Anti Humanitarians

I think in total we had thirteen people this week. A sharp drop from the dizzy heights of the previous week but still respectable all the same.

I started off with Skull and did pretty badly. Player elimination is usually quite rare but I was the first to be taken out followed soon after by a couple more. After the first game James arrived having heard about IpBoG from Mike when attending the Colchester Board Game Club, and joined us for a second game. Again player elimination ensued but someone ended up winning. It was a few days ago now and I've forgotten who. Please accept my deepest apologies and a promise to try harder next time.

Philip had brought a newly purchased copy of Forbidden Desert (unless it turns out to be Forbidden Island, I've not played either so they both merge into the same game in my head) and Dan, owning the game himself, offered to show them how to play it. And by show them, I mean show them how to lose.

After Skull I played a couple of games of Biblios. After getting a stern telling off for getting the card distributions the wrong way around when I was explaining how to play, I won the first game. The second game was won by someone that wan't me. Yeah, I remember my own wins, what of it?

The usual group that had been turning up recently to play cards against humanity didn't show up this week. Still, it got some play this week by another group along with Fluxx. Zepplin Attack also got some table time.

I ended the night with Quantum. Last time I played this with Mike, I won with Mike barely being able to place a cube. This time the tables were turned with me not being able to score and Mike storming ahead to a quick victory. He'd built himself an almost unbeatable combination of command cards.

Twenty Fifteen

Although we started a week later than expected we've made it into 2015. When people arrived last week we found out that Cult was closed for a private function. Apologies to anyone that turned up, we only found out ourselves on the night. Although I hear a few renegades played games in Isaacs that evening. But the good news is that with the addition of Matt's wife, we finally managed to break the 20 attendee mark that has eluded us for so long.

I brought a couple of new games; Imperial Settlers and Biblios. I launched into Imperial Settlers with Muir, Dan and Danny. I'd played the game a few times before but only with two players. This was my first time playing with four people and will probably be my last, it ended up taking us over two hours. I like the game a lot but it's possible to get a lucky streak of cards and have a runaway victory. I'm not saying that's what happened with Dan but it's kinda what happened with Dan. He was able to build so many production faction cards early on there was no way to compete. Danny made a valiant attempt but Muir and I trailed behind. Afterwards I played a quick game of Biblios with Dan and he destroyed me again, with twelve points to my embarrassing four.

Johnny was the betrayer in Betrayal at House on the Hill. Some kind of invisible man haunt was triggered but he was beaten by the forces of good. Afterwards they played The Witches, based on the Terry Pratchett novels.

Alex played Eight Minute Empire followed by Domaine, a game with a name and a box cover very similar to that of Dominion. In its defense it did come out years before Dominion. And is also a totally different game. Alex won Domaine and went on to play Carcassonne which was won by Dan.

Andy had brought Pandemic with the On The Brink expansion. After the game defeated them they played again, winning the second time. Afterwards they played a couple of games of Coup and a couple of games of No Thanks!.

And as usual a group played Cards Against Humanity all night.

Festive Break

I turned up to Cult last week to be greeted by a lonely Craig. Usually there are a couple of people that arrive before me. As time passed we became increasingly worried that no one else would make it so close to Christmas and it would turn into some sort of awkward, online dating gone wrong scenario. Luckily a bunch of people turned up. Two of them berating me for not writing the blog for last week, so this will be some sort of combined entry for the both.

In the last post I said something about if the cards against humanity players turned up next week I'd count them in the numbers. Well, as it happens they did turn up so true to my word I'll include them. That meant about 19 people two weeks ago and about 13 last week.

In all honesty I can barely remember what happened a week ago let alone what happened two weeks ago. I do have a small amount of photographic evidence to jog my memory though. It kind of goes a bit like this; Cards Against Humanity, Dominion, Betrayal at House on the Hill, The Resistance, Lords of Waterdeep and Settlers of Catan.

I won Dominion, which I was pretty pleased about. I'm always pleased when I win Dominion. I started off strong in Waterdeep but ended up coming last, if memory served. I think Dan came first. Mike declared it one of the few worker placement games he didn't hate so if anything it's a win for the game itself.

Surprisingly it was the first showing for Settlers of Catan at IpBoG, the game which inspired its logo. I'm sure other games were played but I don't remember what. However I do know a drink was spilt, but this time not over a game, just a bag. We have to start paying attention to the drinks on the table rule.

