inconsequential ruminations

And the winners are.... Ticket to Ride Europe and War of the Ring

This is the first time I have ever owned (or maybe even played) a game before it won an award. Both are good games, especially War of the Ring. Ticket To Ride Europe is bland, but, as the voting procedure write-up makes clear, the lowest common denominator won.

I think that is appropriate for a game award. Voting Antiquity as the winner, because that was the winner of the first round, might have rewarded appealing to a subset of hardcore gamers, but would be useful to almost no one. Newcomers to the hobby will enjoy Ticket To Ride, and that is who awards are really aimed at. The cognoscenti made up their minds long ago.

Christo has put up a session report of our game of War of the Ring last week. He won, but only just as I was two Mordor spaces from victory. Very enjoyable, but we finished at 1am and I felt bad the next day.

Gamefest has a preview of the new expansion. It looks good, but I am worried it will extend the play time even more. I will wait to spray paint my figures until I can buy it and include the new ones.