Game: Mermaid Rain

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Little Dragon — 2008-08-25T11:34:29+00:00

the rulebook

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Little Dragon — 2008-06-25T21:17:41+00:00

Adventure cards - turtle

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Little Dragon — 2008-06-25T21:14:58+00:00

Adventure cards - seagull

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Little Dragon — 2008-06-25T21:14:02+00:00

Adventure cards - dolphin

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Little Dragon — 2008-06-25T21:12:09+00:00

Choose a colour...

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Little Dragon — 2008-06-25T21:09:32+00:00

Pile of movement tiles.

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Little Dragon — 2008-06-25T21:08:23+00:00

Piles of treasure tiles

Thread: Re: Clarification: Can keep melding AFTER playing mermaid ca

dkuznick — 2007-11-25T17:01:22+00:00

John Weber wrote:
David, there's got to be something wrong with your translation if it says that. (Keep in mind there are multiple translations of the rules out there.) What you call the "Mermaid Card" we call the "stop" card because, when you play it, that signifies you are removing yourself from playing further cards in the "Surf Predicting" phase of the turn.

Yeah, that's the only thing that made sense. Thanks. The translation on the Geek needs to be fixed/removed and a better one put up.

Thread: Re: Clarification: Can keep melding AFTER playing mermaid ca

John Weber — 2007-11-25T16:57:18+00:00

David, there's got to be something wrong with your translation if it says that. (Keep in mind there are multiple translations of the rules out there.) What you call the "Mermaid Card" we call the "stop" card because, when you play it, that signifies you are removing yourself from playing further cards in the "Surf Predicting" phase of the turn.

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BigWoo — 2007-09-12T16:30:54+00:00

Mermaid Rain (box cover)

Thread: Re: Clarification: Can keep melding AFTER playing mermaid ca

dkuznick — 2007-01-28T22:26:47+00:00

dkeisen wrote:
Certainly the only English translation I have seen did not say that. Play the mermaid card when you are finished building your meld.

From the .doc file posted right here on BGG, page 5, 5th paragraph under "3. Making the Melds":

He may add to the meld again once he has played the Mermaid Princess Card. Note that players cannot include the Mermaid Princess Card as one of the two cards they play at first.

Thread: Re: Clarification: Can keep melding AFTER playing mermaid ca

dkeisen — 2007-01-28T21:53:39+00:00

Certainly the only English translation I have seen did not say that. Play the mermaid card when you are finished building your meld.

Thread: Clarification: Can keep melding AFTER playing mermaid card?

dkuznick — 2007-01-28T18:32:19+00:00

The English translation says that you can add more cards to your meld after you play your mermaid card. That didn't seem right. It seems like once you played your mermaid card, you drop out of the bidding. Can someone who can read the actual Japanese rules please clarify?

Thread: Re: User Review

Moosehead — 2007-01-05T21:03:29+00:00

I gave this tread a thumbs up.

A very good, and well reasoned discusion/comparison by Jonathan and Alan, very nice analysis guys....

Now, Jonathan, you share that thumb with Alan!

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Ipecac — 2006-09-27T17:30:35+00:00

Plastic Mermaids (Google Mermaid "Drink Creatures") used to replace pawns.

Thread: Re: Aquamarine Waltz Tile clarification.

Rulemonger — 2006-03-25T20:48:00+00:00

You get a face down current tile from any stack (i.e., any shape), yes.

You leave it face down (you cannot look at it).

Then when you play your current tile at the beginning of the surf-riding phase, you get to place both your regular tile and the face down tile.

I assume you can look at it when deciding where to place it, but that bit is open to interpretation -- you may have to decide where to place it and then turn it face up.

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thdizzy — 2006-03-07T12:46:34+00:00

The cover art on the box

Thread: Re: Aquamarine Waltz Tile clarification.

Tigress — 2006-03-04T23:29:29+00:00

The way we play it, when it's your turn and you had made an aquamarine, you get to choose one of the remaining available water tiles plus one unknown tile of any shape. You then immediately place both of them in any available board positions.

I guess an alternate form might be that you get the unknown water tile and you can save it for later in the game, revealing it and using it in a later turn... I had never thought of that.

Thread: Re: 2 VP per treasure chip.

shawn_low — 2006-02-27T03:58:34+00:00

You are right. You can score all the 2VPs per chip at the end of the game instead. Makes scoring easier and less fiddly.

Thread: Mermaid Rain SR

TamiWhitsett — 2005-09-26T23:24:09+00:00

This is a game that I first heard about at my first Gathering, and I've been curious about it since the beginning. Of course, I love merfolk, and the mythology surrounding them, so it's really not surprising to me that I was interested in this game. At its most basic, this is a set collection game; you want to get 1 of each of the types of “treasure” to pay off the sea witch at the end of the game. However, you also want to have the most of any particular type of treasure as well. There is also a poker aspect to it, in that you are using the hand you are dealt to make poker hands, which determine what you get each round, in terms of VPs, treasures, and/or pathways. However, you don't necessarily want to make the best poker hands, because you have only the cards left in your hand to pay the passage along the routes. Some of the pathways go away at the end of the round, while others stay behind. I didn't really understand this game, as evidenced by my paltry score: 31 points. However, I thought it was fun, and would give it a solid 6+ for a rating. Scott ended with 40 points, Kendall had 49, Tony 50, David 51, and Tom ran away with 65 points

Thread: Mermaid Rain report

dougadamsau — 2005-05-30T01:23:09+00:00

First game for all players. This is a nice, light game. Players are mermaids, trying to become human by collecting treasure counters and bribing a witch. Something like that, anyway. This is essentially a move-around-the-board-and-collect-stuff game. Players are dealt a hand of cards, and use those cards to augment their movement across the board. If this sounds like Elfenlandgoldroads, then you're spot on - it feels a lot like that. The major difference is that where the Alan Moon game is a more or less pleasurable jaunt around a colourful map, Mermaid Rain is a rather cutthroat game of get there first and grab stuff before others get it. In order to move first, players play something akin to showdown poker hands, with the player with the best hand taking the start player role, and getting to move first. It is definitely an advantage as the stuff you want is still there on the board, but you have to burn about half your hand of cards (which you also need for movement). Our game saw very tight play, with nobody really having a lead in treasure chips, and no outright nasty blocking play either. There was one Teleport move (the reward for 5-of-a-kind). Roger and Debbie tied for the win, with around 75 points each.

Thread: Session Report

lorna — 2004-11-28T13:48:53+00:00

Well, since I wasn't in time to submitmy national game day event to the library, I had to celebrate with a home game. The usual bunch was here.

We started off with Mermaid Rain. I really enjoy this game. We had 5 mermaids playing, Christina, Barb, Eric and Jeff. Eric and Jeff make especially cute mermaids. MR is basically a card game of hand management. You use the card deck, which consists of 3 suits, to bid on tiles and to pay for movement on the board.

Each player is dealt 7 cards. The players then bid on wave tiles which are used to place on the board to allow your mermaid to move from island to island to pick up treasures.
The bids are done by playing 2 cards, then one at a time until your are done. The bids are in a series of "poker" hands such as a pair, 3 of a kind, 2 pair etc. Your bid may also get you bonuses such as VP or an extra treasure chit.

The wave tiles and islands have symbols on them corresponding to the 3 suits (dolphins, turtles and seagulls). You must have the corresponding card to move onto a wave (surfing) and onto an island. You then may pick up a treasure. Some islands have treasures face up and some face down. The game is played for 5 rounds.
At the end, each mermaid must pay the sea witch one type of each treasure (there are 5 types) or lose points. Then leftover treasures are scored with the person having the most or each type scoring 12, 2nd place 6 etc.

During this session I tried to conserve cards in bidding to try and pick up treasure but it backfired on me and I was hemmed into a corner during round 4 having then to expend 5 cards for 1 treasure in round 5. Christina won with a monopoly of coral treasures giving her 12 plus 3 extra for the monopoly. My rating goes up to an 8 for now.

Thread: User Review

gschloesser — 2004-11-05T19:49:36+00:00

Awhile back, Ben Baldanza wrote a very positive review of this Japanese game for Counter magazine. I was certainly interested in obtaining the game, but due to the high import costs, the price was prohibitive. I figured I would content myself with playing the game at Gulf Games or the Gathering. However, I really didn’t place a high priority on organizing a game.

