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Dec. 29th, 2013 05:36 pm
Road to Dokonimo
The main reason I didn't get more sleep in St Louis, of course, was that I was trying to fit in as many games as possible. Dad and his wife won't be here for another hour? Time enough for a game! Half an hour before the roast goes into the oven? We can fit in a game! Kids all in bed? Time to play a complicated game!
Here's the roster for the week (new games in bold):
The reason I put "impossible to say" for Tenzies is that it's so quick we played at least twenty or thirty games without really keeping track. I think I was winning anywhere from a third to a half of the time. The conception could hardly be simpler: Everyone rolls ten dice. Each picks what number they're going for, sets aside the dice which show that number, and keeps rerolling the rest until they match. In short order, we started trying out variations (e.g. "Splitzies", five of each) and inventing our own. For instance, "Tower Tenzies" was too difficult given the unstable card table, so we came up with some pyramid variants: four of one number topped by three of another, then two of another, and crowned by one of yet another number. Fun fun fun!
One game I wished we could've played more of was my Christmas present for my sister, Tokaido. In form, it resembles a race game, but the goal is actually to take as long as possible since you win by netting the most points and you get those from stopping at various points of interest along the way. Each character has a different special ability. For instance, I first played (and won with) Hiroshige the Artist who gets a bonus Panorama card every time he stops at an inn. (Each card has a point value plus a bonus for being the first to complete a panorama.) Sis generally tried to spend her way to victory by purchasing souvenirs. (Again, there's a point value for each card and a bonus for completing a set.) It paid off for her in second game. I'm sure there are many more possible strategies but we switched to something else at the request of COB just as we were beginning to discover them. For instance, my second character was a priest who had the ability to make donations to temples without expending his own money. BIL tried to squelch this by occupying temple spots before my turn came up, forcing me to halt elsewhere, but I still got the bonus for most generous donor in the end.
If I have one complaint about the game, it's that it's a little more generic than I'd expected. I understand the need to space out the various stops (temples, scenic spots, villages, hot springs, etc.) equitably in order to support a range of strategies, but still I couldn't figure out why only the endpoints of the route were named. How hard would it have been to choose nine of the most famous temples between Kyoto and Edo and label them? I can't help but feel that if the designers had been Japanese rather than French, there would've been more attention to that kind of evocative detail. But at least they weren't German so it doesn't feel like a mechanic fitted to a theme by whim rather than by design.
Love Letters was another quickie. I feel it's very similar to an existing card game whose name escapes me. In any case, the goal is to end up with the highest ranking card and there are various ways to force another player to discard theirs or otherwise fold. We nearly had time for a second game but one of an uncountable number of distractions intervened. I was happy to end on Small World. BIL was happy to play it, since he hadn't had a chance yet that year. We've played it my last night for three years running and I think this was the first time I didn't win. I did come second, which is much better than I expected given my sister's outstanding performance. (Damn those Spirit Pixies!)
Here's the roster for the week (new games in bold):
- Settlers of Cataan: 1 for 3[*]
- Ticket To Ride: 0 for 1
- Tenzies: Impossible to say.
- Tokaido: 1 for 2
- Small World: 0 for 1
- Roll Through the Ages: 1 for 1
- Love Letters: 0 for 1
The reason I put "impossible to say" for Tenzies is that it's so quick we played at least twenty or thirty games without really keeping track. I think I was winning anywhere from a third to a half of the time. The conception could hardly be simpler: Everyone rolls ten dice. Each picks what number they're going for, sets aside the dice which show that number, and keeps rerolling the rest until they match. In short order, we started trying out variations (e.g. "Splitzies", five of each) and inventing our own. For instance, "Tower Tenzies" was too difficult given the unstable card table, so we came up with some pyramid variants: four of one number topped by three of another, then two of another, and crowned by one of yet another number. Fun fun fun!
One game I wished we could've played more of was my Christmas present for my sister, Tokaido. In form, it resembles a race game, but the goal is actually to take as long as possible since you win by netting the most points and you get those from stopping at various points of interest along the way. Each character has a different special ability. For instance, I first played (and won with) Hiroshige the Artist who gets a bonus Panorama card every time he stops at an inn. (Each card has a point value plus a bonus for being the first to complete a panorama.) Sis generally tried to spend her way to victory by purchasing souvenirs. (Again, there's a point value for each card and a bonus for completing a set.) It paid off for her in second game. I'm sure there are many more possible strategies but we switched to something else at the request of COB just as we were beginning to discover them. For instance, my second character was a priest who had the ability to make donations to temples without expending his own money. BIL tried to squelch this by occupying temple spots before my turn came up, forcing me to halt elsewhere, but I still got the bonus for most generous donor in the end.
If I have one complaint about the game, it's that it's a little more generic than I'd expected. I understand the need to space out the various stops (temples, scenic spots, villages, hot springs, etc.) equitably in order to support a range of strategies, but still I couldn't figure out why only the endpoints of the route were named. How hard would it have been to choose nine of the most famous temples between Kyoto and Edo and label them? I can't help but feel that if the designers had been Japanese rather than French, there would've been more attention to that kind of evocative detail. But at least they weren't German so it doesn't feel like a mechanic fitted to a theme by whim rather than by design.
Love Letters was another quickie. I feel it's very similar to an existing card game whose name escapes me. In any case, the goal is to end up with the highest ranking card and there are various ways to force another player to discard theirs or otherwise fold. We nearly had time for a second game but one of an uncountable number of distractions intervened. I was happy to end on Small World. BIL was happy to play it, since he hadn't had a chance yet that year. We've played it my last night for three years running and I think this was the first time I didn't win. I did come second, which is much better than I expected given my sister's outstanding performance. (Damn those Spirit Pixies!)