BEWC Meeting Recap 5/5/12

Attendees: Greg Chandra, Chris Cregan, Michael Feinberg, Jim Halloran, and Michael Kelly

Club Business: None.

Games Played:
1) Michael F, Jim, and Michael K started with 7 Wonders with the Leaders expansion. Michael F’s first leader was Tomyris, which deflects the -1 points from military losses to his opponents, which allowed him to ignore the military and concentrate on science. Combined with a few high value blue cards this led him to a comfortable victory with 66 points.

2) Chris, Michael F, Jim, and Michael K played Jim’s classic copy of Cosmic Encounter. Michael F got out to an early lead in colonies, using his torture ability to broker some good deals, but Chris soon caught up and an allied victory for their fifth colonies gave them a shared victory.

3) Greg, Chris, Michael F, Jim, and Michael K played Puerto Rico. Chris had the most experience with the game and seemed to be leading, but Michael F was racking up a lot of points near the end shipping sugar and corn, while Michael K had both small and large markets so was making great profits at the trading house and plowing them back into guilds. The VP from his buildings allowed Michael K to edge out Michael F, 42 to 40.

4) After lunch, Greg, Chris, Michael F, and Michael K played Innovation. Chris quickly acquired a strong tableau, a special achievement, and a lot of score, but it was his first time playing and a misunderstanding of the rules causes him to miss picking up some regular achievements that were then taken by Michael K and Michael F. This kept Chris from having an early win and settled the game down to a fairly even match. Both Greg and Michael F racked up high scores and looked to be able to snag some of the last achievements, but Michael K dogma’d fission and everyone was nuked back to the stone age with only three cards below age 8 left in the game. Michael F drew and melded the age 1 card ‘Oars’ which gave him a scoring opportunity and when the game ended three rounds later with all of the age 10 cards drawn, the score from oars gave him the victory.

5) Greg, Chris, Michael F, and Michael K finished up with a quick game of Munchkin. Some lucky monster encounters and treasurer draws had Michael F quickly gain levels and while he was beat back down a little, some helpful allies and generosity with the treasurer quickly got him to level nine. To gain the 10th (winning) level in Munchkin, you need to win a combat, with one exception – the divine intervention card causes all clerics to gain a level and that level can be the winning one. Michael was a cleric and on his next turn, kicking down the door revealed the divine intervention card. In addition to winning, the text on the card gave him permission to mock the other players mercilessly.

BEWC Meeting Recap 4/28/12

Attendees: Dan Carey, Greg Chandra, Chris Cregan, Linda Galperin, Lionel Galperin, Jim Halloran, Michael Kelly, Dave Landon, Karen Landon, and Alex Wright

Club Business: None.

Games Played:
1) Dan and Dave played Conflict of Heroes: Storms of Steel! Kursk 1943, the “Get the Satchel” scenario. Dave won when his panzer grenadiers overpowered Dan’s Soviet infantry, got the satchel with the battle plans and took them off the map.

2) Dan, Dave, Lionel, Linda, and Karen played Vegas Showdown. Linda built the best Vegas hotel and won.

3) Michael, Greg, Jim, and Chris played Power Grid: Factory Manager, a new game of Michael’s by the makers of Power Grid. Chris won.

4) Dan and Dave played another Conflict of Heroes Kursk scenario, “Wounded Tiger.” Dan’s Soviet T-34’s charged Dave’s immobilized Tiger and knocked it out then proceeded to destroy the rest of Dave’s tanks.

5) Jim, Chris, Karen, Greg, Michael, and Alex played Bohnanza where Greg won.

6) Karen, Michael, Greg, Chris and Alex finished up a game of Ra, with Chris just edging out Alex for the victory.

BEWC Meeting Recap 4/21/12

Attendees: John Boyle, Chris Cregan, Michael Feinberg, Frank Fulton, Robbie Fulton, Lionel Galperin, Jim Halloran, Michael Kelly, Dave Olson, and Jay Olson

Club Business: None.

Games Played:
1) Chris, Michael F, Frank, Robbie, and Jim played Lungarno, which Chris taught to the rest. Both Michael and Jim concentrated on a strategy of Tower Houses and Plazas that gave end game points and which payed off for both of them, with Michael just edging out Jim for the win, 30 to 28.

