The Elysian Fields

I've brought in 8 WUs for 11,981 points, and I've moved up to 113th place in Team Geekdō.

The team itself has moved up to 563rd place, which means it has just overpowered the team from Slashdot (569th place, at the moment).

If anyone has any questions about the proteins being folded, ask aequitaslevitas. Apparently he is interested in biology. He could look at the molecule the older client on the system downstairs was displaying and identify it and what it was made of. And he was right.

If you have a system to spare, join in the fun by Folding@Home. You can find out more info about Team Geekdō here, and if you play RPGs and/or board games, you already have a Geekdō login, right? =)

ZERTZ - 2 players ages 12 and up

So simple, so elegant.

Part of the attraction for me in any game is how it looks: if the bits and pieces are interesting, if there's nice art, if, in part, it has a nice theme, and, correspondingly, if that theme is more than surface deep.

Abstract games have the advantage here. The theme is no-theme: it's all about the gameplay. However, the bits and pieces can still be beautiful.

And the gameplay, the other part of the attraction of any game, is there in spades.

There's thought required to play a game like ZERTZ, the third installment of Project GIPF.

Now, I'm no great strategian ~ in fact, I've got a history of being a mediocre chess player at best, and, although my eldest son says I'd always win, I tend to see myself as fairly challenged even at a game of checkers ~ but I really enjoy the times I can see my way through a series of possibilities and correctly determine the way to get things to flow in my favor.

The game of ZERTZ isn't lacking in the looks department. There's no real board, per se, for the hexagonal playing area is constructed out of a series of convex (or, if you played them as we did in the first game, concave...) rings made of a heavyweight plastic ~ good quality feel about them ~ and marbles. The marbles are largish ~ shooter sized, I guess ~ and are beautifully speckled, with white, gray, and black base colors. The marbles have a lot of weight, enough so you might be led to believe that the marbles could, in fact, be made from marble.

To play the game, you have two possible moves you can make: the first is to place a marble from the pool of marbles (or, later in the game, from your own collection of trophies) on to an unoccupied ring and to remove one unoccupied ring from the edge of the board; the second possible move is to jump a marble over one or more marbles on the board, thus capturing the marble(s) you leap over.

Capturing works much like checkers, you can leap in a straight line over any single marble, and, if you can string a bunch together, over any other marbles in the series. If two or more initial jumps in different directions are possible, you have the option of deciding which way to jump. However, the choice to jump is out of your hands: if the move is available, you must take it. One of the strategies that is possible is to force your opponent to make certain captures, thus setting you up in a desired position.

Their are several goals to the game and the first player to achieve one of those goals wins. You need to capture three of each of the three colors of marbles, or capture four out of the five white marbles, or five out of the seven gray, or six out of the nine black marbles.

The first game I played, with Justin, seemed to easy, and it led to an easy strategy, and I rapidly collected all four of the white marbles. The game seemed a bit too easy, and too controllable, and a wee bit shallow of strategy. We reviewed the rules and discovered that ~ oops! ~ we goofed, misread some rules, and were both placing and capturing on the same turn. Of course, this makes for an entirely different game than designed, and, while it does allow some strategic thinking, it pretty much flattens it into a simplistic race without any depth whatsoever.

The second game I played, with Rachel, followed the real, actual rules. Now, as a disclaimer, Rachel can't stand games like this. She likes the ones with the themes well enough, but abstract games in general, and the ones she's played in this series in particular (GIPF itself, and the now-demoted TAMSK) did not entertain her, so it was under some duress, and much puppy dog eyes on my part, as well as providing her the choice of playing ZERTZ or ZERTZ, that I got her to agree to play along.

I almost came to regret that, as I spent most of the game playing catch up, two or three captures behind her, and, seemingly, always setting her up for a capture on her next turn. I had fairly well resigned myself to losing, especially after she managed to succeed on a move I had failed on ~ to isolate a marble on a ring by removing the last ring linking it to the rest of the board.

This method of capturing marbles comes into play not through leaping, but when placing marbles and taking rings from the board. When you take away the rings, you can only remove rings that can be slid away without disturbing any other rings. If you manage to leave an island of one or more marbles, without any open rings, and have it fully separated from the rest of the board, you can claim that marble (and the ring, although that doesn't provide you with any advantage except providing a place to store your captive).

I think Rachel managed to do this twice.

