Operation: Game Night
Travis Smith, Jared Erickson, and Clay Gable get together to discuss the latest and greatest in board games in this weekly podcast. What's hot, what's hitting the table, featured discussions about board games and the board gaming culture, and the primary mission objective- to play more board games!
Operation: Game Night
Joint Ops June: Games Y Más - Castles of Burgundy...Top Shelf or Yard Sale?
This edition of Joint Ops June comes from the Games Y Mas Podcast with our good friend Vic (@gamesymaspod)! Dice, duchies, and heated debate! In this episode, we try to determine whether Castles of Burgundy deserves a coveted spot on your gaming shelf or if it's destined for the neighborhood yard sale.
The question seems straightforward enough, but this beloved Stefan Feld classic sparks passionate discussion as we break down what makes a board game truly essential. Our guests, all active duty Air and Space Force officers united by their love of tabletop gaming, bring hundreds of combined plays to the conversation, offering invaluable insight into this dice-driven tile placement game.
We systematically evaluate Castles of Burgundy across eight critical criteria: learning curve, component quality, visual design, replayability, setup time, price point, thematic immersion, and turn pacing. The contrast between the original Ravensburger edition and the luxurious $180 Awakened Realms version becomes a central point of contention—does premium production justify the steep investment, or does the accessible gameplay stand on its own merits?
Throughout our conversation, we discover why this seemingly simple euro game continues to captivate players after countless plays. From its surprising strategic depth to its satisfying tableau-building mechanics, Castles of Burgundy offers something special that transcends its modest appearance. Whether you're new to the hobby or a seasoned gamer, you'll walk away understanding why this game generates such loyalty despite its shortcomings.
Ready to roll some dice and build your medieval duchy? Before investing in a physical copy, follow our guests' advice and try it free on Board Game Arena—then decide for yourself if Castles of Burgundy belongs on your top shelf. Subscribe, leave a review, and let us know your verdict on this contested classic!
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Welcome my nerd family to another episode of games. You must the podcast where we talk about all things board games, video games and pop culture. On today's episode we are doing another top shelf or yard sale game. Here we're going to be looking at castles of burgundy. A fun game, uh. Two to four player game Uh, what would you guys consider this game as like an area control game or kind of like tile placement game?
Speaker 2:Yeah, tile placement tableau building, tableau building.
Speaker 1:Here we are joined by tra Clay and Jared from Operation Game Night Guys.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for joining us here on this episode. I'm very excited. I love your guys' content. They are the hosts of Operation Game Night podcast. Go check them out. I'll be leaving links below to all their socials, all their things. There you go. We're repping this shirt, very excited. We're going to hear a little bit about their origin stories and stuff and then we're going to decide if Castle of Burgundy is a top shelf or a yard sale game. So very excited to hear you guys' answers on that. Thank you guys so much for joining us and thank you guys for watching. Thank you so much for watching, for liking and subscribing. We love seeing those comments. We love seeing those. You know. Let the world know about Gamesy Must and also let the world know about Operation Game Night Pond, because they are awesome. But with all that being said, though, guys pull up a chair, grab some dice y acompañeme a jugar. I definitely don't practice that intro in the mirror like four times a day, of course. Definitely don't do that. Travis Clay, jared again, thank you guys so much for joining us here. Um, on this, on this episode. I'm very excited. I know we've been talking about trying to collab for a while and I'm glad that our schedules got to meet up. And, um, yeah, I've been listening to you guys's podcast episodes. I love it, um, and you guys thought you guys know your stuff. That's what I love, like. You guys know your stuff. You guys know your games. Clay, we see that you got that wall behind you for those that are watching. You got that big wall right there.
Speaker 1:I mean, we know we're in for some good stuff here and stuff, but before we get started with the episode, we're going to ask the icebreaker questions here that we do at Games Dimas for our first time guest and I'm very curious to hear your guys' answers here. Feel free. If one of the answers you guys are not a big fan of, don't worry about it. We can move on here. But I'll ask the questions and I'll let you guys decide who wants to go first with that one.
Speaker 1:But the first question, first part one of the question is what is your guys' favorite board game of all time? It could be a childhood game, it could be a game you guys played last week and you guys love it. It's anything goes any tabletop game, dice games, card games, you know, you guys know the whole spiel with the tabletop games. So that's your favorite board game of all time. And then part two is going to be what is your guys's favorite video game of all time and now, and now I'm including console, pc, I'm even including arcade games, if you guys go like a special arcade memory that you guys loved when you guys were a childhood, when you guys went playing, I'll live, I'll leave all, anything goes.
Speaker 1:Um, what I tell my guests is sometimes, as gamers and as board gamers, it's very hard to narrow down to just one. So I'm allowing top three. I'll let you guys go. Top three four games, if you guys want to go, or top three video games if you guys want to do it hey, you better be careful because we can eat up a lot of time.
Speaker 3:I about our top three. I'm down, I'm just saying.
Speaker 1:I'm good. I'm good with that, bro. I love that. That's what I do with these icebreakers, because it engages in conversation, and if this whole episode is just an icebreaker question, then all right, guys. Sorry, we had no tabletop shots, so we did just top threes.
Speaker 3:But yeah, I'm curious, castle of Burgundy is already on the top shelf, so we can just do icebreakers the whole time. There we go. I don't know if those are fighting words or something.
Speaker 1:Hit them up on the comments, let them know. Let them know, let's debate, let's debate. Yeah, I'm curious. I'll let you guys take it away. Whoever wants to go first, we'll go with board game first. What's your guys' board games? If you guys feel like top three is too much to talk about, we could just go top one. It's open floor to you guys.
Speaker 2:So whatever you guys want to come up with Go ahead.
Speaker 1:Go ahead, whoever wants to take it away.
Speaker 2:Okay, I will start then. So this is Travis from Operation Game Night and I would say that my number one game we actually did a top five podcast, top five episode and my number one was root wearing my root shirt today, got my my marquise the cat on my hoodie and, um, yeah, root is a phenomenal. Area control, woodland critters battling for supremacy, board game uh, it's a little deep and it's a little hard to introduce new players because each of the factions play differently and it's really complex and at this point it's like chess like there's an entire podcast on each individual faction and their openings and the different starts and it's taken on this kind of whole life of its own. People create fan factions that you can play with tons of like homebrew type stuff. For root, it's constantly evolving. They just uh, launched a new kickstarter for the new factions that just came out, so real excited about that one, uh, so root is my number one.
