Gaslands looks like a ton of fun
I played the full game with the cubes today. It was a rousing success. We kept the Leader minis to give us still the feel of the minis.
It didn’t take anything away from the game other than the frustration of the minis. I ordered a bunch of extra cubes just in case one goes flying. Kept aside for the free peoples, of course, due to set limits.
I never thought removing minis from a game would help.
The hero and elite minis do all the lifting that needs to be done. More readable, because now you can see the map under the armies, and I think it looks better, to boot! Very nice, Mark.
Well, shoot a monkey, I went back to search and couldn’t find who it was, but I seem to recall a brief exchange with one of y’all about Garphill’s West Kingdom games, back when I’d only played Architects and Viscounts, but hadn’t tried Paladins yet. A couple of y’all were calling out Paladins as your favorite, and one of you in particular was particularly full-throated in your acclaim. I made a mental note of it and I’m only now thinking back to that exchange, because I’ve finally played Paladins of the West Kingdom.
So why am I going back to the West Kingdom series, especially when Garphill is going strong with their South Tigris series and especially especially when they’ve just released Ezra and Nehemiah?
A little history: The South Tigris series currently consists of Wayfarers and Scholars, with Inventors due out later this year. Scholars is incredibly complex and a bit daunting and I’m scared of it, to be honest. Which is a sensation I crave! I love being intimidated by a game! I love being dragged out of my comfort zone! I can’t wait to tackle Scholars in earnest, and it’s sitting on my shelf, burgeoning with all its little colored dice, waiting until I’m ready.
And I love that Garphill is calling out the Golden Age of Islam in the South Tigris series, which is partly why the earlier and simpler Wayfarers is so dear to me.
It’s such a lovely little glittering example of Garphill’s dopamine machines, intricately built on the concept of exploring the lands, the seas, the very heavens; a game themed not with accumulation, but with learning; a game about wisdom instead of wealth, set in the culture of Mohammed and the Arabs’ newfound dominion over most of the known world: “…and when the Caliph saw there were no more lands left to conquer, he didn’t weep, but he rolled up his sleeves and got to work!”
So you can imagine my delight that Garphill’s next series is visiting Biblical history, beginning with the recent release of Ezra and Nehemiah (that’s one game title, named after the two reformists who were instrumental in rebuilding the Temple in Jerusalem).
I eagerly bought it the moment it was available (last week!), tore off the shrinkwrap, set up a solitaire game (this is how I play most of my Garphill), and sat down to play. Only to discover that it’s repurposing one of the basic concepts in Viscounts of the West Kingdom! Ezra and Nehemiah, like Viscounts, is about managing a posse of three townsfolk cards who give you icons to perform actions.
And if I’m being perfectly honest, I’m a little disappointed at the theming in Ezra and Nehemiah. It has its share of historical/textual specifics (the three reformers available for hiring, the two prophets making their demands each week, Sabbath as bookkeeping phase, clearing the rubble of the old Temple, sacrificing resources onto an altar, building up the priesthood, the tech tree supposedly representing study of the Torah) but for the first time, they feel a bit slapped on to me. What’s up with that? Perhaps because I have a more intimate frame of reference for the time period, having spent a lot of my advanced education studying the Hebrew scriptures? Or perhaps I’ve just seen so many Garphill games at this point that they have an innate familiarity? Or perhaps the theming is, in fact, thinner this time around?
Whatever the case, I decided to forego playing it until I’d spent more time with its influences. Before I draw any conclusions, let me jump into its history real quick. So I went back to sample some Viscounts and had a grand time, all over again. I normally hate the restrictions of rondels, but when it’s presented as Marching A Dude Around The Kingdom To Do Stuff, and when it’s driven by my townsfolk and can be mitigated with the judicious use of money, it feels a lot less arbitrary than the usual rondel. So in an almost RPG way, I really enjoy making the rounds with my viscount, managing my followers, and choosing whether to push the kingdom into prosperity or let it sink into poverty. It’s not just an economic engine builder, but a nifty little Kingdom Simulator. Whereas Architects is a nifty twist on the tired old worker placement games but ultimately still a bit of a tired old worker placement game, Viscounts is an adventure disguised as a rondel!
