My top ten card games

Inspired by Dice Tower Episode 206, Chris Norwood (GamerChris) recently posted his favorite card games.  Since inspiration begets inspiration, I thought I'd explore the topic myself.

Before I get into my top ten list, I'll mention that the definition of a "card game" might be ambiguous. I think Alhambra qualifies, for example, because the card play (among four suits or "currencies" of a range of values) drives the purchase of the tiles that are placed for scoring. But I wouldn't include games that just "have cards in them," like Agricola or Clue, because card play isn't the primary aspect of the game (even if they are essential to the mechanics). I'm not sure how to write the definition of a "card game," but I'd be curious to know people's thoughts on which games are close to the frontier between card games and "other games" and how you decide on which side of the boundary a game falls.

My honorable mentions would include:

Chrononauts: A goofy title from Loony Labs that my wife really seems to like. I prefer Martian Fluxx, but this one is also a likeable game.

Incan Gold: I'm always fascinated by the way teenagers play push-your-luck games, so this is a fun one to play with my kids. I never know what they're going to do.

Guillotine: The artwork in this Wizards of the Coast title still makes me chuckle.

Triumvirate: A recent discovery that I am only beginning to appreciate

Mille Bornes is a nostalgic favorite that has fond memories going way back to when I was growing up.  It was a family favorite then and still sees the light of day from time to time even now.

So, my top ten card games:

10. Alhambra: I used to dislike this game because I thought it had a "run-away" aspect to it, in which an early leader was hard to catch. That is, until I thought I'd run away with a game in the PrezCon semifinals and then lost somehow in the final scoring. Perhaps I completely misplayed near the end, but I prefer to think that my worthy opponent had a more subtle appreciation for the game and how to score big without leading in many categories.

9. Munchkin: My kids have taken a sudden recent liking to this game, and I like anything I can get my kids to play. Another good one for laughs.

8. Empyrean, Inc. This is a regular go-to game for my wife and me, a surprise hit we received as a gift. We love this game so much that we started to wear the cards out, so I bought a backup copy.

7. Martian Fluxx: A genius little game from Loony Labs. What a crack-up.

6. Down in Flames III: Zero!: A very clever card-play mechanism for air combat

Image courtesy of
Rio Grande Games

5. Race for the Galaxy:  This is a game I want to like more than I do. My wife and I found all the symbols confusing and frustrating, and we haven't played it since. Having said that, I'd still like to try it with a fresh (patient) group and find out why people rave about it.  (San Juan is worth mentioning here as something we explored as an alternative to RftG, but I think we found it a little simplistic and perhaps disappointing. We kept thinking, "Why don't we just play Puerto Rico instead?") 

4. Battle Line: Great mind-bending game with my wife, except that she always wins.  What is up with that?

3. Condottiere: I haven't had a chance to play this nearly as much as I'd like. I fell in love with it in just one session. I wish I could play it a lot more to fully appreciate it.

2. Pacific Typhoon: Very fond of this game with a bigger group of people. I love the historical photographs. Very clever game-play structure that motivates some pretty lively negotiation.

1. 7 Wonders: Currently my favorite game of all. I will play this at the drop of a hat.  Will Wonders never cease?

Poor Man's Triumvirate

I read Chris Norwood's recent post on Triumvirate, and it intrigued me enough to learn about the game.  I'm always on the look-out for new two-player games to try out with my wife.  On boardgamegeek.com, I found Ender Wiggin's review, which was sufficiently descriptive that I was able to reproduce the game play with a modified deck of regular playing cards (in true cheapskate fashion).

The premise of Triumvirate is that the players are playing cards to represent political machinations to place Caesar, Pompey, or Crassus on the throne as Emperor of Rome.  When one of the three nobles becomes Emperor, the game ends, and the player who has secretly pledged greater support to that noble house wins the game.

To assemble a knock-off for Triumvirate, I removed all the clubs, all the tens, and the two jokers from a normal deck of playing cards.  The three remaining suits - spades, hearts, diamonds - represent the three Roman noble houses of Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus.  The face cards in each suit are used to track the progress of each faction, so that when spades (or hearts or diamonds) wins a hand, the Jack of spades (or hearts or diamonds) is turned face up.  When spades wins a second hand, the Queen of spades is turned face up, and when spades wins a third hand, the King of spades is turned face up to indicate that the "leader of the house of spades" has won ascendancy as Emperor of Rome.

The Ace through nine of spades, hearts, and diamonds are used to win tricks on behalf of the three suits.  When three tricks are won in a single suit, that hand is over, that suit wins the hand, and that suit's next face card is turned face up to represent progress in that suit toward becoming Emperor.  The four, six, and eight of each suit are also eligible to use as "pledges" for the players each to secretly support one of the three factions.  At the end of the game, players reveal the cards they have pledged in each suit, and the player with the greater total in the "winning suit" wins the game.

The details of how to play each hand and how to win tricks are well described in Ender Wiggins review on boardgamegeek, so I won't belabor the mechanics here.

Kathy and I tried two games on Tuesday evening.  The first game was a learning game as we got familiar with the mechanics.  The second game gave us a little more appreciation for the tactics of vying for ascendancy and throwing support behind the faction you think will win while undermining your opponent's efforts to advance the faction to which you think he or she has pledged the most support.  In the end, we both agreed that it is an interesting game, but we didn't get as excited about it as we have about other games.  We'll probably try it again some time, but it won't be on our short list, at least not right away.

SJW: Stuart's Raid (or, "I don't need you. I can lose all by myself.")

Monday my friend Paul R. and I got together for another session of Stonewall Jackson's Way at Game Parlor, Chantilly, VA.  We decided to try the micro-sized Scenario 3, "Stuart's Raid," dicing for side in the first game then switching sides and playing again.

General J.E.B. Stuart
Source:  www.sonofthesouth.net

From the game notes:  "This scenario simulates J.E.B. Stuart's 22 August cavalry raid against Pope's lifeline, the Orange and Alexandria Railroad.  This is a very simple scenario and should take only a few minutes to play.  Again, this is something of a hypothetical scenario as Stuart's raid actually encountered little opposition."  The three-day episode runs 22 - 24 August 1862 and occurs primarily in Fauquier County and northern Culpeper County, Virginia.  The Rappahannock River forms the boundary between the two counties.

In the first game, I had the Confederates, which consisted of F. Lee's cavalry brigade and J.E.B. Stuart, normally a corps commander but in this case simply an augmenting headquarters unit.  My Union opposition consisted of two cavalry regiments, 1st Maryland and 4th New York.  My objectives were to damage railroad stations at Catlett's Station and Warrenton Junction and to occupy Waterloo or White Sulphur Springs at the end of the three days.  Inflicting Union casualties also counted toward Confederate victory, whereas suffering Confederate casualties counted toward a Union victory.

