Mr. Jack- Time's short, catch Jack the Ripper if you can!

I was contemplating on which game should I review next and that's when it occurred to me that I could continue my review with the Mystery/Deduction genre of games and hence Mr. Jack!

As mentioned in my previous review Cluedo was a sort of revival of my boardgaming interest. I always enjoyed the mystery themed games (not sure was this after Cluedo though), but one of the problems with the Mystery games that I had before getting Mr. Jack was that they were all 3+ players and above. Both Cluedo and Mystery of the Abbey and it wasn't that I always used to have 3 people that I could play with. Also, I was looking at a shorter game ('cos Cluedo and MoA takes about 60-90 min).

After some reading around, I found the answer in Mr. Jack. Got it through a friend of mine from Singapore. This is a 2-player murder mystery themed game that takes about 5-10 min to learn and takes about 30 min to play.

Mr. Jack by Bruno Cathala & Ludovic Maublanc

Both Bruno and Ludovic are French game designers. Bruno has designed one of the most popular Co-operative games Shadows over Camelot (more about it some other day :-)...) and Ludovic has designed another popular game called Cash 'n' Guns a fun game like Bang!

What do you get in the Box?

Well before I go to the content bit, I have to share how I felt after opening the box ;-) As I mentioned before I had read a few reviews about this game and thought that this was a simple enough game for 2 players. I wasn't completely into lot of strategic Euro games and hence wanted the game to be simple (things are different now though).

When I opened the box and saw the rule book, I almost fainted looking at the size of it!!!! It is a 38 page magazine!! and I thought that I had blown up money on this one. But don't fret :D as I realised moments later the rule book comes in 7 different languages and hence so big. In actuality the rule set is just 5 pages :-)


Now to the contents:

• You get a nice big board with lot of hexes
  
• 8 character tokens with suspect on one side (dark color) and innocent on the other side (white background)- Characters come from the popular Sherlock Holmes series like Sherlock, Dr. Watson etc.
  
• 6 hexagonal gas light tiles with 4 of them having numbers1-4 for removal after each of rounds 1-4
• 2 hexagonal manhole tiles
• 2 police cordon tokens
• 1 turn counter token
• 1 card witness/no witness indicator
• 8 cards with green back with the names and pictures of the character along with their special abilities
• 8 alibi cards with red back and picture of a character on each card

The quality of the components are top notch with really thick cards and absolutely brilliant art work! In fact I'm wrong in calling these cards as cards, they are really really thick boards!

How does it play?

First let's look at the set up before we see the game play:

• Set out the board look the the cover page of the rule book to set out the gaslight markers, manhole markers, police cordon tokens and the starting positions of the 8 characters with their bright/darker side up
• Place the turn counter token on the bottom right corner of the board where it says 1
• Choose a player who is going to play lack- he gets the witness card and draws one of the character cards from the red back stack
• Shuffle the 8 green back stack and draw the top 4 cards and keep it open next to the board
• Ensure that the player playing Jack faces the grey side of the board (upside down) and the detective player faces the board upright (gold side)

Now we are all set to play :-) If you noticed I haven't mentioned the objective of this game. Well if you read the above section of set up that gives you the clue to the game. One of the 8 characters is Jack the Ripper i.e. the card the Jack the Ripper player chooses is the culprit. The other player has to find out this guy, and to make matter tense you have just 8 turns in which to do that! Of course did I mention that if Jack is clever he will escape from the city (board) even before you get to the 8 turns!! So buckle up you are in for a roller coaster ride!

On each turn the following happens:

• The turn order token tells you the order of play. Eg: Grey-Gold-Gold-Grey (for turns 2-4-6-8) or Gold-Grey-Grey-Gold (for turns 1-3-5-7)
  
• Players choose one of the open character cards depending on who they are representing (see above of grey and gold description)
• Players move the character tokens on the board as per the movement points for each character and use the character's special ability. E.g. Sherlock can move upto 3 places and draw a card from the red back pile etc.
• After a turn is over i.e. 4 cards the Jack player uses the witness card to indicate whether the culprit is visible or invisible.
• Once this is done, depending on whether the culprit is visible or invisible the tokens are turned around to indicate their innocence. Meaning- if the culprit is visible then all the invisible characters are innocent and vice verse
• The turn counter moves to the next number and one of the gas light is removes from the board (numbers 1-4 for each round)- i.e. your city is going get increasingly darker and becomes difficult for the detective to catch Jack ;-) so hurry up

Note on Visibility:

• Any character adjacent to another character is visible
• Any Character adjacent to a gaslight is visible
• Any character in the line of sight of Dr. Watson's gaslight is visible
• All other characters are invisible
• Jack can escape the city only when he is invisible and through one of the exits that does not have the police cordon marker!
  

