Game: Struggle for Rome

Thread: Re: Struggle to hold interest

Alan Kwan — 2008-08-11T23:20:46+00:00

The beginning of the game is not "exciting", but it shouldn't be slow or long. You just need to plunder three cities before you can settle, so that should be done in 3~6 turns, and these turns should be quick since you're making only a few moves. Strategically, these turns are interesting to play since there is struggling for position.

The problem is probably because players don't know what to do if they don't draw horses. Players should know the rule that, if they pay 3 gold, it can substitute for a horse (not for a random draw from the deck) when building, and that the development cards are really a bargain (compare with the costs of the same in other Settlers games!) and they should not hesitiate to buy them with their cows.

Thread: Re: Struggle to hold interest

TMJJS — 2008-06-19T13:08:38+00:00

I've played the game a few times, but unfortunately always with new players so the game takes almost 3 hours plus. Of course it shouldn't take this long, but I can't get the players to give it another try because of the length and how slow and repetitive the beginning of the game is before getting the conquered cities going.

I really like the game, but can't seem to find players.

Thread: Re: Struggle to hold interest

Alan Kwan — 2008-06-18T17:30:23+00:00

This is a game with many intricate parts, finely balanced. I largely enjoyed it since my first playing, since I'm playing the English version and I studied the rules throughoutly, and I'm generally fast in grasping a new game. The German website explicitly encouraged people who aren't initially impressed to try the game again, and it gives some strategy tips, which I agree with. In other words, the game has some intricacies that do take some players a few playings to figure out - and you shouldn't even hope to get them in your first playing when you're getting so many rules wrong, including the very crucial rule that you need 3 different colors before you can start a kingdom. (If you're not sure what you're playing towards, how can you strategize how to play efficiently towards your goals?)

I do have the gripe that the game took too long for my first playings, yet it is evident that the time will shorten significantly with experience - just count how many things you're doing every turn, and it's evident that the game should be much shorter if players are familiar with the game sequence and move promptly.

Thread: Re: using Traitor with no figures

crazytalk — 2008-06-16T03:02:02+00:00

a) The way I understand it the card does not have the requirement that you need to have figures in your tribe to use the bonus the card gives you. So, Yes you can use the Traitor card to plunder a city without any figures.

b) You use your figure marker for the first kindom you build and not the figures in your tribe box. Yes, you can use the Traitor card to start your first kingdom.

c) You have to have a figure to place on the newly created conquered city when you do an expansion. No, you can't use the Traitor card to expand if you have no figures in your tribe box.

I hope that helps to clarify some things for you.

Thread: using Traitor with no figures

Alan Kwan — 2008-06-15T20:15:57+00:00

If I have zero figures in my tribe, can I use the Traitor card against a city with 2 towers for:

a) plunder
b) start kingdom
c) expansion

Note that plunder sometimes cause the loss of a figure, start kingdom doesn't require a figure, and expansion always requires a figure to be placed in the target city.

Thread: Re: Tweaking the Game

Alan Kwan — 2008-06-15T05:02:11+00:00

I think you are underestimating the rewards for an early caravan.

Assuming that your tribe is plundering at least three cities, the caravan will yield for you at least 3 gold if you build it before the first looting. So even if you pay 3 gold to substitute for the horse when building the caravan, you'll at least earn it back after the looting. So in the end, an early caravan gives you a 3 gold/1 card profit. And it's a no-risk, pure-profit investment, since you have to build that caravan sooner or later in order to score VPs and win the game.

If you have extra caravans, you can more profitably rob duplicate cities to hamper your opponents, and you'll earn even more profit should you decide to go for Scrouge of Rome. The increase in plunder is not "slight": for a plunder without losses, gold from your caravans are all you get, and for a plunder which costs a figure, the extra loot is worht roughly as much as the lost figure, so your net profit is about the same. Gold income from looting is very useful, because with gold you're not paying for the chance to draw a horse from the deck; you're paying for the sure thing of substituting for a horse when building.

You get one grain (and a horse/cow) and 5 gold to start the game with. It is often more profitable to invest any early grain/horse/gold into a caravan than development cards, or to rush on with faster movement and then worry about caravan building later.

Thread: Re: Struggle to hold interest

Jimzik — 2008-05-22T01:01:38+00:00

What you guys need is the "Terror of the Legions" free expansion. Holy cow! What a difference this expansion makes. The poor Legions are clinging to their cities and you get to terrorize them for extra points. How f@#king cool is that?

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isaacc — 2008-05-03T14:30:31+00:00

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WatchmanX2000 — 2008-03-08T19:11:50+00:00

Move in progress

Thread: Catan - Struggle for Rome - My first attempt to bring down the empire

Chanfan — 2008-02-14T08:04:42+00:00

Greetings - just freshly back from my first playing of Struggle for Rome.

It was a four player game - one player had purchased it as her first game purchase! One other player had played once before. Everyone had previous experience with the original Settlers.

We settled in to learn the rules. Many aspects seemed familiar enough - resource generation, development cards, the "robber" in the form of a Roman Legion, VP rewards for certain progress.

Things started a bit slow, as folks worked their mind around the movement system, and how plundering worked. The trade off between moving to optimize your plunder, set up further moves, end up in a good resource generating spot, or passing for the guaranteed resource seems to present interesting choices.

