This had been something of an exhausting week, so on the spur of the moment I cast around yesterday evening for some folks to play games with. I found precisely two--one of the results of doing things as snap decisions. Both were fellow Civil Warriors from the office, but I eschewed wargames for two more Euros to introduce them to.
I chose Ra and Taluva. We did Ra first. It's gratifying to see people get more comfortable with games, and thus with rules. The actual play of Ra is fairly straightforward, but there are a lot of things to keep track of, particularly with scoring. Talking everything out led to a lot of a-ha moments. The first epoch saw ridiculously few Ra tiles come out; there were several auctions called before we started seeing Ra tiles. As it happened, I had three suns left when the other two bowed out, so I got a pretty big haul. I ended up winning the game; the scores were something like 60-50-40.
On to Taluva. As always, choosing colors is fun. "Do you want to be the brown people, red people, yellow people, or white people?" None of us felt secure choosing the white pieces, so they were left in the bag. By the second turn pretty much everyone was comfortable with the rules.
This game was insanely close. I won, and Jonathan (to my left) would have won if I'd missed my chance. Looking at the game afterward, though, we discovered that Tim (to my right) missed a win on his turn...so yeah, it was close.
What came next cemented our status as dorks. We analyzed our created island for militarily important typology. The island was really two islands, connected at a pair of isthmuses (isthmi?). Clearly those two points were critical, as was the long saddleback ridge on the east island. The west island had one big mountain that dominated the whole works, with a sort of "lost valley" in the middle, a single hex surrounded by elevated terrain. We figured that the east island would likely have better soil.
We also concluded that Tim's Red Peoples had were a maritime people; with just a couple of exceptions they were all at Level One by the sea. Jonathan and I, on the other hand, had a more varied cultural topography.
What can I say? It's what we do. Tim told us about how when he and his fiancée go for walks, he periodically asks where she thinks the defensive lines should be from an attack out of [some trees/a road/a car dealership]. I've done something similar on my walks; if I walk from Road A uphill along Road B to my apartment, I often think about what an ordeal it would be to charge up to take the ridge my apartment is on; there are three military crests that can be stoutly defended, and it could take hours to get to the top. The other options, though, are up some sheer surfaces in the woods. It's quite a ridgeline. I figure this kind of planning will come in handy if some kind of "Red Dawn" situation breaks out in State College.
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