ConTrail, part 5 of 5: Game results and pictorial summary, day 2

Games played: Euphrat and Tigris, Lost Valley, Perpetual Commotion, A New Hope, Conquest of the Empire, Roma Aeterna, Betrayal at the House on the Hill.

Pics, here and in all ConTrail '06 reports, again of course courtesy of the keen eye and lens of Brad.



Euphrat and Tigris: This seemed to be open before breakfast. About 1 hr and 15 minutes long, with a narrow victory to Pat.
Pat: 8. Richard V: 7/8. Craig: 7/7. Brad: 4.



Lost Valley: 80 minutes long. Alex killed this, with 19 gold. Paul miles behind in second place on 7. Mikey: 5. Rick D.: 0.




Perpetual Commotion: Crazy real-time card game in which you try to deplete your deck of cards by building on the shared stacks in the middle of the table. Brad and Alex "shared" turns in this; the rule sheet deceptively implies up to 8 can play, but there are only 6 decks in the set! 20 minutes.
Richard V.: 87. Paul: 32. Alex/Brad: 31. Rick D.: 25. Pat: 20. Mikey: -22.

A New Hope: Ken's creation based on the Star Wars universe. Marcus as the evil empire defeated Ken's rebel forces in 90 minutes. Here they are in a corner behind a pile of games that didn't get played!

Roma Aeterna: This is Alex's home-brew and now quite mature after several years in the vat with occasional tasting.
Time taken = 2hrs 45mins, but I gather this includes some rules explan and perhaps some post-game analysis too.
Pat declared the winner, then Al, then Richard, Ken and Marcus.




Betrayal at the House on the Hill: I was surprised to see this one rolled out again, and I gather that from Pat's celebrations at the end that it was quite an experience! My notes here say that Pat was the sole survivor of the winning team of investigators against the evil 11-year-old Richard. Pat's earlier observation seems to indicate that this was against all odds!



Conquest of the Empire (again): A 4-player round this time with Paul, Michael, Rick D., and Brad. 290 minutes from start to finish, including significant rules-explan time.
Paul and Brad formed the early alliance against Mikey and Rick, but unfortunately Brad couldn't recover from the occasional but significant beating! For the next two turns thereafter, Paul manipulated (legally through bidding) the turn orders and alliances to force Mikey on his side, preventing invasions from the red menace and positioning around Rick (yellow).
On the last turn, Brad helped me out by bidding him and me as opponents, which I didn't quite understand, but nevertheless I was cool with it. I then weighed up out of Michael and Rick who I most wanted on my side and whose territories I most wanted to invade, eventually deciding that Rick was a juicier target, although probably a tougher opponent! So I bid to try and retain Mikey on my side, while Rick bid "against" me, trying to force me to ally! Around the $30 mark I decided it was too expensive, and figured the saved money would help me instead gain some good ground from Mikey, so I passed on further bidding.
And that's when Mikey surprised me! He took up the bidding against Rick, deciding to play for position and figuring he'd be pushed back to 3rd with both Rick and me as enemies! In hindsight I guess it wasn't such an unexpexted play, but at the time it was classic gamey goodness. I loved it - it was like these guys were fighting over me!!
Of course, it was the right end-strategy for Michael, who did successfully come in 2nd. Paul: 250. Michael: 220. Rick D: 195. Brad: 100.
So I won again, perhaps setting an unbeatable precedent, in which I've actually won an economic military expansionist epic game, not once, but twice in a weekend! I expect this is the zenith of my gaming lifetime. It doesn't get any better than this...