Japan Project - Takai Ki shrine

I've now completed the shrine for my Japan project, which will sit outside the village, now named Takai Ki.

I started with flat-pack kits of a building from Plast Craft Games and a torii gate from Sarissa, but I wanted to make more of a feature of the shrine.  I started with a piece of dense foam which I cut and edged with balsa.

I scored some marks on top to represent paving around the shrine and used my dremel to carve a stone wall effect into the balsa edges.  This was painted black and then dry brushed with grey and white.

The next step was to use thin balsa to construct a perimeter fence.

I painted the fence white and grassed the area between the paving and perimeter.  I constructed some steps and added a couple of lanterns.

The shrine itself required little painting.  I sprayed some elements in a bright red and painted the windows and doors.  More time consuming was etching the plain base to represent the grain of the floor boards.

The torii gate was painted in the same red and based.

There are a few finishing touches I plan to make but this is another big step of the project complete.

The fall of Singapore - 26 May 2015

Andy hosted a BKC game this week, having been up until 3am that morning painting the remainder of Kieron's Japanese army.  Adrian and James were the British in Singapore (in and around the buildings at the near edge of the table below), with Kieron (supported by Andy) as the invading Japanese.

James scheduled some well-timed attacks with his Hurricane which decimated one of Kieron's commands as it advanced across the table.  Andy had two lucky escapes on the other side of the board.

But Kieron's pair of planes retaliated by a relentless bombardment of James' troops in the buildings.

Whilst Andy and Adrian fought in and around the jungle on the far left of the battlefield.

Both the British and Japanese lost a division in the battle, but the Japanese had occupied buildings by the end of the evening, and a minor victory was assured.

Japan Project - village buildings

I constructed the Japanese village buildings pretty quickly after Salute but found that the fur for the thatched roofs had been cut the wrong way round.  4ground provided replacements and a couple of cart kits as village accessories to apologise, and I glued the fur onto the roofs a couple of days ago.  After 24 hours, the fur was then coated with a 50/50 water/PVA mixture to flatten it down and stiffen it up, and I think it's not a bad representation of a thatched roof.

The buildings are very detailed with dark wooden frames with a lighter wood or white plaster infill.  The roofs are removable and inside you can see working doors (both hinged and sliding types), raised floors and hearth, and windows.

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.

Keyflower - May 6th

We engaged the fast-return-switch to revisit Keyflower, a game we played a few weeks ago. Andy suffered from not having played this before, and struggled to get enough production going. This game is not kind to first-time players. James went for a strategy of collecting and upgrading high VP buildings. Kieron and Adrian both started producing lots of resources with the hope of securing a high VP payout. David played a conservative meeple hoarding strategy and was able to make it pay off by grabbing some buildings that paid out for population, just pipping Adrian's massive resource score.

The scores were: David 74, Adrian 70, Kieron 61, James 50, Andy 28

This is a strange game. The big VP payouts are gained through collection of the high scoring buildings at the end of the game. However you are often already committed to a strategy by the time they are available, leaving very little room for manoeuvre. I was very lucky in the last round that three meeple scoring tiles were available and I was able to secure two of them.

The Castles of Burgundy - 29 April 2015

Another play for this very clever game.  As we noted, the scoring strategies pretty much converge with four players because every tile is available (this isn't the case with 2 or 3 players).  Kieron soared away following his recent pattern of establishing a strong lead but with Adrian not far behind him, and Andy and James dawdling some way back.

But as the other strategies started to score victory points later in the game, the gaps closed, and in the final scoring there were big scores, particularly from Andy who almost but not quite overtook Kieron.

In the last phase, we were a couple of tiles a short.  A knowledge tile that we could easily work out (number 16) and an animal tile that we couldn't (and so we agreed to randomly re-introduce a discarded tile).  Having now sorted through all the tiles, the real missing tile contains sheep, but we'd brought back a discarded pig tile which was to my benefit as the only pig farmer.  So I think the real winner would have been Adrian.  But then again, I'm the one who just sorted through dozens of little tiles when I should have gone to bed, so I'll record the actual scores achieved on the night :-)

I've e-mailed the games company on the off-chance that I might be able to get spare tiles from them.  I know I've a little collection of games parts I've found on the floor after games nights, so if anyone else finds these missing two tiles, do let me know!

Final scores: James 221, Adrian 219, Kieron 193, Andy 192

Hang 'em high!

I exercised significant self-control at Salute in buying nothing for any existing game (Wild West, Pirates, Dads' Army) and focussing on building up the Samurai Project.

With one exception.

My cardboard Wild West town is wearing well.  Except the gallows which obviously don't have the box structure of the buildings to keep them square.  I found a laser cut MDF flat pack for just £2 and had to have it.

A very quick build which was a practice run for the 4ground Japanese buildings.  A simple construction with a trap door which I hinged with tape, and I made a proper hangman's noose.

Butcher Casually prepares to meet his maker...

Dancing the "High Noon" jig...