(It’s time for me to play catch-up and write about a couple of games that have come and gone.)
Railways of England and Wales
A couple weeks ago Ben, Owen, Mike B. and I played Railways of England and Wales. This is an expansion of, sorts, to Railway Tycoon. I say “of sorts†because you use a completely different board—one of England and Wales. As many of you may know, Owen and Ben are both from England, so the board was very familiar to them. For us U.S. folks, I think they should provide an extra map of the board. Once the game gets going and there are tracks all over the place, a lot of the city names are covered up. This causes us (me) to repeatedly ask where the city of Flumbuckets is or ask if Splurgleville is close to London or not.
Our game was unusual is a couple of respects. One, Owen sold shares like they were how you win the game. (They are not.) He may have broken some previous share record having 15 shares by the end of the game. I think the closest person to him had 5 shares. Still, in true Owen fashion, he did not come in last. The second distinction was that Mike B. did so poorly. This was Mike’s first game using this map, but Mike usually rises above any disadvantages like this and does very well. I think we can all blame Ben.
Ben seemed to have a plan from the very beginning. He set up his delivery machine around Flumbuckets, Splurgleville, & London. Even late in the game, when deliveries may become scarce, he was still making 5 and 6 city deliveries. Ben eventually went on to win with 76 points. I came in second with 63 points. I blame my second place showing on the other players, who simply refused to help me win. Owen came in one tiny point behind me (amazing) with 62 points. And poor Mike B. was last with 58 points.
It should be noted that we played this game because Evil Mike was missing. He likes these delivery-type train games, but normally doesn’t do well in them. We wanted to spare him the embarrassing last place finish, instead bestowing it on Mike B.
Lancaster
The following week we played Lancaster. It could be said that some people buy games based upon the number of bits inside and the weight of the game box. I’m not pointing any fingers, but that’s how Ben decided to purchase this one. It turns out that his approach appears to be a perfectly good system to base game buying upon.
What is Lancaster? Stealing the text from BoardGameGeek, who probably stole it from the game box: in 1413, the new king of England, Henry V of Lancaster, has ambitious plans: The unification of England and the conquest of the French crown! Each player takes the role of an ambitious aristocratic family. Who will be the best supporter of this young king, and the most powerful Lord of his time?
So that’s it then? We’re to become powerful lords. We do this by careful placing our knights (and their cannon-fodder squires) in various locations on the board. When knight placement is completed, the most powerful knight “wins†that section of the board and gains some advantage for their lord. This advantage might be gold, more soon-to-be-dead squires, more knights, or maybe an improvement to the lord’s castle back home. Some of these advantages score victory points immediately while others score them at the end of the game. There is also a parliament phase of the game where the lords can enact laws.
It all seems so simple. Unfortunately, just like the previous game I talked about, I blame my poor showing on the other players. There are things you can focus on to score points at the end of the game. You most likely can’t focus on all of them, and splitting your focus could end of in disaster. (See Steve’s finish for verification.) For most of the game our point scoring was pretty equal. But good planning throughout the game can cause big points at the end of the game. (See Steve’s finish for verification.)
Mike won with 51 points. This really surprised him. It probably surprised Ben too, who thought he would win. Ben came in second with 47 points. Owen was third with 41 points, and me (Steve) was last with 38 points. (Darn those other players!) We all enjoyed the game and look forward to our next time playing it.
Chaos Steve