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‘Olympos’ confirmed for next Tuesday, from Ystari and Philippe Keyaerts (Vinci, Small World and Evo), is a fast playing game of technology development, prayer and conflict set in Ancient Greece.
‘Grimoire’ has been printed in a new edition by Zman games, originally a Japon Brand design this was my fastest selling game from Essen 2010. Best described as a cross between ‘Citadels’ and ‘Fairy Tale’ this game has been a sort after cult classic, now everyone can own a copy.
‘Age of Industry Expansion one’ is a double sided board with maps of Minnesota and Japan.
Both are excellent with Japan players need to plan for the scarcity of home grown natural resources and on the Minnesota map Chicago dominates the board, with special rules for iron production and sales.
‘NightFighter’ from GMT and Lee Brimmicombe-Wood (‘Downtown’, ‘The Burning Blue’) , simulates the cat and mouse fights in the night sky above Germany and Japan. Game play is quick at under an hour for each scenario; and players take it in turns to control the night fighters or moderate for the other player
‘Case Yellow’, GMT and Ted Reicer, is a light simulation of the 1940 invasion of France.
Already in store is ‘Miskatonic Horror’ which contains additional game material for Arkahm Horror and its expansions.
The 2011 reprint editions of ‘Curse of the Dark Pharoah’ and ‘The King in Yellow’ are in stock.
Restocks
‘Olympus’ (with a ‘U’) was one of my top three picks from 2010 – its been reprinted and is back in stock as is ‘Cosmic Encounter’.
Bargain ‘Troyes’ is back and I have managed to pick up some very inexpensive German automobiles (its language independent and I will provide English rules
The Royal Society of Gamers Podcast
I have a new favourite podcast. Checkout The Royal Society of Gamers Podcast.
A quick-and-dirty wargame taxonomy
Most seasoned board game spotters don’t need binoculars to tell the difference between Fantasy Flight-produced Ameritrash and its European cousins, the Caylus family of luck-free games. On the other hand, the dizzying array of wargames can present problems for even veteran gamers.
In this entry, we’ll identify the main phyla of these games – their identifying marks, their habits, their mating rituals – and briefly discuss what makes them tick. Wargames aren’t as daunting as they may seem at first, and there’s at least one out there for nearly everyone.
Card-driven wargames
These games – often called CDGs – come in all shapes and sizes, some easy and accessible and others quite daunting. Typically, players will have a hand of cards that they can use to move armies around or give them actions; this can mean commanding individual troops (as in GMT’s Combat Commander), whole legions (as in Sword of Rome) or squads (Memoir ’44). The grandfather of this genre, Hannibal: Rome versus Carthage, has not only escaped extinction, it’s won legions of fans (and a few reprints) since it was released in 1996. The American company GMT Games is one of the biggest producers of this subtype - they make many (though certainly not all) of the best card-driven games, backed up with a superb attitude toward their customers.
Lighter card-driven wargames include the aforementioned Memoir ’44, its fantasy clone Battlelore, and the complex-seeming but easy-playing Maria, which uses an innovative system based on playing cards.
More complex card-driven games include the squad-level classic Combat Commander; the magnificent, deep World War I game Paths of Glory; and Successors, a truly brilliant and not-overly-long multiplayer game about the ills that befell the Macedonian empire after the death of Alexander the Great.
Block games
Block games can be recognised by the heft of the boxes they come in. Block wargames usually mean moving armies around a map, with each wooden block labelled on only one side and representing a unit of varying strength. Since your opponent can see how many blocks are in an advancing army but may not know exactly what kind of troops you’re moving, block games usually mean making careful decisions with only partial information. These games go out of their way to model the 'fog of war', the notorious difficulty military commanders face as they try to make the best decisions. Columbia Games is widely noted for its range of block wargames (which are usually heavy in more ways than one).
Notable block games include Hammer of the Scots, Bobby Lee and Richard III. Also, keep your eyes peeled in case Europe Engulfed if it comes back into print - it may be the best example of the genre.
Hex-and-counter wargames
If you’ve ever seen a few grizzled board gamers huddled pushing cardboard chits around on a board that’s divided up in to hexagons, this is what they were doing. (For mathematical reasons, hexagons are easily tiled, and offer finer control of movement and facing than would be possible on a mere grid.) While these games can frighten off anyone but the most dedicated grognard, the hex-and-counter crowd harbour a dark secret: these games are easier than they look.
Conflict of Heroes is a common gateway into the world of hex-and-counter gaming, as are most of Victory Point’s budget productions of extraordinarily fun games. For heavier fare, try SPQR or A Victory Denied.
Hybrid wargames
Some designers can’t just stick to one mechanic, and given the breadth of wargames out there, it shouldn't surprise anyone that plenty of mongrels populate the genre – and some hybrids are among the most acclaimed wargames available.
Commands & Colors: Ancients and its sequel, Commands & Colors: Napoleonics both use a combination of blocks and cards, while also behaving a lot like a simplified hex-and-counter game. While putting the stickers on the blocks can be a chore, the games themselves are history-buff heaven. They're an engaging way to while away the hours, picking up strategies from Caesar, Scipio and Boneparte himself without feeling like you're studying for a history A-level.
Many a nerd has engaged in internet fisticuffs over whether GMT’s card-driven Cold War game Twilight Struggle is a wargame at all. Players use cards as events but also to influence different countries’ disposition toward their chosen superpower. While learning TS can feel like a steep climb, it’s easy enough once you grasp your options, it's highly replayable, and as of this writing, users at Boardgamegeek have rated it the best game currently in production.
In this entry, we’ll identify the main phyla of these games – their identifying marks, their habits, their mating rituals – and briefly discuss what makes them tick. Wargames aren’t as daunting as they may seem at first, and there’s at least one out there for nearly everyone.
Card-driven wargames
These games – often called CDGs – come in all shapes and sizes, some easy and accessible and others quite daunting. Typically, players will have a hand of cards that they can use to move armies around or give them actions; this can mean commanding individual troops (as in GMT’s Combat Commander), whole legions (as in Sword of Rome) or squads (Memoir ’44). The grandfather of this genre, Hannibal: Rome versus Carthage, has not only escaped extinction, it’s won legions of fans (and a few reprints) since it was released in 1996. The American company GMT Games is one of the biggest producers of this subtype - they make many (though certainly not all) of the best card-driven games, backed up with a superb attitude toward their customers.
Lighter card-driven wargames include the aforementioned Memoir ’44, its fantasy clone Battlelore, and the complex-seeming but easy-playing Maria, which uses an innovative system based on playing cards.
More complex card-driven games include the squad-level classic Combat Commander; the magnificent, deep World War I game Paths of Glory; and Successors, a truly brilliant and not-overly-long multiplayer game about the ills that befell the Macedonian empire after the death of Alexander the Great.
Block games
Block games can be recognised by the heft of the boxes they come in. Block wargames usually mean moving armies around a map, with each wooden block labelled on only one side and representing a unit of varying strength. Since your opponent can see how many blocks are in an advancing army but may not know exactly what kind of troops you’re moving, block games usually mean making careful decisions with only partial information. These games go out of their way to model the 'fog of war', the notorious difficulty military commanders face as they try to make the best decisions. Columbia Games is widely noted for its range of block wargames (which are usually heavy in more ways than one).
Notable block games include Hammer of the Scots, Bobby Lee and Richard III. Also, keep your eyes peeled in case Europe Engulfed if it comes back into print - it may be the best example of the genre.
Hex-and-counter wargames
If you’ve ever seen a few grizzled board gamers huddled pushing cardboard chits around on a board that’s divided up in to hexagons, this is what they were doing. (For mathematical reasons, hexagons are easily tiled, and offer finer control of movement and facing than would be possible on a mere grid.) While these games can frighten off anyone but the most dedicated grognard, the hex-and-counter crowd harbour a dark secret: these games are easier than they look.
Conflict of Heroes is a common gateway into the world of hex-and-counter gaming, as are most of Victory Point’s budget productions of extraordinarily fun games. For heavier fare, try SPQR or A Victory Denied.
Hybrid wargames
Some designers can’t just stick to one mechanic, and given the breadth of wargames out there, it shouldn't surprise anyone that plenty of mongrels populate the genre – and some hybrids are among the most acclaimed wargames available.
Commands & Colors: Ancients and its sequel, Commands & Colors: Napoleonics both use a combination of blocks and cards, while also behaving a lot like a simplified hex-and-counter game. While putting the stickers on the blocks can be a chore, the games themselves are history-buff heaven. They're an engaging way to while away the hours, picking up strategies from Caesar, Scipio and Boneparte himself without feeling like you're studying for a history A-level.
Many a nerd has engaged in internet fisticuffs over whether GMT’s card-driven Cold War game Twilight Struggle is a wargame at all. Players use cards as events but also to influence different countries’ disposition toward their chosen superpower. While learning TS can feel like a steep climb, it’s easy enough once you grasp your options, it's highly replayable, and as of this writing, users at Boardgamegeek have rated it the best game currently in production.
Eleven Games Every Family Should Own (Or, How to Train Your Gaming Ninja)
Go on, admit it. When your first squalling infant emerged into the world, you celebrated, you looked fondly on as she took her first step, grew her first tooth... and yet, in the dead of night, you were already plotting to get her to join your hobby.
Here’s our suggestions for the first games that should hit the table, once your young turn ten or so. Use whatever rationale works best. Call them ‘Family Night.’ Call them a bonding activity. Because really, you know you’re training your ninja spawn, honing her skills so one day she can go out into the world and kill on her own... at the Agricola table.
[Note: if you’re not already a board gamer, you’ll be seeing the world this way just a few games in. Jump in!]
Ticket to Ride
Probably the ultimate family game, in Days of Wonder’s venerable Ticket to Ride franchise, you teach your children to take the cards their opponents need out of sheer cruelty, to sense and exploit weakness, and to block other players’ moves. Like Karate Kid’s Mister Miyagi might say, ‘Wax on, wax off!’
Settlers of Catan
Settlers of Catan is a game in which players build up settlements that score them resources on certain rolls of the die. There’s also a trading phase, so game ninjas-in-training can learn when to hold ’em and when to fold ’em, when to trade and when to hold out. The dice still play a big role in your ultimate fate, so young players can always blame their failures on luck.
Bohnanza
Not all beans are created equal. This light card game teaches young gamers the importance of scarcity, and acquiring the right bean at the right time. If your young student can master the art of trading a stink bean for a valuable one, then what are you doing reading this article? You should have them enrolled at La Sorbonne already!
No Thanks!
Every budding ninja needs to know her limits. In this push-your-luck game, players can either give a chip or take a card, but chips are important (and limited), and cards give negative points. No Thanks! features incredibly simple rules but strategy that takes a lifetime to master, and it’s a quick game, sure to satisfy even the most jaded sensei.
Carcassonne
Lurking inside every child gamer is a vicious beast, struggling to emerge and destroy! What makes the tile-laying game Carcassonne singularly appropriate for training young gamers is its scalability: it can be played casually, simply, kindly... but once players are past the basics, they can use meeples and tiles to destroy other players’ cities, to cancel each other’s farmers out, and to steal points out from under their opponents’ noses.
Bausack
Sneaking past an enemy daimyo’s forces requires swift, precise movements. Spend a few hours a week sharpening your students’ coordination with this block-piling dexterity game, and each hour will repay them tenfold... with the swift deaths of their enemies.
K2
Young shinobi all think they’re going to live forever. An experienced ninja is always aware of the possibility of defeat; that’s how they learn to value patience. Sometimes the long way around is best. K2 is perfect for imparting these lessons – players scale the world’s toughest peak, choosing their path up carefully, hanging back as long as they can while struggling to acclimatise to the thinning oxygen every step of the way. Sometimes players have to harden their hearts, and leave one of their team’s climbers behind – but to make a decent omelette, you have to break some yolks.
Blokus
The young trainee's mind should never be at rest, but there are times when an abstract, Tetris-like game is just what the doctor ordered. Blokus works well for two, three or four; it refines players' sense of spatial relationships, helping to develop IQ and grace under pressure. You don’t even have to know your Jackie Chan from your Koharumaru to enjoy this one.
Survive! Escape from Atlantis
Survive! is based on an ’80s-era classic in which players flee the sinking island of Atlantis while trying to keep track of their hard-won treasure amid the chaos. As the venerable Sengoku-era Ninja master Hachisuka Tenzo learned during his botched attempt on Takeda Shingen’s life, knowing how to escape in style can be as important as knowing how to get in.
