September 29 RussCon Report

15 of us. Please read about LaserQuest below and let me know if you're interested!

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Laser Quest Monday October 18 at 7pm:

I've gotten a few more replies about our private LaserQuest outing. There are now 13 people committed. We are planning to do this October 18 at 7pm for a couple hours. If you plan to come, *PLEASE* *EMAIL* *ME* and let me know so I know how many people to expect, or if we have to reschedule because people can't make October 18! Last time we got over 30 people, which I hope to do again (since we're splitting the fixed cost among us, and the more the merrier). If you don't email me, you can still show up, but you run the risk of getting booted by people who did RSVP. (There is an upper limit of 36 players. At this point, given the small number of RSVPs I've received, I'm frankly more worried about too few of us, so please tell me if you want to play!)

People committed so far:
JeffF (free) & Jonobie
RussW
WendyWhe
William
JP
Eric & Laurie
Brady
J4 & Steven
Marty
Jessica

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Nosferatu with Brown Whornet Friday October 15 at 7pm!

Some of us saw Nosferatu (1922) accompanied by Brown Whornet last year at Alamo Drafthouse. It was great! In the intense spooky parts, they do wall-of-noise electric guitar stuff that works quite well. They're doing it again this year, and I'm buying my reserved seating tickets very soon because this will sell out. Let me know ASAP if you want in on this rare treat. Brown Whornet rocks.

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Run Lola Run Today:

If anyone's interested, Wendy & I are seeing Run Lola Run at 5pm at the Arbor today! This is a very cool interesting fun German movie with an awesome soundtrack and the spiffiest opening credits I've seen in long time. (I like it enough to see it multiple times...)

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Game Results:

MoleHill 2 JeffF 1 Jerrie -1
Kahuna 2 RussW 1 William -1
Bluff 5 William 4 JonathanC 2 RussW 0 Clayton -2 Jerrie -4
AmFuss 3 Steve 2 Marty 0 ChrisH -2
Ra 5 Harry 4 Bob 2 JP 0 Jerrie -2 William -4
BuddelBande 4 Tim 3 Fred 1 JeffF -1 Bob -3
AmFuss 4 William 3 Marty 1 ChrisH -1 Steve -3
Streetcar 6 JeffF 5 RussW 3 Tim 1 Clayton -1 Fred -3 JonathanC -5
AufHellerUndPfennig 3 Bob 2 Steve -1 William -1
Tayu 2 RussW 1 JeffF -1
ZirkusFlohcati 5 RussW 4 William 2 JeffF 0 Steve -2 Bob -4
Metropolis 5 ChrisH 4 Fred 2 Harry 0 JP -2 Marty -4
Acquire 6 Harry 5 William 3 Bob 1 WendyWhe -1 ChrisH -3 Marty -5
Pirat 5 Harry 4 WendyWhe 2 William 0 Marty -2 ChrisH -4
Kremlin 4 Steve 3 JeffF -1 RussW -1 JP -1
Pirat 5 JeffF 4 William 2 RussW 0 Harry -2 JP -4
Pirat 5 RussW 4 JP 1 Harry 1 William -2 JeffF -4
Bluff 4 JeffF 3 JP 0 RussW 0 William -3
Bluff 4 William 3 RussW 1 JP -1 JeffF -3
Bluff 4 JeffF 3 RussW 1 JP -1 William -3

Pirat is fun! Arrrh, matey! William reports that Marty missed a crucial rule in their first game: "A player may also defend his own beleaguered trading ships, by making his own pirate attack on the ship."

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Evening's Soundtrack:

Bettie Serveert, Palomine
The Flaming Lips, 1984-1990
King Missile, Happy Hour
Type O Negative, Bloody Kisses
Yo La Tengo, Painful

These are some of the bands I've seen live at Liberty Lunch. For those who don't know, Liberty Lunch was a famous downtown Austin music venue, which our city council recently evicted in order to build a large office complex for a large software company to employ thousands more people downtown. This is just great since Austin could really use a lot more car traffic downtown, and local music clubs don't matter since we're already the self-proclaimed "Live Music Capital of the World." Grr!

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That Wacky "All Letters Except X & Y" Game Name Contest:

I received 4 entries. Everyone admitted to varying degrees of mechanical searching through old RussCon Reports.

It soon became clear that the letter N was going to be interesting. When I publicized the contest, I had only hastily scanned my database and didn't notice that the only recorded N-title was Nile, an overly aggressive shortening of the German game On The Banks of the Nile, so it didn't really count as an N-game. Was I going to have to eat crow and humble pie and other distasteful substances? Desperately I racked my brain for an N-game. I noticed Alfred's copy of Nuclear War sitting around for weeks, but I don't think he ever got anyone to play it, so that hardly counts. But as it turns out, all is well; read on for the surprise resolution...

