Episode 198: City Builder – Ancient Word

1) The Pegs discuss their recent game plays including The Witcher: Old Word, Brew, Jinja and many more;

2) All the Pegs review City Builder: Ancient World; and

3) Look back at Trickerion.

Show Notes

00:01:10 – Trivia: Jack London and Scurvy

Banter

00:06:20 – Jeremy’s Warm Wishes

00:09:14 – Robb’s new podcast, Smells Like Human

00:12:20 – Rouses on Break

00:16:11 – Christina’s Oculus

Plays

00:17:40 – The Witcher: Old World – CD Projekt RED, Go On Board; Designer: Łukasz Woźniak;

00:26:14 – Jinja * – WizKids; Designer: Cory Goff, Kevin Crosby; Art: Lamaro Smith, Justin Lynch;

00:35:35 – Canvas – Road To Infamy Games (R2i Games); Designer: Jeff Chin, Andrew Nerger; Art: Luan Huynh;

00:48:52 – Brew * – Pandasaurus Games; Designer: Stevo Torres; Art: Jake Morrison, Andrew Thompson;

News

00:55:01 – Now or Never Prorder, Red Raven Games

00:59:05 – Adele – A Space Horror Board Game

01:03:34 – Silk Suit Pajamas

Review: City Builder – Ancient World

01:07:06 – Rules Breakdown

City Builder: Ancient World is a tile-laying game designed by Andrei Filip with art by Andrew Dorland and published in 2021 by Inside Up Games.  City Builder:Ancient World offers competitive, cooperative, and solo play styles that will have players building out their cities, blocking in districts, and assigning settlers to these districts in order to score major points.

While the game does offer three modes, the essential mechanics remain the same across all three modes.  Each player starts with a core city tile on the board and three starting tiles.  Between each player and the player on their right and left is a smaller board housing settler meeples, and in the center of the play area are a collection of Monument tiles.

On their turn, a player will place a tile from their hand in their city, adjacent to an existing tile.  Ultimately, players are trying to block in districts – that is, an area of buildings bounded on all sides by roads.  Within each district will be a number of neutral white houses, or various colored buildings.  Depending on the number of variety of colored buildings, players may be allowed to claim one or more settler meeples from the board on either their right or left and place it into the district, provided there are enough white houses to hold each meeple.  These settlers come in one of five colors and two types.

In the competitive game, the claiming of these settlers opens up a scoring track on the board, and players are competing to claim more settlers on each track – and earn more points – than their opponent in a push/pull mechanic.  In the cooperative mode, these settlers work as a timer: if any board fills up with settlers, it ends the game.

Instead of placing settlers, players who complete a perfectly rectangular district may claim a Monument tile and place it on the board.  In the competitive game, these tiles offer end game scoring based on any number of qualifiers, but generally based on how and where and in what number the various colors and types of settlers are placed in the city.  In the cooperative and solo modes, these Monument represent goals the players have to reach by the end of the game, and the selection of a Monument obligates the players claiming it to reach that goal.

Play continues in clockwise order until all the tiles have been placed in the competitive game, and then final scores are tallied.  In the cooperative game, the game continues until all tiles are placed OR overcrowding on one of the Settler tracks triggers the end game and defeat for the players.

01:09:31 – Review

01:33:14 – Ratings

ReRoll

01:45:SS – Trickerion – Mindclash Games; Designer: Richard Amann, Viktor Peter; Art: Villő Farkas, László Fejes;

Check out our original review for Trickerion during Episode 173.

Gameplay Photos

* Disclosure: These titles were received free of charge by the publishers or distributors. If you are interested in submitting a title for review, please read our Review Policy.