Foreword
What you are about to read is an analysis of a board game. The analysis will be structured in such a way that it will be easy to follow. It will begin with an introduction and then carry on with a basic look at what the game is followed with a listing of mechanics and explanations; then a list of the good and the bad followed by target audience and conclusions. Each subject matter that is touched on and explained in different parts of the text will be in bold letters.
Try to enjoy your read.
Introduction
We were assigned the task of analyzing a board game of our choice. The assignment requires us to take a look at, and explain, the core system and mechanics of the game.
A Game of Thrones: The Board Game
A Game of Thrones is a board game for three to six players. The goal of the game is to conquer provinces throughout the land of Westeros. The first player to own seven provinces with a castle in them before the game reaches round ten wins.
Let’s take a deeper look at the mechanics.
-Houses and House cards
During the setup phase each player is assigned a House; House of Baratheon, House of Greyjoy, House of Lannister, House of Martell, House of Stark, House of Tyrell. Each House card shows the player where their starting location is, how many provinces they own, what units they have and their starting locations, what position on the supply- and victory track and their position on all three influence tracks.
-Influence tracks
The influence track is a deeply integrated system that controls the game in many ways. The influence is separated in to three different tracks.
-The Iron Throne
The Iron Throne dictates player turns. The player who is highest up on this track is the king. The king is the first player to play their turn. The next player on the influence track will go next and so on. The king also has the power to decide the faith of other players in the case of some Westeros Cards.
-Fiefdom
The leader on this track possesses the Valyrian steel sword and gains +1 in strength in combat.
-King’s Court
The King’s Court is possibly the most interesting influence track. The leader of this track gets to add the raven to their possessions. The raven gives the player the power to take a look at the next Wildling Attack Card. The raven also gives the player the power to decide the faith of some Westeros Cards. Another interesting part of this specific track is the stars written out on the top four positions. These stars dictate the amount of Special Orders a player can give.
-Westeros Cards
The Westeros cards are basically event cards. At the start of each round three Westeros cards are drawn and resolved. The events can range from Mustering to Supply gain to Wildling Attacks.
-Power Tokens
The power tokens are like the games currency. When a player wants to move their troops out of a province but still control it they need to put a power token. When resolving Wildling Attacks or a Westeros Card called Clash of Kings the players will bid an amount of power tokens of their own choosing.
-Order Tokens
The order tokens are placed during the planning phase of the turn. There are five different types of order tokens. Most order tokens have a number deciding additional strength of the order. There is one special order for each type of order.
March Order lets the players move their units to a neighboring province. These tokens are used for attacking enemy provinces.
Defense Order gives the units in the province extra defensive strength.
Raid Order negates other players support and consolidate power orders.
Support Order adds the strength of the units in the province to a neighboring province’s attack or defense order.
Consolidate Power lets the players gain power tokens. If this is a special order the player can muster their troops if the province of choice has a castle.
-Game Space
The game board displays a map of Westeros. The map is divided into provinces. Each province contains at least one icon; a crown, a barrel, or a castle.
At the top of the game board you will find the Wildling Attack track. On the right hand side you will find the Influence tracks, the supply track, the Victory track, and the turn track.
-Wildling Attack
The wildling attack track is not all that integrated into the game and you do not encounter many wildling attacks throughout a game. The numbers on the track decides how strong the wildling attack will be. If the strength goes up is decided by the Westeros Cards. When the wildling attack commences is also up to the Westeros Cards.
-Supply Track
The Supply track dictates how many units and troops the players are allowed to have on the board at the same time. You gain supplies by owning more provinces with the barrel icon when a certain Westeros Card is drawn.
-Victory Track
The victory track shows who is in the lead; the player with the most castles. To climb the victory track the player needs to own more provinces with the castle icon than the other players. The first player to own seven castles wins the game.
-Turn Track
The turn track shows which round the game is on. When the hourglass reaches round ten the game is over and the player with the most castles wins.
A Turn
-Westeros Phase
During this phase three Westeros cards are drawn and resolved in their numbered order.
-Planning Phase
During this phase the players place their order tokens out upside down. There must be one token in each province with units in it.
-Order Phase
During this phase which I like to call the order phase all the orders will be resolved starting with the player who sits on the throne i.e. the King.
-Combat
When to players clash together in a battle of a province it goes down like this; The two players get dealt a Tides of Battle card. This card gives the players a random combat bonus. Then the players each choose one of their House’s combat cards; these cards have extra powerful bonuses. When the players have shown their cards the strength and powers of the cards is combined with the strength of the units and the supporting provinces. There is four different types of units with different strength. We have Footmen, Knights, Boats and Siege Towers; they have the strength of +1, +2, +1, +2 respectively, though the siege towers can only be used when attacking capitals.
The player with the Valyrian Steel Blade automatically earns a +1 strength bonus.
The Good and the Bad
-The Good
For starters; this game is pretty easy to get in to. After six or seven turns you, as a player, will start to get a hang of it. The duration of a game is not too long and not too short, it’s lagom as you say in Sweden. If the game’s duration would have been any longer I think the players would grow tired of it. The balance of time and the amount of moves you can do during a round is good.
-The Bad
I have only been able to find to flaws with this game so far. The first being; the Wildling Attack system which just felt quickly thrown in to the pot, so to say. It could have been more integrated and the attacks could come more often. The second being; if you are a passive player, like me, or a player who is not all that good at strategy, once again; like me, you will most likely be screwed by the better players.
Target Audience
This game is clearly targeted in first hand towards fans of the Game of Thrones TV-show and the A Song of Ice and Fire book series. The second tier of target audience is the people who like Risk-like board games; that would be the political and strategic war games.
According to the box of the game the recommended age is 14 and up; sure, that is a pretty good age recommendation but I would rather say that the game is for the age of 17 and up.
This game is published by Fantasy Flight Games. I was browsing through their game catalog and couldn’t help but notice that they are terrible at deciding recommended ages for their games. Some of their more advanced board games have a recommended age of 10 and up whilst some of their more simple games are set at the age of 14 and up.
Conclusion
So, I found the most interesting system to be the order and movement system. This is the system that determines how the game will play out and it is the system the players interact with the most. Without this system the game would just be a series of random occurring events.
Some of the minor systems could have been better designed; like the Wildling attacks for example. You can almost play through a whole game before the first Wildling card pops up. Sure, the attack will most likely be very devastating if it comes at the end of a game but I think the attacks could be a strategic advantage for the player who possesses the raven and I would therefore like to see this system to be more integrated into the game.
The Westeros card system is pretty well designed. I like especially the fact that the players who possesses the influence tokens can screw with the other players through deciding what, from three options, will happen. So if the card has the options of mustering troops, re-supply and doing nothing and one of the other players is in a big need of either troops or supplies the player with the raven can decide to not letting anyone get anything to screw over that specific player.
I would like to end with saying that this game was great fun to play and I advise everyone who reads this to give the game a shot. And if you want to take it to the next level you could always do some role playing too.
Thanks for reading.
Tally-ho!
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