Ken Rice is the only gamer I “know” who lives in Japan. He was scheduled to attend his first Gathering of Friends in April, and he passed along word that he would be able to bring copies of the game for those who desired a copy. The price? Ridiculously low. So, I immediately contacted Ken and reserved a copy.

I didn’t have chance to play the game at the Gathering, but did play it at Gulf Games in July. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, and have subsequently played it several more times. I find the game quite good, and it reminds me somewhat of Elfenland.

First, the theme / premise must be mentioned. Players are mermaids exploring the oceans and collecting treasures. Movement is determined by playing cards, which depict dolphins, turtles or seagulls. A penalty must be paid to the sea witch before final scores are tallied. I personally don’t have a problem with the theme, but a few of my Westbank Gamers crew found it, well, silly and unmanly. Hmmm …

The nicely laminated board depicts numerous islands scattered about the ocean. Each island depicts a symbol – turtle, dolphin, or seagull – which is the type of card a player must play in order to move onto it. The islands will also house several treasures, which come in five different varieties – sea shells, coral, crystals, pearls and dragon scales. Some of these treasures are placed face-up, while others are face-down. Players will scurry about the ocean collecting these treasures.

Players each begin the game with seven cards and one “stop” card. This stop card is also a player aid card, but since the text is in Japanese, it is virtually useless for most non-Japanese gamers. The cards will be used not only for movement purposes, but also to form “poker” hands in order to determine the order of movement and the awarding of various perks. It is this card play that gives the game a unique feel and earns it points for originality.

Each round, players will play two cards face-down, then simultaneously reveal them.
Then, each player plays one more face-down card. This can be a movement card, or the stop card. If a player chooses to play his “stop” card, he will play no further cards during this phase. All other players continue to play one more card until all players have played their stop cards. This could take several rounds.

Once all players have completed their card play, the various “hands” are examined to determine who played the best set of cards. The rankings are similar to those used in poker, although not exactly. Hands can consist of a pair, three of a kind, 3 different colors, 2 pair, full house, etc. The highest ranked hand is five of a kind. Each player will receive a bonus based on his hand, which can consist of victory points or the ability to draw a treasure tile or ocean tile. The “five of a kind” hand allows the player to transport his pawn to any location on the board.

Players will subsequently move their pawn based on the strength of their hand. In addition, the player who played the highest ranked hand gets the prince card. This is important, as any ties in the ranking of hands is broken in favor of players seated closest to the player holding the prince in a clockwise fashion. However, a major consideration when playing cards to form your hand is that the cards played during this phase are discarded, and a player must move his pawn with the cards remaining in his hand. So, the more cards used to form your “poker” hand, the fewer cards you will have to move your mermaid. This forces each player to make tough decisions each and every turn.

After all hands are played and the order of play determined, each player chooses one of the six ocean tiles that have been revealed. The ocean tiles come in a variety of shapes, and each one depicts a symbol indicating the type of card which must be played in order to move onto that tile. Some of the tiles will remain on the board throughout the game, while others will be removed at the end of the turn.

Each player then takes his turn by placing the tile he selected, then moving his mermaid across tiles to the islands. As mentioned earlier, in order to move onto a tile or island, the player must play a card that has the same symbol as that depicted on the tile or island. A player may always play any two cards as a “wild” card and move his piece onto an adjacent tile or island.

When a player moves his mermaid onto an island, he may take one of the treasures found there. He may first peek at any face-down treasures before deciding which one to take. When the player takes a treasure, it maintains its face-up or face-down status. This is important as players will never know exactly how many treasures of each type their opponents possess.

An important note is that a player may only take one treasure from an island on a turn. This prevent a player from simply hopping back and forth from a tile to an island, scooping all of the available treasures from that island.

After all players have moved and collected any treasures they can gather, any temporary ocean tiles are removed. Each player must then discard down to two cards, after which they are dealt seven new cards. So, the most cards a player can ever have in his hand at the beginning of a turn is nine cards. Often, it is wise to conserve a card or two, especially if the tiles and islands don’t closely match the cards you possess during a turn.

Five rounds are played in the manner described above. At this point, each player must surrender one of each type of treasure to the sea witch … and who wants to defy her? For each type of treasure a player does not possess, he loses five points. After the sea witch is satisfied, players then score points for their remaining treasures.

Each type of treasure is examined, with players scoring points as followed:

Most treasures of a type: 12 points
Second: 6 points
Third: 4 points
Fourth: 2 points
Fifth or Sixth: 0 points

If a player possesses a monopoly in a particular type of treasure, he earns a bonus of three additional points.

These points are added to the points players earned during the course of the game. The player who has accumulated the most points is victorious and wins the favor of the handsome prince.

The movement mechanism, along with the playing of the ocean tiles to help facilitate this movement, is reminiscent of Alan Moon’s Elfenland. Added to this is the clever “meld making” phase, wherein players assemble “poker” hands in order to not only determine the important turn order, but also earn bonus perks, such as victory points or additional treasure or ocean tiles. Players must balance these “melds” with the need to conserve enough cards to move about the ocean and gather treasures. This presents the players with tough choices each and every turn.

All of these mechanisms blend together extremely well, yielding a game that is enjoyable, challenging and original. Sure, the theme may be off-putting to some, but do yourself a favor and get past it. The game underneath the “cutesy” theme is quite good.

Thread: Session Report

gschloesser — 2004-09-17T21:36:44+00:00

Awhile back, Ben Baldanza wrote a very positive review of this Japanese game for Counter magazine. I was certainly interested in obtaining the game, but due to the high import costs, the price was prohibitive. I figured I would content myself with playing the game at Gulf Games or the Gathering. However, I really didn’t place a high priority on organizing a game.

Ken Rice is the only gamer I “know” who lives in Japan. He was scheduled to attend his first Gathering of Friends in April, and he passed along word that he would be able to bring copies of the game for those who desired a copy. The price? Ridiculously low. So, I immediately contacted Ken and reserved a copy.

I didn’t have chance to play the game at the Gathering, but did play it at Gulf Games in July. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, and subsequently played it a few weekends later while I was visiting with Craig Berg and friends in Ohio. I find the game quite good, and it reminds me somewhat of Elfenland.

First, the theme / premise must be mentioned. Players are mermaids exploring the oceans and collecting treasures. Movement is determined by playing cards, which depict dolphins, turtles or seagulls. A penalty must be paid to the sea witch before final scores are tallied. I personally don’t have a problem with the theme, but a few of my Westbank Gamers crew found it, well, silly and unmanly. Hmmm …

The nicely laminated board depicts numerous islands scattered about the ocean. Each island depicts a symbol – turtle, dolphin, or seagull – which is the type of card a player must play in order to move onto it. The islands will also house several treasures, which come in five different varieties – sea shells, coral, crystals, pearls and dragon scales. Some of these treasures are placed face-up, while others are face-down. Players will scurry about the ocean collecting these treasures.

Players each begin the game with seven cards and one “stop” card. This stop card is also a player aid card, but since the text is in Japanese, it is virtually useless for most non-Japanese gamers. The cards will be used not only for movement purposes, but also to form “poker” hands in order to determine the order of movement and the awarding of various perks. It is this card play that gives the game a unique feel and earns it points for originality.

Each round, players will play two cards face-down, then simultaneously reveal them.
Then, each player plays one more face-down card. This can be a movement card, or the stop card. If a player chooses to play his “stop” card, he will play no further cards during this phase. All other players continue to play one more card until all players have played their stop cards. This could take several rounds.

Once all players have completed their card play, the various “hands” are examined to determine who played the best set of cards. The rankings are similar to those used in poker, although not exactly. Hands can consist of a pair, three of a kind, 3 different colors, 2 pair, full house, etc. The highest ranked hand is five of a kind. Each player will receive a bonus based on his hand, which can consist of victory points or the ability to draw a treasure tile or ocean tile. The “five of a kind” hand allows the player to transport his pawn to any location on the board.

Players will subsequently move their pawn based on the strength of their hand. In addition, the player who played the highest ranked hand gets the prince card. This is important, as any ties in the ranking of hands is broken in favor of players seated closest to the player holding the prince in a clockwise fashion. However, a major consideration when playing cards to form your hand is that the cards played during this phase are discarded, and a player must move his pawn with the cards remaining in his hand. So, the more cards used to form your “poker” hand, the fewer cards you will have to move your mermaid. This forces each player to make tough decisions each and every turn.