Speaker 2:I'm a big video gamer, uh, so my top video game is kind of hard to pick right now. I'm I'm digging some elden ring. I I can't, can't, live without my elden ring. That that's been really good. I'm not a huge FromSoft guy, but that game got me hooked. That world is awesome Arcade game though. I have this special memory of going to a place in I wish I could shout out the name of the actual arcade. But there's this place by my sister's house in Florida. She lives in Boca Raton and they have tons of pinball machines and tons of arcades and there's actually a track and field arcade game. That is awesome. You do the 100 yard dash, you do the long jump, you do uh, you throw the javelin and, as a as a prior, as a prior track athlete, um that's a special place in my heart.
Speaker 2:So, arcade, I'm gonna have to to go with track and field. It's pretty great.
Speaker 1:This track and field game is it like? Are you like physically, like on a pad or something? Or it's like a joystick. I'm like hey they're making you work for this.
Speaker 2:No, it's largely like buttons. You ever play that like flash game on the internet on like E-bombs world, where you're like running and you have to like hit the buttons really fast, yeah, where you're like running and you have to like hit the buttons really fast, yeah. Yeah, it's kind of like.
Speaker 3:It's kind of like that for a lot of them um, or you're, you're timing the jumps for the hurdles or whatever it is, so got you okay, okay, yeah, what? Uh? What event do you think travis did? Oh, this dude, I mean, it's deceiving on video. He's like six, five scary guy to see in an alley.
Speaker 1:I'm just saying super slow, jacked up, okay. Uh, what like what? What I think like track and field, like event you did yeah um, this is an NCAA.
Speaker 2:Uh, athlete right, yeah, oh man six, I'm six, five, two, fifty at this point.
Speaker 1:So okay, dang. Um, oh, geez, I don't know. I feel like you do, like the uh, I don't know much about track and field actually, to be honest, um, is that one, uh, the, the thing that you throw the ball?
Speaker 2:like the shot put is.
Speaker 1:That is that part of track and field I yes, it is, I get that a lot the shot put um, I was actually a high jumper.
Speaker 2:I was a high jumper for like 13 years, 14 years, okay, and um, yeah, I was a high jumper for a long time and I actually, when we graduated I was 6'5", like 200 pounds, so I was really lean and really skinny.
Speaker 1:But since gained a lot of weight Just jumping all over. Yeah, okay, nice, interesting. Yeah, I would never guess that. I would never, I guess shock, but okay, but you were the high jumper. Okay, cool, all right, so good choices. Cool, all right, so all right, good choices. Though Interesting choices with the arcade game. I've never heard of the track and field game, so that's cool that it kind of hit home for you. For that one You're like ooh, this is nice Video game format and stuff. Root, love, root. I mean, yeah, like you said it correctly, like Root's not a, hey, let's whip out Root and let's dedicate. You gotta have people that know how to play the game, because if you don't, then you're spending half the time just explaining what your faction does and so, um, yeah, I love roots of fun, I love playing it, uh, but I think they're coming out. Did they come up with like an rp, like a trpg version of it, like uh?
Speaker 2:they do have a tabletop rpg, and I have all those books too. So really get together, run a tabletop rpg. I'm down, sign me up. Sign me up I'm already done.
Speaker 1:I'm already in all right tomorrow. We're doing it right now uh, but uh, yeah, okay, cool. So all right. So those are travis's choices. All right, clay jared. Whoever wants to take it away for this one here for the ice, no I got you yeah, thanks.
Speaker 4:Please cede the floor to me, jared. Yeah, it pains me to every time someone asks me my favorite board game, because the the truth of the matter is I don't know that I can keep saying it's my favorite board game when it's been well over a year and a half since I've played it, and it is the same board game that is travis's number one board game, I. When you have people that know it and you can just get it going and playing man, it's such a good experience and I've not played any games that match that experience. And even though it's been a while since I played it, I still hold it in very high esteem. And so, yeah, I have to stand my ground, even though it is quite embarrassing to never play your favorite board game of all time, even though it just sits right back there and, yeah, collects dust.
Speaker 1:Oh man, okay Root, we got two for Root, all right, what about that?
Speaker 3:Is that on Tabletop Simulator?
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Awesome digital adaptation too by Direwolf, yeah I, I had the app, but yeah yeah, you can play that on steam why aren't we playing what's going on?
Speaker 1:oh, there you go it's calling you out guys like hey, running into some root sessions here. Um, I think that I think the digital, the digital format of the game, is a really good like uh way to like introduce you to the game that way like the game. Because that way good, like a way to like introduce you to the game that way like the game, cause that way you have someone teaching you that when you're ready to play for like live, you already know the rules, instead of having like the guy kind of explained to you, you can just try it, all the factions, see how they play, and stuff like that. I'm pretty sure obviously the digital version like helps you out with setup time and all that stuff, but of the game and how it plays out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we did a digital adaptations episode a couple weeks ago and root was up there because, as clay mentioned, in that episode it's not only the setup time and learning but they actually have tutorials for each of the factions. You can learn their ins and outs and their kind of intricacies. And then, not to mention, they like animate the whole thing and all the animations are super cute. You get to watch little cats running at a bunch of birds and and getting in a tussle.
Speaker 1:So yeah, I've seen the claw marks go and everything. Yeah, for sure yeah, all right, so clay root roots your uh number one. Okay, and what we got for video games.
Speaker 4:So I will caveat this by saying I'm not a big video gamer, okay, but if I'm going from like recent 10 years, the game that I've enjoyed the most and again, I'm not a big video gamer, so I haven't even finished it, but my wife and I logged a lot of hours on. It Takes Two and I found that to be like such an interesting game that all the little creative ways they change it up in the different levels, I suppose. Yeah, I really enjoyed that. But probably the game I played the most in my life was in high school. Man getting. It was like peak halo three time.
