February 17, 2006 |
| Settlers of the Stone Age |
| Results | |||
| Player | Score | Place | First Time? |
| Jamie | 10 | 1 | |
| Curt | 6 | 2 | * |
| Howard/Lee | 5 | 3 | Howard |
| Mike | 3 | 4 | |
Notes: It seems that I'm trying to outdo my worst score every time out. This time I started out all right, and I still had productive camps in Africa, but there were some tremendous, inexplicable droughts. Once in a while, it seemed like every number rolled was a 9, then I lost my 8 and 8's were rolled. Meanwhile, my lucrative 6's were rarely rolled, as were my 10's and 11's (more explicably).
Other than that, Howard started off grumpy and confused, but he stuck with it, as did Curt, and Howard actually had a nice lead at one point, though Jamie was in a nice position as well.
Jamie was the first to get two exploration tiles, but Howard passed him relatively quickly. Howard had a problem of not spending his cards, usually because Jamie was giving him too much advice. I kept trying to simplify what Jamie was suggesting, and that helped, but getting too much advice when you're a bit frustrated is always a tad annoying.
My brother in "drought-dom" this time was Curt. Ironically, he had a lot of 5 squares, which weren't being rolled until late in the game. In fact, the first 5 wasn't rolled until over an hour into the game. The reason this is ironic is because Lee won the last game because I couldn't stop rolling 5's for him (and Lee had the same initial set up).
Anyway, we all founded settlements quickly, and after Jamie grabbed the Exploration VPs, Howard quickly took it, piling up to 5 tiles. Then Howard made an expansion that kind of hurt him (he took a fire from a productive spot in Africa), and he kind of slowed down, and Lee took over, with 5 points and a big lead in Exploration tiles.
Then Jamie went nuts. All his campsites were still productive and he knocked Curt's and my own decent spots in Africa out of commission. That slowed me a bit, but I just wasn't getting anything. Curt made a nice comeback, spreading his fires out well and grabbing four settlement chips - one of each type, and he had 6 points. He was also preparing to make a few more.
Lee, though he lost the Exploration lead to Jamie, who had scooped up every last one in Australia, was re-gaining on him by running all over the Americas. Curt was in both America and Australia. My settler was still making the journey into Australia but got hung up on the sea for the last 27 turns of the game. I wasn't a target, and when Lee, Jamie, and Curt moved the Neanderthal, they never went after me. I'm starting to believe I just suck at this game.
Anyway, as I said, Jamie had passed Lee for Exploration, but Lee finally managed to tie him. One more chip and Lee would take Jamie's 2 points for his very own. Jamie had three settlement chips, the 2 points for Exploration, 2 Adaptation cards, and had 1 Art VP. On his last turn, he manipulated Curt into trading with him and thereby ending my misery - he built a fourth settlement and grabbed 1 more Art VP to bring his total to ten, one turn before Lee was either going to grab the Art VP or the Exploration chip.
It took about 2 hours, which is a bit long, but Howard was confused early in the game, and Jamie is very deliberate. Also, when Lee started playing, it took him a while to figure out what to do with Howard's lay-out.
It's still fun, but these droughts...I need one to fall my way one of these days. I have to admit, that Jamie maximized a lot of his turns (aided by having cards) and played a fantastic and solid game. Howard's game relied too much on getting lucky, and it caught up with him (or Lee in his stead). Lee played okay, but wasn't getting Howard's rolls (and Jamie and Curt were focusing on him by then and ignoring me altogether - rightly so, as it proved).
| Colossal Arena |
| Results | |||
| Player | Score | Place | First Time? |
| Mike | 18 | 1 | |
| Jamie | 9 | 2 | |
| Lee | 4 | 3 | |
Notes: After my disastrous finish in Settlers and Jamie's very slick victory, Jamie tried to get Curt to stick around for a game of Blokus, but he was exhausted and left.
