December has come and gone, and amazingly enough no meetings were cancelled due to inclement weather. We're actually doing better than the Philadelphia Eagles in that respect...

I tried to emphasize it below and I'm also going to mention it here: there is NO MEETING this Saturday. Because the first Saturday of January also happens to be the first day of the year, it was decided that this month the Oxford Valley Mall meetings will be held on the 15th and 29th. Technically, this means that between the end of January and the beginning of February there will be two consecutive weekends of gaming available! And when that's over with, there's also the Super Bowl...

Also...this is my final newsletter. When I took the position of newsletter editor, I had some ambitious ideas for the newsletter. Unfortunately, they proved to be a bit too ambitious and I fell quite short of my original vision. Having said that, I appreciated the opportunity to contribute to making EPGS the best that it can be. Thank you very much!

Game on!

-Ken

IMPORTANT! Change in Meeting Dates for January
As the first Saturday of January falls on New Year's Day, it was decided that it would best to NOT hold a meeting on this day and instead this coming month's meetings with be held on the third and fifth Saturday of the month (January 15th and 29th). Also, the holiday shopping season is over and so the mall will be returning to its normal hours of 10:00am to 9:00pm.

New Dues Rates for 2011
For reasons touched upon in the previous newsletter, annual membership rates will increase to $40 for 2011. Other payment options include two semi-annual payments of $25 and a per-meeting payment option of $8.

GMs Needed for NEC Event Over Memorial Day Weekend
As reported by Steve Cameron on the EPGS Yahoo! users group earlier this month, the National Eurogame Championships (NEC) is a separate gaming convention ran by the people responsible for PrezCon. Convention Director Justin Thompson is looking for GMs for the almost 30 events planned. Volunteers receive half-price admission to the convention and a "cool" polo shirt. This is on a first-come basis, so anyone who is interested should not hesitate to sign up. Information on how to do so can be obtained by clicking here.

The Games We Played - December 2010 (And For The Year)
Please accept my apologies as I once again I failed to obtain a list for the games played for one of the meetings during the past month (December 18th). However, thanks to Steve Fitchett, I did get a list for the Games Keep meeting this month. For the days I did have information for, Tichu and Axis & Allies were the most often played games with three plays each.

For the year - at least 221 different games were played a combined total of 711+ times. Interestingly enough, again Tichu and Axis & Allies top this list with 51 and 39 games played respectively. As I missed information for two Oxford Valley meetings during the course of the year, the Axis & Allies number should probably be closer to 45 or so. Throw in two cancelled meetings due to weather/mall scheduling conflicts and the number could have been closer to 50. Not bad for a game that takes several hours to play!

Click here to see the complete list of games played in December and in the 2010 year.

Upcoming Events

January Oxford Valley Mall Meeting Dates:

January Games Keep Meeting Date:

January 7th Dimension Games Meeting Date:

February 23-27, 2011: Prezcon 2011
Doubletree Charlottesville, Charlottesville, VA. This convention has tournaments for over 90 games of various types. Seems similar to WBC. Click here for more information.

May 27-30, 2011: National Eurogame Championships
Bethesda Doubletree, Bethesda, MD. A gaming convention from the people responsible for PrezCon specifically dedicated to Euro games. Click here for more information.