat or stay and fight. When you lock antlers you add together your antlers and any food tokens committed, whoever has the higher number wins.
The player board
Actually this is a really fun game, of course lots of double entres during play, and the game plays quickly. We got in 3 games during the evening. In the first 2 games I was pretty good at the rutting, but useless at the fighting. In the last game I won my fight but only rutted with 2 does. Garry seemed to have got the balance just right, good at fighting and rutting.
Final Scores
Game 1 - Richard 15, Garry 11, Colin 7 but didn't win a fight
Game 2 - Garry 12, Richard 13 but didn't win a fight, Colin 8 but didn't win a fight
Game 3 - Garry 14, Richard 7 but didn't win a fight, Colin 3
Antler Island
A stag sizing up the attractiveness of a doe
And finally a real surprise the guys had bought me a copy of Fagin's Gang as a going away present, I must say I have really enjoyed my years gaming with Richard, Garry and Steve, it's been a real pleasure and I will really miss our tuesday night sessions .
Thanks for reading!! Happy Gaming!!!
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
3rd November - PnP4 at Saltdean
Pasteboard and Plastic games group hold a games day 3 times a year and the one in November is a showcase for all the new Essen games. Steve, Richard, Garry and myself made the trip to Saltdean on Saturday to see what it was all about. Having said that I'm sure that Richard and Steve have been before, but for Garry and myself it was our first visit. Dick Ruck organises the event and it takes place in the Scout hut at Saltdean.
PnP gamers in the Saltdean Scout Hut
The day runs from 10am to 12pm, but Garry and I arrived at around 10.15 to find some keen gamers already playing. After we signed in and met a few of the gamers Garry suggested we start off with a game of Giganten der Lufte, a card and dice game about building the Hindenberg designed by Andreas Seyfarth. As we were just starting Jo turned up and we asked him to join us. The game is about acquiring cards by rolling dice, the more cards you get the more dice you can roll. Some cards give you benefits to your dice rolls, some give you more VPs. When you reach a certain point in the game you are then able to attempt to build the Hindenberg. A fairly light game with not a lot of player interaction, but a pleasant 45/60 minutes.
Final Scores
Colin 12, Garry 11, Jo 10
Giganten Der Lufte layout
We had a real life personality join us, Francis Tresham, who had a prototype of a new game which Richard and Steve managed to sit in on. It was a train game of course, I don't know much about it just that it had a lot of bits!
Richard getting all excited about a new train game
Francis Tresham (with paper) explaining his game
As I never managed to get to Essen this year I asked Richard to bring back Galaxy Trucker for me. Jo had already played his copy and said it was a blast so Garry and myself joined him for a ride through space.
Components for Galaxy Trucker
In this game there are 2 phases, first you build your spaceship against the clock, trying to make it as stable as possible with all the shields, cargo holds, cannons, crew etc to survive the trials ahead. In the second phase you use a card deck which represents events that happen which affect your voyage. Smugglers, pirates, meteor storms, landing on planets for goods etc. If you haven't built a very good ship, bits of it tend to fly off if you are hit by meteors or cannon fire. Before you even start your trip you have to check your ship's integrity to see if it holds together, Garry had a bit of a disaster when before he even launched a large part of his ship floated off into space.
The remnants of Garry's ship
This game has to be played in the right spirit, but if you get into the mood it's a real blast. I did hopelessly, ending up with 5 space credits, Garry did better, even with half a ship and Jo had a runaway masssive win. Obviously a career in outer space beckons.
Final Scores
Jo 95, Garry 11, Colin 5
By now the hall had filled up nicely with games going on all over the place. There was a buy and trade table which was doing well, I had brought a few games and managed to sell about half. Board Games Group were there with a selection of games to buy, I think Garry bought a copy of Zooloretto.
Games in full swing
Luke Moscrop and his lady, Lydia, had arrived and were keen for a game of Agricola , I had read a bit about this game, it was getting a great buzz, but there were reservations about the amount of German on the large card decks. Luke assured us we would be OK, he had played 3 times already, and being a german speaker would guide us through the game. We didn't use all the cards, just played the basic game I think. There certainly is a lot to think about and it's a bit Caylus like.
Garry with all the bits for the basic game of Agricola
The game is beautifully produced and designed by Uwe Rosenberg, who 's reputation was based on the Bohnanza series of games. Luke talked us through the rules and explained the various cards we would be using. It took a while for the rules to sink in because there is so much you can do in your turn. I would like to play again but I think an english version would make things easier. As it was Lydia had an easy win.
Final Scores
Lydia 36, Luke 28, Jo 26, Colin 23, Garry 14
Jo discussing the finer points of Agricola
Player board for Agricola
We finished Agricola around 5.45pm and although the games would be continuing into the evening Garry and I decided to call it a day. We had had a great time, met some new gamers and played some good games.....what more could you ask! And finally a big thank you to Dick for running the event.
