Only three of us this week, Tony, Colin and me.
We started with another new game from the recent Euro Math Trade - Notre Dame.
In Notre Dame each play drafts three cards from their action deck of 9, each card corresponding to an area of the board and offering various resources. You need cubes to play onto the board, coins to bribe persons and buy VP at Notre Dame and you need VP to win. And don't forget to not let the rat problem get out of hand.
Once three rounds have occurred a period ends and the 9 card decks are reassembled. I started the first period by making two plays into my park. This set me up for plenty of bonus VPs, but meant I would obviously struggle for resources most of the game. Colin concentrated in the Hotel during the first period, which is unfortunate as it's probably the weakest building, and he was the only person to make any coach moves. I think Tony concentrated generally on resources, ending the first period with more cubes and coins than he started with.
During the second period the rat problem intensified. Plague levels had slowly increased to the point where at the end of round 4 or 5 all three us at were at either 8 or 9 in the harbour. The next turn the cards revealed six rats! Tony already had a reasonable presence in the Hospital and was able to kill enough rats in his turn to be okay and Colin used the minstrel to move 3 cubes from his Hotel to the Hospital. I just accepted I was going to 'bust' this turn and didn't worry about it - in fact I went over 9 for most of the remaining turns. This meant I ended up with considerably less cubes on the board than Tony whilst Colin did not have plague problems, but did run short of cubes in hand and had to move cubes around a few times.
For the second and third periods I mostly got points from collecting messages, and I got decent VP from the Master Carpenter (point for every occupied region) . Tony scored big on Beggar King (points for low plague levels) , Master Carpenter and the Mayor (3VP for each region with 3+ cubes) . Colin had a few messages and scored for the Lady of the Court (VP for each cube in the most occupied region). Notre Dame points were split 4/4 each period, everyone visiting twice. Colin purchased 6VP on his first period visit, but ran short of gold later so this was a mistake I think.
Result: Tony low-mid 60s, Simon mid 50s, Colin high 30s
After Notre Dame we played a couple of games of Face for the Galaxy with both expansions (Gathering Storm and Rebel vs Imperium). Goals were on, and takeovers active for the second game. The second game saw a takeover attempt, the first I have seen! I managed a second place in both games - in the first I had Trade League plus several big VP alien worlds and 3VP Alien goal, and in the second a mixed bag that saw me claim 3VP for both first to discard and full house of powers and 5Vp for 3+ explore powers. I still don't really feel that RvI added a huge amount to the game - though it does seem that we shuffle the deck during play a lot less now. I guess that is good, given it's size!
Next weekend: Grand Prix Brighton! (Magic 2010 sealed)
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