LesCon - the truth

Last weekend's LesCon was great fun. Very comfortable cabin in the Forest of Dean with great facilities nearby - I made three visits to the swimming pool and sauna. We stocked up with piles of food and booze when we arrived then basically hunkered down for an uninterrupted weekend of gaming. Here's what was played:

Up Front Quite a few games of this between various people. My favourite encounter was Paratroop Drop vs Nick - my plucky Brits just barely scraped a win on victory conditions.

El Grande The grand old warhorse of euros. Proved to be better than I remembered it, and I was pleased to get 2nd place (Nick won).

Wits and Wagers Late on Friday. I'm not a fan of party games, but this was OK I suppose.

Struggle of Empires Saturday morning's epic contest. Les quietly pulled off a surprise tie for first place with Dave (who was making a lot more sturm und drang on the board). I came 4th but enjoyed every minute - others seemed less convinced of this game's classic status.

Nexus Ops On Saturday evening I taught the other 4 this game and coached them through it. Dave won with his from-the-off aggression. Everyone seemed to have a lot of fun.

Bean Trader Saturday ended with this fun game. Marty showed his alarming negotiation skills. He should definitely have been a 2nd-hand car dealer, not a doctor.

Dune Nick had to head home late on Saturday for an archaeological emergency, so he missed out on this classic from the 70's. I was delighted to finally get a chance to play this. I won on turn 5 when my Fremen seized the opportunity presented by the overflowing Tleilaxu tanks and snatched Arrakeen. It took us about 3 hours, and the time raced by - there's always something interesting happening. I can't wait to play this one again.

Canal Mania Dave won this one, and I came in last. Very enjoyable light "railway" game.

Shooting Ducks Another party game to finish up before we hit the road back home.

Thanks to Les, Nick, Dave and Marty for making this such an enjoyable weekend. And thanks especially to Les for organizing the accommodation and making a wonderful cooked breakfast on Saturday morning. Mmmmm, black pudding.......

The red box

LesCon - which is actually 5 gaming buddies crammed into a log cabin in the Forest of Dean for a weekend - is fast approaching. I'm getting very excited now, and starting to think about what to pack in my red box. As a necessary discipline I plan to restrict myself to one medium size plastic crate of games, especially as 3 of us are car-sharing so space is at a premium.

I'm thinking of a small number of really good multiplayer games that will take 5, and making sure I know the rules well and am ready to teach them. Current candidates:

Dune (an Avalon Hill scifi classic - very highly thought of in some quarters. I could bring the DVD as well!)
Empires of the Ancient World (a Martin Wallace golden-oldie)
1825 (gentler and shorter than 1830)
Die Macher (the ultimate heavy euro - always wanted to try this)
My amazing poker chips

And perhaps a couple of quick 2-player wargames that don't take up too much space:

ASL Starter Kit 2
Up Front!
Crusader Rex (like Hammer of the Scots with sunshine)
Rise of the Luftwaffe (Up Front in the air! you can do the big bombing missions with more than 2)

And something special from Canada:

Crokinole

Oh dear, even this lot won't fit, so some will have to be left behind.....

Some interesting discussion around my recent post about whether to get into ASL or not. Voting was split, with 3 broadly for and 3 against me taking the ASL plunge. Iain Cheyne and Firestone both preferred the idea of EastFront. Intriguingly Chris Farrell said he would probably still be focussing on ASL if he still had opponents - but what would the gaming hobby have looked like without one of its most insightful commentators?! Marty was against the idea, which is highly significant seeing as he is my only regular wargames opponent at the moment. Andy made the interesting suggestion that I buy only the rulebook (I actually already have a tatty 1st edition), use VASL, and dispense with "the cardboard". Hmmm - surely wargaming would die pretty quickly if we all stopped buying the cardboard?

So where does that leave me? Still confused I suppose.......

Online challenge

Another readers' game anyone? How about Amun Re at SpielByWeb, name "Cingulate gyrus", password "nimrod"?

Crokinole love

My lovely wife Sue just returned from a two and a half week trip to Ontario, Canada for a conference of Mennonite pastors. When I collected her from Gatwick she had a mysterious package with her which turned out to be a truly wonderful gift for me - a Crokinole board! As you already know, Crokinole originated among the Mennonites of Ontario, so Sue was right in the heart of Crokinole country, and she bought my board direct from the workshop of Willard Martin where it was made.

We've had a lot of fun playing this already, although Sue beats me every time, having been intensively coached (I allege) by Canadian Mennonites while she was away. It's great - it's like having a pool table in the house, without having to build an extension to put it in.

