Good review, Luke, but in the 'advanced' variant you don't start with all your work, you have the ability to unlock all of them. In the basic game you can only unlock two of the three on the board, and once you do you remove the third. I've never played the basic and don't know that I ever will.
This is a very nice medium weight Euro that goes down easy like a cold beer on a hot summer day. Comparing it to Santa Maria, that that also uses tile building and dice, I find SM a bit deeper, but not as much fun. Rajas flows well, and everyone should get 1 or 2 good combo turns to make them happy. The board looks busy, but really there are only 4 worker placement areas that are nicely grouped and easily explained. It certainly has a spot in my collection and for now it's one of the games that get suggested every game session.
After having played this a few times each, some friends and I have come to the conclusion that the province tiles have a same-ness to them that gets repetitive quickly. I'd be interested in hearing your opinion about that after you've played it a handful of times more.
Really enjoy the win condition. I'm getting so bored of games that end after a set amount of turns and most points wins. Although I'm not sure why but we struggle with getting the rules wrong on this one.
Excellent review as always Luke, thank you. Sadly it looks a wee bit too complicated for me to focus on to learn at the moment so will likely give it a miss. Mind you, even draughts is too much for my knackered brain to cope with just now.
Hi Luke, thanks for the nice review. I've played this game recently and really enjoyed it, but one of the players complained that he is always doing more or less the same strategy in all games he played before (only 3 though), and he won all times. Maybe is group thinking, but he was then complaining that, even though the tactical decisions might change during the game, there is not enough variation on the overall strategy. Do you have any comment on this, and how do you feel about the replayability/variability of this game in general?
Pedro Feijão no the strategies are fairly limited to balance or full money or full fame, each of win I've won with but much of this is about the tactical decisions and utilisation of your resources and tiles. It will need an expansion eventually but this is also a much shorter Euro game then other more complex affairs.
This was one of my top 3 games of 2017, being Santa maria my favorite. I have to disagree with you saying that the standard game is fine. After a few plays you definitely want to play advanced board.The second spot in the palace is definitely one of the most abused spots, but that is someway mitigated if you play in the advanced mode: because then you don't get immediate bonuses when you use the second space in the palace, but have to place them in your player board to later activate through tiles. It's still a good spot to go, but definitely not as powerful as with basic mode. The markets are overpowered...only if you don't follow what opponent plans! this is part of the core of the game and its interaction: to pay attention to opponent's moves and stop them from taking spots that could end the game (if in end game a player has 15 pts worth of silver commodity) then go and put that a worker on that spot to stop him! I pla advanced mode and still only start with 3 workers and 8 dice (instead of the 10). This game is simply fantastic. The pace and lack of AP in this game is phenomenal. Seldom do you find a worker placement game that at full count plays so fast and is so engaging! The Brand's have definitely been producing hits one after the other. At least for me :)
Good review, Luke, but in the 'advanced' variant you don't start with all your work, you have the ability to unlock all of them. In the basic game you can only unlock two of the three on the board, and once you do you remove the third. I've never played the basic and don't know that I ever will.
This is a very nice medium weight Euro that goes down easy like a cold beer on a hot summer day. Comparing it to Santa Maria, that that also uses tile building and dice, I find SM a bit deeper, but not as much fun. Rajas flows well, and everyone should get 1 or 2 good combo turns to make them happy. The board looks busy, but really there are only 4 worker placement areas that are nicely grouped and easily explained. It certainly has a spot in my collection and for now it's one of the games that get suggested every game session.
Love this game, still my favorite game of 2017.
After having played this a few times each, some friends and I have come to the conclusion that the province tiles have a same-ness to them that gets repetitive quickly. I'd be interested in hearing your opinion about that after you've played it a handful of times more.
Really enjoy the win condition. I'm getting so bored of games that end after a set amount of turns and most points wins. Although I'm not sure why but we struggle with getting the rules wrong on this one.
Excellent review as always Luke, thank you. Sadly it looks a wee bit too complicated for me to focus on to learn at the moment so will likely give it a miss. Mind you, even draughts is too much for my knackered brain to cope with just now.
the number 2, is the biggest flaw. I totally agree and I won't admit that in the FB group :)
Hi Luke, thanks for the nice review. I've played this game recently and really enjoyed it, but one of the players complained that he is always doing more or less the same strategy in all games he played before (only 3 though), and he won all times. Maybe is group thinking, but he was then complaining that, even though the tactical decisions might change during the game, there is not enough variation on the overall strategy. Do you have any comment on this, and how do you feel about the replayability/variability of this game in general?
Pedro Feijão no the strategies are fairly limited to balance or full money or full fame, each of win I've won with but much of this is about the tactical decisions and utilisation of your resources and tiles. It will need an expansion eventually but this is also a much shorter Euro game then other more complex affairs.
This was one of my top 3 games of 2017, being Santa maria my favorite. I have to disagree with you saying that the standard game is fine. After a few plays you definitely want to play advanced board.The second spot in the palace is definitely one of the most abused spots, but that is someway mitigated if you play in the advanced mode: because then you don't get immediate bonuses when you use the second space in the palace, but have to place them in your player board to later activate through tiles. It's still a good spot to go, but definitely not as powerful as with basic mode. The markets are overpowered...only if you don't follow what opponent plans! this is part of the core of the game and its interaction: to pay attention to opponent's moves and stop them from taking spots that could end the game (if in end game a player has 15 pts worth of silver commodity) then go and put that a worker on that spot to stop him! I pla advanced mode and still only start with 3 workers and 8 dice (instead of the 10).
This game is simply fantastic. The pace and lack of AP in this game is phenomenal. Seldom do you find a worker placement game that at full count plays so fast and is so engaging! The Brand's have definitely been producing hits one after the other. At least for me :)
the wife has an issue with blue and green dice , this showed up in divvy dice , so we replaced blue with a black set of dice.
Glad you got it to work!