Speaker 4:Yeah there we go bring the buddies around with the freaking. What was it? Uh, what was that one that shot out the pink laser things a spike?
Speaker 1:Oh, the Spartan Laser.
Speaker 2:Needlers.
Speaker 1:Oh.
Speaker 4:Needler yeah, I get to pick a Needler and just lighten people up. Oh my gosh, so many good memories. But we all sat around the same thing, doing couch together.
Speaker 1:So yeah.
Speaker 4:Halo 3 is definitely the game I would say is my favorite video game of all time.
Speaker 1:What an answer, man. What an answer. Halo 3 is Great answer. That was peak gaming for me, say is my favorite video game of all time.
Speaker 2:What an answer, man.
Speaker 1:What an answer halo 3 is great answer that that is peak right.
Speaker 3:That was peak game for me yeah did you guys do the, the land party, where you, you know, got a bunch of xboxes and connected them.
Speaker 2:You're hauling a 50 pound tv, or yeah, yeah, all over the place to your friend's house yeah, I did that with.
Speaker 1:I did with a couple of buddies of mine. Yeah, we would like bring, like bring your xbox. Are you being here? You got the controllers right. You got the food.
Speaker 2:All right, let's go and we just have like yeah, we have.
Speaker 1:We'd be like four, four, like screens in like around us and just like playing like massive halo games. Yeah, mom's like what are you doing? Like we're playing halo, mom, get out of here. Yeah, dude, okay. So halo, halo three, and then and and uh, takes two. Takes two is a really, it's a. Really. That's a really fun chill game to play with a partner. Now, just kind of like, yeah, have some good, like you know, puzzle solving skills and like figuring out how to play. Again, that's a fun one.
Speaker 3:And then roots okay, cool, all right, jared you got, and the ice breakers with the banger, what we got here uh, I mean I would be, um, I mean I'm just, I'm just gonna break with with tradition here and say it's not Root, oh, my gosh.
Speaker 3:I mean, I really have this fascination with Lost Ruins of Arnak. I don't think I put that as my number one in the podcast that we did. It's probably Dune, but I can get way more reps of, uh, lost ruins of our neck. This one is like a worker placement deck building, uh like going up this research track game tons of fun. And it's on board game arena so I can uh hit it anytime that I want, which is dangerous, dangerous. But I've had this one game going on continuous with my buddy Dallin for two years at this point. As soon as one ends, we just start another one. I'm actually going to go meet up with him for Christmas and we're going to play it for the first time. Live, together. I'm actually going to get out the expansion Clay that you got me.
Speaker 3:I'm excited for it. I've never played the expansion, but I'm looking forward to it. We're going to get an Airbnb together in Savannah. It's going to be a blast. That's probably my number one.
Speaker 4:I'd say Lost Ruins of Arnek for sure he's freaking good at it too, like he knows. He knows he will and I'll be beat.
Speaker 3:He will whoop that ass up and down, yeah I mean, if you look at my bga, uh score whatever that you know the elo yeah, I'm terrible, I I mean I play some dudes from uh like estonia and romania and stuff that'll just like destroy me and a lot of good uh people on the on the east, from the east, you know, hong kong, china yeah those dudes know what they're doing um oh yeah, like second, second round.
Speaker 1:They're already like the top of the temple. You're like whoa, how'd you get there?
Speaker 3:don't worry about it it's like they Mr Miyagi me.
Speaker 2:they let me go up the temple and then they schwack me some other way so I don't know that's probably my favorite, for sure but for record Jared has like a thousand plays of Lost Ruins of Arnak on BGA let's look at the stats.
Speaker 3:I mean I'll pull it up, Pull it up.
Speaker 1:Let's fact check them. Fact check them over here.
Speaker 3:I know I do really love Lost Ruins of Arnak. It's a fun game.
Speaker 1:I mean not every day. You get to beat Indiana Jones and, like you know, go start expeditions and fight monsters and collect all these things. Oh man, that's your number one. What do we got for video games, jerry?
Speaker 3:what we got here I honestly, when these guys were talking, I'm like I I have not played a video game in a very long time. Uh, most of the time I'm playing a board game or like the. I got uh steam, but I used the tabletop simulator to play board games, um, so I was gonna say halo actually as well, so hello it is he's right on the money like like my mother-in-law got me an xbox.
Speaker 3:Uh, when we got married, like right after we graduated, we got married like a couple days later, mother-in-law gave me an xbox and never played it. We actually. It's just sitting in my garage collecting. That's all I don't know, maybe I'll give it to someone for christmas, or maybe I'll bust it out for christmas, who knows there?
Speaker 1:you go there, you go, man, oh, sitting in the garage. I'm like, oh, that hurts me my heart as a gamer, but but no, that's fair, that's fair. Yeah, you're more of a, more of a board gamer, uh, and yeah, halo. I mean you can't go wrong with halo, though that that's everyone could agree. Halo is where it was, where we had the most childhood memories. You know, playing halo 1, halo 2, halo 3. Um, those are great. I mean they should. I think they should have stopped at halo 3. I don't't know why they kept wanting it, but I guess they want to move it. I liked Halo Reach. Halo Reach was fine.
Speaker 2:But shout out to Halo Infinite. And they just brought out. All the Halo 2 stuff just came back. If you like Halo 2 and you have an Xbox, you can download Halo Infinite and play multiplayer for free. They brought back all the Halo 2 stuff, so I'm really digging that right now.
Speaker 1:Oh cool, Like all the maps and everything too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, maps, and they added like a new third person mode. They added all sorts of stuff. So, yeah, halo 2 in Halo Infinite, it's pretty awesome.
Speaker 1:I got to get back on Halo Infinite for sure, yeah, so, before we get into the meat of the podcast, we're talking about Castles of burgundy here. Um, we want to want to let the listeners know, like, who, who or what is operation game night? Um, obviously, from a little bit of of the intro, you guys are a podcast dedicated to board gaming, talking all board games news, um, even a little bit of some pop culture references and stuff like that, which I love, which is awesome, lines up with kind of what we do here as well games, you must. But we would like to know, like, the origins why operation game night? You know what, what, what came across?
