An interesting article from Greg Costikyan on "grognard capure":

All game styles run the risk of what I term 'grognard capture.'

'Grognard' was a slang term for members of Napoleon's Old Guard. Hardcore board wargamers adopted it as a term for themselves. By extention, grognard capture means capture of a game style by the hardest-core and most experienced players--to the ultimate exclusion of others.

The most extreme example I can think of is what happened to the Squad Leader series. Originally a relatively simple, accessible game of infantry combat in World War II, the publishers released supplement after supplement, each with new rules adding to the complexity of the game. Finally, they revamped it as 'Advanced Squad Leader,' publishing it in a loose-leaf binder so you could insert new rules as they were published, with systems as obscure and silly as the 'Sewer Emergence Table' and the 'Kindling Availability Table.'

I can think of other examples of 'grognard capture'. Card-driven wargames for example - compare the simplicity of We the People with the exception-fest that is Barbarossa to Berlin.

Last Sunday Dave John and Simon came over for a go at Taj Mahal. In spite of being wrecked from an overnight flight from the States, John showed his usual scary ability to quickly learn and then dominate a new game. It was an exciting finish as Dave held him to a draw. Final scores: Dave (51) John (51) me (45) Simon (26). We finished off with a very close game of Ra which was great fun as usual: Simon (52) me (50) Dave (49). I'm glad Simon won this one - he needed a morale boost after losing his way a bit in his first ever game of Taj Mahal.

The Space Hulk Saga: Every now and then I'll get obsessed with a game related project. Not necessarily playing the game but working on some aspect of it. More often than not this will be in creating a player aid or a translation. Sometimes it goes further than this and that's been the case with my latest pre-occupation: Space Hulk.

I can't believe he cut the arms off his genestealers! Barbarian!

Columbia have announced a new block game - Liberty: American Revolution: Liberty is a fast-playing game covering the American Revolution from 1775-1783. British, American, and French forces are included and the role of the Indians and Navies is depicted. The unique problems faced by each side become clear in this playable game.

Note that the only place you can get Columbia games now is by online order off their website. You won't see this one in the game shops. (via Terminal City Gamers)

The Stella Artois Screen Tour shows classic films in interesting locations. You can submit suggestions too!

Marcus Stumptner has redrawn the Barbarossa to Berlin map to use areas instead of point-to-point. Talk about a labour of love!

An excellent one page quick start for The Napoleonic Wars: The purpose is not to be a player aid during the game, but simply a quick summary of the key rules, something an experienced player can use to teach a newbie. Details can be filled in during the game.

London Open House Weekend: a unique event that takes place across the capital over one weekend each September, providing free public access to hundreds of buildings of architectural and community interest to Londoners. (via Sashinka)

Just when I thought I had Euphrat & Tigris taped, I got wiped out last night by Simon, Dave, and a complete newbie Michael (Simon's boyfriend-in-law.... no wait that gives the wrong impression.... Simon's daughter's boyfriend). Dave seemed to win by going for a robust monopoly game - he constructed a wholly owned kingdom in the corner with its own monument (he was playing the bulls so we called it "Donkeytown") and when we smashed that up he went over to the other end of the board and rebuilt Donkeytown all over again. I don't quite understand what went wrong with my game but I lost too many conflicts and my leaders spent too much time off the board. Final scores: Dave (10) Simon (9) Michael (8) me (7).

Phil has news of Gavin, who is so obsessive about his favourite band he has gone to America to see them play:

Got a message from Gaz, he managed to blag his way into a free Supergrass acoustic set in Boston the night after the main performance. How long before Supergrass's security start to realise the danger he presents?

After doing lots of admin last night I rewarded myself by playing Final Fantasy for a while. (Yes I know - I have an overactive superego.) Had this cool fight with a giant robot on a ship. Finally managed to activate a crane which pulled the robot's head off and dropped it into the sea! The poor thing didn't last long after that....

Dave and Steve came over Sunday afternoon to try out Taj Mahal. I've been itching to play this for weeks, and that itch was fully justified. This is a superb game, tense and clever and interesting - like a cross between Settlers and Poker! Final scores: me (68) Dave (57) Steve (47).

Then we went onto Ra, another Knizia masterpiece, and an ideal end-of-session game. Dave played very well, further refining his repeated-early-Ra-calling tactics, which irritate the heck out of everyone else but produced a victory for him this time: Dave (45) me (38) Steve (28).