The Confederate cavalry start the scenario on the north side of Wellford Ford on the Hazel River, about three miles west of its mouth on the Rappahannock.  Union cavalry start in White Sulphur Springs and Foxville, north along the Rappahannock on the far (east) shore.  Scenario restrictions prevent the Confederates from crossing the Rappahannock downstream of the Union position (unless it is at Kelly's Ford, a good seven miles south of the Hazel River, rather the long way around to the objective rail stations).  On the first day of the raid, scenario restrictions also prevent the Confederates from conducting an extended march and prevent the Union from moving at all.

My initial thought on reviewing the scenario was that if I had good dice rolls (for movement points) on the first day, I could swing north of the Union forces, cross the Rappahannock at Waterloo three miles north of White Sulphur Springs, then head for the Warrenton Branch Railroad and follow it east toward my two objective stations.  As it happened, my first roll was quite poor, and I feared that I would make insufficient progress on the first day.  Rather than leave the Union forces unmolested, I figured that F. Lee's brigade, which outnumbered the 4th New York three to one, could force its way through at White Sulphur Springs, bloody half the Union cavalry, and shorten the route to Warrenton Junction.

My thinking was seriously flawed.  My advantages of leadership and manpower were largely nullified by having to attack across the ford, and although I forced the enemy's retreat and occupied White Sulphur Springs, I ended up disorganizing my cavalry and exhausting my troops for the day.

On the second day, I gained the initiative but had to conduct an extended march by virtue of my troop's fatigue from the previous day's fighting.  As it happened, my die luck was poor, and I lost a third of my manpower from extended marching with a disorganized force.  Retaining the initiative, I elected to conduct a second extended march, seeking to regain lost ground toward my railroad objectives.  Again, poor die luck led to loss of another third of my original manpower on the extended march while disorganized, leaving me with but a third of my original manpower, and that completely exhausted.

And hereupon we realized the fatal error I had made.  In order to damage a rail station, I needed at least two combat factors (i.e. at least two-thirds of my original force size).  So here I was, having conducted a day of battle and a day of extended march, only to leave myself with a force too small to damage either of my objectives.  A quick analysis of the victory conditions led us to conclude that even if I wiped out the Union forces and occupied Waterloo or White Sulphur Springs at the end of the third day, the Union would win for having protected both railroad stations.

Thus I managed to lose the game without my opponent having to move a single piece.  If that's not an indictment of my cavalry operational skills, I don't know what is.

Next post:  We switch sides.

She beat me again at Battle Line

Kathy and I broke out Battle Line again Sunday evening.  I had some pretty strong Tactics cards to work with, but on at least two occasions, I didn't use them early enough, and she managed to win flags that I was positioned to take if I'd used my Tactics cards more aggressively.  She ended up beating me pretty soundly, five flags to two.  I really, really haven't figured out how to win this game (at least not against my wife), but the great thing about it is, I love playing it.

Seven Wonders and Maori

Friday evening had two friends over for dinner and games.  Since it was Good Friday, Kathy made fettuccine with shrimp.  Jeff W. brought white wine; Rebecca E. brought strawberry chocolate mousse.  My ten-year-old serenaded us on the cello.  So how do you follow a meal like that?

With the seven wonders of the ancient world, of course.  Jeff had played 7 Wonders once before, but it was Rebecca's first time, so the first game was a learning opportunity (and a refresher for Jeff).  Rebecca had the Lighthouse at Alexandria, Jeff had the Pyramids at Giza, Kathy had the Statue of Zeus, and I had the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus.  It was a great learning game, with very close final scores.  Kathy won the first game, in part by using the special ability of the Statue of Zeus to build the eight-point Temple for free.  Interestingly, no one played any significant number of green science cards in that game.

Lighthouse at Alexandria
Image courtesy of Repos Production

My experience with 7 Wonders is that once everybody has played the game one time through, all subsequent games go much quicker, and everybody seems to have a handle on what they're doing.  That was certainly true Friday night.  We randomized the wonders again for the second round, but Rebecca and Kathy ended up with Lighthouse and Zeus respectively again, and Jeff and I ended up trading Pyramids and Mausoleum.  Since everyone had neglected the green science buildings in the first game, I decided to try to capitalize on them in the second game and see how well I could do with them.  I ended up doing rather well in the sciences (two full sets of three for a total of 26 points) but grossly neglected my red military (minus six) and blue civics (one building for six points).  Rebecca, however, completely dominated the game, with strong showings in military, civics, and guilds (including the Strategist Guild, which earned her nine points - in no small part to my terrible military performance).  So, not bad for Rebecca her first time out.

We wrapped up the evening with Maori (designer Gunter Burkhardt, publisher Rio Grande), a game I learned in a pick-up session at Congress of Gamers a year and a half ago that has become a favorite in my family.  Each player places tiles (or "discovers islands") in his or her own array (rather like Alhambra), but with a unique tile selection mechanic.  Sixteen tiles are arranged in the center of the table, around which the players move a canoe to determine which tile to choose.  A particularly desirable tile that can't be reached for free can be obtained by spending shells (the currency of the Maori, presumably).  The objective is to obtain the most points by discovering islands with trees, huts, and completed leis, and having the most canoes and shells at the end the game.

The nice thing about Maori (pronounced MOW-ree, according to my 15-year-old Liam and dictionary.com -- not may-OH-ree, as we had thought) is that it is relatively easy to teach.  Strategy is pretty straightforward, from the standpoint of trying to commit one's tile placement in a way that maximizes the opportunity for points, while at the same time positioning the canoe that moves around the tiles in the center of the table so as to minimize the opponents' opportunity to gain the most valuable tiles.  Our game started with a lot of high-value tiles early on, with a dearth of point-scoring tiles toward the end.  It made for a rather challenging finish for all of us, and it looked as though Jeff had a very solid position to win the game, but it turned out that I outscored him by two points, primarily owing to have a completed lei (where he did not).

Most important, everyone had a great time, and we look forward to playing both these games (and others, I expect) again soon.

