Carcassonne

Carcassonne is an award-winning game where players place tiles with a piece of French landscape on it, and claim features with Meeples! In this episode Greg, Megan, and Todd try to steal each other's farms while discussing this seemingly simple yet absolutely cutthroat classic. Give us a listen!

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
[music]

(00:20):
Welcome to "Replayable" wherewe go into depth on our favorite
tabletop games that keep uscoming back again and again.
I'm the star player Todd, andtoday I'm joined by Megan and Greg.
For our 30th episode, we will be visitingthe double laureate game Carcassonne.
It was designed by Klaus Jurgen Reedand released by Hans M. Glueck in 2000.
Are you two ready to competein the French countryside?

(00:43):
I'm gonna steal your farm.
I mean, it's your title, it's right there.
I am ready to cost yourtravelers on the road.
There you go.
Carcassonne is a tile placementgame where players draw and
place a tile with a piece ofsouthern French landscape on it.
The tile might feature cities,roads, monasteries, or fields.

(01:06):
Players then decide ifthey want to place one of
their followers on thesefeatures to score points.
These followers were laterrenamed to, you guessed it, meatballs.
City score points whencompleted, roads when
finished, and monasterieswhen surrounded.
Fields, however, score at the end of thegame based on connected, completed cities.
The game ends when all tiles are placedand the player with the most points wins.

(01:29):
This particular game, at the end ofour last pod, which was on Carnegie,
I hinted that we would be discussinga classic that is easily overlooked.
And I think, at least when I'mtalking about playing a classic game,
I'm often thinking aboutmaybe Catan or El Grande and
like Carcassonne doesn'treally come to mind as often.
Do you feel the same way about it, Megan?

(01:51):
Yeah, I do feel like you arecorrect in that in conversation,
it doesn't come up the same waythat Catan, that to get to ride does.
And I don't understand it because I loveCarcassonne and I think it has influence.
I mean, you just said, you know, it hasthis piece that was renamed The Meatball.

(02:16):
And obviously that has an outsizedinfluence on the board game industry.
Oh yeah.
This hobby that we enjoy.
But also, I just think the game is fun.
I enjoy it every time I play it andit's a game that once you know it,
you can sit down and play withvery little refresh of the rules needed.

(02:40):
And that's exactly what I lovein an old, stamped-eye game.
I have played Catan in so long.
I think if I sat down, Iwould need a rules refresh.
But for Carcassonne, I don't.
So I love it.
I think it should be rightup in there in the pantheon.
And I'm ready to debatepeople who feel otherwise.

(03:00):
I'm with you, Megan.
I put it above a lot of thegames that people talk about
as like the best gamesfrom the early days of this
board gaming renaissancewe've been having here.
You know, if you talk about Catan orwhat was the other one you mentioned?
Todd Elgrand.
I don't think of those as gamesthat I want to play anymore.

(03:22):
They're games that I mean, ElgrandI never played a lot to begin with.
And Catan, I'm just notinterested in anymore.
It's a solid game I would playit if somebody else wanted to.
But I would never evenbother suggesting it.
Carcassonne though, it's stilla game that I would suggest.
And it's a game that I'mhappy to have in my library.
It's in a very visible, easy-to-reach spot.
I don't get it to the table as muchas I probably should, but I enjoy it.

(03:46):
It's fun.
I've played a lot of it on apps andI've played it a fair number in person.
And it's a game that I won'tsay I've always enjoyed it.
But even when I've hadmy gripes, it's always
been with the playersstealing my farms.
Not with the game itself.
Right?So what the mechanics enabled them to do?

(04:07):
Yes.
Let's talk about that for a moment.
So this game can be playedin a very cutthroat fashion.
Or it can be played more carefree.
You think it's worthwhileto play destructively
and use your turns to limitwhat other players are able to do?
Yeah, absolutely.It needs to be played cutthroat.
If you're not gettingin each other's way, if

(04:28):
you're not making problems forother people, you're up doing it right.
It's the only way to play.
Right? But what aboutplacing a tile such that you are
removing the opportunitiesfor someone else as opposed
to setting yourself up toshare in the opportunity?
Oh, yeah.
So I'm not a big share in this game.
I will absolutely try tomake a placement if I can.

(04:49):
That will block something.
You know, my first interest is alwaysgoing to be bettering my own position.
Right.
But you know, a lot of times you geta tile that's just almost useless for you.
But maybe you can causesome pain for somebody
else by making it hard for themto finish off a road or make a city.
You know, I've even given people points.
You know, you get that citytile that's all city on all four sides.

(05:13):
Right.
And plop that on somebody.
And now they're nevergoing to close that city.
And that maple is stuck.
Right.
You know?
So yeah, you gave them two points.
But they're never goingto see that maple back.
Exactly.
Megan, I see you nodding your head there.
I mean, Greg, we have neverbeen this aligned on something.
It makes me think you're maybe awolf, but that's a whole different game.

(05:37):
But yeah, absolutely.
This is not a cozygame where you're just
building out your littleFrench country side.
No, no, no, my friend.
You guys need to be fighting.
This needs to beruthless to me in terms of
like the feeling that this gamemight end your friendship.

(05:58):
It should be diplomacy is number oneand Carcazone should be number two.
You should be fighting.
And now, thankfully, youknow, I have wonderful
friendships that can handle thatkind of antagonistic fight in Carcazone.

(06:19):
I love to play that way.
I think, you know, as Greg was talking,I was like, oh, I wonder if I could provide
a different perspectiveand say, you know,
at the beginning of the game, there'sso much opportunity and potential.
And so there you wantto focus on building
out, you know, cities andthings for yourself to score.

(06:40):
And then later you go after the opponents.
But no, I think that's all wrong.
I think that is what youngerkinder Megan might have said.
I think that mature,sophisticated, experienced
Megan knows youfight from the start.
I think this is post-law'sMegan talking because
I saw a lot of cooperationon that road with Paul.

(07:00):
Angry Megan?
Yeah, in the game we played Monday night.
But yeah, I think you've got to fight.
I think the game, it iswhat people say it is.
If you just pay, if you're just playing toachieve your own objectives and you're not
paying attention to what other playersare doing or trying to share or steal.

(07:23):
Yeah, absolutely.
But I think that is whatmakes it interesting
and what keeps thegame engaging now that
it's been out for a million yearsis that you are playing the game.
But the game is the venue in which youare playing the people you're playing with.
Whereas I think a lot of the gameswe like, you're playing the game.

(07:47):
Right.
But this, you're playing thegroup you're playing with.
Absolutely.
Interesting.
So you mentioned younger Meganmight have more naive, friendly Megan.
Might have played more constructivelyand not tried to get in the way.
Do you remember what your firsttime or first exposure to the game was?

(08:07):
That's a good question.
I was exposed to somestrategy board games in college.
And I played Catan and I think Iplayed Parker's zone in college,
which I'm revealing how young Iam compared to my two other guests.
You know, no one's sayingthat it was a new release.

(08:27):
Call it out here, Megan.
But I think it was this exciting new game.
When I was in college.
It was new to you.
No, it was new.
I'm trying to give you an out here.
I know my age.
It's totally fine because I'myounger than both of you.

(08:49):
I think the point is you and I werewell out of college when this came out.
Correct, correct.
I'm trying to make you feel bad,rather than wasting on myself.
I'm starting to notice a lot ofcollaboration on that road there.
But I remember, I think I played it then.

(09:09):
There were a few games thatI had experience with before.
I think I've told this on the pod before,
but I had a friend who recommendedShadows Over Camelot to me.
And that was really whatstarted my board game journey.
But I have played a few other games before,
but I played, there weresome years in my late 20s

(09:31):
that there was unemploymentand depression and a lot of BSW.
And I played a lot ofCarcazone on BSW at that time.
Yeah, I sure, of course, I have funnessfor it because of that experience as well.
Right, how about you, Greg?
Yeah, so this came out during a timethat I wasn't playing a lot of board games.

