Nations - 7 October 2015

A second go at Nations, this time with just 3 players (James, David and Adrian).  The smaller number meant that we could play the entire game of 4 epochs through to the finish comfortably.  This game is possibly the most complex of all the Eurogames that we've played recently, not so much in terms of the rules, but rather the variables and choices that present each turn.  In this go, James went for the asymmetric tactic of not developing militarily.  In the final analysis we agreed that this probably wasn't a winning strategy, since military forces enable multiple benefits (from colonies to battles) that are unavailable to the pacifist.  We reckoned that this wasn't unreasonable in terms of what the game was trying to simulate, but it did mean that the final scores were a play off between Adrian and David.  The end result: Adrian 35, David 34, James 27.  Worth playing again soon a trois...

Nations - 2 September 2015

We tried out one of Adrian's 2015 Xmas presents at Stu's last week - Nations, a new game from a Finnish designer which continues in the tradition of Civilization but adds an abstract Eurogames approach.  Players buy card upgrades each round to increase military power, state stability, and production of various resources.  Golden Ages can provide extra resources or victory points as can winning battles.  Starting wars has the general affect of causing grief to the other players and encouraging a military arms race.  And this was the tactic that started a Stu/James militarism vibe that went through the game and probably contributed to Stu and James coming out on top - that, plus the construction of Wonders of the world that gave James more options than the rest of us.  Although we only played 5 of the possible 8 epochs, we started late and had to go through the rules so this is probably a game we could finish comfortably in an evening.  Final scores: James 35; Stu 28; Adrian 22; Deej 15; Andy 7.