Ra, of Taluva & Euphrates
After our excursion to Play in Public, Chip, Keith, and I returned to Hypermind for the rest of our regularly scheduled game night. It turned out to be a night of old favorites, all of which are previous Games of the Month!
Ra [BGG]
Right after their game of Nexus Ops ended, Alton and David joined us for a game of long-time favorite, Ra. I always enjoy the game, but I seem to get worse and worse at it. In this particular debacle, I did not win a single auction in the first epoch, resulting in a loss of 7 points going into the second. I didn't do much better there, however, winning only two auctions and netting a whopping 2 points. In the third, I used all my suns, but still only scored 7 points for a ridiculous total of 13.Meanwhile, Chip did well in all three epochs and managed to collect all but one monument (along with all of the pyramids) for some crazy endgame scoring to take the win.
Time: 58 minutes
Score: Chip 61, Keith 45, David 35, Alton 31, Me 13
Ratings: Chip 9, Keith 9, David 8, Alton 10, Me 8
I really need to play this a lot more... both because I love it and because I obviously need the practice!
In addition to my pittiful play, this game also saw what was perhaps the worst full slate of tiles ever...
Taluva [BGG]
I guess that our mention of playing Taluva at Barnes & Noble musta got Chris' juices for it flowing, because he suggested it as his closer for the evening. Tom had never played before, so he and I joined in as well.I started pretty strong in putting together a nicely-sized settlement including a temple, but then realized that my placement of volcanoes (and the aforementioned temple) was not very conducive to splitting it up and pulling off some temple-building shenanigans. Instead, I focused on starting to build upwards and get out my towers. Unfortunately, Chris didn't get tied up quite as much as I did, and managed to get his last hut on the board just a turn or two before I could have done the same.
Time: 16 minutes
Score: Chris - Win (Towers & Huts); Tom* & Me - Lose
Ratings: Chris 9.5, Tom 8, Me 8
I mentioned it the other day, but Taluva is just such a great investment of 15 or so minutes. Even in this simple tile-laying game, there are multiple paths to victory and tons of choices to make every turn. Go and read my review of it...
Tigris & Euphrates [BGG]
It's been more than a year since I last played Tigris & Euphrates, which is just a crime for such a great game, especially considering that it's one of only three "10's" for me. I've been toting it to game night pretty regularly for the last few months, and finally got it to the table this week with Kenny and Tom, who were both new to it. I was a little rusty on the rules, and it showed throughout the game, especially when I totally missed an exteral conflict that could have proven to make a pretty big difference at one point. Still, Kenny and Tom caught on pretty well, and it was relatively close by the time that the treasures started dwindling. In the end, though, I guess that my experience (dusty as it was) still gave me the edge enough to win.
Time: 60 minutes
Score: Me 9 (9u,9b,11g,11r), Tom* 7 (7u,7r,8g,8b), Kenny* 5 (5u,7g,10b,14r)
Ratings: Me 10, Tom 9, Kenny 7.5
After this play, I continued to rate T&E with my "usual" rating of 10, but it didn't really deserve it from this particular play. However, I'm not going to penalize it for me being rusty. Instead, I hope that I get the chance to replay it a few more times in the next little while, just so that I can remember exactly what I loved so much about it. I think that Kenny and Tom (and hopefully a few others around the game group) might be agreeable to that, so we'll wait and see.
