Game: Senji

Thread: Re: Do you want my wife?

cero — 2008-07-06T05:40:48+00:00

THX
I got the title during play - i think it was a silent moment and suddenly someone asked: Do you want my wife?
For the rest I prepared the review a few days ago and had to wait until I got some more games done.
Your review is may be not as detailed but I enjoyed it and it seems pretty clear you like the game just as I do.
Have fun

Thread: Re: Do you want my wife?

Gyges — 2008-07-06T04:48:46+00:00

Nice review.
I spend all this time doing a review, a task I can't say I relish, so there will be an English review--and apparently moments after mine is approved, your most excellent review is as well. With a similar title. :)
Oh, well.

Thread: Re: Honour: Trading your grandpa for weapons

Gyges — 2008-07-06T04:38:39+00:00

LordStrabo wrote:
Paragraphs. They'll make your text a lot more readable.

Hm. There were paragraphs, and then not. I'll put them back in.

Thread: Re: Do you want my wife?

Rastak — 2008-07-06T03:24:31+00:00

Nice review! This looks like a great game, but probably not one for my collection. It doesn't seem to scale well on the low end, which is where I usually end up.

The bits look awesome and the diplomacy aspect seems well thought out.

Thread: Do you want my wife?

cero — 2008-07-06T01:31:55+00:00

Remark: I have the German version of the game - in the English rules they might use other words - and I hope you understand my English!)

Do you want my wife? :shake: This question and the hillarious laughing afterwards may show a little bit whats goin‘ on playing SENJI - you‘re never save of weird situations.

When I first heard of Senji i knew i gotta have this game, the diplomatic possibilities, treachery but also the kind of treaties you can make exchanging the diplomacy cards not knowing where they might go and which player may finally use them got me very excited.

I read the rules and I read a lot of comments on trictrac. Obviously there was a problem: Many people thought, Senji was kind of a „Risk“, or „Game of Thrones“ (me too) or even „Diplomacy“. So there was a big disappointement, when during play, war played a minor role and lots of the requested Honour-Points could be made collecting hanafuda-cards. The game was called luck-based (gotta draw the right cards, many dices in battles etc. etc) in the bad sense of meaning.
On the other hand there were commentaries like: A game like never seen before, something new - a game you have to play at leat 3 times just to realize what it‘s all about: Diplomacy, not war, very exciting to play...

As the duo Laget/Cathalla brought us „Shadow over Camelot“ and I had played Mare Nostrum & Expansion a while ago and liked it quite a lot, i was curious about Senji and got it in my FLGS. That‘s what I got:

Opening the box
Content
- 36 castles in 6 different colors: The castles looks a bit too plastic for my taste and personally i‘d preferred something else. On the other hand, during play, there will be no problem confounding the colors of the castles and even if I do not like the material they‘re made of, they are nicely sculpted.
- 18 Samurai-Figs: I was surprised by the size of the samurais, they were bigger than I expected and they are well sculpted. Still putting the stickers on the samurais was a little fuzzy.
- 6 Point-Marker (1/family) with the symbol of the family printed on them.
- 72 military units - 12/family: The tokens are made of solid cardboard and look ok, but alas, not every symbol chosen looks like traditonal japanese to me, I‘d preferred other symbols (eg like the ones on the dices of „Honour Of The Samurai“ from gamewright).
- 54 order-tokens made of solid cardboard in red (marching) blue (recruit) and green (production). They are very functional.
- 96 hanafuda cards & 72 (12/family) diplomacy cards & 18 samurai cards: The cards are great. Very nice graphics and they are of good quality too. To me in point of view of the game components, they are the masterpiece of the game.
- 9 dices: They‘re white, with one symbol of one faction carved and painted black per side. To me they look awesome, even if the symbols on the dice do not match the color of their faction, what had made it easier to ‚read‘ them. If this should become a major issue, the dices could be replaced easily by dices with coloured dots on each side (the colours are: green, red, blue, yellow, purple, and black ). We had no problem with the dices during the games we played.
- 1 big hour Glass (4Minutes - exactly 3,5 min!!) - it was bigger than expected.
- 1 Gameboard The Gameboard was rather a disappointment first (I had the ‚Shogun‘-Map in mind (Queen Games)), but it‘s simplicity helps to keep a good overview over what‘s going on in ol‘ Japan. The score-track goes around the map. And after a second look I have to say, that it‘s well done, fits the game well and the quality again is very good (as expected nowadays)
- The game comes with 6 coloured Player-aids that show possible combinations of hanafuda-cards and what they give for advantages (mostly honour points).