Incan Gold and Game Theory

We had a family session of Incan Gold (or, more precisely, my home-made knock-off) this afternoon.  An interesting development came up when my wife Kathy and I had bailed out of an expedition, and only my two sons Liam and Corey remained to explore the ruins.  One instance each of three different monsters had been turned up, which meant that there was a very real possibility that a second monster of one type would appear and scare the remainder of the party out of the ruins at any point.  But then an artifact showed up, and a very interesting stand-off ensued.  By the rules of the game, if there are two or more people in the expedition, neither gets the artifact, and it stays on the card.  In a subsequent turn, if exactly one of the remaining two people decides to return to his tent, he gets all treasure left on cards from previous turns - including the coveted artifact.  If both players turn back, neither gets the artifact, and the round is over.  If both continue on, both continue to share discovered treasure but risk encountering a monster and losing everything.

What followed was an almost comical staring contest between the two of them to try to figure out whether the other was going to stay or return, and therefore whether to return (in hopes that the other was staying, which would leave the artifact to the returning player) or stay (and keep any subsequent treasure for oneself).

The decision to turn back or to continue is simultaneous among remaining players, so the result is a fairly classic game theory problem, in which the outcome of a decision depends upon an opponent's simultaneous unknown decision.

Own decision  Opponent decides to stay  Opponent decides to go
Stay          Turn over another card    Opponent gets artifact
Go                  Get artifact          Nobody gets artifact


Since "Turn over another card" is mutually risky or mutually beneficial but in no case advantageous for one player over the other if both players stay, then game theory would conclude that the only logical decision would be to go.  But if both players decide to go, then neither gets the artifact.

The piece that's missing in my decision table above, however, is that if either player stays, another card will be turned over, to the risk or benefit of the player(s) staying.  So there might be an advantage to staying if a player perceives a potential treasure greater than getting the artifact.  But that's really unlikely, in fact, so the stand-off will typically end up in both players going back and neither getting the artifact. Having said that, however, the game actually plays unpredictably, and perceived risk and reward tend to rule over cold logic.

We've really come to like this risk management game.  I'm apparently way too conservative, however.  I came in last today, and Corey (10) beat us all.  (I seem to recall that he ended up with the artifact more than once, by the way.)

Intrigued by Incan Gold?

I just learned that my son Liam - the teenager who couldn't stop and who lost all his loot to the monsters in every round of our first game of Incan Gold - taught the game to his little brother and his friend yesterday afternoon, and the three boys had a great time playing it.  So I guess that means he wasn't put off by the game after all.  Good sign!

Poor Man's Incan Gold

I read an entertaining review yesterday of Incan Gold (designers Bruno Faidutti and Alan Moon, publisher Fred Distribution's Gryphon Games).  I really like risk management games (also known as "push-your-luck games"), even though I'm pretty bad at them.  (I got eliminated early in the Can't Stop tournament at PrezCon, which my buddy Grant G. won.)  In the case of Incan Gold, players advance into an ancient ruin to find and share treasure but risk encountering monsters that can force them to drop their loot and run.  At any point, each player has an opportunity to take his share of the loot back to his tent, which guarantees that he keeps what he has but means that the players who continue get a bigger share of whatever additional treasure turns up.

I found the mechanics and components to be straightforward enough that I could recreate the gameplay (if not the artwork) with simple gaming components.  From a normal deck of playing cards, I assembled the two jokers, the twelve face cards, and one each of black ace, two, three, four, five, seven, and nine, and red ace, three, four, five, and seven.  Each player gets a different colored pawn, and a set of poker chips serves as gold treasure.

In my version of the game, the aces and number cards represent treasure.  Black cards are worth their face value in gold (with an ace representing a value of one).  Red cards are worth their face value plus ten (so that the red seven is worth 17).  Jokers represent single artifacts worth ten each.  Face cards represent monsters.

[What follows is a description of the rules of the game, but the review I read illustrated them nicely and with a touch of humor.]

The game consists of five rounds.  Each round starts with the deck being shuffled and a card being turned face up to start the journey into the ancient ruin.  If it is a treasure card, the players divide the loot equally.  Now, players have two piles of money over the course of the game.  One pile is their "loot bag," which is where they add found loot but is also what is at risk of being dropped if a monster scares them away.  The other pile is their tent, which is where they dump their loot bag when they decide to leave the ruin and keep what they've found.  Treasure in the tent can never be lost.

When treasure from a treasure card is divided evenly among the players, any remainder is left on the card.  Each player now has an opportunity to decide to go back to his tent and keep the money in his loot bag, or to keep going deeper into the ancient ruin in search for more treasure.  This decision is simultaneous among all the players.  The way it is executed is that all players take their pawns and put both hands under the table.  All players then place one closed hand on top of the table.  When everybody is ready, all players open their hands.  A hand with a pawn in it means that the player has decided to go back to his tent; an empty hand means that the player has decided to continue with the expedition.

If any players decide to go back to their tents, they divide evenly among themselves any treasure that had been left on any cards so far in the expedition.  Then they move all the treasure in their loot bags to their tents, and they are done for the round.  If any players decided to continue with the expedition, they place their pawns on the table next to the face up cards, and another card is drawn and placed face up alongside the last one.

If the card drawn is a face card and it is the first face card of that suit (spade, heart, diamond, or club), then nothing happens.  Players again decide whether to continue or to turn back.  If the card drawn is a face card and it is the second face card of that suit, then all players who are still in the expedition lose all the treasure they have accumulated in their loot bags, no one gets any of the treasure left on any cards, all the cards are shuffled into the deck, and the round is over.  (Players that had previously left the expedition and returned to their tents suffer no loss.)

The Jokers represent special artifacts.  When a Joker is turned up, poker chips representing ten gold are placed on the card.  An artifact can't be divided among players, so if more than one player is still in the expedition, the ten gold stay on the card.  Later, if exactly one player leaves the expedition and returns to his tent, he can retrieve the ten-gold artifact along with all the other treasure still on cards.  If two or more players leave the expedition simultaneously, none gets the artifact (because they squabble among themselves), and it stays on the card.

A round ends when all players have returned to their tents or when a second monster (face card) of a suit is turned up and scares everybody out.  After five rounds, the player with the most treasure in his tent wins.

My son Liam, my wife Kathy, and I tried out this home-made knock-off of Incan Gold yesterday evening, and Liam bolstered my working hypothesis on teenagers and risk assessment.  He was always still in the expedition when the second monster of a suit came up, so he ended up with no treasure after five rounds.  I ended up winning because I adopted a thumb rule of bailing out of the expedition when three different suits had turned up; in my mind, the risk of getting a second monster of any of those three suits was generally too high to justify hoping for more treasure.  Often, I was the only one to leave the expedition, so that meant I got all the leftover treasure on the cards at that point for myself as well.

