The Mine Shaft Gap

Venue: Richard’s place.
Present: Brad, Alex, Neil F., Neil M., Andrew, Pat, Brian, Richard, Paul.
Played: Power Grid, Tsuro, Vinci, Gheos, Fifth Avenue, Tsuro (again), Word Jam.

A relatively small number of games played tonight given the number of attendees, and yet, for me at least, it still felt like a good, solid games night. That’s probably because of the “banter” factor.
Thanks again to Brad for the pics.
BTW, I also just fixed a site problem with page links that I introduced last time I was editing the site options.

Power Grid: It’s all timing in getting your right
Surprising perhaps that last week’s experience didn’t completely sour Andrew’s feelings towards this game, but he was eager enough to put this one forward. In fact, we had a five - perhaps the first time I’ve played this with this number.
After the initial setup (on the US board), I have to say that there were no geographical placements throughout the whole game by any player that were particularly surprising. Furthermore, resources of any type never really seemed to be at risk of becoming scarce.
Despite these factors, I found this one of the more tense and intense sessions of Powergrid I think I’ve ever played. More than ever I was consumed with the timing of turn order and the availability of good power stations. Richard remarked that he thought the turn-over of power station cards was particularly high in this playing, and that was reflected in the resources remaining in relatively good supply throughout the game.
I actually felt like I was in a good position for most of the game. I worked around Richard’s apparently cornered position on the map board and limited access to it for other players come phase 2. I matched site purchases to generation capacity (power station cards) to keep the fat low and the cash float high, and was usually able to make the all-important position swap (to last place or near) for early picks at resources and new building sites on the map.
What didn’t go well for me was the availability of adequate power station cards in the second half of the game. In one auction I let Andrew win a size-4 garbage plant with the expectation that I was about to pick up something better - and ended up with a size-2 garbage plant instead. On about the turn following I was desperate to upgrade any of my 2s for a 5 or above (preparing myself to pay outrageously), and all I could get was a 3.
By about the second last turn, Richard was lamenting a certain lost game, probably to Andrew, due to some error he (Richard) had made earlier. In the meantime, I was looking at everyone else’s generation capacity and thinking that I would probably come last. My only hope at redemption was that the game would go for another two turns and I would pick up some 6 and 7 plants, stay in last position, and hold enough surplus cash to buy resources and city sites before everyone else.
In fact it was Richard who was to cross the 15-city threshold (or rather, sit upon it) in the next turn, despite looking like he was cornered on the map. To my surprise, the other players, although ending with plants totalling 15s or 16s, had insufficient money to buy new sites and thus didn’t bother powering up to their full capacity. My powering on the last turn was “optimal”, just unfortunately two cities behind Richard’s!
An intriguing session, and I look forward to playing this again soon with five, or even six players.

10 mins setup; 109 mins game time.
Results: Richard (blue): 15. Paul (timber): 13.14. Andrew (red): 13.13 (yes, I beat Andrew to second place on a tie-break with $1). Brian (green): 12.18. Neil F. (purple): 12.0.

Tsuro: This was played alongside Powergrid, and seems to resemble Aqua Romana, but simplified and with Japanese-style artwork.
Two games played within 25 minutes.
Brad won the first against Alex and Pat. Pat was the sensei in the second, with Neil M. arriving and joining in too.

Vinci: Something a bit heavier for the Tsurists to follow on with. Apparently playing a variant in which the arrival location from the edge of the board for any new civilisation is predetermined using a d20.
Judging by the score in this game, the vets let the newbie win :-^)
10 mins rules and setup; 68 mins game time.
Results: Neil M. (green): 111. Brad (black): 91. Pat (blue) and Alex (yellow): 87.

Gheos: I was keen to play this myself, but with a “new” game on offer at the other end of the table, I left the other boys to this.
15 mins rules; 45 mins game time.
Results: Richard: 117. Alex: 93. Neil M.: 88. Brian: 73.

Fifth Avenue: Oddicity
Pat introduced this to the rest of us and explained that this was an unusual game, probably not one of his favourites, but something he was keen to have another go at. It kind of reminded me of Manhattan at first sight, with city blocks and little skyscrapers.
But this game is very different. There are five sites in each of the seven city blocks. The sites can take your coloured skyscrapers, or “neutral” shops that benefit skyscrapers adjacent. On a turn, before moving a commissioner token to another block, players typically (but not necessarily) draw cards, which help them in site auctions. Auctions are the only way to get more of your skyscrapers into the city blocks, and are triggered each time one of the commissioners completes a stroll of the board.
The commissioner aspect of the game is a little strange in terms of theming, although I gather this is meant to reflect some kind of town planning process. There is also an extra, Central Park block for which spaces are also auctioned, and the points accounting mechanism for this seems completely arbitrary to me and devoid of all reason.
However, in our playing at least, the game seemed to work OK. I say this because Pat indicated that there had been reports of the game being broken, in particular by the playing of shop tokens which, if used quickly by the players, could bring the game to a premature and abrupt end. In our game, I think the pace of this was about right, and in fact it was me who triggered the game end, thinking I would have just enough points to stay ahead of Neil F. A careful but simple count would have shown that this was not so, but I didn’t care too much about the end result by the time it came around.
I doubt that Fifth Avenue will hit the table top too often in our group. But I’d certainly be prepared to give it another playing.
24 mins rules and setup; 78 mins game time.
Results: Neil F. (yellow): 65. Paul (green): 57. Brad (red): 49. Pat (blue): 46.

Tsuro (again): The Gheosians played this while waiting for the Fifth Avenuers to finish.
Brian won the first game (ahead of Richard, then Alex) in 8 minutes. Alex won the second game (ahead of Richard, then Al) in 12 minutes.

Word Jam: Rules Jam
An Arabian Nights -themed word game - what??
Ok, so the idea is that a topic is drawn (eg., food), then five letter cards are drawn (random consonants) with each assigned a value between 1 and 3, and players must try to work out the most valuable word they can formed from a combination of these letters. The first player to claim they have one announces this word and its value, and they then assume the mantle of Ali Babar, who believes he knows the secret word to open the cave. All other players must then immediately decide whether they join Ali Babar’s gang, or instead join the thieves. Then, after 20s worth of sand runs out, the first thief to Ali Babar’s right either announces a higher-scoring word than Ali Babar, or else they pass, and hand off the privelege to the next thief. Whichever team has scored the best will open the vault and score points that round (with the higher points value going to the leader (first chooser)).
Simple enough in principle, but there was considerable confusion around the sequence of play and when the sand timer was supposed to start. The rules might also be flawed in that they fail to recognise or reward a player who thinks of a better word, but is simply seated further clockwise from the first caller.
We then ran into some difficulty when the topic of “verbs” was drawn in the second last turn. Guidance in the rules stated that conjugated forms were not allowed, and so some discussion ensued over exactly what a conjugated verb was. As an additional task I agreed to check Wikipedia and report on this here, and the answer seems to be that a conjugated verb is simply one that is modified by the object or subject of the sentence. Hence for the verb “to be”, conjugated forms include “am”, “is”, and “are ” (as in, I am; he is; they are).
This is all very interesting, but doesn’t seem to help the game any. I suspect that Word Jam was originally published in another language (French, perhaps?) in which the conjugated verb issue is more significant than it is in English, and that the rules were not really playtested in English once they were translated. But of course that’s just speculation.
In summary then, I could see myself playing Word Jam again, but only after multiple rules issues were fixed. I doubt, however, that anyone would have the inclination to do this.
10 mins rules; 20 mins game time.
Results: Richard: 21. Brad, Paul, Neil: 16. Brian: 15. Alex: 9. Pat: 8.