To resume (personal taste):
-very nice cards
-cool dices
- big hour-glass (4min)
-18 rather big and detailed samurai-figs
-simple but nicel gameboard
-average tokens
-functional player-aids
-and ok. castles (6/faction)
Everything is of good and durable quality and very functional. Not all the pieces of the game are artwork, but they surely help to keep a very good overview over the game - and finally that‘s what it‘s all about.

The rules
I will only give a short overview over the rules, as anyone can download them, if they want to read them.

A game round consists of 5 steps:

1 - Host of the Shogun
The player with the most honour-points welcomes the shogun in his home for the year to come. To welcome the shogun is very important and gives big advantages, as the host of the shogun points one province after the other to resolve it‘s (still hidden) order, and also one player after the other to ‚deal‘ and play his hanafuda-cards in autumn. E.g. it makes a big difference if you‘re attacked before or after you have recruited new troops, or if you only can start dealing, when all the other players have already laid down their hanafuda-combinations and have not many cards left in their hand) Little gifts during the diplomacy-phase may help the host of the shogun to make the right decision :-). Beeing the host of the shogun round after round will end in a clear victory of this player.

2. Winter - Diplomacy
This is where the interaction takes place and the hour-glass limits this phase to 4 minutes. Unlike in many other Diplomacy-games you may (or not...) not only rely on the promises made by different players, but you may also give or get or exchange diplomacy-cards.
There are 3 kinds of them:

- Family cards: To underline the eternal friendship between two families, they can send members of their own family to the other family (by giving or exchanging family cards). These Family-members are considered as guests. The player hosting guests may place them in front of him in autumn and get‘s honour points equal to the number on the family card (1-5).
If he keeps them in his hand-cards they are an insurance not beeing attacked by the player who‘s family-member they are. Because if you‘re attacked by this very family the guests become hostages and may be killed - as defender you still get the amount of honour points written on the card, but the attacker loses twice this number of honour points - and this hurts!
As all the diplomacy-cards have the same backside, you‘ll never really know where your family members are - are they still where you sent them, have they been traded away? Obviously honour and moral virtue have nothing to do with each other :D
Killed hostages are out of the game - this means, the player also has a little less possibilities in upcoming diplomacy phases.

- Military support: They are played after throwing the dices in a battle where all the dices are thrown at once. As dices are always a matter of luck, the right military support at the very right moment will help you just what you need to win the battle. As battles may provide many victory points (up to 24), having good military support may rocket you to victory.

- Trading cards: The number on the card shows, how many of his hanafuda-cards the player of the family the card belongs to has to show you. You then may choose one of these cards. This may help you to get the one card you needed badly - or at least prevent the opponent player to play a big suit of cards that will give him a lot of points (the best suit (cards gives you 24 points).

Military support cards and trading cards are given back to their original owner after having used them, so they might be used again in the next diplomacy-phase.

You have 12 Diplomacy-Cards at the beginning of the game ( there are different decks for every family/faction). You have to make the best out of these. Diplomatic skills will be very important and as written - sometimes little gifts make life a lot easier.....
There‘s no limit how and what for the cards may be exchanged: a card for another? A card for a promise that might be broken? May be you can make very good deals with players in bad need of something and if you‘re the host of the samuray, as said, the little favours will surely have their price :-) (remark: You may only exchange diplomacy cards and / or promises in this phase)

3 - Spring
Order Placement: Players place one of three orders (marching, production or recriutement) in every province they control.

4 - Summer
The host of the Shogun points a province after the other - in the pointed province the order is turned around to show it‘ and then the order is resolved.

