CHIPPENHAM BOARDGAMES CLUB – 15/12/2011

1.       13 players showed up tonight. To start on table 1 Mike led a group of 5 playing “FISCHE FLUPPEN FRIKADELLEN”, a quirky game from Friedmann Friese about collecting fetishes. Players move around the board, either by foot or by ferry, to visit Merchants to buy the goods on offer and/or to sell goods they already have. When this happens the market price of the sold product drops. Alternatively the players may visit a Trader, who offers 2 particular goods for 1 of another particular good. Eventually the players will have enough goods to visit the Fetish Dealer and exchange goods for a fetish. When this happens the prices of the goods used also drop. For each Merchant or Trader visited there is an associated action depicted on it and these can affect market price, produce more goods for sale, exchange goods between Merchants or offer the player another turn. The game is over when a player collects 3 different fetishes but each level is more difficult to collect than the previous one. In general the players found the movement and graphics difficult to understand in the early phases until someone completed the acquisition of a fetish. The feeling was that the game had been over-complicated for what it was trying to achieve and it was not rated very highly. Jeremy was the player who grasped the mechanisms quickly and he bought and traded cleverly to gain the required goods to claim his fetishes to win the game.

2.       Tony was in charge of table 2, with 3 members playing  “RACE FOR THE GALAXY”” the card game in which players build galactic civilizations by playing cards in front of them that represent worlds or technical or social developments. These allow the players to collect goods to be used later on when the appropriate technologies are available to them. In play that is similar to Puerto Rico players secretly choose a role each round from a selection of 7 roles and get to perform it. Not surprisingly it was Tony who developed the best set of cards and chose the right role to maximise it.

3.       Table 3 had 5 players playing the game of “PILLARS OF THE EARTH”, based upon the Ken Follett novel. A worker placement game in which players are trying to build the most beautiful cathedral of its day. They use their workers to gain resources and then turn those into victory points. They can also use them to produce gold, the currency in the game. Players also receive 3 Master Builders each turn, which they can use to recruit more workers, buy or sell goods, or just gain more victory points. They have to strike a balance between using these for future purchases or racking up the points. The eventual winner was Paul, by a large margin.

4.       As tables 1 and 2 finished simultaneously they split into 2 tables of 4 each. Table 1 saw Geoff explaining the game of “OREGON” to Jeremy and Lucy, Mike having already played it. In this game players use a combination of landscape and building cards to either place a settler on a particular square on the game board or to construct a building in a certain location. They score points for having settlers adjacent to the buildings and move around the scoring track. Each player has 2 tokens, one of which acts as a Joker for any landscape type and a ‘have another turn’ token. When they use these they are turned faced down and cannot be used again until re-activated, which is done when they place a settler next to certain buildings. Play is swift as they quickly populate the board and score points and the game has 2 ways of ending, either when a player runs out of settlers or any 4 of the 7 types of buildings are exhausted. Mike led early on with Lucy in pursuit. However Jeremy was steadily collecting tokens from the gold mines for end game scoring. Geoff made a late surge but Lucy cashed in a large amount of tokens for both Gold and Coal mines and she was just able to catch Jeremy, who placed a lot of settlers near the game end to score heavily. Mike was a distant 4th

5.        As the game finished quickly Table 1 played the dice game “SUSHIZOCK IM GOCKEKWOK”, a popular filler. 2 games were played with the aggregate score determining victory. Mike and Geoff scored 5 points each in the first game but were rubbish in the second game and fell away. Lucy and Paul recovered from their poor start and contested the final scoring, which Lucy won with 11 points to Paul’s 9.

6.       Table 2 saw 4 players playing another space game, this time “GALAXY TRUCKER”, in which players add components such as laser and guns and boosters to their spaceships and then face attacks from alien forces. The game was played a couple of weeks ago so is not reviewed again. The eventual winner was Tony.

 
Games played and Winners were:

Fische Fluppen Frikadellen – Jeremy Hurualt;

Race for the Galaxy – Tony Simons;

Pillars of the Earth – Paul Bulpin;

Oregon – Lucy Newbury;

Sushizock im Gockekwok - Lucy Newbury;

Galaxy Trucker -  Tony Simons.

CHIPPENHAM BOARDGAMES CLUB – 08/12/2011

1.       12 players showed up tonight. To start on table 1 a group of 4 played “DOMINION”, at the request of Rob and Freya. The chosen combination of card decks led to very little attacking and Freya was able to build a good cash-building ‘engine’, with which she frequently bought Provinces. Mike and Tony tried to offset this by playing Witches to give the other players Curses but the final reckoning saw Freya win easily by a margin of over 20 points.

2.       As the other tables were in play the same group on Table 1 played another game of “DOMINION” but with a more attacking combination of card decks. This time Tony and Mike were more in contention and attacked Freya at any opportunity. In a much closer finish Tony won by 3 points from Freya, with Mike third and surprisingly Rob last.

3.       Table 2 had 3 players playing the new game “CARGO NOIR”. Players loads ships with cargo and then sail them to different destinations. When they reach a certain port the players perform an auction to determine who gets to unload the cargo and sometimes the winner can sneakily move some of the cargo from the dock to their personal warehouse. The resultant gains can be traded to increase the size of your fleet so that you can get even more wares. The eventual winner was Roger, mainly because he got a set of 7 goods  in the last turn.

