Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Tuesday 10th October
In attendance:
Huw Morris
Ralph Grimble
Simon Canter
Steve Sykes
Janet Rintoul
Adrian Barnard
Rick Appleton
Simon Waldman
Tom Fowler
Tom was joining us for the first time. Ralph had bought a copy of Goa, and kept quiet about it. We've been waiting for this reprint for so long, it's aquired an almost mythical status. To say I was pleased is a bit of an understatement! Goa only takes four players, so Ralph, me, Simon C and Steve played that, while the rest played a 5-player Settlers Cities and Knights.
Goa
Ralph and I had played before, but Simon and Steve had not. I think we must have done a pretty good job of explaining, since they both picked the game up quickly and played very well.
I started with the flag. My strategy was to advance the card track as quickly as possible, and despite failing with my first attempt to found a colony, by the end of the second round, I had advanced all the way to the bottom of the card track. Steve was focussing on the money track, and had the most money all game. Simon was trying to advance all tracks equally for the bonus action, and Ralph was advancing the card/colonist/replenish tracks.
Mid game, I think I was a bit stingy in my bids. In particular I needed to have bid more aggressively to secure a pepper plantation, to allow me to advance the replenish track more easily. That's always the way with auction games for me - I'd rather lose the item than overpay (especially when that money goes to another player rather than the bank!) and I'm a weaker player for it. I was also having great difficulty winning any auction that involved extra actions, and that can be fatal. There was one turn when Ralph, Simon and Steve all held three action cards, when I had none. That was the point when I realised I probably couldn't win the game.
By the end of the game, everybody had managed to establish all four colonies except me. A first turn failure followed by generally sub-par colonists on the cards proved hard to recover from. One notable settlement came when Simon took a gamble and attempted to colonize Calicutt, needing 5 colonists from the cards - and got them, the lucky swine! I had two 4-point bonuses, and Steve had a 3 point bonus. I can't remember who had 1 point plantation bonuses, but I think it was just Steve and Simon. Steve also had the bonus for most money, unsurprisingly.
Final scores: Steve 45, Huw 39, Simon 38, Ralph 37. (I announced 37 at the time, but looking back I didn't add on the 2 points from my cards, which propels me from joint last to second..)
Cities and Knights
(report by Adrian)
Huw Morris
Ralph Grimble
Simon Canter
Steve Sykes
Janet Rintoul
Adrian Barnard
Rick Appleton
Simon Waldman
Tom Fowler
Tom was joining us for the first time. Ralph had bought a copy of Goa, and kept quiet about it. We've been waiting for this reprint for so long, it's aquired an almost mythical status. To say I was pleased is a bit of an understatement! Goa only takes four players, so Ralph, me, Simon C and Steve played that, while the rest played a 5-player Settlers Cities and Knights.
Goa
Ralph and I had played before, but Simon and Steve had not. I think we must have done a pretty good job of explaining, since they both picked the game up quickly and played very well.
I started with the flag. My strategy was to advance the card track as quickly as possible, and despite failing with my first attempt to found a colony, by the end of the second round, I had advanced all the way to the bottom of the card track. Steve was focussing on the money track, and had the most money all game. Simon was trying to advance all tracks equally for the bonus action, and Ralph was advancing the card/colonist/replenish tracks.
Mid game, I think I was a bit stingy in my bids. In particular I needed to have bid more aggressively to secure a pepper plantation, to allow me to advance the replenish track more easily. That's always the way with auction games for me - I'd rather lose the item than overpay (especially when that money goes to another player rather than the bank!) and I'm a weaker player for it. I was also having great difficulty winning any auction that involved extra actions, and that can be fatal. There was one turn when Ralph, Simon and Steve all held three action cards, when I had none. That was the point when I realised I probably couldn't win the game.
By the end of the game, everybody had managed to establish all four colonies except me. A first turn failure followed by generally sub-par colonists on the cards proved hard to recover from. One notable settlement came when Simon took a gamble and attempted to colonize Calicutt, needing 5 colonists from the cards - and got them, the lucky swine! I had two 4-point bonuses, and Steve had a 3 point bonus. I can't remember who had 1 point plantation bonuses, but I think it was just Steve and Simon. Steve also had the bonus for most money, unsurprisingly.
Final scores: Steve 45, Huw 39, Simon 38, Ralph 37. (I announced 37 at the time, but looking back I didn't add on the 2 points from my cards, which propels me from joint last to second..)
Cities and Knights
(report by Adrian)
Variation: we seemed to be missing around 3 tiles! So the island was a
little smaller than usual - for 5 players this was not as constricting
as it might have been for 6.
There were okay spots for all dotted around the island, ore was likely
to be the least prevalent resource given it's 12, 12, 3, 4 and 11
numbers and placement, clay was likely the next most rare due to it's
mere 3 tiles, the numbers here being poor too.
Rick gained an early lead - 5/13 lent itself to a lot of early flak from
the other players. Janet seemed to be doing the majority of the robbing
and swindling of people, especially as her trade abilities rose on the
'calendar'.
Tom made a conscious effort to stay behind to use the cards he had, an
error in my view, I feel that moving to the front in mid game with such
cards in reserve for catch up if required is a better manoeuvre.
Allowing the barbarians to burn your city down when you could have taken
two more with you was an 'interesting tactic!' He only got to use one
action card to gain two resource cards from one other player, once it
became obvious we weren't going to complete the game. Not revealing his
'printers' card lost him a point to a spy as well.
Rick suffered from the early lead he gained and therefore the early take
down, he'd managed to seriously advance his 'calendar' and expand his
road network to some good locations.
Janet suffered as did others from the early arrival of the ship borne
barbarians, more so having only one city, most of the rest of the game
Janet had to make do with settlements, and creating strife for other
players.
Simon had a steady game but ended up a bit boxed in, not disastrously so
but restricting none the less. He also seemed to be Janet's main
thievery target.
Adrian gained a very early city and managed to get a double knight ahead
of barbarian arrival so retained this edge. However whilst having all
resources the numbers were poor and the likely expansion numbers were
poor. Upon realisation that we'd come nowhere near completing the game,
due to very hard trading, Adrian stole Ricks trader to bring him up to
the same points as Tom's points grab longest road build.
The final points likely don't reflect the end, Rick was set to expand
well with good numbers at his attained build sites and the calendar
means to have a good advantage over all. Adrian's and Tom's scores were
merely boosted 'cos they could be. Simon also had good numbers at his
restricted sites.
Mid game close:
Adrian:8 3 cities, 1 points card, trader. (level 3 knights)
Tom: 8 1 city, 4 settlement, longest road. (aqueduct)
Simon: 7 3 cities, 1 settlement.
Janet: 6 1 city, 4 settlements.
Rick: 5 2 cities, 1 settlement. (3:1 port, 2:1 commodities, aqueduct)
# posted by Huw @ 1:11 pm 
