Game: Honeybears

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siuchak — 2008-06-18T16:40:48+00:00

Strong Fireman

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siuchak — 2008-06-18T16:39:58+00:00

Fireman Rush Around

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siuchak — 2008-06-18T16:37:40+00:00

The cards

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Gola — 2007-12-10T03:06:09+00:00

Bucket Brigade edition. Run, little dudes!

Thread: Re: The new Bucket Brigade edition

Jim Cobb — 2007-10-13T16:03:22+00:00

I don't think this board needs to be stuck down any more than any other board. Any board game can be bumped by a careless hand or dangling sleeve.

However, I do agree the fireman-meeples are poorly designed. It took us quite a while to "see" how they could even be firemen -- finally looking at the cards and considering the silhouette to be the shape of the firemen. If they'd left the bucket out of the silhouette it would have looked more like a fireman, but it probably would have been even more prone to tipping over.

It was a moderately interesting game though, providing that angst where you don't want to play any card from your hand, yet you have to.

Thread: Re: Bucket Brigade rules

ssmooth — 2007-10-12T23:28:12+00:00

Thanks to David Fair for checking his copy of Honeybears against the rules for Bucket Brigade to help us find out that they are identical!

Well done, Face2Face!

Thread: The new Bucket Brigade edition

ssmooth — 2007-10-12T20:02:08+00:00

We played Bucket Brigade last night to generally positive reviews but with just a wee bit of quibble to report.

First I should say that I'd played Honeybears once or twice several years ago and had had it on my wantlist ever since, but due to the scarcity of the game never quite managed to nab a copy until this newly decorated edition by Face2Face Games made its appearance. To give the Bucket Brigade re-design its "props," the artwork on the cards is pleasing, with the firemen looking kind of old-fashioned and drawn with a heavy line, a little like woodcuts, and nicely colored, and the board looks fine and is easy to read for scoring purposes. I'm also very happy to report that no rules changes were made during the transition to the new edition.

With the full complement of five players, the game was at its theoretical maximum length already, and in the middle of the third hand, "Earthquake" Jack managed to jostle the board with his sleeve on the way back from moving a fireman, shaking the positions of all the pieces up beyond recall, so after five minutes of trying to fix it we finally had to declare a misdeal and start the round over. So the game did run a little longer than was really good for it... and I've made a "note to self" that the board is going to need to be anchored to the table somehow, played on a tablecloth at least or stuck down with silly putty or something. Also the pieces themselves (the four firemen who are racing up the ladder) have two problems: (a) You'd never guess from looking at them that they're supposed to be firemen, and (b) they are so poorly balanced, and have so little traction with the playing surface, that it takes an inordinate amount of care to place a fireman on the board in such a manner that it will stay standing up!

Anyway, those were the quibbles, and I did say generally positive reviews. Leon and I had played Honeybears in the past, so we sort of knew what to expect: You play cards from your hand to move a color, but what you score for at the end of the race is how many cards you still have *left* in your hand for each color. So all five of us reached again and again that point near the end of a race where we didn't want to play *any* card... the defining moment of frustration that I suppose makes people either find the game delightful or never want to play it again!

Fortunately for the four guys, Angelika was at the table with us, never having played it before and bubbling over with exclamations about the wonderful irony of the game, unmistakably amused and entertained, so with that added sparkle we could hardly help but have a good time with it.

Just the same, I'll be interested to find out if the game gets a little better with only four players and thus four rounds and three cards taken out of the deck.

And as for the verdict on the new Bucket Brigade edition: It looks good, we like it, and we'll figure out a way to stabilize the bits.

Thread: Bucket Brigade rules

ssmooth — 2007-10-10T22:02:48+00:00

Are the rules for Bucket Brigade exactly the same as the rules for Honeybears? Or have small changes been made?

Having played Honeybears only years ago, I'm not in a position to know the answer to this question myself. But I've just gotten Bucket Brigade out of the shrinkwrap and am looking forward to having it on the table.

Thanks!

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Boomer — 2007-06-20T18:38:23+00:00

Face 2 Face Edition: card backs

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Boomer — 2007-06-20T18:37:56+00:00

Face 2 Face Edition: cards

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Boomer — 2007-06-20T18:37:28+00:00

Face 2 Face Edition

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edroz — 2007-04-26T15:27:19+00:00

Ready for the race!

