Bridge Troll (2009)

In Bridge Troll, you and your friends are hideous trolls who each guard a troll bridge. Each turn, you throw boulders to bid for travelers, who vary in number depending on the weather for that day. Travelers include fat merchants, pilgrims, poor monks (who make good eating), and if you are lucky, royal personages. As travelers come to your bridge, you use them to collect tolls. But watch out! Knights, bandits, dragons, and vicious Billy Goats Gruff prowl the countryside. You'll have to use some of your boulders to chase them away (which means you’ll have fewer left to use on your bridge!).

Although you need to collect tolls from travelers so you can buy building supplies, working on your bridge makes you hungry, so you will have to eat some of your travelers instead. It is important to balance tolls with food in order to make your bridge very appealing to travelers. If you eat too many travelers or just collect money, you won't be able to fix up your bridge. The player who uses toll-money, food, and boulders to build the most impressive troll bridge operation wins the game.

Awards
* 2010 "Games 100" nominee for Best Family Strategy Game in Games Magazine
* The Dice Tower "Top 10 Games -- 2009" (Giles Pritchard's #5)

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Bridge Troll fan

The illustrator for all those fun images in Bridge Troll is Ryan Laukat.

Here are the two most commonly asked questions about Bridge Troll's rules (see full FAQ in FILES, below):

Q: If I close my bridge and the supply of boulders runs out, the rules say that I should collect boulders from the player who has the most boulders in his or her supply. Do I collect boulders one-at-a-time and check for the remaining player with the most boulders after each one I take? Or do I take them all from the same player?
A: You take them all from the same player. Trolls are not exactly polite about this sort of thing. See Rule Variants in the FAQ for a way to play that involves less bouldersnatching.

Q: If I am CLOSED and the supply of boulders runs out, I am supposed to collect boulders from the player with the most boulders in his or her supply. What if after collecting these boulders *I* become the player with the most boulders? Can the next player then take boulders from me?
A: No. When CLOSED players collect boulders, they should keep collected boulders separate from their supplies until after ALL players have collected. Do not count the boulders you just collected as part of your supply until all players are finished collecting. (It might be convenient to temporarily put these boulders on top of your bridge to keep them separate from your supply.) See Rule Variants in the FAQ for a way to play that involves less boulder-snatching.