After last years forced hiatus due to obvious world events happening the annual Jeff’s Birthday Gaming Bash was back.

This years big game saw the return of Twilight Imperium 3, which was last played at the bash in 2018 (joys of recording plays in the board game stats app).

I’m a fan of Twilight Imperium, I own the fourth edition plus it’s first and currently only expansion. Although yet to play it with the expansion due to the fore mentioned world events. The thing with these big games is if you get to play them once a year that’s good going. Anything more than that is amazing and unusual.

Before hand via the messenger group Jeff shared which optional rules would be played with the base game to “enhance” our experience. Which you can see below in the included screen shot for those interested.

As you can see in the collage below the tile layout used was a two galaxy one, with Mecatol Rex in the middle, plus a dual worm hole tile by itself.

Who got what race, and was positioned where on the map was decided by the cards. I pulled the ace and got to choose first. My choice was position on map or race, whichever choice I went with would mean I’d be last to choose for the other. I went with position on map.

Below is how the races were spread out between the two galaxies after the selection process.

• The Mentak Coalition – me (Galaxy alpha)
• The Xxcha Kingdom – Katie (Galaxy alpha)
• Sardakk N’orr – Gavin (Galaxy alpha)
• The Emirates of Hacan – Diego (Galaxy beta)
• The Clan of Saar – Jonas/Gerry (Galaxy beta)
• The Winnu – Jeff (Galaxy beta)

Before play commenced an end time was agreed by everyone. I had the time constraint of I had to leave by 6pm. So it was agreed that at 5pm the current round would be completed and that would be the end of the game, highest score at that point would be declared the victor.

I had decided to concentrate on production and technology to make use of the “aggressive” nature of my race. During the whole game I only got to take a trade good twice from another player. The swines kept spending them so I couldn’t help relieve them of the pressure of storing those trade goods.

The beta galaxy compared to the alpha galaxy seemed a lot more peaceful, and more interested in trade deals and alliances! In the alpha galaxy it looked like an arms race. Gavin upgraded his pds units so they could fire into neighbouring sectors. Which meant I had to too.

I did warn my fellow alpha galaxy companions do not attack me, retribution would be swift. And that retribution was swift indeed. Katie decided to attack me. However between my upgraded pds unit and race ability to have a free attack by two destroyers before combat started, her aggression against me was stopped before it started. I was going to be vindictive and retaliate by destroying her home world. But pity got the better of me, and I didn’t want to totally ruin her first experience of the game.

While we in the alpha galaxy were duking it out, the beta galaxy occupants were busy clocking up objectives and victory points. It was a good two rounds before I even scored an objective.

In a game like Twilight Imperium it’s individual moments that make the day memorable. Like when I lost a carrier, 4 ground units and a cruiser when they flew into a super nova! How everyone did laugh at my mishap. I admit it did hurt. But I could live with it as it sealed off a worm hole, and added a barrier between me and Katie, helping to seal up my borders.

Gavin had one in the last round when he took out my War Sun with a single point of damage by playing an action card that destroyed a ship he did damage to. Getting a War Sun out was a personal target I had set myself. I knew I was out of the running for victory. So getting that out on to the board was a personal win. Sadly it was too late in the day to do any real damage. As was my final arrival in the beta galaxy. But I got there!

The final two rounds were basically team Jonas/Gerry jockeying with Jeff for completing objectives and victory. Which allowed Diego to sneak in and steal second place. However team Jonas/Gerry were the victors, and Jeff falling into third spot.

Lunch for the day was once again homemade curry made by Jeff. Which as usual bloody amazing.

The only drawback on the day was once I got home. Mum had not had a good day looking after Nan. So I need to look at how to get some help/support for her while I’m out for something like this. It also impacts if I can go see my son for a couple of days or UKGE next year.

But it was a great day otherwise. Looking forward to next year!