Phil has just filed this wildlife report from Exeter:

Just saw the coolest thing ever on the way back from town. On the lawn of the old people's home I saw a sparrowhawk killing a pigeon. There was another pigeon trying to fight the sparrowhawk away (fool!). It failed naturally, and ran off. The dying pigeon seemed to give up after about five minutes, and the hawk started to pick at it and eat it. It had been tearing little bits off the pigeon's chest for another five minutes when some stupid woman came out of the home, and without seeing the bird, walked right past it and scared it off. The sparrowhawk tried to fly off with the pigeon, but it was too heavy and he dropped it. The pigeon miraculously stood up, looking dazed and confused. The sparrowhawk tried to swoop down and get it again but missed, and the pigeon rather worse for the wear flew away. Pigeon 1 - Sparrowhawk 0.

I really couldn't believe my eyes. It was such an impressive little bird, very pretty with the most amazing amber eyes. It looked truly gutted when the pigeon went. It sat in a tree, doubtless waiting for another victim. The most incredible part is that all this occured not 5 yards from a busy city road. Birds of prey are back!

The Literature Network: Online classic literature, poems, and quotes. Essays & Summaries: "We offer searchable online literature for the student, educator, or enthusiast. We currently have over 300 full books and over 1000 short stories and poems by over 90 authors. "

Only 33 left now: Last post for Great War veterans

I finally received Blue vs Gray yesterday, which I pre-ordered from GMT 11 months ago. That's so long ago that it seems like an unexpected present that someone else paid for. And it will be appearing in the game shops for about twice what I paid for it, so I think I will continue to support GMT's P500 program for a while in spite of the delays. It looks nice too - a repackaged "deluxe" version of a game that was originally very innovative - a fairly serious strategic treatment of the American Civil War that you could fit in your pocket. Just a couple of decks of cards, with rules, map, play-aids, as well as leaders, units and special events all provided as cards within the deck. It comes at the wargame/simulation game from a very different angle to what we're used to. I've become a bit jaded with wargames recently, this elegant little game could be just the refresher I need.

Too much dreaming is bad for you? New Scientist interview with Joe Griffin:

The important thing is to know how depression is manufactured in the brain. Once you understand that, you can correct the maladaptive cycle incredibly fast. For 40 years it’s been known that depressed people have excessive REM sleep. They dream far more than healthy people. What we realised – and proved – is that the negative introspection, or ruminations, that depressed people engage in actually causes the excessive dreaming. So depression is being generated on a 24-hour cycle and we can make a difference within 24 hours to how a person feels.

(via Sashinka)

Had an excellent game of Euphrat & Tigris with Simon last night. A real tussle, both of us play more aggressively than we used to, which makes the game shorter as the tiles get used more quickly. Simon succeeded in pushing me off the board altogether at one point, and I spent the final third of the game struggling to reestablish my red and black leaders, while Simon was quietly pulling in the points unmolested. Final score: Simon (11), me (10).

Cheapass Games - Kill Doctor Lucky Variants: William pointed these out to me. The "Kill Your Cohorts" variant looks interesting, last time we played I wanted to literally kill my fellow-players so this might help me feel better.

Some new strategy articles have been posted by Avalon Hill recently, including good stuff about Civilization, Turning Point Stalingrad and Diplomacy. (via Terminal City Gamers)

Well I don't feel tired today. But you probably don't really want a daily update on my energy levels. I did indeed fiddle with Napoleonic Wars yesterday evening. Also, because I was home early, I was able to watch Buffy (for the first, no second time ever) - and I enjoyed it! I've even set the video to record the concluding part of the episode today (Episode 55: Graduation). Worrying this, I think I'm turning into a geek - I've probably been reading too much PvP and Dork Tower lately.

Gosh I thought I was tired yesterday but now I'm really tired. I had to get up at 5:30 to come into work for a maintenance slot. The colleague who insisted we do it so early turned up 45 minutes late! Still at least I can leave at 3 this afternoon. I'll go home, fiddle with Napoleonic Wars for a couple of hours (I'm trying to absorb the new rules) then get a very early night I think.

America is a mystery to any good Englishman.
G K Chesterton, "Charles Dickens"

Long tiring but really good weekend in London.

High point: breaking bread for the last time with the folks at the Workshop course. "Next year in Jerusalem...."

Low point: karaoke night at The Gregorian deep in darkest Bermondsey, listening to Gavin and friends murder "Wuthering Heights".

Cheapass Games: Diceland: Deep White Sea: "Diceland is a completely new kind of tabletop game, featuring unique combat mechanics and colorful paper dice. Each player takes one army of five dice (there are five armies in the set). Players take turns throwing dice into play and manipulating their dice in play. "

Had a great Euphrat & Tigris session last night. This is such a lovely lovely game - as much fun and interest crammed into an hour and a half as you get in 6 hours of say 1830. The more we play it the more depths it reveals. Nick and Simon played "monopoly" strategies, each with a wholly-owned empire on the margins of the board peacefully collecting points every turn, whereas Dave and I slugged it out with multiple conflicts in the centre. I was helped out critically at one point by Simon pushing me into an unlooked-for conflict with Dave which completely solved my problem in black. Final scores: me(8), Simon(6), Dave(5), Nick(5).