Alhambra
Swift calculation, economy of movement, focus: these are the watchwords of the ninja. Alhambra is a city-building, tile-laying game that rewards those who can react to their opponents’ actions as efficiently as possible. Use Alhambra to refine your trainee’s tactical sense.
Zooloretto
The last step in the ladder before joining the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad (or playing Agricola). It’s a game about keeping animals in a zoo. Unfortunately for this metaphor, there’s nothing even remotely menacing about it.
Here’s our suggestions for the first games that should hit the table, once your young turn ten or so. Use whatever rationale works best. Call them ‘Family Night.’ Call them a bonding activity. Because really, you know you’re training your ninja spawn, honing her skills so one day she can go out into the world and kill on her own... at the Agricola table.
[Note: if you’re not already a board gamer, you’ll be seeing the world this way just a few games in. Jump in!]
Ticket to Ride
Probably the ultimate family game, in Days of Wonder’s venerable Ticket to Ride franchise, you teach your children to take the cards their opponents need out of sheer cruelty, to sense and exploit weakness, and to block other players’ moves. Like Karate Kid’s Mister Miyagi might say, ‘Wax on, wax off!’
Settlers of Catan
Settlers of Catan is a game in which players build up settlements that score them resources on certain rolls of the die. There’s also a trading phase, so game ninjas-in-training can learn when to hold ’em and when to fold ’em, when to trade and when to hold out. The dice still play a big role in your ultimate fate, so young players can always blame their failures on luck.
Bohnanza
Not all beans are created equal. This light card game teaches young gamers the importance of scarcity, and acquiring the right bean at the right time. If your young student can master the art of trading a stink bean for a valuable one, then what are you doing reading this article? You should have them enrolled at La Sorbonne already!
No Thanks!
Every budding ninja needs to know her limits. In this push-your-luck game, players can either give a chip or take a card, but chips are important (and limited), and cards give negative points. No Thanks! features incredibly simple rules but strategy that takes a lifetime to master, and it’s a quick game, sure to satisfy even the most jaded sensei.
Carcassonne
Lurking inside every child gamer is a vicious beast, struggling to emerge and destroy! What makes the tile-laying game Carcassonne singularly appropriate for training young gamers is its scalability: it can be played casually, simply, kindly... but once players are past the basics, they can use meeples and tiles to destroy other players’ cities, to cancel each other’s farmers out, and to steal points out from under their opponents’ noses.
Bausack
Sneaking past an enemy daimyo’s forces requires swift, precise movements. Spend a few hours a week sharpening your students’ coordination with this block-piling dexterity game, and each hour will repay them tenfold... with the swift deaths of their enemies.
K2
Young shinobi all think they’re going to live forever. An experienced ninja is always aware of the possibility of defeat; that’s how they learn to value patience. Sometimes the long way around is best. K2 is perfect for imparting these lessons – players scale the world’s toughest peak, choosing their path up carefully, hanging back as long as they can while struggling to acclimatise to the thinning oxygen every step of the way. Sometimes players have to harden their hearts, and leave one of their team’s climbers behind – but to make a decent omelette, you have to break some yolks.
Blokus
The young trainee's mind should never be at rest, but there are times when an abstract, Tetris-like game is just what the doctor ordered. Blokus works well for two, three or four; it refines players' sense of spatial relationships, helping to develop IQ and grace under pressure. You don’t even have to know your Jackie Chan from your Koharumaru to enjoy this one.
Survive! Escape from Atlantis
Survive! is based on an ’80s-era classic in which players flee the sinking island of Atlantis while trying to keep track of their hard-won treasure amid the chaos. As the venerable Sengoku-era Ninja master Hachisuka Tenzo learned during his botched attempt on Takeda Shingen’s life, knowing how to escape in style can be as important as knowing how to get in.
Alhambra
Swift calculation, economy of movement, focus: these are the watchwords of the ninja. Alhambra is a city-building, tile-laying game that rewards those who can react to their opponents’ actions as efficiently as possible. Use Alhambra to refine your trainee’s tactical sense.
Zooloretto
The last step in the ladder before joining the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad (or playing Agricola). It’s a game about keeping animals in a zoo. Unfortunately for this metaphor, there’s nothing even remotely menacing about it.
Paul's 2010 review Part one
I played 73 games released in 2010 which sounds like a lot until I consider the list of games I did not play. Overall 2010 was a good year, lots of games that I have enjoyed and played multiple times, they just fall short though of my personal criteria for greatness – which is a game I have, or can see myself, playing well over twenty times, Agricola, Through the Ages, Le Havre to name but three.
If there’s a theme running through my likes and dislikes it is inconsistency; this list won’t correlate with my Boardgamegeek ratings, the top five I submitted to Counter Magazine last week and most definitely not to any list I might write next week. It also reflects the fact that I would like to see Euro designers take a few risks and move away from the formulaic.
Onto the list and let’s start at the top – as I intend to cover all 73 games the summary for each game is brief.
1) Navegador – the best of Mac Gerdt’s Rondel series, and has the perfect, but not non confrontational, intense interaction that is the hall mark of a great Euro. There are many strategies to explore and they all seem to have a good chance of success if you are playing your opponents as well as the game.
2) Dominant Species – a brute of a game that bucks the orthodoxy of Euro design, though it’s really more a wargame than Euro. It requires players to accept and then manage chaos, muster huge amounts of concentration and be prepared to ride the roller coaster for three hours or more. Please Chad Jensen, give us some more!
3) Civilization – Purely as a game this should be lower on the list. However, it feels like I’m playing the greatest computer game ever with mates around the table. And it continues to surprise me with the wealth of strategic choices.
4) War of the Ring Collector’s Edition – Should a game be so high on the list when most of my time with it is spent staring in delight as the bits? Yes, the game itself is wonderful and this edition is a lot easier to play than the original
5) 7 Wonders – Once you have got beyond the first few games this a great game of balancing efficiency and counter drafting.
6) Inca Empire – It’s a reprint, but is a shining example of what Euro design should aspire to – clean, thematically coherent and interactive in a subtle, and in this game symbiotic, way.
7) Olympus – A Euro/Civ. game with some ‘take that’ – this game has the most interesting timing issues and the military side of the game means you cannot treat this as a multiplayer solitaire exercise.
8) We Must tell the Emperor – A gaming history Haiku of the Pacific campaign in 45 minutes. It’s so simple yet so tense and for such a short game captures the Japanese expansion and decline perfectly. This is about as long as I want to play a solitaire game which adds to the appeal
9) Defenders of the Realm – This is the first co-op I have loved, it feels like an adventure rather than a puzzle solving exercise, the side quests add a lot of fun and the garish board and components take me back to my gaming youth.
10) Merchants and Marauders – The world needs the perfect pirate game; this is a close as we have got so far. Despite the absence of parrot’s it has adventure in spades and so long as it’s played with said spirit of adventure it’s a captivating way to spend a few hours
11) Age of Industry – It makes ‘Brass’ playable with most gamers, rather than just the hard core. If there are regular map releases then this could be as successful as Power Grid.
12) Command and Colors Napoleonics – The first time I played Battledore I thought the system would be perfect for Napoleonic warfare and CCN is my favourite of the series to date.
13) K2 – It can get very gamey towards the top of the mountain, however its tense, original and popular with my family
14) Lords of Vegas – the spiritual heir to Acquire, demands players actively trade to impose some order on the dice rolling shenanigans. It also gets top marks for looks
15) SNCF (‘Paris Connection’) – If Chicago Express is a sub atomic particle of the Rail 'n Equity school of games, Winsome have found the quark with this gem. Its genius is its simplicity and I defy Mr Bohrer to reduce the formula further.
16) Irondale - John Clowdus is one heck of an original game maker, remarkably so as he only makes game that will fit in a Small Box. Irondale is tremendously challenging and I am sure one day a large publisher will snap up this protean designer
17) Circus Train – There is a wealth of game design talent outside the pool of usual suspects that publishers go to time after time for bland, rehashed Euros. Circus Train is evidence of this talent, if it were picked up by Days of Wonder and given a deluxe production job this would become a best seller. Eulogy over now, the game is reminiscent of coliseum with some point to point movement.
18) Key Market – Any game my wife likes and is willing to play has got to be good, any complex game my wife likes is great by default. The artwork, the speed and variability of play are the other attractions of this game
19) Grand Cru – Had I made this list three months ago this would have been higher up the list. I like the ‘Age of Syrah’ toughness of the game and the small incremental actions, however virtually no one else iIknow does – and this game needs all players to be engaged either wise it can fall flat. Most promising debut design from the multi-talented (Actor and Chef as well as board game designer) Ulrich Blum
20) Dominion Prosperity – My liking and admiration for Dominion has gone up year on year. ‘Prosperity’ adds some complexity and length to the game, though I am unsure about the length part being good, but the new cards add to the game
21) First Train to Nuremburg – Were it not for this being a reprint it would be a top ten game for the year. I like the 2 player game and the new rules, however the old map is easier to play on for this colour blind gamer
22) Firenze – a tower building game, with some special powers and a Thurn und Taxis constraint on having to keep the towers going up. It’s not as light as it first appears, and you feel faced with tough decisions from the outset
23) Asara – another tower building game, the hook being a great action selection mechanic which requires players to follow suit to take an action. The joy of the game is the hand management, the scoring and tower building pedestrian. This fills a light medium weight spot which I think it will keep in the rota for a few years
24) Workshop of the World – I like Ragnar Brother Games, the themes and the little idiosyncrasies in game design. This is one of their dryer offerings however, the auction mechanic is subtler than it first appears and the joy of the game is the constant revaluation of each route to you and your opponents
25) 1655 Habemus Pape – This auction game works so well because the sets you are bidding for, and their, interactions, tell a story. By the end you will be a lot more familiar with the Papal Election of 1655
26) Fires of Midway – Cracking tense two player game of bluff and hand management that captures the essence of Carrier Warfare in a rather unusual way
27) London – I enjoy every play but every play feels the same, its Wallace treading water and that a bit like Wagner writing a waltz, it just ain’t right
28) Troyes – played it five times, and it’s gone down in my estimation with every game. What appeared novel and genius at first is now just another pleasant way of building a Cathedral in a Medieval City.
29) Innovation - Like Troyes this has gone from being a top game to one I find mildly frustrating, when the cards come together for all players it’s a great game, but that seldom happens
30) Thunderstone Wrath of the Elements – Not got the finesse of Dominion, but the series gets better with each expansion and it’s a go to game when I fancy some solitaire dungeon crawling
31) Castle Ravenloft – An alternative provider of the Dungeon Crawl fix this is just a little too fiddly for me to hit the spot. I love the minis though and some of the character powers are OTT. ‘Wrath of Ashardalon’ is an improvement, but let’s save that for 2011’s list
32) Sun. Sea and Sand - The theme is bright and breezy and the choices pleasantly challenging in this Worker placement game. However, the charm has worn of after a few plays – I will probably enjoy it again after a longish break
33) Runewars – The action selection mechanic is great, there are a lot of options. I wish I could get a little more enthusiastic about the world of Terrinoth – it ain’t Miidle Earth and never will be
34) Dixit 2 – If anything the hypnotic artwork is even better in this expansion. This expansion is necessary to give Dixit longevity, especially if played a few times with the same group
35) Wars of the Roses – If you can put aside the fact this is a Euro squeezed into a theme, this is a solid area majority game with a nasty catch up mechanic through the drafting. The amazing production qualities make the game worth a look
36) Alien Fronteirs – Not the second coming, more like a well themed Euro for the Ameritrash market. Great dice, and if played at pace a good game
37) Key West – The fantastic bidding mechanics and the gaming geography of the Florida Keys provide the ‘hook’.
