Game Night Light 19

Last night was the weekly beer exchange and game night. I was pleasantly surprised that post-Thanksgiving torpor didn't scuttle this week's event.

We returned to an old game from the early days of the monthly game night. Napoleon:

We did indeed manage to finish the game in one evening. Back in the day this was a good 2 or 3 player game that we played a lot before moving on to Viktory II and then Catan. I bought several more of these block war games in case we needed new ones for variety. But new players and a preference for strategy games pushed those games aside.

But that's one reason why weekly game night was born!

The game came back to me as the evening progressed. 

The difficulty of moving masses of troops with limited movement from command and road network limits was a challenge. 

Getting the British and Prussians within supporting distance was hard and not always fully successful. Defending allied supply bases was a constraint. 

And pushing the masses of French troops into position to exploit the allied centrifugal forces was hard. 

Preserving your armies in battle was also a challenge and the occasional night turns were both problems and opportunities. 

And the hidden nature of the enemy always added tension as the assumption of a strong enemy force near you was always made.

The tactical battle map is interesting and we only screwed up once in the first smaller battle--neglecting that artillery can't advance to engage. But the error didn't change the results of the first fight.

One thing neither of us did was form square in battle. I always preferred to keep shooting rather than losing a battle move going into square and then another returning to regular formation.

We only had three major battles in the game. The first was on the knife's edge and could have gone either way. The second was at Waterloo. And the third was the result of a massive surge south as both sides marched to fight for the Prussian supply base. The outcome was on the knife's edge as both raced into position for a final battle near the end of the game's time limit.

It really is a nice game, balancing the tensions of maneuvering on the map and the terror of committing to battle against an unknown foe on the battle map, with your artillery, cavalry, and infantry mix.

Anyway, it was fun to trade and drink beers, and play a war game. Weekly game night forces me to resist the winter urge to just hybernate and wait to emerge in spring to socialize. Or even to use my brain for doing more than browsing my streaming services. 

So thanks for attending!

November 2021 Game Night

We had game night this last weekend! "We" being:

We dined on two kinds of pizza, two kinds on corn chips, two kinds of chip dip, two kinds of cookies, and twin packs of Nutty Buddies. We had Labatt Blue Light and the regular version plus the usual pop. Joe also brought chocolate and Bailey's. Dave brought chocolate-covered pretzels.

We played Catan on the expansion map and using the harbormaster variant, managing to get four games in. I was blue, Dave was green, Paul was red, Joe was orange, and Pete was white.

Game One

Where'd the wheat go! That was a brutal limitation.

Dave went first, followed by Paul, Joe, Pete, and myself in the coveted DP position.

Amazingly, other players didn't jump on wheat to the extent I expected. I had to forego sheep and accept weak wood, but I had the best wheat, good brick, and only had weak rock left to me. I felt penned in but at least could hope for expansion space south of the southern desert.

This was the game start map.

Joe built toward the coast in the south, threatening my potential expansion room. Mostly he too had space in the north shielded by the desert.

Dave was blocked on his interior settlement and fortunately moved north on his western settlement initially.

Paul oddly built just one road despite having a 5 road-building capacity. But with a strong rock capacity, he concentrated on building his cities. He retained expansion room in the north.

Pete started close together but he managed to spring across Catan to get close to the coast while keeping open an option to link his settlements to get longest road.

I reached the coast from both initial settlements, and also blocked Joe from going inland by improving my wheat position and actually getting a rock from that near-useless 2. My year of plenty card was key to building roads to move in two directions and build--finally getting sheep. Amazingly, I earned the longest road with 5 segments, worrying about Pete taking it over; and got harbormaster ahead of two players who also had 2 port points. With two cities and three settlements, that put me to 11 points and victory. Woo hoo!

This was the end map:

Paul, Joe, and Dave had 5 points, while Pete had 4.

 

Game Two

This time wood was the scarce resource.

I placed first, followed by Dave, Paul, Joe, and Pete in the coveted DP position.

This was the game start map.

I pounced on the good rock and brick, and when it got back to me I settled for excellent sheep and adequate wheat. No wood was even within range. And no sheep port was close. Egad. Perhaps I should have grabbed the good wood space in the south and prayed I'd make it to the weak wheat. But as it turned out, Pete had the southern horizons pretty open to his empire.

But without road-building materials, Pete built up his cities with little expansion. Although he did snag harbormaster, as he often does.

Dave was crippled with no brick. He linked his settlements but found that he was ensnared by Joe, Paul, and myself.

Joe reached the coast and moved to link his settlements. Mercifully he didn't head for the coast first in the west where I desperately needed settlement options.

I reached the coast in three locations and hoped to challenge for harbormaster. I especially wanted another port on the wheat before Joe could reach it. But road-building was weak for me. 

Paul was prolific in building cities. And after building a settlement, he went on a road-building spree (every 4 roll gave him 2 roads alone) to get the longest road title and reach 11. Congratulations Paul!

This was the end map:

Pete was second with 7 points, including harbormaster and his fancy non-relic dice tray. Joe had 6, with a victory point card. I had 5 points. Dave had 2.

 

Game Three

No resource sucked by wheat was the weakest.

I forgot to write it down but I think Pete went first, followed by me, Dave, Paul, and then Joe.

This was the game start map.

I was happy with everything but my wheat but at least lacked no resource. I had room to expand, although my inland direction relied on the shield of the desert mostly surrounded by crappy resources. But I did manage to expand with good road-building resources. At one point I had 10 points, including the longest road. 

