This variant introduces fruit trees to our beloved Agrícola.

I'm using the original cube cows that came with the game as trees, and the E deck minor "fruit trees" as an additional action card:
- Plant a tree [1+]: You may plant 1 tree on one of your unused parcels or in one of your parcels with 1 tree.

The rules for fruit trees are as follows:
- You may only plant a tree in an empty space or a space with only 1 tree.
- The spaces must be orthogonally adjacent to other spaces with trees (like everything else)
- Spaces with trees aren't unused.
- At every harvest, each tree produces 1 food.
- At any moment, you may cut down a tree to receive 1 wood*. Return that tree to the supply.
- If all the trees on a space are cut, that space is now unused.

At the end of the game you receive points for your trees:

Trees Points*
0 -1
1-2 1
3-4 2
5-6 3
7+ 4

* Subject to testing

This variant will be featured in the upcoming Ñ Deck, so please test it!

This variant makes me want to buy Finca, with its wonderful fruiteeples...

Do you suggest it as arriving in a particular phase (I-VI), or as an action available at start of game?

When you say 'orthogonally adjacent', do you mean that all Fruit Tree Orchards after the 1st must connect orthogonally? Why wouldn't it be possible to plant trees in, e.g., column 3 row 3, and then later on in column 4 row 4, other than for aesthetics? (Just posing the question...)

As an additional action at the start of a game (like the 3, 4 or 5 player additional actions, but for 1+).
Addendum: In the 5-player game, the 1-wood action card now becomes "1 wood (accumulates) -OR- plant 1 tree".

It's orthogonally adjacent to keep it in line with fields, fences and rooms.

Edit: I found these trees (number 4). I've contacted them, I'll keep you informed

Can spaces containing trees be used for other purposes? Can I build a pasture around my trees, for example? Can I plow a field "over" a tree and leave the tree there?

If so, I think planting a tree in Round 1 is so powerful that the first player is almost forced to take that action. It provides 7 food for one action. You will almost never get an action that good in Agricola.

This is the first unofficial variant that I've found interesting. But I kind of like the idea of being able to plant them anywhere, rather than only orthogonally.

You can only plow fields or fence pastures on unused spaces, so no. You can cut down the trees for 1 wood each and then plow or build, though.

The 4 first trees give 6 food each along the whole game. It's not nearly as powerful as 6 food now.



As with everything in this variant, this is subject to testing, so house-rule it at your desire. But then, give your fellow players the option of plowing or building anywhere too

I agree, planting trees in round 1 would be a little powerful. Maybe, instead of a "Plant Tree" space, have a "Take Fruit" Space. You can use the Sow action to plant the tree (with or without a plowed field, but you cannot plant grain or vegetables in the field), or you can use the Fruit at any time as 1 food (without a hearth or having the bake bread). Each Harvest you gain 1 Fruit from each tree.

Even if you kept the "Take Fruit" space in Phase 1, you would devote an entire turn to getting your tree planted, which I think could be a decent balancing for recieving 7 food over the course of the game.

Fun fact: we're testing something similar for an upcoming official Agricola release.

And will we also get to plant olives and watermelon? Inquiring wiseguys want to know.

And what about the chickens?

I would caution against scoring the fruit trees at the end of the game for two reasons.

First, as you can see from the above photo, it is possible to have an "optimal layout" and still have a fruit orchard. However, any additional orchards would just trade points with other categories (most likely fields in this configuration). This lessens their impact because at most you would be adding/subtracting a single point to the overall scoring in the end.

Second, The amount of perpetual food this can generate is quite powerful and should trade off against scoring. Most elements of the game seem to work this way (i.e. sacrificing grain by baking bread to make food, sacrificing actions to make food [by fishing, etc.], cooking animals, etc). something that makes food and scores should be considered very carefully before implementing.

Olives have their own minor. And as long as I know, watermelons don't grow on trees yet (next station: Agricola, the Monsanto edition).



Damn, I was thinking on emailing Uwe Rosenberg or you the whole Ñ thing (may I?)



On my 3 to 5 player games, you won't get the chance to build a perfect farm, this is just another thing to round it up.


And


I'll keep that in mind, making the trees more difficult to manage; but adding yet another resource to the game makes me shiver.

Thanks for your suggestions!



Here you have your chickeeples. Have you thougt what to do with them? Just adding a "take 1 chicken" action may be a little lame. Which came first, the chicken or the egg? (Mmmhhh, eggples)

Sure.

Maybe the trees don't reach maturity until the start of the round AFTER you plant them (you put the treeples on their side to indicate immaturity, or something). Immature trees don't produce fruit, so you're one food down per tree for the whole game.

Also, maybe you can plant a tree on an empty space only if you don't already have a space with one tree on it. This will make your orchard grow slowly and make it harder to fill your empty farm spaces.

