Thursday 29 May 2008

Game night, what again, so soon?

Last weekend I held a second consecutive weekend game night, mainly because I forget that the previous weekend was a long weekend. So I did it two weeks in a row.

I had seven players show up for gaming, and the only returnee was me (was it something I said?). We wanted everyone to get a chance to play, so we started with Bohnanza, a nice light bean trading game. I was wiped from walking in the relay for life the night before, and then I had two glasses of wine with supper, and 5 beer, so I was playing and not doing very well. I won... I finished with twelve dollars, Brenda and Thushy finished with 11, Tim had 10 and Laura had 9, the last two refused to tell me their scores.

One player had to leave after that so our second game was Frank's Zoo, a trick taking card game. This was ended short of a final victor but I was leading so I claimed victory again!

Two more had to leave (something about working at 6 AM) and we wrapped up the night with a 4 player game of For Sale. I must admit, I love playing this game, it is fast, has tension to it and is just plain fun to play! I didn't win, Brenda slayed us all, beating second place by 20,000.

I had a great time, and if there is anyone reading this blog that is interested in coming out, drop me an email at bgamegeekATgmailDOTcom, or leave a comment below. I am not sure when the next game night is, but I am guessing it is either the 14th or the 21st of June. Does anyone have a preference?

This saturday is Commands & Colors Day, I have 6 signed so I do have room for a couple more.

Still in the planning phases are: another big game day, and another Power Grid A Mania! If you have a preference for a game, let me know.

Tuesday 27 May 2008

Myth Games, good and bad

I have been dealing with Cory at Myth Games for the past year. I even ran my BattleLore league there.

Well Cory was broken into Sunday night and they stole a pile of stuff. Here is the text of the email he sent to registered users on his forum:
Myth Games was broken into Sunday night (around 12:30 AM). the cowards stole most of the electronics (DVD player, Sound system, Ipod, router and the modem) plus they took a lot of Magic the Gathering and WoW Cards. They stole pretty much the entire D&D minis RARE cabinet, some Warmachine (painted Cryx and Legion) plus some rare HeroClix.

If you hear of anyone suddenly selling a lot of Rare D&D minis (like the Undead Beholder, Raisltin the mage, The Githyanki Lich Queen etc. Contact the Calgary Police Services or Crime Stoppers.

We are currently doing inventory at the store so we will be closed until late Tuesday afternoon and we will be on Cash/Credit until we get our phone lines fixed (they actually YANKED the wires and broke them, then took the phone base.) so you cannot call the store until most likely Wednesday


So if you do hear of someone selling rare D&D minis do as Cory requested.

The good:
Myth Games is holding a launch party for AD&D 4th edition on June 7th, it is sponsored by Wizards of the Coast.

June 21st is Free RPG Day, and Myth Games are having a party for that. They is a whack of sponsors for it, including:
Wizards of the Coast
Goodman Games
Mongoose Publishing
White Wolf Publishing
Green Ronin
Paizo
Chessex
Q-Workshop

So if there is an RPG you are interested in trying out, maybe drop into Myth Games one of those two weekends.

If you are looking for some boardgames or RPG stuff, why not drop in and give Cory some business as well.

Tuesday 20 May 2008

Gaming on the long weekend!

I forgot this was a long weekend when I planned game night so we only had a small contingent show up. There were five of us and we played 6 games over the course of the night.

The first game we played was Ticket to Ride: Europe, the second in the famous Ticket to Ride series. I ended up winning it, by completing both the longest trip and by building the tunnel between Sweden and Russia for 21 points. The game was fairly close, with 4 players at 100 or more and last place missed 100 by only one point.

We played Vegas Showdown as our second game. I tried a new strategy. My previous strategy was to crank up my income and then outspend everyone. The object of Vegas Showdown is to amass the most fame, so I only purchased a couple of slot machines and always tried to purchase things that gave me fame. I won, but only by 4 points, I was always starved for cash and had a hard time purchasing anything but my strategy did work. I actually finished last in both income and population.

Will and Cory had to leave as Will was a little tired, but Al stayed and the three of us played cards (yes cards, like in normal none boardgames stuff). We played a couple of hands of 9-5-2, a game for three players. John (the other one) decided he did not want anyone winning so he deliberately lost it. Al had enough of this so for the second game he killed us both.

