B20: Rob had a game that looked like Streetcar. I was interested in playing it and we were able to get Dave and Steve to join. This is a tile-laying game with the object is to create long stretches of tracks for your trolleys. Each tile the trolley traverses the player scores a point and if your trolley ends at a center depot then it doubles the score. One of the strategies was to close an opponent's loop to minimize this score and it was usually the player with the most trolleys on the board. Dave was the first victim of this strategy but everyone got a taste of it. Rob was looking like he had the game locked up when Steve got a 24 point score and squeaked by Rob for the game. I liked this game because it was puzzle-like and had lots of screw your opponent maneuvers. I bought it!
Steve (68), Rob S. (66), Me (49), Dave F. (46)

B20: Went over the rules for all since most had only played this game once and that was a long time ago. Dave L started by exploring the tile next to the start tile while I head up to the top edge for my exploration. Rob and Dave F headed to the other edge. Everyone ran into adventure tiles but I had an easier time of getting the goods that I need to complete them. Dave F saw what I was doing and concentrate in hooking up his path with mine. I got to the temple, which was surrounded by adventure tiles. Only Dave F got there a turn later and Dave L got there in the last turn. Spent the rest of the game doing adventures but only succeeded in getting one chip for 3 points.
Finish Me (22), Rob S. (17), Dave L. (16), Dave F. (15)

B20: Played a cute race game about hedgehogs. The board is a 9-column, 6-row grid with each row identified by a number. Each player begins with 4 tokens (hedgehogs). During a turn, you roll a die and move any hedgehog in the row your rolled forward one space. You may move one of your hedgehogs one row up or down before or after moving a hedgehog. Some squares contain tar pits with prohibits movement of the hedgehog until all hedgehogs are at that column or further. First player to get three to the finish line wins. This was fun game with heavy opponent screwage. Unless you can break out early, any lead chip will be at the bottom of the pile. This leads to a leapfrogging situation so you're always trying to avoid being in the bottom since only the top chip of a stack can move. Kelli got off to good start as she rolled the same number several turns in a row. Adam got two of his hedgehogs stuck on a 2nd column tar pit. Everyone was able to get one hedgehog to the finish line. Steve got his second in and it looked like he was going to win. The other opponents buried him and Adam with his rear hedgehogs was able to leapfrog to the win. I ended the race with two of my remaining tokens in the pits. Nobody liked me.
Adam S. (3), Steve (2), Pat (2), Me (1), Kelli P. (1), Scott H. (1)

B20: Played bluff while we waited for the other group to finish. In both games it came down to Scott four dice against my one.
Scott H., Me, Adam S., Pat, Kelli P., Steve
Scott H., Me, Kelli P., Steve, Pat

B20: Pat was the newbie. We played three rounds. I had consistent scoring but Steve had one huge scoring round.
Steve (82), Me (80), Kelli P. (76), Pat (72)

B20: Broke in my new filler. Went over the rules for everyone. A Couple of hand into the game we felt we were doing something wrong, the king had no food. I asked Adam if we were doing something wrong. The only thing wrong was we were playing with our hand face up. I guess that when we realized that if the king doesn't get fed we don't get points. So we began taking mystery meat (blind draw form the deck) so the king's portions would build up. It worked. It felt better but I think the three player game needs a tweak
Evan (79), Me (76), Dave (67)

B20: Broke in Adam's new game. Simple game, nice bits and a movement mechanism that is similar to Mancala. During a turn a player selects a group of spaceships on a planet. He moves it to the next planet and drops off a ship. Repeat until no ships are left. There are three sizes of ships and the large one are the first to be dropped off and the smallest are the last, otherwise the player has a choice on which ship to drop off. Some spaces are not planets but black holes. A ship that is dropped off on a black hole is removed from play. The game continues until one player has no ships left. Big ships score 4 points; medium 3 points and small are worth 1 point. Additionally players get four chips that can be used to take an extra turn or move a ship on space in between other player's turns. The game started with Jim getting hammered but then Kyle started the "he's so winning" chant and everybody got black holed. Everybody had a few ships left so people started using theirs chips. Jim was the unlucky one to have no ships left.
Me (8), Adam S. (8), Kyle (5), Jim (0)

