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Gary Heidenreich
United States
Milwaukee
Wisconsin
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ImageID=947118]
May 8th, 2012
Sorry, just a little late this week as I was off work yesterday. Also, missed last week. I don't like missing weeks but it could not be helped.
Three of us this past week, Timm, Kevin and myself. Kevin brought over his sweet ass Crokinole board...
Yep, he won this in St. Louis last year for the Geekway (which is next week, finally!). So, since he was first, we started to play a game on it. Timm showed up about half way through the game so I gave up my spot so Timm could try the board, as well. I think Timm hammered the win home for us. Over the past few weeks I got my groove back so I'm hoping I'm not as miserable as I was last year in the tournment. I want to get out of the first round.
After that, since it had been awhile, we played a little bit of Sheepshead. I did not get a decent hand out of the six hands we played. Not one. Kevin got a monster hand at the end to end up way up, Need to play some five handed for cash really soon, I think. Call some of the folk who used to play.
So, it was time for the main game of the night. Since I said I would teach it in St. Louis and have been wanting to play again, we broke out Garden Competition. It's a tight game about gardening (with deduction involved). Now, that it's my second play, I discovered I *really* like this one. There are different ways to go about playing it. One thing to remember is to take care of the weeds or they will take care of you. You get 24 actions total in the game so each one counts. Kevin, in his first play, won with 17. Timm and I each had 13 points. Once you get the game play down, it's a quick game too.
We ended the night with Alea Iacta Est, a dice allocation game in the Alea series. And, quite frankly, one of my favorite of the dice games like this. Tough choices, interaction, fun, quick, and easy to teach. Also a really tight game, as well. So every choice matters (as you will see with the scores). Well, the scores. Kevin had 44, I had 43 and Timm had 42 points.
Next week, games on Tuesday and then St. Louis on Thursday!!!!
#182
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Gary Heidenreich
United States
Milwaukee
Wisconsin
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April 24th, 2012
We started out with three of us...Timm, Chris, and I. Kevin was going to be a bit late, and we had some time. Lexio was that choice. So, we played a three player game where Chris killed with 127 and I had 86 with Timm grabbing 87. We start with 100 points of chips. As we finished up, Aaron arrived so since we were waiting for Kevin still, we played it again and taught Aaron. He's a card player so two minutes we were up and running. I did not note the scores, unfortunately, but we got in three, pretty damn exciting hands.
So, Kevin arrived and we decided, what the Hell, we played our third game of Risk Legacy. I'm not going to go into any real detail as if someone is playing it, I don't want to get into ruining anything for anyone playing. But, we had our third different winner, Kevin. He exploited something now that we all see. The next game is going to kick up to a new level.
This is so quick compared to the Risk I grew up with. We had time to get a game of The Princes of Florence in. We all had played before, obviously if you read this blog you know that, and jumped right in. I can't speak for the others, but I was going to try something different.I went and grabbed up bonus and prestige cards. The Prestige cards were going cheap. No, I did not win but I think that strategy needs to be mixed with something. Anyways, Kevin won with 66, Chris had 59, Aaron had 57, Timm 52 and I had 49.
#181
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Gary Heidenreich
United States
Milwaukee
Wisconsin
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April 17th, 2012
One hundred and eighty meetings. I find that pretty damn amazing that this has went on this long with no signed of fizzling out. Thankful for the guys who join me each week. It's something I always look forward to (through thick and thin). Last night it was only Chris, Kevin and I. I gave Kevin my spare copy of Bazaar (yes, of course the 3M version) so we decided to play it. As Chris noted, it is sort of the reverse of Monad with both being Sid Sackson games. I jumped out early with some pretty efficient combos but Kevin really came on at the end (as well as Chris) to make it a battle to efficiently finish off the game. Chris ended it but Kevin grabbed the win with 23. Chris had 19 and I had 18. This game can burn your brain if you let it. But it's so fast and I like the retro look (it is over 40 years old).
