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Introducing Sumeria
I think the gaming companies are on to us. They know everything about us! Yes, everything! Even the fact that we secretly read game rules while sitting on the porcelain throne. I know this, because I was doing exactly that with the rule book of the newly released game Sumeria (June 2009). And then in the very first paragraph of the rules I read this: "Players have to time their movements carefully." At that moment, it dawned on me that the game was up. If they knew the timing of my bowel movements, I had to be afraid. When I read Steve Kearon's comment about the game I started to get quite worried: "The movement rules are wonderfully simple, yet create real dilemmas over creating & breaking connected chains of settlements." Were they talking about bathroom behaviour or a board game? I looked at the box again, and checked the name of the publisher: Reiver Games. Hmm, I'd have to remember that name. They were nice enough to send me a review copy of their new game, but they were making me just a tad nervous. I had good intentions, honestly! Just trying to make our time on the can productive, aren't we? As interesting as Uncle John's Bathroom Reader can be with its tales about elk-dropping earrings, radioactive watches, and the origins of superglue, most of us would rather spend our time reading stuff about board games than useless information or bizarre trivia, and we don't particularly care about which room in the house we are doing the reading!
But just to be on the safe side, I retreated to the safety of my couch, and resolved to finish reading the rules before undertaking another bathroom mission. After all, it's all part of "timing your movements carefully," as the rulebook said, and taking control of the situation. So if you're the kind of person who likes to take control, and time their movements well, then this game for you. Because even in ancient Sumer they had movements that needed careful timing. But since you can't really expect to call a game "Uncle John's Bathroom Reader: The Board Game" and have massive success, they decided to go for the more subtle title "Sumeria". In other words, a Tigris & Euphrates theme.
So let's flush away the toilet humour, and put on our serious hat, to find out what this interesting game is all about! It was released at the UK Games Expo in 2009, where it was edged out narrowly by Snow Tails for Game of the Year - it did win the public vote, however, so look for this game to do well at Essen 09!
Components
Our box cover introduces us to the designer, Dirk Liekens, whose previous game was Wind River.
It also pictures an ancient looking guy who has been around so long that he's turned to stone. As for those buildings you see, they are not outhouses. Shame on your for thinking that, we were going to end the toilet humour, remember! They are buildings from ancient cities of Sumer! We learn more from the back of the game box:
There we read: "In ancient Sumer, power comes from the strength of trade. By moving your traders from region to region, you can increase one city-state's power and diminish another. Dominate the most powerful city-states at the end of each dynasty to gain the vital influence needed to win the game. Over six rounds, Sumeria challenges you to plan ahead, using your wits to gain control of the right regions at the right times."
Inside the box is the usual assortment of gaming goodness, including wooden cubes! No surprise there!
And if we spread everything out nicely, here's what we find:
● 1 game board
● 8 city state tiles
● 56 trader markers (14 in each of the four player colours)
● 36 influence counters (9 in each of four types: political, military, religious, economic)
● 1 bag (for randomizing and storing the influence counters)
● 2 rule books (English and German)
Rulebook
The rulebook is an eight page booklet, and there's one for both German-speaking folk as well as English-speaking folk:
Notice how the rules introduce the basic idea of the game: control of Sumerian city states, by placing and moving traders. In other words, it's basically a variation on the area control game. The rules themselves are very straight forward and easy to learn, and one of the strengths of this game is its elegance. The rule book is well organized, has clear headings, and some good illustrations. Thumbs up so far!
Components: Game board
The game board is essentially a map of part of ancient Sumer. Oh goody, not only do we gamers love timing our movements, but we also love maps!
Notice carefully how the map is divided into eight different regions, or "city-states". These are important, because you will be vying for control of these city states, by trying to get the majority of traders in a particular city-state.
The rule book nicely illustrates what the different parts of the game board are: the regions themselves are City-states, and within each region is a city, three towns, and three villages, all connected by trade routes.
I do like the artwork on the board - here's a closeup of the city-state of Eridu, showing the city, and surrounding towns and villages:
And yes, the publisher is aware that the correct name for the location is Sumer, not Sumeria!