(09:52):
You know, it was morevideo game time of my life,
but it was ready andwaiting and a popular game
when I jumped back into boardgames and early odds, as they say.
So, you know, there wereso many things to try at the...
When I first played it, I didn't love it.
It was okay, you know.
It wasn't until a few yearslater, and a lot of that was, I think,

(10:14):
because we kind of played itmore that almost cooperatively,
where everybody kindof does their own thing.
And then, you know, I didn't reallyunderstand how to score farms.
You know, it was just kind of like,you know, somebody would win farms.
And it wasn't until after ourMonday night game group got started,
and there was a guy, Mike,that showed up early every day.
And he got me to sitdown and play two-player

(10:36):
Carcassonne with him whilewe waited for other players.
And his only requirementswere that you draw
your next tile as soon asyou've played, and you play quick.
And we were playing, you know,two-player games in, like, 15 minutes.
And it was great.
It, like, it revealed wholenew levels to the game to me.
You know, just partially because,you know, playing fast and loose,
you know, you kind of geta messy board a little bit,

(10:57):
but you also start seeing theseopportunities develop where,
oh, wait, yeah, he'sgot that farm that's
going to score fourcities, but I've got it.
I can, if I play some maple right herewith one more tile, I can be on his farm.
And, oh, and I've got that other one.
You know, you start, like,seeing some of those things that,
you know, I didn'tsee in the game at first,
where there's a lotof, like, positioning you

(11:17):
can do, and trying tooutmaneuver the player.
It's not just about building your own road.
It's about, like, we've discussed gettingand really playing against the other player
more than playing for yourself,especially in a two-player game,
where there's only oneother person to worry about.
You can really focus on,like, oh, he's building a big city.
Let's, let's make, let's spoil that city.

(11:38):
You know, you know, let's not,or at least let's tie down the maple,
or let's make it so, oh,he needs that one tile.
Let's, let's make it sothat it's a harder tile to find.
Okay, so let'sput a pin in that.
I want to come back to thattopic here in just a second.
First, experiences for me, I got backinto board games after I had kids, right?
Because I wanted an activitythat didn't require screens.

(12:01):
And so suddenly this,you know, nascent love,
and I had played through highschool and some in college,
and then got really into a kick withcards, but not really board games.
And then I found board gamegeek and Euro games after I had kids,
and there used to be ashop at the main place
mall in Santa Ana called TheGamekeeper, I think it was.

(12:21):
And when they wentunder, they had a sale.
And so I went and looked ininventory, and here's this game,
Parkasone, that they had, and Iwas like, oh, okay, I'll pick that up.
That looks interesting.And totally rocked my
world as far as theway that it was so simple
in its construction, and yet the waythat you could use these meatballs,
and then the timing ofit, and then wondering

(12:42):
if you could find thatperfect tile to close off
your city and surround your monastery atthe same time or whatever the case may be.
It was brilliant.I absolutely fell in love with it.
And as the game aged forme and my taste changed,
you know, it lost alittle bit of that luster,
but I still have really funmemories of learning how to play it.
So I wanted to come backand touch base on what

(13:03):
you said, prevent themfrom finding that tile.
I mean, you can't really preventsomeone from finding a tile,
especially when they'rein face down stacks.
Do you have any thoughtsabout either knowing
or keeping track ofthe tile composition?
Like how many tiles havethree road exits in one
field, or two cities on aside, or cities on two sides?
Well, I don't know if they stillhave it, but I know in the first edition,

(13:26):
they had a tile list. They showed youevery single tile that was in the game.
So I think the game is kind of meant.I got it in my hands right now.
Show it to camera.
Okay. I remember finding a PDF of it andprinting it out and putting it in my game.
I don't remember that Ihad a tile in the corner.
I don't know if this is firstedition. The game I have is
first edition rules, though,but it might be Jay Tummelsen.

(13:49):
Right. Rio Grandeedition. But anyway, I don't
remember ever lookingat that when playing the
game, but I think youget a feel for like what
kind of tiles are commonand what kind of tiles
are hard to get, like something that hascities and roads on it. And so if you see
somebody trying to build somethingand it's already got a road, you know,

(14:10):
they're trying to builda road and it's going by
a city, you place anotheropen city tile next to
it. And well, nowthere's only a couple tiles
in the stack thatare going to fit there.
Right. So you makeit harder for them.
Of course, I did that on Mondaynight to Paul and he immediately
placed the exact righttile. And his next draw
was the next tile tofinish off his monastery.
So it doesn't always work,but, you know, because

(14:31):
there is luck in the game,but you know, you can
try to play those odds alittle bit and make things
difficult for people.Like I said, you try to
lock down their meatballsand yeah, they're still
going to score points forit at the end of the game.
But that means that,you know, the worst
thing you can do toyourself in this game is
not have meatballs to playwhen you've got an opportunity.
Right. And if youcan take away those
opportunities from other people,you know, you're playing well.

(14:54):
I agree. What doyou think, Megan,
about keeping track of tilecomposition and how many are left?
So many years ago, when I wasplaying Carcazade on VSW all the time,
we were playing sofrequently that we just kind
of did know the tilecomposition. Okay.
And I was always playingwith the same person.

(15:15):
So there were similar levelsof knowledge. And so that kind
of made it okay. Ithink where that feels
uncomfortable is whenthere's that big disparity,
right where it's a newplayer that you're teaching
the game or whatever.And then you know that, hey,
they've already builtsomething that they're
never going to be able tocomplete because I know

(15:37):
that tile either doesn'texist in the set we're
playing or has alreadybeen played elsewhere
and there's only the oneor something like that.
And so I think that's my whole kind ofstatement on that, is that I think that feels
fine when it's a levelplaying field and it's
uncomfortable when there's that difference.And I think it's something that is going to

(16:01):
make the experience lessfun when there's that disparity.
Though I alsothink the player with
greater knowledge canbe cool and not keep saying
like, well, you're nevergoing to be able to close
that because I know thathelps them to know what
you really want them toknow for their own benefit

(16:22):
so they can stop saying, well,if I can only draw that one tile.
Yeah, I don't think there'sany any good comes
from you being like, youknow, I know this and you don't.
I don't think that helps anyone.
But I don't think it is itcertainly didn't take away
from the fun when mygaming partner and I both

(16:44):
knew what the tileswere and we would know,
the thing I needed justgot played by the I mean,
in a way that was somuch more fun and it was
exciting for both of us.When I would get the
tile that they needed andwould get to play it and
they'd be like, youare so happy right now.

(17:06):
And I'd be like, I really, Ireally, really am and it made
it almost more adversarial,right? Yeah, but you
have to have knowledgeof the tiles to recognize
that moment whenit happens. Exactly.
And it sounds like in yourgame, that was the case as
opposed to someone whocontinues to draw, even
though you know they'redrawing dead, right?
They're never going tohave a shot at finding that tile

(17:28):
because it no longerexists. Yeah, the app that I
think it was the Appleand Android app that I was
playing for a while. Itmade it really easy to
see what tiles were stillavailable and it would
even gray out areas thatwere no longer playable.
So yeah, I mean, itdoes kind of add a level of
planning to the game whenyou have that information

(17:48):
that you can really playa little more strategically.
And I think it does addsome fun to the game.
It does slow the game down though whenyou're starting to think at that level.
And that's what was myconcern. So I really liked
the initial suggestions thatwas it Rob told you about?
His name was Mike.That Mike had told
you about take yourtile at the end of your turn
and then play quicklywhen it becomes your turn.

(18:08):
I really liked that idea.And the one thing I
don't like about havingthe tile inventory and
trying to plan ahead andrecognize what's been
played and what couldbe left is the AP that it
induces in the the lengtheningof the game because
that's just not fun,especially if you're in
a four player game andeveryone's doing it or or more player.
If you, I think basically it scores upto five and with what was it ends in

(18:30):
cathedrals, I think itintroduced the ability to
add a sixth player. AndI mean, at that point,
it just starts to get silly. Athousand percent agree.
This is a game that'smeant to be played quickly.
Right. All right. So scoring, there havebeen some changes to scoring over time.
I mentioned this was a doublelaureate game. And by that, I
meant that it won boththe Spiel de Yaris and also

(18:51):
the Deutre Spieler Priest in 2001. Very fewgames have managed to accomplish that feat.
And we've talked abouta couple of them already
in Catan and El Grande.Under those first edition
rules, small cities. Socities that were just two
segments, right? So twotiles, each of them have
a city on one side,complete the city.
And those were only worth twopoints. Whereas if you complete

(19:15):
a city that's any larger, it'sworth two points per segment.
So a city made of four segments would beworth eight points. And they later changed
that so that even twosegment cities scored two
points per segment andwould be worth four points.
And that wasn't even the bigchange. The big change was in fields.
And heck, sometimes that scoring
is still confusing. What areyour thoughts on scoring?

