1. Due
to Easter Holidays we had 6 members attend this week, so we played on 1 table only.
5 of us started with “SAN FRANCISCO”,
the game about rebuilding the city after the great earthquake of 1906. Tiles
representing 3 different categories of building are placed randomly in a grid
of the city and the players try to place their ‘building rods’ such that they
surround a tile and claim the points for rebuilding that part of the city. On
each players turn a contract card is turned over which dictates how many
players will get to place a rod and the basis on which the contract is
resolved. This will be one of 3 methods, either by the playing of Influence
cards, by the playing of Cheques, or by the use of ‘auction chits’. The twist
in the game is that when a bid in the Influence cards is revealed any ties
means that the players are eliminated from that auction and the resolution
passes to the next lower bid. So in a 5-player game the bids of 9, 9, 6, 5,
and 3 will result in the player bidding 6 winning the auction. If the auction
card indicated 2 players will get to place a rod then the bidder of 5 will also
get to place. The cheques are resolved by players simply adding cheques to
their bids until every one bar one has passed. The ‘Auction chits’ are chosen
secretly and revealed and if one player is the only one to choose a
particular category of tile they get to place a rod. If more than 1 player
chooses the same category they resolve it by secretly bidding up to 5 cheque
cards and the highest total wins. When a tile is built it is turned over and the
relevant points on it are awarded to the builder as Prestige Points.
Furthermore one of the ‘bonus cards’ is turned up. These enable players to gain
more money or more influence points or to move building rods. They are resolved
by bidding in the same way as above, or sometimes every player gets the chance
to perform the action depicted. The bonus card is placed on a grid on the
board, in which there are 12 spaces and this dictates the length of the game,
which ends as soon as the last card is placed. Kevin started out with an early
lead by building some low values tiles and Lucy soon caught him up by doing the
same. Mike waited for his chance to build the more prestigious Town Hall tile
for which he received 10 points and closed on the leaders. Some spirited
bidding by Geoff and Roger meant that they soon closed the gap but the amounts
being bid were rising all the time, so those who kept money back were able to
win the later auctions. Despite a late effort Lucy couldn’t quite catch Kevin
who held on for the win by 3 points by building a tile late on.
2. Paul
had joined us by this time so 6 of us played “7 WONDERS”, the card game that has been reviewed recently. Mike and
Kevin were beaten up on the Military front, both scoring -6 points in that
category. Mike never recovered but the others all scored well in different
categories and the final scores were very close, these being Paul 50, Kevin 49,
Lucy 48, Roger 44, Geoff 40, Mike 29.
Games played and
Winners were:
San Francisco
Kevin Ward;
7 Wonders Paul
Bulpin.
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