Sep 9 RussCon Report
We had a larger than average turnout, 18 of us, including 2 new folks (George and KevinH). There were 4 parallel tracks of gaming! Visiting Chicago dignitary EricH graced us with his presence.
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Thanks to Jay and RussD, we have distinguishing names for the 2 Jonathans: Sea Biscuit and Squeaky. It remains to be seen whether Squeaky takes hold, but Sea Biscuit shows good signs of longevity.
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A good variety of games were played: 12 different titles! There are lots of new games since many of us visited the Dragon's Lair 30%-off sale...
JonathanC (Sea Biscuit), EricH, and William each won a game of Settlers.
RussW won Euphrates.
JonathanC won Kill Dr. Lucky.
JeffF & Marty won a joint victory of Cosmic Encounter.
Brady & William each won Guillotine, and JP & Marty shared a joint victory of Guillotine.
RussW won Entdecker.
RussW won Mississippi Queen. I sure wish someone would write an unambiguous rule for determining which ship is farthest ahead. I actually enjoy this controversial game, but this core vagueness about the lead ship really bugs me.
KevinH won Modern Art.
JonathanB (Squeaky) won Ursuppe. This is the wondrously strange new German import Ken bought. Each player is a species of amoeba. You have amoebas on the board which must eat and poop each turn. You may acquire a variety of useful genes. Interesting weird game!
James won Loewenherz.
WendyWhi won Downtown. A single zone valuation earned her $42! That's the largest single chunk of income I recall anyone earning in Downtown. This is a neat little game, but I think it suffers a bit from many of the early votes and decisions being arbitrary don't-cares. We seem to be evolving more strategy though, and there was again more diplomacy in this game than in many RussCon games.
RussW won Medici.
Thus RussW won 4 games. JonathanC, Marty, and William won 2 games. Brady, EricH, James, JeffF, JonathanB, JP, KevinH, and WendyWhi won 1 game.
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Evening's Soundtrack:
Cracker, Gentleman's Blues
Grasshopper and the Golden Crickets, The Orbit of Eternal Grace
Hole, Celebrity Skin
Kidney Thieves, Trickster
Ozzy Osbourne, The Ozzman Cometh
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Rank ratings: 0.7143 JonathanC (3 games played) 0.5294 RussW (5) 0.3333 WendyWhi (4) 0.2143 Marty (4) 0.1429 JonathanB (4) 0.1176 William (6) 0.1111 EricH (3) 0.0667 Brady (4) 0.0556 JeffF (4) 0.0000 KevinH (4) 0.0000 JP (4) -0.1111 James (4) -0.3333 George (3) -0.3333 Tim (2) -0.3750 Jay (3) -0.5455 Ken (3) -0.5789 Alfred (5) -1.0000 Clayton (1) Win ratings: 0.8936 RussW (5) 0.6190 JonathanC (3) 0.4000 Marty (4) 0.2000 EricH (3) 0.0976 Brady (4) 0.0870 WendyWhi (4) 0.0811 JeffF (4) 0.0667 KevinH (4) 0.0625 William (6) -0.1579 James (4) -0.1818 JonathanB (4) -0.3333 JP (4) -1.0000 George (3) -1.0000 Tim (2) -1.0000 Jay (3) -1.0000 Ken (3) -1.0000 Alfred (5) -1.0000 Clayton (1)
For those who don't know the system, your rank rating is given by:
(#opponents you beat - #opponents beating you) / #opponents.
This ranges from -1 to 1.
Your win rating is messier to describe but measures your winningness (your rank is irrelevant if you didn't win) and takes into account #opponents and ties. It also ranges from -1 to 1.
Combining these ratings gives a partial order too complex to draw with ascii art; sorry! It is quite obvious that RussW and JonathanC are above everyone else, however, so Sea Biscuit and I are tied for Devil. On the off chance that JonathanC somehow arrives at my own house before I do, he gets to stake out the dining table, else I am the Devil! Hoody-hoo!
2nd place is Marty, 3rd is WendyWhi. Clayton pulled off the rare and dangerous Reverse Brady Maneuver (play 1 game and come in dead last). James and Ken were uncharacteristically undevilish.
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Cultural News:
The live theater event to see is Heather Woodbury's Whatever at the Planet Theater. It runs this weekend and next. It's actually 8 parts (each an hour or so), with 2 parts each evening, but you could see any single evening's worth and get a full complete experience. It's a solo show, and she performs over 100 different characters with interleaving storylines. Teenagers, retired business executives, migrant workers, old widows, prostitutes, etc. It's quite impressive. I saw parts 1-4 last weekend and am seeing parts 5-8 this weekend (Friday and Saturday night). The following weekend shows all 8 parts, 2 each on Thursday through Sunday. If you enjoy live theater, it would be madness to miss this funny, moving, amazing experience.
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See you next Wednesday September 16!
Er... rave on!
Russ