As I looked at the card distribution, I noticed that most of the treasure cards are prime numbers or at most the product of two prime numbers.  I find that significant because the intent of the designer seems to have been to try to have some remainder to leave on the card after the treasure is divided among the players, at least more often than not.  (There is no six-, eight-, 12-, or 16-gold treasure card, which would frequently divide evenly among a typical number of expedition members.)  The interesting effect is that as the expedition progresses, the motivation to bail out becomes stronger; not only does turning back allow a player to keep what he has in his loot bag and avoid the risk of a monster, but it provides the added "carrot" of picking up some or all of the leftover loot on the previous cards.

Agony in Alexandros

Image courtesy of
Rio Grande Games

My good friend Grant gave me Alexandros (designer Leo Colovini, publisher Rio Grande) for Christmas a few years ago.  Kathy and I had played several times, and I won perhaps every game we played, so it sat on a shelf for some time since then.  Now that she has been waxing me at Battle Line, she proposed we try Alexandros again.

I really like Alexandros.  It's not like any other game I know.  The map depicts the extent of the empire of Alexander the Great in Asia, divided into equilateral triangles, a little over half of which are blank and the remainder each having one of five icons reminiscent of Hellenistic Greece - an urn, a horse, a lyre, a soldier, or a temple.  Each player represents one of Alexander's generals, who seek to govern provinces in Alexander's empire and collect taxes.  The player to collect the most taxes wins.

The game includes a deck of 55 cards, each of which features one of the five icons that appear on the board.  Over the course of the game, Alexander will traverse and conquer his empire, and his path establishes boundaries of new provinces.  Alexander's movements are influenced by the players to the extent that the available cards allow, so there is some opportunity to control where the province boundaries are set.  Players each have four Macedonian guard pieces that can be used in combination with cards from their hands to conquer provinces once they are completely enclosed by boundaries.  Players can elect to levy taxes, but when any player does so, all players get points for their governed provinces simultaneously.  So it is important to try to govern the most profitable provinces (those containing the most blank triangles) before levying taxes.  Provinces can also be taken from other players by card play.  Guards can be removed from one province and, in a separate action, used to occupy another.

In our most recent game, I occupied a large province early on and started levying taxes to jump to an early lead.  I committed guards to other, smaller provinces, while Kathy accumulated cards because there was little else she could do in the early stages.  I continually levied taxes and increased my lead, and it looked for a while as though I was going to run away with the game.  But with a big hand of cards comes a lot of options, and Kathy soon established a much stronger position.  Around mid-game, she took one of my larger provinces and occupied a couple of others as well.  Then she was the one to start levying taxes.  The game end can be triggered when one player exceeds 100 points, and it was right around the 55-point mark that Kathy passed me and never looked back.  I had spent so many actions placing guards and levying taxes early on that I never accumulated cards for any kind of hand strength, so I was in no position to catch up to her.  She ended up beating me by over 20 points.

Alexandros provides a whole different game-playing challenge, and I can see that I still have a lot to learn in the way of tactics and nuance.  I also hope to have an opportunity to play in a three- or four-player format, where I'm sure gameplay can get even tighter.

Embattled in Battle Line

Image courtesy of
GMT Games

In the last two weeks my lovely wife has beaten me twice in hard-fought games of Battle Line (designer Reiner Knizia, publisher GMT), one of my acquisitions at PrezCon last February.  In fact, since I brought Battle Line home, my wife has won every game we've played.  My buddy Grant Greffey had introduced me to Battle Line years ago, and I was intrigued at the time, though I didn't buy it right away.  More recently, trolling boardgamegeek for ideas for games suitable for spouses, the name Battle Line came up more than once.  So at PrezCon, I saw that GMT was selling it for $15 and snapped it up (along with another game that I'll post about later).

The main deck consists of six suits of ten ranks of "Troop" cards representing various troop types from the Hellenistic Greek period.  The eponymous "battle line" consists of nine "flags" against each of which the two players each commit up to three cards in an effort to construct a superior "formation" and win the flag; three adjacent flags or five total win the game.  The superiority of one formation (three-card set) over another depends on their pattern; a "wedge" formation (three-card "straight flush") beats a "phalanx" (three-of-a-kind) for example.  Grant describes Battle Line as "nine hands of three-card poker," but I think that description sells the game short.  The real genius of the game is that the deck is never re-shuffled.  As a card is committed to one position in the line (i.e., one of the nine "flags"), that card becomes unavailable for any other position.  The real skill in this game seems to come in knowing where to commit and where to keep one's options open.  If I can prove that you can not come up with a better formation ("hand") than mine for a certain flag (based on cards that have already been played elsewhere on the table), then I win that flag immediately.

The game also has a ten-card deck of unique "Tactics" cards that can modify a position in the line to one's advantage.  A player can choose to play a Tactics card in lieu of a Troop card, sometimes to devastating effect.  Some Tactics cards are wild or semi-wild cards.  Some allow shifting cards on one's own or one's opponent's side of the battle line.  Some change the heirarchy of formations or conditions for winning a specific flag.  The only limitation on playing Tactics cards is that you can't play one if you've already played more Tactics cards than your opponent has.

The fascinating thing is that Battle Line has a very martial theme, so I really didn't expect it to appeal to Kathy.  She really didn't expect to get the hang of it, either, but was willing to try since she's such a good sport about trying new games.  Well, apparently she got the hang of it just fine.  All three of our sessions have been close (more or less), but her timing with Tactics cards is downright uncanny.  More than a few times did I think that I had a flag won only to have her snatch it from me in the nick of time.

Next post:  Another game with a Hellenistic theme - and another loss to my lovely wife.  (What is up with that?)

Punked in Puerto Rico

Image courtesy of
Rio Grande Games

Well, my wife did it to me tonight in a two-player variant of Puerto Rico (designer Andreas Seyfarth, publisher Rio Grande).  I had a pretty good corn shipping strategy going, and then went long in sugar and eventually coffee.  But I think I overdid it with the Hacienda and filled up my island plantations too quickly with other crops that didn't really pay off.  I only had one quarry, which made it difficult to construct buildings.  She wasn't producing many goods until she got tobacco going.  Along with the Office, her tobacco sales made it possible for her to buy the Fortress, the Guild Hall, and City Hall (?).  Despite my shipping like a fiend with my Wharf, her big buildings enabled her to outscore me 52 to 43.

I'll blame the rum...