Speaker 1:This, this, this, the creation of a podcast. That's amazing, which you guys should check out again. Oh, click, just stop watching this video, just go click, watch their stuff right now, just do it, just do it and like give them a thumbs up, like subscribe, send my, sent you over there and you can come back afterwards and watch. Um, but yeah, um, yeah, whoever wants to take it away there, give us, if you guys give us a bit of a spiel of the creation of operation game night and you know you guys's purpose in the future for it and stuff like that. So let you guys take it away for that one yeah, so, um, just a little bit about us.
Speaker 2:We are all active duty air and space force officers and so we are serving all over the world. Jared's going to school right now. I'm in germany, clay's in colorado. He's transitioning out of the space force right now. Um, but we had a really solid game group and we were all in colorado. These two have been friends forever for a super long time. I'm kind of new to the crew, um, but we had a really strong game group when we were in colorado and we had a weekly game night, pretty religiously I'd say, and, um, you know, we all moved away. We all kind of scattered to the wind, as air force people often do.
Speaker 2:Air and space force sorry, clay, and you know I really miss, you know, playing games with these guys, talking games with these guys. You know we could go to places where we don't interact with a whole lot of board gamers. And one one day, out of the blue, I kind of just texted these guys like, should we just start a board game podcast? And so it, it kind of came out of out of just wanting to sit down and chat with these guys about board games, and um, these guys were on board and and have devoted a lot of hours to just sitting around and talking about board games. And so we wanted to embrace our military roots as current and future serving officers, and so we stuck with Operation Game Night.
Speaker 2:We were kind of leaning into our military roots a little bit. So we debrief our week in gaming. All of our plays and procurements we talk about, you know, we'll hit the table that week and then oftentimes we'll do a special topic for the week where we'll talk about how to set up a good game night, how to get your kids into gaming, how to, you know, collect and cull your games, whatever it is. We just have special topics most of the time. And then once a month we will pitch jared, uh, two board games of similar mechanics and uh, because jared for our listeners at least know that jared does not collect a lot of games. He plays a lot of games but does not go out and buy anywhere near to the amount that clay and I do yeah and so we will
Speaker 1:just like that's being financially stable.
Speaker 2:That's what it's called frugal uh there you go he's the most responsible of the three of us, for sure, and so we will pitch him a board game and he will decide on which game he would rather buy. He's under no obligation to buy them, but we'll pitch him two games and those episodes have been really fun. Um, so, yeah, that's operation game night. Um, we do a couple special topics at the end where we kind of go over the fence outside the wire and we talk about what we've been doing outside of board gaming, and it's just been fun. We love interacting with the board game community. We've got a decent following on Instagram right now, but we're on all the social media platforms and we just love talking about board games and meeting people in the board game community. So that's how we met you and yeah, uh, yeah, we're. We're excited to be here. We're excited to just be a part of this community and and have our little space to chat about board games definitely, definitely.
Speaker 1:Yeah, thank you so much for sharing that and that that's awesome. I mean, first of all, thank you guys for your service. Thank you guys also for your service for board gaming community as as well. So double service.
Speaker 2:It's my pleasure.
Speaker 1:There you go, but that's cool. I love the origins of that and, yeah, keeping with the military roots of Operation Game Night and with the whole board game, I think it's perfect. That's your guys' niche and that's awesome and I love it. I love watching your content. I mean, I have you guys on my alert system when it comes to YouTube so I know when a video drops. I'm like let's run it. Follow them on Instagram. Are you guys on TikTok or are you guys just mostly on Instagram, facebook or what kind of social media?
Speaker 2:you guys are on. I think Instagram is probably the easiest way to reach us if you are looking for our content, but we do have a YouTube and we post all of our podcasts and videos and stuff. Clay is we're just getting into the video aspect of podcasting. So, yeah, clay has been leading that charge as our uh, you know social media manager.
Speaker 4:So okay, no worries as a social media manager, I feel like it's important to point out that we're primarily on instagram. You want to get us. We do have accounts for other platforms, but Facebook locked me out, so good luck finding us there.
Speaker 2:You can find us at Operation Game Night Podcast on Instagram.
Speaker 1:For sure, I'll leave you guys' links on there below as well.
Speaker 3:I'm just waiting for the Office, that Wolf app or whatever they were talking about on the office tv show, where you do one thing and it sends you a fax and an email and a text, and that's what we really need.
Speaker 3:But yeah for sure I was I was just going to jump in and say it was beautiful to watch travis get introduced for the first time, because he's our fearless leader. Uh, it's a thankless job, but publicly we want to say thank you to travis, for he's the one who's uh, you know, leading this, putting this all together and, uh, yeah, making it happen. He corrals wouldn't be doing this if it weren't for him.
Speaker 2:There you go, they give. They give me too much credit. I sent them a text that said we should start a podcast, and they're like all right, cool, set it up I thought he was kidding.
Speaker 1:There you're you're like yeah sure, I can do it on an episode record, something like three, three weeks later, we had our first episode published.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, they moved pretty fast and we're we're still learning as we go and you guys say you post on YouTube.
Speaker 1:Are you guys posting as well, like on Spotify or Apple Podcasts or anything like?
Speaker 4:that, yeah, mainly YouTube. It's on YouTube and Spotify, okay, cool.
Speaker 1:Apple Music. Yeah, the podcast goes everywhere. Got you the content. The social content is on Instagram for sure.
Speaker 4:Yeah yeah yeah.