It was time to decide on another game. After a little looking, throwing out names, etc., we hauled out San Marco. A nice pie-cutting, area control game. It's also pretty damn quick and the board looks awesome. We noticed the hidden cat on the board. Chris had not played before so we gave him the run down and away we went. It's not a difficult game, that is certain, but it has some great decisions, mainly in the splitting of the cards phase of the game. The start player gets action and limit cards and splits them into three piles, however they want. Then the other two choose which grouping they want, with the splitter getting what is left. This was a tight game but in the end Kevin pulled out the win with 61, Chris had 56, and I had 48. End game, I couldn't get cubes back on the board.
It was shaping up where everything is coming up Milhouse for Kevin. Kingsburg was what we decided on. I just found out last night, from Chris, what at least one of the expansions is about. Now, I have to get it. It sounds like it will vary up the board and my feeling is that would be huge. I dont' drag this one out much as it is sort of samey to me (but I like it). Anyways, we gave Kevin a quick refresher and on we went. To change things up, I tried to go dominate in a strategy (I went for the Chapel row full out, bank some cubes at the end and keep up with the military). It didn't work for me and Kevin, won again, with 41, Chris had 36 and I had 32. I need to track down the expansion for this.
#180
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Gary Heidenreich
United States
Milwaukee
Wisconsin
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April 10th, 2012
Got a little play of my guitar in prior to games last night. I thought of an old, old, song Timm and I wrote when we were in early high school. Melting Walls. It's amazing that after 30+ years, I still remember lyrics and chords. No, this doesn't tie into anything...just something from yesterday I wanted to add (since I still need to replace The Skull). I sometimes think that talking solely about games gets a little dry. Some personality always helps (as the game group itsself has all sorts of personalities in it).
Four of us tonight, Kevin, Chris, Timm and myself. Kev was leaving at around 8ish so we weren't going to play anything long. It took us a bit but we decided on one that hasnt' made it to the table in awhile. In the Year of the Dragon along with the Great Wall expansion from the Alea Treasure Chest expansion. This game is so brutal, so Feldian. I think it was the first one of Feld's that I have played. The game was very tight. Everyone seemed very focused and taking different routes to success. We all commented on how we have forgotten how good of a game this is. It was a battle all the way to the end and it finished as the absolute tightest game of this I had played (online or in person). I pulled out the win with 106 points, Timm had 104, Kevin had 103 and Chris had 101. A satisfying win with a a satisfying game.
We still had time so when it's the four of us, we will break out Some'R'Set. Partners were Chris and I versus Kevin and Timm. We played four hands I belive. First hand, Timm and Kevin bid 19 (out of 24). Crazy. They had a great run, but only got 18 points. So, they were set and Chris and I jumped out to a lead. Chris and I won the next hand to give us more of a lead. The third hand, I had an awesome hand loaded with 10's. Timm, unfortunately, was loaded with 12's (those numbers are the suits). Got into a bidding war and I bid up to 23 (geez). I *knew* he had 12's and would have stomped if I let him call that suit as trump. I took a nice amount, but because I could not get rid of the 12's in my hand, we got set. So, the bad guys had the lead. We played one more hand before Kevin left. I bid up to 14 and got stuck with the bid (I was really just bidding it up). I called 2's. It was a struggle but we managed to pull out the win with some good card play by Chris. We ended with Timm and Kevin winning with 33. Chris and I got 32. Again, another very tight game.
Kevin left so Timm, Chris and I chose to play Saint Petersburg. I figured I didn't want to see Timm win and he NEVER wins this game. So, yeah, perfect! It was a really tight money game and of course, I went off that track trying to get a jump on points. It was working okay but I know I made two errors that sunk the game for me. Timm and Chris were battling but ultimately at the end, Chris won on the strength of his aristrocrats. He had 85, Timm had 79 and I had 51. If I did not make the mistakes I made, I would have been in the 70's, I believe.
I want to thank anyone who reads this for bids in the Milwaukee Auction that we ran the last couple of weeks. Those bids were much appreciated!
Geekway in a little over a month from now! Whooo!