Now for the fun element- Well it is extremely important for players to use the gas lights to their advantage and also the manholes. Using manholes can absolutely turn things around for players. There is no luck element in using the manholes, but there is surely a surprise element! Add to this the special abilities of the characters are really important and if used wisely can enrich the gaming experience immensely.

How long does this play?

Typically each game should last somewhere between 20-30 min, yes it is that short though my review makes the game appear long. In very rare circumstances I've seen games stretching upto 45 min (i.e. when I play this game with some serious chess players :-)

Who would you recommend it to?

I would categorise this game as a light-medium game and hence this can fit into most game collections with ease. Serious gamers can use this as an ice breaker before they want to get into something really serious and casual gamers can play this for hours before getting bored :-) I would say this is a great game for get away- so couples might find it very attractive, but if you are a person who plays games with larger groups and seldom play 2 player games, then you may not want it because this is a 2-player game :-)

Any Downsides?

Well I had to think long and hard before writing this section. Downside of such a nice game, well can it really have one? The answer to me was yes, and I say this as I have played this extensively for over 2 yrs now- One serious downside is games tend to become repetitive after you have played many times. There are actually 2-3 different strategies and once you crack them in your initial games the surprise element might die down. Playing with different players will give you different experiences as the style of play will be different, but you can nail down the trends after a point in time.

For beginners learning the movement abilities and special abilities might take a game or two, and if they play against experienced gamers there is a huge disadvantage. This game is also fairly unforgiving in that if anyone commits a simple error early in the game, you can be sure that your game is going to be short- specially true with errors made by players playing Jack.

Personally I feel that this game is not very well balanced- what I mean by this is, it is very difficult for Jack to escape and not get caught. After some games you know that Jack will get caught (experienced gamers) and the challenge is how long can Jack keep running away. For this I do play certain variants like playing it for 6 turns instead of 8, removing 2 lamps instead of 1 etc. but still the detective has a lot of advantage unless he plays really stupid.

Final Thoughts!

Well don't get carried away reading my downside section and dismiss this game as a flash in the pan. This is a very very good game and can keep you engaged for hours, days, years. Though I don't play it very often, I do see this game hitting my table every other month at least for a couple of games. Yes there are some drawbacks, but I guess there are very few games that are perfect. If you ask me this game is perfect to satisfy your mystery/deduction itch without brain burn within a short time! With an expansion and a full blown game released I can only imagine this game getting more and more popular! As I said before catch this Jack before he escapes from the market stands.

Cluedo- Prof. Plum, in the Studio using a Candle Stick!

I guess I would be wring calling this a review. This game is so popular that it doesn't need a review. For more than 60 yrs this Parker Brother's game has intrigued people and I should add, is still continuing to do so. I say a great game to introduce mystery genre games for newbies (3-6 players)

I have lot of people on Boardgame Geek tell that Settlers of Catan was a genre breaking game that actually got a lot of them back to boardgaming. But I'm a little different. Coming from India, my knowledge of boardgames was extremely limited to say the least and this game actually got me into boardgaming and hence a special affiliation towards Cluedo :-)

I was probably one of those in India who had no clue about this game, though some of my friends had played it years ago. Unfortunate is all that I can say. But all this changed when a friend of mine showed me this game in Target or Big W in Melbourne i.e. during B-School days. He said "why don't we pick this game up for our weekend?" We were supposed to have some friends at my home and spend time and he suggested that this was an interesting game.

This set the ball rolling :-)

Cluedo the age old game of mystery and intrigue has reached immense heights where people host Cluedo Parties, murder Mystery parties etc. All that is required is to identify a hypothetical murder that has taken place- you need to tell who don it, with what weapon and in which room. In fact there has been many better murder mystery games after this, but to me this stays close to my heart!

BTW, this is available across all stores in India and don't wait to read this review to buy this game :-) If you look at my pictures you can probably make out how worn out this game is- i.e. how much I've played this :-)

Cluedo or Clue by Anthony E. Pratt

Anthony E. Pratt (August 10, 1903 - April 9, 1994) was an English game designer who is credited with creating the popular board game Clue. He came up with the game idea while working as a fire warden during World War II in Leeds. He was inspired to create the game by Geoffrey Bull, inventor of the board game Buccaneer. (Boardgame Geek)

What do you get in the Box?



