After Action Report – Strategic & Adventure Games Association @ El Toro Public Library, April 27, 2013

I attended the Strategic & Adventure Games Association (SAGA) on Saturday at the El Toro Public Library in Lake Forest, California.  This is an event that I host every 2^nd and 4^th Saturday from 10:00am to 4:45pm.  We have 15 people attend this time, which is a little below average for a 4^th Saturday, but still a reasonable number to get a variety of games out on the tables.  At the peak there were 5 games being played at one time.

I played four games during the day.

The first game that I played was a game called India Rails.  India Rails is a 2 – 6 player edition of the Empire Builder family of games that takes place in India.  In the game the players own railroad companies that are competing to build rail lines and move freight from one city to another based on a set of demand cards that they have.  Once a demand on a demand card is completed the player discards it and draws a new one from the deck.  Included in the demand card deck are a number of disaster cards which include things like derailments and river floods which impede the player’s progress to victory.

The unique feature of the Empire Builder family of games is the free form building of track that it allows.  The player uses special crayons that are included with the game to draw their track on the board.  Between games the marking from the previous game are erased from the game so that in the next play of the game the players start with a fresh board.

After a rough start to the game, having been derailed after delivering my first load.  I was able to recover and come in second out of four players.

The second game that I played was Salmon Run, which I played last Thursday at Paradise Perks as well.  Salmon Run combines deck building and race elements into a game.  Your goal in this game is to move you salmon up a river to the spawning ground using a deck of cards that you build up during the game.  The first player to the spawning ground is the winner 

There are obstacles in the river that make it more difficult to reach your goal.  They include immobile things like rapids and mobile ones like bears that can be moved on to you by other players.

I came in second this time as well.  I had a strong start to the game but my cards failed me in the end and I was not able to cross into the Spawning Pool first.

Next up was a game called The Hanging Gardens.  It is a 2 – 4 player game that has tile placement and set collection elements in it.  The players take turns adding tiles which are actually cards divided into six sections.  1 – 3 of the sections will have features on them that the player needs to combine in groups of 3 or more sections.  Once a player gets a large enough group of tiles together, he can then earn tiles that score points depending on the number of similar tiles he collects.

I have played this game a number of times in the past, but this is the first time I was able to play the game with only 2 players.  This can speed up the game and allows for more scoring opportunities and a 3 or 4 player game does.  I came in second on this game as well.

The last game of the day for me was Saint Petersburg. Saint Petersburg is a 2 – 4 player card drafting and set collection game.  Players take turns doing actions during each round, which include purchasing a card from a tableau of cards, play a card from their reserve, or activating a special power on a card until all the players pass. 

The goal is to get money in the early game because money is very tight throughout the game and then start generating as many victory points as you can as the game progresses.

I was able to come in second against some very experienced players, which was great considering I play the game maybe once a year.

My standings for this event are as follows:

Game	No. of Plays	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th	Avg.
India Rails	1		1						2.00
Saint Petersburg	1		1						2.00
Salmon Run	1		1						2.00
The Hanging Gardens	1		1						2.00
Totals	4	-	4	-	-	-	-	-	2.00