Waluigi Wins!

As talked about here I'm going to Fan eXpo and was looking for a moustached costume. Almost everyone who chimed in on the subject thought Waluigi was the best of the provided options. Andrew kept trying to find something better (Von Kaiser from the Punch-Out series was his best find) and the King of All Cosmos holds a special place in my imagination. I don't have any muscles at all though, so I really couldn't pull off the bare-chested beatdown look. If the thought of pastel spandex was bad, this would probably be worse. Waluigi wears a lot of baggy clothes!

So, with Waluigi as the winner, what do I need? Well, the Mario Wiki describes Waluigi as follows:

"Waluigi usually wears a purple undershirt under black overalls, orange shoes, and a purple cap that covers short, brown hair. He has a large, pink nose, a thin mustache which is straight (horizontal) and pointed up at the edge (forming an L much as Wario's forms a W), and gray eyes, surrounded by rings that appear to be a result of insomnia. He also has long legs which sometimes work to his advantage in sports. The yellow symbol on his hat and gloves is a vertical mirror image of Luigi's "L" which forms a "Γ", just as Wario wears a "W" in contrast to Mario's "M". The "Γ" is actually the Greek letter Gamma, which is pronounced similarly to "G" (as in go)."

I placed an order with a Hong Kong company last week for a hat and gloves and they came in today. With the time zone difference they would have gotten the order on Thursday, so the fact it was here in Canada early this morning was pretty remarkable.

The hat's not perfect (it's a cross between a newsboy and a baseball cap while Waluigi's is more of a greek fisherman) but it's pretty close and it's definitely a lot better than anything I could have done on my own. The gloves are puffy and clearly designed as Marioesque gloves but are pure white so there's no yellow gamma on them. It'll be nearly impossible to play board games in them (small wooden cubes + big puffy fingers = disaster) but overalls should have a pocket in them for storing gloves. What's left after that?

• purple undershirt - matching the hat colour may be tricky (guess I need to wear it to the mall one day) but should be doable
• black overalls - getting big yellow buttons might not happen, but I figure a Mark's Work Wearhouse or some such should have black overalls of some kind
• orange shoes - I actually looked in every store in the nearby mall and the only orange shoes I found of any kind were for a 4 year old. I think my best bet is to go to the Crocs store, they have lots of ugly shoes...
• purple cap - CHECK!
• large, pink nose - I may try to find some Hallowe'en makeup
• thin moustache - CHECK!
• grey, insomnia eyes - my eyes aren't grey but I can definitely get the baggy part down
• white gloves - maybe I should find some fabric paint and add my own gammas, probably I will just run with what I have
• pointy ears - CHECK!

A trip downtown to find some Crocs, a shirt, and some overalls and I should be mostly good to go. Then I should probably find some games he's in and play them to get mannerisms of some kind down. Some internet searching did find that he pulls out the D-X crotch chop when he scores a goal in both of the Mario Soccer games. I haven't watched wrestling in 10 years or so, but back in the day I was a big D-X fan so I get a real kick out of Waluigi copying them.

WBC 2010 Day 6 Summary

Woke up very early (9am) to get to my Vegas Showdown heat. I think my team game must be cursed, as I once again finished third. This game featured someone buying the theatre on me when I had the only fancy lounge. He tried to build it for 12 points and we had to stop him and show the pre-req chart. He told me after the game if he'd known the rule he wouldn't have bought it and I would have won handily. At any rate, a second fancy lounge was sold on the same turn, leaving 2 left. They both came up at the same time when he didn't have 33 bucks on hand. I bought one for 33 and needed someone else to spite the other one. No one stepped forward (second place paid 42 for a space-age sports book instead) and he managed to buy the other one the next turn for 25. (Even though it was clear he'd pay all his money for it no one was willing to place a high bid just to bump him up.) There was a small but non-zero chance the game would end the turn he bought the fancy lounge (4 flips at 2-2-2 piles, so we needed 3 of a kind with some string pulling shenanigans) but it wasn't to be and he got the theatre placed and won as a result. I suspect the guy who finished second would have won if he'd spited the second fancy lounge.

And as a side note, early on I paid 12 for a high rollers room with 2 table games to go. The guy who bought the first table games paid a combined 46 (I think) for the next two table games to ensure I could never place it.