So last week we started off with Fluxx while we waited for people to arrive. The rules explicitly allow people to join part way through so it seemed like a good choice. After a while we had a terrible rule set where we could play only a single card but that card had to be chosen at random by another player. This started to drag so when Dan got a chance he dealt one of his keepers to me, winning me the game. Sometimes Fluxx outstays its welcome and just has to be ended.

Other Dan had brought Eight Minute Empire. I jumped at the chance of a go at this. It was a pretty fun little area control/set collection game. I've heard people call it a 4X game but it really isn't. It also isn't 8 minutes, at least with the full compliment of players. It's still pretty quick at around half an hour.

We played another 5 player game of Hanabi and did very well again (23 points, I think). Dan wasn't sure if there was a rule change for more players but we didn't think so because we hadn't played it differently last time with 5 players. I've more recently been told that we have less cards in our hands with more players. I've not verified this but it sounds likely. We probably accidentally cheated both times, it was kind of easy.

Quarriors made its first appearance. We only made it about half way through the game before closing time. Again so many more games were played but I don't have photos of them so I forget what they were. I'm pretty sure Johnny played Bang! However I do know a drink was spilt again, but this time not over a game, just a crotch. We really have to start paying attention to the no drinks on the table rule.

We'll be taking a festive break from IpBoG next week (the 29th) as Cult is closed. We'll be back with a vengeance in the new year, no doubt with a whole host of new board games we received for Christmas. See you there!

All Filler No Killer

So depending on who you believe, this week we either had 17 or 22 people this week. I say only 17 count but Dan disagrees. Apart from the potential extra 5 that Dan is counting I don't think we had any new attendees this week but it's getting a little difficult for me to keep track.

Last week Gemma said she wanted to play King of Tokyo, so as the super nice guys both Dan and I are, we'd both brought it in. I lead King of Tokyo while Dan set up Kemet. We played standard King of Tokyo without Dan's extra expansions because, to be totally honest, I couldn't remember exactly how they worked. I got taken out quickly after rolling all 6 dice three times and failing to get a single heart.

I was in fact out so quickly that Dan was still teaching the rules to Kemet. I think Dan is channeling some Egyption gods because he's winning every game of Kemet he plays recently and this week was no different. Note to self: make sure we gang up on Dan next time I play. The others had lowered the usual upstanding and civilised tone of the evening by playing Cards Against Humanity.

After King of Tokyo we split into two groups with one playing Splendor and the other playing Machi Koro, another dice rolling game of luck mitigation. In the same way it can go in King of Tokyo, due to no fault of his own, luck was not on Alex's side and he got left far behind. I thought I was bound to win, needing less than ten coins to buy my final landmark. The main contender to my victory was Demetri but he needed over twenty coins. I rolled a nine which would give me five coins and him ten. Instead of re-rolling I let Demetri get the ten, sure that no one else would roll another nine before his turn. How wrong I was, another ten was rolled giving us both the money required to win but his turn was before mine and my victory was stolen from me.

Mike arrived at his usual 8:30 and we launched into a game of No Thanks! followed by For Sale. Contrary to last week's success, Alex continued his losing streak, coming last in For Sale. I'm pretty sure I ended up winning but I played so many games I'm having a hard time remembering who won anything..

After this we played Hanabi. I'd played this a couple of times before but always with two or three people and I'd found it fiendishly hard. This time we were playing it with five people and found it much more enjoyable and forgiving.We actually ended up doing pretty well, playing all the cards and scoring something like 22 points but with a bit of accidental cheating when people let on more than they meant to. It's easily done in this game though.

After that we joined with a few other stragglers and played a seven player game of No Thanks! Strictly more players than the game can support but we removed five cards instead of nine and started off with less tokens and it still played pretty well.

I can't be sure of every game that was played this week but I know Johnny was running a game of Betrayal at House on the Hill. I also know Lost Legacy was played with two sets of the game in play. I know this because there was a drink related accident. Someone had split their drink all over the table, drenching Alex's cards. Luckily to avoid too much awkwardness it was James, Alex's brother, so I guess sibling rivalry dictates a series of headlocks and Chinese burns as punishment. Either that or James buys Alex new copies. I think that's probably what they're going with. This is the second drinks related accent that I'm aware of, the previous one involving my copy of Citadels but in that case the cards came off relatively unscathed. I guess we should try and make sure we put drinks on the sides, not on the tables to avoid such mishaps in the future.

Finally the mystery of the extra five players. Towards the end of the night some passers by borrowed Cards Against Humanity and played that for a while with Craig. I'm not counting it because they didn't come specifically for the club, it was just a happy accident. If they're back next week to play again then I'm counting them!