Paul Lister
United Kingdom
London
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Ka mate, ka mate! ka ora! ka ora (I die! I die! I live! I live!)
If there’s one think more thrilling than watching the New Zealand’s rugby team perform their pre-match Haka, it’s watching them play rugby afterwards - unless it’s a World Cup year but we won’t go in to that.
Rugby what’s that you ask? Well it’s the most physical and dangerous sport on the planet they play without helmets or body armor and they do it for a full 80 minutes of body contact. I’m not sure there’s much point eulogizing the sport to most BGG users who are American, in fact might be pointless for most of the world. Rugby is really only played seriously in a small number of countries, and to non aficionados looks like a cross between a bar room brawl and mud wrestling without the excitement of either.
From a gaming perspective rugby is a very hard game to model, for a start it has 15 players on each side, the re-starts are not uniform and 40% of the action (scrum, maul. lineout and ruck) is opaque to all but the cognoscenti. For the full 15 man aside experience Crash Tackle has the best reputation as feeling like a game of Rugby. However, for those needing a quick rugby fix without all the trappings could do no better than purchase a copy of Kahmate.
Kahmate is a stripped down and slightly abstract re-creation of rugby. There are only six players on each side. The set-piece is entirely lacking from the game and if anything it feels more like Rugby League (without the be-loved Eddie Waring ‘oop and oonders’). For all of the things the game does not have it has the most important it feels like rugby. Territory and match ups are all important, it’s hard to score from your own half and you are always looking to maneuver your players to get the uneven match up fast guy versus slow guy, big man versus small man.
How does it play? The game is played on a board eight squares wide by eleven long. Each player has 6 disk team members. Two of the team members are’ normal’ they can move three squares with no diagonal movement allowed. The other players have special characteristics, the fast guy can move four squares but is a runt so has a penalty when tackling or being tackled, the tough guy moves three and has a bonus when attacking, the strong guy moves two but has a bonus in attack and defense, and the clever man has a bonus when defending. Success depends on getting the right men in the right place at the right time.
On a players turn they can move up to two team members, pass an unlimited number of times backwards (behind of diagonally) to team members up two squares away or kick the ball forwards up to three squares. Kicking diagonally is allowed. Only one team member disk can occupy a square and when a player, with the ball, comes into contact with a defending player he can try to force his way through him. Force through and tackles are handled in the same way; the attacker is the player trying to force or a player attempting to make a tackle. Each player starts the game with an identical hand of six ‘Stamina’ cards numbered one to six and he plays one of his cards to resolve the play. Bonus points are added or subtracted from the cards and the higher number wins. The losing team member is flipped over to show he is collapsed in a heap and can’t be used on the players next turn. A successful tackle with a two point card advantage causes a turn over; otherwise the ball is reset behind the player tackled. The card played is discarded and can only be picked up again to be played after all six cards have been played. Thus timing the use of cards is crucial you don’t want your skinny bloke trying to tackle the strong man on the line when you only have a one value card left in your hand.
The game was a finalist for the French Tric-Tac boardgame award 2008 award and is the first game from Igor Davin. It’s a pleasure to play, each game takes about 15 minutes and it feels like rugby that for me is the most important thing and I’d recommend this game to anyone who loves the oval ball but does not have the time to play one of the longer rugby simulations.
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Miguel
France
Caen
(from Valencia, Spain)
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Sorp222 wrote: A successful tackle with a two point card advantage causes a turn over; otherwise the ball is reset behind the player tackled.
Good review. It seems there was a mistake in the English version of the rules, for the turn over to happen you need to win the tackle by more than 2 points.
I like it a lot as a light and fast rugby game. One thing I noticed last summer, though, is that for over-analyzing players (my brother is a chess player) the one starting possession has a clear advantage. We played that matches ended when one gets to 3 tries, and the home team started possession, but when the ball began in front of the other team's fast guy the home advantage was lost!
Anyway, I guess this game has to be played lightly, for example with kids! One variant posted on the game site is adding a random element by throwing a die instead of playing a card, or drawing a card randomly from the deck...
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Alec Chapman
United Kingdom
South London
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No mention of the stalemate possibility, Paul?
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Paul Lister
United Kingdom
London
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No but now you mention it It is possible to shield the ball from the other player by placing all your men around the ball. if the ball is on your own line then there is no incentive to pick it up - sort like zugzwang in chess. i think we agreed that if this situation arises then if the ball is not picked up for two consecutive plays then the opponent is eithe automatically awarded a penalty try or can run through the opposition to pick up the ball.
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Miguel
France
Caen
(from Valencia, Spain)
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If you want to have a more "rugby" feel, I have uploaded a Six Nations file adapting the art from Crash Tackle and writing the movement/bonus numbers on the counters.
Just before uploading, I had the idea of slightly customizing each of the teams, so I added an alternate player, that may be used to replace the corresponding "normal" player, and that has a +1 on attack or defense. I wanted to create one stronger and one weaker team, for my matches vs my small kid, so I added +1 on both attack and defense for NZ and -1 on attack for Wales, no offense intended!!!
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Sean Dooley
United States
Cincinnati
Ohio
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Sorp222 wrote:
Rugby what’s that you ask? Well it’s the most physical and dangerous sport on the planet they play without helmets or body armor and they do it for a full 80 minutes of body contact. I’m not sure there’s much point eulogizing the sport to most BGG users who are American, in fact might be pointless for most of the world. Rugby is really only played seriously in a small number of countries, and to non aficionados looks like a cross between a bar room brawl and mud wrestling without the excitement of either.
Hey, now! We're making progress. The USA team did rather well in the USA Sevens tourney (granted, we sucked ass in HK) and the tournament did recieve some prime (well, close enough) network TV time.
There are plenty of American ruggers that get pissed off when freakin Marv Albert or Brent Musberger refer to a few guys diving on the ground in a basketball game as a 'scrum.'
Anyways, we're trying! Good review!
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Alec Chapman
United Kingdom
South London
Love movies? Love TV? Love Free Content? Please try our free Movie and TV Podcast at 3m3.posterous.com.
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US rugby... I dread to think about what your team would be like if the nation got behind it instead of the stop/start game.
Or is it league you play in the States mainly? Because Union is the only rugby for me!
A
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Jason Kimmings
United Kingdom
Bathgate
West Lothian
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And now available on the iPad! Brilliant!
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