Games in a Pub - 10th July 2011

From Bees to Trains

The Games Sundays seem to come around so quickly that I barely have time to write up the last event before we are planning the next one, so apologies for the delay in getting this note out.

Last Sunday saw another good turnout with two new faces, again people who had never played modern board games coming along specifically for the games.

The evening started with us setting up a game of Trans Europa for three (Gwen, Liza and myself), however just as we were about to start we were joined by Mark and his wife so we quickly explained the rules and added two players to the game only to be joined by Oliver and finally just after we had started Chris. So after a fourth explanation and me stepping out to let Chris take my place they were off building
rail links across Europe. I think I may have said before that whilst it doesn’t sound very exciting it plays quickly, has a nice board and just enough tactics and strategy, not to mention ability to impede your fellow players, to make it a really nice starter game – gently challenging.

Luckily I was not left in the role of observer for long as Malcolm arrived so he and I got in a quick game of Hive (a game about defending your Queen Bee whilst attacking your opponents).

With our warm-up completed (victories going to Gwen, never a surprise, and me, always a surprise, we had a brief discussion of options before deciding on a game of Settlers of Catan led by Gwen whilst I would lead the others in a game of Small World a game I felt would appeal to Oliver amongst others. Small World is a game of constant conflict but whilst early on there was a degree of uncertainty about the game play and which of the races to pick (there are lots of strange ones!) to use on the board once everybody got into it there was lots of conflict on the board but only humour around it. In the end Sue emerged the winner by a massive margin, belying her protestations that ‘I don’t really understand games’ (something we have heard many times from Daniella – normally she goes on to beats us as well!).

Over on the other table Gwen won the first game of Settlers of Catan but the second was won fairly convincingly by Liza.

So in an evening we had managed to play 5 games amongst the eight attendees. The attendees were nearly 50/50 male to female and age ranges from 18 to over 60. Again I ask how many activities can attract and engage such a broad cross section of society.

Who knows maybe more people will join us for the next evening on 24th July 2011 at the Blue Anchor Crowborough from 7pm. The Facebook Group for these events can be found here