Macao - wind rose, is a wind rose, is a wind rose, is a wind rose.

Game Designer - Stefan Feld
Game Publisher - alea/Rio Grande Games
Game Type - Euro

Macao - wind rose, is a wind rose, is a wind rose, is a wind rose...

On the surface, I shouldn't like this game. Elegant isn't quite the hotword to throw at this title. The production quality of the game is functional but bland. As Tom Vassal would say, "Wahoo! Another game about the exotic world of shipping goods!" That being said, Stefan Feld is one of my favorite designers and it all started with this game. In fact, I still have several titles by him that I've yet to play. To date I've played only three of his designs: Macao, Luna and The Speicherstadt. Within these three excellent games Macao is by far the stand-out. Here's why...

• The Windrose- Stefan, you clever little bugger you. This mechanism is amazing. For those that haven't had the chance to play this game, I'll offer a brief explanation. Every turn prior to the card draft and player actions, one player rolls the 6 dice (all of different colors) for that round. Players take a look at the results. The players will draft these different values in their specific color for actions on future rounds. So if you take a black six, you put 6 black cubes by your "6" on the windrose. Every turn the windrose arrow turns to the group of cubes you get for that turn. So in my example with the black six, in six turns from the point of choosing it, that windrose will work itself around eventually to the place on the table where the number six once stood and the 6 black cubes still do. It's hard to explain in words but once you see how it works you'll be taken back at how interesting it makes planning for your actions. The even trickier part is that several of the actions require cubes of different colors to activate, so if you have a card that requires a 2 black cubes and a green cube to play, you need to line up some green cubes with those black ones as well. You'll have six turns for the dice to work out, where you can put those green cubes on the spot where the black ones are... or be forced to adjust your intentions. 

• The cards - This game comes with a massive deck. If I showed you a picture of it you wouldn't be all that impressed. Sorry ladies, you've seen bigger. What makes it so lengthy is the result of only seeing a relative handful of the cards each game. I don't want really want to concern myself with percentages, but out of the variable cards, you only see around *half of the deck a game. Some of the cards have overlapping similarities but no two are exactly the same. This gives the game a lot of variety play to play. I've actually seen some people players comment on how the deck is too big. They argue that not enough is consistent game to game to count on, I don't think they're entirely wrong, but I don't see this as a shortcoming to the game at all. There are quite a few different niches to specialize within Macao and most will be accommodated no matter which cards come out. It's mostly a matter of what combo's or lack there of, become available throughout the game. This leads some to think there is a bit too much luck of the draw, when cards come up that easily aid in what you're already trying to accomplish without them. Really I think some cards are deceptively difficult to work into your efficiency machine but every card has it's place. If someone keeps snatching up your cards before you get a chance to pick, this game has a nifty turn-order mechanic as well.

• The Wall - I really like this as a turn order mechanic. I like the fact that one needs to sacrifice to gain preference in turn order. If the cards are bugging you, or you really need to get that crucial office card, invest here. It seems more of a compromise to spend points here than some of the more commonly used methods. Passing early to go first next round (e.g. Carson City) never seems like much of an option, most of the time the player is basically forced to pass early in situations or games that use this method. It never seems to hold suspense or drama. The worker placement "spot" for turn order in several of those games also seems to not retain that dramatic flair either. I don't know if it just seems to easy to do, like placing your worker on the turn order spot in Caylus for example, or if it just seems unfair to be able to catapult your way from last to first in one motion. In Macao, cubes that could be accomplishing a wide variety of different actions can be spent on the wall fight for tun order. I really like that it's a gradual and measured approach to the turn order struggle. It takes keeping up with the whole game. You can actually get far enough ahead where one significant play from an opponent will not be enough to get them back to the front of the line. In this way it seems, idk, somewhat more "fair". It's also a nice little subsystem, a race within a race. You can even completely neglect it if you're fine with taking everyone's leftovers. 

• 2P - The game plays beautifully two-handed. It scales very well. There are more cards with more players in the drafting lot each turn, but besides that no changes need to be made to make this game play well with two. The dice are open availability, so that doesn't change. The only thing that get's a little screwy is some of the competition in the area control aspect of the game. It's not entirely messed up though, just far less competition. The city can feel very tight with 4, almost impossible to get desired results without stepping up in the turn order so you can build first. While that tension remains in the card drafting, it's essentially absent in the city 2P as no locations are removed or sequestered with varying player counts. You can only buy one section of the city per round normally anyways, which sort of tames this a bit. You just see more cohesive groupings of area in smaller player counts, couple that with the area scoring (2 pts/connected region) and it gets a little hairy, but not even close to broken... just different with 2.

All in all, Macao is one of my favorites. It provides for some very interesting decisions, tight gameplay and a drip of drama that is sometimes missing from Euro games. On the surface it seems like a mish-mash of different mechanics but somehow something great emerges from the chaos, all the loose ends tie into one another. I look forward to trying Feld's other designs, especially In the Year of the Dragon, Notre Dame, Trajan and Die Burgen von Bergund. It's no wonder to me the BG world seems to Feld-crazy these days, dude's brilliant.