(19:37):
And do you have apreference as to which
way it should go? I knowas soon as I say something
here, someone's goingto say Megan, you just said
BSW works this way. Butinstead, it works this other way.
Oh, no, we're talking about how weplayed Monday night. So it's all good.
There's no one in the factcheck you here. Well, what I'm
going to say is I thinkthe only way I've ever

(19:58):
played is thirdedition scoring. Okay.
And so to me, the thought ofdoing these others seems ridiculous.
But we were playing small cities wereonly worth two points on Monday night.
Right. Oh, okay. Yeah,I've played with them being
worth four points. ButI didn't fight because

(20:20):
that's just not I'm readyto fight in the game.
I'm not ready tofight about the game.
So can we look at it?Oh, yeah, I wasn't going
to fight over that. Tome, they all just changed
the balance ofthe game a little bit.
I don't have a hugepreference towards one.
I think my instinct is to saythat, you know, score fields the

(20:42):
way they're scoredin third edition.
But scoring small cities forfour points seems like that
encourages people tobuild a lot of small cities.
Well, it does. Butit happens anyway.
So I don't know. I mean, Idon't really have a strong
preference as long as youjust agree on it ahead of time.
It's all good. Right.Well, I don't like

(21:02):
the first edition rulesof scoring the cities
individually at the endof the game for fields.
I felt like that was really confusing andhard to keep track of versus just scoring
each field, howeverlarge it was. Right.
Yeah, I agree with that.But I do prefer the small cities
scoring because you'reright to allow a small

(21:22):
city to be worth four points,just encourages more small cities.
And then the knock on effect is thatwhen you do the fields, the fields suddenly
are worth even that much more becausepeople have built more cities. Right.
And it also, it makes it, itmakes big cities harder to finish.
Right. May I interjectwith a counterpoint?
Sure. I will sayyou can be wrong.

(21:44):
I think a nice thing abouthaving the small cities be
worth four points is thatat the end of the game,
there can be times whereyou draw a tile and it's
not helping you do maybesome of the bigger move
you're trying to do,like connect that farm or

(22:08):
finish that road, finishthat cloister, whatever.
And so you look aroundthe board and you're like,
I can't interferewith anyone else.
I can't join the city. Allthis is going to let me do is,
yeah, close off a smallcity. And sometimes those
end like your last twoturns can almost feel like

(22:29):
you're just drawing tiles andplacing them and they aren't
doing anything for you oranything to hurt your opponents.
And there's something niceabout being able to get a four-point
city at that point that feels beneficial toyou in a way that I think a two-point city
doesn't. And so I thinkit gives the possibility

(22:51):
for those last coupleof turns to feel not as,
like if you don't getthe really big thing you
want, you're still able toget something that seems
more valuable, I guess. Sure, buttwo points is still better than no points.
Yeah, it changes thebalance of farmers and cities
in other ways, though,because like, you know,

(23:11):
when they're worth twopoints, I might not want
to finish that city. Imight not want to do that
small city because it'sgoing to give the person
who's controlling thatfield four points at the
end of the game. And so itmakes me go build somewhere else.
But if it's worth four points, to me,or sorry, three points at the end of the
game to the farmer.But if it's worth four points
to me, well, of courseI'm going to finish it.
And I think thatwas the intent of it.

(23:32):
Of the rules change is theywant to encourage people to
finish things up,but I don't know.
I like the incentive of having peoplewant to build decent-sized cities.
I think that that addssomething to the game.
I can't really explainexactly what it is,
but seeing people investin a large city and either
or doing it yourselfand being able to finish

(23:52):
it is like, it's a funpart of the game, and
something that you getto kind of fight over and
hope that you're goingto be able to finish the
city off before the gameends. And I think that
when you're scoringfour points for small cities,
why am I going to evertry to make a big city?
Any tile that has more thantwo city sides is just trash.
It's like, give it tosomebody else.
I don't want it becauseI'm not going to ever

(24:13):
finish that city. Andit's only a one-point tile.
Right. Okay. Iwould agree with that.
And I'd like the idea aboutit being worth four points
to you and three points tothe person who owns the field.
So you're at leastnetting something positive.
I'm not sure I'mconvinced, but I do
appreciate that. I mean,ultimately, I'm happy to
play the game either way. I justthink one of them is more right.

(24:34):
Okay. Audience, if you wonder what playinggames with Greg is like, that comment
right there told you everything you needto know. I told you she was a wolf. Right?
She's suckering me inwith saying how much she
agreed with me, just soshe can come back and
turn the wholeaudience against me. No.

(24:56):
Editors, note, listen to MeganBeowulf on our January 1st episode.
So with that, let's move on to theprompts. The first one waiting complexity
on board game geeksscale of one to five.
How would you rate thecomplexity of Carcassonne?
Megan, I'll let youstart. I rated this a two.

(25:17):
I think there's a reasonthat this is called a
gateway game, right? Andthat means it's easy to learn.
There's there's areason there's all those
memes and jokes andwhatever about how painful it
is to be taught a boardgame. Carcassonne is not
painful to be taught,which is great.

(25:37):
You know, that's great. I thinkespecially the base game is a nice two.
I think potentially if you're playingwith a bunch of the expansions,
maybe you could there'san argument there that
it bumps up just becausethere's that many more
mechanics and tiletypes and let a rookie track
of. But I think asis, it's a two. Okay.
Greg, what did you have? Itotally agree. Well, with the

(26:00):
one caveat that, you know,the first time somebody
plays, I think even withthe simpler field rules,
I've still seen people'seyes glaze over when
you're trying to explainto them what area majority
is and you know, how itapplies to fields and end
game scoring, you know.But that's usually just
because they don't knowthe difference between end
game scoring and scoringduring the game, you know.

(26:20):
But yeah, I mean, it's a simplegame to teach and easy to play.
You don't have alot of decision depth.
You're just drawing atile and playing it, right?
So and then decidingif you want to put a
meatball on it, right? Doesn'tget much easier than that.
And there's a reasonthat like you mentioned,
it's, you know, kind ofone of the quintessential
gateway games of it's thereason that that meatball

(26:41):
became, you know,iconic for the whole gaming
industry, you know, boardgaming industry is that
I mean, obviously it'sbecause it's a cool icon
and it's because thisgame was that influential at
its, you know, in itspeak. Yeah, I also secretly
suspect that like HansM. Glueck mass produced
gazillions of these, right?You've got your four basic
colors, your threeprimaries plus green.

(27:03):
And they then started adding them toevery other game they possibly could.
Hey, but good call.
It is a wonderful playingpiece. I also had the weight
of carcass on down as a two and for largelyall the same reasons, right? The four basic
meatball placementoptions are fine.
And if they weren't situationaland how they get removed and

(27:25):
maybe they aren't reallyit's when a road gets
completed, you pick it up when acity gets completed, you pick it up.
But knowing the timing of that is anotherissue. And so I think it makes it more
than just a one. And Ithink it's a perfect wait
for what the gameis. So then strategy.
How much opportunity isthere for strategy and long term
planning in this gameon the same scale?

(27:46):
Greg, why don't you start us out?I mean, I don't think it's that deep.
I would love to rate it a three.
I think in like at itspeak, it can edge over
there, but most of thetime it's a two because you
just don't have a lot ofchoice. And that's okay.
It's not meant to be a deepgame. You know, you can
try to if you learn allthe tiles, like Megan,
you can, you know, try tospoil the game for other people.

