State of Play: Battle Line without tears

 

 

With T still away overseas, I caught up with B at my local watering hole for a few quick rounds of Battle Line (GMT Games, 2000). This time I made a concerted effort not to stray down the rabbit hole of probability, or at least not much further than the entrance (see my previous ramblings on this excellent game here.

Obligatory beer not pictured.

Three rounds were played, the first going to B. I managed to eek out a win in the second, and in the third game, the odds ended up playing us both for fools, with the game ending in a draw. I don’t often win playing one-to-one against B, so I was happy with the 1-1-draw result. I went lean on tactics cards all three rounds, trying to increase my odds of gathering the particular cards I sought to complete the tricks I thought I had the best chance of winning. B is harder to read than T when it comes to what cards he’s hoping to nab, and I made his win easier by conceding a battle of my three 1s against his three 2s, then pulling the Mud tactic card almost immediately, which would have allowed me to stretch that particular battle to a four-card trick, when two of the other three 2s were already on the table. I think this would have only prolonged the inevitable, though, so it didn’t stick in my craw too badly.

In the third game, B had the Red 9 and 10 on one position, and the Red 6 and 7 on another and I sat on the Red 8 for at least two-thirds of the game, which left me in a position to sue for peace (bring the game to a draw), when he played a Red 5 with the 6 and 7, matching my Yellow (Lemon?) 5-6-7 suit.

Battle Line is probably still my number one favourite filler game. The simple line structure and rather arbitrary allocation of card strengths as designated by unit types shouldn’t be able to capture the theme of Greek city-state era land warfare as well as it does. And you have to love a game that has elephants.