- \n
- <\/a>Medici (Reiner Knizia)<\/a><\/b>
\n
\n![\"Medici\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.westpark-gamers.de\/Ressourcen\/medici_t.jpg\")
This is an earlier effort of Reiner Knizia, a very abstract game of bidding
\nand trading. It is played in three rounds, each of these rounds is divided into a bidding
\nand a scoring round. There are 36 cards depicting 5 differently coloured wares in values
\n0 to 5 (0-1-2-3-4-5-5), and one \u201cneutral card\u201d with the value of 10. In turn,
\nevery player turns over 1, 2 or 3 cards (s\/he can decide to turn over additional cards
\nafter seeing what card was turned over). The player to her\/his left starts bidding (each
\nplayer starts with 30 \u201cgold\u201d). There is only one bidding round, so the last
\nplayer in the round (incidentally the card turner) can always make the bid if s\/he wants.
\nThe maximum amount of cards you can own is 5, and you can not bid for cards which would
\nbring your assembled cards to more than 5. This makes for an interesting decision for the
\ncard turner, as s\/he can exclude certain players from the bidding by turning over more
\ncards than they can take!<\/p>\n![\"Medici](\"https:\/\/www.westpark-gamers.de\/Ressourcen\/medici_b.jpg\")
At the end of the round the players count the value of their cards and
\nget the most money for the highest sum, less money for the second highest and so on. Then
\nthe scoring round begins: Now the colours come into play. Each player advances tokens on
\ndifferent \u201cware pyramids\u201d, one step for each card s\/he owns at the end of the
\nbidding round. Again each pyramid brings money after scoring \u2013 but only to the two
\nhighest tokens. The \u201c10\u201d card doesn\u2019t move any token at all (but will
\nassure you profits at the end of the bidding round, which is also important). Who has the
\nmost money after three rounds wins.<\/p>\nThe dilemma is obvious: Should you collect cards to advance tokens, accepting bad values
\nlike \u201c0\u201d and \u201c1\u201d? Or should you concentrate on winning the
\nbidding rounds (which gives, in the short term, more money).? And that\u2019s about it
\n\u2013 what we have here is a purely mathematical game, which doesn\u2019t have
\nanything to do with the historically fascinating exploits of the real
\n\u201cMedici\u201d. The game could be called \u201cGrocery Store Empire\u201d or
\n\u201cChewing Gum \u2013 The Game\u201d and would play the same. But well, that
\nwouldn\u2019t sell wouldn\u2019t it?<\/p>\nA capable effort from Germany\u2019s most prolific game designer, that\u2019s all we
\ncould say after playing it. It works as a mathematical dilemma, but doesn\u2019t really
\nmake for an exciting or colourful game.<\/p>\nWestpark-Gamers score: 5.67<\/p>\n<\/li>\n
- <\/a>Vinci<\/a><\/b>
\n
\n![\"Vinci\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.westpark-gamers.de\/Ressourcen\/vinci_t.jpg\")
Definitely one of the most successful of the \u201cEuro-Games\u201d line
\n(surviving atrocious rules translations and counter misprints). The game is like a small
\nversion of \u201cHistory of the World\u201d \u2013 on a relatively small map (for this
\nkind of games) of Europe various cultures and empires rise and fall, with the goal to
\naccumulate as many victory points as possible. The Empires are created by an ingenious
\nrandom (counters are drawn from a bag) combination of \u201ccultural traits\u201d which
\nresults in immensely various player powers. For example you could have the combination
\n\u201cgalleys\u201d and \u201cmines\u201d. The galleys bring you additional attacking
\npower when attacking along coast lines, the mines bring you additional victory points
\nwhen occupying spaces with a \u201cpickaxe\u201d. Other traits could be
\n\u201cfortresses\u201d which bring defensive forts, \u201cspies\u201d which give you
\nthe ability to make an especially cheap attack, or \u201cdiplomacy\u201d which prevents
\none player from attcking you (and you from attacking her\/him) each round. The
\ncombinations are virtually limitless. Of course they are not all eqally powerful, which
\nis partly dealt with by giving the more powerful traits less \u201cpeople power\u201d –
\nyou see, each counter also determines how many tokens you get when founding the empire
\n\u2013 the more tokens you have, the more expansive power is apparent in an empire (you
\nneed tokens to conquer spaces and to occupy them after conquest).<\/p>\n![\"Vinci](\"https:\/\/www.westpark-gamers.de\/Ressourcen\/vinci_b.jpg\")
But there is an even more ingenious idea: there are always 6 empire
