January 23, 2004
Cold weather and snow in the forecast didn't keep everyone away. We had 8 attendees, and played 7 games.

Attendees: David F. & Noreen F. (Hosts), Scott, Calvin, Carly, Bill, Peter & Andrew

Games Played: 6 Takes!, Traumfabrik, Alhambra, Medici, Citadels, Battleball, Battleship (A * indicates a player's first time to play the game in question)

We started out with a massive game of Wolfgang Kramer's "6 Takes!". This is a card game wherein players attempt to not take any points. One card is revealed by everyone simultaneously, with the cards then playing from lowest to highest, on stacks from low to high and the 6th card laid on a stack must take the other 5 as a penalty. Playing a card lower than the lowest card on the table means you can take a stack of your choice. Games are played to 66 points. Final standings: Noreen 7, Peter 13*, Carly 28, Scott 52, David 52, Andrew 68*, Bill 69*, Calvin 73

For the next game, we split into 2 tables. Table one played Traumfabrik, and table 2 played Alhambra. Calvin took worst movie, and Bill best director, and the final standings were: Bill 63*, Calvin 58, Andrew 58, Peter 50*, Noreen 47*. The game went *very* quickly, and was over before Alhambra was!

For Alhambra, Scott, Carly and I played and the game was very close into the second scoring. Carly got a bit restricted by her wall construction and was hampered in the later rounds, while Scott built an oddly question-mark shaped Alhambra. I was finally able squeak out a victory despite my not noticing that I had lost the majority of purple buildings to Scott. Final scores were: David 145, Scott 141, Carly 104. I get to move Alhambra out of my list of games I own but have never won. :)

Peter and Andrew played a pair of 2-player games, BattleBall and BattleShip. BattleBall is a lot of fun, a dice-fest wherein each player controls a futuristic football team bent on chaos and destruction, and the occasional scoring play. Peter won both games, but I don't have any details on the actual events in the games. It was Peter's first time to play BattleBall.

Th rest of us played Medici, Reiner Knizia's excellent auction game of shipping. The game play grew ever more intense and as the three scoring days went by, and each of us tried to ruin lots for the others. I took a gamble to try to make Bill overpay for a set of lots, and paid dearly for it, there were several close battles for second place slots on the pyramids, but in the end, Scott prevailed by a large margin. Final scores were Scott 124, Noreen 97, David 90, Calvin 89, Carly 76, Bill 61.

Finally, we played a game that was new to all of us, and learned as we went. Citadels, Bruno Faidutti's card game of medieval city building, hit the table, and lasted a bit longer than we expected. I think it probably plays much better with 4 than with 6. We will give it another try soon, and maybe use some of the expansion characters. Final scores were Scott 32*, Calvin 27*, David 23*, Carly 21*, Noreen 14*, Bill 11*.

We had a great time, and it was a good variety of gaming. No plans were made as to what to play next week, but I suspect Coloretto and Amun-Re may both come out, and I picked up Attika so we may play our first Essen 2003 release as well. We meet again this coming Friday (January 30), starting at 7:00 and going until around midnight or so. Follow the links below for directions, and email me for more information, if you wish.