Monthly Archives: April 2013

BEWC Meeting Recap 4/20/2013

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Attendees: Michael Feinberg, Jim Halloran, Chris Cregan, and Dave Olson

Games Played

1) Alea Iacta Est was brought out to determine who was the better Roman senator.  Michael focused heavilly on Patricians and Senate and ended up with a total 36 points.  Dave focused more on provinces while mostly ignoring the Senate and ended with 25.  Jim had a diversified stratedgy and ended with 26.  Chris focused on Patricians and Provinces and ended with 36 points.  In all tie breakers Chris and Michael were even and thus grudgingly shared victory.

2) Dave began to set up the 3rd game and so did not participate in a game of Stone Age.  It was Jim’s first game and ended up with 128.  Chris managed to have the most tools, people and farms but still only ended in 2nd with 165.  Michael ended the game thus wasting the fewest resources and getting 169 points mostly through huts and artifacts.

3)Continuing the trend of JRR Tolkein inspired games the group divided up into two teams of good (Michael and Chris) versus evil (Jim and Dave) in War of the Ring.  Evil started off strong, crushing Rohan in the first few turns while good spent their time getting the northern men into the war.  The Fellowship quickly lost Gandalf, but due to Saurmans intervention Gandalf the White was quicly brought into play.  This seemed to turn the tide, rallying in Minas Tirath he defended the city from the first incursion of Saurons forces, negating a large Ringwraith presence.  Over the next several turns Good fortified the walled town and Evil was not able to advance.  The fellowship made it down to the city with almost no corruption, though they had lost everyone but Frodo and Sam.  The journey from Gondor to Mordor would prove more difficult and quickly gained corruption.  Evil finally won a few steps from Mt. Doom.

BEWC Meeting Recap 4/6/2013

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Attendees: Michael Feinberg, Jim Halloran, Chris Cregan, and Dave Olson

Games Played:

1) Dave showcased Lord of the Rings expansion Friends and Foes as the first game for Jim, Michael and Chris in order to determine if the club should buy it.  All four played as the well remembered hobbits from the movie, leaving Fatty back in the shire.  Jim played as Pipen and staying true to the series had troubles with corruption through most of the game.  Dave played as Merry and had great success with defeating monsters, a new feature introduced in the expansion.  Michael played as Frodo and used his charecters ability to overcome difficult checks.  Chris played Sam, and took control of the ring for most of the game due to his ability to reduce the corruption it caused.  The party fought through to Isengard but it was clear that they would not make it to Mt. Doom before Sauroun’s corruption killed the hobbits, so instead they choose not to skip Helm’s Deep and instead make it their final stand and hopefully finish off all the agents of Mordor.  They were doing well, with only a few more foes to vanquish when an event forced Pippen to gain corruption and be fully taken by evil and thus dead to the group.  Frodo offered to use an item to save him, but Sam and Merry talked him out of it, they need to protect the ring bearer at all cost, and in this case it was Pippen.  The three remaining Hobbits then promptly won the game the next turn calling up the last foes and dispatching them.

2) Jim then advocated a game of Samurai Swords to get some desired revenge on Jim, Chris and Michael.  Chris was dealt the majority of the south island cards and proceeded to use that as his base for the game.  Jim out in the center of the island, just a little north.  Michael rallied his forces on the southern side of the main island between Jim and Chris.  Dave split his forces along the eastern coast fortifying the  island just North of Chris.  The map was very much south heavy, with the northern lands lightly occupied.  The game started off predictably, Jim expanded a bit north, Chris and Dave solidified their islands and Michael solidified the coast.  An alliance was formed between Dave and Michael, which prevented Dave from fully taking the island that lasted until the end of the game.  Later Jim and Dave fought for control of the North, eventually Jim would push Dave out towards the coast.  Michael and Chris danced around each other on the main southern peninsula, but their major battles would happen on the outskirts islands.  Eventually everyone had lost one of their leaders, with Chris’ being the last to fall to Dave.  The battle had taken a large toll on Dave’s forces and soon a rush was on to take out his leaders and take control of his territory.  Michael was next and took out the daimyo responsible for the latest offense.  Michael then tried to make the final assault on Dave’s island fortress but was rebuffed shortly after making landfall, both armies weakened but still alive.  Jim arrived next from the north, following in Michael’s path, and crushed both armies.  Chris was too late to make an attack on Dave so instead rallied to take out Michael s last daimyo, bring both of his remaining daimyo’s into the fight and succedding.  After tallying up total territories, Chris won due to Michael’s land size greatly exceeding Dave’s.

3. Finally a game of Carcasonne was played.  Final scores Chris 173 Michael 104 Dave 158 and Jim 123.  Dave and Chris “cooperated” to create an immense city with a cathedral.

Club Business

It was determined the club would purchase the expansion of Friends and Foes for Lord of the Rings.

BEWC Meeting Recap 3/16/2013

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Attendees: Michael Feinberg, Jim Halloran, Chris Cregan, Alex Wright and Dave Olson

Games Played:

1) While waiting for others to show up, Michael and Chris taught Jim how to play Dominion using only the Sea Side expansion.  Jim started off slow, making a deck based off pearl divers and outposts.  Michael and Chris focused more on navigators and fishing villages both starting off strong.  Later on Chris diversified his deck which ultimately only lead to diluting his deck thus ending the game with only 25.  Michael stayed consistent throughout and managed to put away 33 points.  Jim turned a corner halfway through, with some incredibly good turns and occasionally double good turns with a well used outpost.  In the end Jim managed to not only catch up to Michael score wise but pass him with a final score of 36.

2) Next up Thurn and Taxis was set up.  Alex dominated that game* with 26 points, followed by Chris with 17, Michael at 16 and Jim with 9.

3)To end the day a game of Middle Earth Quest was started, but was not able to be finished.  Jim the Ranger was blighted by floods at the start of the game, which adled his movement and kept him mostly in the north the entire game, trying to keep Dave, Lord of the Rings, from establishing influence in the shire.  Chris the Dwarf, quickly completed his first quest and then with no rest headed for Moria.  Tired but eager to complete his 2nd quest Chris was disappointed to find a Balrog, and was then promptly eaten.  Michael the horse lord spent his time running around the south dashing several of Dave’s nefarious plots, at one point having to sell his horse to salvage Minas Tirith politically.  In the end, the heroes had beaten back several plots, but were growing incredibly tired.  Dave had made sure that it would be through his counters that the game would be over, it was just a question of weither he could achieve out right victory or if it would all come down to one last fight.