Session Report July 3, 2007

We gathered at our house for pre-4th of July gaming. It was nice to welcome David and Mary Ellen Kennemer back since we hadn't seen them for some time. Attendees (8): Michael, Barbara, Sharon, Warren, Andrew, Steve, David, and Mary Ellen.

Notre Dame

Sharon taught us this game. It is an interesting game but not very interactive during most of the plays. However, the key element of 'drafting' your actions is very interactive and really drives the decisions in the game. I was fortunate to build up a strong early income and then transfer all of these cubes to the Hospital to control the rat population. This proved key as I always had money to bribe special characters and put cubes in Notre Dame. A fun game but I would like to play several more games and see how it holds up. Final Scores: Michael (73), Mary Ellen (48), Sharon (40), Steve (36), and David (32).

Blokus

Heather got a chance to play this game with the game group. This is an easy to learn abstract game with some clever strategies. Each player places one of his colored tiles (they are various Tetris like shapes) on the board. Each tile must connect to another of the same color by touching at the corners. The object is to get rid of as many tiles as possible and your final score is the number of remaining tile sections that you cannot play.

Barbara (0), Warren (15), Heather (21), and Andrew (21).

Ingenious

This is a game that I considered for my in-laws since they like Blokus. It is another abstract game and plays very easily but the scoring element is taken from Tigris % Euphrates. Your final score is equal to your lowest total in any color and whoever has the highest final score wins. This requires you to score in all the colors and so you must try to score in your weakest color.

Warren (11), Andrew (10), and Barbara (9).

Mystery of the Abbey

I finally got a chance to play this game with the game group. It is a more involved deduction (a la Clue) game that has a great thematic element. The players are at a monestary and trying to uncover the murderer that killed Brother Adelmo. The game allows you to move to various spaces and take special actions as well as encountering other players and asking them questions. If you ask a question then the other player may take a vow of silence or answer the question. If they choose to answer then they get to ask a question back and you must answer it (no vow of silence!). At the end of each round players go to mass and pass cards around the table. This keeps players hands changing and makes it difficult to deduce anything conclusively. This plus the scoring rules encourage guessing and this game was no exception as Andrew made an incorrect accusation (-2 pts) before he correctly accused Father Michael of the crime (4 pts). Mary Ellen made a correct Revelation so she also scored 2 pts but since Andrew correctly accused Father Michael he was the winner.

Andrew (2), Mary Ellen (2), Michael and Sharon (0).

Puerto Rico

They played this one with the expansion buildings which is definitely my favorite way to play it now. I like randomly choosing the buildings since it allows for different strategies to be viable.

Warren (40), Steve (38), Barbara (35), and David (34).

Ra

Andrew and Sharon stayed a little later for a quick game of Ra. I was fortunate to get a collection of all the monuments and win majority in Pharaohs for most of the game to pull out the victory. Michael (63), Sharon (47), Andrew (39), and Barbara (29).