\ncombinations to choose from, the ones that are the \u201cfurthest away\u201d cost more
\nthan the \u201cnearer ones\u201d. If you take any empire, the gap is filled by adding
\nanother empire at the topmost position, and moving the others down. Everytime you take
\nmore expensive empires, the point cost you pay is added to the empires \u201cjumped
\nover\u201d. This means that empires which seemed uninteresting at first become more
\nattractive later in the game as you will get the accumulated points as a bonus when you
\ntake these \u201cnobody-wants-me\u201d combinations. Playing an empire is easy – you
\nstart somewhere on the rim of the board and try to conquer spaces through combat. The
\nlatter is handled totally deterministic: the number of tokens necessary to conquer a
\ngiven space is calculated by taking the number of defending tokens, terrain and special
\nabilities into account. If you can match that number, you conquer the space \u2013 easy!
\nThe problem is you have very few tokens for an empire, and each attack on you will result
\nin you losing one token permanently. And to get victory points for spaces needs you to
\noccupy a space with at least one token. This means that most empires \u201cmax
\nout\u201d after 2 or 3 rounds. Any attack after that will always weaken you without you
\never having the chance to build up again. This is when you decide to put your empire into
\n\u201cdecline\u201d to start a new one. The old surviving tokens become passive (like
\nin \u201cHistory of the World\u201d), but will give you additional points as long as
\nthey survive.<\/p>\nIn a normal game you play 2-4 different empires \u2013 if a culture survives 4 or 5
\nrounds it can already be described as being very succesful. In a 6 player game the final
\nround begins when 1 player reaches the score of 100 \u2013 the round is played to
\nit’s end and the player with the most points wins. This will normally not take longer
\nthen 2 hours, and you have seen dozens of empires rise and fall (think of the endless
\n\u201cCivilization<\/a>\u201d in comparison!).<\/p>\nThe game is good, no doubt, the mechanisms work, and it is easily explained and played
\neven with novices. But… and that\u2019s a big \u201cbut\u201d, it is one of the
\nWORST \u201ckingmaker games I\u2019ve ever seen. As the scores are open and the moves
\ntotally calculable, every player can hurt the position of any player badly, if s\/he
\ndecides so. If you want to play aggressively against one player because you already lose,
\nyou will most probably prevent her\/him from winning . At least with our gaming group
\nthere is constant bickering about who should attack whom at any given point. It
\ndoesn’t have to, but it can degenerate into a kind of \u201cbullying\u201d game, in
\nwhich not the playing style but pure group dynamics decide who will win in the end.
\nBecause of this this game has recently taken some flak, and there have been some attempts
\nto remedy this problem (hidden scores, for example).<\/p>\nStill, it is one of the few \u201cgrand-style\u201d empire building games, that is
\nplayable in a very short time without feeling cheated. If you can bear the fact that the
\ngame is totally ahistoric (the empires don’t have names, although the combination
\n\u201cfarmer\/mountaineer\u201d will bring certain Swiss traits to mind, for example)
\nyou will be in for a treat.<\/p>\nWestpark Gamers score: 7.5 (lowered)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n
- <\/a>…und Tsch\u00fcss!<\/a><\/b>
\n
\n![\"...und](\"https:\/\/www.westpark-gamers.de\/Ressourcen\/undtsch_t.jpg\")
One of our group commented \u201che must have a lot of time\u201d
\nwhen reading about Martin Wallace’s (this game’s designer) job as a grammar
\nschool teacher! Well, he certainly designs an impressive number of games \u2013 not all
\nof them winners, but excellent games like \u201cLords of
\nCreation<\/a>\u201d or \u201cEmpires of the
\nAncient World<\/a>\u201d come to mind when thinking of Wallace.<\/p>\nThis game is a relatively minor effort of his \u2013 a simple \u201ctrick-taking\u201d
\ncard game of no great inventiveness. 9 cards are dealt out to each player, ranging from
\n15 (highest) to -10 (lowest). Then one card less (from the same -10 to 15 stack) than the
\nnumber of players is dealt out openly. Each player now plays one card face down, then the
\ncards are turned over, and the lowest played card takes the lowest open score card (the
\n\u201ctrick\u201d). S\/he is \u201cout\u201d and greeted by a rule-enforced (!)
