For multiple years I have been visiting the Geek daily, and I have seen several games hyped up. The major claim of any such hype is that the new game will finally replace Puerto Rico as the number 1 game on BGG. Except for Monkey Auto Races, that never happened. I have seen these claims for Agricola too. Is the game really that good?

Since no English version of Agricola yet exists, the game is still smack-dab in the middle of the hype-phase. Currently in seventh place in the rankings, people predict its steady rise and defend its worthiness for first place. In this relatively short review, I will examine Agricola on its merits as a Puerto-Rico killer. My experience with the game is half-a-dozen multiplayer sessions (three and four players), and about ten solo plays.

The gameplay, in short, is as follows. Each player has an empty farm at the start of the game, with two wooden huts, and a farmer and his wife living in them. Over the course of the game, players attempt to grow their farm by plowing fields, planting crops, fencing pastures, breeding animals, and extending their home and family. The winner is the player who has the "best" farm at the end of the game.

During the game, the players choose actions on the central game board by playing family members on action spots, such as "plow a field", "get a grain", "get a stack of wood", or "purchase an improvement". Each spot can only be taken by one player during a round. The actions allow the players to collect resources (wood, clay, reed, and stone), and extend their farm. The total game lasts fourteen rounds. During the game there are also six harvest phases in which the family needs to be fed. The crux of the game is that many farm products can be turned into food for the family to consume, but that you also need these products to score points at the end of the game. Therefore, at its core Agricola is a pure resource-management game.

The variety of the game is in its cards. At the start of the game, each player gets a hand consisting of seven Occupation cards, and seven Improvement cards. These are chosen from a deck of about 300 cards, and all of them are different. By playing these cards (for which a player needs to use actions, sometimes pay food or resources, and sometimes needs to meet certain requirements), the player gains some special abilities. Examples of such abilities are "when you plow a field, you can plow one extra field if you pay one food", "in the following three rounds, you get one free reed per round", and "at the end of the game you score three points if you live in a stone house".

The cards that you get determine for a large part the strategy that you are going to follow in the game. You will never be able to play all of them, so you are looking for a nice combination of cards that allow you to play a strong game.

For instance, you might find that you have cards that allow you to get vegetables early in the game (usually vegetables only arrive in the game at round 8 or 9). You could then decide that you want sow those vegetables as quickly as possible, and build an Improvement that allows you to eat those vegetable when the harvest comes. This would meet your need for sustenance for a major part of the game, so you would not need to compete for other food sources but instead focus on gathering lots of wood and start building pastures and collecting animals.

Another example is that you might have a card that says that you gain three free food per round as soon as you have a stone house. In itself, this card is not very strong, as there is little or no stone available early in the game. However, if this card is combined with a card that allows you to get a good amount of stone early in the game, you may decide to try to get these two cards out quickly, and focus on getting that stone house so your hunger is quenched for the remainder of the game.

Both these examples are referencing the need for food, and that is intentional. Your main objective for most of the game is to get a food-production engine running. Once you have that in order, you can look towards getting points. Agricola offers many ways to get food, but you do not just want to get food, you want to get it efficiently. Your cards form your main opportunity to achieve this, but you need flexibility to adapt your strategy to your cards (and to your fellow players, who might want to execute the same actions as you).

The cards are both the strength and the weakness of Agricola. Their strengths are that they provide a high variety; and that they require flexibility and inventiveness on the part of the player. Their weakness, however, is that they unbalance the game. If two players know the game equally well, the player who has the best cards wins the game. The designers aimed to balance the cards by making the really good cards more expensive or having high requirements. That works, to a certain extent, to level the strength of individual cards. But a player who receives a smashing combo in his hand is far ahead of one who does not.

Players can experience this effect for themselves when they play the solo game. In a solo game, a player will score between 40 and 70 points. The difference is purely the consequence of the cards. For instance, if a player has no card that allows him to plow several fields at once, in practice he will not be able to get the five fields, eight wheat, and four vegetables which are needed to score the maximum number of points in their respective categories. Or, if a player has no card that allows him to get extra wood or reduce the need for wood in some form, he will not be able to get all the barns out, build four pastures, and get the amounts of livestock required for the highest scores.

