Hey Mangetout - what do you mean by giving away some of my strategy! I was thinking of an interesting little ploy featuring the platform doors rule, but there’s no point now! (No harm, no foul, but please try to be a little more discreet in future!).
Anyway, we now have Waterloo. Good!
I now play West India Quay and ruff District Line doors from Blackfriars to Elm Park. An interesting twist, yes?
Sorry about that. Salve to my conscience though is the fact that even with the cat out of the bag, there’s plenty of scope there for an experienced player such as yourself to amass a significant strategic advantage. I’ll say no more though.
Oh, what delight!
This takes me back to my school days, truly. Oh, the joy it must have been for dear Professor Fforbes-Perthwaite to find a colonist fascinated with this beautiful game. How innocent and childish I must have looked sitting crosslegged on his office floor, reading Stovold’s seminal work till gone three. I learned a great deal in that office, including some novel uses of a toast-rack, but that is neither here nor there.
I blush to admit to the founding of the Seventeenth Mornington Crescent College Convocation at my own beloved university. I remember all too well the nights we spent going at it, the swift back-and-forth of it. I remember the rooms we reserved at the Student Union and the time Caleb Farnsworth spilled an entire pot of chocolate over Turpington’s Tactics – all ten volumes. I almost feel bad for old Cheesy Caleb; he still can’t see out of that left eye of his.
But my reminiscences are old hat to experienced players, and while the new sheen wore off the game for me even before I graduated (barely, thanks to a few too many all-week sessions; I once filled in an entire blue book with Krznyev’s Gambit rather than the detailed events between the taking of the Alamo and the massacre of Goliad), I’ve been absent from any serious games for years. It’s like playing for the first time (albeit with a creditable rules library) all over again!
Being a lover of relatively new innovations, I’ll knock in Themylthorpe’s famous gambit from the 1948 John Ink Memorial games. I think you’ll agree that with Smelting’s additional rules in 1978 I can still play Charing Cross despite possessing both legs (my father, obviously, reached Lieutenant Commander prior to his retirement and I am over 5’4")
Sorry, Little Plastic Ninja, but no, you can not play Charing X. Perhaps Mangetout can adjudicate here. LPN you are missing the point of my having previously declared Bassingtons and then making sure to include Upney in my ruff. This creates a de facto straddle block on tri-hued stations, so dear old Charing X is out. If any further evidence is needed, I refer Mangetout (or any other adjudicator) to page 223-224 of Tringham’s ‘Interpretations & Rulings In Tournament Play’ 2005 (revised).
Otherwise, LPN, may I say how much I appreciated your taking the time to describe your fond memories of this wonderful game.
Hm. I admit to being a bit out of date, but my most recent copy of Crescent Quarterly indicated that the tri-hued stations flip order if Bond Street has not been played – but you’re right, that does imply a blockage at Oxford Circus. Are we or are we not using McClaggen’s stirrup?
Though the old Scot is a bit of a daftie…
Regardless, I will bow to the adjudicator and, assuming a cancellation of my previous move, will counter with Seven Sisters.
And thank you, ianzin. We played a local version, in fact, but just for a doddle between classes to keep our skills honed.
Crumhorns!
does the obligatory shimmy
I’ve got a bit of a tear in my eye now at LPN’s recollections, bringing to mind as it does my childhood in Singapore, the thatched roofs reaching close to the ground to keep the sun off, our little wooden trains and hand-drawn cardboard maps. Of course we played a very cut-down version of the Game in those days, with no Mopsy and no Nips and only three lines in operation, but I firmly believe that drilling in the basics is the best thing for under-eights. Old Mrs Bradbrooke used to make book on the games, and I must admit it was only in recollection that I realized how often I used to be out of pocket money, although it was worth every Singaporean cent.
Burlington’s book hadn’t been rendered into the Initial Teaching Alphabet at the time, which was only a good thing as it was frankly execrable (as was the entire ITA fad), so although we had to master all of the peculiar spellings it was pure gold once it had been thoroughly grasped. Whoever scored the most blue tokens at lunchtime was allowed to hand around the milk, I remember.
Anyway, Mrs B always dinned into us the virtues of the Switchback, so I’ll keep the ball rolling with Victoria. Bunny-hops are disallowed.