#179
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Gary Heidenreich
United States
Milwaukee
Wisconsin
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April 3rd, 2012
Election day again and once again we played a five player game of Tammany Hall. We all played once before (April 5th, 2011) with the exception of Aaron. I have not looked back at any detail of it, except the final scores. Those showed it was a tight two man race for first/second, third and fourth was tight with fifth way behind. How was it going to stack up?
All the districts were used and we were working with the people to gain power and favors. A lot of favors were gained as the population grew. After the first elections, I was slanderized early, putting me back as I was gaining a stronghold of people on the southern docks. Timm had a pretty good hold in the southern tip of NY. Chris was way out in front early with power in some of the northern wards.
This game works on a few different levels. You get points by ruling a ward. That is done by having bosses in the district and favors from people in the district. You gain favors by adding different groups (Italians, Germans, Irish, English) to the board. You add an Irish cube, you get an Irish favor. Those favors are used to take over districts. At the end of an election, if you are the boss for the most of a group, you get three favors from that group. That is huge and cannot ignore that (as it won the game). It is a unique area control type of game and I find it thematic as all get out.
Anyways, even though Chris had a nice lead, Timm was building his power pretty high. He had accumluated all sorts of favors and was flexing his muscle. I had laid back the first couple of rounds, gained some favors and by the time the third election rolled around, I was able to overwhelm the docks and have my bosses in place. Chris, Aaron and Kevin were fighting for some of the smaller wards in the north. They might have been getting points, but they were not able to amass favors as there weren't as many people in those areas. Because I consistently worked with the Italians and stockpile favors, I was able to use that to my advangate by adding Italians in other wards to gain an advantage. It worked well. as I couldn't really be stopped in the last election. I ended with 28, Timm had 17, Chris had 16, Kevin had 14, and Aaron had 8. I know that type of win will not happen again. We discussed it as the end was fairly anti-climatic. I think it comes into playing it more often. Remembering you need to watch and pay attention to how many groups you have control of. Getting those favors is huge.
We had time for one more so I pulled out The Prototype. I had not played it with five yet and was anxious to do so. Aaron was new to the game but learned it pretty quickly. I was worried that the points would be curtailed as we had max amount of players. Not that it matters, I guess, but something I was thinking about. Well, I should not have been worried. Timm ended up with 18, Kevin had 14, Aaron had 9, Chris 3, and I ended with -1. With five, all the cards are used. Also, with five, I think a wide range of scores is going to be the norm as it becomes more difficult to get points. We sat and brainstormed some on a name for the game...nothing yet.
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Gary Heidenreich
United States
Milwaukee
Wisconsin
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March 27th, 2012
Alllrighty! First, I want to welcome Aaron to TEG. He came by for the first time last night as the newest member TEG. Welcome!
As we waited for Aaron to show up Timm, Chris, Kevin and myself squeezed in a few hands of Some'R'Set. Amazingly, we got three hands in, in a short period of time. We figured we would get one in so we did not keep a cumlative score. Kevin and I won one game, Timm and Chris won one. It fails me who won the third (I'm thinking Kev and I). I do know neither team was set.
Aaron arrived and I pulled out the classic, first time at TEG game, Fast Food Franchise. Aaron had not played so we have him the quick and dirty and jumped in. Kevin grabbed the Atlantic seaboard and started spreading Burger Bros. like roaches. I tried to squeeze in there with Ice Cream, but was blocked off. Aaron started chicken markets in the Mid West and Texas. Chris had started a high end steak house out in the Pacific Northwest. Timm owned the middle of the country with his pizza. Burgers got off to a nice start, stopping any Ice Cream growth. Chicken and Pizza were expanding nicely and Steak And Salad had a considerable chain in one area. They were an expensive choice for the game. Simce my ice cream stands weren't getting bigger, I expanded into the chocolate business in Cali. BOOM! They liked chocolate there. It grew, people visited. Steak and Salad eventually shuttered up their doors followed shortly by Burger Brothers. The need for burgers apparently stopped. Ultimately, at the end (15 minutes after S&S went down) we ended the game. I pulled out the win with Dark and Gooey with 755k, Aaron had 340k, Timm had 270k. Yeah, it's dice. But, who cares, I find it fun.