I ended up not filling either hotel or casino at game end but still came 3rd thanks to a large number of triangles.

Having spited me for choosing a team game the fates decided to smile on me for the rest of the day. I proceeded to play Tigris and Euphrates, Ra!, Race For The Galaxy, Le Havre, and Agricola and won them all. (Well, 2 games of Race of which I won one which is good enough to qualify for the playoffs.)

Tigris featured a game against 2 former champions and someone who made the finals against one of them. I've played Tigris maybe 5 times ever and have no real idea of strategy besides just getting colours I don't have. I ended up camping 3 different monuments for most of the game and scoring 8-9-9-11.

Tigris I at least have a rough idea of how to win... Ra! I have no concept. I don't know that I'd ever won a game of Ra! before in person in my life. I played the aggressive Ra!ing strategy and people kept buying the terrible lots I put up. I only failed in the Can't Stop phase once over the three epochs!

More details to come later, maybe. I also remembered I played Lost Cities against Eric Brossius on Wednesday and lost a pretty close and fun match.

WBC 2010 Day 5 Summary

Woke up 'early', played Vegas Showdown at 11, came 3rd. Scores were 50-49-49 and a lot of things conspired against me to cause the loss, though a lot of things went well too.

Ate at Applebees.

Played the Factory Manager heat and got a pretty solid win in. May try to make the semifinals, but it conflicts with Lord of the Rings: the Confrontation so I'm not sure.

Played an Agricola heat. Won a game featuring David Platnick and a couple other people. Platnick ended the game with 7 stone rooms and a half-timbered house but he had a lot of negative points due to not having any fields, grain, vegetables, sheep, or cows. I ended up winning by 5, including a full 4 points for cows of my own. Unfortunately there were 17 games played in this heat alone and top 16 overall advance, so I need to find a way to play another round if I want to make the semis it would seem.

Played Facts in Five. Lost pretty badly but had fun. Managed to get points for randomly guessing that there has been a Pope Steve and a Pope Theodore.

Ate at Cracker Barrel, which ended up being rather amusing. They seated us and it took them 5 minutes to notice we didn't have a server. I think the girl who ended up serving us (Joy) wasn't supposed to and just took pity on us. We ordered and 15 minutes later she came back and told Pounder and I that they were out of our orders and we needed to pick something else. When the new stuff eventually arrived Robb was missing bacon and cheese and dumplings, Pounder was missing apples and coleslaw, and I had extra weird balls. Pounder's iced tea got refilled as water. It was a real comedy of errors. Joy ended up giving us free dessert to go to try to make up for all the issues but I think we were more amused than bothered and it definitely helped that she seemed to care that we were getting randomly screwed. Contrast to the day before at Waffle House where we were randomly screwed and no one noticed or cared.

Played Can't Stop. I got the 12 but got no further. I went last and 2nd player had good turns so I felt I couldn't win unless I went all out. I fell. The table beside mine decided to literally play Can't Stop, only stopping if they'd locked out a column. One guy took it to the very illogical extreme and kept rolling after he'd locked out a column. He had gone from nothing to full 6 and full 8 and was two rolls away from full 7. Probably close to 50 people were gathered around cheering him on. He fell. 8(

Open gamed a game of Beep Beep! and a game of Kingsburg.

WBC 2010 Day 4 Summary

Slept in late again, first time I've had 3 full nights sleep in a row in a long time. Hopefully that has me nice and rested for the rest of the week, since I don't imagine it happening again. EVentually got up and open gamed with Robb and Pounder. We played Smallworld and then Tichu before their El Grande heat. I went up to the room to get Queen's Gambit and then wandered down for the Merchants of Venus demo but ended up being a little late and was unclear on exactly what was going on. I think I got the jist of it and can likely play a heat if I wanted to though.

Went to Queen's Gambit where I ended up playing the light side. I won the Jedi battle pretty handily but lost a lot of guards in the palace before I could get Obi-Wan out, which meant I couldn't block the entry way. Instead I ran Obi-Wan up to the top, stood him in the door to the throne room, and rapelled the rest of my team in. Unfortunately a destroyed droid ended up ripping through Obi-Wan despite him having 9 hitpoints left. (1 in 36 to get 4 hits? Run it twice! 1 in 6 to riposte? No way!)