After all hands are played and the order of play determined, each player chooses one of the six ocean tiles that have been revealed. The ocean tiles come in a variety of shapes, and each one depicts a symbol indicating the type of card which must be played in order to move onto that tile. Some of the tiles will remain on the board throughout the game, while others will be removed at the end of the turn.

Each player then takes his turn by placing the tile he selected, then moving his mermaid across tiles to the islands. As mentioned earlier, in order to move onto a tile or island, the player must play a card that has the same symbol as that depicted on the tile or island. A player may always play any two cards as a “wild” card and move his piece onto an adjacent tile or island.

When a player moves his mermaid onto an island, he may take one of the treasures found there. He may first peek at any face-down treasures before deciding which one to take. When the player takes a treasure, it maintains its face-up or face-down status. This is important as players will never know exactly how many treasures of each type their opponents possess.

An important note is that a player may only take one treasure from an island on a turn. This prevent a player from simply hopping back and forth from a tile to an island, scooping all of the available treasures from that island.

After all players have moved and collected any treasures they can gather, any temporary ocean tiles are removed. Each player must then discard down to two cards, after which they are dealt seven new cards. So, the most cards a player can ever have in his hand at the beginning of a turn is nine cards. Often, it is wise to conserve a card or two, especially if the tiles and islands don’t closely match the cards you possess during a turn.

Five rounds are played in the manner described above. At this point, each player must surrender one of each type of treasure to the sea witch … and who wants to defy her? For each type of treasure a player does not possess, he loses five points. After the sea witch is satisfied, players then score points for their remaining treasures.

Each type of treasure is examined, with players scoring points as followed:

Most treasures of a type: 12 points
Second: 6 points
Third: 4 points
Fourth: 2 points
Fifth or Sixth: 0 points

If a player possesses a monopoly in a particular type of treasure, he earns a bonus of three additional points.

These points are added to the points players earned during the course of the game. The player who has accumulated the most points is victorious and wins the favor of the handsome prince.

The movement mechanism, along with the playing of the ocean tiles to help facilitate this movement, is reminiscent of Alan Moon’s Elfenland. Added to this is the clever “meld making” phase, wherein players assemble “poker” hands in order to not only determine the important turn order, but also earn bonus perks, such as victory points or additional treasure or ocean tiles. Players must balance these “melds” with the need to conserve enough cards to move about the ocean and gather treasures. This presents the players with tough choices each and every turn.

All of these mechanisms blend together extremely well, yielding a game that is enjoyable, challenging and original. Sure, the theme may be off-putting to some, but do yourself a favor and get past it. The game underneath the “cutesy” theme is quite good.

Keith, Spouey, Jules, Kurt, Jim and I rode the waves across the ocean, collecting treasures and trying to satisfy the sea witch. Amazingly, all of us managed to collect every type of treasure, so no one lost any points for failing to appease the witch. In the end, Kurt and I managed a tie for the favor of the prince.

Finals: Kurt 35, Greg 35, Jules 32, Spouey 30, Keith 26, Jim 21

Ratings: Jim 7.5, Greg 7.5, Kurt 7, Keith 6, Jules 6, Spouey 5

Thread: Overview

gschloesser — 2004-09-17T19:05:43+00:00

Awhile back, Ben Baldanza wrote a very positive review of this Japanese game for Counter magazine. I was certainly interested in obtaining the game, but due to the high import costs, the price was prohibitive. I figured I would content myself with playing the game at Gulf Games or the Gathering. However, I really didn’t place a high priority on organizing a game.

Ken Rice is the only gamer I “know” who lives in Japan. He was scheduled to attend his first Gathering of Friends in April, and he passed along word that he would be able to bring copies of the game for those who desired a copy. The price? Ridiculously low. So, I immediately contacted Ken and reserved a copy.

I didn’t have chance to play the game at the Gathering, but did play it at Gulf Games in July. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, and subsequently played it a few weekends later while I was visiting with Craig Berg and friends in Ohio. I find the game quite good, and it reminds me somewhat of Elfenland.

First, the theme / premise must be mentioned. Players are mermaids exploring the oceans and collecting treasures. Movement is determined by playing cards, which depict dolphins, turtles or seagulls. A penalty must be paid to the sea witch before final scores are tallied. I personally don’t have a problem with the theme, but a few of my Westbank Gamers crew found it, well, silly and unmanly. Hmmm …

The nicely laminated board depicts numerous islands scattered about the ocean. Each island depicts a symbol – turtle, dolphin, or seagull – which is the type of card a player must play in order to move onto it. The islands will also house several treasures, which come in five different varieties – sea shells, coral, crystals, pearls and dragon scales. Some of these treasures are placed face-up, while others are face-down. Players will scurry about the ocean collecting these treasures.

Players each begin the game with seven cards and one “stop” card. This stop card is also a player aid card, but since the text is in Japanese, it is virtually useless for most non-Japanese gamers. The cards will be used not only for movement purposes, but also to form “poker” hands in order to determine the order of movement and the awarding of various perks. It is this card play that gives the game a unique feel and earns it points for originality.

Each round, players will play two cards face-down, then simultaneously reveal them.
Then, each player plays one more face-down card. This can be a movement card, or the stop card. If a player chooses to play his “stop” card, he will play no further cards during this phase. All other players continue to play one more card until all players have played their stop cards. This could take several rounds.

Once all players have completed their card play, the various “hands” are examined to determine who played the best set of cards. The rankings are similar to those used in poker, although not exactly. Hands can consist of a pair, three of a kind, 3 different colors, 2 pair, full house, etc. The highest ranked hand is five of a kind. Each player will receive a bonus based on his hand, which can consist of victory points or the ability to draw a treasure tile or ocean tile. The “five of a kind” hand allows the player to transport his pawn to any location on the board.

Players will subsequently move their pawn based on the strength of their hand. In addition, the player who played the highest ranked hand gets the prince card. This is important, as any ties in the ranking of hands is broken in favor of players seated closest to the player holding the prince in a clockwise fashion. However, a major consideration when playing cards to form your hand is that the cards played during this phase are discarded, and a player must move his pawn with the cards remaining in his hand. So, the more cards used to form your “poker” hand, the fewer cards you will have to move your mermaid. This forces each player to make tough decisions each and every turn.

After all hands are played and the order of play determined, each player chooses one of the six ocean tiles that have been revealed. The ocean tiles come in a variety of shapes, and each one depicts a symbol indicating the type of card which must be played in order to move onto that tile. Some of the tiles will remain on the board throughout the game, while others will be removed at the end of the turn.

Each player then takes his turn by placing the tile he selected, then moving his mermaid across tiles to the islands. As mentioned earlier, in order to move onto a tile or island, the player must play a card that has the same symbol as that depicted on the tile or island. A player may always play any two cards as a “wild” card and move his piece onto an adjacent tile or island.

When a player moves his mermaid onto an island, he may take one of the treasures found there. He may first peek at any face-down treasures before deciding which one to take. When the player takes a treasure, it maintains its face-up or face-down status. This is important as players will never know exactly how many treasures of each type their opponents possess.

An important note is that a player may only take one treasure from an island on a turn. This prevent a player from simply hopping back and forth from a tile to an island, scooping all of the available treasures from that island.

After all players have moved and collected any treasures they can gather, any temporary ocean tiles are removed. Each player must then discard down to two cards, after which they are dealt seven new cards. So, the most cards a player can ever have in his hand at the beginning of a turn is nine cards. Often, it is wise to conserve a card or two, especially if the tiles and islands don’t closely match the cards you possess during a turn.

Five rounds are played in the manner described above. At this point, each player must surrender one of each type of treasure to the sea witch … and who wants to defy her? For each type of treasure a player does not possess, he loses five points. After the sea witch is satisfied, players then score points for their remaining treasures.

Each type of treasure is examined, with players scoring points as followed:

Most treasures of a type: 12 points
Second: 6 points
Third: 4 points
Fourth: 2 points
Fifth or Sixth: 0 points

If a player possesses a monopoly in a particular type of treasure, he earns a bonus of three additional points.

