nlbarber

After the board game sessions during the last two trips to Denver, I broke down and bought 10 Days in the USA, 10 Days in Europe, and Ticket to Ride Europe. My prime gaming buddies are the nieces (ages 10 and 12), who have decided I have the coolest games. We just played TTR-E this evening though we had to truncate the game for bedtime--it being TV-Free week, the kids are wanting post-homework, pre-bedtime entertainment. Sister-in-law joined us for a 4-player game. Older niece won thanks to good contracts, younger niece hit her wall before the last round when she was lagging in the scoring, SIL and I had respectable showings.

10 Days in Europe is....different from Europa Tour. I'm not sure, but I'd say I prefer Europa Tour. I liked the ferry routes instead of this "any two countries connected by the same ocean", and I'd love the read a "real" board gamer's analysis of the differences (if any) caused by the different weighting of the various cards. But hey, it's still fun, as is 10 Days in the USA.

Game night of the Denver trip: we borrowed the little conference room off the breakfast area from the Residence Inn folks, and set out the collection. Ended up starting with Europa Tour, a four-person game that I may try to find a copy of. Good refresher on European geography as you try to assemble a deck of 10 cards that makes a tour from country to country. I actually won that one. Due to a good bit of blind luck, of course, as all the players started with little idea of strategy--the owner of the game was just coaching us and not playing.

Then we moved to Elfenland with 5 people, and three people stuck with Europa Tour. Elfenland is much more complex, and took a lot longer to play. Not too much offensive strategy showed until the final round, when those of us who were new too it were a little more comfortable with the play, and could see where T. was trying to go and try to block him. Besides, he placed the first block--serves 'im right!

So we managed another evening of gaming in the hotel lobby, this time 5 of us playing Ticket to Ride. That was lots of fun, too--it was the first time playing it for 3 of us, so I suspect the overall strategic level was pretty low. I was the 3rd highest scorer, but did manage to get the longest train. I think I was the only one with northern contracts, so the competition was for the routes in the middle of the country.

T. and K. say Ticket to Ride Europe is better,

norabombay--have you played it? I'm now going to have to lobby for one of them to bring a copy to the next database test (3 weeks away). We'll keep the gaming going...

At the training center where we're having our database test this week, some other group is having a team-building training session. Well, we decided we just finished the water-use version of team building: an evening of games in the lobby of the Residence Inn.

The game of the evening was "You Must Be An Idiot", a trivia game with bluffing. At each question round, the players have a secret card that tells them if they are an idiot (who must get the question wrong) or not. Correct answers score points, correct guessing of who had an idiot card (and whose wrong answer was therefore a bluff) score points, and unchallenged idiots score points. Incorrect challengers lose points. Lots of fun, enhanced by knowing each other pretty well. If K. misses the baseball question, she must have an idiot card. Same thing for T. and movie questions. Unless they are bluffing... Lots of fun. However, there were no takers for a follow-on game of "Ticket to Ride" when YMBAI ended at 9:45.

Windy tonight in Denver--the emergency door in the lobby area whistled and rattled all through the game, and up here in my room I can hear the window rattling through the closed curtains. Yep, here we go--30 mph winds out there, bringing the wind chill to the low 20s. Hopefully it'll be calmer tomorrow.

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This may be a new addiction

Game night

Ticket to Ride

Team building, water use style

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November 2016

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