Akbash
End of Game Statements
Bill Scharf (Imaginary Number):
Thanks for running the game, and congrats to Andy on winning it, always
enjoyable. I started the game running into walls I didn’t see because I
didn’t zoom in enough to see them…..grrr, which I did during the last
game too. Note to self, Bill, next time zoom in. (But I can see there
are no walls). No, zoom in anyway to make sure. (But I’m sure there are
no walls so it would be a waste of time). Look anyway, damn it, or get
that cataract surgery you’ve been putting off. (Sigh, ok, hopefully
I’ll remember).
Brendan Whyte (Botulism):
What took you so long Andy? I expected you to win a couple of turns
ago! Quite a fast and furious game, and rather fun. Thanks for handling
the frantic pace Chris, I think at one point I was getting in 2 turns
during daylight hours of the same day here in Australia!
Beginning the game by thinking I was in a different start square than
the one I was really starting in sums up this game for me. When I got
good cards someone pushed me away from my target. When I didn’t get
good cards, I got shot anyway.
In postal games I think players should be able to say at the start of a
turn that they are shutting down. Having to announce it a turn in
advance is too harsh. I know the idea is that you shouldn’t get to see
your cards for the upcoming turn and decide to shut down based on that,
but the rule as it stands can be frustrating: you have a bad turn, get
shot up badly, and then have to spend ANOTHER turn waiting before you
can shut down. On a frenetic board like this one, it’s too much.
I think the special cards allotted on GT1 can also have a big impact,
especially if there’s an imbalance. I got recompile, which is pretty
useless at the best of times, especially when others had bigger
weapons, tractor/pressor beams, ramming gear etc. Guess who got
shot/rammed to death? While dealing out specials on the first turn does
add variety to the game, I wonder if everyone should be dealt 3: one to
keep, and one to pass to the player on the left, and one to pass to the
player on the right. We used to do that in Cosmic Encounters and it
worked really well. It prevents one player drawing a dud.
I think flag 1 was a bit too tough to reach on this board too. Only 2
players tagged it, and they were the players who got all 4 flags. No
one else got it. It cannot be reached from the west, and only with
incredible luck from the south; from the east it takes a lot of turning
and shuffling, and only from the north is it really accessible. While
there is a temptation to overload boards with elements and put flags in
difficult places, I think ‘less is more’, especially with 5 or 6
players who will cause enough chaos between themselves without on-board
hindrances.
But the torus structure worked well I think. IT certainly prevents one
getting trapped in a corner, or missing out on the action. Three cheers
for donuts!
Chris Geggus (GEGS):
Always fun guys, thanks. Started alright then flag 3 threw me out of
contention. Just could not ping it and once I realised that Andy was
cruising to victory I thought to go after him, but that is difficult in
itself. Agree with Brendan re the specials. For once mine was of some
use, but expecting to pull hordes of robots into black, bottomless pits
didn't actually work out. Oh well, I can always dream. Thanks once more
to Chris for bringing order out of chaos.
Andy York (Dalekbot):
That was a close one, some poor sets of cards and a pesky tractor beam
foiled some of my plans. Plus WAIL-E picked up his 4th flag while
closer to a starting space than I was near the end. Though, I'm happy
to have squeaked to the win. As always, thanks to Chris for a crisply
run game.
Dave Hooton (WAIL-E):
Congratulations to Andy and I agree with him about the closeness. I was
in the game until I misordered in Turn 15, going away from the starting
spaces instead of towards them. However, I would have needed just the
right cards. Thanks to Chris for running it.