PBEM Olympics - UR Game 1

After the crushing defeat of PR, I chose to start our next series in a game none of us had tried before - MaBiWeb's implementation of UR. Having virtually no clue, we setup - I was immediately unhappy with my choices. I had pinned myself between Justin and Nathan and the edge of the board (Chester was off by himself). I had to punish Justin in order to break out, which only helped Nathan and Chester. Both of them managed to score double ziggurats and my late push wasn't enough to catch the two of them. Justin hadn't caught onto the rules or the scoring and floundered in this first round. Final scores: Nathan-39, Chester-37, Me-36, Justin-13

Geekway to the West 2010

One more day until the Geekway 2010. Ok, the official event starts Friday at 8:00AM, but I get to leave Thursday morning and will be gaming most of Thursday. I'm excited about this year's Geekway for a number of reasons. First and foremost, I get to hook up and game with a familiar cast of characters - Nathan Winchester, Justin Easley, Jason Easley, Chester Ogborn, Steve Wicklund, John Davis and Matt Steele. Nathan of course is my local gaming buddy, Justin and Jason are guys I met in Omaha who have trekked out for the Geekway the past three years, Chester is an Omaha native who is an ingrained part of the history of the Geekway, and Steve, John, and Matt are guys I worked with at Union Pacific. I look forward to sitting at a table at some point with all of them. Justin, Nathan, and Chester are of course the other three players in my online PBEM Olympics group so I'm sure there will be plenty of bitching the whole weekend. Though the point of the convention is to play games, the point of playing games is social. A long weekend of relaxing games is Chicken Soup For the Boardgamer's Soul.
Beyond getting to see (and beat repeatedly) good friends, there are the games. The first year I attended I didn't know what to expect and played a pretty good variety of games. Some new and I taught a number of games I knew. Last year we wanted to play certain games and only got in a handful of ones we planned to. What we ended up doing a lot of last year was playing the excellent selection of games from the Play to Win table. For those unfamiliar with the PTW table, here's the deal - sponsors have donated a huge selection of games that are available to checkout and play. After playing, everyone that played the game gets their name entered into a drawing for that game at the end of the Geekway. This year's table is again loaded, but I think we may actually try to play a few more of the games we've been talking about this year. I think last year's table was actually a bit more interesting - not a slight against the sponsors, rather the games that came out this past year just aren't as interesting (to me).
There are also the other events - tournaments and the trade table. This year there are a number of tourneys being run. Justin and I are returning as The Droids Ur Lookin 4 in the Crokinole tourney. I'm also planning to play in the Pitchcar tourney. Both are going to be nice breaks from the mental strain of being abused by my so called friends for three days. The trade table is a deal where you put your games up for trade. At the start of the event, a name is drawn at random. That person gets first pick from the trade table. After that, whomever's game is picked picks next and so forth. Good fun.
There are some changes to the event this year. Previous years have been in smaller venues with fairly "normal" hours (8Am-11Pm). As the event has grown, so has the need for a larger venue. This year the Geekway is being held at a hotel and there will be 24-7 (24-3) gaming. I'm not sure how well I'll hold up (its hard getting old), but I imagine I'll push through. In truth, I know that after two solid days of gaming my brain is fried. Perhaps the open ended times will take of some of the "pressure" to cram in as much playing as possible. Also, since we are staying at the same location as the actual event, taking a break whenever we like will be nice.
So, what games am I looking forward to trying (or trying to play)? Here's what I'm packing:
Amazing what you can fit into one regular sized game box.

• Q-Jet 21xx
• Edel Stein and Richt
• Fjords
• Tichu
• Landlord
• Buried Treasure
• Excape
• Sushizock im Gockelwok
• Undercut

I'm also planning to bring out:

• Senji
• Wings of War II (minis)
  
• Steam
• Steam Barons
• Gulf, Mobile, Ohio
• A Game of Thrones
  
• Twilight Struggle
• Combat Commander: Europe

Twilight Struggle is something Nathan and I will play while traveling. Once we get to the hotel, I'll try and break out Combat Commander to teach to Nathan. I imagine I'll get in at least one more game of that with Jason Easley too. In addition to the games I'm bringing, I expect to play Greed Inc, Indonesia, Planet Steam, Confucius, Chaos in the Old World, War of the Roses, Thunderstone, and who knows what else. If last year was any indication, I'll play about 25% of what I think. Whew! I better get some rest :)

Combat Commander: Europe - Closed For Renovations

Humaine, Belgium, Dec. 27, 1944 - After days of fierce combat and heavy bombardment, the town of humaine was surrounded by forces of the US 2nd Armored Division. Most of the German defenders surrendered after some hard fighting. Remnants of 9th Panzer Division occupying a chateau on the north end of town refused to give up, however, and it fell to CCR to root out these stubborn troops.

