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A very good turn out, 22 people signed in. Tom Dunning and Frank Mestre showed up around 2 from Buffalo and our Syracuse and north contingent made an appearance. Millennium cleared out the back computer room for us so we had plenty of room. We were not stuffed in the corner like last time. Bob Reed even had a place to spread out his games for sale. I believe he sold several. Winds of Plunder (Bill Peeck, Rob Winslow) (Bill Peeck) Rob just bought Winds of Plunder, GMT's new Euro. We played 2 games during the Session. The first game it was Rob, Ed Fear, Bill H, Myself and 1 other. The second game it was Tom Duning, Jeff Aaronson, Rob and myself. A very interesting game. The object is to get the most victory points. Points
are scored by visiting ports in the Carribean and collecting plunder chits that are there. These chits have a VP point value from 2 to 5. They also have a symbol on them that allows you to collect cannon, provisions, crew or treasure maps. Each of those categories allows you to score points also at the end of the game. Every 3 cannon is a point, and the person with the most cannon gets a 2 VP bonus, Crew is 1 vp per 2 crew and there is 2 VP for the most crew. Provision is 1 per provision and 2 VP at the end. The 'leading in the category' card switches between players as one passes another. If you are tied with the guy with the card he keeps it until surpassed. Each of the 3 cards also provides a bonus during the game turns. If you have collected a treasure map it will be for a specific port. Getting your ship to that port allows you to collect bonus victory points for the map -- 2 for the
first treasure, 3 for the next, the more you collect the higher the Vp for each map. Finally you can get VP for presence. The first player to visit all 3 ports in a zone gets 7 vp, the second player 5, and the 3rd 3. During the operatons phases you bid for the wind, expend 3 operations points per player to take actions and then collect your plunder. You start the game with 14 cubes. These represent money. The first thing you do is bid for the direction of the wind. This is very
important because if a player is at the top of the map (north) and the wind is north he essentially can't do anything. More on that later. Basically each player picks a direction of the wind and bids the number of cubes. The direction of the wind is based on the most cubes for the bid. Basically if player 1 bides 2 cubes west, player 2 2 cubes south, player 3 2 cubes east, and player 4 1 cube west, the wind is west and player 1 having bid the most gets to decide who goes first. The map is divided into 4 zones, with 3 ports per zone. If the wind is east or west you can sail 1 or two zones in that direction and to any ports in those areas. But you can't go against the wind and can't stay in the same zone. If
its north or south then you can stay in the same zone or go one east or west of
you but you can't go to a port that is north of you if the wind is south, or south of
you if the wind is north. You can spend all 3 of your operations points to catch a gust of wind and take your ship in any direction you want with in the movement rules. Operations points can be spent to draw cards, play cards, or get more of the
cubes (money). 1 ops point gets 1 card drawn or played or 2 cubes, 2 ops points gets 5 cubes, 3 gets 9 cubes. The cards allow you to take extra actions, get things from free, steal stuff from the other players, or mess up their operations. An example of the cards that were played is tavern brawl, This cost the target 2 VP or 2 Ops points. Finally if you end up in the same port as another player and have more guns on your ship than he does you can steal stuff from him. You can steal either 2 VP, 1 gun, 1 crew or 1 provision. As I said we played 2 games of Winds of Plunder. Game 1 Ed Fear won with 67 points, Rob 2nd with 62, and myself third with 58. In game one 4th had 52 and 5th had 51 points repectively. The second game Tom Dunning won with 70, Rob
67, Jeff 64, and myself at 61. As you can see the points are quite tight. The game will accomodate 5 players. (Rob Winslow) Played 2x Winds of Plunder (new GMT Pirate-themed euro). It was a fun game, though I was always the bridesmaid (games won by Ed Fear and Tom Dunning). We did a few rules wrong... 1. Wind direction is revealed by all and THEN you vote with cubes. 2. You gain provisions, weapons, etc. BEFORE you gain VPs for entering a port. Therefore, one could get the ADVANTAGE for "Most Provisions" based on port entry, which would then score 2 additional VPs! 3. You only place a reputation cube upon entering a port where you have AT
LEAST as many guns as another pirate in that port (or port is unoccupied). 4. Reputation cubes come out of reserve, not from the wind cubes. Overall, I enjoyed the game, and look forward to playing again. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr! Commands and Colors Ancients (Jack Morrell) Alexanders March began for two stalwarts this month. Steve Cuyler in the guise of Alexander began his conquest of Persia . He met the Persian satraps at the River Granicius. He displayed great leadership and courage and forced the Persians back all along the front. The elation of expected victory and glory carried him forward where elements of the Persian force counterattacked cutting the young king down with his Companions. Macedonian general Ptolemy while mourning the loss of his monarch, carried forward the Macedonians to a 6-4 victory. With Alexander dead the Greeks turn homeward to decide who will be the successor to Philip and Alexander. Later Rob Winslow faced his own Granicius. His strong right wing push forced the Persian back. Then a move on the left accomplished the same. The Persians were in disarray. Alexander came forward on the right and a Persian reply showed great prejudice to the young upstart who dared challenge the mighty Persian Empire. His Companions were slaughtered and Alexander came near death. Showing judgement beyond his years, Alexander beat a hasty retreat to successfully rally his troops to full strength. The first of two times he did this. A push by the Macedoian Phalanx on the center left took advantage of increasing Persian disorder after two of their generals fell in mortal combat. The Eastern Empire tried to halt the Greeks but the hoplites continued to drive forward winning the day 6-3. Alexander listened to his oracles who whispered his multiple scapes with death indicated his right to rule the world and continue his march. A teaching session of Granicius between Jeff Aaronson(Persians) and Steve ?(Greeks) made it a clean sweep for the day . Three Macedonian wins. Axis and Allies Naval Miniatures: War at Sea (Jack Morrell) Savo Island. Seth as Japan tries a night attack on American transports off loading at Guadacanal. The allied covering force of
cruisers and destroyers were commanded by Jack and Steve. Seth took the most direct route to the Transports sinking the forward element of 2 tin cans and one light crusiers. Before going down the US ships crippled a Jap. CL sending it retreating for home(as it occurred the only survivor of the Nippon squadron). The other allied ships converged on the attackers, guns blazing at long range. 30 minutes of close in night fighting ensued with the range ever closing, torpedo wakes fanning out with devastating effect. The Japanese heavy cruiser Tone reached the edge of the transport area only to suffer the combined gunnery of three US cruisers,and sinking fast, ending the melee. Unlike the real Battle of Savo Island where 4 allied cruisers were sunk, the tables were turned and the good guys won although by a narrow 66 to 62 margin in points. When Steve Cuyler returned that evening, we started a rerun of this episode and history was not reversing itself. The allies were taking grevious losses,
particularly from Long Lance torpedoes and were only saved by the Millenium call
for Closing. |