Onstage / SangDen

The Game

OnStage is a trick-taking game from Vietnam. I first saw the game at the Asian Board Games Festival Malaysia (in Penang) in July, but I had to take care of my booth that weekend and didn't have time at all to play others' games. It was later, in November, at the Thailand Board Games Show that I managed to try the game myself. I had a local assistant for my booth at the fair so I had some time to explore others' games. 

The most eye-catching part of the game is this little stage you build with the game box. The setting is traditional Vietnamese opera. But this stage is not just for show. It is a practical visual tool that supports gameplay. 

During game setup you line up the twelve performers randomly in a queue next to the stage. Before the start of every trick, the first in line goes on stage. The players compete to attract performers who are on stage. The performers hold one to three flowers, which represent their popularity among the opera fans. The flowers are also your victory points. You try to win tricks in this game so that you can attract performers. 

The trick-taking mechanism here is mostly standard. Whatever the start player of the trick plays is the lead colour, and everyone else must follow suit if possible. Only when you don't have that colour then you can play any colour. By default, it is the highest card in the lead colour which wins. The exception is when the trump colour is in play. The trump colour is determined by the performers on stage. If there is one single colour of performers which has the most flowers, that colour is the trump colour. In case of ties, there is no trump colour. If any trump colour card is played in a trick, then the highest card in the trump colour wins. The trump colour keeps shifting during the game, because the combination of performers on stage keeps changing. 

When you win a trick, you will hope to win one performer from the stage. This doesn't always happen. When you win a trick, you can only claim a performer in the same colour as the winning card. If there is no such performer, you don't get anything. Well, other than ridicule from your friends. The cards numbered 1, 4 and 7 have special powers. You get to manipulate the performers on stage. You may add, remove and even swap them with another still in the queue. What this means is the trump colour might change in the middle of a trick, because you can manipulate who are on stage. 

The cards have 1 to 3 flowers. When you win a trick with a card, you can only claim a performer in the same colour. If there is a performer with the same number of flowers as the winning card, you must take that performer. If that particular performer is not on stage, then you may take a different performer in the same colour. You will notice that the higher numbers have fewer flowers. It is easier to win a trick with a high number, but when it comes to picking a performer, you might be forced to pick a lower valued one. 

There is a shoot-for-the-moon mechanism. If you find that things are going poorly, you can try to aim for this rare situation of being the only player to not win any performer. If you can achieve that, you get to take all remaining performers who are still on stage. If there are none on stage, you get to take all performers still in the queue. Needless to say, being able to do this is difficult, especially in the 3 player game. With 5 players, it might be easier, and it is something everyone will watch out for. If you aim to do this, but accidentally win just that one lousy performer, you will be royally screwed. 

The Play

I'm not specifically a fan of trick-taking games. I don't dislike them, but I don't seek them out. I do think the trick-taking mechanism in general is a good one. There are reasons why this genre is so popular. I have played many trick-taking games recently. Sometimes I get a nagging feeling that trick-taking games are a shortcut to fame which small publishers are taking. Come up with a small twist, slap on a pretty theme, and voila! You have a product that has many ready fans. I must admit I am slightly negative towards this abundance of trick-taking games. The moment I tried OnStage, I immediately decided this is a trick-taking game I want in my collection. Probably the only other trick-taking game I feel so strongly about is Sticheln. I find that in OnStage, the tweaks to the standard trick-taking formula come together really well and create a fluid yet smooth experience. You get many surprises, and also opportunities for clever plays. 

You don't always score points when you win tricks. It depends on whether you are able to claim a performer. The stage situation keeps evolving, so it is not easy to manage your hand. If I distill the game down to just the mechanisms, this is a pretty abstract trick-taking game. However the opera performer setting matches this combination of game mechanisms very well. This certainly enhances the play experience. 

The spotlight on the stage is not just for show. It serves a purpose. If there is a trump colour in play, you place all the performers in the trump colour in the spotlight. This is a good visual cue for everyone. It makes gameplay smoother. 

Eight flowers mean eight victory points. 

The cards are in four suits (colours) and are numbered 1 to 9.

The Thoughts

Among trick-taking games, I wouldn't say the game mechanisms in OnStage are very radical. It is nowhere near as radical as Cat in the Box. I like OnStage more than Cat in the Box because the latter can be quite a stressful experience. It is an excellent, very clever and innovative game, and at the same time it stresses me out because I need to play defensively to avoid creating any paradox. Not that stressful is necessarily bad. In OnStage, I feel more positive and energised because the ever changing situation presents many tactical opportunities. You want to manipulate the performers on stage to your benefit. You have to consider how things will change when you claim a performer from the stage. You want to save your strong cards for the right moment. You won't always win a performer when you win a trick. However there is still the advantage of dictating the lead colour for the next trick. I am keen to see what other games Michael Orion will be making. 