After dinner, it was Dancing with the Stars night, so I thought I'd check and see what Robert Bolan was doing. Turned out he wasn't doing anything so a little while later he stopped over and we sat down to play the 4th scenario for Combat Commander: Europe. This scenario pits the US forces in an assault against the German defender. The Germans have only two "1" command leaders and a small force of Elite Rifle Squads backed by some good weapons - heavy and light machines guns as well as the bad ass IG 18 Gun (pictured). Robert was tired of playing defender and choose to be the US forces this time around, so I setup my Germans. The main objective to the map was the chateau in the middle of the map (worth 15vps), so I setup the bulk of my forces there and one small group on my left flank. I setup wire in front to slow down any guys wanting to make a charge. Robert had to setup his US forces only in the first row of the map and spread out accordingly. My first turn was vanilla - I fired the IG 18 to let the Us forces know I could see them. Robert's cards weren't quite what he wanted, so he discarded the first hand - something I hoped for early - and I capitalized by getting reinforcements immediately. I choose a sergeant (leadership 2) which immediately gave me a huge amount of flexibility that I hadn't had a minute earlier. The US forces then called upon their artillery to lay down a couple of thick fields of smoke. With the German vision of the enemy reduced to one unit, there was nothing to do but fire and wait. The Germans managed an early kill by breaking and then routing an American squad. Then there was a lot of waiting - by both of us. Robert couldn't get movement cards, and I was holding cards waiting for the inevitable assault. It never came. Time ticked away rapidly in the early stages of the game. Finally Robert was able to press - he started moving troops up the German right flank, covered by a wall and lines of trees. Rather than waiting to be hunted down, I moved a couple of weapon units and heavy machine guns from the position in the house, out to some trees outside the wall in the hopes of catching the Americans out in the open. The US forces caught the Germans moving into position and open fire, breaking both weapon teams. I was forced to use my Recover card to restore the teams instead of getting off some shots with my Assault Fire. Once recovered, the machine gun teams were able to break an American leader, but the US brought up a medium machine gun and blasted the weapon teams, breaking them again. For a while it was a stalemate as the US tried to finish off the troops, but they were able to dig in a bit and last (though I couldn't get a Recover card to restore them to fighting prowess). Finally, I used an advance to pull the group back. A breeze came up and wiped the smoke from the map. With the view cleared, both sides started firing, though to little effect. And then the game went against Robert. Time and again, he called for an artillery barrage - time and again, the people shooting the artillery missed. A lot. Twice Robert hurt himself with artillery while the German forces looked on. The third time cost Robert the game. The third time, Robert rolled a Time! and then rolled sudden death. He never got a chance to see the perfect shot his artillery was about to deliver into the heart of the Germans. Sadly for the Americans, not a single German unit was lost, while the US suffered 3-4 losses and lost by a score of 31! I fear for our next game - Robert's luck has been so bad these two games, it will be bound to swing around soon enough.