Most of my Anakin cards were on the bottom of my deck so I didn't even have a chance to win, unfortunately. I eventually lost while still 3 squares away.

Next up: Le Havre. I ended up building 2 steel ships, a luxury liner, and shipping 7 steel and 10 coke. I hardly built anything but I ended up scoring 290 thanks to an awful lot of shipping. I also ran Feedlot to get 2 cows a harvest and shipped the extra ones whenever I got about 6. It was pretty sweet, and I won handily.

Waffle House finally came home with terrible service. My hashbrowns with ham in them also included some of Robb's onions, which made them unedible. I ordered an omelet which ended up being a brick of cheese with an egg wrapped around it. Also terrible. Robb got cheese on his hashbrowns which ended up being a slice of processed cheese slightly melted on top of them. In all, a terrible trip to the Waffle House and exactly what we expect from it.

We ran The Stock Market Game when we came back. I lost money. Pounder and Robb each made a small fortune. 8P

WBC 2010 Days 2 and 3 Summary

Sunday involved sleeping in until 11am and then heading out with Robb and Pounder to a nearby game store that has open gaming tables. Once there we played two games of Dungeon Lords and then had to leave when they closed.

We returned to the hotel and tried to sign up for WBC. We bought week passes which start on Monday and they were afraid we'd try to use our week pass to play in a pre-con on Sunday, so they told us to come back at 7 to pick them up. We just sat down at a table and played Hansa Teutonica. 7pm came, and the registration room had a padlock on the door. Oops?

So we went to eat at the Asian Bistro, and when we came back registration was open again and we picked up our badges. Then we played another game of Hansa Teutonica, met up with Daniel (guy who taught us Notre Dame 3 years ago!), and played a game of Le Havre.

Waffle House followed with a chocolate chip waffle, and then sleep.

Monday featured sleeping in until 1pm. This is not a good pattern for actual WBC, since I intend on playing things at 9am. Maybe. At any rate, we went to the open gaming library and pulled out a game to learn. Robb taught Pounder and I how to play Havana, which is apparently a card game version of Cuba which is a game none of us had ever played. We played 3 times and decided the game was not much fun and I doubt I'll ever play it again.

This took us to 4pm, which was the start of the San Juan event. The format here is you play 4 rounds and everyone with 3 wins advances to the single elimination bracket. I won my first two games pretty handily and then lost round 3.

Round 3 I was paired up against a young girl. As I was shuffling up to start Andy Latto came by and told both of us we'd drawn a difficult opponent, which turned out to be very true. She played a near optimal purple building game, and I had a decent Zumft game, which resulted in a 12 point loss.

So I had to win the 4th round to advance. When the game ended we ended up with exactly 40 points each (32+palace) and exactly 2 cards in hand which is the first tiebreaker. Second tiebreaker was number of buildings built which I won 12 to 11, so it was a very close game but I pulled it out. It turned out my opponent had a way to win for sure, but it involved prospecting into something cheap and good and he didn't want to risk doing so and having me dig deeper for the 1 palace in the deck which was my only way to come back. Turned out it was in my hand already, and the top of the deck was the exact card he needed, so it would have worked. It's unclear if he should have risked it or not.

30 people ended up advancing, which meant 15 games in the first SE round and then someone got a bye in the round of 16. (Preferentially to former champions.) I built a chapel fairly early in my round of 32 game and then played builder chicken with my opponent. He was going for a zumft strategy so he kept counciloring with a prefecture, often going above 7 cards with me at 8. So I just took null actions instead of building for him (I crafted once to give us each an inidigo, I sold once when I had no goods and he did...) and kept dropping things into my chapel. My hand was terrible so this was letting me cycle to try to find the statues which was my plan to win. Eventually he decided I was putting too much under the chapel and tried to accelerate to game end but it was too late. I'd found the buildings I wanted and ended up with a triumph bogen and a city hall to go with my 10 card chapel for a score of 55. People commented on how this was the highest score they'd seen, but Robb had scored 70 in round 3 earlier in the day.

I won my round of 16 match as well, with the game ending at near identical boards. You could match up 10 of our buildings exactly (library, smith, prefecture, zumft, indigo, silver, sugar, 3 tobacco/coffee) but I had an extra indigo and an archive. My opponent had nothing in those slots.