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Pableras — 2007-03-31T14:02:25+00:00

The Games components of the new version

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Moviebuffs — 2007-03-28T16:03:02+00:00

Cover of Bucket Brigade ... the new Honeybears

Thread: Re: Review by SOS (from 2000)

sos1 — 2007-02-27T17:35:06+00:00

Yes, Tal has some similarities - Honeybears is a simpler version of Tal, without the extra scoring possibilities for diamonds, etc. In some ways, it's like Grand National Derby versus Titan the Arena vs Galaxy the Dark Ages...

Thread: Re: Review by SOS (from 2000)

smithhemb — 2007-02-27T16:51:46+00:00

Tal der Abenteuer seems like yet another variation on this mechanism. I've been looking forward to Bucket Brigade but wonder if it'll seem duplicative, given that I have both of the others. For what it's worth, Tal der Abenteur feels/plays nothing like Loco! even though, intellectually, you recognize the similarities.

Thread: Re: Review by SOS (from 2000)

sos1 — 2007-02-27T16:42:08+00:00

Well, they are by the same designer. But they have more differences than similarities, I think.

Honeybears has a board, a straight race track, that all bears move along, and they can never go backwards. Loco cards move on their own individual tracks, and the numbers can go up or down. Honeybear cards are both VPs and movement cards - there are no chips. Loco cards are "movement" and the relationship between the final card and chips held is VPs.

Thread: Re: Review by SOS (from 2000)

paulclarke339 — 2007-02-27T16:23:32+00:00

This sounds a little bit like "Loco!".

Thread: Review by SOS (from 2000)

sos1 — 2007-02-27T01:19:52+00:00

Aww ... Honeybears is a cute little game. It has a small board showing a beehive at one end and a bear's cave at the other. There are four colorful bears which start at the beehives and race to the cave, eating honey on the way. And finally there are 55 cards. Even the artwork on the cards is cute.

The game is aimed at children 8+, but it's one of those games that can be enjoyed by adults as well. The mechanics are pure Knizia - in fact, they have a purity that he sometimes loses in other games.

In this game, you don't control a single bear, but may move any of the four bears. All four bears are used whether you have three, four, or five players. The bears are moved by card play.

Each color bear has eleven cards: six showing a walking bear (move 1 space), and five showing a running bear (move 2 spaces). In addition, there are eleven cards of a rainbow suit, with the same proportion of walk to run cards. With a rainbow card, you can move any bear. The cards are shuffled and dealt out randomly to all players, so you'll usually have some of each color.

The board is only 14 spaces long, and that includes a start space and finish space. Half the board is labeled "-1", and the other half has spaces ranging from "0" to "+3". When a card is played, the appropriately colored bear advances one or two spaces, depending on if it's walking or running.

A round ends when one bear reaches the cave. At that point, everyone scores for the round, the scores are recorded, and the race is run again until everyone's been First Player once. Then total up all the scores to determine the winner of the game - very simple.

Scoring is interesting, and bears the Knizia hallmark. When one bear reaches the cave (the +3 space), everyone reveals the cards remaining in their hands. Each pair of Walk cards of the same color is worth five points times the value of the space the same-colored bear is on. An additional Walk card is worth one point times the value of the space. Run cards are worth two points times the value of the space. Rainbow cards are worth nothing. The player who moved the bear into the cave gets a six-point bonus.

Scoring Example: if you have one Walk card for the bear that made it to the cave, that's three points. If you have one Run card for a bear on a +1 space, that's an additional two points. A third bear finished on a 0 space, so you score zero points for it no matter how many cards you have for that bear. And if you have a pair of Walk cards for the final bear on a -1 space, that's worth -5 points, which brings your score for the hand to zero!

So the simple yet truly lovely catch to the game is this: in order to move a bear, you have to spend potential victory points!

Obviously, there's some luck involved here: whoever gets the most Rainbow cards can move a bear they have a lot of cards for, thus saving their victory points. True, but it's hard to have that many Rainbow cards - and if you don't spread their use around, no one else will move your bear. Generally, for a bear to make it to the cave or even to the +2 spaces, it has to be moved by more than one player.

