Author Archives: boegames

BEWC Meeting Recap 10/1/11

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Attendees: Tom Dunford, Scott Harris, Joe Kauffman, Michael Kelly, Michael Feinberg

Club Business: The copy of Power Grid we voted to buy last meeting is on order and should arrive for the next meeting.

Games Played:

1) Scott, Michael, and Michael started with a game of Risk: 2210 AD. Scott took an early lead, taking control over the moon and most of the ocean territories, but Michael and Michael then ganged up on him. Michael F wasn’t able to hold on to Europe, which basically knocked him out of the game, but Michael K plowed through Scott’s forces on the moon and in South America and then used his stack of diplomacy cards to foil any attempts to take them back, giving him a commanding victory.

2) Tom, Scott, Michael, and Michael then played an epic (4 hours!) game of Cities and Knights of Catan. Tom took over for Scott who had to leave just after the set-up phase, and Scott’s settlement placement gave Tom a key early game monopoly for ore, preventing many knights from coming into play and allowing the first barbarian ship to arrive to raze Joe and Michael F’s cities. Michael F thought he was basically out of the game after the dice failed to give him any resources for the first three turns and then was penned in to just three settlements, but a pair of 2:1 trading harbors and early achievement of the aqueduct allowed him to turn all three of those settlements into cities and claim both the trade and science metropolises. Combined with the merchant and a victory point from a progress card, he was only one point from victory, which would have come when the barbarian ship next arrived and his six knights would have given him the Defender of Catan title, but Mike K had been steadily expanding and was able to snatch away both the trade metropolis and the longest road title (from Tom), pushing him to 14 victory points and his second win of the day.

BEWC Meeting Recap 9/17/11

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Attendees: Jason Bowen, John Boyle, KC Deitrick, Joe Kauffman, Michael Feinberg, Scott Harris, Josh Lichti, Jesse Lute, Lane Taylor, Dave Olson

Club Business: We voted to purchase Power Grid. There was also strong interest in Alien Frontiers and we’ll likely decide to purchase it when the third printing becomes available next month. [For those interested in Alien Frontiers, Clever Mojo is currently running a kickstarter campaign to fund an expansion. At certain backer levels you get a copy of the base game – http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/clevermojogames/alien-frontiers-factions]

Games Played:

1) John, KC, Michael, Scott, Josh, and Lane played 7 Wonders with the Leaders expansion. Lane and Josh got into a military race, which tied up their resources leaving them tied for last pace, while Scott just managed to edge out John for the victory, 67 to 66.

2) Jason, John, KC, Joe, Michael, Scott, Josh, and Lane had an epic game of Red Dragon Inn. After some early players were knocked out, mostly by running out of money (the wench kept thinking the pot was her tip…), it settled into a game of pick on the leader, whittling the pack down to Josh’s Deidre the Priestess, Scott’s Dimli the Dwarf, and John’s Wizgille the Tinkerer. Deidre was drunk under the table first, then Wizgille and Dimli were both teetering on the edge when Wizgille’s random gear deck forced John to draw more cards then he had left, giving Scott the win.

3) Once KC was out of Red Dragon, he joined Dave for a game of Battle Line, which Dave won.

4) Jason, KC, Lane, Michael, and Dave played Kingsburg, which was close the whole game with Lane leaping past KC at the very end to win 44 to 42.

5) Joe, Jesse, and Scott played Pandemic, but succumbed to a triple outbreak in the Middle East.

6) Joe and Jesse played one round of Lost Cities, which Joe won, but there were some misunderstandings on the rules, as it was the first time playing for both.

7) Jason, KC, Joe, Michael, Jesse, and Dave played Battlestar Galactica, where Dave and Michael enjoyed a cylon victory. Interestingly, Dave and Michael were also the two cylons at the last club battlestar game…. The game started off very slow, but turned disastrous for the humans after the sleeper agent phase when Joe’s Tyrol was thrown in the brig as a sympathizer (where he was stuck for the rest of the game) and then Jason had to leave early, leaving the humans one player down. Suspicions were flying like mad, particularly after Michael’s Admiral Adama (who became a cylon during the sleeper agent phase) choose a particularly disastrous next jump, leaving the fleet with only one fuel. With only two free players, the humans couldn’t manage to send him to the brig before he revealed himself on his next turn, immediately followed by Dave’s Starbuck, which sent Joe’s Baltar and Jesse’s Tigh to the brig and sickbay respectively, leaving the humans completely overwhelmed by a cylon super crises, consuming the last of their fuel.

BEWC Meeting Recap 9/3/11

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Attendees: John Boyle, Joe Kauffman, Michael Kelly, Michael Feinberg

Club Business: None

Games Played:

1,2) John, Joe, and Michael F started with 2 games of 7 Wonders with the Leaders expansion. John ran away with the first game with 66 points, but Michael came back in the second game to edge John out 55 to 53, despite both concentrating heavily on military.