We finished off the evening with a game of Ra, which was also great fun, especially after Dave decided that calling Ra early is a good way to mess up people's plans. I'm afraid I won this one too (not very hospitable of me): me(61), Simon(44), Dave(38), Nick(2).

Mikko Saari has been playing Go online: "For some reason my rating has crept up while I haven't played"

Gary Steven's offers 4 historical boardgames, downloadable for free from his website. Henry VIII and Bloody Mary are political intrigue games with no map, Mesopotamia is a simple variation on the History of the World theme, and Richard III (not available yet) seems to be heavily influenced by Kingmaker and looks like it will be the most interesting of the lot. They all look very nicely done, I shall have to print one off and make it up soon.

The Bag N Box Man Ltd - Bags, Boxes, Tubes, Envelopes, Labels and more!: aimed at crafty types, but they sell stuff that might be useful to a gamer, like A4 or A5 boxes, and drawstring bags. Not very exciting I know, but it's the best I can manage this morning - I was out late Cerocing last night....

So how did I get on with my weekend list?

GoKarting on Sunday - this was great fun, if rather scary. I was really pleased that I got into the final, but Nick did even better, coming in third for a place on the podium!

Wargame show at Devizes on Saturday - went to this. Found it slightly boring. Surely I'm not growing out of toy soldiers?

Paint my front door and fit door-knocker - not done. Simon advised against painting in this heat. Good excuse.

Plant stuff in the garden - not done. Can't think of an excuse.

Finish large piece of coursework for Workshop next weekend - made good progress on this on Sunday morning.

Go to church - skipped church to do my course work. It made a very pleasant change to stay at home.

Sit around chatting in a coffee shop - done. Very pleasant too.

A pretty enjoyable weekend, especially as it was rounded off with a few pints in the Wyndham Arms playing Chrononauts with Nick and Simon. I won two out of the three games!

Behold, Lord, an empty vessel that needs to be filled. My Lord, fill it. I am weak in the faith; strengthen me. I am cold in love; warm me and make me fervent that my love may go out to my neighbour. I do not have a strong and firm faith; at times I doubt and am unable to trust you altogether. O Lord, help me and strengthen my faith and trust in you.

Martin Luther

Things I want to do this weekend:

GoKarting on Sunday (already booked)
Wargame show at Devizes on Saturday
Paint my front door and fit door-knocker
Plant stuff in the garden
Finish large piece of coursework for Workshop next weekend
Go to church
Sit around chatting in a coffee shop

I need to face facts - it's not all going to fit into 48 hours.....

Yuk, I was up at 5:30 this morning to take Phil to Heathrow (he's off to Rumania for two weeks). It's an uncanny time of day, very light, blue skies, it could be midday apart from the silence and lack of movement on the streets.

Terminal City Gamers made me aware or Reiner Knizia's website which includes articles, variants and free games, but sadly no weblog.

The latest Dork Tower collection is called Understanding Gamers.

Inspired by bidding games like Ra and Taj Mahal, I ran a little auction game in church yesterday morning. I gave three volunteers £10,000,000 each (play money from Game of Nations) and auctioned off three Mona Lisa's (scanned and blown up from the Chrononauts deck). It worked well, with two of the three players carelessly buying obvious forgeries for large sums of money. It was meant to illustrate the importance of choosing genuine not fake life goals, based on Jesus' parable of the hidden treasure.

Mikko Saari has brought Spielboy to my attention - a rather strange new webzine about boardgames featuring glamour shots of a slightly undressed model draped across a copy of Mare Nostrum, and also an "Am I Hot or Not" contest with pictures of girls taken from various game components, interspersed with some game designers (no Reiner you are not hot). A clear and present moral danger to the game geek community?

Zendo is finally available! Looks nice, and seems like a bargain at $40 especially as it includes 4 Icehouse stashes which retail at $8 each. I wonder when we'll see it in the game shops over here?

Zendo is a game of logic in which the Master creates a rule and the students attempt to discover it. They do this by building and studying configurations of pyramids. The first person to correctly state the rule wins!

CardsUneed.com - for Magic the Gathering singles, UK based - good grief, £12 for a single card! Just as well I'm not attracted to this game/lifestyle. I'm not. I'm not.....

London Bloggers Tube Map - doesn't reach out as far as Salisbury.

Last night I finally got over to one of Scott's evening sessions. For starters I foisted Ra on them, which I have been longing to play since it arrived a couple of weeks ago. Seemed to go well, Robin won (46) even though he didn't really seem to have much of a clue what was going on. The rest of us - me (36) Scott (32) and John (31) - were well behind him. I got the feeling that there are tactical depths to this game that I haven't even started to grasp yet. Hopefully it won't be long before its next outing.

