by A.J. Coltrane
Title: Agricola
Game Type: Resource acquisition/allocation game.
Number of Players: 2-6
Complexity of Rules: Medium/High
Time to Play: 2 players, over an hour. 3-4 players, 2-2.5 hours. The box says 30 minutes per player, which is probably true if everyone has played once or twice and they’re focused on the game. Four players is plenty if I’m going to be playing. (See “Why I Like It”, below, for more explanation.)
The Concept: The players are European farmers, around 1670 AD. Each player is striving to build the biggest and best house and farm, as well as have the most livestock and most vegetables/grains. Having a big family is desirable too. Players must balance this growth against the never-ending need to feed their family. Starvation is always possible at the next harvest.
Each turn the player designates a family member to acquire resources. Resources can be anything — grain, mud, reed, food, wood, sheep, coal, grain, cattle, stone, etc. (Even using a family member to claim “first player”, or to make more family members, costs an action.) Players then use their resources to build stuff — fences for livestock, more rooms for the house, upgrading the wood house to something better, building a brick oven, or digging a well, or a host of other things.
The game ends after 6 harvests (14 turns). Whoever has the biggest family and biggest and best farm wins. Ideally nobody starved out in the process.
Why I Like It: Agricola is a fairly involved game. Thinking about what you’re doing is highly rewarded — really, it’s mandatory. However, the “thinking” isn’t really *heavy* thinking. It’s not the thinking required for really deep strategy games like chess. There just aren’t that many viable decisions to choose from. It’s definitely possible to have a beverage, chips, and a conversation, and still keep the game moving.
But here’s the rub:
Note that the game lasts 14 turns. On average each player gets about three actions per turn. Let’s say we’re playing with four players. That’s 14 x 3 x 4 = 168 actions. If people are thinking ahead and paying attention it might take 30-40 seconds per action, and the game will conclude in about 2 hours, like it says on the box … if the group isn’t paying attention and they’re not thinking about what their options might be when it’s their turn to play, or they can’t make up their minds, or they’re taking smoke breaks — look out. 168 actions at 1 minute per action is 3 hours, and at 90 seconds per action it’s 4.5 hours.
Having said that, Agricola has been either liked or loved with everyone I know. Get two or three friends together and turn off the tv and the cell phones. Agricola finds a nice balance of strategy without being headache-inducing. Highly recommended.
Available at Gary’s Games in Seattle or Amazon(dot)com. BoardGameGeek page is here.
Also recommended is a Plano 3500 to go with it. (Photo by Brian Spieles via BoardGameGeek images.) I believe that’s the same one that I have here.
FlatbreadGarden 