(28:10):
But wow, just repeated shots fired.You know, it's a two. All right, Megan.
I've read it as a one,actually. To me, I associate
planning with this game,and I'm totally willing
to be corrected on this.But to me, I associate

(28:31):
planning with that kindof if you want to turn
Carca's own into likean role playing game and
you're imagining thatyou're the, I don't know,
member of the royalfamily or some sort of lord
or some nobility whois constructing cities and
roads and whatever andyou're trying to plan out

(28:52):
what your version of Carca'sown is going to look like.
And it's just kind ofworld building and
not really a game. I thinkthat's, you can make a
plan for what you wantyour Carca's own to look like.
I don't know that there'sany way to actually
plan gameplay in this game.I don't see a way to do it.
But again, audience,feel free to absolutely

(29:14):
destroy me in the forumsover that. I welcome it.
I will say, I don't thinkit's planning on that level.
I think it's more planning on, in the senseof like, you want to get in on a farm,
you've got to placea tile in a position that
you can put a meepleon it that's not connected
to the farm, but then inone or two moves can be
connected to that farm.So, you know, it's not,

(29:35):
it's not long termplanning, but it is planning
ahead two or threemoves maybe. Greg, I'm still
surprised that you'reletting her slide with
audience corrector. But youand I, no, we don't have a shot.
Both times I'vestepped up. You have.
So, I had this downas a two as well.
And for a similar reasonthat some strategy is required,

(29:57):
especially if you'replaying the meaner game,
and to know what's the bestway to utilize that one tile.
And yes, Megan, you're right, you'redrawing a tile and you're placing it.
And, you know, talkingand shake doesn't make a
difference if you're drawing itat the end of your previous turn.
So, you have moretime to think about it.
Maybe, maybe not.But I do think that
when it comes down tohow you're going to deploy
your meeples and howquickly you think you're

(30:18):
going to be able to recoverthem and make them
available again, I think thatratchets the strategy up to it too.
So, audience, feel free to agreewith me and let Megan know. So, luck.
How much do you think luck playsa factor on same scale one to five?
And by the way, strategy and luck don'thave to add up to six. No, they're not,

(30:38):
they're not inverselyrelated, perhaps.
I actually put this as a three.I know it should probably be a
four, but again, I just,I feel like you have
control over things.Even though you might not
get the tile you want, youalways have something
you can do with the tile,right? Well, not always,
but you often have thingsyou can do with the tile.
And if you're lettingthe tile you drew,
control your game, thenagain, you're not, you're

(31:01):
not playing it, right?You're, you've got to,
you know, have contingencyplans and, you know,
you've got to have, andthat's just experience, though.
I mean, that's, youknow, you get, you get
a feel for like, or evencount the tiles and you
know what's going to come upand what can't come up anymore.
And so, you can playthat to your advantage.
Okay, I can see that.
Greg, just like I want toshare your city and the game,

(31:23):
I'm going to shareyour rating here and say
that I think this is a three.I think it's luck with higher.
I would win more often.
So, I think your tile drawn,just like you said, is huge,
it's huge, but there isalso a skill component.
And I know that becauseI don't win as often as I

(31:46):
should, if it was just luck.You don't win 25% of the time.
And no. For fourplayer games? Yes.
The time for two playergames? No, I do not.
Okay. Well, you may haveme rethinking my score.
I did have it down as a four.
And largely because of, it'snot just your luck I'm thinking
about, but it's also theluck of your opponents.

(32:08):
For example, that situationwhere Greg, you tried
to edge, pull out, andthen he turned around and
drew the exact tile thatcompleted the city and
and surrounded hismonastery, even though you
didn't think that hewould be drawing it any
time soon, much lessthe very next opportunity.
Right. Well, and that,and that was a, you know,
for raiding it, that wasdefinitely a four luck moment.

(32:29):
You know, I mean,that's the kind of moment
that makes it feel like,okay, that that's where
it feels like a four, butit could have just as
easily gone the otherway. And it wouldn't have
been luck that gave itnot didn't give him the tile.
It would have been the fact that Imade it a harder tile to draw. Right. Okay.
So then moving on to theme.How much do you think the
theme has been integratedwith this game? Same
scale one to five? I'll go ahead. I gaveit a two. I didn't feel like it was very

(32:53):
teeny, but I did giveit an extra point for the
meatball because thatwas pretty amazing.
What did you have,Megan? I gave this a one.
I think at the base gamelevel, this could be anything.
The expansions maybeadd a little something to
it. And when we playedthis the other night,
we played this in conjunctionwith heaven and ale.
And so there was likea monk connection.

(33:14):
And so there was adiscussion of Hey, Megan,
it's a theme night foryou because apparently
that's that's my thing.Were there birds?
No, no birds. But yeah,I feel like this could be
anything and it wouldbe equally as enjoyable.
Yeah, you're probablyright. I gave it a two.
And it's more along thelines of what you were saying

(33:37):
earlier about how youcan kind of imagine, you
know, you're buildingout these farms, you know,
you can pretend you're alord and planning you should.
I mean, obviously when we play it, I'm notthinking about that kind of stuff at all.
But I do think some peopleget that from the game.
And it's a theme thatkind of gives rise to the
reasons why you're doingit. Although, you know,
I don't understand why thelord's putting thieves on the road.

(33:59):
The locals call theTolwin, you know, right?
Yes, correctcollectors or something.
Yeah. Okay, that's funny. Although ifyou look at a map of Carcassonne, there's
a teardrop shapedcastle in the middle.
So at least that part lookssimilar in some awkward shaped
fields around it. Imean, like, it's not strong
enough of a connection tomake me change my mind

(34:21):
on the theme here. But atleast that part's mildly similar.
Yeah, I wonder ifthat maybe was what
makes me wonder whatthe origin of the theme was,
you know, if they weremaking a tile lane game
and then thought it, oh, hey, that kind oflooks like whatever. Right. I don't know.
Maybe interesting to findout. I think this is also one
of those games whereyou often will find pictures

(34:43):
on the board game gamepage of people playing the
game in the city. Thegame was in Carcassonne.
Right. St. Petersburg andSt. Petersburg sort of thing.
In the year of the dragon,in the year of the dragon.
Okay. Now, haveyou been to any, I've
been to Bruges and I'vebeen to Paris for Paris, Paris.

(35:06):
I'm trying to thinkwhat other board
games cities have I been,I've been to New York,
I think California and California.Nice. There you go.
Does St. Petersburg,Florida count? Sure.
All right. Favoriteplayer count?
What is the, what is the best player countfor Carcassonne, do you think, Megan?

(35:26):
Two. I like thathead to head fight.
That's what I want. I thinkwhen, well, I don't want to get
into the negative yet.So I'll just say for the
positive, I love, I love thehead to head experience.
And I checked and I saw how that BGGthere people have said that two is the best
count. So I think thatother people are having a

(35:46):
similar experience tome. And I think that's also
been mentioned earlierin this pod by the two
of you that there issomething to the two player
experience of this game.And yeah, I just really love it.
Well, you also mentionedthat on your PSW plays,
you only mentioned reallyplaying against one other
person, or at least regularly. Yes. So Iagree. I also had two players down, Greg.

(36:09):
Same here. I mean, likeI said, the most fun I had
playing the game wasthose quick games that I was
playing back in the earlydays of Monday nights.
It just, it's all the bestparts of the game,
especially like if you'replaying at equal level,
it's just, you don't really need a thirdor fourth let alone a fifth player. Right.
I will say though that when Iplayed in the against an app,

(36:31):
three player was more funthan two player for some reason.
Okay. And you can't quite put yourfinger on it. That was against two bots.
Maybe it's becauseI didn't feel like it was
enough of a challengeto play against one bot.
Okay. So then least favorite player count.Sticking to the base game here,
not including player counts that might besupported with expansions. What do you have
down as your leastfavorite player count, Greg?

(36:52):
Five slows the gamedown, comes to you. Okay.
It's just way toochaotic. I totally agree
that chaotic and theneven more point sharing.
So then the luck is definitely a four.
You're a good point. Yeah, absolutely. Andsuddenly those small cities start making
a big difference, right?Yeah. Because you can
close them off and takeit while it's still yours.

(37:13):
Oh, yeah. You can't feelbig in a five player game.
You have to, youhave to build small.
Yep. Greed. Megan. Iabsolutely agree. Five.
I think the only thing Iwould have to add here
is that I think sometimesit can be easy for
someone to kind ofnot be part of the fight
and I think there's timeswhere people can be

(37:34):
focused on, hey, someone istrying to steal the city from me.
And so I'm so focused on getting thatcity back or closing it off that I can't go
deal with this other,like I can't go try to steal
this other person's city.And the other two are
in a fight over a farmover here. So they're not,

(37:55):
they're also not focusedon stopping that person.
And so suddenly thatperson is having the
like Disney princess, the birds aresinging, there's a rainbow shining on them.
And they're just out therebuilding their little carcass own.
And it's like, well, everyone aroundthem is in this knockdown drag out fight.

(38:15):
And I don't think that's agreat experience for anyone.
Yeah, I think thatthat was part of what
happened on Mondaynight. Dave walked away with
the game easily. AndI think a lot of it was,
he was just doing hisown thing and nobody
was stopping him. Andsomebody was stealing my farms.
Well, one of myfarms. But I know I was,
I had two different, becauseI went for farms early.