Next John got his copy of Illuminati out. He always seems to have the dratted thing with him these days. This game is quite amusing I suppose in a cynical way, but I find the mechanics clunky and not very interesting really. It always carries on well beyond the point where I am still enjoying it. And I always get completely stuffed at it, which I suppose colours my reaction to the game. Had to cut it short at 10:15 but John was romping away with his Gnomes of Zurich.

The Haslehurst family movie review cooperative. From recent emails:

Peter: Saw Matrix Reloaded on Saturday - what a load of tosh.

Gavin: You're right about the Matrix Reloaded - very poor I thought. They could've done so much more with it!

Phil: Can't believe you even bothered watching the matrix re-hashed or whatever it's called. It is a pile of bollocks.

Inspired by OddPost, which as well as successfully catching 100% of my incoming spam since I subscribed, can also function as an RSS aggregator, I have finally added an RSS feed to nimrods. Scroll down to the blogrss icon on the right hand side. Now you no longer have to breathlessly check back here every few minutes to see if I've posted anything else exciting, you can have my pearls of wisdom fed to your desktop automatically!

Plus I've finally been migrated over to the slick new Blogger interface. And it works (so far). My cup runs over....

I don't know about you but I am getting really sick of getting twenty emails a day telling me how to make my penis larger. But thanks to Nick Denton I have found the antidote to Spam - OddPost. It really works. It's slick. You don't even have to change your email address. OK it's not free, but it's worth it!

Oddpost features a peerless junk mail filtering system that blocks up to 99% of all spam. As you send and receive messages, Oddpost automatically learns what you personally consider valid mail and what you consider garbage, and uses this fingerprint to quickly attain a nearly perfect filtering accuracy rate (yes fellow nerds, it’s Bayesian content-based filtering, and it works like a charm!). On the rare occasions that Oddpost misses a piece of spam, just click the nuke button to both delete the message and make the filter smarter the next time around.

William Gibson reminds us of George Orwell's Six Rules

1. Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.

2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.

3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.

4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.

5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.

6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

Unfogged:

Iran doesn't need external opposition groups. There are good and brave people aplenty in Iran. There are the ones you can see, in the streets. And there are the ones you can't see, who have been fighting the mullahs while the rest of us were going about our business. They are in the jails and this is their revolution.

I'm getting really tired of Blogger. As everyone knows, permalinks don't work unless you regularly do "Republish all" on the archives screen. Latest news - "Republish all" fails with a Java error.

Seven days of hard studying coming up for me. Firstly a weekend of hardcore theology at Workshop, then a week at "Oracle University" learning how to become an Oracle DBA. I've also been promised a Sun Solaris course later this year - is this my opportunity to escape the wonderful world of Microsoft and become a Unix geek?

I've just started playing Blogshares and I'm making money already! This is so easy, maybe I should try the real stock market....

Iran va Jahan:

A few thousand University of Tehran students have shaken the Islamic Republic of Iran to the core. Teary-eyed veterans of the student movements of the 1960s celebrated by dusting up their situationist slogans and their Bob Dylan anthems: could this be the first revolution of the 21st century?

David Warren on the prospects for Iran:

The live question is, What will the mullahs do to hold power? Will they abandon all reserve, and plunge their country into a true reign of terror? Or will they, like Soviets and others before them, crack in the realization that they are unloved, especially by their own children?

It may not matter. The mullahs may be running the world's largest terrorist operation (Hizbullah), and be well on their way to acquiring nuclear weapons with Russian, Pakistani, and North Korean help. But the Iranian people may be about to overwhelm them.

The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation (via Textism)

The car service saga continues - on the way home yesterday the grotty Rover courtesy car that the garage had given me broke down. Steam pouring from the bonnet. I spent an hour and a half at the side of the A30 waiting for the recovery vehicle, which arrived with an even grottier Rover ("Whatever you do, don't open the back door sir!") for me to transfer into. As a result of which I once again failed to show up for Scott's weekly gaming session where I was hoping to force everyone to play Ra. And my Vectra isn't ready yet so I'm still in the Rover today. I just hope it gets me home tonight....

BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Hope on the streets of Tehran

A lot of women have gathered around the front gate of the Tehran University and they've taken off their scarves in the demonstration.

They've been severely beaten by chains, you know the old chains and locks they use here for motorcycles? Do you know how thick they are? I broke down in tears when I heard this.

When the time is right we will all join. I can smell it in the air. This time is different.

I despise Islam and the mullahs even though I am officially a Muslim now. I don't have the right to change my religion in Iran.

I despise the regime and so do 90% of the Iranians. All the people who elected Khatami despise the regime and they thought he'd bring change.

