Masons, ah Masons. A game that has been on my "to buy" list since it came out. The reasons are beyond me though, as this would mark my first Colovini game to date. Quite possibly my last too. The initial attraction to this game eludes me, its lure broken and lost by cracking the lid open. Maybe I made the mistake of judging a book, er, game by its cover. Maybe because it had open fields, which is something I'm into for some reason (Bison is also on my "to buy" list). The shape and size of the box, at least on the internet, reminded me of Goa, the picture on the box of various other games I like. I'm still not sure where the appeal came from, but it sure left in a hurry.

All it took was half a reading of the rules.


Image by garyjames
An image of a game in progress. Keep in mind that, for the most part, the players had no choice in location of the colors you see. Looks nice though doesn't it?

I was at my game group one slow Thursday, just finishing up my second ever go of Race for the Galaxy. I started browsing their available selection for games I hadn't played yet, when I noticed they had added Masons to their arsenal. Excellent. It was a game that nobody in my group had bothered to purchase and lately I had been buying mostly wargames. Few people had bothered to show that night, and didn't think to bring many games, making a new suggestion halfway appealing. I offered up Masons for a three player game.

All right then, open it up
The cover comes off the box and the pieces out of the bags. Rules get quickly read and explanations all around. The simple nature of the game helped things go along smoothly, no questions asked. Everything is of the expected quality, with my favorite kind of cards; tiny.

The Walls
The first action a player takes is to place a wall on the board. The walls are placed along the lines, and when the walls enclose an area of the board, there is a scoring round. The players can then play cards, which is what gains them points. The don't have to be placed next to another wall, but they cannot be placed in already enclosed areas. Pretty standard. One bonus is that when a wall is placed so as to enclose an area, and that area shares a border with another, that border can be removed.


Image by IronMoss
Here is an image of the walls in the game. They are white and the nicest pieces in the game, other than the board.

The Dice
Many things are wrong with this game. Not the mechanics, per se, as the "place a wall, roll the dice and place a tower/house(s)" mechanics work together nicely, making, technically, a fully rounded game. Sorta. It is the lack of control of which color tower/house(s) the player is able to place because of the chaotic dice rolling that irks me. All the points in the game are gained by having certain color pieces in certain areas, so when the dice force you to stray from what you need for your strategy, it kills the fun your were almost having.


Image by Moviebuffs
This image shows the dice in the game. All three are rolled simultaneously. One shows the color of the tower that is placed at one end of the wall the player just placed. If both ends of the wall are free, then the player may place another tower of his color choice as well. The other two die show the color of the houses the player must place on either side of the newly placed wall. Each of these die has one "?", which means the color house is at the discretion of the player.

The Cards
The cards are another chaotic element, used in a similar way as those in Amun-Re, having random ways to score points that are connected with how the board looks at the time of play. However, more than half the cards have nothing to do with how the just enclosed space looks, making the pillar of game's point, its purpose for theme, irrelevant. The players are meant to build a strategy around these cards in Masons, as they are the sole scoring mechanism. Some of the cards are also alot more powerful than others. Its likely for a player to have a hand of cards that score him between 3-7 points if she can close off her intended city, and another player to have cards that score upwards of 15-20 regardless of which space becomes enclosed. And thats just totally unfair.


Image by Moviebuffs

This picture shows some of the available cards. When played after a space gets enclosed, the bottom three will give the player 2 points for each tower that is part of the enclosed space, and the top three will the player 1 point for each house in one of the regions with that specific Coat of Arms (those are the only three.)

Overall
To be fair there are some interesting ideas in this game, they just weren't implemented very well. For instance, nobody actually owns anything on the board, similar to Acquire or T&E (without the partial ownership through stocks or Leaders.) Pieces are placed on the board to try and maximize the bonuses your cards allow when a space is finally enclosed. Unlike Acquire or T&E, the players rarely have a choice in which color towers or houses get placed on the board. However, where the walls, towers and houses go is in the power of the player.

I don't think I will write it off just yet though. If nothing else, I still have hope in this game, although I'm not sure why. I just want it to work so badly! I'll update this review later if my opinion changes, which it often does.

6/10