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Good EndGames
Jan. 6th, 2005 01:39 amAfter a week of downtime, it was off to EndGame tonight for, well, games. I had a great time tonight, playing two new games (to me), which were both good, and all with people I liked and who played fast.
First up was Mare Nostrum. I've heard somewhat mixed things about it, but it was still early (7pmish) and so seemed a great time to try a longer game. Mare Nostrum is, to some extent, Civilization but shorter and with better rules. Each player takes control of 1 of 5 civilizations around the Mediterreanean and then builds up cities and trade locations to get cards which he can then build into armies (or further economic expansion).
I liked most elements of the game. The asymmetric setup positions are nice and give the game color. The card usage is very clever, as you have to either collect a set of different commodities (up to 12) or else a group of tax cards (which you get from cities); this can make purchasing the higher value items quite difficult. There's also a clever trade system, wherein one player determines how many cards will be up for trade, each person puts that number out, they all get flipped face-up, and then players select them one at a time, with each person who had their card selected getting to choose next.
Now the downside is that a lot of this felt like it undercut the warfare aspect. With clever & careful trading to get 9 (or 12) different commodities, you could potentially win the game. Likewise, the win could come about very suddenly (and in fact did in our game).
However, really what this means is that we should have hit the warfare aspect harder, as by letting the player who won get to the point where he could manage a set of 9 goods (to get his final hero/wonder) we gave him the game. The owner of the game agreed afterward that it was one of the friendliest games of Mare Nostrum he'd ever seen. We had rogue Grecian nations attacking me (Babylon) and Egypt, and that was about it, other than a last minute stab by Carthage at Greece (who'd left himself badly open).
This was definitely a game where I didn't understand all the elements at the start, but even with understanding there's issues of resource management that are hard to balance (economic v. military development, primarily), which is all a good thing. Definitely a game I'll play again, though not something I'd play every week, since the average playtime is probably more like 3 hours than 2.
Second up was Industria, an auction game that I've actually had sitting around for 10 months, but never played; this was Krishna's copy. The game has a few unique elements. First, in the auction phase, N things get auctioned each round (where N is the number of players), and the auctioneer gets to keep all the money *UNLESS* he takes something himself (for free) in which case the auctioning of the rest of the lot passes on to the next player. Second, the items auctioned are often need to build future auction items. (First you have to buy an item *then* build it in all cases; if there's a prerequisite, however, you can pay for the privilege of using it, if it's actually available.) Third, there's a graph connecting some auction items, which can increase their values if you have the items on either side of a link.
To a certain extent Industria reminded me of Ra, because it's got a semi-baroque system for buying items, and you get to see a lot of sale items all at once, and items have variable values to certain players, depending on what you've already gotten. This is all good, because I think these are positive elements in any auction game.
The big question that I have at the end is how many players this should be played with. I'd before heard *4* and I can understand that, because with 3 you can have more chaos in auctions where it's possible that neither non-auctioneer player will bid, in which case the auctioneer gets stuck with his own item, and thus loses the auctioning position. Definitely, I can see that decreasing strategy. However with 4 it looks like the 4th player can get hurt pretty badly because he doesn't get much money in until the 4th turn of play, which is already in the second epoch of development.
Yeah, I was the 4th player in our game, and I did get creamed, though part of that was going 4th, part of that was a really bad draw of items to auction on my first turn of auctions, part of that was that the player to my right held on to auctions until the bitter end, and so I never got free money or items from the auction passing to me, and (finally) part of that was due to me playing badly during the first part of the game because I was still grappling with valuations and strategies. If I'd played better I probably would have made 3rd instead of 4th, but I can't see doing better with what was stacked against me (though I may figure out how to in additional games).
I've glanced at some comments on the Industria page, and some folks just said you needed to have a "different" strategy if you played fourth. Helpful.
In any case, despite the bad loss, Industria was another one that I look forward to trying again. It'll probably get pulled out at a local Thursday gathering too, once I get through some review copies I have about currently.
First up was Mare Nostrum. I've heard somewhat mixed things about it, but it was still early (7pmish) and so seemed a great time to try a longer game. Mare Nostrum is, to some extent, Civilization but shorter and with better rules. Each player takes control of 1 of 5 civilizations around the Mediterreanean and then builds up cities and trade locations to get cards which he can then build into armies (or further economic expansion).
I liked most elements of the game. The asymmetric setup positions are nice and give the game color. The card usage is very clever, as you have to either collect a set of different commodities (up to 12) or else a group of tax cards (which you get from cities); this can make purchasing the higher value items quite difficult. There's also a clever trade system, wherein one player determines how many cards will be up for trade, each person puts that number out, they all get flipped face-up, and then players select them one at a time, with each person who had their card selected getting to choose next.
Now the downside is that a lot of this felt like it undercut the warfare aspect. With clever & careful trading to get 9 (or 12) different commodities, you could potentially win the game. Likewise, the win could come about very suddenly (and in fact did in our game).
However, really what this means is that we should have hit the warfare aspect harder, as by letting the player who won get to the point where he could manage a set of 9 goods (to get his final hero/wonder) we gave him the game. The owner of the game agreed afterward that it was one of the friendliest games of Mare Nostrum he'd ever seen. We had rogue Grecian nations attacking me (Babylon) and Egypt, and that was about it, other than a last minute stab by Carthage at Greece (who'd left himself badly open).
This was definitely a game where I didn't understand all the elements at the start, but even with understanding there's issues of resource management that are hard to balance (economic v. military development, primarily), which is all a good thing. Definitely a game I'll play again, though not something I'd play every week, since the average playtime is probably more like 3 hours than 2.
Second up was Industria, an auction game that I've actually had sitting around for 10 months, but never played; this was Krishna's copy. The game has a few unique elements. First, in the auction phase, N things get auctioned each round (where N is the number of players), and the auctioneer gets to keep all the money *UNLESS* he takes something himself (for free) in which case the auctioning of the rest of the lot passes on to the next player. Second, the items auctioned are often need to build future auction items. (First you have to buy an item *then* build it in all cases; if there's a prerequisite, however, you can pay for the privilege of using it, if it's actually available.) Third, there's a graph connecting some auction items, which can increase their values if you have the items on either side of a link.
To a certain extent Industria reminded me of Ra, because it's got a semi-baroque system for buying items, and you get to see a lot of sale items all at once, and items have variable values to certain players, depending on what you've already gotten. This is all good, because I think these are positive elements in any auction game.
The big question that I have at the end is how many players this should be played with. I'd before heard *4* and I can understand that, because with 3 you can have more chaos in auctions where it's possible that neither non-auctioneer player will bid, in which case the auctioneer gets stuck with his own item, and thus loses the auctioning position. Definitely, I can see that decreasing strategy. However with 4 it looks like the 4th player can get hurt pretty badly because he doesn't get much money in until the 4th turn of play, which is already in the second epoch of development.
Yeah, I was the 4th player in our game, and I did get creamed, though part of that was going 4th, part of that was a really bad draw of items to auction on my first turn of auctions, part of that was that the player to my right held on to auctions until the bitter end, and so I never got free money or items from the auction passing to me, and (finally) part of that was due to me playing badly during the first part of the game because I was still grappling with valuations and strategies. If I'd played better I probably would have made 3rd instead of 4th, but I can't see doing better with what was stacked against me (though I may figure out how to in additional games).
I've glanced at some comments on the Industria page, and some folks just said you needed to have a "different" strategy if you played fourth. Helpful.
In any case, despite the bad loss, Industria was another one that I look forward to trying again. It'll probably get pulled out at a local Thursday gathering too, once I get through some review copies I have about currently.