FED PHRASE GAME ROADSHOW
Wednesday August 8
by Gwaptiva
The Sierpinsky Lounge on Silk is an oft-overlooked location in Sol, and so I decided to host the Roadshow from that location this week. Stiddleficks, Myda, Lagkiller and Butters showed up this week to play and all were keen to win the glory and the slithy tove that Myda kindly donated (and tried really hard to win back). Following the previous week's hilarity surrounding Free Spins, I decided to trial a new rule: if you land on a Free Spin, one is automatically gained - no more need to guess a consonant for it. If it works out well, we'll keep it. If not, we go back to the old rule; simple.
After the order of play was determined as Butters, Myda, Lagkiller and Stiddleficks, we got underway with the first phrase. Once again, the players would go in search of a Fed Song. Butters got it going, but quickly handed over to Myda, and then Lagkiller. He looked well underway to solving the phrase, but the wheel had other ideas and conjured up Lose a Turn. As Stiddleficks was thinking hard, Freya dropped by briefly to join in, but her contribution of a D was followed by a Bankrupt and that made her decide it wasn't going to be her day, and went off again to get some rest. That D, and the good work by Lagkiller, allowed Butters to solve the phrase correctly. "Bad Moon Rising by CCR" scored him the minimum for a correct solution of 750 points.
Myda got first go at the second phrase. She didn't get much to work with from the category information as Object can refer to a lot of things. Myda built up a nice total before losing it all again when the wheel showed Bankrupt. Lagkiller added some but then guessed the wrong consonant and this let in Stiddleficks who struggled a little bit to see the solution, but when she bought the final vowel it suddenly dawned on her that the object was a "bracelet with Venusian opals".
With Stiddleficks in the lead by 400 points over Butters (and 1150 over the rest), Lagkiller started the third phrase in the category Institutions. He added letter after letter, managed to keep himself alive with the use of a Free Spin, but in the end he just ran out of ideas, letting Stiddleficks in with a chance to increase her lead. She got the two final words displayed completely, thereby providing evidence that Gwaptiva hadn't been paying attention, as he had allowed all vowels to be sold. Blushing profusely, he apologised to the gathered masses, saying something about not hearing the buzzer noise or something. Stiddleficks offered a completely plausible solution, but unfortunately an incorrect one, but there was no real shame in that, because neither Butters nor Myda after her managed to either. Lagkiller didn't have any such problems and solved the phrase as "Kaka's Brazilian Brilliance", a phrase very much at home in the Roadshow, aimed as it is at a European audience [Kaka is a famous player of association football - ed.].
The final phrase was in a new category called Fedstitutions: not quite people, not quite objects, not quite institutions, not quite events, in short: a catch-all for the rest. Stiddleficks was the first player to try to solve one of these, and she made good headway. The chatter in the Sierpinsky Lounge did upset her rhythm a little, but after we all promised betterment, and Stiddle promised to tell us if we distract her too much, she continued and romped home to solving "Catspaws flushable toilet" and a massive lead of 4650 points against Lagkillers 1600.
Here Stiddleficks proved to be a great sport and she agreed to risk the slithy tove prize and play another round. Of course, she was well in the driving seat, but stranger things have happened. All spun again to determine the order of play for this bonus round and Butters was first to try and solve another Fedstitutions phrase. He seemed to have no problem working out which letters to ask for, but he did need an enormous number of points to beat Stiddleficks' total. Spin after spin added points to his total, edging closer and closer to Stiddle's total. With only a few letters left to get, and the solution terribly obvious to everyone, the question was only if the wheel would continue to favour him; a Bankrupt or even Lose a Turn would hand the game to Stiddleficks on a platter. But Fate smiled on the man in the nappy [diaper - ed.] and with one last big spin of he overtook Stiddle's total and took the Glory and the Slithy off her.
Stiddleficks bore defeat most graciously and was the first to applaud Butters and congratulations were due to both these players for creating a wonderfully exciting game played for the most part in the fine spirit of sportsmanship. Lagkiller and Myda this time came up empty but showed themselves to be fine Phrase Gamers and they will surely take their chances next time.
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