review

RACE TO THE NEW FOUND LAND

With ships from five nations

The title is a double entendre on new found land and our destination which is Newfoundland in the Northern Atlantic Ocean. Captain and First Mate are Martin Kallenborn and Jochen Scherer. Both are, at least form me, rather unknown designers, who have signed on for this game with Hans im Glück Verlag. Martin Kallenborn has travelled already once before, with Matthias Prince for Helios, a game that I did like very much then. He has also created „Baumhausparty“ with Haba. Together with Jochen Scherer, he has published „Asselschlamassel“ with Drei Magier Verlag.

What is the topic for this new cooperation, then? We try to discover countries or islands, that is, and to settle them, if appropriate. At the same time, we trade in Wood, Cloth, Ore and Gold. Gold is a joker for all goods when needed. The cover of the game box very nicely interprets delight in discoveries and in adventures with the ship and crew it shows.

So, what’s in the box? In addition to the obligatory board, there are five player boards which represent various countries – The Netherlands, England, Spain, France and Portugal – and feature varying starting conditions. Four of the five boards are used in a game; the backside of the unused nation’s board is used as a deposit board. The same principle is used for the starting ships of the respective nations.

The remaining ships, designed das tiles, are divided into big and small ones. The small ones can be acquired during the game for a fixed price of 1 Wood and 1 Cloth, while the big frigates are expensive and need to be paid for in various ways. However, if you buy them, they yield three additional victory points. As all ships vary in equipment, it is necessary to consider which of the vessels from the display can be of best use. Furthermore, the box holds 34 island tiles and 18 order tiles as well as five geometric frames; I’ll come back to their function later. Eight compass tiles and a starting marker complete set. For cards, there are 21 for once-only use, five of which are starting card and vary in their requisites. 15 target und five captain cards offering various advantages can be acquired during the game. Extra points are available for whoever reaches or passes the 50 points mark first. Wooden parts in the game comprise 25 wooden blocks in every player color and a ship marker. The commodities range offers 15 cloth and wood pieces, plus 12 ore and gold pieces.

At the start of the game, the already mentioned frame markers are placed on slots 7, 15, 20, 25 and 35 of the scoring track. The player, who is first to arrive at or pass one of those frames, can select a card from a stack of five target or captain cards, whichever one he believes is of most advantage. Then you move the marker to the next ship, but maximum three cases back. The next player to master this obstacle, however, has fewer selection options

You begin with one Ore commodity. At the start of each of the four round, you receive one Wood and one Cloth. In the Land Phase, you can now expand the harbor with an additional shipyard or buy useful ships. In the consecutive Planning phase, there are action like Loading, Settling, Delivery and Discovery. Each player decides which of the options he will use for himself and places one ship – in case of loading – or up to three ships for the other variants at the respective positions.

Now it is necessary to explain the different traits of the ships. Each ship shows a number for persons – 1 or 2, crates – 0-4, and telescopes – up to 4. In case of Loading, the number of crates decides which commodity you receive. Furthermore, you can  - depending on the number of crates – draw a corresponding number of once-only cards from their stock and keep one of them. The others are discarded. While loading is done in clockwise direction, the sail value that is also marked on the ship tiles, is relevant for the other actions and determines the turn order.

If you decide on Settling, the person number value is active. You put your color marker on a free island tile. Those tiles have two bonus options and you can select one of them. When the ship you use, shows two persons, you may place a stack of two markers, will however, still only receive one bonus.

Now a short discourse on the available islands:

Anticosti Island:

With its 400 shipwrecks, this island is deemed to be the graveyard of the St. Lawrence Golf. Despite having been discovered already in 1534, there are only 280 people living there and today the island is a Nature Reserve.

Nova Scotia Island:

As indicated by the name, the island was an English colony originally that in 1867 was integrated into Canada as a province.

Prince Edward island:

The smallest among the islands, previously named St. Johns Island, it carries traces of settlements from 9000 B.C. Was leaning towards the United States, but was “convinced” by Canada by picking up the cost of the then railway system.

Newfoundland:

With Newfoundland I usually associate a race of dogs, animals weighing around 50 kilos. Actually, the island was famous for its schools of codfish, that were so numerous that they presented an obstacle to ships. The residents are descendants of Vikings, Frenchmen, Irishmen and Scotsmen and are considered to be „Ostfriesen - Friesians“ of Canada.

If you cannot decide on an island, there is always New England for an alternative. New England denominates a region comprising Connecticut, New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts, Vermont and Rhode Island in the Northeastern USA, famous for the beauty if its “Indian Summer”. This region also harbors the famous American universities of Yale and Harvard, and even the War of Independence or Revolutionary War started here with the “Boston Tea Party”. If you place your marker here, you dot reap a bonus, but a victory point at the least.

