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Fig 01: The story begins right here with this incredible cover…
World-building.
Not a phrase you often see in association with a board game. It’s the kind of terminology usually reserved for movie franchises or fantasy novel series and their tv adaptations. It’s not just backstory, it’s the art design, the environment, the sensation of a deep and rich history. It’s the background details
Again, not something you expect from a board game.
Welcome to Scythe.
There’s a very strong chance that you’ve heard of it. I am very far from the first to write about Scythe – after all, the game was released in 2015 and sold a ton of copies and had a great critical reception (which doesn’t necessarily mean a game is right for you – we still have our personal tastes, don’t we?). So, I’m a tad behind the times. But Monopoly had been around for a fair few decades before I first played it, and is still finding new fans today. The same is true for all games. Yes, we can spend all of our time (and money) chasing the myriad latest releases, but there’s so many games already out there waiting for us to discover them. I only came to this hobby at the start of the year, which means I missed out on some heavy hitters when they were first released. The time has come to grab some and form my own opinions, to view them through my own particular filter, and what matters to me is how far I'm plunged into a story.
Of all the games I’ve played so far, Scythe is quite unusual in that the world-building permeates every part of the product, to the degree that it feels to me like the main point and purpose. As an author (there’s no pressure to check out what I write, none at all, we’re all friends here) I have the deepest interest in the stories board games can tell - and every game you play tells a story to some degree or another. Snakes and ladders would provide a very basic - but still thrilling - story, one where your sister or brother had spent the entire game hitting every snake then fluked a jammy roll to land on the longest ladder, thus robbing you of victory. On another level, Horrified tells the terrible tale of a village attacked by classic monsters and your efforts to defeat them with puzzle solving. Scythe is on the highest level of board game storytelling (in my opinion, dear reader). It is the tale of a world, and your part within it.
We often say that something can be more than the sum of its parts. What is it about Scythe that got me so excited then? What, aside from the dieselpunk alt 1920s setting? Well…
First Impressions
Wow.
Right, that’s that section done, let’s move on…
What? Okay, alright, I’m happy to go into a bit more detail. And I really should, because this is where my take on the game begins. The world-building starts upon first sight of the box cover. Straight off you’re faced with a great piece of art depicting an agricultural alternative world of farmers and mechs – it actually puts me in mind of a renaissance painting as rendered by a time traveller - and I immediately want to know more about it. I haven’t got far to look to find it. Instead of a fairly dry description of how Scythe will play, there’s a couple of paragraphs of back story. This gives me a feel of where the game will play out, and a strong reason to play – what effect will I have upon this world.
Fig 02: The card art’s not half bad like…
There’s a fair bit of weight to this big box, which gives the impression that there’s plenty of game awaiting inside (it turns out I’m spot on here). Lid off, and look at how well organised this is! I do like it when there’s a place for every piece. The game board is thick and high quality and depicts in luxurious detail the world I’m about to explore. And the epicness continues upon first sight of the miniatures. There’s so much detail on the characters and mechs, so much personality. There is storytelling here too: each player piece is very different (that one’s got a tiger as a pet!), which hints that they may play a little differently too…
The rulebook is an area where a lot of games can stumble, particularly when they’re mixed with people like my fine self. A bit of a worry: this is a fairly chunky rulebook, which means there’s a lot to understand. True enough, but thankfully the instructions are set out clearly and in a sensible order. The information is uncluttered with plenty of illustrations. Thumbs up so far from the Stickler! (This is the name for people who love rulebooks and I’ll keep saying it until it lands in the Oxford dictionary.) There’s even an achievement sheet to record your greatest gaming moments – a neat idea which reminds me of old-school arcade high scores. There is a separate solo rulebook – which I’ll test out later – and a quick reference guide, and it all maintains the same art style and attention to detail throughout. It’s this unity of art direction that can really pull a player into a game and hold them there, as the colour scheme ties everything back to that big glorious board.
As you read, it becomes clear that there’s going to be a lot of choices and many routes to victory, and there’s one piece of advice from the rulebook that I advise you to take to heart: dive in, and don’t overthink it. The player’s guide goes even further, given suggestions for your first few turns and recommending that you take a different top-row action than your opponents do, which is a great way of seeing what the results of these actions are. A single annoyance with the rulebook: no ruddy page numbers despite there being a contents page! I can’t tell you how handy page numbers are when familiarising yourself with the rules during your first few games. Proper slap on the hands for that one.
What else have we got? Dual-layered player mats. Oo, nice. They make it so much easier to keep track of your player pieces and hold them in the right places, excellent when you’re a sausage-fingered clod-hopper. The various card decks are great too. I’ve recently come to really appreciate a good quality set of cards, after reviewing a card-based game which might as well have used the last pack of paper from the pound shop. These have a lovely finish, which is only right considering the artwork they depict. There’s nice and chunky markers and meeples, and once everything is on the table it looks stunning, very dramatic and bold. The map is made of chunky hexes – a good job considering how many figures and tokens they can contain - and littered with detail. I will say that I’ve had a few games push the limits of my dear trembling table, and at three players this one goes beyond. Once players are moving their mechs and characters across the map, it looks (to me) as being up there with the best miniature wargaming I’ve seen… although, as I was about to find out, there isn’t much combat.
