B2O June 7, 2002 at Cole Hall, Bridgewater Ma. Courtesy of Scholars
and Dave T.

We saw new faces and old friends show up this week, along with the
usual cast of characters.

Attendance: (19) Brian, Greg, ScottH., David F., Vitas, Ralph, Dave
B., Richard, New Guy Adam, Gary, Danielle, Terry E., Matt, Craig,
Max, Nick, Ben, Jason (Ben's brother) & Scott A.

Games Played: What I Saw: Fruit Fight, Princes of Florence, Puerto
Rico, Twilight, Crokinole (a lot!), Where's Bob's Hat?, Modern Art
and much more!

Games I Played:
Attacke- While waiting for more people to show, we played a quick
round of Attacke. I taught this simple card game to 3 new players:
Brian, Greg & David F. Brian was behind for a while with Greg, but
Brian won a key hand from Greg into which they both dumped an
impressive amount of yellow cards. That tipped the scale to Brian who
reeled off 3 more chip colors quickly for the win.
Scores: Brian 4, David 3, Scott 2 & Greg 0 (he had really bad cards!)
A nice quick filler to open or close with.

Buffalo- An Alex Randolph board game that has 9 Buffalo trying to
cross the board squares. Trying to prevent this is an Indian hunter
with his 4 hunting dogs. The buffalo can only move ahead one square
at a time (like chess pawns). The Dogs can move in any direction as
many spaces as are open (like a chess queen). The dogs can not `take'
a buffalo, but they can block them. The Indian hunter can move only 1
square at a time in any direction (like a chess king). The hunter
can `take' any buffalo that he lands on, removing it from the board.
The buffalo need to get just 1 buffalo across the board to win; the
hunter has to prevent this to win. You can try balancing the game for
different strength players by allowing the buffaloes to move 2 per
turn, or giving them less buffaloes to help the hunter side. I need
some help, as I must have been distracted. I allowed Terry to waltz
a buffalo right across the board. Good play Terry!
Score: Terry E. wins as Buffalo player.

Diablo- A German card/speed/word game. You flip cards on the table;
each card has 1 or 2 letters on it. The cards are flipped one at a
time, as fast as the dealer wishes. When a player shouts out a word
all action stops until it is decided if that word is valid. If it is
a valid word, the scoring player takes all cards used to form the
word. If the player is wrong, every other player takes a card. You
are supposed to play enough rounds so that all players deal through
the deck. The game was not well received at the table and we shelved
it after Terry dealt through the deck just once. New Guy Adam
probably won, closely followed by word ace Matt. I had 3rd most, but
way back from the leaders. Brian was not too far behind me and poor
Terry, handicapped by dealing, had very few cards.

Atlantic Star- I broke out my newly arrived copy of this Showmanager
re-make. We had a full complement of six players trying to set sail
across the seas with dazzling cruise liners. Okay, the theme is not
as strong as Showmanager, but I can still buy Atlantic Star, while
its predecessor is long out of print. It was a tight game, with
many `clear the board' shouts heard to the usual cheers and groans.
My English translation sticker on the help card brought to Terry's
attention a rule he had overlooked, that a player putting on a show…
er cruise, can still clear the board before the cruise is played. I
finally won a game of this, so my rating of this game must go up.
Scores: Scott 50, New Guy Adam 45, Terry E. 41, Tom 33, Kyle 31 &
Matt 20! (He really was so losing).

Kardinal & Konig: Das Kartenspiel-What started as a 3 player game
turned into 5 as we set up. Which is okay, as this game seems to
scale from 3-5 quite well. I taught this Essen release to Kyle, Dave
B. & Tom. Old game hand Brian joined me in the explanations. It was
a fairly quick game (except for an occasional analysis paralysis) and
when the dust cleared Kyle had grabbed victory. Dave B. noted it was
his first game with Kyle (who is not Susan). Dave also thought he was
doing poorly all game, only to finish 2nd, while going 4th in a 5
player game, very respectable I'd say!
Scores: Kyle 42, Dave B. 37, Brian 36, Scott 32 & Tom 24
This game is still a favorite of mine. I am SO glad I received a
copy! I hope they release a big production copy at some point soon.
Werewolf!- Shortly after Dave left a Werewolf game formed. If we had
known sooner we might have conned Dave into staying later. Richard
moderated the game with 2 werewolves and 10 villagers. Terry was
werewolf number 1 and went down early, but his clever partner
convinced everyone else it was anyone but him. Brian brilliantly
manipulated the villagers into hanging everyone who might expose him.
Another hapless performance by another wiped out village. We even
hung our Seer! (Sorry Ralph). Danielle tried the "I'm cute don't hang
me ` defense. It wasn't pretty, so I can't recommend this defense to
future innocent villagers.
Score: Werewolves Brian & Terry win vs. Villagers: Scott, Kyle, David
F., Gary, Danielle, Ralph (seer), Vitas, Nick, Jason & Ben

Verräter: Scott A. came down to join us as Nick, David F. and I
played this clever board game disguised as a card game. David was
start player, so he and his opposite, Nick, were Eagles to start,
while the 2 Scotts were Roses. As the person to the dealers left,
Scott A. placed the conflict card on the 1st turn. He kept that honor
for many turns, as the Strategist was the buried card for the 1st
four hands!
Nick took the early lead as he won the 1st battle by joining with
the Roses (Traitor!). He re-joined Dave a few turns later for even
more points. I tried to stay close to the leader. The game is only 8
hands long, so it passes quicker than you think! I grabbed the
Strategist on the last round. I was the dealer, so I knew that the
Traitor was the buried card. I had stayed a Rose all game, and Scott
A. had re-joined me. Nick and David both had an Estate house, which
requires you to have cards in your hand to score at the end of the
game. I went for a big scoring battle hoping that the Eagles would
conserve cards for points. The other Scott took the '5' Diplomat and
also played all his cards for a big Rose victory! I took my 6 points
for victory plus the
2 point bonus given the Strategist. Those 8 points just edged me
passed Nick for a slim victory.
Scores: ScottH. 25, Nick 24, Scott A. 18 & David F. 17
A great game that should come out more often!

How Ruck!- David F. taught me Richard Borg's latest 2 player release.
The speed-split aspect was a little tough on me as I didn't know the
cards, but that didn't stop me from winning. I just need to learn
when to tug on the rope! You are suppose to play best of 5, but we
cut it short so I could go home and David could join another game
just starting (at 1:15 A.M.!).
Score: David wins 2 straight rounds.
I liked it enough to want to play again. I will hold off on buying it
until I play a few more times.

Great evening again. I traded Zombies & Warhamster Rally to Terry for
the German copies of Amazing Labyrinth & Heimlich & Company. Brian
bought my Battle Cry and that money went immediately to Scholars as
I picked up a copy of Web of Power (which was missing from my gaming
shelf).
Thanks to Dave T. & Scholars for the hall space. Don't forget to
thank Dave by dropping by and spending some time (and money) at his
store.

ScottH.