November 23

Photos of this session.

• 2:18 pm: Bob, Dan K, Carol and Eric played Corsairs while Alex (as White) and Rachel (as Black) played LOTR: The Confrontation.
• 2:24 pm: Rachel won LOTR.
• 3:10 pm: Dan won with 43, Bob 23, Eric 13, and Carol 11.
• 3:13 pm: Rachel and Alex started another game of LOTR.
• 3:21 pm: Alex played black and won. Next the six of us played Medici.
• 4:58 pm: Carol won with 104, Rachel 97, Bob 80, Eric 78, Dan 58, Alex 52.
• 5:30 pm: Bob and Alex played a game of LOTR. Bob played white trying to demonstrate that white doesn’t always lose. He lost, although just barely.
• Bob loses with white.
• 5:33 pm: The rest of the Ruvinskys arrived while Bob and Alex were playing. We all went upstairs to watch the extended version of Lord of the Rings.
• 7:57 pm: About 7:30, the first disk was done and we took a break for dinner.
• 8:07 pm: After dinner, we started the second disk.
• 10:18 pm: The movie was over about 10:15.
• 11:02 pm: Jason and Bill played a game of Gravitation, which Jason won.
• 11:12 pm: Bill and Rebecca Ruvinsky went home. Carol, Bob, Alex, Rachel, Jason and Eric then played Draco & Co.
• 12:26 am: Carol won with 19, Bob had 17, Alex had 16, Jason had 11, Rachel and Eric each had 9.
• 12:38 am: Carol, Bob, Alex, Jason and I played Web of Power.
• 1:30 am: Bob won with 41, Carol 36, Alex 32, Eric and Jason had 29 each.
• 2:24 am: Bob, Jason, Alex and Eric then played Löwenherz.
• 3:50 am: Eric won with 40, Bob 38, Alex 34, Jason 26.

November 16

• 4:18 pm: Eric arrived at the White’s house around 3:45. Eric played a game of Lord of the Rings: the Confrontation with Bob. Eric played the dark forces and had two characters in the Shire when Bob got Frodo to Mordor and won. Royal got home shortly after we finished.
• 4:38 pm: Royal, Bob, Carol and Eric started a game of Dragon Land.
• 5:32 pm: Bob won with 50. Royal and Eric had 42 each while Carol had 41.
• 5:48 pm: After the game, we took a break for dinner.
• 6:52 pm: After dinner, Bob, Royal, Carol, Rachel and Eric played Carcassone: Hunters and Gatherers.
• 8:35 pm: Bob won with 85, Carol had 69, Rachel 46, Royal 45, Eric 33.
• 10:54 pm: We called it a night after H&G.

October 19

1:40 pm: Eric arrived at the Jones’ house around 1:30. Bob, Paul and Rachel J were playing Cartagena. Bob won.
2:22 pm: The four of us played another game of Cartagena which Paul won.
2:36 pm: Carol and Ben came home. Paul, Rachel J and Eric played pinball. Rachel J won.
2:40 pm: Next Carol, Rachel J, Paul, Bob and I played Adel Verpflichtet.
3:37 pm: Rachel J won with 28, Paul 27, Eric and Bob tied at 23, Carol had 18.
3:40 pm: Next the 5 of us played Big City.

4:46 pm: Paul won with 88, Bob 60, Eric 57, Carol 43, and Rachel J 24.
4:55 pm: Dan K, Zachary and Rebecca arrive.
4:59 pm: We decided to play Aladdin’s Dragons with Dan, Carol, Paul, Bob and Eric.

5:53 pm: Rachel S arrived.
6:55 pm: We paused the game so Carol could order dinner.
8:05 pm: We took a dinner break just before the last round and then continued with the game around 8:00.
8:23 pm: Paul won with 7 treasures two of which were scrolls. Bob had 7 treasures and one of them was a scroll. Eric had 6, Dan and Carol had 5 each.
9:00 pm: Next we played Corporate Shuffle with Rachel S.
9:27 pm: We played to 10 points and Carol won.

9:42 pm: Rachel S, Zachary and Rebecca left. We played another game of Corporate Shuffle with Rachel J.
10:21 pm: Eric won. Bob had 0.
10:34 pm: Next we played Princes of Florence without Rachel J.
1:10 am: Dan won with 58, Bob had 51, Paul had 48, Carol had 44 and Eric had 41. Everyone produced five works.

1:21 am: We called it a night.

September 14

Adel Verpflichtet
Royal - 30, Bob-27, Carol-19, Eric-19
While we played, Stephanie and Kimberly went out to pick up dinner.

We took a break for dinner; Chinese from Grace’s Fortune.

Carcassone
Carol - 97, Eric - 61, Kimberly-51, Bob - 49, Stephanie-44
Played with the expansion but without the River tiles.

We talked for awhile and watched the Harry Potter preview, then said goodnight around 11:20pm.