These points are added to the points players earned during the course of the game. The player who has accumulated the most points is victorious and wins the favor of the handsome prince.

The movement mechanism, along with the playing of the ocean tiles to help facilitate this movement, is reminiscent of Alan Moon’s Elfenland. Added to this is the clever “meld making” phase, wherein players assemble “poker” hands in order to not only determine the important turn order, but also earn bonus perks, such as victory points or additional treasure or ocean tiles. Players must balance these “melds” with the need to conserve enough cards to move about the ocean and gather treasures. This presents the players with tough choices each and every turn.

All of these mechanisms blend together extremely well, yielding a game that is enjoyable, challenging and original. Sure, the theme may be off-putting to some, but do yourself a favor and get past it. The game underneath the “cutesy” theme is quite good.

Thread: Overview

gschloesser — 2004-09-17T19:05:28+00:00

Awhile back, Ben Baldanza wrote a very positive review of this Japanese game for Counter magazine. I was certainly interested in obtaining the game, but due to the high import costs, the price was prohibitive. I figured I would content myself with playing the game at Gulf Games or the Gathering. However, I really didn’t place a high priority on organizing a game.

Ken Rice is the only gamer I “know” who lives in Japan. He was scheduled to attend his first Gathering of Friends in April, and he passed along word that he would be able to bring copies of the game for those who desired a copy. The price? Ridiculously low. So, I immediately contacted Ken and reserved a copy.

I didn’t have chance to play the game at the Gathering, but did play it at Gulf Games in July. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, and subsequently played it a few weekends later while I was visiting with Craig Berg and friends in Ohio. I find the game quite good, and it reminds me somewhat of Elfenland.

First, the theme / premise must be mentioned. Players are mermaids exploring the oceans and collecting treasures. Movement is determined by playing cards, which depict dolphins, turtles or seagulls. A penalty must be paid to the sea witch before final scores are tallied. I personally don’t have a problem with the theme, but a few of my Westbank Gamers crew found it, well, silly and unmanly. Hmmm …

The nicely laminated board depicts numerous islands scattered about the ocean. Each island depicts a symbol – turtle, dolphin, or seagull – which is the type of card a player must play in order to move onto it. The islands will also house several treasures, which come in five different varieties – sea shells, coral, crystals, pearls and dragon scales. Some of these treasures are placed face-up, while others are face-down. Players will scurry about the ocean collecting these treasures.

Players each begin the game with seven cards and one “stop” card. This stop card is also a player aid card, but since the text is in Japanese, it is virtually useless for most non-Japanese gamers. The cards will be used not only for movement purposes, but also to form “poker” hands in order to determine the order of movement and the awarding of various perks. It is this card play that gives the game a unique feel and earns it points for originality.

Each round, players will play two cards face-down, then simultaneously reveal them.
Then, each player plays one more face-down card. This can be a movement card, or the stop card. If a player chooses to play his “stop” card, he will play no further cards during this phase. All other players continue to play one more card until all players have played their stop cards. This could take several rounds.

Once all players have completed their card play, the various “hands” are examined to determine who played the best set of cards. The rankings are similar to those used in poker, although not exactly. Hands can consist of a pair, three of a kind, 3 different colors, 2 pair, full house, etc. The highest ranked hand is five of a kind. Each player will receive a bonus based on his hand, which can consist of victory points or the ability to draw a treasure tile or ocean tile. The “five of a kind” hand allows the player to transport his pawn to any location on the board.

Players will subsequently move their pawn based on the strength of their hand. In addition, the player who played the highest ranked hand gets the prince card. This is important, as any ties in the ranking of hands is broken in favor of players seated closest to the player holding the prince in a clockwise fashion. However, a major consideration when playing cards to form your hand is that the cards played during this phase are discarded, and a player must move his pawn with the cards remaining in his hand. So, the more cards used to form your “poker” hand, the fewer cards you will have to move your mermaid. This forces each player to make tough decisions each and every turn.

After all hands are played and the order of play determined, each player chooses one of the six ocean tiles that have been revealed. The ocean tiles come in a variety of shapes, and each one depicts a symbol indicating the type of card which must be played in order to move onto that tile. Some of the tiles will remain on the board throughout the game, while others will be removed at the end of the turn.

Each player then takes his turn by placing the tile he selected, then moving his mermaid across tiles to the islands. As mentioned earlier, in order to move onto a tile or island, the player must play a card that has the same symbol as that depicted on the tile or island. A player may always play any two cards as a “wild” card and move his piece onto an adjacent tile or island.

When a player moves his mermaid onto an island, he may take one of the treasures found there. He may first peek at any face-down treasures before deciding which one to take. When the player takes a treasure, it maintains its face-up or face-down status. This is important as players will never know exactly how many treasures of each type their opponents possess.

An important note is that a player may only take one treasure from an island on a turn. This prevent a player from simply hopping back and forth from a tile to an island, scooping all of the available treasures from that island.

After all players have moved and collected any treasures they can gather, any temporary ocean tiles are removed. Each player must then discard down to two cards, after which they are dealt seven new cards. So, the most cards a player can ever have in his hand at the beginning of a turn is nine cards. Often, it is wise to conserve a card or two, especially if the tiles and islands don’t closely match the cards you possess during a turn.

Five rounds are played in the manner described above. At this point, each player must surrender one of each type of treasure to the sea witch … and who wants to defy her? For each type of treasure a player does not possess, he loses five points. After the sea witch is satisfied, players then score points for their remaining treasures.

Each type of treasure is examined, with players scoring points as followed:

Most treasures of a type: 12 points
Second: 6 points
Third: 4 points
Fourth: 2 points
Fifth or Sixth: 0 points

If a player possesses a monopoly in a particular type of treasure, he earns a bonus of three additional points.

These points are added to the points players earned during the course of the game. The player who has accumulated the most points is victorious and wins the favor of the handsome prince.

The movement mechanism, along with the playing of the ocean tiles to help facilitate this movement, is reminiscent of Alan Moon’s Elfenland. Added to this is the clever “meld making” phase, wherein players assemble “poker” hands in order to not only determine the important turn order, but also earn bonus perks, such as victory points or additional treasure or ocean tiles. Players must balance these “melds” with the need to conserve enough cards to move about the ocean and gather treasures. This presents the players with tough choices each and every turn.

All of these mechanisms blend together extremely well, yielding a game that is enjoyable, challenging and original. Sure, the theme may be off-putting to some, but do yourself a favor and get past it. The game underneath the “cutesy” theme is quite good.

Thread: Re:User Review

Matt Boehland — 2004-09-01T21:59:56+00:00

pinkunicorn (#52149),

It becomes expensive, but I wouldn't really blame either of them. Shipping baordgames from Japan is expensive, and there's not enough other new JPN boardgames for them to be able to save much money by combining shipments (unless they picked up the line of Aeronaut games..)

Thread: Re:User Review

pinkunicorn — 2004-09-01T11:09:23+00:00

Also, each tile has one of three symbols: a dolphin, turtle, seagull, or mermaid.

It seems your math got wet.

Another downside is the price for North Americans (and presumably Europeans). Funagain and Boulder Games are selling it for US$65-$70. (I had my sister-in-law pick it up in Japan…she made it into a gift, so she won’t tell me the price, but I presume it’s much cheaper in eastern Asia).

I got a copy in Tokyo today, at slightly less than $50 (I don't know the exact exchange rates).

I'm definitely looking forward to trying this out when I get home again.

Thread: 2 VP per treasure chip.

dkeisen — 2004-08-20T05:49:49+00:00

Seems you get 2 VP for every treasure chip you pick up, including those you get by teleporting or by melding an Ocean March (a full house).

You are supposed to score these 2 VP immediately.

Seems less error prone to just bag this and score 2 VP per chip you have at the end of the game, immediately before the tribute to the witch?

Or is there some way a player can get a chip where 2 VP is not awarded so you need to track those separately and might as well score the 2 VP immediately when you get a chip other ways?

Thread: Aquamarine Waltz Tile clarification.

dkeisen — 2004-08-20T05:47:28+00:00

If you meld an "Aquamarine Waltz", i.e., one of each kind of card, you get a free ocean tile. The rules say you cannot check its symbol.

Does that mean just before you select it? Or can you not check it until after you have chosen the tile you choose by virtue of every player choosing a tile in turn? Not until after you have chosen which tile to place first?