\n\u201c… und Tsch\u00fcss\u201d by the other players (which means \u201cgood
\nriddance\u201d in German, well that reminds me of the games I had to endure as a grammar
\nschool kid…). In subsequent rounds the sum of the cards played until then is counted,
\nnot only the newly played card. Sounds easy and stupid (well it is, a little), but
\ndon’t forget there is 1 card less than the number of players. You see, there will
\nonly be two players left who compete for the last card, and one of them will get…
\nnothing. So it might be more clever to drop out early on and be satisfied with a low
\ncard, than to spend lots of cards on nothing.<\/p>\nCards unused are kept, you fill up to 9, and a new turn begins. The player who dropped
\nout first also has the opportunity to exchange cards s\/he doesn’t want. After the
\ndeck has been exhausted a certain number of times, the player with the highest collection
\nof score cards wins.<\/p>\nIf this sounds not particularly exciting you’re right. The question is, as there are
\nso many interesting German card games around (think of \u201c6 nimmt!<\/a>\u201d for example), do we really \u201cneed\u201d a
\nhalf-baked effort like this? Well, Goldsieber seems to think so. Not atrociously bad, but
\nnot a winner either.<\/p>\nWestpark Gamers score: 3.0<\/p>\n<\/li>\n
- <\/a>Bluff<\/a><\/b>
\n
\nAgain we delved into this favourite of ours \u2013 I have already described it
\nabundantly, so let it be said that this game had two \u201chistorical events\u201d
\n\u2013<\/p>\nLet me describe the end game of game 1: Aaron and Walter had one dice left each, I had
\ntwo. We roll, Walter places the die on two \u201c2’s\u201d. Hmm… interesting.
\nAaron shoves the die immediately to three \u201c2’s\u201d. Even more interesting!
\nWithout hesitating I bid four \u201c2’s\u201d, which Walter, as there were no more
\ndice than 4, had to challenge. I had two \u201c2’s\u201d, and Walter and Aaron each
\nhad a star or a 2! Nice win for me….<\/p>\nThe next game was totally wild. It immediately became clear that there were a lot of
\n\u201c5’s\u201d around in one particular roll. People kept \u201csaving\u201d
\n5’s outside their dice-shaker and re-rolling. In fact, we ended up placing nearly all
\nof our dice into the open, which moved the \u201cbidding\u201d BEYOND the count printed
\non the track (which ends at 20). Only when we reached 24, somebody disbelieved
\n(rightfully) the illusion. In my experience this has never happened in a game I know of
\n\u2013 any similar experiences out there? A new record?<\/p>\nWestpark Gamers score: 7.58 (lowered, Basti didn’t like it that much)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Game Session Report 14.08.2002 Author: Moritz at the table: Basti, Aaron, Moritz, Hans, Peter, Walter on the table: Medici, Vinci, …und Tsch\u00fcss!, Bluff Medici (Reiner Knizia) This is an earlier effort of Reiner Knizia, a very abstract game of bidding and trading. It is played in three rounds, each of these rounds is divided into … Game Session Report 14.08.2002<\/span> weiterlesen
- <\/a>Vinci<\/a><\/b>