Somewhere in Maine: Poor Vitas broke his arm and he needed my help to drive him up to Maine. There I met his Lithuanian cousin and some of her friends with strange names like ghev-ve-lay, gid-dre, and oh-auk-ta. We had some time to kill before returning to Boston so we played a game of Metro. Vitas was wary since it looked like Streetcar, which is a game he hated. After the first round Vitas didn't understand why I was giving him points. I explained that I was really reducing his point potential. After that he start hammering my point potential. He also got two very long paths both over 20 points. I lucked out that the Vitas' final tile gave me a loop that increased my score by 5 points. Vitas enjoyed the game and would be willing to play again.
Me (121), Vitas (118)

Al's: Scheduling conflicts forced Al to shift his gaming session up one week. Better than going three Wed without a game night. I taught the group this new game. When Dimitri went to pick up more wine when the king had no win, I knew he didn't pay attention the first time around. Lucky for him I was nice enough to explain it to him again. Chicken was the dish of the game, there were seven portions for the king, and everything else had less than three. Al had two portions and Maria had four.
Maria (50) Al (42) Me (36) Dimitri (35) Steve (31)

Al's: Al and Dimitri ran out to get the pizza and calzones. We played a quick game of Zirkus. Steve got a trio. I had nine of the ten colors early but lime green just wasn't coming up for me. I was almost tempted in playing a trio when the lime green card showed up.
Me (53) Maria (50) Steve (45)

Al's: Starting Order: Maria, Dimitri, Me, Steve, Al
Maria needed a rules refresher, since it has been many moons since she played this one. I started off by building an indigo plant and tobacco storage. I got tobacco production going by the fourth turn. After that I got sugar and corn going so the next step was to buy the factory. I got it just in time too, Maria bought one and Steve was foaming at the mouth for the other. I thought it was a weird choice for him since he was going heavy corn whore, having 4 corn plantations. The only problem for Steve was he didn't get the Wharf early enough to rack up the points. Dimitri had the trader set up going smoothly with coffee, office and markets. He used all that money to build two large buildings, the Residence and City Hall. I picked up the Guild Hall, Al the Custom House and Maria the Fortress. Dimitri and I ended in a tie but lucky for me I made a final turn sale of my tobacco for five doubloons. I beat him in the tiebreaker by two.
Me (44) Dimitri (44) Maria (36) Steve (36) Al (32)

B20: This group likes tile-laying games so I pushed this one. Within a turn, I showed people that the game is partially a game of reducing other opponents point potential by placing a tile so that Steve and Maria scored three points. Roberto thought that was nice of me so I had to explain to him the concept. The group caught one and it was one fun "hose-fest" except we all ignored Dimitri until it was too late. Some how he had set up three of his trains to have some long runs. One of them went 15 tiles into the center depot to score 30 points. Not sure if Dimitri is a pattern matching savant or if the game is broken with 6. I will have to play some more to make that determination.
Dimitri (67) Me (40) Roberto (35) Maria (31) Steve (29) Al (22)

B20: Dimitri might be a pattern-matching savant but he sucks with numbers. In the first round he broke Siano record of 43 points in one hand by five points. Part of the reason he got so many points was the final hand of the first round. One column had been hosed since the beginning of the game. It was full of color and it 102 in the lead. I seriously thought I was going to get that card since I had the 104. I was ecstatic when Dimitri played the 103. He was able to stem the point flow in the next two rounds so that he was not in last place. Maria had a bad third hand, which sent her over the top to end the game.
Roberto (10) Me (18) Steve (51) Al (55) Dimitri (57) Maria (67)

Al's: Went to Tennessee's for Lunch. I brought along a couple quick games, just in case. Ilise and Craig were interested in playing King's Breakfast. I went over the rules for them. I also decided to use the variant for 3-players that I found on the BGG. It uses one less card for all suits and one additional card on the deal. It seemed to work since the king got more food this time.
Me (115), Craig (90), Ilise (87)

Holly's: Holly decided to have a last minute game night. She got five, which is pretty good for such a short notice. I brought along ice cream, so Holly could make her famous mudslides. She was out of Bailey's so I ran out to get some. When I got back they were playing Money. I jumped in after the first round. I was given 520 points for the first hand. How nice of them, they should've given me points equal to the low score. My last hand was a sweet one, three cards shy of two full sets plus three 20s of another suit for another hundred points.
Me (520+370+830=1720), Annette (750+520+380=1650), Holly (660+490+370=1520), Matt (480+460+510=1450), Chet (370+500+390=1260)

