Tag: board game

Since we got Ark Nova two months ago, we have played over 30 games, including some 2-player games. That’s 1 game every other day on average. Considering each game takes 2+ hours, this clearly shows how popular this game has been in our household.

With 30+ games under the belt, I think I can write an in-depth review of Ark Nova with more strategy thoughts.

It’s All About Timing

Ark Nova is a racing game. One player can abruptly end the game and all other players only have one more action. It means you may not be able to spend all your resources or play all the power moves you planned. It sometimes feels cruel. But it’s a great design. It makes each game 2+ instead of 3+ hours. It also makes each game heated from the midpoint. Everyone needs to pay attention to the progress, as any player may start dashing to the finish line at any time, and everyone else has no other options but to follow.

The peculiar condition that triggers ending (Appeal and Conservation markers cross) also means even as the leading player, you’d want to calculate when exactly to end the game. If you have three power moves planned, e.g. play two strong animals and support two conservation projects, you want to end the game right on the 3rd move. Not before, not after. And you want to make sure these three moves are tight, without too many low-return moves in between. It almost feels like 收官 (“play the endgame”) in Go. You can absolutely lose a game with a great start because you mess up the endgame.

At its core, a racing game is about the efficiency of each move. Every player has the same amount of actions so “action” is the most precious resource. The “Coffee Break” mechanism in this game is a great way to disrupt other players’ plans to make their moves less efficient than yours. This gets us to the next point…

Interaction Under the Hood

An early impression of Ark Nova is usually “lack of interaction”. Everyone is building their own zoo happily. Someone got lucky and won. Is that so?

After playing ~10 games, I realized this game has plenty of interaction. It’s just at a deeper level. Taking the Coffee Break as an example, when you find your opponents are low on cash and you have more cash to spend, you may want to stretch this turn so they have to do a few wasted moves to wait for income. When you have sent your associate and your opponents haven’t, you may want to enter break so they waste the opportunity to use associate for this turn. We found ourselves watching the coffee break token much closer when we get familiar with Ark Nova.

The card display and conservation projects are also huge interaction points. Pay attention to other players’ strategies and snap/draw/dig cards they want. Counting other players’ icons and competing for conservation projects. It’s much less likely to win if you ignore other players after everyone knows how to play.

Luck And Balance

As a card-driven game, Ark Nova inevitably has some luck factor. Several new players scored wins at our place. While considering Gaia Project, which has a very low luck factor and is one of our favorites, it’s nearly impossible to win for new players when playing against experienced players. A few strong cards that combo nicely from the beginning can really boost a player’s chance to win the whole game.

But this game’s luck factor can be mitigated by the 6-card display. Experienced players tend to favor getting known cards instead of getting unknown cards from the deck. And we often say you have to find the strategy based on your cards, not find cards based on your strategy. Overall I think Ark Nova has the right amount of luck to give people hope and excitement, without breaking the game.

So what about balance? Are there game-breaking combos? I think there might be, but not too many. Any two cards are fair combos from what I see. And if someone gets three or four cards that exactly combo together… it can be a bit game-breaking but they’d also be really lucky to get the exact three or four from 200+ cards.

I do feel different strategies have some balance issues. For example, I think focusing on small animals generally pays off better than on large animals, because small animals grant you many more icons so you have an advantage in conservation project competitions, and large animals’ benefits are often highly situational and rely more on getting the right cards at the right time. But it could also be me over-indexing conservation projects. Research icon also feels a rather strong strategy as the combo can get pretty wild.

In summary, Ark Nova is a solid game and worth the hype in my opinion. Get one while you can. And play!