We wandered the basement looking for a game. Evo was a finalist, so was Santiago but we chose Atlantic Star. We did a rehash of the rules and taught Aaron and got going. Aaron missed a rule where he could not run a cruise a second time but he managed to salavge that mistake. I made it through the game without having to borrow on my past cruises but did it matter? Nope. Chris won with 53, Kevin had 47, Timm 37, Aaron had 32 and I had 29. Yeah, borrow.
As a note, next week the Guild will be having an auction and I will have the following games in the auction...
Memoir '44: Hedgerow Hell
Pony Express
The Downfall of Pompeii
Los Mampfos
Brass
Keythedral
Auction is here...http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/139649/the-auction-tha...
Hope something is in the bunch that you might like and bid on!
#177
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Gary Heidenreich
United States
Milwaukee
Wisconsin
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March 20th
Just Chris, Timm and myself again. Before they got here, I pulled out an alea series game, Augsburg 1520 to try and learn before they came over. It's supposed to be a tight, quick auction game and would like to get this to the table. But, after setting it up, I realized I did not want to hack through it (and neither did anyone else). So, we packed it up and Chris suggested The Settlers of Catan. That was definately agreeable so we pulled out the game.
This game was not one of my gateways to gaming (even though it seems like everyone else had played it hundreds of times. My gateway was Monopoly when I was 7. Right aboutn 40 years of gaming for me and here I am, gaming regularly with people I have met over the past three and a half years of gaming on Tuesday and a friend who I have been gaming with for 35+ years.
Back to the game...we set the board up randomly and laid the numbers down. The wheat seperated the board into two. Chris placed first, then I, then Timm. Chris and Timm ended up in the same area which allowed me to strike a long road from the wheat and brick fields over to the wood. Timm and Chris battled for settlements and Chris had the best of him and was at 9 points late in the game. I drove a pretty good army to take over the largest army late. And then I managed to trade for the one wood I needed which allowed me to build two road segments, grabbing the longest road and the win. After this play, I have to say I am liking this game the more I play it. I still don't see this as a gateway (I would never use it as one) but that's me.
Looking for another game, we chose what would be my second choice in a gateway. My first choice would be Fast Food Franchise as a gateway. It has worked for me over and over again. That needs to hit the table soon. Anyways, we chose Ticket to Ride. I use all the 1910 tickets in the game and when we started this one, we each had a big ticket and three smaller ones to start. Timm kept 3 tickets as Chris and I each kept two. Timm and Chris started in the Northeast which allowed me to take my time along the southern streches of the US, racking up long connection points. At the end, Chris earned the longest train bonus (he drove the game end) but ultimately, it wasn't enough as I did grab an extra ticket to complete, as well as Timm. I ended with 116 and Timm and Chris tied at 114. Really tight game! Great, quick game (35 minutes with three of us).
We broke out Monopoly Express as it had been awhile, I got a new, complete copy (lost a die in my other copy) so it was beckoning. First game, Chris just dominated scoring 19.3k. I had 7k and Timm had 4k. Second game was closer but I managed to hit 15.6k to end the game with Timm at 13.3k and Chris at 8.4k.
Still in the non-thinking mood and Timm was waiting for his wife to come pick him up, we broke out Can't Stop. Timm got Stormtroopers (6,7,8) and drove the 7's to be closed early. Chris had a lot on the board and I had nothing. I made a pretty sweet comeback by closing the 12's and driving the 8's all the way up in one turn. When I play this game, I either win in grand fashion or crash and burn badly. As I said last night once you pick up the dice and start to shake them, you WILL roll them. No doubt. It is law. Well, it got to a point where we all were pushing it as Timm's wife was waiting and we were trying to quickly end the game. We ended with no winner as we just wrapped it up. Still exciting!
As a note, next week the Milwaukee Guild will be having an auction and I will have the following games in the auction...
