March 2019 Game Night

Gentlemen,

Joe hosted game night in South Lyon yesterday, joined by myself, Paul, and Pete.

Pete and I arrived for the pre-happy hour pub visit and were primed for destruction by the sober Paul.

We dined on hot dogs with chili and condiments, cookies and peanut M & Ms, and potato and corn chips with assorted dips. And Labatt Blue (not Light!! The calories! Arghh!). And Paul had his specific dietary needs met with actual Girl Scout thin mints, with disparaging comments on my Keebler ersatz versions made (so cookie shaming is okay now?).

I'm going to say this right off the bat. Be afraid, gentlemen. Be very afraid. Pete was a virtual terminator--the P-888 model, apparently,--who destroyed us all in the three games we played. And in each game he gained the largest army.  I told Pete he should write the recap given this record, but he declined. So my Beej-centric review will commence as usual.

In game 1 I hoped that a solid base of wood and bricks but very weak rock could provide victory with a staked out empire and trade for rocks. Pete managed a strong base in everything but sheep including a very good rock supply and rode that to victory with the longest road and largest army (apparently riding down the road raping and pillaging as it went). Joe was SO CLOSE with harbormaster and 10 points. Paul and I brought up the rear with 5 points, with my only glory being a single city.

Surely game 2 would be better, I thought. And it was. This time I had rocks but a weak brick source that didn't hit until the end of the game, making my oddly high supply of wood on repeated 5 rolls (and Paul whined about that a lot) useless and mere 4:1 bank trade currency. Sigh. Still, I had three cities and 9 points, including a victory point. Joe had 6, Paul had the harbormaster card, 4 cities, and 10 points! But Pete had 11 points and won the game. Although oddly, my picture of the game doesn't show who had longest road. Pete and I both had 7 road segments. Did he have it and win with 13 points? Or did I have it and--perhaps because of front-loading my drinking--not notice I had won the game because I didn't notice I had 11 points? Oh good grief. That can't be. There is no way I could have missed that. I was sobering up by that point so I could drive home. I MUST have been trying to get longest road from Pete and he simply bounced the rubble with his point total. The show off bastard. (Oh wait, I meant to just think that.) Anybody remember for sure? Anyway, the recorded outcome stands with no asterisk even if I was too dumb to declare victory when it was within my grasp. Stuff (possibly) happens. Pete wins!

In game 3 I was in sad shape penned in with my 8 rock failing to supply me with any cities. Joe late in the game cut off my last outlet to a build spot. Ouch. And I could have built to stop him but was hoping to get the resources to build the roads and settlement in one shot to prevent him from going his alternate route to block me. Oops. Pete road his sheep empire and heavy rock presence on 8 (his two cities dwarfed my single settlement production). Joe had 7 points including harbormaster. Paul had 8 points and was threatening harbormaster. I had 4 settlements, the longest road, and was praying for time to exceed Pete's largest army and somehow do it fast before I lost my longest road--which had an end point well shy of Pete's building options. And all while trying to get the remaining point deficit met with VP cards or cities. My only glory was taking Pete's longest road which led him to proclaim victory while the rest of him looked at him puzzled until we realized he didn't know I had taken the longest road from him. But the largest army took care of that in short order with the usual killing of chickens and whatnot. And all this despite Pete robbing himself twice in a row earlier and then doing it late and STILL having the cards in his hand to promote a city! So it was 11 points after all.

We wrapped up early because someone "had a lot to do this morning." Joe made coffee with his fancy machine. And we did watch season 4, episode 9 of Game of Thrones with an epic battle at the wall. But with none of our special visual dietary needs met. The night wrapped up at the ungodly early hour of about 12:30 or so. Joe offered us lodging if we had to.

Pete forgot to bring umbrellas but Paul didn't have his usual Baileys with Joe, so no joke potential lost.

Also Pete complained that Chef Joe should really be capable of better cuisine than hot dogs. The spread was tasty so what's up with that food shaming? Saaay ... was that actually a jab at your mild mannered usual host for the taco bell feast we had in February? Harrumph. Although I did wake up at 4:30 AM with gut wrenching stomach pains last night. Sadly, I'm getting old and can't handle junk food like I used to. Curse you Father Time.

Also, if someone knows Tom's new email, tell him to send it to me! My last game night reminder bounced back so his address looks as dead as if it had tried to stand up to a rampaging largest army under Pete's banner.

Much fun! congratulations Pete. We'll be back to Casa Beej in April.

Beej