BEWC Meeting Recap 12/17/11

Attendees: KC Deitrick, Michael Feinberg, Ryan Frans, Lionel Galperin, Scott Harris, Joe Kauffman, Michael Kelly, Dave Olson, Jay Olson, Alex Wright, Elaine Wright

Club Business: We voted to purchase copies of Mystery Express and Samurai Swords (recently republished as Ikusa) that Dave Olson picked up cheap. We also voted to order Ascending Empires and Lionel donated a copy of Duel of Giants to the club.

Games Played:

1) Michael F, Dave, and Jay started with a game of Martian Flux, but stopped once Starcraft was set up.

2) Michael F, Scott, Ryan, Joe, Dave, and Jay played an epic 5.5 hour game of Starcraft with the Brood War expansion. It was a very well laid out map with a lot of interaction between all of the players. The game culminated in a sprawling last turn with many changes of fortune and almost everyone having a shot at victory. With it fairly clear that this would be the last turn, everyone raced to satisfy a victory condition. Scott as the Overmind had just managed to satisfy his special victory condition, building a 4th base, right before his 3rd was destroyed, bringing him back to the three he needed. Dave as Jim Raynor also just managed to satisfy his special victory condition, as his one lone marine managed to survive against a vastly superior Zerg force and hold on to his sixth resource producing territory. Dave had an extremely depleted combat deck, so drew randomly from the top of the pile and managed to come up with the one card in the entire deck that had sufficient defense for his marine to survive. Leading up to the end, Jay as Arcturus Mensk had been reasonably set up to satisfy his special victory condition, but then Michael as Aldaris sent a huge invasion fleet to one of his planets, while the other became the most contested territory in the galaxy as every player but Michael issued orders on it try and claim its two conquest points. Joe as Queen of Blades and Ryan as Tassadar managed to split those conquest point territories, and so were going to be tied with 16 points, satisfying the regular victory condition and having to go to a tiebreaker. However, stage III had been triggered, so everyone had an opportunity to play a leadership card and upset the game dynamics. Michael chose to not play the card that would have blocked checking regular and special victory conditions this round, since it was nearly impossible for him to catch up on conquest points with only one more round and the game would likely be forced to end anyway by the End Draws Near Cards, considering how many event cards were drawn last round. Ryan had a card that he thought would cost Joe one conquest point and give him the win, but a last minute attack on his forces caused the card to also lose him a conquest point, keeping them tied at 15. Scott’s leadership card secured his special victory condition, since it allowed him to build another base. The final leadership card however was Dave’s and he played To The Bitter End, causing all other players to loose two conquest points, pushing Ryan and Joe below the threshold for regular victory, which then allowed special victory conditions to be checked for. That final card gave him the win, as Dave and Scott were the only players satisfying special victory conditions and in the tie breaker of most conquest points, Dave easily beat out Scott’s zero.

3) KC and Michael K played Race for the Galaxy, where Michael just edged out KC, 37 to 36.

4) KC, Lionel, and Michael K played Merchants & Marauders, but didn’t finish the game before Lionel had to leave.

5, 6, 7, 8) Alex and Elaine had their timing off from everyone else’s games, so got in two player games of Lost Cities, Innovation, Ticket to Ride: Europe, and Kingsburg. Alex won the two rounds of Lost Cities, but Elaine was victory in Innovation and Ticket to Ride, not sure who won Kingsburg.

9) Michael F, Joe, and Michael K played a remarkably quick game of Settlers of Catan. Joe got stalled at 9 VP and it seemed like the tide might have been turned when Michael F stole longest road, but Joe was able to take the title back and then bought the first development card of the game, which turned out to be a 1 VP card, giving him the win.

10) Ryan, Dave, and Jay played Thunderstone, which Ryan won.

11) Michael F and Michael K played Innovation. Michael K managed to scoop up almost all of the low point achievements and had built an impressive tableau, but mid-game Michael F got into a rhythm with the Pottery dogma, allowing him to score 5 more points and achieve every turn. With all of the regular achievements taken, it turned into a race for the special achievements. Michael K was able to claim Wonder using Invention, though he also simultaneously satisfied it’s five colors splayed right requirement, and was only a turn or two away from claiming Monument or Empire, either of which would have given him the win, but Michael F finally drew a blue level 6 card, which when melded allowed him to dogma Astronomy and claim the Universe achievement for his sixth achievement and the win.

12, 13) Ryan, Dave, and Jay played two hands of the three-player variant of Bang! which has just the deputy, renegade, and outlaw and no hidden roles. Ryan won both games as the deputy.

BEWC Meeting Recap 6/19/11

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 5/21/11

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.