4.       The players then regrouped and on Table 2 a 3-player game of “SMALLWORLD” took place. There were cries of “Smelly Socks” heard, so goodness knows what combinations were being played. The eventually winner was Freya

5.        Table 3 saw Paul leading a group of 5 players in the game “ENDEAVOR”. In this game players move around the Mediterranean and colonize it, and ships goods to all parts of the world to increase the empire’s status and glory in Industry, Culture, Finance and Politics. Eventually they will attack other empires to retrieve resources from them. Players have to maintain a balanced portfolio of people under their control so that they can activate the power of buildings they have constructed. Not surprising Paul won the first game as he knew the mechanisms.

6.       As the game was well received by all 5 players Table 3 played another game of “ENDEAVOR”.  This time the contest was much more closely fought and Lucy emerged as the victor.

7.       Table 1 saw 4 players in the game “HAMBURGUM”, the recent purchase from “The Works” at a bargain price of £7.99. Plenty of attractive bits in this trading game, which provide s a pleasant gaming experience in around 90 minutes. Basically players are trying to build the 5 various levels of 5 churches and 1 cathedral, for which they gain tokens, which they can eventually turn in for VPs. The VPs are dependant upon how many buildings of a particular type they construct, or how many are in a particular region, or how many ships they have in use at the time. To achieve this they move around the familiar Rondel system, collecting timber, stone and bells with which to build Churches and Buildings. To finance this they can also obtain supplies of Beer, Sugar and Cloth from the Rondel and eventually they trade these for cash, in a market that decreases in price as the relevant building are constructed. The game ends immediately the 6^th Church is built, leading to a sudden end, so timing is vital. There are several different ways to play the game and turns come round quickly so interest is held high throughout. The eventual winner was Tony by a clear margin.

 
Games played and Winners were:

Dominion – Game 1 – Freya Freestone;

Dominion – Game 2 – Tony Simons;

Cargo Noir – Roger Skull;

Small World – Freeya Freestone;

Endeavor – Game 1 - Paul Pulpin;

Endeavor – Game 2 - Lucy Newbury;

Hamburgum-  Tony Simons.

CHIPPENHAM BOARDGAMES CLUB – 01/12/2011

1.       9 players showed up tonight. To start on table 1 Geoff led a group of 4 playing “OREGON”, the game about settlers making their way across Oregon, which has been reviewed before. The winner was Kevin, with Rob a resounding last.

2.        Table 2 saw Tony leading a group of 5 players in the game “TIME PIRATES”. In this game players move around time zones and collect tokens in 5 different colours, representing continents. They eventually trade these in for larger scoring tokens and return to their time travels. However whenever a player chooses to re-stock a Time zone by drawing tiles from the bag there is the risk that the Time Police will turn out to chase the explorers. If players are in the same zone as the Police at the start of their turn they have to give up any ‘joker’ tokens and one from their biggest collection of tiles. Eventually 8 Police tiles are drawn and the round ends and scoring occurs. This process is repeated a further 2 times to determine a winner. Poppy and Jerry collected sets readily and exchanged them to gain control of some continents, which scored them good points in the first 2 rounds, with Tony, Mike and Roger trailing badly. In the final round Poppy secured an extra 2 bonus points for a continent, which was enough to give her victory over her Dad, a fitting result on the eve of her 11^th Birthday. Many happy returns Poppy!!“

3.       With the arrival of Jeremy Table 1 saw 5 players involved in a game of “INCAN GOLD”, much to the delight of Rob once again, as this is a game he rarely loses, and this proved to be the case once again, with a comprehensive victory.

4.       On Table 2 Mike led a group of 5 in the quick card game “5 ALIVE!”, in which the aim is not to play a card that would put the total over 21, as if you do you lose one of your 5 lives. There are many ‘modifier’ cards in the special pack, which change direction, reset the running total, make players miss turns and even a killer card, which causes all other players to lose a life if they don’t possess a zero card in their hand. Much laughter was generated as Mike was first to be eliminated, quickly followed by Poppy, then Roger. Tony and Jerry fought out the final duel, again to a backdrop of laughter, and Jerry was the eventual winner. A lightweight family game which gives a lot of fun.

5.       On table 1 Geoff led a group of 4 playing “TOBAGO”, which has been described before. Jeremy was making his debut in the game but quickly picked up plenty of high-scoring treasures, which led to a clear-cut victory by 10 points from Rob, with Geoff 3^rd and Mike 4^th

6.       The remaining 3 players played “GALAXY TRUCKER” as an introduction to the game of many pieces. Players use ‘pipes’ to construct their spaceships to their own design, equip it with batteries, boosters, weaponry etc and then move around space collecting cargo and fighting off meteor storms and pirates. Due to time constraints the game had to finish early but Tony, with his prior knowledge , was declared the winner. 

Games played and Winners were:

Oregon- Kevin Ward;

Time Pirates – Poppy Jabelman;

Incan Gold – Rob Piesse;

5 Alive! – Jerry Jabelman;

Tobago – Jeremy Hurault;

Galaxy Trucker- Tony Simons.