review

Adventures in eight chapters

Aufbruch nach Newdale

The Saga of Oh my Goods continues…

And how! After, all, we immerse ourselves in a story spanning eight chapters. You need to equip an expedition which you then undertake yourself. Weapons must be part of the equipment, even if they are not really used for battle, and, in the end, you will even set sails!

This nice background story is absolutely insignificant for the flow of the game, but it provides a tad of fun for playing, as do six different boards and new components and game elements that are introduced round by round - for instance additional action slots, difficult to overcome mountain passes and moor terrain or bridges that you have to build and which you will build, as you will, as the builder, cash toll from other users of the bridge. And if background stories are not your thing, don’t worry, simply play the chapter that you like best.

All players begin with a coal mine and some cards in hand and then must make a few first decisions: Which building should be built? Do I build it orderly at higher building costs or do I build sloppily and suffer loss of revenue?  But, first of all, and in every one of the seven rounds, an event is revealed. His gives you assistants of varying colors and a - usually helpful - event. After you have decided on where to place your action tokens - worker placement at its best!- additional face-down assistants are drawn. At that point, if you have risked too much, because the assistants you did hope for have, unfortunately, not be drawn. Or could you have taken even more risks, because all of a sudden there are three rare blue assistants loitering about unused. No use crying about missed chances, because - alea iacta est, no, it should be the action tokens have been placed.

Now to the actions - the core of the game: When the placed action tokens are resolved, the building turns out to be the most thrilling action, because here, in the run for the most lucrative building slots, the only really interaction happens. Because only the first builder in the respective village will be rewarded with a - sometimes deciding - bonus. For those building pioneers there are also valuable bonus tokens waiting, all over the board. Less spectacular but equally important are action like “improve movement range”, “draw cards for your hand”, “acquire goods from the black market”, “hire additional action tokens” or “produce”. Produce is the action where you will find out who has learned how to work chain production best from Oh my Goods - if you produce planks in the sawmill you are well advised to use them immediately to produce the more valuable barrels in the Cooper’s Workshop. Should you happen to have grapes, too, you can manage to produce high-priced wine in the vinery in one single production chain, provided of course that you have built all those production buildings. At the end of the action phase, all players can build one more time and use their special buildings - a very rewarding phase!

In the final round the focus is exclusively on collecting the all-deciding victory points, which you can acquire with military power from Barracks or Towers, from completing the chapter order, from produced goods, secret tasks and valuable buildings. At that point, Fortuna could frustrate, if you based your long-term planning on a certain card which, however, implausibly, does not come into play. Bitter - play it again, even solo by all means!

Aufbruch nach Newdale is an excellently balanced worker placement game for experts in a nice ambience, which is played nearly solo also in rounds of four players. Attractively designed - with the exception of the box interior - and well created, it is a felicitous derivative of the card game Oh my Goods. The individual chapters provide additional allure including a moderate legacy feeling and the solo game is in a league of its own!

R.W. Langer

Players: 1-4

Age: 12+

Time: 90+

Designer: Alexander Pfister

Artist: Klemens Franz

Price: ca. 50 Euro

Publisher: Lookout Spiele 2019

Web: www.lookout-spiele.de

Genre: Worker placement, campaign

Users: For experts

Special: 1 player

Version: de

Rules: de en

In-game text: yes

Comments:

Well balanced

Attractive design

Plays in individual chapters or as campaign

Derivative of Oh my Goods

Compares to:

Oh my Goods

Other editions:

Lookout Spiele (en)

My rating: 7

R.W. Langer

Oh my Goods was excellent, Aufbruch nach Newdale is even a little better - fantastically balanced, offering a marvelous solo variant and using worker placement as it should be used!

Chance (pink): 1

Tactic (turquoise): 3

Strategy (blue): 3

Creativity (dark blue): 0

Knowledge (yellow): 0

Memory (orange): 0

Communication (red): 0

Interaction (brown): 2

Dexterity (green): 0

Action (dark green): 0