(38:36):
And so I was spending too much time defendingthem, you know, worrying about that.
And so that's all Ispent half the game on is
worrying about farms that whenI should have been scoring cities.
Oh, that's interesting.
Do you think there's an idealstage of the game when you
shift your focus fromcity building to farms?
Absolutely. There's,it's worthwhile to get
down on a farm early,but don't over invest.

(38:58):
I mean, because thatmeatballs not coming back to the
end of the it's nevercoming back, at least if
it's on a, if it's on anythingelse, it can come back.
But right on a farm,it's set there for the
end until the end of thegame. And somebody can
steal that farm from youand make that investment
completely worthless.Right. So we covered the
different scoring rules, which Ithink also covers the additions.

(39:20):
And we reached a consensus on which editionof the game was the best. First, second,
third combo,something different.
I don't know about collectorsedition with wood tiles.
I mean, I'm fine with thirdis the best, because second
technically didn't fix thefarm rules all the way.
So okay, same. All right. LikeI said, I prefer the small city.
I know there's been a lot of art, andI will say this, and this was probably

(39:43):
goes back to the theme discussion.They all look the same to me.
I know that there's differences,
that they all look the same to me.I'm particularly fond of the first edition,
or at least the artfrom the first edition,
which carried throughto the Rio Grande Games
edition that I got. Yeah.And once again, we're
talking art by Doris Matos.So we, she had done
the original artwork on St.Petersburg and also El Grande.

(40:05):
Here's going to be thefun one, expansions.
Now we're, we'renot going to try to
address all of them. There'slike over a hundred of them.
We can, we can talk aboutthe catapult though, right?
So your favorite one, maybe two,which expansions do you like or love?
And are any of them mustinclude for you? So Megan?

(40:29):
Okay. So just like tellingsomeone your favorite
pizza order, this is mypreferred Carcazone setup,
is base game with River 2, Inza Cathedral,traders and builders, princess and dragon.
That is my preferred Carcazone play. That'swhat we used to play on BSW all the time.

(40:50):
I love the big meeplefrom Inza Cathedral.
I think that adds areally interesting decision
point to the game of trying todetermine when to play that.
And there is nothing worse than like havingthat get stuck in a city or something

(41:11):
that then someonebuilds something weird so
you're never going to beable to complete that city.
And you can't really usethat big meeple tactically.
And you're justlike, ah, and that's,
that's fun, right? That's coolwhen the game does that.
And because I liketo play fiercely, the
dragon and the fairyfrom princess and dragon

(41:35):
and those volcanoes, theyjust add such a delightful
wrinkle and like havingyour dragon go out and
and eat up other meeples,especially farmer meeples
is just, it's maybe themost satisfying thing
that can happen in Carcazone. It's so good.So that's me. Was that short enough, Todd?

(41:59):
Oh, no, no, it was perfectas I may be leading the
witness, but now I'mgoing to be very interested
in what games remindyou of. And I'm hoping for
a particular answer there fromyou. But how about you Greg?
I haven't played with a lot of the expansions,so I don't have a ton of depth here,
but I have played with ins and cathedrals.I've played a couple times with traders and

(42:21):
builders, builders. Iliked ins and cathedrals.
I think that that doesthat little extra risk
reward to everything.You know, you double the
value of cities or roadsand but they're worthless
at the end of the gameif you don't finish them.
And then like Megan wassaying about the larger meeple,
I like that, you know, being able to like,oh, yeah, I'm, I'm committed to this one.

(42:43):
You know, I'm going to finishthis, right? Or I'm going to own
this and you can't, and youcan't take it from me kind of thing.
I like those, but I haven't played witha lot of the other things. So it's, I can't
really speak to it. And ofcourse, the river I've played with.
I've played with RiverOne and River Two.
And yeah, I likeRiver Two a lot.
I don't know if it's necessaryin a two player game,

(43:04):
but I definitely think ina three player game or
more, you got to playwith that because it opens
up the board a littlebit. So people aren't
just sitting on top ofeach other and, you know,
finishing things offright away. Got it.
Got it. Okay. And Megan,I'm not familiar with the
differences between theRiver One and the River Two.
So you called outRiver Two specifically.

(43:24):
Why was that? Itforks, it branches off.
River One is just a straightshot. You know, I mean,
it curves a little,but that that's it.
River Two has has two end points.Okay. If I remember it correctly.
Your choice. Okay.
The set that I purchased had RiverOne, like included in the base game.

(43:48):
Mine too. Same here.I've always played
with it and wouldn't imaginenot having it be in a game.
And I'm in a similar boat with you,Greg. I mean, I've played and enjoy ancient
cathedral, ancient cathedralsand traders and builders.
And then if you like the meanness, thenI've gone as far as the fourth expansion,
which is called thetower. And on your turn,

(44:08):
you have an opportunityto add a tile to the tower.
And when you do,you can capture other
people's meatballs who areconnected orthogonally to the tower.
And if the tower is one piece high,then it can only capture meatballs that are
immediate, youknow, one tile away.
And if it's two pieces high,two and so on and so forth.
And not only do playerslose the points that

(44:29):
middle people wouldhave scored for them, but
they have to pay threevictory points if they
want to free their meatballs from thetower. So it's an extra level of meanness.
But those are the onlyones that I know of.
And I really haven't playedmuch with Princess in the Dragon.
So aside from knowing that it hasa really cute dragon meatball that

(44:49):
used to show up in alot of pictures and people
would have there, you know,showing up in other games even.
Yeah, I'm looking forward to playinga few times with that expansion added.
Do we want to take this timejust to talk about this space
idea spawned a family ofgames? And while we could
probably do a pot on anyone of them, are there any
of the Carcassonne familiesthat you particularly have enjoyed?

(45:11):
So this is the same thing as the expansionsfor me. I just haven't played a lot of
the Carcassonne brandedgames. I've owned hunters
and gatherers, but I'venever actually played it.
So, yeah, I know. I know. It's somethingthat I've been wanting to get to the table.
It's still sitting on ashelf. But it's a good one.
I had the opportunity ofplaying that with our friend

(45:33):
Valerie and her husbandMike when they came out
to California to visit. Andthey introduced me to that one.
And I thought, oh,that was a really
interesting, you know,different take on the base game.
How about you, Megan?I should have looked
before we startedrecording. I think I've played
hunters and gatherersquite some time ago. Okay.
I just once. But I didjust this past fall play

(45:57):
Miss Over Carcassonne,which is a spooky Carcassonne
variant that is co-op.And both times I played
We got trounced. Butyou can use the tiles in it.
I mean, it's a totallydifferent game, but you can
use the tiles in it alongwith a regular Carcassonne

(46:18):
set and have to dealwith the fact that there's
like this mist andghosts and other things in
a regular Carcassonnegame. And I love a spooky
variant and would loveto play more of the co-op
game, just because itwould be nice to win and not
feel so humble by game.Also to add in some of

(46:41):
those mechanics to atraditional Carcassonne game is
something that I wouldlike to explore. All right.
The other one that I'veplayed that I'll mention
is Carcassonne theCastle. And this is a two
player game that was actuallydeveloped by Reiner Kenizia.
So he took the basemechanism of tiling,
but then he created theidea of a castle wall frame.

(47:03):
And so all the tileshave to go inside the
castle walls, which constrainswhere you're able to build to.
Sometimes when you're up against
the wall, that's it, right?You're running out of options.
So it's the boarddoesn't grow as
organically as the originalgame. So most recognizable
comparison, what's thehighest ranking game that
reminds you themost of Carcassonne?
And Greg, I'm going to giveyou the honor of going first.

(47:26):
Oh, good. I'm going tocall out something relatively
new because I played itfirst as a computer game
and spent more time than Iprobably should have playing it.
But it reminded meof Carcassonne in
a number of ways. It'slike solitaire Carcassonne.
It's Dorfromantique. Oh, yeah.Because, you know, it gives
you that feeling of when youcomplete a big city or whatever.