The quarterfinals featured a match against Rob Flowers (the El Grande GM). He went for a purple building strategy that didn't quite come home. I went for a Zumft strategy that did. (I built a turn 2 library and then after a turn had a hand of palace, city hall, Zumft, indigo.) After building the Zumft and palace and a couple silvers he was basically done.

The semifinals were against Bruce Reiff, a former champion and the guy who was running the show. He built a turn 1 gold mine which gave him a prefecture right away. I built tobacco which eventually dug me into a library. His second gold mine pull revealed both Zumfts, so it was a purple building day for both of us. We both pulled off pretty decent purple games, with Bruce using a crane at the end to go with his library+prefecture+carpenter combo and me using library+quarry+carpenter. I eventually did build a Zumft for 4 and a city hall for 10, but Bruce used the crane to bust out a late palace and triumph bogen that he otherwise couldn't have afforded. He had also been chapeling for a good chunk of the game (ending with 4 under it I believe) and won the game by 2 points. It was definitely close and I think we both played near optimally. The big difference was the early gold mine proc for prefecture. I've said it before and I'll say it again... I hate gold mine.

So, I ended up either 3rd of 4th depending on if Bruce won the finals or not. The other semifinal loser was the young girl who beat me in round 3. I was hoping for revenge in the finals but it was not to be.

Afterwards we went to the Texas Roadhouse where they gave me a menu featuring an 18 oz t-bone that they actually didn't have in stock. Boo! I ended up getting some other large steak. If you're going to eat breakfast, lunch, and supper all at once at 9pm you should make it count!

We returned to the hotel and learned to play Factory Manager and Mystery Express. Factory Manager is the new Power Grid which is actually a lot different and pretty fun. Mystery Express is a Clue variant that seemed like fun but maybe not the right game to play at 2 in the morning. Oh well.

Waffle House followed, though since I had eaten a big steak a couple hours ago I only had a large order of hashbrowns with ham cubes inside. Very greasy!

WBC 2010 Day 1 Summary

It took 6 hours to get to the US. This should take less than 2 hours. It turns out leaving Toronto on New Brunswick Day weekend is a baddish plan. Got in at 11:30. No time to do anything.

Now I'm going out for games. Pounder and Robb are making me leave.

WBC 2010 Prelude

The 2010 edition of the World Boardgaming Championships starts today with some pre-con events (mostly wargames). I will be spending most of the day in Pounder's car on the 8 hour drive from Toronto to Lancaster, Pennsylvania where there will be no board games played (even wargames) but I imagine there will be lots of board game discussion. One of the things sure to come up is what we intend to do over the course of the next week.

What do I intend to do? Well, it's summarized in a nice little chart below. It's probably too small to read in its embedded state, but I think you can click on it to enlarge it. Chances are I'll end up deviating from this plan a fair bit (Pounder has 8 hours to convince me of something, I'm sure) but here's my preliminary schedule.

Important things to note that went into the creation:

• Vegas Showdown is my team game, so my number one priority is to try to make the semifinals. There are two heats, so I must go to the first one and if I lose that I have to go to the second one. So, they're both on the schedule.
• Vegas Showdown round 2 is at 9am. Vegas Showdown semifinals are at 11pm. The same day. I must admit, I'm not a fan of that scheduling quirk. I hate waking up early.
• I've only scheduled two demos on here. This is my 4th year at WBC so I've attended demos for a lot of the events already so I'm running out of games that look interesting to me and I don't know them already. The two this year should be Merchant of Venus and Factory Manager.
• If you've read my summaries from previous years you'll know I keep wanting to play Empire Builder but never manage to. It didn't make the cut this year either. I really like crayon rails and I think I'm very good at it, so it seems like something I should really try to make room for. Conflicts this year for the three heats? {Merchant of Venus Demo + Queen's Gambit, Vegas Showdown heat 1, Factory Manager Demo + Factory Manager} Also, the semifinals are at the same time as Vegas Showdown heat 2... I may try to open game Factory Manager so I can squeeze it in.
• No Titan this year. Normally I try to play 1 game of both 2 and 4 player Titan for a few reasons. I like the game and never get to play it; I want to inflate their attendance numbers so it keeps being two events; I really like the Titan crowd. Alas, 2 player Titan starts with Vegas Showdown heat 1, so it's right out. I may try to squeeze in a 4 player game if something goes awry but it's not in the schedule for now.
• I put all 3 heats of Stone Age on here. I don't know why. I'll need to look things over and replace at least one of those. Especially if I win the first one!
• I got cocky and scheduled 4 different finals on here. Vegas Showdown, San Juan, Lord of the Rings: the Confrontation and Le Havre. Le Havre is the biggest stretch but I can't see waking up at 9am on a Saturday so there's no point in scheduling something realistic there.
• I really, really, really want to be the LIAR'S DICE CHAMPION OF THE WORRRRRRRRLD but I can't this year. It conflicts with the Vegas Showdown final, and I can't imagine not making that...
• In retrospect, I wish I'd picked Lord of the Rings or San Juan for my team game since it seems Vegas Showdown is just screwing everything up. But it is probably the game I'm best at.
• Mark my words... If I don't get into a game of Empire Builder this year I'm making it my team game next year. Then I'll feel obligated to play it!
• Look Mom, I left a hole to eat lunch on Wednesday and supper on Friday. Two whole meals! I feel like such a responsible young man now.