Marching: You may move troops from this province in an neighbouring province or on the sea ore even (a little risky) over the see on another coastal province. If you move troops in a enemy region a battle will take place:
- every unit present in that province gives you 1 point of strength.
- for every samurai you control in that province a dice of the nine is taken and turned with your family symbol up and placed besides the samurai -this means 1 more point for you.
- Remaining dices are thrown. Every dice showing your family-sign gives you 1 more strength.
- After this the military support cards of both players are played face down and revealed at the same time. The dices of the family the support cards belongs to, add strength up to the number written on the card to your strength (if you have a card with 5 written on, but there‘s only one dice showing this family symbol you only will get 1 more strength. If there are 5 dices of this family but the card has a 2 written on it, you‘ll only get 2 more strength).
- If the battle ends in a tie, the dices are thrown again and new military support cards must be played. Cards once used go back to the original owner, as the „contract has been fullfilled“. This cards may of course be used again in the next diplomacy phase by their original owner.

Production: You get 2 hanafuda cards for every province you control with a production order on it.

Recruitemet: You get 2 additional army tokens in this province (up to a max. of 6/province).

5 - Autumn
Autumn is the last phase in a round. The host of the shogun chooses a player who may do following things as long as he can and wants in no specific order:
- use the trading-diplomacy cards to get some hanafuda cards from the other players.
- give back 5 (!) diplomacy-cards to their original owners (at least 1 of every player) to get 10 honour points and make the others all lose 1/card given back)
- Lay down suits of hanafuda cards to get honour points
- Lay down guest-cards to get honour points or take them back into one‘s hand (then you loose honour points equal to the number written on the card)
- And if you have no province left under your control, you may recruit up to 6 mercenary-troups for 3 honour points each, to come back in the game from the sea. If you have no honour points left, and also there‘s no province under your control, you‘re out of the game.

When all the players have made all the actions they wanted in autumn, then the leading player (most victory points) becomes new host of the shogun. In case of a tie, the old host of the shogun chooses, which of those families in front welcomes the shogun for the coming‘ year.

Then a new round begins.

Impressions
The rules seemed pretty clear to me abd well done. The questions that arised were answered in the example of a round added to the rules. I think the rules are not too complicated and sound for a very exciting game-experience.

So what about playing the game?
The rules were explained rather quickly and there were no questions left - everything was pretty clear.
The game is played quite fast, as all the phases do not take a long time - except may be the autumn, if you have a player that always wants to find a even better combination of hanafuda-cards and starts thinking about it only when it‘s his turn to perform the autumn-actions - this might become annoying, but it did not in our games - so we had nearly no downtime.

The Host of the Shogun still is in a very strong position and being host of the shogun offers you a lot of options.

In the first game I was the host of the shogun most of the time - that‘s how I found out, how one can slow down the progress of a player - do not make any diplomatic exchanges with him. If this happens to you, your out of the game until someone will start new diplomatic relationship with you: Why is this?
1. You have no military support , and so you become an easy target for attacks
2. You have no trading cards - so no additional hanafuda cards in your hand
3. You will not get any honour points by hosting members of other families.
So I dare to say: the diplomatic phase is the heart of the game - good diplomatic deals will help you like nothing else to win the game. The deals you offer must be good - and if your host of the shogun, a little threatening may help.

For the rest, the diplomacy-phase (winter) gives a good amount of interaction without lasting too long (4 min. pass by quickly!!) and is quite enjoyable. As you most of the time deal with cards, and you do not have to explain complex plans, it‘s rather easy to deal one with another.

Placing the orders is done very quickly (average of 3 orders/ Player), and to resolve the orders you‘re very much depending on the host of the Shogun. It might be very important to try to get some influence on his decisions.

The battles were fast and very exciting. I liked the mechansim and the playing of the support cards very much. You never now, who‘s going to win a battle until those darn cards are revealed. And the use of some samurais is sometimes decisive. The bigger the losses the bigger the gain of honour points - sometimes a province is safer without any army - as no attacker will gain honour points by attacking it. As you get a lot more points attacking a big army than a small one, you‘ll probably rather attack the big one, if you see any chances to win the battle. Still: Do not take too big risks, because loosing a batttle gives honour points to your opponent.

