This card seems too strong the way we played it, but I couldn't really find an alternate interpretation. Here's what we did: if you have Coliseum, you do your Legionary role exactly as normal (place card(s) from hand, get said card(s) from both pool and adjacent opponents). You then, in addition, steal any matching card(s) from their Clientele(s) and put them directly in your Vault.

In our game, I had Coliseum built and led Legionary, and also had a Legionary Client. So I put down two cards (the two "best" I had, namely Patron and Architect). I then gathered those two from the pool, took them from the hands of my opponents (I got three total from them, so five cards moved into my Stockpile), and moved three cards from their Clienteles into my Vault (two Patrons and one Arch, for 8 VPs plus a nice lead for the Patron bonus). I did this again later for "cheaper" cards but still netted huge gains on them, as I locked in the Laborer bonus chip too (plus the nice side effect of weakening their Clients). Then it was stolen by the Prison and I ended the game soon after, winning by a pretty wide margin (40 to...29 and 20, IIRC).

The above is just one example, but this one building netted me ~25 points by itself (3 for the building, 6 in bonus chips, 14ish in "stolen" Vault points). It wasn't like I had to go crazily out of my way to do this; I just built it midgame and followed the path of least resistance. Does anyone else think this card is overpowered? Please let me know what I'm missing here.

Hi Jon,

Yes it sounds like you're playing correctly. The Coliseum is definitely powerful, especially if you're not expecting it, but there are several ways to defend against it:

1) Because it's a [][][] building your opponents can usually see it coming--Palisades are common and make you immune to it so it's not unusual to start a Coliseum and discover you've got Palisades on both sides of you before it's completed.

2) The Coliseum function only works while there's space in your Vault; so when it's operational it can make sense for other players to start playing a lot of Merchant roles; if you don't end the game quickly then they can recapture the advantage--especially if you've put some mid / low value cards in there because the clients were available.

3) Often when I start a Coliseum, Eric or Anne immediately start a Prison in retaliation and we sit there for most of the game with both buildings one off completion.

This is a card that really demands a reaction from the other players; it certainly has the potential for a big pay-off, but it also has the possibility of going nowhere (or worse, if it gets stolen). That said, it probably is a little too powerful--it's one of a short list of cards that we're investigating toning down (or up) slightly for the 2nd edition.

Thanks, Ed. Couple of follow-ons:


In my situation, no Palisades were available in our game, as I grabbed the last one for myself (so the Prison, which I knew was coming, wasn't too bad for me). More generally, I think it would be unfortunate to have to consider holding a Palisade in anticipation of a possible Coliseum build. But I agree with what you're saying if it's an early build.


Well, it was built midgame, so none of us were in any danger of maxing our Vaults (mine was...12? 14? and I finished with 9 cards in it). One player did exactly as you suggest and made a decent run, but of course I was able to keep pace somewhat and had a *huge* stockpile to work with. More generally, it's the ease of this that's unsettling. Normally, getting things in your Vault is (desirably) clunky and slow, esp. as you're trying to time it so you minimize your opponents' benefit on the whole Laborer/Legionary --> Merchant cycle. Coliseum cuts that cycle by more than half, *and* has the very nasty additional perq of harming their Clienteles.


Yes, this was our situation, and the other two agreed it felt like that might be the best defense. Of course, I was the only Palisade owner.... Prison is likely to be built in any game, but considering there are only three of them in the deck, I'm not sure it's not too situational. I also think that, just as with Palisades above, if there's a single card that you have to gear everything around, it's likely overpowered. Might be a tautology, there....


I have to think the percentages are vastly on the side of big payout, as you have decent foreknowledge of your Vault size and the presence of Prisons.

I like the idea of the Coliseum, I just think the effect should be mitigated. Maybe just reducing the effect to a choice between the "normal" Legionary card pull from their hands OR the Client theft. Just feels more justifiable in game terms to have to give something up to benefit from such a nice function. Plus it works thematically, right? If you're pandering with bread and circuses, you're not getting any real work done for Rome....

At any rate, thanks so much for your thoughtful response. I really like the game, so please don't think me too harsh in my criticism. I just think it has a couple of rough edges that could be polished.

So you had a Coliseum / Palisade combo...nasty.

Like I said, this card is on our fix list for the next edition--the current version we're playtesting is this:

COLISEUM : Functions as currently, but only from YOUR clientele; basically it allows you to throw your clients to the lions for a share in the take.

BATH : Remove 'may replace clients' function so that it is only 'Clients execute role upon entering Clientele'

This version down-grades both the COLISEUM & the BATH (another card on our hit list) while creating a nice combo if you can get both of them stood up. Since the COLISEUM is now the only way to replace clients and it offers an alternative merchant path (Patron-->Legionary) we're pretty sure it will still get built.

Feel free to try out this version and let us know what you think.

