8) Belfort

This game is a great combination of worker placement, resource management, and area control. This game is elegant in that it is very simple to pick up and the game play is very straight forward, yet there is a lot going on and you're constantly pulled in so many directions as you try and complete as much as you can each turn. It also has a lot of details that I enjoy in games, namely 1) the player interaction when placing workers to gather resources and vying for the bonuses awarded to the player with the most workers in each spot leads to some tough decisions that I enjoy. and 2) the area control mechanic where you're fighting for a top 3 scoring spot in multiple (in this case 5) regions may be my favorite type of game mechanic.

Elves and Dwarves ready for duty. 

Yes - the other group was playing belfort too!

Nearing the end

My final player board

Final score in a tight game

This was everyone's first time playing and we all agreed that this is going to hit the table more in the near future. My one fear is that after multiple plays a single 'best' path to victory may emerge, but I should probably play it a bunch more to find out if thats the case.

7) Small World

A pictorial guide to losing this game:

Turn 1 ghouls, turn 2 decline = 8 points in 2 turns

Lonely humans after an 18 point turn

8 inactive ghoul spaces, 1 active human space. Decline = 1 point

Despite the rough game I still love this game. The pairing of characters with special powers make for interesting and new combinations every game. And each time you start a new game you dream of that perfect combination of abilities that will turn into an epic story. Although the story may go the other way as seen below:

Poor dwarves, no one wants them--the halfings were chosen shortly after this picture.

6) Ad Astra

In general as we played this game we were all feeling frustrated about the inability to get the resources we wanted or to even find the resources we were lacking. There was was the general feeling that the people who started on one of the metals had a greater advantage due to the perceived advantage of being able to build ships early. I do tend to agree with this, however, the more I think about the game the more I think its all about timing when you play the scoring cards and successfully ramping up for your scoring opportunities.

Amassing the troops

green, yellow, red, blue, green, yellow, red, blue, green, yellow...whaaa, blue red? 

The picture above needs a bit more explanation. We were all so excited about this card placement mechanic, but almost every time each player would select the lowest available number, which defeats the purpose of this mechanic. None of us could find a good reason not to play in order like this so maybe others will have suggestions. Also, it becomes evident that red is probably scoring this round to gain the first player token (and given that I was red this game I can say for a fact that that was a scoring card).

Starting worlds

The expanse of space in all its glory

We all felt like we had put in our time on this game and would be happy not to play it again, but after a few days the possibilities of what could have been are making me consider giving this one a second chance.

5) Troyes

First time ever playing this game. The rules were a bit of a slog, but once we got going the game play seemed to flow nicely. Although, seeing how the cards work together was a whole different story. After playing this once I'm excited to try again with a greater understanding of how to make winning combinations of cards or to just make better decisions about what I invest in throughout the game.

Half way through a 3-player game

Meeples in city hall, probably passing laws 

Final Score

Looking forward to playing this again. The cards should make the strategy of each game slightly different so the replay value seems to be there as well.

4) Libertalia

Arrrrgh, a pirate game. Ended up playing this one twice in a row. It's quick (under an hour) and simple to play, and you just can't beat the suspense and anticipation of flipping over the cards. It's always interesting how everyone gets the exact same start hand, but almost from the get go the strategies used are so divergent. At the beginning of one of the rounds I think three or four of us were all saying there was an obvious first play, but when the cards were revealed only two people had chosen the same card.

First round gambler never pays off.

Finally got the illusive third treasure map.

I would highly recommend this game as a fun, light strategy game. It's also a great gateway game for introducing people to more complex games.

3) Viticulture

Post Pending Pictures

2) Farkel

3 photo-shy dice not pictured

I guess this game is good for passing time, but again not my favorite. After a slow start where I wasn't able to get the required amount of points to begin scoring for a few rounds I adopted a fairly aggressive "strategy". The general rules of the game are that you roll dice, pull out dice that you plan to score, and then choose to either risk your current points and re-roll the unscored dice in hopes of getting more points or decide to bank your current score and let the next person go. I decided that if my point total was less then 700-800ish I would always re-roll, which often led to me scoring no points and very rarely led to high point totals. In short I was creamed.

I suppose the biggest surprise to me was how the game restricted the player interaction to only talking about the game. I suppose this is true for most games and may be considered a sign of a good game, but the lack of true strategy and limited decision making in this game made it more surprising that it was able to suck everyone in so completely.