We decided to have a last minute KFCgamers session to wrap up the year & true to the "last-minuteness" of the event, we had 11 people show up instead of the original 4 that confirmed on Facebook.
Game(s) Played:
Famiglia
Caverna
Session – Famiglia
Player(s):
Hayen
Mo
I got Famiglia for Mo this Christmas, mostly for the mafia theme & the wacky art by Lars-Arne "Maura" Kalusky, the man in charge of giving that distinct look to most of Friedemann Friese's designs. Famiglia is a game for 2 Players only, where each Player takes the role of a Don in trying to build a mafia family that is better (has more VPs, it is a euro after all) than the other Player.
There are four types of mafioso: the Accountants, the Mercenaries, the Brutes & La Famiglia, all of whom have special abilities apart from La Famiglia whose only call to fame is that they carry the most points. So each turn, Players hire mafiosos from the street (2 lower level mafiosos can hire a higher level mafioso of the same type) & each mafioso comes with a fixed number of points, higher level mobsters carrying more points of course. Famiglia then is a clever card game where you utilize the powers of each type of mafioso to manage your hand in order to hire the best mafioso on the street available.
We had a lot of Accountants (blue) show up early
Mo & I had to restart our first game because I had read the Accountants' power wrong (typical Accountant) where we were actually swapping cards from our hand with those on the street (serious abuse) instead of where the rules says you swap cards from your hand with those you have already played. This proved to be the first in a long line of mis-plays for the afternoon (it was just one of those days).
I was going towards the Mercenaries (green) who are like jokers & can be any color
Time Taken: 20 minutes
Results Of Game(s)
Winna – Mo (70 Points)
Dead Last – Hayen (45 Points)
I really liked Famiglia. It has clever mechanisms & the powers (including lack of powers) appear to be well balanced. The theme & mechanics of the game mesh well together & it does feel like you are building a mafia family. Sadly, all that's missing is the take that element of bashing up your opponents boys that should be included in all mafia games.
If you frequently play boardgames with 2 Players & need a filler to space out your heavy sessions, Famiglia fits the bill nicely as it is easy to set up, fun to play & quick to resolve.
Rating: 8/10
Session – Caverna
Player(s):
Hayen
Jimmy
Louanna
Mo
Gideon's side had finished 3 games of Smash Up, 2 rounds of Shadow Hunters, 1 round of Once Upon A Time & another round of Smash Up before we actually finished our one play of Caverna. Admittedly setup and rules explanation takes a bit of time but 210 minutes was a really long play for Caverna. This will probably be reduced with more frequent plays.
The super long gaming table at KFC
The 4 Player setup made more interesting actions available & rubies in particular were made available earlier to help with the flexibility of food requirements. Mo & I started levelling forests from the get go but I took an early break to equip some of my dwarfs with weapons so I could start looting from my adventures. Somehow Mo decided to stay away from that & focused on rooms & having boatloads of animals (it should have sounded familiar to me since it's the same exact strategy as the one he used previously but I was busy keeping track of Jimmy & Louanna's moves as well). Jimmy did the opposite & aggressively equipped his dwarves & focused entirely on adventuring. I tried helping Louanna with her mountain clan but playing keep up in Caverna as opposed to planning ahead doesn't usually net you a particularly good score.
I was pretty successful in keeping my mountain clan very balanced. I had mines & enough farmland for both crop & animals to keep my mountain community going. I pushed for family growth early knowing that the family growth actions would be hard fought over in the later rounds & was the only one to hit 5 dwarves albeit right on the last round. Jimmy was really min-maxing his actions for points & largely ignoring the food needs of his clan (drowning out their shouts of hunger by throwing rubies in their face) whilst Mo was quietly urging his donkeys to go forth & multiply.
This is me close to the end, just looking to add another ore and ruby mine then I'm done
This is Mo & he still hadn't gotten the Fodder Chamber which I should have taken to block him, he'd probably never forgive me
Louanna & Jimmy's mountain clans & you can tell Louanna might have some food trouble coming
Time Taken: 210 minutes
Results Of Game(s):
Winna – Mo (78 Points)
Second - Jimmy (70 Points)
Third - Hayen (69 Points)
Dead Last – Louanna (36 Points)
In the end, it was once again the Fodder Chamber that handed Mo the win (something to look out for in the future). That is until we realized... that Mo had been making the classic Agricola & Le Havre rookie mistake of gaining 1 new goat for EVERY 2 goats that he had. The problem with 4 Players is that when someone breaks the rules, it tends to be discovered a tad too late due to the number of turns that would have already passed. This happened to us when Jimmy placed two of his Dwarves with weapons before his last unarmed Dwarf without paying any rubies. With the evidence as presented & a serious case of sore-loserness, I hereby declare the results of this game annulled & demand a rematch "Disputed Wins (through cheating, error & absurd luck) Act".
Regardless of the disputed win, I actually had a fun time playing Caverna with 4 Players & in comparison with Agricola (sorry, they will invariably be compared), quite a fair bit more of fun. There were many turns where I was waiting for my turn & could honestly say to myself that whatever the guy before me does, it won't matter one jot to me because I had sooooo many good choices and I could spend time joking around & actually enjoying the game. So that at least is one potential fear of having more Players in Caverna making the game tighter... busted.
Me at game end, happy with what I accomplished despite missing out on the ruby mine
Mo who used illegal contraband to multiply his goats
Louanna & Jimmy who had to utilize rubies to do last minute patchwork to fill their single empty plots
Funny Things I Remember Happening:
Gideon: The only thing missing from this game is the ability to use your weaponized dwarves on each other
Me doing the scoring at game end for Louanna and "Say Something" by A Great Big World feat Christina Aguilera comes on
Me: This is really sad (referring to the song)
Jimmy & Gideon: Yeah, she has no cows, donkeys or any crops left. Quite sad
No, they didn't get what I was referring to in the end
Rating: 8/10
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