"Through the Ages" session report
Players: Simon, Darren and Shay
We played the full game. Everyone read the rules in advance so we didn't go over them. First game for everyone.
We did miss out on a few of rules:
1. We didn't remove the +4 cards from age I. Once we found out that was the case, we removed them from age II and age III.
2. Towards the end of age II we realized that we did not take out two yellow tokens from the yellow bank of each player and put them in the box.
3. We did not remove the Antiquity age cards after it was gone, nor did we remove the first two cards in the row for the first turn or two, but we soon picked up on that and fixed it.
Probably there were a few other minor things. All in all, I think we did a very good job on not screwing the rules up too much considering.
A general overview of the game (with pictures) can be found here.
In a couple of sentences though: "Through the Ages" is a *map-less* civ-type board game that puts an emphasis on resource and action management. It has all the components of any good civ game: Population growth, the need to feed it, producing goods, researching techs, keeping population happy, researching technologies, corruption, military (and thus, aggression), historical leaders, wonder building and of course - culture (VPs).
There are a lot of rules and the game is super-deep and complex, but the flow of it is really good and it creates tension, adrenaline rushes, challenges the mind and all that jazz.
A really surprising and positive thing is that 3 completely new players who are stumbling on the rules managed to end the (full) game in about 3.5 hours (!)
So I think we were right to choose the full version.
Since I was focusing mostly on myself (there's too much going on for you in the first game to manage and keep up on what other people are doing), I'll give a very general overview of the game:
Early game:
Simon focused on military and has done so early. For some reason, he never made actual aggression on anyone, but he did win very lucrative territories (all 3 of them actually) and has got the better end of events (which usually reward the (military-wise) strongest player and hurt the weakest (myself)).
Darren went on culture (VPs) right from the start (and emphasized it all the way to the end) and has done a very good job.
I completely neglected army and focused on getting more civil action and more science (built the Pyramids and upgraded 'irrigation' and my labs).
I suffered heavy blows from events - loosing population, culture and resources for being the weakest civlization.
Mid game:
Simon got a leader that gives him 2 culture for each colony each turn, making himself a great culture engine and also kept making his army stronger.
Darren built urban building that provide mostly culture (theology and another thing - theater perhaps?).
I kept focusing on science, got myself Leonardo De Vincy and used my science to switch to Monarchy and upgraded my civilization from bronze to iron (Darren has done so before me actually).
Towards the end of the mid game I boosted my army and took the lead, with Simon close behind (I've researched strategy, built a railroad wonder and also upgraded knights and had a cavalry army tactic card).
Late game:
At the start of the late game I was so far behind it wasn't even funny... I had something like 30 points while the other had 70-90 (with Darren heavily in the lead).
I brought Albert Einstein to play and was researching everything I could get my hand on for 3 vps per research. I had upgraded my government to Fundamentalism, giving me a huge pool of civil and military actions, bringing my army strength to the maximum possible - 30 - with Simon close on my hills and Darren far behind with 11.
I've played an aggression card on Darren, stealing 7 vps from him and for some reason invested heavily into agriculture, all the while researching more and more useless stuff (I had tons of science and while I didn't benefit from most of the things I researched, I had enough civil actions that it didn't matter).
Last turn:
I am at -40 points to Darren and about -20 to Simon. Things look grim.
I research a few more technologies for 3 vps each (thanks, Albert!) and play an action card for 3 vps.
But then I finish building a wonder that gives me for each technology researched it's age number in vps. That netted me about 30 VPs.
Another aggression on Darren steals additional 7 vps from him to me.
And another investment into agriculture.
When the last turn ends, we count age 3 events that were put into "future events". There are two - one by Simon that nets him vps per colony (he got the only 3 colonies in the game), and another one that gives each player VPs per food they produce (now we see why I went heavily into agriculture ^_^ ) - I harvest 18 points while Darren and Simon harvest about 6 each.
Final score: Me first with about 20 points lead on Darren which has about 10-15 points lead on Simon.
Single reason why I won and a lesson for the future - don't stay on despotism government through the entire game (as both Simon and Darrend have). Better government = more actions = more good stuff in general = more vps at the end ^_^
Everyone were very happy about the game, we spend some time during tear-down talking about how complex and exciting the game is and how we can't wait to play it again ^_^
Players: Simon, Darren and Shay
We played the full game. Everyone read the rules in advance so we didn't go over them. First game for everyone.