上周末开了今年很热门的一个新桌游Ark Nova，动物园主题的卡牌游戏。一盘下来几个人的感受反差有点大。xw作为赢家很喜欢玩，我作为垫底则是觉得运气成分有点过大。。之后一周里我们两个人又玩了四盘，xw连战连捷直到最后我才赢了一次。对这个游戏了解有一点深度了，可以写一写。

Ark Nova初看起来会觉得跟几年前的大热游戏TM(Terraforming Mars)有些相似，事实也确实是吸取了TM的不少要素：没有固定回合数而是靠游戏进程触发结束条件，三类卡牌里的animal牌和sponsor牌很像火星里面的绿牌和蓝牌，也是拼六角格地图只是变成了各自拼自己的，Conservation Project也有一点像火星里面的milestone。相似的点是相当的多。

但Ark Nova比TM要复杂很多。从讲规则就能很直接的感受到，东拉西扯要讲好几种机制。比如五张action牌轮替，最右侧的action效果最强，每个action用过就会落到最弱的位置。Association这个机制又有一点迷你工人放置游戏的性质。每个人自己拼图不需要跟其他玩家抢地盘了，然而每个建筑大小形状各异，于是又有一个小拼图游戏在这里，要规划布局。可以摸的卡有六张顺序流动的明牌，于是摸牌的时候就有一些互相之间的博弈。最后的算分也是一个奇怪的“两个分数相减”的算法，于是打得快结束游戏的人可能只有十几二十分，落后的人甚至会是负分。。

好在熟悉规则之后并不会觉得复杂的机制使得游戏缓慢，大部分时候还是相当流畅的。虽然偶尔也会有长考或者多次combo导致很长的回合，但大部分回合的动作都是比较直接。

前几次玩的时候感觉这游戏的互动太少，每个人都在闷头打自己的牌和修自己的动物园。会打一些之后会体会到一些互动的点，比如抢牌和break，还有根据对方的action牌位置来预测对方下一步可能的行动。但即使如此我还是觉得这个游戏的互动有点偏少，尤其是新手局基本不会有互动可言。

作为一个类似TM的卡牌游戏，Ark Nova在combo方面更进了一步，五花八门的能力combo可以各种叠加打得很爽。但这也带来了一些平衡性问题。有些牌和combo我个人感觉过强了。xw开始赢的几盘有一大半都在走小动物路线，我觉得对应的几张能力卡过强，即使对手在摸牌阶段着力抑制也很难见效。还有就是卡牌游戏常见的运气问题，后期的conservation project拿到一张对口的可以差出十几分，作为这个复杂度的游戏来说我觉得运气成分太重。

游戏自带的收纳盒好评，虽然是个重度游戏，收纳和铺开倒都很简单快捷。版图很大，需要很大的桌子才能玩。第一次玩的体验不会太好因为规则繁复加上需要会玩之后才能有互动，玩个两三次以后可能会渐入佳境。

总的来说Ark Nova还是很好玩的，不然我们也不会一周玩五局。卡牌都是各种动物画得很好看。探索各种能力combo和排布自己的动物园也很有趣。由于互动偏少偶尔又会有长回合，其实很适合两三个人玩，四个人可能会嫌多。可以说如果不讨厌强运气成分，又能接受BGG 3.5+复杂度的桌游的话，应该会喜欢Ark Nova。

最近开了两个排名很高的合作类桌游。Spirit Island是别人送的。Gloomhaven则是贵且缺货于是一直没下手买。回顾18年觉得Terraforming Mars玩得有点太多了，于是打算开些新游戏。

Spirit Island

Spirit Island的主题很有趣：玩家扮演原始岛屿上的各种神明来驱逐殖民者，水金火木土各显神通。神明的手段有直接的杀伤，但更多的是显灵吓唬人，驱使（唆使？）岛上的原住民去搞破坏，移动地形来防守等等。在滚滚而来的殖民者面前，神明的力量其实显得有点薄弱。而且每个神明都有擅长和不足的领域，要赢几乎一定要深度合作才行。

Spirit Island的内核有点像经典的瘟疫危机，英雄换成了神明，病毒换成了殖民者。玩家每回合的重点也是先去看几个要爆发的点来考虑怎么防御，然后再考虑如何以余力进攻。不过相比之下Spirit Island的机制要复杂很多。每个神明起手都有五六种相当复杂的能力，游戏进程中还会学习新能力。需要很多资源控制，把敌人在地图上推来拉去的配合比瘟疫危机复杂了至少一个量级。