Whether 'tis better

The big question is: to ASL or not to ASL. I have over £100 accumulated in my games budget, and I'm wondering whether to splurge it on the ASL Rulebook and Beyond Valor. They are actually getting rather scarce in the UK - most of the online retailers are out of stock - but on Saturday, on the way to Iain's, I got off the tube at Leicester Square and had a peep in The Orc's Nest, and there they were, pristine in their shrink wrap. I reverently turned them over in my hands for a few minutes, while the following thoughts went through my head:

1. That's a lot of money.
2. It's so complicated, will I ever actually play this?
3. 14 counter sheets, for all love! How long will that take me to punch and clip?
4. And how will I store all those counters anyway?
5. This is only the start - I would also need For King and Country, Yanks etc etc.
6. These are both out of print at the moment, this may be my last chance to buy them for a year or two.
7. There are some other cool games I could get with my £100. What about EastFront for example?
8. I have plenty of other wargames on my shelf I haven't even played yet.
9. If I get into ASL I'll never have time for any other games, anyway.
10. That's a lot of money.

So I balked. Put them back on the shelf and walked out of the shop. Did I do the right thing dear reader? Maybe I'll drop by the Orc's Nest again next time I'm in town......

MayDay Feast

The bank holiday weekend was a feast of gaming for me. On Saturday I went over to Iain's lovely home on the bank of the Thames at Chiswick. While we waited for James to arrive, Chris introduced Iain and me to Race for the Galaxy. I could tell this is an amazing deep game, but on my first time through it was all I could do to get the hang of the mechanics. Strategy will have to come later. (Fortunately I have a nice new copy of my own to study.) Then on to the main event - 1825 Unit 2. This was new to the other 3, so I was kept busy explaining the rules, shepherding everyone through the first few turns, answering rules queries, doing mental arithmetic for folks, and running the bank. Anyway, that's my explanation for my poor showing, as I came in last. James, who was new to any kind of 18xx game, did extremely well and got 2nd. The general verdict on 1825 was very favourable, so hopefully we'll do it again soon.

Next day Phil and Gav (my 20-something children) came over, cooked me an amazing lunch, and then demanded to play a game. I thought I would risk trying Puerto Rico on them, and was pleasantly surprised by how much they enjoyed it. The scores were very close - I just scraped a win with a quarry strategy, and the boys asked me if we could play again online, which we are now doing, at the clunky but effective www.pr-game.com.

Life without revision

Finished my last exam yesterday. Gosh it's been a long haul. I feel a bit bewildered and at a loose end - not sure how to get through a day without revising any more. Maybe I'll just do an hour or two today, just in case......

I've got the day off today - lab project starts tomorrow. So today is a pottering day. I think I'll be spending at least part of it soloing through an ASL Starter Kit scenario. Maybe I should get out in the sunshine at some point as well (sunshine? I vaguely remember that.)

Irresponsibly, I spent some potential revision time on Sunday creating my first ever geeklist. I'm so proud - 16 thumbs!

Getting my mind off brains....

A man can't be always revising for his neuroscience exams, so this week I have managed to fit in soloing an entire game of Clash of Giants II in between all the anxiety, depression, psychosis and amnesia. I played the Ypres scenario and had a fantastic time. The Germans managed to take Ypres but at the cost of seeing their left wing collapse and the French swarm back into Lille. This game was such fun solo I can't imagine how great it must be face-to-face! With a simple rule-set it very precisely captures the feel of WW1 mobile warfare - the constant worries about keeping in contact with friendly units on your left and right, the difficulties of co-ordinating large-scale movements, the slight superiority of defence over attack and the tendency for things to bog down. I like the combat system and the way that troop quality is separated out from raw manpower. And the chit-pull mechanic generates friction and anxiety aplenty.

In my opinion this is an absolutely classic operational-level wargame. I enjoy strategic wargames (like Paths of Glory or Europe Engulfed), and I've had mixed experiences with tactical wargames (ASLSK cool, GBOH not so cool). But for me this sort of thing is the apex of cardboard and paper wargaming: the traditional hex-and-counter operational wargame.

Euphrat & Tigris: always something new

I've been playing it for a decade but this game still holds surprises. I challenged Phil to a quick two-player match after lunch today in his trendy Shoreditch flat. Never seen a game go like this before. Every monument was on the board well before the end, and we made a serious dent in the cube supply. Final score 30:13 to me. I've never scored anything remotely this high in E&T before. How can such simple rules produce so much variety?

Two done, two to go

This morning's exam must have degraded all the structural proteins (like GFAP, actin, tubulin etc) in my brain. It feels like there's just mush in there this afternoon.

Spreading the word

Sue's family have been visiting this week (with strict instructions to keep out of my way during the day when I am revising). We played Through the Desert on Monday evening and Ticket to Ride Marklin last night. Leaving out the passenger rules speeded up setup and made a nice playable game that the less enthusiastic gamers (sister-in-law Maggie and niece-in-law Sarah who always wants to know "is it like Risk?") still enjoyed. Everyone was playing very nicely until nephew-in-law Tom suddenly figured out how to be nasty, and spent the rest of the game gleefully blocking his mother's routes. Sarah, who had spent most of the game stressing about completing her long route, won by a nice margin.