Holly's: Holly wanted to break in her copy of Mamma Mia. I went over the rules for the newbies, Matt, Annette and Chet. During the first round Chet had trouble figuring out the game. He couldn't visualize how the ingredients were going to be used to make a pizza. After the first round of pizza making Chet got it. Holly and I had the lead with a couple completed pizzas. During the second round, Holly and I again completed a couple more pizzas. I busted out on the third round with three more pizzas. Holly sneaked in and finished her bombastico making my bombastico the only pizza I didn't finish. Chet didn't like this game, saying it up there with Puerto Rico, which is a game he doesn't enjoy.
Me (7), Chet (4), Holly (4), Matt (3), Annette (3)

Holly's: Annette and Matt were wary of the game since they, like Vitas, don't like Streetcar. The game got off to a quick start in the screwage department and Chet got the raw deal.
Holly (46), Matt (45), Me (43), Annette (32), Chet (24)

Holly's: Holly saw the box and thought the sheep were cute. I went over the rules for them. Annette and Matt made the 6 nimmt connection. Holly technically had the worst hand because she had the most life preservers while I had the best hand with three life preservers. The first round was chaotic as people figured out the strategies. Holly did the best with her hand losing no preservers and got the low flood card bonus. The game settled down in the later rounds with no real surprises other than I drowned using Matt initial hand, which was played well by other players. It was a close one with Annette making a final round surge.
Annette (2+4+1+4+6=17) , Holly (7+3+0+5+1=16), Me (1+4+4+1-1=9), Chet (-1+0+5+1+4=9), Matt (1+0+1+0+1=3)

Holly's: Annette and Matt pushed for Klunker. Went over the rules for Holly and Chet. Looking the results of the game you'd figure I was the newbie. My draws were horrible. I never got more than three of a set so I was forced to buy four cards from Matt just to complete a couple of sets.
Chet (14), Annette (14), Holly (12), Matt (9), Me (3)

Holly's: Last week, Holly and Chet learned how to play Alhambra and were interested in playing it again. Annette had brought along her copy just in case there was interest in playing. I guess I used up my luck while playing Mamma Mia. I couldn't get exact matches to buy building while Matt and Chet were going hog-wild buying buildings. After the first scoring round I was dead last with zero points. The wait paid off as I was able to buy lots of buildings with my wad of cash. I got back into the building race but wasn't able to build a long wall. By the end Matt had completely enclosed his Alhambra.
Matt (95), Chet (84), Me (76), Annette (69), Holly (71)

Holly's: Closer for the night. The group liked it.
Holly (69), Me (66), Chet (57), Annette (52), Matt (43)

SN@C: Played a couple of quick games while we waited for Rob to arrive. First up was Money, which was Todd's first play. Everybody won one round but I had the biggest winning score and was able to keep the other score consistent.
Me (520+990+520=2030), Chris (860+470+690=2020), Todd (530+530+860=1920)

SN@C: Started setting up Tal Der Konige but we still had no Rob. We decided to give Coloretto a try. I was very lucky in this game, getting the right cards to give me two full sets and one with five cards. I had some negative points but they didn't hamper my victory.
Me (56), Chris (46), Todd (40)

SN@C: Starting order Rob, Me, Chris, Todd
Well I finally get to break in Tal, a game I had acquired on my last Adam-Spielt order. Object of the game is to score points by building pyramids, the more homogenous the better. Pyramids are built using cubes that are acquired by a blind bidding process. After the bidding is done, each player secretly plot their overseers movement and then reveal it simulatenously. After the overseers have moved then each player will move their workers in turn order. After movement, players determine if any blocks and/or sites can be stolen. The final phase is to build pyramids at sites with a player's workers. Any unused blocks are used to build the Pharaoh's pyramid which when completed ends the game.
Chris had a bad start as he didn't win any of his bids while Todd and Rob grabbed two sets each. I had one set. Rob and Todd went for grabbing the larger sites but couldn't move enough workers to use all their blocks. I proceeded to grab two small sites and completed two pyramids by the end of the second turn. Todd had two solid color pyramids and was building a large layered one. I should have concentrated on attacking his sites to steal blocks but my workers were busy building my large pyramid. Rob made an aggressive move and stole a site owned by Chris. Realizing I couldn't finish another large pyramid, I figured I just end the game after the fifth round. Chris and Todd finished their large pyramids just in time.
Todd (17), Rob (14), Me (10), Chris (5)