Since in the multiplayer game less food is needed the effect of the cards on the final scores is less obvious, but it is still real. I have seen a game where a player managed to very early in the game play a combination of cards that allowed him to build the last three Large Improvements as Small Improvements for a mere 1 resource each. I have seen a game in which a player managed to create so much food from nothing that he could not find a purpose for most of his actions. And, when looking at it from the opposite perspective, I have seen a game in which a player received a set of seven Improvement cards, none of which could be played in the early game because of their requirements or ridiculously prohibitive costs.

So, after this criticism on the card mechanism, what do I really think of it?

Well, actually I think the cards make the game. They are fun. Studying your hand and forming combo's in your head are fun. Devising a game plan based on your cards is fun. And playing them is fun too, because even if a player manages to get out a devastating combo, usually that is not clear until late in the game.

There is something counter-intuitive about all this. Games in which the outcome is (partly) determined by chance, should, in general, be short. Agricola is not short: the half hour that you should set aside for each player is a low estimate. But it works. One reason that it works is that skillful play is needed to get the combo's out. A skilled player with bad cards will win from a weak player with good cards. And the game is still young enough that it is not clear from the outset that a hand contains a strong combo.

However, the chance element of Agricola is what will keep it from first place on the BGG rankings. Some people will get disappointed when they finally play the game and discover that their analytical powers do not guarantee success.

There are four more criticisms I wish to point out for Agricola.

The first is that Analysis Paralysis is a big problem for the game, especially in the last few rounds. So much, in fact, that in my games group we are considering introducing an hourglass timer.

The second is the insufficiency of the twiddly bits. With three or more players, you will run out of several resources, and the solution that the game offers is meager at least and does not always work.

The third is the intensity of the maintenance tasks on the game board. In virtually every game that I have played until now, we have found at some point that the resources on one of the Action fields could not be as they were placed. Agricola would really benefit from a computer-controlled game board that is maintained automatically. There is not much that can be done about that, apart from carefully checking each and every maintenance action, but that would extend the length of gameplay even more.

The fourth is the regular publication of errata. Really, when I purchase a game, I want a finished game. I do not want to read on BGG that the requirements or the effect of a card have changed, and that I should paste over them. A change in the rulebook might be acceptable, but I am not willing to damage my game elements because the creators feel obliged to fix some of the unbalancing elements. There is no way to fix all of them anyway, so why bother? Or, if they really must, then they should release a fix-pack with replacement cards. In this respect, I would advise any potential buyer to delay purchase until the game has been out for a year and all the bugs are fixed. Just let some friend buy it for now and play it at their place.

But to end on a high note: I like Agricola. It is fun. It can be enjoyed by players of different caliber, although they should not shrink away from some heavy thinking. I definitely see this as one of the games that I will play a lot. But it is not in the same class as Puerto Rico, Caylus, Power Grid, or Tigris & Euphrates. Therefore I think that Puerto Rico's first place is safe.

Edit: I had accidentally said there were seven harvests, while there are actually six.

Thanks for the excellent review. Finally, I get a picture of what to expect from this one, without having to read the long manual.

Well Puerto Rico was initially popular during the same time Boardgamegeek was coming into its own. Therefore there are 11,000+ ratings for Puerto Rico, making it difficult if not impossible to unseat. It will be a long time before Agricola or any other recent game get that many positive ratings.

It's interesting that you mention a solo game for Agricola while comparing it with Puerto Rico, since Puerto Rico has no solitaire rules and would not be nearly as interesting to play solitaire as Agricola is. Puerto Rico doesn't even have official (published in the game) two player rules and it still is #1.

Just like the chance element you mentioned. If chance is that much of a factor in game ratings, then why isn't Chess rated at higher than 196. In fact, Chess could be out of the top 200 in a week or less, depending on what goes on with the ratings. Part of the reason Chess isn't #1 is because of that nebulous thing called 'fun'. And I think Agricola has 'fun', at least as much as Puerto Rico.

