Author: Rob Askew

Crack List trial success

Mid winter and chilly outside, there were six of us – Nicole was away at work in Melbourne, and El Prez at a birthday party. Mind you, knowing Wayne‘s attitude to tonight’s main game it wasn’t surprising he’d rather be at a birthday party for one of his neighbours turning 92.

The main event was Five Crowns in which Rob got off to a flying start by immediately “going out” in the first two rounds, and also in round 3 not long after the deal, but then his luck ran out and he was caught by Louise who had four consecutive zero scores (remember it’s low scores that win). So Louise won with Tara 2nd and Rob 3rd.

The scheduled backup game Scattergories was replaced after we found out Wayne would be absent (he has that game) – Tara brought a card game called Crack List which turned out to be quite a success. It has many of the qualities of Scattergories with a bit of similarity to Uno thrown in. It’s now listed on the games page with a link to the rules. Peter won the game with Matt and Val the runners up. I have a feeling that Crack List will be picked again before the season ends.

Uno shows no mercy, usurped by Pigs

It was mid-winter and a bit cool outside as we all gathered to play two new untried games. The main game was El Presidente‘s latest production Swashbuckler – and we had our buckles well and truly swashed! There was a fair bit of explanation needed before getting under sail, but we eventually got the hang of it. There were some changes suggested which Wayne will be trying to address, but it has promise. My own issue with the game is that players do not start as equals in the land of pirates, so for example my character had 2 attack points and 1 defence point, and I had no “special” ships that could fire a broadside (in effect an extra dice throw) – all this is determined by the cards dealt. On the other hand Matt‘s character had 8 attack points, plus he had a ship that could fire broadsides. Despite this imbalance, I still won somehow!

The backup was another variation on the Uno franchise, it was Uno No Mercy. It is far more brutal than Uno Flip, and we had a severe problem working out the rules. We couldn’t understand why a player being banished if carrying 25 or more cards could end up with a score advantage of zero (remember it’s low scores that win). Perhaps we were supposed to add up the score of the banished 25-card hand? What eventually happened was a historically rare game abandonment! We ditched Uno No Mercy and instead played Pass the Pigs which I happened to carry in my laptop bag. After much “pigging out” it ended in a draw between Tara and Pete, so we had a pig-off which Tara won convincingly with double Pete‘s score.

Galloping Billionaires!

A cool and damp evening in late Autumn saw us once again at the Jannali Gamerdome to play Peter’s choices – Gallop and Billionaire! Nicole was a late no-show despite last week’s false alarm in which she couldn’t make it on May 11, then rejoiced on finding out the meet was May 18. How frustrating for you Nicole.

Gallop went off well, and we discovered a rule that we’d been routinely violating – it is in fact compulsory to follow an available track if one is available. One could be given a Steward’s Inquiry card if deliberately choosing a blocked path when a clear path is available. The game was won easily by Wayne – this puts him tied with Rob in 3rd place. Our April leader Louise (WHP) has been overtaken by Tara who scored two helpings of points tonight with two second placings. Also with two lots of points, Matt has increased his gap from the bottom ladder group. Also scoring a WHP are Val and Rob, both of them getting no points for two consecutive months. We had an aborted round in Billionaire! when Rob called one only to find he was one card short of a full hand, possibly short changed on a quick trading frenzy.

We had a good news flash when Wayne announced that he’s due to pick up his new hearing aids this week – murmurs of “about time” went around the table. Wayne also previewed his new creation “Swashbucklers” which is on the June program along with another untried game UNO No Mercy. June will be an interesting meet.

Sherlock & Sherwood

It was a cool Autumn night at Tara‘s, and she convincingly won the main event – Sherlock Holmes. This was sufficient for her to overtake Rob by 10 points into second place on the competition ladder. Louise is now the ladder leader – she was only 5 points behind Rob in March, and since he WHP, it took only Louise‘s second place in Sherlock to put her at the top. Also back in March you might remember there was a historic 4-way tie for last place between Val, Nicole, Pete and Matt – this has resolved into a tie for 4th place between Matt and Wayne.

The second game Sherwood was resurrected from the archives – I believe I heard Wayne say it was last played in 2017! We eventually got used to the scoring rules, and I thought it went over very well. Pete displayed the most polished archery technique which landed him 2nd place in the game. One weakness of Sherwood in my opinion is that no matter how skilled the archer, the draw card can make or break a turn, ie; the draw card has too much influence on the score. What do you think?

SmartAss again and Reno Casino

It was a pleasant evening at Louise’s On The River, but it started late due to our Treasurer forgetting that it was meeting night, despite a reminder from tonight’s host Louise that very morning. My apologies to all. So it was all hands on deck.

Matt thought he had SmartAss in the bag, only needing a single dice roll to take the win, but he was overtaken at the last minute by Rob who had been a very late starter and had already given up hope of winning points in that game. Louise also made it across the line ahead of Matt – so the first two placings were a reverse of the same game in February.

Reno Casino was enjoyed by all, and it was won by our rookie – her first points ever, congrats Val. I think Val is a very serious gamer and could be a force to be watched. Wayne and Tara were the minor placings in Reno, and it was Nicole and Peter who WHP tonight. Note on the scoreboard the rarely seen 4-way tie for last place – Val, Peter, Nicole and Matt. That would make for an interesting play-off for The Spoon if it happened in November!

