New Year's Games!

Whats the best way to celebrate? Some good food, drink, and friends of course- but what else? Games of course! Between New Years Eve and New Years Day I played Exploding Kittens, Joking Hazard, Through the Ages, Five Tribes, and Zombie State! An excellent array, with an excellent array of friends!

I hope to do much more in the year to come- specifically, my family is thinking about starting the 10 x 10 challenge. We'll see!

The Big Game of the weekend, Dad's Christmas Gift to himself. I ragged
on its length a bit, but was tentatively interested in seeing if it lived up to
its reputation.

A shot an hour and a half (or so) in from Dad's PoV. Moses leading his
nation to population explosions.

Dad's board by the end of the game. Some powerful stuff going on, especially
with the three wonders.

My board. I had difficulty with happiness and resource production, but
my Science was top notch. Library of Alexandria, Hammurabi, Leonardo
Da Vinci, and Sir Isaac Newton all helped with that. When I lost Newton to
an event, Churchill shored up my Democracy with some needed VPs.

Almost the final scoring. We forgot a few points tallied later- but it ended up with
me in a narrow first, with Dad three points behind. I... honestly have no idea what happened.
If we stopped in the second age (as we first planned) Yellow would have probably won
due to a massive boost from a Michelangelo/St. Peter's Basilica combo. All in all, lots
of fun.

We tried Five Tribes with the Thieves and Artisans expansions. We basically ignored
the Thieves, but Artisan's added some fun stuff. This was my pimp palace- with a host
of genies buffing palm trees, and a tent on the lawn. This one tile was 30ish points!

I managed to win this one as well, though I have no idea how. I usually really
suck at Five Tribes. It was another narrow one with some key assassinations
tipping the scales in my favor.

Some Jenga with friends- this is moments before the Tower came down.

Zombie State again! It made an impression. This time I took the reins of
South America.

Our Africa Coalition player had hot dice, succeeding every research roll
all game. She was close to getting the infrastructure to cure her whole
area!

However peaceful methods wouldn't carry the day this time either. The Asia
player (through luck and planning) managed to have the entirety of his zombie hordes
consolidated in Eastern Sibera. Nukes were called in...

...and all the zombies are reduced to ash- as well as the single brave population
'bait' die.

North America was utterly overrun.

My own lands at the end of the game. South America is decimated,
but our resource base is MOSTLY secure. Boliva was saved from
becoming food by the bombs dropping, but they were next.

  It was a great send off to a sometimes disappointing year, let's hope that 2017 is better in every way!