When can you look at your free tile? And when do you have to show it to the group?

Thread: Session Report

daw65 — 2004-05-13T23:25:07+00:00

Four of us got together at Jeff's house to play a couple of games. Four games were nominated: Railroad Dice, Tikal, Mermaid Rain, and Merchant of Venus. The choice? Mermaid Rain

We started pretty orderly, with Sterling and Jeff staying on one side of the board, and Dave and Rich staying on the other. And about halfway through the game the treasure counts were about even: Rich had 4, and everyone else had 5. At this point Dave played a big set to teleport to a different area of the board to collect the low-frequency treasures (a pearl and a dragon scale), and Rich got there via "deep sea movement" when the wave tile he was standing on disappeared, but that just made that section of the board crowded. Sterling did head toward the other direction, and Jeff eventually did, too. On three occasions players were stymied by the other players' tile placements, and had to either spend extra to get somewhere, or just not go anywhere. Only Jeff avoided that fate. In the fifth and final turn Sterling played a five of a kind, to be able to teleport. He jumped right to where Dave and Rich were standing, and sucked up two of the remaining treasures on that side of the board. That hurt those two a bit, and it gave Jeff free rein to scramble about the islands alone and collect more, and more rare, treasures.

With the fifth round complete, we tallied the scores. Everyone had one of each item. Jeff had monopolies on pearls and crystals, earning him 15 points apiece. He also had the most dragon scales, though Sterling did have second place in that category. Dave earned 12 points for his lead in coral, and Sterling had second there as well. And Dave, Rich and Sterling all had one shell, to divide the 22 points among them. It was Jeff who truly wowed the Prince, with 82 points, to Sterling's 46, Dave's 46, and Rich's 43.

Thread: Re:User Review

Jonathan Degann — 2003-08-26T17:11:30+00:00

Ah, you're correct about us playing the face down chits improperly. Thanks for the catch, and I look forward to playing with corrected rules.

Without going into great deal on Elfenland, I don't find the game to be solotaireish at all. There is an enormous amount of analysis in determining where opponents are likely to play chits and the degree to which that will help or hurt you. You are always taking calculated risks on the path you'll take, or the order in which you'll play your chits, and of which ones to play in order to gain flexibility should your plans go awry. Additionally, given the fact that you are typically using other players chits as part of your own path, there is ample opportunity to use chits in your own hand to muck up other players.

Thread: Session Report

Alan Kwan — 2003-08-25T16:50:45+00:00

After some games of Domaine and Ra, we have 6 players left and an hour or so before we need to eat dinner, so we settled for Mermaid Rain, which nicely accomodates 6 players. The 6 players were Alan (me), Waa, Sunny, Him, Gaan, and KC.

Being a commercial institution, we have the house rule that the owner of the game gets to be the start player. So I was the first start player.

On the first round, there were two mermaid wave tiles. Him (being a novice player) played a full-house, Gaan played 3-suit, and everybody else played 3-card or a pair. But Him didn't get a mermaid tile, which allowed me, who played 3-card and went third, to get a mermaid tile. Since a mermaid tile can be traversed with any one card, this gave me a convenient advantage. Usually, the players who go first should take the mermaid tiles; if they take another tile because they want the shape, this allows a later player to get a mermaid tile, and that player has more cards to take advantage of it. We also warned Gaan of the problem with playing 3-suit: for a 3rd card you get an extra wave tile but no bonus points, so it is basically an inefficient play which should be used only if one specifially has a good reason to need an extra wave tile, or to go before other 3-card/3-suit players. Anyway, Gaan is a weird player who tends to play for 'style' instead of play to win.

On the second round, I saw that there was a dragon scale between Waa and me, so I played a high 4-card in order to go before Waa. At the end of the second round, we noticed that Sunny was all alone on one side of the board while everybody else was on the other side. Thus, Sunny was easily playing low in melds and grabbing treasures, while the rest of us had to struggle and compete for treasures.

At the end of the game, everybody had a set so no points were deducted. Sunny had a few more treasures than me, but I won by a small edge because of my concentration in dragon scales and pearls: my 1 dragon scale and 2 pearls scored me 6 + 12 = 18 points. It turned out that Sunny had got 3 dragon scales, which was too many; he got 12 points for his three dragon scales, while I got 18 for my 3 aforementioned treasures. In Mermaid Rain, diversification is basically better than concentration. Another observation in this game was that the players ended up with fewer shells than crystals and corals. This had happened before too, a result of players intentionally avoiding shells because they think they are the cheapest. But in fact, some players had too many crystals and corals, and an extra shell instead of one of those could have won them more points. Actually, I was aware of this possibility when I was playing my final move (since I've seen it before), but because there were no shells within easy reach, I just got a coral. It turned out that the coral scored me 4 points, while a shell would have scored me 6. If one pays attention to the face-up treasure chips everyone has got, one can idnetify this trend when it happens and go for shells for some good points.

The scores were close, but Him (being a novice) was a bit behind because he played full-house (an inefficient play which should be used only in endgame or tactically important situations) in the first two rounds, and Gaan was in last place because of his 'stylish' but meaningless 3-suit plays.

Thread: Re:User Review

Alan Kwan — 2003-08-23T09:05:57+00:00

FinbarSaunders (#18516),

A typo of "small chips", of course.

Another possibility for Jonathan's complaint is that they have mis-played a rule. When you enter a space with face-down chips, you don't pick blindly; you take and inspect the face-down chips, and then choose any one among the face-up and face-down chips in the space.

Thus, the only cases where you "pick blindly" is when you play a full-house, or when you enter a space where all the face-up chips have already been taken. But in the latter case, you know what face-up chips your opponents have chosen over the face-down chips (and that they have not re-visited the space to get the face-down chips), so you should know what to expect, if you pay attention.

Thread: Re:User Review

FinbarSaunders — 2003-08-23T05:59:28+00:00

Alan Kwan (#18509),

What's that you say about Mermaid's having small chits?

Thread: Re:User Review

Alan Kwan — 2003-08-23T03:58:54+00:00

Jonathan Degann (#18458),

There are several advantages of Mermaid Rain over Elfenland. In Elfenland, you try to make a grand tour around the board, but that is to some extent a multi-player solitaire. Someone has commented that any player interaction is "accidental", and I would tend to agree. In Mermaid Rain, the race aspect is very strong. A player often have to play intentionally to beat an opponent to a certain wave tile or a certain treasure chit. In the latter case, the interaction is often specifically targetted: I need to play before /him/ by beating his poker hand, or he'll get the treasure before me. In Elfenland, a problem of the game is that a player has more cards than chits. Thus usually everyone will tend to play all the chits for himself, and one can afford to put a chit in an opponent's way only when he has one he can't use. In Mermaid Rain, there is tension when one needs to beat certain opponents in the poker play, or when one hopes that a tile or a treasure he needs will not be taken by players before him. In Elfenland, I feel that the play is mostly random, and there is little tension. Especially, I feel that the chit acquisition mechanism is flawed, as everyone wants the good chits, so soon the face-up supply is filled with lame chits which nobody wants, and everyone just draws blindly. So the game is mostly luck of the draw. The luck in the card draw is high, too. In Mermaid Rain, there is some card luck too, but the degree is minor compared to Elfenland: there are only three types of cards which are symmetrically equal in "power" (unlike Elfenland), and you need to play just any two cards when you don't have the card you need to move. Thus, while Elfenland is a game which pits you against a rigid system and lady luck, Mermaid Rain is a game which pits you against other players in a system which allows more flexibility and choices.

One common mistake by novice players in Mermaid Rain is to play too large melds. The only case when you "draw a treasure chit blind" is when you play a full-house. But as I have explained elsewhere, a 5-card play is an inefficient play which should be used only when you can't otherwise get (good) treasures by moving on the board with your cards. Playing a full house costs you 5 cards and gives you only a treasure and no bonus points. If you play a 3-of-a-kind and use the 2 cards you saved to get a treasure, you get an additinoal 4 bonus points. If you play a pair, you save 3 cards; even if you have to play these 3 cards to get a treasure, you still have 1 bonus point, but if you can get a treasure using only 2 cards, you save one more card, which is very valuable. And in all these latter cases, you have control over which treasures to go for when you move on the board, as opposed to the blind pick. Basically, the game rewards playing small melds and using the cards for movement to get treasures, but the players are under the dilemma of the competition for wave tiles and treasure chits. If your opponents play large melds, they don't have cards to move and get treasures on the board, so they will leave lots of treasures on the board, which means that you can easily get treasures with movement at good card efficiency. You can beat them easily with more bonus points and more and better treasures! It is true that Mermaid Rain would be a very 'flat' game if players play large melds (esp. full-house) all the time, but that is a sub-optimal strategy by which a game should not be judged.