Drive a Rover at the Mars Stations!

Mars Stations are designed to give everyone the experience of exploring an unknown world through the eyes of a robotic rover. The Planetary Society and LEGO Company have teamed together to establish a network of Mars Stations around the world. Each station contains a LEGO® rover equipped with a Web camera that you can drive over the Internet!

(via Rebecca's Pocket)

The first rule of car servicing: it always costs more than you budgeted.

I just got the "I'm sorry sir but you need new brake pads" call from the garage. The choice is fairly simple - pay up or die. Looks like I will have to stop buying games for a few weeks....

Amazing emails from some very brave kids in Tehran. BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Iranian protesters remain resolute

I read your comments about the Iranian students and their protests against the regime of the mullahs. I was in Teheran at the weekend, some policemen hit me, but I fought for Iran. I wish that Mr Bush would help us in our fight for freedom. I have a dream! Maybe one day, every Iranian man and woman will be free. In a country without Mullahs, without radical groups. Until this day has come, we'll fight for our right to live freely. Freedom for Iran.

Trinity Sunday

We confess neither a solitary nor a diverse God.

St Hilary: Of the Trinity

Ra arrived yesterday, it looks fantastic. It's out of print but I tracked down possibly the last shrink-wrapped copy in England, thanks to ex-Esdevium in Aldershot. But this game-buying habit must stop soon. Right after the next one.

Andrew Looney has redone his game designer page, including a good article on playing Magic without two full decks.

My heart was warmed to get a Father's Day present from Phil in the post yesterday. He got me a Batman and Robin card, and a copy of "1984". But I did worry that perhaps Phil sees a connection between my parenting style and Orwell's story of 24hr surveillance, authoritarian control, and forbidden furtive sex.

Architecture Week 2003 June 20 - June 29 Organised and Managed by Arts Council England: Celebrated architects will be inviting you to visit them during Open Practice and you'll get the chance to have an architect come and help sort out your own home as part of RIBA Architect in the House

Philadelphia Inquirer | U.S. has gained little if Bush lied about reason for war

I trusted Bush, and unless something big develops on the weapons front in Iraq soon, it appears as though I was fooled by him. Perhaps he himself was taken in by his intelligence and military advisers. If so, he ought to be angry as hell, because ultimately he bears the responsibility.

(via Rebecca's Pocket)

Tate Collections

Turner Worldwide brings together online over 2,000 works by Turner held in public and private collections around the world. The project provides online access to these works alongside Tate’s own Turner holdings, creating a comprehensive online catalogue and rich central resource of information about Turner’s works outside Tate.

Independent's front page today:

A global search by the Tate gallery has unearthed 500 lost works by JMW Turner. Some have never been seen in public; others have not been displayed since the death of possibly Britain's most important painter.

While I'm here I must just mention a great game of Euphrat & Tigris I had at my place last Wednesday. I scored 12, against Dave's 9 and Simon's 8. Until the screens were removed, I had no idea that I was so far ahead. It had been a fairly bruising game, and I wasn't really expecting to win.

Over the last couple of weeks I have experimented a couple of times with playing The Lord of the Rings as a solitaire game. Frodo goes on his quest all alone, and gets 4 cards at Rivendell and at Lothlorien. He also gets the two cards for being the ringbearer at the end of each board. It worked very well - there was still a tremendous feeling of rising pressure from the events and the corruption track, even though all the decisions were down to me and there were no other players to throw spanners in. The first time I lost very early, on the Shelob's Lair board, but the second time I actually completed the quest and destroyed the ring - a new experience for me, even in playing multiplayer! Next time I'll use it as an opportunity to learn the rules for the Friends and Foes expansion which is waiting at home on the gaming table for its first outing.

Whit-Sunday

He loves Himself and every creature by the Holy Ghost, inasmuch as the Holy Ghost proceeds as the love of the primal goodness whereby the Father loves Himself and every creature.

Aquinas: Summa Theologica

Hmm. Blogger is back today, but it's making me nervous. Yesterday I got switched to "Blogger New" and was presented with a blank slate - all my posts for the last two years had disappeared! This sort of thing just makes me nervous. How long before they lose everything permanently? I think the problem is they just have one guy over there running the whole system. I can just imagine it - no test environment, making live changes on the fly, working all night to fix self-inflicted problems. I've worked in that sort of environment myself and it's not much fun for anyone, including the customers. Hopefully at some point the new owners will impose some sort of change control discipline. I suppose I shouldn't grumble, it's not as if I'm paying anything for this.....