3) Michael K joined us for a game of Red Dragon Inn. John got a bit picked on and his Zot the Wizard fell out first, leaving a tight game until Joe’s Eve the Illusionist took out Michael K’s Dimli the Dwarf before succumbing to his own drink at the end of the round, leaving Michael F’s Fiona the Volatile the last adventurer standing.

4) Settlers of Catan came out next for the first time in a long time. Joe dominated the longest road contest, cutting the whole world in half, but couldn’t turn it into more victory points. John then snuck in to edge out Michael K for the victory, 10 points to 9.

5) We next played Race for the Galaxy, which was the first time playing for just about everyone, but we soon got into it and Joe built up a rare earth production machine that led him to a comfortable victory.

6) After John left we finished up with a game of Carcassonne. It looked like Joe was going to win this one when he drew the one piece left in the pile that let him simultaneously close three cloisters, while Michael and Michael fought over a sprawling city that kept getting bigger and seemed to have no chance of closing, but with the second to last piece in the game, Michael K found one that closed that city, giving both Michaels 46 points, and propelling Michael F to victory with a score of 120.

BEWC Meeting Recap 8/20/11

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Thanks to John Boyle for the meeting Minutes

Attendees:

Scott Harris, Joe Kauffman, John Boyle, Josh Lichti, Michael Kelly, Jesse Lute, Dave Olson (for 5 minutes), Chad Willard & Haley Willard

Game 1: 7 Wonders

Scott, Joe, John. Scott won with 57 points focusing mostly on Blue VP and 15 points on the Pyramids, Side A.

It was Joe’s first game

Game 2: 7 Wonders. Jesse and Josh showed up.

Scott, Joe, John, Jesse, Josh

Josh squeaked out a first place win with 47 points, combining 16 points in science with 21 points in Blue VP. Jesse and Joe were a close second with 46 points.

It was Josh and Jesse’s first game.

Game 3: 7 Wonders + Leaders expansion. Michael Kelly showed up.

Scott, Joe, John, Jesse, Josh, Michael

This was Michael’s first game of 7 Wonders period, but everyone’s first game with the Leaders expansion. The expansion introduces a new game mechanic via Leader cards. Before Age I begins, all players are dealt 4 Leader cards. Each player selects one card and passes the rest to the next player (just like the regular game). Continue until everyone has 4 cards.

Now, at the beginning of each Age, each player selects a Leader card to play. The leader cards provide similar abilities or resources found in the base game such as more resources, extra gold, science symbols, etc. However, there are new abilities such as allowing the player to spend one less of any resource for the different colors of cards, or increasing the Money bonus at the end of the game. It’s almost like playing with 3 extra Wonder abilities which really mixes the game up in a fun way.

Scott won Game 3 with 61 points, banking up an impressive 23 blue card VPs, despite Jesse’s dominance with 28 science points.

Game 4: 7 Wonders + Leaders expansion

Scott, Joe, John, Jesse, Josh, Michael

The final 7 wonders game of the day ended in a second Josh victory with 63 points (26 of which were blue cards). Scott was second place with 58 points, 43 of which were Science. He had two leaders that gave him extra science symbols, but it wasn’t enough to pull ahead.

Overall, I think everyone enjoyed the Leaders expansion, though it may have been a bit overwhelming for some of the new players (except Josh, obviously).

Game 5: Pandemic + expansion.

Jesse, Scott, Joe, Michael, John

This game was a nail-biter, going down to the wire.

Jesse: Scientist

Scott: Troubleshooter

Joe: Ops Expert

Michael: Researcher

John: Epidemiologist

The group got out to a decent start, quickly curing 3 of the 4 diseases. However, in addition to the 4th disease, since we were playing the expansion, we also had to deal with the occasional mutation. Our predicament came when we were on the brink of several fatal outbreaks and we had enough cards to cure the final disease and mutations, but didn’t seem to have enough turns or actions to get the cards and the pawns to the right place at the right time. Scott was able to switch to medic partway through to help and with a LOT of discussion, planning, and replanning (and a lot of luck), we managed to cure the mutation with no margin to spare.

We did realize, though, that for part of the game we hadn’t been properly adding mutation tokens, but figured it all evened out in the end and still counted it as a solid win.

Scott and John Left.

Games 6+: Chad Willard and his daughter showed up and played some games they brought with them. I don’t know how those games went since I left by then.

BEWC Meeting Recap 8/6/11

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Attendees: Eric Bowen, Jason Bowen, Jeff Bowen, Josh Bowen, Scott Harris, Brandon James, Michael Kelly, Dave Landon, Karen Landon, Dave Olson, Jay Olson

Games Played:

1) Scott, Brandon, Dave L. and Karen played Thurn and Taxis, with Scott giving Scott a chance to show his prowess at delivering mail in Germany.

