Shadrach Anki

The endgame bonuses for donating generously at the temple are not insignificant. Even the donation of a single coin will net you a minimum of two additional points at the end of the game. However, it is important to realize and remember that an overwhelming lead in this category is not necessary.

If you are in the lead by a coin or two, or if you are tied with another player for the first place position (both scenarios that will net you 10 additional points at the end of the game), it is likely better for you to save your coins for a good meal at the next Inn or souvenirs from the nearest Town.

While it is best, generally speaking, to focus on completing quests that will garner you additional points through your Lord card, pay attention to the various rewards all the different quests provide. Completing quests that provide you with more resources frequently makes it easier to complete more quests more quickly, even if the resource-granting quest won’t directly get you extra points at the end of the game.

Quest reward synergy is especially important if you find yourself in a game where one or more of the resources remains critically low. (I played one game where the only place to get fighters off the board for the first six rounds was at the Field of Triumph. Quests and Intrigue cards that gave fighters were in high demand.)

This may seem like an obvious tip, but I have found pile shuffling to be the best way to break up clumps of similar cards in Morels (or any set collection game, for that matter). I pile shuffle at the end of play while I sort out the night cards, and then a couple of times before playing the next game (along with any other shuffling method I may choose to employ). Doing this ensures a more even spread of card types throughout the deck, which makes for more enjoyable and strategic play.

House of Wonder and Smuggler’s Dock both require the player placing an agent on them to spend 2 gold before taking the adventurers from the supply.

In a recent game, my gaming group ruled that if you only have 1 gold available you can place an agent in one of these buildings and spend that single gold for half the benefit the building would normally provide. In these cases the owner’s benefit (if applicable) would also be halved.

I like this ruling because it makes mathematical sense, maintains the spirit of the game, and provides a bit more flexibility when players are strapped for gold.

At the beginning of the game, hold on to the cards in front of you if you are certain of where they go in the timeline. It is much easier to place the cards you are unsure of at the start because the timeline isn’t too full yet. Save the cards you’re certain about for later in the game.

Instead of going through the special building phase as written in the rules at the end of every turn, my gaming group does a quick poll around the table. If nobody wants to build anything, play proceeds to the next person. If one or more people want to build they do so more or less simultaneously, then the next turn begins. This simple modification to the written rules allows us to take advantage of the special building phase without having it bog down our playtime overly much.

The more or less simultaneous build time is facilitated by the fact that we always have one player acting as banker to manage the various and sundry resource cards. I don’t know how well it would work if everybody was getting things out on their own.

The game board is gorgeous and in keeping with the overall theme of the game, but it also takes up quite a bit of space for something that is essentially just a card bank. If you have the room on your table, fine and dandy; the board is a great thematic addition. If you don’t have a whole lot of room, just set up the palette cards in a more traditional bank format. When space is at a premium it is much better to have room for all your players and for the actual in-play components than it is to use all the accessories in the box.

On your turn, instead of just giving a treasure card or cards to another player, you may trade cards with them. However, as two treasures are being exchanged, trading automatically costs two actions.

To make it a little more challenging, the Messenger cannot use his ability to trade cards. He can still give cards to anybody on the board, but in order to trade with someone his pawn has to be on the same tile as that player’s. Of course, after trading with that player he is still free to give a treasure to anybody else on the board (provided he has an action left, of course)….

I’ve found this variant to be particularly useful when playing with younger players and people who are new to the game.

Another fun selection variant for Kingdom cards uses the players imaginations to come up with a story, or theme, to link all the cards together. This can be done with just the base game or with any and all expansions if you so choose.

Players take turns choosing cards and adding them to the story being told. The story should follow a semi-logical path, but it doesn’t need to be overly complex. As each card is named in the course of the story, set it out on the table. The player choosing the tenth kingdom card should provide some sort of conclusion to the story (again, it doesn’t have to be particularly complex).

To keep this selection process from taking overly long use just a list of the card names, or shuffle the randomizer deck(s) and deal out a pre-selected number of cards to each player which they can chose from for the story.

This variant adds an extra bit of flavour to an already fun game, and it can create a lot if interesting card combinations and strategies.

If you have access to several different expansions in addition to the base game it can be fun to play a game or two where you pull out all the Kingdom cards of a specific cost (say, three coins) and choose your set of ten from that selection. Doing this changes the game dynamic and makes you approach things in a different way.

I wouldn’t recommend this selection style for every game, but it makes for a change of pace when added in every now and then. I’ve found that for me, at least, knowing that all the kingdom cards have exactly the same cost allows me to focus more on card interactions than I would otherwise be able to do.

If all you have is Dominion (or a combination of Dominion and any non-Intrigue expansions) you can play with up to six people by tweaking the starting decks to contain eight Copper and two Estates. While this does reduce the overall Copper supply it keeps the number of available Estates more or less constant with a normal game, and it increases the early game play speed slightly, which offsets the downtime introduced by additional players.

I’ve found this minor change to be particularly helpful at game nights where we have five or six people who all want to play Dominion at the same time, but where we don’t have access to Intrigue.

This variant of Scrabble requires the tiles (and only the tiles) from at least two copies of the game. Mix up the tiles and place them face down at the centre of the table. Each player then draws five tiles from the pool as their starting hand. When everyone has drawn their tiles, play begins.

Each player tries to form words in standard Scrabble, crossword fashion using the tiles they have in front of them. Once any player has used all their tiles, they say “go” or “draw” and every player then draws a new tile to add to their personal puzzle. This puzzle can be rearranged and restructured as often as a player would like; the only real requirements are that all the words be real words of at least two letters (dictionary use is encouraged) and that all the words be connected as per standard crossword format.

Play concludes when any player says “draw” and the remaining number of tiles in the centre of the table is such that one or more players are unable to draw a new tile. At this point puzzle creation stops (players can no longer add to or change their layouts) and scoring begins. The point values on the Scrabble tiles in each player’s puzzle are counted (tiles used twice are counted twice), and the point values on any unused tiles a player may have are subtracted from the total. Player with the highest score wins.

Endgame variant
When playing with younger children or in a more casual/less competitive group, allowing all players a certain amount of time after the tile pool is exhausted to tweak their individual crosswords in order to use more tiles helps to level the playing field.

—-
Game length is generally no more than about fifteen to twenty minutes, and this variant is flexible with regards to the number of players. I have played with three to eight people using the tiles from two Scrabble games, and more players can easily be added by combining in tiles from a third game.

There are similarities between Speed Scrabble and the game Bananagrams, but I personally prefer the former as it maintains the point rewards for using less common letters in English.

The recommended sets of ten found at the end of the rules are very useful for highlighting different game strategies and mechanics, particularly if you have several new players or are adding in an unfamiliar/new expansion. It’s easier to form strategies in random games if you have some experience working with a more optimal setup for a particular mechanic or strategy. The recommended sets can also help level the playing field between experienced and new players.

For all scoring it helps to designate one person as the score keeper. They manage the meeples on the scoring track during the game, and during final scoring the score keeper is the one to remove the meeples from each of the unfinished features and make note of the score. This helps speed up the scoring process.

When playing with fewer than five (or six, with the expansions) people, I use meeples from one of the completely unused colors to mark the scored cities during the farm scoring step. If all the colors are in use in the game, I substitute flat glass counters for the meeples during this step. That way there is no possible confusion among the players.