(47:47):
That's what that game's allabout. So fun game. Absolutely.
Yeah, good choice.Megan, what did you have?
I have a game that Imentioned a little bit earlier,
unintentionally. Alhambra,I think that Carcassonne,
if we were playing somegame where you had to
respond to a prompt superquickly and someone said,

(48:09):
"Tileling game" or "Tileplacement game," the game
that would come to 99%of gamers minds first would
be Carcassonne, right?It just kind of feels like the
the "Tile placementgame." And so I feel like
that's what I sostrongly associate with it.
And so as I was thinkingabout other recognizable

(48:29):
comparisons, I waslike, "Are there things I
can even think aboutthat don't have tiles?
" And it was just no.The answer was no.
It feels so intrinsic to me. SoAlhambra, just such an enjoyable game.
Obviously, you know,there's not that shared
field for building the tiles.You're just building your own.
But I think a super enjoyable game, anotherone that kind of has a history has been

(48:55):
around a while and haskind of stood the test of
time, I think, for gamers.And I do have some
others in mind, but theyweren't quite as highly ranked.
And maybe you'reabout to say one of them.
So I'm not going to sayany of my other thoughts,
but I did have other thoughts.I have a couple of backups.
So let me get myone out there and
then let's see what else youhad. So I had Cascadia, right?

(49:18):
So placing tiles andthen putting something
on top of the tiles thatbased on patterns and
things helped you scorepoints. It was the first
one that came to mindwhen I thought of this,
although others also cameup later. You didn't say
the one I washoping, and that's fine.
We'll get to that in a moment.What else did you have?
Oh, the other one Iwas thinking was, and I'm
not sure if I'mpronouncing this correctly,
but Attica or Attica. I'm notsure how you should say it.

(49:42):
But again, there isthat tile placement.
Now they're not square,but right. And you are.
It's also a fight, I think, andthat is something that I enjoy.
So another one, but I know that's justoutside of the 750. That's like a thousand
something right now onBGQ. But you could have had

(50:04):
it for your last recognize,which we'll get to.
Yeah, but it still feelsrecognizable to me.
Okay. And that's Attica with aK for those who are interested.
So Megan, the one I was wondering, youwould say just because of the meanness and
you even said volcanoeswas downfall of Pompeii.
Oh, yeah. Which,have you ever played it?
I don't think of that as atile lane game. I realized that

(50:26):
there's a tile lanecomponent to it, but there's...
So the first half of thegame, you are building
out the city and placingyour family members,
and then the secondhalf of the game, you're
laying lava tiles. It justwaited a few weeks ago.
I mean, tile lane, meanness,and volcanoes would
have me thinking a differentgame. And it's not one

(50:50):
that I have as my lesserrecognizable comparison
either, but that would beMondo, which, you know, okay.
Yeah. But yes. I was thinking, I waswondering if Mondo was going to make an
appearance in this podcast. Well, therewe go. There you did. What's funny about
downfall of Pompeii, atleast the version I have,
is that the family membersare those octagonal

(51:11):
cylinders, becausewhen you put a lava tile on
one of your opponent'shouses and their family
members can't escape,you drop their family
members into thevolcano. And so they're, like,
permanently gone.Amazing. And I feel like if
they had actually donethat with the meatball,
you know, it would have been toobrutal. So let's recognize the comparison.

(51:36):
What is your game outside of the top750 that reminds you of Carcassonne and
Megan, I'll let yougo. So I think there are
people who playCarcassonne, and maybe they're
listening to the pod right now, andthey're thinking, I don't want a fight.
I don't want aggression. Ijust want to be in the French
countryside building mylittle city. And for them,

(51:57):
I recommend a gentlerain, which is a lovely
little you can play it solo.You can play with people.
It's more experienced than game, butit's very delightful. It's a little puzzle,
kind of tiling game thatyou can play very quickly,
very easy to learn.It's a very easy game to

(52:18):
travel with, and it's veryaesthetically pleasing.
It's calm, it's chill.It's everything I don't
want Carcassonne pretty.And if that is what you
are looking for, if you'rethinking, I would like
to place tiles and haveit look pretty, and have
it be chill, and you werethinking that you could

(52:39):
get that from Carcassonne.I encourage you to play
a gentle rain instead.Okay. Well, I was never
going to come upwith that one. Right?
What did you ask? I put down, Imisspelled it, but I put down Babylonia.
Yes. I was tryingmy best to think,
and I feel like there's agame out there that I'm
just not remembering.I was trying my best to

(53:00):
come up with somethingthat had that organic
growth that you werementioning. And I couldn't
find that, but then Ithought about other aspects
of the game and wentto the more conflict and
area control, and gettingin each other's way,
and all that stuff. AndBabylonia has all that in
spades, you know.Oh, that's a great pick.
Yes, and it has a relativelyquick playing time, too.

(53:22):
Relatively quick playingtime. And this one,
that one supports fourplayers, no problem.
Right. The one I pickedwas another classic by
this point from 2003,and that's Santiago.
So you're laying the tilesto build out your fields,
and you're auctioningoff the fields.
But the person who comesin last gets to be the canal
overseer and gets todetermine where the water

(53:44):
canal is going to go,and you're trying to get
water to your fields, andyou can bribe the overseer.
So there's definitely anextra level of meanness
and underhandednessthat goes with the game.
I think it's absolutely brilliant fortiling, and also being completely cutthroat.
Which is why, Megan, I said,I would never have thought
of a gentle rain, because mymind wasn't even going there.

(54:04):
Yeah, I got mypuppies and rainbows
comparison out withDorford Mantique, you know, I
mean, it's a co-op. And Ieven had another backup.
If you are looking forsomething that is more
of a game than a gentlerain, which is a game,
it's got a listing in DGG.But if you're looking

(54:24):
for something that's alittle more game, there's
one I got this past holidayseason and just actually
got out of shrink andplayed this past weekend
called Beacon Patrol.And it's a tiling game, you
can play solo and up to, Ithink, maybe four players,
and you are exploring asyou are laying out your tiles.

(54:46):
Essentially, you'repatrolling with the
North Sea and checkingthe buoys and kind of the
beacons and thelighthouses are all functioning.
So it, again, is veryfriendly, very chill.
It's cooperative if you're playingwith more than one person.
So again, for peoplewho want Carcazone

(55:06):
to be something other thanwhat it is, which is ruthless then.
I'm giving you some opportunities here withBeacon Patrol and a gentle rain to have
a kind of different experience.Nice. Very thoughtful of you.
So house rules, how wouldyou improve this game?
Do you have anyideas here or thoughts

(55:27):
or is it perfect as it is? Playa tile, draw a tile immediately.
Don't wait till it'syour turn to draw a tile.
You've just slowingthe game down.
I agree with that. I alsothink, as I've mentioned
before on the podcast, that youshould play what is fun for you.
So if some combination of second editionand third edition scoring is what works

(55:47):
best for your group,great do that. If you're like,
we want the big needlefrom instant cathedrals,
but not the tiles frominstant cathedrals, pick
the mechanics andthe fits that work for you,
play that, celebrate it. Whocares for board game purity?
How ridiculous,play what can be it?
I mean, I do think itsays something about the

(56:10):
quality of the backbone ofthis game that you can do that.
You can tweak the scoring a little bit andit doesn't change the nature of the game
so much that it's notstill really enjoyable.
And you can add largemeatballs or the whole
expansion and they adddifferent flavor to the game.
They might make thegame take a little longer.
That's my big complaintabout the expansions

(56:30):
in general, is thatit's hard to play fast
unless you're already anexpert at the base game.
But yeah, I mean, thegame plays well when you
with and without those.And they just add a variability.
Yep, I agree witheverything that's been said.
So then if this gameis being played a
game night, what do youwant to play afterwards?
I put down Isle of Sky.Okay. It's another tile
lane game, differentflavor to it. And you know,

(56:53):
you're building yourown little kingdom though.
So now you get theexperience of trying to plan
out your own little kingdomand you get a lot more choices.
But now all those choices come with anice weighted decision of first off, how
much are you going totry to squeeze out of other
players for the tilesthat you are selling and
how much are you willingto pay for the tile you want?
Or is it even goingto be available by the

(57:13):
time it gets around toyou? There's a lot of fun
decisions there. And theone thing you don't have
to worry about like youdo in Carcassonne is you
never have to worry aboutsomebody else placing a bad tile.
But sometimes youhave to place a bad tile.
Because it's the onlyway you can afford.
Right. I like that. Megan,what did you have?
Well, I did have Mondo. There it is. Justbecause it is another tile placement game,

(57:40):
but speed is so mucha factor. And I also think
something that I can getswept up in in Carcassonne
is that there's somethingnice about building a pattern.
Like there's something nice about seeingthe cities get closed off and whatever.
But sometimes it'snot what's best for you.
But actually having thepattern work for you is what

(58:02):
scores you points inMondo. So you can kind of get
that satisfaction in thatgame. I will say another
fun idea is maybe toplay like a Paris, Paris,
so you're kind of timetraveling through France.
Yeah. Which I could be a kindof fun theme for a game day.
Okay. I thought when you said time traveling,you were going to say something like,

(58:25):
I don't know, some ofthe other games that were
contemporary to it likeCatan or Trans America.
Oh, right. You know,something along that line
where you're playingkind of time traveling back
to those early collegedays of gaming.
Or as we've done in the past, aBSW themed game. Yeah. Yeah.
I had riffed off of theidea of drawing one
thing and playing onething. And so that would be

(58:47):
Kingdom Builder, right?Draw a card and then play on
that terrain on the map.And just like Carcassonne,
it's so easy to describeand sometimes even
be dismissive as to howcomplex that decision actually is.
And then the game, tome, had surprising depth.
So at first, I thought itwas really too simple.
I'm going to havea card and play it.

