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Turn 33 (2680 BC)
The settler is away, and of course a bear takes this opportunity to poke around.
While the settler is moving we revolt to slavery which preserves the overflow for our first chariot. A missing forest gives some indication of where Dreylin probably settled, which wasn't quite the spot I'd expected. If he has a worker on hand, he can have the copper mined T36, and assuming Wheel finishes in time (which it should) connected on T38. He probably does not have time to research Hunting as well.
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Slightly premature, but say you kill Dreylin with minimal to no losses. What would you do with chariots then?
Erebus in the Balance - a FFH Modmod based around balancing and polishing FFH for streamlined competitive play.
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Most likely barb control and exploration. We're pretty sure there is someone to the east, but I don't think we can pull of a double rush, at least not profitably.
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Turn 34 (2640 BC)
Augustus is settled on the horses, and we still beat half the field to the second city (only 7 players had settled as of last turn) despite doing the double-worker/no-whip opening. In fact, there's only been three whips so far, two of them double-whips.
Due to the presence of the bear, we'll be taking the coastal route with the warrior. Dreylin's second city is with 99% certainty SW of the peak, which means he has vision of the entire floodplain, and complete surprise is not possible.
(Rise of) Augustus is a showcase of the power the Spiel-des-Jahres award has: I bought it blind on the last day of Spiel in Essen, just because it was cheap, I had room, and it was on the shortlist: how bad could it be? It has become one of my favorite filler games, as it has very low footprint, setup time and the rules are very simple, yet it offers deceptive strategic depth.
The core mechanic is very much like "bingo"; every player has three score cards they are trying to fill with markers. The active player draws a token out of a bag and announces it, and each player can then place a marker on the matching symbol. The catch is that you have a limited supply of tokens. The score cards have various symbols (both in type and total amount), and differing scores and effects when completed. The game finishes on the round when a player completes their seventh score card, which usually takes about half an hour.
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How many players? My partner and I are always on the lookout for good two player games, it's harder to get a group together.
Erebus in the Balance - a FFH Modmod based around balancing and polishing FFH for streamlined competitive play.
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The box says 2-6. I've mainly played with 4-6, but should be playable with two without turning into a duel.
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Some suggestions for good two-player games, some of which are not from the shortlist:
Azul: Abstract puzzle game that's fast and replayable. Normally suffers from the Puerto Rico Seating Problem; the player seated after the worst player is most likely to win, but that's not an issue in two-player.
Ticket to Ride: Specifically the Switzerland map is rather good with two players; other maps are decent if you're non-competitive.
Villagers: Very cute tableau-building drafting game.
Bärenpark: I usually dub this "Tetris: The Board Game";
Imperial Settlers: Empires of the North: Streamlined version of Imperial Settlers, with very asymetric gameplay.
For larger games, there's always Star Wars: Rebellion, Gloomhaven and the like.
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Turn 35 (2600 BC)
Dreylin's warrior arrived at Augustus this turn.
This wasn't unexepcted, as we knew he had two warriors, and they were likely to be fogbusting, and there's a limited amount of directions that are of interest to him. I consider the surprise part of our attack spoiled now, the question is how many warriors he will build to drag this out. For now we move the warriors up incase he wants to try a pre-emptive choke. We also whip the first chariot, and start choping the next two.
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Turn 36 (2560 BC)
We were afraid that Dreylin would move NE and threaten to harass our capital, but he pulled back to the forest. Our warriors are chasing him away; if he doubles back the chariot can kill it. Graphs reveals that he did build a third warrior (probably while growing to size 4). Unfortunately he can reach the SandyBeach site before the chariot can hit it.
In foreign news, pindi war-peaced Commodore.
October 6th, 2023, 14:21
(This post was last modified: October 9th, 2023, 13:38 by Tarkeel.)
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Turn 37 (2520 BC)
Dreylin's warrior stood fast in the forest, which we found to be a bit of a mistake as SandyBeach would be a better position to hold. Onward the warriors go...
It's a trap! That's slightly annoying, but I'd actually rather fight them with warriors in the open than chariots holed up in cities. Nothing to do but press on and roll the dice. Two chariots done, two more next turn.
Tech-wise we're going Mysticism next, as several of the next cities will need monuments, including Augustus. After that it's most likely Fishing and Pottery in that order, but we're not currently tech-gated.
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