So Ticket to Ride lived up to its reputation as an ideal gateway game (ie a great game for people who don't like games).

Judgement Day

I've been revising since mid-January. That's two and a half months. I think that's the longest I've ever revised for anything, including my finals at Oxford. At last, it's nearly over. I had a relaxing day with Sue yesterday, pottering around Highgate, reading the papers and cooking a nice meal back home. Today it's one last look through my mindmaps for module 1 (yes, I have made a mindmap for *every* lecture in the course)then an early night and the first exam tomorrow.....

That was easy.....

Shiny new template only took about 20 minutes to get up and running. And the new customization features are a whole lot easier than fiddling with the template code. However, I see my little avatar on the right has confused things. And I would really like to be able to pull over my bloglines list and my google bookmarks without having to use code. One day soon perhaps.....

Hooked on victory?

I got a big jolt of dopamine - and whatever other euphoric chemicals my brain rewards me with - when I won the readers' game of Euphrat & Tigris the other week. And when I lost the next one by a similarly impressive margin I received an equivalent dose of dysphoria. (See how I'm thinking neuroscience these days? That's what 2 months of solid revision has done to me.) I can't deny that the big win (13/5/4/4!) was an especially memorable and pleasurable gaming experience, whereas the loss left me slightly grumpy and less motivated to play again. So I was wondering how important winning is to my enjoyment of the hobby. If I never win another game, will I continue gaming? I like to think that I'm a fair-minded opponent who gets most of his enjoyment from the playing not the winning - but how long would I last without an occasional dose of victory to keep me interested? We've all met people who take this too far - gamers for whom winning seems to be their only motivation for playing, and who are prepared to be very unpleasant opponents in order to get what they crave - but I'm not sure that I'm high-minded enough to do without the occasional win myself.

I won! I'm starting to like this game.....

I'm starting to come to terms with Combat Commander:Europe. It helps that I've finally - third try - managed to beat Marty. It was quite a satisfying win as well - it didn't feel too random or gamey. My main line of attack was held up by wire for several turns. By the time I finally cleared it (OK that bit was random) I had saved up a pretty deadly hand of fire combos, and caught his defenders in a deadly storm of FT and HMG attacks. They crumbled and fled.

So I'm starting to figure out which levers to press to make things go my way. Never give up the initiative card - if you do you'll never get that crushing attack result you're after. Never forget it's a card game - the state of your hand is just as important as the position of your troops on the map.

Nevertheless, it still feels lacking in authenticity compared with Up Front! or ASLSK. I don't think it will ever draw me into the same visceral experience that its towering forbears can do.

Anyone for another readers' game?

Anyone for Euphrat & Tigris on the BGG server? It's called Insula with password "nimrods".

Camden Lock Market went up in smoke last night. It's a shame, I liked the shabby hippyness of the place. Ans it's especially a shame as there was a little game shop - Village Games - which most likely burnt down with all the other little businesses there. They sold fancy Go sets and tarot cards and dice and stuff, but they also had quite a few Eurogames stacked on top of cupboards and on the floor. The whole shop was tiny, about the size of a pantry. I hope they were insured...

An open letter

My darling Sue,

You have probably noticed that there have been rather a lot of parcel deliveries to our home recently. There were two just before Christmas (Conquest of Paradise and Runebound), and another two just after (Clash of Giants II and Reef Encounter), and then a specially large one from the States last week (Commands and Colors:Ancients expansions 2 and 3). I would hate you to think that I have got some sort of compulsive game-buying disorder, so I just want to explain what's going on so that you can understand it's not like that at all.

The easy ones first: Runebound and Reef Encounter were BoardGameGeek trades - I swapped games I don't want (Hansa, Caesar & Cleopatra, and Tempus) for games I do want from some friendly geeks on BGG. It didn't cost me any money (except the postage, quite hefty in the case of Tempus) so I got all the fun of the new-game-in-the-post experience without the expense.

Next let me explain to you about the P500 items: Conquest of Paradise and the Commands and Colors:Ancients expansions. I preordered these from GMT ages ago - back in the summer when I had a well-paid job - so it's almost like getting a free gift in the post - from my old prosperous self. I don't think you can blame me for that - can you?

So that only leaves one: Clash of Giants II. This was in GMT's Christmas sale for their loyal P500 customers. 50% off any two games. I was very restrained - I only bought one, so in fact this was an example, not of extravagence, as might first be assumed, but of careful budgeting and prudence.

So there you are. I hope that's all cleared up in your mind now, and you understand why all those parcels were necessary.

Your loving husband,
Peter

Blue Moon heaven

This is a fantastic boon for me - Reiner Knizia's Blue Moon is one of my top ten games of all time, but I only know one other person (my good friend Les) who likes to play it. But now, there is a wonderful computer program that I can practice against. It's a free download!

And it beats me every time......