Rattus: Pied Piper
2-4
10+
45
Europe, 1348. The Black Death ravages Europe. Until now the players have used the help of a handful of different medieval classes to fight the plague. Now it’s time to call for reinforcements.
12 new personalities are ready to provide their help to the players. Some of these, like the Queen and the Emperor, use their wealth and power to aid the players. Some, like the Nun and the Bishop, use wisdom and faith to avoid the plague, while others resort to magic and witchcraft, like Pied Piper, who uses his magical flute to lure the rats along with him.
This is not a stand-alone game. A copy of Rattus is required to play.
User Reviews (4)
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As noted in my review of the main game, it is almost essential to get this expansion to have much more choice in your characters. The option I prefer, is to randomly select a character from each category, or, if players agree, choose certain characters from the different categories. This way, the balance is there for how players are effected by the rat tokens, and you have mountains of replayability.
The additions are actually all fun, creating whole new avenues for creating interesting combos. The expansion also comes with some additional components, besides the 16 characters, because some of those characters have very special rules like walling off areas, or sending out nuns. And the titular Pied Piper can lure rat tokens from one region to another.
As I am a great fan of the game, I also own the smaller 4 character expansion that adds some legendary figures to the mix like Robin Hood and Merlin, the single promo Spiel ’10 expansion, and the exclusive Boardgamegeek Jester promo character card.
Lastly, keep your eye out for this year’s expansion, which adds a 5th and a 6th player, plus some interesting new play options. Rattus remains at its heart a chaotic and quick affair, but it is so much fun, and so interactive, that it doesn’t tire quickly.
The Pied Piper expansion creates more replayability opportunities because it creates three new role cards for each category! Their abilities all operate in a similar manner to their originals, but are significantly different to give you a very different feel for the game.
This expansion also includes game components to be used by some of the cards, such walls that are impassable.
One role that we are happy to switch out is the witch role. While I’ve been having fun grabbing the witch and tinkering with different strategy ideas, we have never come up with a good winning strategy for her. The other witch/replacement roles add a lot more to be more appealing for players to take.
The only downside to this expansion is that it is slightly more complicated than the base game, so it will take a little more effort for some gamers to understand.
The original Rattus came with 6 classes, and you had to play with all those every time. The games would be a bit repetative, and it lost a lot of replayability.
Rattus: The Pied Piper amends this, and adds 12 new card for a total of 18. You may now pick and choose between these 18 roles, as only 6 are played each time. The expansion cards are all unique and provide a lot of different options. And since each game usually contains different roles, the replayability just got real.
I won’t go into detail on what the actions do, but the Pied Piper is true to its name, and you may choose a player cube to pull rat tokens with it into another country.
If you’re looking at Rattus, then get this expansion at the same time. It’s that important!
This expansion actually makes the game better. I was tempted to give it a 9. This is a go-to game… always happy to play it. It’s good for a wide range of ages and skills.