On the nature of Help

For the most part, in whatever actions people take, they are trying to help.  Sometimes they are trying to help themselves, many times they are trying to help others.  This desire to help is one of the most fundamental and universal features of our being.

Unfortunately there is a universal truth about being helpful that is almost universally forgotten.  Help is almost never successfully delivered without the consent of the recipient.  The entity that you are trying to help must be willing to receive the assistance.

In my case the immovable force that seems to be unwilling to be helped is at work.  Corporate entities are intractable forces that with embedded processes and an idea that holding to process is more important than successful delivery of goals on schedule.

Look, I get that processes are there for a reason, and that without these processes there would be no accountability and without that, everything would eventually fall apart.  My response is this.  These <bleep> processes have not been followed at any point of this project so far, so why the <bleep> is it so critical to hold to your guns now?

The answer to the preceding question is simple.  We are getting close to delivery dates, and everyone knows that things are going to be either delayed or released badly.  As a result, everyone is so busy covering their respective arses that they can't see where they are going, or what they could do to fix it.

Risk avoidance is one thing.  Like anything else, it can be taken too far,

Enough of that .  Game report catch up.

Game report day 11: Fluxx
This is one of the best little filler games out there.  Fluxx is a card game that starts out with one rule: draw one card, play one card.  Then things change.  The cards you play will inevitably change the rules.  Sometimes there are specific actions to take.  Other times the cards you play will change the Goal to win the game.  Everything is in a state of , well, Fluxx.  This game plays just as well with 2-3 players as it does with 8.  And if you get extremely bored with the original Fluxx game, there are a myriad of themed versions such as Zombie, Space, stoner, Eco, Family, Monty Python, and more.

Game report Day 12: Evolution, Settlers of Catan
On to the weekly Tuesday Meetup.  I had brought Evolution the previous two weeks, so I had intended on bringing something different, but then I discovered that there was an important rule that I had missed in the earlier playtesting so I wanted to run one more game with a larger group.  In practice the rule change affected game play about as I expected.  It did indeed speed the overall game up (not necessarily a good thing), and it made recovery of players from an extinction event much faster (definitely a good thing).  I won this game, but I can't brag too much as the other players were new, and not particularly aggressive.
After Evolution was done, the table scattered and I took the opportunity to eat some tasty yum yums.  Shortly after that, a trio of new players wandered into the Meetup.  They were new to the Meetup and to gaming in general, as was indicated by their wandering over to the game shelf and selection of the only game they recognized, Catan.
Some hobby gamers look down on Catan these days regarding it as kind of passe.  The more open minded regard it as one of the great gateway games and a modern classic.  I am of course one of the latter.  At the host's request, I accepted the task of teaching the newbies how to play Catan.  The game went very smoothly and was remarkably close.  I ended up losing, albeit barely.  It was one of those aggravating losses where you know that just one slightly better dice roll, or one different card draw, could have given me the win. Ultimately the important thing is that fun was had by all, and it is likely that the game world just got three new regulars.

Game report Day 13: Tiny Epic Galaxies
This third installment in the Tiny Epic series from Gamelyn Games is something that I have been wanting to get to the table for a while.  This night was the inaugural play with my wife and I.  I will need to play it again with her soon, as she was rather out of it on this evening.  The game itself it pretty fun.  You roll a set of dice that determine what actions you can take, moving ships, gathering resources, advancing tracks, etc.  You goal is to get victory points.  These are primarily acquired by colonizing planets.  In addition, with each planet you successfully colonize, you get access to additional actions and abilities can can accellerate you progress to the final goal.  More to come on this one later.

Game Report Day 14: Moose in the House
This is another Gamewright card game that my wife picked up.  It looked cute and was another game that could be played with the kids.  In addition, this was an opportunity for my son to try and teach me how to play the game.  He made an admirable go of it.  The goal of the game is to keep wandering moose (plural mooses or meese) out of your house.  Complete exclusion is generally not possible, so you need to just do a better job of it than your opponents.  To that end, you get doors to close up open rooms, and moose traps.  You also can use offense as your defense, adding more rooms to your opponents house to defend.  When all the meeses were settled, I ended up winning by tiebreaker.

Now back to work, staring out my level 42 windows, wishing I was somewhere else...  Enjoy all!