38) Mord Im Arosa – I can’t think of any other auricular/Euro hybrids. Not to be played whilst listening to AC/DC, but perfect for a late night filler at a convention
39) 11 Nimmt! – No game could be quite as random as it’s little brother, 6 , and this adds a little more strategy to the Nimmt! Family
40) Napoleon’s War 100 days – Lovely system hampered by bargain basement production values, also by the fact CC Napoleonics is sitting next to it on the shelf
41) Level X – This is the only Schmidt Spiel Easy line game i have played, and if this representative then i should try more. It’s a Yahtzee varaiant
42) Vinhos – I never want to teach this game again. I have played it four times and everyone has been a chore because of the constant need to remind players of how to play. Monster complicated, thematically rich – the verdicts out until I get to play a game without having act as a moderator every two minutes
43) 51st State – If this game was themed as European powers in the age of colonialism I think it could have been a stratospheric blockbuster. The Neuroshima setting does not work for the original card play
44) Pocket Battles – Orcs v Elves – I love the first game in the series; Celts v Romans. However Orcs and Elves need some rich gaming texture to make them entertaining, this is not the system for fantasy battles – back to the historical for the next game please
45) Wax – Further testament to John Clowdus’s seemingly bottomless well of creativity. A perfect game for three and a half hours on an Easyjet flight
46) Dominion Alchemy – I really like the potion addition to Dominion. It creates an extra choice that increases the early game options and for that the game is richer
47) Hotel Samoa – No one i know likes this game, which is a shame as the bidding system (high gets you hotel improvements, low gets the income paying tourists) makes each round very tense
48) Heroes of Graxia – The most ‘Magic’ like of the deck builders suffers a little because of the constant need to recalculate stuff.
49) Braggart – Folksy art and drinking gameplay – a good filler for three or four players
50) Rattus – I quite like the aim of escaping the plague and pushing towards the others. Need to play more as I suspect this would be much higher in my rankings with more exposure
51) Porto Carthago – This I need to play again as I remember neither liking or disliking the game
52) Forbidden Island – I am not a Pandemic fan, this has though has the advantage of theme and were I to game with the under 10s I am sure this would become a favourite
53) Don Quixote – I should not like this but I do, especially if the squares are called in a faux bingo voice.
54) Fresco – Looks lovely, thematically wonderful – the rest is almost a parody of the current state of Eurogames.
55) Junta Viva El Presidente – I wanted to like this knock about dice rolling negotiation game but it’s tedious in the extreme no matter how much you try and role play it
56) Seeland – Treading water for Kramer. Pleasant to play once or twice and looks great, but fairly forgettable
57) Poseidon – The errors in the rules are almost unforgivable in an 'entry level' xx game. My first game was a toxic experience, the second marginally better.
58) Leaping Lemmings – It’s like Herbert Von Karajan conducting Barry Manilow – if your bread and butter is the serious stuff (GMT) then stick to it
59) Regatta – Light and fluffy, a ‘Wings of War’ for the Cowes brigade
60) Titania – It’s hard to believe that the same designer created Goa. The game is so over dependent on the mistakes made by the player to your right and very little else. Looks a million bucks but the first HIG spring miss for a few years
61) Samarkand – It’s over before you get going and it really feels like the winner is randomly determined. Fun for the first two or three games, but frustrating beyond that.
62) Last Call the Bartender Game – The first time Wattalspoag have released a duffer. Far too much brain power required for a game about drinking, especially as it should be played when alcohol is in the vicinity
63) Travel Blog – I can’t see the point of this game, especially when compared to the ‘10 Days in’ series – this relies on geographic knowledge whereas in 10 days there is a game underneath the surface. Vlaada please stock mucking around and give us ‘Through the Ages Two’
64) Railways of the World The Card Game – Take all the fun out of Railroad Tycoon, add some cards and this is what you get. I can’ think of any train game that has had a good card game version – the upside for this is that it is better than Ticket To ride’s lamentable effort
65) Settlers of America – A wonderful host of ideas and mechanics shoehorned into a mono victory condition. The end game is excruciating and destroys any enjoyment to be hand in getting there.
66) Merkator – Rosenberg’s next game is not an auto buy for me; it might be unreasonable to expect another Agricola or Le Havre. This is a tedious exercise in cube pushing efficiency.
67) 20th Century – I need to play this game again as my first filled me with apoplectic loathing. I just hated the solitaire optimisation element of the game, to me the antithesis of fun – can’t we share the same board?. Most people tell me I am wrong so will play again
68) Founding Fathers – Unlike 20th Century I did give this a second go and it was worse than the first. Any attempt at planning is easily destroyed by the OTT cards. Why on earth let players build positions which can be ‘Wrath of God’ed out of the game. Armageddon resets were weeded out of Magic the Gathering ten years ago and have no place creeping into boardgame design
69) Puzzle Strike – Interesting game destroyed by the playing pieces and the terrible first set of rules
70) Ascension Godslayer – Deck building with the interesting parts taken out, ugly artwork and a totally unnecessary board.
71) Khan ¬– A blockbusting theme that hides the diriest of multiplayer abstracts
72) Le Grand Hameau – The cards are amusing but broken, and can spoil a nice game of Le Havre.
73) Nuns on the Run – A game about Nuns with LOS? Tedious record keeping, easy to make a mistake, about as amusing as life in a nunnery
If there’s a theme running through my likes and dislikes it is inconsistency; this list won’t correlate with my Boardgamegeek ratings, the top five I submitted to Counter Magazine last week and most definitely not to any list I might write next week. It also reflects the fact that I would like to see Euro designers take a few risks and move away from the formulaic.
Onto the list and let’s start at the top – as I intend to cover all 73 games the summary for each game is brief.
1) Navegador – the best of Mac Gerdt’s Rondel series, and has the perfect, but not non confrontational, intense interaction that is the hall mark of a great Euro. There are many strategies to explore and they all seem to have a good chance of success if you are playing your opponents as well as the game.
2) Dominant Species – a brute of a game that bucks the orthodoxy of Euro design, though it’s really more a wargame than Euro. It requires players to accept and then manage chaos, muster huge amounts of concentration and be prepared to ride the roller coaster for three hours or more. Please Chad Jensen, give us some more!
3) Civilization – Purely as a game this should be lower on the list. However, it feels like I’m playing the greatest computer game ever with mates around the table. And it continues to surprise me with the wealth of strategic choices.
4) War of the Ring Collector’s Edition – Should a game be so high on the list when most of my time with it is spent staring in delight as the bits? Yes, the game itself is wonderful and this edition is a lot easier to play than the original
5) 7 Wonders – Once you have got beyond the first few games this a great game of balancing efficiency and counter drafting.
6) Inca Empire – It’s a reprint, but is a shining example of what Euro design should aspire to – clean, thematically coherent and interactive in a subtle, and in this game symbiotic, way.
7) Olympus – A Euro/Civ. game with some ‘take that’ – this game has the most interesting timing issues and the military side of the game means you cannot treat this as a multiplayer solitaire exercise.
8) We Must tell the Emperor – A gaming history Haiku of the Pacific campaign in 45 minutes. It’s so simple yet so tense and for such a short game captures the Japanese expansion and decline perfectly. This is about as long as I want to play a solitaire game which adds to the appeal
9) Defenders of the Realm – This is the first co-op I have loved, it feels like an adventure rather than a puzzle solving exercise, the side quests add a lot of fun and the garish board and components take me back to my gaming youth.
10) Merchants and Marauders – The world needs the perfect pirate game; this is a close as we have got so far. Despite the absence of parrot’s it has adventure in spades and so long as it’s played with said spirit of adventure it’s a captivating way to spend a few hours
11) Age of Industry – It makes ‘Brass’ playable with most gamers, rather than just the hard core. If there are regular map releases then this could be as successful as Power Grid.
12) Command and Colors Napoleonics – The first time I played Battledore I thought the system would be perfect for Napoleonic warfare and CCN is my favourite of the series to date.
13) K2 – It can get very gamey towards the top of the mountain, however its tense, original and popular with my family
14) Lords of Vegas – the spiritual heir to Acquire, demands players actively trade to impose some order on the dice rolling shenanigans. It also gets top marks for looks
15) SNCF (‘Paris Connection’) – If Chicago Express is a sub atomic particle of the Rail 'n Equity school of games, Winsome have found the quark with this gem. Its genius is its simplicity and I defy Mr Bohrer to reduce the formula further.
16) Irondale - John Clowdus is one heck of an original game maker, remarkably so as he only makes game that will fit in a Small Box. Irondale is tremendously challenging and I am sure one day a large publisher will snap up this protean designer
17) Circus Train – There is a wealth of game design talent outside the pool of usual suspects that publishers go to time after time for bland, rehashed Euros. Circus Train is evidence of this talent, if it were picked up by Days of Wonder and given a deluxe production job this would become a best seller. Eulogy over now, the game is reminiscent of coliseum with some point to point movement.
18) Key Market – Any game my wife likes and is willing to play has got to be good, any complex game my wife likes is great by default. The artwork, the speed and variability of play are the other attractions of this game
19) Grand Cru – Had I made this list three months ago this would have been higher up the list. I like the ‘Age of Syrah’ toughness of the game and the small incremental actions, however virtually no one else iIknow does – and this game needs all players to be engaged either wise it can fall flat. Most promising debut design from the multi-talented (Actor and Chef as well as board game designer) Ulrich Blum
20) Dominion Prosperity – My liking and admiration for Dominion has gone up year on year. ‘Prosperity’ adds some complexity and length to the game, though I am unsure about the length part being good, but the new cards add to the game
21) First Train to Nuremburg – Were it not for this being a reprint it would be a top ten game for the year. I like the 2 player game and the new rules, however the old map is easier to play on for this colour blind gamer
22) Firenze – a tower building game, with some special powers and a Thurn und Taxis constraint on having to keep the towers going up. It’s not as light as it first appears, and you feel faced with tough decisions from the outset
23) Asara – another tower building game, the hook being a great action selection mechanic which requires players to follow suit to take an action. The joy of the game is the hand management, the scoring and tower building pedestrian. This fills a light medium weight spot which I think it will keep in the rota for a few years
24) Workshop of the World – I like Ragnar Brother Games, the themes and the little idiosyncrasies in game design. This is one of their dryer offerings however, the auction mechanic is subtler than it first appears and the joy of the game is the constant revaluation of each route to you and your opponents
25) 1655 Habemus Pape – This auction game works so well because the sets you are bidding for, and their, interactions, tell a story. By the end you will be a lot more familiar with the Papal Election of 1655
26) Fires of Midway – Cracking tense two player game of bluff and hand management that captures the essence of Carrier Warfare in a rather unusual way
27) London – I enjoy every play but every play feels the same, its Wallace treading water and that a bit like Wagner writing a waltz, it just ain’t right
28) Troyes – played it five times, and it’s gone down in my estimation with every game. What appeared novel and genius at first is now just another pleasant way of building a Cathedral in a Medieval City.
29) Innovation - Like Troyes this has gone from being a top game to one I find mildly frustrating, when the cards come together for all players it’s a great game, but that seldom happens
30) Thunderstone Wrath of the Elements – Not got the finesse of Dominion, but the series gets better with each expansion and it’s a go to game when I fancy some solitaire dungeon crawling
31) Castle Ravenloft – An alternative provider of the Dungeon Crawl fix this is just a little too fiddly for me to hit the spot. I love the minis though and some of the character powers are OTT. ‘Wrath of Ashardalon’ is an improvement, but let’s save that for 2011’s list
32) Sun. Sea and Sand - The theme is bright and breezy and the choices pleasantly challenging in this Worker placement game. However, the charm has worn of after a few plays – I will probably enjoy it again after a longish break
33) Runewars – The action selection mechanic is great, there are a lot of options. I wish I could get a little more enthusiastic about the world of Terrinoth – it ain’t Miidle Earth and never will be
34) Dixit 2 – If anything the hypnotic artwork is even better in this expansion. This expansion is necessary to give Dixit longevity, especially if played a few times with the same group
35) Wars of the Roses – If you can put aside the fact this is a Euro squeezed into a theme, this is a solid area majority game with a nasty catch up mechanic through the drafting. The amazing production qualities make the game worth a look
36) Alien Fronteirs – Not the second coming, more like a well themed Euro for the Ameritrash market. Great dice, and if played at pace a good game
37) Key West – The fantastic bidding mechanics and the gaming geography of the Florida Keys provide the ‘hook’.
38) Mord Im Arosa – I can’t think of any other auricular/Euro hybrids. Not to be played whilst listening to AC/DC, but perfect for a late night filler at a convention
39) 11 Nimmt! – No game could be quite as random as it’s little brother, 6 , and this adds a little more strategy to the Nimmt! Family
40) Napoleon’s War 100 days – Lovely system hampered by bargain basement production values, also by the fact CC Napoleonics is sitting next to it on the shelf
41) Level X – This is the only Schmidt Spiel Easy line game i have played, and if this representative then i should try more. It’s a Yahtzee varaiant
42) Vinhos – I never want to teach this game again. I have played it four times and everyone has been a chore because of the constant need to remind players of how to play. Monster complicated, thematically rich – the verdicts out until I get to play a game without having act as a moderator every two minutes
43) 51st State – If this game was themed as European powers in the age of colonialism I think it could have been a stratospheric blockbuster. The Neuroshima setting does not work for the original card play
44) Pocket Battles – Orcs v Elves – I love the first game in the series; Celts v Romans. However Orcs and Elves need some rich gaming texture to make them entertaining, this is not the system for fantasy battles – back to the historical for the next game please
45) Wax – Further testament to John Clowdus’s seemingly bottomless well of creativity. A perfect game for three and a half hours on an Easyjet flight
46) Dominion Alchemy – I really like the potion addition to Dominion. It creates an extra choice that increases the early game options and for that the game is richer
47) Hotel Samoa – No one i know likes this game, which is a shame as the bidding system (high gets you hotel improvements, low gets the income paying tourists) makes each round very tense
48) Heroes of Graxia – The most ‘Magic’ like of the deck builders suffers a little because of the constant need to recalculate stuff.
