Fire in the Lake 17 (and more)

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The long awaited day where we had the time to set up the long game and play as many coup rounds as it took. As had been usual lately, I took ARVN/US, the usual opponent took VC/NVA.

We made it to the second Coup.

It turns out those sneaky VC managed to get all their bases on the map…and with a couple of real sweet events, managed to turn on just enough opposition to score 36.

And we had the whole day!

Dammit.

Enough of this COIN businss. Silver Bayonet is going into rotation starting right now. We'll get back to Fire in the Lake when we can team up on a couple of buddies, maybe later this fall.

More games

As is usual when we finish early, we play a number of much shorted games, mostly brainless. It's a nice counter point to heavy games to follow with very fast playing games. Here's the list.

Think Thrice

Think Thrice seems sort of a dumb game, and maybe it is. Certainly, the rules-as-written are not playable, at least to us. However, given the colorful tiles, we've managed to create a decent little game out of it.

Here are our rules:

  1. The tiles can be laid down in either all same or all different colors and patterns, to a three-in-a-row limit.
  2. Either:
    1. Play one or more tiles, or
    2. draw a tile.
  3. Completing a triad with the last tile wins the game.

We played two games, I won the first, AS won the second.

First game, my win:

Think Thrice game 4

Second game, AS win:

Think Thrice game 5

Quirkle

Qwirkle is Think Thrice's bigger, but possibly not necessarily better, brother. AS smoked me on this game. I'm sure I would get better at it with more plays, but it requires scoring during play, which I'm not a fan of. I'm willing to play it again, but it's not something I intend on acquiring for myself.

Zombie Dice

Played Double Feature and Lunch Wagon. I won this one, 15 to 10! I usually don't win at Zombie Dice. This was Game 30.

The Agents

It's been a while since we fired up The Agents, and it took a few rounds during this game to get back into the rules. Once we got started it went pretty well. Still a unique game, haven't played anything like it still.

I won this game pretty handily, but we're putting it into rotation, so we'll be playing a lot more of it in the future.

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What to play next?

Deciding what to play next is always a tough call when faced with a closet full of games, all of which were purchased with intent to play. Here's one I'm dealing with the decision.

  • Something New: this means both something new to me and a game which has been published recently, within the last two or three years.
  • Something Classic: I've acquired a number of games properly considered "classic" which haven't yet been played. The current example would be PanzerGruppe Guderian.
  • Something Again: mastery requires constant practice, which means playing games many, many times to allow nuance to appear.
  • Something Vietnam: as I'm on a Vietnam binge. I don't have all the Vietnam games ever published, but I can say that I have a lot of them, and probably more than most people.
  • Something Obscure: as it's fun to poke around in the dustier corners of game design.
  • Something Different: break away from the same old publishers and try a game from one of the new kids on the block. Or, conversely, dip into legacy with a classic tried and true.
  • Something Light: once in a while it's nice to actually finish a game all the way through in one sitting, in an hour or two.
  • Something Heavy: if possible, it's nice to set up something big and complicated which can be left out for days or weeks or even months, for a leisurely stroll through a very large or long game.

There are surely many more ways to choose, but the above method keeps me busy enough, helps me get both breadth and depth into my play, and provides me with a sense of progress.

The odd man out

When there is an odd man out:

  • Have a solo game ready to play.
  • Keep score or advise on a game in progress.
  • Referee a game in progress.