Combat Commander: Europe

Well, I was planning to do a little gaming at the Gamer's Inn this Friday evening, but plans went south and so Robert Bolan and I elected to simple meet at my place and play some Combat Commander: Europe. Since Robert lost our last game I let him decide if we should replay the 2nd scenario (Hedgerows and Handgrenades) or move on. He choose to replay the scenario as well as to reprise the Germans. Well, this time around, the result was the same - The American forces smashed through and forced the German surrender after extracting a good number of casualties. Robert managed to take out my mortar very early on, but I surrounded and isolated a couple of his Germans, weakening him as I advanced. After the defeat, we decided to play another game. This time, he choose to move on to the third scenario - Bonfire of the NKVD.
Outside Brest-Litovsk, June 24, 1941 - A Soviet forward command post belonging to the retreating 133rd Infantry Regiment is to be abandoned by noon, but not before all communications equipment is smashed and documents burned - including detailed plans of much of the frontier fortifications in and around Brest-Litovsk several miles to the east. A battered company of Russian militia must halt the German juggernaut long enough to affect a withdrawal to the relative safety of the Brest-Litovsk citadel.
Basically, the Russians (Robert) are defending the map. The objective on the far side of the map is worth a whopping 16 victory points - the Russians also start with 20! In order to win, the Germans will need to smash most of the Russian army and/or take the major objective before time runs out. To make matters worse, Robert gets to setup first - including a dozen wire obstacles in the way. He uses these to funnel me away from the forest (and cover) and towards a couple of houses he's setup in with machine gun units. This turns out to be a mistake. As the first turn taker, the Germans immediately overwhelm and eliminate 3-4 Russian units. They chase down and kill another couple while making a lightning fast push up the Russian left flank. Robert has to pull his troops back together and tries to regroup. I've got a couple of good positions, so I hole-up and start firing on his units. I'm now within a couple units of forcing a surrender. I figured this was my best plan of attack, as not a single German unit has been killed. Then Robert gets lucky - reinforcements. First artillery, then a new squad. I have one unit pinned down and am relentless in shooting at it, but can't ever even break it. The Russian artillery is becoming annoying, but not seriously damaging, so I regroup and re-position some troops to try and apply more pressure. The Germans finally break a couple of Russian units and then immediately rout them off the board to force the Russian surrender. This is an important lesson - when the Russians break, they are often hard to recover and easy to rout by the Germans. Without leaders, the Russians are just too easy to push back.

Hedgerows and Hand Grenades

Robert Bolan came over to my place last night to get in a game of Combat Commander: Europe. We moved onto the second scenario in the book - Hedgerows and Hand Grenades. The background:
Bocage Country, Normandy France, July, 1944: A few weeks after the D-Day landings, General Bradley was keen to choose a suitable place for a swift, decisive breakout with a minimum of casualties in order to get his armored forces into more tank-friendly terrain. The key ground to the south of US First Army, however, was the town of St. Lo along the Vire River - which could only be had via a tough slugging match through moors, marshes and a patchwork of tiny fields surrounded by dense hedgerows. One such skirmish occurred amongst the latter terrain on the outskirts of Pont-Hebert, just a few miles from the vital St. Lo-Coutances road.
The map for this one was nasty. Lots of hedgerows, very little line of sight. Since Robert won the previous match, I chose my side - the Allies (Americans). I had to setup my side first in the first three rows of the map, after which Robert could dig himself in anywhere else on the map. I decided to go with the attackers so I could play with the mortar and artillery. As the defended, Robert would have a lot of ways to make life hell for me though - including being able to setup heavy machine guns pointing down the only easy terrain - the roads. Robert also started with 10 VPs. After we setup, I was allowed to place one of my leaders - Lt. Blankenship in position to be my forward observer. I placed him near the back of map - I hoped to get a few artillery shots on the rear flank, then exit him off the map for points and a quick reinforcement. Our objectives for the map? 2pts for each of the 5 spots, plus Robert drew a house in the middle worth an extra point, and I drew the one objective on Robert's side of the map for an extra point :(.
The battle started with my moving my troops up the left side, while the group on the right used the mortar to try and soften Robert up. Lt. Blankenship was able to call in a couple of artillery strikes, but to no real effect. The one effect - I got my Real American Hero into the game! I placed him near Blankenship - planning to exit them both off the map (only realizing after I did that, that the hero is worth ZERO points). Robert had advanced one of his squads and a leader into a house, which I decided I needed to invade (despite not being an objective point). A quick advance let me eliminate a couple of his guys right away and a few rounds into the game, I was quickly gaining points back. The first time card came in fairly early and Lt. Blankenship and the hero re-entered the game, moving to support my mortar team. By this time, Robert had taken control of the central locations - two houses tucked away from line of site of anything. I was forced to advance into the house and my group overwhelmed the occupants. I had now knocked Robert's lead down to a mere 2-3 points and had comfortably advanced to a point where I thought I had a chance. Then lady luck struck.
Robert, tired of being shelled, moved some units down to eliminate my mortar team, which they did with a swift advance. In addition, a couple of events for Robert were letting him score points for objectives held and units he had eliminated. Before I knew it, his points had skyrockets back up to 15! He also managed to get a number of foxholes, some wire and other crap into play. My offensive had stalled and was in danger of being done. He started breaking my units, and if he had gotten some rout cards, I was going to be in a world of hurt. That was when I noticed that I had killed a lot of Robert's guys. Though I wasn't going to be able to dig out his guys much, I was in pretty good position to win the game if I could kill a couple more guys. With that in my head, I made a push to try and take out another of Robert's groups. He brought in another team to try and help, and that was the mistake I needed. He made a group vulnerable and I brought a number of fire teams down on him and was able to force Robert's surrender. Robert had a huge number of points, but the casualties were too much for him. I may have won, but I think future attacker/defender battles will much much harder now that we know a few more of the tricks.