On to your four criticisms--Analysis Paralysis isn't a problem in Puerto Rico at this point because so many people are anxious to tell others how to play. For whatever reason, Puerto Rico invites this behavior more than any other game I've seen, and I've been playing for 20+ years. Part of it is because Puerto Rico is a perfect information, while Agricola is not. So even though it may appear that Puerto Rico doesn't suffer from AP, in reality it doesn't matter. The time that would be used with AP is instead often used by other players to offer suggestions, so there is no net improvement here.

I would agree that there aren't enough bits, but there are enough that the lack of bits is really a minor problem. Same with the fact that folks don't update the boards properly. I think with practice the board problem will go away.

As far as the errata goes, I think this is a good thing. Back in the old days, a publisher would publish a game, and only a few thousand people might be exposed to the game over a period of years. These people had very little chance to tell the publisher what was wrong or give other feedback, so we didn't see errata or if we did it was given through word of mouth. Testing of a game was done with a few people and then the game was published. Now we have boardgamegeek, and the opportunity for giving feedback is tremendous. A publisher will never have as many testers as there will be players (or at least they hope this is the case ) so issues will show up over time. I commend Lookout Games for addressing the issues. I've never seen a list of as many testers (in a board game) as Agricola has, so to imply that somehow the game is not finished is wrong. The game may in fact never be in a 'final' form. Hell, they still can't decide on the farmers rules in Carcassone and that game has been out for 8 years. If Uwe and company want to make changes to the game to freshen or correct the experience, more power to them! As long as they are willing to support it, I think it's awesome.

So while I do appreciate you taking the time to present a critical view, I wanted to write up a counter point. Thanks for your review

I am SOOO tired of people talking about "hype" when what is actually happening is not hype but simply people giving their opinion of a game!
I think this game WILL eventually overtake Puerto Rico after the English release. It has a broader appeal and scales better.

Come on, you can play it with little kids or you can play it with your hard core friends. I use Robert Norman's hand generator pogram with my German version to translate the cards into English and this makes it as playable as anything out there.

Don't believe the "hype". Hype would be a company publicizing it's game in an unfair, extravagant way. That's not what's happening with Agricola. The game is inspiring legitimate praise because it really IS that good.

It's okay to be skeptical, but just try it and if you like it rate it high and if you don't then just rate it low, but no "reactionary ratings" please. Is that what we're here for?

Just tell us what YOU think. Don't react badly if somebody really loves a game.

Did everyone think that no better game than PR would ever be created?

Hype, by definition, implies excessive, unjustified praise.
Legitimate high marks are not "hype."

It's just hard for people to tell the difference, especially on the internet. And so they label ANY praise at all as "hype."

Good review, although I disagree with your above quoted comments.

In a solo game, the cards do affect your score, although not really to the degree you describe. Without any cards in hand at all it's possible to get 66 points, so having a bad hand will get you no worse than that (you are not required to play cards, you know). So the impact of a horrible hand vs. an awesome combo is just not that huge, once you learn the game.

This effect is reduced in the multiplayer game, though, and virtually disappears. Opponents can see the cards you've played, predict your planned actions, and counter your moves. Get that card that gives you food for having lots of sheep? Okay, let me take these sheep then so you can't have them. Get the card that allows you to build clay roofs? Let me gobble up the clay more than I would otherwise. Not to mention that competition for improvements and occupations can make getting those cards to the table either difficult or exceedingly expensive.

Like most games, the players make the game. If your typical group ignores the other players -- true multiplayer solitaire -- then the cards are gonna have some impact. But you're missing out, because a large part of the game is neutralizing someone's awesome card combos.

I do not understand the main point of the OP - that Agricola has no chance because of a random element in cards. At least thats an acceptable mechanic. How big would you say are the chances of being number 1 for a game in which the winner is decided randomly not by the cards he gets, but by the chair he chooses to sit at? that's so close to being broken, I really wouldn't fault anyone giving puero rico a 1 just for this reason.