With the Delivery action you can now sell the commodities that you acquired while Loading or from Once-only cards. The area for this activity comprises the cities of Stockholm, Hamburg and Venice. In analogy to New England, Antwerp serves as the alternative in this action. Stockholm offers five orders with varying numbers of points, Hamburg and Venice offer three orders each.

For the Discovery action, you have to consider the Telescope symbols. Those symbols allow you draw this total of island tiles and place one of them for each ship you deployed. The shape of the tile you place must, however, correspond to the template shape on the board. You mark the tile with your personal marker and take both indicated bonuses. One slot remains empty for future settlement.

When one of the four rounds in the game is completed, additional island tiles are revealed. For this, one of the eight compass cards is turned over and - in relation to the number of players - additional tiles are added to the island indicated on the compass card. If the corresponding landscape is no longer available, you continue turning up tiles until one is suitable.

When then one of the islands is completely filled, a scoring is triggered. The owners of most and second most person markers on this island are rewarded with bonus points. Furthermore, all markers on the island are worth one point. The scoring is done in player turn order in clock-wise direction. Doing it this way is necessary in relation to the arriving at frame markers or for the 50/100 cards. After the island, the cities are scored using the same mechanics.

At this point, you can make use of target cards which you acquired during the round - the use of the first one is free of charge, using additional ones costs you two commodities for each target card.

In the final scoring, you receive one point for each marker on islands and cities that have not yet been scored. Unused Once-only cards and target cards give you two points each. For this scoring, there is now required scoring sequence, which could again be pivotal for the bonus points from the 50/100 cards.

Finally, a few words on the advantages of the various nations.

Portugal has the option to upgrade an additional shipyard to add one more ship to the harbor.

Spain - If you have developed the Colonial administration, you can- during Settling - add an additional marker on one of the two slots on an island tile on display and select one of the two bonuses again.

France - If you have upgraded Customs, you receive three additional points for each delivery.

Netherlands: If you have upgraded the Naval Office, you can raise you Sail strength by two for each action to influence turn order.

England - If you developed the colonial harbor, you can keep an additional Once-only card, if you draw minimum two cards.

The special abilities of the Captains:

Christoph Columbus places an additional island tile when settling and accrues both bonuses of the tile.

Ferdinand Magellan is played with a ship in the planning phase and raises the Sail strength of the ship by 7.

Hernán Cortez gives you immediately and then in each Land Phase one additional gold.

Vasco da Gama is played together with a ship in the planning phase, the ship receives +3 crate symbols for Delivery or Loading.

Francis Drake  provides an additional shipyard where you can place one more ship.

Let me start with my positive impressions: The options and variations are really nearly unlimited. It begins with the option of five nations to choose from for four players and continues with the fact that the various ships and order cards come into play randomly. The variety continues with the sequence of the discovery of islands. The same goes for the target cards, which are stacked in three stacks of five cards each. Therefore, additional charter ships can appear early in the game or very late in the game, which can have a significant impact on the game. Very interesting is the mechanisms that you do a kind of card drafting, when a certain point count has been reached (frames), even if this is chance-driven, as mentioned earlier in this review.

Now for my critical remarks. First, about the design. I do not understand why ships are advanced on a drawing of a cloth strip serving as point track, and also not why a huge region like New England is placed into the ocean as an island. The same goes for the order cities. There would have been enough suitable cities around the island or Canada or the US which would, in my opinion, have been better suited to the theme than European cities. Or was a forced appearance of Belgium, Sweden, Germany and Italy necessary? The rules are very exerted but sometimes somewhat exaggerated. I quote: “The starting player calls the order for Loading”! I believe that in the target group for the game, a clock-wise turn order should not be unknown. Or, and I quote again: “You must not place more tiles than you have drawn”. Oh, really?

As I am an ardent fan of Hans im Glück, I was a little bit disappointed by Race to the New Found Land. The game works, but is definitely not for strategists. Too many variants were crammed in, they make long-term planning difficult. For me, the target group would be families with some gaming experienced or our target group of Friends. The components are perfect, as is standard by Hans im Glück games, and the rules, aside from the points I mentioned, are flawless.

Rudolf Ammer

Players: 2-4

Age: 10+

Time: 90+

Designer: Martin Kallenborn, Jochen Scherer

Art: Alexander Jung

Price: ca. 45 Euro

Publisher: Hans im Glück 2017

Web: www.hans-im-glueck.de

Genre: Discover, trade

Users: With friends

Version: de

Rules: de en fr nl

In-game text: no

Comments:

Homogenous total of standard mechanisms

Rules a bit overzealous

Board design somewhat questionable

Compares to:

Development games with tile and worker placement

Other editions:

999 Games (nl), Z-Man Games (en, fr ),

My rating: 5

Rudolf Ammer:

The game stands out due to a plethora of varieties, albeit with a high element of chance

Chance (pink): 3

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