Pining for the Fjords

[surrealestate]

Some time ago, JV left a game at my house (as people are wont to do): Fjords, a hex tile-laying game that is a bit of a cross between Carcassonne and Go. Mark and I played a few times and he was sufficiently interested in it that he started working on an online version. When his birthday came around, DD and I debated what sort of treat to make, and he suggested a cake in the shape of a gamepiece. I thought that was great inspiration, and (inspired by Julia) had been looking for an excuse to make an edible game, anyway, so countered with the entire game in gingerbread. He called me insane, but he ended up not helping at all, so who cares what he though? :) That morning I made the dough and put it in the fridge to chill.

Upon returning home from Illuminations that night, I set to work rolling, baking, and cutting. My friend Brett came home with me and was a great help, as I quickly discovered how much more difficult a hex tile-laying game is to cut out than square tiles. Especially without a hex cookie cutter. Really. So Brett and I each fabricated cookie cutters from an aluminum mini-loaf pan that gave it's life to the cause. I cut little house shapes freehand (planning to double them up with icing) for the houses and we used a lipbalm stick as a template for a cutter for the tokens. And thusly were born 40 tiles, 40 tokens, and 16 house pieces.

The next morning, I got to work icing them by laying out all the original game pieces to copy and doing all the green, all the blue, and finally all the brown. Phew. Then I icing-glued pairs of houses together so they would stand up properly. The gingerbread on its own worked well as for one player, and I used white icing to color a set for the other. And since I had letter cutters and extra dough, I also baked off a bit extra and cut out Mark's name.

Mark showed up and was appropriately floored. :) Of course we had a play a round right away, and whaddaya know? It worked! A few more friends and a dog showed up later and we drank wine and generally had a great time. While it wouldn't do to eat the game, Mark had his name to eat and I also had a bowl of scraps from all the cutting out. Yum!

We played several more times over the next few days before finally eating the game with other folks at R&R's place.

Some pictures of game-play. (For comparison, here is a photo of the actual game

This is somewhere in the middle of the game, during the tile-laying phase.


Close-up of the three starting tiles (plus one more)


Endgame! Dark wins.

Comments

[fenris-lorsrai.livejournal.com]

I heartily second this suggestion.

Since you indicated you were tempted to make Catan cakes, here's some photos of Catan cakes on Boardgamegeek
Catan Cake (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/319100)
Catan cookies (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/112486)
Gingerbread Catan (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/185558)
Catan Pizza (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/65551)
different gingerbread Catan (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/185554)
Fruit tart of Catan (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/269292)

Who knew gamers were so into eating their games?