I awoke this morning at about 4:30am local time.  Not too bad in all - that's about 7.5 hours of sleep and I'm on may way towards adjustment.  I wanted to go for a run along the river, but it was still dark so I decided to play some Middle Earth: the Wizards solitaire.  I've owned this game since 1995 but never got a chance to play it and it has sat on my shelf all this time (next to my stash of Magic cards).  Back in 1996 I also purchased the book Middle-Earth: The Wizards Companion.  This is a better (i.e., more readable) version of the rules than you find with the starter decks, and also has some solitaire rules and interesting scenarios.

Last week a box of preconstructed challenge decks arrived at home, so I was eager to give this game a try. Part of my inspiration to give it a go was Chris Farrell's high opinion of the game, particularly before some of the later expansions were shipped.  Oh, and this is why I picked up some D6 yesterday.

The cards sitting on my ottoman in my hotel room.

There are quite a few similarities to the Lord of the Rings TCG, which I have played quite a bit.  Or, should I say, the LOTR TCG bears a lot of similarity to METW.  There is a movement mechanic to both games, and conflict is created by opponents challenging you while you move your group(s).  Thematically I think METW is much better, primarily because a big part of deck construction involves matching characters, items, and sites they will travel to.  If you want to recruit Treebeard as an ally, you must travel to Wellinghall to get him.  The rules for moving in METW are extremely confusing at first though; this is one game where it really would be best to be taught by someone in the know.  Hey, maybe I can become that person now.

Here's a summary of the solitaire rules from the book:

• Getting Started: Separate hazard cards into a separate shuffled deck.  I used the Saruman challenge deck and just took out the challenge cards from that precon.  Your hand size is 5 cards.
• Play normally with the following exceptions:
  • There is no opponent's player turn.
  • Whenever you would draw or discard to get a hand of 8 cards, you now draw or discard to get a hand of 5 cards.
• Playing hazards: During the movement/hazard phase, for each company, you draw hazard cards equal to 2 plus twice the number of hazard cards normally drawn for that site (oops, I just realized I missed the twice in that statement).  Then you must play as many of those hazard cards as you can within the hazard limit for the company.  You should play the hazard cards in the fashion that is most disadvantageous for your companies.
• Object of the game: Accumulate as many marshalling points as you can by the time you exhaust your play deck for the second time.

I only got through my deck once, and as I mentioned I wasn't drawing enough hazard cards (though I was playing the right amount).  It was a slow process of referring to the rules, playing a little, double-checking the rules, etc.  I do think I'm getting a grasp of the game and look forward to playing it face to face.

I arrived in Melbourne about 10am Saturday morning after about 18 hours total flying time.  Things sure have changed since the last time I was here: I had to rent a phone for the week to be able to affordably stay in contact with folks at home.  Now, my Blackberry works: phone, email, browser and all.  I was able to call Julie within 5 minutes of landing here as if it were a local call.

One key to recovering from jetlag when traveling to Australia (and arriving in the morning) is to stay awake the first day and switch to a local timetable.  I made a mistake last time I was in Sydney and took a nap in the afternoon - this lead to repeated awakenings in the night and another day of recovery.  So, my colleague and friend Mike and I set out to explore downtown north of the Yarra River.  What follows is a short photo journal of our day.

We started the day with a short walk to Flinders Street Railway Station.  We had lunch and a beer across the street at Young and Jackson's.

Next we hiked west and rode to the top of Rialto Tower to check out the Melbourne observation deck.  The views were stunning - clear, beautiful day with plenty of visibility.  Here you can see (upper left) the Melbourne Cricket Ground and (middle right) the National Tennis Centre, home of the Australian Open.

Ahhh, a little slice of home.

So we're wandering down Swanston St when I happen to gaze across the street - lo and behold, a game store!  Mind Games is a nice store - emphasis on family board games with a HUGE selection.  I probably would have bought something if the prices had been more reasonable.  I suspect they were 20% higher than retail in the US.  I did buy 5 wooden d6.