49) Braggart – Folksy art and drinking gameplay – a good filler for three or four players
50) Rattus – I quite like the aim of escaping the plague and pushing towards the others. Need to play more as I suspect this would be much higher in my rankings with more exposure
51) Porto Carthago – This I need to play again as I remember neither liking or disliking the game
52) Forbidden Island – I am not a Pandemic fan, this has though has the advantage of theme and were I to game with the under 10s I am sure this would become a favourite
53) Don Quixote – I should not like this but I do, especially if the squares are called in a faux bingo voice.
54) Fresco – Looks lovely, thematically wonderful – the rest is almost a parody of the current state of Eurogames.
55) Junta Viva El Presidente – I wanted to like this knock about dice rolling negotiation game but it’s tedious in the extreme no matter how much you try and role play it
56) Seeland – Treading water for Kramer. Pleasant to play once or twice and looks great, but fairly forgettable
57) Poseidon – The errors in the rules are almost unforgivable in an 'entry level' xx game. My first game was a toxic experience, the second marginally better.
58) Leaping Lemmings – It’s like Herbert Von Karajan conducting Barry Manilow – if your bread and butter is the serious stuff (GMT) then stick to it
59) Regatta – Light and fluffy, a ‘Wings of War’ for the Cowes brigade
60) Titania – It’s hard to believe that the same designer created Goa. The game is so over dependent on the mistakes made by the player to your right and very little else. Looks a million bucks but the first HIG spring miss for a few years
61) Samarkand – It’s over before you get going and it really feels like the winner is randomly determined. Fun for the first two or three games, but frustrating beyond that.
62) Last Call the Bartender Game – The first time Wattalspoag have released a duffer. Far too much brain power required for a game about drinking, especially as it should be played when alcohol is in the vicinity
63) Travel Blog – I can’t see the point of this game, especially when compared to the ‘10 Days in’ series – this relies on geographic knowledge whereas in 10 days there is a game underneath the surface. Vlaada please stock mucking around and give us ‘Through the Ages Two’
64) Railways of the World The Card Game – Take all the fun out of Railroad Tycoon, add some cards and this is what you get. I can’ think of any train game that has had a good card game version – the upside for this is that it is better than Ticket To ride’s lamentable effort
65) Settlers of America – A wonderful host of ideas and mechanics shoehorned into a mono victory condition. The end game is excruciating and destroys any enjoyment to be hand in getting there.
66) Merkator – Rosenberg’s next game is not an auto buy for me; it might be unreasonable to expect another Agricola or Le Havre. This is a tedious exercise in cube pushing efficiency.
67) 20th Century – I need to play this game again as my first filled me with apoplectic loathing. I just hated the solitaire optimisation element of the game, to me the antithesis of fun – can’t we share the same board?. Most people tell me I am wrong so will play again
68) Founding Fathers – Unlike 20th Century I did give this a second go and it was worse than the first. Any attempt at planning is easily destroyed by the OTT cards. Why on earth let players build positions which can be ‘Wrath of God’ed out of the game. Armageddon resets were weeded out of Magic the Gathering ten years ago and have no place creeping into boardgame design
69) Puzzle Strike – Interesting game destroyed by the playing pieces and the terrible first set of rules
70) Ascension Godslayer – Deck building with the interesting parts taken out, ugly artwork and a totally unnecessary board.
71) Khan ¬– A blockbusting theme that hides the diriest of multiplayer abstracts
72) Le Grand Hameau – The cards are amusing but broken, and can spoil a nice game of Le Havre.
73) Nuns on the Run – A game about Nuns with LOS? Tedious record keeping, easy to make a mistake, about as amusing as life in a nunnery
Pantheon - 2011 Spiel Des Jahres winner?
Its Spring time, and, as they have for the last few years, Hans Im Gluck has released a beautifully produced family game; a chunky box, lovely components and board and eight pages of rules. In 2008 it was ‘Stone Age’, followed a year later by ‘Finca, then last year saw ‘Titania’. The game (firmly aimed at the medium weight German family market) quality has fallen off year by year since the superb ‘Stone Age’, with ‘Titania’ being a bit of a flop (Rio Grande, wisely has not picked up this game for and English language release). No matter the game quality the games have looked lovely, and have been a joy to unbox. The latest HIG game bucks the trend, firstly because the eye candy quality is not up to the previous releases – but far more importantly it has reversed the declining gaming quality and is up there with ‘Stone Age’ as a great medium weight game that takes about an hour anda bit to play – so much so that I think this might be in the running for 2011’s main Spiel Des Jahres award. It may be no coincidence that this is the best in the series since ‘Stone Age’ – because it’s from the same designer Bernd Brunnhofer. Brunnhofer is not a prolific designer, before Stone Age his previous game was ‘St Petersburg’, so it’s quite a pedigree. ‘Pantheon’ I can report adds to his record of putting quality above quantity.
The game is set in a world after the ‘Stone Age’ (and a long time before ‘St Petersburg was built), when the early civilisations were forming, many gods were worshiped and tribes were building monuments to these gods. The aim of the game is to score points by recruiting gods, demi-gods and building columns.
Components and setup
The game is, mainly, played on a map of Europe, North Africa and the near East. A hexagonal grid is superimposed on the board. There are home hexes for each of eight nations (some, for example, Iberia a little distant from the real ancient geography) ,marked hexes for the placement of bonus tiles for each nation and hexes where only columns can be built. In each of the 4 player colours there are a supply of feet (used to move your tribe on the board) and 12 columns. Each player starts with four feet and three columns, the rest form a reserve which he can acquire throughout the game. Other game material includes a deck of cards; the cards are money, steps (used to place feet and columns on the board) and four different types of sacrifice cards. Four of the cards are drawn laid out on the table, Ticket to Ride style, the rest form a draw pile. There is a small special deck of money ranging in value from 2 to 5 in value (all money in the main deck is worth 1). There are 40 god tiles shuffled into a draw pile and a demi god tiles that are shuffled into two piles, one with values one to three and the second with values four to six. The lower value pile is placed on the higher value pile. Demi-gods sound exciting but they only score you points. Gods score points but also have one off or permanent benefits associated with them. There are four types of sacrifice tiles (misnamed because you never lose them) of the same ‘suits’ as the sacrifice cards and each type comes in two tiles , one value one and two on the reverse the other value three and four on the reverse. For a medium weight game there a surprising large number of bits and bobs that you need to play! And there’s more, there are forty hexagonal bonus tiles that are placed in a bag and will be later placed on the map. There are also six starting bonus tiles, eight nation tiles and a card for each nation. And lastly there is s the Big Foot and the Temple, wooden bits. I am a fan of Franz Vohwinkel’ artistic work but there’s something a bit uninspired and washed-out about the design here.
The aim – how do you score points
The game is played over six epochs, with a scoring at the end of the third epoch and the last. Victory points can be acquired in five ways; columns score you points with the point per column increasing with the number of columns you own; from 1 point per column if you only own one to 3 to the almost unachievable 4 points per column if you manage to get all 12 on the board. You also score points from demi gods – these tiles just have a victory point value on them and they can be acquired as a starting bonus, from bonus tiles on the board or from the god Pliasiris. Gods score you points as well, depending on which epoch you acquire them from; one point in the first epoch to six in the sixth and final epoch. Causing the end of an epoch scores you three points, and lastly one god gives bonus points at each scoring
Game play
At the beginning of the game players are randomly given a bonus tile (most are a one off bonus, a god, a demi god, a sacrifice tile, place a column, an extra foot and a column), five cards and four feet and three columns. At the beginning of each epoch the top card of the nation deck is flipped over, the temple marker is placed on the home spot of the drawn nation and then gods (number of players plus one) placed on the board as are bonus tiles from the bag (number of players plus one). Each nation has a ‘trait’ this is then executed. Most traits are beneficial, e.g. card draws, a sacrifice tile or a purchase action. Two of the eight countries are a double edged sword as they reset your hand size to seven, either giving a draw or making you discard. Players take actions in turn into the Epoch ends; which is caused by either the last god tile or bonus tile being claimed. This leads to a lot of variability in the length of each epoch; if the gods available each round are cheap and juicy and the bonus tiles all corkers then the epoch will fly by. If the gods are expensive and the bonus tiles stinkers then players may stock up on cards so it might be a longer epoch. However, a longer epoch will probably be followed by a shorter epoch as players will have a lot of cards to blitz the board or purchase gods. This unpredictability is one of the attractions of the game for me.
On their turn players choose one of four actions. They can take three cards, Ticket to Ride like, from the four on display, or from the top of the draw pile. Secondly they can take a movement action, which will allow everyone else to, Puerto Rico like, take the same action. Movement involves placing feet and columns on the board; the player who selected the action takes the big wooden foot which gives him one free step. He then can play as many step cards (worth two steps each) as he likes. Each step allows him to place a foot or a column on the board. They must start from the temple and form a continuous route back to the temple. If he places a foot on a bonus tile he takes the tile which is activated at the end of his movement action. The number of feet and columns that can be played is limited by the number he has in his personal reserve. Bonus tiles are either yellow or blue, with yellow tiles a one of bonus and blues permanent to be reused. They include demi gods, a free god from the draw pile, card draw, a money card from the special money deck or extra feet and columns, or free permanent steps to be used in future movement actions. He can also place columns, but only in the column hexes. There can be two feet and columns of different players in each hex, but the second foot or column costs two steps to place. The other players may also take a movement action, though they don’t get the free step awarded to the player who initiated the action. However, they may have free steps from bonus tiles or the god Vinthrad. They also may play step cards to place feet and columns. If a player does not place feet or columns on the board they take a card from the draw pile. The decision to take the movement action is a tricky one, you can leach of another player’s movement action but you are going to get second (or third or fourth) pickings of the available bonus tiles and column spaces. As the bonus for ending the round goes to the active player, it means that if the last bonus tile is taken by another player leaching then they are giving three vps to the player who initiated the movement action.
The third action is to buy stuff, and you pay for it with money cards and the god Stonkus (called so, I imagine because he is stonkingly powerful) provides a cash bonus for each buy action. You can buy as many items as you like up to what you can afford. Feet and columns cost one money each (you will need to supplement your starting feet and columns as soon as possible), Sacrifice tiles vary in cost depending on the level of the tile with level one tiles costing one money up to Level four tiles which cost ten money. You can also level up your tiles by paying the difference between the costs of the levels, for example levelling up a level one to a level two tile costs two. You can only own one of each type of tile. You can spend money to buy steps to immediately place feet and columns on the board at a cost of one money per step. This is a rather handy way of getting stuff on the board without giving the other players a free ride.
The fourth action is to take a god tile from the selection laid out at the beginning of each epoch. Each god has a cost in sacrifices. These can be paid for with either sacrifice tiles or cards or a combination of the two. The cost of each god is shown in the number of different types of sacrifices that have to be made (between one and four) and the number of sacrifices of each type that have to be made , for example Stonkus requires four types of sacrifice, with one being four , another three , then two then one. I can pay for that for ‘free’ if I have four sacrifice tiles of these values, more likely I will have to pay with a combination of cards and tiles, with the cards going to the discard pile and the tiles staying in front of me to be reused. Gods are good, but as I have found not essential to winning the game. The most immediate benefit a god gives is victory points, one in the first epoch through to six in the last. Gods, like bonus tiles, either provide one off or permanent benefits. You can own multiple copies of the same god. Permanent benefits help you throughout the games for example gives free steps, Stonkus free money, Detraccus two cards at the beginning of every epoch, Gaiviles helps you jump over occupied hexes on the board. The one off benefits might be another free god (super powerful in the last epoch as you score points or both gods) or the top card from the speciality money deck.