Galaxy Trucker.....Jo's super, duper spaceship
PnP gamers in the Saltdean Scout Hut
The day runs from 10am to 12pm, but Garry and I arrived at around 10.15 to find some keen gamers already playing. After we signed in and met a few of the gamers Garry suggested we start off with a game of Giganten der Lufte, a card and dice game about building the Hindenberg designed by Andreas Seyfarth. As we were just starting Jo turned up and we asked him to join us. The game is about acquiring cards by rolling dice, the more cards you get the more dice you can roll. Some cards give you benefits to your dice rolls, some give you more VPs. When you reach a certain point in the game you are then able to attempt to build the Hindenberg. A fairly light game with not a lot of player interaction, but a pleasant 45/60 minutes.
Final Scores
Colin 12, Garry 11, Jo 10
Giganten Der Lufte layout
We had a real life personality join us, Francis Tresham, who had a prototype of a new game which Richard and Steve managed to sit in on. It was a train game of course, I don't know much about it just that it had a lot of bits!
Richard getting all excited about a new train game
Francis Tresham (with paper) explaining his game
As I never managed to get to Essen this year I asked Richard to bring back Galaxy Trucker for me. Jo had already played his copy and said it was a blast so Garry and myself joined him for a ride through space.
Components for Galaxy Trucker
In this game there are 2 phases, first you build your spaceship against the clock, trying to make it as stable as possible with all the shields, cargo holds, cannons, crew etc to survive the trials ahead. In the second phase you use a card deck which represents events that happen which affect your voyage. Smugglers, pirates, meteor storms, landing on planets for goods etc. If you haven't built a very good ship, bits of it tend to fly off if you are hit by meteors or cannon fire. Before you even start your trip you have to check your ship's integrity to see if it holds together, Garry had a bit of a disaster when before he even launched a large part of his ship floated off into space.
The remnants of Garry's ship
This game has to be played in the right spirit, but if you get into the mood it's a real blast. I did hopelessly, ending up with 5 space credits, Garry did better, even with half a ship and Jo had a runaway masssive win. Obviously a career in outer space beckons.
Final Scores
Jo 95, Garry 11, Colin 5
By now the hall had filled up nicely with games going on all over the place. There was a buy and trade table which was doing well, I had brought a few games and managed to sell about half. Board Games Group were there with a selection of games to buy, I think Garry bought a copy of Zooloretto.
Games in full swing
Luke Moscrop and his lady, Lydia, had arrived and were keen for a game of Agricola , I had read a bit about this game, it was getting a great buzz, but there were reservations about the amount of German on the large card decks. Luke assured us we would be OK, he had played 3 times already, and being a german speaker would guide us through the game. We didn't use all the cards, just played the basic game I think. There certainly is a lot to think about and it's a bit Caylus like.
Garry with all the bits for the basic game of Agricola
The game is beautifully produced and designed by Uwe Rosenberg, who 's reputation was based on the Bohnanza series of games. Luke talked us through the rules and explained the various cards we would be using. It took a while for the rules to sink in because there is so much you can do in your turn. I would like to play again but I think an english version would make things easier. As it was Lydia had an easy win.
Final Scores
Lydia 36, Luke 28, Jo 26, Colin 23, Garry 14
Jo discussing the finer points of Agricola
Player board for Agricola
We finished Agricola around 5.45pm and although the games would be continuing into the evening Garry and I decided to call it a day. We had had a great time, met some new gamers and played some good games.....what more could you ask! And finally a big thank you to Dick for running the event.
Galaxy Trucker.....Jo's super, duper spaceship
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Wind of Change for Billygames
No this is not a review of Before the Wind, but to let you dedicated readers of Billygames (if there are any) know of a few changes coming up. First of, I am moving house, unfortunately not just down road, so I won't able to attend the Billygame sessions after next week. The plan is that we will be moving to live in Austria and taking early retirement! I'm sure I wil be able to find a few gamers out there. As for the blog, well hopefully Richard, Steve and Garry will keep the reports coming, for a start I would like to see what's been going on.
So I would like to take this opportunity to thank all you gamers that have visited the Billygamers blog and hope you will continue to do so. Next week's report will be my last and it's my choice of game......mmmm which of the tasty Essen releases will I choose?
See you next week.....happy gaming!!
So I would like to take this opportunity to thank all you gamers that have visited the Billygamers blog and hope you will continue to do so. Next week's report will be my last and it's my choice of game......mmmm which of the tasty Essen releases will I choose?
See you next week.....happy gaming!!
30th October - Container
So here we are, the first session since Essen. Last week was cancelled due to illness, this was the first time we chance to play a new Essen game. Garry's choice and he chose Container, published by Valley Games and designed by Franz-Benno DeLonge and Thomas Ewert. The main theme of the game is container shipping, producing goods in your factories and buying goods produced by other players factories to store in your warehouses. These are then loaded onto other players freighters and shipped to a central island and put up for auction.