Components: City-state tiles
Corresponding to each city-state, is a matching tile:
Eight city-states, so eight tiles!
There's something immensely satisfying about saying names like Adab, Shurrupak, Uruk and Eridu in a thick Middle Eastern accent! Go ahead, try it, you know you want to!
I appreciate how the tiles clearly mark the city-state they are referring to with red in a miniature map on the tile itself - this saves a lot of headaches in trying to memorize places and names, by using a simple visual aid that shows at a glance where on the map this particular city-state is:
During the game, the city state tiles are going to be placed in a row of eight, and as traders are placed and moved on the map, the order of these city-state tiles will change. At the end of the round, the three city-state tiles on the left of the row will be regarded as the most influential city-states, and earn players with the majority of traders in those states influence counters (which at the end of the game will generate points to win the game).
Components: Trader markers
Trader markers. Yes, next come our Traders, which are going to be placed on the map, and exerting influence. These come in four colours, one colour for each player:
Note that the game is marketed as being for three to four players (but the official variant for two players works excellent in my opinion!). In a four player game, each player gets 10 Trader makers each, in a three player game each player gets all 14 Trader markers in their colour.
These markers represent traders belonging to a player, and will be placed and moved on the map to determine which city-states are the most influential, and thus earn players influence counters.
Components: Influence counters and Bag
Players with the majority of traders in the most influential city-states at the end of each round will win Influence counters, of which there are four types, corresponding to economic (yellow), military (red), religious (green), and political (blue):
The theme is somewhat thin here - the idea is just to earn as many as you can. The more you have in each colour/type, the more valuable they become. Your first influence counter of a particular type is worth 1, your second is worth 2 points, the third is worth 3 points, etc. Since there are 9 of each type, theoretically you could get 45 points if you managed to get all 9 influence counters of one type in a game!
The influence counters are placed in a black cloth Bag (also provided):
At the start of each of the six rounds, six influence counters will be drawn randomly and placed on the board, as available for the players with majorities in the most influential city-states that round.
Components: Markers
Finally, there are also two special markers:
The white pawn is the turn marker, and is placed on the top right of the board to keep track of the three turns that constitute each round of play.
The brown pawn is the start player marker.
Game-play: Aim and Theme
Keep in mind that the aim of the game is to collect as many influence counters as possible, and that the more you have of a particular type, the more each influence counter is worth. At the end of each of the six rounds, you have the opportunity to earn these influence counters if you have a majority in the most influential city-states at that point. So during each of these rounds, everyone will get three turns, and on each turn you have the opportunity to manipulate which city-states are most influential, by placing and moving your traders. Doesn't sound that difficult does it?
So what does this have to do with the theme? From some comments I'd read about the game before playing it, I was expecting something totally dry and with a paper-thin theme, but actually I didn't find it as bad as I'd been led to expect. The eight city-states are all real Sumerian cities from the Ancient Near East that have been studied by archaeologists.
That river that you see in the middle of the board? It's the Euphrates! We've seen this before haven't we? - it's reminiscent of our BGG Top 10 game Tigris & Euphrates! Both games also figure ziggurats, in view of the theme. Each of the city-states of Sumer consisted of a walled city and its surrounding villages and land, in which the ziggurat (temple) featured prominently.
Game-play: Set-up
Each player gets all 10 Trader markers in their chosen colour (use only 14 Trader markers per player in a three player game). The eight city-state tiles are shuffled and placed in random order in a row underneath the board.
The influence counters are shuffled, and six drawn from the bag and placed above the three city-state tiles at the left of the row - these are currently the most "influential" city states, and these influence counters will be the "prize" for the players at the end of the round.
Each player in turns then places one of their traders to a city, town, or village on the board (only one Trader is allowed on each space), until each player has placed five Traders (eight Traders in a three player game). Here's how the start of a four player game might look after initial placement:
Note that currently Shurrupak, Uruk and Eridu (on the left of the row) are the most influential city-states, and thus are obvious targets for Traders, to try to get a majority in those city-states. It's important to know that when resolving majorities later in the game, ties will favour players who control the city in a city-state, and or secondarily towns, so these are obvious choices as well. For planning purposes, it's also good to spread your Traders around the board.