At the end of an epoch any unclaimed gods or bonus and god tiles are removed from the game and all players feet are returned from the board to their personal reserve. The game then moves on to the next epoch. At the end of the third and sixth epoch there is scoring phase where players score columns, demi-gods. The player with the most Victory points wins.
Why I like the game
Each action is simple, however from the four actions available to me each turn most of the time I find myself wanting to take all of them; Worried that if I grab some quick points I am going to sacrifice future gain, on the other hand concerned that the demi -god I am forsaking could decide the game if I don’t take him now. The decisions sit on that delicious cusp right between strategy and tactics and that’s where I like it best.
I have noticed a few comments that the game is too dependent on the luck of the draw – cards, gods, bonus tiles. For me that is missing the point of the game. – The random nature of the draw is one of the games strengths because it poses a new challenge game by game and epoch by epoch. The draw can mean that an epoch might be short or long (five juicy bonus tiles won’t be there for long), or it might be long with hard to pay for gods and weaker bonuses. The three points round ending bonus puts pressure on players to make moves rather than accumulate and you need to be looking for short term scoring opportunities as well as trying to grab gods that help your longer term plans. Making too many long term plans is a mistake in this game; it’s over before you know it and the random draw might militate against it so you need to keep flexible. You just have to play to it as you see it; with a sharp eye on the other players. You might not be seeing feet cards. No problem – you use money to buy map placement or you get yourself cards for a juicy god. One of the joys of the game is that it plays out differently every time and you can’t wed yourself to one strategy, e.g. it would be nice to aim for 12 columns at the beginning of the game however one the random draw of the countries might make it nigh on impossible and the other players are going to block you (well I am going to )
Unlike ‘Stone Age’ (which I love as a 2 player game) the full complement of four is the best number for Pantheon, there’s more potential for screwage on the board, some of the gods increase in value (especially the hex jumping god Gaiviles) there are less turns per player per Epoch which creates more tension. Three is also very good but two is the least enjoyable experience for me as you can pretty well do your own thing on the board (though that might be a plus for some gamers who want more control). I have played five games and none has lasted more than 90 minutes and I think it will come down to 75 minutes with four when everyone is up to speed.
‘Pantheon’ now sits on my shelf between ‘Stone Age’ and ‘World Without End’ as a go to medium weight Euro, for occasions when I like a little bit of unpredictability in my gaming. I understand that Rio Grande hare going to be publishing this in an English language edition later this summer
The game is set in a world after the ‘Stone Age’ (and a long time before ‘St Petersburg was built), when the early civilisations were forming, many gods were worshiped and tribes were building monuments to these gods. The aim of the game is to score points by recruiting gods, demi-gods and building columns.
Components and setup
The game is, mainly, played on a map of Europe, North Africa and the near East. A hexagonal grid is superimposed on the board. There are home hexes for each of eight nations (some, for example, Iberia a little distant from the real ancient geography) ,marked hexes for the placement of bonus tiles for each nation and hexes where only columns can be built. In each of the 4 player colours there are a supply of feet (used to move your tribe on the board) and 12 columns. Each player starts with four feet and three columns, the rest form a reserve which he can acquire throughout the game. Other game material includes a deck of cards; the cards are money, steps (used to place feet and columns on the board) and four different types of sacrifice cards. Four of the cards are drawn laid out on the table, Ticket to Ride style, the rest form a draw pile. There is a small special deck of money ranging in value from 2 to 5 in value (all money in the main deck is worth 1). There are 40 god tiles shuffled into a draw pile and a demi god tiles that are shuffled into two piles, one with values one to three and the second with values four to six. The lower value pile is placed on the higher value pile. Demi-gods sound exciting but they only score you points. Gods score points but also have one off or permanent benefits associated with them. There are four types of sacrifice tiles (misnamed because you never lose them) of the same ‘suits’ as the sacrifice cards and each type comes in two tiles , one value one and two on the reverse the other value three and four on the reverse. For a medium weight game there a surprising large number of bits and bobs that you need to play! And there’s more, there are forty hexagonal bonus tiles that are placed in a bag and will be later placed on the map. There are also six starting bonus tiles, eight nation tiles and a card for each nation. And lastly there is s the Big Foot and the Temple, wooden bits. I am a fan of Franz Vohwinkel’ artistic work but there’s something a bit uninspired and washed-out about the design here.
The aim – how do you score points
The game is played over six epochs, with a scoring at the end of the third epoch and the last. Victory points can be acquired in five ways; columns score you points with the point per column increasing with the number of columns you own; from 1 point per column if you only own one to 3 to the almost unachievable 4 points per column if you manage to get all 12 on the board. You also score points from demi gods – these tiles just have a victory point value on them and they can be acquired as a starting bonus, from bonus tiles on the board or from the god Pliasiris. Gods score you points as well, depending on which epoch you acquire them from; one point in the first epoch to six in the sixth and final epoch. Causing the end of an epoch scores you three points, and lastly one god gives bonus points at each scoring
Game play
At the beginning of the game players are randomly given a bonus tile (most are a one off bonus, a god, a demi god, a sacrifice tile, place a column, an extra foot and a column), five cards and four feet and three columns. At the beginning of each epoch the top card of the nation deck is flipped over, the temple marker is placed on the home spot of the drawn nation and then gods (number of players plus one) placed on the board as are bonus tiles from the bag (number of players plus one). Each nation has a ‘trait’ this is then executed. Most traits are beneficial, e.g. card draws, a sacrifice tile or a purchase action. Two of the eight countries are a double edged sword as they reset your hand size to seven, either giving a draw or making you discard. Players take actions in turn into the Epoch ends; which is caused by either the last god tile or bonus tile being claimed. This leads to a lot of variability in the length of each epoch; if the gods available each round are cheap and juicy and the bonus tiles all corkers then the epoch will fly by. If the gods are expensive and the bonus tiles stinkers then players may stock up on cards so it might be a longer epoch. However, a longer epoch will probably be followed by a shorter epoch as players will have a lot of cards to blitz the board or purchase gods. This unpredictability is one of the attractions of the game for me.
On their turn players choose one of four actions. They can take three cards, Ticket to Ride like, from the four on display, or from the top of the draw pile. Secondly they can take a movement action, which will allow everyone else to, Puerto Rico like, take the same action. Movement involves placing feet and columns on the board; the player who selected the action takes the big wooden foot which gives him one free step. He then can play as many step cards (worth two steps each) as he likes. Each step allows him to place a foot or a column on the board. They must start from the temple and form a continuous route back to the temple. If he places a foot on a bonus tile he takes the tile which is activated at the end of his movement action. The number of feet and columns that can be played is limited by the number he has in his personal reserve. Bonus tiles are either yellow or blue, with yellow tiles a one of bonus and blues permanent to be reused. They include demi gods, a free god from the draw pile, card draw, a money card from the special money deck or extra feet and columns, or free permanent steps to be used in future movement actions. He can also place columns, but only in the column hexes. There can be two feet and columns of different players in each hex, but the second foot or column costs two steps to place. The other players may also take a movement action, though they don’t get the free step awarded to the player who initiated the action. However, they may have free steps from bonus tiles or the god Vinthrad. They also may play step cards to place feet and columns. If a player does not place feet or columns on the board they take a card from the draw pile. The decision to take the movement action is a tricky one, you can leach of another player’s movement action but you are going to get second (or third or fourth) pickings of the available bonus tiles and column spaces. As the bonus for ending the round goes to the active player, it means that if the last bonus tile is taken by another player leaching then they are giving three vps to the player who initiated the movement action.
The third action is to buy stuff, and you pay for it with money cards and the god Stonkus (called so, I imagine because he is stonkingly powerful) provides a cash bonus for each buy action. You can buy as many items as you like up to what you can afford. Feet and columns cost one money each (you will need to supplement your starting feet and columns as soon as possible), Sacrifice tiles vary in cost depending on the level of the tile with level one tiles costing one money up to Level four tiles which cost ten money. You can also level up your tiles by paying the difference between the costs of the levels, for example levelling up a level one to a level two tile costs two. You can only own one of each type of tile. You can spend money to buy steps to immediately place feet and columns on the board at a cost of one money per step. This is a rather handy way of getting stuff on the board without giving the other players a free ride.
The fourth action is to take a god tile from the selection laid out at the beginning of each epoch. Each god has a cost in sacrifices. These can be paid for with either sacrifice tiles or cards or a combination of the two. The cost of each god is shown in the number of different types of sacrifices that have to be made (between one and four) and the number of sacrifices of each type that have to be made , for example Stonkus requires four types of sacrifice, with one being four , another three , then two then one. I can pay for that for ‘free’ if I have four sacrifice tiles of these values, more likely I will have to pay with a combination of cards and tiles, with the cards going to the discard pile and the tiles staying in front of me to be reused. Gods are good, but as I have found not essential to winning the game. The most immediate benefit a god gives is victory points, one in the first epoch through to six in the last. Gods, like bonus tiles, either provide one off or permanent benefits. You can own multiple copies of the same god. Permanent benefits help you throughout the games for example gives free steps, Stonkus free money, Detraccus two cards at the beginning of every epoch, Gaiviles helps you jump over occupied hexes on the board. The one off benefits might be another free god (super powerful in the last epoch as you score points or both gods) or the top card from the speciality money deck.
At the end of an epoch any unclaimed gods or bonus and god tiles are removed from the game and all players feet are returned from the board to their personal reserve. The game then moves on to the next epoch. At the end of the third and sixth epoch there is scoring phase where players score columns, demi-gods. The player with the most Victory points wins.
Why I like the game
Each action is simple, however from the four actions available to me each turn most of the time I find myself wanting to take all of them; Worried that if I grab some quick points I am going to sacrifice future gain, on the other hand concerned that the demi -god I am forsaking could decide the game if I don’t take him now. The decisions sit on that delicious cusp right between strategy and tactics and that’s where I like it best.
I have noticed a few comments that the game is too dependent on the luck of the draw – cards, gods, bonus tiles. For me that is missing the point of the game. – The random nature of the draw is one of the games strengths because it poses a new challenge game by game and epoch by epoch. The draw can mean that an epoch might be short or long (five juicy bonus tiles won’t be there for long), or it might be long with hard to pay for gods and weaker bonuses. The three points round ending bonus puts pressure on players to make moves rather than accumulate and you need to be looking for short term scoring opportunities as well as trying to grab gods that help your longer term plans. Making too many long term plans is a mistake in this game; it’s over before you know it and the random draw might militate against it so you need to keep flexible. You just have to play to it as you see it; with a sharp eye on the other players. You might not be seeing feet cards. No problem – you use money to buy map placement or you get yourself cards for a juicy god. One of the joys of the game is that it plays out differently every time and you can’t wed yourself to one strategy, e.g. it would be nice to aim for 12 columns at the beginning of the game however one the random draw of the countries might make it nigh on impossible and the other players are going to block you (well I am going to )
Unlike ‘Stone Age’ (which I love as a 2 player game) the full complement of four is the best number for Pantheon, there’s more potential for screwage on the board, some of the gods increase in value (especially the hex jumping god Gaiviles) there are less turns per player per Epoch which creates more tension. Three is also very good but two is the least enjoyable experience for me as you can pretty well do your own thing on the board (though that might be a plus for some gamers who want more control). I have played five games and none has lasted more than 90 minutes and I think it will come down to 75 minutes with four when everyone is up to speed.
‘Pantheon’ now sits on my shelf between ‘Stone Age’ and ‘World Without End’ as a go to medium weight Euro, for occasions when I like a little bit of unpredictability in my gaming. I understand that Rio Grande hare going to be publishing this in an English language edition later this summer
Neil Walters picks eight games from Essen 2010
Troyes
Top notch euro game that utilises dice in a unique way. Dice by nature are random but Troyes has very little luck. I have played this half a dozen times and while high die rolls are generally more useful, I have never felt that my low rolls were having a major impact on how I was doing. The major feature is that everyone’s dice are available to all, at a cost naturally! You have to temper the natural tendency to persistently take your own dice that are free. Money can be tight but does not count for anything in its own right at the end of the game, so paying for dice is not as bad as it might first appear. It does matter though which and whose dice you choose and of course your gain is another player’s loss. The setting is the medieval city of Troyes that is divided into three sectors, military (red dice), civic (yellow dice) and church (white dice). The number of different coloured dice you roll is dependent on how many of your men occupy a particular area. The dice are used to undertake various actions such as booting out other player’s men replacing them with your own, building the cathedral, helping to get rid of enemy invaders or earning more cash. One of you main actions will also be to hire artisans from each of the city areas for their specific abilities that could help you achieve more VPs, cash or even give potential bonuses to your dice. There are 27 such artisans in the game (9 per area) but only 3 of these per area will be called upon for each game. In addition only one per area will be revealed in each of the first three rounds of the game. This gradual seeding is great for me as I don’t have to remember them all at once. Great replay value as each game will be different depending upon what combination of artisans appear. Two other excellent features are worth mentioning. Players can earn influence during the game, from fighting invaders or building the cathedral for example. Influence can then be spent to mitigate their own dice, such as re-rolls or flipping of dice as well as bringing on additional men to allow you to hire more artisans or claim another spot in one of the three game areas. I also like the way that the game system deals with the enemy invaders. Each round an additional two invader cards are introduced that can upset players plans but like a bad penny they will keep coming back each round to haunt you until the players eventually deal with them. There is an aspect of co-operative play here to get rid of the card if it affects everyone. No downsides to the game for me I can think of, so all in all, one of the best games from the Essen show.
