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I was introduced to the world of modern board games when a friend brought around an ‘easy, little’ game for us to enjoy called Caverna.
Looking back now, I question why he thought this would be a good game for a first time board gamer but nevertheless I am so glad that he did. What he unknowingly started was a life-long love of meeples, dice and resource management mechanics for which I am so grateful. And not only that, Caverna is still, to this day, my favourite game.
As a board game streamer, I often talk about how Caverna is my favourite and therefore how Uwe Rosenberg is my favourite board game designer, but in reality, until about 4 months ago Caverna was his only game that I had played. I therefore set myself a challenge to explore a range of his games to learn for sure if he was my favourite designer or not. All of these games I played using ‘Board Game Arena’ and there are two of them which I would love to add to my real life collection.
It’s time to get our Uwe on:
A Feast for Odin
Overview: When trying my second ever Uwe game, I knew I had to stick close to the mechanics and components which had made me such a fan of Caverna. I therefore chose to try A Feast for Odin, a worker placement game with tile placement, resource management and sheep. The theme was also really engaging because, let’s be honest, Vikings make any game better (I’m looking at you Champions of Midgard).
In A Feast fo Odin, you use 1-4 meeples to carry out actions: simple actions allow you to take money to the market and come back with fish and meat, whilst the most complex, meeple heavy actions, allow you to build stone houses and plunder mountains of treasure. These actions are displayed in a central, illustrated board in which all players are waiting, with their fingers crossed, hoping their opponents don’t block the action spaces they need for their strategy. This central board limiting your actions based on what other players decide to do is a mechanic mirrored in Caverna and so helped me to feel right at home.
What was a surprise, was the whopping -86 score you start on…That’s right, it’s always good for your self-confidence to begin a game with almost 100 points in the wrong direction. This vast pit of negative points comes from your game board being uncovered at the start of the game, with your points going up with almost every square you cover.
Pros: This game is endlessly satisfying, I thought I’d seen all that tile placement games had to offer but I was wrong. But, the most impressive thing about this game is actually the feeding mechanic. As with most worker placement games, once your turn is over you need to feed your meeples, it’s only right but it doesn’t stop it being a frustrating resource tax. In Feast for Odin however, Uwe decided to redesign this popular concept and create something fresh. During your turn, you need to fill the feasting table with food tiles you have collected from your actions. When each new turn releases a new meeple under your control, they are moved off the end of the feasting table, making it longer to signify that you now need more tiles as you have more people to feed each turn. So elegantly simple, it turns a frustrating food tax into a solid game mechanic.
There is also SO MUCH to do, you can focus on livestock, you can explore new islands, you can build new buildings, you can pillage.... I have been able to approach this game in so many different ways, try so many different strategies and this has really kept me coming back for more.
Cons: Enormity. I have only played this game online and personally I think this is the ideal way to learn this particular game. I have not seen the rule book but I imagine there are novels shorter. The sheer number of pieces that must be nestled unassumingly in a box of Feast for Odin boggles my brain. You would need serious table space to lay this game out properly.
But not only that, there are 12 steps to every turn and 61 action spaces to get your head around. That is a lot of admin… By playing on Board Game Arena I was able to enjoy the game play without getting bogged down in the admin swamp, this meant I was able to really enjoy my first game knowing I was not only having fun but playing it correctly.
Would I own it?: Yes! It is a really fun game, perfect for anyone who loves a worker placement game as much as I do. Not to forget, the solo version of the game is really enjoyable. I would need to wait until I got a bigger table but I would really like to use the physical components and work out the best tile placement whilst holding the real pieces, it gives another level of satisfaction that the digital version would never be able to achieve, if you’ve ever played Isle of Cats, you will know what I mean.
Nova Luna
Overview: Now Nova Luna was not what I was expecting from the king of worker placement games but this was such an unexpectedly fun find. Nova Luna is a tile drafting game which cannot be played solo unlike the other titles on this list. Each turn you move around a circle of tiles, deciding how many steps to jump so as to pick up a certain tile before then placing it in your game area and trying to achieve point scoring colour combinations.