The overall Container layout - player boards and the central island
The game was produced in China and there have been some problems with boards warping and the resin ships being a bit smelly. I know Garry had to weight the boards down to straigthen them and gave the ships a good soapy wash to try to reduce the whiff. Anyway, once you get going the game is pretty straightforward. In your turn you have 2 actions out of a choice of 6, you can perform the same action twice with the exception of producing goods.
This is the choice you have:
1) Produce containers from your factories
2) Buy containers from other players factories to stock your warehouses
3) Buy a factory or warehouse to increase your production or storage capacity
4) Sail your ship to open sea
5) Sail your ship to the centre island and auction containers
6) Sail your ship to another players harbour and buy containers from their harbour store
Player board showing, factories, production area, warehouses and harbour storage
In the picture my ship is docked at Garry's harbour waiting to buy some containers from his harbour storage area. So far so good then, the interesting bit is the card each player is dealt at random at the beginning of the game. This shows how much each container that is on his island area is worth at game end. The cards are kept secret so you don't which colours are worth the most to each player. One colour is also only worth 5 unless you have all five colours in your area, then it's worth 10. Just one other thing to consider, whichever colour you have the most of is discarded before scoring takes place.
So what the hell do you do first? Well, both Garry and I chose to build an extra factory and produce on the first turn, Richard on the other hand built an additional warehouse and bought some of our production, providing an early target for ships. As I said the sequence of play is pretty straightforward, but contriving to get those 10 point containers on the island is another matter. It seemed as though I had taken early lead as I had a reasonable number of containers on my island base. But as the game progressed it evened out and looking at the other players containers it is quite difficult to try and work out what is their 10 pointer. The game ends when 2 colours of containers are depleted from the supply and before long there was orange gone and only 1 white left. Both Richard and myself had all five colours and then I put up 2 beige and 1 brown cube for auction, I only had 7 money so I probably knew I wouldn't be able to take them for myself. This was confirmed when Richard took out 2 loans for $20 and bid 11. Sounded good to me so I accepted his bid and took another 11 from the bank. It was Richard's turn next and he built a factory, a white one, and promptly ended the game by producing. It was the time to turn over our cards and tot up the points.
Final Scores (Containers+money+cubes in harbour- loans)
Colin 46+29+0-0 = 75
Richard 82+0+4-22 = 64
Garry 29+15+4-0 = 48
The overall Container layout - player boards and the central island
The game was produced in China and there have been some problems with boards warping and the resin ships being a bit smelly. I know Garry had to weight the boards down to straigthen them and gave the ships a good soapy wash to try to reduce the whiff. Anyway, once you get going the game is pretty straightforward. In your turn you have 2 actions out of a choice of 6, you can perform the same action twice with the exception of producing goods.
This is the choice you have:
1) Produce containers from your factories
2) Buy containers from other players factories to stock your warehouses
3) Buy a factory or warehouse to increase your production or storage capacity
4) Sail your ship to open sea
5) Sail your ship to the centre island and auction containers
6) Sail your ship to another players harbour and buy containers from their harbour store
Player board showing, factories, production area, warehouses and harbour storage
In the picture my ship is docked at Garry's harbour waiting to buy some containers from his harbour storage area. So far so good then, the interesting bit is the card each player is dealt at random at the beginning of the game. This shows how much each container that is on his island area is worth at game end. The cards are kept secret so you don't which colours are worth the most to each player. One colour is also only worth 5 unless you have all five colours in your area, then it's worth 10. Just one other thing to consider, whichever colour you have the most of is discarded before scoring takes place.
So what the hell do you do first? Well, both Garry and I chose to build an extra factory and produce on the first turn, Richard on the other hand built an additional warehouse and bought some of our production, providing an early target for ships. As I said the sequence of play is pretty straightforward, but contriving to get those 10 point containers on the island is another matter. It seemed as though I had taken early lead as I had a reasonable number of containers on my island base. But as the game progressed it evened out and looking at the other players containers it is quite difficult to try and work out what is their 10 pointer. The game ends when 2 colours of containers are depleted from the supply and before long there was orange gone and only 1 white left. Both Richard and myself had all five colours and then I put up 2 beige and 1 brown cube for auction, I only had 7 money so I probably knew I wouldn't be able to take them for myself. This was confirmed when Richard took out 2 loans for $20 and bid 11. Sounded good to me so I accepted his bid and took another 11 from the bank. It was Richard's turn next and he built a factory, a white one, and promptly ended the game by producing. It was the time to turn over our cards and tot up the points.
Final Scores (Containers+money+cubes in harbour- loans)
Colin 46+29+0-0 = 75
Richard 82+0+4-22 = 64
Garry 29+15+4-0 = 48
Friday, October 19, 2007
Another pic from Essen 2007
Apparently there was a strong attraction to the Valley Games stand, Jo seems to have found it particularly alluring!!
Miss Canada at the Valley Games Stand
Miss Canada at the Valley Games Stand
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