Speaker 1:Which is awesome, yeah, so give them a follow. I mean again, like I said, I'll leave links below on description for you guys, for all you guys' socials, your Instagram, on your YouTube, spotify, everywhere that they can find you guys. So it's easier to just click it like subscribe, watch and just do it Like I don't know why you're still watching this. Let's keep going over there. But thank you again for giving us the intro there of what Operation Game Night is all about. I'm very excited to talk to you guys. I'm even more excited for the future. I'd love to have you guys on again. More topics, more board game content. We can keep talking. We can always collab. I'd love to be on your guys' pod whenever time permits. Love to talk whatever you guys want to do. But let's get into the meat of the podcast here. Um, we did intros, we did the, the origins, but let's talk about what this podcast is about top shelf or yard sale for those that are watching for the first time. Um, again, thank you so much for watching. Um, we do a segment here called top shelf or yard sale, where we're diving deep into board games, deciding if this game is worthy to be on your top shelf, or if it's sadly going to end up on your neighbor's weekly yard sale down the street, which it's uh, to us board gamers is a horrible sight to see, but maybe also an awesome sight to see because we can just snag up a cheap game. That's usually expensive, um, but um, yeah, so we're our target audience, for these questions are mostly for for you guys, gamers that are maybe intermediate, beginner gamers, that are unsure about what to get next on the collection, maybe you guys played a little bit of some, uh, caracason. Maybe you guys played a little bit of some survive or some some some of the like the middleweight games and are looking to make the next step into these other games that we're going to talk about here, and so we're going to talk about castles of burgundy.
Speaker 1:Uh, travis, I gave you guys the questions. Uh, I gave you the questions ahead of time before we started recording here. Um, like again, a previous day, I said I've only played this game once. Um, I've had some bad memories, um, with with this game, but I need to play it again for sure.
Speaker 1:Um, but we, the way we we structure this is uh, we have eight questions in order for it to make it a top shelf game, it has to pass at least six of the eight questions here, and so we're going to let Travis, clay and Jared drive this episode here with the questions here. Travis, I don't know if you even want to answer. You can ask these questions and let these guys go ahead and dive into it, and if there's any uncertainty I can be the tiebreaker and decide what the question should be or what the answer should be, and then we'll go see if this game is worthy to be on your top shelf. So, castles of burgundy here. Um, in fact, before we do the questions, if you want to give like a quick rundown, travis, of what this game is, what, what is castles of burgundy? What? What do we, what are we doing here with this board game? Here as well?
Speaker 2:so in castles of burgundy you are rolling dice to select tiles to add to your duchy, which is basically your tableau that you're building your city in front of yourself, um, you are selecting um different buildings to add to your duchy. You're selecting different bonuses that can add to your end game scoring. You are selecting ships to improve your turn order and to collect goods to sell to earn points. And you are then collecting animals, fields, to add to your duchy, and those are worth points, and you can combine them in certain orders and certain sets to then add additional points to your overall score. And the person at the end of Clay Clay, help me how many rounds? Six, five, five rounds. A, b, c, d E. Yes, yes, a, b, c, d E. At the end of round E, which is also round five, whoever has the highest score plus their in-game bonuses is the winner. It's super easy and it's a great game. I'll let these guys gush about it some more, but yeah, castles of Burgundy is deceptively simple and it is a great game.
Speaker 1:There you go. Top shelf. End of podcast. Is that the reason?
Speaker 3:why we have a board game arena game going on right now.
Speaker 2:We were doing a little pre-work for the for the podcast no, I just love that game and I invited you guys to play there you go, there you go, hey, I'll take, I'll take the work here.
Speaker 1:Um yeah, jerry kelly, if you guys want to chime in with the, with the board game, a little bit, me some thoughts and then we can do some afterthoughts at the end of the podcast, but some big beginning thoughts to anyone listening about this game that's never even heard of this game before.
Speaker 4:If you guys want to chime in a little bit, yeah, so take it for what you will, but this is easily the game I've played the most. So Jared's played Lost Ruins of Arnak 300 times and I've probably mirrored that with Castles of Burgundy, both in person and on BGA. So definitely a lot of experience. Experience and I certainly wouldn't be playing this one game that many times if I didn't think it was pretty darn good some would say top shelf there you go nice clay clay, even just recently had like a castles of burgundy night, a board game night at uh at his place.
Speaker 3:He did like groups and there was like a tournament style right.
Speaker 4:Oh yeah, oh yeah. I mean I don't want to speak too much until we get into the questions, because I'm probably going to have a lot of ammunition stored up from those various experiences.
Speaker 1:He's ready, he's ready.
Speaker 4:I'll leave it at that.
Speaker 1:He's going to fight for this game.
Speaker 4:He's going to fight, yeah.
Speaker 3:I did check the stats on BJ and Travis and clay. Both that's their number one game they've played, but Mary clay's wife is actually has the highest win percentage. Ooh that's probably, that's probably true.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Mary, mary, she's a formidable opponent. Clay's had to drag her through this hobby of his. Like. He does most things, but she in other ways. She just comes out on top. That's just what she does, that's.
Speaker 2:Mary for you. There you go, I personally just comes out on top.
Speaker 3:That's just what she does. That's, mary, for you. I personally just really like the game because it's very simple, especially on BGA. You got a BGA account.
Speaker 1:I don't actually. I've heard of Board Game Arena, but I haven't. After this episode, I'm going to create one and we're going to get game nights going. Right, that's what I was about to say.
Speaker 3:If you want to get a couple more reps, just get you a Board Game Arena account and we'll find you and we will add you to our game list. You can do asynchronous games where it's like you have a day to make a turn. You play the game over a couple weeks, so it's like it's not a big commitment yeah, so it's like not live, like you can take your turn, yeah especially because you got travis. He's like what time is over?
Speaker 3:there's like 10 o'clock at night pushing nine o'clock pushing yeah so you know, but you can play with your buddies around the world. That's what's so great about yeah online, the online side of it, but borgia got some burgundy. It's a hexagon. Like all the shapes are hexagon.
Speaker 4:I like hexagons yeah, look at your background, man, you got hexagons yeah, yeah, that's why I got this background up in here, I don't know what I don't know what this is from.
Speaker 3:Um, hopefully it's nothing bad, but uh, that's when you combine all the duchies, you combine all the duchies, you combine all the duchies in the world, and that's that's they become, that they become this.
Speaker 1:So he is the castle of burgundy's for sure all right yeah, king of the castle, uh, so board game arena. I gotta check that out, okay, um, all right. So there you guys have a little bit some thoughts of the opening of what castle of burgundy is, and if you've piqued your curiosity, keep listening and we'll see if this game is worthy to be on your top shelf or who knows. I mean, I know Clay's ready to fight and say that it is and needs to be on everyone's top shelf, but let's see if he can outsmart these questions and give them one.