2) When more people showed up, the proposed game of 7 Wonders was abandoned, and Chris, Michael F, Frank, Robbie, and Jim sat down to A Game of Thrones: The Board Game. Alliances were loose and shifting, with a great deal of squabbling in the north between Robbie’s House Stark and Jim’s House Greyjoy, while Michael’s Baratheon forces expanded in the center of the board. In a 5-player game, House Martell’s territory is neutral and their fortress’s are relatively weakly guarded; giving an advantage to House Baratheon and House Tyrell (Frank) who have easy pickings on their borders. After fortuitous supply and muster Westeros cards, Michael was well positioned to strike out for the Martell fortresses and was poised to win in Round 5, but Frank’s forces in south and Chris’s Lannister forces rushing across the Reach were able to beat him back. With Michael having lost the rich supply of blackwater, another supply Westeros card would have decimated his forces leaving Chris well staged to steal the win, but one did not come up. Careful spending of influence combined with the Baratheon’s control of the Iron Throne’s tie breaking ability allowed Michael to position himself near the top of all of the influence tracks and stage an unbeatable force to seize his seventh (winning) fortress at the beginning of Round 7.

3) John, Lionel, and Michael K broke off to play Innovation, where Michael used the dogma effects of mapmaking and montheism to rack up score and take all but 1 of the early achievements for a quick win.

4,5) Dave and Jay played two rounds of Lost Cities, winning one each.

6) Dave and Jay started a game of Unidentified Walking Objects, but Dave surrendered his poorer position so they could go join another game.

7) Lionel, Michael K, Dave, and Jay played Outpost, where Jay was victorious.

8) Chris, Michael F, Robbie, and Jim finished up with a game of Munchkin. Michael and Chris jumped out ahead when Michael used his Kneepads of Allure to force him to help with a level 12 monster. Once it was cursed up to 17 and then doubled with mate, Chris renegotiated the deal so that he could charm one of the monsters and they both raked in the treasure. Another round brought both of them to level 9, but Chris drew an easy combat on his next turn and no one had any curses left, giving him the win.

9) Michael K, Dave, and Jay ran out of time to finish their game of Power Grid Japan, getting just about to the end with it still being anyone’s game. When they stopped, Dave was able to power the most cities, while Michael had the turn order position to expand the most, but only if he got lucky in the power plant market.

BEWC Meeting Recap 4/7/12

Attendees: Dan Carey, Chris Cregan, Frank Fulton, Roberta Fulton, Jim Halloran, Scott Harris, Dave Landon, Karen Landon, Dave Olson, Alex Wright, Elaine Wright

Club Business: None.

Games Played:
1) Dan, Chris, Scott and Dave L, played Carcassonne: The City, with Dan coming away with the win.

2) Frank, Roberta, Karen and Dave O. played Dominion, Dave won this one.

3) Scott and Dave L. played Conflict of Heroes, with Dave coming out on top.

4) Dan, Chris, Alex and Elaine played Ora et Labora, a close game where Alex edged out the win with 200 points to Chris’ 194.

5) Frank, Roberta, Jim and Dave O. played Andromeda. Dave was the most successful trader.

6) Roberta, Jim and Dave O. played Settlers of Catan with the Cities and Knights expansion. Roberta was looking strong throughout, but Dave O. managed to edge out the win.

7) Frank, Dave L. and Karen played Medici, with Dave coming out the victor.

8) Frank (Mr. Jack) and Dave L. (The Investigators) played Mr. Jack, which saw Dave’s investigators nabbing Mr. Jack as he attempted to escape.

9) Dan, Chris, Frank, Karen, Dave L., Alex and Elaine played 7 Wonders, with Alex taking the win.

10) Chris, Dave L., Karen, Dave O. and Alex played Medici, with Chris coming out the winner.

BEWC Meeting Recap 3/17/12

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

Club Business: None.

Games Played:
1,2) Chris and Michael F started with two rounds of BattleLore. In the first, First Chevaucheé, Michael as Charles of Blois was unable to develop any momentum and Chris as John of Montfort completely walked over him, 5 to 0. In their second game, they added in wizards, playing the Wizard and Lore scenario – Aquitaine 1369. It was a little less unbalanced, but Chris’s sir Robert Knolles was still victorious over Michael’s Sire Bertrand du Guesclin 6 to 3.

