Caylus arrives: First Impressions

Updated, 7:00pm (added a new paragraph, and a few sentences to clarify my opinion a bit).

Caylus finally arrived, and Doug was kind enough to host an evening of it last Friday. Kevin, Caleb, Doug and myself spent around 45 minutes learning the rules from Kevin, and about 2.5 hours playing our first game. My initial thoughts?

Length: It was longish. The game says "60-150" minutes on the side of the box, which equates to about 30 minutes per player (it can be played with 2-5). Two hours for a 4-player game doesn't sound like much, but it is actually somewhat long for a German game. I can't help but compare Caylus to Puerto Rico for many reasons, and PR played by 4 experienced players should not be longer than 90 minutes. Granted, it was a learning game for us, so we probably took significantly longer than necessary to make our moves.

However, there are many more options in each turn than their are in PR. Over half the time in PR, your moves are obvious, as you can eliminate choices very easily, and narrow down your role picks to 2 or 3 within a few seconds. Then, by examining your opponents positions, you can usually make your choice from there.

In Caylus, there can potentially be more than a dozen potential plays each turn, and with up to six pawns to place on the board in the placement phase, there are many more things to consider. One might argue that many choices work out to be of equal value. But when fighting against equally skilled opponents, searching for the tiniest advantage can really slow the game down, and I don't see how this can really be cut down much. One play is not enough to judge entirely, for sure. But the length of the game could be a concern.

Components. Beautiful board, nice wooden bits, well illustrated manual, box and buildings. Nothing new or original in terms of construction, we've see the pawns in Power Grid, Settlers, Tikal, etc. and the building tiles are the same type of cardboard seen in Alhambra or Carcassone. But still a pleasure, and the board would look great framed and on a wall (my personal standard for excellence in map art).

Theme. Winner here, the medieval theme fits the mechanics well, and seems to have a universal feel. The individual buildings seem somewhat generic, despite the differences in power and value. Illustrations on the tiles were fine, but did not stand out to me. Perhaps if the names of the buildings were on the cards, it would make communication after and before the game a little easier. As a "construction game", they seem to be always popular, and the different roles the buildings and actions play into this nicely, as one builds strength over time.

Balance. Yes, was extremely well balanced, as all choices are open to all players, and the ability to bid for play position (although an extremely artificially game mechanism) made the game very very agonizing, in a good way. I get the feeling after the first play that there will be perhaps dozens of games that will need to be played before the best strategies are worked out, and like PR, they may never be! Game lends itself immensely to expansions, as well...

Interaction. Some debate could be made that the game can be played in a vacuum, as it is impossible to plan your moves in advance (except perhaps when working towards a high-priced prestige building towards the end of the game). With no hidden information, you can simply "play the board", examine what each opponent can do, and select an action that limits their ability and maximizes yours. There is no need for communication between players, no negotiation mechanism.

Pushing the "thief" or "provost" around to block other players actions could be discussed and debate among players, but it is questionable whether this constitutes table talk. The lack of interaction between the players is the same in Puerto Rico, and it didn't bother me, so it's hard to criticize the game here. Perhaps in a 90-minute game of PR, the interaction is less of an issue.

To play a 2+ hour game of Caylus, with no need to communicate with other players...? Power Grid and Princes of Florence handles this through competitive auctions. Settlers through Trading. Mare Nostrum through trading and negotiation.

Fun. Yes, it was fun taking the turns, activating the buildings, moving the provost, and trying to make different strategies work out. I decided up front to sacrifice my early game chances by cornering the market on a couple of hot buildings, made myself cash poor and vulnerable for several turns. By passing, other players cut down my number of actions due to expense, and I had to spend valuable turns generating a money strategy. Once I did this however, I was able to control the board more, landing the valuable "1-1" space that kept my costs down, and keeping it. I was also able to move to first place in turn order late in the game and controlled the tempo from there, landing the 25-point prestige building and winning by a large margin.

Kevin chose to pursue a strategy based on favors in the early and middle stages, and converted to a "big-prestige" building late. Doug attempted to use cash to buy his VP's, and Caleb appeared to be trying to corner gold for a while. It was a great time discussing all the strategies during the post mortem, and I look forward to playing a few of them myself next time.

Agonizing decisions are generally always a fun part of any game - and Caylus delivered a lot of those. My only concern is that with a 2-hour time frame to play, will it drag on too long for players in last place? Will the lack of interaction during this time make the game feel too much like solitaire? Does this matter? (It doesn't in PR). More plays (which I definitely hope to get in) will tell the story for sure.

I can definitely see why Caylus is currently ranked in the top 3 games in the world right now.