Plowed field wins game

Last night was POB at the Pub. The Portsmouth On Board group meet up usually every month at the Stamshaw Arms in Portsmouth for a few hours of gaming.

Last night we played Pandemic, Agricola, Battleline and Gheos.

Pandemic started off first while we waited for some others to show, Myself, Mudhoney, Ade and Methsdrinker managed to fight off the deadly infections and win the game. Quite a good win actually with 4 rounds of player cards left. I really should start playing at a harder level but after being soundly beaten when I tried it I always feel I need a bit more practice.

Some of the otehrs had turned up now so we decided to play a bigger game. Agricola was chosen and we settled in for a 5 player game. Things progressed quickly as we all knew how to play except for Methsdrinker. 5 players was harder as we were all fighting for actions, particularly the build fence one. Starting player was swapped frequently.
In the end it all came down to 1 point with Ollie managing to win the game. Luckily using a plow action as his last action to fill up an empty spot on his field.

Agricola gets better and better the more I play it, the posabilities and options are just fantastic.

Lastly the group seperated with Mudhoney, Princess of Florence teaching Ade how to play Battleline while the rest of us gave Gheos a go.
It was my first attempt at teh game and I found it a bit bewildering at first. Probably because I was a bit tired but I kept up. Scoring confussed me at first but after I had watched the others play I picked it up. I must have done as I went on to win the game ;-)

That was it for the July meet, hopefully August will bring along some other games.

Knights of the Brush

Since my games of Battlelore have increased, I thought it would be an idea to grab the paint brushes and start giving some of the mini's a bit of a paint job. I used to paint mini's all the time back in my Warhammer years but girlfriends don't get it so I stopped.

Now I am married I just get sarky comments and I have to admit I kind of missed it. Its a very relaxing way of spending some time.

Needless to say most of my Citadel Paints had dried up, but Earthquake pointed me in the direction of a new source, Vallejo paints and they are really nice.

So these, red knights are my fist ones finished. The spider and a squad of blue's are nearly finished.

Now I need to find some way of storing them and they probably need a varnish.

Disease and Cow Cubes

A few of the guys came over last night and we played Pandemic and Agricola. It was a first for most of them and we had some good gaming.
Pandemic was first and we lost the first game to a violent outbreak of red cubes in Asia. Our hard pressed Medic just couldn't keep up with the epedemics while the rest of us tried to be in the right location to swap cards.
We all decided to play a second game, even though Agricola was at the other end of the table looking very inviting. Roles were dealt and cubes were placed. We quickly managed to cure Black and remove it from the game meanwhile yellow and blue were getting a bit lary.
Some quick moves from the dispatcher and we have yellow and red cured. I finally managed to cure blue with 3 cards left in teh player deck. Close but a win none the less.

Agicola then hit the table with all its boards and bits. The rules were explained and as it was a first play for the other 3 we just decided on an open game with all questions asked and hints passed. The game went on and we all experimented with different occupations and improvements. As I had played before I knew that I needed to have as big a farm as possible and lots of animals. We played through, Ollie played the dancer occupation to gain more food. I went for a berry picker as it worked well for Hanna last week.

Game ended with me winning on 33 points. I totally put it down to remembering what I needed to score. Everyone enjoyed it and its definately a hit so will be played again.

I now need to find a source of animeeples as I am getting all cubed out.

Vassal

I have just finished a game of Battlelore using the Vassal online engine. My opponent was Earthquake of the Meeples and Minatures podcast. It was good to get a game in, even though I lost.

The Vassal engine is a great bit of software, it provides you with a virtual table, dice and counters and keeps track of the cards played during the game. You still need to know how to play the game as the rules are not there, but if you want to play either live or using a pbem system its perfect.

My games have so far been PBEM based, where you record your moves into a log file and mail it to your opponent. They then replay the log file and then create a new one with there moves. It's simple and works, as long as you know the rules. I have been brought up for court martial for doing a few things wrong but now I know better.

I also lost a game to Steerpike, much to his amusement. Damn those weighted virtual dice.

I am ready for a rematch, and if anyone else wants a game, just holla.

Agricola - First Game

Thursday night saw Agricola opened and played for the first time. Joining me in my night of farming was Croppertarty, Mudhonney and The Princess of Florence.

It was the first time for all of us and we took it slow for the first few rounds. Setting up the game took a bit of time and space, but after a couple or rounds we picked up the basic rules.
Nobody had any real idea of strategy, just making sure we had enough food for the harvest turns was the main one. Trying out the other actions such as stables, ploughing and occupations was also used.
Croppertarty was the first to expand his family and house and started getting more actions per round. Princess played a key occupation, Yeoman Farmer that would eventually win her the game. I continued fencing and letting my sheep breed but didn't get anything to turn them into food.

When we got to the last round we were all in the swig of the game and wished we had a few more rounds. Scoring was close

Croopertarty : 7
Count Zero : 8
Mudhoney : 8
Princess of Florence : 11

Cropertarty blundered in the last round by expanding his family to 5, but failed to feed them so a begging card negated his 3 points for the extra family member.

ll in, a great game. Now we know how to play the game we can concerntrate on learning how to win the game.