Joraku

"Joraku" is a Japanese term which means advancing to the capital. In Japanese history, sometimes local warlords will lead their armies and move to the capital, claiming that they are there to protect the Emperor from evil forces. In truth, they want to take control of the Emperor and rule the nation. The game Joraku has an interesting combination of two popular game mechanisms - trick-taking and area majority. This combination works well in presenting the whole concept of joraku. 

The game is played over three rounds. There are seven regions on the board, with Kyoto on the left and the other six regions being numbered 1 to 6. There is a little scoring table in each region, specifying the points you can score at the end of each round. You'll score the most points if you have the highest strength. Second and third places will score points too. In the first round, regions far away from the capital are worth more points and Kyoto itself is worth nothing. However by the third round this switches over entirely. In the early game you will compete in regions further away from Kyoto, but throughout the game you will advance towards Kyoto. 

During game setup you will place your daimyo (your clan leader). Everyone will start in a different region. During the game you will deploy troops, move them, move your daimyo, and your can also kill enemy troops. All of this is done through card play. This is where the trick-taking comes in.

There are three suits, and the cards are numbered 1 to 6, matching the regions on the board. In each suit there is one ninja, which is like a joker. At the start of a round cards are dealt out to all players. You will play one card at each trick, and someone will win that trick. Once all your cards are played, the round ends and you do scoring. Most of the trick-taking rules are standard. You must follow suit if you have cards in the lead suit. The largest card wins the trick, regardless of suit. If anyone has played a 6 and another has played a ninja, the ninja wins the trick. The ninja has no value, but it can beat the 6. 

Whenever you play a card, you perform an action. You do this when playing that card, not when resolving the trick. One of the most important things you can do is to deploy troops. You can deploy up to three soldiers, and you must deploy them in the region matching the card value. The number of soldiers you have is limited, so you don't always deploy the maximum number. You need to think about where you want your soldiers to be. If you play the ninja, you can deploy troops anywhere. If you do not deploy troops, you can use the card value to perform actions. You can move your daimyo or soldiers. Your daimyo can kill enemy soldiers. 

When comparing strength, your daimyo is strength 2, and soldiers strength 1 each. In the early game these regions far away from Kyoto are worth more points, so more soldiers will be crowded here. 

Most cards are dealt out at the start of a round, but there are some which are not known. You can somewhat count cards, but you do not have perfect information. Since you have to follow suit, you are not entirely free to do what you want. You can make use of this to limit what your opponents can do. If you can quickly get rid of one suit, you will have more flexibility. There is card passing before a round starts. That can help you adjust your hand, and the cards your opponents give you will offer some insights too. You know that if you don't have a certain card, it is quite likely one of your opponents has it. Most of the time you plan how to play your hand assuming others do have cards that can spoil your plans. The card play part of the game is quite strategic. 

The area majority plays a big part in this game. You must optimise your resource usage. You don't need to win by a lot, you just need to win by a little, but you want to win in as many regions as possible. That's efficiency. 

Winning tricks matters, even though you already perform your action when you play your card. One important reason is, of course, being able to lead the next trick. This gives you some control. Also, when you win a trick, there is a small evaluation done in the region where your daimyo is. You score points based on relative strengths. You want to make sure you are strongest where your daimyo is, because otherwise when you win a trick, you are helping someone else score more points. You can make use of this to take advantage of other players. Let them win the trick, but move your soldiers in to the region of their daimyo so that you can steal some points. It's not a lot, but it can add up.

The green daimyo is in Kyoto now

By game end all daimyos have arrived

Joraku combines trick-taking and area majority, and both mechanisms play important roles in the game. This is a game with much strategic planning and tactical manoeuvring. You have to think carefully about what cards your opponents might have and how they might be used against you.

Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring - Trick-Taking Game

There has been quite a few Lord of the Rings games in recent years. I think that's a good thing. I hope this brings more people into the boardgame hobby. There are two games in the Lord of the Rings Trick-Taking Game series so far - The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers. I have only played some of the missions in The Fellowship of the Ring. I was told The Two Towers is more challenging. That certainly makes sense. 

