The Mine Shaft Gap

Venue: Brian’s place.
Present: Brad, Pat, Brian, Andrew, Richard, Alex, Paul.
Played: Caylus, Attika, Clans, Tichu, Bohnanza.

We playtested a new game design by Alex and Richard this week, and a brief account of this may appear here soon. The rest of the evening was consumed with Euro titles.
Pics as usual are by Brad.

Caylus: I suggested this one because I had only played once before (some months ago) and was keen to give it another go. So I was surprised when this was not met with much enthusiasm. It seems that maybe Caylus has had its time in the sun, and is now falling off the popularity pace.
But we dug in, and it wasn’t long before I at least felt like I was holding my ground against my more experienced opponents. However, Pat stormed ahead anyhow with most of the building activity for the whole game, and before we were at the halfway point it was less a question of who would win than it was of by how much. In fact the whole game proceeded very quickly, and I believe Pat remarked later that this was the fastest game of Caylus he had ever played.
With the experience of (now) exactly two games, I wonder what the “normal” or typical frequency is of movements of the white token during the Bridge phase. I believe this option was not exercised at all during our game, and the Provost (did I get that right?) seemed to advance two spaces every turn.
There are two rules subtleties that I failed to appreciate until about the last turn of the game, which I may have taken advantage of had I been prepared:
1. When you reach the end of a Favours track, you can take the last level again when awarded another Favour.
2. The first player to build in the castle on any turn receives a bonus Favour.
Anyway, I don’t expect this will be my last game of Caylus, but I might not get too many more with this particular complement of opponents.
5 mins setup time (and rules refresher); exactly 60 mins game time.
Results: Pat: 73. Alex: 55. Paul: 51. Brad: 35.

Attika: The other guys played this twice in the time we played Caylus once.
Apparently Andrew beat Richard and Brian both times.
Note: The fish in the picture are inlaid into Brian’s table, and are not part of the game. Seems a shame that they couldn’t have been worked in somehow…

Clans: The same guys played Clans, in 18 minutes flat.
Results: Andrew: 47. Brian: 42. Richard: 41.

Tichu: Only played 2 hands as a filler. Much carrying on at the start again over the arrangement of partners. Because of my insistence that Pat and Alex should not be allowed to team, I was left to explain myself again as to why I would insult Brad by not wanting to be his partner…
Let me state again for the record, you manipulative buggers: Any insult to Brad would be that he would be stuck with me, not the other way around.
Honest.
Anyway, by random card draw (the second attempt!), Pat and I were teamed against Brad and Al. On Tichu calls in both hands Alex went out first for 150 and 145 points respectively, beating Pat and me for a total of 295 to 105.
22 minutes.

Bohnanza: Plantin’ them bean fields.
Well, I don’t know what the winning strategy is for this, but obviously I don’t have it. Manipulative trading? Could be - that would be consistent with Pat and Alex having the two highest scores. Third beanfield? Apparently not - neither Alex nor Pat invested in this. Only Richard and Brian bought one they ended up 3rd and 4th respectively. Focus on rarer beans: I don’t think so - only Richard seemed to take this strategy. Good fortune on card draws: Almost certainly a factor!
43 minutes.
Results: Pat: 14. Al: 14. Richard: 12. Brian: 11. Brad: 11. Paul: 9. Pat nudges out Alex on a tie break for most cards left in the hand (2 vs. 3).