30th Anniversary Rivals Weekend

Somehow three decades have past since the formation of Rivals games nights.  Last weekend we got together to mark this and play a load of games.  Sadly Adrian couldn't make it, he was much missed.

We played a range of games, figures and board, old favourites and new.  We started with a "Bearers' Steeplechase" - a simple race game James had been planning for a while with some of the figures he had been collecting:

The figures were (from left to right, starting with the back row) Captain Scott on his Husky Sled, Lady Tsukiyama in a Palanquin, Sir Henry Pottinger in a Sedan Chair, Wilfred Owen on a WW1 Stretcher, Chief El Dorado the Muisca Chief, and Mrs Mavis Pike on her bicycle.

After looking for suitable rules for some time, James came across a game called Stage Chaser in a charity shop, a card based game simulating cycle races, with counters and tiles.  The tiles were reproduced as strips the figures could be placed along side.  The game uses three colours of poker chips to represent the energy a player has for attacking uphill, downhill and on the flat.  

Unfortunately this energy is depleted not by effort but by other players landing on your space and nicking your tokens.  This was quite fun but makes it tough to catch up, particularly if your hand of cards doesn't help your current position.  A good little filler game but if we play again, we'll use David's suggestions of allowing players the option of missing a turn in order to discard and replenish their hand in full.

The second game was a Dad's Army scenario - full write in this blog post.

Alternating with games of old favourites Ra and Pelopennes (and a picnic-style lunch and pizzas for dinner), we also had a couple of games of Hare and Tortoise that James had bought specially having recently discovered it was the first Spiel des Jahres winner back in 1979.  It was actually first published in 1974 but the German edition came out in 1978.

This 2010 edition from Gibson Games comes in an uninspiring box with an almost Victorian style board, suggesting a game of ludo-like simplicity.  But it's much more complex and devious than that - a race game that doesn't use any dice and (unless you take a chance card) has little luck element at all.  Suggested for ages 7 and up, we could imagine some very unhappy families trying to play this together - no doubt the reason there are so many copies under a tenner on eBay.

Each player starts with 65 carrots and 3 cabbages.  You move by paying carrots in triangle numbers for the number of spaces i.e. 1, 3, 6, 10, 15 etc carrots for 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 etc spaces, and have to visit limited and busy locations to drop off your cabbages.  The added challenge is passing the finishing line with 10 or less carrots (or 20 or less if in 2nd place, etc).  You can collect a lot more carrots by going backwards and taking a tortoise approach, resulting in some large moves e.g. 20 spaces costing 210 carrots!

We really enjoyed it and played it twice.  The first game especially had much hilarity as we struggled to get over the finishing line with the right number of carrots remaining.

We next played the bidding game Medici followed by a 6 Nimmt, a Board Game Arena favourite from the COVID lockdowns.

After David left, we had a game of St Petersburg with James' new copy recently acquired from a Board Game Geek seller for a reasonable price.  This rare but excellent game attracts some very high prices on most selling sites.

In the morning, we had a hearty full English breakfast before a very close game of Airlines Europe.

A great weekend, missing only Adrian, in both senses of the word.  Our last games weekend was just before the first COVID lockdown, so over three and a half years ago now.  We felt we should try and do this more often!

New Year Games Bonanza - 2 January 2020

A lot of players and a lot of games for the first session of 2020.  Lucas, Kieron and James started with Byzanz, a neat little card game with bidding and collections.  In a promising sign of a good game, the final scores were really close: 32, 34 and 36 points.

Andy was then subbed in for a game of St Petersburg.  Kieron went for buildings only leaving James and Andy to collect large numbers of nobles, with James winning with a set of nine.

After Adrian and Stuart arrived, we played James' new game Flash Point: Fire Rescue.  This cooperative fire-fighting game had a great theme, looked the part and modelled the spread of fire really well.  Perhaps we were lucky with some of the rolls but we rescued the target number of victims with ease, so we didn't really experience the peril.  Next time,we'll play in heroic mode with more initial explosions and hazards to make it more of a challenge.

Next up was Ra.  The usual shenanigans.  Another win for Andy.

Lastly, Lucas, Kieron, Andy and James played 7 Wonders - yet another win for Andy.