(the main fault of agricola is the first player mechanic, borrowed from pillars of the earth, and this is where both these games are close to being broken, just as puerto is with its 'sit behind the newbie' deal. this is were the game is lost or won randomly in my opinion, much more so than in what cards you get. this luckily is easily fixed by borrowing the start player mechanic from caylus, not pillars. had this been in the rulebook agricola would be a clear 10 for me.)

But isn't spending your very limited pool of actions and resources to thwart another player simply going to hand victory to a third? My exposure to Agricola has been extremely limited, but it is usally the case in other games that a player who spends his resources to stop another player usually does so at the expense of his own position. How is Agricola different in this way? It is often good to try and encourage other players to make blocking moves against a leader, but it rarely benefits one to be the actual blocker. So whose job is it to do the blocking? The player to the right of the one with the awesome card combinations? I don't know. I just don't get the feel that awesome card combinations can be effectively countered by the other players to the extent that their effect on the game virtually dissapears if the other players themselves hope to implement their own combinations and win the game.

So, I do feel like the OPs point is valid in regards to the cards being the "make or break" factor in games with players of equal skill. Having said that, I still think the game is fascinating and enjoyable and don't mind the element of randomness or chance the cards interject at all.

I do appreciate your comment about not being required to play cards and that a very good score can be obtained without doing so. I've never played the family game and now am interested in going back and trying it, so thanks for the excellent point.

about half the people I know that played 6+ games prefer to play without cards. this is labeled as family (suggesting lighter) version, yet it actually is the more strategic one. cards add randomness (more family-like), make everyone need different resources to match the cards they have (meaning much less interaction than without cards) (again, more family-like)...

what cards add is: replayability (not that the 'family version is less replayable than most games I know anyway), and a chance for a less skillfull player for a win against a more skillfull one. (again, making this more of a family game).

so my suggestion - play with cards if you enjoy them, but for the really cutthroat game of experienced players with similar skill the only real way to play seems to me the so called 'family' version.

and the fact you are able to make the choice is what makes the game better than puerto rico, not worse. imagine in puerto rico a possible variant of everyone getting a hand o 7 extra buildings they can build. how would puerto rico be any worse with this added as a possibility? it wouldn't.

agricola 'family' version with fixed turn order is a much better game than puerto rico in my book, and if it's too heavy for you go ahead and use the make-me-lighter variant of cards if you wish.

a shame really the 2 variants were named as they were, making people assuming wrong things which one is best for whom...

That has not been my experience.

Perhaps the difference is that everyone is chasing the same (broad) set of goals in Agricola. If I take Sheep this round instead of Wild boar, it's unlikely to destroy my game unless I have a particular card that requires me to get Wild boar. I'll get points for the Sheep regardless, but I may be able to stop you from using it to get bonus points.

The 66 points are only achievable if the Action cards are turned in a very specific order. Not getting Sheep in the first turn, not getting the Family Growth in the 6th turn, and several other key events not occurring at the right time will be devastating for this play. Still, an impressive analysis which really gives another view on the use of cards in the solo game. Actually, in my solo games I usually play very few cards, as the actions are too precious. Playing a card should make up for at least two actions to make it worthwhile, and that is asking rather a lot.



I completely agree that the solo game and the multiplayer game are not comparable at all as far as gameplay is concerned. Perhaps I should stressed that more in the review.

Agricola used that mechanism already before PotE was released.
A little bit more caution regarding accusations of "borrowing" mechanisms is always appreciated.

(edited for spelling)

one was released essen 2006, the other essen 2007. the assumption seems quite natual. at the very least agricola had a chance to see why the mechanic sucks, having pillars released o year earlier .
how about 'agricola uses the same first player mechanic that sucked just as much in pillars, had it borrowed one from caylus it would have been a clear 10'


(I am however sorry if that sounded like I have a problem with the 'borrowing' part rather than with the mechanic itself. To me reusing of mechanics in games is absolutley normal, and it doesn't really matter to me who was first, I in no way feel someone who reuses a known mechanic is doing something immoral, or 'less worthy of respect'. if it sounded like I am critizing the author for possibly reusing something known already I am again sorry. I even said I'd love him to 'borrow' the mechanic from Caylus to make the game perfect :-) )


I can't help having a very strong dislike for this mechanic - in my groups there invariably is one player who will desire to take the first player space more often and sooner than is reasonable, and it always means the player right after him has a HUGE advantage over the player right before. so much irritation, so easily fixed with Caylus ordering...