If you need to limit them further, perhaps you could turn them to wood only at a certain time (harvest, BEFORE they give fruit, or whatever), or maybe you could require an action to get wood from them, but they give you more than one wood for this.

Finally, don't trees reproduce? If you have a farm space with only one tree on it during the breeding phase, you can "plant" a second tree on that space for free!

Just throwing around a few ideas.

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Excuse my traslation mistakes, I've only played in Spanish and don't know the exact terms used in English

I like the idea of them being "Take 1 Fruit" action space and you have to take the "Sow" action to actually put them in the ground. However I think each farm yard space should be able to hold 4 trees and you MUST fill a space before you can move onto another space. Each harvest you receive 1 FRUIT which yes can be converted to 1 food freely or it can be resown into a new tree. I agree with orthogonal placement. Cutting down a tree to get 1 wood I feel should be able to be done any time like you can do with grain/veg to food at any time. I also think there should be no scoring other than saving you from a -1 penalty for the trees.

I'll try this out next time I play and report.

You should buy Finca anyway. It's a very good game. :-)

I like it, but I don't like adding a new action card - the board is too big already, and I don't think additional scoring is needed.

Why not just use the "Sow" action to plant trees? The only difference is that you may later "Sow" a second tree into that space. In fact, according to the FAQ, you MUST fill the space with a second tree before you plant another space. And "Sow" right now is pretty useless in the first couple rounds. In addition, this use gives players a reason to compete with the baker. If someone is getting multiple extra grain or veggies by sowing, I can't compete unless I can also sow grain or veggies. Now I can "Sow" food trees. I like it.

I suggest there should be *no* way to plant two trees at a time. That makes Food way too easy to get. Trees take a long time to mature, and in a way, you are scoring the trees. Someone, some time, is going to say the Forester, for example, can plant two.

The "Fruit Trees" (E43) imp can hold 4 trees, but doesn't fill a space in the farm.


edit: spelling

My wife and I have tried this a few times. We tried to incorporate it with the Forest tiles from the Moor expansion, but it's been a little iffy. Here's how we played it:

* Made a new "Take 1 Fruit" card

* When you Sow, you may plant the Fruit; we played you could plant it in a Forest as a new Fruit tree, or in an empty space as a sapling. This didn't entirely work right.

* At Harvest, each Fruit Tree produces 1 Fruit. Each planted sapling grows into a full blown Fruit Tree. We used the Forest tiles with Clay discs on top to indicate Fruit Trees.

* Your new Fruit from the Fruit Trees can be taken into supply, or replanted immediately [in the same space as the originating tree: "the apple doesn't fall far from the tree"].

* Replanted apples we had grow immediately into trees [no way to distinguish them, using our way of marking Fruit Trees / orchards]; taken apples, you could sow into empty spaces.

* We allowed only 2 Trees per space.

* Fell orchards with "Fell Trees" as normal

We like the idea, especially combined with a few other variants we co-playtested at the same time [potatoes/"onions" and chickens]. We were less sure of it than the potatoes.

Some thoughts for improving our version:

* Make you plant Fruit in empty spaces only; you have to wait at least 2 harvests before they start producing Fruit for you. First Harvest, they become trees; second, they bear fruit.

* Distinguish Fruit Trees from Forests better; I like the idea of the little wooden trees, but I don't see an easy way to source them from that particular board game bit supplier.

* Allow up to 4 trees in one orchard.

* Keep the idea of allowing Fruit harvested to be taken for food or to be replanted immediately, but I like the idea of being able to expand once the initial orchard is full of Trees.

* With having to wait 2 harvests to get any food out of them, it seems the fruit you get should probably be worth more than 1 food each, but I'm not sure. We did 3 food per 2 "potatoes".

* Maybe each tree should provide more than 1 Fruit each, but still keep the ratio as 1 food to 1 Fruit? I don't know. Having to grow the trees is neat, but difficult to work in.

We really like the idea, but it seemed the most difficult to get right of the three unofficial variants we co-playtested [potatoes/"onions", the fruit trees, and chickens].

When we're done tweaking, anyone want to test our full variant? [Onions - Fruit - Chickens]

This all sounds just about right, probably the perfect fix to the way we played the fruit trees.

So, when you sow the fruit, it becomes a tree immediately? And, at harvest, you can either take 1 fruit for food or resow the fruit immediately to make a new tree? Or do you have to wait to sow it into a new tree?

I guess the only thing I don't like is that the idea of having to wait a harvest for trees to grow is cool.

Given the amunt of time that trees take to harvest, what if the tree didn't produce edible fruit until the final harvest. You could add one fruit to a tree at each harvest and then get so many at the last harvest. the earlier you plant the trees the more powerful. If they are not worth anything for score then there is little reason to fill in space with them if they are not going to give very much fruit.

I like the idea of planting up to 4 trees per orchard, I'll test this, changing the score to 1 point per full orchard.

Thanks for the reviews!