Beer Necessities

A couple of weeks to report on this week. Two weeks ago despite fairly modest numbers that barely hit low 40's table space was at a premium, but eventually resolved itself without hassle. Just about. Spurred on by space issues, some debate about the reasons why Tuesday has suddenly and solidly been busy this last month, no extra space available upstairs in the pub on Tuesdays, the pros and cons of pre-arranged games, free will, possibly adding a second day, possibly reserving tables with the pub and blah, the upshot of all of that being, it's a potential issue on the Management Agenda.

Potential issues have the frustrating properties of suddenly appearing, threatening to grow long term, and just as possible disappearing without trace shortly after being first encountered. Like any good questing adventure your choice of whether to attack, wait and see, or flee in the face of such monsters will determine your fate.

Titanic. I need my space. You'll just have to swim.

Whilst fleeing from them - iceberg, what iceberg ? - is an easy no hassle lazy out, the captains of said ships often end up historically noteworthy for all the wrong reasons when something bad does occur. You either deal with a problem and have them potentially turn out to be non issues and being a waste of time - or you don't deal with them and have them potentially turn into Bad Things and not letting your boyfriend get on your liferaft with you because you'd like a lovely story to tell 70 years later about how he tragically slipped under the cold waters for the last time.

Procrastination would dictate you do nothing. Prudence would say you do something.

As possibly an interesting insight, the debate about whether to move premises from the Ribs to somewhere else simmered for a good couple of years before it actually had something done about it - and first triggered when we started to continually hit 20+ people a week. In hindsight, it probably should have happened a lot sooner than it did.

This week - and of course, because fate is an arse - the pub was largely empty, space was a non issue, and we had tables to spare. Uh huh. *shakes fist at chaos*. And this was with a player count of 53. Despite this, I've pencilled in a need to talk to the Tun about a number of points including possibly getting a second NoBoG day running ( which is almost certainly going to be Wednesday or Thursday ). The Tun used to be host to the Harbercue at the latter end of the week from Thursdays onwards, but this has now shut up shop, potentially changing the busy days and footfall of the pub.

In news of a similar vein at the end of the evening this week, some guys ( which might be related to the Maddermarket Kitchen, not 100% sure yet ! ) revealed the plan to sell food in the pub next Tuesday - nachos, burritos and "street food", and they seemed keen to get NoBoGers partaking of their wares. Stuffing your face with tasty food whilst gaming could be a nirvana to some, and an anxiety inducing, dont get chilli sauce on my cards, experience for others. Depending on whether this is a long term thing, or a Tun replacement for Harbercue and how that again effects space and yada is up in the air. Who knows. Aaaaaand probably another good topic of conversation to have with the Tun. In the short term I get to eat nachos - yay. Which is never ever a bad thing. More info to come.

Enough managerial things. Games. This week Norwich is holding host to the Gaming Festival ( one of a number of gaming events being held in Norwich over the coming weeks ). Whilst the Gaming Festival is largely about video games, Pete spent Monday and Tuesday flying the flag of board gamers and game designers at the event, by organising some NoBoGers to play games with passersby. Alas if you're reading this your chance to game with Pete, Hal et al has already passed, but the Gaming Festival is on all week, and if you want to see new and old computer game stuff then go take a look. Dean - newly appointed wizard of the dark gaming arts lecturing at the UEA, big congrats to him - is involved with the organising of the Gaming Festival week, and is giving a talk this Thursday on matters of game design and narrative and things of that nature. Go have a listen to what he has to say to get a glimpse into being a student in his class - one of the few classes where you get awarded credits for sitting at home in your underpants whilst playing console games and then writing up a report about the experience* ( * possibly not true ).

Brewcrafters - Tom plays a blinder and wins. No one collaborates.

Brewcrafters has been down the Tun the last two weeks with it has to be said nothing short of stellar feedback on this indie Euro title. Frustrating and satisfying in equal measure players seem to be digging its varied paths to victory, ultra tight and challenging choices to be made and the glow of seeing all those bottles of beer rattle off down your production line. Post game discussions about mistakes made, second attempts at doing better are the order of the day - and probably a good sign that the game sinks its teeth into you. Plus. Its making beer. Whilst in a pub. And has a Mash Tun building. Whilst playing in the Mash Tun. This game wins all the thematic context awards. Special mention to Tom who put in a stonkingly good first time score of 65 to win last weeks game, and Joe who managed to get a decent 62 points this week in a tight 5 player game with somewhat low resources on offer.

James has brought along Titan Race for a couple of weeks - described as what Mario Karts would be like if you made a board game of it. Martin further explained it by being a very slow Mario Karts. Not sure if that was good, bad, or just an obvious thing because of its turn based board game nature. Much fun is being had with it, and Martin won this week by mind controlling an opponent to shove him across the finishing line. I have no idea.

Champions of Midgard.

Elliot has singularly refused to bring his Mausoleums game back to NoBoG - despite several people wanting to have a go at it. The game is back in the skunkworks of development undergoing some modifications and streamlining and is currently unavailable - the game has been shortened from 12 to 9 turns, and Elliot is mulling over the awesome possibilities of building Lego tombs. Aww yeah. Bonus points for including a minifig inside your edifice ? Expect this game to go viral big time if Lego get on board and the gaming community realises that respectable Euro style games + lego = More Fun. Wooden blocks will be so last year.

In the meantime he has been spotted with Champions of Midgard and this week back to classics, Ticket to Ride.

Ben got his first chance to play Champions of Midgard last week, and when asked about what he thought of the game he made a direct comparison to Lords of Waterdeep. Which seems to be a common comparison. He felt CoM was simpler than Waterdeep, less restrictive in the strategies you needed to apply to win ( your lord tying you down in Waterdeep ) and overall thought the game was better.

Suburbia

Suburbia also revisted the Tun - quite some time after the pretender to the throne Castles of Mad King Ludwig has been dominating it popularity wise ( the games aren't a million miles away from each other mechanically ).

Stu has been doing his best to keep the hardcore Euro faith, Zooloretto ( the board game equivalent of Theme Zoopark ? ) and a host of other solid Euros on offer.

And of course Secret Hitler has been doing the rounds. I'm not sure, but I'd probably like to bet that NoBoG has to be one of the, if not the site of most played games of Secret Hitler in the world. Particularly as its not even officially released yet. It's been getting multiple plays, with multiple copies every week for a month. Shurely some of our members must rank as some of its most veteran veterans at this point ?

This week was the turn of an almost entirely new to it table, but everyone very quickly picked up the fascist finger pointing, and oh wow, how inappropriate this game is played loudly in a pub with somewhat drunk people shouting you're a fascist at each other and assessing how Aryan your features or parentage might be. Favourite name of the night. "Heidi Edelweiss" thrown out by Sam. And she turned out to be Hitler, so, he wasn't wrong. Great fun. But you can definitely see how it might rustle the jimmies of say, the local bridge club.

Imperial Assault finally picked up its regular pace again this week after a prolonged hiatus of Euro farming in La Granja in between, only to have the mission completed in under half an hour from an excessively fancy door removal followed by an equally impressive console demolition. The Imperials barely had time to get out of bed before the Rebel attack was complete. You can imagine that Darth Vader handed out many handshakes of doom to the staff in the aftermath of that day. Apology accepted ! Gaaahhhhhkkk.

I leave you with the gallery.