3) Jim, Joe, and Michael K played Tanto Cuore, where Joe was victorious and crowned King of Maids

4) Michael F and Dave sat down for their first play of Star Trek: Fleet Captains. Michael controlled the Federation fleet and turning around his earlier bad luck with BattleLore, drew some readily achievable missions, which combined with some lucky die rolls, brought them game to a fairly early end with 10 VP to Dave’s Klingon’s 4 VP.

5) Chris, Jim, Joe, Michael K, and Alex played Betrayal at House on the Hill. Surprisingly quickly, Chris was revealed as the Haunt, but the banshee he summoned was only able to kill two of the other four players before he was defeated, so the investigators won.

6) Chris, Jim, Michael K, and Alex played 7 Wonders, where Chris won with a commanding 61 points, specializing in science, and Mike K came in second having earned the maximum possible 18 points from his military.

7) Chris, Michael F, Jim, Dave and Alex played a surprisingly slow game of Battlestar Galactica with the Exodus expansion. Chris was a cylon from the start and tipped his hand a little earlier due to a misunderstanding of the rules (it was his first time playing) so he got sent to the brig, but did a valiant job of protesting his innocence and until after the first half. Unfortunately with the revised loyalty deck of Exodus, one card doesn’t get dealt out, and against the odds, this time it was the other cylon card, so Chris was on his own. The rec center closed before we finished the game, but it was still up in the air which way the game would go – the humans had just made their 8th distance of jump, so just needed to get through the jump track one more time, but several of the resource dials were down to two or three, galactica was damaged, and a large cylon fleet had just jumped in.

BEWC Meeting Recap 3/3/12

Attendees: Dan Carey, Chris Cregan, Karen Deitrick, KC Deitrick, Tom Dunford Michael Feinberg, Rhonda Frans, Ryan Frans, Linda Galperin, Lionel Galperin, Brandon James, Michael Kelly, Dave Landon, Karen Landon, Chris Leitenberger, Ian Rojas, Dave Olson, Alex Wright, and Elaine Wright

Club Business: None.

Games Played:
1) Planned games kept getting shuffled as people trickled in in the morning, but eventually Karen D, KC, Michael F, and Karen L started a game of Amun-Re. KC hoarded his money through much of the New Kingdom, and in the last round engaged in massive pyramid construction, giving him the win with Karen D coming in second.

2) Dan, Chris C, Tom, Brandon, Dave L, and Dave O played Power Grid with the China map, with Brandon winning and Dave L coming in second in a close game.

3) Linda, Lionel, and Ian played Wasabi where Ian won.

4) Chris C, Chris L, Dave O, and Alex faced off against Michael F in scenario 4C of Mansions of Madness, “Classroom Curses.” Things started off poorly for the investigators, which much of the school plunged into darkness and their sanity slowly being chipping away, but they persevered, steadily exploring and working their way through the clues. Ultimately it game down to a slugfest, to see if the players could kill the witch Helena Detaigne, before one of the Mi-go’s killed them. Michael’s luck as keeper had turned and none of the mythos and trauma cards he drew were helping him inflict damage, and so while he got close to killing several of the investigators, he couldn’t quite do it before Helena fell and the investigators were victorious.

5) Karen D, KC, Ian, and Elaine played a learning game of London that Ian won.

6) Dan, Rhonda, Ryan, Brandon, Michael K, and Dave L played Imperial. Michael was the best investor, with Rhonda coming in second.

7) Continuing the Cthulhu theme, Karen D, KC, Karen L, and Elaine played The Stars are Right, which Karen L won.

8,9) Chris C, Michael F, Ryan, Brandon, Michael K, Dave L, Dave O, and Alex played two rounds of The Resistance. In the first round, Michael K and Chris were the spies, the problem was Dave L was also a spy, but didn’t realize it having misread his card. This led to a lot of confusion and an easy resistance win. In the second round, Michael F, Dave L, and Alex all realized they were spies, but some miscommunication and bumbled cards led to an equal degree of confusion. Team after team got voted done under near farcical conditions, until at the last possible chance a resistance team was approved and succeeded for another resistance win.

10) Karen L and Elaine squeezed in a quick game of Bananagrams where Karen came from way behind to win.