This game perhaps comes in so many flavors that I really can't say with certainty that there are the things in the box. But the Parker Brothers version that I have has the following:

• Nice big game board depicting 9 rooms
• 6 colored pieces representing 6 different characters (Ms. Scarlet, Mrs. White, Prof. Plum, Col. Mustard etc.)
  
• 6 miniature weapons (knife, revolver, candle stick, rope, wrench, lead pipe)
• 9 room cards
• 6 weapon cards
• 6 character cards
  
• Dice and deduction sheets

Neat components. Also you can download deduction sheet from BGG whenever you run out of it or create your own.

How does it play?

• Each player chooses a character, gets deduction sheet and start off from their respective character's starting position
• one card at random is chosen from each of the 3 stacks i.e. character, weapon, room) and set aside. This is what is needed to be deduced.
• The rest of the cards are distributed among the players and it doesn't matter if is it unevenly distributed.
  
• Ms. Scarlet starts 1st, else choose a way that you like
• Throw the dice and move the counter towards the entrance of any of the rooms that you want to enter
• Once a player is at the door step others can't enter the room
• Another player cannot enter the room already having a detective by throwing a dice
• How ever other characters can be summoned by detectives on their turn to the room that they are currently present
• Players can suggest/suspect using the following combination- Character name- Weapon- The current room that they are in. Eg. Scarlet-revolver-kitchen (assuming the player is in kitchen)
• Players can suspect/suggest themselves as well i.e person playing Scarlet can suspect Scarlet themselves
  
• Note: Players cannot suggest that the murder happened in another room by staying in one- so you cannot stay in Study while suggesting the murder happened in Ballroom
• After a player makes a suggestion he/she goes round the table asking if anyone has an objection to that combination. If they have they must prove it showing one of the cards of the combination (i.e in case more than one card of the combination used). Remember all players have to be truthful when it comes to objecting and cannot bluff.
• Play continues like this round the table until a time when someone comes forward to accuse- Each player gets just one chance to accuse. i.e by accusing you are publicly saying that you know he combination of room, character and weapon and you take a look at the hidden cards. If you are right you win, else you are out of the game. Even if you lose you have to be present in the game to show the clues to others. So be very sure before making an accusation
  
• If you have a winner, people can decide if they want to continue the game or each one can go and make an accusation (this is how we play)

People use some interesting strategies like using clues from their hand and trying to mislead others into believing that the combination is a strong possibility of being the right answer ;-)

How long does it play?

This game usually takes somewhere between 45 min to 75 depending on how experienced your group is. But this game is fun so don't worry about the time :-)

Who do you recommend it to?

Well, I would like to say that this game is for all. But yes, if you are starting out on boardgaming and have no idea about what board games are, you should not miss this one. Yes I do accept that there are better games, but this is surely one of the good games. If people have been playing it for more than 60 yrs, I surely believe that there is substance to play this game.

Any Downsides?

Having said that this game is fun, enjoyable etc. this game is not without flaws. One thing that really makes this game annoying after you become comfortable is the dice mechanism- unnecessarily slows things down. This is where games like Mystery of the Abbey- MoA (which I own as well) scores over Clue. After many plays you'll exactly know that there are 3-4 different strategies to crack this and it is just a matter of time before someone cracks it. Again games like MoA or American Werewolf or Werewolves of Miller's Hollow (the last 2 are very different to MoA and Clue) scores. Some people find it hard to keep track of things on the small deduction sheet. Some people have also complained that this game is more of an elimination than deduction. But honestly I have played this close to 80 times and still don't mind playing it, though the preference has gone down a bit.

Final Thoughts!

This game got me into Board gaming and just for that reason alone, I'll not be getting rid of this game :-) I still get kicks playing this, but definitely enjoy MoA more due to the mechanics involved and the complexity involved. Having said that I would say this game should be played by everyone in case you have not played it before. I really don't mind if you don't want to buy, but not playing this is a crime :-)

Jambo- How Good are you at Trading?

