254: Bites | Euphoria | Ship of Treasures

What this episode covers

Welcome to Which Game First where we boldly explore the hilariously huge world of board games. Did we unearth any hidden treasures you’ve been missing out on? Let’s find out! First up: We go marching one by one, eating food along the way in BitesNext up: We unite the workers of the future world whether they like it or not in Euphoria: Build a Better DystopiaAnd lastly: We search for pirate booty and avoid cannon balls in Ship of Treasures Bites Designed by: Brigitte Ditt, Wolfgang DittPublished by: BoardGameTables.com / Allplay (2020)Players: 2 – 5Ages: 10 & upPlaying time: 20 minutes In Bites, players move ants along a trail and collect food as they go. However, the value of that food depends on how the other ants move. Shared incentives mean you are always trying to figure out what the other players are up to. Variable “rules cards” tweak the rules to every game so that each play is fresh. During setup, a trail of food is laid out. On each player’s turn, they can move any ant to the next food in the trail that matches their color (red ant to apple, purple ant to grapes, etc). Then the player takes the food token directly in front of or behind the ant, saving it to score at the end of the game. However, players don’t know for sure how much the food is going to be worth until the matching ant makes it to the ant hill at the end of the trail. This creates shared incentives as players work together to advance some ants and hold others back. Along the way players also have the chance to pick up chocolate, which can be turned into special actions, and wine, which provides a way to score bonus points. Euphoria: Build a Better Dystopia Designed by: Jamey Stegmaier, Alan StonePublished by: Stonemaier Games (2014)Players: 2 – 6Ages: 13 & upPlaying time: 60 minutes In Euphoria: Build a Better Dystopia, you lead a team of workers (dice) and recruits (cards) to claim ownership of the dystopian world. You will generate commodities, dig tunnels to infiltrate opposing areas, construct markets, collect artifacts, strengthen allegiances, and fulfill secret agendas. Euphoria is a worker-placement game in which dice are your workers. The number on each die represents a worker’s knowledge—that is, his level of awareness that he’s in a dystopia. Worker knowledge enables various bonuses and impacts player interaction. If the collective knowledge of all of your available workers gets too high, one of them might desert you. You also have two elite recruit cards at your disposal; one has pledged allegiance to you, but the other needs some convincing. You can reveal and use the reticent recruit by reaching certain milestones in the game… or by letting other players unwittingly reach those milestones for you. Your path to victory is paved with the sweat of your workers, the strength of your allegiances, and the tunnels you dig to infiltrate other areas of the world, but the destination is a land grab in the form of area control. You accomplish this by constructing markets that impose harsh restrictions of personal freedoms upon other players, changing the face of the game and opening new paths to victory. You can also focus on gathering artifacts from the old world, objects of leisure that are extremely rare in this utilitarian society. The dystopian elite covet these artifacts—especially matching pairs—and are willing to give you tracts of land in exchange for them. Four distinct societies, each of them waiting for you to rewrite history.

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