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Ben Bateson
United Kingdom
Ross-on-Wye
Owner of original 'crappy art' GtR and pleased about it.
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With last-minute cancellations from both Ian and Becky, it was a particularly refined threesome that took to the White Lion this week. Ben, Jules and Peter (Freeman most junior) discovered a shared passion for card games that most certainly wouldn't have been found in the absentees!
Having read some of the tails of poor social gamer habits on this site, I count myself very grateful to be in nominal charge of the Ross-on-Wye group. Sure, we have two game nerds, one Analyst Paralysist, a dice obsessive, a dungeon-crawler, and a lot of people who don't answer their email, but it's a good bunch to meet up with. And there are moments of unexpected agreement, such as happened this week.
Having kicked off with a swift couple of games of For Sale (eternally grateful to Tony for finding me a first edition, even if the art's not quite up to scratch of the later versions), Ben and Jules found themselves tied at a game apiece, although Peter had managed second place in both.
Apart from the fact that the post-first editions had been neatly chiselled into shape, I can find very little to complain about regarding this superb game; I expect it will remain one of my staples for a very long time.
With continuing uncertainty regarding further arrivees, we moved on to another short filler, the lovely Coloretto, another game not destined to move out of my 'favourites' zone any time soon. Amid much swearing and cursing, I believe Peter and Jules came out with a game apiece. Although I'm impressed by the theming and general atmosphere to Zooloretto, I think my heart will always come back to the simplicty of this little game; along with For Sale, it captures so many essences of a good board game. A thoroughly satisfactory start to the evening, in other words.
Jules was looking for something a bit heavier and Artus hit the table, and along with it a painful lesson for Jules and Peter in managing risk. Even within its short 2-month lifespan at Ross, Artus has managed to win the accolade of 'game most people think is brilliantly nasty', which is kudos points in my book any day. A thoroughly addictive game, as always, resulted in a slightly runaway lead for Ben. It is possible that there is a lot to be counted for experience in this game, but that only puts it on a par with such luminaries as Puerto Rico and Modern Art.
On The Cards was deservedly being eyed up again, but after a couple of preliminary hands of whist, I thought it was reasonable to establish both Jules and Peter as card-gamers worthy of something even better.
A little aside on the handling of a traditional deck of cards: I surely can't be the only person to have noticed that some people have an intuitive skill with traditional cards that others lack. It seems to have little to do with their abilities at any 'non-standard' card game, although those played with a near-standard deck (ie. most of Knizia's output) will doubtless offer some advantage. It doesn't particularly surprise me to find that such a skill is inherent in some families.
Pondering aside, it wasn't difficult to notice Peter observing some pretty good card-handling strategies, so the time had to be right for a game third only to Bridge and Poker in my estimation: the quite wonderful Ninety-nine. A couple of outstandingly unbalanced deals early on highlighted the very best of this game, but also the value of the number 3 in so many contexts. Whilst On The Cards has many fine aspects, there is really only one traditional card game I want to teach to a group of three.
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Owner of original 'crappy art' GtR and pleased about it.