While I agree a little bit with the criticism about the starting player action (at least in 4+ player games), I completely disagree on the "luck" argument. Surely, Agricola is not as luck-less as e.g. PR, but it is not in now way luck-driven... Out of 10 games, maybe one was heavily influenced by cards. If we had used the "exchange bad cards" rule, it would probably not have been a problem at all.

I said more random, not very random :-) I am always ready to exchange the cards I was given with everyone at the table, and will still expect to win comfortably. somehow everytime I play everyone whines what great combos I was given, yet I always think to myslef "it's a blessing I didn't have your cards, or the whining about the combos I'd make out of your set would be so much louder"

so more random, yes. significantly random, no.

As noted in another thread, using the Caylus player order method might prove disastrous for Agricola, (although you could always use what you prefer - thats what board games are for!) as the first player is pretty important.

Current system cons: If the guy to your left is eager to be first a large part of the game, you'll end up being last pretty often.
Current system pros: If you're last, and anyone takes first player, your position improves.

Caylus system pros: You won't be first one turn and then last the next, you'll just drop down a step in the order.
Caylus system cons: Once at the bottom, you'll have a monster of a disadvantage to get out of, as your position won't improve if YOU don't take the first player. First player will be very attractive for the 4th or even 3rd player, and they go before you… they're very prone to get there, especially if they know wha life is like down there.

I voted for the Caylus system before, but only because I failed to see the pros of the current system. And "first one turn, last the next" isn't that much of a chance, as the guy to your left will be second if you're first. So he's not likely to grab the position, it's not enough of a gain. I think it balances out well.

if you don't agree, use the Caylus system, fer crying out loud. Boardgamers shouldn't be be blinded by rulebooks!

well, my interpretation of caylus turn order is that more than 1 person can place their worker on that space (like caylus, 3 places to fill there). the first one gets an additional benefit (1 food/minor improvement), the rest just get an improved turn order...

Mike, I referred to the reviewer's luck critics, not yours.

Having thought about it for about one hour now, I have to revise my opinion on the starting player: In Agricola, you can not effort that often to "waste" actions for the start player action. In Caylus, this is not that much of a problem. So, I think the Agricola mechanism is ok, although maybe not perfect. But after all that being said, I still rate Agricola a 10 - best eurogame since PR in my book.

Ah. Well, that might be the answer then. Sorry, it was such a long time since I last played Caylus that I'd forgotten about that.

Hi!

Thank you for this clear review. Also I apreciate it that you criticize a game you say you like and you think its fun, I have the feeling I should comment some of your statements...



Even without the cards (in the 'Family Game') Agricola has at least as much variety as Puerto Rico...




Yes and No - of course it is a big advantage to have a strong combo - but using all the actions and ressources to play the combo is very expensive too - the player without such a combo can use these actions to improve his situation. In most games I played the person with the most played cards was not the winner in the end - end I had no game so far where I felt I had no chance because an other player had overpowered cards (although I must confess that there is a possibility that some day I will experience such a situation...).
Cards are very strong and powerful but they are overestimated!


If you have less then 60 points on a regular basis you make something wrong (If I ignore all cards and the action cards are in worst order I bet I will get at least 50 points most likely 55 points... - and there are always cards which help you to get more points!)
And to compare solo-game with multiplayergame is not the best idea as in a solo game it is much easier to use your handcards probably.




Yes and no - the cards are fun! but the game is fun without cards too - it feels a bit different but it is still a wonderful game.



Yes!!!


I don't want to comment this - other people did it before me

Let them play the 'Familiy Version'!



Yes! The last 2 rounds are all about AP... (I would love it if I could say you are wrong - but it IS a problem of the game!)


That is personal opinion - I don't think so!

Why that? I understand that you don't like it but why shouldn't it work???