SN@C: A game requested by Chris. Went over the rules for the guys. Those BGG phase cards I printed really make the explanations easier. I also remember to mention the errata for the Deluge card, which is something that I usually forget. Chris, early on, figured that his approach was to build a hearty beast. Todd whether on purpose or just by accident did an event card strategy. Rob got the mutant gene early and used that to force our bids up. I went for the movement strategy eventually getting three legs. My initial card draws were climate control, which I usually use to wipe out opponent's dinosaur but in this game I didn't seem to have the killer touch. At the end Chris was able to keep a nice herd of dino alive to keep his lead.
Chris (52), Todd (48), Rob (47), Me (45)

SN@C: We settled on playing this mainly cause I hadn't played Giganten yet and it was kind of late. The game started out friendly as people concentrated on extending their tracks. We made a couple of placement mistakes during the first couple of turns but we fixed them. Then the screwage commenced and Chris was getting a hefty dose of it. Chris was not enjoying the game, whether it was the beating he was taking or cause it was a pattern matching game. With all my lines were complete so I started to concentrate on making sure the Todd couldn't surpass me. I was so close too.
Todd (60), Me (58), Rob (39), Chris (36)

SN@C: Final game of the night. I only picked two tiles before the first scoring round and scored on both building types. Chris was getting really lucky, as he just seemed to be able to buy a tile every turn. He soon ran into wall problems and had to spend several turns moving tiles on his Alhambra. I was able to concentrate on keeping dominance in tower buildings and tied in several others. I connected my walls to get a long chain. I too was starting to have wall problems but it was late in the game so it didn't really hurt my game that much.
Me (106), Rob (99), Chris (94), Todd (83)

Online: It had been a long while since we played online. The first wave of barbarians hammered Lloyd and me. The next wave of barbarians took out James. I was able to rebuild my city first and that gave me the big advantage. I got the longest road, defended catan three times and upgraded four of my five settlements to cities.
Me (14), James (7), Lloyd (4)

Online: After playing my best round of golf, I went over to Ilise for dinner. After dinner, Ilise suggested we play a game of City and Knights. John got of to a smoking start. He got lots of rolls on numbers next to his city, which was centered on hexes containing a Sheep, Ore and Woods. Needless to say he was moving up the city developed on all three technologies. He also cranked out lots of knights and picked up two defender points. A start like that is just asking for some pain, which he got. Ilise challenged John's knight dominance and succeeded in scoring two defender points. Ilise was near victory when she got longest road and a green metro. I scored a yellow metro just to make my score look good. Ilise ran away with it a turn later.
Ilise (13), Me (10), John (7)

B20 Well I usually take a short nap before going to B20 but this time it wasn't short. I arrived at B20 about an hour later than my usual time. There were three milling around deciding on a game. With my arrival, Richard pushed for Medina and I'm always game for a first play. Simple game. Each turn you play two pieces and the game has several methods of scoring. It reminded me of several Knizia's games. I started by securing the highest scoring palace and a high scoring wall section. I misunderstood several of the rules that made me lose those chips. One of them was think that when the third palace is taken the remaining palace belongs to the fourth player, which was not the case. Another opps was when the game was supposed to end. I thought it was the first player to run out of pieces. In the end Richard got 6 of the 8 bonus scoring chips.
Richard (51), Dave (36), Me (28), Evan (25)

B20 I was hungry so I headed out for food. When I came back everybody was involved so I sat around and waited for an opening. It wasn't long and I joined a group to play a quick card game. Well it wasn't quick cause no one really played bad enough to give up big points. After five hands Dave the leader with 8 points, I was the closest with 28 and Terry was dead last with a score in the 40s. It wasn't until the tenth hand that Dave's lucky finally gave way. Two hours and 12 hands, the magic number was broached.
Adam (59), Me (80), Terry (112), Dave F (113)

B20 Dave pushed Elfenland. I was looking to add more people but Dave said that four was the best. I thought it was going to be kind of limiting but it did work out fine. Jim and I took a similar path while Dave and Kelli both took solitary paths. Everyone one picked up 6 tokens in the first round. The third round is where I was able to outdistance the other players. At that point I had 17 points, everyone else had less than 14. My problem was the there was no way I was going to pick up more than two while Dave was looking good for a run. I had used my obstacle the previous turn so I didn't even have a way to slow him down. Jim for some odd reason decided to hose Kelli, which really pissed her off.
Me (19), Jim (18), Dave F (17), Kelli (16)