This also shows, and this may irritate many Diplomacy- and / or Risk-Players: Armies in Senji are first of all an important way to gain honour-points (the more army-tokens you loose in a battle you win, the more honour points you get) and i suppose they are meant to be aggressive, as you earn double points if you attack (compared to if you defend). This invites to a much more aggressive strategies - on the other side as you loose many of your troups even if you win a battle makes you choose carefully, where you will attack and when. If there are no attacks, because the players fear to loose everything in the next few rounds - then of course the winner of the game is the one that draws the best hanafuda cards. Or in other words - the less battles, the more important the hanafuda cards become.

Unlike most other military-diplomatic games, you loose no victory points or influence when you loose a province - in extreme case you could win the game without possessing any province at all. One must focus on winning honour points and nothing else! If you focus on having a big territory, then you‘re definitely on the wrong train (allthough having provinces is a good thing).

Of course the hanafuda cards are very important, but it‘s far away from playing rummy, as most of the time you have to choose between several options: Will I play my hanafuda cards now to get some points or a Samurai or two, or shall i wait until I have even better cards to make some more points? As you have to play all your actions at once, you have to decide rather quickly, what you want to do. Making 8 points this round instead of 12 next round is a very important question if you could become the host of the shogun.

And finally: The Samurais - do not underestimate them - they are somehow the pepper of the game - in our game the good and sometimes lucky use of samurais was very important!

The ‚Luck‘-thing: Senji is a game with a part of luck needed to win. A good combination of randomly drawn hanafuda-cards, nice dices during battles help you very much. On the other side you have some great possibilitiese to change the odds in your favour, if you have good diplomatic skills and if you're able to make the best of the situation.

Player number : The more the better.

Senji, even if a diplomatic game, has nothing to do with the game „Diplomacy“ - if you‘re looking for a Diplomacy light, DO NOT BUY Senji!!! Senji is also not a heavy game in sense that you could control and overview most of what‘s going on and calculate your best moves - it‘s impossible (at least for me) to plan more than the round youre in, there‘s too much chaos or too many choices. There‘s not much room for long-time strategies, allthough they might be possible. Also you have no direct influence on battles, in which you are neither attacker or defender. And very Important: Strategies that may work in most of ‚military-diplomatic‘ games will fail playing Senji, because Senji definitely has a different approach of the theme!

Conclusion: I like Senji very much, because the game is not very complex concernig the rules - on the other side you have to make more or less important choices all the time: Shall I go for two more hanafuda cards? Shall I attack- and if so, whom shall I attack?... and where have the members of my family gone? Have i enough military support to risk a big battle? Shall I play this Family card in front of me to gain honour enough to become host of the shogun, or shall I keep it to be sure not being attacked by that player?

Allthough collecting cards and fighting battles are also a matter of luck I must say that I was impressed, that the winners in the games I played always could look back on a combination of some great card-suits and successfull battles - you need both to win this game (omly collecting hanafuda cards will slow down your progress - by only attacking other players even if successfull, you will not make enough points).
Short: You need the right combination of hanafuda-cards, battles, good use of your Samurai(s) and some diplomatic skills to win the game - and of course a bit of luck, too. If you do not like this idea, do not play Senji!

Gaming time was about 2 hours - enjoyable light /easy but still with a lot of tension and a lot of laughter round the table, as there were many unexpected situations.

I liked the game a lot, good quality of the material, clear and well done rules, and from time to time a nasty situation, astonishment, the tension when throwing the dices, waiting for the good hanafuda card, clever use of the samurais - well I give Senji a good 8/10.

„... and how comes my wife‘s with YOU now?“ :shake: :shake: :shake:

Thread: Re: Honour: Trading your grandpa for weapons

LordStrabo — 2008-07-06T09:10:15+00:00

Paragraphs. They'll make your text a lot more readable.

Thread: Honour: Trading your grandpa for weapons

Gyges — 2008-07-06T07:18:48+00:00

Senji is the latest boardgame from Bruno Cathala and Serge Laget, whose previous collaborations include the highly acclaimed Shadows over Camelot. Senji combines diplomacy, conquest, and economics in 90 minutes.

And you get to trade your Grandpa for weapons.

