Recap: Ora et Labora First Impressions
So many resources!
I’m a big fan of Uwe Rosenberg’s designs. Agricola is a perennial favorite, Le Havre is fantastic, and I always get a kick out of Loyang. So it was with great enthusiasm that I cracked open Ora et Labora, a recent design by Rosenberg. And, while much of it was fantastic, there were a couple of major disappointments.
First, the good. I loved the resource production wheel. This was a masterful way to create the competition for resources without having everyone bogged down in the same space. In fact, one starting building for each player gets you either wheat or livestock. And, if you have a pawn left over on that space, you may not be able to grab the other resource.
The buildings were very reminiscent of Le Havre. Each was unique and there were plenty available. Buildings produced resources, allowed favorable resource exchanges, and often could convert raw goods into refined goods or points. Plus, if someone else nabbed a building you wanted, you could still pay them to use it – and they would have to use one of their own pawns. This was an interesting twist on the usual worker placement game where the benefiting player still uses his own workers even if he has to pay for another player’s building.
Although we spent much of the first few rounds learning the game, the pace picked up dramatically thereafter. Players are usually able to do only a single action in a given round, so the pressure is always present. It provides a blend of the “not enough time” element from Agricola with Le Havre’s ability to specialize. Our first game lasted close to three hours. But, truth be told, it certainly didn’t feel that long. Especially after we got the hang of it, we were all very much engaged in the game.
Our first game had a bit of a wide point disparity. The leader had 204 points, with fourth place at 168. The other two players were in th3 170s and 180s. And that is my one critique about gameplay: the scoring is very opaque. It is extremely difficult to count up the points on each player’s board to determine who is in the lead. Settlements, which are played five times over the game, gain bonus points for every building around them. As a result, each settlement requires four separate additions to determine its point value. While this can be calculated, it generally takes several minutes. And in a game that is designed to move at a quicker pace, it can be a real drag. Without knowing who is in the lead, and who to watch out for, the game really has an element of multi-player solitaire that I don’t think is present in Rosenberg’s previous designs.
But, the most disappointing aspect of the game were the components. Every prior Rosenberg game published by Z-Man has had top notch components. Vegimeeples, wooden bits, thick cardboard player mats, full size cards, etc. Ora et Labora took a different approach. Euro half size cards on average stock. Plain and non-descriptive resource markers. The player boards are on very thin, flimsy cardboard. And, perhaps most egregious of all, the player aides are not on any kind of stock. Instead, the game came with four simple sheets of paper – and they had to be cut into French and Irish (the game supports two variants) by the buyer. Does any of this really detract from the game experience? No, not really. But, after having come to expect a certain standard from the publisher – and paying the same price as previously stellar games – the drop in quality was both significant and disappointing.
Overall, I’m eager to play again. The experience was enthralling and a few bad pieces won’t spoil the fun. But, this is definitely a game for fans of Rosenberg’s designs. It has a very similar feel to Agricola and Le Havre. So if those two games aren’t your cup of tea, I wouldn’t expect Ora et Labora to be either.
Image via BoardGameGeek.com
Thunderstone Advance. Awww yeah. I also got in some plays of the brand spanking new (not yet released) Thunderstone Advance. I’m brewing up a review of this bad boy for later this week, so I won’t spoil the surprise. But stay tuned and see it up on Friday. If you are a fan of Thunderstone, then Advance is the way to go.
What did you get up to?
This is definitely a game that demands to be replayed (and not just because there are two variants in one box!). My frst game, I didn’t know what buildings were coming up or how scoring happened or what combinations were valuable so I just played ‘blindly’. I still had fun, but can see how having some knowledge of what kind of buildings are available in future rounds will increase the strategic factor of the game.
I do think this game has more interaction than Agricola–and I’m surprised you think this is more multi-player solitaire than it. In Ora et Labora, you can use other people’s buildinds, often derailng a player’s turn. Not a whole lot of interaction, to be sure, but certainly just as much as Agricola.
I’ve been looking at this one for a little while… and Hoping to hear good things. Great news that the game-play works and it’s a good game. Sad about the components. I’m trying to stretch my game dollar right now so, that expense for cheaper components doesn’t make me happy. Thanks for the heads up (man I’m using that phrase a lot!)