Conquistadores and Missionaries
Santa Maria
Gold and religion
The name of the game is probably meant as an allegation to the discovery, conquest and settlement of Middle and North America, as the Santa Maria, the flagship of Christoph Columbus, part of his fleet in his first Atlantic crossing in 1492, has nothing whatsoever to do with the game itself. More probably, however, the game title alludes to the following years, when Conquistadors like Pizarro and Cortez waged war on the indigenous population, e.g. the Incas, and plundered their gold, and when the missionaries coming with them tried to convert the indigenous population to the Catholic Faith.
We simulate the events of those times during three rounds or years, with the goal to end up with most satisfaction, that is, victory points at the end of the game.
The board is placed centrally, showing, besides a track for conquistadors and religion, slots for three Scholar tiles, three Bishop Tiles, four Missionary Stations and four Starting Shipment tiles as well as five Retreat = Pass slots and the action summary, showing the four main action options. At the very bottom of the board, white dice symbols are depicted; next to those you then place three dice per player, according to the results they show after all dice being simultaneously rolled once.
Each player receives a Colony board, comprising 6x6 cases in a grid. On top of that grid you find six white dice symbols of values 1 to 6, in a horizontal line from left to right; to the left of the grid, you find six blue dice symbols, again of values 1 to 6, and arranged from top to bottom. You begin the game with one blue die, which everyone rolls for themselves and sets it out on the corresponding blue dice symbol. The boards show, besides a lot of free cases, some cases that are already showing symbols for various resources like coins, grain, shipping, religion, conquistador, satisfaction points and various trade options. Finally, you receive six monks of your color and personal starting money between three and six coins, plus two wood.
In, turn players select and resolve one of the four main action, until all players select the Pass action and thus quit the current year:
A) Expand your colony: Buy a landscape tile from the display prepared at the start, featuring five two-square tiles and five L-shaped three-square tiles, at the price of two wood or two wood plus 1 grain, respectively. Those tiles, of course, show the previously mentioned symbols, also called landscapes, and also crossroads symbols featuring between zero and two colonists. You can then place those tiles on free cases on your board without covering symbols already there and thus extend the number of symbols and with it the options and resources yields of your colony. Those tiles are only replenished at the start of the next round/year, so it might happen that they run out.
B) Activate a landscape of any symbol in your colony that does not carry a coin or a dice, with one coin and receive the corresponding yield, or resolve the action connected to the symbol. To activate another landscape during the same round when it is your turn again, costs you already two coins, so this gets rather expensive rather quickly.
The action (symbol) Shipping allows you to take a ship tile and to place it - after discarding the resources demanded for it - to the right side of your colony, exactly corresponding to the symbol where you took it from (coins, conquistador, religion, satisfaction), because this ships become relevant again for the Pass action.
When selecting the Conquistador action, you move exactly one case forward on the track; should you be passing a gold slot or end up on one, you receive one gold, which is a joker resource which can be used to replace any other resource. Furthermore, it is important to be as far ahead on this track as possible, as there is a reward of a not to be disregarded number of satisfaction points for this, raising with every year.
When selecting the Religion action, you can advance by one step on the Religion track, or even two, if you discard one grain. This can enable you to acquire your second and third own blue die. Furthermore, you can, of course, after any few cases, place a monk, either for a Scholar and various permanent advantages, or as Bishop for points at the end of the game in relation to how well you met the Bishop condition, or as a Missionary Station and an instant once-only effect, gold, jewels, sugar or satisfaction points.
C) Activate all not covered landscape symbols with one of your blue dice in a row or with a white die from general stock (therefore limited) in a column, up to a maximum of three dice each. You can of course only activate the row or column corresponding to the die value, but you can change the value of the die by one point up or down for one gold that you spend, even more often than once - yes, money makes the world go around, and also the dice symbols. This activates all free symbols without a die or coin, resolving them in turn from top to bottom or from left to right. Cautious planning when positioning landscape tiles is therefore very important to achieve the optimum yield. The die you used is then placed on the last symbol in the row or column and blocks it for the rest of the year. So, the order of dice activation must be planned carefully, coping with the problem that the white dice are available to all players and the desired value might be gone quicker than you like, especially when it was rolled maybe only once or twice.
D) Pass: This is important too, as it also gives you various actions, for instance gold, religion, satisfaction and shipping. Furthermore, ships previously placed as described above are now activated according to their number, which can have enormous consequences, especially in year Three.
At the end of the year, the conquistador points that I have previously mentioned, are awarded. The markers on this track are then reset back to Zero and various other preparations are executed for the next round/year.
At the end of the game after three years there are points to be acquired from resources, money, colonists on road cases in completely covered rows or columns, points for monks that have been placed, points for bishop tiles and for the number of ship sets on each landing stage - on ship per symbol constitutes one complete set.
Conclusion: Santa Maria works very well; it is varied; the game mechanics suit the topic very well and it is thrilling and challenging as regards to taking landscape tiles and white dice from general stock. Will I manage to acquire the tile or dice value that I need imperatively, or will it be snatched away after all, and I will have change my plans?
For an expert game, in my personal opinion, the element of chance from rolling dice is a bit too high, especially when rolling my own up to three blue dice (which I will hopefully have acquired in the second or third year at the latest). If I have only little money or no money at all to modify the value of a die (money is always scarce, and to change a 1 into a 6 has a price of five coins, after all) it is a very deciding influence on my point yield, if I am able to use a die in one of my optimum rows and thus am able to activate a lot of very important symbols, or if I will only manage to active the few or even only one symbol in one of my less advantageously upgraded rows.
Another thing that I would like to mention is that the placement of monks is only free of charge for the first monk in a case, regardless to which player that monk belongs. In all other cases you must pay two coins to every other player whose monk is already present in the case and this severely limits the availability of attractive monk cases very quickly. I believe that one coin would be more appropriate, as, especially in the third round/year, it can happen that some players forfeit their monks, simply because they cannot afford to place them.
Another rule that I did not like much is the rule that you have to discard two victory points at the end of the game for each occupied bishop case, so that the placement of more than one monk there does make a lot of sense because the yield in points is too low or the balance is zero, because you pay two points and receive two points. Maybe, at this points, you should decide to play with house rules, that is, demand only one coin for each opposing monk present and deduct only one point for a bishop case respectively.
Gert Stöckl
Age: 12+
Time: 90+
Designer: Eilif Svensson, Kristian Amundsen Østby
Art: Gjermund Bohne
Price: ca. 42 Euro
Publisher: Pegasus Spiele 2018
Web: www.pegasus.de
Genre: Strategy, resources, dice
Users: For experts
Special: 1 player
Version: de
Rules: de en es fr it pl ru
In-game text: no
Comments:
Somewhat high element of chance
Mechanisms and topic go well together
Maybe use house rules for some mechanisms
Compares to:
Marco Polo, games using resources and dice for workers
Other editions:
Aporta (en, fr ), Arrakis (es), Dal Tenda (it), Granna (pl), Lavka (ru), some of them only announced
My rating: 5
Gert Stöckl:
Nice strategy game with dice for workers and a somewhat too high element of chance from rolling dice
Chance (pink): 2
Tactic (turquoise): 1
Strategy (blue): 2
Creativity (dark blue): 0
Knowledge (yellow): 0
Memory (orange): 0
Communication (red): 0
Interaction (brown): 0
Dexterity (green): 0
Action (dark green): 0