December 8th, 2004 |
Another game night, this time with our first ever 5-player game of Amun-Re (and with all the real rules being played!). Attendees were the omnipresent Mike, Karla, and Dan, with Annie and (quick-study) Jim.
| Amun-Re |
| Results | |||
| Player | Score | Place | First Time? |
| Jim | 41 + 10 pyramids | 1 | * |
| Mike | 41 + 8 pyramids | 2 | |
| Annie | 39 | 3 | |
| Dan | 35 | 4 | |
| Karla | 33 | 5 | |
Notes: We played this game for the first time with 5 players, and I went over the rules. Of course, it's tough to remember every single rule, and this was the closest we came to playing it correctly. The only rule I forgot was that, if you want, during your turn, you can exchange cards back to the bank for 1 gold each. I remembered this only before the last sacrifice, which got everyone mad at me.
First, I think it's worth mentioning what rules we were playing wrong that were corrected and led to some aggravation
(particularly from Dan):
#1 - Auction: If you are outbid, you do not get to immediately switch provinces, you have to wait until it comes
around to you again (we were playing the Evo way, with immediate bid switches).
#2 - Card Play: Only one card of a certain type could be played per round. In the past I wasn't so strict on this
rule.
#3 - Sacrifice Rewards: We used to play where ties got to share the best goods, and that if you weren't in the top
3, you didn't get anything. The real way is to play that the tie-breaker goes to the person closest to Amun-Re, and
even if you only bid a far distant 1 gold for last place, you still get a freebie.
Those were the main rules. Dan also got upset that the -3 gold card (which gets NO rewards), was re-usable. He said that was dumb, but if you think about it, it isn't. Sure, you get 3 gold, but you lose an extra good. Say you've bought 3 farmers this turn. For the low price of 1 gold, you can get another farmer, which would, in reality, have cost you 4. What's better? 3 gold, or a discount farmer, plus what the farmer nets in the income phase? Usually the latter.
Anyway, Dan had a bad game and tried to take it out on me.
I started out nicely, but I made a New Kingdom mistake, which I'll get to later. I managed to have the most pyramids on one side, Dan the most on the other side. Unfortunately, Dan didn't manage any sets of pyramids in the Old Kingdom, which left him a bit behind. Everyone else had at least one set, and Dan, Jim and Karla were really raking in the dough. Annie went for cheap provinces and managed to get a couple bonus cards. Karla was kind of behind because she ended up with all 3 camel provinces, which only netted her money in the 2nd round. I managed to get the 2 temple province, while Dan and Jim each had one other one, and after the first round I had a nice lead: Mike 19, Annie 13, Dan 12, Jim 10, Karla 9.
At the beginning of the New Kingdom, my old pyramid province, which had three of them already in there, was up for auction. I put my bid on 3 with the blocker power card placed there. So whoever wanted it would have to bid at least 10. As the province had no room for farmers, I thought I'd get it. But Jim bid 10, which wasn't bad, because he had a ton of money, and because the province gives an instant return of 12 gold and a power card. With the big lead in pyramids in this province, I essentially lost the game to Jim. Jim's excellent play was THE move of the game, I believe. I ended up getting a pretty good province cheap anyway, so it didn't kill me.
From there on, I went with a different strategy. I wanted to get two sets of pyramids total, try to get the majority on the other bank, and get 3 points from one of my bonus point cards. I managed the first and third, but Karla got a headstart on the right bank majority, as she was the only one to build on that side in the first round of the New Kingdom. She managed to keep the majority the whole game.
Dan went for a big farmer province and then a bunch of pyramids. I got my two sets, and tried to save up for a big pyramid push, but I never really made that much money. Karla and Jim and Annie were getting all the bonus farmer, +1 per farmer, and 8 gold cards. Dan got a few, but I never got the +1 or the 8 gold card the entire game. Thus, with my modest farmer output, I was never the richest, and I was often passed for pyramids. Here, I think, if we had been exchanging our useless cards for gold earlier in the game, we would have been able to stop the insanity. I had bad luck in my draws, for sure, but if we had thrown back bad cards, the income bonus cards would have been more few and far between (and maybe I would have gotten some!).