Review: Chicago Cribbage

Chicago Cribbage is a 2007 title by Outset Media for two to four players.  It requires a cribbage board (not provided) and familiarity with the traditional game of cribbage.  It comes with its own deck of conventional playing cards plus 28 "Chicago Cards" that modify the game of cribbage.  In a sense, Chicago Cribbage can really be thought of as a "cribbage expansion" deck.

Full disclosure:  Outset Media gave me a review copy of Chicago Cribbage.  No other consideration was given associated with this review.

[Since Chicago Cribbage is intended for players already familiar with cribbage, I refer to standard cribbage terms and rules without definition in this review.]

Artwork

And a rather handsomely printed deck of cards it is, too.  The playing cards that come with Chicago Cribbage are designed with a font and art deco style reminiscent of 1920s Chicago.  The face cards and aces feature mob characters and icons representing the period.  Overall the game presents a rather nice look and feel just in the conventional deck of cards itself.

Gameplay
The real innovation in the game comes in the form of the additional "Chicago cards," which add a new dimension to the familiar game of cribbage.  Each player starts with a fixed set of seven Chicago cards, each of which may be used only once in the course of the entire cribbage game.  There are two opportunities during a hand of cribbage where a Chicago card can be put into play.  The first is immediately after the deal (before players place cards in the crib), at which point any player may play a "Deal Again" card.  The second opportunity comes immediately after the cut (when the "starter" card is revealed but before any play starts), at which point a player may play one of any of the other possible Chicago cards - "Cut Again," "Trade Hands," "No Fifteens," or "Reverse Counting."

As you might expect, "Deal Again," "Cut Again" (which forces cutting a new starter card) and "Trade Hands" can be played to change the cards that you have to work with.  "No Fifteens" and "Reverse Counting" affect scoring of the current hand.  "No Fifteens" affects all players (including the one who played it); when played, combinations that add to fifteen are worth no points - not when playing cards, nor when scoring hands, nor when scoring the crib.  When "Reverse Counting" is played, all opponents hands (and crib, if the dealer is an opponent) score negative points, but one's own scoring is unaffected.

Impressions
At first, incorporating the additional Chicago cards takes some getting used to.  The two opportunities to play Chicago cards come almost as interruptions to the normal flow of a cribbage game, at least at first to the conventional cribbage player.  Once the Chicago cards become familiar, however, the opportunities to play them are anticipated and become a natural part of the flow of the game.  We found that when a hand is first dealt, the first thought isn't, "what should I put in the crib" but, "should I play the 'Deal Again' card?"

Likewise, after the cut, players start to evaluate the cut and the cards in hand against one's remaining Chicago card options.  A player holding several fives might benefit from a "Cut Again" in hopes of bringing up a face card as the starter.  Or if an opponent has built a big lead, it may be time to play "Reverse Counting."

We found that the Chicago cards nicely mitigate card luck, which had been a rather significant factor in our previous conventional sessions of cribbage.  A standard cribbage game requires some basic tactics to make the most of the cards that are dealt, but once dealt, the course of a hand is confined to the available cards.  Chicago Cribbage adds several opportunities to make up for bad card luck - but only a few opportunities, so the player must apply them judiciously.

Timing of Chicago card play can be crucial.  In one game, when my wife had built a big lead and I had the deal, I decided to wait to play "Reverse Counting" until she had the deal and the crib, when I figured the effect of the card would be greater.  But instead she scored so high during my deal that she ended up within pegging distance of winning the game.  Since "Reverse Counting" only affects hand and crib scoring (not pegging from card play), she was able to win the game on the next hand regardless of the card I played - a valuable lesson in timing.

We found that Chicago Cribbage is better suited to a full 121-point cribbage game, less so the shorter 61-point version.  It takes the full length of a 121-point game to force careful consideration of when to play a Chicago card, since there are only one or two of each available, and each can be played only once.  Most of them came into play over the course of a 121-point game, whereas they seemed underutilized and less tactically demanding in the shorter 61-point game.

One dimension that Chicago Cribbage adds is a certain poker-like element of trying to read one's opponent's reaction to his or her cards.  If I'm dealt a hand and react too enthusiastically, I can expect my opponent to play "Trade Hands" to take advantage of whatever got me so excited.  Similarly, if my opponent seems pleased with the starter card that is cut, I might consider playing "Cut Again" just to thwart whatever benefit he or she saw in that starter.

All of the games played for this review were in the standard two-player format, but Chicago Cribbage comes with enough Chicago cards to be played with three or four players as well (just as standard cribbage can be).  

Summary
Chicago Cribbage is a clever addition of a new dimension to conventional cribbage.  It spices up an old familiar game in a new and challenging way.  Purists might object to introducing new gameplay elements to a time-honored standard (like some chess variants, for example), so I wouldn't recommend it for those who like their cribbage "just fine the way it is, thank you."  For those who have played "the old cribbage" but find it a little dry and uninteresting, however, Chicago Cribbage provides a new element of strategy and thought, perhaps more in keeping with the kind of decision-making and gameplay that characterize more contemporary board and card games.  I would especially recommend Chicago Cribbage if you have a cribbage board gathering dust in a drawer or closet and vague memories of enjoying cribbage but never recently including it in your list of, "so what should we play today?"

I should add that my wife and I are divided on whether Outset Media ought to consider offering Chicago Cribbage as a complete set, with cribbage rules and board provided.  My wife feels that Outset Media could expand its customer base and broaden interest in cribbage by offering the game in a form that players can learn from scratch.  For my part, I'm skeptical that the game would work as a way of learning cribbage itself; to me, the appeal of the product is in bringing new life to an old familiar game.

Chicago Cribbage is recommended for ages 10 and up (although Outset Media's "cribbage game" web page lists it as "8+").  Frankly, the age recommendation is irrelevant; if you are familiar with cribbage, you can play Chicago Cribbage.

Outset Media doesn't sell games from their website but refers customers to independent retailers across North America and provides a toll-free phone number to inquire about finding a local retailer.  I did find that Chicago Cribbage is available at Amazon for $9.99.

Progress toward release of my first title

While at PrezCon, I had the opportunity to meet with my publisher and hammer out the final details of the rules to my game.  We nailed down some of the final wording, and in so doing I caught a mistake I had made in handling a case where a player's piece lands on another player.  We were able to resolve that at the eleventh hour, so I believe the rules should be ready to go to press.

The only outstanding decision they have at this point is to choose between two manufacturing options for the board.  They are very interested in making the right quality decision consistent with the target price point.  The intent is to go to the printers in time for an April release.  

I've got my fingers crossed.  