2) Michael, Dave O. and Jay played Piretenbucht (Pirate’s Cove). Jay pulled ahead to a commanding lead in the end to claim the title of most feared pirate on the high seas.

3,4,5) Michael, Dave O. and Jay played 3 games of Code 777. Dave O. picked up 2 wins, and Jay won one.

6) Scott, Brandon, Dave L and Karen played Tigris and Euphrates with Dave dominating the game.

7) Dave L and Brandon played Pandemic, and they were successful in curing all four diseases and saving the world. Thanks guys.

8) Michael, Dave O. and Jay played Vegas Showdown. The scores were pretty close throughout, but Dave O. was able to pull away in the end for the win.

9) Brandon, Dave L. and Karen played Wings of War: Dawn of War, with Karen taking the win.

10) Eric, Jason, and Josh played Survive: Escape from Atlantis. Not sure who won that one.

11) Michael, Dave O. and Jay played Saboteur, with Dave O. and Jay in a tie for the win.

12) Michael, Brandon, Dave O. and Jay played Ticket to Ride: Europe. Michael and Brandon were fighting it out for the lead, with Brandon coming out on top in the end.

13) Eric, Jason, Jeff, Josh, Dave L. and Karen played Citadels. Karen ran away with this one.

14) Michael, Dave O. and Jay took a crack at Pandemic. With 2 outbreaks on the first (maybe second) turn, it was an uphill battle. Unfortunately, that battle was lost.

15) Dave L., Karen, Dave O. and Jay played Galaxy Trucker, with Dave L. taking a commanding win.

BEWC Meeting Recap 7/16/11

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Attendees: Jason Bowen, Kelly Burnaby, Zachary Burnaby, KC Deitrick, Joe Kauffman, Ryan Frans, Michael Feinberg, Scott Harris, Michael Kelly, Ed McGran

Club Business: None

Games Played:

1) Ryan, Jason, Ed, KC, and Michael F played Thunderstone. It was the first time playing for everyone but Ryan, who had a commanding win, but Jason put in a decent showing for second place.

2) Kelly, Zachary, Joe, and Jason played Starcraft, where the Protoss dominated the Terrans, with Kelly winning as Tassadar and Jason coming in second as Aldaris over Zachary’s Jim Raynor and Joe’s Arcturus Mensk.

3) KC and Ryan played Combat Commander: Europe with Ryan’s Germans defeating KC’s Russians in the Bonfire of the NKVD scenario.

4) Scott, Ed, Michael K, and Michael F played Dungeon Lords. It was the first time playing for everyone and it was initially pretty slow going as we taught the game to ourselves (leading to a number of overlooked and misplayed rules), but it ended up being a lot of fun. Michael F won and Ed also managed to score enough points to earn his dungeon lord license, while Scott and Michael K were done in by back taxes – it probably would have helped if we had read enough of the rules to have known that taxes were coming due….

5) KC, Michael K, and Michael F played Innovation. Some lucky dogma effects and factory dominance gave Michael F an early win.

BEWC Meeting Recap 7/2/11

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Attendees: John Boyle, Joe Kauffman, Rhonda Frans, Ryan Frans, Michael Feinberg, Scott Harris, Dave Landon, Karen Landon, David Olson, Jay Olson

Club Business: None

Games Played:

1) Dave L, Karen, and Joe played Attika with Dave winning.

2,3) John, Dave L, Scott, and Karen played a round of 7 Wonders that Dave won, and then Michael joined them for a second round where Scott came back from his tied for last position in the first game to win.

4) Ryan, Dave O, Jay, and Joe played a close game of Nightfall that Joe won.

5,6) John, Dave L, Scott, and Michael played two rounds of Innovation. For the first game, John was the only one that had played before (though not in some time) and we misplayed several rules before John took an early fairly unbalanced victory. The second game went much better and was neck and neck through much of the game, before a lucky card transfer allowed Michael to claim his 4th (winning) achievement right before Dave could.

7,8) Ryan, Dave O, Jay, and Joe played two games of Thunderstone. It was the first time playing for everyone, with Joe winning the first game, and Dave O winning the second much tighter lower scoring game.

9) John, Dave L, Karen, Rhonda, and Michael played Vinci, and despite some early runaway leaders the game ended quite close for everyone. Dave managed to achieve exactly the 100 points to trigger the last round, and Michael was one troop short of being able to gain 100 points himself, and had to settle for second place with 99 points.

10) The group successfully guesses several cases from Crack the Case with Joe as the moderator.