IMO, the main advantage of Elfenland over Mermaid Rain is the components. Elfenland is a standard German production, with Doris map and thick, large chips and good quality cards. Mermaid Rain has a small map, small chits, and cards you tear from a sheet. But in the game play aspect, I like Mermaid Rain much more.

Thread: User Review

Jonathan Degann — 2003-08-22T14:11:02+00:00

The game has understandably been compared to Elfenland. As in Elfenland, you are building paths between points, and spending cards to travel over the paths. While the game systems are in the same family, they play very differently.

In Mermaid Rain:
You play on a free form hex map. Now you are literally building the paths using tiles that contain 2-3 hexes in varying configurations.
You are trying to pick up chits located around the board. There is no need to visit every location, but there is a need to arrive before all the chits are gone.
Your score is based on having majorities in the different types of chits, and also on having at least one of each type.
The control for moving first and having ones choice of path tiles is a subsystem in itself. Players now bid 2-5 cards in a competition to have the best poker hand.
The nifty part of this is that the cards you bid are the cards you would otherwise use for travelling. So being able to move first and have first choice of the tile you play comes at a cost of mobility. I found myself often in the position of not wanting to bid high - but then finding that my choice of tile remaining was useless, forcing me to develop an entirely new approach to my turn.

I enjoyed the game, but did not find that it measured up to Elfenland. Some of the problems may be correctible, some are in the nature of the game.

The greatest source of weakness is the fact that there is no need to plan a grand tour of the board. It is entirely possible to zig zag around a localized area of the board picking up whatever chits are nearby. One of the really appealing aspects of Elfenland is the need to engage in some long term planning, and to develop alternative strategies when unexpected obstacles or opportunities arise. In Mermaid Rain, the focus is on just maximizing the payoff for the turn, and just ending up in a decent spot for future actions.

Additionally, the scoring is very chaotic. You are aiming for majorities in any of 5 different types of chips, with very little control. By game end, a player will have taken about 10-12 chits. You lose 5 points for each type that you're missing - so players will typically have 4-5 of the types. Now everyone LOSES on chip in each type. Therefore, it is common to have a majority with only a single chip of that type - and doing so earns you huge points - up to 15. Furthermore, about half of the chips you take in a game are drawn blind, so there is not much way of preventing a player from getting a sole majority. You wouldn't know it if it was happening, and you might have to just draw your next tiles blind anyway. Often the difference between a getting 15 point jump and a worthless tile was a matter of luck. This is an area of the game that desperately needs to be retooled.

Still, I'm a big fan of the Elfenland system - it's one of the freshest games around - and it's welcome to see a game that takes some of those ideas into a new direction. This may not be a long term keeper - but I do look forward to future playings.

Thread: Session Report

daw65 — 2003-08-20T13:36:39+00:00

One more change of personnel, as Alice decided to call it a night. Helen stepped in, and we played a new game, Mermaid Rain.

Mermaid Rain has a theme unlike any other game. The players are mermaids, surfing the waves to find treasures, in the hopes of using them to woo the Prince. But first, they must pay the Witch Hag for a potion that will make them human, because after all, a Prince can't marry a mermaid, right?

The game started innocently enough. Stiev, Jim, and Helen wound up on one side of the board, while Dave started on the other end. In fact, Dave was left alone on his side for most of the game, just sailing along and picking up treasures. In that first round Stiev started a little slowly. Apparently he overdid his meld, and wound up with not quite enough cards to move like he wanted to. The second hand was kind of interesting in that everyone bid the same meld, one pair. With more cards in hand, there was a lot more movement. At one point in the third round Jim deliberately tried to hem Helen in, playing a tile for which he felt certain she didn't have a card. It turned out to work for that hand, but Helen ended up keeping cards in her hand, to carry over for the fifth and final round.

In that final round Dave made two miscalculations. First, he figured that he only had need of four cards, and so bid a third card unnecessarily, trying to fake out the other players. He also assumed that in this final round he'd still be all alone on his side of the board. Both ended up being quite wrong. Stiev and Helen both melded big, laying out five of a kind. The bonus for a five of a kind is the ability to teleport to anywhere on the board. Both Helen and Stiev teleported over to Dave's area, taking treasures before he could get to them. Also, with his low, one pair bid, Dave went last, and had to take a tile for which he had no travel cards. If he had had that extra card that he bid, he could have used it for a two-card movement, and still collected two treasures. As it was, he only could get one.

After all five rounds, we tallied up the final scores. Everyone had one each of all five types, so there were no penalties. In the majorities count, Helen tied for two firsts, had one first all to herself, and tied for second once. It was enough to give her nine points more than her closest competitor, and the victory (and the Prince!).

Thread: official rules clarification

Alan Kwan — 2003-08-14T13:24:06+00:00

You can get only one treasure chit from each treasure space per turn. This also includes any treasure you get using the "Mermaid Rain" (5 of a kind) special teleport. If you teleport to a treasure space (in practice, one would always want to teleport to a treasure space) and get a treasure, you cannot get another treasure from the same space on the same game turn.

Thanks to Group SNE for the reply to my question.

Thread: Re:Session Report

MisterCranky — 2003-06-30T14:01:06+00:00

Hopefully it IS worth the $45 I shelled out at Origins for it. My guess is that more Asian exhibitors (if not the same fellow from Origins) at other large cons will also bring some copies of this, so that probably bodes well for people near Indianapolis, next month....

Thread: Re:User Review

shumyum — 2003-06-25T20:35:04+00:00

Alan Kwan (#9934),

Yes, your analyses here and in other comments are spot on and I hadn't noticed how the treasure distrubition stacked up per player per round. It seems two treasures per turn per player was designed to be the average, so going for three every once in a while is a definite goal. However, many times you see a tile in the pool that will be absolutely worthless to you (you have no turtle cards and there's a turtle tile)...and you know that if you go last, there is the possibility you will get stuck with it.

I think it is also worth going into areas that you think others will ignore, and "burning your bridges" (deplete the treasure sites along the way) as you go there. I have lost at least two games because I've found myself at the end of the game in a part of the board that has been completely picked clean...with no chance of getting to any treasure whatsoever.

Thread: Re:User Review

Alan Kwan — 2003-06-25T19:48:24+00:00

Thanks for the detailed review.

I've just taken a closer look at the various set-up maps today. The basic map has 50 treasures. "Mermaid 3" (for 3 players) has 29 treasures. "Mermaid 4" (for a "tight" 4-player game) has 40 treasures, and "Mermaid 6" has 60 treasures.

So, it seems that the standard is to place 10 treasures on the board for each player.

Each turn, you are dealt 7 cards, and have to play at least 2 cards in surf prediciton. So you can use up to 5 cards each turn for movement. Over 5 turns, that's 25 cards. At an optimal 2 cards per treasure, that's 12 treasures per player, which is more than the 10 per player set up on the board. Thus, if the players have been getting treasures efficiently, the race for the remaining treasures can get quite intense in the late game.

While one may use the basic set-up for 4 beginners while learning the game, for "gamers" who want more competition, the "Mermaid 4" set-up should be used once everyone is familiar with the game.

One may play more cards in the meld, in order to get more points. A 4-of-a-kind is worth 7, two pairs is worth 6, and one pair is worth only 1, but you have two more cards for movement, which may get you one more treasure. A treasure is usually worth more than 5 or 6 points, but not always. (It depends a lot on which treasure: dragon scales and pearls are often worth more, obviously.) If the players are getting few treasures, each treasure one gets is worth more, so automatically playing 4-of-a-kind's every turn is probably a losing strategy. But sometimes (due to treasure depletion or unsuitable wave tiles) one can't even get a treasure with 2 cards.

Note that the 5 treasure types have different rarities: dragon scales being the rarest, and pearls the second rarest.