So from here, I figured it was finally time to complete the West Kingdom trilogy. It was time to play Paladins of the West Kingdom, to complete this stage of my Garphill fandom before more fully exploring the South Tigris series, and especially before visiting their new Biblical game, since it seems partly inspired by Viscounts.
And, holy cats, do I see now why some of you called out Paladins over Viscounts and Architects! I’m not sure I’m ready to declare a favorite West Kingdom game yet – I’m smack dab in the middle of my Paladins honeymoon phase and aflush with magical new fondness! – but, oh my golly, am I having a grand time with Paladins. If I thought Viscounts was an RPG Kingdom Simulator Adventure, I hadn’t seen nothin’ yet! The eponymous Paladins, like Knights of the Round Table tasked with quests, making their appearances to whip the kingdom into shape with soldiers, scouts, merchants, and priests (so much is lost if you just think of them as red, green, blue, and black workers!). Whereas Viscounts was about exploiting and developing the young kingdom, Paladins is about heroic knights helping position it in a hostile world: sending teams to secure and build walls around the city, expanding into the lands to the east with monks and outposts, conquering/assimilating the people who live there. And probably more than any other Garphill game, it’s stuffed full of unique and interesting characters: the paladins, the townsfolk, the workers, the outsiders.
It’s still very new to me. I’ve only gotten in one full game, and I had no idea what I was doing, so I have a feeling I’m going to be playing more learning games. But I wish I could have found where some of y’all were calling out Paladins of the West Kingdom as your favorite, because now I see what you mean!
Also, I can’t believe I’ve missed this, but there is a whole mess of add-on material for the West Kingdom games! There are expansions for each individual game – two for Viscounts, it seems! – and even that crazy overarching Tomesaga mode. I had no idea they’d put so much new West Kingdoms content into the pipeline. Hoo boy, do I have my work cut out for me.
Definitely. I haven’t played Gaslands but I dug into Car Wars at an early age. I need to find out more about this game.
This is making me want to try Paladins again. Did you play solo?
I wasn’t that fond of it when I played it (only once). I played 4 player and it felt really long, interesting, but completely heads down. I don’t remember thinking about other players’ actions a single time during the game. But that may mean I’d love it solo. I wasn’t playing board games solo at the time so didn’t give it a shot, but I am now, may need to revisit it.
I actually had the opposite experience with Viscounts as Paladins. I got it, played it solo about 5 times and didn’t love it. I thought about getting rid of it, but then tried it multiplayer and it suddenly clicked. If you get the expansions, tell me how they go! I didn’t know about them. Watching quick overviews it’s not clear to me whether they’d be interesting or not.
Yep, solo only for me. I showed a couple of friends Raiders of Scythia, but it didn’t “take”. I’ve also pressed a couple of other friends into playing Wayfarers with me, but again, it didn’t seem to take. Maybe it takes more than one Garphill game, or perhaps more than one playthrough? But I’ve had very little luck getting others to play Garphill games with me. : (
Fortunately, Garphill is all-in on solitaire support, and not in the half-assed “throw 'em a bone” way of most multiplayer designs.
Yeah, I can imagine it really dragging with four players. Those last few turns will be absolute beasts at any player count, and having to wait for three other players must have been deadly. This is very much a multiplayer solitaire game, more so than other Garphills, given that there is literally no interaction beyond blocking and taking something someone else wants. I mean, you don’t even have to select a player color in Paladins of the West Kingdom, because the player pieces never interact! Even the “Inquisition”, this game’s Moral Crisis, feels minimally interactive.
Interesting! But that makes sense to me, since there are more interactive systems in Viscounts: the Moral Crisis can be a big deal for everyone, the Prosperity/Poverty fate of the kingdom can be a big deal for everyone, the workers jostling around in the castle for the center spot can be a big and very interactive deal, the race for the cleric cards. Yeah, off the top of my head, I can see how Viscounts feels like a definite course correction after Paladins to include more player interaction, to keep up the pace for four players.
And I figure it’s only a matter of time before I get the expansions, especially since one of the Viscounts expansions apparently affects the solitaire mode? I haven’t even read the marketing on the boxes, but I believe I saw a BGG post to that effect. Anyway, I’ll definitely report back as I bang on these and either dig deeper into West Kingdoms or move on to Scholars or Ezra & Nehemiah.