We did miss out on a few of rules:
1. We didn't remove the +4 cards from age I. Once we found out that was the case, we removed them from age II and age III.
2. Towards the end of age II we realized that we did not take out two yellow tokens from the yellow bank of each player and put them in the box.
3. We did not remove the Antiquity age cards after it was gone, nor did we remove the first two cards in the row for the first turn or two, but we soon picked up on that and fixed it.
Probably there were a few other minor things. All in all, I think we did a very good job on not screwing the rules up too much considering.
A general overview of the game (with pictures) can be found here.
In a couple of sentences though: "Through the Ages" is a *map-less* civ-type board game that puts an emphasis on resource and action management. It has all the components of any good civ game: Population growth, the need to feed it, producing goods, researching techs, keeping population happy, researching technologies, corruption, military (and thus, aggression), historical leaders, wonder building and of course - culture (VPs).
There are a lot of rules and the game is super-deep and complex, but the flow of it is really good and it creates tension, adrenaline rushes, challenges the mind and all that jazz.
A really surprising and positive thing is that 3 completely new players who are stumbling on the rules managed to end the (full) game in about 3.5 hours (!)
So I think we were right to choose the full version.
Since I was focusing mostly on myself (there's too much going on for you in the first game to manage and keep up on what other people are doing), I'll give a very general overview of the game:
Early game:
Simon focused on military and has done so early. For some reason, he never made actual aggression on anyone, but he did win very lucrative territories (all 3 of them actually) and has got the better end of events (which usually reward the (military-wise) strongest player and hurt the weakest (myself)).
Darren went on culture (VPs) right from the start (and emphasized it all the way to the end) and has done a very good job.
I completely neglected army and focused on getting more civil action and more science (built the Pyramids and upgraded 'irrigation' and my labs).
I suffered heavy blows from events - loosing population, culture and resources for being the weakest civlization.
Mid game:
Simon got a leader that gives him 2 culture for each colony each turn, making himself a great culture engine and also kept making his army stronger.
Darren built urban building that provide mostly culture (theology and another thing - theater perhaps?).
I kept focusing on science, got myself Leonardo De Vincy and used my science to switch to Monarchy and upgraded my civilization from bronze to iron (Darren has done so before me actually).
Towards the end of the mid game I boosted my army and took the lead, with Simon close behind (I've researched strategy, built a railroad wonder and also upgraded knights and had a cavalry army tactic card).
Late game:
At the start of the late game I was so far behind it wasn't even funny... I had something like 30 points while the other had 70-90 (with Darren heavily in the lead).
I brought Albert Einstein to play and was researching everything I could get my hand on for 3 vps per research. I had upgraded my government to Fundamentalism, giving me a huge pool of civil and military actions, bringing my army strength to the maximum possible - 30 - with Simon close on my hills and Darren far behind with 11.
I've played an aggression card on Darren, stealing 7 vps from him and for some reason invested heavily into agriculture, all the while researching more and more useless stuff (I had tons of science and while I didn't benefit from most of the things I researched, I had enough civil actions that it didn't matter).
Last turn:
I am at -40 points to Darren and about -20 to Simon. Things look grim.
I research a few more technologies for 3 vps each (thanks, Albert!) and play an action card for 3 vps.
But then I finish building a wonder that gives me for each technology researched it's age number in vps. That netted me about 30 VPs.
Another aggression on Darren steals additional 7 vps from him to me.
And another investment into agriculture.
When the last turn ends, we count age 3 events that were put into "future events". There are two - one by Simon that nets him vps per colony (he got the only 3 colonies in the game), and another one that gives each player VPs per food they produce (now we see why I went heavily into agriculture ^_^ ) - I harvest 18 points while Darren and Simon harvest about 6 each.
Final score: Me first with about 20 points lead on Darren which has about 10-15 points lead on Simon.
Single reason why I won and a lesson for the future - don't stay on despotism government through the entire game (as both Simon and Darrend have). Better government = more actions = more good stuff in general = more vps at the end ^_^
Everyone were very happy about the game, we spend some time during tear-down talking about how complex and exciting the game is and how we can't wait to play it again ^_^
