![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shannon_aEdel, Stein & Reich was one of my earlier board game purchases. Before I had found that community of gaming that is Endgame, I was still ordering from various online gaming stores, and that meant that I could order foreign editions (which Endgame has only carried on and off as an experiment). So Edel, Stein & Reich went onto one of my online orders, probably because it was an Alea title unpublished in the US. When it arrived I dutifully printed up the English rules, probably from BGG, read them, put them back in the box, and then had it sit ... for years.
The problem was the German language on the cards. It combined unpleasantly with the fact that each card had lots of variations (e.g., you can get a VP bonus for red gems or green gems or yellow gems), and so even printing up English translations didn't make things entirely clear. And that's why Edel, Stein & Reich didn't get played.
In the meantime I played Basari, and I found it very intriguing. To offer a brief synopsis: players move around a board, and the space each player is on gives values in gems and victory points. After arriving at their new space, each player simultaneously selects whether to take gems or victory points (based on the values on his space) or to move further (which moves him toward a +10 bonus at the end of the round).
When the simultaneous choices are revealed, there are problems if multiple players selected the same thing. If three or more did, no one among those players gets to do anything. But, if two people choose the same thing, they got to barter. This is, I think the game's most clever feature. You barter by offering gems back and forth, always bidding higher (either by offering more gems or more valuable gems). There are some opportunities for real cleverness, where you can try to force an opponent to go higher based on the particular bid you made.
Edel, Stein & Reich is a variation of Basari, but it always seemed like a pretty exciting variant to me: it replaces the board positions with card draws, it replaces the movement option with event cards which can do many things, and it gives a fourth option, a gem exchange, which increases the 4-player limit on Basari to 5.
Well, Wednesday I finally played Edel, Stein & Reich and sad to say, I was disappointed. In short:
Overall, I have to say that in a German edition, Edel, Stein & Reich is a worse game than Basari. In an English edition (if such existed), I might like it better, because it has better art, and the event cards have the potential to be cooler when you get used to them ... but I'd try to avoid playing it with five players.
More generally, I continue to think the core system is cool, with a somewhat controlled blind selection and a neat bartering system. I also think it is a nice complement for the card-driven games of the Small Box series.
However, I doubt I'll play it again, and it's going to stay in my collection for now only because of its Alea markings.
More generally, I'll also warn that some people don't like it because of its chaos, even with four players. One player told me that he thinks for a game of this sort to work, the choices other people are going to take need to be more predictable, and the results of butting heads need to be less punishing. It's difference in preference of game style, so I'll leave it at that.
L1: Ra. A+. (Plays: 15) [ Read my Review ]
L2: Chinatown. B-. (Plays: 1)
L3: Taj Mahal. A+. (Plays: 7)
L4: Princes of Florence. A. (Plays: 4+) [ Read my Review ]
L5: Adel Verpflichtet. B. (Plays: 2) [ Read my Review ]
L6: Traders of Genoa. A+. (Plays: 3+) [ Read my Review ]
S1: Wyatt Earp. B+ (Plays: 2)
S2: Royal Turf. A- (Plays: 6)
L7: Puerto Rico. A+ (Plays: 11) [ Read my Review ]
S3: Die Sieben Weisen C (Plays: 1)
S4: Edel, Stein & Reich B- (Plays: 1) [ Read my Basari Review ]
And I've now played every Alea game at least once ... but there's still a lot to replay this year. Either Mammoth Hunters or San Juan must be next.
The problem was the German language on the cards. It combined unpleasantly with the fact that each card had lots of variations (e.g., you can get a VP bonus for red gems or green gems or yellow gems), and so even printing up English translations didn't make things entirely clear. And that's why Edel, Stein & Reich didn't get played.
In the meantime I played Basari, and I found it very intriguing. To offer a brief synopsis: players move around a board, and the space each player is on gives values in gems and victory points. After arriving at their new space, each player simultaneously selects whether to take gems or victory points (based on the values on his space) or to move further (which moves him toward a +10 bonus at the end of the round).
When the simultaneous choices are revealed, there are problems if multiple players selected the same thing. If three or more did, no one among those players gets to do anything. But, if two people choose the same thing, they got to barter. This is, I think the game's most clever feature. You barter by offering gems back and forth, always bidding higher (either by offering more gems or more valuable gems). There are some opportunities for real cleverness, where you can try to force an opponent to go higher based on the particular bid you made.
Edel, Stein & Reich is a variation of Basari, but it always seemed like a pretty exciting variant to me: it replaces the board positions with card draws, it replaces the movement option with event cards which can do many things, and it gives a fourth option, a gem exchange, which increases the 4-player limit on Basari to 5.
Well, Wednesday I finally played Edel, Stein & Reich and sad to say, I was disappointed. In short:
- Changing the board positions to cards really took away a lot from the game, as you no longer felt as connected to what the other players were doing.
- The events would probably have been cooler than the movement if not for the fact they were all in German.
- Adding a fifth player turned out to be a bad thing, not a good thing. There's always some chaos in the game, but if you add a fifth player, that just increases the chance of three players butting heads and getting really screwed.
Overall, I have to say that in a German edition, Edel, Stein & Reich is a worse game than Basari. In an English edition (if such existed), I might like it better, because it has better art, and the event cards have the potential to be cooler when you get used to them ... but I'd try to avoid playing it with five players.
More generally, I continue to think the core system is cool, with a somewhat controlled blind selection and a neat bartering system. I also think it is a nice complement for the card-driven games of the Small Box series.
However, I doubt I'll play it again, and it's going to stay in my collection for now only because of its Alea markings.
More generally, I'll also warn that some people don't like it because of its chaos, even with four players. One player told me that he thinks for a game of this sort to work, the choices other people are going to take need to be more predictable, and the results of butting heads need to be less punishing. It's difference in preference of game style, so I'll leave it at that.
L1: Ra. A+. (Plays: 15) [ Read my Review ]
L2: Chinatown. B-. (Plays: 1)
L3: Taj Mahal. A+. (Plays: 7)
L4: Princes of Florence. A. (Plays: 4+) [ Read my Review ]
L5: Adel Verpflichtet. B. (Plays: 2) [ Read my Review ]
L6: Traders of Genoa. A+. (Plays: 3+) [ Read my Review ]
S1: Wyatt Earp. B+ (Plays: 2)
S2: Royal Turf. A- (Plays: 6)
L7: Puerto Rico. A+ (Plays: 11) [ Read my Review ]
S3: Die Sieben Weisen C (Plays: 1)
S4: Edel, Stein & Reich B- (Plays: 1) [ Read my Basari Review ]
And I've now played every Alea game at least once ... but there's still a lot to replay this year. Either Mammoth Hunters or San Juan must be next.