Pros: One of my favourite things about this game is the push your luck element, you have to decide whether to jump 1, 2 or 3 tiles ahead: do you go for the tile you really want or do you try for the closest tile to give yourself the most number of turns. Just like in Tokaido, the person at the back goes next, so if you jump too far ahead to secure the perfect tile, your opponents may pick up multiple tiles before you get to play again. This turns this simple tile placement game into a thinker!
Also, unlike the other games on this list, there is such a reasonable number of components. You can very happily fit this game on a normal sized dining table. It is also a very straight forward game, perfect for new board gamers.
Cons: There are no sheep, not one, not a single tile with a picture of a sheep on or a little wooden sheep that you can put into the perfect pasture where you know he will grow old and content…
The reason I love Caverna is the complexity, it is the way that the different action spaces complement and interact with one another. Due to the simple nature of this game, you don’t get to lose yourself in strategy in the way that Caverna allows and that just isn’t what I want from an Uwe Rosenburg game.
Would I own it?: Yes! Despite my con section, this is a fantastic, fun and simple game. I would love to bring it out at dinner parties with new gamers. It is also a good workout for your brain, it’s a puzzle that helps you keep those gooey neurons young and stretchy.
Glass Road
Overview: The final Uwe I tried (though there are many more for me still to discover) was Glass Road. When I spoke with other gamers, Glass Road came out as the top Uwe recommendation. As with Feast for Odin, Glass road incorporates the idea of a universal set of actions which you are trying to play on your turn, forcing you to always have several strategies under your belt.
Unlike Feast for Odin and Caverna however, this is not a work placement, this is about placing cards. At the start of your turn, you have 15 specialist cards with each card displaying a play cost and 2 actions. From your 15 cards, you have to pick only 5 to form your hand for that round. There are 3 turns within a round and at the start of each turn you all play one of your five cards face down, you then take it in turns to turn your cards over. If you turn your card over and no one else has it as part of their chosen hand, you can play both actions, but if someone has it in their hand, they can ‘interrupt’ and therefore you only get to play one half of the card. Other players still limit which actions you can do as with Uwe’s other titles, but this is also a game of reading your opponents, predicting what they are aiming for and playing the game in a way that scuppers their plans. It’s an Uwe game with some mind reading involved.
One of my favourite things about Uwe’s game design is the inspired way he streamlines a mechanic. I have already mentioned how impressed I am with the feeding mechanic in Feast for Odin, I did not expect to be as surprised again when playing Glass Road. The idea is that you are manufacturing glass and bricks, to make each resource you need a number of ingredients from quartz and charcoal, to water and food (these represent the labour and human energy that goes into making those items). As you use your specialist cards to generate ingredients, the counters on the dial move around to show you have more of those ingredients. If at any point, the left most space of the dial is empty, the prongs move around to indicate how one of each of those ingredients has been used up and now you have 1 more total glass/brick. It is so impressively elegant and the skill to be able to think up such a dial that can show both the quantities of ingredients and final product is why Mr Rosenburg has succeeded in designing so many amazing games.
Pros: I think this game utilises player interaction so well and, as everyone has a matching set of specialist cards, this game ensures that no strategy is ever guaranteed. You have to think several turns ahead and several possibilities to really make the most of your cards. And let’s not forget the design of the dials, this is just inspired and is a unique mechanic I am yet to see anywhere else.
Cons: The solo mode makes the game very different, I feel it would have been better to have an ‘Auto’ opponent rather than a different play style as you don’t get to use the dual actions on the cards very often. During a game, there would often be turns where I didn’t feel like I had a lot to do or that I was achieving anything, there isn’t as much strategy variability as Caverna and Feast for Odin.
I also found the art style of the main game board quite uninspiring, the artwork of this game is my least favourite on this list.
Would I own it?: I actually would not, I am glad that I played it as the dials are a marvel and a true testament to Uwe’s skill and talent, but the theme and artwork personally don’t draw me in and as there is a lack of strategy variability, it would never be my Uwe game of choice.
Overall, I am so pleased that I took the time to explore some of the other titles that Uwe Rosenberg has created. I can now assuredly claim that he is my favourite designer as I have 4 games worth of evidence to back that claim up!
I wonder, who is your favourite board game designer?