Navegador
As a fan of the rondel mechanic, there was little chance that I was not going to like this game. For the uninitiated the rondel is a very clever but simple device for controlling all the player’s actions. It consists of a circle drawn on the game board divided into eight segments. With the exception of one particular segment, the Market action, which occurs twice, each of the other six are completely different. In your turn you advance your marker up to three segments (you can move further but it’s prohibitively expensive to do) and complete the action on the segment you finally decide to land on. There is no blocking so you have the freedom to plan your future moves as you wish. It also has the advantage that you can see what your fellow players are up to as well. Tension comes with those actions where there is an incentive to get to a particular segment first, as some actions have a limited number of resources or benefit to pick up, or the resources become increasingly more expensive as cheaper ones have already been taken. In my view it is one of the most innovative mechanics to have come out in the last ten years. It’s clean, simple and totally transparent with the added attraction of very little down time in play. Even in five player games it’s your turn again before you know it. But it’s not good enough having a great mechanic if the rest of the game doesn’t shape up. No fears here either. Set in the 15th century, you are a Portuguese explorer building a colonial empire. You can explore the seas and oceans going east, found colonies, sell sugar, gold and spices for profits to invest in ever more ships to continue your quest eastwards. Or not. You could also be that “stay nearer to home type” of explorer. After all sailing long distances is time consuming and expensive. So why not hang back a little and snaffle up a few colonies that the others have left behind, and perhaps build lots of factories to process the goods for lots of cash instead. Both alternatives might work and can work. I’ve seen both happen successfully. Along the way you can also build churches to recruit workers, shipyards to build your ships and also obtain privileges for instant cash and future victory point potential. It is a game of maximising the efficiency of your actions both in your selection on the rondel but also the volume of benefits you can manage to reap in a single turn. It is also a game where you have to keep a close eye on what the other players are doing, as the market for selling and processing goods is dynamic. Prices could easily have dropped by the time your turn comes round again. You need to be particularly aware of what your right hand neighbour is selling, and be prepared to adopt a flexible strategy. All this adds up to just my type of game. The components are excellent and the artwork on the board is the very best combination of great to look at and total clarity. To be honest, I’m really struggling to come up with any negatives to say about Navegador and instantly became a favourite from the Essen crop. There may be some, but if so they’re not immediately apparent to me. Navegador is not totally original of course, but my feeling is that there is a natural progression and improvement in the rondel series. In my view this is the best of the series so far and if you haven’t tried one before, then I think you should seriously consider treating yourself to this one.
Vinhos
After your first game of Vinhos, your head may be spinning from the overall complexity and volume of options, but trust me it does get easier! Thematically fantastic as I love wine... you don’t have to like wine to play, but it helps. You are setting up you own estate in Portugal which can accommodate four vineyards. Each vineyard specialises in one variety of grape (either white or red) from one of the eight wine growing regions of Portugal. Once you have decided on a particular grape variety for one of your vineyards you are stuck with it for good or bad for the rest of the game. You need to give thought to what variety you pick as your decision will have large bearing on how your game pans out. You only have 12 basic game actions in the whole game so you need to be focused on what actions are important as you can’t afford to waste them willy nilly. Each two game actions followed by a bank and wine production phase constitutes a game year, so six game years total make up the game. After years 3, 5 and 6 there is a wine fair where you must exhibit one of your wines for tasting and hopefully earn more VPs. Getting your wine production engine going as early as you can is a good thing. The main focus is getting at least three and possibly four vineyards up and running by the end of year 2. This will ensure that you get the volume of wine production for the rest of the game to earn money and VPs and the wine fairs. You will also need wine to exchange for additional actions above the basic twelve with help from your wine managers. A ready supply of cash is required to invest in infrastructure for your vineyards to enhance the quantity and quality of your wine, eg wineries, enologists and cellars. What I like about this game is the juggling act you have to perform to get the best advantage from your choice of actions. The timing and sequencing of your actions is crucial. You have a limited number of them and the order you carry them out is important. Depending on the game situation and your strategy there will be some actions you may not need at all in the entire game, but equally there will be other actions such as getting more vineyards that will be a must at some point. Also I think the game concept of cash in hand and separate bank account is inspired. It’s different and it works although it does add an extra layer of complexity that may not be to everyone’s taste. Going to the bank to draw out cash for future purchases costs an action. There are alternatives in the game to get more cash that don’t require an action but which is best? Possibly you may need to do both. It is these kinds of choices that really make the game interesting to play. Another example is where you can take an action to go to the wine fair early. You will get a choice of benefits up front for doing so but is it worth wasting a full action out of your precious twelve when you can just turn up at the fair for no action cost later? Make no mistake, this is a heavy euro game but one that has been lovingly put together by the designer over many years. And it shows. It may take up to half an hour to explain the rules to others but the time investment is worth it. The iconography on the board is very clear and to be fair once you’re under way it flows fairly smoothly given its depth. I recently played a four player with 2 noobs and it took roughly 2.5 hours, but I would say allowing 45 mins per player for your first game is about right. Experience of the game will be key in how you do and newcomers will be at a disadvantage as there is clearly a learning curve. There is a lot going on and it’ll take a few plays to sink in. A little randomness is thrown in, which is good as it keeps the game fresh and the players on their toes. This is in the form of weather that can add or deduct up to 2 from your wine production values. Fortunately the weather forecasts in the game are better than the ones you see on the telly as you are given advance warning at the start of a year of how production will be affected by the end of the year. So at least you have a couple of actions to try and mitigate the weather’s effects if you wish. With the exception of ensuring that you really must have at least three vineyards up and running by the end of year 2, there are many viable paths to pursue and for me exploring these is what makes Vinhos fun and interesting to play.
Rallyman
A new race game with lots of innovation and one that really gives the feel of what rally racing is all about. The dice mechanic is really clever with a push your luck element. Each die represents a gear (1st to 5th) that you can only roll once in your turn plus two acceleration dice that you can use anytime during your turn. Each die only allows you to move your car one space. Each die also has one or two hazards showing on the faces and if three turn up during your turn your car goes out of control with a subsequent loss of time. And time is what the game’s all about. Most car racing games are of the traditional first past the post type where you are directly competing against other cars to reach the finish line first. But in Rallyman the important thing is to achieve the best time when crossing the line. At the end of your turn you will receive a card corresponding to the gear you finished your turn in, ranging from 10 seconds if you’re in 5th gear, then down in 10 second increments to 50 seconds in 1st gear. At the end of the stage you will tot up all your cards for your final stage time. While it would be nice to drive continually along in 5th, there is always going to be those pesky corners to negotiate and how well you handle them will determine your final stage time. Typically your car will be approaching corners in gears 1 to 3 so a degree of advance planning is required to negotiate them without going out of control. You never feel that your fate is totally determined by the outcome of your die rolls. To some extent the game has a solitaire puzzle feel about it and it’s heaven for those who enjoy some forward planning. Like the real thing, the cars are run at intervals, so the first car away will get two full turns before the second car goes and so on. Some see the waiting around to have your turn as a weakness of the game but it’s one I don’t share. We are only talking about a few minutes here. Indeed I don’t mind going last as I can see how the other cars in front are negotiating the course and I can copy or make alternative plans as appropriate. The potential downside to going last is that the cars in front could possibly throw dirt into the corners that may force you to use a lower gear. During your turn you have the choice of throwing your dice in one of two ways. You can roll your dice one at a time that gives you the opportunity of stopping if there is a possibility you may crash if you continue. Alternatively you can take a chance and roll them all at once and by so doing earn seconds in the form of chips. This is a great feature and adds extra tension to the risk taking element of the game. These chips can either be save to reduce total time at the end of the stage, or used during a future turn in lieu of a die roll to offset any possibility of going out of control. I am a big fan of race games in general be they cars, horses, bikes, or whatever. However for me race games can sink or swim depending on how the random disaster features in the game are handled. It’s a fine line, but penalties have to be severe enough both to maintain tension in the game and keep true to the sport while at the same time not be so severe as to wreck a player’s chances especially early in the race. I think that Rallyman gets this balance right. You can assess the risk before throwing the dice, and also the time penalty for going out of control is one minute total for your turn i.e. just 10 seconds more than you would normally get if you were in 1st gear. In some circumstances you can lose the ability of rolling all the dice, but this will only last until the end of the stage. The game lasts three stages (each stage is about 20 mins long) and this is really the minimum you need to race to get the best from the game. Rallyman is very well supported online with dedicated six stage rallies such as the Monte Carlo and Corsica and I’m really looking forward to trying these out. I also notice that the designer always replies to any rules queries that crop up on the Geek. I really like this game and it is evident that the designer is a big fan of rallying. The boards provided with the game can be put together in a seemingly infinite number of ways so you will possible never need to play exactly the same stage twice if you so wish. Further variety is provided on the reverse of each of the four boards that shows the same track but in snowy conditions. You can even have a stage with both normal and snowy conditions. This will give you an interesting decision on tyre selection that is another aspect of the game that adds variety. A unique feature that this race game brings to the genre is that you never really know who has won the stage until the final count of your time cards. Rallyman brings a lot of totally fresh ideas to the table and has already established itself as one of my firm favourites.
Era of Invention
Era of Invention is a game about the development and production of inventions at the turn of the 20th century, for me thematically appealing and unusual as well. Although there is nothing significantly new in the game play, there is a subtle re-mixing of the usual ingredients that gives the game a different feel that I like. Describing how the game works is simply done. You place two action tokens (three in a 3 player game) one at a time in an empty slot in one of the six action areas on the board. Each action area has two slots available, so twelve slots all told. You then carry out those actions one at a time in any order. Both activities are carried out in strict player order. In addition, players also start the game with between one and five extra action tokens again depending upon the number of players. One of these can be used at any time and in any area after a regular action. Apart from the odd bit of end of turn tidying up and preparations for the following round that’s all there is to it. In a sentence, stick your tokens down and do the actions. Which for me is actually quite a pleasant change. The simplicity of the mechanics leaves you free to concentrate on the interesting bits such as deciding what your best selections will be bearing in mind what other players are doing, your position within the turn order and how best to manage your scarce resources. Turn order is important as first player rotates clockwise after each round. This means that the first player in turn one will be the last player is turn two, so there is definitely an element of forward planning required here, as actions that you would ideally like to take next turn will not necessarily be available. For me this adds to the challenge. The idea of the game is to turn your scarce resources into a combination of factories (to produce different resources), designing new inventions (for mainly VPs or possibly cash) and producing the aforesaid new inventions (for VPs or cash). It is not sufficient to concentrate just on one of these activities alone, but equally spreading your actions too thinly across all three activities will likely dilute your overall potential. There is a finite number of regular actions in the game so you need to make them count. Along with many other games, this is an exercise in efficiency and timing, and a very good one at that. I have seen a game won with loads of factories, and in contrast another where the winner has not bought or produced any factories at all. Some criticism has been levelled centred on games that people have played just the once with 5 players, and mainly around the assertion (misplaced I think) that players sitting in 4th and 5th position at the start of the game are at an acute disadvantage. While I don’t agree this is necessarily the case (two of my games have in fact been won by the player in 4th start position). It is fair to say though that the five player version is a lot more challenging to play and less forgiving on mistakes, but it plays very well for 3 or 4. I’ve really enjoyed my games so far and I’m looking forward to future plays.