Online: John put his city in the right place. The rolls came up so often that he acquired the green metro on his fourth turn. It was definitely looking like a quick victory for John, but I should know better. In the early part of the game my knight was stolen (defection) and I lost my city to the barbarians. James and Lloyd proceeded to hammer on John. John's lucky rolls abandoned him for James. James got plenty of ore rolls and was able to upgrade his settlements and he got the blue metro. James got control of the longest road and the trader for the victory. I struggled in this game due to a serious lack of wheat. I was able to rebuild my city only to lose it to the barbarians in the end game.
James (13), John (10), Lloyd (6), Me (4)

GSG: Mark said he was expecting nine so we milled around for about half an hour. Phil finally suggested we start playing and I just had to pushed my new game. I quickly punched out the tokens from the spruce and set up the game, half expecting a flood of people to arrive. No one else arrived so we started the game as a three player. Both Mark and Phil had claimed they hadn't play in a long while. Everybody went for their nearby three point watering holes. I managed to claim a very large area with one off my caravans, capturing 6 points in water holes plus about 10 points in hexes. Mark also managed to zone of an area to the dismay of Phil. I was on the verge of capping off two more zones but Phil noticed it and chose to end the game. Phil and Mark got two each of the 10-point longest caravan awards and I got other one.
Me (83), Mark (71), Phil (63)

GSG: Eric and Jan arrived just as were finishing Durch Die Wüste. The next game was a negotiation game. I wasn't looking forward to playing it since I tend to suck at that type of game. Simple mechanics. Each turn, players will randomly be dealt a set of locations, variable through out the game. From this set of locations, the player can only keep a certain number of them, variable through out the game. The kept locations are marked by the player's colored tokens on the board. Next the player receives business tiles. Then the wheeling and dealing begins. Players can make trades for tiles, locations and/or money. After the negotiations are complete, players are allowed to place tiles on their locations. Players collect income for each their business on the board. This is done six times, the player with the most money wins.
During the fifth turn I gave the game away to Mark when he made me an offer and I stupidly accepted. I should have seen that he needed my two tiles to complete a business that would score huge points for him, 28k in the long run. I got a tile that gave me 2k in the long run.
Mark (101), Yan (96), Phil (92), Me (80), Eric (76)

GSG: Dice rolling, stock speculation game in which being the banker sucks. Yeah, I was the banker. It looks that my previous games of shark were played wrong. According to the rules, each player starts with a share of stock. This was the new version so maybe we were playing using the old rules. Phil and I both took green stock and everybody else had a unique stock. I believe that helped us early since there were two people interested in growing the green hotels. I got off to a quick start because green was rolled twice in the first turn and I started speculating on yellow, which paid off. Initially blue was absent from the rolls but when they came there were plenty of them. Blue had lots of singletons on the board so everybody started speculated on blue. As a result, blue grew to become the dominant chain. I capped off the game by growing blue to fifteen and destroying a three yellow chain in the process. I didn't notice that Yan was the big shareholder having twice as much blue as anyone else. I gave another game away!!! Ugghhh.
Yan (369), Phil (342), Me (339), Mark (313), Eric (310)

Al's: Taught my latest acquisition to the group. I was a bonehead during placement, placing three of my caravans within two hexes of each other. Al and Steve had some good placement and were both able to seal off a good chunk of real estate. Only one of my threesome group was able to grow to an acceptable length, the other two got sealed in. I tried to get two long caravan routes but only succeeded in getting one. Al got one of the routes and the rest of the caravan routes went to Steve.
Steve (83), Al (69), Maria (62), Me (56)

Al's: We decided to play a quick four player while we waited for Roberto's arrival and it also allowed Maria put the kids to sleep. This game belonged to Steve. He handily beat us in the first round and was one short from victory after the second round. We collectively tried to prevent Steve from winning but to completely shutout a player is nearly impossible.
Steve (28), Me (26), Al (23), Dimitri (22)

Al's: Everybody was present, well fed and ready to learn a new game. It's always a fun play with a newbie but with five I was expecting some crazy action. To my surprise, people were very cautious with their bids resulting in a well-played game. The game came down to a bidding session between Steve and I. He tried to force me into overpaying for a card that would win me the weight race. Since the card didn't really help him I let him which resulted in enough of a point swing for me to win the game. People were very positive about the game and Steve was already talking about buying the game from Amazon.com. Dimitri was the only person who didn't enjoy it.
Me (95), Maria (92), Roberto (92), Steve (83), Al (80), Dimitri (74)