Things of No Interest

• I saw this article on the BGG about pimping up Combat Commander with bits from Litko and of course I couldn't resist. It is a little pricey for the size of the bits, but looks awesome. BTW, the pieces aren't assembled - if you do this, watch out for the glue. It works really well. It works too well - It dries in seconds and there is no forgiveness. I accidentally globbed a ton out on one piece and for lack of a better term - it is hosed. After that, I got a toothpick and started applying it that way - also a pain as you can't squeeze out much (remember, it dries damn fast). At any rate, I pimp up my normal games, so doctoring up a game that is all chits shouldn't come as a surprise. And yes, of course I clipped my counters. Even got a jig for it.
• I also found (ok Robert Bolan) a copy of Combat Commander: Pacific for $50 shipped - in sleeves and the chits all punched and sorted in a plastic box. The next logical purchase should have been Combat Commander: Mediterranean or maybe Combat Commander: Battle Pack #1 - Paratroopers, but the price was right and so I couldn't resist - though I did resist for one day to see if Robert was going to buy it himself.
• In keeping with the WWII theme, I also grabbed a copy of Wings of War: WWII Deluxe - this is the WWII (in case you missed that) version of Wings of War, and comes with 4 of the minis included. I ordered an additional four planes and plan to bring the whole shee-bang along to the Geekway To the West 2010 in a couple of weeks for a little bit of 4 vs 4 action.
• Speaking of the Geekway, I'm not sure what we'll get played for sure this year. As always, there is a laundry list of games that we'll never have the time to play. Last year we played a lot of games from the Play-To-Win table. This year, there are maybe 3-4 games I really want to play from the table. The rest I either own or just don't care about I guess. Which games are they? Samarkand: Routes to Riches, Kingsburg (a little), Runewars (a little), and I can't decided about Dungeon Lords. I hear it is ok and it is not all that. I know lots of folks want to play it, but I've decided there aren't quite that many worker placement games that capture my interest.
• So if I'm not totally engrossed in PTW games, what do I hope to play? A couple of Splotter games maybe - Greed, Incorporated and/or Indonesia. Steam and Steam Barons. I'd really like to play a big game like Descent, but I'm guessing that won't happen. And then there are the games that will for sure happen - Chicago Express, Tichu, Twilight Struggle, Combat Commander: Europe, Pitchcar, Crokinole, Wings of War (as I've already noted) and a host of little side games like Sushizock im Gockelwok and Exxtra. All I know is that normally about 15% of what we plan to do happens. This year they are having 24-3 (there is only three days) gaming, so who knows what we might fit in...

PBEM Olympics - Amun-Re Game 1

And the first game of Amun-Re is in the books. Amun-Re got moved up in the competition after we discovered it was getting pulled from SpielByWeb. We started 4 games (as any game started by a certain date could be played to completion) and took first moves in those games so that we could be assured of playing them through. In our first game, Justin and Nathan were first time players. Nathan got a pretty good overview from Steve Bauer at a Friday night session a few weeks back - it must have paid off as Nathan pulled out a second place finish in a pretty tight game. Justin missed how the pyramids scored until nearly the end of the game and had started the game with the fewest points in the first half of the game. Me? I got dang lucky. I squeaked out a 1 point win - barely scoring more points in the second round than I did the first - not a good showing. Chester never got in a rhythm nor found bonus cards that helped and brought up the rear this game. I expect his experience will help him in the coming games. I don't really care for this game and hope that this first place finish won't be followed by some 4th places. Final scores: Me-40, Nathan-39, Justin-36, Chester-34