Speaker 2:Travis, go ahead. My name is outsmarting, yeah there you go.
Speaker 1:You want to take it away with the first question? Go ahead. We can alternate with questions.
Speaker 2:Question all right, I might alter the verbiage just a little bit, but go ahead, go ahead. First question is is this game easy to learn and understand? Like somebody new to the game, can they pick it up easily and can they run with it?
Speaker 1:with a brief explanation of the rules like they, they could just look at the rules and figure out how to play this game. Or is it kind of like wait, I'm? With a teacher or on their own it's on your own, it's your your. You bought this game and you're trying to figure out what's going on with this game here I mean, most of the way I learn board games is I.
Speaker 3:Uh, what's his name?
Speaker 3:rodney, I don't know how I played yep, yeah, um, but I think one thing that's that castle bruno has got going for it is like is it called? Like the iconography or the pictures matching the colors, and so, like you have a die that you roll one through six, like that's pretty standard. Now I take that number and I look in this area for certain color of tiles. Oh, do I want that tile? And I can match it to my tableau in front of you. So I don't know. I think it's pretty easy to pick up and learn and they've done a good job of the layout making it straightforward. The only thing I would say that is a minus on it is just there is meaning to each of the tiles. So, like I don't, I've never played it in person, have I played it in person? Clay would would maybe know.
Speaker 4:But if there's a good player aid that tells you hey, this, this tile means this, yeah, I'm sure that that would help you get a special edition does have player aids with it and you can certainly go on BoardGameGeek and find some if you have an older copy that you can print out. But yeah, what Jared said is true, the actual turn-to-turn flow of the game is fairly easy to understand. You roll the number, you have things that have that number on and you can take them or place them. But yeah, the the complexity is in knowing what all the different tiles do and why. You would want to do that because the yellow tiles I I've played this game so many times.
Speaker 4:I still just ignore the yellow tiles because I don't want to deal with figuring out what they do. I know I know what all the rest of stuff does and it's probably to my detriment because the yellow tiles give you like a lot end game points and stuff and and ongoing abilities during the game. But you can have a heck of a good time with the game, like I have, and for the most part just kind of ignore those. There's some that are pretty easy to understand, but the rest I have to look at the player aid to figure out.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's 26 of those yellow tiles, so 26 different bonuses or special abilities. That could be tough. But once you understand the game you can look it up and be like, okay, this one means this, and each of the tiles is numbered, so it's 1 through 26. So you can go look on a list and say, oh, if I get this one, it gives me four extra points at the end of the game or whatever. So they do have iconography. That's supposed to help with that as well.
Speaker 2:But yeah, and I know we're not talking strictly digital adaptation, but digital adaptation you just hover your mouse over or you click and hold on any of the tiles and it'll have a little pop-up window that tells you exactly what it does. So, yeah, it's, it's pretty easy and once you get the hang of it I think the yellow tiles are probably the hardest then maybe like the buildings, because the buildings all have special abilities that trigger once you place them in your duchy.
Speaker 4:Yeah, but there's like five different buildings you have to learn, versus the 20 yellow tiles that you need to learn you learn pretty quick yeah, okay, so are we going.
Speaker 1:Uh, so, jared, were you going? Yes, on this one I'd say yeah yeah, yes, clay, clay, we're going yes on this answer I've come around to it yes, yes, what do you what?
Speaker 2:do you?
Speaker 1:think travis, do you think it's?
Speaker 2:uh, I'm saying yeah, I'm saying yes because your actions that you're taking, even if you don't understand what they all do, you can roll dice and pick the tiles based on the dice that you roll. The iconography on the main board has little dice icons next to all the different areas that you're drawing from, and so you roll a one, you go over to the one spot and you can pick any of those tiles, like that's the whole thing, that's it, it's pretty easy, straightforward, there it is Just roll, pick it up, okay, so yeah.
Speaker 1:So first question is a yes, so we got it here. I'm making it where, if everyone's unanimous on yes, we'll make it the answer yes. If we have difference of opinions, we'll see how we go with that one. These next two questions, travis, I'll ask so we can, so we can kind of like, uh, preface it real quick. Um, these next two questions kind of mesh with together, but I kind of separated them a little bit.
Speaker 1:So first question is does this game have good game components? And that, and what I mean by game components, is how are the tiles? Are they nice, crafted, or how are the pieces? How are the dices? Um, is it? I have the old version, so, like my, my cutout tiles are like, just like little cardboard boxes, like plain little little pictures of the box cutouts. They're not like you know we can compare to, like maybe like Twilight Imperium or like some of these other heavier games that have like the nice components, like Nemesis has those nice components to them.
Speaker 1:What do you think that this game is is? I haven't had, I haven't played the Waking Realms one, so you were telling, travis, that the components are a little bit different on that one, so we can go straight with the newer version, because I'm pretty sure the Ravensburg one is probably kind of hard to find nowadays. So the Waking Realms one. What do you think? Does this game have good game components to it? Are the pieces looking nice? We're not talking about game design, that's the next question. But we'll just go straight to most components. Are they plastics? Are they nice plastic? Metal maybe a little bit, or are they just straight little cardboard cutouts that most games have? I'll let you guys go for that one. What do you guys think?
Speaker 2:I am really excited to talk about the Awakened Realms version because, like all Awakened Realms games, this is way overproduced and beautiful. In the Awakened Realms version and realms games, this is way overproduced and beautiful. Um, in the awaken realms version it comes with nice little sewn bags that are color-coded based on the the color of tiles that go in them. The tiles are all nice and thick and acrylic. Um, the player boards are all dual layer, the double layer boards. Um, they even it even came comes with this little like plastic divider that you set in there that can hold all your tiles in place as you build your duchy.