The ultimate goal is to take over cities, however - as soon as one player "broke the dam" by having one of his tribes conquer, we all followed suit. At this point a tribe is more fixed in place, and the placement of the ~~robber~~ - err, that is, Legion - has more effect.

Trading did occur in our game, but does seem less driven by need than in basic Settlers. There are numerous ways to get a resource card of your choice - plunder, paying gold, a 3:1 trade, passing with a tribe - and waiting a turn seems to be a perfectly viable option (or often the only option, as often others were not interested in trading).

As soon as the conquering started, the game did seem to speed up - either you have the required wagons and troops to take over an adjacent city with that tribe, or you don't and you pass, and work on building up the resources to get what you need to continue with your conquest of Roman cities. At this point it seems like a maneuver game to cut off other players paths of attack.

It was hard to tell in only one playing - and a learning game - but it seemed like it became clear about half way in that the person who had played before was in the lead, and there was precious little that could be done to his inevitable win. Repeated theft of resources had some effect, and a competing player turned out to be closer than it appeared to me - but the player ran away with the win all the same. He had established a strong lead by having both tribes meet the prerequisite of three different colored plunders first (which is needed before a tribe can begin conquering), and by securing the ~~largest army~~ - sorry, Diplomacy card, for 2VP. He gathered a further 2VP from having a tribe plunder one of each color of city, and ground out the rest in conquests.

At the end, the players were at 10, 9, 8, and 7. The person placing had advance further than I had expected, including possessing two victory points in development cards (or whatever they are called in this version). I showed, and the game owner rounded out the pack.

My impression was that it was difficult to stop the leader, but I believe his previous play was a distinct advantage - further play would be needed to bear this out. However, our session dragged on, clocking in at around 3 and a half hours - which seemed much too long, even given that we were learning. The box claims 90 min, which would be more reasonable, and seems achievable with prior rules knowledge - just.

I'd be willing to give it a few more goes, but didn't quite feel driven to try it again. I suspect a couple more plays would either polish it up to reveal hidden depth, or exhaust my patience in searching for it!

Thread: Re: Multiple 7s: Legionnaire goes havoc?

Kiko — 2008-01-28T23:15:38+00:00

I'm sorry, it was a stupid question of mine. I was fully aware of the token on the windrose, but for some reason I had assumed that the number 7 was not showed there. Go figure.

Thread: Re: Multiple 7s: Legionnaire goes havoc?

skrebs — 2008-01-28T21:55:53+00:00

Kiko wrote:
When rolling the dice for production, what happens if I roll 7 several times? For example, I roll 4,5,7,7,7,8,7,12. Do I get to move the Legionnaire four times, thus stealing a lot of cards from my angry opponents, or should I consider only one 7?

Remember that you put a token on the windrose whenever you roll the dice, so each number can only be rolled once, even the 7.

Thread: Multiple 7s: Legionnaire goes havoc?

Kiko — 2008-01-28T21:17:57+00:00

When rolling the dice for production, what happens if I roll 7 several times? For example, I roll 4,5,7,7,7,8,7,12. Do I get to move the Legionnaire four times, thus stealing a lot of cards from my angry opponents, or should I consider only one 7?

Thread: Re: Tweaking the Game

crazytalk — 2008-01-15T05:03:38+00:00

I think it really depends on your strategy. I have built caravans as early as possible for one of my tribes with the intent on having them conquer as soon as they are able. Not for the extra gold, but for the extra resources I would gain by having more numbers to hit on. It was risky move that paid off later in the game.

Thread: Re: Tribes becoming a Kingdom?

Octavian — 2008-01-10T18:41:43+00:00

You played correctly - and this is the only way to get gold after becoming a kingdom.

-MMM

Thread: Tribes becoming a Kingdom?

Darkfate — 2008-01-10T13:52:57+00:00

After a tribe conquers its first city and becomes a Kingdom, can it still take no action on subsequent turns to take 2 gold or a resouce of its choice? The rules make us think that this might only be possible by a tribe that is still wandering, but we ended it deciding that a tribe that had become a kingdom could do this as well.

Thanks,

Joe

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fenolin — 2008-01-09T18:34:45+00:00

Catan all-in-one:struggle for rome:rome board, cost aid included

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fenolin — 2008-01-09T18:33:21+00:00

Catan all-in-one:struggle for rome:rome chips

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fenolin — 2008-01-09T18:32:44+00:00

Catan all-in-one:struggle for rome: deck & VPs (terror of the legions included)

Thread: Tweaking the Game

BotD — 2008-01-07T22:38:30+00:00

Having played this game a few times I find it enjoyable, but a few different aspects irk me a little. First, caravans never get built at the beginning of the game. The slight increase in plunder doesn't really justify the cost, especially the very important horse. Secondly, I think the city settling phase of the game comes too late and and proceeds too quickly.

Does anyone agree with me and what could we do to address these issues?

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StormShadow — 2008-01-03T00:36:09+00:00

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StormShadow — 2008-01-01T23:03:32+00:00

Units, Reference card and the board

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Merg — 2008-01-01T21:55:25+00:00

Thread: Re: Getting Trapped While Expanding

Vollick1979 — 2007-12-31T05:09:10+00:00

It's definitely possible to get blocked off in Hispania, but there are usually enough cities in Hispania that it's usually not a big deal. Plus if you're building in Hispania and there are other more open territories to expand your kingdom, spend your wheat and gold and get your tribe over there. And if there aren't other more open spots to build and then expand your kingdom you're really not getting blocked off you're just settling the last area.

