1 Game of Puerto Rico

Yitzchak, often member of our game group, just got married this afternoon. Mazal Tov.

Nadin stopped by on the way home from the wedding to play a game of Puerto Rico with Rachel and me.

We played with the usual set of buildings, except for one: Poorhouse 2/1 - At the end of any Building phase in which you have 1 or 0 doubloons, take a doubloon. It looked decent enough, but no one ended up buying it, so I can't tell you how it worked out.

I played corn, and I won by a point: 64 to Nadine's 63 to Rachel's 55. I had an early coffee monopoly, successfully trading two coffees before Rachel got coffee going. She never got to trade it, however.

Selecting trade goods in a three-player game

In a three player game, the first person to activate a trade good (coffee or tobacco) wants to ensure that their right-hand opponent (RHO) activates the next trade good. This is because they're likely to want to activate whatever you haven't. Then, when your left-hand opponent (LHO) activates a trade good, they're going to activate what your RHO chose (being on your LHO's left) rather than what you chose (being on your LHO's right).

Nice theory, but unfortunately you have more influence over what your LHO does than your RHO. As a result, I kind of forced Nadine on my left to choose first. Naturally, she chose tobacco, and Rachel, on my right then chose coffee. That gave me a headache (which I managed to survive) and Nadine a tobacco monopoly.

For the record, if your LHO chooses first, you want to choose what they chose, not the other good. If you choose the other good, your RHO will choose the same good as yours, not as your LHO's. This gives your RHO a monopoly, but at least you're in front of your LHO producing the same good. If your RHO selects first, you want to select the other good, which is just ace all around.

All of this naturally assumes that no one is choosing both trade goods. Which happens.