Game-play: Flow of Play
Each of the six rounds has three turns (keep track of this with the white Turn marker at the top left of the board).
Each turn: Placing and moving Trader markers
On your turn, you may do one of three things:
1. Add one of your traders to the board
You can take a trader from your supply (if you have some left), and place it on any empty settlement. This increases the influence of the city-state containing that settlement and trader, and so the corresponding city-state tile under the board is moved across one to the left. To illustrate, consider the picture below:
In this situation, if you added a trader to the city-state of Nippur, it would increase in influence. The Nippur city-state tile is moved one to the left, meaning that the Uruk city-state tile effectively drops down in the order. If the round ended at this point, Uruk would generate two influence counters for the players with majorities there, and not just one!
2. Move one of your traders on the board
You can move one of your traders along one of the trade routes to the next empty settlement in that direction (so if settlements are already occupied, you just jump over them). To illustrate, here the Red player could move his circled Trader to one of three possible settlements:
But now for the important one: if your Trader ends up in a different city-state from where it was originally, the new city-state increases in influence - once again indicated by moving the corresponding city-state tile to the left.
3. Remove one of your traders from the board
You can also return a Trader from the board to your supply in order to decrease the influence of that city-state - in this case indicated by moving the corresponding city-state tile to the right. This choice is used less frequently, but might be useful in situations where an opponent is about to gain important influence counters that they need, and you might be able to prevent this at the end of a round by minimizing the influence of the city-state controlled by your opponent (assuming you have a Trader in that city-state also!)
Each round: distributing Influence counters
The round ends when each player has had three turns, and at this point of the game the board might look like this:
Now it's time to distribute influence counters to the players controlling the most influential city-states, which are the three at the left of the row at this point of the game. In this example, they are Adab, Lagash, and Shurrupak:
We'll call them City-state #1, City-state #2, and City-state #3:
City-state #1: the player with the most traders in this state gets his choice of two of the three influence counters above this city-state tile, and the player with the second most traders gets the third influence counter.
City-state #2: the player with most traders in this state gets his choice of one of the two influence counters above this city-state tile, and the player with the second most traders gets the second influence counter.
City-state #3: the player with the most traders in this state gets the single influence counter above this city-state tile
This is where the area majority control comes into play. Ties are broken in favour of the player who controls the city, secondly in favour of the player who has most traders in towns. if still tied, the tied player who played first that round wins the tie.
You then begin a new round, by drawing six new influence counters from the bag and placing them on the board (the player with the fewest traders in City-state #1 becomes the new start player). Before the start of the next round, the top three city-state tiles are also moved to the right of the row in reverse order (i.e. #1 becomes #8, #2 becomes #7, and #3 becomes #6).
Game-play: Scoring
How to calculate scores
After six rounds, players earn points for their influence counters, according to the following chart:
In other words, the more you have of each influence counter, the more valuable they become! Here a player has scored 28 points, 3 points from the economic counters, 10 from the political counters, and 15 from the religious counters:
Example of scoring
Here's a scoring example from a three player game:
I'm glad to see that Dirk won - after all, he invented the game! 
Sumeria for Two Players
The original prototype of the game was playable with two players, but due to some initial imbalance and the extra costs with including some extra trader markers for the two player game, the final production version is officially only for three to four players. However, subsequent play-testing of the two-player game resulted in tweaks that further improved the two player variant. In fact, I think the two player game is outstanding! I enjoyed it even more than the three and four player game, because it seems to remove some of the chaos and down-time, and gives more possibilities for strategic play.
The two player game requires 20 trader markers per player (either play with two colours each, or steal components from another game), and has four turns per round instead of three. There's a slight difference in scoring (the second influence token for the second city-state is discarded instead of being awarded to the player in second place), but the basic game is unchanged. Full details here: Official 2-Player Variant. I highly recommend it!