Thread: Re: Getting Trapped While Expanding

LORDs_diakonos — 2007-12-28T13:03:15+00:00

Right I kind of thought this also. But in Settlers you can still get VP other ways. Especially in like cities and knights. Much harder in this game if both tribes get blocked.

But I guess you pays your money you takes your chances :-)

Thread: Re: Getting Trapped While Expanding

Michael Ward — 2007-12-28T08:58:07+00:00

Sure it can happen. Just like in regular Settlers of Catan your road network can get cut off from further expansion.

I see cutting the other players off from expansion as a vital tactic towards winning in Struggle for Rome. I can't give you any statistics, but in a four player game I'd expect something like three of the eight tribes to get cut off, some more quickly than others, before the game ends. Just make sure it doesn't happen to YOU.

Thread: Getting Trapped While Expanding

LORDs_diakonos — 2007-12-28T06:45:01+00:00

Well I am wondering about the possibility of getting blocked from expanding. Does this happen often? It seems that because you can only build 1 arrow land/sea away that you could be at less then 10 points and have already conquered with both tribes and be blocked from expanding because of other players. I got one of my tribes blocked tonight in our first game in Hipanola

Is there a rule I am missing or does anyone have any thoughts here?

Thread: How to increase downtime and make this game drag...

eratos — 2007-12-24T23:59:24+00:00

In this simple variant, ignore the quite clearly stated rule that each player gets to build in every round. Instead, only allow one player to build each round, and make them perform all their actions from trading through building, and both tribes, before another player gets to do anything.

Sit and wonder why everyone seems to have so many resources, why there were tiebreak rules included when only one person can score each turn, why it takes such a long time to get round to the next persons turn.

Finally realise that everyone has pretty much lsot the will to live, and only then work out that you've actually been playing the game completely wrong.

Ouch.

Notch 1 in the accidental variant column. Hope I can convinve these players to play it again some future date, this time as Herr Teuber intended...

Thread: Re: Review: Catan Histories: Struggle for Rome

Jimzik — 2007-11-28T20:32:08+00:00

The other part of the game that is harsh, is there is very little you can do to try to stop the player in the lead. The Centurion is but a small pin prick in their side sometimes. So while they have tried to lessen the effect of luck in this game, the game mechanics have made it such that there is almost no way to stop people from winning.

I can't agree with this as the same mechanics are here as in every other CATAN game to stop the leader.
1st off, DON'T TRADE WITH THE LEADER! A simple concept but one which people just can't get a proper grasp on.
2nd, the Centurian isn't a little pin prick in this game but instead a huge prick! With 4 die rolls a turn the leader is almost sure to get the Centurian on every other players turn. This becomes quite irritating when they keep taking needed cards for building wagons and also shut down a needed resource space.
3rd, the Diplomat is bound to keep sending the Centurian the leaders way many additional times each turn.

On our last game I got 2 Scourge Of Romes, the Diplomat and started conquering for a 7-3-2-0 lead. They jammed me so bad with the above strategies that I barely won 12(12 gold)- 12(5 gold) - 10 - 9 (playing with the "Scourge of the Legions" variant). They completelly surrounded my Horseman so he couldn't expand and I luckily got to my last city to conquer just ahead of the next player who planned on cutting the Tribesman off too. If I hadn't got 2 resources from a 3 and 11 I wouldn't have been able to go there and would have been trapped from any further conquering. With repeated plays in the same group this game couldn't play any tighter or with more tension.

Thread: Re: Struggle to hold interest

crazytalk — 2007-11-22T01:50:53+00:00

My first few plays I found the game play a bit dry. The first time we played everyone learning the rules at the same time it took about three hours but now the average game time is about an hour and a half.
After a few more plays my group enjoyed it more each time and it became a favorite as new strategies emerged and the players actively were out to hamper each others goals. Your assessment of where the tension lies in the game is dead on in my opinion, and the blocking and racing come up frequently during our games.

Thread: Re: Struggle to hold interest

koopy83 — 2007-11-13T21:22:10+00:00

I pretty much agree completely with you on this one. I love the other catan games that I have played, but this one just falls flat. We pulled it out recently after wondering why we hadn't played it in some time. It didn't take too long to realize why. We enjoy the beginning aspect of plundering and racing around trying to beat everyone else to the 'best' spots. But it gets repetitive and boring quickly. So you settle. And then it is an equally boring race to expand your conquests. So we put it back in the closet, probably until it has been too long to remember why we haven't played it in so long...

Thread: Struggle to hold interest

Paul Mackie — 2007-11-13T13:02:27+00:00

Let me put this right out there: This game turned out to be a major disappointment. From my recent $200 batch from ADAMspielt, this was the one title I was most looking forward to playing. At the end and after nearly two hours of game time, Pat declared simply that this was the worst of the whole Settlers line. Brad kept quiet about his opinion, but I suspect that he had simply lost interest, like Pat, by about the halfway mark.