Now, at WBC I tend to have no free time at all for anything but sleeping and eating waffles at 3am, but I've been browbeat by Andrew and Jeff at work to try to make updates about what's going on throughout the week. I make no promises about the quality of the writing (it's likely to happen at 5am after the post-waffles game) but I'll try to get something up every day.

Fan eXpo 2010 Costume

Fan eXpo is a huge geek convention that happens in downtown Toronto at the end of August. It’s a combination convention which mashes together Comics, Sci-Fi, Horror, Anime, and Gaming into one large crazy event. I’m intending to attend this year for a few reasons:

• There’s a cool board game tournament.
• My sister is flying in from New Brunswick to attend.
• Awesome celebrity guests. (Spike, Al Calavicci, Batman, CAPTAIN JAMES TIBERIUS KIRK, Worf, Chewbacca, Leslie Nielsen, etc…)
• An excuse to dress up like an idiot and maybe not look like an idiot!

It’s the last part that’s of concern here today. I asked for options on Facebook for moustachey costumes I might be able to wear and got a couple responses (all from Tom P). Now, I’m not one to just make a decision, I need to make the right decision. I can’t really use a spreadsheet here, sadly, but I can set out some rules for what I’m looking for, provide the options I’ve found so far, and solicit feedback for better options. There is definitely a front-runner in my mind right now, but I’m open to other suggestions for now. Here's what I look like today:

To start with, what am I looking for? Well…

• I don’t intend to shave my moustache and don’t really want to trim or dye it. As such, the character should have a handlebar or related moustache.
• I don’t even have a stapler let alone a sewing machine, so the costume would either have to be readily available for rent/sale at a costume place or be relatively trivial to put together. (Especially since there’s only a month or so to go and I’m spending over a week of that at WBC!)
• If I’m going to look silly, I want to look good silly. This means it should be something many people would recognize (this is many people AT Fan eXpo, not the general population. I don’t care if people on the subway have no clue what I am) and be a reasonable attempt at a portrayal. Two years ago I wore a Star Trek uniform but didn’t have any Spock ears so I wasn’t really much of anything. That’s not cool and not the goal here.
• It would be nice if it was a character I actually like.

Snidely Whiplash

The stereotypical moustached villain. When I started posting pictures of my moustache on Facebook I got multiple comments about how I needed a tophat, a cape, and to start tying damsels to train tracks. How does Snidely (the character, not the rogue in my WoW guild) fair?

• My moustache is pretty much just what I need for this. The colour is wrong since Snidely has pure evil black hair, but that’s not a deal breaker.
• Top hats are surprisingly hard to find (and NOT cheap) but I’ve always wanted one so it wouldn’t be a waste. Beyond that I need some sort of trench coat or cape. A suit would also work, but I’d need a pitch black tie. I have black pants and black boots, so I’m good there. Nothing to really put together and just a few purchases makes this one very plausible.
• Does Snidely actually fit any of the Fan eXpo categories? He’s from an American cartoon from the 60s. He’s tangentially related to Comics and Anime I guess… I suspect he’d be recognizable, certainly I’d imagine most people would know who I was after I told them.
• I don’t really care for or against Snidely as a character. He’s just some guy from a show I kinda watched 20 years ago.

