Once again we tried our hands (and brains) at Rise of Empires–the game where you build an empire in just three short eras. Of course, for us those three short eras took four hours. If you want to know more about the game itself you can check out my previous post. Let’s just jump right in.
Ben is an idiot and so am I. That was the first revelation of the game. It doesn’t matter why or who said those things because those involved will be crushed! Crushed I tell you! But that will have to wait until another game–maybe Roborally.Â
Just like our previous game, Mike took the lead and refused to let go of it. We tried everything short of poisoning his drink to overtake him, but he just kept scoring more victory points. I spent most of the game in last place, while Ben and Owen shuffled around in between. Owen tried a different strategy that didn’t depend upon owning areas on the board. Instead he grabbed up victory point yielding cities, technologies, and territories. This served him well at the end of the game. Both Mike and Ben took the shipping technology, that along with island territories; gain you any type of resource you want. This time I settled on grabbing up forests that gained me people.  It cost me a fortune in food, sending me to the low edge of the food track, but I think it worked ok. Looking back on the game–and this may be obvious to everyone else–but it seems the less you need to fight with the other players over resources, the better you are.
Our game ended with Mike garnering about 160 victory points, Owen was only a short eight points away from him in second place. I think I was about 20 points behind Owen and Ben was way in last place…at the end…behind everyone…even me…again. Â
(Ben’s still in his gaming slump, but on the up side he has been working feverously on a piece of gaming terrain for Mike. Somehow that makes it all ok.)
Chaos Steve