We never had a problem with this. If every player has his duty (animals, food, wood,...) he should be able to do it right and if noone else tries to do somones other job there will be no problem...


You have a finished game! The game plays well without any changes it will be a bit better with them but it is still one of the best games in my collection


They will do that! As far as I know all the actual 'fixes' will be changed in the english print and the german reprint. And for the people with the first german edition there will be a fix-pack which you will get for free at the next Essen-fair or for simply the postale charges by sending a mail to lookout (as soon as the fix-pack is available) (Perhaps you have to insert some of the old cards to ensure that only people with the old game make use of this service.) [disclaimer: I'm not an official - these infos are all somewhere out of different forums and are based on comments of the publisher or the author - if I have misinterpreted s.th. or they change s.th. it's not my fault ]



Agree!


I think it IS in the same class - it has not more luck than E&T (red markers!) or Power Grid (which power plant will appear at which time?) and has the same depth of thinking!

Greets

Fluxx

PS: @Starting player problem: I don't think the Caylus-way is the right thing for Agricola. In caylus you have a 2nd and 3rd place you can get by using an action - in agricola it is only one! If you change agricola in a way you can get a 2nd place by using an action you have a problem to make it worthwile - in Agricola you have less actions than in Caylus...
Until now I have not heard a suggestion which sounds better than the variant-by-rule. (the best so far is switching the direction - 1st action clockwise, 2nd action counterclockwise, 3rd clockwise...)
But lets discuss that here: http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/294048

Well, that's an old thread and this is a new one, so let's discuss it here instead!

This is the first time I've heard of the switching direction variant and it strikes me as being the first suggestion I've heard of that seems to keep the spirit of the First Player action without introducing other inequities. Let me see if I understand it: On the first action of the turn, the first player takes an action, followed by the player to his left, and so on. On the second action, the first player again begins, followed by the player to his right, and so on. Is this correct?

What I like about this is that the first player gets all of the current benefits of the First Player space (as he should--after all, he spent an action to choose it), while the other players don't necessarily get an undeserved advantage or disadvantage by their relationship to him in the seating order. It's another rule to have to deal with, but it doesn't really add much complexity to the game.

My first thought when I read the variant was that you alternated direction each turn. That is, on Turn 1, you go clockwise with all actions, on Turn 2 you go counterclockwise, and so on. Alternating per action is probably fairer and makes it less likely that players will be screwed because the arrow is pointing the wrong way on a crucial turn. It does mean that some players will choose their actions relatively close together, but I don't see that as a huge issue, as it makes up for having a late action on the previous round. In other words, it's a Settlers style balancing.

I'd still recommend that the direction taken for the first action each turn alternate. That is, on Turn 1, first go clockwise, then counterclockwise, then clockwise, etc. Then, on Turn 2, first go counterclockwise, then clockwise, and so on. The most crucial action of each turn is often the first one and if the same player always has the second action of a turn, for example, it might be just as unfair as the original method.

What do other people think of this variant? Can anyone think of a drawback to it, other than the additional complexity?

Wellll, I think of taking Starting Player as a strategic advantage - and table talking someone *else* into taking Starting Player as even more of a strategic advantage. And the strategic advantage is over the person who will be last.

This option would ruin the Beat-up-on-my-husband Agricola variant.

Only if he's foolish enough to sit to your right, Melissa!

It's hard to avoid that, Larry, if you're playing the 2 player game.

Whatever you want My Idea was that all discussion about this topic should be in one thread but it is to late now...


In fact I always supposed that on the second action the startplayer is last - but your version is much better. So the startingplayer has still his advantage and taking the startplayer is still worth an action.


I don't know if you really need this. It makes the whole thing about turn order much more complicated... (OK - I'm one of the persons who are fine with the original turnorder-rules so you shouldn't ask me *g*)
And I don't know if it would be an improvement - the chances are high that the startplayer is taken by another player nearly every round, so perhaps it will be more unfair to switch the turnorder than to leave it clockwise for the first action ineach round. (If startplayer moves from the player on my right to the player on my left it is a big advantage or a big disadvantage for me...)


Fluxx