Abnercon '08 Postmortem

The thing about playing boardgames is you sort of expect the people you're playing with to, you know, give you a game. Baroo was all over the place at Abnercon 08, winning a couple games of Settlers of Catan and Mare Nostrum. Mary crushed the field in Shogun. I absolutely owned Rails of Europe. Hell, even my wife, Angie, got in on the action with Citadel. Now, I don't know what Bill's particular deal was, but you don't expect your host extraordinaire to just mail it in like that. It was very disappointing. I can forgive him because he and Mary fed us incredibly well, but I hope that when (if?) we do Brakkecon '08 later this year that Bill is able to give us all his real "A" game because that performance was just shameful.

In all seriousness, what a great time that was. Four days of shooting the shit and playing great boardgames is an experience that just can't be matched on Xbox Live. I've gotta say that the I love -LOVE- the Rails of Europe expansion to Railroad Tycoon. The European map on which you play this expansion is so much more well thought out and challenging than the American map that it's not even funny. I just wish we'd had time to give it another go.

Mare Nostrum, too, was a fun experience. You never know when just playing a game once if the mechanics will break down upon repeat plays, but I liked the combination of resource gathering, combat and the inclusion of the mythological in this game, which centers around the major ancient civilizations of the Mediterranean Sea.