Egged on by a cabal of my foes friends, Paul blocked one link-up route for me. I wasn't worried because I bypassed it and knew that his commitment there limited his challenge for longest road in the other part of his empire. I knew I could beat Paul because I had only one "wasted" one road segment. But Joe had the potential to max out if he kept building.

Joe stretched out in the south, looking for longest road and with a lot of spaces for ports, too, if the game went on.

Pete also had a mid-range shot at longest road in his southern expanse. But he had potential blockers all around him.

Dave built up his cities even though he was limited in expansion options. But he did begin deploying knights and got the largest army.

I was hoping to regain longest road while Dave lurked uncomfortably close. And not because he was sitting next to me.

But I digress.

Paul completely hemming in Dave at the coast, built his road north, defending his longest road with his 15th road segment, reaching 11. I had 9. But Paul grabbed harbormaster, too, and reached 11 points! Congratulations Paul!

This was the end map:

Dave was looming more than we thought because he had a victory point card in addition to largest army, finishing with 10 points. I had 9 points, the hard way. Pete had 6. And Joe had 5.

 

Game Four

We debated ending for some Game of Thrones or perhaps Xena: Warrior Princess. But one more game beckoned.

Wood was purely crap this game. Except for one lodged up against a desert.

This time Joe went first, followed by Pete, myself, Dave, and then Paul.

This was the game start map.

I grabbed the good wood spot and even had a good brick available. I was denied no resource and if I built out quickly had good settlement options.

I did manage to get to the coast at both locations. As it turned out, it was a mistake to build my first city inland on ample resourcess rather than locking in harbormaster by promoting a port settlement with fewer resources. My sheep port was at least useful for my good sheep resource. Sadly I needed to expand in every direction to block other players and retain build spots--especially ports.

Paul was purely SOL this game for some reason. 

With Joe poking Paul with pointy roads where Paul did manage to build roads, Paul was limited.

Dave expanded in the south, with the potential for harbormaster or longest road. And despite poor wheat managed to promote two cities.

Pete was struggling with roads as Paul and I were. But he staked out some ground in the middle and had room on the coast with Joe preoccupied in the north.

Joe expanded a bit toward the coast in the west but reserved his major attention to ports in the north and his road that cut off Paul at the knees. But with harbormaster and 7 road segments for longest road, Joe made it to 11. Congratulations Joe!

This was the end map:

Dave followed with 8, including a victory point card. I had 6 and Pete had 5. Paul had 3, including a victory point.

It was a fun evening as usual. Thanks to all who made it!

And a meme:

As always, feel free to add your perspective or clear up uncertainties or gross errors of fact.

And a shout out of prayers and best wishes to our friend Tom. May he pull out of his health problem. We'd love to have him return to game night for beer, banter, and friendly games of Catan.

Game Night Light 18

Monday was the weekly game night.

First, the beer exchange:

Ah. Want beer.

 And the game:

This is an old game called "Fox One" on air-to-air combat. The F-15C is the most modern aircraft in the game. It goes back to first generation Korean War era planes. Only two cards of each fighter are available. Although it would be pretty easy to photocopy plane cards on card stock. The reverse side isn't important. The same goes for missile cards.

There is at least a ground attack expansion (which I don't have). I've never played it. It requires a 10-sided die, which I had. Pennies or some other marker are needed.

We played one F-16 versus one Mig-29. Each side adds missiles and then draws six action cards. These cards affect you or your opponent, can enhance your attacks, or evade enemy attacks. 

You maneuver forward on the range track with the environment revealed as you move over it. Clear skies are the usual. But there are clouds and cluttered ground that can affect combat. And you can turn around.

It was pretty easy to play. And it can be fought with teams. Although with more people it gets less realistic unless you are a huge fan of Lanchester Square Theory of combat. 

Still, we liked the game and it is a fine candidate for group play.

We could have played another game but instead kept drinking beer and watched Xena: Warrior Princess.

Game Night Light 17

Last night was the weekly game night. Last week fell through with an unexpected non-game night, shoot-the-shit visit.

Three of us gathered to take a 2-hour SAT math word problem test and then played Car Wars for a bit over 2 hours. I even got the new-dice smell by breaking the seal on the bag of dice in the pristine, never touched game components.

But first, the beer exchange submissions:

Well played, gentlemen.

And this is what the game looked like as we started out on 4 laps of death and destruction.

That's also where we finished, with some rough respect for the ending time of weekly game night.

We only played two or three turns of 5 phases each. The game rules are fairly extensive, not well written, or organized. But we decided to try anyway because we have memories of playing the game in college. And basic physics knowledge helped us figure out what some opaque rules and charts must mean.

The first obstacle was figuring out how to design the cars. With scrap paper we each toiled away with a subcompact and its weight and space limits along with a $3,500 budget to outfit the vehicle with the means to survive each other.

We all passed.

Then we played the game for a bit. As we played we figured out the rules. And many of the daunting list of maneuvers were clearly unneeded by our primitive vehicles. My capacity was almost limited to gentle turns, acceleration, and braking; and an occasional full drift, I think.

Otherwise I'd flip, roll, and burn.

We got to see how dropped spikes, machine gun fire, and armor worked.

And we recalled that our friend Pat owned this game and was the referee back in the day. Which explained our failure to remember the complexity.

We are saving the positions and cars we made to continue the game at a future game night.

Of course, this morning, I wondered why this old game wasn't partly online. I spent 5 seconds on a search and found this site.

Oh good grief.

Well next time we do this from scratch, everyone playing will be expected to design their car with chassis and money limits we all agree on before arriving to play.

But we agreed it was much fun and a great game to revive.