Al taught us a new three player bidding game he called Mexico. It uses the cards from 7-A of all suits. You deal out the cards to everyone except 2, which go to the side as kitty. The bidding starts at 5 and the dealer can call "My Five" and to outbid the dealer you must go to 6, the bidding is similar to Kaiser but instead of taking the bid you can still overbid the dealer. There are also Low (take no tricks, can be outbid by an 8 or higher bid) and Mexico (take all ten tricks, go down in score by 10, all others go up by 10).
Scoring goes as follows; everyone starts with 31 points and the goal is to get to -1. Every trick you take reduces your score, but if you fail to make your bid, you go up by that amount. If one of the players fails to take any of the tricks, they also go up by the amount bid. The Low bid is the exact opposite, if the Low bidder does not take any tricks, they go down seven and everyone else goes up by 7.
Ok, enough explanation! We played twice and I won twice. The final game I won by setting Al twice, once when he was at 0 and only needed to make one trick to win.

I enjoyed the games, and I am glad Al taught us Mexico.

Remember, game night is also this weekend, as many were gone for the long weekend.

Have a fun time!

Friday 9 May 2008

Settler's of Catan National Championship

Once again short notice, but next week is the Settler's of Catan National Championship. If you are interested you should head on over to the link and register. Myself, I am cheering for Dan Flaman of Saskatoon to repeat as the "King of the Catan"! It takes place in Edmonton, Alberta over the MayDay weekend. Winners head to someplace in the US for the World Championships.

This year I may even remember to post the results from the event.

Sunday 4 May 2008

Commands and Colors Day Update

It looks like I have about 5 players for my 2nd Annual C&C Day and I am capping the registration at 10 players. If you are interested let me know!

You can either register with me via email at bgamegeekATgmailDOTcom or post here and let me know

Mayday

So I went to Mayday on Saturday for some good old miniatures (and wargaming) fun. I left Calgary at 5 AM and made it to Edmonton by 7:40.

I was there to play Contemptible Little Armies, Will ran the Battle of Ypres using this system. I made some mistakes, and had some bad die rolls, and caused the Germans to win. The game was great and beautiful. Will did a great job and the players were fun.

Game two was my Commands & Colours: Ancients game, this was my third year running it, but my worst attendance, I only had three players show up so I filled in as the fourth. We played two scenarios, the first being the battle of Baecula and the latter being the battle of Telamon from the second expansion. My goal was to get the players interested in the game and teach it. I played against a new player and Cory played against someone else that was new. Cory's battle was even and close, my wasn't. I won both sides, once as the Barbarians and once as the Romans. My dice were hot, I mean smoking (I killed 5 barbarian units on the first turn). We switched games and Neal and I played Baecula. I won as Carthage by killing 2 units of medium troops with my heavy unit led by Hasdrubal and later following up with two more kills with them.

My final game was a Napoleonic battle using 54 mm miniatures and the Commands and Colors: Ancients system. We did well as the French, the moderator being surprised by the French winning by being so aggressive, as he had never seen that done before. France won 7-4 and we switched sides. I did some charges (even rolling 4 dice to kill one figure and failing) and we lost the battle 7-3, thus the other guys won the game 11-10, after stealing my brilliant strategy!

I really enjoyed the games, but I have to decide if I can afford to drive down for one day next year. The extra bonus for me was seeing some of my friends that I only see there, so chances are I will be back.

Thursday 1 May 2008

2nd Annual Commands and Colors Day

May 31st is the date of the 2nd Annual Commands & Colors Day, my annual adventure into the world of Richard Borg.


It will be a full day (2pm to whenever people leave) of all the Commands & Colors line of games; this is to be a learning-friendly playing session. If you have never played before and have been interested, or you are a veteran, you are welcome.

There are 4 games in the Commands & Colors System and I have two of each game:

Battle Cry the first of the series and a game of the American Civil War, published by Hasbro in 2000. This is the simplest of the C&C system, but is still a lot of fun.


Memoir '44 the second, and the highly successful World War II game by Days of Wonder, I have all but one of the expansions, so the Russians and the Japanese are available to play. I have yet to purchase the Air Pack.


Commands & Colors: Ancients is GMT's block version of the series, featuring Rome, the Greeks and Carthage. This includes the all the expansions. It is the most complicated of the C&C system, but to me, is the best of them.


BattleLore the fourth and currently final installment. Battle Lore is unique in the series in that it starts out with historical battles it moves into the fantasy range. This is the only one if the C&C system that allows for Goblins, Dwarves and Hill Giants. I currently have all the expansions for the game.

Here is my commentary on last year's event. We had a ton of fun, and I would love to recreate that day again.

Since this is running out of my house, space is limited with only room for 10 people total. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me via email, bgamegeekATgmail.com