Al's: I only had one other six-player game and it was one that hadn't been played for quite some time. Al was on fire! He made his first eight bids; some bids were in the fours and threes. I on the other hand was ice, missing my first three bids for -30 points. Even the newbie Dimitri was way ahead of me. Either Al's luck ran out or maybe people started to play him nasty. Al lost enough points for Maria and Steve for a three-way tie.
Steve, Al, Maria (210), Roberto (120), Me (100), Dimitri (80)

B20: Campbell and I got off to a good start with both of us getting an extra mole to the second level. The second level was the equalizer with everybody getting two moles into the third level. I wasn't able to get one of my moles into a hole so I was knocked out of the final level.
Dave F, Adam, Campbell, Me

B20: We debated on whether to play a six player or two three-player games. We finally settled on a game of Wizard. I again started badly, missing my first two bids. Steve was doing great and it was his first play. About half way through the game Steve started to falter. This allowed Terry and Adam to move into first place and remained there until the final hand. Terry was able to make an additional bid for the extra ten points.
Terry (190), Adam (180), Dave F, Campbell (150), Steve, Me (120)

B20: We finally had enough players for multiple games. We started a game of Age of Steam, which most of us had only played a few times. Except for Adam, the first turn was good for everyone. I was able to make three jump deliveries by the third turn, which is the earliest that I've achieved it. Adam looked like he was in trouble, as he had to sell more shares to stay afloat. His desperation hurt me since he targeted the same sites and he always seemed to be one step ahead of me. As a result my track became a closed loop. Adam got his train link to the max, I stalled at four but even if I could have increased it my closed loop would prevent me from taking advantage of it.
Adam (74), Dave (68), Nick (65), Me (55)

B20: Greece (me), Babylon (Campbell), Egypt (Dave F), Carthage (Adam), Rome (Nick)
We had four to play Mare Nostrum and were waiting for a fifth. Terry and Kyle were playing Bang and wanted to play our game. We told them the first to die gets dibs. Campbell was the first to die and joined us much to the dismay of Kyle. We played with the advanced set up rules. Four turns for set up, in which each player will buy 9 points worth of units. During setup everybody except Adam chose to buy their leader. Roman was the Commerce directory for the first couple of turn and he didn't want anyone trading. He used that to his advantage to buy more caravans. The military leadership shifted between Carthage and Egypt. On the third turn Egypt invaded the Greek Island of Cnossus. The Greeks tried to take it back but failed. On turn five Nick decided that trading was in order and he set it at six. I was able to acquire enough resources to build the last available city but Egypt surprised us all by building the Pyramids.
Dave F (Pyramids), Nick, Campbell, Me (1), Adam (0)

B20: Next up a game of Puerto Rico. I decided that I would avoid doing the Factory strategy but couldn't quite figure what other strategy to approach. My game was ,as Adam said, "Sub Optimal". I didn't ship, my trading was weak and I only bought one large building, the Customhouse. Nick and Campbell did the factory strategy with Nick making it work much better than Campbell. Adam went corn whore and tobacco for cash. Dave F had the markets and could sell corn for big bucks. Nick picked up the Guildhall, Dave bought the Fort and City Hall.
Dave F (45-4), Nick (45), Adam (38), Campbell (28), Me (26)

B20: Play three hands of Trans. I continued my trend of "Sub-Optimal" play!!! Bad luck? Brain off? Cursed for playing Medici with 5 newbies? Who knows!!!
Nick, Campbell (7), Dave F (5), Adam (2), Me (0)

B20: Well, it was getting pretty late but there were still enough players hungering for one more. Terry would only stay if game were Traum, which made the choice easy. In the first round, the first actor (Errol Flynn) available was a zero star tile. Kyle bought it for big bucks. He would later lament his decision since it didn't pay off in the first party and he had trouble keeping up in the actor race. I only had one actor through most of the game and I usually went last at the party. By the end of the third round, I was able to finish a strong comedy. In the fourth round, I was able to get a lot of three that finished another two movies leaving one with an open anything spot. I got lucky and had a decent pick for the final movie. I had a choice between taking a three star tile that would make an 11 point movie or a 2 star tile that would make a 3 point movie. All the previous numbers had been used. Since it would get me the worst movie, I picked the 2-star tile. Keeping points away from other players, that was my thought!! I got the worst movie and best comedy. Terry had the Best Action and Best Direction. The best Drama belonged to Kyle.
Me (79), Terry (66), Kyle (62), Paul (58), Jim (40)