August 31

Eric arrived at the Jones’ house around 1:30pm. Kimberly was already there. Royal arrived at 2:00. While Royal was eating, Bob started setting up Web of Power. During the process of setting up, he found that some of the purple pieces were missing. Stephanie arrived around 2:30.

Web of Power
Royal - 53, Eric - 46, Kimberly - 39, Bob - 34, Carol - 20
We missed a rule that would have given Carol one more turn at the end of the game.

Wongar
Bob - 68, Kimberly - 68, Eric - 64, Carol - 49, Stephanie - 44
There was some minor confusion due to the poor rules translation provided with the game.

The Ruvinsky’s arrived around 6:50. Bob started grilling hot dogs and hamburgers.

After dinner, we watched Lord of the Rings and then the making of The Two Towers preview. Bill and Rachel Ruvinsky left. Then we watched certain scenes again, pointing out flaws. We finished about 1:00am. Stephanie White left. Then we watched the MTV video awards parodies of the Elrond Council and Spiderman. About 1:40 Royal and Carol went to bed.

Kimberly, Bob, Jason, Rachel, Alex and Eric then played Chrononauts (won by Bob), Elixir (won by Rachel) and Democrazy (won by Bob). Kimberly went to bed around 4:20am.

Klunker
Eric - 16, Jason - 14, Rachel - 8, Alex -4, Bob - 3

At 5:10, we decided to call it a night.

People started waking up around 8:00am. At 10:00am, we started gaming again.

Mississippi Queen
Eric - 1st, Carol - 2nd, Bob - 3rd, Kimberly - 4th, Royal - 5th

Royal left around 11:45am.

Citadels
Alex - 30, Jason - 29, Bob - 28, Eric - 23, Carol - 23, Kimberly - 21

We split into groups of 3 and 4. Kimberly, Jason and Eric played Castle, which Kimberly won. Rachel, Alex, Bob and Carol played Dragon Land. Alex won with 44, Bob had 43, Carol had 42 and Rachel had 35.

Bill Ruvinsky returned about 3:15pm. We split into groups of 4 and 4.

San Marco
Jason - 66, Bob - 65, Kimberly - 56, Eric - 53

Big City
Alex - 106, Bill - 99, Carol - 75, Rachel - 73

July 27

• Babel - Bob, Eric
• Octi - Eric, Bob
• Octi - Eric, Rachel
• Doge - Carol, Eric, Rachel, Bob
• Octi - Rachel, Carol
• Carolus Magnus - Eric, Bob, Carol
• Chinatown - Bob $150000, Carol $102000, Eric $101000
• Burn Rate - Carol, Eric, Rachel, Bob
• Citadels - Eric 29, Jason 24, Bob 25, Bill 24, Alex 29, Carol 24
• Taj Mahal - Eric 40, Carol 38, Bob 33, Jason 45, Rachel 16

June 8

First up was Puerto Rico. Eric got an early monopoly in coffee but, kept getting shut out of shipping until he bought a wharf. Carol won, Jay came in second, Eric in third and Bob last. We then played Atilla. Once again, Carol won, Jay came in second, Eric in third and Bob last. Then we played Starfarers of Catan. This time the finish was reversed: Bob won, Eric came in second, Jay third and Carol last.

We took a break for dinner and, then Glenn and Steve arrived. Jay ran his Boldhome D&D campaign until 11:00pm. The party wandered through an old missile silo, killing giant ants and other things, then finally escaped.

Eric left at 11. Carol, Bob, Jay, Steve and Glenn played a game of Acquire, which Carol won.

Babycon IX

We need a bigger house. Only our second year in the new house and we had the biggest Babycon attendance ever. A whopping 24 people played at least one game at the event. If you count attendees (kids and spouses who didn’t play), we saw 31 people during the weekend.

First time attendees were George Lewis, Zoe Spencer, Dan Korn and, Rachel Silber (and their children, Zachary and Rebecca), and the entire Ruvinsky family (Bill, Stephanie, Jason, Alex, Rachel and, Rebecca). Yikes! We pretty much set up a full day care center in the family room!



We had planned Friday night’s kick off dinner at the new Red Robin hamburger restaurant in Germantown. Unfortunately, Red Robin ignored our twice-confirmed reservations for twenty-five people and forced us to make an on-the-fly change. We ended up at our old favorite, Old Shanghai, which accommodated all of us quite nicely. Despite the confusion, dinner was great.

One highlight of the weekend was the 18 player team Robo Rally using two boards in different rooms! When your robot stepped into a teleport space, you immediately appeared in the other room on the other board, not knowing what would be awaiting you. It was wild, loud and, chaotic but, a lot of fun. Much of the action took place in the board in the main room as the board layout made it rather difficult to get onto the teleporter to go back to the other board. The team that won (see the Master Tote Board) leapt to an early lead by killing off most of the other team. However, a small group (Steve, Glenn and, Alex) remained alive to rally and nearly won, making it an exciting finish.

Thanks to Royal and Eric, who provided most of the pictures. Also, thanks to Glenn who contributed to the prize bin and Mark who donated a couple of good games to Bob’s Ultimate Game Room for the enjoyment of all. Thanks to everyone who donated food and drink.