Short takes: Counter Spy, Co Ca Ngua, That's You

These are three games I tried and watched at the recent Thailand Board Game Show. All are from South East Asian designers. 

Counter Spy is from Vietnam. It is a 2-player deduction game. During setup, reveal one card to be the murder victim, and place one card face-down at the centre to be the murderer. The rest of the cards are dealt out to the two players, becoming their starting hands. Your objective is to find out who the murderer is. There are only 15 cards in the game. They come in four colours, and the numbers range from 1 to 7. The distribution is as follows. 

This is a notepad for taking notes when you play. 

You can already eliminate many cards from suspicion once you get your starting hand. The rest will take a bit more work. On your turn, you have two options. You either attempt to guess the murderer, or you give a card to your opponent. The round ends when you take a guess. If you are right, you score 2 points. Otherwise, your opponent scores 1 point. You win when you score 3 points. So the game will go at least 2 rounds. 

The more common thing you do during the game is to give a card to your opponent. When you do this, you must also share information in a specific format. E.g. you can say that you have 3 yellow cards, including the card being given, and that card must also be yellow. Information can be based on colour, or number, or number of cards in sequence. E.g. I have a sequence of four consecutive numbers. You use the information you get to work out who the murderer is. You have to mindful of what information you give to your opponent. You want to minimise helping them. 

Cards given to you are placed face-up before you. 

Victim, murderer and point card. 

I had two black cards and that is lucky. The black cards are numbered 5, 6 and 7, and this distribution is different from other colours which come in 1 to 4. I did my best not to reveal any information about my black cards. This way, it was very difficult for my opponent to determine the murderer. If he had the black 6, and he felt the murderer was a black card, he would have only a 50% chance when taking a guess. If he didn't have the black 6, his chance would be just one third. If I could eliminate the possibilities of all other colours, I would know the murderer was the black 6. 

This is a microgame. It's short. It's clever. I like how it doesn't need to rely on special abilities on the cards to make the game interesting. It's only numbers and colours. 

Coca Ngua is not exactly the correct way to type the name of the game. I don't know how to type Vietnamese. This is a light roll-and-move race game. Before you dismiss the game, let's take a closer look. 

The characters are cute. 

The race track is assembled randomly using cards. You only need to make one lap to win. There are four sections, each with four number cards. They must always be in ascending order. On your turn you roll two dice to attempt to move. If there is a card of the number you roll in front in the same section, you get to advance to that card. When you reach the last card in a section, you will get a free move onto the corner card on your next turn. After that you enter the next section. 

This is certainly not only a roll-and-move game. There are several other mechanisms which add some tactical elements to the game. You have hand cards. Whenever you fail to move, you get to draw a card. Cards can be used in several ways. If you play a pair, you get to advance to that specific number. If you play thee cards, you take an extra move. You may also play a card to modify the race track. Remove a vacant card and insert your card instead. The section must still be sorted in ascending order, which means you may be helping yourself towards the next corner (by removing a card before you) or you may be slowing down an opponent (by inserting a card before them). 

From the second section onwards, you can attack other players. When you land on the same space as another player, you knock them over. They lose a turn. There is a catch-up mechanism in the game. If you trail the lead player by at least one section, you get to roll three dice instead of two, and you get to choose which two dice to use. This makes it easier for you to make a useful combination. 

It is still a simple game, but the options you have give you a bit more control and allows you to do some strategic planning. 

That's You is a party game from Indonesia. It is a cooperative game. You don't exactly win or lose. You just try to work together to score as many points as you can, like in Hanabi. 

Every player gets one chance to be clue giver. Once everyone has had the chance to do so, the game ends, and you check to see how many points you have scored. When you set up a round, you draw six cards from the deck. The cards describe a person. For example mommy's boy, or someone who is always friend zoned, or someone can't even hurt a fly. Each card will be assigned a token facedown. One of these tokens mark the correct answer, and only the clue giver knows which one it is. The clue giver has three discs to give out. This is the only way you can give clues. There's a disc labelled "Most Likely", which you should give to the person best matching the description on the correct answer. There's a disc labelled "Least Likely" which of course you would give to a person who does not fit the description at all. Then there's a third disc which is double sided. You have to choose which side. One side says "More Likely", and the other "Less Likely". 

If you play with old friends, you will be giving clues based on how well you know them. If you are playing with new friends, it will be based on your first impression of them. Both cases are interesting and fun, and trigger discussion. 

Once all three discs are given out, all players except for the clue giver must work together to eliminate the wrong answers one by one. If you do poorly, you will lose points. If you manage to find all five wrong answers, you score 3 points. 

The fun in this game is the table talk about how we perceive one another. You may be surprised by how your friends perceive you. The cards in the game come in two types, a normal type and a whacky type. The whacky type has some silly descriptions and also some fantasy-based descriptions, like necromancer. You can play with one or the other type, or mix them up.