Growing up, I played Spades a lot—my brother and I made a pretty good team because we were pretty good at reading each other. I also played Hearts (though not quite as much), and though I'd always meant to learn, I never got around to playing Bridge or Pinochle. What these have in common, of course, is that they're all trick-taking games: each player plays a card and the winner takes the "trick." Depending on the game, you also have trump suits, bidding, and other variations.
I've recently played two games which are quite different from each other but both have trick-taking at their cores, so I thought they'd make a good pair for a review. Rowboat, the first game from newcomer Moosetache Games, has a nautical theme and is a little closer to a traditional trick-taking game like Spades. Myth: Pantheons is published by Alderac Entertainment Group and pits a dozen deities from various cultures against each other. Each is an interesting spin on a traditional card game, and which one you'd prefer depends on your personality and gaming style. Read on for my individual reviews of each game, plus a chance to win a copy of Rowboat!
The Basics
Rowboat is a new game from Moosetache Games for two to four players. It's recommended for ages 13 and up, although I would think a younger kid who's familiar with other trick-taking games might be able to pick this up. (Do younger kids still play Spades, though?) The website states that it can take anywhere from an hour to three hours, though the two-player games I've played were significantly shorter than that. Rowboat comes with 61 cards and a sand timer.
Rowboat looks a little more like a traditional card game at first: the cards have different, nautically-themed suits (Shells, Maps, Waves, and Oars) but the layouts are the same as what you're used to from a poker deck. The Ace has been replaced by an Anchor; instead of the Jack, Queen and King, the high numbers are the Dolphin, Mermaid, Seeker, and Whale—so it's basically like a poker deck with an additional card in the lineup. Bidding is similar to Spades, too: you bid on how many tricks you think you'll take, and you get ten points per successful trick, plus one point for each trick you take over your bid which counts as a sandbag. Accumulate five sandbags and you lose 100 points. Don't make your bid, and you lose ten times your bid, regardless of how close you came to it. First player to 200 points wins. So far, that's all a fairly straightforward trick-taking game.
The Twist
What's new is the Tide, Knobs, and a few specialty cards. Before the round begins, the dealer reveals the Tide: a series of cards ("ruling cards") face-up in the center of the table, stopping when either all four suits are revealed or twelve cards have been played, whichever comes first. The Tide determines both the number of rounds in the next hand and the trump suit for each round. (For example, in the photo above, the hand will last eight rounds, and the trump suits will be: Shells, Waves, Waves, Oars, Waves, Shells, Waves, Maps.) I noticed after playing a few times that in cases where the Tide hits twelve cards and not all four suits have been revealed, you're likely to have a lot of the remaining suits in your hand and not so many trumps, which makes bidding an interesting exercise in guesswork and probability.
On top of that, though, are the Knobs. (I'm really not sure how "knobs" fit into the whole nautical theme, but I'm not a sailor so who knows?) The Knob is the most powerful card in the round, and is the card with the same value and color as the ruling card in the Tide. So for the first round pictured above, the ruling card is the 6 of Shells (green), and the Knob is the 6 of Maps (also green). There's also the "Off-Colored Knobs," those cards that have the same value as the ruling card but in a different color—those are the most powerful non-trump cards in a round.
With the Tide, changing trump suits, and Knobs, it makes for some very interesting strategy over Spades. The rules say that you can leave out bidding for beginners, but for me it really adds a lot when you're trying to figure out how best to match up the cards in your hand with the cards in the Tide.
Each player (or team, in a four-player game) receives one of each card, which can be used only once during the entire game. The Rowboat is a super-trump, beating every other card in the game (and cannot be beaten by a second Rowboat). But it can't be played on the last round of a hand. The Lighthouse allows you to look at your opponent's hand for the duration of the included sand timer, which lasts roughly a minute. The Moon card can be played by the dealer before the Tide is revealed, and allows the dealer to declare the number of cards in the Tide (between four and twelve).
The Verdict
So far I've gotten to play a few two-player games of Rowboat and I've enjoyed them, and I imagine a four-player team game would be a lot of fun. That said, because my typical game nights tend to focus on big board games with lots of bits, I haven't been able to entice as many of my regular gamers to try Rowboat. Next time I see my family, though, I think I'll probably bring this along to see what they think. In the games I've played, we haven't really used the specialty cards much, and I think the game has pretty good gameplay and strategy without them. In particular, the inclusion of the sand timer seems like something just to make the box a little bigger and doesn't really add much value for me. (Then again, I'm a weird gamer who likes small, compact boxes.)
The one other thing that bugged me was the backwards 9—you can see it in the photo above. I was told that it was actually an intentional design decision which I won't really get into and it's certainly shouldn't be the deciding factor in trying out the game, but it really messes with your brain while you're playing, seeing that and trying to make it look right.