Five friends and Seven Wonders

Last week our friend Jeff W. hosted Sheila D., Keith R., my wife Kathy, and myself for dinner, with the stipulation that I serve as "game sommelier."  I brought several boardgame options but had a special desire to introduce the group to 7 Wonders (designer Antoine Bauza, publisher Repos Production).  After a marvelous steak dinner prepared by master chef Jeff, we cleared the table and pulled out the game for a little run-through.

I enjoy 7 Wonders for a number of reasons.  It's relatively easy to teach.  The components are beautiful.  All action is simultaneous, so you are never waiting for your turn.  Everybody is in the game until the very end.  There are several different ways to win.  Once everyone is familiar with the rules, the game goes pretty quickly.  And most of all, it's fun, with just enough strategy to demand some brainpower.

The process of explaining the rules of a game is a real skill, one that I feel I'm still developing.  As I went over the rules to 7W, apparently I introduced some confusion regarding how to use resources to build structures and how to purchase resources from your neighbors.  It took a while for everyone to realize that building a structure doesn't "consume" a resource production card, and buying a resource from a neighbor doesn't "transfer" that card from one player to another.  So I still have some room for improvement as a game "explainer."

It's also important to get all the rules right.  Previously, one rule that I had forgotten is that you can't build two of the same structure, like two Barracks, for example.  My friend Keith Ferguson, whom I'd taught the game a few weeks ago, learned that the hard way in competition at PrezCon.  During one tournament game, he ended up having to give up one of his redundant (and therefore illegal) structures for three coins.  "Oh, sorry, man.  Missed that rule....."

So back to our recent game last week:  Jeff had the Temple of Artemis, Kathy had the Lighthouse at Alexandria, Keith had the Colossus of Rhodes, Sheila had the Pyramids of Giza, and I had the Hanging Gardens of Babylon.  People got the hang of the game pretty quickly, and it was clear early on that Sheila was starting an arms race.  I think she was worried about Keith's Colossus giving him extra military power in his second stage.  As she put it later, she could understand the value of building up her military, so that was the approach she took.  Her neighbors Keith and Kathy tried to keep up, and in so doing did some fair damage to Jeff and (especially) me.  For my part, with the Hanging Gardens, I had built a number of scientific structures in pursuit of a "technology" strategy, but somehow - inexplicably - ended up in last place.  Sheila's military superiority and completed pyramids won the day quite handily.

Jeff had mentioned earlier that he had a copy of Rail Baron (a 1977 Avalon Hill title designed by R.S. and Thomas F. Erickson), so after our game of 7W, we had him pull it out and teach it to us.

Learning Rail Baron took me back to the days when I played Avalon Hill games as a teenager.  It was a remarkable contrast in standards of game design and production between two eras, and really two different markets in boardgaming between my early gaming days and today.  In the 1970s, Avalon Hill tried to develop games as models of real-world decision-making.  So the railroads in Rail Baron reflected actual railroad companies and routes at the height of the rail industry.

The early game of Rail Baron is a bit mechanical, as most routes are unowned and therefore traveled at little expense to the players.  Destinations are largely determined at random, and so players roll dice and move until they reach their destinations and earn money.  It is with the opportunity to invest in a railroad company or locomotive upgrade that the game begins to get interesting.  Even so, the first few railroad company purchases are largely inconsequential, as it is relatively easy for opponents to avoid having to travel on your rail line and pay through the nose for passage.

It was rather late in the evening when we were each beginning to purchase our second or third railroad company, and we regrettably did not have the stamina we might have had in the 1970s to continue the game to its conclusion.  But I could see, as we began to buy up all the railroad companies in the southeastern United States, that the next player to draw Miami as a destination would have to pay somebody for passage aboard that opponent's rail line, and that would be where the game would really get interesting.  I was really intrigued at the notion of trying to dominate a region in the interest of forcing payment and gaining some return on the investment.  We just never got to that stage in the game before we had to call it quits.  Too bad, too; I was just starting to get my avaricious capitalist tycoon on.

Kathy described her impression of Rail Baron as something like railroad Monopoly, and I could see her point.  The game progressed with gradual accumulation of property (indeed, the railroad company title cards closely resemble property deeds in Monopoly) and the opportunity to collect payment from opponents who were forced to travel on the rail lines you own.  Although there is no property "improvement" in the obvious sense, there is still an opportunity to "monopolize" a region to guarantee payment when an opponent rolls a destination serviced only by railroads you own.

An aspect of the game that surprised me was the frequency with which it was necessary to look data up in tables - both to determine payment for destinations reached and to determine the next destination.  I say it surprises me today, but it wouldn't have surprised me in the 1970s, and that fact opened my eyes to a facet of game design that has clearly changed over the years.  Seldom do today's new titles require many table look-ups during the course of gameplay.  For the most part, game data are either easily memorized or readily available on cards or on the board.  It's hard for me to think of a game today - at least among those I typically play - that requires referral back to rules or tables the way that the strategy games of the 1970s did.

Gunfire tables
from Tobruk

I remember Tobruk was notorious for requiring multiple dice rolls and table references with every weapon shot.  I think some people reveled in that degree of realistic detail at the time - the extent to which armor and ammunition characteristics were so carefully modeled in a tactical game like that.  Nowadays I wouldn't have that kind of patience, certainly not in a new game.  But then again, I'm not the wargamer I used to be.  I'm much more interested these days in games that are playable but still pose a mental challenge.  

So, the question comes to mind:  If I were to redesign Rail Baron today, how would I go about it?  How would I preserve the general strategic sense of accumulating railroad companies to dominate regions of a transportation market without having to resort to detailed payment and destination tables?  How would I improve the playability and approachability of the game while maintaining the capitalistic appeal of railroad investment?

Before I pursue that question very far, I have to be honest about the fact that I am rather unfamiliar with the state of the art of rail games today.  Other than Ticket to Ride, I haven't played any of the recent rail game genre.  The 18xx series has quite a following, and I would probably do well to research those games first, to see whether they haven't already answered the "Rail Baron of the 21st century" question.

Pay attention when you discard

A couple of weeks ago at PrezCon, I played in two heats of Ticket to Ride (designer Alan R. Moon, publisher Days of Wonder), and it was in the first of these that I came face to face with my own absent-mindedness. 

As those familiar with the game know, each player starts with three tickets, each of which identifies two cities to connect by rail for points.  Longer routes in general are harder to connect but are worth more points, and having multiple tickets with overlapping connections make it relatively easy to compile a substantial score.  Of the three tickets at the start of the game, each player must keep at least two.  The disadvantage of keeping too many tickets is that uncompleted routes lose points at the end of the game, so it is prudent to keep no more routes than one is reasonably confident of finishing.