- SEE THIS POST @ BGG  -

Endeavor for 2 - A Selective Look at the 2P Variants

(originally posted on BGG August 2011)

Game Designer(s) - Carl de Visser & Jarratt Gray
Game Publisher - Z-MAN Games
Game Type - Euro efficiency engine/area control/set collection

This article will discuss the two most popular variants:


The Official Variant:
http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/437708/2-player-endeavor


Faster, Friendlier:
http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/590949/faster-friendlier-2-player-endeavor

Well let's start with the official variant. This variant introduces a 3rd neutral player whose markers are played by both players. This is sort of a dummy player if you're familiar with that sort of concept. Most of the rules are identical to the full player compliment with a few exceptions. Often, when you choose different options for your action you are going to, in-turn, place down the neutral discs. When occupying, you can place a neutral disc afterwards in any region in which that neutral player is allowed to play a disc. The neutral player placement follows the same rules as the active player, this neutral player must have presence in the region in order to place his disc. Very often you'll be using these neutral discs to interfere with your live opponents progress. Attacking works exactly as it would with normal scaling. When you ship, you place a neutral disc into any shipping lane, just as it would be for any other player. There are no prerequisites for shipping however. Drawing cards works in a similar way to occupation. When you choose your draw action you can "take" a card for the neutral player in any area in which he is eligible according to normal rules. It is important to note that the blue "action chits" when spent do not provoke neutral actions. There are a few other subtleties and options, but that gets to the gist of the official variant.

As for the Faster, Friendlier variant, it is obvious that it is based on the official variant with a few significant changes. Besides the drawing cards action the neutral discs are assigned or allotted to the different regions during setup. Each region gets a specific amount of discs to be laid out during the occupation of each area, the shipping lanes start with a pre-determined amount discs, placed in the first few spot in the shipping lane. The decisions on behalf of the live players, regarding the neutral player, take place when you choose to draw cards. When you draw cards you may choose to discard the next highest card from the draw pile. The neutral player "gets" this card.


The only reason I'm writing this article, is because both actually work! Obviously both, in different ways, simulate the tightness in available area that you'd find with more players.



-Here are some notes of comparison: (OV=official variant, FF=faster,friendlier)

Shipping

•  in the OV, your shipping is left inherently alone, the other live player may decide to interfere with you by placing neutral discs into your area, soaking up valuable space. Making you compete against the neutral player for control of the governance for that region.

• in the FF, there are a certain amount of neutral discs present in each shipping lane during setup. The competition is there regardless.

Occupying

• in the OV, according to normal placement rules your opponent may place neutral discs into an eligible (for the neutral color) spot in an open region.

• in the FF, the neutral discs are spread out among the neutral regions and are added when there sufficient room left for placement. So, if there is a disc set aside for the purpose of neutral occupation (counted out and placed beside the region as a reminder) it is placed as soon as there is only 1 space left to occupy in that region. If there are four  neutral discs for that region(europe only), they are played onto the board when there are only 4 spaces left unoccupied. Europe starts the game with 4 neutral discs to the side, whereas each other region has one neutral disc set aside for occupation.

Drawing   

• in the OV, the active player after drawing his own card may choose to draw for the neutral player by placing an eligible (for the neutral color) card in the box.

• in the FF, the active player after drawing his own card may remove the next card from the stack of cards he draws his own from, regardless of eligibility for the neutral player.

This pretty much breaks down the major differences between the two most popular variants. Now, which is better? Why would I want to write an article based on such a specific case of circumstances when there are so many other 2P specific games available?

 The inspiration for this article, is that they both actually work. As in for me, they each have their own unique appeals and turn-offs, they each expand on the game, or at the very least present the system in a different light. There are games published to scale down to 2, that don't work this well!

The official variant seems to try and simulate a 3 player game. Now I know what you're thinking, this game isn't even close to "best with 3". I think this is because of the size of the board. It leaves too much open space and freedom to expand without worry. If you've played a 3 player game of Endeavor, there still is too much room to expand your domain uninhibited by the other players. I've heard things like, "well, who would actually play the game that way, the conflict is part of the fun"... this is true but just having that idea in mind isn't enough to achieve that tension in a real game. Why? Because there's still too much damn room! If one player makes it their goal to be the fly in your ointment, he is going to lose track of his own goals and effectively only be able to disrupt one of three players. That's where the "dummy player actually makes it interesting. You see, he's soul-less. He doesn't care about his own win, he gets his jollies in creating havoc and disruption. That is because you are in control of him. So where maybe only a certain percentage of [i]your[/i] plays will be in confined spaces, [i]all of his will be[/i]. He is your drone. He thrives on conflict. This makes up for the plays where a live player would be seeking to "carve-out" his own territory.