A – video tutorial on how to play Rowboat is available on YouTube. Rowboat is available from a few game stores (with more locations coming soon), or from Amazon
Wired: The Tide and the Knobs make for a very fun and challenging variation on Spades.
Tired: I didn't really care for the specialty cards or the sand timer.
The Giveaway
Moosetache Games is generously providing three copies of Rowboat so you can help spread the word about their debut!
You have two ways to win:
- Post a comment on this page (make sure you mention Rowboat so I know you're not commenting about Myth: Pantheons).
- Tweet about it! You must include the hashtag #gdrowboat and a link to this review to be eligible.
Entries will be accepted until 11:59 pm (PST) on Friday, May 14, and we'll draw three names at random to win the games.
Note: Moosetache Games provided a review copy of Rowboat.
Myth: Pantheons was released last summer by AEG (the company behind The Isle of Doctor Necreaux), but I just recently got a review copy to try out. This is a game that, at first glance, does not look like it's a trick-taking game—almost everything has a carved-in-stone or etched-in-bronze look to it, there are Deity cards and City cards, and that big pile of tokens. It's a lot to take in, but at its core Myth is still essentially a trick-taking game.
The Basics
Myth is for 3 to 6 players, ages 10 and up, and the box says it takes 45 minutes to play. Our first time through was closer to an hour and a half, though we were still working through the rules as we played. I would definitely recommend a careful reading of the rules before introducing the game, but there are still some parts that are easier to understand once you're actually playing.
The box comes with 12 gods and goddesses (with 5 Deity cards each), 30 City cards, 60 Mortal cards, and 160 Domain tokens. The artwork is pretty nicely done and suits the theme, but because a lot of it is beige-colored, I found it was pretty hard to distinguish the tokens and the domains (suits) on the cards at a glance. Also, the numerals on the Mortal cards (which correspond with your playing cards) are in Roman numerals printed fairly small in the corners, which makes legibility an issue at times.
The Twist
In Myth, the players choose from the dozen deities from various cultures, each with their own special abilities. Since each deity has five special cards they can use, learning each one's strengths and limitations is surely a significant part of the game, and will take some time to work into your strategy. The goal of the game is to have the most followers at the end of three "epochs." The end of an epoch basically amounts to when a player runs out of Mortal cards—but since there are ways to get more cards, the length of the epochs can vary.
The rules are fairly complex (you can download the rulebook from BoardGameGeek) so I won't get into all the details here, but I'll try to give you at least a glimpse. Each City card has a number that represents the number of challenges (tricks) that you need to win in order to claim the city. The Cities, in addition to the followers they come with, also grant you various abilities for the rest of the game. Challenges are won by having the highest value card in the leading domain (whatever suit started the trick), unless somebody plays a card from the ruling domain (trump suit). But many of the cards also grant you tokens, cards, or Divine Acts even if you don't win—or in some cases, only if you don't win the trick. You also gain a token whenever you lose a challenge, matching the domain of the card you played. The tokens match the five domains (Harvest, Weather, the Heavens, Death and War) and can be used to protect your own Cities, attack other Cities, change the ruling domain, or even increase the value of your cards. Because of the extra features on the cards and tokens, selecting a card for any given challenge can be a real puzzle.
It's not enough just to take a bunch of tricks, because the other players may be able to amass tokens and Divine Acts to devastate your winnings. Myth is a balancing act, winning tricks to get the cities (and followers), but then losing tricks to gain tokens to protect your cities and followers. And there's also knowing when best to use your five precious Deity cards.
The Verdict
Once we got the game going, I really enjoyed it but was a bit surprised by how complex it was. There's a lot to keep track of—sure, it's a trick-taking game at its core, but that core is pretty deep inside a whole mess of resource-management and special ability stuff. I think it's not necessarily one that I'd introduce to casual gamers for fear of scaring them off, but somebody who's used to multiple-level strategies would probably enjoy it. My biggest gripes, in fact, were not about the gameplay but the presentation. Because of the design of the cards, it's very hard to hold your cards in a fan and read the suits and the values at the same time (the numbers are in the top right corner, which doesn't work well for the typical fan direction). The instructions aren't always very clear—I had to use the process of elimination to tell which cards were the Mortal cards, because there is not a single image in the instructions labeling them as such. Also, I understand the need to make the terminology fit the theme, but renaming everything sometimes just makes teaching the game harder. "Ok, domain means suit, ruling domain means trump suit, challenge means trick, epoch means round ..."
Overall, I think it's one that I'd like to try again, particularly with the different deities, but it has a pretty steep learning curve.
AEG's website has a closer look at the twelve deities. Myth: Pantheons is available at many game retailers or from Amazon
Wired: A complex game that expands significantly from its trick-taking core.
Tired: Attractive but not necessarily practical visual design; rulebook not so great.
Note: AEG provided a review copy of Myth: Pantheons.
