UNSERE REZENSION

I will build you a castle

DIE SCHLÖSSER DES KÖNIG  LUDWIG II

Mad or only beautiful?

Those readers among you that are a bit advanced in years might still remember – at least in Germany and Austria – the hit by Heintje played up and down in the radio, to the chagrin of some, to the joy of others. Unfortunately, the melody has imprinted itself indelibly in my memory. I wish I could remember much more important things that easily, too – but this is not the topic here.

Who would not love to own a castle, if we disregard the costs of up-keeping for the moment? Well, in this game by Ted Alspach we can immerse ourselves into that feeling easily. Obviously, the designer was inspired by the castles of Bavarian King Ludwig II., one of the most dazzling and enigmatic personalities of his time. His extravagant and luxurious urge for building has given us, after all, „Lindenhof“, „HerrenchiemseeW“ and last but not least „Schloss Neuschwanstein“, building monuments of incredible beauty, albeit having forced the national finances of Bavaria into near bankruptcy with the total building costs of more than 300 millions. In the end this was the reason for his incapacitation based on an alleged madness. But if you take a look at today’s number of visitors of those monuments and the entry fees they pay, maybe the money wasn’t that ill-spent after all? It took an American publisher to pick up this topic.

It is interesting, by the way, that in the title of the American edition King Ludwig is called “Mad” or crazy, while this qualifying addition has been left out in the German title, probably out of consideration for the German market.

The company Bézier Games has been founded in 2006 in California by Ted Alspach, the designer of this game. He has also published games like Age of Steam, Ultimate Werewolf, Kniffel the Card Game, Mutant Meeple and Suburbia as well as expansions for Suburbia. He is also the author of more than 30 books.

But now to the game itself: 75 rooms and gardens in ten different sizes need to be developed by 1-4 players and built by them in their guise as builders. The starting point for each castle is an entry hall. There are also six stair wells and nine corridors. At the same time we also need to take into consideration four out of 24 demands of the King. With the help of bonus cards – there are 28 different such cards in the game – you can acquire additional points in order to leave the table as the victorious builder.

For the game set-up the various rooms are sorted by size and deposited on the two room game boards. A so-called score tower records the victory points of participating players. There are two types of bonus cards. With one type of cards certain types of rooms are preferred and you are awarded points for them in relation to their numbers. The other type of cards concentrates mainly on the size of rooms. At the start of the game you receive three bonus cards out of which you choose two and can then use them. At the same time four Demands of the King are selected randomly out of the total of 24 demands. Those demands award points at the end of the game or provide room sizes, exits from the castle or money. You see that you have already take quite a few things into account for the course of the game even before the game has started. 15.000 Mark are your starting capital for the game. Now seven different rooms are set out, the corresponding room cards are sorted and the rooms are assigned to a price list, ranging from 1000 to 15.000. This completes the set-up of the game.

The Starting player is given the master builder marker. This gives him the privilege to re-arrange the rooms on display so that there will be new prices for acquiring those rooms. Now players in turn, beginning to his left, decide on one of those rooms and pay the price to the master builder! If nothing suitable is available or if you think the price is too high, because he have already depleted your finances, you may pass. This passing is rewarded with 5000 Mark from the bank. As the last player of the round the master builder has the right to buy. He must pay the price for his chosen building to the bank or he can decide to pass, too. Rooms that have not been bought are assigned 1000 Mark as additional allure. Using the room cards you determine which rooms are used to fill the empty spots in the display and the master builder marker is passed to the next player in clock-wise direction.

What happens to the rooms that have been acquired? They must be added by each buyer to his personal castle instantly. At least one door must correspond to a room already in the display. You must also take card that the castle has at least one exit. Basement rooms that you acquire may only be connect to the ground floor of the castle only by stair wells. If you cannot adhere to all of those rules when placing a room you are not allowed to acquire this room.

As soon as a room has been placed you are awarded victory points. The number of points is marked on the room cards in the top left-hand corner. Furthermore, there are symbols in the middle of each card that influence the adjacent rooms. There are drawing rooms, bedrooms and dining rooms as well as gardens, hobby rooms, utility rooms and basement rooms, and of course also connecting elements like corridors and star wells. Understandably, it is not desirable that, for instance, bedrooms are placed next to hobby rooms or dining rooms and such placements are penalized with less of points.

Rooms are considered to be completed when all doors of a room are connected according to the rules to other rooms. This brings additional privileges. Those privileges are: A double scoring in case of a drawing room, 5 extra points for a hobby room, another turn for a dining room, 10.000 Mark in case of a garden and an additional bonus card for a utility room. So, paying attention to placement can be useful.

The end of the game has been reached when the stack of room cards has been emptied. Now the Demands of the Kings and bonus cards owned by players are evaluated. An additional point is earned for each 10.000 Mark you own. In case of – a rather improbable – tie the size of the castle you constructed will decide the tie. For this purpose, each card carries a number for the room area in the top right-hand corner.

For summary cards are included in the game to assist you with the game flow. The components are of excellent quality and nicely designed. For this my praise goes to the artist Keith Curtis. The rulebook of six pages is also straightforward, well structured and leaves no questions. Dale Yu as the editor is a renowned professional who put his mark of excellency on the job. Dale Yu was involved in creating Dominion, the solo version of Agricola and also the Fir Tree Deck. His experience was obviously well-used and valuable for the design of this game.

Due to the bonus cards and the demands of the king that vary in each game no game is similar to the previous one. The many options for scoring points also introduce lots of variation and provide the game with a high replay value and diversity. The solo version offers the opportunity to compete with a score of 50 (Jester) to 101 (King of Castle Builders). An absolutely coherent topic has been implemented in an optimum way, the game must be recommended to all fans of tile placement games.

Rudolf Ammer

Players: 1-4

Age: 13+

Time: 90+

Designer: Ted Alspach

Artist: Keith Curtis

Price: ca. 36 Euro

Publisher: Bezier Games 2014

Web: www.beziergames.com

Genre: Tile placement game

Users: With friends

Special: 1 player

Version: de

Rules: de en

In-game text: nein

Comments:

Excellent components

Equally excellent rulebook

Many ways to score

Lots of variety due to varying component selection

Compares to:

Versailles and other tile-placing building games

Other editions:

Castles of Mad King Ludwig, Bezier Games

My rating: 5

Rudolf Ammer:

The title-providing topic has been implemented with great flair and offers high replay values with its many and variable options.

Chance (pink): 1

Tactic (turquoise): 1

Strategy (blue): 1

Creativity (dark blue): 0

Knowledge (yellow): 0

Memory (orange): 0

Communication (red): 0

Interaction (brown): 1

Dexterity (green): 0

Action (dark green): 0