Mike Con

On 6 Feb, Mike held a get together at his mother's house, Steve Perkins christened it Mike Con, this is Mike's report

A simple idea really, get together four players for some of my games that don't get much table-time at the Club and give them a dusting-off.  While we waited for Steve H, who depsite living closer to the venue than anybody else manged to get lost on the way, we managed a quick game of classic Knizia-fare :

KATZENJAMMER BLUES

1st Donald 8 pts
2nd Steve Pe 4pts
3rd Mike 3 pts

then a re-run of a very bizarre card-driven game which I think was spoiled last time I aired it by a very dodgy translation, fixed this time by an effort from the Geek.  The amount of luck involved is mitigated by the fact that the game is just about perfect length for its' content :

VOM KAP BIS KAIRO

1st Donald
2nd= Steve Pe Steve H, Mike

Time for an old favourite just before lunch :

SAN JUAN

1st Steve H 40 VP
2nd Mike 36 VP
3rd Donald 30 VP
4th Steve Pe 29 VP

On to Mykerinos : there is a school of thought that getting a Brown patron early on is a huge advantage, well, I managed to disprove that mightily by failing to pick up a Violet patron until last turn and being constantly short of cubes as a result.  Donald suffered a bit from the learning curve but I think he still enjoyed it :

MYKERINOS

1st Steve Pe 50 VP
2nd= Steve H, Mike 42 VP
4th Donald 29 VP

I'm afraid that the luck element that affects all card games hit me a bit in Caylus Magna Carta : after ditching my opening hand for free, the replacements weren't much better, and with hindsight I should have ditch those too, it left me without any resource producing buildings and I was always behind the others in VPs, Steve H built two producers, didn't make any mistakes and cruised to victory :

CAYLUS MAGNA CARTA

1st Steve H 34 VP
2nd Donald 28 VP
3rd Steve Pe 27 VP
4th Mike 21 VP

By now a pattern was emerging : me not winning anything.  Having failed in the previous San Juan to win with a score that would usually give victory, I managed to do it again in this one.  3 early Libraries and 2 Prefectures meant that the player losing out (Steve Pe) was always going to struggle, and even though I had a brilliant non-production building engine going, Steve H getting the Palace while I failed to find the last Monument gave him the edge :

SAN JUAN

1st Steve H 45 VP
2nd Mike 37 VP
3rd Donald 28 VP
4th Steve Pe 21 VP

Donald then had to go, time for the three remaining to play the only game I think that Steve Pe hadn't encountered before.  New England tends to be a bit less competitive in the land grab with three, but there was still a bit of nasty stuff going around, with me being the main culprit, unfortunately this didn't compensate for getting constantly short on cash when I didn't pick up the few very early pilgrims and then the supply of them completely drying up, and paying through the nose to deny Steve H a prime development card, only for 2 of them to turn up in the next round and he picked one up for peanuts!  In the end I'm amazed I wasn't even more heavily beaten :

NEW ENGLAND

1st Steve H 35+ VP
2nd Steve Pe 35 VP
3rd Mike 29 VP

All in all, I thought it was a really enjoyable day amongst good company, for me all of the games were fun, none outstayed their welcome.