Senji is a contraction for Sengoku jidai, the Japanese term for their Warring States period of history. The Emperor is old and without heir, and 3-6 players represent warlords trying to force the Emperor to declare them Shogun--and hence the ruler of Japan. One does this by scoring sixty points before anyone else can.
(note: this review is of the French Asmodee edition)

Components: There are many, many cards. There is a deck of Samurai cards, a large deck of hanafuda (lit. “flower card”) cards, and each player gets their own deck of diplomacy cards. The cards are well-illustrated and of very nice quality. There are 18 plastic figures for the Samurai, 36 plastic fortresses in the six player colours to represent control of the various provinces, tokens for armies, order tokens, and--best of all, in my estimation--nine beautiful custom dice. There's also a 4-minute sand timer (it's huge!) and, of course, a board of Japan.

People have complained that the samurai figures are all identical and merely differentiated by stickers on their banners, but in my opinion that's just grousing. The plastic bits are nice, but by no means the main draw--I much prefer the attractive cards. The cardboard is typical Euro fare—thick, well-cut, nice finish. All in all, Senji’s components are very well done, making it an attractive game.

Gameplay: (this is a summary only) Each turn consists of the four seasons. Before each turn, it is determined who gets to host the Emperor--this is player with the highest score. Whoever hosts the Emperor sets turn order, which is a large advantage. I find this a really clever mechanism. Normally the player who's currently winning has a huge target on their back, and Senji is no exception--but at least they get a significant compensation.

Winter kicks off with the player hosting the Emperor turning over the sand timer. This gives players 4 minutes to trade diplomacy cards. There are no restrictions on trading--you can trade with whomever you see fit, however you see fit. The trades need not be even, nor need they be made publicly—you are even encouraged in the rules to leave the game table and negotiate in secret. You can also trade cards for mere promises, though the latter will not be enforced.

There are three kinds of diplomacy cards: family members, military support, and trade deals. Family members are hostages; if you give someone a family member, if you then attack them they may execute their hostage. This nets them points at your expense. Military support cards can be called in later so as to bolster an attack. Trade deals can be cashed in later to get more economic cards, namely the hanafuda cards.

There are two twists to the diplomacy cards: first, your own cards can never be used by you! They can only be employed by your opponents, so the only use that you can get out of them is trading them. Secondly, all the diplomacy cards have the same backs, and you are allowed to trade any card(s) for anything—the upshot of this is that the grandpa you gave to your trusted ally might have been traded to yet a third player. You tend to discover this when your armies arrive at said player’s doorstep, much to your chagrin (to say nothing on the chagrin of your dear, late grandpa).

After the 4 minutes of Winter, Spring kicks off. Everyone gets to put an order token face-down into each of their provinces (you start the game with three provinces). There are three different orders: military recruitment (add two armies to the region), economic development (draw two hanafuda cards), and move (move any armies you like, often resulting in attack(s)). Every player does this simultaneously.

Summer follows. The player hosting the Emperor (remember her?) activates each province in whatever order she desires. This power is huge. She can use this to reinforce a province before it is attacked, or attack a province before it is reinforced—or simply allow a region to produce hanafuda cards before it is overrun. It is not uncommon for players to bribe the one hosting the emperor with a card or two simply to get preferential turn order.

When a province is activated, the order token is revealed and executed. Drawing cards and adding armies is very straightforward—but then there’s combat. You can attack by land or by sea, the latter being slightly riskier. Resolution of an attack is simple. First, the player being attacked may execute any hostages she has of the attacker’s family. After that, you take the nine “Dice of Destiny” and start the bloodshed. Each die shows the symbol of each player on its six sides, and each symbol counts as one point of strength in the fight. Each army counts as one point of strength, as well.

The first thing that happens in combat resolution is that one die is set aside per samurai, each showing the symbol of the owner’s family. So if you have two samurai and five armies, you’ll start off with seven points in the conflict. Some samurai also have special powers, though not all are related to combat. Then you roll all the remaining dice, setting aside any that match the symbols of the two players involved in the fight. There’s one last thing to do, and that’s call in military favours. Each player simultaneously plays a military support card face down (or, if they don’t have one to play, a 0 “dummy” card that each player has) in an attempt to claim some of the remaining dice. A military support card of a given player will be worth 1-4 symbols, based on the value of the card.

