Twilight Imperium

Finally took time to organize 8 player Twilight Imperium 3rd Ed.

Black - Nekro Virus (Me)

Green - Sardak' Norr (Juris)

Red - Ghosts of Cresus (Klāvs)

Orange - Embers of Muat (Jānis P.)

Yellow - Emirates of Hacan (Viesturs)

Blue - Arborec (Dmitrijs)

Grey - Mentak Coalition (Māra)

Yellow - Brotherhood of Yin (Miks)

Short summary - 

Early game speed was down to a crawl.

No one was completing objectives.

From my point of view, mistake was making trade treaties with both neighbors, so, to conquer, I had to go through Metacol Rex or similar.

It took ages to obtain my preliminary objective - acquiring three yellow technologies, none of my neighbors had them, even so, I didn't want to break trade agreements by attacking them. 

Most suitable targets were on the other side of the board....

(Nekro Virus obtains technologies by destroying enemy ships in space battle, and copying one technology after fight from oponent).

Midgame, when things started to roll, got lucky by strategy card selection - Bureaucracy landed several times for me, so I was able to catch up.

At the end of midgame, I was tied for lead in objectives, however my board presence was abysmal.

Meanwhile, Ghosts were having an argument with Sardak' Norr.

It ended with Ghosts not going outside their separate home system for a while... 

Lesson learned - You do not mess with Sardak' Norr!

Mentak Coalition had slowly overpowered Arborec, Embers of Muat - they were having problems with handling Haccan, but then Sardak' Norr and Brotherhood of Yin ganged up on Embers crippling them.. 

Endgame.

I was reduced to controlling Metacol Rex and my Home System. Home system was under large assault from Brotherhood of Yin, but it was holding. I still had options for completing objectives.

But it was not fast enough.

End results 

Brotherhood of Yin - Victorious. (2 Supports of the Throne)

Nekro and Sardak tied second at 13 points (so close, yet so far for both of them)

Mentak Coalition at 11 points. (There are theories, if the empty space random event - giving 1 victory point would have been near Mentak, they could have won. (33% chance at that moment, but this particular random event was the only one not placed on board))

Haccan at 10 points

Ghosts at 5 points

Embers and Arborec at 3 points.

GG