The "Faster, Friendlier Variant" seems to try and shorten the board size down. There are spots on the shipping lane already occupied by the neutral player at the games beginning. So besides that neutral player being a legitimate candidate for governor, these spaces might as well not even exist. This is in stark contrast to the OV because the neutral counters are spread equal. You can't elect as the opposing player to push most of the neutral discs into one area. There isn't much to wonder about as far as the occupation strategy of the neutral player. It's pre-determined, in timing and amount.

Card drawing is significantly different between the two. In the OV the discarded card draws are going to be a little more spread out. Some defensive (blocking your opponents ability to pick up a card by snatching it up for the neutral player) or offensive (removing cards from regions you are in in hopes of getting through the deck a little faster to get to the more powerful). The FF just works on the 2nd premise alone. You can only draw cards out of the decks for the neutral players from the same deck as you just drew your own. There are rare circumstances that arise that may carry some of the tone of the defensive position. This happens when 2 players are competing along with the neutral player in one region. The neutral player will have a fairly decent presence to start and there really isn't much room at all in each. Therefore if all 3 players are present you can sort of snuff out the weakest player (always one of the 2 live players) from the quality cards... or really any cards at all.

"Are these really dummy players, I've already been told this is a terrible mechanic, I don't know why I hate it so much... I just do!" Well clearly that was the inspiration for the FF variant. Or atleast it presents an alternative for those with a similar attitude as the quoted fella. For the record, the official variant came first, the FF is almost, as I see it atleast, a variation on the variant. Get all that? A whole separate article could probably be written on the pro's and con's of such mechanics, from fun to un-fun, strategic to annoying. One thing that is very clear and I sort of alluded to it earlier, is that for every few moves you make in this game you're going to be getting into someone's business with your own moves. That is with the normal player compliment (3-5). Yes I am aware of the butterfly effect, not everyone likes to think of all remotely abstract games as being as fluid as GO and me thinks for good reason. The neutral player serves just to complicate and interfere. So yes, you might understand that although a normal live player's move might have some interference associated with it there are personal motivations for it. The move helps further their "efficiency engine", if it slows you down in the process, all the better, The neutral player's moves don't share that quality. If taken too emotionally and in context of normal play, they seem mean... because they are. Another reason for the FF as stated by the author is that it is easy to forget the neutral actions after taking your own. I would agree, but that isn't the fault of the variant. It definitely feels less intuitive to play these neutral markers, so I think in combination with residual habits formed by the normal order of procedure, it seems to break the flow of the game up. I think there's something to this, but it's definitely not the fault of the variant.

Something I found very interesting that I didn't expect was the realization that this is more of an abstract game than I had thought. Sometimes I get caught up in the distraction of theme. Pretty pieces, an interesting layout, these things are very much to the benefit to the game but sometimes these elements overshadow the beauty and simplicity of the abstract quality of the game play. The phrase I keep coming back to, whether it's because of the quicker games, lack of motion between turns, or just more directly seeing the implications of certain positions, "these variants strip away some of the mystery of the game". This phrase over and over in my mind has been ringing. But what are the mysteries? This is a game of open information and zero luck, so the mystery has something to do with the abstract play. Seeing the further implication of your placements and decisions in more brevity and clarity. This is the only thing I can come up with. I'd like to rant along more about this, but again it's a bit off topic and would make this article less appealing or digestible for some folks with a more casual approach to gaming. I also don't want to ruin the game by exposing people to strategy that I haven't fully thought out or they weren't looking for.

I must say I enjoy the official variant more than the FF for the following reasons:

• The neutral discs set aside for occupation present a very stale set of circumstances once they enter the game.

• I feel less of the original strategy remains viable when playing the FF version.

• The card drawing aspect of FF feels cheap, for a reason I can't fully describe. I guess it just feels so much different than the normal game.

• There are certain shipping situations in the FF that feel scripted, broken, or less than inspiring from a design standpoint. Even though the neutral player has a leg-up on the competition in the governor race, it feels as though at some points the strategy becomes far less elegant.

• The spread out approach of the neutral player is a bit unrealistic. I like the ability to "preempt" my opponents future strategy by playing discs in a diverse and varied way, at a variable rate and concentration.

That being said, the FF is what it set out to be.

• Faster,especially at first when compared to the original order of operations.

• Friendlier, you get no choice where the neutral discs will be placed, well at least as far as concentration.

I actually very much enjoy both. I remember thinking, would I like this game if it was published as a two player game with either of the variants as the official and only set of rules? I honestly can say I would. This is one of those variants that if more people knew about it, I think sales might have been even better for this game. Endeavor really doesn't have a lot of "screwage" to begin with, and unless you've been coddled by non confrontational Euro's for most of your playing, you'd probably find that even with the intentionally blatant disruptive force that is the dummy player, it really doesn't feel all that nasty. The attack action is already weighted pretty heavily in expense, so if you could handle that and can accept the fact that your opponent taking up space to meet his goals is already hindering your chances to expand, the blatant motivation behind neutral play should be seen as nothing more than a little slap on the ass. Even though the dummy player can't speak up to tell you, his motivation are very much the same as yours would be, just remember that guy is a dummy after all.

- SEE THIS POST @ BGG  -

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