This is a cooperative trick-taking game. It is for 1 to 4 players, and it plays best with four. Like a book, it has multiple chapters, and every chapter is a mission you try to complete. One game is playing one chapter. The chapter specifies which characters are in play. Some characters are mandatory, i.e. someone must pick them. There are also optional characters. Cards are dealt to all players before they decide which characters they want to play. The character you pick determines the objective that you must fulfil, for example Frodo must win at least 2 Ring cards, and Merry must win either 1 or 2 tricks. To win a game, everyone must fulfil their objective. Based on the cards you get, you can determine which character is easier or harder for you to play. The player who gets the 1 Ring card must play Frodo. Ring is one of the suits in the game. I find it hilarious that you call the value 1 card of the Ring suit the "1 Ring". Sorry, I'm childish. One Ring to rule them all! 

Depending on the character you pick, you may be asked to exchange cards with certain other characters. This helps to communicate some information with your teammates. Normally you are not allowed to share information about your cards. 

Most of the rules follow standard trick-taking. The Ring suit is your trump suit. They are numbered only 1 to 5, while other suits go up to 8. You can't lead with the trump suit until a trump card has been played in a trick led by another suit. 

The ring marker on this grey side means the trump suit has not yet been played yet.

Use these tokens to mark who has completed their missions

One thing special about the 1 Ring is when you play it, you can choose to win the trick, even if by normal rules you would not, for example normally it loses to the 5 Ring. This means Frodo can almost always fulfil his objective. 

The gameplay reminds me of The Crew, which is also a cooperative trick-taking game with limited communication. Here, the objectives and characters are all related to the Lord of the Rings story, which is nice. You can't talk about what cards you have. Your communication is through your actions, e.g. which cards you pass, which cards you play, which characters you pick. 

What I enjoy about the game is how the story is told through the characters and their objectives. If you like Lord of the Rings and trick-taking, this is a no brainer. I'm not specifically a fan of either. I find the game enjoyable enough that I would always be happy to play with the full four players. For me it is not breaking new grounds, when I compare it to The Crew. However I would say the theme integration is done well. Even a casual fan of Lord of the Rings like me will enjoy the game. 

This is a campaign game. When you buy a campaign game, you will feel motivated to complete the campaign. It feels like unfinished business if you don't. If you do complete the campaign, you will have gained many plays of the game to make the purchase very much worthwhile. The tragedy of many games that we hobbyists buy is they don't get played all that many times.  

This above is a setup you have to do when you play a 2-player game. I almost played this, but we were able to get two more players to join us for a 4P game. So I have not tried the 2-player game and I don't know how it works. It looks cumbersome to me. The general agreement is the game works best with four. 

Haratama

Haratama is a trick-taking game from Japan with a horror theme and great art. Every round, three card values are randomly drawn to become the penalty values for the round. That means if you win these cards you will be penalised. This is a game about scoring as few points as possible. Points are bad. 

Most standard trick-taking rules apply. You must follow suit if you can. There is a trump suit. However you are not allowed to lead with a trump card until someone has played a trump card. In the game story, the trump suit represents the demon, which is initially sealed and suppressed. However at some point when the first trump card is played in a trick led by a regular card, the seal breaks and the demon is freed. 

Every penalty card you win gets you a point, which is bad. However if you manage to win at least 8 out of 12 penalty cards, the demon possesses you. You become one. Now everyone else gets points instead. This, of course, is no easy feat. 

That’s basically it. What is interesting is how the penalty values will differ from round to round. You will need to adjust how you play depending on whether they are large or small, and how many of them you have in hand. 

Card backs - so scary!

This is a pretty clean design that’s quite close to standard trick-taking. The small twist that it offers is fun and viable. I have a soft spot for games which allow you to shoot the moon. One minor problem we had was with the font style. We thought the 8 was a 0. 

Torchlit

 

I have been playing many trick-taking games lately. I am not specifically a fan of the genre, but I don't dislike it either. If anyone suggests a trick-taking game, I'm usually happy to play. Torchlit is a trick-taking game which emphasises making predictions. Based on your starting hand, you secretly choose one card as your torch. This number is your prediction about how many tricks you will win. This card is kept until the final trick, when you have only two cards remaining. You have the option of playing this card normally and use your other remaining card as your torch, i.e. your prediction about the number of tricks you have won. 

Eight dungeon tiles are laid out like this. Every player gets a pretty wooden pawn. The dungeon tiles are just for recording how many tricks you have won so far. Everyone starts on the left, which means 0 tricks. The max is 7 tricks, and if you win more than 7 tricks, you circle back to the 0 space. Cards placed below the dungeon tiles are important. They are worth points. For every trick played, the winner advances his pawn. Some or possibly all of the cards in the trick will be added to dungeons based on the card values. For each suit, only one card will be added. If there are multiple cards in the same suit, it is the player with the lowest numbered card (not necessarily the weakest or the loser) who decides which card gets added. Having played the lowest card can be a powerful position. 

