The Tao of Gaming

for being named Best Blog by Boardgamenews. I particularly like the comment that "A vote for Brian is a vote for Race."

Just to be ornery, I'll have to post something non-Race soon. Other than that I'll be the same blog, except with more groupies. I promise to keep my scandals interesting, and I'll inspect my hookers for Adam's apples.

According to my profile, I've played 10 different games in the last 30 days. ~70 games of Race, and nine other titles once each. [The other nine include sitzkriegs as R-Eco, Loco, Apples to Apples and Geschenkt!]

Larry Levy waffles about the Designer of the Year here. I look forward to his political post where he endorses Clinton, McCain, Obama and "That weird one."

I haven't forgotten the Master Solvers post, but I'm a) waiting for it to die down and b) wishing for a one-armed economist. As for doing more, well, send me the problems and I'll post them. (I'll watch for interesting draws ... I could do mid-games, but that means a lot of typing to get the setup).

Another idea I'd considered is running an annotated PBEM. If you want to play, shoot me an email, but you have to write up your reasoning with your plays. I'm not convinced I want to do this yet, as my wife is already giving me strange looks.

Update: As to how the PBEM would work (as there have been questions). I'd shuffle a deck (make an excel spreadsheet of the deck, assign each card a random number and then sort the card based on those). I'd also have to create a file for the "open" position (everything except hands) and email it out seperately. Obviously commentary would only be revealed after the game (or perhaps a few turns delay would suffice). Ideally most players would send in their role selection, I'd send out the update (along with any explore cards) and then they'd send back builds/consume/produce to minimize traffic. Toward the mid-end game players are probably more likely to want to see each build before continuing.

I always like those in old Bridge Worlds. So, here we go. Answer in the comments.

Problem 1a:

You are Earth's Lost Colony. [3 Players, the opponents are Epsilon Eridini and Old Earth]. Your opening hand is:

1. Alien Tech. Institute
2. Alien Rosetta Stone World
3. Destroyed World
4. Drop Ships
5. Galactic Engineers
6. Spice World

What do you discard and what's your first turn plan?

Problem 1b: As above, but instead of Drop ships you have New Economy.

I've uploaded my spreadsheet of card names/effects. Let me know if you see any errors. (For some reason a card or two doesn't like the sort fuction. I've never seen that before.