Well now that the weight of letting you all know to get your games is off my shoulder, I can get back to writing my reviews :-)

This game is by far the most advanced Kosmos- Rio Grande, 2 player game that I have played till date. The reason I say it is complex is not because the game mechanic is difficult. In fact the mechanic is very simple, but the sheer variety of cards that exist makes the learning curve really really steep for players! More about the cards etc a little later.

I just stumbled upon this game on the Internet, when I was looking for a lighter option to Caylus (really complex strategy game). The reason I was looking at a lighter game is because my wife was in tears after the 1st game play of Caylus. It took us nearly 4 hrs! An absolute marathon!!

More about that game later. But I read up a few reviews and finally decided to get my hand on it and got it through a colleague of mine who was traveling to the US. After having played this some 10-15 times I can say that this game offers enough strategic depth as any other big box games. Yes, it may not be as deep as a Puerto Rico or Caylus or Princes of Florence, but hey! Make no mistake this one's a winner!

Jambo by-Rüdiger Dorn

Rüdiger Dorn (born 1969) is a game designer of popular Eurogames. He was nominated for the 2005 Spiel des Jahres award for his game Jambo, which also placed 8th for the Deutscher Spiele Preis award. He was also nominated for the 2007 Spiel des Jahres award for his game Die Baumeister von Arkadia. (from wikipedia). He has designed many popular Euro games like Louis XIV, Traders of Genoa, Arkadia, Goa etc.

Euro styled games are strategy board games where luck plays almost no part in the outcome. You have all the details in front of you to take decisions and plan your game play. A tactical board-game on the contrary is one where things are very dynamic and changes every move. You really can't plan ahead of your game play in a tactical game. Eg. Balloon Cup, Lost Cities

I'm writing about these as Jambo falls somewhere in between the two. It has enough depth and strategy to keep players engaged and at the same time tactical to keep players engaged. Sometimes strategy games tend to become isolated and people may spend loooooooonnnnng periods before they make a move and that for certain people can kill the fun.

Now back to Jambo- At the heart of it is a trading game- you buy low sell high and in doing so gain gold coins. Anyone who wins 60 coins is the winner. This game comes with some amazing artwork! In fact you can spend quite a bit of time just looking and admiring the cards! By far the best artwork I've seen from Kosmos-Rio Grande.

The game comes with so many special cards that it takes 4-7 games just to get used to the variety and understand how they work in turn! More about all these in the following sections.

What Do you get in the box?


This game comes with some really nice and neat pieces:

• 2 large market stand cards- one for each player
• 5 small market stands
• 40 Ware cards
• 22 Utility cards
• 29 Person cards
• 14 Animal cards
• Gold coins in 1's and 5's
• 6 different ware chips (6 of each variety)
• 5 action markers

The artwork on all of them is top notch.

How does it play?

This game takes about 5-7 minutes to set this game up. Just that you need to separate all the bits out and place it in groups. Then you deal 5 cards to each individual, take 20 gold coins and a large market stand (that can accommodate 6 resources) and then you start the game.

• Each player gets 5 actions that he can perform on his/her turn (counted using the action marker)
• There are 2 things basically that a person can do and both of them are optional- Draw Phase and Play
• Both these phases are optional
• In the draw phase you can continue drawing a card until you decide to keep one; and once you do so you go onto the play phase where you play cards for the remaining actions
• Because they are optional, you can directly go onto the play phase and play as well

Now with the game play being so simple, you might start to wonder where on earth is the complexity? Well that is precisely what I'm going to answer in the following paragraph.

• This game comes with 8 different animal cards (14 cards overall)- these cards can cause harm to your opponent and give you a distinct advantage
  
• 10 different utility (22 overall) which gives players lot of advantages during every turn! These cards stay in front of the player (upto a max of 3) and can be used once every turn!!
  
• 13 different person cards (29 overall) that gives lot of advantage to players at different points in the game!

I'm not going to go very deep into each cards because I'll be writing out a thesis then and not a review :-)

The objective is to use these special cards along the ware cards to buy wares at a lower price and sell it at a higher price to reach 60. But there are some interesting aspects with these wares itself. A card with 3 different wares is worth more than card with the same ware! Also when you buy your 6th ware and you don't have a small market, you have to pay 2 gold extra for keeping them! If you are the 1st person to buy a small market then you need to pay 6 gold opposed to the 2nd player who pays just 3....phew so much isn't it. Well not really. Just get used to it and it is lots of fun! Trust me on that.

How long does it play?

