This time Richard sat next to him, theoretically to advise, but Chris had picked up the game very quickly, and really didn't need much assistance at all. If any. It meant that I was sitting at the end of the table for once, giving me a different view of the board.
It wasn't nearly such a nice layout as last time. No good numbers with both wood and clay, for instance. Becky (white) placed first, Daniel (brown) was second. Richard (red) went third, and they all chose obvious spots from the number perspective, with three resources. Chris, playing blue, didn't need any advice to take yet another useful place for numbers. Then it was me, with my usual orange pieces. I couldn't easily get all five resources, so - as I so often do - I decided to do without sheep. It looked as if there would be plenty for trading, anyway. Wood looked as though it might be in short supply, so I opted for an intersection that included wood-5, and was pleased that it also had clay-10 - the best combination of the two - although the third was a 2. I then opted for two different numbers, plus 12, to give me good access to ore and wheat. But, naturally, took the cards from the wood-clay-wheat hex.
On the way back everyone did what they could to choose the best numbers and/or resources, but I'm not sure that anybody was entirely satisfied with their choices. On balance, I thought Chris probably had the best spots, number-wise.
With plentiful ore and wheat, the game started with cities being built. 11s were rolled rather more than they should have been, statistically speaking, which enabled Daniel to build some roads and gain the longest street card.
Up to that point, Chris had been in the lead with five points; Daniel now equalled him, since he had three on the board. But since Becky and I both had four, and Richard had three, it was all pretty even so far.
Richard made an attempt to built a long street going across the board, stopping Daniel from making his also go from coast to coast, but Daniel managed to block him and extend his own advantage. It seemed pretty certain that nobody was going to challenge Daniel from the perspective of the longest street on this Catan board.
Chris had just crept into the lead again with six points, while Daniel and I had five, Becky and Richard had four.
The next picture didn't come out so bright, for some reason, but should still be viewable. I took this one after Daniel built the last of his settlements, giving him seven points, and realised that he would have to start building cities:
Chris was just ahead, still, with eight points (and plenty of building spots remaining). I had seven, and so did Becky who had a sudden spate of being able to build. Richard only had four points on the board, but had played four knight development cards by this stage, which gave him the 'largest army' and thus six points in all.
Chris was primarily being targetted with the robber, as were Becky and I; Daniel was buying cards since he kept picking up sufficient to give him more than seven in his hand, but not enough to build a city.
Then Daniel's turn came round again. He managed, with some careful trading, to build his first city. So now he had six points on the board, plus the longest street card, giving him eight in all. Richard, Becky and I also had eight each, and Chris had nine. It was really remarkably close....
... except that Daniel then revealed that he had FOUR victory point cards:
He said he'd been quite annoyed when he picked up the first one, as he'd hoped for a knight - wanting to gain the largest army. When he got the second he was quite pleased. When he had the third and fourth, he was pretty amazed.
So Daniel shot ahead to 12 points and won the game, much sooner than we had expected a victory.
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