OUR REVIEW

ArcheOlogist or Tomb Raider?

JENSEITS VON Theben: Die Grabräuber

Striving for knowledge and treasures

Jenseits von Theben was one of the big surprises on the board game scene and market in 2004. First published by designer Peter Prinz himself as a self-published edition under the label Prinzspiele, the game was re-issued in 2007 by Queen Games and impressed from the first with a marvelous mechanism and also commercial success. So it is rather surprising that it took 9 or 6 years, respectively, until Queen Games followed up on this success with a variant similar to a card game. Usually, publishers do not hesitate that long to follow up successful board games with affordable, slimmed-down card game versions.

One reason for this might be that it is not possible to mirror the mechanism of Jenseits von Theben in a pure card game and therefore Jenseits von Theben: Die Grabräuber is not a card game, but a slimmed-down version of the board game in a medium-sized box, with a lot of cards which drive the game, but also with a small board and a few wooden markers.

The basic mechanism is that from Jenseits von Theben: In your turn you resolve one action. Each action comes with a price of time segments, sometimes many, sometimes only a few. Those segments are marked on a time track. The next player in turn is always the player who is in last place on this time track. Ingenious, simple and always fair, a fabulous mechanisms, as I have mentioned earlier.

The majority of those actions simply comprising the picking up of one of the cards on display. From those cards you acquire knowledge, victory points or certain special abilities. Let me mention one of them, the name giving Tomb Raider card, a very powerful card. The gap in the card display is refilled with a card from the draw pile.

Now and then you instigate digs in one of the four regions for digging - Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece or Crete. In relation to the knowledge, that you have acquired on the digging area or region, and in relation to the time that you invest you may then draw a certain number of cards from the corresponding stack of pieces found at the dig and keep the finds thus made. Those stacks of finds are formed in the course of the game again and again by going through the draw pile. This is one of the essential differences to the original game, where the finds were cardboard chips that you drew from a bag. But as regards to game mechanisms is difference is negligible.

Another difference is that travelling has been abolished. In the original game you had to spend time to travel to the different cities in order to acquire the cards on display there. In Jenseits von Theben: Die Grabräuber there is no map, you just take the card that you want to have.

The last difference worth mentioning is the end of the game. While in Jenseits of Theben you played a given number of years, marked on the time track, a game of Jenseits von Theben: Die Grabräuber ends when the draw pile has been used up. In both games the winner is whoever has acquired most victory points in the guise of finds or additional cards.

In a direct comparison between old and new version a see a clear winner: The new version is somewhat simpler, plays more quickly and is simple more elegant. The flair and feeling remain 100% intact and nothing got lost in transition. But, my main point for criticism of Jenseits von Theben also fully applies to Jenseits von Theben: Die Grabräuber: Both games are for the better part decided by drawing of the finds. All the interesting considerations you pondered for taking cards are good for nothing when luck deserts you at the wrong moment.

If you are, on the other hand, looking exactly for that - a beautiful, well-working game in which you cannot err too far, because chance is dominating over strategy and tactic, if you like to be happy about marvelous finds and can like to get aggravated about washouts, then this is a game for you without doubt. Fans and owners of Jenseits von Theben are recommended to take a look at the version. If the elegant reduction to the essential elements is worth the acquisition you must decide for yourself.

Markus Wawra

Players: 2-4

Age: 10+

Time: 30+

Designer: Peter Prinz

Artist: Michael Menzel, Christoph Tisch

Price: ca. 25 Euro

Publisher: Queen Games 2013

Web: www.queen-games.de

Genre: Set collecting, time allocation

Users: With friends

Version: de

Rules: de en

In-game text: no

Comments:

New version of Jenseits von Theben

Professionally reduced version

Elegant time mechanism

Compares to:

Jenseits von Theben

Other editions:

Jenseits von Theben: Tomb Raiders

My rating: 4

Markus Wawra:

For me, personally, the element of chance in Theben: Die Grabräuber is too dominant. I do prefer if strategy and tactic decide on win or lose. Therefore Jenseits von Theben, the board game, did not get played very often by me. The new version, probably, will not be played much oftener, albeit me believing it to be the much more elegant game.  All the same, I do like the time mechanism very much and therefore I can give a good evaluation.

Chance (pink): 3

Tactic (turquoise): 1

Strategy (blue): 2

Creativity (dark blue): 0

Knowledge (yellow): 0

Memory (orange): 0

Communication (red): 0

Interaction (brown): 1

Dexterity (green): 0

Action (dark green): 0