The Euro Queen

Well, my wife must officially be a gamer because for the third week in a row we were gaming with her brother and wife.  Also, the new plan is to get together on Christmas Eve and play as well.  Am I lucky, or what?

In his continuing mission to make us Euro gamers, Logan introduced us to Istanbul.  Istanbul is a worker placement game where you are a merchant trying to collect the most rubies.  You travel around the city buying and selling resources and trying to collect rubies in a variety of locations.  You start with a stack of discs representing your assistants.  As you travel around the board, you drop them off in different locations to do your work.  You can travel back to pick them up one by one or head to the fountain and call them all back.  No assistants left?  No work can get done.  Better get 'em back!

Here is the start of the game.  The rubies in the bottom left corner can be purchased with gold.  Far right rubies can be traded for coffee beans.  The bunch in the very middle can be traded for using other resources like spices and cloth.  There are a few other ways to get rubies by completing certain events/actions at different locations.

Here I am, end of game.  I had the biggest, most complete cart, giving me a ruby.  I gathered three ones through my amazing trades.  But...

...the Euro Queen, my wife, wins again.  She came out of the gates fast, racking up three rubies in the first few turns.  She slowed down for a bit but then finished strong, taking the rest of us down.

We needed to play a game that she couldn't beat us at, so we switched genres and themes completed and decided to take on some forest fires as Hotshots.

And, pun intended, we were on fire.  We won our first game in record time, getting rid of all the fires in under three turns per player.  Some early burn outs turned into natural firebreaks and the fire was easily kept under control.  Game two was a little tougher but with the same result: another victory for us heroes!

Switching from one Fireside Games game to another, we traveled back into time to engage in some Castle Panic.  However, this did not go so well for us.

We played two games and we got WRECKED.  We were also playing with the Wizard's Tower expansion and in both games our wizard's tower was taken out.  We lost our first game in only a few turns, which was a new record for me.  We held on longer in game two, but ultimately succumbed to the same fate: death and destruction.

I have to be honest, I'm really enjoying playing these non-confrontational Euro games.  I haven't enjoyed them solo, but with others it's been quite fun.  I am a very sore loser, I admit this weakness in myself, so I like games where people aren't attacking me.  Competitive games are always my favourite for this same reason and because they can be played solo if need be as well.

Next week you should see some Christmas Eve board game fun on here!