It's always an excellent service with brilliant products at a very competitive price - will use again! Sukumaran, Arjun (2018-09-07). "Get Down to Spice Business." The New Indian Express. Retrieved 2018-10-06. The clever thing about these three games is that as well as being excellent gateway games in their own right, any two of the three can amalgamate, providing a new bumper-game, entirely. However, in this tutorial we’re only focusing on how to play the one that set the ball rolling – Century: Spice Road. So clamber onto your camel, join the caravan and let’s trade some spices… Century: Spice Road – Set-Up Play a card from your hand. These may be an upgrade card which allows you to upgrade a spice cube to the next level or a Spice Card where you collect a set amount of spices. I had never heard of Century: Spice Road prior to attending UKGE and the mass amount of posts asking about it on Facebook got me intrigued. I had a read up online and a lot of people were saying it was a game that would get rid of Splendor from people’s collections as it was a better game. This was a bold statement and one I had to find out if was true as I love Splendor.

The other card everyone starts with – two grey cubes with an upwards-facing arrow – is an Upgrade card. When played, this allows you to upgrade any two spices in your caravan into the next-most valuable spice, or to upgrade one spice cube twice. Return spices from your caravan to the bowl and claim the upgraded version of it. You do not have to execute all conversions that are possible according to the card. In the illustrated example, you were allowed to turn a yellow turmeric into a red saffron and do the same again, or convert the converted saffron into a green cardamom. To get the most out of your time with Spice Road, we’d recommend playing with around three or four players, opening up the more interesting interactive aspects of the design while keeping play time a comfortable length. Place golden coins above the Point cards – specifically, the first (left-most) card in this row. Put as many gold coins here as the number of players, multiplied by two (eight, for example, in a four-player game). Place the same number of silver coins above the second card.Duffy, Owen (2017-06-03). "Century Spice Road, Catch the Moon, Sagrada Games Review – Fiendish Fun." The Guardian. Retrieved 2018-10-06. These coins are metal (just try to resist that delightful clink) and, like everything else in the box, contribute to Spice Road’s universally breathtaking visual panache, from its gorgeous cards to the spices, which come with four diddly bowls to tidy up unruly heaps of cubes.

The game-end triggers once any player completes five Points cards (in a four- or five-player game; six Points cards in a two- or three-player game). Play resumes, however, until the end of the round – so each player has the same number of turns. Now the value of each player’s Points cards are added up. Additionally, gold coins earned are worth three points each; silver coins are one point each; and any non-turmeric cubes left in player’s Caravans are one point each, too. Most points wins! Sage Advise If you play a conversion card, you may convert spices on your caravan into the next most valuable spice (i.e. yellow (turmeric), red (saffron), green (cardamom) , brown (cinnamon)) the number of times depicted on the card.

Last of all, there’s just enough thyme for a few winning tips (okay, that’s the last of the awful spice puns, we promise)… Century: Spice Road is the first in a series of games that explores the history of each century with spice-trading as the theme for the first installment. In Century: Spice Road, players are caravan leaders who travel the famed silk road to deliver spices to the far reaches of the continent for fame and glory. Each turn, players perform one of four actions: The simple setup and playtime helps keep her interested and even though the theme is not one that really shines through, the game has enough fun and depth to keep all levels of gamers invested throughout the play time.

At the end of your turn, if you have more spices on your caravan than you can transport, you must return spices of your choice into the bowls until your upper limit is reached.

The last round is triggered once a player has claimed their fifth victory point card, then whoever has the most victory points wins. Therefore getting spices and, more importantly, the orange Points cards is kind of a big dill (groan) to winning. But how do you accomplish that, we hear you ask? Rules Breakdown Century: Spice Road is a 2017 table-top strategy game designed by Emerson Matsuuchi and distributed by Plan B Games. The game is a simulation of fifteenth-century spice trading, and each player competes for points as they buy and sell spices represented by colored cubes. An often-forgotten rule is that this action can be repeated multiple times in one turn, providing you have the appropriate cubes. So, using the example above, if you played that Trade card and had six cardamon cubes, you could do that trade three times. As a result, you’d receive three cinnamon and six safran.

When the game arrived I didn’t know what to expect. For its relatively cheap price the box was a small to medium size with great artwork, but nothing I hadn’t seen before. Upon opening the box I was pleasantly surprised, the rule sheet was one piece of card with pictures and writing on both sides. Overall, I am very pleased to add this to my collection and always have a great time when it hits the table. I will be looking forward to the next installment of the Century trilogy and it will be great to see how they all work together. One card, for example, provides the trade of two cardamon cubes in exchange for one cinnamon and two safran. If you (eventually acquire and then) play one of these cards, you’ll trade the spice(s) shown, for the spice(s) promised – again, returning spices to their bowls and taking the relevant ones onto your Caravan card.At some point during your first match – and a few turns into every game afterwards – the juggling of cubes and cards turns from a cautious step-by-step experiment into a fully confident spice-trading ballet as you lay down patterns of acquisition, upgrade and exchange cards to work towards the next rainbow of condiments required to score big. Example: Tom would like to acquire the 4th trader card from the left A so he places one spice on each card to the left of it B. Century: Spice Road is a neat little strategy and engine building game where you and your opponents are Spice Merchants. Put twice as many gold coins as there are players playing above the leftmost scoring card. C Place the same number of silver coins above the second card from the left. D