After Pablo
This game has had a very low profile since its Essen release. I suspect that one of the reasons may have been down to its theme, namely the producing of cocaine by the cartels from Columbia and their subsequent sale to Mexico and the USA, so if that is a concern to you, read no further. This would be a pity because if you can get past the potential “bad taste”, After Pablo is actually a very interesting and well designed game. None of the individual mechanics are particularly new. There is a little bit of card drafting, area control, “take that”, auctions, attacking and the ability to take extra actions that we have all seen somewhere before, but not necessarily all in the same package. You will potentially be earning VPs both during and at the end of the game in a number of different ways. Such as from being the boss of either the Columbia or Mexican cartels, fighting other cartels, the smuggling and sale of cocaine, and the exchange of cash for luxuries that can be converted into VPs. The heart of the game and for me what makes it stand out is the function of the multi purpose cards. These show the portraits of various cartel members, eg assassins, politicians, guerrillas, etc together with their various abilities. Pretty much everything you do involves the playing of cards. If you use the card for fighting for example, you are giving it up for using its potential transport capability when smuggling drugs across the border. I like the fact that there are both different strategies to adopt but you also can take advantage of various one off tactical choices that can occur during the game. You also have a limited supply of influence markers at your disposal that are used to claim control of the Columbian and Mexican cartels and also to influence the DEA (extra actions). The random element to the game is how successful you smuggle or sell to the USA. The backs of the cards show either a blank alley or a police car. If the police car is revealed then one of your influence is “arrested” and in the normal course of events you will have to wait a lot of turns to get it back. But even this random element can be mitigated by the extra actions provided by the DEA. There is even more scope to the game than I have time to cover here, and there are plenty of options to consider and do. Thematically it has the feel of what I would imagine (naturally I only know what I read and see on the telly!) the illegal drug industry would be like. It can be played in around 90 minutes by 2 to 4 players, but I think it is at its best with 4.
K2
K2 is the world’s second highest mountain and reputedly one of the most challenging a dangerous to climb. Difficult to categorise this one as it’s not really a race game. It’s not the first man to the top either, but more of the highest you can possibly get and survive. Each player has two parties that begin the game at base camp with the overall objective of getting them as high up the mountain as you can whilst preventing the other players from doing the same. The higher up the mountain you climb, the more VPs you will earn, but if your party does not survive until the end of the game, those VPs are lost. There are two drivers to the game. The first is your own deck of cards that allocate movement and also improve your chances of survival. Each player’s deck is identical but individually shuffled. All the cards will be used at some point (indeed you will go through your own deck twice) but clearly the cards will come out in a different order each time. The second driver is the weather, which can be good, bad or worse depending upon the current altitude of your team. But you do get highly accurate advance notice, so a lot better than real life if you were really on the mountain. Players choose one from their hand of three cards and reveal them simultaneously. These will either allow your party to move or increase their survival rating. Priority for moving first rotates after each round of cards played. This is important especially when a party reaches nearer the top as the number of parties that can occupy the same place are strictly limited. There is nothing to prevent a party from reaching the top and staying there for the remainder of the game, weather permitting of course, thereby preventing anyone else reaching your ledge. Such behaviour is probably frowned upon in the mountaineering fraternity, but in game terms it works rather well and we like it! If the weather gets really bad you can always pitch your tent! I rather like the “push your luck” element as you consider how far up the mountain you can get away with and survive. You will also have to time your surge to the summit taking into consideration the future weather patterns, where your opponents are on the mountain and turn order. K2 is a highly original game with plenty to think about within a short playing time of around 15 mins per player. For those who want a tougher challenge, the reverse of the standard board shows the mountain with slightly more treacherous routes up in bad weather. The ultimate challenge is using the bad weather side with the alternative “bad weather” cards. I can’t wait to try it!
First Train to Nurenburg
FTtN is an updated version of Martin Wallace’s Last Train to Wensleydale. Along with the less colourful graphics, the new package includes a double sided board with the familiar Wensleydale map on one side and a new map set around Nurenburg on the other. The board also includes some additional iconography in the form of arrows that helps you identify pick up points for stone that greatly improves ease of play. The game also features a dedicated 2 player, 4 player as well as two different 3 player versions. Without beating about the bush I think this is one of MW’s finest games all time and a totally different style of railway game from his earlier “Steam” and “Rails” series. I’m not sure how he went about creating this but I think it’s a brilliant design. It has pretty much everything... bidding for influence, variable turn order for different phases, track building, picking up goods and passengers, securing the best rolling stock, takeovers of track, cash (in the form of investment cubes) management. Each game will play out differently on the board as the goods and passengers are seeded randomly at the start, so a different puzzle to solve as you try and work out potential optimal routes. The minor downside to this is that it will take slightly longer than average to set up before each game. One of the really compelling aspects about this game is the juggling act you have to perform with the influence tracks. All are potentially important, but you are forced to prioritise. The idea of the game is to build a network of tracks to link up to goods and passengers. The latter are transported on trains that are hired each turn to earn VPs and profit. Once the tracks have served their purpose you will then need to convert them into one of the major neutral railways, the Midland or the NER. Maintaining unprofitable track of your own ultimately costs you profit (end of game VPs) and also the ability to build future track as there is a limited supply to build with. Along with many features of the game this is a tricky balancing act. The game forces(!) you to diversify in many ways. For example there are two types of goods and also two different passengers, one for each of the two major railways. End of games VPs are earned for a set (one of each type) so there is nothing to be gained by concentrating on even just three. You will also need to keep an eye on how you spend your investment cubes. They are dual purpose, used both for bidding on influence and also for building your track. How much do you need to spend or possibly hold back for next turn? Influence is key to performing your actions and comes in the form of four different tracks. One determines the order you build track, another is the order you hire trains and ship goods and passengers and the final two represent the major railways and your ability to convert your defunct track. There is just one variable in play. Some of the influence up for auction each turn will be randomly drawn so if you are particularly desperate for one type, there is no guarantee that it will turn up. So in summary a great game in its own right and a railway game that has a totally different feel to any other ones I’ve played. And that’s a lot!
Top notch euro game that utilises dice in a unique way. Dice by nature are random but Troyes has very little luck. I have played this half a dozen times and while high die rolls are generally more useful, I have never felt that my low rolls were having a major impact on how I was doing. The major feature is that everyone’s dice are available to all, at a cost naturally! You have to temper the natural tendency to persistently take your own dice that are free. Money can be tight but does not count for anything in its own right at the end of the game, so paying for dice is not as bad as it might first appear. It does matter though which and whose dice you choose and of course your gain is another player’s loss. The setting is the medieval city of Troyes that is divided into three sectors, military (red dice), civic (yellow dice) and church (white dice). The number of different coloured dice you roll is dependent on how many of your men occupy a particular area. The dice are used to undertake various actions such as booting out other player’s men replacing them with your own, building the cathedral, helping to get rid of enemy invaders or earning more cash. One of you main actions will also be to hire artisans from each of the city areas for their specific abilities that could help you achieve more VPs, cash or even give potential bonuses to your dice. There are 27 such artisans in the game (9 per area) but only 3 of these per area will be called upon for each game. In addition only one per area will be revealed in each of the first three rounds of the game. This gradual seeding is great for me as I don’t have to remember them all at once. Great replay value as each game will be different depending upon what combination of artisans appear. Two other excellent features are worth mentioning. Players can earn influence during the game, from fighting invaders or building the cathedral for example. Influence can then be spent to mitigate their own dice, such as re-rolls or flipping of dice as well as bringing on additional men to allow you to hire more artisans or claim another spot in one of the three game areas. I also like the way that the game system deals with the enemy invaders. Each round an additional two invader cards are introduced that can upset players plans but like a bad penny they will keep coming back each round to haunt you until the players eventually deal with them. There is an aspect of co-operative play here to get rid of the card if it affects everyone. No downsides to the game for me I can think of, so all in all, one of the best games from the Essen show.
Navegador
As a fan of the rondel mechanic, there was little chance that I was not going to like this game. For the uninitiated the rondel is a very clever but simple device for controlling all the player’s actions. It consists of a circle drawn on the game board divided into eight segments. With the exception of one particular segment, the Market action, which occurs twice, each of the other six are completely different. In your turn you advance your marker up to three segments (you can move further but it’s prohibitively expensive to do) and complete the action on the segment you finally decide to land on. There is no blocking so you have the freedom to plan your future moves as you wish. It also has the advantage that you can see what your fellow players are up to as well. Tension comes with those actions where there is an incentive to get to a particular segment first, as some actions have a limited number of resources or benefit to pick up, or the resources become increasingly more expensive as cheaper ones have already been taken. In my view it is one of the most innovative mechanics to have come out in the last ten years. It’s clean, simple and totally transparent with the added attraction of very little down time in play. Even in five player games it’s your turn again before you know it. But it’s not good enough having a great mechanic if the rest of the game doesn’t shape up. No fears here either. Set in the 15th century, you are a Portuguese explorer building a colonial empire. You can explore the seas and oceans going east, found colonies, sell sugar, gold and spices for profits to invest in ever more ships to continue your quest eastwards. Or not. You could also be that “stay nearer to home type” of explorer. After all sailing long distances is time consuming and expensive. So why not hang back a little and snaffle up a few colonies that the others have left behind, and perhaps build lots of factories to process the goods for lots of cash instead. Both alternatives might work and can work. I’ve seen both happen successfully. Along the way you can also build churches to recruit workers, shipyards to build your ships and also obtain privileges for instant cash and future victory point potential. It is a game of maximising the efficiency of your actions both in your selection on the rondel but also the volume of benefits you can manage to reap in a single turn. It is also a game where you have to keep a close eye on what the other players are doing, as the market for selling and processing goods is dynamic. Prices could easily have dropped by the time your turn comes round again. You need to be particularly aware of what your right hand neighbour is selling, and be prepared to adopt a flexible strategy. All this adds up to just my type of game. The components are excellent and the artwork on the board is the very best combination of great to look at and total clarity. To be honest, I’m really struggling to come up with any negatives to say about Navegador and instantly became a favourite from the Essen crop. There may be some, but if so they’re not immediately apparent to me. Navegador is not totally original of course, but my feeling is that there is a natural progression and improvement in the rondel series. In my view this is the best of the series so far and if you haven’t tried one before, then I think you should seriously consider treating yourself to this one.
Vinhos
After your first game of Vinhos, your head may be spinning from the overall complexity and volume of options, but trust me it does get easier! Thematically fantastic as I love wine... you don’t have to like wine to play, but it helps. You are setting up you own estate in Portugal which can accommodate four vineyards. Each vineyard specialises in one variety of grape (either white or red) from one of the eight wine growing regions of Portugal. Once you have decided on a particular grape variety for one of your vineyards you are stuck with it for good or bad for the rest of the game. You need to give thought to what variety you pick as your decision will have large bearing on how your game pans out. You only have 12 basic game actions in the whole game so you need to be focused on what actions are important as you can’t afford to waste them willy nilly. Each two game actions followed by a bank and wine production phase constitutes a game year, so six game years total make up the game. After years 3, 5 and 6 there is a wine fair where you must exhibit one of your wines for tasting and hopefully earn more VPs. Getting your wine production engine going as early as you can is a good thing. The main focus is getting at least three and possibly four vineyards up and running by the end of year 2. This will ensure that you get the volume of wine production for the rest of the game to earn money and VPs and the wine fairs. You will also need wine to exchange for additional actions above the basic twelve with help from your wine managers. A ready supply of cash is required to invest in infrastructure for your vineyards to enhance the quantity and quality of your wine, eg wineries, enologists and cellars. What I like about this game is the juggling act you have to perform to get the best advantage from your choice of actions. The timing and sequencing of your actions is crucial. You have a limited number of them and the order you carry them out is important. Depending on the game situation and your strategy there will be some actions you may not need at all in the entire game, but equally there will be other actions such as getting more vineyards that will be a must at some point. Also I think the game concept of cash in hand and separate bank account is inspired. It’s different and it works although it does add an extra layer of complexity that may not be to everyone’s taste. Going to the bank to draw out cash for future purchases costs an action. There are alternatives in the game to get more cash that don’t require an action but which is best? Possibly you may need to do both. It is these kinds of choices that really make the game interesting to play. Another example is where you can take an action to go to the wine fair early. You will get a choice of benefits up front for doing so but is it worth wasting a full action out of your precious twelve when you can just turn up at the fair for no action cost later? Make no mistake, this is a heavy euro game but one that has been lovingly put together by the designer over many years. And it shows. It may take up to half an hour to explain the rules to others but the time investment is worth it. The iconography on the board is very clear and to be fair once you’re under way it flows fairly smoothly given its depth. I recently played a four player with 2 noobs and it took roughly 2.5 hours, but I would say allowing 45 mins per player for your first game is about right. Experience of the game will be key in how you do and newcomers will be at a disadvantage as there is clearly a learning curve. There is a lot going on and it’ll take a few plays to sink in. A little randomness is thrown in, which is good as it keeps the game fresh and the players on their toes. This is in the form of weather that can add or deduct up to 2 from your wine production values. Fortunately the weather forecasts in the game are better than the ones you see on the telly as you are given advance warning at the start of a year of how production will be affected by the end of the year. So at least you have a couple of actions to try and mitigate the weather’s effects if you wish. With the exception of ensuring that you really must have at least three vineyards up and running by the end of year 2, there are many viable paths to pursue and for me exploring these is what makes Vinhos fun and interesting to play.