11) Chris C, Michael F, and Karen L played Stone Age. Karen was ahead in victory points through most of the game, but Chris skillfully acquired civilization cards that pushed him to a commanding victory in the final accounting.

12) Ryan, Brandon, Mike K and Dave L finished up with a game of Pandemic with the On the Brink expansion. Ryan took the role of bio-terrorist and successfully sabotaged all of the team’s research stations bringing them to a point where they could only survive one more outbreak, leading to a crushing defeat for them on a turn that brought six.

BEWC Meeting Recap 2/18/12

Attendees: John Boyle, Dan Carey, Chris Cregan, Michael Feinberg, Richard Heller, Joe Kauffman, Michael Kelly, Melissa Laface, Ian Rojas, Lane Taylor, and Alex Wright,

Club Business: None.

Games Played:
1) While waiting for morning stragglers, Michael F and Lane started with a quick game of Battle Line. Michael came to the edge of victory, having the card in his hand that would prove lane couldn’t beat a meld that would have given him his third adjacent flag for a breakthrough, but he didn’t have any remaining flags to play it on, and even if he could, Lane completed a meld on the next turn to give him five flags for an envelopment and the win.

2) John, Chris, Michael F, Joe, Ian, and Lane played A Game of Thrones: The Board Game. The game started with Michael’s House Stark and John’s House Greyjoy allying themselves in the north and a much looser alliance of Chris’s House Martell, Ian’s House Tyrell, Joe’s House Lannister, and Lane’s House Baratheon against them. The southern alliance got off to a shaky start when Martel took one of Baratheon’s strongholds (supposedly so Chris could show the rest of us who hadn’t played before how combat worked) but most of the conflict was between Greyjoy and Lannister as fleets battled for the west coast of Westeros. By mid game most players had acquired three of the seven necessary fortresses with Michael and Chris each having four and being well placed to expand, when Chris suddenly exploded into Ian’s territory taking all three remaining Tyrell fortresses in one turn and winning the game.

3) Dan and Michael K played the club’s new copy of Outpost. It was a learning game for both as they had never played it before. In the first era the game was fairly close as both players had the same number of victory points. Both built more water and ore factories, though Michael bought during the auction key items of technology that would help him down the road. In the second era Michael began to pull away, with his titanium factories and larger hand size. Dan was later able to buy robots, a laboratory and a new chemical factory to stay in the game, but could not close the gap. In the third era Michael’s resource advantages were simply too much for Dan to overcome. Michael was able to buy the very expensive moonbase which enabled him to reach 75 points to end the game. He won the game with the most points. Overall it was a fun game despite a few bumps along the way as both players learned the rules and how to apply them.

4) Chris, Michael F, Ian, Lane, and Alex played a half game of Shogun, deciding to stop after the first scoring round and not continue on to the second year as we wouldn’t have had enough time to finish it. Winter was a brutal -7 food, causing everyone to suffer varying degrees of shortages and revolts. Alex lost one province to revolt, but Michael was extremely unlucky, not only losing both of his revolting provinces (by the barest possible of margins) but also having them be strategically critical ones whose loss cost him 9 points that would have given him a comfortable victory. In the end, Chris was victorious with 22 points, followed by Ian and Lane, and then Michael and Alex beat back to 17.

5) Richard and Melissa’s timing was off from everyone else’s games, so played a two player game of Uwe Rosenberg’s new game Ora et Labora, unfortunately running out of time to finish it before the rec center closed.

6) Chris, Michael F, Ian, and Lane finished up with a game of Bohnanza, given the luck of the cards, Michael ended up concentrating on planting numerous low value beans, which in turn led to receive lots of free cards as the other players tried to get them out of their hands, and a comfortable victory with 29 points.

BEWC Meeting Recap 2/4/12

Attendees: John Boyle, Dan Carey, Michael Feinberg, Ryan Frans, Brandon James, Joe Kauffman, Michael Kelly, Dave Landon, Karen Landon, Dave Olson, Jay Olson, Alex Wright, and Elaine Wright

Club Business: None.