Speaker 2:The metal coins I'm a sucker for metal coins. This game comes with beautiful metal coins that you couldn't collect to then spend later on. And then, if you get the terrain packs, the terrain packs come with little actual castles that you can build into your duchy and so you put these these big little terrain uh castles all over your board. The buildings all look like the buildings that would come on the little um cardboard chits that you would get in the in the base version. Um, and then, like the, the ships that you would add, are these actual physical ships. You can go on board game arena or board game geek and look at pictures of these, but it is so overproduced and beautiful and phenomenal clay is like yeah, I mean I think we should clarify that the base version of the awakened realms, uh production of this, does not have all that okay and you're yeah that's, mr kickstarter, getting all I have to.
Speaker 4:I just walked into petri's today and they had the awakened realms version and that sucker's still 180 bucks. So it's a nice production. Yeah, yeah, it's a. It's a nice production, but you do not get the acrylic tiles. You do not get like all the minis for every little spot on the board. You do get the castle minis and you do get a nice dual layered board with that plastic insert where you can put your cardboard tiles into. Back to the teaching of it is the cardboard tiles of it are actually pretty nice because on the back of every cardboard tile it tells you in words what that tile does. So if you get the acrylic ones, which are nice to feel, you lose that. But in the base version, which it feels crazy to call a hundred eighty dollar game of the base version, you don't get all that stuff. But still great components, great production, definitely elevated the game experience and I is price a question later.
Speaker 1:Yes, it is.
Speaker 4:Okay, well, I will bite my tongue then.
Speaker 1:Until the future.
Speaker 3:So if we're just talking off the chart, I will say us at Operation Game Night are a sucker for some bags, so the base game comes with bags, right, oh yeah, or whatever, the old version we are talking about. You got to be able to draw these tiles randomly.
Speaker 1:No, so the base version. It just has you shuffle them and put them set aside.
Speaker 4:Yeah, no bags in that there's no bags in the base. No bag in the base, the the base version. It just has you shuffle them and put them.
Speaker 1:A set aside to the on the yeah, no bags. And there's no bags in the base, no bag in the base of the old version now in the base awakened realms version that we're talking about 180 bags for sure beautiful, velvety bags awakened. Loves them, bags, man, they love them.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, do yourself a favor, do yourself a favor and go out and buy some nice bags for your Castle. St Berger indie copy. I love drawing things out of a bag.
Speaker 1:Yep, gotta love a bag builder game for sure. Okay, so are we going solid? Yes for this one, for the Awakened Realms version, not the Ravensburg, because the Ravensburger version the components are just little cardboard, little things.
Speaker 4:Yeah, that's a hard no on the Ravensburger version. The components are just little cardboard, little things. Yeah, that's a hard no on the Ravensburger over there. Awakened Realms yes, Top show.
Speaker 1:I think the Awakened Realms is more common to find anyway, so the Ravensburger one, I mean. I tried even looking for it online and it's like you got to go through channels to find the old version and play a a lot more.
Speaker 1:So we'll go with yes for the newer vision. Uh, especially because chances are, if you're looking into this game, guys, you're probably going to find the awakened realms version instead of the ravensburger one. So, um, yeah, we'll go with yes. That's another yes question here. Yes, so we got two, two out of the eight so far. Um, so the next question is that it kind of meshes in was does this game have good game design? How is the artwork for this game? How are the pieces, the pictures of the castle, the pictures of your resources, of how? How well is design? Or is it just kind of some just little basic generic little house and then that's it like? How does it show that there was time put into the design artwork? Maybe even the box? How does the box look? Um, I know the the old version is kind of cartoonish, but I mean I like the artwork for it. It's pretty cool. But, yeah, what do you guys think about this? What's the design for this game? What do you think?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so the box art is pretty nice, even for the Awakened Realms version, and this box will stand alone on its shelf. The thing is big and beefy. It's a pretty big box. Um, just the you know, the base version of the awakened realms is pretty big and and has a nice artwork on it. Uh, I would say, if you're getting the robinsburger it, I don't know, I I think all together, the artwork is not its strong suit. I think it's more the mechanisms and the way that all the tiles interact and that type of stuff. But yeah, I don't think art is a strong piece, much like many euros and stuff like euros are not known for their artwork most of the time, and I think this is similar.
Speaker 4:Okay, yeah, yeah I mean the pictures of the sheep and cows on the tiles really don't do much for me. I mean they're not bad, but that's not. That's not what gets me excited about playing castles of burgundy, like travis said. But yeah, the the box art love. It looks great, um, and the art is still definitely improvement over the burgundy box. You got over there, oh yeah, okay.
Speaker 1:What do you think, jared?
Speaker 3:Again I feel like I'm a little bit. I only I'm coming from the electronic perspective. I mean it's fine.
Speaker 2:I guess compared to what.
Speaker 3:I mean it works for me.
Speaker 1:So what do you think? Where are we going for this question? Do you think it's a good game design or is it could be better? Maybe a no for this one.
Speaker 2:If we're talking art, I think it's probably a no. I don't think it. The art is its strong suit.
Speaker 4:If I'm being, if I'm going to have to go no to on the art.
Speaker 1:Okay, nah, yeah, yeah, just like it's passable. It's not like I can take it or leave it.
Speaker 3:So I'm not going to go against these two guys. I'll say that All right.
Speaker 1:We'll go with no on the design of the artwork and stuff Not too wow factor-ish but I mean it's not a big factor here. The artwork and stuff nothing too wow factor ish, but I mean it's not a big, big factor here. But we'll go with no that one. Uh, travis, you want to ask the next one, this one.
Speaker 2:The question yeah, is it replayable? Does it have replayability?
Speaker 4:I think I I think I already said that any, I play most games one to two times and I've played, and I've played castles of Burgundy hundreds and hundreds of times. So, uh, in my opinion it is an amazingly replayable game. You have in the awakened realms version. There are so many different, um, starting player boards that you can have that switch up the way the tiles are laid out on your board. They're going to change your strategy probably, and just every time you play the switch up the way the tiles are laid out on your board they're going to change your strategy probably, and just every time you play, the way the tiles come out into the different spaces are going to dictate what you can get and what path you might go down. So, yeah, every time you play you're going to. You know I have strategies I like to try and do, but if I sit out there and there's three sheep in the first round, maybe I'm going animals, you know. So I think it's certainly replayable.