另外Spirit Island的规则还是很有些复杂的，我们前两次玩是四个人，且都玩错了一些规则😰 以至于整个游戏难得毫无希望，几个回合之后大家就瘫成一片觉得肯定没戏了。后来我看了一个playthrough的视频才搞清楚了玩错的地方。终于赢了两盘。

规则搞对之后玩起来其实还是很难。开头压力很大，随时会输，慢慢的角色能力成长了往往会有突然翻盘的感觉，很爽。一个桌游能做出这效果来真是很赞。

值得一提的这游戏因为规则很复杂，配合起来交流相当麻烦。尤其是一群人都是新手的话一边学规则一边还想打配合就更不现实。我觉得这游戏要三四个人玩得起来的话必须得有一些house rules来帮助交流。。类似卡片横置表示用过，钱放在卡上表示付过了钱之类，否则会很混乱……另外新手局的话个人认为两个人就差不多了，四个人几乎没法玩。

Gloomhaven

Gloomhaven从2017年发售以来已经雄踞BGG榜首一段时间了。作为一个价格100多重量20多斤的桌游，这货是我这儿当之无愧的No. 1。

拿到手玩起来才意识到这就是一个现代版的跑团。很多概念都是从跑团借鉴过来的，游戏分成战役模式和休闲模式。休闲模式就是随便拿一张地图练习着玩一盘，认真玩的话是肯定要玩战役模式的。一上来玩家每人要选一个职业然后写一张角色卡来创建角色，大家组成小队开始历险。战役模式基本上有点像战棋游戏，一场一场的战斗是走格子的方式，有一本厚厚的手册里面是每场战斗的剧情、地图，敌人设置、过关奖励等等。随着剧情的发展会开放越来越多的地点，有主线任务也有支线任务，慢慢还会有几条主线可以自由发展。创建角色的时候要抽一张“人生目标”卡，达成目标的话角色就要退休，之前扮演这个角色的玩家就再创建一个新角色加入小队来玩。游戏总共有差不多二十个职业，初始有六个可以用，其他的会随着战役进程慢慢解锁。每个职业都有自己独特的手牌，不仅仅是特技，行动方式什么的都差很多，玩起来感觉很不同。

相比传统的AD&D跑团，Gloomhaven可谓是去粗取精。比如不需要一个专职DM了，剧本加道具加自动战斗系统就够用。掷骰子换成了deck building，加上丰富多彩的能力卡，使得战斗有趣了很多。经验值和钱是非常古典的在人物卡上手工记录，随着人物成长，卡上密密麻麻写满了东西的感觉也蛮有趣，成长感很足。

Gloomhaven的规则也是相当的复杂，YouTube上介绍规则的视频大约半小时但只是讲了主要的规则，看完还是会一头雾水。很多边边角角的规则我觉得我玩了十几盘之后还在查。有一个人已经熟悉规则之后再带着开会好很多，一群新手一起从头学的话比较艰难还很容易搞错。

我们第一次玩是四个人一起看视频学，然后乱打了一盘，规则搞错了不少，最主要的是Attack Modifier Card用错了deck。。后来我和xw开始开战役，我用了Mindthief（鼠人），她用了Tinker（矮人）。结果她的Tinker三级就完成了开小店的人生理想退休了，开了新角色Quartermaster来用。我的鼠人现在都七八级了感觉退休还遥遥无期，估计会暂时开个新角色来用用等有了鼠人退休的线索再切换回来。至今我们打了十几二十场，还不知道要打多久才能通关，感觉总流程比Pandemic Legacy要长多了。

战斗方面很有挑战。因为每次回收打出的手牌都要失去一张，一定程度上有stamina的概念也就是回合数有限，所以并不是一直小心谨慎龟着打就可以赢的。敌人是按规则自动行动，并不是特别智能，但每回合敌人会翻行动卡所以他们的行动不是完全能预测，所以也经常会有“惊喜”。有那么几关我们赢得还是很惊险刺激的，甚至用上过分兵偷袭之类的战术，也输过几次。所以绝大多数战斗都得全力以赴的认真打，并没有虐怪的感觉。一场一场打下去确实有冒险的感觉。