A good game should go on anywhere between 40-45 min. Very rarely when the game gets real close I've seen it go on for an hour. But you really won;t figure out how time flew by! It is very fast, interactive with both players going at each other and loads and loads of tactics and some strategy.

Who would you recommend it to?

Well, if you have got bugged with playing some basic card games like Lost Cities, Balloon Cup etc. But fret the idea of getting into a Caylus or an Agricola, then this one's for you! Even for hard core gamers, this is a great game, because it is light compared to lot of other big box Euro Strategy Games. This game is also great for people who like to tingle their gray cells! But definitely not a brain burner. This is an enjoyable nail biting experience fo 2 players.

Any Downsides?

Well as I said before the variety is something that this game provides in plenty! But this is a double edged sword. As you can see the number of different cards can become overwhelming for some. The learning curve is really steep. As the rule set recommends you have to play the 1st few games just to get used to the cards. Most of the cards come with lot of text on them and hence can slow down the game till you get familiar with them. The inter-relation between various cards is something that you'll pick as you keep playing more and more games. As you have to draw cards from a face down pile this is definitely not a 'no luck' game. Because of this element the game has a tilt towards tactics more than strategy- though there is definitley a plan you can go with once you get to know all the cards.

Final Thoughts!

I would say Jambo is an experience (well though I don't classify it in the same league of other Euro Strategy Games). This is definitely a great 2 player small game. Don't get misled by the fact that I've laid out so many rules. The rule set in fact is smaller than my review hahahah!! This game is definitely easy to learn and play!

It is neither too long nor too short, nethier a brain burner nor a dumb game, nether is this too easy nor is this too difficult. This makes it a very attractive propositon and wants me to play more and more with casual gamers. If you are one that likes some strategy with luck, this is definitely one for your collection. But play other simpler games before you get to this; then you'll appreciate this game a whole lot better. Very elegantly desiged, this award winning game will leave you surprised at the amount of depth it offers in such a small box!

Caesar & Cleopatra- Indulge Yourself in Ancient Politics!

Didn't take long for me to get back to Kosmos- Rio Grande combination....did I?

Continuing the series of 2-player light games (dare I call this one a filler game, though some of them do), here I'm with Caesar & Cleopatra, perhaps a highly debated game- Do I like or Not?

If you have read my previous reviews say Lost Cities, Balloon Cup etc. This game is definitely deeper than those, however why is it that it is not highly ranked by people and lot of people want to trade it? Answers lie below!

I saw this game for the 1st time durng my visit to the game store 'Games People Play'- Harvard Square. I got interested, but did not venture out to buy this one. However after almost an year and having played Lost Cities and Balloon Cup to death decided to read about this game on the Boardgame geek and then asked a friend of mine to get it for me from the States :-)

After having played this game for more than 60 times, I started asking myself- Do I really like this game as much as I used to when I got it? The frank answer to that was a "No", but I still play it occasionally. I don't play it as often as I used to play just because I go games that are better than this. However let me take you through this interesting game and leave the final verdict to you guys :-)

Caesar & Cleopatra- by Wolfgang Lüdtke


Lüdtke is a banker by training and profession and started collecting and reviewing games and moved on to creating games now (something that I aspire to do- the creating part).

The game says this is a game of influence and politics. In this game a player can either choose to take Cleopatra or Caesar. Each one comes with a set of cards, though the nomenclature is different both sets are the same with same functionalities. Like with any other Rio Grande games the quality of cards are excellent, though the size seems very odd and makes it a little hard to shuffle. The art work is neat and very thematic with the Caesar and Cleopatra age. However this in itself is its downside as the game fizzles out on the theme. Though we are talking about politicians, winning them on your side to gain a majority, all that transaltes to having a larger sum on your side compared to your opponent(smaller sum in case of a 'Philosoper' card).

The objective of the game is to win as many Roman particians on your side using your cards, tact and skill so that the winner gets to keep Egypt!

There is definite tactical depth and variety, but the randomness seems to take away a large portion of the tactics (More about this in the next section). This game will appeal to a lot of people who would want to try out a slightly more complicated game than say Lost Cities and seek more variety. It by no means is a game that is bad or somthing that you'll absolutely detest owning (though few people have that opinion ;-)..) Not me though!

What do you get in the Box?