In my first heat, the three tickets I drew were all north-south routes with virtually no opportunity for overlap.  One was to connect Vancouver and Phoenix in the west, another Sault-Sainte-Marie and Houston in central Canada-U.S., and the third New York and Miami along the eastern seaboard.  So these routes had nothing in common, and clearly the logical thing to do was to discard one and strive to complete the other two.  After some thought, I decided to keep the eastern and central routes.  I discarded the third card, laid down the two tickets that I kept, and proceeded for the first half of the game to try to complete the two routes I'd decided to keep.

In a five-player game of TtR, there can be quite a lot of overlap among the competing players for key routes, and it became necessary for me to assemble a pretty convoluted network to get Sault-Sainte-Marie, Houston, New York, and Miami all connected.  I glanced at my tickets to double-check that I'd connected the right cities, and was horrified to discover that I still had Vancouver-Phoenix in my hand.  I had discarded New York - Miami without realizing it.

There was no hope at this point of making the Vancouver-Phoenix route; my opponents had by this time completely locked up the western U.S.  So the rest of the game involved scrambling for more tickets that I could reasonably complete by making extensions of my existing route in the eastern half of the U.S. and Canada, in the hope of accumulating more points.  I was actually rather successful, but I couldn't quite make up for the eleven points that I lost from having held on to Vancouver-Phoenix.  In fact, I came in second, only ten points behind the winner.  A most frustrating lesson in paying attention to one's cards.

A weekend of gaming

On the occasion of our son's birthday, his good friend and his friend's mother Sue Cochran came to stay for the weekend.  The boys played computer and video games in the basement; we played boardgames in the dining room.

We started with Cities and Knights of Catan (designer Klaus Teuber, publisher Mayfair), a favorite variant on Settlers of Catan.  Although Catan usually remains close a contest throughout the game, this time my wife Kathy pretty much ran away with it by exploiting a very profitable wheat port.  She left Sue and me in the dust and won handily.

Sue had played Agricola only twice before and wanted to try it again, so we played the family version (without occupations or minor improvements).  Sue outscored both of us on major improvements with the well, the pottery, and a cooking hearth, and Kathy got her farm running strong on grain and vegetable fields, but I was the only one to renovate to a stone house, which proved to be the difference in my very close win.

Sue next introduced us to Iron Dragon (designers Darwin P. Bromley and Tom Wham, another Mayfair title), which turned out to be the big game event of the weekend.  I read up on some of the reviews ahead of time, and a few comments were less than enthusiastic.  In the interest of simplifying the game somewhat and perhaps shortening the playing time, I convinced Sue to allow us to play without the event cards, which at least one reviewer described as randomly bad and not in general an improvement to overall gameplay.  She also agreed to make the "Rainbow Bridge" connection between Bluefeld and Octomare a permanent portal, which greatly simplified access between the new and old worlds in the north.  I can see that some fans of the game might think that we deprived the game of some of its challenge and flavor, but I think as an introductory session (in the context of wanting to play other games as well), the adjustments proved reasonable.

One reviewer expressed frustration at having to discard route cards frequently in order to find profitable assignments, but we didn't find that true in our session at all.  Admittedly, there were a number of times early in the game where it was necessary to spend more money building rail lines than would be collected in the final shipment, but I considered those costs to be an investment in infrastructure.  Many of the rail lines built early in the game turned out to be useful for multiple subsequent shipments, as well as the basis for a more extensive network later in the game.  Seldom did any of us discard route cards (if at all) in our session. 

In the end, I got to the point where I had enough surplus cash to extend my network to satisfy the victory condition of being connected to seven of the eight major cities.  After that, it was just necessary to complete several major shipments to reach a cash balance of 250 gold pieces to win the game.  All in all, I would say that it is a fun game, despite being a bit idiosyncratic in its design and execution.

Image courtesy of
Outset Media

We wrapped up with a game of Word Thief (publisher Outset Media), which my wife usually trounces me in.  I had a ridiculously good string of luck and managed to use all seven cards in three consecutive turns - a total of 60 bonus points.  I did win the game, but only by 27 points, which means that I needed two of those awesome turns just to keep my wife from crushing me.

Power Grid at PrezCon

I had two tries at Power Grid (designer Friedemann Friese, publisher Rio Grande) during PrezCon this year.  This is a game that I love to play but at which I certainly have no degree of mastery.  In other words, both my games were learning experiences.  We played on the map of Germany in both games. 

Image courtesy of
Rio Grande Games

I have a tendency to move out aggressively in terms of building power plants and connections, because I like to build up an income base early on.  The first game was no exception.  I think I led the pack in income per turn for most of Phase 1.  The disadvantage of my approach is that the more cities to which you are connected (or the bigger your biggest power plant as a tie breaker), the later you come in turn order for purchasing fuel resources and connecting to new cities.  The quickest way to build high-capacity power plants is to buy plants that are big fossil-fuel-burners.  Buying resources late in the turn means paying the highest prices for coal and oil.  So I really had a strategy that couldn't last. 

But the real problem in my first game was that Aaron Buchanan was at the table.  Aaron is a terrific game player, and in our game he had built plants up to a capacity of 13 cities.  Late in Phase 2, we were all hovering around ten cities connected and powered, when suddenly Aaron made new connections to five cities in one turn, which brought his total connected cities to 15 - the trigger for game end.  None of us was expecting that.  Although he could only power 13 of them, it was more than any of the rest of us, which won him the game.  I finished third of five, for what that was worth.

In the second heat of Power Grid, I played among a delightful group of players, all very good.  Kathy Stroh, Jake J., Leslee E. (if I remember right), and a fourth whose name escapes me.  I followed largely the same strategy (because, frankly, I couldn't think of what else to do) except that I bought a couple of nuclear plants to reduce my dependency on fossil fuels.  It's a good thing I did, because late in the game, Kathy and the player to her left colluded to deplete the coal market and made it impossible for Jake to power what could have been a game-winning 17 cities (if he had the connections).  The game ended with four of us tied powering 16 cities.  The tie-breaker is cash, and Leslee and Kathy were tied with five electros each.  The third place player had three electros, and I was dead broke, finishing fourth in what was by far my closest game ever.  Both Leslee and Kathy advanced to the semifinal.

My good friend Grant G. made it to the Power Grid final, where he faced Aaron Buchanan and Bill Crenshaw, among other top-notch players.  They decided on the central Europe map for the final round.  Grant finished in fifth, which he attributes to an unfortunate early selection of location.

