Session - SWAGamers S03E07 (Kings of Air and Steam [PB])

17th December 2016 (Saturday)

Game(s) Played:

Session – Kings of Air And Steam

Game: Kings of Air And Steam
Designer: Scott Almes
Players: 2 – 7 Players
Playing Time: 90 minutes
Main Mechanisms: Pick-up and Deliver, Movement Programming, Network Building

Player(s):

Kings of Air And Steam was one of the earlier Kickstarter releases which I backed more due to peer pressure and hype rather than after extensive research into the mechanics of the game as well as background of the creator. Those were the days when the electric buzz was still going around where we felt like we were "co-content creators" and where your name of the printed list of backers in the rulebook felt special. Whilst not a bad game, I have hardly ever brought it out to the table as the pick-up and deliver game mechanic does not particularly appeal to me. (That and how Moses used Ezekiel Crane's OP ability to whoop me in our first 2 Player game didn't particularly endear me to having more plays either).

I don't know what made me suggest it this session but Gideon expressed his interest so we decided to wipe the 3 year old dust of the box and give it a go. And here is my "Play Better" report from our session on Kings of Air And Steam.

TIP #1 – Choose Your First Depot's Location Wisely

Where you place your first depot is also where your Airship will start on the map, and this affects two things:

(1) Signalling: As with any strategy game that involves competing over limited resources, signalling your area of interest is key to having a good start which is likely to result in a good game. Don't waste your time trying to deceive your opponent through false signalling because movement is a precious commodity in Kings of Air And Steam.

(2) Matching Factories & Cities Are Not As Important As Exclusivity: Naturally you want to start in an area that has the shortest distance between factories and the cities demanding their specific goods to get an early boost of income but if you're fighting for this area with another Player(s), it is not worth it compared to an uncontested area. The game rewards Players who build the first depot on a railroad track with a discounted price on the depot. When $1 = 1 VP, having to pay more for depots in a crowded area starts to erode into your VP outcome. The following two illustrations demonstrate what NOT to do:

A classic case of "neighbourly love" gone wrong

This results in scratching of Airships, one finger salutes & yells of "YOUR GRANDFATHER'S RAILROAD AH?!?!"

TIP #2 – Use And Abuse Your Ability

I learnt this tip from my opponents at game end, who felt I went too soft with my "Transmogrify" ability which lets me turn 1 good into 2 different goods (second most important jutsu of the DaVinci Guild after turning metal into gold). Moses' character, Eva Blane's ability was "New Construction" and was nearly as OP as his previous character by giving him the ability to construct new railroads with a depot, for flippin' FREE! No bets on who used up all their ability tokens by game's end.

Illustrated here is how I transmogrified my 1 good into 2 pink goods to fulfil all the demand slots for the city on the right before Moses (red depot on the left) could ship his own 2 pink goods:

Eurogame style KS-ing

And illustrated here is Mo's blatant abuse of his "New Construction" ability to not only bypass Gideon's depot (cyan) but to also get a depot for free at the same time. This move alone is worth 7 points.

"Flaunt it if you got it" is the way to go

Sidenote: Just as an aside, I think the OP characters (IMO) are balanced by having a slower speed, which means in a movement speed tie, these characters are designed to go later, thereby potentially losing out on grabbing goods. My problem with this is that a character can be 7 speed levels away from me but the speed disadvantage is greatly reduced in a game with smaller Player counts, because he will just make his move after mine. After today, I am inclined to think that the characters should only be used in games with 4 or more Players, which is a shame because the characters add so much fun and theme to the game.

TIP #3 – Given The Option, Placing Depots Next To Factories Are Downright Useful

If your area of operations has a railroad track next to a factory, it is a good idea to plonk a depot on that hex of railroad. Here's the comparison:

(1) Depot 2 or more hexes away: Move to factory & Load | Action | Move to depot & Unload
(2) Depot 1 hex away: Move to factory & Load | Action: Adjust 1 hex to depot & Unload

Here you can see one my depots next to the gold luxury factory at the bottom.

It was pretty neat to be able to load & unload in one move

Time Taken: 90 minutes

Results Of Game(s)
Winnah – Moses (169 VP)
Second – Gideon (158 VP)
Last – Justin (126 VP)

So why did I lose? I think it is possibly because at a smaller Player count, having an upgraded Airship is important because speed differences don't really matter and that was something I chose to ignore. It is definitely because I chose to compete in the same space as Moses. I also think that it is possibly due to an error in calculation, thinking that the VP differential favours shipping goods at $8 vs $4 instead of upgrading my train to get 30 VP. But these are all "possibilities" that I want to confirm in future games before I put them up here as tips.

As always, we have the obligatory winner's tableau pic

At least I had fun this time even though I lost again, will try to get this to hit the table more often