Memoir '44: Hedgerow Hell
Pony Express
The Downfall of Pompeii
Los Mampfos
Brass
Keythedral
Hope something is in the bunch that you might like and bid on!
#176
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Gary Heidenreich
United States
Milwaukee
Wisconsin
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March 13th, 2012
Today, Chris, Kevin and I were waiting on Timm. We had about 45 minutes so we broke out "The Prototype" again. Man, this game needs a name. I also need to type up the rules, as well. We talked about it before and checked the tile distribution, we tweaked that so there were seven positive tiles and five negative tiles in each round. It did not affect the scoring much it seemed as Chris and Kevin tied with 13 points and I had 9 points. Chris won the tiebreaker which was the number of tricks taken. I know Kevin digs the game, as do I. Need to get the ruleset written up and another set put together for the Geekway contest. If I can't, well, I'm bringing it down anyways.
Timm arrived shortly after we finished and we decided on Mexica, my personal favorite of the The Mask Trilogy. It's an action point/area control type of game with very fluid movement. The game allows you to be very creative in play and I really enjoy that. It is definately not scripted. I had been wanting to get this to the table for awhile but for some silly reason I always thought it would be a bear to rehash and explain the rules. Nope. Pretty simple and straightforward game to explain, actually. Chris ultimately was the winner in a closer-than-the-score-showed match. He had 101, Timm and I each had 89 (Timm got the tiebreaker), and Kevin had 75.
After that, we went with a quicker card game. Condottiere. It had been some time since we played it and was a welcome suggestion. Well, at that moment for me. It was a very quick game even for this game. I think we had two hands total. My first hand was pretty bad. Some sixes, a three and ones (and a Bishop). Bah. My second hand was WORSE. I only had 10 cards as I did not take a territory the first hand. I had two 3's and all special cards. TWO 3's! Dang. I tried to win a territory, but to no avail. Chris pulled out the win in this one, as well with a very strong final hand. Bad hands, but really good game.
We had time for one more short, brainless, game. Pickomino was the choice. Chris' skill in dice rolling was highlighted in this game as he collected tile after tile while the rest of us were lucky if we had one. Well, I think everyone had at least two tiles, except me. I had none at the end. Ugg. Chris won again with 9, Timm had 5, Kevin had 4, and I had the big goose egg. Chris with the clean sweep. It had been some time where someone got the sweep in an evening.
#175
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Gary Heidenreich
United States
Milwaukee
Wisconsin
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March 6th, 2012
It was just Timm, Chris and I yesterday. We started off the evening by breaking out the game I'm working on. We made no tweaks from last week and went at it. With Timm and I knowing how it is playing now, we pretty much beat up on Chris with Timm and I each with 16 points and Chris had -1. Chris brought up a point to consider for the next plays and it will be something I'm going to pay attention to. If you take a trick, you lead. Sometimes, leading on a negative tile is not a good thing. Chris brought that up and it was something I thought about during the game, as well. So, we will see in future games. The time it took was right about 40 minutes and the scores were in line with the rest.
We milled about trying to find a game to play and Chris suggested The Climbers. We all played it once, perhaps a year and a half ago or something like that. We rehashed the simple rules and started to climb. Timm was the first to use a ladder but shortly after, I set myself up to use two ladders to be way up on everyone. That worked to my advangate as I worked to keep them lower as they were trying to climb. As it does in this game, it gets tight up in the nosebleed areas of the game and I managed to hold on to a victory.
Yspahan was next as it had been talked about for weeks now. Something we all know how to play and enjoy. Timm jumped out to an early lead and was really working the caravan. I had a slow start but picked it up later and Chris was grabbing the bulk of his points in the city itsself. Timm managed to hold on with 96 points. Chris stormed back and ended with 89 (I think he used almost all his cubes in the city). I ended with 75. It was the perfect game at that moment. It also solidified the night being quicker games, which was good as it had been awhile.