Note that a special promo with 24 extra wooden trader markers (6 in each colour, to bring the total to 20 per colour) is planned for Essen 2009, as can be seen here: Sumeria: 2-Player Expansion. See also my review of the two player variant here: http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/435808
Sumeria Computer Game
You will also be pleased to hear that the publisher has a computer version of the game in the works, see details here.
What do I think?
I think Sumeria will especially appeal to fans of games like China, and San Marco, and will find favour with gamers who enjoyed those two offerings, being a similar weight and style. Some of my own observations about this particular game:
● It offers a lot of game in a relatively small box! The publisher doesn't believe in selling games in boxes with lots of empty space. Despite the fairly small package, you get decent components, and a solid game.
● It is somewhat abstract. Some of the critics find it too dry, and on the other hand that's exactly the kind of game others enjoy and are looking for! The gameplay is arguably extract, but I think the theme works reasonably well, and there's at least as much theme as many a Knizia game.
● It is the epitome of elegance. The rules are very straightforward and easy to learn, and yet it offers a solid gaming experience. The rules can be explained in under five minutes, and yet the game-play is not simplistic, but can involve difficult tactical choices.
● It has a good playing time for its depth. You don't get the feeling half-way that you wish the game was over. Yet at the end of 30-45 minutes, when the game ends, you're left feeling satisfied.
● It has high interaction. What else do you expect - it's an area majority control game after all!
● It has very little luck. The only randomness comes in deciding which six influence tokens are selected each round.
● It has an interesting twist on the typical majority control game. By having the city-state tiles move up and down, the game is not just a battle for simple majorities, but also priorities: which is the city-state in which the majority will be determined? This is a simple and yet interesting mechanism.
● It rewards tactics above strategy. Because of the mechanism which constantly changes the relative order of the city-state tiles, the board situation can change quickly from one turn to the next. This fact that the board changes quickly each turn lends the game more to reacting than planning far ahead and setting up long term strategies.
● It should be treated as a light/medium weight game. Some gamers will argue that Sumeria has elements of chaos and lack of control that rewards short term decision making, whereas others will enjoy the tactical decision making that results from this. I personally didn't find this frustrating, especially if the game is treated as one step above a filler, and not as a more serious abstract game like chess. With AP prone players who take it too seriously, it could become painful however, since it is best enjoyed if moves are made fairly quickly, rather than over-thinking a position which will change quickly anyway.
Any gripes? Having a score track on the board might be a nice addition. And like others, I wonder about the advantage given to the player who goes last each round. A second edition would do well to include the extra components for the two player variant (even though this would slightly increase the cost), since this is certainly not an inferior form of the game, and targeting the two-player market would broaden its appeal. For the rest, most aspects of Sumeria are a matter of personal taste, and will boil down to: do you like this type of game or not?
What do others think?
At the time of this review, Sumeria is just appearing on the market, so it's early days as far as feedback goes. But here are a few representative comments to give you an idea what some enthusiastic players are saying about the game:
"Excellent little largely abstract game for 3-4 players." - Richard Lea
"This is a superb game. It has the qualities of a Spiele de Jahres winner! The rules are simple to learn but the game presents satisfying challenges during play." - Paul Willcox
"Very fun game in a small box. Simple area-control mechanism but the shifting advantages of controlling particular city-states add to the challenge of this straight-forward game. Simple rules, nice components, and ever-changing strategies." - Todd Lang
"Nice medium game. Small box but quite a brainburner. Simple and easy rules." - Nuno Sentieiro
"Thought heavy, abstract take on majority control with some nice ideas." - Peer Sylvester
"Simple, very elegant rule-set, that creates an engaging game." - Ian Fleming
"Very quick and easy to pick up. Rather abstract for my tastes but I still found it fun and would play again." - Chris Barnard
"We read the rules, played a full game and really enjoyed it and all in ca 45 minutes. I thought it a clever, elegant design with some of the feel of a Leo Colovini game, but somehow more elegant." - Sid Hawkins
"The new game from Reiver Games is small, cheap and good." - EYE of NiGHT
"Very imaginative game! Lots of strategic choices, yet simple and elegant rule system and a fairly quick play. Well done!" - Philip duBarry
The final word
Sumeria is a solid game, as long as you are not a gamer with a very narrow taste:
1. If you are the gamer who insists on epic stories and deeply thematic game-play: you will find Sumeria too dry.
2. If you are the gamer who insists on a clinical and deep abstract, where your choices are carefully calculated many turns in advance: you will find Sumeria too chaotic.
Don't get me wrong: I enjoy games with deeply thematic game-play. And from time to time I even don't mind a deep abstract. But most of the time, I'm looking for a game that's a low/medium-weight affair, just one or two notches above a filler, something that is elegant, satisfying, and can be played in less than an hour. Ladies and gentlemen, Sumeria fits the bill. The fact that it also works well as a two player game is a definite bonus. It's also family friendly - my children had a great time playing this.
And take it from me: I really don't think the publisher minds if you're reading the rules in the John. In fact your fellow gamers probably won't mind either, when you emerge in less than 10 minutes, "relieved" and ready to teach Sumeria. It's all part of carefully timing your movements! Steve Kearon was right: "The movement rules are wonderfully simple, yet create real dilemmas over creating & breaking connected chains of settlements." Thanks Uncle John, and thanks Reiver Games!
Edit: Correction made to set-up numbers, as suggested by Isamoor.
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The complete list of Ender's pictorial reviews: http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/37596
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Sheamus Parkes
United States
Indianapolis
Indiana
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Awesome review!
And I only pick at rules because I know many people (myself included) use your reviews as rules books sometimes
During setup, I believe you get only 10 markers with 4 players, not with 3 players.
And I don't know about a score track... but at least a scoring rubric that presents the triangle progression so you don't have to remember it at the end
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Maaike
Netherlands
Nijmegen
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I never understood why men have to be on the toilet for so long that they can read a paper or something. I just go and then I'm off again. Do they like their own smells so much? Or are they hiding from their wives/girlfriends/children?
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Matthew Hurst
United States
Plain City
Ohio
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maaikefest wrote: I never understood why men have to be on the toilet for so long that they can read a paper or something. I just go and then I'm off again. Do they like their own smells so much? Or are they hiding from their wives/girlfriends/children?
It's our quiet time.
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Bob
United States
Nebraska
In a man-to-man fight, the winner is he who has one more round in his magazine.
Experience teaches us that it is much easier to prevent an enemy from posting themselves than it is to dislodge them after they have got possession.
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Super review. Well done!
Just added to my want list... 
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Joel Weeks
United States
Roswell
Georgia
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I immediately fell in love with this game and bought it right after I got home from Oasis.
I know others had another opinion of it, but that's what makes the gaming world go round.
I think its exquisite and is not a 10 on my list yet simply because it needs a few more plays to cement it.
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mojo shivers
United States
San Pedro
California
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Zen Postman wrote: maaikefest wrote: I never understood why men have to be on the toilet for so long that they can read a paper or something. I just go and then I'm off again. Do they like their own smells so much? Or are they hiding from their wives/girlfriends/children? It's our quiet time.
QFT
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Zé Mário
Portugal
Senhora da Hora
Matosinhos
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EndersGame wrote:
Inside the box is the usual assortment of gaming goodness, including wooden cubes! No surprise there!
Synaptic Eurogamalisis, seeing wooden cubes where there are none.
I'm bored with your good reviews. Make a bad one for a change!
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Jacob Lee
Canada
Victoria
British Columbia
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I prefer written reviews over video reviews, but written ones with pics are even better. This is one heck of a review, but not the game for me.
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Marc Mistiaen
Spain
Torrelavega
Cantabria
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This is well-written, thank you. I was a little concerned at first you may call the game shit but the final conclusion proved very different.
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Posted Wed Aug 5, 2009 5:09 pm