Also, moving a bear to the +2 rank is risky, as someone else can then move it into the cave, scoring the +6 bonus for finishing the round. And of course, the more Rainbow cards you have, the fewer scoring cards in your hand - Rainbow cards score you no points at the end of the round. Besides, the distribution of Rainbow cards evens out over the rounds, so it hasn't been a problem in my experience.

Bad card distribution is the only possible flaw, and the odds are against the same player getting the most Rainbow cards every round. No, for all it's cuteness and apparent youthful target audience, Honeybears is actually a very fine quick game. A great filler with some substance in an all-adult group, and a fine family game parents will enjoy playing with their children. I recommend it!

Thread: Re: Pic of rethemed Bucket Brigade

Leonardo — 2006-12-22T18:52:21+00:00

I dont like this new theme. Honeybears is not a great theme but its considerably better.
A more appropriate theme could of been mountain climbing, car racing etc...

Thread: Re: Pic of rethemed Bucket Brigade

Robrob — 2006-12-22T18:33:29+00:00

A pure abstract so any theme is as good as another. Bears are a little cute so maybe the firefighter theme might work better encompassing a larger range of buyers?

Thread: Pic of rethemed Bucket Brigade

matt769 — 2006-12-22T14:11:46+00:00

BoardgameNews posted pics of F2F new version - http://www.boardgamenews.com/index.php/boardgamenews/comment...

Any thoughts?

Thread: Re: Reprinted in 2005

shawn_low — 2006-11-02T13:45:01+00:00

Playroom should have reprinted this instead of doing some of Reiner's other average fillers...

Thread: Re: Reprinted in 2005

mmarshallmd — 2006-09-12T14:40:45+00:00

New title is Bucket Brigade. Release date is "early 2007," which probably means this time next year...

Thread: Re: Reprinted in 2005

ltux — 2006-03-26T18:08:41+00:00

Their site now says that it's for 2007...and rethemed?!! But how can you beat a theme involving bears who want honey? How?!!

Thread: Re: Reprinted in 2005

Norbert666 — 2006-01-19T09:36:15+00:00

Now 2006... Where is it???

Thread: Re: Reprinted in 2005

jpearso2 — 2005-11-23T22:56:31+00:00

Does anyone have news on this reprint? Face 2 Face no longer has the game
listed on the link?

Thread: Re:Reprinted in 2005

BilboAtBagEnd — 2004-10-13T04:42:42+00:00

EYE of NiGHT (#50380),

Do you see a timely publisher for Settlers?

I'm pleased Honeybears is going back in print. Hopefully it will be cheaper than $30.

Thread: Re:Reprinted in 2005

mlvanbie — 2004-08-26T05:02:42+00:00

Robrob (#50923),

Here's their catalog: http://www.face2facegames.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=catalog

I've bought Sleuth and Martin bought Boomtown so you should be able to get a good idea of what they're charging now.

Thread: Re:Reprinted in 2005

Robrob — 2004-08-26T04:17:15+00:00

It's 55 cards, four pawns and a cardboard rectangle let us hope it is priced accordingly.

Thread: Re:Reprinted in 2005

EYE of NiGHT — 2004-08-22T09:26:14+00:00

mlvanbie (#50371),

Wow, it looks like I know what I'm talking about. See my prediction on the previous comment....

I see....I see...giant silver birds flying in the sky, with men in them. I see war, in the east. I see an English publisher for Settlers...

Thread: Re:Reprinted in 2005

mlvanbie — 2004-08-22T06:37:53+00:00

mlvanbie (#50370),

Make that Face2Face ... and read more carefully next time.

Thread: Reprinted in 2005

mlvanbie — 2004-08-22T06:36:06+00:00

... by Piatnik in English.

Thread: Session Report

gschloesser — 2004-05-13T23:25:07+00:00

I figured that, at most, I would only own a handful of games that Sheila & James did not own. They had time for one more game before departing, so she searched the shelves and shouted out “Honey Bears!” It has been years since I’ve played this nifty Reiner Knizia title, so I was happy to oblige. Jim and Steve joined us for the race to the honey pots.