As always, everyone started with 15 Babycon coins and had to ante one per game. Jeff Spencer had a good year, winning the most coins with Bob close behind, followed by Royal.

Babycon 10 is looking to be the biggest Babycon ever. We are already deep in preperations. Thanks to Glenn, we now have a web domain. Go to www.babycon.org (now defunct) for all the details on Babycon 10, full color pictures, and a look at past Babycons. We hope to see everyone in May, 2003!

March 9

We started at about 3 P.M.. Bob, Dan K, Kimberly and Rachel S played Settlers of Catan, while Carol, Eric and Rachel J played two games of Aquarius. Rachel J won the first game of Aquarius and Eric won the second. Royal and Stephanie arrived at this point, while the Settlers game continued on. Carol, Eric, Rachel J, Royal and Stephanie then played a game of Wiz War, which Royal won pretty quickly. As the Settlers game looked like it was finally winding down, Carol, Eric Rachel J, Royal and Stephanie decided to play a quick game of Fluxx, which was won by Rachel J. The Settlers game finally ended with Rachel S winning and, Bob and Dan at 9 points each.

At this point, it was about 6 P.M. so, we decided to break for dinner. Some ordered from Old Shanghai and others from Pizza Hut.

After dinner, Rachel S left. The remainder played two games of Werewolf. With this small number of people, we figured one werewolf would work better than two. Bob acted as narrator for both games. In the first game, Rachel J accidentally revealed herself as the Seer and, of course, was immediately killed by the Werewolf. The Werewolf won, and turned out to be Dan K. In the second game, Stephanie as the Seer, was able to determine fairly quickly that the Werewolf was Rachel J and, was able to convince the other villagers to vote to lynch her. The Villagers won.

For the last game of the evening, we decided to play Robo-Rally. We used our homebrew team, capture the flag variant. Bob, Carol, Rachel J and Dan K were on the red team, while Royal, Stephanie, Kimberly and Eric were on the green team. There was some initial concern that the board layout was not completely fair as most of the conveyer belts ran from the red side to the green side but, it was decided that since both teams had to traverse the boards in both directions that this would even out over the course of the game. The green team got off to a poor start, with Stephanie getting hit by one of her own proximity mines and Royal shooting himself in the back with one of his own missiles. However, they quickly made up lost ground and Stephanie grabbed the red flag. Meanwhile, the red team’s offensive ground to a halt. So, Bob who had held back on defense, switched to offense. Dan K was the first person to lose all three of his lives and was out of the game. As Stephanie was heading back for the green home square, Bob simultaneously pushed Royal off the board and grabbed the green flag. It was Royal’s last life and now, both teams were down to three players. By the time Bob made it one quarter of the way back towards the red home square, he was heavily damaged and elected to power down. At this point, dissension broke out on the red team; several members felt Bob should drop the flag and allow Carol to carry it back to the red home square. Bob elected to keep the flag as Kimberly was close and he felt there was no good way to get it to his team mates. While Bob was powered down, Stephanie made excellent progress towards the green home square. In the meantime, Eric dropped goo at points near the red home square, just in case Stephanie couldn’t get back to the green home square. With Stephanie only a few squares from the green home, Bob tried to catch her and use a self-destruct option to stop her but, he was too late. Stephanie made it to the green home square and won the game for the green team.

At the end of Robo-Rally, it was about 1:30 A.M. and, we decided to call it a night.

January 12

Before gaming, several of us went to see Lord of the Rings. This was at least a second viewing for everyone who went and, for some a third or fourth viewing. As you can guess, we really like this movie.

On our return from the theater, Glenn, Bob, Bill, Jason and Eric started a game of Quo Vadis. Unfortunately, Jason had to leave part way through the game. From that point on, his pieces were moved by general agreement of the other players. At the end of the game, everyone had one senator in the head committee. Eric won with 16 laurels, Bill had 15, Bob had 14, Glenn 11 and Jason 8. Bill had to leave after the game.

While the Quo Vadis game was on going, Carol, Royal, Stephanie and Alex played a game of Carcassonne. Royal won. After Carcassonne, Royal and Stephanie left.

In the meantime, Rachel and Connor played a game of Hera & Zeus, a 2-player card game, which Rachel won.

Next, Bob, Glenn, Carol, Alex and Eric played a game of Traders of Genoa. We made a mistake during the game and, Glenn took ownership of several buildings in one turn early in the game when, the rules allow one to take ownership of only one building per turn. Glenn won with 610 ducats. Bob came in second with 520. Alex, who kept making what seemed to be very generous deals with other players, came in third with 450. Carol came in fourth with 445 and, Eric was last with 435. After Traders of Genoa, Glenn left.

Carol, Bob, Rachel, Alex and Eric played Evo. Carol won with 46. Bob had 45, Rachel 39, Alex 34 and Eric 30. After Evo, Carol and Rachel went to bed.

Bob, Alex and Eric played one last game of Samurai, which Bob won.