Blake Haber's page pertaining to the subject of the game called "Baduk" in Korean, "Weiqi" in Chinese, "Igo" in Japanese, and "Go" in English. (via Mikko Saari)

Phil came over yesterday, on a brief rest & recuperation break from University. We had a great political argument over dinner, just like old times. I've been feeling a bit wobbly on the war recently, shocked I suppose by the levels of violence we had to employ to achieve our objectives in Iraq. Phil performed a valuable service by trotting out all the dumb conspiracy theories and knee-jerk anti-Americanism of the left, reminding me of how much I am repelled by the rhetoric of the peace movement. Thanks Phil!

Thanks to John for pointing me at The Geek Test. What a relief! I only scored 16.76%.

Chris Lawson provides an excellent set of expanded rules for "Lord of the Rings", and lots of other goodies as well.

And this article (pdf) from David Farquhar gives an insiders view of the game's design process.

We can now play Cosmic Encounter online! (via Terminal City Gamers)

I would love to be a writer - successful, famous, and (most importantly) popular with the ladies - but this sort of thing is just so difficult: 12 Exercises for Improving Dialogue (via Sashinka)

I am going through a bit of a Knizia phase, but in order to convince myself that this hobby isn't really that expensive, I have ordered Ra and Taj Mahal from Discount German Games at amazingly low prices. Slight drawback - these are the German versions, but shouldn't be too much of a problem....

Last weekend I walked the Clarendon Way between Salisbury and Winchester. It took me two days, with an overnight stop in Nether Wallop, to travel the 30 miles. Every morning I drive 45 miles in roughly the same direction to get to work. It's a weird feeling to pace out with aching muscles and blistered feet a stretch of country that usually slips past the car windows so effortlessly. Who says England is densely populated? - it doesn't feel like it when it takes two days on foot to get from one town to its nearest neighbour.

Lots of beautiful scenery, especially the heavily wooded, folded country near Tytherley. One highlight of the trip was finding a slowworm on the path (until he crapped on my hand). Another was the Wykham Arms at journey's end. They have a pot of HSB sausages behind the bar which they sell with mustard for 45p each. This is the ideal accompaniment for a pint - now I never want to drink beer any other way.

Xiangqi: Chinese Chess: Xiangqi, or Chinese Chess, is an extremely popular game in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is currently played by millions (or tens of millions) in China, Taiwan, Thailand, Singapore, Vietnam, Hong Kong and other Asian countries. Xiangqi has remained in its present form for centuries. It is believed that both Xiangqi and Orthodox Chess derive from the original Indian game of Chanturanga.

Beat Simon at Euphrat & Tigris last night, thus avenging my humiliations at Hay. Dave dropped by to give me a bottle of wine, then John dropped by and drank it! It was interesting playing E&T with just two. It was a real knockabout game with lots of conflicts, much of it over one big kingdom, battered by catastrophe tiles and strung out along the board. A close result, 20/19 - much better than the 3 that I scored last time I played!

Isn't the internet wonderful? Going round Hay-on-Wye's second-hand bookshops I was looking out for a children's science-fiction novel I remember clearly from my early years, about a voyage to Mars made by a professor in a home made space ship launched from his garden. I had completely forgotten the name or author of the book, and have never met anyone else who knows the book. I can still clearly remember the beautifully drawn illustrations. It was one of those books that I desperately wished to believe was true.

Anyway, I finally got round to searching the web for this book - 15 minutes with Google last night turned up the details, thanks to David Drake for whom it is also an early literary memory. The book is "The Angry Planet" by John Keir Cross. David's description brought it all flooding back:

The Angry Planet is in form a typical children's SF novel of the period. A Scottish scientist builds a spaceship in his back yard. He and a writer-friend fly to Mars in it. Three children in their early teens, staying with the writer, stow away on the spaceship.

The atmosphere of Mars is breathable. The planet is inhabited by the Beautiful People--willowy, intelligent folk with a fringe of cilia which serve them as hands--who inhabit glassy cities, and their racial enemies, the Terrible Ones--massive, tentacled monsters; also intelligent but utterly evil.

The humans visit the Beautiful People's city; one of the children is captured by the Terrible Ones but escapes; and there's a climactic battle in which the humans aid the Beautiful People against the monstrous foes. The humans return to Earth.

The really strange aspect--for a children's book--is the theme. The Angry Planet is a clear story of the battle between Good and Evil. Evil wins.

Even better, thanks to AbeBooks I have tracked down a copy in Leigh on Sea for £5, and I now know that the talented illustrator was Robin Jacques. I wonder what else he did? Time for another Google....

This week's game of Euphrat & Tigris is looking less hopeful - maybe I will play Taj Mahal Online tonight instead. It looks beautifully done, and it's a chance to play before I purchase (as Taj Mahal is next on my insatiable game craving list).

And Chris Lawson's excellent Euphrat & Tigris FAQ - plus other stuff including the rules in English.

And Euphrat & Tigris page at BoardGameGeek, with loads of material, including some useful play-aids.

