Can i remind people that in internet games they need to bolden the tube names please. Its not like that hasn’t been pointed out a million times already in the Mornington Post. :rolleyes:
I’ll kick of with Camden Town (Bank Branch) and since we’re playing the Winter Variant i call Leaves on the Track
Sorry, but Leaves on the Track is eliminated by the 2002 PFI Implementation Protocol (surely you’ve not forgotten Ken’s expletive-ridden interruption of the round-table discussion?). So I claim a free Oyster card, and call Debden.
**debden ** eh? Big old trip out there. I think we need to get back into town here - so using the waterloo and city arrangements (which is now a tube line, before you all start) I’m going with
Bank/Monument
Chalk Farm
Is it too much to expect that players of the game can have at least a rudimentary knowledge of the rules?They’re perfectly straightforward and whilst we do everything to encourage the newbies,it does make life very difficult when you have someone attempting to play who has obviously no idea what they’re doing.
:wally
I agree that at least a perusal of the first dozen or so volumes of the abridged regulations would help keep things moving.
Brixton
Earl’s Court
Brixton was ridiculous. I can’t see any way of avoiding MC in a Syrian monoeuvre now, but I did my best. I hope I am wrong, but if not, I will say: [UL]bloody middle class amateurs[UL].
I’m surprised you forgot that post-1968 stations are exempt from the Charing Cross confliction.
Temple
Excellent! The Jefferson amendment… of course! Now I can see what you were getting at. Incidentally, I don’t know if you’re interested in this kind of trivia, but if you check your Ribden’s Annotated Classic Games (74 edition) you’ll find Game 15, Madlow .v. Djordevich, from the 72 Paraguay Masters Tournament, in which Madlow (the old rascal!) played what is *technically * a Jefferson manoevre, some 13 years before the Jefferson was officially defined and accepted as an amendment to the MA rules! I can’t reproduce the whole game, but the key exchange goes like this:
[ 1970 WMCF Tournament Rules; Ngyang opening; stirrups declared for motions west or Parks; cross-waters barred ]
After which Djordjevich knew his prospects were limited, and he resigned seven moves later after a rather tedious exchange concerning Bayswater which didn’t fool anybody. But just look at that 18th move after the Circle Line bar! Not only was it heralded at the time as something of a stroke of genius, but in strict technical terms it constitutes a Jefferson! How’s that for being ahead of your time?! But then again, that was Madlow all over. Never won a thing, of course, but a terrific player and if you ask me one of the great characters of the modern game.
Terrific player, I will grant you, but lacking style. Compare that slick motion with that of Lord Ashenockerbury, who would toy with the intricacies of the Earl’s Court platform-allocation requirements, leaving his opponents to shuttle from one terminus to another. He really was a spectator’s player. Naturally, he was doomed with the introduction of the Fleet Line, which made his northbound permissions go the way of the geographic route map. But just to watch Pathe’s surviving clips of him in action really do suggest that today’s players wouldn’t be able to touch him.
However, to return to the game, with the Off-Peak Expiration revolution being in play, I’ll cut my losses with Liverpool Street.
As a complete novice (and a 'Merkin) who is just following along, watching the Masters…it seems to me that the obvious next move would be Shepherd’s Bush. Is this too simple a move for mid-game? Or would **Preston Road ** be tactically a superior choice?
Preston Road would be a high-risk strategy. It’s a tight rope to walk between Hammersmith and North Acton, with the all-too-obvious pitfalls in between.
Assuming you therefore go for the steady centre-fairway of Shepherd’s Bush, I’ll call Paddington.
Leads into a classic Womble-McKifferty loop with Arnos Grove
The next few moves should flow thick and fast 
Sure will…
New Cross Gate
(and I know what you think I think you won’t play next, but you’d be wrong)
Welcme to the game, Silenus. While Shepherd’s Bush would be a perfectly competent move, a little thought shows that it fails strategically to either South Harrow or Warwick Avenue, both of which leave you rather short of endgame options (unless you want to wade into the rather sticky complexities of stations featuring repeated vowels).
The other slight mark against SB at this stage is that if someone should happen to declare Line ends revoked, then you are left rather vulnerable to Mile End. You see?
However, please don’t feel disheartened. You wouldn’t be the first to get snared in the Mile End trap. I refer you to the fiasco in the semi-final of the 86 World Chamipionships when no less a figure than the mighty Szefranski, well ahead on points against the little-favoured Durble, completely overlooked the line ends / Mile End option and consequently lost the game! There is a particularly witty write-up of this wonderful match in ‘Tales From The MC Championships’ by D.K. Wykeham, which I recommend highly.
I think I see. Thank you. Then accordingly, still playing a very conservative game, you understand, my next move would be…Hackney Wick? That can’t be right! Let’s see…mutter…carry the two…nope. Still looks like **Hackney Wick ** to me. What am I missing here?
How long do we let him carry on perplexed before we point it out to him?
OK, I’m sick of people skirting round the obvious. I’m going for Elmstead Woods
You do realise what you’ve gone and done, don’t you? Now I can play the Commissioner’s Exemption (Simpson vs Takahashi, Berlin 1983) on a semi-strile, by moving Bank. You are in brabbers for the next two moves now, unless you can somehow manage a reverse half-shunt and the loss of a blue token. Too easy.
Southwark Bridge Road opening conduits to Lambeth,Victoria and Vauxhall
I declare a state of Indulgence in Zones 1 and 2
Hi Silenus. Please don’t feel discouraged! Yours is a common source of confusion among newcomers. Although it has been declared that we are playing according to Marble Arch rules, you will note that Goldhawk Road has already been played without anyone declaring Bassingtons Declined. This can only mean that the Uttoxeter Conventions are in force. Never forget the distinction between rules and conventions!
Hackney Wick would be a fine, fine move if we were playing according to several of the other conventions, such as Double Parks or Mansion House Wild. However, having adopted Uttoxeter Conventions, there are no limits on rotational cross-water motion and Fairfax’s Loop is void. This being so, I fear any attempt to visit Hackney Wick would be answered with Chiswick Park! This produces two consecutive cadence K stations, which pretty much kills your chances of winning.
There are several alternative options. Tower Gateway is a legal move if rather cheeky-for-the-sake-of-it, and Giles’s choice, though perhaps obvious, nonetheless has its merits. I’d have been tempted to play Theydon Bois myself, thereby evading any attacking moves North without falling foul of the dreaded Consecutive Wood rule (the only part of the Uttoxeter system that, as it happens, I don’t like).