(59:08):
But suddenly, ideasopened up and getting to the
different castles and thengetting that special power.
I was like, oh, okay,this actually is a
lot more interestingthan I originally thought.
And it opened in a waysimilar to Carcassonne.
What feature of the game still stands outto you? What has aged the best thoughts?
Do you not answerquestions first anymore? I can.

(59:29):
I'm just curious. Thisone is rhetorical for me.
So it's the Meeple. I don'teven have to go beyond that.
So for me, it's the Meeple.
But I was leaving it out there incase one of you also had that answer.
Okay. For me,if you like, I still
like this format if youlike. But so for me, I think
it's just the fact thatfor such a simple game,

(59:50):
you have to think abouthow you're investing
those Meeples and havea conscious plan of what
you want to have happen.You know, you can't
just play a Meeple onevery tile that you play.
You have to really thinkabout like what you're
going to do with once you'veplaced a couple Meeples.
Now you've got aninvestment there.
You either need to bringthat investment home or if
you don't draw the righttiles, you've got to be
really careful about what youdo with your other Meeples.

(01:00:11):
And for me, those decisions are still asgood today as they were when I first really
discovered the game, youknow, and there as good
as any other game out thereand in such a tight package too.
All right. I agree, Megan. Yeah.
What stands out the most to you?
Absolutely, the Meeple. Imean, I can't wait to come on.

(01:00:31):
But also, I think the fight.If you look at the other
games of this generation,I don't think any of
them have this reallyhead-to-head opportunity to
really push youropponents. And I just think
it's exciting is what keeps this game freshand exciting for me even now. All right.

(01:00:55):
So then what feature of the gamedo you now look back on and is
either disappointing or haslots, some of its luster for you?
I mean, I think weall know that there's
expansions that we wouldnever consider life, right?
There's expansionsthat have terrible
reputations that everyone'slike, and I think that

(01:01:17):
kind of thing to thecommunity is very frustrating.
Seeing people kind of makethings that are Carcazone
that are tarnishing the reputationof the brand of the game.
You know, that's frustrating.
Catapulting the Meeple.But that's all right, exactly.
But that's allkind of peripheral.
That's not about actualCarcazone the game, right?

(01:01:39):
To me, there's nothing aboutthe game that is disappointing.
But some of that kind ofanti-consumer, anti-player
Carcazone stuff Ididn't love. Okay.
I had the feeling of trying tokeep track of which tiles have
been played and if I wasdrawing dead. Like, I can't
shake that feelingwhen I play this game.
And I have, I guess thetile inventory is printed on

(01:02:02):
the rulebook, but I haveanother one that I've
printed out as well.And I still, when I play it,
I just have to shed thatso I can enjoy the game
for what it is insteadof trying to make it be
something that it's not.Yeah, I agree with that.
I think for me, it's thething that has aged the
worse is the fact thatultimately your cane can get
can get spoiled by a badtile draw by not getting

(01:02:22):
a tile that you need.And getting your, you just
keep investing yourMeeples out there and they
never come home. Youknow, and you can't get the
home because you can'tget that another road end.
You can't get anotherclose, you know, can't close
that building, you know,and you're just watching
people score atpoints over and over.
And yeah, you've got a nicelong road, but you'd rather
have that Meeple backto invest somewhere else.

(01:02:43):
Right, exactly. That'swhat's age worse.
And I think there aregames that still have a lot of
that cutthroat fightand that tight resource
management thatplay in a short time that
have over time, there'sbeen some other options
that have come outthat also give that.
And so, I'm not going tosay I'm going to choose those
over this, but there's othergames to play that do that.
Got it. Yeah, goodpoint. So did this game

(01:03:05):
replace a previous onefor you? And I'll just go
ahead and say for me,no, because I was getting
back into the hobby. Greg,what did you have? No.
All right. You know,it was the same here.
I was getting back in thehobby. It was a new experience,
a new, new type ofgame that I never played.
And Megan? Absolutelythe same, same experience.
You know, I mean,asking if Kirk is on replaced

(01:03:28):
another game for you,it almost feels like asking
a little kid like, Oh, didthe nursery rhyme to
replace some other story, youknow, like it's just such a burling.
This is how youstart kind of game.
This is one of thosegames you start with.
Yeah, I agree. So it hasn't since beenreplaced. And if so, by what, Megan?

(01:03:51):
No, I say no. What? No. Isay no. I love Kirk's own.
I, in our group, youknow, it's not like all of
us attend every gamenight, right? Right.
We're adults with lives andother responsibilities and
obligations, whatever.And so even if the group

(01:04:11):
is playing a game veryregularly, it's not that
everyone in the group isplaying that game as regularly.
And so because ofthat, we spent a lot
of time either teaching orrefreshing people on rules.
Man, I could nottell you of the people
that were there this pastMonday night, how many
of us, you know, howlong it's been since each

(01:04:34):
individual one of ushave played Parker's own.
We took no time. Like, Imean, there was a little,
a little bit of how are wescoring the two tile cities?
And then it wasoff to the races.
And we were able to justplay. And even with a member of
our group complainingthat we were playing this,
it was done so quickly.And we were able to
move on to anothergame. And it's super easy

(01:04:56):
to set it up and put itaway. I mean, what a great
game for what it is. I hadno, it can't be replaced,
won't be replaced.Wow. Okay. My drop.
How about you, Greg? Thisone was hard for me to answer,
because it's a kindof a little bit of what
Megan's saying therethat, you know, it still has a

(01:05:16):
place in my collection.It still has a place that
I want to play it sometimesoon, always, you know, right?
What makes it hard, though,is that I don't play it that often.
I mean, when we playedMonday night, I had forgotten a
lot of the specifics ofthe rules, like, you know,
exactly what is whichversion has are we playing?
And what was thatthree points for cities or
four points per city ona farm? You know, and

(01:05:39):
it's not my go-to game fornew players anymore, either.
It is a go-to game. It's one of thegames I will bring them to. But that said,
there's not a specificgame that replaced it.
It's just kind of in thepool. It is so in that
sense, it hasn't beenreplaced. It's still in the
pool games that I willplay with new players or
when I want a quickfiller. I think that's probably
one of the challengesof it, though, is that the

(01:06:01):
people that I end upplaying with it aren't the
ones that are playingcutthroat and playing it the
way that I have mostfun. And so, right, and
then the people that wedo play with tend to want
something deeper,longer, meatier. Right.
So, yeah, this is interesting,because I feel like Carcosón
has enjoyed a bit ofa renaissance here.
Let's just overload the podwith, you know, French terms.

(01:06:21):
But I feel like it's beenreplaced by just about
any polyamino tiling gameas far as what we would
actually play with oneof the more recent ones
being Wild Tiled West,which was fun and had a
fun Western themeabout it. Still, there is
something that's attractiveabout the simplicity of Carcosón.
And now that I canhave dragons and

(01:06:42):
eat other people's farmers,I really want to do that.
While I'm reallycurious about that miss
of Carcosón, thatsounds fun. But I will say,
though, I think for ourgame group, Babylonia is
probably the currentclosest to Carcosón that we
play that we would actuallyplay on a game night.
That's true. That's onethat we can often reach

(01:07:02):
to as a nightcap at theend, because it can be
played pretty quickly.So, soundtrack.
What music would youwant to listen to while playing?
So, thanks to Melodice.org,I found an album called
This Is Bardcore by an artist named Algo,A-L-G-A-L. And so... Bardcore. I like it.

