by Adam78
bradandmary wrote:
Thank you for the review - I appreciate your opinions and I think this review will help potential buyers approach this game with their eyes open.
I have a couple questions, and as I have to wait for months yet before I can purchase a copy, thought you might be able to answer them:
Do you think that having more people play would help to remove the apparent lack of meaningful choices? I was reading another review that mentioned how in a two-player game you are unable to run too far up the road as you'd allow your opponent to sweep up every other location along the way.
How tight is money in the game? I have read the rule book a few times, and it seemed as though a lack of money would keep players from being able to stop everywhere, and force players to work on specializing in a couple areas instead.
Would it help or hinder the game to play with a dummy player regardless of the number of people playing? They do this in Glen More and it works for that game. I wonder if it would add a slightly greater amount of strategy or if it would simply take up too many locations...
In your game did you attempt to create a balance between the different scoring areas, or did you try to focus on only a couple. Would collecting a larger amount of souvenirs, for example, offset losing out in other areas?
Thanks again for your review. You'll have to update us on your thoughts of the game after a few more plays to tell us if opinions have changed at all... :)
I have a couple questions, and as I have to wait for months yet before I can purchase a copy, thought you might be able to answer them:
Do you think that having more people play would help to remove the apparent lack of meaningful choices? I was reading another review that mentioned how in a two-player game you are unable to run too far up the road as you'd allow your opponent to sweep up every other location along the way.
How tight is money in the game? I have read the rule book a few times, and it seemed as though a lack of money would keep players from being able to stop everywhere, and force players to work on specializing in a couple areas instead.
Would it help or hinder the game to play with a dummy player regardless of the number of people playing? They do this in Glen More and it works for that game. I wonder if it would add a slightly greater amount of strategy or if it would simply take up too many locations...
In your game did you attempt to create a balance between the different scoring areas, or did you try to focus on only a couple. Would collecting a larger amount of souvenirs, for example, offset losing out in other areas?
Thanks again for your review. You'll have to update us on your thoughts of the game after a few more plays to tell us if opinions have changed at all... :)
I think playing with more players is bound to limit choices, and probably makes the game more interesting. I wouldn't like to pass judgement on the two-player game, because I haven't played it, but it seems to me that a dummy player might very well make it more interesting. I suspect Bauza has avoided this because it makes for a cleaner design, but randomness is not over-abundant in this game and it could survive one more random feature.
Money is not in short supply, but you can run out if not careful. It is a limitation on heavy donaters to the temple, for example. They may not have enough to spend elsewhere. A temple WITH souvenirs strategy is going to be particularly costly.
I think the game is intended to be played with each player attempting a specific strategy, probably based on their character choice. For example, I played the character who can draw two encounters instead of one and choose their favourite to keep. As a result, I tried to land on all the encounters spaces even if it meant jumping ahead a little, and I also got the "Chatterbox" bonus, for having the most Encounter cards at game-end. I think specialising is rewarded, but only subtly; a player who visits random spots on the journey will probably do well too, but I doubt they'd win.