Most other trick-taking rules are pretty standard. You must follow suit if you can. There is a trump suit - red (called dragon). When a trick is lead by red, you don't have to follow suit. This is different from other games. Normally only cards in the lead suit can win. That, of course, is overwritten by trump suit cards. That's standard. One more exception is that for the very last trick, you don't have to follow suit. This is the trick where you take your torch back and you may switch your torch - the prediction about where your pawn will end up. 

You play three rounds and add up your points

The reference cards have different art but the content is the same

You can refer to the reference card above to understand how scoring works. At the end of a round, if your torch card is correct (matches the position of your pawn), you score 3 points. Else, that torch is added to the corresponding dungeon, and it becomes worth 2 points for any opponent(s) there. At each dungeon tile, trump cards are worth 2 points, and regular cards 1 point. You score points for where your pawn is. If players share the same location, they must share the points there too, rounded down. 

Throughout the round you are manipulating how many points each dungeon tile is worth, and you are also manipulating the positions of everyone's pawn. You have made a prediction, and getting it right certainly helps, but sometimes depending on how the round goes, you may intentionally get it wrong because some dungeon tiles are worth doing it. Or if you have a better backup torch in hand, work towards that. You want to move your opponents to the same tiles, so that they are forced to share points. You want to stay away from others, so that you don't have to share. 

This is almost like a market manipulation game, because you are constantly adjusting the values of the dungeon tiles. Low cards can be good because they help you control which cards are added to dungeons. Your choice of suit affects whether more cards are added to dungeons. You don't know exactly which dungeon tile you will end up on, and you do your best to control that. 

Torchlit, despite the great-looking components, doesn't stray far from standard trick-taking mechanisms. I feel this is a game you play in a calculative way. More meticulous accountant than monster-fighting warrior. 

LUZ

LUZ is a trick-taking game. The twist here is you can’t see your own cards. You don’t know exactly what cards you have, but you can see everyone else’s cards. However you know the suits of your cards, because the cards have different coloured backs following their suits. At the start of a round, based on knowing everyone else’s cards and the suits of your own, you must predict how many tricks you will win. You score points if you get it right, and you lose points if you get it wrong. You may choose to make a precise prediction, or you can predict two numbers. The latter is safer, but you score fewer points if you get it right. 

The rest of the trick-taking rules are pretty standard. You must follow the lead suit if you can. Only the lead suit can win, unless a trump suit card is played. 

This is a fun twist. Not all cards are dealt out. Although you can see all your opponents’ cards, you don’t have complete information. If you have a yellow (trump) card in hand, but based on what you see, both the 1 and the 12 are missing, you’ll have a tough time guessing how your yellow card will play out. Many of the trick-taking tactics still apply. It feels good to have so much information. Still there is some anxiety in what cards you have exactly. Your opponents’ predictions are important information. They tell you your opponents’ intentions and whether they are still trying to win tricks. 

This is an enjoyable game and if you like trick-taking games, well, you probably have already played this. 

The Fox in the Forest: Duet

This spin-off of The Fox in the Forest changes things up a bit, turning a competitive game into a cooperative one. This is a trick-taking game for two players. You have a pawn moving along a track. There are markers placed next to the track. As you move that pawn back and forth along the track, it removes a marker whenever it stops, if there is one next to it. Your goal is to remove all markers from the track within three rounds of play. You have to be careful not to move off the two extremes of the track. Do that too many times, and you will lose. 

Cards come in 3 suits. At the start of the game, a card is randomly drawn to become the decree, and the suit of the decree is the trump suit. Cards have movement values, ranging from 0 to 3. Odd numbered cards have special powers. The winner of a trick moves the pawn in his direction, and the number of steps to move it is the sum of the movement values of both the cards played. Standard trick-taking rules apply. You must follow suit if possible. You can't discuss your cards with your partner. Some cards are not dealt. You don't know exactly which cards he has. The game is about trying to maximise every move so that you are always removing a marker from the track. At the same time you don't want to fall off the track. That generally means you don't want one person to win too many tricks in a row. 

A big part of the game is making use of the special abilities of the cards. The 9 lets your opponent play a card of any suit. This flexibility can be very helpful. The 1 lets the winner move the pawn in either direction. When a 7 is played, you must exchange a card with your opponent. There is also a card that lets you change the trump suit. 

