A lot of attendees with more new faces than usual.
Thank you to everyone who helped set up and clean up, a big help. Thank you especially to David for taking care of the long food order. We ordered from Pollo Loko for the first time. David had them read back the names for each item, but the order came without any names, missing one item, and without silverware or napkins. When David called to complain they said people need to request those. You would think with a large order they might ask if we want?
Antike
Yael+, Eszter, Binyamin S, Avi, David E
Bang the Dice Game
Sheriff Yael, Bandits+
Shariff Yael, Deputy Binyamin S, Bandits+
Bridge
Avi / Nadine, Ben / Jon
We played one hand before switching to Tichu, Avi made the 3NT that we bid.
Empires: Age of Discovery
Gili 104, Shnuer 94, Aaron 70, Arie 50
Castles of Burgundy
Gili 242, Yuval 206, Avi E 180, Yedidya 129
Gili taught this, first play for the others.
Codenames
Jon: I taught this to David C, Avi Einot, and Yokhay, and they all liked it. In the first game, Avi and I gave clues, in English to David C and Yokhay, which didn’t always go so well since they are Hebrew speakers and we are English speakers. In the second game, Avi gave clues to me in English and Yokhay gave clues to David in Hebrew. Sometimes they switched to English in order to give a clue that is one word in English but two words in Hebrew.
Five Tribes
Eszter 138, Dov 129, Tal 114, Nimrod 107
Gold West
David 115, Eszter 98, Nadine 81
Eszter taught us. Then when we saw Ezra wasn’t playing a game, she taught it again to him. After being interrupted by dinner, Ezra ended up leaving, but we finally played. I didn’t get all the rules right away, even when I did, I didn’t like the resource movement mechanic. Eszter helped us with recommendations, David liked the game.
Hawaii
Gili 104, Binyamin S 90, Eitan 86, Emily 70
It’s Alive
King of Tokyo
Avi+, Nadine, Gili, David, Yedidya
I killed Gili, David and Yedidya, but then Avi killed me to win.
Lo Ra
Nadine 35, Shneur 27, Aaron 20
New to both, they liked the game. Before counting most and least money, Shneur had 32, Nadine 30.
Magic
Jon++, David +
David says Jon is on a long winning streak. Jon: David and I drafted cards and I ended up with a relatively tight deck that had some fliers and creature control, but nothing else spectacular. In the first game, I drew as well as I could have, but I had limited land after the initial opening hand and David took me down with bigger creatures.after killing my fliers. In the second game, David was entirely mana screwed, with a hand full of blue cards and no blue lands. In the third game, I was able to eke out another win where both of us had average draws.
Nefarious
Ben didn’t win, I don’t know who else played.
Pax Pamir
Gili, Cliff, Shalom, Refaela
Gilli and Cliff won together.
Phoenicia
Jon, David, Avi, Aaron
Jon: David made one strategic and one tactical mistake in the penultimate and ultimate rounds. Avi thought it was too hard to catch up once ou were losing (although with more experience, hopefully no one will be losing by too much). I taught the game again to David, Avi, and Aaron. I hadn’t played it in a while, and we are not sure that we got the action card availability mechanics correct. David took a wide lead in the middle of the game and held it, but he spent one 
round too long building up his infrastructure. I used that one round to gain a huge amount of victory points; that was the penultimate round. On the last round, he neglected (forgot) to deprive me of a card I used to keep my lead. While I would have gotten almost as many points anyway, it was a mistake.
Scythe
Ofer
Signorie
Ben 154, Nadine 133, Assaf 120
First play for Ben, second for Assaf. Ben complained the whole time that he wasn’t getting the game, and about his limited possibilities, though of course he did well. I don’t think he liked the game despite winning. He’s right about the luck elements, such as which flag tiles are available and which ones you need. Assaf did well with marrying daughters into cities, he placed them all in one city which limited his end game bonuses, which lost him 8 or 12 points, and he didn’t invest in many white discs. I concentrated on the book track, not enough to beat Ben’s training of sons – and he also got points from the book track.
Slap Deck
Jon: I taught this to several new people and played several times. Many people liked the game a lot, especially David C (guy from my work who came for the first time), Avi Einot, and Yokhay Liot (the last two guys are new to me and I met them at the end of the evening).
Smiley Faces
Gili, Yuval, David, Avi
Steam
Jon 55, Nati 52, David C 52, Yael 47
Jon: first plays for Yael, Nati, and David C, who all liked the game. I invited them to gang up on me, and they did some of the time but not all of the time. They also all played very well, but I managed to get a 2 or 3 point lead by mid game and just managed to keep hold of it until the end.
Tzolk’in
Eliezer 68, Alan Greenspan 66, Michael 61, Ofer
Tichu
Avi / Nadine, David / Yedidya+
Avi / Nadine 915, David / Ben 1050+
Avi and I had a pair of kings overtaken by a pair of aces twice, ruining our plans.
Jon / Yechiel 1195, Aaron / Shneur 605
Jon: I played with Assaf’s friend Yechiel from Kokhav Hashachar (first play) against Aaron and Shnuer (first or second play). Yechiel made some beginner mistakes, but played very well for his first time. He even called Tichu twice (made it once). I called it three times and made it twice. In one of the times I made it, Aaron on my right played his second to last card (a 7) and I called Tichu, which shocked him. I played an 8. Luckily for me, my partner played his K so Aaron could not play his last card, which was a K. I overtook my partner’s K with one of my aces, played a long straight, then a full house of Q’s over aces, and then got out with the dog.
In another interesting hand, I pulled in my opening 2 aces, 3 Q’s. 3 tens, a straight 2 to 6, and the phoenix. David and Avi’s advice for passing was to pass one 10 to each other player, but I decided to pass the 2, 3, and 4. I got back 2 4’s and the dragon, making an easy tichu. Aaron also called and made or lost some tichus. At one point, one hand took us from 795, and them at 105, to us 695 and them 405, and then us 695 them 605. But those two hands were their only streak. In the next hand it was 995 to 605, and then 1195 to 605.
Year of the Dragon
Nadine 105, Ben 96, Shneur 81, Assaf 79, Ezra 76
New to everyone except me, Ben had played once. This is a very hard game to get on the first play but they all did well, especially Ben. Assaf jumped ahead of me in turn order before the game and took a dragon, I took one on the next round. Ezra started with Books but couldn’t maintain it, no one else focused on it either. Ben had a lot of people, but was slower with round points. I did single building for a while until I finally took a builder. I took a Monk at the beginning for turn order, and was unexpectedly able to keep him til the end of the game. I got one double one, Ben had two double ones.
Bang the Dice Game