Thanks to all from me for switching the April meet from 20th to 13th due to my trip starting on 14th.

Welcome back Nicole and welcome Valerie

On a damp evening at Jannali Gamerdome (aka Wayne’s common room) we welcomed the return of Nicole – back from her sojourn in the nation’s capital to her Engadine address. Welcome also to probable new member Valerie Hooper. Val, who comes from Amarillo in Texas, is a long time member of the Chuck Norris trivia team which also includes Rob and Matt, and she also has acquaintances in common with Tara. Only absentee tonight was Matt who is holidaying with his family somewhere near Coffs Harbour.

The main game tonight was Sixty Second Scribble which we play with an extended time limit of 90 seconds. In fact we further extended the time limit to 120 seconds for cards of the “tricky” level. My apologies for failing to start the timing device in the first tricky round, giving everyone about 250 seconds. The Sisters Tara and Nicole took out first and second place with Louise coming third. Louise got a second helping of points by getting 3rd in Pass the Pigs which was won by Peter with Wayne 2nd. This gives Pete 50% of his score for the whole of 2025, so it looks like he might be making a determined effort to shake off the dreaded Wooden Spoon. Rob and Val were the only unfortunates who WHP* tonight.

Note that this year we are attempting to have a default date for meetings to aid in forward planning. Meets will be scheduled for the third Monday of the month unless circumstances make it hard to do so.

*for newbies, WHP is Went Home Pointless.

Grand final results – Goodbye GG

A pleasant spring evening at the Jannali Gamerdome saw seven of us tackle old favourite Word Power and trial a new game Word Yahtzee, based of course on the original Yahtzee. The championship results weren’t quite as expected; the battle between Tara and Matt, separated in October by only 5 points, did not occur due to Matt’s WHP and Tara’s 35 points from coming third in both games. Third place was a fight between the tightly grouped Genelle, Louise and Rob with GG getting the honours by winning the main game, beating Rob by only 10 points with Louise WHP. The bottom end of the league table has been static since September with Wayne pretty safely avoiding the Spoon, and Pete being relegated to the Spoon by Nicole by only a 10 point margin. Note that tonight three players scored double helpings of points, and four people WHP. I think we’ll see a better performance from Pete in 2026, and we’re all hoping we’ll see more of Nicole next year.

Of course the sad news is that Genelle has retired from SBGA starting from 2026. She cites old age and the long distance night drive she always covers to get to meetings as the reasons. We will miss her greatly – especially her keen love of games, having introduced several new games to our roster, and also her generosity to her opponents that saw her nicknamed Mother Theresa right from the start of her SBGA career. We wish you well GG.

Tight at the Top

A pleasant Spring evening at Como saw seven of us gather to play Scattergories and old favourite Ride ’em Cowboy. We’re looking forward to more frequent appearances from Nicole if she returns from the A.C.T. in 2026.

As the headline says, there is only a 5-point gap between Matt and Tara at the top of the ladder (they both got two helpings of points tonight), so the November meet will be very interesting indeed, especially since Genelle has chosen a new game for the backup – Word Yahtzee. It’s related to “normal” Yahtzee, but the dice show letters rather than numbers, and like Scrabble, you make words from the dice using the letters which have point values on them, so some words are worth more than others. On our home page I’ve included a link in the name of the game to a site that explains the rules.
We had a roll-off for the minor placings in Scattergories – Genelle grabbed 2nd place by rolling “G” while Tara rolled “M”. It was won by Matt. Rob & Pete both WHP.

Below the top of the ladder there is about a 300 point gap to the next bunch who look like fighting it out for third place – this is the Louise/Rob/Genelle group. It looks like El Presidente, the 2024 Spooner, will be safe from that particular kitchen implement this year – it will be fought out between Peter and Nicole, who, even if she is not at the meeting, will still have a chance of avoiding the Spoon if Peter maintains his current form.

Two Golden Oldies

A spring evening of reasonable weather (neither aircon nor umbrellas needed) saw us once again at the Jannali Gamerdome. Nicole away in Canberra and Genelle also away meant we were six. The “Golden Oldies” were the games picked by their author El Prez. I call them Oldies because neither had been played for about 9 years; that’s long enough for all of us who were there 9 years ago to completely forget the rules, so it was like playing new games again – which was El Prez‘s intention all along.
The main game was Olympic Event which took a couple of rounds before we were comfortable with it, and it was won by our host himself. In my opinion the game needs improvement, there seem to be too many moves in which nothing happens, it makes no attempt to mimic the actual olympics. Of course, the fact that I came a convincing last place may have left me a bit biased agains it. I probably wouldn’t choose it on my hosting turn.
The backup was Reno Casino which was much better – and not because I happened to win it! I might choose it one day as host. The stand-out play was when Pete managed to unload a whole lot of bad cards on the player to his left (Wayne), then only one or two moves later, Wayne landed on “swap hands with the player on your right” so he gave them all back and received a nice small hand in return. It was priceless.
On the scoreboard Matt has narrowed the gap between himself and the leader Tara from 95 down to 55 points, and Wayne got two helpings of points to break out of his 5-month tied score with Nicole and is now part of the middle bunch 185 points below Matt. The trailers in Spoon territory are Nicole and Peter who was the only WHP.