Princess & Dragon League: Princesses

[Rich_The_Fish]

Sorry we missed. Mrs. Chuck and Little Chuck are home now. I hope, I'll be back later!

Ok, no worries. I've not got much time tonight but should be avail tomorrow from about 8pm (UK).

[khalidqasrawi]

Hi Folks.  I'm in the chat room if any of you folks want a game.  I've got a good Internet connections too as I'm back at home.  I should be in and out this evening (between unpacking, washing clothes etc.).

kq

[khalidqasrawi]

  Khalid 181
  Kettle 143

Dragon did a little early munching which worked to my advantage.  I drew all the princess tiles which was nice for me because I was building cities which stopped Kettle grabbing my work.  Also I managed to eject / complete 2 of her medium cities.  I had a string early lead.  I had a super city planned but Kettle halted development by a threatened "join" of her meeple.  Kettle started agricultural activities early.  Several times during the game I made a mental decision to "go big on farms" but kept getting tempted by the off road / city.  During the middle game, Kettle was incrementally catching up.  I was getting concerned so my moves started to take a little linger.  Not much cloister action.  The portal was useful once or twice.  I "shared" a couple of Kettle's roads which worked out well.
With 20 tiles to go, there were still 7 dragon tiles left but the eating was shared, thankfully.  I kept my lead and the farms ended up pretty equal.

[kettlefish]

As khalidqasrawi said he was happy to get all the princess tiles - 2 of my meeple in cities has been replaced.
The dragon ate some of my meeple and his meeple joined my roads and the farm.
All time I had no choice. In the first half of the game - I've got to many road tiles and also cloisters, but I wouldn't like to put to many meeple on cloisters on the same time.
It was a nice game - but more for khalidqasrawi than me.
I did some stupid placements - really I didn't see that the meeple on the right farm has only the one city.
I had on the right farm a farmer too - but the dragon did his job, and I forgot to join with the other farmer the bigger farm...

[Rich_The_Fish]

I should be online in about 10 mins should anyone fancy a game.

[kettlefish]

Here comes the x-score list - CarcC-B-Princesses 29 01 2016:

[khalidqasrawi]

  khalidqasrawi 156
  Rich_The_Fish 135

Wow!  I was losing for the whole game.  Phew!

This was the only derby in our group, a north / south one at that so I was expecting a feisty game and that is what we got.
Rich_The_Fish took the advantage from very early on.  Nice steady play from him whereas all my good guys were taken by the dragon and my stuck guys were, um, stuck.  I tried to build another super city which had two meeps on it but Rich_The_Fish sent the dragon my way and took one.  I fought so hard for that city for so long and eventually just needed a CCRR to finish it.  Lucky Rich drew the CCRR with the Princess and killed my dream.

Rich_The_Fish was steadily earning but I noticed an opportunity.  The farm was getting bigger.  I had a near full complement of meeps, so when he placed the second cloister, I was able to trap both together.  From then on it became a farm battle.  The dragon ate some of my farmers but I had plenty of meeps and a bit of luck and forced more on and won the farm.  Hooray.  Even though he killed my city, I got the farm and won the match.  Na-na-na-na-na.

p.s. beware the tunnel tile, the farm creeps around it!

[Rich_The_Fish]

p.s. beware the tunnel tile, the farm creeps around it!

Yes, that was the most fatal flaw in my game. I hadn't realised that this CRCR tile had allowed another farmer into the main farm - if only we were allowed to use farm hints!! I was quietly confident after placing the last tile with the score tied at 102 v 102 and had 24 tied up in cloisters so thought I'd done just enough. In hindsight, I guess it didn't help that I wasn't aware that 2 of my cloisters couldn't be completed when their inhabitants became trapped with about 50 tiles left, or I would have sacrificed at least 1 monk to the dragon (I'd spent a long time during the game without any meeples in hand).

Still, it was a really enjoyable yet tense game - you played well Sir (especially with your astute use of farmers) and deserved the win. Congrats and well done.

[kettlefish]

  kettlefish 162 -  Chuck 146

The score was during the game very close. The dragon had enough to eat some of the blue meeple and some of the green meeple. The Princess was only one time active. Chuck was happy - he closed his big city with one of the last tiles. But I joined with my 4th farmer the big farm and - it was mine.
The tiles for the volcano and the dragon and the princess - I had the feeling that in this game each of us got regularly such tiles. The first volcano tile came late in the game - perhaps after 30 tiles.

Thanks for the game Chuck.

[Rich_The_Fish]

I played my 4th league game with Chuck tonight. He was quick out of the blocks, claiming a 4 point city on his first go and then secured the second city whilst blocking me out making the score 2 v 19 with 80 tiles left. I managed to almost draw level, earning 12+3 points for the moustache-shaped city, despite having the dragon just 1 tile away for a couple of turns – thanks for your protective powers Fairy! However, Chuck clearly wasn’t worried and guided the dragon to consume a few of my helpless meeples and finished off another city for good measure. A few farmers started to appear and I managed to get back into a city after being displaced due to the Princess to claim a much needed 18 points, squeezing into the lead at 45 v 39 with 67 tiles to play.