Combat Commander: Europe

I don't remember where I got Combat Commander: Europe, only that I got it last April for $35 (plus shipping) and I didn't actually play it until June last year. When I finally played it, I realized I had got a bargain. Not because of the price, but because it was such a good game. The game felt like I had been thrown into Saving Private Ryan - chaos. Controlled chaos to be sure, but the game does such a good job of being a story and a game. Sadly, I hadn't played it again until last week. Dion Garner called to see if I'd be interested in getting together for a little gaming. I asked if he'd be interested in playing CCE, since it had been so long since I played. He agreed and so I brought it over to his place and we got setup. He hadn't played in a couple of years, so we played the first scenario - Fat Lipki. Despite fumbling a bit through some rules, we had an interesting game. The objectives were not great and so I put my German forces into the houses near my starting point and waited for Dion's Russian to come to me. He looked to have a good numbers advantage and it was only through some good recovery rolls that I was able to frustrate his efforts. Then he made a mad dash at me and had a really bad round. I was able to get up on him by six points when time ran out.
A week later, Robert Bolan came over so I could teach him CCE. We also played Fat Lipki, but since I had only played the German side, I took the Russian this time out. Also, the first thing we drew was the 5 point #5 objective - one of the houses. This meant that instead of random skirmishes, the game was going to be mostly about #5. It only took about two turns for Robert to declare that he loved this game. Maybe that was because at the end of the turn, I rushed the house with a rifle squad and a leader and got turned away. Down almost immediately with my best leader, I scrambled to get into position to take the house. Again I rushed the house, this time with two rifle squads and luck was not with me. The battle was looking rather hopeless and my casualties piled up. I tried to get my units into position again - looking again for an advance and ambush card and hoping Robert wouldn't have one too. His Germans flanked my team and started shooting from the woods, but the Russians held and managed to get dug into some foxholes. Then they started returning fire ferociously and a few routs pushed his wounded men back. Finally the cards were right and I went for a last ditch melee. This time the Russians were victorious. A bonus card for surviving the melee brought me back to within 5 points. If time ran out, we'd be tied - and Robert had the tiebreaker card! I hoped to massacre his remaining troops when they crossed the road (I had multiple cards for using my machine guns on moving targets), but time ran out and so did my luck. The game ended in a tie, and Robert still held the initiative card.

What is There to Say? Its Ballon Cup

Well, I taught Robert Bolan how to play Ballon Cup online at Yucata.de. This game works well for mindless game play during the boring parts of the day and we've logged 9 plays since the start of April. The cards don't like me much though - I've only won 3 of our games thus far. Hopefully, the luck of the cards will reverse themselves before we get totally bored of this game.

PBEM Olympic Standings

Medal count after 3 events
Player	Gold	Silver	Bronze
Justin	2	0	1
Nathan	0	1	2
Charles	0	2	0
Chester	1	0	0

PBEM Olympics - Puerto Rico Game 4

Well, it is finally over. Chester won his first medal in style with a nice gold for Puerto Rico. The fourth and final game of PR was fairly close - we all did well getting an economic engine going and scoring points. Chester didn't score a couple of early shippings and it kept him out of first place but he had two firsts and two seconds. I manged a second, third and two forths for last place and no medal. Nathan played well this last game - well enough that he took home the silver and broke his streak of bronze medals. Justin brought up the rear this game, but his earlier first and second place finishes made up for the fact that he finished last twice too. Gratz to the medal winners. And again - I'm glad we are done with this game.

PBEM Olympics - Fearsome Floors Game 2

The second heat of Fearsome Floors completed today. Since everyone understood the game, we jumped into the advanced setup (which nobody understood). Despite the painfully long process of setting up the board, the game seemed to fly by - likely because we setup the board to put the monster right into our lap nearly immediately. Justin outran all of us to the exit and put three guys out the door before Chester or I could get our second. Nathan already had two guys out, so he managed second place. Chester got his first out well ahead of me, so I finished dead last. Again. For those keeping track, Daniel Karp didn't die, but didn't make it out either. This time, he sat right near the door only to watch Justin win the game before he could escape.