We played three races as I’ve always felt that this was the “sweet spot” for the game. More races just feel like too many. Sheila raced to the lead in the first heat, but was surpassed by Jim in the second round. Jim managed to hold onto the lead for a narrow victory.

Round-by-round scores:

Round 1: Sheila 25, Steve 22, Jim 22, Greg 19, James 19
Round 2: Jim 43, Sheila 37, Steve 33, James 31, Greg 30
Round 3: Jim 61, Sheila 59, Steve 54, Greg 53, James 48

Ratings: Sheila 8, Jim 7.5, Steve 7, James 6.5, Greg 6.5

Thread: Re:Price Insanity

EYE of NiGHT — 2004-04-05T17:51:51+00:00

Eric Brosius (#32234),

Sorry Eric, but Honeybears is way over-rated. It's a nice children's game, but adults will be disappointed. Anybody that pays $9.95 for it has paid much too much, but 30 dollars?!
Cheers,
Jon.
ps - The good Doktor seems to be on a re-print roll. Lots of his recent games are coming back in print. Wait a while and this will too no doubt...

Thread: Re:Price Insanity

Eric Brosius — 2004-04-05T11:06:22+00:00

Robrob (#32226),

Honeybears is a highly-rated, out-of-print game. Funagain has been finding caches of out-of-print games, marking them up, and selling them on the website.

Thread: Re:Price Insanity

gamesbook — 2004-04-05T10:03:00+00:00

Robrob (#32226),
Maybe you should start a new list "Simple Games, Wayout Prices"... this is not the only game suffering from "price creep". Maybe its just the lack of competition in the market? My advice - make your own copy, using cardboard tokens instead of playing cards.

Thread: Price Insanity

Robrob — 2004-04-05T05:01:12+00:00

OK, I admit this is a cute and playable abstract game designed for kids and tolerable for adults. But the Funagain Games website is now listing this one for $29.95!!!!!!!!!! Are they insane? It's 55 playing cards, four pawns and a cardboard rectangle for gosh sakes. Soon Knizia will be selling the "Rock, Paper and Scissors Game" for $29.95.

Thread: Session Report

Dan Bosley — 2002-05-02T17:46:49+00:00

Dan here - while we were waiting for others to arrive, Rick, William and I decided to try out the Reiner Knizia game of Honeybears. This is a filler-type game. The game comes with 4 wooden bears - red, yellow, green and blue, and a deck of Walking Bear and Running Bear cards.

Each player is dealt a hand of cards. The cards consist of red, yellow, green, blue, and joker cards. Half of them are Walk-cards, which allow you to advance the matching-colored bear one space along the forest track heading from the beehives to the honeypots. The other half of the cards are Run-cards, which allow you to move the matching-colored bear two spaces. The jokers allow you to move whatever bear you want to move.

The catch is, as soon as any bear gets to the honeypots (the finish-line), each player scores points for the cards he has remaining in his hand. And the closer each bear is to the finish-line, the more points the matching-color bear cards score for you.

Thus, in order to advance a bear, you have to use up your matching-color bear-cards, which in turn leaves you with LESS of those cards to score that particular bear at the end of the race. Because of this, the races tend to be close - no bear gets too far ahead.

Scoring is typical Knizia. Each pair of same-color Walk cards is worth 5 points. Each single Walk card is worth 1 point. Each Run-card is worth 2 points. Then, you multiply the previous values by the number along the edge of the racetrack. The finish line is worth 3 points. Thus, if the red bear finishes first, and you have a pair of red bear Walk-cards, you would score (5 times 3) 15 points for those 2 cards. And you would score 3 points for a single red Walk-card, or 6 points for a red Run-card. Jokers score zero. And the player who moves a bear across the finish line first gets an additional 6 points.

The further away you are from the finish line, the smaller the numbers on the edge of the race track, which means those bears that are further away score less (or possibly even negative).

So you want to keep your cards in your hand in order to score them. But unless someone else is moving the bear you want moved, you may have to use up some of those scoring cards in order to move the bear or bears you want to, in order to score whatever you can.

In the first game, William and I tied with 32 points, while Rick scored 25

Then Patrick arrived.

We then played with Rick’s Start-Player Pointer-Atter for a few minutes. This is a little metal hand-spinner that basically spins for about 12 minutes once you start it. We played 3 rounds of Honeybears while we waited to find out who should go first. Then we got into the game.

