Session Summary – 12 November 2008

Just a quick update this one, so I get it done before Midcon, after which I expect to have some more to write about.
A good attendance of 9, including Simon, who we haven't seen for a bit, we split over 2 tables.
On our table we played 2 games, the first was Race for the Galaxy, using the Gathering Storm expansion, but excluding the goals as it was Julian's first game, although considering that he won despite this, we maybe should have stuck them in anyway. I started with Earths Lost Colony and when I looked at my opening hand I found I had been dealt the Alien Toy Shop. Now I have been reading on the geek in the last few days that this is a broken combination, so I thought I'd try it out. It became apparent (as indeed as had been suggested on the geek) that if the combination is broken, it is in relation to the advanced 2 player game, since it relies on running out the VP chips through a string of Consume(x2)/Produce cycles and ending the game before your opponent gets up and running earning 6VP a turn. The problem with multiplayer is that you only get to play one action a turn so you are scoring 6 points (instead of 12) per 2 turns, also you only have to exhaust 24VPs in 2 player compared with 60 for 5 player. Any way I had a try at this and although I got the consume engine going, I couldn't afford to keep powering it as I had to select other actions to get cards, etc.
Perhaps I would have been better going all out on consume/produce earlier but I missed on the possibility if the games end by miscounting the size of Andy's tableau. On the final turn I went for produce and the following turn I would have been up at least another 12 points if the game had gone on. Oh well.

Race for the Galaxy 80 mins
Player	Posn.	Points
Julian	1	37
Dave D	2	34
Andy	3	32
Ben	4	31
Dave C	5	28

Next up was Colossal Arena, won by Dave. I didn't get off to a good start in this when the Cyclops, with my secret bet on it was eliminated in the first round, I had been relying on Dave to protect it because he had a 4 value bet on it himself. This is not a bad game but It can sometimes be a bit irritating when the player or 2 following you plays a low card on your favoured creature toward and end of a round and the round then ends before play comes back to you and you don't get the chance to protect it.

Colossal Arena 40 mins
Player	Posn.	Points
Dave C	1	14
Andy	2	10
Ben	3	9
Dave D	4	7
Julian	5	6

Over on the other table the other 4 played Agricola in what seems a low scoring game, I don't know which cards were used. Looking at the score sheet Steve H scored for 5 family members and 5 stone rooms, but had no grain, sheep or boars without penalty, so it looks like he had a card preventing the penalty. Steve P looks like he had a better spread, just missing grain, but had only 3 family members in a wooden hut. Gordon had at least 1 of everything, but had 4 unused spaces and also hadn't upgraded hit hut. Simon had upgraded his house to stone, but had 7 unused spaces and also missed out on boars and Cattle.

Agricola 150 mins
Player	Posn.	Points
Steve H	1	36
Steve P	2	26
Gordon	3	25
Simon	4	20

Finally on a stats note this week we passed last year's rather low totals for both games played and also player time. Next Midcon.