Alex and I are both inclined to feel a little more charitable, and certainly both of us want to give it at least one or two more playings before writing it off as a lemon. After all, it still looks like it should be a fantastic game…
The specific criticisms for us boil down to two key points: 1. One of the strengths of the original Settlers is the inter-player trading aspect. This has almost entirely disappeared, without apparently being ‘replaced’ by any compensating game features of interest (actually, I do have some thoughts on this which are discussed below).
2. Other game decisions seem to be obvious or otherwise generally uninteresting.
When you combine the great components and artwork with these factors, the result is an experience more like a toy than a game.

Time now to come clean with a few facts. First, my copy is the German language edition, with rules translation from Cinulph in this thread on BGG. I have annotated my copy of the rules with any additional points picked up from the rules discussions also on BGG, and I have watched the Prof. Easy tutorial on the Catan website twice.

Second, despite being pretty sure about the rules, we inadvertently broke a number of them a few times: Pat got one of his early trades wrong, and I think I might have used a wheat once to travel by sea. I completely forgot the rule that if you take no action with a tribe, you can take a resource card of choice (we just always took two gold). And despite trying to check this point multiple times, I think we got the Legionnaire "7" roll wrong. We played that the Legionnaire blocks its current space until the end of all four rolls, then the roller applies it after the resources are collected for the other three rolls, regardless of when it occurred in the set of four. I’ve since read another review that implies resources should be collected, and the Legionnaire moved, immediately upon rolling.
But the real clangers were that two of us carried out conquests after acquiring only two plunder tokens. The rest of us didn’t notice until a few turns later, when it didn’t seem worthwhile to try and roll back those actions. But, despite these mistakes, none of us who played really felt that not making any these errors would have changed the outcome of the game, or more importantly, our enjoyment of it.

So where does, or should, the interest and tension lie in SfR? I don’t think it is in the collection and spending of resources - for me at least these were too scarce to consider making any interesting decisions around. My current thinking is that it is mainly in the movement of tribes and expansion of conquests that should be the main source of tension. That is, getting the right combination of position and timing to reach prime spots on the board ahead of your opponents. Once or twice in our game I was blocked from desirable plunder tokens or conquest spots, and was therefore forced to consider more creative - and expensive - routes to alternative locations. This aspect I did enjoy, although these types of decisions did not seem to arise all that often in our game. Perhaps through further playings with experienced players this “chess-game” aspect might arise more strongly - I can only hope so.

I have read reports from well-read and respected game reviewers that all give SfR the big thumbs-up, which leaves me somewhat perplexed - why has their experience been so much more positive than ours? I expect that when I cross-post this on BGG I will get a number of responses that sing the praises of the game and report how much fun is had when played in other groups. Others possibly will assert that our rule breakages are responsible for our general negative experience (which I won’t argue with, since I don’t believe it). But the replies that I will be really interested in are those that come clean with similar assessments from their own early plays, and whether these were validated in subsequent sessions.
30 mins rules and set up; 112 mins game time.
Results: Alex (gold): 12. Paul (red): 8 (+$11). Pat (blue): 8 (+$9). Brad (white): 6.

(Originally posted in The Mine Shaft Gap. Pics by Propofol.)

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Tobold — 2007-10-08T18:55:25+00:00

The coins. Detailed, but they sure look like honey-glazed treats!

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crazytalk — 2007-09-23T02:56:51+00:00

Unlucky number seven.

Thread: Re: Legionairre blocks Plundering/Conquering?

Orgulas — 2007-08-15T12:57:41+00:00

Innovan wrote:
What effect does the Legionairre have on stopping players from Plundering and/or Conquering the cities adjacent to his hex?

The Legioniare has absolutely no effect on plundering, conquering, movement and so on. It solely prevents production.

Thread: Barbarian vs barbarian

Allopes — 2007-07-22T11:28:15+00:00

Me and my group played Struggle for Rome again yesterday and came up with this idea for a variant:

After a player's tribe has founded a kingdom, another player's wandering tribe(s) can plunder its cities.

* The city's defense value is equal to the number of warriors or horsemen in the kingdom's box (i.e., the number of warriors or horsemen in the wandering tribe's box has to be at least equal to the number of warriors or horsemen in the kingdom tribe's box).

* if your tribe plunders another player's city, you draw a card at random from the hand of the plundered player (if that player has no resources, you instead take 2 of his gold coins).

* a wandering tribe cannot conquer another player's cities.

We plan to try it on our next session (I'll post the results here). Any thoughts?

Thread: Re: After Conquering

Innovan — 2007-07-13T05:35:10+00:00

Yes you may purchase more wagons, warriors and horsemen to place in a tribe's boxes after a tribe has conquered. The Professor Easy game demo shows the players doing so.

Thread: After Conquering

briand72us — 2007-07-13T02:47:23+00:00

After a tribe has started conquering can you still purchase more wagons, warriors and horsemen to then place in that conquering tribe's box so that it can continue to expand it's kingdom?

We looked over the rules several times and it didn't say one way or another. We decided that the answer should be no and that the player had to gather the resources that he wanted before starting the conquer cities and that that tribe could then no longer be added to. We also discussed how different the game would be one way or the other. Thanks for your help.

Thread: Re: Legionairre timing

Alan Kwan — 2007-06-23T14:55:03+00:00

You can just roll until you get a 7, then stop and resolve the rolls before the 7, and then resolve the 7, and then roll on. Then you can play a little bit faster without substantially changing the mechanism.