The end of the New Kingdom scored much differently. Jim and Karla managed majority pyramid provinces, Dan had 2 sets, I had 2 sets, Karla had 1, Jim had 2, and Annie had 3 sets. The temples were each worth 3, and Jim and I each had two of them. I only manged to get one bonus card, Annie got two, Karla and Dan one each. I now had a 2 point lead on Annie, 4 points on Jim. Dan and Karla were out. Karla had most money, Jim 2nd most, and Dan 3rd, giving Jim 4 points and a tie with me. I checked for the tie-breaker, and Jim's acquisition of my 3 pyramid-province netted him the victory.
It was a fun game, but I honestly felt bad that I (again) forgot a rule, and wasn't that clear on a couple of the correct ones. My apologies, guys. We'll get it 100% correct next time! Maybe...
| Malarky |
| Results | |||
| Player | Score | Place | First Time? |
| Jim | 10 | 1 | * |
| Karla | 6 | 2 | |
| Mike | 3 | 3 (Tie) | |
| Dan | 3 | 3 (Tie) | |
| Annie | 1 | 5 | |
Notes: Man, did Jim do a number on us in this one. When he heard that this game was sort of like Balderdash, he really wanted to play it. So we did, and he schooled us.
The funny part was that everyone kept voting for Jim, and I kept getting the "true" answer. One time Jim had the answer correct, and I had to B.S. when I had the correct answer. Unfortunately, my B.S. answer was awful (For why do band-aid wrappers have a red string to open it? I answered because it used to be cinnamon flaveored complementary dental floss!). The true answer - to keep the bandage sterile, was correct. What was annoying was that I kept having the true answer and no one voted for me, except twice.
Annie and Dan made rather pathetic bluffs, I must say, and Jim's sounded excellent. He did two things that smooshed us: he was smooth & articulate, and he looks like he knows what he's talking about. In short, he was a shark in a pool of little tuna fish.
After he dusted us (in about 20 minutes), he mentioned that he used to beat the crap out of his roommates in college at Balderdash. "They always voted for my definitions over the true ones." That made me not feel so bad.
| Midnight Party |
| Results | |||
| Player | Score | Place | First Time? |
| Annie | -24 | 1 | |
| Mike | -28 | 2 (Tie) | |
| Jim | -28 | 2 (Tie) | * |
| Karla | -35 | 4 | |
| Dan | -36 | 5 | |
Notes: After two games where the rules were questioned and confounded a couple times - we had a false start a couple times in Malarky, I should say - I thought we'd have an easy time with Ghost Party. No such luck.
First, Dan and Karla freaked out because we played with 3 people and not 2 (we normally play this with 6-8 people. With fewer, each player gets more people), and I forgot to tell Jim, the only person who hasn't played this game 80 gazillion times, that there's only one person to a room. As this was about the 27th rule I didn't explain tonight, Jim was a little miffed. So was I, at myself. I had just read on the 'geek about how a guy wrecked a really good game (Amun-Re, coincidentally enough) by not explaining the rules enough and then suddenly doing something new. (Sound familiar so far?) So - and this is the God-honest truth - I felt awful after game night tonight and couldn't sleep.
Anyway, Dan and Annie had the lead after the first round, but Jim and Karla had poor first rounds. Jim then adjusted, and actually outperformed everyone over the rest of the game. The problem with Jim is that he learns quickly and negates the advantages I have from knowing the rules and cheat...I mean, and from experience and stuff.
So, as usual, Dan went in the tank, I never quite managed to save all three of my people, getting captured 1st the last two rounds. Karla played well after the 1st round, too, but only managed to get out of last. Annie held onto her 6 point lead after the last round despite getting two people captured.