The board was seriously shrinking, and we were already going into our own stock of captures to be able to play, and there weren't many open spots left. On my last move, with Rachel having 5 black marbles (one from winning on that goal), 4 gray marbles (one away on that goal as well), and two white marbles (one away from getting three of each, and two away from winning on the four white marbles), and with me having 4 black, 2 grey, and 2 white, I had to play one of my captives, thus taking me further from the goal.

Luckily, I saw my chance, placed one of the grey down as the point of a three-marble V with another grey and a white, and took the last ring separating them from the rest of the board to complete my move. By doing so, I captured all three marbles, and that provided me with the three-of-each needed to win the game.

The gameplay, when you actually follow the rules, was much more satisfying, and both Rachel and I greatly enjoyed the game.

While it might be a while before I can convince her to play a different abstract game, this might have made that easier, and I'm fairly sure she'll play this one again some time.

I also think I'll need to practice, because I'm not sure I'll stand a chance against her next time...

In the overall scope of the Project, it looks like the edition of the game that I have ~ a few years old, and it has changed publishers since ~ includes some of the ZERTZ potentials to play in a game of GIPF. I still haven't experimented with adding any additional potentials. These pieces provide special moves within GIPF, and can be used to link the other games in the Project together. The reason the pieces are called potentials is because their special move only occurs if the piece reaches the center of the GIPF board, and, even then, the opposing player can challenge you to the game corresponding to the potential, and if the opposing player wins the special move is cancelled...

This greatly expands the possibilities of gameplay, and can also make for a day (or evening) of gaming, all centering around one game of GIPF.

Potentials for both ZERTZ and game #4 of the series, DVONN, can be found in Expansion Set #2

Here's a video explaining the game ~ although note the requirements to win specify one less marble of each type; this is the "blitz" variant of the rules:

Labyrinth - 2-4 players ages 8 and up

This game's been around for a couple of decades, but I've never played it. I picked it out as something all the kids could play, including Mr. B. There is a flavor of the game out there for kids ( Junior Labyrinth, ages 5 and up) and an advanced version ( Master Labyrinth, ages 10 and up), but this one, rated for ages 8 and up, seemed the best fit. The Junior flavor has larger sized pieces, thus a smaller area of play, but looked to have the same mechanics. The Master game has a final dragon battle and guards and changes the mechanics a bit, thus making it not fit my purpose of entertaining Mr. B.

Still, before we played it, I wavered a bit and actually held off on bringing it out for a while. I finally decided to give it a go, and he picked it up without a problem. In fact, he won the game.

The game is played on a standard sized board, but most of the playing surface is made up of tiles, about two inches square, that are slid in from all four sizes. Some of the tiles ~ both the sliding ones and the stationary ones which act as guides ~ have treasures on them. There are cards with pictures of the different treasures, so language is not a part of the game play. The cards are divided amongst the players and kept in secret. You have to get your share of the treasures by traveling to them, in order.

You start each turn by sliding the extra piece into the board in a location of your choosing. You can then travel as far as you want in an attempt to get to the treasure. As the maze shifts with each turn, this can take some planning and some patience. Once you get all your treasures, you have to get back to your home location in one of the four corners. The first player to do so wins the game.

For Mr. B, we did make a few changes to the rules ~ we played the cards face up, so we could help explain to him where he needed to go, but I expect next time we'll be able to try the standard rules. To make this face-up variant work for a kid, we also tried to help ~ or, at least, to not hinder Mr. B ~ with the placement of our tiles, as well as providing him some advice.

It might not be a fit for the serious gamers out there (who sometimes really need to step back a bit and remember that gaming should be fun =), but it's definitely a good choice for a family game night. With a little help from the other players, you can stretch that age range down two or three years and the kids will have a blast.

We went to see a certain piratey type movie today. And then we played Cartagena (review : game) and Pirate's Cove (review : game), and then we watched Dead Man's Chest (review : DVD).

Justin won Cartagena for the first time, and I utterly lost it - the only one who didn't get all six of my pirates onto the boat - for the first time. Along with Justin, both Rachel and Josh (a first time player) out-strategized me. They may have had me down and out, leaving me alone in prison, but when we next spent a year of sailing out of Pirate's Cove I never returned to the cove once, although I sent people back a time or two. In the end, I sailed to Treasure Island to take on Blackbeard, and, along with Justin, we brought him low and took the spoils. My planing was wise, and despite losing nearly everything - one more hit on my cannon and it would have been all over after a very close battle with Josh - I gathered more fame and fortune than all the other captains combined.

And, in PotCII: Dead Man's Chest we noticed certain things a lot more than we had the first time.