Thread: Legionairre blocks Plundering/Conquering?

Innovan — 2007-06-19T06:22:36+00:00

What effect does the Legionairre have on stopping players from Plundering and/or Conquering the cities adjacent to his hex?

Thread: Legionairre timing

Innovan — 2007-06-19T06:16:36+00:00

We were playing "Roll all four times, then collect your resources". But this makes the Legionairre perhaps stronger than Teuber intended.

Say in this turn 4,5,6,7 was rolled. You take the Legionairre and decide to place him on a 4,5 or 6 to block the player from the resource that would have been provided *this* turn.

Officially you're supposed to roll one number, collect, roll 2nd number, collect, until you've reached 4 distinct rolls. If 7 is rolled in that sequence it doesn't have the ability to block any already provided resources.

Thread: Re: No coins after establishing kingdoms?

Shakar — 2007-06-18T19:16:11+00:00

If your tribe did nothing (no expansion of it kingdom) it can get either 2 gold or 1 card. Exactly like when your roaming tribe did nothing in 1 turn they get either a card or 2 gold.

Thread: No coins after establishing kingdoms?

Innovan — 2007-06-18T18:01:05+00:00

Your wandering tribes get coins by looting cities, or even just by not taking any action for a turn.

After you loot three different color cities and start your Kingdom, it seems there is no way of generating coins for the rest of the game, and that you are only able to collect adjacent wheat, ore and pasture fields --no coin source and so no way to by cards from the Upgrade Deck. (Which cost a bull and a coin)

Is this correct?

Thread: Re: Missing piece - Is Mayfair Customer Service any good?

Tobold — 2007-06-13T20:23:17+00:00

My missing red horseman arrived today!

Now my copy of Struggle for Rome is complete. Thank you, Mayfair Games!

Thread: Struggle for Rome -- Session Report

gschloesser — 2007-06-12T14:40:02+00:00

Note: My full review of Struggle for Rome will be published shortly. Following is an abbreviated version.

The Enemy is at the gates. The powerful Roman empire has grown weak, and is teetering on the brink of disaster. Barbarian hordes gather on the eastern border, aiming to plunder and pillage the cities and countryside of the once powerful nation. Rival tribes vie for wealth and riches, and to ultimately establish the dominant kingdom on the ashes of what once was the glory of Rome.

Struggle for Rome by designer Klaus Teuber is the latest in the Settlers of Catan series of games. It is a stand-alone game, rather than an expansion. It is along similar lines as Settlers of the Stone Age in that it has a historical setting, but mechanisms that are not mere clones of the Settlers system. There are a few similarities, but the game does have a decidedly unique feel.

The large board depicts a section of the Roman empire, including Italy, parts of France and Hispania. Unlike the original Settlers, the hexes are fixed in place. Like Settlers, each depicts a specific type of terrain: pastures, wheat fields, mountains and forests. All except forest will produce resources when the corresponding number is rolled, provided player’s units are adjacent to those hexes. Players will use these resources to construct additional units – warriors, horsemen and supply wagons – and purchase development cards. The ultimate objective is to achieve ten victory points by conquering cities, obtaining cultural advancements, and possibly earning other bonuses.

Players begin the game with one horseman and one warrior poised on the outskirts of the empire. These units represent the player’s armies, whose actual strength is based on the number of warriors and horsemen in the respective boxes. Players will move their forces to plunder and eventually conquer Roman cities, but must have a force at least equal to the defense value of the city in order to succeed. Building one’s forces is a constant affair, especially since casualties are often taken when plundering, and forces must be assigned occupation duties when conquering.

The game turn sequence is a bit different than that found in most other Settlers games. The dice are rolled four times per turn for resource production, and all players get to build, trade, move, and plunder and/or conquer during the active player’s turn. Plundering rewards players with coins and/or cards, but sometimes inflicts casualties on the invaders. Eventually, players will have plundered in enough regions to begin conquering cities, which yield victory points.

Conquering cities is the major path to victory, as each city is worth 1 victory point. Further points can be earned from the handful of cultural cards hidden in the development deck, as well as the three special victory point cards for certain achievements. The conditions include possessing the most diplomacy cards (minimum of three), plundering cities in five different regions with one tribe, and conquering four cities with each of your two tribes. The game ends at the end of the round when one player reaches ten victory points.

Players should not rush to begin conquering cities, however, as plundering is the main source of income and a good source of obtaining development and resource cards. The only other way to earn money is to decline taking any actions on a turn with either your horsemen or warriors, which will earn the player two gold. Waiting too long to begin conquering can also be problematic, as the conquering begins, there is an emphasis placed on positioning. Players must keep their expansion options open, and it is possible to completely isolate tribes and prevent them from expanding. Deciding when to begin conquering is a critical decision to be made.

Games often begin slowly, with players plodding across the board and plundering cities. It takes quite some time to acquire the necessary resources to build one’s forces, and this aspect of the game has the tendency to drag. The pace quickens dramatically when the first city is conquered, usually resulting in a rush by all players to begin conquests. Choosing the right locations to begin and expand in critical, as it will assist in resource yields and expansion possibilities. This aspect of the game is tremendously more exciting and tense than the initial plundering phase.

