Nobody cares, I'm sure, but...
Session Report!I got to play my first game of IRL Agricola today! It was a 5p game. One friend had already played it twice, the other three were new. It was tough explaining the rules at the start -- I don't have any patter down. I probably should have used the instructional side of the game boards. But once we got a few rounds in, they got the gist of it.
My experience was completely different from the one in the game we played on BaJ. In that game, I was heavy into improvements because I knew I would have Braggart coming up. This time, I delved deep into occupations. I actually ended up playing all 7! They were all pretty great even though we just dealt randomly. I did find that it was much more difficult to keep a plan in mind when playing IRL. Online, I kept a sticky note on my desktop with some notes.
In the first round, P1 predictably took the free occupation spot. I snapped up the second one despite the 1f cost to put out
Mushroom Collector (when taking wood, you can leave 1 behind to get 2 food instead). I got SO much use out of it. My friends did not realize at first how important wood was (like me in our game). I just hoarded wood and got a bunch of food as well.
I realized that I had a nice 3 card combo:
Patron (when you play an Occupation, you get 2 Food before you pay the costs of the Occupation),
Writing Desk (When you use an Occ action, you may play 2 Occs one after another; the second costs 2 food), and
Reeve (take X wood depending on # of rounds left; all players with most occs gets 3 bonus points at end of game).
With this in mind, I played Patron. Soon after, I played Writing Desk (which had a prereq of 2 occupations).
Eventually, I was the first to build rooms, and it was a double expansion to boot. I was able to FG early, and this of course really helped me take a lead. Elsewhere, two players were setting up bread engines. This was quite nice because of another occupation I had, which I soon put out. With Patron and Writing Desk, I could put out two occupations with one action and they were free (actually, I gained 1 net food if I got the cheap occ space). So I put out
Bread Seller (get 1 food per grain baked whenever anyone bakes) and
Land Agent (take 1 veggie; when I use the veggie space I get a grain). I had a soft spot for this guy after our game, and when I played him it was nice because I needed the veggie for food. Late in the game I used his power twice to get veggies with grain, which helped a lot with efficiency.
Soon after that, both hearths got taken. That was a bit sad -- I was hoping to pick one up. But the cheap Fireplace was returned, so I renovated to Clay and grabbed the fireplace to boot.
I was still hoarding more Wood, and I also managed to score several 6 Clay actions. This was especially nice when I put out my next set of occupations.
Clay Seller, which lets me convert: 2 Clay to 1 Sheep or 1 Reed; 3 Clay to 1 boar or 1 Stone; 4 Clay to 1 Cattle. I ended up using him a LOT. I know I pulled 2 Cattle at once from him right before a harvest, and I used it a couple of other times as well. And the other occupation was
Stone Carrier -- whenever you take Stone, get an extr stone. If I receive other resources (i.e. from the SWR spot) it costs 1 Food. I ended up using this several times as well, always from the SWR spot actually. And then the only occ left in my hand was the Reeve itself, which I played in the second last round or so.
Late-mid game I built all 15 fences into 3 pastures. I converted clay into a pair of breeding cattle and I also managed to get a pair of sheep and a pair of boar at some point. Later on I expanded my clay hut and built 1 fenced stable. A while after that I built the
Spindle (get 1/2 extra food in the field phase of a harvest when I have at least 3/5 sheep) and the
Drinking Trough (each pasture holds an extra 2 animals).
In the end I had filled every space, 4 grain, 3 veggies, 8 sheep, 5 boar and 5 cattle. No extra food really (though I could have managed my animals a bit better) and only like 1 wood for 53 points!
We all had a blast. There was one guy who did not realize that you got negative points for empty spaces and for not diversifying, but he ended up second anyway. They should do much better next time, now that they know the various rules.
But man, Mushroom Collector sure was fun at the start, and the Bread Seller was so handy later on. I must have pulled nearly 10 food from each.
It was also a bit odd not being first player most of the time.
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Topic: Agricola IV (Read 19848 times)