Games Played
1) John, Dan, Michael F, Joe, Michael K, and Dave L played Battlestar Galactica with the Exodus expansion – using the new characters and cards, the cylon fleet board, and the final five loyalty cards. Even though it turned out there was no cylon in play at the beginning of the game, the system really beat up on the humans, but spread the damage out so that none of the dials were in the red at the halfway point, causing Michael K’s Boomer’s to side with the cylons when he received the sympathizer card. After the cylon fleet wreaked havoc on the civilian fleet and Dave’s Baltar revealed himself as a cylon things were looking quite grim for the humans. Suspicions were also also high, as there should have been one more cylon player, but almost miraculously the humans were able to hold on for the final jump to Kobol. The human victory was dependent on a really luck break though – with the exodus expansion the loyalty deck includes one extra card to account for possible executions and against the odds, it was the last cylon card that was not dealt out.

2) Brandon and Karen played three rounds of Wings of War: Dawn of War, with Brandon winning two and Karen one.

3) Dave O, Joe, Alex, and Elaine played Small World where Alex won with a commanding 107 points due to his pillaging gypsies.

4) Michael F, Michael K, and Elaine played Agricola, allowing Elaine to break her Agricola loosing streak when she beat Michael F by 1 point.

5) Joe, Dave L, Karen, and Alex played Ra with Dave winning.

6) Dan, Brandon, Dave O, and Jay broke in the club’s new copy of Ascending Empires, with Dan being the inaugural victor.

7) Lack of table space exiled Dave O and Alex to the kitchen for a head-to-head match up in Hannibal, where reportedly Dave’s Carthaginians marched all over Alex’s Romans.

8) Michael F, Ryan, Brandon, Joe, Michael K played a second round of Battlestar Galactica with the Exodus expansion, this time also adding in the personal goal loyalty cards. This games started almost the exact opposite from the first, with the humans having the easiest time any of us had seen, with resource dials actually going up instead of down. Things started to change after Ryan fulfilled his personal goal and had to draw a new loyalty card, which was a cylon. After some subtle working against the humans, he revealed himself, sending Michael F’s Starbuck to the brig, where he ended up stuck for the rest of the game. While it was unlikely any of the resource dials were going to be depleted, Galactica was accumulating damage and things were looking unexpectedly tight for the humans. Mike K then unexpectedly used Helo’s moral compass ability to force a bad choice on a crisis card, making it clear he was a cylon just before he revealed himself. With two cylons each using the basestar bridge to do two points of damage to galactica, plus potentially moving the jump track back, it didn’t seem like there was much change left for the humans who only had two players not in the brig. Some lucky rolls however allowed Brandon’s Adama to nuke most of the cylon fleet into oblivion and a well timed draw of a repair card allowed FTL control to be repaired, letting Joe’s boomer jump the fleet to Kobol just before the next cylon turn which would have destroyed Galactica.

9) Karen and Dave finished the day off with a game of Metro.

BEWC Meeting Recap 1/21/12

Attendees: Jason Bowen, Jeff Bowen, Josh Bowen, John Boyle, Dan Carey, Chris Cregan, KC Deitrick, Michael Feinberg, Ryan Frans, Joe Kauffman

Club Business:
2012 Officers elected:
President: Dave Olson
Vice President: Dave Landon
Treasurer: John Boyle
Secretary: Michael Feinberg

New games: We voted to purchase the Battlestar Galactica: Exodus Expansion, Kingsburg, the Kingsburg: To Forge A Realm Expansion, and the new Stronghold Games reprint of Outpost which should burn through a chunk of the new dues money.

Games Played:
1) Dan and KC settled down for a day of playing Avalon Hill’s Turning Point: Stalingrad, Dan as the German, KC as the Soviets.  Dan’s Germans launched their assault behind a massive artillery bombardment.  KC caught some of Dan’s tanks in a weak position and destroyed them.  Dan’s attack on the southern portion of the city bogged down into a slugging match, especially around the Kuibyshev Sawmill, where KC committed reinforcements to hold the area, which is worth a victory point.  Dan shifted to the center of the board, and behind his Stukas captured the key hill of Mamayev Kurgan.  KC counter attacked and was only able to contest it, not retake it.  Late in the game Dan’s panzers slipped through KC’s lines in the north and captured the Red Barricades Factory and landing on the Volga River, worth two victory points.  KC launched counter attacks, but the German advantage in mobility was the telling factor as Dan was able to reinforce the forces at the factory and widen the gap in KC’s lines.  KC’s last turn attacks were unable to change the situation, so Dan won by gaining 7 victory points.