Peloponnes & Ra - 11 December 2019

A classic double bill for the (almost) surprise appearance of Kieron.  Peloponnes was the usual fun with groans as the disasters wiped out our progress.  Andy pipped James to the bronze medal by the virtue of having a single luxury good left at the end of the game.  We resolved to not let Kieron win any more now he has decided to return!  Final scores: Kieron population/prestige 27/31, David 24/32, Andy 18/17+, James 18/17, Stuart 12/27.

Then Russian Roulette with Ra.  A very unusual first epoch where the Ra tiles were really slow to come out.  Which of course meant the other two epochs were particularly frantic.  Final scores: David 39, Stuart 34, James 31, Kieron 29 and Andy 22.

Seven Wonders, Sushi Go, Ra - 18 July

Five player games at Adrian's saw us fit in two old favourites and a new try-out.  First up was Seven Wonders with Adrian and Kieron returning to the fold in first and second place (Adrian 62, Kieron 55, David 50, Stu 49 and Andy also 49).  We then tried the beautifully designed Sushi Go for two rounds of raw fish fun: Andy won the first, and Kieron the second (Andy 54, 41; Adrian 53, 42; Stu 51, 44; David 48, 46; Kieron 42, 53).  Finally David stormed to victory with Ra with Adrian barely breaking even (David 58, Stu 30, Kieron and Andy 17, Adrian 13).  A fun evening.

Classic Double - 9 May 2018

Peloponnes and Ra double bill.  Andy made it this week before his holiday so we let him crush us.  Andy population 40/prestige 34, Dave 33/29, Stuart 24/24, James 24/20.  An unexpectedly early earthquake pretty much wiped out James, resulting in the smallest final civilisation ever:

After catching up with news, we had a late finish with a game of Ra.  Final scores: Stuart 47, Andy 41, David 40 and James, last again, on 26.

Peloponnes & Ra - 29 December 2017

Last games night of 2017 and a double win for Stuart.  First game was Peloponnes where Stuart got a very balanced score of Population 36 (with a 4x card) and Prestige 37.  Other scores were David 33/28, Kieron 27/34, Andy 33/24 and James 24/27.

The second game was Ra where Stuart managed to get through the first epoch with only one winning bid and still sitting on his 16 tile.  Despite this and thanks to an impressive collection of five Civilization tiles in the second epoch, and getting five extra points from James at the end due to having the highest sum of bidding counters, he won the game!  Final scores: Stuart 38, James 37, David 34, Andy 31 and Kieron 28.

Ra & Alea Iacta Est - 13 December 2017

A double celebration tonight - of David's achievement and Kieron's visit.  Since we had an old favourite with us again, we played an old favourite Ra, with the usual Derren-ing and hilarity over others' misfortune.  And we even let Kieron win.  Final scores: Kieron 35, Andy 34, David and James both 28, Stuart on 19.

Then a game of  Alea Iacta Est in which Stu had us in hysterics in the last turn of the game as he failed to roll a 2 ten times.  Final scores: James 47, Andy 44, David 42, Kieron 36 and Stuart 33.

And before I went to bed I got one more clue on the Christmas quiz.  I worked out what an uneducated burglar says to a policeman who has arrested him: "Let go" with a dropped "t" becomes "Lego".  I should have got that earlier ;-)

Artificium & Ra - 29 June 2017

Another play of Artificium, a clever resource chaining card game.  David scored 62, Andy and James both 54.  The rules claim that "if two or more players have the same number of victory points the game is tied and all tying players win!" which suggest Andy and James were the joint winners, but we generously allowed David his victory.

We played Ra - for the first time in quite a long while.  Lots of fun and winding up as usual.  Andy just squeaked a win by a single point.  Final scores Andy 50, James 49 and David 31.

Peloponnes & Ra - 7 December 2016

Another cracking double feature of Peloponnes & Ra.  James got a huge early population growth followed by a similarly huge population slump in the final few rounds.  Adrian collected lots of prestige with extra points for his stack of money with the 2:1 card.  Andy got a better result but David won with an almost perfect balance.  Final scores: David 24/25 population/prestige, Andy 30/21, Adrian 18/40, James 12/26.

After Adrian headed off for an early night, we had a game of Ra.  Final scores: David 36, Andy 35 and James 33.  However, Andy had scored loads of points in all three epochs, ending up with "der längste Fluss" of 11 tiles of Nile, and there is a very very slim possibility that he picked up tokens representing 5 when scoring instead of 10, so should have scored something like 55 points.  Steward's enquiry generously awarded Andy the win.