SOG: I arrived at Chip's house to find Vitas, Chip and Sarah doing nothing and for awhile we were just sitting there doing nothing. Chip had a card game (Sherlock Holmes) but no one seemed interested so I pulled out Land Unter. I knew that Chip would like it since it had sheep. Sarah and I got off to a strong start while Chip and Vitas both drowned. Chip figured it out after the first round and had positive scores for the rest of the game. Vitas was a little slower, drown once and the was on the verge of drown as the hand ended. Vitas finished off with the highest scoring hand but he had too many negative hands.
Sarah(3+2+4-1=8), Chip (-1+4+2+2=7), Me (3+1+3-1=6), Vitas (-1+0-1+5=3)

SOG: We were getting ready to play "Meine Schape, Deine Schape" when Chris arrived. Josh was itching to play "Modern Zeiten" and most of us half heartily agreed. It turns out that I've been playing this game incorrectly. Apparently a player cannot jump to the end spot, if there any uncovered locations before him. It stretches the game out, adds some tension, and almost guarantees that the grid will be filled. Not sure if I like it this way. Well Rob kicked out butts in this game, he got New York for six points and a few of the industries. Chris had bad luck, having trouble securing a dominant share position to place a tile on the grid.
Rob (13),Josh, Me (9), Mark (8), Chris (3)

SOG: Since Chris got spanked he decided that he should pick the next game. Josh, Rob and Mark were first time players. After the first round Josh had a commanding lead with 31, Chris was next with 19, follow by my 14, Rob's 11 and Mark's 6 points. The next two turns were the worst I've ever had. Most of my hands ended with three way ties for no action. When I did get something it was usually a barter situation and I was not trading well. I finished the game with the same number of points that I had after the first round. Ughhhh!!!
Josh (74), Chris (56), Mark (50), Rob (46), Me (14)

SOG: The night was drawing to a close and the loser (me) picked Bluff.
Starting order Me, Rob, Mark, Josh, Chris
We started with six dice each. My neighbors, Rob and Chris, lost their dice quickly. The rest can be better described by Rob's commentary from a Unity Games session report.

[Elkind, Rob] Ralph put on the most impressive displays of a head to head final I've ever seen, He had four dice to Josh's five and in five quick successive rounds eliminated Josh one die at a time without losing one die himself. It was like watching Minnesota Fats against some two bit pool hustler. Josh, don't feel bad, you still finished ahead of me.

SOG: Chris had some more time to burn so we decided to break in his copy of LotR:The Confrontation. I had played once and he had been reading about this game for the past month so we just jumped in. Both games were won by black. The first was a game of attrition and once Frodo was identified, the black rider flew in to take care of business. The second game was a black rush to the shire. Frodo got over the mountains to Fangorn but three black pieces got to the shire to end the game.
Game 1: Me (Black)
Game 2: Chris (Black)

SOG: After 9 holes of excellent played golf, Chris and I went to Piccadilly pub for dinner and few quick games. First up was LOTR: Confrontation. I was black and this time I couldn't stop Frodo from getting to Mordor. Looks like Chris figured out the needed strategy for white.

In the flip game I used the standard "Noble sacrifice" maneuvers and Boromiri to kill some of the stronger black pieces. The orcs found Frodo, game over! As we were getting ready to leave the pub, I read a line of the strategy guide that Frodo can use his special ability to escape the orcs. So I could have escaped!!! Asterisk game!!!
Game 1: Chris (White)
Game 2: Chris (Black)

SOG: Played three hands of MR1. In the first hand I went out rather early leaving Chris a big hand of negative points. I got the vote right, so I had 45 points to Chris's 12. Chris played better in the later hands but I had picked up too many points for him to catch up. Plus, I was on a winning steak when it came to the vote.
Me (122), Chris (84)

B20: Finally got a shot to play New England. Adam went over the rules since everyone else had never played before.
I was the initial start player. Figuring that cards were more important than tiles, I decided on a five/four split. Since I was the start player I picked the 1 gold per item chip. Boy was I wrong. The tiles disappear first and the left over cards were not worthwhile for me to acquire. I got nothing. I used my money advantage to secure an all-important pilgrim. Which game me a slight edge since pilgrim produce more income. Adam bought a barn early, which is the only piece that doesn't free move between the tiles. My first thought was the barns weren't really all that useful but I changed my mind after seeing the flexibility that it gave Adam during the game. Gregg was looking really looking strong as he locked up several large plots but I think that hurt him in the long run since he had limited tiles for his units. Adam developed his land to have a good ratio of tiles to units and used his barn to store a huge pasture, which he used at the end game.
Adam (36), Scott (32), Me (29), Gregg (28)