Cards, cards and cards. This game is all about bunch of cards:

• You get 37 influence cards for each player (Caesar & Cleopatra)
• 13 Action cards for each player- don't worry about the names, they are all the same
• 6 influence bonus cards
• 8 vote of confidence cards
• 21 patrician divided into 5 groups (3 groups of 5 cards and 2 groups of 3 cards)

A very interesting aspect is the nomenclature- they have use Latin names for charecters, which of course the moment you look at it, you'll realize are very ficticious and bad in humor. E.g. Justitianus ANUS, etc. Most names are similar, very artificial I felt!

How does it Play?

There are a few things that you do right at the beginning:

• Each person takes the influence cards for his charecter i.e. Caesar or Cleopatra and seperates out 2 sets of cards numbered 1-5. One set he places face down in front of the partcians and the other in his hand
• Each person arranges the 13 action cards in an order that he wants to use them throughout the game (this btw is a very good mechanic and gives players some tactical advantage)
• Each player also takes one influence bonus card, which tells him which group he needs to win a majority to score the bonus
• He then shuffles the vote of confidence cards and keeps them in a different stack and shuffles the rest of his influence cards

Once this is all don, you start the game play:

• On your turn, you can choose to be either active or passive (though I've not seen many being passive)
• If you are active then you can play 2 cards face up in front of any of the patrician groups or play a single card face down
  
• He may with the influence cards play an action card anytime during his turn
• If there are a total of 8 cards both sides put together, you count the toal and the higest total gains a patrician card from that particualr group (remember that you can have only a maximum of 5 cards on your side- if that is the case your opponent can have only 3!)
• There is a special influnce card called the philosopher card which reveres this rule and give a patrician card to the player with the lowest total.
• Once you place your cards on your turn, irrespective of the number of cards you draw one of the vote of confidence cards and see which group needs to be scored (this btw is a spoiler and wI'll tell you why in just a bit)

The game finishes when all the patricians are won and the score is calculated:

• 1 point for each patrician
• 1 extra point if you have a majority in a group (3 cards for a 5 member group and 2 cards for a 3 member group)
• 1 extra point if you have won all the cards in a particular group
• 2 extra points for winning a majority in a group that matches your infuence bonus card

Some unique mechanics, with 13 action cards, the philosopher card makes C&C a very entertaining game, but if your are seeking a no luck game, this definitely is not one. The vote of confidence cards can absolutely annoy you. All your plans can go for a toss if you turn up a 'no vote orgy today' card. This element takes away a lot of sheen from this game.

How long does this play?

As it is printed on the box, thi takes about 30-40 minutes. The game plays fast and keeps you occupied with very little downtime. With 13 actioncards that you can arrange it the way you want allows for a fair bit of tactics and variety. However this game is definitely not deep enough for keeping you engaged for long periods of time. This is no brain burner, but at the same time not a dud that you play it blindfolded. I would say this game is liht-medium in its weight and lies somewhere betwen a filler and a full fledged game. Requires a little bit of learning to get used to the ction cards and how to stack them.

Who would I recommend it to?


Definitely not to everyone. This is a game that people who do not want very heavy games like. It can be entertaining and exercising your grey cells a little bit. I would say this game is suitable for people to play it once in a hile, if they don;t want to play very light games. You play this and then perhaps move onto something more serious (just to se the mood right hahahaha). This game can be a good get away game as it is just a set of cards and hence good to carry along- though you have to like it first.

People who play a lot of 2 player games may find this a nice change and addition to their collection as simpler to 'Hera and Zeus" (Don't quote on me as this is what people say, I don't have Herta and Zeus so can't take a stab at that one)

Any Downsides?

Apart from the odd sized cards and funny names, the game has some serious shortcomings:

• The vote of confidence can absolutely annoy you as it is completely random and can screw up your plans (mind you for people liking randomness this is great). The great idea of having action cards that adds so much variety is in a way lost out due to the vote of confidence cards
  
• There is no theme and you end up using just the numbers, so the entire artwork goes waste
• Requires some learning as the action needs to be arranged smartly, else you can pay quaite a hefty price as you cannot have more than 5 cards in your hands and having an action inappropriate to the game situation can really hurt you (say having a scout right at the end)

Final Thoughts!

This game is another one which blows hot and cold for me. Up until recently I used to like this game a lot, but after playing Battle Line and some other games that I'll talk about in the coming weeks the interest level has gone down. But I don't see myself getting rid of this game any time in the near future as this keeps hitting the table once every couple of months!

For more detailed reviews please visit http://www.boardgamegeek.com/forum/63/thing/132