Gameplay
Far warning, this is considered a medium-to-heavy euro game which takes a few plays before you really start to see how your available actions stack and work together. Once you're used to what each action does (it won't happen straight away), turns will be fairly quick as each player only does one or two actions before the next person plays.
Fig 03: The game in full flow, and someone’s made a break for The Factory.
As I hinted at earlier, I expected this to play out like ye olde Command and Conquer. You know what I mean, gathering resources from a growing map to fuel and upgrade your army before the inevitable war. It came as a big surprise to me, then, that we played our first game of Scythe for over an hour before a battle occurred – and during the entirety of that game, it was the only one. This is more akin to everyone at the table playing The Settlers at the same time, wherein you have a few basic resources to gather and actions to take, and as you venture further into the world more options become available. There’s a strong sensation of progression as the turns cycle past. You’re accessing additional resources, which helps you to develop your mechs or improve your resource gathering capabilities or a myriad of other upgrades that gradually become available.
I won't go into great detail about every single rule in the game - I should imagine that's been done countless times since Scythe's release and we don't need a rehash here. There are a few key elements and mechanics that make the storytelling work, however. In the base game there are five factions to choose from, and the choice can shape how the game turns out. Each faction has their own starting position on the map, and their own player mat which has subtle differences to the others - top actions will be paired up to different bottom actions - urging you to lean into a specific play style to take advantage of the alternative benefits on offer.
Combat plays an important role in Scythe, even when it doesn't actually happen. Some of those vital stars can be won from winning combat, however it isn't always worth engaging in,andight not fit in with your strategy at all. The threat of aggression can push an opponent away from you, or it can steer you in a different direction to a tooled up opponent. There are stars to be gained from fighting, but there are plenty of stars to be earned in other ways too.
I didn’t miss the constant combat that I’d initially expected, because I was so busy making decisions and chasing along tracks. The low amount of fighting does make for a low level of in-game player interaction (I suspect that four or five player games may be a tad livelier in this respect, although I haven’t been able to play at that player count to confirm this). However, the actions of other players will affect your decisions. For example, rather than going that way towards a player who has gained a little more strength than you, you could go the other way and get yourself some much-needed oil. There are some other interactions that can come up as you play, such as making deals using coins, but it didn't come up much when we played. There was plenty of discussion, though, often triggered by the encounter cards or reminding each other what the many actions do.
Fig 04: All the miniatures are top notch - and the mech types are different for each faction.
Obviously I like the game: the question is, how much?
A hell of a lot, is the answer.
I've talked about categories of games before, and I'll give you a new system of categorisation now. There's the board games that you simply don't like or bond with, and they won't be sticking around for long. There's the ones that you quite enjoy, but you know that at some point you'll get bored of them and they'll find their way into eBay eventually. There's the ones that stay because they come out at Christmas. You have games that remain in your collection just because. And there's the ones that you know for a fact you'll never part with because they're simply too damn good. Scythe has landed smack-bang in the middle of this category. It’s too good, too deep, too rich to let it go.
There are plenty of options to consider whenever you play. Should you get your mechs on the board asap? Should you make a beeline for the factory? Which track should you focus on completing first? Should you get your Mill built before anything else? Every choice you make changes your path - just as it would in real life, if in real life you were a farmer in a 1920’s dieselpunk version of Europe with a clutch of huge mechs at your disposal. I love getting to the end of a game of Scythe and looking back over my actions, seeing which were the major milestones, where were the crossroads in my decision-making, where could my strategy have improved. There are other versions of that story that could be told, and next time we play I’ll definitely tell another of those versions. The choices made by other players will alter my own actions, the Encounter cards will boost me in ways I didn’t anticipate, and the aspect of all this that I find most interesting? Very little is down to luck. It is player choice that drives the narrative. Scythe, then, is emergent storytelling.
Every time I play, I’m there. What I’m trying to say is, I bought into the part that I was given. I lived the role. I was a farmer in a world of strange technology, I was telling the story of my own development. Those Encounter cards I just mentioned serve to boost the immersion as well: they treat you as a character in a story with a decision to make, with each option providing a different outcome, much like an encounter in a book can alter the story’s path. Each card has its own beautiful illustration that tells a little chapter in your progress, and they’re perfect for changing the flow of the game, a punctuation of interest. They can get your opponents riled up as well, as they watch you land some juicy rewards dependent on the choice you make.
Fig 05: Time for a decision. Choose wisely…
This isn’t the cheapest game out there (also far from the most expensive) and it does represent a bit of an investment if you’ve never played before, but quality-wise the value is definitely there, and it feels to me like a blockbuster story with wide-screen ambitions. Where it does require a lot of investment is in time, because you need to give this game the room to show all of its elements and nuances and to win you over - you've got no hope of mastering Scythe in a single playthrough.
Scythe proved to be a step above what I've been playing up until this point complexity-wise - which was initially a bit scary - but it does three things that let me know it would be worth persevering. It looks amazing, the rulebook is as clear as it can be, and it promises you that you'll get there in the end with its encouraging player guide. If I feel like I'm getting it, then I guarantee that you can get there too.
Scythe, then, lands the joint-highest score I’ve given to any game. Am I fanboy? Yes. Yes I am.
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