Nytmare
David Jose
Kings of Air and Steam - Programmed turn, economic, steam punk rail-and-air-ship game - We only played one game of this, and though I enjoyed myself, I don't know if I have a really good handle on the game. It was unfortunately one of those new game where, between my turns, instead of being able to strategize and pay attention to what everyone else was doing, I was busy reading through the rule book answering everyone else's questions.
The game is split into 5 rounds. Each round is split into four turns.
On each round your airships will be zipping around the map, picking up and redistributing goods to your rail lines, so that your trains can then deliver the goods to the cities that want them.
At the beginning of each round, you choose (program) four movement cards that designate how far (not where) your airship will travel. On each turn, players simultaneously flip over their movement cards, and in initiative order (designated by the cards) decide where their ship moves, whether they pick up, or unload any cargo, and what action they want their ship to take. The possible actions are to drift (move one space), build a new train depot (make traveling along a rail line possible/cheaper), upgrade your ship (make it's movement and carrying capacity better), upgrade your trains (increase the movement of your trains), make a delivery (move goods between your depots or a city), or to collect 3 dollars from your investors (get money from the bank).
After 5 rounds (plus one last run of deliveries for any goods already in the rail system) the game ends, and victory points are based off of a combination of money, your ship and train upgrades, and how extensive your rail lines are.
As I said, overall I enjoyed it, I don't think it's going to be one of those games that I want to play all the time, but I'm definitely looking forward to playing it again. The production value of the game is through the roof. Everything, the boards, the pieces, even the freaking box, are well made and have some serious heft to them. The only minor quibble I have is that the (albeit beautiful) plastic airships are so big that they kinda get in the way of playing the game. I think that, in the end, I would have been happier with some wooden meeple airships instead.
The game is split into 5 rounds. Each round is split into four turns.
On each round your airships will be zipping around the map, picking up and redistributing goods to your rail lines, so that your trains can then deliver the goods to the cities that want them.
At the beginning of each round, you choose (program) four movement cards that designate how far (not where) your airship will travel. On each turn, players simultaneously flip over their movement cards, and in initiative order (designated by the cards) decide where their ship moves, whether they pick up, or unload any cargo, and what action they want their ship to take. The possible actions are to drift (move one space), build a new train depot (make traveling along a rail line possible/cheaper), upgrade your ship (make it's movement and carrying capacity better), upgrade your trains (increase the movement of your trains), make a delivery (move goods between your depots or a city), or to collect 3 dollars from your investors (get money from the bank).
After 5 rounds (plus one last run of deliveries for any goods already in the rail system) the game ends, and victory points are based off of a combination of money, your ship and train upgrades, and how extensive your rail lines are.
As I said, overall I enjoyed it, I don't think it's going to be one of those games that I want to play all the time, but I'm definitely looking forward to playing it again. The production value of the game is through the roof. Everything, the boards, the pieces, even the freaking box, are well made and have some serious heft to them. The only minor quibble I have is that the (albeit beautiful) plastic airships are so big that they kinda get in the way of playing the game. I think that, in the end, I would have been happier with some wooden meeple airships instead.