Things of No Interest

• Well, what's new and not interesting? I think I'll have more nickles in 2010 than ever before - mostly thanks to the PBEM Olympics. By playing a load of four game series, I'm right there at the cusp of the nickle. In many cases, I've had to play one game just to get the rules down or re-figure the game out. I've also been a lot more inclined to play a lot of my older games than I have in the past. I don't know why - probably a combination of things. I've hit the saturation point on my collection. A lot of games I see or look into are just derivative of a game I have and the crop of recent games aren't over the top interesting (the exception being Chaos in the New World which is great). I'm also enjoying getting into the potential I saw in a lot of games by getting multiple plays. The flip side of that is that there are games that didn't deserve four (let alone five) playings. Puerto Rico, I'm speaking to you.
• Speaking of the PBEM Olympics, things are as Chester Ogborn suggested they might be - the metagame is almost as interesting as the games themselves. Thus far in our games, there is usually one guy who jumps out to a lead in the heats leaving the rest to fight for second and third. It also makes for "playing just to screw someone" moments. Sometimes you do something that screws the guy in third place instead of the leader, because you need to make sure the guy in third stays there. Sometimes you screw that guy because he screwed you in another game. Regardless, it is fun and adds a bit of unpredictability to some otherwise predictable games.
• I really like Heroscape. I LOVE the comic hero version. It is too bad that Hasbro / WoC decided (or were forced to) take the comics off the table. It is pretty cool that the Heroscape community has so many customs that can use cheap Heroclix minis because they really are a blast to play.
• I have WAY too many cards for A Game of Thrones LCG. Especially since I've only played it once. I finally broke down and bought a 3200 card deck box and dividers. Now, I don't have 3200 cards, but I'll load it up with all the CCG/LCG stuff I have (and maybe even Thunderstone).
  
• When is a deal too good to pass up? When it is Roads and Boats + &Cetra for $115 (plus $12 shipping). I don't know if I really want/need this, but $200 worth of games for $127? Worse case scenario, I'll math trade them.
• I swapped out all the little tiny wood bits from Through the Ages for glass stones. It is a small little parts upgrade, but the glass stones really look nice.
  

Putting the Hero in Heroscape

Since we had our big map already built (and since I wasn't going to take it down without getting a couple of games on it first), Ashton and I decided to get a couple more games of Heroscape in this weekend. On Saturday, we grabbed all of Ashton's comic heroes. I went with the Fantastic Three - The Thing, Mr. Fantastic, and The Human Torch (The Invisible Woman suffered a tragic "dog" episode). Ashton then chose Annihilus, Ghost Rider and with the last 50 points, he chose the Tarn Viking Warriors. Ghost Rider is pretty cool, getting to move really quickly and with some good attacks that let him go after two adjacent guys - and to top it off, he's really cool looking. Annihilus has a load of defense and pretty good attack if he doesn't move, so once he's in a spot, he is tough. The FF (FT) work best as a team, so I ran The Thing up to meet the Vikings and he took them out quickly. I then used Mr. Fantastic to pin down Annihilus while the Human Torch worked him over. Annihilus was having none of that and took out Mr. Fantastic. The Human Torch and The Thing were left facing off against The Ghost Rider who managed a couple of good attacks and took the The Thing down to one life. In a last ditch effort, The Thing pulled off a wrestling move and sent the Ghost Rider to the land of the dead.
For our game on Sunday, Ashton wanted to pick first this time. He again chose Annihilus, but then grabbed The Thing (after seeing how awesome he is) and Hawkeye. I decided to give The Thing a match with another bruiser and chose the Hulk. I also grabbed a flying ranged guy with Thanos (who also has the ability to come back after dying). With my remaining points, I chose the Mandroid. I started by running the Mandroid to the defensive marker while the Hulk and Thanos used their massive moves to cross the board and start the attacks. The Hulk flew into a rage immediately and took out poor Hawkeye. Annihilus devastated Thanos with a huge roll of 8 skulls. The Hulk took revenge on Annihilus immediately, but the damage had been done and Thanos never made it back to the board. The Hulk and The Thing then squared off for an epic battle and the Thing pulled off a win by the skin of his teeth, holding only a single life. Ashton then raced The Thing to the healing marker and with his rejuvenated hero, he hunted down the Madnroid and smashed him.

Heroscape

Ashton has been trying to get me to play some Heroscape with him, so I set up a map for us the other night. I looked around and found a fairly complex but cool looking map and got it setup. Despite the fairly sever elevation changes, I went with a straight forward Samurai army rather than a load of flying guys. Ashton wanted to play with the new elemental guys, so neither of us took advantage of the terrain at all. As we battled back and forth, the biggest problem for me was that I didn't have the firepower to take out his Ice Elemental and despite destroying the rest of his troops, he won by pounding me with that guy.