Struggle for Rome is a fine addition to the Settlers line. The Rome setting is intriguing, and there are enough new concepts to give the game an original feel. I am a bit worried, thought, that the game may grow stale with repeated play, as the board is fixed and the strategies and options may become static. I’m afraid that the game will suffer the same fate as Settlers of the Stone Age and become one of those “once-a-year” events. On the other hand, that may be less a knock on the game than it is a statement on the sheer number of new games being released.

I dove quickly into the development deck, and was fortunate to draw numerous diplomacy cards. This earned me the Diplomacy victory point card early, and I was able to keep ahead of my opponents in their quest to wrest it from me. When the conquering began, I felt very good about my board positioning. Bo was less fortunate, and had trouble expanding on the eastern section of the board. Byron, however, had the upper hand, as he conquered two different cities that were on the lucrative ‘6’ and ‘9’ resource areas. This resulted in a steady supply of resources, and he converted that to victory … one turn ahead of me.

Finals: Byron 10, Greg 9, Rhonda 6, Bo 5

Ratings: Greg 7.5, Byron 7, Bo 7, Rhonda 6

Thread: First game with Catan veterans

jbuergel — 2007-06-01T02:46:03+00:00

I sat down on Monday night to a first game of Struggle for Rome with three people who have been around the Catan block a few times: Chris, Mark and Jarrett. I still have a lot of affection for the Catan games, even though I rarely play any of them except the two-player games any more. Rolling two dice for production is always going to cut a certain amount of ice for me, since Settler of Catan is the game that launched me headlong back into board gaming. I enjoyed Settlers of the Stone Age and the tweaks it made to the Catan formula, so I figured that Struggle for Rome would be a nice time. We all sat down, I read through the rules with everybody listening, and then we took run at things with few rules questions.

The first observation, that Mark made, was that the starting positions don't really matter, since the movement rules and positions of the arrows ensure that you'll be able to get to the same places no matter where you started in the starting area. So that's nice, it helps reduce the reliance on the initial setup. It also seemed at first blush that the first player, with the ability to get to a second plunder location without spending additional resources, might be in a powerful position. However, looking at the numbers you'd wind up with for production in that situation convinced us that it probably wasn't such a powerful spot.

For those who don't know, you start out with two tribes who are wandering around the board, smiting Roman cities and carrying off plunder (and, usually, their own bodies). The intersection where those tribes are standing will also determine your production on the following turn, in the usual Catan manner. The other twist is that the first player in a round makes four rolls (re-rolling and duplicates) for production, flattening the distribution of numbers and ensuring that there won't be and crazy swings in number frequency that result in a runaway. It's another clever adaptation, and we were unanimous in liking it.

Anyway, as things developed, we quickly spread out across the board, plundering as we went. There wasn't too much competition for really juicy plundering locations, although there was some jostling for position. We quickly learned that livestock was king, and started camping good pastures if we didn't have anything else to do. Jarrett started piling up the supply wagons in an attempt to make a massively profitable plundering stack, I started angling for a couple of Scourge of Rome VP cards and Chris was the first to settle down, with Mark quickly following on the edge of the Iberian penninsula.

Fueled by good luck in plundering, drawing a number of no-casualty plunder chits, as well as a fortunate draw of three of the cards which permit unlimited movement, I managed to secure two Scourge of Rome cards for 4 VP. I also drew two VP cards, so after I settled down, I would only need to expand twice to get the requisite 10 VPs. That turned out to be a fairly easy task, and I won 10-8-6-5. We all agreed that the game was better than Settlers of the Stone Age, and I think we'd all be willing to play again.

Thread: Re: First Player - too powerful?

pierrot — 2007-05-20T21:26:49+00:00

Andrew Parks wrote:
We really enjoyed playing this the first time out, and we're looking forward to the next game. The only balance issue seemed to surround the first couple of rounds. It seemed that, because of the seeming importance of the first couple of rounds, players 3 and 4 were playing catch-up for most of the game, because players 1 and 2 plundered all the easy cities on round 1, and player 2 was able to again grab the goodies first during the second key round. It seems like Player 2 was in the best starting position, and Player 4 was in the worst.

Well I just played my first two games today, with my normal group - the other three had already played a couple of games.

First game - I started last, but with a bit of good luck managed to win - by grabbing Heir of Rome/Scourges of Rome and then Settling.

Second game - I started second, and with some bad luck came last !

One of the biggest differences between the two games was my starting cards.

In the first game I was able to build my tribes up early, so that although the easy cities fell to the other players I could hit the 3 strength cities.

In the second game I just couldn't get the cards to build tribes early so the others managed to freeze me out of getting any of the victory cards.

Andrew Parks wrote:
One possible variant we discussed was having the players go in regular turn order for the Horse Tribe Phase, but then reverse the order for the Warrior Tribe Phase (i.e the last player goes first, followed in counterclockwise order by the other players).

Thoughts?

That does however seem to be an excellent and very simple way to even things up, we'll try it next time.

Thread: Re: Two player game works

vandemonium — 2007-05-11T19:09:26+00:00

Thirded. Just did this last weekend. Seemed to be balanced nicely using the three player modifications.

