We'll Never Be Invited Back, I'm Sure

My friend Mark has a new house that turns out to be awesome for big gaming parties. This is unsurprising, considering how much he likes to throw them. Today was the first of those. I had to leave early, as I had an improv performance at 8 PM, but I managed to get in a few plays before I took off. The first was a tossed-together, six-player game of Rise of the Luftwaffe, which I managed to arrange a trade for and had just appeared in the mail as I was walking out of the house. Gwen seemed to enjoy it quite a bit, though that might have been because she got to shoot down Ted. Twice. I do really enjoy the Down in Flames games, and I’m glad I’ve been able to pick them up.

Once everyone arrived, we broke up into smaller groups, and I found myself teach and then playing Carcassonne: The City. We were very aggressive about wall-building, and we actually finished the game before getting to the third stack of tiles. This is my favorite Carcassonne variant, and this game demonstrated that I’m definitely getting better at it.

Before I left, I fit in a game of Winds of Plunder, which was also fresh from the mail. I did substantially less well than in my first play of the game, but I still think it’s excellent. I was somewhat strategy-less for the first two or three turns, which didn’t help. There are multiple paths to victory in this game, but you need to actually choose one.

It ended up being a shorter day of gaming than I would have liked, but it was still fun. Hopefully, given the suitability of his new house, Mark will invite us back again.