I would like to get Power Grid, which is ranked 5th overall on boardgamegeek.com, but it does not come well-recommended as a two-player game, and it takes upwards of two hours to play.  I have doubts that it would work for my wife and me in our late-afternoon gaming sessions.

Next post:  Tickets, please...

An old favorite and a new discovery

My first victory at PrezCon last week came Wednesday afternoon in the first heat of Alhambra (designer Dirk Henn, publisher Queen Games), a favorite of mine.  It was a very friendly game, despite the propensity for Elisabeth P., a PrezCon newcomer, to continually buy the very tile I was looking for.  (How dare she?) 

Winning in the first heat qualified me for the semifinal the next day.  Somehow in the semifinal I had a hard time waiting my turn.  Three times I tried to skip Tedd Mullally on his turn.  He was a good sport about it; he didn't even break the skin when trying to bite my hand off.  ;-)  Despite what I thought was reasonably strong play, I came in second in the Alhambra semifinal.  Losing semifinals would be a recurring theme for me in PrezCon this year.

Later that afternoon, my friends Brian Greer, Keith Ferguson, Glenn Weeks, and I got together for my first full game of Stone Age (designer Michael Tummelhofer [pen name for Bernd Brunnhofer], publisher Rio Grande), a worker placement game that reminds me of both Pillars of the Earth and Agricola.  As such, the game continually poses a variety of options for limited resources, all the more challenging when only one player can grow the family, upgrade a tool, or develop agriculture in a turn.  The rest are left to claim victory point options and collect resources to pay for them - not to mention gathering food for the family.  In my case, I thought I played a relatively solid game, though not good enough to place better than third of four.  I like this game, although I'm not eager to buy my own copy, given its similarity to Pillars and Agricola.  Nevertheless, it's a very fun game in its own right.

Next, bringing power to Germany and transportation to America...

One day at PrezCon

So much happened at PrezCon that I think I'll take it a little bit at a time.  Wednesday opened with an introduction to Leaping Lemmings by one of the designers, Rick Young (the other being John Poniske, the publisher being GMT).  My good friend Glenn Weeks was already familiar with the game, so we jumped in for a heat, which was going very well - until one of my lemmings failed miserably at what would have been a five-point cliff dive if not for an ill-timed rock slide.  Despite my last-place finish, this was a great diversion, and I'd love to try it out on the kids. 

LL is a nice light-hearted title with a decent degree of strategy.  It vaguely reminds me of Lost World: Jurassic Park from the standpoint of being a fox-and-geese kind of game (outnumbered predators trying to catch prey running the length of the board), but LL is far superior to Lost World from a play balance standpoint.  Rather than having predator players vs. prey players, everyone controls one faction of prey (lemmings), and control of the predators (eagles) rotates around the board.  It would be interesting to modify LW:JP along the same lines.

Unfortunately, LL sold out pretty quickly at PrezCon.  We all found it surprising that GMT would release this kind of title.  GMT has a reputation for solid wargames and a few other represented genres, but LL is downright goofy by comparison with their usual line-up.  It's very interesting to see GMT branch out in this direction.  Regardless, LL is now at the top of my wish-list for family games.

More posts to follow over the next few days - games played and lost, games bought, and the status of a game sold.

Eagerly anticipated box art

Hey, I just got a note from my publisher with a first cut on the box art for the "eagerly anticipated game."  They've got a good artist, and he's done a great job capturing the flavor of the game.  The company has also created a new trademark, apparently for their family game line, to distinguish those titles from their traditional wargaming base.  So it's all very exciting to see come together. 

It's a little intimidating to think about how important box art is to the sales of a game, but I guess that's a fact of the marketplace.  For my part, I'd like to think the outside of a game box doesn't drive my purchase decision.  To me, the most important factor in deciding whether to buy a game is whether I've played it before.  Second is whether someone has recommended it.  Third is seeing it demonstrated, as at a convention, for example.  Fourth is whether I recognize the designer or publisher and trust that I can buy something "untried" just because of their reputation.  Seldom will I buy a game based entirely on the box, but I have done it before, and with some success (as Can't Stop) as well as with some disappointment (as Clue: Secrets and Spies).  Conversely, I've seen some games I would never put money down for, just because the outside was so poorly done. 

I'm curious to know how many people there are who will buy a game just based on what's on the outside of the box, and what they look for.  I also wonder how big a company has to be to spend time, money, and effort on real research to analyze customer reactions to box art and appearances. 

A funny thing just occurred to me:  All else being equal, I think I'd be willing to pay more for a game if it felt heavy when I picked it up.  That sounds dumb, but it's important to recognize one's own human foibles, and that's one of mine.  I specifically recall a conversation at HistoriCon with the president of one wargame company in particular.  They have some excellent naval wargames, but as we discussed the latest release and why it was priced the way it was, I casually reached down and flicked the corner of the mapsheet with my thumb.  The map was essentially a glossy poster paper mapsheet, not hard-mounted.  Mind you, the graphics were terrific, and the reputation for the series of games is excellent, but to me, if I'm going to pay a lot, it has to weigh a lot.  That's dumb, but it's true. 

Something to think about if I ever get into the production end of the business.

There's gold in them thar moons

I'm working in earnest on an idea I've had for a while and mentioned here once or twice.  The game will be set at a time in the future when mining expeditions to other planets and moons in the solar system become cost effective.  Precious materials like gold, uranium, and tritium are scattered all over the solar system, and earth-bound industrialists will pay top dollar for them on the commodities market.  Players are CEOs of newly-capitalized mining companies seeking wealth - that is to say, "shareholder value" - by prospecting and mining rare raw materials as close as the moon and as far as Mercury or even Titan. 

This game is going to be a step up from my previous designs in terms of complexity and, I hope, nuance of game play.  The real balance I want to strike is to make sure that there is no single run-away strategy.  I want players to be motivated to take risks, but I don't want the game to devolve into a matter of dice and card luck. 

One thing I might be in danger of doing at this stage is trying to do too much.  I want to include a corporate strategy element, in which players decide how much to borrow to fund rocket missions and how much to pay in dividends to keep stockholders happy.  I also want to include a commodities market element, so that players deal with rising and falling prices of the raw materials they sell and the aerospace products and services they need.  I'm even entertaining the idea of have a futures market, so that players can sell inventory for future delivery.  I also want to have a space mission element, in which players are faced with the problems of getting equipment and crews to distant planets and moons and then retrieving the raw materials back to earth. 

I think this is going to take some real time to work out, and a lot of playtesting to be sure I have the right balance.  I really want this one to work.  I really want it to be fun.