LPN - thank you for being so good-natured about it. And Seven Sisters was a better move anyway!
So now friend Malacandra has opted for Victoria. Which, of course, is not only a Tube station but also a mainline rail station and a bus and coach station. This being so, I revoke Bassingtons, declare myself in Stirrups (yes, it’s legal!) and play… Chalfont & Latimer!
Bassingtons revoked, eh? Very well. I declare consecutive, and invoke the Disused Platform rule, with Shoreditch! It’s a bus link these days, if my reading of the East London Line is correct.
That reminds me – Sunspace, I’d really adore playing with the TTC sometime, but from what little I’ve seen it doesn’t quite have the intricacies of MC. The game’s Victoria Park, isn’t it? I admit to some interest in the subtleties of the escalator-construction tactics…
I have to agree, ianzin – especially now that you’ve revoked Bassington’s, Seven Sisters is even better. Shoreditch is putting me into a bit of a corner, though.
I’m going to have to invoke Cartwright’s Colours. That’s right – riverboat services are wild, ladies and gentlemen. With a north ricochet off Blackfriars I’m safe and sound at St. Pancras.
Bassington’s revoked! That reminds me of that famous exhibition game, previous to the Berlin Olympics, which launched the infamous Prague so-called WorldConference due to a similar move. They even tried to spin off a Paris-Metro game! Thank Og WorldWar2 put an end to that folly!
Well, I’ll try to keep up with you folks, though I’m admittedly a newby at this game (I only started playing 15 years ago). So, to fend off the Worthington Maneuver I’ll play Kew Gardens. And revoke left spins.
You’re quite right; the Toronto subway by itself just doesn’t have the combination of topological complexity and constraint that makes for a good MC pitch. I admit that if you add the streetcar lines, there is some promise, but at present the only beastie in the Toronto area that might qualify is the network of arterial roads. And, of course, that’s a whole other ballgame. So to speak.
Back to the Noble Pursuit.
No left spins. That means that platform doors are valid again, doesn’t it?
Canada Water. (Yes, I know.)
Ah, Canada Water! Splendid stuff! Splendid! Alas, my dear Sunspace, I too have read Waskowski’s Advanced Tactics For Rotational Play, and I shall not be obliging you with any move that would permit a Waskowski Straddle!
I now invoke the Fossingham Protocol and play Highbury & Islington.
Exactly what I discovered on my journeys there. I’m sorry, Toronto, but your subway system is far too straightforward and simple to navigate.
Austin city roads, though… we had endless fun, especially considering the changing limits and the three-name rule. Five-way intersections make for, I’m sure you’d agree, a delightful complexity to spins and turns.
ianzin, the Fossingham protocol? That blows my original move out of the water, I’m afraid. Still, it opens up a number of doors to me. I’ll take my favorite: a south turn to Acton Central, but don’t think I’ve forgotten the Waxham feint. I’m counting my tokens carefully, my friend… you might want to check your tide tables before moving again.
That’s good. That’s very good.
A bit stuck.
Um. Not a lot of room for manoeuvre.
Cyprus.
Hah! Excellent news for me!
I’ll double my stakes and play Knightsbridge for an Iron Cross!
AND declare ARISTOCRACY!
West Silvertown, and I declare Stibbs wild.
Bother. I’m going to be stuck south of the river unless… unless… yes!
I Leapfrog* via the DLR and land triumphantly at Tower Gateway!
[sub]*Hobson’s p 213, footnote 4: “A Player may Leapfrog if he is using the Commonwealth Exception and is capable of dual-voltage operation.” I believe this is an early way of describing what we would now call “Overground” operation, but of course my book predates that terminology.[/sub]
Smart move, Sunspace, but on this occasion I was ready for you…
Theydon Bois!
Gentle, friendly correction: you mean Commonwealth Exclusion. Commonwealth Exception pertains to reversals crossing tri-name locations. Easy mistake to make - done it myself a few times and lost appeals accordingly!
I’m sorry, ianzin, but isn’t that move illegal when Bassington’s revoked and *left turns are illegal * as well? After all, the consonants outnumber the vowels in Theydon Bois…