Peloponnes & Ra - 19 October 2016

One of the classic double acts of games.  First we played Pelopennes with the Victoria expansion, which allows players to purchase a 2nd tile at face value once in the game - or alternatively score an additional 3 prestige or population points at the end.  David has the population-producing civilization tile again and by the middle of the game was at the maximum 20 population.  Andy bought up all the stone producing resource tiles and relied on the luxury goods from his over-production to meet this food demands.  After a wobbly start, James built up a good set of buildings and bought coinage in the last round so that his pile of money was worth 1 prestige point for every two, rather than every three coins.  The different strategies resulted in a very close result, with Andy taking the win.  Final scores: Andy 30/29 population/prestige, James 27/34 and David 27/31.

Then a quick game of Ra with the usual teasing and Russian roulette moments.  Final scores: James 63, David 54, Andy 35.

Notre Dame & Ra - 5 May 2016

A good night for Stuart with a double win.  Despite the name of the game, Stuart managed to win Notre Dame with 60 points without a single visit to the church, followed by James 53, Andy 50 and David on 43.

A much closer result with Ra and Stuart pipping David to 1st place by just one point.  Final scores Stuart 50, David 49, Andy 30 and James 26.  I still really enjoy this game although I've forgotten how to play it well - must try harder to rise out of the lower quartile!

Ra - 13 April 2016

The first of a series of games nights at Andy's over the coming weeks - with special guest gamer Keren, whose speciality was making bids that inadvertently (but entertainingly) had the most devastating impact on David's game (the table overflowed with sympathy....).

Andy was much more alert than we hoped and built his usual extensive collection of buildings, accumulating a huge score in the final round but the winner was James with hardly any buildings but a steady collection of points in each of the three rounds.  The final reckoning of bidding counters saw Andy slipping to third place after giving five points to Keren.  Final scores: James 48, Keren 41, Andy 39 and David 34.

Peloponnes & Ra - 20 January 2016

A full house this evening for another cracking double bill of Peloponnes and Ra.  Most of the expansions for Peloponnes stayed in the box (as usual) since there are lots of opportunities for different approaches with the standard game plus the seas.

Adrian and Stuart got devastated by disasters hitting their population at the end of the game, James lost almost all of his buildings to an earthquake, Andy played a strong balanced game, but David surged ahead with about half a dozen tiles delivering huge amounts of resources each turn and achieving at one point the previously unheard of position of full population (20!).  Final scores (population/prestige): David 36/29, Andy 21/27, James 30/17, Adrian 12/33, Stuart 12/27.

With Adrian departing for an early start the following day, the remaining four had another hilarious game of Ra.  The highlight was Stuart starting the game with the strongest tile (13) but failing to actually use it until the third epoch.

After nine years of playing this game, it finally dawned on me that with fewer than five players, the Ra tiles are more likely to appear in later epochs than with 5 players.  With five players, an epoch ends after 10 Ra tiles are drawn - so 10 Ra tiles per epoch.  But with three players for example. the epoch ends after 8 Ra tiles - so in the final epoch there are 14 Ra tiles left in the bag.  Not a problem and people suggesting tweaks to this most respected of games seem to get pretty roasted on Board Game Geek, so I don't think we remove Ra tiles with fewer players - it's just something worth considering when you're trying to get a full run of tiles towards the end of the game.

Andy won this game well ahead with a good haul of buildings - final scores Andy 52, David 39, Stuart 34 and James 29.

And as an added bonus, here's a cute photo from a player who clearly travels with their copy of the game!  Several more on BGG in a similar style here.

Alea Iacta Est & Ra - 16 December 2015

A classic double act this evening with firm favourites Alea Iacta Est and Ra.  A solid cluster of scores for the dice game but James pulled ahead with valuable Senate and Fortuna Cards.  Final scores: James 51, David 38, Adrian 36 and Andy 35.

Ra provided the usual laughs and groans, and the unusual situation of both Adrian and David scoring 4 civilisations in the first round.  Final scores: Adrian 51, David 45, Andy 39 and James 29 (20 more than last time we played, so I was happy!).

