RogerBW's Blog

The 1 Player Guild is a group of solo game players, communicating through BoardGameGeek. This was the fifth get-together for the UK contingent, and we were back in the upstairs room of a pub in Silverstone.

With images; cc-by-sa on everything.

I should say the pub in Silverstone, because apparently there's only one. But the food and beer are both good, even if downstairs does fill up with sports people. (This year apparently "England" weren't playing in whatever it was that day, so it was a lot quieter than last time.)

We started with classic PitchCar, in which I blew a couple of key shots but still took third place.

Then new arrival Rallyman: GT, for which I'm still in the first flush of enthusiasm (even if I did crash on the first move, and the second, and never really recovered). As a multiplayer game this is definitely better than classic Rallyman for me: it keeps the interesting movement choices, but having to choose from multiple paths through a corner, some of which may be blocked by other racers, leads to a lot more analysis. (Even so, we completed the teaching plus a single lap of a complex course in about an hour.) Some very impressive burning of accumulated focus tokens in the final straight.

There was Crisis at the other end of the table.

Next I played The Quacks of Quedlinburg, with some very shiny components. (From BGG, so either postage will be very expensive or I'll have to get lucky at Essen – even once they come back into stock at all. But they feel so lovely I'm not sure I'd want to play the game without them.)

This was the second time I've played this, and I tried for a very simple strategy: "don't explode". Which allowed me to run away with the game with about a 20-point lead.

We moved on to Nations: The Dice Game (with the Unrest expansion). I haven't played the original Nations, but this was quite fun, and with a strict turn limit didn't overstay its welcome. I may have come last, but half the world was speaking Polish and cowering at the feet of our navy. Or something.

On to V-Commandos and the Battleship terrain, which went quite well until the Scout got spotted; in the end, the sabotage was a success, but only the Officer escaped. ("I'll tell them that you were terribly brave.")

A brief game of FUSE which I'm finding one of the more enjoyable real-time games; the stress level is about right for me.

(During this time, other people were playing The Princes of Florence, Myrmes and The Shipwreck Arcana, but I didn't get photos.)

Then those of us who were left tried Letter Jam, which I seem to do worse at each time I play. I think we all found it quite hard going; sometimes the luck of the draw does that.

Supper, and another newish party game Just One (which I didn't photograph; I'm still interested in getting hold of this if it ever gets cheap); then 1PG tradition Die Kutschfahrt zur Teufelsburg, in which I got traditionally confused.

We finished off with Glen More, a rather drier Eurogame than my usual style, but still enjoyable once I got the hang of the spatial element – and thanks to a terrible performance by the owner of the game I didn't come last.

Another good day with excellent people. I will probably organise another of these get-togethers later in the year.