Blokus is unplayable with 3, so Jamie said, "Colossal Arena" and I said "RoboRally" and Lee said, "Let's flip a coin." He flipped, Jamie called heads. It was heads. Damn. Jamie won two games in a row!
Still, I played with a determined focus that left Jamie and Lee in the dust. Sort of. The monsters were the Troll, Seraphim, Ettin, Wyrm, Gorgon, Unicorn, Colossus, and Daimon.
I placed three first round bets on the Ettin, Wyrm, and Gorgon. Jamie went with the Unicorn and Colossus, and Lee only bet on the Troll. We all had a secret bet.
I manipulated my creatures powers to the Nth degree. The first round is usually pretty safe, and despite the Seraphim being my favorite monster, I had no cards for it, so I put my secret bet on the Wyrm and killed off the Seraphim to no one's obvious detriment. So far so good.
In the second round, Lee placed a bet on the Daimon and and became its primary backer, then plunked a bet on the Gorgon. Jamie jumped in on the Troll. Looking at the Troll, it looked like he was going to be a tough kill. The Ettin and the Wyrm were moderately attacked, but by using both creatures' powers I managed to have the last turn, saving the Wyrm from certain destruction and killing off the Unicorn. Jamie wasn't very upset.
In the next turn, Jamie took back his Unicorn bet and placed it on the Gorgon. I still had a bet left, and I pretty much forgot about it. Lee wasn't doing much, so I asked him for a Wyrm card. He didn't have one, and his hand was full of low Colossus cards. I was wondering why he wasn't playing them (to save his Daimon and Troll, as Jamie was the only person with bets on the Colossus) so I suspected him of having a secret bet on it. The Wyrm was in a somewhat dangerous position this turn, but Jamie didn't kill him off - I suspected it was because he didn't have the cards. (As you will see, I was totally off on both guesses. I need to work on my poker reads...)
Anyway, as I had three live bets still around, I was conditionally targeted. Jamie wanted to keep the Wyrm (secretly) alive, and Lee wanted to keep his Gorgon bet alive (though he was still placing low cards on it). Somehow I managed to fend off disaster again (through the Wyrm's power) and I wiped out the Daimon. Lee groaned.
In the fourth round, with pretty much only the Troll around, Lee made a terrible move, playing a low Troll card to pick up an earlier Troll card (which he expected to play in the next couple rounds - he now had the 9 and 10 in his hand, doing nothing). Jamie chose to put a high card on the Colossus, and there were now two empty spots out there. I had pretty low cards (plus the supporter 3 card and 10 - the Behemoth, which I had played earlier but re-acquired via a Prefect) but managed to get the Troll killed by using my Ettin and playing two cards. I used my 3 supporter on the Wyrm which was 1 point higher than the Troll.
Lee, who had been in really bad shape, was now completely toast. Jamie was still okay, but I thought I had him. Still, if I could finish off the Colossus, I'd have attained a glorious, dominating victory. It was a tight finish. On my final turn, the Colossus had an 8 supporter (the Kraken), the Gorgon had a 2, the Ettin had the Behemoth (10), and the Wyrm was still empty. All I had was pretty low cards, so I played my 4 Wyrm and managed to wipe out the Kraken, which left him and the Gorgon tied at 2. Lee had the opportunity to kill one of them off, and in the hunt for second place he chose to kill off the Colossus, as he had no bets on him.
Jamie groaned, and I coasted to victory. Had Lee wiped out the Gorgon instead, I would have lost 5 points (and dropped to 13), Jamie would have lost 2 but gained 5 for a total of 12; victory was mine in any case, but it would have been very very close.
The secret bets were on the Wyrm (me and Jamie), and the Daimon (Lee). My combination of monster powers was pretty devastating, and I manipulated them every round. Lee didn't use the Troll very well - he tried to use him more long-term, and the Colossus and the Daimon just weren't as easy to manipulate, though Jamie did use the Colossus well once. The Unicorn and Seraphim never had much of a chance.