Inevitably, the evening started with Blue and Burgundy eating pizza while discussing Essen and what goodies might be available.  For lots of reasons, it was a very quiet night, but the “Feature Game”, Squirrel Rush, had enough pieces that everyone could join in, so we started off with that.  It was a new game to the group, but not terribly complex, even with the “Smart Squirrel” variant that we used.  That said, there was still a little bit of an “analysis paralysis” problem and at times we were in danger of getting into a “Chariot Race” situation again…

– Image by boardGOATS

The game takes place over six rounds with each round consisting of players moving their wooden squirrel around the board turning over tiles as they pass them and collecting nuts as they go.  Each tile has a different number of nuts on each side, but the catch is that squirrels can only move orthogonally and as players move their squirrel, each tile must have fewer nuts on it than the last.  Thus, a squirrel could move over a  tile with five nuts on it, then a three nutter and stop on a double nut tile (perhaps because there were no singletons available).  From round two, players can also play a card from their hand that allows them to break the rules slightly, for example by moving diagonally once or jumping a tile, or even leaving the “board and returning somewhere else.

– Image by boardGOATS

It sounds quite simple, but in practice, we were all a little bit prone to over-thinking the problem and trying to spot that perfect move.  With five players there was also a lot of unproductive down-time.  This was because the board was constantly changing as tiles were turned over so meaningful decisions could not be made until the previous player’s turn at the earliest.  There were the inevitable nutty jokes to keep people amused between turns though, and Ivory enjoyed winding up Pine about how enormous his nuts were and how he was sure Pine would be happy to share them with Blue who didn’t have any…  Pine retaliated with a nutty factoid, asking which bird buries more nuts than a squirrel.  Only Burgundy knew the answer is the Jay, funny, yet beautiful birds.

– Image by boardGOATS

Meanwhile the game continued, though everyone was finding it a bit of a struggled thanks to the tile layout which had lots of “fours” along one side.  The nutty comments continued as well with, Pine commenting that he’d found a nice bit of glade to sit in, nibbling his nuts…  In the end, it was a surprisingly close game, despite the fact that everyone knew Ivory was miles in front and had an insurmountable lead.  Insurmountable until the last round in fact, when Burgundy picked up a massive eighteen points thanks to an well placed nut, finishing on seventy-one, beating Ivory by just one point.  Pine nearly managed the same feat, finishing just one behind on sixty-nine.  In fact, it was a tight finish all round as Blue and Black finished in joint fourth with sixty-six.    All in all, it was a beautifully presented, enjoyable little game that would be play differently with a different tile layout; as Pine pointed out, “It’s Nuts!”

– Image by boardGOATS

With so few of us, we needed something that played five.  Although lots of options were put on the table, it was almost inevitable what were going to end up play.  Ivory had been very envious of the fact he’d missed out when he’d been away last time due to a work team-building event, and his eyes lit up when he realised Roll for the Galaxy was a real option.  Problem was, Burgundy was not keen as he (like a lot of people), struggles with the icons and the procedure.  It is not actually as bad as the slightly older card game, Race for the Galaxy, but it’s still quite unlike anything else we play and the iconography adds to the challenge.  Black and Blue were firmly of the opinion that the reason we all struggle with this game is because we don’t play it enough and were therefore quite keen play it in order to become more familiar.  So Burgundy bravely agreed to give it a another go.

– Image by BGG contributor haslo

On the face of it, the game is quite straight-forward:  players roll the dice in their cup in secret, behind their screen then separate the dice according to their symbols (Explore, Develop, Settle, Produce and Ship). Players then, still in secret, re-position one of their dice to use it to choose one action they would like to activate.  Players can also put a die to one side for a turn to “Dictate” the symbol on another die, i.e. reassign it to a different phase. When all the dice have been assigned, Once everyone has positioned their dice, they are revealed and players simultaneously carry out the phases that have been chosen in the appropriate order.  The catch is what happens to the dice when they are “spent”.  For example, dice used to Explore are simply placed straight into the “Citizenry” where they wait to be recycled on a later turn when they can be returned to the cup at a cost of $1.

– Image used with permission of BGG contributor punkin312

Dice used in the other phases have a slightly more complicated route, so those assigned to Development or Settling are placed on to the appropriate pile of tiles until there are enough to build them, and then they are placed in the Citizenry to await recycling.  Dice used for Producing are themselves turned into produce and placed on the Production World tile, where they stay until someone activated a Shipping phase.  When the goods are Shipped, they are removed from the Production tile and placed in the Citizenry where they can be similarly recycled.  This is complex enough, but it is only really the back-drop to the game, the guts of which are centred on choosing tile combinations to build according to a particular strategy.  The problem is, if players are struggling to get the nuts and bolts of the game to work, then strategy inevitably will suffer.

– Image used with permission of BGG contributor punkin312

Unsurprisingly given his enthusiasm for playing it, Ivory made all the early running, settling early and making good use of his Terraforming Robots Development which meant he had pots of cash and was referred to as “Money Bags” for most of the game.  Meanwhile, Burgundy and Pine were struggling to get their heads round the different “Dice Cycles”.  Pine had played it for the first time only a couple of weeks ago, but it is such a unique game in many ways that it is hard to remember what to do.  In fact, although both Black and Blue have played it several times now, they were both quite slow off the mark as they had to remind themselves of what they had to do.

– Image used with permission of BGG contributor punkin312

It was about halfway through the game that the Christmas music started; Ivory was thrilled while Pine was disgusted in equal measure.  The bar staff were all feeling very festive and were not impressed when we pointed out that there was still Halloween and Bonfire Night to go before we could even begin to consider Christmas!  When Ivory built his twelfth world and  triggered the end of the game, his mood was improved even further, making him a very happy squirrel indeed.  With nobody else close to twelve worlds, it looked like Ivory was home and dry with some to spare, however, although she only had nine Worlds she had a lot of higher value, Genes Worlds.  This, together with the large pile of Victory Point chips she had acquired towards the end of the game, much to everyone’s surprise, drew her level with Ivory on forty-eight.  This led to a tie-break, which, despite the fact that we’d already started packing up clearly went Ivory’s way as he had many more dice and loads more money than Blue.  Magnanimously though, Ivory offered to share the victory.

– Image used with permission of BGG contributor punkin312

Learning Outcome: It’s probably best not to comment on the size of a squirrel’s nuts…