I was unable to celebrate Tabletop Day on Saturday in any organized fashion, though Joe was running an event. I have been busy with family things and Nick and his family were in town.
I did get to play a few games, starting with Clash of Cultures on Friday with Nick. It was my first play with the Civilizations expansion, and Nick’s unfamiliarity with the game proved to be unfair. He was playing as the Celts and founding a bunch of settlements, but wasn’t defending them. I was focusing on boating with Carthage, and Nick didn’t realize that I could sail pretty much anywhere once I learned Navigation. He left two coastal cities undefended and I was able to sail in and claim them as my own. After that it was pretty much a forgone conclusion and we called the game.
Then on Saturday, Laura, Nick, and I kicked things off with Castles of Mad King Ludwig. I had a decent castle going, but I was trying to complete the “one of every room size” bonus card. I was able to complete it, but at the cost of passing up on some high scoring rooms. Nick had a much better flow, and was able to snag a couple extra bonus cards that helped propel him to victory.
We finished the evening with Firefly. We were playing the Desperadoes story, trying to avoid the authorities and accumulate 15k credits before retiring. We were each doing our own thing. Laura was collecting crew to prepare for a big job. Nick was gathering a small crew and started missions early. I gathered a crew of mostly companions and planned to talk my way through trouble. Things were going well in general, though I did get ripped off on my high paying negotiation mission and only got paid half of what I deserved due to some trouble.
Then the Reavers hit. Nick and I got hit hard when I drew the Reaver attack card. The deck was shuffled and I got hit again immediately. It was looking ugly, but Nick and I finally managed to escape the outer rim, but not before he was hit again, costing him two more of his crew.
I finally made it to my mission location and was able to waltz through, thanks to a handy fake ID. That provided the last few credits I needed to end the game. Nick made one last push to close the gap, but was hindered by some Alliance entanglements and came up just short.
Until next time, happy gaming!
