SdRA meeting and War (game...)

Today is Easter. That means Friday is holiday, too. Now, to prove that there's an universal conspiracy against my studies: friday I had just had dinner and was about to start a report I still had to finish. At the second I sit in front of the computer, the phone rings. A former university classmate calls saying that a group is having dinner at a pizza parlor and asking me to show up.

"Former" because when I went to Japan I kinda "lost" one year at my university. As I'm in the last year now, all the others in the group have graduated already. And the group was a part of the SdRA ("Sociedade da Régua Amarela". The name is just one we gave to the group. If someone who doesn't know Portuguese is curious about the meaning just run it through a online translator. Even Goggle will do).

So, the meeting. I didn't eat anything since I had just had dinner, but the conversations were nice. Meet old classmates, know how they are doing now (studying, employed, unemployed...) and lots of small talk. Remember old times and exchange info.

That was funny by itself, but some decided to extend it by going play some game at someone's house after. The game was War 2 (Link in Portuguese. Couldn't find any link in English. I wonder if it's a Brazilian game, or it has a different name in English... I saw a Risk that is similar, but not the same). Whoever have ever played the game know a little of what happened later.

It's almost impossible to finish it soon. It's a board game with a world map. So, you have to move your troops around territories trying to fulfill your objective, fighting other player's troops when needed. Fights are solved by dice up to 3 vs. 3 troops each time. Greater number wins.

I won't explain all the rules here...

Anyway, just some highlights:

• I started in the middle of Asia with Middle East, China and everything in between. As having majority of territories in Asia grants many extra troops at the next round, I was attacked by almost all the other players (as I could be attacked from almost any other continent except South America). Smashed, I had to hide and hope no one would kill me for good... And the balance of power was always oscillating like that. When one player ws becoming too powerful, he was smashed by the others...
  
  
• A friend was able to resist an air raid with about 8 planes, beating all of them before his troops were wiped out, but then he was raided by ground attacks... (in Vietnam) what I believe was the most unlikely thing to happen... Like an attacker rolling 3, 2 and 2 and the defender losing all by rolling 2, 1 and 1...
  
  
• Some Portuguese jokes like "taking Peru from another player" (hummm... I'm not telling the meaning of this one... just that Peru could be translated as "turkey"...)...
  
  
• There was a hot fight for Brazil for some rounds... I wasn't in that one. And another player was telling jokes about me not attacking and conquering Japan right beside China (there was no meaning according to my objective), like that I was not Japanese (well... I'm not) and was ignoring Japan...
  
  
• My objective was "destroy all yellow troops" (Dalai), and I was really close of accomplishing it. The problem is that I must destroy the last troop, but as that player was wiped from Europe (thanks to Wilson) and was cornered in Oceania another player was also attacking him to take Australia... AND HE GAVE THE LAST BLOW! Damn... The problem is that my objective was changed to "conquer any 24 territories"... and I almost sacrificed all my troops to destroy all yellow troops...
  
  
• Almost 5 am. Most players were tired and wanting to finish the game, except one (Osni). In that player's turn, he could complete his objective if he made some moves and was really fortunate. All players were hoping he'd finish the game, so it was pretty funny when a defending player was happy for being beaten in a territory... In the end he won. The same player who killed the last yellow troop...