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28 February is kick off for the Six Nations rugby tournament and so of course we have to celebrate all the countries participating in our own special way! With a low-ish risk of broken fingers and cauliflower ears (!), here’s a game suggestion inspired by each of the competitors for you to enjoy!
England: Brass Birmingham
Dark, moody, and malty is the order of the day in Brass Birmingham. This game is a reimplementation of Brass Lancashire which was a huge hit for Martin Wallace. Another mid-heavyweight economic euro-style, resource management game from him, this has surpassed its predecessor’s popularity (although Lancashire’s two player board is still hitting all the right notes for his cardboard connoisseurs.
Incorporating many well recognised mechanisms, this is a game to settle into with a chocolatey stout, or perhaps a juicy sausage! Why? Well, because beer is big business in Brass Birmingham and so be sure to use your money, factories, and network wisely
France: Get on Board: Paris and Roma
GOB Paris and Roma comes hot on the heels of the original, Get on Board New York and London. It’s a fun flip and write where we are travelling around Paris (1-3 players) and Roma (4-5 players), trying to create the most point-tastic route possible. But, like a cool component cocktail, there’s also traditional board game elements in the form of path markers which you place on the map on your turn.
It combines set collection, route making, and push your luck all wrapped up in a lovely stylised puzzly package. Placement optimisation is key, and the fun two player mode also includes a bonus for using routes of a randomly selected colour which is another delightful decision dilemma inducing aspect. Multiplayer solitaire in spirit, invest in making your own route the best it can be. With plenty of objectives and personal goals, you’ll be at the whims of the ticket flip, when making new routes and hunting down different passengers for those extra points each game!
Ireland: Lucky Numbers
Bruno Cathala has designed a super-fast tile laying game where the goal is to be first to fill all 16 spots on your clover board. Drafting from either the face down pile or any face up on the table (discarded by players on previous turns), you place the tile (variously numbered 1 – 20) you take. It can go on an empty space or you can swap it for a tile you have already placed.
But, in order to place a tile, it must be valued higher than any tile in the column space above it and higher than any tile in the row space to the left of it. So the values of the tiles must increase in each column from top to bottom, and in each row from left to right. Diagonals don’t count, although there is a variant which allows you to take another turn if you place identical numbers in diagonally adjacent spots! Incredibly fast with a solo mode comprising 40 puzzles to solve, Lucky Numbers is a fun filler game that has the luck of the Irish about it!
Italy: Mille Fiori
Mille Fiori is a glasswork technique meaning a thousand flowers. Here it really means a thousand points though. Reina Knizia has (rather unusually for him) designed a game that is trying very hard to give you VPs. Every section of the board is burgeoning with point scores possibilities. A tile laying, area majority game, the board is beautiful and shows the different processes in glassmaking production, trade, and shipping. Using cards from your hand, you will be placing your diamonds onto the board or moving your ship along its own track
Mille Fiori is pretty and pretty clever. Whilst it’s a great feeling to amass eleventy billion points, it’s generosity is relative because everybody around the table has the same opportunities to ramp up their scores too. In fact, what you do can quite often assists other players who can build off your placements to gain them (or block you from getting) more points. And placement decisions become thinkier as the spaces on the board reduce (even more so at higher player counts), this game shines like crystal cut glass at 3P!
Scotland: Isle of Skye: From Chieftain to King
William Wallace never played Isle of Skye but if he did, he would be territory claiming like a boss. And that’s pretty good because Isle of Skye is just that: a territory building tile placement game. Not only that, however, it has a brilliant auction bidding mechanism that unusually works well at 2P! Alexander Pfister (of Great Western Trail and Boon Lake fame – to name but a few) and Andreas Pellikan want you to build the kingdom that generates the most money. Because money equals points.
Each round, you’ll be building out your territories (with their own feature based point boosters) whilst trying to achieve a specific objective or series of objectives. Interestingly they come round more than once but only in a specific order (if you’ve played Cartographers you’ll be familiar with this). But have to set the price for two if the three tiles you have and secretly trash one. Your opponent(s) then have the chance to buy your tiles. If they don’t , you get to keep them but you have to buy them back yourself. So you need to price the tiles you know they want at a point they’ll be tempted to pay whilst leaving you to take the tile you really wanted to keep for yourself. Success therefore depends on a mixture of planning and cunning money management.
Wales: DragonKeepers
Calling the dragons in Dragonkeepers dragons doesn’t do them justice. They are just too cute. They melt my heart every time I look at them, and luckily I get to hold them in my hand in this game too!
Dragonkeepers is a drafting, set collecting, game for 2-4 players that plays fast and pushes you to push your luck. With four adorable dragon suits you are trying to collect (herd) them in order to cast spells and gain VP worth amulets and other goodies. But you’re limited to what you can collect and where you can lay them down in front of you. And choosing between picking up dragons and laying them down is a particularly devilish dilemma. Why are you forced to decide? Well, because the top cards on the spell book act as both the draw deck and the spell criteria! So if you take a card, the requirement for the current spell you could cast is instantly changed! Dragonkeepers is fast, fun, and feels fresh! The rules are simple but there is a synapse sizzle lurking behind those cutagons which starts to emerge after just a few games.
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