A round ends when you play all your cards. You will shuffle and deal a new hand for the new round. Some markers will be added to the track. The track will also shrink. 

The Fox in the Forest: Duet can be played very strategically. You can keep track of what have been played. You can calculate what cards your partner might have (you can't discuss your cards). There are many effective ways you can use the card powers. Compared to the original, I prefer the competitive original and find it more exciting. Certainly the cooperative version offers a very different experience. If you are in the mood for something less confrontational and more like collaborative problem solving, give it a go. 

Fishing

Fishing is a deck-building trick-taking game from mad scientist designer Friedemann Friese. The game is played over eight rounds. Every round you score points based on the cards you win. These cards are shuffled, and they go to the bottom of your personal draw deck. In the next round, you draw cards from your personal draw deck. Your draw deck starts empty. In the first round, if you don’t even win enough cards to add to your draw deck, you will get some help. This is where things start getting interesting. When your draw deck runs out, it means you need help, and the game will help you by letting you draw powerful cards from reserve decks. There are several reserve decks, each containing cards more powerful than the previous. How many of these decks will be used in a game depends very much on how the game goes. Due to how more and more powerful cards get into circulation, the landscape of the game changes as you play.

It is probably not accurate to describe this as a deck-building game since you don’t have much control on what cards get added to your deck. You just know the cards which get added becomes stronger and stronger. 

Cards come in four suits. The reserve cards will introduce a trump suit. In the reserve decks there are also cards with higher numbers than the starting cards, and also some cards with special powers. One special power in the game allows you to steal one card from the current trick, even if you don’t win it. Another power lets you become the start player for the next trick.

The game has an interesting ebb and flow. If you do poorly, you will get to draw new powerful cards, and they can help you greatly in the next round. It might not be a good idea to intentionally lose all the time. It is still important to score points. The special power card which can steal someone else’s card is important. This is one way you can improve your deck without needing to lose too much or taking too many weak cards. 

Whenever you win a trick, you place the cards in the pile on the left, so that you can keep track of how many cards you have won in the current round. When the round ends, you shuffle these cards and add them to the bottom of your draw deck, on the right. 

These are some of the the reserve cards from the strongest reserve deck (5 stars). 

For 4 players, these are the hand sizes for each of the 8 rounds.

You can do a fair bit of card counting. By observing which cards your opponents have won, you know what cards they have in their decks so you can somewhat anticipate them. This is a strategic element in the game. 

Fishing is a fun twist to the trick-taking genre. I like it! 

Diamonds

Diamonds is a trick-taking game for 2 to 6 players. The basic rules are the same as standard trick-taking games. You must follow suit if you can, and the highest card in the lead suit wins the trick. There is no trump suit. What's special about this game is the suit powers. There are four suits in the game, and the cards are numbered 1 to 15. 

The theme is jewellers. Each player has his own jewellery shop and vault, and you can place diamonds at both places. The difference between putting diamonds at your shop or your vault is diamonds at your shop might get stolen by your opponents. When the game ends, diamonds in your shop are worth 1pt each, and those in your vault are 2pts each. Everyone can see how many diamonds are at your shop, but the amount in your vault is secret. 

The winner of a trick gets to perform the action associated with the lead suit. It the suit is diamond, you earn a diamond and put it directly in your vault. If it is heart, you earn a diamond at your shop. If spade, you move a diamond from shop to vault. If club, you steal a diamond from the shop of a specific player. One interesting rule is if you are unable to follow suit and must play a card off suit, you get to perform the action associated with the card you play. So not being able to follow suit is a good thing. You won't win the trick, but you get to do something. At the end of a round, you compare your cards won and see who has the most cards in each suit. The winners get to perform an action associated with the suit. So you do want to win tricks. 

There is a victim marker which gets passed around. Whenever anyone steals, they steal from the player holding the marker, and then the marker is passed left. If you steal when the marker is with you, you lose nothing. You just pass the marker to the next person. 

Diamonds is a pretty conventional trick-taking game, so it will be easy to teach non-gamers. The tactics are similar to traditional trick-taking games, and they will be able to play competently quickly. Mike Fitzgerald is the designer of the Mystery Rummy series which I greatly enjoy. Diamonds is built on top of a traditional game, but it adds some fun ideas, turning a traditional game into something new. It is a game that can be played in a light-hearted manner, but it does offer some strategic depth.