2) John, Chris, Michael, Ryan, and Joe played a round of The Resistance, where Joe and Ryan as the spies had no difficulty undermining the resistance.

3, 4, 5) Jason and Jeff joined them for three more rounds of The Resistance. The spies (Chris, Michael, and Joe) again fairly easily won the first round, taking advantage of good placement in the turn order, but in the second round Jason, John, and Joe were finally unable to succeed as spies and the resistance overthrew the government. The final round returned to what is apparently the norm for the base game and Jeff, John, and Joe (again!) were successful as the spies.

6) Jason, Jeff, John, Chris, Michael, Ryan, and Joe played 7 Wonders with the Leaders expansion. Joe won with 77 points, mostly from money, leaders, and yellow cards, but Chris was close behind with 73.

7) Jason, John, Chris, Michael, and Joe moved on to Kingsburg with the To Forge a Realm expansion. Joe tried a new strategy by rushing to build the embassy as early as possible so as to maximize the number of seasons he got the extra VP. It paid off and he was well ahead most of the game and won comfortably with 49 points, but others were catching up and Michael just edged out Chris for second place, 43 to 42.

8) Jason, Josh, Chris, and Michael played Tikal, which none of us had played before. Chris quickly mastered the art of placing tiles to create sections of jungle only he could cost effectively explore and ran away with the game, 151 points to Jason’s second place 100 points.

9) Joe and Jeff finished with a quick game of Chopper Strike that Joe won.

BEWC Meeting Recap 1/7/12

Attendees: Dan Carey, Karen Deitrick, KC Deitrick, Tom Dunford, Michael Feinberg, Linda Galperin, Lionel Galperin, Joe Kauffman, Michael Kelly, Dave Landon, Karen Landon, Alex Wright, Elaine Wright, Shawn Yoon

Club Business: None.

Games Played:
1) Dan, Tom, Michael F, Joe, Michael K, Dave, and Karen L started with a full 7 player game of 7 Wonders with the Leaders expansion. Joe took advantage of his Babylon wonder to acquire 3 full sets of science cards and then Aristotle’s bonus to get 3 extra points per set for a whopping 57 science related points and 70 total points, just edging out Dan’s 69 points (fairly evenly split between blue cards, military, and wonder points.)

2) Dan, Tom, Michael F, Michael K, Dave played Mare Nostrum. The game was fairly balanced but minor border skirmishes between everyone except Dave’s Roman empire kept everyone distracted with the military side of the game. Michael F’s Carthaginians had just managed to acquire the first of three wonders/leaders needed to win the game when Dave’s massed armies swept in, stealing a rich province before it could be reinforced. Those additional resources gave Dave the Director of Commerce title and allowed him to steer the trading phase so he could acquire all 12 unique resources and built the pyramids winning the game.

3) Lionel, Joe, Alex, Elaine, and Shawn played Kingsburg with the To Forge a Realm expansion. Alex just edged out Joe for the victory, winning by 3VP.

4) Karen D, KC, Linda, and Karen L played Galaxy Trucker where Karen L ran away with the win.

5,6) Linda, Lionel, Dave, Karen L, Elaine, and Shawn played two rounds of Ca$h ‘n Gun$, with Linda and Lionel winning one each.

7) Michael F, Joe, Michael K, and Alex played Innovation using the Echoes of the Past expansion for the first time. The game settled down into a fairly balanced game with Michael F, Joe, and Michael K all acquiring 3 of the 5 necessary achievements and Alex having just caught up with 2 when Joe dogma’d Fission and a red card was revealed destroying the world and removing all of the accumulated score, tableau, and hand cards from the game. With most of the low age cards eliminated, we rebuilt from the ground up, drawing and melding trying to work back up to the largely untouched age 9 and 10 decks. Joe managed a few combinations to accumulate a decent score and likely would have one if the game ended from exhausting the age 10 deck, when Alex comboed stem cells and bioengineering to leave him with the most leaf icons and satisfy bioengineering’s special win condition.

8) While the game of Innovation rebuilt from the stone age, Dave and Shawn finished up with a game of Lord of the Rings: The Confrontation. Shawn controlling the forces of Mordor managed to wipe out almost all of Dave’s fellowship, but Sam sacrificed himself to the cave troll, allowing Frodo to sneak past and make it to Mordor and win the game for Dave.