Back to the Masonic Hall on a slightly too warm weekend (thus rather better than the days before or afterwards).

Friday

was probably the hottest of the days, or perhaps I was over-tired after the drive, but this evening felt like a bit of a slog at times. (I blame myself, not my fellow players!)

We started with dnup, definitely the game that's occupying my "take in a pocket to play with non-gamers" slot now. It's quick to explain and quick to play.

On to Sea Salt & Paper which I generally enjoy more, but to people who don't already play a lot of different games there's a fair bit to learn before they can start (pairs of cards and their effects, collectables and their effects, and the starfish, sea horse and mermaids, and you have to be able to keep track of what your hand will score; and optionally the Extra Pepper conditions too).

Trio next, and I enjoy this though I don't often get it out. I should try playing it more and then decide whether I want to keep it.

Then Flip 7, perhaps not at its best with three but still good fun.

On to some slightly longer games, starting with Xenon Profiteer, in which as usual I grabbed too many pipelines too early but still just about did all right. (No photos here; I was definitely fading a bit and concentrating on the game itself.)

Old favourite Project L (various people wandered by to comment on my extra-large box with all the crowdfunded extras and special storage trays).

Finally for the night, Skull Queen, which I feel was done a great disservice by its publisher which chose that title to remind potential purchasers of the entirely unrelated game Skull King. It's not that and you shouldn't think of it as that; but it's a solid game in its own right.

Saturday

The day started with a long Flash Point: Fire Rescue experiment: with a 16-sided die, can we play a map with both attic and basement add-on boards? Yes, it turned out (though the die seemed to roll a lot of 16s and I eventually switched to a die roller on my phone); and while we started with four firefighters, it was clear that they'd never get much chance to do more than keep the fire suppressed, so we added two more. It was a long game but I'll definitely keep this in mind for future play with large groups.

On to Line of Fire: Burnt Moon, a miniature version of the Undaunted card-wargame. It's essentially a lane battler, with very limited opportunities to act, and each side is both sending robots in to fight and getting people to use their special abilities; I suspect it would repay some dedicated play, and a clearer rulebook would definitely help.

Another longer game next, Earth, in which I ran away with the animal-card objectives at the cost of almost everything else, and ended up tying for the win. (I still haven't got the expansion into play for this. I suspect a custom rulebook is in its future too.)

Some racing next, with Rush 'n' Crush. While I appreciate the compact layout, the "cars" aren't half fiddly, not to mention hard to tell apart from each other. I need either to find or to 3d-print something better!

More racing, of a sort, with Ticket Gagnant. While I can see the inspiration from Wolfgang Kramer's series of games from Tempo to Downforce, I find this more enjoyable, with the pure chaos implicit in the "move one horse next to another" card. (Yes, this makes it less predictable, but everyone's in the same boat.)

On to Nova Luna, which is much more fun when played correctly. (Use my pocketmod rules, they're much clearer than the official ones!)

Finally some Zombie Dice and off to bed.

Sunday

No board games today, but a very enjoyable session of the Space: 1999 RPG (a bit more to do in this scenario than the last one I played), and then a drive home from a pleasantly cool Stockport to 30°C by the time I got back to Buckinghamshire.