( I suppose I should do this, because you know, click here and there just may be spoilers. )

I'll do an actual review once it's out on DVD. Until that time, go see it - preferably before you read the previous paragraph. Either immediately before or after seeing #3, watch #2 carefully.

Mississippi Queen
Mississippi Queen: The Black Rose

This is a race game with a dual-minor in strategy and resource management. I can't vouch for the dynamics without The Black Rose expansion, as I haven't played it that way - but it felt right playing as we did.

We played this at one of the cookouts, so we had a good sized crowd, hence we didn't actually bring The Black Rose herself onto the board.

The game boards are hex sections of the Mississippi River, and each turn the first one onto the last section rolls a die to determine which way the river flows next. Your job is to pilot a steamship along the river and be the first to reach the ending docks.

One thing you have to manage and balance out is picking up two passengers - if you don't slow and stop at two different docks, you can't dock at the end.

Another aspect of resource management is gauging your supply of coal. Each turn, you get one facing change for free - this allows you to change direction. Want to turn more? It costs a coal. You're on a hex, so it takes four turns to do a 180 - you've only got six coal, and only two chances of picking up more coal along the way.

You also can change speed by one position each turn - if you need to slow down or speed up faster, it costs coal. Your speed determines how many spaces you move in one turn. To pick up a passenger or more coal, you must move onto the space at a speed of one - and often, you have to spend some coal to slow down in time.

On the river there are obstacles to avoid - sandbars and logs can be piloted through but cost you speed, coal, and other things. There's also islands, and the direction of the river itself to take into account when charting your course. The other players also form an obstacle - they can hit you and force you onto their choice of an adjoining hex. The only plus to that is you get to choose your facing, which might actually result in a very positive change.

The rules were fairly involved, but they were also grasped easily as many of them only needed to be learned in certain circumstances - and with a lot of players, there were a lot of reminders about what you could and couldn't do.

It was an enjoyable game to play, and one I would purchase (although it doesn't seem to be available at the moment - hopefully it will be in the future!)

GIPF

I wouldn't describe myself as a fan of abstract games. I tend to like a good, creative theme. It is, of course often pointed out that themes have little to do with game play, but that doesn't phase me, I still prefer things with a theme rather than without. With GIPF, the only thing vaguely themelike is the beautiful but simple artwork on the cover.

For those who are unsure exactly what an abstract game is, think of checkers vs. Monopoly or connect 4 vs. Operation. There is no premise for why you are doing what you're doing, there is only the game, the rules, and the strategy. There is no king of Candy Land to be found, just winning or losing. Chess straddles the line - it is nearly abstract, but there are the shadows of kings and knights cast over the board.

It's very easy to think of GIPF in terms of checkers - it's a two-player strategy game. The pieces are similar in size, they can even be stacked in certain types of games. The pieces move about on a game board. That's about where the comparison ends.

The board is a grid of intersecting points, and on each point a piece can sit - however, every piece enters the board on a dot outside of the grid and slides in. Any piece on the intersection it slides on to is pushed back along the line, in the direction the piece is going; that piece moves others in the same fashion. No piece can be pushed off the board. There is no "side" - both players can slide in from any point, provided the spot is free or the piece(s) in line can be moved one intersection further along the board. Get four pieces in a row, and you remove all pieces on adjacent positions along that line. Your opponents pieces are captured, yours can be reused. You win when your opponent runs out of pieces and can not add any to the board.

That's the basic game - there is also the standard and tournament games, which have variations on those rules.

Justin and I are still exploring the basic game, although I've gone a bit further and have some level of understanding of the standard and tournament rules. There's a lot of depth in it just sticking with the basics. Patterns, out-maneuvering, and out-thinking your opponent come into play even with the simple rules.

GIPF actually goes even further - and here is where it moves from interesting and addictive to downright intriguing - you see, the game is extensible.

GIPF is the first game of Project GIPF - six abstract two-player games that can be played separately or blended in a number of ways. The first extension is to use special Potentials pieces from each set, which can be put into play on top of a basic playing piece. Slide one into the center, and it can do something special, each of the other five games providing a different game mechanic. Further, you can play it such that the ability can not be used immediately - get a potential on the center, and your opponent can choose to challenge you to the corresponding game to prevent you from using that ability.

For me, that will be a long way away, as I want to really solidify my abilities at GIPF before I extend it, but I look forward to learning and playing those other games, and then combining the games.

First, I have to sharpen those basic skills...