Other Games Played
Alice in Wonderland
Time: 53 minutes
Score: Ellen* - Win; Adam*, Alton*, Chris*, Graham* & Shawn* - Lose
Ratings: Ellen 4, Adam 4, Alton 6, Chris 4, Graham 4, Shawn 5
Can't Stop
Time: 32 minutes
Score: Graham 3, Shawn* 2, Chris 2, Alton 1
Ratings: Graham 8.5, Shawn 8, Chris 8.5, Alton 8
Command & Colors: Ancients
Time: 45 and ?? minutes
Game 1: Britt* 5, Kenny* 3
Game 2: Britt 5, Kenny 3
Ratings: Britt 9, Kenny 9
Founding Fathers
Time: 76 minutes
Score: Graham* 28, David* 20, Brad* 16, Michelle* 14
Ratings: Graham 8.5, David 6, Brad 6, Michelle 6
Nexus Ops
Time: 75 and 102 minutes
Game 1: Alton 12, Ian 7, Michelle 6, David* 5
Game 2: Matt 12, Britt 11, Kenny 7, Tom 7
Ratings: Alton 8, Ian 10, Michelle 8, David 8, Matt 7, Britt 6, Kenny 7, Tom 6.5
Samurai
Time: 54 minutes
Score: Ellen - Win; Shawn* & Adam - Lose
Ratings: Ellen 8, Shawn 8, Adam 9
The Settlers of Catan
Time: 75 minutes
Score: Ellen 10, Tom 8, Adam 6, Shawn* 2
Ratings: Ellen 8, Tom 8.5, Adam 8.5, Shawn 9
Sultan
Time: 11 minutes
Score: Brad* 56, Chris* 41, Graham* 41
Ratings: Brad 8, Chris 8.5, Graham 8
Thunderstone
Time: 58 minutes
Score: Graham* 35, Chris* 18, Brad* 14
Ratings: Graham 7.5, Chris 7, Brad 7
Thurn and Taxis
Time: 85 minutes
Score: Alton 30, Keith* 22, Chip 22
Ratings: Alton 8.5, Keith 8, Chip 8.5
* First play for that Person
Posted by Chris Norwood at 8/20/2010 4:45 PM 
Categories: Gaming Weblog, Hypermind BoardGamers
Tags: Taluva Tigris and Euphrates Ra
Categories: Gaming Weblog, Hypermind BoardGamers
Tags: Taluva Tigris and Euphrates Ra
Shawn, Alton, Ken and I
(plus Brad D. for one game) had a marathon session in the wake of the postponed BloodBowl SuperBowl on Saturday. It was like a Greatest Hits session:
Ra
Roll Through the Ages
Thurn & Taxis (plus another play of this after I moved to EDH, thanks to my informing the guys of a pretty key rule that drastically changed how they had been playing)
Tigris & Euphrates
Tribune
Settlers of Catan (using the Event cards to see if I liked it more than dice; it failed)
...plus I think one or two others that I'm forgetting.
It was Shawn's first play for almost all of these. He didn't win any, but he put up a damned good fight in a few, especially a surprising near-win in his first-ever game of T&E.
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I enjoyed this game night a lot. First, I got in a good game of Settlers. This was the first time playing it face to face. I like this way much, much better. I had a good game too. Unfortunately, Ellen whopped me with a monopoly right before my winning turn. Augh! But it was really fun and a well played game. I got to play with Ellen and Shawn for the first time too. Lots of fun.
Taluva was fun but I need more plays of this. I trapped myself in my first settlement with no way to increase my levels.
T&E was really fun. It is a brain burner where you have to keep an eye on the whole board. Hence Chris's error that we discovered at the end of the game. I definitely want to play it more.
Nexus Ops hates me. I think I rolled '1' about 12 times. I still had a decent score but only due to one win that got me 3 points.
All in all it was another great game night.
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yeah last week sucked for me, monday was my birthday and my sister told me she was getting married on wendnesday. so i was extreamly stressed bout the whole thing because she wanted me to be the maid of honor. it was just a bad week....
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Wow, Michelle... I'm so sorry that you had a bad week, especially with your birthday and all. I wish I'd known, 'cause we could have done something to celebrate.
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Yes, Saturday was a marathon of games, thanks again to Alton, Chris I, Ken, and one game with Brad D. I had a blast! I would love to do this again some time soon. I'll have to check my schedule, but I may be free this next Saturday if anyone wants to do a marathon or half marathon of games at Hypermind! I'll update you some time on the geek...check over there! Also, I think one of my favorite games of all time is going to be RA. I really enjoyed that game a lot! I just need to see if Alton can make me one of those cool bags, so when I buy my game I'll have it already. What do you say Alton? Check the geek for more details.
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I also had a blast playing with the rest of the gang last Tuesday, new faces, new friends, a heck of a blast of a time! Thanks again.
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Nexus Ops Top Four and Alternates Update
1 -Alton
2 -Britt
3 -Chip
4 -Chris N.
1st Alt -Tom
2nd Alt - Matt
3rd Alt - Ian S.
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But of course, the actual "championship game" won't take place until next week, right? So these standings can still change... ( Because there are, you know, 5 Tuesdays this month)
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ROGER THAT! Chris.
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