11) Joe, Dave O, Dave L, Jay, Ryan, and Michael played Battlestar Galactica. It was a fairly uneventful first half of the game, but after the sleeper agent phase, Ryan as Baltar determined that Dave O as Boomer was a cylon and sent him to the brig. Michael as Adama was the other cylon and played it covertly for a few turns until using the admiral’s ability to choose the jump effects to pick a particularly devastating card and then revealed himself before he could be sent to the brig himself. The situation was dire for the humans with all of their resource dials near critical, and it then looked like the game was over when two centurion boarding parties were poised to take over the Galactica on the next cylon turn, but their scout managed to delay the boarding party and then some key rolls from Jay wiped out the centurions and moved the humans into position to jump to Kobol and win the game. But just when the cylons in turn had given up hope, a lucky shot from one of their basestars damaged the jump control room and trapped the humans. It was not to be however, as the control room was repaired and the fleet jumped to safety before the cylons could capitalize on the delay.

BEWC Meeting Recap 6/19/11

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Attendees: Jason Bowen, Jeff Bowen, John Boyle, Michael Feinberg, David Olson, Jay Olson, Chad Willard

Club Business:

We voted to purchase Innovation and Ticket To Ride: Europe

Games Played:

1) John and Michael played two rounds of Lost Cities, with John winning 32 to 23.

2) John, Jay, Jason, Dave, and Michael played 7 Wonders where Dave edged out John for the win with 58 victory points.

3) John, Jason, and Michael played Mansions of Madness scenario 1B “The Fall of the House of Lynch” with John as the keeper and Jason and Michael each controlling two investigators. It’s a fairly complex game and I was worried about the puzzles being distracting, but we made short work of those (to the keeper’s frustration). The investigator’s early success in the search for clues turned into a long weaponless slog through the mansion harried by a maniac and with Ashcan Pete always on the verge of insanity. After the diabolical plot was revealed, we thought we had no chance to stop it, but a well timed reveal of the final clue stunned the Shoggoth and it was trapped in the collapsing mansion giving the investigators a somewhat pyrrhic victory (they too were trapped in the mansion, but surviving apparently wasn’t part of the victory condition). Mansions played much faster than Arkham Horror or Descent (which it shares many elements with, along with Betrayal at House on the Hill) allowing us to finish just as John needed to leave, but we benefited from John having done a lot of the scenario deck building ahead of time, otherwise setup looks very time consuming.

4) Dave, Jay, and Chad played Middle Earth Quest where Dave was victorious as Sauron.

5) Jason and Michael played three rounds of Lost Cities. It was Jason’s first time playing and in the third round he’d picked up the game enough to double Michael’s score for that round, but Michael had the overall victory.

6) Jason and Michael played Dominion: Intrigue where Jason’s deck got bogged down with too many action cards and not enough money, allowing Michael to overtake his early lead for the win.

7) Chad, Jay, Jason, Dave, and Michael played Bang! with the new Wild West Show Expansion. Jason and Michael managed an outlaw victory, despite being the first two players eliminated. Teren Hill’s (Dave) special ability kept the Renegade barely alive an extra half dozen or so turns with the Deputy (Chad) and the Sheriff (Jay) ganging up on him and it looked like a sure law win until the dynamite went off.

BEWC Meeting Recap 6/6/11

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Attendees: John Boyle, David Landon, Karen Landon, Dave Olson

Club Business: Mansions of Madness, Lost Cities, and Bang! Wild West Show have arrived and are in the club cabinet.

Games Played:

1) John, Karen Dave L. and Dave O. played Hamburgum. Karen and Dave L were dominating early in the game, but in the end all players were grouped nicely on the score track, with Dave O. edging out the win.

2) Dave L and John took on Karen and Dave O. in a game of Blokus. It was a close game, but John and Dave L. nabbed the win.

3) John, Karen and Dave L. played a game of Kingdoms, with Karen getting the win.

BEWC Meeting Recap 5/21/11

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Attendees: Jason Bowen, Jeff Bowen, John Boyle, Michael Feinberg, Scott Harris, David Wilcox

Club Business:

We voted to purchase Mansions of Madness, Lost Cities, and Bang! Wild West Show.

Games Played:

1) John, Michael, and Scott played 7 Wonders. Michael and Scott tied with 57 points, but Scott had the tiebreaker of more money.

2) John, Michael, Scott, and David played Alien Frontiers which David brought and no one had played before. After some reading of the rules, we quickly got into it and had a lot of fun with the interesting die based ship assignment mechanism. Scott managed to play his sixth colony first, ending the game and putting him over the top in victory points for the win.

3,4) Jason, John, Michael, Scott, and David played two games of Bang! John won the first as the Renegade, and the second was a law win with John as the Sheriff and Michael as the Deputy.

5) Jason, Jeff, John, Michael, Scott, and David played 7 Wonders. John won this game, again with 57 points, with a ridiculous 45 of them coming from science.