Several 2 tile cities were completed next. Chuck continued with his cloister collection and I focused on a couple of long roads and extended the lead slightly to 74 v 58 with 53 tiles left, but Chuck had almost finished yet another city and his third cloister. I tried to prevent this cloister (bottom centre of the board) from being completed and make it difficult for his sole remaining farmer to join in with my farming fun! We both completed a city and received bonus points from the Fairy again, which saw the scores stand at 109 v 79 and just 37 tiles remaining.

The rest of the game saw a big battle for the 2 farms – I was fortunate enough to make it somewhat difficult for Chuck by trying to reduce the number of possible tiles so his farmers could join in, and unfortunately for him these tiles proved to be rather elusive. I took a punt and placed a CCFF to complete a city and used the Princess to remove Chuck’s knight despite it being protected by the Fairy despite not being convinced it would work! I used a portal to strategically place a farmer of my own above the bottom city which would have negated any impact if Chuck got one of his farmers from the south west into the field. However, he took a bit of a gamble and placed a volcano next to my newly placed farmer - this saw his cloister become complete and the dragon was just 1 tile away from said farmer and he looked a little hungry! Fortunately for me though, the farmer survived the dozen or so remaining tiles (there was only 1 dragon movement tile left by this stage). However, whilst Chuck didn’t get the desired tiles to join the main farms, he did build a large city in the north east which would have given lots of points had be been able to finish it.

It was an entertaining and pretty well balanced game, with the lead constantly changing during the first 50 tiles or so. We both made pretty equal use of the Fairy, often managing to get the 3 bonus points when completing a feature. The dragon was either a little off-colour or on a diet, as he didn’t devour all that many meeples, preferring to spend time heading randomly around the board towards dead ends rather than tasty morsels.

Thanks very much for the game Chuck, it was a good and entertaining battle.

Final scores were...
  Rich_The_Fish – 177
  Chuck – 135

[jungleboy]

I have my game with Carcking at 4pm CET today. Then I will only have one game left - against khalidq. Khalid, I've sent you a PM.

[Chuck]

Rich, it was enjoyable playing against you and so was the reading of your summary! :-)

What I can say so far in this tournament: although I haven't played against many of you, all matches were good fun!!

Regarding my missing matches: I'm unavailable today and tomorrow till 7/8 pm due to family and friends.

[jungleboy]

jungleboy 171 Carcking 148

A very enjoyable game with a top opponent. It was closer than the score indicated and with 5 tiles left Carcking was in a winning position until I got a bit lucky

There was some good use of the dragon throughout, and a good battle for the large, incomplete city in the northwest and for the main farm in the southeast. I drew 5/6 princess tiles, but couldn't really take advantage, as when I removed Carcking from the large city at one point, he got right back in on his next turn. Soon it became clear that the city was likely to be tied, and we turned our attention to the farm. Carcking was the first to get 3 in it but with 5 tiles left I finally drew the CRRR tile I had been waiting for almost the whole game to add my third farmer in the north. This tied the farm, and with points advantage I had been building up in the second half of the game, that was enough.

[kettlefish]

  kettlefish 165 -  Rich_The_Fish 164

Early in the game - Rich_The_Fish closed 3 cities and some roads - so he had many points

58 tiles left - RichTheFish has 51 points and I only 11

The dragon ate some of my meeple early in the game and the princess did her job too...
The first half of the game - I thought I would have no chance to win this match.
Later in the game the dragon got also some blue meeple.

But I have finished my big city - I've got the needed 2 tiles (1x cccc and 1xcfcf) - both were holes in the landscape before closing. My cloister and a road has been finished at the same time - and then I had enough meeple for playing - I put a farmer on the right farm and build there some small cities. And with one of the last tiles I joined with a 2nd farmer on the big farm on the right side - I've got the majority of this farm.

Rich_The_Fish had early two meeple on the left farm - and one meeple on the farm at the bottom of the landscape. I was lucky to get a tile which joined the 3rd meeple from Rich_The_Fish into the big left farm. So he didn't get 9 points for a separate farm.

With my last tile - I've got a tile with a magic portal - I put a meeple into a cloister with 6 tiles plus the just placed tile = 7 tiles = 7 points = 1 point for the win

[Rich_The_Fish]

Wow, that was a really good game and you timed it to absolute perfection by making the winning move using the portal on the very last tile to earn 7 valuable points and winning by 1 point! I felt bad early on, as I tried hard to prevent you from scoring points without having to share them - I was pretty determined to win. However, you didn't lose heart and fought back well in the second half of the game. You deserved the win after successfully completing the large city earning 38 points (after repeatedly closing me out) and then claimed the most valuable farm worth 24 points and kept increasing your farmers as I tried to muscle in or eat yours with the dragon! There were several key moves that I hoped you hadn't seen, but you did and played very smart. Well done.