Thursday Night Gaming at Paradise Perks was well attending again
this time. There were over 30 people at
the event and six games being played at any one time.
I was not every energetic this time and only played two
games. Both games were games that I had
target to play this month.
The first game I played was Alhambra. In Alhambra players are trying to build the
best palace complex by acquiring buildings that enhance increase its
value. The more expensive the building
the more versatility it has in the way of being able to build more additions to
the complex.
At the beginning of the game the players start with a single
fountain tile that all buildings that are build must have a path to or they may
not be placed, and 20 – 28 coins to be able to purchase buildings with. Coins come in denominations of 1 – 9 in one
of four different currencies. There are
four different buildings that will be up for sale during each players turn, the
currency that is used to purchase the building is dependent on where it is
placed in the market.
The player may perform one of three actions during their
turn. They can purchase a building, take
more coins, or take a tile from their reserve / redesign their palace
complex. If they purchase a building for
the exact amount during their turn they may take an additional action during
their turn.
There are three scoring rounds during the game. During each scoring round the player with the
most of one of the types of building scores they points for that type of
building. In the first scoring round,
only the player with the most buildings of a type gets the points. In the second round the players that have the
most and second most score points for the type of building. In the third round the top three players get
points. In addition each player scores a
point per segment for their longest wall.
This was the first time I played Alhambra this month where
there were no new players in the game. I
was the first player because I received the lowest amount of cash during the
initial deal. I decided to concentrate
my strategy in this game to building walls almost ignoring what color the tiles
were. I figured that since I was at a
disadvantage in money it would be easier for me to get tiles if I looked to
getting the cheaper ones with more walls on them initially and focus on the
more expensive tiles as the game progressed.
I was concerned as to how this was going to work out for me
after the first scoring round when I found myself in last place. However looking at my tile placement I
realized that I had a good foundation. I
find when concentrating on a wall strategy you need to build either wide or
tall instead of in a block. This way you
are able to keep you options open when trying to get more tiles. My Alhambra was taking on a nice wide
appearance already.
After the second scoring round I had been able to get myself
tied in first place because I was able to get full points for three lower value
tile sets and the other players were splitting the higher value sets. Add to that the 13 points I got for my wall,
I had a pretty good scoring machine going.
By the time that the final scoring happened I could not be caught and
won the game.
The other game I played was Trans Europa. In Trans Europa, the players are required to
connect up five different cities in different regions of Europe. The players select these cities from a set of
cards. Each player must take one card of
each color. These colors represent each
of the five regions on the board. During
the first round of the game the players place their starting post on the board. The starting post is where the player will
start building their track from during the rest of the round. It may be placed anywhere on the board except
where another player has placed their starting post.
In the following turn, the players start building track from
their starting post. On their turn each
player may place up to two pieces of track on the board as long as it connects
to their starting post. If they connect
up to another player’s track, they can build off of that player’s track as well
as their own. In this way players can
end up helping each other out while trying to achieve their own goals.
A round ends after the first player reaches connects all
five of their cities to their starting post.
All of the other players reduce their scores, which start at 13 points,
by the number of spaces they missed hitting their cities by. Then the game continues to the next
round. The game ends when one of the
players loses all 13 of their points.
The winner is the person who has the most points remaining.
This game was a mixed bag for me. It lasted only three rounds. In the first round I used my north south
placement strategy. It served me well as
I was able to make it so that I only lost one point when other players lost
between five and seven points in the round.
The strategy failed min the second round mostly because
three of the five cities I drew were on edged of the board and I could not get
to them fast enough. I took a
catastrophic nine loss in that round.
I knew I was in trouble in the third round. I changed strategies up base on the placement
of the other players’ starting posts towards a more central placement of my
starting post. It did not prevent me
from losing a point by then end of the round, but it got me into a three way
tie for second place out of five players.
My stats for the event:
|
Game
|
No. of Plays
|
1st
|
2nd
|
3rd
|
4th
|
5th
|
6th
|
7th
|
8th
|
Avg.
|
|
Alhambra
|
1
|
1
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
1.00
|
|
Trans Europa
|
1
|
-
|
1
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
|
|
2.00
|
|
Totals
|
2
|
1
|
1
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
-
|
1.50
|
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