On that note, I pulled out Lexio. It had been months since we played on a Tuesday. My friend and his wife stopped over after shooting on Saturday to visit and we played a game of it then or it had been really quite a while since it came out. We had some great plays. Chris had a great hand the first round and managed to stick me with 10 tiles left (and a 2). My hand was quite good, as well, but it just didn't work out. Next hand I had all four 2's. I had to slap that down in play, just because. I didn't win that hand but still got a couple of points. Timm took that hand but got very few chips out of it. Third and final hand worked well for me and I managed to win and get a fair amount of chips. But, with Chris dominating the first hand, he ran way with the win with 134. I had 87 and Timm had 79 (we start with 100 points in chips). I need to go to more antique stores. I have these antique clay chips that are the same size of the chips that come with it, but they clink nicely and are nice, flat colors. The quality of the chip goes with the quality of the tiles (unlike the chips that come with the game). I finally got rid of the insert too. I liked it but couldn't store my chips with the game.
Back to the next game. Lots of short games yesterday. We broke out another old favorite of mine, Poison. I think it had been near two years since I last played. We taught Timm and away we went. After the first two hands, Timm had the lead but the last hand both Timm and I sucked up a bunch of purple and tied on it. Ouch. We both had to eat those points and Chris pulled out the win with 16, Timm had 20 and I had 26.
We ended the evening with another brisk game of Cartagena. I'm not sure but I think I had been playing it wrong by not allowing more than one play a turn. Maybe I had been playing it correctly, but I was thinking we had some games go long as this one took us right about 20 minutes. With the 'up to three' plays in a turn, it made the game fast and really good. I'm a Leo Colovini fan (I might have said that before). One of these days I want to have a day dedicated to all of his games. Anyways, I lost this one with 2 guys, Timm got four to the boat and Chris, with some really slick play, pulled out the surprise win. Good stuff!
#174
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Gary Heidenreich
United States
Milwaukee
Wisconsin
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February 21st, 2012
Once again I forgot my notes. They were on my kitchen counter for cripes sake. Eeesch. I can remember rules for hundreds of games but I can't remember to put a piece of paper in my pocket. Last night, Kevin, Timm and I got together. With that, we figured we would bust out "The Prototype". That is now the name of the game I'm working on designing. We played it for the first time a few weeks ago and it went over well but we had some tweaks. This week, we added the tweaks, sreamlined the point tiles (got rid of special tiles) and changed how you gained negative tiles. It went over very well. So well, we played a second game of it right away. Point totals were close. I think Kevin won the first game with 15, Timm had 12 and I had 3. Second game, I believe Timm won with 13, I had 11, and Kevin had 10. The game has consistently took about 45-60 minutes. The game is feeling pretty damn good now. Tense with strategic and tactical planning and I feel with a pretty easy ruleset. After the two plays last night, I'm actually really excited and frankly, I wanted to play again. Needs more plays to see how the scores are coming out and to start writing up the rules. I'd love to have this ready for the competetion at the Geekway to the West in St. Louis this year.
Kevin brought a couple of games so we broke out Kingdom Builder. This one was new to Timm and I, so Kevin quickly taught it to us (which did not take long at all). I found this to be an interesting game. It reminded me a lot of Through the Desert but not nearly as tense. It also was a very quick game where the players can push for the end. The scoring cards add a variety to the game along with the variable set up boards. Now, this is where I have an issue with Queen Games lately. It seems to me they are putting out incomplete games in order to pump out expansions to suck more $$ from us. In this instance, they could have made the boards double sided instead of having a, frankly useless, score track on each side of the board. They could have added more scoring cards, lets say 20 versus the 10 the game comes with. I don't really care for this trend with Queen. Well, back to the game. Timm pulled out the win by connecting to the majority of the castles compared to me (as we were tied before doing the castle scoring. Kevin was in third.
This all happened right about 9pm so instead of a board game, we went to the tried and true hands of Sheepshead to finish the night. We got in about nine hands with a few doublers mixed in as the cards were pretty evenly split all night (except for the last hand). Kevin stomped on us with the last hand (which is always a doubler) and ended up with +14. Timm and I each had -7.
#173
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