Thread: User Review

shumyum — 2003-06-25T19:04:51+00:00

Under the sea, under the sea
Darling it’s better
Down where it’s wetter
Take it from me
-Disney’s “The Little Mermaid”

Like the movie quoted above, the premise of Mermaid Rain, a delightful strategic board game from Japan, was lifted the from the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale. The big difference is that the land lubbin’ prince has inspired not one, but up to a half dozen impressionable young mermaid sisters to give up their aquatic paradise – and he’ll only take one of them. The mermaids must first make a tribute of treasures to the Sea Witch in order to get a Potion of Leg Growth, and then they must compete with each other to win the prince’s heart with gifts of pearls, dragon scales and whatnot. The game itself concerns collecting those treasures throughout the ocean, using sea creatures as transportation. The treasures lead to victory points and the mermaid with the most victory points gets the prince. The losers presumably become Seaworld attendants or perhaps move to New York City in search of Tom Hanks and John Candy.

The game takes five rounds and each round consists of two distinct phases: a surf-predicting phase (a fresh approach to determining turn order) and a surf-riding phase (where the mermaids move around the oceanic board collecting treasures).

Surf prediction

Each player starts a round with a hand of seven to nine cards dealt from a deck with three different types of cards: dolphins, turtles and seagulls. In the surf-predicting phase, each player chooses a subset of cards (up to five of them) to construct a poker hand. Whoever has the best hand goes first in the surf-riding phase, the second best goes second, and so on. There are no ranks on the cards, just the three animals, so there are no straights or flushes (which is too bad, considering the watery theme). With initial hands of up to nine cards to choose from and only three types of cards, it is likely that almost any hand can be constructed…there actually isn’t as much “luck of the draw” in this phase as you would expect. If two players show equally ranked hands, the tiebreaker goes to the person closest to the player who has the “prince card”. The owner of the prince card is chosen at random at the start of the game (actually the rules suggest it goes to the person who had most recently been to an aquarium), and for subsequent rounds it passes to the player who played the best poker hand in the previous round.

Simple enough, but there are three twists:

The first twist is that each type of hand confers a special bonus. For the most part, the better the hand, the better the bonus: five-of-a-kind (dubbed a Mermaid Rain) allows the player to teleport anywhere they like on the board in the next phase, four-of-a-kind (a Mermaid Squall) gives 7 victory points, a full house (an Ocean March) gives the player a free treasure, and so on down to one pair (a Mermaid Raindrop) giving one victory point and the Octopus (two unmatched cards): no bonus.

The second twist is that the poker hands do not have to contain five cards (if you just want to play one pair, you only have to play two cards) and any cards not used in the first phase can be used in the second phase: each card carries the potential to move the mermaid one space in her journey to collect treasures. The catch is that the best poker hands have the most cards, so although a good hand gives a good bonus and allows the player to go early in turn order (which can be a big advantage), it also slows the player down by using up the “fuel” needed for the movement phase.

The last twist is that the hands are not revealed all at once. All the players pick two cards and reveal them simultaneously. Then the players reveal additions to the poker hand one card at a time (again, simultaneously). If a player wants to stop growing her hand at (let's say) three-of-a-kind (a Mermaid Mist), the fourth card she plays will be a decoy card (which has the same design on the back and a reference chart on the front). The other players won’t know that this player is not going for a better hand until she turns the decoy card over. This leads to opportunities for bluffing. As an example, a common situation is when two players have thus far shown four-of-a-kind. If player A has the prince card and goes for five-of-a-kind and the other player plays their decoy card (staying at four-of-a-kind), then the first player has essentially wasted a card (and to top it off, the teleport bonus is often worse than the 7 victory point bonus); but if the player A stays with their four-of-kind, player B has the potential of beating player A out.

Surf riding

The second phase is the surf-riding phase. Whoever played the best poker hand goes first, whoever had the second best hand goes second and so on. A player does two things on her turn: she places a surf tile and then moves her mermaid pawn. At the very beginning of each round (even before the poker phase), a small pool of surf tiles are turned over from facedown draw piles. The number of tiles in the pool equals the number of players. The tiles are placed on the board and essentially form watery roads for the mermaids to surf upon. There are four different shapes (some long, some short, some curved, some fat) and they cannot be placed such that they cover other surf tiles, treasure sites, and various other obstacles. Also, each tile has one of three symbols: a dolphin, turtle, seagull, or mermaid. Each treasure site on the board also has one of the three animal symbols (none have a mermaid). The treasure sites are permanently on the board, but the actual treasures are distributed randomly on them, with one to four treasures on each treasure site.

Once a player chooses and places her surf tile, she moves her mermaid pawn. Each surf tile and each treasure site constitutes a “space” and to move to an adjacent space, a player must discard a card that has the matching animal as the space she wants to go to. So if a player wants to move on to a dolphin surf tile along to a seagull treasure site, they must discard a dolphin and a seagull from their hand. Mermaid tiles are “wild”: any type of card can be discarded to travel upon them. A player can travel on surf tiles that have been played previously and they can go to multiple treasure sites in a turn (but not to the same one twice). A treasure can be chosen each time a pawn visits a site, immediately giving the player two victory points.

Thus, it is apparent why it is important to go early in turn order: certain surf tiles will be much more useful than others, either for all players (the mermaid tiles are highly sought after) or for your particular plans (perhaps only the curved tile will be able to get your mermaid to the treasure site she needs to get to). If you go last, you will get the dregs and have to make do. However, it is also apparent why you don’t want to waste cards in the first phase: each treasure site will take at least two cards to get to, so playing four-of-a-kind for your poker hand, as opposed to a pair, could easily cost you a treasure. In the games I’ve played, players usually can nab one or two treasures per turn; a three treasure haul is a rare coup (although it IS theoretically possible to get four treasures in one turn). Because there are only five rounds, getting two or three treasures per round, as opposed to one or two, can be very significant.

Importantly, any cards that are not used in the surf-riding phase (up to two of them) get carried over to the next round. Seven new cards are dealt at the beginning of each round, which is why it is possible to have up to nine cards in a hand.

Certain types of surf tiles disappear after the round they are played while others are permanent. Thus, as the game progresses, longer distance routes are available. The last round has the board filled with surf tiles, with just a handful of treasures left for the players to race to.

Who gets the prince?

After the five rounds, the mermaids must pay tribute to the Sea Witch to get their humanizing potion (for each one of the five types of the treasure and player does not have, they lose five points) and with the remaining treasure, they try to impress the prince. For each of the five treasure types, the player with the most gets 12 points, the player with the second most gets 6 points and so on. Players who tie split the proceeds of the two positions (a tie for first nets (12+6)/2 = 9 points).

The final analysis

That was a rather long-winded summary, but rest assured Mermaid Rain is not complicated in the least and it is quite easy to pick up, even for "non-gamers". All the mechanics are quite intuitive and the two phases fit very well with one another. In the end, it is an exceptionally elegant and tight game (the only exception is that the final scoring is a bit fiddly, causing a slight anticlimax). The choices are gut wrenching and it is quite satisfying to pull off a long profitable ocean journey.

The downside is that the player interaction is quite subtle and it is almost entirely in the surf-predicting phase: is it worth beating out that other player with a killer poker hand? Perhaps I should lay off because I think they won’t take the tile I want, or perhaps I need to go first to deny another player of the tile they really need. There is essentially no interaction in the second phase (it’s more of a solitaire puzzle) except when the treasures become so rare that everyone is racing for the same ones. But even with the races, the interaction goes back to the first phase: whoever has the best poker hand will get first dibs at the treasures in the second phase (if they leave themselves the right cards to carry off the journey). This subtle player interaction can be a bonus, of course, if you are playing with players who don’t like confrontation. I hate to stereotype, but the decidedly girly theme carries over quite nicely to the comparatively peaceful gameplay. We had no problem at all with Mermaid Rain's girly nature (after all, the world desperately needs more girly board games), but your mileage may vary.

Another downside is the price for North Americans (and presumably Europeans). Funagain and Boulder Games are selling it for US$65-$70. (I had my sister-in-law pick it up in Japan…she made it into a gift, so she won’t tell me the price, but I presume it’s much cheaper in eastern Asia).