Cheers,

Ed

P.S. I believe that COLISEUM / BRIDGE would still let you take clients from all players but it hasn't come up yet so I'm not certain--will check with the rest of the team and confirm

will owners of the existing version be able to receive new cards? i'm interested in the game, but i wouldn't want to pick it up now if on-card errata is forthcoming.

Wow, that's a vast change, and significantly devalues the Coliseum. Perhaps useful as a late-game push to get "dead" Clients to provide better value for you...hmmm. We'll try it.


I like this. The replacement is messy, esp. in a combo situation.


Well, since it's so situational and hard to execute, I wasn't going to go into the possibility of a Coliseum / Bridge under the current rules, but I can't really imagine anyone pulling that off could possibly lose. You get a Legionary Client or two and you could pull in upwards of 15 points in one lead, and esp. devastating in the endgame if you pull Merchants out of their Clienteles...eesh.

Curious to hear your ruling on this, but I'm a little confused...does this apply to the "new" Coliseum or the existing? I thought the rule was clear for existing, but it's irrelevant for the "new" one, as you're not affecting anyone else.

Yes, it's clear for existing. In the new version you'd get to legionary from one person (You) and since the Bridge lets you legionary from everybody you could argue that it extends that.

Two card killer combos are very much in the spirit of the game (my favorite is Palace, Circus Maximus) so my hunch is that's probably the way Carl would want to set it up.

Hmmm... I knew there was a reason why I wasn't supposed to be talking about this yet.

This is clearly going to come up, and we'll certainly work out some upgrade path, although I need to think through the precise process. It may be as simple as using BGG to trade new cards for old...

Oops, sorry Carl

I really thought this was one you'd signed up for...

So a tool for depriving opponents of their Clients (and exerting some control over their Vaults), but at the price of granting them VPs. Would you give discretion to the Coliseum holder as to whether an opponent exercises his option? Would you also allow the owner to kill his own Clients?

This could produce a penalty for ownership instead of a benefit, depending on the stage of the game and your answers to the questions I posed above. One case would be to max out their Vaults with cheap stuff, but to do that you'd have to play Legionary with Laborer/Craftsman many, many times, getting overloaded with Wood and Rubble in your stockpile, the very items you don't want to move to your own Vault. Killing Merchants or Patrons would only make sense if there's enough time left to make up for helping them move 3+ VPs into their Vault. Pretty subtle stuff to get this to work in your favor, and maybe that's what you're looking for. It's certainly a far, far cry from the current Coliseum. I guess we'll play this way and see what happens.

I played Glory to Rome for the first time yesterday and I interpreted the Coliseum a little bit differently. I was obviously wrong, but maybe the way I played it would be a slight enough change to make it a good way to play it.

Take card(s) from the pool as normal, but instead of taking cards from opponents hands AND their Clientele, it was an either or thing. You decide if you want to take from their hand to your Stockpile, or if you want to steal their Clientele for your Vault. Still powerful, but not crazy powerful. Any thoughts?

In I.V we've undercut the COLISEUM in several ways:

1) The Wall now also makes you immune to LEGIONARY (and is not overcome by the Bridge)

2) The 'Out of Town' sites make it much harder for the Wood sites to run out completely, so that it's easier for your opponents to build PALISADES to stop you

3) We've beefed up some of the LABORER powers, reducing the relative strength of the LEGIONARY role as a whole.

The actual power for the COLISEUM has stayed the same (since it's been undermined on all sides) although we've updated the wording to:

In addition: When performing LEGIONARY action may take opponent's client and place in VAULT as material



Yep--this is gone. It was a nice power related to executing your actions out of turn, but too hard to explain (and certainly not easy to work out from the card description).

I just played Glory to Rome for the first time yesterday and our group stumbled upon the Coliseum "cheese tactic" (as we called it) the second game we played. There were four of us playing, and both I and my friend across from me had two legionaries as clients. It was pretty late in the game, and for just about every move after I had built the Coliseum I just spammed legionaries repeatedly when it was my turn to lead. With the combination of the two of us having 2x legionaries, plus one of us having the coliseum, it made the game very un-fun for the two other players. I think the scores were somewhere around 35 (me), 32 (guy across from me), and then 13 and 12. The other players were just squeezed out of the game.

I've only played the game a few times, but my armchair analysis leads me to believe the Coliseum (and legionaries) would be significantly improved if they only effected ONE other player of your choosing. If that were the case then I could have targeted my only real threat in that game -- the guy sitting across from me, and the other two players would have still had a chance to win.

Came up with a semi-defense against Coliseum this weekend. My opponent laid the foundation for a Coliseum and on the same turn I used my completed stairway to make it a public building. He never bothered to finish the Coliseum after that. Just the threat of immediate retaliation prevented it from being completed.

I think you can only use the Stairway on a completed building.