It’s a good, solid game; I think the trick is getting over preconceptions about it. It’s much lighter than you might think from appearances (I’d thought it was going to be like Catan), or from price (I still think it’s pricey for what is essentially a “filler” game).
A friend described it as what would happen if Civilization and Blokus had a developmentally-challenged baby.
The rules are simple and there are few exceptions, so you can explain it quickly to anyone. The entire game is about placing settlements. Almost all of the rules about scoring your settlements are determined by drawing 3 cards at the beginning of each game – in some games, you want big connected clumps; in others, you want straight lines; in others, you want to favor coastlines, etc. Since it’s a random draw, sometimes the rules can contradict each other – which isn’t quite as bad as it sounds, since it just means you can tend to emphasize one thing (e.g. as much coverage of the board as possible) over another (e.g. one big, interconnected settlement). The board layout is also randomly chosen at the start of each game, along with the set of special abilities you’ll have.
In case I’ve made it sound completely random, the randomness really just affects variety. Once a game has started, you can still develop a strategy and stick with it; you just can’t expect the exact same strategy to win out from game to game. There’s also randomness in that you draw a card at the beginning of each turn to determine where you place your settlements; if you don’t like that, a good house rule variant is to draw 3 cards and choose 1, or to draw cards for each player at the beginning of a round and then draft them.
I always bring it with me to a game event, but it’s never my first choice.
Also: Somebody earlier recommended The Manhattan Project, and I’d second the recommendation. It’s a more sophisticated worker placement game than Lords of Waterdeep, but I don’t think it’s as well-designed or well-balanced. I often feel like there’s nothing great I can do in a turn, whereas in Lords of Waterdeep I almost always feel like I’m accomplishing something. Plus there’s a fairly long build-up period at the beginning of the game, while everyone’s collecting workers and money and yellowcake and the like. Several of the games I’ve played, I was just starting to get my machine going when someone else suddenly announced he’d won. And each time, I didn’t feel like I’d done anything particularly wrong; it was just luck of the draw, or needing a space that never freed up.
Still, it’s got great graphic design, the theme is more interesting than the usual sci-fi or fantasy, there are novel mechanics involved (for instance, leaving workers in place across multiple turns to prevent other players from getting access), and multiple strategies available. I just wish it were balanced better, so that I was able to feel more productive instead of constantly making the best of a bad situation.