(01:07:22):
Bardcore, he has takenlike common songs and
played them on a stringinstrument or a lute or
something like that. Forexample, Nothing Else
Matters is absolutely fantasticwhen played by a bard.
So, take a look atThis Is Bardcore.
What did you have, Greg?I went with a YouTuber/
you can find them on, Ithink, SoundCloud and

(01:07:44):
Bandcamp and Spotifycalled Medieval Lo-Fi.
It's lo-fi music, kind oflike Lo-fi girl, but it's all,
you know, so it's got abeat like that, but then
it's all lutes and zithersand other stringed
instruments, you know, witha kind of a medieval vibe to it.
It sounds like you feel like you're sittingin a tavern along that road not wanting

(01:08:05):
to leave because thethieves are out there. Nice.
A good story too.Way to keep it on topic.
So, that was MedievalLo-Fi? Medieval Lo-fi. Okay.
And Megan, what did youhave? I went in an entirely
different direction and Ihave one song that I'm
wanting to say here.And this is a song for when

(01:08:25):
someone else getstheir stupid people in your
city or on your road or they share yourfarm or steal your farm and you're so mad.
And the song I want you to cueup in that moment is called Who
Invited You by theDonna's. It's really good.
And it's your way ofsaying, I don't want you here

(01:08:49):
and I'm not happyabout it. All right.
I'm going to have to listen tothat after we're done recording.
Okay. So, rating onBoard Game Geek
Scale of 1 to 10 now. How wouldyou rate Carca Sone, Megan?
It's a seven for me.
I'm happy to play it, especiallya preferred player count.

(01:09:10):
I think for how long ittakes to play for the ease
of play that it doesn'ttake the rule of refresh,
that it's so easy toset up and put away.
I think it really delivers atthat level. Is it an all-time
favorite game for me? No,but I'm always happy to play it.

(01:09:33):
And I will say with my old BSW friend, Imean, I think it's rare that we play games
and don't play aroundwith Carca Sone.
So, there's also justthat affection for it, right?
All right. And Greg,what did you have?
You know, I want to give it a seven.That was the first thing that I thought of.
But if I'm honest aboutthe amount that nostalgia

(01:09:56):
weighs into that andthe fact that it just doesn't
hit the table, I have to give it a six.You can talk, Megan. Yeah, be vocal, Megan.
I mean, okay. Hold on. Hold on.I'm listeners. I am going to be internet.
I'm going to... I'm goingto fight Greg on that.

(01:10:19):
No, I'm not going tofight him, whatever.
But I want to... I need tolook up something more.
Okay, hold on amoment. Okay, great.
So, we've talked beforethat on BGG, they give you
a short descriptionfor the ratings.

(01:10:41):
And a six is good, usuallywilling to play. Whereas a seven
is very good, enjoyplaying, and would suggest it.
And I'm curious, Greg,for your six, that usually
willing to play meansthat there could be times
where someone elsesuggests Carca Sone, and you

(01:11:03):
would say, "I'm notwilling to play that.
" Is that the case? Man,I didn't realize we were
going to have to havethis kind of scrutiny.
I didn't think we'dhave to defend it.
Yeah, geez. Judge alittle less, why don't you?
I wasn't looking at theratings strictly speaking.
I don't know. I think ofit more on the level of

(01:11:24):
like, when I'm lookingat games that I want to
suggest, because itsays, "I would suggest it.
" It's not a game thatcomes out of my mouth.
It's just... Itisn't. And I like it.
I would say I'm always willingto play, but I don't suggest it.
And it's kind of... It iskind of on that borderline.
Yeah. I mean, I don'tsuggest it for our group.
Well, I'm not sayingthat's part of the problem.

(01:11:44):
It's like the people thatI play with, you know,
my family and ourMonday night group almost
exclusively at this point.Yeah. My family's not
interested, and either isour Monday night group
most of the time, you know?So it just doesn't hit the table.
Now, if we have otherfamily members come
over and, you know,we're looking for a game to
play, and they want totry something new, yeah,

(01:12:04):
I'll put that out there. Imean, I know my wife
has played it and enjoyedit, and I know it's easy
to teach and fun to play.So yeah, at that point,
I will, but it just doesn'thappen often enough for
me to feel comfortablegiving it a 7.
I'm not advocating for it.Yeah. Okay. I'll allow that.
So with that, our final question is...What? Did you rate it? Did I rate it?

(01:12:28):
He's trying to duckout of this question.
He's afraid of the makingshame he's going to get.
I know. I've got nothing to be afraid of. Ihaven't even made an edit. I had this down
as a 7, so there you go.I'm in the Cool Kids Club.
No, but I mean, I think with the rightblend of expansions, it could be an 8.

(01:12:48):
That's what I was tryingto find from you, is like,
in the ideal situationwhere you could choice
pick the componentsout of the expansions that
you really like and play justa two-player game with them.
Like, in that ideal scenario, thatfeels like it's more than a 7. Sure. Yeah.
Right. But I'd say thatthe game overall is a 7,
but Greg, we're going tocatch up to what you were
saying here on the nextone. So is it replayable,

(01:13:09):
and how soon would I want? How soon wouldyou want to revisit the game? There we go.
And I had it down asit's definitely replayable
as a family game orsomething that I'm introducing
to new players, but I'mafraid it's not going to
see a whole lot moreplay with our specific group.
Yeah. So what didyou have, Greg? Yeah.
I mean, it's replayable.I've played this game
probably hundreds of times. You know, Imean, most of those are going to be an app.

(01:13:31):
Still, I played it. I had fun.I played it dozens of times
with real people, andI've enjoyed most of those
games, even the one onMonday night with somebody
who wasn't happy to be thereand somebody stealing my farms.
You know, it's still fun.
You know, I felt so rusty,you know, and I kind of wanted
to play again underother circumstances.
I would have been suggestinga second play because I wanted

(01:13:53):
to it was like, okay,yeah, now I remember.
Now I want to play thisright, right? But so, yeah,
it's replayable. Absolutely.But I don't know how
soon I'm going torevisit it. All right, got it.
Megan, you and I need tohave a Carcassonne night.
We do. Hey, I'm in for it.
You make it three play. All right.Have your own Carcassonne night.

(01:14:14):
Have fun, you two.Get out of my city.
All right, and I'm takingmy podcast and going home.
I think it's absolutelyreplayable.
You know, we have a sharedtool that Tom rigged up for
us, where we can seeall of the games that
we all own in our gamegroup. And everyone owns

(01:14:36):
Carcassonne exceptfor the person who did not
enjoy playing on Mondaynight. And I was honestly
shocked to see thatthey didn't own it because
it just feels like agame you have to own.
And I realized theydon't like it, but I
just somehow expectedthem to own it as well.
But the fact that, you know,so many of us own it that says
something about thisgame, you know, and our

(01:15:00):
willingness to play it,I think. And so while I
don't see our groupprioritizing this when
there's three, four, five,six of us, seven of us,
whatever on a gamenight, I absolutely see in
other circumstances wherewe're doing, you know,
we do special occasiongame days or something.

(01:15:21):
And hey, two of us haveshown up and are, we're
available a half hourbefore anyone else.
I can see, you know, plopping outCarcassonne and really enjoying it.
So I think it isabsolutely replayable.
Just it kind of dependson the circumstances,
but isn't that everygame? Yeah, absolutely.
It's not every game. By the way, thatperson you're talking about used to own it.

(01:15:45):
If you tick the switch forpreviously owned, we don't
know anybody gettingdocs just because they don't
like Carcassonne. Right?No, or gave it a six. Yeah.
I own Carcassonne.And so with that, we've
placed our final tile andthe game is now over
sending you an inviteto play on BGA, Megan.

(01:16:07):
Perfect. There it is.Hey, thanks for being
available tonight, YouTube.That was a lot of fun.
I think for our next episode, we're takinga stroll through a forest. We'll see.
I'm not quite sure yet.We'll have fun with that.
All right. We'll do.Thank you. Thanks, Dad.
Thank you for listeningto replayable support
for our podcast comesfrom listeners like you.

(01:16:29):
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You can also joinour team at patreon.
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(01:16:52):
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