Thread: How Rome was conquered - Game2

bikini — 2007-05-09T10:21:08+00:00

GAME 2:
We immediatley followed up our first game with (surprise :laugh a second game. This proceeded much quicker than the first. This time I was the one left in the starting blocks (couldnt build up my army size through poor resource draw), while everyone else pillaged at leasure. Red and Blue adopted a tactic of building up their army size quickly, I resorted to large wagon collections and selective raiding. This worked well as I was able to quickly stuff my coffers with gold.

Hardly any Diplomacy cards this time, but Red managed to almost single handedly collect all the Development cards. Although being left behind in the initial invasion gave me only the city scraps to choose from, my gold reserves gave me greater freedom of movement. Strangely I was the first to complete both my Scourge sets.

Red had realised that she couldnt easily complete her Scourge set so, had settled down and started building her kingdom. In a similar occurance to the previous game, Red had begun her second Kingdom at about the same time Blue and I began our first. Although I had also positioned myself well to begin my Kingdoms - I had all the wagons and troops I needed to complete enough cities to reach my 10 VP target without needing any further resources! I also had enough diplomacy cards to score the 2VP diplomacy bonus!

But then out of nowhere, Red declares she has reached the target! All those development cards concealed a treasure trove of VPs! I could only reach a total of 7VPs, my perfect plan didnt have time to mature. Oh well I think I know what I'll do next time...

Thread: How Rome was conquered - Game1

bikini — 2007-05-09T10:14:09+00:00

What with the constant aquisition of new games by my friend, and my lack of gaming time, its been a long time since I last played a Settlers game. Every time I meet with my friend he has a new game that we try out, as it was he was completing his first read of the rulebook when I arrived.

GAME 1:
There were 3 of us playing. Our first attempt was a bit slow as we absorbed the rule variants and strategic possibilities. I pounced quickly on the closest 2 tower cities and my horseman made quick progress into Spain. The Red player started last and had a couple of preferred cities snatched away from under her nose, which left her out of position on occasion. Meanwhile Blue battled to find the cards he needed and this slowed his start.

We soon settled down and pursued our personal directions and strategies. I decided to conquer in Spain with my horsemen early on - it wasnt pre-planned - a poorly plotted course and desire to test out this possible strategy lead me to this choice. While the Horsemen settled down to make house, I left my warrior to continue with the carefree, wandering life of the pillager. Everyone else continued to pillage and plunder.

Diplomacy cards were flying fast and furious, with Red getting the lion's share, but her raids were not as fruitful. She was very put out that she was never rewarded with freebies (cities that didnt reduce her army size). Blue started staking a serious claim on the Scourge of Rome VPS.

Red and blue began building their first Kingdoms about the same time I started building a kingdom with my Warrior tribe. At this point I had 1 secret VP (development card), 2VP Scourge and 3 cities on the board, but the next couple of turns were quite frustrating as I failed to draw the resources I needed and had no money to substitute. Fortunately the dice rolls were doing few favours for everyone else too.

I eventually reached 10 points first in my horseman stage by completing my 4th horseman city, and by the end of the final turn I had added another Warrior city to scoop the additional 2VPS for 4 cities with each tribe for a grand total of 13 VP!

Thread: First Play - 3 Players

feydjm — 2007-05-06T04:59:12+00:00

This was our group's first experience with the branching out of the Catan series to a different style game. We all loved Catan so we were looking forward to this.

We stumbled through the rules a bit, basically playing a round while muddling through the rules. This led to a slow start while we all tried to figure out what was happening.

I found this to be a game that sort of snuck on up us. Each of us was plundering cities here and there. I ended up staying almost entirely on one side of the board while my wife and buddy spread out a little more. My wife had a couple warlord cards she was able to use to move freely across the board which helped her expand. She also got out a couple diplomats early setting herself up for the 2 extra victory points for 3 diplomats later in the game.

Given the priority on getting enough horseman and warriors on the board and the requirement on ore to get them out, we were a little worried that ore would decide the game. We were pleasantly surprised by the fact that this was not the case. We all stayed in the game in different ways. I had more ore than the other two but they still found ways to get their warriors and horseman in the game.

I bought very few development cards as the game went on. My wife got out her third diplomat taking the 2 VP bonus. I conquered the first city and claimed my 7th VP with that. My buddy was busy plundering in the west.

We slowly realized that the plundering options were dwindling so I began to focus on expanding my empire. I was sitting at 8 VP, my wife had 9 VP, and my buddy was showing 7. I say showing because he had 2 secret VP points in development cards. He plundered one more city, called 10 VPs and showed us his cards. Since he called it during the warrior tribe phase and he was second on that turn, I only had one turn left. Unable to pull 2 VPs out, I conquered one more city but came up one short.

Final score: My buddy 10, wife 9, me 9.

We also enjoyed this game very much. All of our initial concerns about balance were put aside as the game went on and the final score shows that there are many different ways to get those 10 VPs. Great game.

Thread: Re: Review: Catan Histories: Struggle for Rome

Sarge77 — 2007-05-02T13:33:19+00:00

Very well done. May make me go and get this one.

Thread: Re: Missing piece - Is Mayfair Customer Service any good?

Tobold — 2007-04-27T10:38:36+00:00

Hey Michael, one of my wagons was deformed too, only it looks alright, almost as though it was on purpose. I took a photo of it (yes, I must have too much time on my hands). It's only possible to enjoy being idle when you have tons of work to do (which I do).