I think it was here, in January of 2021:
Got a 2p base game Arcs played last week… And I happen to think it was amazing.
It is an aggressive game, and I lost 32-31 against my very aggressive opponent, but I was already dreaming up different ways to combat that style in the future.
Even the base game created distinct narrative. I was focused on fuel and materials, while my opponent got gobs of aggression cards and focused on pushing me to the limit.
In round 4 I had a shot to get a double ambition and put it out of reach, but he made a clever maneuver and got a fleet across the map to ransack my court and take the double ambition.
I can’t wait to play the leaders and lore, and the campaign.
Oh man, the ancient times of 2021! That means I’ve only been playing these Garphill games for three years? What the heck, they feel like lifelong friends.
I still can’t find where someone was telling me with absolutely certitude that Paladins was their favorite, and I remember thinking, “Huh, I need to remember to let them know what I think of Paladins when I finally try it…” and now I don’t remember who it was. Heck, maybe it wasn’t here…
Thanks for looking, though! That was fun to go back and read my charmingly naive 2021 self who had no idea what he was missing out on. : )
I didn’t like Paladins, I thought the card draw limited the worker placement too arbitrarily. It’s the same problem I have with Dune Imperium. Ezra and Nehemiah is way better to me, every time I’ve played it I’ve done something completely different strategy wise.
Paladins is my favorite of the West Kingdom series. It might be my favorite overall but I haven’t played it enough.
Legacy of Yu, Paladins and Raiders if Scythia probably top my list (all solo).
I enjoy Shipwrights Redux and Architects a lot.
I’ve only played Scholars of the South Tigris once, but enjoyed it. Need more time with it.
Played the app for Raiders of the North Sea, and like enough.
I own Explorers of the North Sea, Viscounts and Ezra and Nehemiah, but haven’t played them yet. Ezra is calling me because of the positive buzz!
Only one I really didn’t enjoy was Hadrian’s Wall, but that wasn’t even Shem Phillips.
Shem is my favorite for that resource optimization puzzle, and it is why his games work SO WELL solo
Great video about Arcs from the SU&SD crew. To sum up, from Tom: “Arcs is the best boardgame I have ever played.” I haven’t spent enough time with it to say that definitively but it’s really great.
I’ve played twice and the game made an appearance in a dream I had last night.
I think about it constantly and have barely scratched the surface
Still playing a lot of Forest Shuffle (with alpine expansion). Still not got bored, every time it is your turn there are really hard decissions which cards to play and which cards to use for paying the costs and making available to your opponents. They say (bgg) deer/wolf is a dominant strategy, they are wrong. It is a strong combo, but there are other ways to score high. deer/wolf is like big money in Dominion, it is easy to implement if you get the cards. The alpine expansion allows for more varied strategies like making butterflies a better option.
You need to listen to your forest (cards), what they are whispering to you, and after a while you will form a plan. Hoping for a wolf that never comes is not the best.
Excellent Arcs interview with Cole Wehrle that talks a lot of design philosophies, trick-taking, Arcs design paradigms, etc.
Wait… I thought you disliked Mage Knight?!
FWIW, I much preferred MK in coop with just another player. Sure, it takes a bit longer, but MK feels even more draining without company to me, and having someone play his turn lets you relax a bit 
I wouldn’t try to play with more than one other player. Some even had fun with PvP, but I think it snowballs pretty hard (I have never tried, though).
I think the Lost Legion expansion makes it much better for coop.
As for Paladin Oath, it is a nice MK reimplementation, but it lacks the expansions. The blessing made it easier iirc? I liked it for what it is, but I still prefer MK in coop.
Immensely. But people change and it would certainly be one of my desert island games today (speaking of desert island games, another would be Robinson Crusoe, which I also used to dislike). Oddly enough, I’m pretty sure I stand by and can even argue convincingly every one of the reasons I used to have for disliking Mage Knight; it’s just that the reasons either don’t bother me anymore or have somehow been addressed.
And, yeah, I can imagine co-op being pretty cool with another like-minded and patient player. I can especially see the appeal of collaborating on who’s going to do what and where you’re going to do, but wait, what about this thing over here, and so on. That can be fun, and I bet it’s a grand time with a game as rich as Mage Knight.
I like MK co-op the best, too. But only with one other player. Any more than that is just too much.