Rallyman
A new race game with lots of innovation and one that really gives the feel of what rally racing is all about. The dice mechanic is really clever with a push your luck element. Each die represents a gear (1st to 5th) that you can only roll once in your turn plus two acceleration dice that you can use anytime during your turn. Each die only allows you to move your car one space. Each die also has one or two hazards showing on the faces and if three turn up during your turn your car goes out of control with a subsequent loss of time. And time is what the game’s all about. Most car racing games are of the traditional first past the post type where you are directly competing against other cars to reach the finish line first. But in Rallyman the important thing is to achieve the best time when crossing the line. At the end of your turn you will receive a card corresponding to the gear you finished your turn in, ranging from 10 seconds if you’re in 5th gear, then down in 10 second increments to 50 seconds in 1st gear. At the end of the stage you will tot up all your cards for your final stage time. While it would be nice to drive continually along in 5th, there is always going to be those pesky corners to negotiate and how well you handle them will determine your final stage time. Typically your car will be approaching corners in gears 1 to 3 so a degree of advance planning is required to negotiate them without going out of control. You never feel that your fate is totally determined by the outcome of your die rolls. To some extent the game has a solitaire puzzle feel about it and it’s heaven for those who enjoy some forward planning. Like the real thing, the cars are run at intervals, so the first car away will get two full turns before the second car goes and so on. Some see the waiting around to have your turn as a weakness of the game but it’s one I don’t share. We are only talking about a few minutes here. Indeed I don’t mind going last as I can see how the other cars in front are negotiating the course and I can copy or make alternative plans as appropriate. The potential downside to going last is that the cars in front could possibly throw dirt into the corners that may force you to use a lower gear. During your turn you have the choice of throwing your dice in one of two ways. You can roll your dice one at a time that gives you the opportunity of stopping if there is a possibility you may crash if you continue. Alternatively you can take a chance and roll them all at once and by so doing earn seconds in the form of chips. This is a great feature and adds extra tension to the risk taking element of the game. These chips can either be save to reduce total time at the end of the stage, or used during a future turn in lieu of a die roll to offset any possibility of going out of control. I am a big fan of race games in general be they cars, horses, bikes, or whatever. However for me race games can sink or swim depending on how the random disaster features in the game are handled. It’s a fine line, but penalties have to be severe enough both to maintain tension in the game and keep true to the sport while at the same time not be so severe as to wreck a player’s chances especially early in the race. I think that Rallyman gets this balance right. You can assess the risk before throwing the dice, and also the time penalty for going out of control is one minute total for your turn i.e. just 10 seconds more than you would normally get if you were in 1st gear. In some circumstances you can lose the ability of rolling all the dice, but this will only last until the end of the stage. The game lasts three stages (each stage is about 20 mins long) and this is really the minimum you need to race to get the best from the game. Rallyman is very well supported online with dedicated six stage rallies such as the Monte Carlo and Corsica and I’m really looking forward to trying these out. I also notice that the designer always replies to any rules queries that crop up on the Geek. I really like this game and it is evident that the designer is a big fan of rallying. The boards provided with the game can be put together in a seemingly infinite number of ways so you will possible never need to play exactly the same stage twice if you so wish. Further variety is provided on the reverse of each of the four boards that shows the same track but in snowy conditions. You can even have a stage with both normal and snowy conditions. This will give you an interesting decision on tyre selection that is another aspect of the game that adds variety. A unique feature that this race game brings to the genre is that you never really know who has won the stage until the final count of your time cards. Rallyman brings a lot of totally fresh ideas to the table and has already established itself as one of my firm favourites.
Era of Invention
Era of Invention is a game about the development and production of inventions at the turn of the 20th century, for me thematically appealing and unusual as well. Although there is nothing significantly new in the game play, there is a subtle re-mixing of the usual ingredients that gives the game a different feel that I like. Describing how the game works is simply done. You place two action tokens (three in a 3 player game) one at a time in an empty slot in one of the six action areas on the board. Each action area has two slots available, so twelve slots all told. You then carry out those actions one at a time in any order. Both activities are carried out in strict player order. In addition, players also start the game with between one and five extra action tokens again depending upon the number of players. One of these can be used at any time and in any area after a regular action. Apart from the odd bit of end of turn tidying up and preparations for the following round that’s all there is to it. In a sentence, stick your tokens down and do the actions. Which for me is actually quite a pleasant change. The simplicity of the mechanics leaves you free to concentrate on the interesting bits such as deciding what your best selections will be bearing in mind what other players are doing, your position within the turn order and how best to manage your scarce resources. Turn order is important as first player rotates clockwise after each round. This means that the first player in turn one will be the last player is turn two, so there is definitely an element of forward planning required here, as actions that you would ideally like to take next turn will not necessarily be available. For me this adds to the challenge. The idea of the game is to turn your scarce resources into a combination of factories (to produce different resources), designing new inventions (for mainly VPs or possibly cash) and producing the aforesaid new inventions (for VPs or cash). It is not sufficient to concentrate just on one of these activities alone, but equally spreading your actions too thinly across all three activities will likely dilute your overall potential. There is a finite number of regular actions in the game so you need to make them count. Along with many other games, this is an exercise in efficiency and timing, and a very good one at that. I have seen a game won with loads of factories, and in contrast another where the winner has not bought or produced any factories at all. Some criticism has been levelled centred on games that people have played just the once with 5 players, and mainly around the assertion (misplaced I think) that players sitting in 4th and 5th position at the start of the game are at an acute disadvantage. While I don’t agree this is necessarily the case (two of my games have in fact been won by the player in 4th start position). It is fair to say though that the five player version is a lot more challenging to play and less forgiving on mistakes, but it plays very well for 3 or 4. I’ve really enjoyed my games so far and I’m looking forward to future plays.
After Pablo
This game has had a very low profile since its Essen release. I suspect that one of the reasons may have been down to its theme, namely the producing of cocaine by the cartels from Columbia and their subsequent sale to Mexico and the USA, so if that is a concern to you, read no further. This would be a pity because if you can get past the potential “bad taste”, After Pablo is actually a very interesting and well designed game. None of the individual mechanics are particularly new. There is a little bit of card drafting, area control, “take that”, auctions, attacking and the ability to take extra actions that we have all seen somewhere before, but not necessarily all in the same package. You will potentially be earning VPs both during and at the end of the game in a number of different ways. Such as from being the boss of either the Columbia or Mexican cartels, fighting other cartels, the smuggling and sale of cocaine, and the exchange of cash for luxuries that can be converted into VPs. The heart of the game and for me what makes it stand out is the function of the multi purpose cards. These show the portraits of various cartel members, eg assassins, politicians, guerrillas, etc together with their various abilities. Pretty much everything you do involves the playing of cards. If you use the card for fighting for example, you are giving it up for using its potential transport capability when smuggling drugs across the border. I like the fact that there are both different strategies to adopt but you also can take advantage of various one off tactical choices that can occur during the game. You also have a limited supply of influence markers at your disposal that are used to claim control of the Columbian and Mexican cartels and also to influence the DEA (extra actions). The random element to the game is how successful you smuggle or sell to the USA. The backs of the cards show either a blank alley or a police car. If the police car is revealed then one of your influence is “arrested” and in the normal course of events you will have to wait a lot of turns to get it back. But even this random element can be mitigated by the extra actions provided by the DEA. There is even more scope to the game than I have time to cover here, and there are plenty of options to consider and do. Thematically it has the feel of what I would imagine (naturally I only know what I read and see on the telly!) the illegal drug industry would be like. It can be played in around 90 minutes by 2 to 4 players, but I think it is at its best with 4.
K2
K2 is the world’s second highest mountain and reputedly one of the most challenging a dangerous to climb. Difficult to categorise this one as it’s not really a race game. It’s not the first man to the top either, but more of the highest you can possibly get and survive. Each player has two parties that begin the game at base camp with the overall objective of getting them as high up the mountain as you can whilst preventing the other players from doing the same. The higher up the mountain you climb, the more VPs you will earn, but if your party does not survive until the end of the game, those VPs are lost. There are two drivers to the game. The first is your own deck of cards that allocate movement and also improve your chances of survival. Each player’s deck is identical but individually shuffled. All the cards will be used at some point (indeed you will go through your own deck twice) but clearly the cards will come out in a different order each time. The second driver is the weather, which can be good, bad or worse depending upon the current altitude of your team. But you do get highly accurate advance notice, so a lot better than real life if you were really on the mountain. Players choose one from their hand of three cards and reveal them simultaneously. These will either allow your party to move or increase their survival rating. Priority for moving first rotates after each round of cards played. This is important especially when a party reaches nearer the top as the number of parties that can occupy the same place are strictly limited. There is nothing to prevent a party from reaching the top and staying there for the remainder of the game, weather permitting of course, thereby preventing anyone else reaching your ledge. Such behaviour is probably frowned upon in the mountaineering fraternity, but in game terms it works rather well and we like it! If the weather gets really bad you can always pitch your tent! I rather like the “push your luck” element as you consider how far up the mountain you can get away with and survive. You will also have to time your surge to the summit taking into consideration the future weather patterns, where your opponents are on the mountain and turn order. K2 is a highly original game with plenty to think about within a short playing time of around 15 mins per player. For those who want a tougher challenge, the reverse of the standard board shows the mountain with slightly more treacherous routes up in bad weather. The ultimate challenge is using the bad weather side with the alternative “bad weather” cards. I can’t wait to try it!
First Train to Nurenburg
FTtN is an updated version of Martin Wallace’s Last Train to Wensleydale. Along with the less colourful graphics, the new package includes a double sided board with the familiar Wensleydale map on one side and a new map set around Nurenburg on the other. The board also includes some additional iconography in the form of arrows that helps you identify pick up points for stone that greatly improves ease of play. The game also features a dedicated 2 player, 4 player as well as two different 3 player versions. Without beating about the bush I think this is one of MW’s finest games all time and a totally different style of railway game from his earlier “Steam” and “Rails” series. I’m not sure how he went about creating this but I think it’s a brilliant design. It has pretty much everything... bidding for influence, variable turn order for different phases, track building, picking up goods and passengers, securing the best rolling stock, takeovers of track, cash (in the form of investment cubes) management. Each game will play out differently on the board as the goods and passengers are seeded randomly at the start, so a different puzzle to solve as you try and work out potential optimal routes. The minor downside to this is that it will take slightly longer than average to set up before each game. One of the really compelling aspects about this game is the juggling act you have to perform with the influence tracks. All are potentially important, but you are forced to prioritise. The idea of the game is to build a network of tracks to link up to goods and passengers. The latter are transported on trains that are hired each turn to earn VPs and profit. Once the tracks have served their purpose you will then need to convert them into one of the major neutral railways, the Midland or the NER. Maintaining unprofitable track of your own ultimately costs you profit (end of game VPs) and also the ability to build future track as there is a limited supply to build with. Along with many features of the game this is a tricky balancing act. The game forces(!) you to diversify in many ways. For example there are two types of goods and also two different passengers, one for each of the two major railways. End of games VPs are earned for a set (one of each type) so there is nothing to be gained by concentrating on even just three. You will also need to keep an eye on how you spend your investment cubes. They are dual purpose, used both for bidding on influence and also for building your track. How much do you need to spend or possibly hold back for next turn? Influence is key to performing your actions and comes in the form of four different tracks. One determines the order you build track, another is the order you hire trains and ship goods and passengers and the final two represent the major railways and your ability to convert your defunct track. There is just one variable in play. Some of the influence up for auction each turn will be randomly drawn so if you are particularly desperate for one type, there is no guarantee that it will turn up. So in summary a great game in its own right and a railway game that has a totally different feel to any other ones I’ve played. And that’s a lot!
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