B20: Groups quickly got going on the next set of games. I ended up on a group that chose to play Formula De Mini. I decided to give it a try. We used Scott suggestion that reduce the number of damage points from 20 to 15. This is basically Formula De without the paper work. All damage points are now generic, the car crashes when it reaches negative one. Players can use the pit to recover damage points. When pitting, if a player roll is higher than his current damage number the value rolled becomes his new damage number and comes out of the pit in three gear. Otherwise he has to wait till the next turn. We had a three-lap race. After the first lap the game become a race for second. Jim just seemed to roll the perfect number to avoid heavy downshifting or damage. Scott and I were vying for second and Scott was able to scoot around the final turn for a clear shot to the finish line. I had enough damage to take up to a roll of 18 so I decided to go for it. I rolled a 20, my car disintegrated at the turn. Paul rolled to the finish line with no damage markers. Dave L was 1/2 lap behind third but at least he finished.
Jim, Scott, Paul, Dave L, Me (burnt to a crisp)

B20: The bidding had begun but the group was nice enough to let me in. Brian and I got off to a good start getting over 750 in the first race. After the second race I was still up there with Brian, Kelli was definitely in last place. The third race was the double pay out and Kelli picked the top winning horses for a come from behind victory.
Dawn, Kelli (2150), Me (1800), Brian (1650), Pat (1450)

B20: A quickie while we waited for other games to finish. Kelli and I were "trio happy" with both of us laying down three sets. Brian finished the game with the gala but Dawn had lots of seven and sixes in her hand.
Dawn (56), Brian (51), Me (50), Kelli (46)

B20: Still waiting for the other games to finish so we decided to play Money until someone finished. We only played one hand. Dawn did not like this game at all. Brian also learned that he was playing wrong. He didn't realize that turn order changes if a player swaps currency with another player. I headed home since I had to drive to NJ in the morning.
Brian (600), Dawn (290), Me (270), Pat (190), Kelli (100)

Vacation: Lloyd was itching to play SOC. I figured I could get PT interested in this game. Went over the rules for PT and his son, Thomas. Lloyd and I tried to give the newbies a break by place the robber only on each other tiles. Thomas picked up on the dev card strategy and used that to get largest army. I built lots of settlements and upgraded three to cities. Took the longest road for victory.
Me (10), Lloyd (8), Thomas (6), PT (5)

Vacation: Next up was one of my favorite games and this ex-MIT bunch should have a good time with it. The game is about bluffing (lying) and aren't little kids supposes to tell the truth? Not a game for a little boy (Thomas).
Game 1: Me, PT, Rohan, Thomas

Saw Peter teaching Peggy the rules. I jumped in to make a better game. Guess I got cocky!
Game 2: Peggy, PT, Me

Bluff had caught PTs fancy. This time we got Lloyd, Rohan and Roseanne to play. Lloyd couldn't lie for squat, his wife has done a good job on him. Rohan on the other hand was a master of deception. He had no chance on the final face off since I had three dice to his one.
Game 3: Me, Rohan, Roseanne, PT, Lloyd

Vacation: I bought Quiddler with Roseanne in mind. She not much into strategy games but she'll play card games. She definitely had a knack for cranking out words. Not a bad game, a little down time but manageable.
Roseanne (278), Lloyd (246), Me (214), Thomas (202), PT (184)

Vacation: Pulled out another classic "reel in the newbie" game. As usually, the initial game was full of blunders. PT broke the one hand scoring record with 46 points. After the first game everybody wanted to play again. Peggy went to put the children to sleep, so Rohan took her spot.
Game 1:Roseanne (19), Peggy (44), Me (44), Kim (65), PT (75), Lloyd (80)
Game 2:Lloyd (25), Roseanne (31), Me (36), Kim (47), PT (50), Rohan (68)

Vacation: It was getting late but it didn't stop Lloyd and PT from wanting to play another game of SOC. I was the whipping boy in this game. Any and every time the robber came into play I would get hammered. I didn't tell PT that he was making a mistake to continue whacking me, I figured it be better if he saw it for himself. Once PT realized that it was Lloyd that needed to get smacked, it was too late. Lloyd cruised to victory.
Lloyd (10), PT (4), Me (3)