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Expect game reviews and replays from our weekly game. I may also talk City of Heroes, movies, books and whatever else catches my fancy.

Monday, January 16, 2012

F$@& Bohnanza aka The Bean Game


Bohnanza

Plot:  you farm cartoon beans.

Goal: Earn the most money farming cartoon beans.  

Mechanics:  The key mechanic to keep in mind is to not sort your hand.  Beans must be planted in order, but can be traded from anywhere.

A turn consists of: 

1-      Planting a bean in a field.  You must plant one and you may plant two.
2-      Draw two cards face up.  You can claim or negotiate trades for these beans.  Any trades or claims are set aside to be planted in clean up.  Trades must include the active player, but that is the only restriction.  Future considerations are considered non-binding.
3-      Planting traded/claimed beans.  This happens game-wide, anyone who traded for a bean must plant.  Everything must get planted, but this can occur in any order.
4-      Draw 3 cards

Harvesting beans can be done at any time, with the restriction that a field with multiple beans in it must be harvested before a singleton.   There’s a ‘beanomoter’ at the bottom of each card telling you the value earned by harvesting.  Each bean has a different track, based on how many duplicates occur in the deck.   If you have met the requirements for getting gold coins, the appropriate number of beans are flipped over to the gold coin side and moved to your treasure stash.

A 3rd bean filed can be bought at any time for 3 gold.

Tactics:  in general, the more beans you get into a field before harvesting mean better ratios for gold coins.  Or in other words, if a bean requires 4 duplicates to earn 1 gold coin, it is probably something along the lines of 11 or 12 beans to earn 4 gold.   Trade for what you have planted, but also trade for what is coming up in your queue.

Review:  This is another family gateway game to me.  It’s got a nice cooperative vibe, and easy to play once you stop trying to sort your hand.  It’s better than Carcass1 for nerdcore gaming, but if people  are really taking it seriously I start wanting to do something else.  9/10 for family and n00bs, 6/10 for gamers.

Tips: 
Cleaning up your hand with donations is occasionally important, but choose what you donate with care.  You can easily find yourself on a slippery donation slope where every turn you are just giving away assets, all in the name of cleaning up your hand.

Don’t be a jerk!  Screwing someone on a trade or not following through on FuCons can make you lose a trading partner.  Losing a trading partner can be devastating.

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1 comment:

  1. MikeJanuary 16, 2012 at 1:36 PM

    i like this game because if you get too competitive people start embargoing you. You do have to occasionally screw people, but it should be clear why you did it. Still, it's not a game about luck, like Darren said, you can't just donate everything that doesn't fit your plan. CHANGE YOUR PLAN.

    tips:
    *more often than not it's better to wait to trade something rather than give it away for free. sometimes you get stuck with it, so be careful.
    *buy your third bean field right away.
    *Do not, under any circumstances, be lured into offering Mike C. any advice whatsoever. In all cases you will be blamed for steering him into an ill fated strategy (probably for your own benefit)

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