Friday Gaming

Friday March 26, 2010 - Gamer's Inn
The day actually kicked off a little early as I taught Robert Bolan how to play GIPF. I really enjoy this one for its opportunities for clever play and the speed with which a game can be completed. Robert and I weren't playing too heavy and we simply played the basic rules so he could learn something new. I whittled him down until he had nothing left to play.
The night at the Gamer's Inn started later, with Nathan Winchester and I meeting up with Robert, Jake Troken, Matt Cullinan, and Brendan Coffee. I pulled out Power Grid and we gave the Korea map a whirl. I'm not a huge fan of this six players, but this game was ok and the plant distribution worked out alright. I started well in back, but made my surges at the right times and pushed us into step two and grabbed my end game plants early enough for the late surge. Unfortunately, I mis-played in purchasing fuel and came up short one city in the second to last round. In the final round, Matt and Jake each powered 14 cities while I was my one city back. If I had not screwed up, I think I would have won the game. As it was, Jake won with $5 in his hand to Matt's zero.

The last game of the night was one that I specifically requested from Steve Bauer, who was happy to bring it out. I had asked him to bring Amun-Re. This is the next event in our online Olympics and I wanted to get in a game before we started and Nathan wanted to get the lowdown on the rules. Steve went through the game, but then Nathan bailed out for the night. Steve still wanted to play, so he and I were joined by James Smyth and Rob Romano. For the record, I just don't enjoy this game. My biggest complaint with the game is that the cards can really favor you, or go against you. With this game being a standard Knizia tight scoring/auction game, I dislike this part of the game. The rest of the mechanics are fine and this is probably one of his best themed game, but I just don't care for the game. At any rate, I led after the first half of the game and knew I was screwed after the first turn of the second. Rob and I tied with 33, James was second with 35 and Steve killed us with his 41. In the second half, I never got a scoring card for my lands (I could have used farmers, Upper Nile, Off the River to score 3 points, but never saw a single bonus card in the second half of the game (and only 1 bonus card the whole game). Blech. The main reason we are playing this next in the PBEM Olympics is that Knizia games are getting yanked from the internet. I'll be only too glad when that game is done.

PBEM Olympics Standings

Medal count after 2 events
Player	Gold	Silver	Bronze
Justin	2	0	0
Charles	0	2	0
Nathan	0	0	2
Chester	0	0	0

PBEM Olympics - Mykerinos Game 4

Our last game of Mykerinos for the PBEM Olympics finished with a decent (to me) result. First let me say congratulations to Justin who nearly swept this event and now leads the competition with two gold medals. The score were such that he had clearly won the gold after three heats, so we were playing for the last two spots. I was in good position and needed to just finish ahead of Nathan (and hope Chester didn't win the last game). My turns were mostly spent making sure that Nathan wasn't scoring many points. Chester got some early positions in the museum and Nathan had nearly no spots near the end of the game, which seriously hurt his score. Nathan was able to hold of Chester and for the second game series in a row we finished: Justin-Charles-Nathan-Chester.

Bus

After a false start (because we had no real clue) Robert Bolan, Nathan Winchester, Matthew Frederick and I got in a game of Bus on Spiel By Web as a followup to our face-to-face first time game. Well, I'm not sure if anyone else benefited, but I'm as lost as I've ever been. Oh sure, I get the rules, but I still don't see this game yet. I ran out of actions a turn before everyone else and finished third (6pts and tied with Matthew). Nathan managed a clean win with his 9 points. One thing to note - Nathan started the game and won. I've heard that first player has a good advantage, and I believe it. Things are so tight in this game, that a free action like that is definitely an advantage. I think if I play it face to face, I'd argue that if the first person takes a bus in the first round, they have to pay 2 for it.

PBEM Olympics - Puerto Rico Game 3

Game 3 of the Puerto Rico series didn't go well for me. Overall, the competion tightened up as the scores were much much closer. Chester started in the first position followed by Justin and then myself, with Nathan at the rear. I went full on into the "corn" strategy. With the Hacienda by my side (and a little luck) - I had 5 corn fields pretty early in the game, which made my play pretty easy - ship every time I had the chance. Unfortunately for me, the end of the game saw me locked out of doing just that. I needed one more shipment to win and never could get it. Instead, I came in last. Justin and Chester tied at 54 points (Justin won the tie breaker and probably locked up second place here), while Nathan had 52 and I had 51.