2005-04-06 RussCon Report

News

13 of us played 16 games!

BobK appeared in a surprise visit, back from Paris for a few weeks! He plans to be here next week as well, so old-timers who want to catch up with Bob will get more opportunities.

Meanwhile, KevinU spent his last RussCon for a while as he's heading out on a months-long ramble out west.

Spanish/Esperanto: 2pm Sunday at Texspresso on Anderson Lane (by Alamo Drafthouse Village) is the weekly basic informal Spanish RussCon study group as well as the Esperanto formal study group.

If anyone in Austin wants about 5 shelf feet of Doctor Dobbs Journal and some other computer magazines from the past decade for free, let me know.

Game Results

Boggle	6	RussW 5 Tim 3 KevinU 1 Ben -1 TimG -3 Clayton -5
Hare&Tortoise	3	KevinU 2 JP 0 Tim -2
Exxtra	3	Clayton 2 Ben 0 RussW -2
Guillotine	3	RussW 2 Ben 0 Clayton -2
RicochetRobot	4	Ben 2 ToddG 2 RussW -1 Tim -3
EinfachGenial	3	KevinU 2 Marty 0 Clayton -2
PuertoRico	4	Matt 3 MarkH 1 BobK -1 TimG -3
StarVenture	4	ToddG 3 RussW 1 KevinU -1 Jeffles -3
Frank'sZoo	4	Ben 3 Tim 1 Clayton -1 Marty -3
BigBoggle	3	ToddG 2 Jeffles 0 Tim -2
BigBoggle	3	Tim 2 ToddG 0 Jeffles -2
Tichu	2	( Chad BobK ) 1 ( William Matt ) -1

OMG Star Venture got played again! Yay! I am often inclined to a strategy of lots of outposts, which I've done these past couple weeks, and which seems to be good for finishing me in the upper half but not winning... Gotta do more expanding onto stars to get the quick cash sometimes, I think. BTW thanks to Jeffles for giving some useful feedback on improving the presentation of the rules. (Most importantly, it was very unclear as written that you get a share of stock when you grow a corporation.)

Boggle continues its improbable reign of popularity. After years of weird eurogames, it amuses me that some of us are so into this venerable classic now. Miraculously I pipped Tim in Boggle (he usually trounces the rest of us!)

We had an epic game of Guillotine... so many extra nobles came out that we had to reshuffle the discards to get more nobles!

Ratings

Rank Ratings:       
 3.1781 ToddG
 2.0794 KevinU
 1.7918 RussW
 1.7918 Ben
 0.6931 Chad
 0.6931 Matt
 0.4055 MarkH
 0.2877 BobK
 0.0000 JP
-0.6931 William
-1.1632 Tim
-1.3863 Marty
-2.3026 TimG
-2.4853 Jeffles
-3.2968 Clayton

Win Ratings:
 2.7726 ToddG won 3 of 4
 1.7272 KevinU won 2 of 4
 1.5041 RussW won 2 of 5
 1.0862 Ben won 2 of 5
 0.6931 Chad won 1 of 1
 0.6931 Matt won 1 of 2
 0.4055 BobK won 1 of 2
-0.1824 Clayton won 1 of 5
-0.2877 MarkH won 0 of 1
-0.4054 JP won 0 of 1
-0.4700 TimG won 0 of 2
-0.6931 William won 0 of 1
-0.6931 Marty won 0 of 2
-0.8754 Tim won 1 of 6
-1.0987 Jeffles won 0 of 3

Todd is the Devil! KevinU is the Vice-Devil. I am the Vice-Vice-Devil. Then Ben.

If you are confused how the ratings work, you could peruse the FAQ.

I used GraphViz to generate the graph image.

Meta Game

I was the Meta Devil and mailed out the following Meta Game:

Our Most Assiduous Reader may recall that a month ago we played a social game that involved ranking your preferences of various activities:
http://russcon.org/RussCon/2005/0223.html#results

Being wrapped like a mummy was actually very high on several people's lists. So this week's Meta Game will fulfill this fantasy for those interested. I will supply saran wrap; you will supply your naked body! Assistants will be needed to help people stay balanced while they are wrapped, and then to lower them to the floor once fully wrapped. We will note the time that each wrapping begins, and you will stay wrapped as long as you like. (The alert reader will note that being mummy wrapped will severely limit one's ability to participate in boardgames, but hey, you suffer for your art.) Whoever stays wrapped the longest wins and will be next week's Meta Devil!

Awesome People Rolled Into Luscious
Film Optimize Our Lovely Sport!

Our Most Assiduous Reader will notice the acrostic couplet, but many apparently did not, and some appeared to take the email seriously. I guess it was too plausible! Which left me in the position of deciding to just let this April Fools Meta Game stand since it mostly didn't go over as a recognized April Fools joke!

In theory someone might have gone for it, but in actuality nobody chose to get wrapped, so people were asking how I would determine a winner. I decided to reward Matt, since he was the one who inspired this Meta Game by sending me an email saying he couldn't wait to see what April Fools Meta Game I would email out this year, and reminding me of the popular 2002 April Fools "Rate My Poop" Meta Game... So Matt is the Meta Devil and will design next week's Meta Game.

2005-04-06 RussCon Report

News

Game Results

Ratings

Meta Game

Evening's Soundtrack

Links