I suppose it happened because there was not enough plastic in the mould, but it really does look alright to me. I didn't bother mentioning it to Mayfair. I am generally rather fussy, but this wagon has character, so it doesn't bother me.

Thread: Re: Missing piece - Is Mayfair Customer Service any good?

Michael Ward — 2007-04-27T05:12:05+00:00

I had a similar problem with this game. Two of my plastic pieces were deformed (an orange supply wagon and a red horseman). I e-mailed Mayfair customer service about this on February 16th. They responded the same day that they'd send me replacements. I received the two new pieces twelve days later on February 28th, at no cost to me. I was very happy with their response.

Thread: Re: Missing piece - Is Mayfair Customer Service any good?

Tobold — 2007-04-26T20:56:10+00:00

Indeed!

Hooray for Mayfair!
I just got a reply to my email, within a couple of hours, and the part will be sent off to me sometime next week. I always feel a little akward when publishers respond so well to these types of requests. On the one hand, I am thrilled to be getting the missing component. On the other, I feel a little guilty for costing them time and money in sending off one little part. If I wasn't so darn uptight....

Thread: Re: Missing piece - Is Mayfair Customer Service any good?

LennyS — 2007-04-26T18:06:06+00:00

Perhaps all of us here at BGG have a game piece missing!

Thread: Re: Missing piece - Is Mayfair Customer Service any good?

Tobold — 2007-04-26T16:33:51+00:00

Thank you, Ogdred Weary.

I feel better about it now. I must learn to relax about these things. It's only a game, that's what I need to remember.

Thread: Re: Missing piece - Is Mayfair Customer Service any good?

gashlycrumb — 2007-04-26T16:20:17+00:00

I've had good experiences with Mayfair. They might take a day or so to respond but no complaints from me. I have a couple missing pieces coming from them right now in fact.

Thread: Missing piece - Is Mayfair Customer Service any good?

Tobold — 2007-04-26T15:48:14+00:00

I was horrified (I am generally easily startled) when I opened this game today (having just brought it home) and found that I was missing a red horseman. On the (sort of) positive side, I have an extra red footman to take his place, and an extra small coin (26 instead of 25). Still, call me fickle (everyone else does), but I would have preferred the horseman instead of the two extras.

I know there are those who feel that too much is made of missing or faulty components. I understand that, and I am not looking to cast a shadow on the game, nor on the publishers. I have emailed Mayfair and told them that I am willing to mail the extra pieces to them, and that I am also willing to pay for the postage to get the missing piece out to me (I do live on the dark continent, after all).

I was just curious as to their level of customer service in this regard. Days of Wonder, Fantasy Flight and Rio Grande Games have all been wonderful. I have never had a problem with a Mayfair game before, which says a lot for their quality, and have not seen people mention it here before. I did a forum search and didn't come across anything, although I could have searched harder I suppose.

Does anyone know if they are good with things like this? Sorry to expose you to my angst. I'm suffering from a bit of "I spent more money than I wanted to on a game I couldn't get out of my head and now it has missing components" blues. Alright, the plural wasn't merited there, as there is only one missing piece (although the voices are telling me to count everything again - I did not count the cards), but it is a generic term for a feeling I have felt too often.

If you do not understand how a missing piece (or pieces) can bring one to despair, I envy you and offer you my apologies. I wish I was wired differently, but there it is. Thank you for your time.

Thread: VERY close game

rmartinc — 2007-04-03T18:07:51+00:00

I just picked up Struggle for Rome and brought it to the Upstate Board Gamers monthly Game Day

http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/upstateboardgamers/

Allen, Tim, and Russ joined me for our first game. Allen and Russ have played the original Settlers many times, but Tim had only played it once.

I went over the rules and set the board up.

The game took a long time, but there was a lot of distractions because of the game day.

Allen started the game by plundering three cities with his horse tribe without a loss.

Tim got the first Development card and made good use of them throughout the game.

Russ was the first to get a Special Victory card with the Diplomat, but I believe it was later taken by Tim.

My Warrior tribe was the first to become the Scourge of Rome, but the Horse tribe was out of position to get one of the colors and lost out.

We could all see that Allen was about to become Heir to Rome, so we all knew it was the last round. We were all out of gold, so we needed to get the right resources.

Russ went first and he could have had 10 points as well if he could get 2 wagons, but he was short one Cattle. He traded 3 or for a pasture card, but he got a horse. He knew he was going to be out of it now with a final score of 9 VP.

I tried to trade to get a gold with my ore, but nobody was interested. I couldn't buy a development card (I looked at after the game was over and it was a 1 VP card). In my horsemen phase, I took over a third city and played the VP card I already had to claim 10 points.

Allen didn't need to do anything with his Horse tribe, so he took a Wheat card.

Tim surprised us and went to 10 points with his Horse tribe

I didn't do anything with my Warriors and took 2 gold to give me the tie breaker.

Allen took over a 4th city with his warriors to become Heir to Rome and get 10 points he would have been tied with me if he took gold instead of the Wheat.

Tim did take the two gold and secured the two way tie for first.

This game could easily have been 10-10-10-10 with three of us having 2 gold for a three way tie (since Russ had to use both tribes and couldn't take the gold)

I wasn't sure what to expect with the fixed board, but the movement of the Armies and the addition of Gold were great. We all enjoyed the game and want to play it again.