9/2/2026 – Berkshire Gamers Session Report #26-35

14 at the UNO Park Community Center for a night honoring pioneer American game designers Sid Sackson & Alex Randolph.

9/2/2026 @ UNO Park Community Center

IN: Steve & Sandy, Sean, Tim, Zach, Chris, Julie, Rob, Reimi, Cady, Kelby, Fred & Janet, Beth 
ON OUR TABLES:
Sid Sackson Games
Can’t Stop (led by Sean) 1980 push your luck classic dice game where players roll four d6 and pair them off to advance their pawns, claiming columns on a stop-sign shaped board.
Choice/Can’t Stop Express 2X (led by Sandy) originally a paper and pencil game in one of Sid’s books published in Germany as Choice/Einstein in 1989. Split 5 d6 into 2 pairs of sums and a crucial 5th die. Plan your probabilities as the scoring has cruel penalties but generous rewards.
I’m the Boss (led by K-ban) 1994 classic deal making, negotiation and backstabbing free for all. The order of play is very simple, playing more like a card game than a board game. There are six investors (divided up among the players) that must try to complete ten to fifteen deals and split the profits of those deals in a manner agreeable to all parties. Each deal lists how many investors are required, and which ones MUST be part of the deal. Each deal is worth somewhere between $6 million and $30 million. The game ends somewhere between the 10th and 15th deal, and the person with the most money wins the game.

Each player starts the game with five influence cards in his hand. The dollar marker begins on any open space. The player can choose to make the deal on that space or roll the single die. If he rolls, he moves the dollar sign and has the option of making the deal shown on the space where he lands. He can then choose to try to to make the deal, or he can pick up three influence cards.
Once a deal is proposed, the real fun starts. Any player (in any order) can interrupt the negotiations by playing influence card(s). These cards fall into one of the following categories:
– Clan cards: These are relatives of the investors who can be used in place of one of the main investors to make a deal. Unlike the investors, though, each clan member can be used to finalize only one deal and is then discarded.  Travel cards: Allow you to break up a deal by sending an investor or clan member on vacation.
– I’m the Boss cards: These cards allow you to take over the negotiations that are in progress. You can use your power to re-negotiate the deal to benefit yourself or just flush the whole deal right down the toilet.
– Recruitment cards: Must be played in groups of three, and allow you to steal an investor from another player. (Other clan members cannot be recruited).
– Stop card: Can be played directly after a travel card, Boss Card, or Recruitment cards to negate the effects of that card.
Once the negotiations have opened, since any player may lay down a card at any point, you must decide when you feel it’s the right time to jump in. Jump in too early and your best influence cards can be wasted. Jump in too late and the deal will close before you know what hit you.
The dominant element of this game is the player interaction during negotiations. With hardly any guidelines for negotiations, the negotiation process is a lively give-and-take session filled with straightforward wheeling and dealing, unprovoked backstabbing, outright greed, last-minute desperation, and even some unexpected camaraderie, all in good fun (well, most of the time).

Our game ended on Deal #12 as a 2 was rolled on a d6. 
Samarkand/ Bazaar II (led by Tim) 1980 desert trading game. Players visit nomad camps, oases and trading posts in a race to turn 200 Piasters into 500 through buying, trading and selling 6 different types of goods. We played on the board from the recent Samarkand Bazaar which includes the author’s Bazaar, Samarkand and Business – all in one box.
Sleuth (led by Sean) 1971 deduction game – identify the missing gem (of 36) by type, setting and color using a 54-card  search deck.  This was part of the classic 3M game series.
Acquire (led by K-ban)  Classic 1964 hotel chain building game where each player strategically invests in businesses through buying up to 3 shares of a chain per turn, trying to retain a majority of stock. As the businesses grow with tile placements, they start merging, giving the majority stockholders of the acquired business sizable bonuses, which can then be used to reinvest into other chains. All of the investors in the acquired company can then cash in their stocks for current value or trade them 2-for-1 for shares of the newer, larger business. The game is a race to acquire the greatest wealth.  We played on the recent opulent 60th Anniversary edition – which includes money on heavy poker style chips, the option for ‘tycoon mode’ tertiary bonuses for mergers and optional extra rules that were found in Sid’s notes. This was one of the original 3M bookshelf games.
Alex Randolph Games
Sisimizi (led by K-ban) 1996 connection game where players are competing ant colonies that are attempting to link all of their ant mounds together. Players attempt to create chains of ants from one ant mound to the next while also trying to cut off other players’ chains.
Raj/What the Heck?/Beat the Buzzard (led by Zach)  1988 classic bluffing game. Rarely is a game broken down to its barest elements like this one. Players are given an equal deck of bidding cards from one to fifteen. Each turn, a prize tile is randomly selected from a pool. A prize tile is worth either positive or negative points (from -5 to +10). Each player is attempting to gather the most positive points from these prizes. Players secretly select one of their remaining bidding cards and reveal them simultaneously. For positive prizes, the highest card gets the prize; For negative prizes, the lowest card is stuck with the prize. However, if two people play the highest (or lowest) card, they cancel each other out and the prize goes to the next in line. The highest total score after all fifteen prizes are awarded wins. Good mindless fun with much laughter.
Steve

14 at the UNO Park Community Center for a night honoring pioneer American game designers Sid Sackson & Alex Randolph. 9/2/2026 @ UNO Park Community Center IN: Steve & Sandy, Sean, Tim, Zach, Chris, Julie, Rob, Reimi, Cady, Kelby, Fred & Janet, Beth  ON OUR TABLES: Sid Sackson Games Can’t Stop (led by Sean) 1980 push your…

14 at the UNO Park Community Center for a night honoring pioneer American game designers Sid Sackson & Alex Randolph. 9/2/2026 @ UNO Park Community Center IN: Steve & Sandy, Sean, Tim, Zach, Chris, Julie, Rob, Reimi, Cady, Kelby, Fred & Janet, Beth  ON OUR TABLES: Sid Sackson Games Can’t Stop (led by Sean) 1980 push your…

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