Ticket To Ride & Ra - 21 October 2015

It had been a long time since we'd last played Ticket To Ride.  We used the 1910 expansion, which provides much larger cards, and a set of extra tickets.  James had a good initial set of tickets which pretty much gave three routes from one elongated route (despite almost blowing it by attempting to build a short connection to New York with the wrong colour cards - fortunately no-one blocked the route before the build was completed the following turn).  Stuart had a similar coast-to-coast route allowing him to build to pick up other tickets.  David and Andy were more geographically contained and weren't able to break out and cash in too many more tickets.  Final scores: James 187, Stuart 130, David 95 and Andy 90.

In a complete reversal of fortunes (we decided it's about being fortunate, not being lucky!), James completely messed up Ra, ending up with less points than he started with.  Andy just pipped Stuart to first place with a large collection of buildings.  Final scores: Andy 39, Stuart 36, David 21, James 9.

Notre Dame & Ra - 26 August 2015

Just the three of us last week, so we tried Notre Dame.  The closeness of the regions with three provided easier pickings with the carriage movement, and Stuart and Andy pretty much cleaned up before James got a look in, but he did get an early visit to the Cathedral instead.  Rats came and went, character cards provided variety, and we had a good close game.  Final scores Stuart 51, James 49, Andy 43.

Time then for perennial favourite Ra.  With three players, each has four bidding tokens, so potentially more opportunities to win bids, but the best bid token (13) wasn't even used in two of the epochs, due to rapid arrival of Ra cards.  Final scores James 47, Andy 34, Stuart 26.

Peloponnes & Ra - 20 May 2015

This was the penultimate games night before Kieron departs and the last occasion for board games, so a couple of favourites were brought out.

First Peloponnes without any of the expansions.  James benefited from a civilisation that grew in population every round but Andy suffered from an earthquake and Adrian lost a group of people in the final turn, giving final scores (population/prestige) of James 39/33, David 28/35, Kieron 33/27, Andy 24/22 and Adrian 15/31.

Then Ra which is always fun.  Fittingly, this was yet another win for Kieron who stormed home with 52 points, master builder Andy 2nd on 40 points, then David 32, Adrian 29 and James just 23.

Cleopatra and Ra - 4 March 2015

Egyptian night at Adrian's, starting with a game of Cleopatra and the Society of Architects, the Days of Wonder 3D crocodile-fest which Andy and David had never played.  Cards representing building materials and special characters are collected and then exchanged for building extensions to Cleo's palace.  Employing corrupt practices allows the players to build more and faster, but the most corrupt ends up being fed to the crocodiles.  The philosophy of going all out to build was taken to heart by James who ended up on 62 points, but was the most corrupt by a significant margin so was consumed by the crocs.  Kieron was thus the winner on 49, David on 41, Adrian on 37 and Andy on 36.  A fun game, which we should play more regularly than the 5 or so years between this game and its last outing.

We then had the obligatory go at Ra, David triumphing on 41, followed by Kieron on 39, James on 36 and Andy and Adrian equal last on 32.  Nefertititastic.

Notre Dame and Ra - 25 February 2015

Another play of the ingenious Notre Dame which has some neat mechanics and a nice theme.  A variety of strategies were employed and it was a high-scoring game across all players.  David won after making big donations at Notre Dame in the final rounds of the game, reaching 67 points, then James on 55, Kieron 54, Andy 50 and Stuart on 46.

Plenty of time for a hilarious game of Ra, notable for being (we think) the first time that a player has ended all three epochs with a smaller score than the 10 we each started with.  Another clear win with David on 44 with lots of buildings, James on 33, Andy 28, Stuart 23 and Kieron on 8 (no sniggering at the back please!).

Love Letter & Ra - 7 May 2014

Stuart, Kieron and James met up for a last minute convened games night.  We played a couple of light games which allowed plenty of time to catch up.  The first of these was Stuart's excellent Love Letter - a very clever little game involving just 16 cards, some bluffing, some informed guesswork, and a fair bit of luck.  The winner is the first to win five rounds so there is inevitably some levelling as the person out front gets more attention from the other players.  So we all got to four points before James' lucky "Princess protected by a Handmaid" combo won him the last game.  Enormous fun and it plays quite quickly, so definitely one to bring out at the end of games evenings (I've already bought another copy!).

We followed up with the comfortable pair of old slippers that is Ra.  Always fun - James scored big early on with pharoahs and civilizations, Stuart scored late with a huge collection of buildings, Kieron had a more balanced strategy, but the final scores were James 48, Stuart 38 and Kieron 37.