Random.Klingon

Klingons don’t curve their moustaches upwards, and most of them have beards. But they do tend to have long moustaches waxed to the side, so I think it would look factually correct. (General Chang had a moustache with no beard, for example, but he’s also bald with an eyepatch and grey hair…)

• Klingons tend to shave right under the nose, and they curl downwards into more of a fu-manchu than a handlebar. Also: black hair again.
• An awful lot of makeup work goes into becoming a Klingon. Andrew and I found a sci-fi store a while ago that I think sold ridges, so it would be doable. Getting the leather suit/armor would probably be a lot more complicated. It’s certainly possible a costume shop (or the sci-fi store) would have a Klingon suit, but if I couldn’t find one premade I doubt this could be done.
• Done right, everyone would know what I was. I bet there will be other Klingons there though, so done wrong I’ll just look silly silly instead of good silly. Certainly sci-fi.
• I am a huge Star Trek fan, but I never really liked the Klingons. Vulcans, Ferengii… Awesome! Klingons… Meh.

Waluigi

Luigi’s arch-nemesis from many Nintendo puzzle/sports games.

• Waluigi’s moustache takes a near 90 degree turn that’s simply not possible to replicate. I can make my hairs curve, I can’t make them shoot off in a random direction. His moustache is thin and points up though, which are the two things my moustache does well. Also: black hair again.
• I have pointy ears. Beyond that, I’d need to get a purple hat with a L logo. A purple shirt. Black or deep purple overalls. Orange pointy shoes. White gloves, also with L logos. The shoes I have real doubts about but the rest should be doable with a little effort. Also, bright pink nose? Really?
• Who doesn’t know who Waluigi is? He definitely fits into the gaming category.
• Waluigi was introduced to the Mario games after I stopped really playing them, so I never really formed an opinion of him. One thing I can say, though, is I have always hated Luigi with a fiery passion…

The King Of All Cosmos

King from the Katamari Damacy series. He’s a little over the top…

• As a cartoon his moustache looks painted on, but it definitely is a handlebar. Downside, the Knig also has a soul patch and mutton chops which I can’t feasible get so I’d either need to go with fake beard/real moustache or be a little unauthentic with just the moustache. Also: black hair.
• Wow, there’s a lot going on here. The second image above is from a couple that actually made their own costumes well in advance with actual sewing and such. (Aside: I really wish I had a Queen Of All Cosmos…) I’d need to build a gigantic coloured tube to attach to my head, and find a really flamboyant collar. Speaking of flamboyant, that shirt and those pants are so far over the top they’ve circled all the way around. I might be able to find pastel coloured shirts and spandex at some thrift store that would be half-decent, but I have real doubts about getting authentic enough.
• Fortunately, as long as the tube is good enough and the rest is close I have no doubts anyone who’d played a game in the series would know who I was. (And random people on the subway would have NO chance, which is sweet in its own way.) I’m not actually sure I’d be comfortable enough to wear spandex pants in public, but I could see being willing to try.
• Katamari Damacy is an amazing game. In every sense of the word. The King of All Cosmos is awesome. Playing in the board game tournament with a gigantic tube on my head might be hard, though, and if I took it off I’d just be a dude in pastel tights…

Don Paolo

The bad guy from the Professor Layton series of Nintendo DS puzzle games.

• He’s from the DS, so he’s not in a lot of detail. Most importantly, he has the handlebar moustache. Less good, he has a soul patch and a really insane hair style that would be hard to replicate without a wig. The only option that doesn’t demand black hair, but it’s still darker than my hair.
• Black gloves, shirt and tie, purple overcoat, orange pants… All things I can probably buy pretty much anywhere. The lack of detail from the DS means I can probably get a way with a lot of things as long as I have the broad strokes right. Unfortunately, one of those strokes is that crazy hair! Without the hair, I just wouldn’t be Don Paolo.
• I have doubts that even people who have played the first game would know who I was. Definitely obscure, but the people who would get it would probably think it was awesome. I’m just not sure how many people that would be. A failure to get the broad strokes right would really relegate me to silly silly land.
• I’ve only played the first game and didn’t really remember he was in it. I really liked the game (it was a little easy) but not so much the bad guy.

Any opinions or other suggestions? I’m open to ideas here!