We played 4 rounds (or 4 mini-games). Rick, Patrick, and William all thought the game had too much luck. I disagree. Oh, there’s luck of course. This isn’t Chess. Or Tigris and Euphrates. Or Tiggers and Eeyores. Any game with cards will have the distribution of cards to deal with - that is luck. But it’s what you do with the cards you’re dealt with - there is some strategy involved. I think it’s sort of like 6 Nimmt in a way - when you first start playing it, you think the game is total luck. But there is strategy to 6 Nimmt. Sure, sometimes you do get screwed by a bad hand of cards. But skillful, strategic play will let you make the best of those cards, and allow you more wins than mere chance would dictate.

You will note that I won handily 2 of the 4 rounds played, plus I tied for first in the 3-player game above. Skill, my friends, skill. And in only one of the 5 rounds did I score the 6 points for moving a bear to the finish line - I let other players do that while I tried to maximize my score. Luck, Ha! The Honeybear Master speaketh. (Wait for the strategy guide...)

Anyhow, enough chest-beating.

In the first round the scores were

*Dan* ... 25
Rick ... 21
Patrick ... 10
William ... 7

In round 2, Rick commented “This game is pure luck”. Rick, Rick, Rick. And this from a 6 Nimmt master...

For round 2, Patrick wanted to play a variant. So we faced all the wooden bears backwards, so they had to keep looking over their shoulders to see where they were going....

The scores in Round 2:

*Dan* ... 26
Patrick ... 25
Rick ... 23
Willliam ... 23

In round 3, William and Patrick wanted to try another variant. So the bears started out upside down, laying on their backs. The bears found that this was a much more awkward way of moving, since their backs weren’t made for walking and running. This new bear-position obviously threw me off my game, since I didn’t win this round....

The scores in Round 3:

*William* ... 28
Patrick ... 20
Dan ... 16
Rick ... 14

Finally, in round 4, we found the bears in rather unusual starting positions. Fortunately, the race started early enough that we were spared the sight of seeing any orange or turquoise bears develop....

The scores in Round 4:

*Rick* ... 31
*William* ... 31
Dan ... 30
Patrick ... 23

Corwin Composite Scoring:

*Dan* - 97
Rick - 89
William - 89
Patrick - 77

We forgot to rate the game, but I have no doubt that due to Rick’s constant comparisons to Tigris and Euphrates, it would have gotten 9’s all around.

Or maybe 3’s.

I’d give it a 5. It was cute, and kids would like it. And I do think there is a little strategy. Not tons, but there is some. It’s not 100% luck. Besides - could all those other session reports on BoardgameGeek be wrong?

In a way, the game also reminds me of Galloping Pigs. Maybe the 2 games could be combined and we could have Galloping Honeybear Pigs...

Thread: Session Report

gschloesser — 2002-04-30T18:55:19+00:00

Time for one more game to close out the evening. Larry Levy, Rob
Derrick, Bryan Rankin and Chris Lohroff joined me for a game of Honey
Bears. We raced three heats, with Brian leading from the get-go.
Several of us made a good run at him in the final rounds, but he had a
large enough lead to hold on for the victory.

Finals: Bryan 65, Greg 61, Larry 59, Rob 57, Chris (Lard Butt) Lohroff
37

Thread: Session Report

BoardGameGeek — 2001-08-02T14:38:23+00:00

HONEYBEARS - With Joe, Mark, Rob and myself. A nice 4 player game of Honeybears which may feel a little childish but the game has some interesting strategy elements and has enough to it to be a nice filler for adults. And it's kinda neat watching the bears advance down he track towards the pot of honey! There was a lot of lobbying for different bears - it was clear on at least one round that "Red Bear Must WIN" although I don't remember if he did or not! This is a race game - where you use different colored cards to move different colored bears down the track - the first to reach the honey pot ends the game. You score for cards left in your hand (so cards you actually used to move the bears are "spent" and do not count) and they score higher values depending on the advancement of the corresponding bear. A neat little game - and three full rounds took well under an hour. I think everyone enjoyed it as a cute filler. I think this one is sadly out of print now but I recommend this light and somewhat underrated Knizia game.

Thread: Session Report