While walking back to the hotel, we happened by a wedding at the Scots Church.  Very cool bagpipes - how can you resist stopping and having a listen?

I'm sitting in the Red Carpet lounge at PDX, doing some demo work for Corillian and waiting for my flight to SFO.  I'll end my journey in Melbourne, Australia sometime on Saturday morning.  Mostly meetings next week, but as I'm arriving early (about $1500 cheaper leaving today rather than Friday), I'll have some time to explore Melbourne on Saturday while I try and stay awake and shift time zones.

BoardGameSearch is a useful site for searching prices for online games.  This is a good start, but I want more (actually, my friend George wants more and I agree with him): scrape the sites rather than frame them in, then present the prices in a list.  Sort of a Froogle for board games.  Froogle already does a decent job here, but it needs to index more retailers.

I know these are SO scarce these days, but let me know if you'd like a gmail invitation.  Please leave a comment here with your first and last name and email address.  Oh, and tell me what your favorite board game is.

There are a few good deals out there that are worth looking into:

• ToysRUs is still offering Roller Coaster Tycoon for a paltry $5.97 plus shipping.  Well worth it.  You should probably stay away from Austin Powers Pictionary though.
• GameFest is running a blowout sale with some decent titles at some decent prices.  Some good deals include Adam & Eva and Amun Re.  Make sure you compare prices with Boards & Bits - they generally have the best prices on the web.

I recently organized a lunchtime gaming group at Corillian in our cafe.  A couple of us had met spontaneously for some gaming over the past year, but about a month ago I decided we had a critical mass of folks interested in playing regularly, so we are now meeting each Friday at 11:30-1pm.  Well, most of us: I'm traveling way too much recently, so missed this week and will miss the next two.  I'm glad folks are getting together without me though - this is a great way to get to know folks at work and expand the gaming community.

Two weeks ago we played San Juan and Colossal Arena (Dave was even able to join us).  It was great to see Paul spontaneously decide to sit down and join us - he's now a regular attendee.

This week I was away in NJ and OH, but the group met on Friday for some Ticket to Ride action.  Eric wrote up the results:

For those that couldn’t make it today, we brought out Ticket to Ride.  After I explained the game to Arron, Jason, and Paul, we dug in and started.  Arron was taking the early lead due to some longer connections.  Jason had the west coast mostly to himself, while the rest of us fought over the Midwest.  Oddly enough, there was hardly ANY activity on the eastern seaboard.

Paul started pulling in a LOT of tickets as the game progressed, while Arron focused on building track.  Jason and I mixed the two around a bit.  As the game neared completion, Arron and Jason were pulling out to a lead while I hung right behind with Paul bringing up the rear.  Finally Arron built down to his last train.  Paul gambled by taking tickets on his final turn – hoping for some free points.  Jason built a two segment track somewhere and I pulled of what turned out to be the game winning move by building from New Orleans to Miami on my final turn, completing a Los Angeles to Miami ticket in the process.

Final order was Eric, Arron, Jason, Paul, and the scores were rather spread (40 points or so).  However, the game was much closer than that, as had I not built that final section, I would have finished last and had Paul not gambled on the final turn, he would have been no worse than third.  Overall, the game lasted 90 minutes including instruction, so we’d easily be able to finish it in an hour in the future.

Everyone came out impressed with the game, Paul even suggesting he might exchange a couple recently purchased games for it.

This session report spans a week, but I'll but just put down all the stuff I've played at once.

We spent last weekend at Salishan doing some work on the house and getting it ready for some massive reflooring work scheduled the following week.  The weather wasn't great so we spent a good deal of time on Saturday indoors, and that meant games.  Nice not having a TV or computer handy...

First up was another playing of Robo Rally.  I spent some time coaching Matthew this time to ensure that he wouldn't make foolish mistakes programming his robot.  This game is hard enough without misunderstanding the orientation and movement rules of your robot!  Things went much better for him this time.  He can navigate OK himself, but still has some challenges anticipating others' moves and knowing how to hit the targets.

