STRAC MADNESS Results!
We did kind of an interesting experiment at STRATEGICALLY CORRECT, my board game club this weekend. Instead of the normal free-for-all where a ton of people show up, drink beer and play games at random, I capped this week's attendance at 4 players. Each of the 4 players selected four games, and we put them into a bracket. We then voted on each bracket, 2 vs 2 ties were ended with a die roll. Which left us with four winning games in our bracket!
Here's a neater version of the bracket done in Challonge.
The bracketing system wound up being REALLY fun. With the size of the STRAC collection, game selection can be a bit overwhelming. Breaking each person's preferences down into four picks and then having each try to sell their game to the group was a blast. There were definitely several instances where people voted against their own picks after hearing an impassioned sell. I think with a little tweaking, this could be our default format for STRAC streams.
On the technical angle, we had some pretty severe problems with a wayward audio source and some autofocus, so sadly the recording is not up to snuff for release. I hope to correct these issues before our next game.
We played ELYSIUM, which was a ton of fun, sort of a more advanced version of Splendor, but much more thematic and with a variable setup that's given it a lot of replayability.
Also we got in a round of MYSTERY RUMMY CASE 1 - JACK THE RIPPER which is an old favorite. I had not played with 4 before, it holds up surprisingly well! This is one of my most played card games of all time, Mike Fitzgerald has a special genius for creating games that hold up for hundreds and hundreds of plays.
All and all a Successful STRAC outing, thanks to everyone who attended!
CAM | ZAK | MICHAEL | DAVID