Is it worth it? Well, many of the components are quite nice, especially the art: the rules have a comic book story, but the game itself is not cartoony in the least; the animals are done in realistic watercolor and the board is quite snazzy (some may complain that it isn’t bright enough, but in my opinion, the washed-out look fits the theme perfectly). The surf tiles are nice and thick and look cool in all their shapes. If you are looking for Japanese quirkiness, you’ll find it in the rulebook comic, the premise, and the funny names of the poker hands...but the game itself is completely no-nonsense.

However, a big problem (in my opinion) is that the board is too small, which means the treasure tokens are tiny and difficult to pick up and move around. I get the feeling it was originally designed to be twice as big. Also, the treasure tokens are just cardboard chits and the playing pieces are generic plastic pawns…no mermaid miniatures I’m sorry to say. I would rank the component quality a step down from German fare, but a couple steps up from Hasbro’s standard games.

All in all, the game is splendid and quite fresh. Despite its similarity to Elfenland, I felt it conjured up completely unique kinds of strategy. All aspects of it fit together nicely and smoothly; it seems to have been very well play-tested. It is on the light side (on par with Settlers of Catan, I suppose), but it is not at all insubstantial. Don’t let the poker aspect fool you: it is definitely not a luckfest. As a bonus, it scales quite well from 3 to 6 players (you just add more treasures to the board if more people of playing). It is completely language independent if you get the excellent rules translation available here on boardgamegeek. The "not-quite-there" component quality could make the expensive import price difficult to swallow, but if you are really into mermaids or have money to burn, I can assure you the gameplay itself will not disappoint you.

Under the sea. under the sea
There'll be no accusations
Just friendly crustaceans
Under the sea!
-Homer Simpson

Thread: Re:baisc strategy

shumyum — 2003-06-25T15:45:06+00:00

Alan Kwan (#9669),

Yes, this decision (small or large hand) is the key to the game and what makes it so great. The seven points for four-of-a-kind is not quite enough to go for just for the bonus. Five-of-kind is usually a very bad idea unless your mermaid is in the middle of nowhere OR (more likely) there is just one tile that is useful to you AND another player (then you get the nice bluffing mechanism to kick in).

In the final rounds, I think it can become more important to "win" the poker round because the treasures become quite few and you may need to go first in order to make sure another player doesn't get the treasure you need.

Thread: Re:Session Report

shumyum — 2003-06-25T13:49:56+00:00

It is indeed a fun light game that has clealy been well playtested. I have written a long review and will post it soon. The worst thing about the game (for the North Americans and Europeans), is that the import prices I have seen aren't worth it. The game IS fairly unique and the theme and art are sufficiently zesty, but it isn't unique or zesty enough to shell out the $70 Funagain wants for it (IMO).

Thread: Re:Session Report

Alexfrog — 2003-06-24T19:15:03+00:00

I dont know how this game works yet, or what all you were talking about, but reading this report really makes me want to play the game...

If only someone I know, or the local game store, actually had it.

Thread: Session Report

Alan Kwan — 2003-06-23T13:55:50+00:00

Yesterday was our regular gaming session at "City University". We played two games of Mermaid Rain, as well as other interesting games such as Inkognito, Amun-Re, King's Breakfast, and Urland. I myself ran the Mermaid Rain games, and then Urland. In our Mermaid Rain games, we had a mix of first-time players with players who have played one or more times.

The first was a 4-player game, using the basic set-up. (For those who do not have the game,) there are 4 recommended set-ups: a "basic" set-up usually used for 4 or 5 players, a 3-player set-up using only 2/3 of the board, a "harsh" set-up (i.e. with fewer treasures placed on the board) for a more "competitive" 4-player game, and a "loose" set-up (more treasures) for 6 players if they don't want the competition to get too cutthroat. Since there are novice players, we used the basic set-up (instead of the harsh set-up) to give everybody more leeway. (Also, there is an option, for players who want more "randomness", to ignore the specified quota for face-up treasures and place all treasures randomly.)

We had an uncommon initial treasure distribution: in one corner, there were two dragon scales and two pearls (the two "rare" treasure types) in one corner of the board. It seemed that the player who got to start at that corner would have a significant advantage. I won the first wave-prediction bid, and took that corner. I then followed my strategy of bidding low and saving my cards for movement, and got it running smoothly. And I went on to win the game without much hassle.

In the second game, we had a more average treasure distribution, with some starting spots better than others, but no overwhelmingly advantageous ones. I played "three suits" to get a better turn order, and while the players before me had taken the starting spaces with the dragon scales, I got a corner with two pearls. That should have been okay, but I didn't put enough thought in when choosing my tile and just took the only remaining "stay" tile, and when it's my turn to move, I realized that I couldn't get two treasures with my cards. Worse yet, I needed dolphins for turn two, but my turn two card deal had only one dolphin. In retrospect, it could be said that I played my first turn poorly, because I placed the (stay) tiles so that I needed many of one type of card (namely dolphins). I also played the second turn bidding poorly: if I had bid one more card, I would have got a tile which would have allowed me to move smoothly, and I would have got more points from the meld. My mishaps delayed my march towards the center of the board, and other players who got there first got the dragon scales first, so I couldn't find a dragon scale throughout the course of the game (costing me a 5 VP penalty). In the late game, I again had a turn or two which were not smooth, and I ended up in fourth place.

In the second game, with some more experienced players (some have at least been watching the first game), and with a more crowded environment with 5 players in the "basic" set-up, the treasures were depleted more quickly, and it soon became difficult for everyone to easily grab treasures with movement. In the first game, we had only 4 players, and some players played larger melds for the points (which would generally be a mistake if one could otherwise grab treasures smoothly with movement), so more treasures were left on the board for the taking. If the set-up was crowded and the players were conscious about grabbing treasures, depletion can become a significant issue - one which I didn't feel in my games before. When the board is depleted and the other players are racing towards the same treasures, it becomes important to play larger melds in order to go first and get the treasures before the competition. Also, it becomes more important to consider strategically heading towards areas with more treasures left, rather than just grabbing nearby treasures tactically each turn.

Another interesting discovery was about "stay" wave tiles. While it is generally convenient to have a few near you, so that you can better plan your next play with the tiles already in place, they can backfire if you are careless about their placement, or if you place too many. While you can travel back and forth around a tile and grab all the tresures around it, you'll be needing the same card to surf the wave turn after turn, and the odds are that you may be dealt a shortage one turn or another. (This can be especially problematic if the stay tiles have the same symbols as the treasure spaces.) If you get too many "stay" tiles in your area, you can't take advantage of any mermaid tiles you may get (none of the "stay" tiles have the mermaid symbol), and also the existing tiles may block the placement of new tiles you are getting, thus confining you to tiles of certain shapes.

I suppose another player could have changed the result of the first game, provided that he was aware of the threat, by making an early rush to my area and grabbing some of those rare treasures. An extra tile from a 3-suit meld on turn one, or an early turn order for turn two, could have accomplished that.

Doing poorly in the second game, and then understanding the reasons why, has especially improved my opinions on the game. While Mermaid Rain is mostly a "medium-to-light weight" game and not too taxing to play, there are interesting things going on, and some interesting subtleties in the game. The game seems to get more fun when the players are more experienced and start to use the more crowded set-ups for more heated competition. This factor, that the players can customize the level of cutthroat competition in their game by choosing the appropriate set-up, is another plus in my opinion. Despite that the components are a bit fiddly (because they are too small), the mechanics are well-designed and fun to play.

Thread: baisc strategy

Alan Kwan — 2003-06-17T13:04:19+00:00

Although there are rewards for melding various hands, it is generally best to meld as few cards as possible and save your cards for movement and treasure-grabbing, *provided* that you can get one (good) treasure for every two cards. (A treasure is generally good unless you already have too many of a type.) A treasure is roughly worth 2 plus 6 points, so it is better to for example play a pair than to play 2 pairs or 4-of-a-kind, provided that you are getting a good treasure with the two extra cards. However, if your turn order is too late, you may end up with an awkward wave tile. So, you need to meld more cards primarily to avoid that. If you have a "stay" wave tile near you from last turn, and you have saved some cards and thus have more flexibility in movement play, it may be okay to go last. Don't be afraid to take a 1-point deficit by playing "no pair" or "2 pairs", if you need to save the right cards for movement.