And Tigris & Euphrat stuff from Carl-Gustaf Samuelsson (and large numbers of other Eurogames too).

I'm hoping to get a game of Euphrat & Tigris this week so if I intend to win (which I do) I need lots of stuff like this - Euphrat & Tigris strategy tips from Chris Farrell

News just in from Phil (who obviously hasn't got quite enough to do at University these days):

A hungry ferret has caused panic on a train by racing around carriages and eating the driver's lunch, a train company says.

I have a lot of respect for David Warren, especially his refusal to accept received wisdom and his willingness to kill sacred cows. His latest contribution to public sanity is to unmask the "Baghdad blogger":

Salam is the scion of a senior figure from Iraq's Baathist nomenklatura. He was brought up at least partly in Vienna, which is the OPEC headquarters; his father was therefore an oilman, and possibly a former head of Iraq's OPEC mission. Another clue is a hint that his grandfather was an Iraqi tribal chief; from which I infer that his father was one of the Iraqi tribal chiefs that Saddam Hussein rewarded for loyalty, outside the Tikrit clan.

The nimrods weekend at Hay-on-Wye passed off successfully, with no-one getting murdered (although William came pretty close). Things that surprised me about our weekend away together:

Everyone turned up. I was expecting one or two last minute dropouts from unreliable people.

Dave was drunk within about one and a half hours of arriving.

You can't get take-away food in Hay on a Sunday.

I didn't win a single game. Not one.

Hay-on-Wye has a game shop.

John turned up in a brand-new Mercedes.

Walking was popular - I had plenty of takers for long walks on both Saturday and Sunday.

Tikal ended with an argument.

Things that didn't surprise me:

Nick consumed an unfeasible quantity of booze and fags.

Nick spent large amounts of money on books about coins and archaeology.

Before we left Dave stripped the fridge of leftover food and drink to take home with him.

I ended up doing all the washing up.

No-one wanted to play The Napoleonic Wars.

Everyone wanted to play Liar Dice variants.

Kill Doctor Lucky ended with an argument.

All things considered it seemed to be a successful weekend. The bookshops and the countryside both provided welcome relief from the gaming tables. People were already talking about when we could do it again, so I think everyone enjoyed themselves. I think I did too.

Greg Costikyan offers us a free game:

Dot Boom is a satirical card game of the Dot Com era. Each of up to five players takes the role of a major venture capital firm (like Eine Kleine Perkins or noidealab!), investing in dubious companies like iPotemkinVillage and Thiefster, and trying to take them public. The game is over when the "dotCrash" card comes up, at which time the player with the most money wins.

I don't understand this website but William says it's "really good" - GameWyrd - Battle Imps - The Battle!

Lost Cities for 4 Players:

Partnership games are particularly fascinating, as the interaction happens on two levels, within the partnership and between the opposing groups. Whenever I play a partnership game, I wonder why I design so few of them (only Digging springs to my mind). When the question was raised, if Lost Cities could be extended to more than 2 players, I seized the opportunity.

It's come at last - the Nimrods weekend starts tomorrow, as eight of us (Steve, Dave, John, William, Nick, Simon, Phil and myself) find our way in various cars trains and buses to Celtic Lodge in Hay-on-Wye. The place sleeps 10 max, so we have nearly maxed out. I'm amazed and really pleased by the take-up on this. Hopefully it will be a big success (ie nobody gets murdered) and perhaps we will do it again next year.

Anyway, last night I was compiling my final list of games to take, with lots of suggestions from Dave - "You've got to take x"...."Oh, and you've got to take y".... "Oh, and you've got to take z (kids game in enormous box)"..... Ignoring most of Dave's suggestions the list is looking like this (dependent on how full the boot looks):

Formula Motor Racing (fluffy but fun)
Hammer of the Scots (short absorbing wargame)
Puerto Rico (I haven't begun to play this enough)
Euphrat & Tigris (a gamer's game)
Aquarius (more fluff)
Chrononauts (fluff)
18xx (anti-fluff)
Battle Cry (for a tournament?)
Hera & Zeus (I feel like a 2-player euro)
Settlers card game (and another)
Lost Cities (and another)

Quite a lot of short games there, not many wargames. I think these choices are a big reaction to last weekend's 14-hour Krieg marathon.

It was good to see Gavin - my estranged son - over the weekend. One of the pleasures of growing older is sitting in your favourite pub sharing a glass of beer and a chat with your son. This was something you dreamed about years ago when you were banished to a freezing, empty room round the back of some "family-friendly" pub out in the sticks somewhere, trying to enjoy your half-pint (because Dad was driving of course) with a couple of bored and fractious kids.

