Sunday, November 19, 2006
Tuesday 31st October
In attendance:
Huw Morris
Ralph Grimble
Adrian Barnard
Simon Canter
Joe Platt
Halloween, and a surprise on walking into the pub - it was all decked out appropriately for the occasion: subdued lighting, skeletons and spiders on the wall, pumpkins, etc. This did make me fear that the pub was going to be busier and noisier than usual, but such fears were unfounded. The only slight problem was the darkness making it hard to distinguish the blue and green pieces.
El Grande
Simon and Joe had never played this before. Even though it's one of my favourites, I still had to scan the rules beforehand, it's been so long since we played it.
You know how there are some games you just never "get"? No matter how much you play, you never win the game? For some reason, El Grande is the opposite for me. I always seem to do pretty well at it. And so was the case tonight.
Right from the off, it was a straight battle between myself and Ralph. Adrian was stuck back with the debutants. Adrian actually had fewer pieces on the board, but was able to score more "efficiently" than either Simon or Joe.
By the end of the second scoring round (round 6) I had a big lead, and I feared that all the others would work together to deny me points. This didn't turn out to be a problem as Joe, Adrian and Simon were so far back that they knew they were battling for 3rd place, and left myself and Ralph alone to battle for the win. Ralph did manage to bring the lead down, but it wasn't enough and I held on for the win.
Final results: 1st Huw, 2nd Ralph, 3rd Simon and Joe, 5th Adrian.
Adrian adds:
There's evidently tactics better than I employ in this game given the lead Huw and Ralph took and increased upon during the game. Adrian managed to stay just ahead of the trailing pack throughout the mid game, gaining praise indeed for doing so well so economically! Read, hadn't managed to push many Caballeros onto the board, yet still somehow managed what was a good score with what I had.
From mid game onwards it was evident that there were two games, 1st / 2nd place and the following pack half way back round the track. The final scoring round saw my now just fourth place fall to last as Simon joined Joe 3 points ahead of me. Ralph made gains on Huw but ultimately Huw was too far ahead to reign in.
My one little victory in the game was to pull Joe back four points on the scoring round to joint third given his pieces were highly concentrated to win in three areas and three areas only, all Caballeros from one region must return to the provinces hit him hard as the last card of the game.
Given the Pub that night was celebrating Halloween we got to play the counters using a positional method for the blue and green ones at least. Or maybe they were saving electricity, the inflatable skeletons would however suggest it was Halloween. Torches next week?
Huw Morris
Ralph Grimble
Adrian Barnard
Simon Canter
Joe Platt
Halloween, and a surprise on walking into the pub - it was all decked out appropriately for the occasion: subdued lighting, skeletons and spiders on the wall, pumpkins, etc. This did make me fear that the pub was going to be busier and noisier than usual, but such fears were unfounded. The only slight problem was the darkness making it hard to distinguish the blue and green pieces.
El Grande
Simon and Joe had never played this before. Even though it's one of my favourites, I still had to scan the rules beforehand, it's been so long since we played it.
You know how there are some games you just never "get"? No matter how much you play, you never win the game? For some reason, El Grande is the opposite for me. I always seem to do pretty well at it. And so was the case tonight.
Right from the off, it was a straight battle between myself and Ralph. Adrian was stuck back with the debutants. Adrian actually had fewer pieces on the board, but was able to score more "efficiently" than either Simon or Joe.
By the end of the second scoring round (round 6) I had a big lead, and I feared that all the others would work together to deny me points. This didn't turn out to be a problem as Joe, Adrian and Simon were so far back that they knew they were battling for 3rd place, and left myself and Ralph alone to battle for the win. Ralph did manage to bring the lead down, but it wasn't enough and I held on for the win.
Final results: 1st Huw, 2nd Ralph, 3rd Simon and Joe, 5th Adrian.
Adrian adds:
There's evidently tactics better than I employ in this game given the lead Huw and Ralph took and increased upon during the game. Adrian managed to stay just ahead of the trailing pack throughout the mid game, gaining praise indeed for doing so well so economically! Read, hadn't managed to push many Caballeros onto the board, yet still somehow managed what was a good score with what I had.
From mid game onwards it was evident that there were two games, 1st / 2nd place and the following pack half way back round the track. The final scoring round saw my now just fourth place fall to last as Simon joined Joe 3 points ahead of me. Ralph made gains on Huw but ultimately Huw was too far ahead to reign in.
My one little victory in the game was to pull Joe back four points on the scoring round to joint third given his pieces were highly concentrated to win in three areas and three areas only, all Caballeros from one region must return to the provinces hit him hard as the last card of the game.
Given the Pub that night was celebrating Halloween we got to play the counters using a positional method for the blue and green ones at least. Or maybe they were saving electricity, the inflatable skeletons would however suggest it was Halloween. Torches next week?
# posted by Huw @ 2:45 pm 
