I got a chance to play two more games of Glory to Rome today. It’s a great game, especially as I won both games… Well, that’s definitely not hard against newbies, and Mari, the only other player with experience, didn’t repeat her excellent performance from the last time.
The buildings are fun. In the first game, with three players, I had Ludus Magna which makes Merchant clients wild. Guess who had three merchants? So basically whatever happens, I get at least three actions. It would’ve been hard to lose that game. The final scores were rather happy 45-26-24 for me.
In the second game we had four players and I was able to get another victory. It was a closer game this time. We were building a lot, so the game was about to end with sites running out. I focused on stuffing my vault with marble, which was the key to victory (and the fact that nobody else stored concrete). I had my trusty Academy (draw cards whenever you do Craftsman), which I’ve had in every game so far, and a Temple (hand size +4). Pretty nifty, if not outstanding.
The end of that game was pretty good, though: I chose Craftsman with two Craftsman clients. With first action I finished Circus Maximus (clients do two actions, when you lead or follow that role), upping my actions from three to five. With those five, I was able to grab two of the three remaining sites (and finish both for two more points!). However, that wasn’t enough… except that I just finished Latrine (discard cards before drawing new), so when I drew cards with Academy, I was able to drop all my cards to draw nine and exhaust the deck before the others could act. Whee! Final results 36-23-20-8 in my favour thanks to a well-stuffed vault.
I like Glory to Rome. It’s tough to learn and people don’t generally get it, but I love it. It’s full of action and offers some rather serious choices to make. Definitely a nine, and a possible 10.
Me and Hannu finished off the evening with some Schnapsen. Well, something like Schnapsen, at least. We used my brand-new Schnapsen pack (I got my order from Piatnik, and it’s a glorious collection of cards). However, actually it isn’t a Schnapsen pack, but a 66 pack, because it has 24 cards: Schnapsen only uses 20. We didn’t figure that out until afterwards, but that’s life. We still used five card hands like in Schnapsen.
Whatever. It was brilliant anyway. It was very close, as we both collected points at the same pace. First one, then two, then two… Hannu got to five, I had six, but in the final round, Hannu was able to beat me well for two points and victory. It was close, and great, great fun. Schnapsen (or something like it) is an excellent game. Now if someone just explained the Bummerln scoring for me and told me what the idiom Einer kriegt immer das Bummerl means… (I think your opponent gets a Bummerln when one of the players wins a seven-point match by getting rid of all seven points. I think. An explanation would be welcome.)
8 responses to “Thursday session: Glory to Rome, Schnapsen”
I’m really happy I bought Glory to Rome now. Did your opponents enjoy it as much as you? 😉
Some did, some didn’t… Mari has played three games now and seems to like it. In our first game Make loved the game during the first half, then got attacked and now gives the game a 5… But right now I have no problems getting the game on table.
Good for you. I’m still trying to persuade Ness that it’s not too complicated.
Play with you no fun! You cheat 😀
Latrine only discards one card.
Oops.
Well, in this case it didn’t matter much, the result would’ve been the same…
I didn’t rate the game after my first play. I’ve played a second time, 4-player, in which I built palisade as my first building against legionnaire (and Coliseum) and won. There was a lot of downtime. It’s an ok game, and I’d like to try it with 2-3 players. It feels maybe a tad too swingy for me right now. In the games I’ve played, a couple of players have always achieved something totally insane. In my last game, I had 18 clients!
Also, the second game of mine was played with the official variant, in which you can use any two hand cards as any role, instead of three. (now Circus Maximus lets you use any card as architect.)
I was told this variant would make legionnaire and laborer better, since there would be more cards in the pool. Dunno, craftsman still seemed to be the name of the game.
I like the wild swings, that’s what makes Glory to Rome to stand out from the fairly refined and balanced San Juan and Race for the Galaxy. I don’t need another game like those two, Race for the Galaxy does that thing very well.
Glory to Rome, for now, is an exciting game full of big swings and outrageous card combinations.