Chris Farrell's Top 14 Overrated Games

Advanced Civilization took a classic, if overly long, game (Civilization) and eliminated the strategy and player interaction elements, increased the length and complexity by 25-50%, and turned the whole thing into little more than an accounting exercise - all in some bizzare quixotic goal to add "realism" to a game that was never intended to be, and still isn't. It's amazing to me how much the intervening 10 years has increased my understanding and appreciation of good games; were Advanced Civilization to be released today, I would probably be able to immediately identify all the problems and avoid playing it, but I was just blissfully unaware at the time.

I played Nick at Krieg! over the weekend, wasting 14 hours of glorious weather on Sunday and Monday crouching over a map of Europe. And basically I regret it. It's not just that I was well on the way to losing (with Moscow fallen a Soviet collapse was on the cards.) I enjoyed the fighting retreat across Russia (especially the bit where I destroyed an overconfident Panzer Army), I enjoyed the seesaw of fortunes in North Africa, I enjoyed inserting a Soviet tank corps into Konigsburg and later holing them up in the Pripet marshes where they stubbornly refused to die. But it just takes so long - after two solid days of gaming we had only reached summer 1942 for goodness sakes. Sorry Nick, it was fun (in parts), but I just don't see why I would ever play this again when I could be playing Barbarossa to Berlin instead.

Here's a big article from Stephen Agar giving lots of detail about Albion, the amateur wargames zine that I subscribed to in my teenage years - The Origins of Postal Diplomacy in the UK

The last ten issues of Albion are probably those most remembered by mainstream PBM Diplomacy, which was taking off in a big way as Albion was entering old age. By now Don's formula was clear - a 50 page issue every two months or so on a wide selection of wargames and boardgames, a kind of Sumo's Karaoke Club before its time.

I've been thinking some more about how I got sucked into the hobby, and I am still confused about the order things happened in. How did I ever get to know about "Albion" for example, or afford the sub? I remember starting a wargames club at Manchester Grammar School - I must have been aged about 12 - which started with miniatures but quickly moved on to cardboard and hexes, as well as Diplomacy and Kingmaker. From that time onwards I was known as "The General" by teachers as well as pupils, which later became "Strategos" when I moved into the classics stream. At one point I started work on a game about the Gallipoli campaign, producing a detailed map before (fatally for the project) I had decided on the rules. Another design project was a Diplomacy variant based on the idea of exploring the New World without foreknowledge of what the map looked like. This was more successful, and got played a few times at school. Two decades later - having long lost the original game - I produced this variant again from scratch as "Columbus", which was played postally in various Diplomacy zines quite a few times over the last decade. I must publish it on this website some time.....

When I went off to University I dropped the whole hobby for many years - marriage and childraising intervened - until in my mid-thirties I purchased a copy of Diplomacy and found a flier for the postal Diplomacy hobby inside. My teenage games collection was mostly handed to friends or taken to jumble sales by my mother, and I sometimes ruefully think of the classics that I lost that way: "Red Star White Star", "Triplanetary", "Conquistador" (S&T version), "Flying Circus", "Sniper".......sigh.

In response to a current discussion on ConsimWorld I've been scratching my head and trying to remember my first wargame - I *think* it was "Waterloo" (AH) but can't be sure at this distance of years. It's rather disturbing that I can't even remember how I got into a hobby which has been such a major part of my life. I know my friends and I had been playing wargames with Airfix figures and ships for years - I always lost the naval battles because my friends were prepared to shoplift from the model shop so they had much bigger fleets than me! It must have been round about the age of 11 or 12 that we discovered hexes and cardboard. I remember playing "Napoleon at Waterloo" (the S&T freebie) in the classroom every lunchtime. And I'm sure "Conquistador" got played on a bench in the physics lab. There was a thick amateur zine called "Albion" which stoked my enthusiasm. And at an impressionable age I had two postal games of "Anzio" with Tom Oleson (who developed the 2nd edition), the first of which I won! Scratching together pocket money for a few months subcription to S&T, exploring games like "Flight of the Goeben" or "Winter War" - ah, happy days.....

Big changes at Columbia Games:

Declaration of Independence

We at Columbia Games are changing our way of doing business. After 30 years, we have concluded that our products can best be sold directly. To improve product output and customer service, all Columbia Games products will henceforth be sold ONLY by mail order, telephone, or via www.columbiagames.com.

And to celebrate they are running a 20% sale until 27 April. They have also done a big tidy up on their website. But sadly Columbia games will soon disappear from your local game shop.

Talking of Columbia, I've just bought a copy of Pacific Victory from Ebay which looks superb - I spent a happy hour last evening sticking the little stickers onto the little blocks. My exciting life....

This post from GMT's Tony Curtis is a bit of a shocker, showing the precarious state of GMT's finances. Time to show some support and buy a few more games in their amazing 50% sale.