Fenland Gamers August Monthly Meet-up 2019

“Do we have a venue this month?” asked adult man child Gavin (he will give me grief for that. Oh wait he already gave me grief on the Wednesday).

Such an innocent question. But relevant.

The “refit” at The Luxe has been a tad longer than the estimated 1 week when it was started at what now seems an eon ago. So we have been improvising with using a local school on an adhoc basis. But it’s use is reliant on a club founder/member.

It also helped remind me if we had a positive answer to the question that an event needed setting up pretty quickly.

After a group messenger chat between Gavin, myself and Jonathan we had a venue for the Monthly meet-up. It was time to get the word out to club members.

Wednesday evening, Jonathan had unlocked, and was ready for members to arrive. But he’d forgotten one important thing on Monday when he answered in the positive. No kids at home, meant his partner was expecting to go out. You know, be adults for a rare occasion. Apparently playing board games isn’t on the radar for going out. Hopefully Jonathan wouldn’t be residing in the metaphorical dog house too long.

Not long after my arrival. Katie and the usual suspect arrived.

Whilst waiting for their other members to arrive we started a game of No Thanks! I made a major boob at the start of the game, I hadn’t realised Katie hadn’t played before! The number of games we have played and with who, I had just assumed we had played the game with her before. So after a quick run through of the rules play started.

While we were playing the other members arrived. One of whom bought a very pleasant surprise with them. That surprise being in the form of Ice Blasts, packets of sweets, tea bags and coffee for those that wanted a hot beverage. Wow! Colour me grateful and impressed. So I think a big big thank you is in order for Nathan and The Luxe Cinema for their generosity.

The new arrivals formed a second play group and after some chat and a sushi supper for a couple of them , started playing some games (and you can see which ones at the end of this post along with some photos).

After 2 games of No Thanks! the honours where shared between The Usual Suspect and myself.

Our groups second game of the evening was Men at Work. Which Jonathan had tried at UKGE and liked so much he bought a copy.

Jonathan and I disagree about this game. But there is also some common ground. Which is we both think that the game is fun. Where we disagree is that I prefer Tokyo Highway. I think Tokyo Highway is more tactical. And I enjoy that element more.

Don’t get me wrong there are some nice extra elements to this game. Such as the deck of cards that control what action you have to do on your go. Some of the actions can be quite fiddly. Basically you are either placing a worker or a girder on your go. But placing that worker could be made more complicated by the fact you have to also balance a brick and/or a steal bar on that worker. The cards also tell you the colour of girder(s) that you have to use as well. So the worker may have to be placed on only a white girder on your turn.

I like how you have 3 lives, that you track using little card board contract tokens. You lose a life if anything touches/falls to the ground on your turn or you control the building site. As soon as something falls off, control passes to the next player, you lose a life, and the next player has to clear up the debris before they can take their turn.

Not sure how I feel about the bonus point mechanic, that kicks in once a particular card appears in the deck. You earn these points for adding a new highest point to the structure.

The records show that Katie won this without losing a life. She was the last one standing.

Our next game was a blast from the past, a game that hadn’t seen the table for 3 years. That game was Traders of Osaka. It’s still a good game. I still think that the payday scoring is over complicated. But from last place The Usual Suspect managed to grab the win with a couple of really well times paydays that saw him grab lots of victory points.

Whilst the others played Throw Throw Burrito (it looks a very exhausting game, and not my cup of tea), Katie and I played Penny Lane. For much of our game Katie had the lead on victory points and I thought I was going to lose the game. But I did manage to catch up and trigger the end of the game. My last action was the top decking of a building that allowed me to complete a victory point icon, taking me to 11 points. Katie sitting on 8 points at that moment, managed to then grab a final 2 points taking her to 10. Talk about lucky. I basically top decked the win with my last action.

Thanks to Nathan I can share some of his photos that he took from the evening as well.

A great evening, I think everyone had a good time. Once again a big thanks to The Luxe for their generosity for providing the refreshments for the evening.