[Board/Tactical Game]: Clans, reviewed by ShannonA (4/4)

http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/10/10022.phtml

Shannon Appelcline's Summary:

A fun abstract stratgy game with bluffing elements, all covered with the thin veneer of a prehistoric theme. If you enjoy most of these elements, a well-worthwhile purchase.

Go to the full review for more information.

Post originally by Myles Corcoran at 2004-01-14 02:27:51
Converted from Phorums BB System

Thanks Shannon for another thoughtful and comprehensive review.

I've played Clans a good number of times now and the translation of the rules that I have (from Boardgamegeek.com) doesn't say that you eliminate the huts from a village created in unfavourable terrain. Is this different in your rules?

I realize that it won't make much difference, as the score doesn't change, but if the huts remain on the board you can't count them as easily to track who's eliminating who.

Myles

Post originally by Viktor Haag at 2004-01-14 06:47:53
Converted from Phorums BB System

Hi Myles!

Yes, Shannon's review is correct (at least as far as the rules in the box are concerned). Any villages built in unfavourable terrain get destroyed. This can be quite important later in the game. A nasty move is to make one move when the timing track is on the border of two scoring zones, when the move will create two villages.

Since if you create more than one village, you get to decide in what order they are "scored", you can really work the system to your advantage (by making a village which would have been destroyed if it were created by itself into a scoring village by scoring another one first). Opportunities for this typically only occur well into the midgame, but that's just the point in time when this kind of tactic comes into play anyway.

--
Viktor

Post originally by Shannon Appelcline at 2004-01-14 11:33:26
Converted from Phorums BB System

The Rio Grande rules do explicitly say the huts are removed from the board.

Really, it doesn't matter what you do with the huts for either the successful or unsuccesful villages, as they can't have any further effect on the game because they're isolated, so do whatever meets your aesthetic and mnemonic preferences.

Shannon

Post originally by Myles Corcoran at 2004-01-15 02:02:57
Converted from Phorums BB System

Okay, I have the German edition of the game and was working from the English translation on BGG. I'll have to ask a German friend if the original rules agree. I know it doesn't make much of a difference.

I'm curious also what happens when a village is created containing only one hut of each of the five colours. The rules translation I have isn't explicit, but I'd assume that the village is immediately destroyed and the active player just gets the bonus chip. We've been playing it so that you can't deliberately do this, but that's merely a preference.

Myles

Post originally by Myles Corcoran at 2004-01-15 02:09:16
Converted from Phorums BB System

Hi Viktor!

I can see this move being useful and indeed it's come into play a few times in our games.

Some of the players in our group grumble that the game rewards the player to the left too much. That is, it's very easy to set up a good move for the next player, and you have to wait for the player on your right to leave you a good position to make a good score. I can sort of see their point but enjoy the game nonetheless. There's a nice tension in waiting for the clustering to reach a critical point before many village-making opportunities present themselves at once.

Myles

Post originally by Jasen Robillard at 2004-01-23 10:03:23
Converted from Phorums BB System

Your initial interpretation is correct Myles. If a village is formed with one hut of each color, the person forming the hut gets a gold piece but the village itself scores squat (0). There is no rule that states that this cannot deliberately be done.

Jasen