Example: Black attacks yellow. Black has five armies and two samurai, yellow has six armies (the province limit). Black is currently winning 7-6. The 7 remaining dice are rolled, showing one black, two yellow, three red and one blue. Now it’s 8-8. But black has a red military support card of value 2 and plays it—this lets him claim two of the three red dice (he can’t claim the third die because the card is only of value 2). Yellow played a blue support card of value 3, granting him one die (he can’t claim any more because there aren’t more blue dice to be claimed!). So the final tally is black 10, yellow 9.

The consequences of victory are simple and brutal: loser loses all of her military forces there (armies and samurai), winner loser an equivalent number of armies but no samurai. Yes, you read that right—mutual annihilation is perhaps the most frequent result of combat. The winner keeps or gains control of the province, putting her nifty plastic fortress on the province. The winner also gains points—as many points as the total number of armies killed if the winner was the defender, twice as much if the winner was the attacker. In the above example, black would have won 22 points—quite a tidy sum for one attack, especially given that the goal is to get to 60!

Autumn: After all the provinces have been activated, the players—in the order designated by the host of the emperor, of course—can cash in their hanafuda cards for points. Hanafuda cards have a number, a colour, and possibly one of three symbols (sun, animal, or tanzaku). This is where the game’s “set collection” aspect enters into it (more on that later); there are a variety of combinations worth a variety of points. For example, you can turn in 4, 8 or 12 cards with different numbers, and that will net you 4, 12 or 24 points. Alternatively, some sets are based on colour, others on symbols, etc. One type of set will get you new samurai. It’s also during autumn that you can cash in your trade deals with other players, forcing them to give you one of their hanafuda cards.

In addition to scoring points via hanafuda cards, you can also score points with diplomatic cards. If you have obtained a card from each of your five opponents, you can hand them all back—this magnanimity earns you 10 points and embarrasses all your opponents, who each lose 1 point. You can also host your opponents’ family members for points, but then you are not able to execute them later.

After all that, you determine who hosts the emperor next year—and you start again at Winter.

Evaluation: Senji manages to blend diplomacy, military conquest, and pseudo-economics into a 90 minute game. And it’s awesome. It combines elements of other games into a tighter, more compelling package. While I enjoyed aspects of A Game of Thrones’ gameplay (like the order programmation), overall I found the game uncompelling—the diplomacy was tacked-on and amounted to whining, and the victory conditions were uninspired and led to a slog-fest. Dirk Henn’s Shogun I found overlong, too computational for little payoff, and very static. Senji is pretty, always leaves you with something to do, and has many clever mechanics. The hosting of the Emperor means that the leading player, while targeted by many and at a disadvantage during the diplomacy phase (who wants to trade with the leader?), has a bargaining chit. The diplomacy cards structure the bargaining while also allowing you to trade them in for points if you don’t want to use the associated favours. The military system encourages both aggressive attacking and holding territory. Most of all, though, the multiple ways to score points are extremely well integrated.

The biggest problem with Senji, in my estimation, is that it doesn't scale well. With less than six players, the game suffers. I personally will happily play with five or four, but am loath to play with three--and even I will admit that four is pushing it.

Some have claimed that Senji is merely an overlong set-collection game with an overemphasis on luck. I would submit that the one criticism explains the other; if you think all there is to Senji is collecting hanafuda cards, then you’re voluntarily putting yourself at the mercy of the card draw. Spending some time and resources setting up an attack would probably be a better plan. Others have claimed that Senji is an overly complicated Euro/war game with an overemphasis on luck. My response to this is much the same as the other claim; if you’re only attacking, you’re ignoring a lot of the game. Furthermore, if you don’t set up your attacks well, you will be at the mercy of the dice.

More legitimate criticisms include the game’s complexity level; although I find the rules nice and intuitive, many other players don’t. The proper use of diplomacy cards, for example, stymies some people, as well as attack resolution. Perhaps I just explain the rules poorly. And yes, there is combat, and the penalty for losing can be extremely harsh—-so if that turns you off, avoid Senji.

But yeah. I think Senji rocks.

Image

Toynan — 2008-07-05T11:16:34+00:00

Top view of a six players game. Blue will rise the 60 points, but red will do it to and win.

Thread: Re: Available?

Purple_FairyQueen — 2008-07-03T06:39:38+00:00

It is now available:
http://asmodee-us.com/games/strategy/senji.php