Jacob and Matthew at the end-game of Robo Rally.  You can see my robot just in front of Jacob's facing the final target.

Jacob was in the lead for most of the game, but I was able to catch up and pull just ahead of him going into the final stop.  If he had been able to keep himself facing me and then drawn a move 2 card the next turn, he could have won by pushing me past the target and landing on it himself.  He ended up the turn facing the wrong way, allowing me to capture the win with an easy move 1.

Next up was Colossal Arena, the remake of the Knizia classic Titan: the Arena. The kids had a great time with this one, with Jacob winning easily (I lost my secret bet on the first round!).  Everyone I've talked to agrees that the rule where the game ends immediately after the last card is drawn is B.S.  We prefer the original rules where you continue playing but with limited hands (i.e., no more draws).

Matthew and Jacob a few rounds into Colossal Arena.

Matthew had been asking to play Lord of the Rings: Risk for ages. I tend to resist due to the playing time (2-3 hours), but every time we get a chance to sit down and play we have a blast.  The game usually turns out about the same: Matthew goes down fairly quickly, Jacob holds his own against me for a while, and I end up controlling over half the board by the time the game ends.

Matthew and Jacob playing LOTR: Risk.  Matthew and I each played the dark side, Jacob took on the fellowship role.

My strategy is fairly simple.  Focus on taking control of an entire region within the first three turns, don't over-extend myself, and use my leaders effectively to continue gaining the bonus cards. One reason I love this version is the time control which virtually ensures that all players stay in the game the whole time.  This changes the focus away from player elimination and keeps it on winning points.

Today after seeing an afternoon movie, the boys and I pulled out Power Grid for our first ever play.  I sat down Saturday night to play a few turns solitaire and get the rules down.  This helped me come up to speed very quickly - much better than just reading the rules.

Matthew and Jacob near the end-game of Power Grid.

Both boys picked up the rules of the game fairly quickly.  Matthew initially had a hard time understanding the relationship between the power plants he owns and the cities he can power, and everyone was confused with the fiddly rules about the different stages, when to replace power plants in the auction, etc.  I think we got the rules right, but it sure is tough to keep it all straight.

Matthew spent most of the game in the lead.  Jacob focused on clean energy, at one point having three power plants that don't require raw materials.  I tried to pace myself and stay out of the lead but in striking distance.

I think we all bought power plants too often, as we never even had a stage 2.  Also, the 8 plants we removed from the game at the beginning (per the 3-player rules) were all high-output plants, making for an interesting end-game where there was a real scarcity of high-output plants.  The end was very close: I won with a total network of 16 cities and 20 electros, Matthew second with 16 cities and 13 electros, and Jacob third with 15 cities.  Fun game and we can't wait to play again.

Julie and I want to see a movie today, probably Shaun of the Dead, so we are looking for a movie for the boys to see at about the same time, at the same theater.  I always end up going back to Google to find sites that review the content of films (particularly PG and PG-13 films) for age-appropriateness.  Here are a few decent sites out there that I've checked out:

• Kids-in-Mind - Probably the most thorough out there, as it provides a great amount of narrative detail in addition to scoring the films on various dimensions (Sex & Nudity, Violence & Gore, Profanity).
• Grading the Movies - Uses a letter-grade scoring system on various dimensions (Overall, Violence, Sexual Content, Language, Drugs/Alcohol). This site gives a combination movie review and rating, dealing with a more subjective assessment than Kids-in-Mind.
• FamilyStyle - Hardly worth mentioning, this site scores films on various dimensions (Profanity, Nudity, Sex, Violence, Drugs/Alcohol) but provides very little commentary to back up the ratings.

We are contemplating whether or not the kids can see Mr. 3000 on their own.  Looks like there may be too much profanity and sexual content for our liking, so we may just opt out of Shaun of the Dead and see Hero together as a family.