Recently played: Civilization
Jan. 16th, 2007 11:50![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
viktor_haagThis past weekend at the Old Huron Redoubt, the size of our group ballooned almost out of control. Seven folks showed up thanks to my more aggressive attempts to recruit: a person I work with and her partner attended, and a pair of folks from the KW Gamers group that I met during the holidays.
Since we had seven, I suggested we play Civilization with the Western Extension map that I had managed to acquire in the fall. It's been a long time since I have been able to play Civilization without being forced to play "Advanced Civilization" (I far, far prefer the original game and this recent play only served to reinforce my prejudice against the "Advanced" version of the game).
I liked the Western Extension map: it gave everyone a reasonable amount of room to manoeuvre. There was not much in the way of conflict for territory. However, this also led to competition for the relatively scarce number of trade cards (I do not own the "expanded trade deck", nor am I sure that I want to), and the brutal rhythms of the trade cards showed through as several players who didn't carefully manage their positions in drawing cards got smacked with calamities again and again and again.
We didn't actually finish the game, but cut it off short. However, I think everyone had fun, and by the time we stopped (about two thirds of the way through), the positions had settled out, and the three players in front were fairly close to one another but well ahead of the remaining four (slightly ahead of the player in the middle, but far ahead of the bottom three).
None of us had played the game in a long time, and the game was brand new to five players (I think, five, perhaps six?).
A subsequent play would speed the game up some, and would also make for a closer game I think: some of the newbie players made moves that were of questionable value that they probably wouldn't make having learned lessons for next time, and I think next game would have more careful struggles over some territories.
With a long game like this, it's hard to really know whether everyone had a lot of fun (there's a lot to absorb), but everyone seemed to have a good time. I had a great time, myself; the game was able to help remove the bitter taste of Advanced Civ from my memory.
Civilization is easily one of my three favourite multi-player boardgames, and I look forward to the next time we can play (perhaps not with seven, but with five or six?).
Since we had seven, I suggested we play Civilization with the Western Extension map that I had managed to acquire in the fall. It's been a long time since I have been able to play Civilization without being forced to play "Advanced Civilization" (I far, far prefer the original game and this recent play only served to reinforce my prejudice against the "Advanced" version of the game).
I liked the Western Extension map: it gave everyone a reasonable amount of room to manoeuvre. There was not much in the way of conflict for territory. However, this also led to competition for the relatively scarce number of trade cards (I do not own the "expanded trade deck", nor am I sure that I want to), and the brutal rhythms of the trade cards showed through as several players who didn't carefully manage their positions in drawing cards got smacked with calamities again and again and again.
We didn't actually finish the game, but cut it off short. However, I think everyone had fun, and by the time we stopped (about two thirds of the way through), the positions had settled out, and the three players in front were fairly close to one another but well ahead of the remaining four (slightly ahead of the player in the middle, but far ahead of the bottom three).
None of us had played the game in a long time, and the game was brand new to five players (I think, five, perhaps six?).
A subsequent play would speed the game up some, and would also make for a closer game I think: some of the newbie players made moves that were of questionable value that they probably wouldn't make having learned lessons for next time, and I think next game would have more careful struggles over some territories.
With a long game like this, it's hard to really know whether everyone had a lot of fun (there's a lot to absorb), but everyone seemed to have a good time. I had a great time, myself; the game was able to help remove the bitter taste of Advanced Civ from my memory.
Civilization is easily one of my three favourite multi-player boardgames, and I look forward to the next time we can play (perhaps not with seven, but with five or six?).
