Date: 17th June 2005
Game played: Tower of Babel ( Hans im Gluck ) BGG Id: 15510

This week, there were five of us and I was keen to try one of the new Reiner Knizia releases. As the other, Palazzo, only plays with up to four, we settled for Tower of Babel. The game is about constructing the seven wonders of the ancient world plus the Tower of Babel. Each wonder requires three projects to be undertaken in order to complete it, and each project needs a certain number of cards of a particular type to be played to finish it, as indicated by a project token on the wonder. Players on their turn choose between drawing cards or undertaking a project. If a project is undertaken, cards can be offered by other players to help complete it. The active player can accept cards and/or play his own and for each card played the contributor places a marker on the wonder. The active player then receives the project token. Other players who offered cards which were not accepted are compensated with VPs equal to the number of cards offered. Once a wonder is complete, VPs are awarded to the players whose markers have been placed on the wonder, with each successive wonder completed being worth more VPs. The game ends once the last token of a particular type is removed from the board and any unfinished wonders are then scored. There are, finally, bonus VPs awarded for having collected multiple tokens of the same type – highest VP total winning.

It took a while for us to get to grips with what we were doing, with Nige suggesting early on that he had made a huge error. Having cards to offer the active player is good but often means when you are the active player your options become more limited through having fewer cards. Afterwards, we all felt we were too generous in assisting the active player and very few projects failed to complete. The bonus tokens are important and we didn’t make it difficult enough for players to grab the tokens they wanted. The game ended very suddenly for me, as I’d forgotten the game-end condition and hadn’t spotted Nige could trigger it on his next turn. And he did, as it was clearly beneficial due to his presence in a few of the remaining unscored regions. He ended up a clear winner with Mark G and Mark K battling for second place. John and I were well out of the running.

I think we’ll have to play again before deciding whether it is a really good game or not. Certainly, the mechanics are solid enough but it felt very dry and didn’t have that spark to make it really enjoyable. However, Nige was certainly pleased with his win. And for those that need reminding, the seven wonders are: The Great Pyramid of Giza, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Statue of Zeus at Olympia, the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, the Colossus of Rhodes and the Lighthouse of Alexandria.

 
Player
Rating
Score
Position
Winner
Nige
8
78
1
Mark G
6
61
2
Mark K
7
57
3
Garry
7
49
4
John
7
38
5

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