LogFAQs > #935482030

15. Castles of Burgundy (2011)

Category: Player vs Player
Genres: Dice placement, tile-laying, drafting, point salad
Rules complexity (0 to 7): 4
Game length: 35 min per player
Experience: 10-15 plays with 2-3, 4 (team variant) - 2016, 2018-19
Previous ranks: NR/100 (2016), NR/100 (2018)

Summary - Everyone competes for the most victory points by laying (connected) hexes on a personal board. Each round, players roll their two dice and, in turn order, take actions for each order. Dice actions include drafting tiles (based on die face) from the market to your supply, laying tiles from supply to a legal spot on your player board, and selling goods. Each placed tile has either an immediate ability (which often will allow you to chain abilities) or an ongoing ability, and finishing connected regions on the board awards points.

Design - I love the combination of simplicity and depth in Castles of Burgundy. One of the few games in my collection best at two, Castles essentially is an ideal depiction of breadth, constraint, and tactics as depth. The theoretical decision space is massive on each turn, and perhaps if you had every option available, you'd make the same board every time - draft and lay the same tiles, the like.

Instead, your two dice limit your window to something manageable. If you want a tile, you have to take it from the marketplace, which means it was first offered on the marketplace, and no one snatched it before you. And even if it falls to you, you'll need to have the appropriate die face, or a plan to get that die face using disposable worker tiles, or the appropriate building to let you "cheat" the action in. Depending on your style and the point of the game you're in, you'll find yourself both strategically angling for the right tile, by hook or by crook, and tactically just taking the best action your dice offer you.

Like any dice game where you roll your own dice, Castles of Burgundy can have luck screw you. But it does a really damn good job at mitigating horrific rolls. You have three spaces in your supply, so when you can't place a tile, you can draft. You have silverlings that let you buy the tile you might need without using dice. You have the sell-goods action, which doesn't build your board but seems rather convenient. You can spend worker tiles to adjust your die faces, and in the worst case, throw your dice away to get worker tiles which, hey, even if you never use, are worth a victory point at the end of the game.

Yes, the default "I pass" action awards you VP. Each game is exactly fifty die-actions, meaning your score to beat is fifty if you just throw away all your workers. Make no mistake, Castles of Burgundy - the only Stefan Feld title on my ranking, I believe - is arguably the definitive point salad. The vast majority of points are scored immediately, so while you can feel a bit bad falling behind, you'll also get that thrill of scoring many, many different times. Sell goods? Points! Mine income? Points! Lay animals? Points! Finishing regions? Points, points, points!

Which isn't to say you can play with no focus at all. The biggest bumps in Castles of Burgundy come from a concerted effort in animal tiles (with no hate-drafting), completing large regions, or finishing small regions in early rounds. At the end of the game, you'll score for certain yellow tiles, but as those are based on the player's board and the tiles they've laid, your decisions will still be paramount there.

Essentially it boils down to, you get tons of choices, almost none of them bad in a vacuum. Any given turn is high-luck, but over the course of fifty dice and five separate entire-market refreshes, your tactics and planning should shine through. Even if you don't win, CoB is the type of game where your score often reflects how well you've played.

And it is very satisfying to play. While there's a lot of overhead/rules-consulting regarding specific tiles (eight different brown building tiles and dozens of yellow tiles!), the core gameplay is super-simple, with just four different die actions (one of which is degenerate). I think it's notable that depending on situation, pretty much any of the six suits of tiles can feel amazing to get. The right yellow tech, the right animal, the right timing on a castle, the right timing on a boat, getting the mine at the right cost, and any of the amazing buildings - that feels like the heart of the game. You get two actions on your turn, but when you slap down the castle, you get a free action. That lets you place your building, which in turn lets you take down a boat. Great, now next turn you can place that, seize first-player, and sell goods! The combination of effects is brilliant and the most satisfying part of it.

Experience - Of course, perhaps there is a large bias here... It was enjoyable but not spectacular the first time I played it, but when it came on my local market at $15, I snapped it up. This is probably the top game for me and gaming buddy #1, at 2p. It's the perfect length for a two-player middleweight euro, and it's the game we've spent the most hours playing. I don't often get to explore heavier games in as much depth as I've gotten to explore CoB.

Future - And the thing is, that high degree of play makes me no less interested in playing CoB. Having a willing partner is huge, but CoB is also brilliant because the tactical dice decisions shape the game so much. CoB is just as consistent as Concordia, and it plays better at 2. It's a big winner.
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yet all sailors of all sorts are more or less capricious and unreliable - they live in the varying outer weather, and they inhale its fickleness