DaveB was the 1st to reply, missing only 3 letters (K, N, O). His list:

acquire
bluff
can't stop
die macher/ durch die wuste
elfenland
fight
GhostParty
HighSociety
IronHorse
jumbo grand prix
kontor
lowenherz
metropolis
n
o (that dice game.. "one chance" or "one more roll" or something like that)
pit
quo vadis
roborally
settlers of catan
TakeItEasy
UncleHappy'sTrainGame
VeldSpoorweg
Wettstreit
xmen trading card game
y
ZirkusFlohcati

His K-candidate was bogus: I hadn't heard of Kontor, but I recently saw it at Dragon's Lair. It's never been played or mentioned at RussCon. It's a new German game that looks promising. Someone should buy it and bring it to RussCon... I don't believe Die Macher was ever actually played at RussCon, but Durch Die Wueste certainly has been. Note the valiant attempt to come up with an X-candidate. As Dave remarked, "Not bad for someone who never shows up."

The 2nd entry received was Marty's, missing only N:

Auf Heller & Pfennig
Bluff
Can't Stop
Durch die Wuste
Euphrat&Tigris
Freight Train
Grand National Derby
Honey Bears
It's Mine
Jumbo Grand Prix
Katzenjammer Blues
Lost Cities
Members Only
N
Outpost
Palmyra
Quo Vadis?
Res Publica
Samurai
Tutanchamun
Union Pacific
Veld Spoorweg
We the People
Zirkus Flohcati
1830
2038

Marty noted his displeasure that no game of Katzenjammer Blues was officially recorded and entered into the RussCon database, since he won that game! I'll take his word for it.

JP sent the 4th entry, a ridiculously voluminous list of 162 games too long to reproduce here. It was missing J & N. A single desperate guess for N was made: Net Runner. To my knowledge, that is not a RussCon game. Ironically, JP erroneously claimed Junta for J instead of the obvious Jumbo Grand Prix that prompted the contest.

And the winner is... Received 3rd was the following sent by JeffS (from go club - not to be confused with Jeffles or JeffF or JeffD or JeffW...):

1830
2038
Auf Heller Und Pfennig
Bluff
Can't Stop
Dampfross
Elfenland
Fight
Grand National Derby
High Society
Iron Horse
Jumbo GrandPrix
Kill Doctor Lucky
Lost Cities
Metropolis
N ??? Nunzilla??? Nomic???
Orcs At The Gates
Pit
Quo Vadis
Ricochet Robot
Santa Fe
Take It Easy
Uncle Happy's Train Game
Veld Spoorweg
Wettstreit
Zirkus Flohcati

Nomic! Positively brilliant. Many of you will recall the month or so some of us spent playing email Nomic (and I use the word "playing" loosely, since I recall much of the play involved debating whose turn it was and whether we had already broken the rules), originally prompted by William and courtesy of a website set up by Jay. Therefore JeffS is free to drop by some evening (and it's about time, since he's not been by to game for well over a year) and be the Special Guest Devil. Since 1830 and 2038 were also mentioned, Jeff may do the Mocking Jig on the regular Devil's grave.

If you don't know what the hell Nomic is, check out:
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/nomic.htm

Congratulations to JeffS, and runners-up DaveB, Marty, and JP.

(And now another contest: what is the origin and significance of the Mocking Jig?)

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Rank ratings:
 0.5000 Tim (2)
 0.4800 Harry (6)
 0.4000 RussW (11)
 0.1765 JeffF (11)
 0.1111 WendyWhe (2)
 0.0682 William (13)
 0.0000 Fred (3)
-0.0714 Steve (5)
-0.1111 Bob (5)
-0.2857 JP (8)
-0.3333 ChrisH (5)
-0.3333 Clayton (2)
-0.3333 JonathanC (2)
-0.5556 Marty (5)
-0.7778 Jerrie (3)

New Win ratings:
 0.4000 Harry (6)
 0.2941 JeffF (11)
 0.2500 Tim (2)
 0.1429 Steve (5)
 0.0857 RussW (11)
 0.0000 William (13)
 0.0000 ChrisH (5)
-0.1111 Bob (5)
-0.2222 WendyWhe (2)
-0.2222 Clayton (2)
-0.2222 JonathanC (2)
-0.2500 Fred (3)
-0.2778 Marty (5)
-0.2857 JP (8)
-0.3333 Jerrie (3)

Tim & Harry are Co-Devils! Since Tim bugged out in the middle of a game to go play softball, Harry gets priority. RussW & JeffF are Co-Vice-Devils. William wins the Dedicted Award. Jerrie is the Generous Angel.

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That softball-playin' Tim dude says:

I have a tree to give away. 4-6 feet tall, live oak, red oak, burr oak, or pecan. It's being given to me as part of Alcoa's tree- planting program, but I don't have a place for it. Provides shade and companionship. Contact me at xxxxxxx.xxxxxx@xxxxx.xxx if interested. Mention you saw it in the Russcon Report and get a free fertilizer spike.

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Sports are for losers. Winners play boardgames!

Russ