Speaker 3:For sure it keeps the game fresh. Play as a sucker for some animals. I'll say that Give you all the sheep. Yeah, but yeah, there's definitely a bunch of different strategies you can take too.
Speaker 2:And yeah, it's completely new each time you play it, in my opinion, so okay okay, I will say so, for background, these two love inviting me to board game arena games that I have never played before and they're like, hey, we're starting this game and I try and jump in and do my best and I don't know what I'm and I'll just click whatever's available. The day that I first bought this game, clay recommended it and he said, oh, that's a pretty good game. I saw it at the game swap or whatever, and I got it for $5. And that night Clay invited me to a game. I had never played it before and didn't really know what I was doing, but it's easy to pick up and I got into the swing of things. But since then and over subsequent plays, this game has, like the strategy of it has unfolded itself to me and I it's. It's become like this sweet puzzle that I really enjoy.
Speaker 2:Going back to, um, I think it is replayable in that you really find some intricacies in the way that the tiles interact and, like Clay will say that he ignores the yellow tiles. But though, if you focus on the yellow tiles, it completely unlocks a new strategy. If you get those yellow tiles out early, then maybe I can chain more stuff together later on. And yeah, I think it's? It's more complex than meets the eye. I yeah, the actions you're taking are really simple, but the puzzle continues to evolve and and get more desperate, especially when you play at higher player counts. You play four people. That board that you're drawing your tiles from, the, the city or whatever. What yeah the main, the main board that you're drafting your tiles from?
Speaker 2:right it becomes sparse and you have to really be, you know uh intentional with your moves, as you, as you select your tiles and as you place them, cause uh, yeah, you're, you're fighting for two, three points that might give you the edge at the end. So yeah, I think it's replayable for sure.
Speaker 4:I'd just like to say that, uh, that that was the heyday when you didn't know how to play and I started inviting. I started, I invited. I had a run of like when Travis didn't know how to play. I just kept starting games with him and I probably won like 20 in a row. Since then I don't know if I've won, but yeah, I was feeling myself. I was like my freaking elo, you're like he's learning, he's adapting, but yeah, I was feeling myself, I was like my freaking Elo.
Speaker 1:You're like he's learning, he's adapting to the craft.
Speaker 4:Now he's into yellow tiles and I still don't bother with him.
Speaker 1:Okay, so yes, on replayability good replayability, we can go with that one for sure. All right, yeah. Next question what do we got here, travis? What's the next question here?
Speaker 2:The next question is about setup time. Does it have a good, a reasonable setup time for this game?
Speaker 1:And usually what I do with these games, if I own them, is what I like to do is actually time myself. I set it up, but not like as if I already knew how to play the game, because usually when you play it so many times you know what to do. So I did it as if this is my first time ever playing a game like I'm. So I opened up the box, I looked at the rules and just started reading the setup, time, setup and just started doing the setups, like, okay, it wants me to take out these tiles, shuffle these tiles, did all that. So the time that we got was about 12 minutes. Um, for a three-player game. Uh, I set it up for like a three-player game. So I gave them the. Uh, I gave, I gave everyone their, their, their little player mat, gave them their starting dice, their starting things. Um, I set up all the, the supplies, um, the, the silverlings, what they're called and and everything um, yeah, it all came out to about, uh, yeah, 12 minutes.
Speaker 1:I think the thing that took me the most was the um, actual, like the, the, the resources, like the, the, the sheep and all that stuff, because there's like 162 tiles of them, I believe, yeah, so I had to take them all out and separate them all, because they want you to separate them all based on their color. So I did all that. Again, it took me like 12 minutes. Me personally, that's a great setup time because, based on all the other games we have, like Twilight Imperium, that's like an hour setup time, a day setup time. You have a bunch of games with so many components. But yeah, I tied myself with 12 minutes of setup time. I know if you guys want to maybe chime in or maybe differ, saying maybe that's a little too long for you guys. I mean, what do you guys think of setup time here?
Speaker 2:if you own this game and you own the base version, the ravensburger version do yourself a favor and buy some backs. They're pre, they're pre-sorted. You give that bag a shake and then you just pull tiles out and it's super fast. It'll cut down at least a couple of minutes of sorting and stuff. But yeah, I think 12 minutes is probably accurate. I, I, I saw set up time listed online as 15 minutes and I think that's that's probably if you're setting it up for your first time. I think 15 minutes is probably accurate.
Speaker 3:Okay, if you're setting it up for your first time, I think 15 minutes is probably accurate. If you're someone like me, setup time is zero, because I do it online. Or I go to Clay's house and Clay is so. He's such a gracious and giving host. He will have everything set up for you and then, when it's over, he's like just go home, I'll handle it later. I don't't clean up dang jerry's like this is a great setup time game I love it. This is amazing.
Speaker 1:This is amazing okay yeah, it's.
Speaker 3:It's like the uh, the magic um coffee table that you know. It just does all the laundry for you. I don't know, I don't know how to tell you this, but I put the laundry for you.
Speaker 2:I don't know how to tell you this, but I put the laundry here. That's a deep internet reference.
Speaker 3:That's great. I'm glad you understood it.
Speaker 4:I did not. I've not been in the internet. Clay, what do?
Speaker 1:you think? What do you think about the setup time?
Speaker 4:I also agree that that's probably for first time, 12 to 15 minutes, just because you have to familiarize yourself with the components and get them out. But yeah, it definitely cuts down having the bags with the awakened realms version and as you get familiar with it, like I mean, I can probably set this up now in like five minutes, no problem. There you go. I've played it so many times, okay, okay.
Speaker 1:So I'll go with yes, I think, yeah, played it so many times, okay, so I'll go with yes, I think, yeah, 12 to 15 minutes is a great, decent time to play, set up, time to set it up and kind of get used to it. It's one of those games where maybe yeah, like I said, if you have a couple of buddies over, you can whip it up real quick and just set it up while they're waiting. It's not like a heavier game. So, yeah, we is the money question. Travis, go ahead and ask the money question here.
Speaker 2:Is this game reasonably priced?
Speaker 4:No, or will it break your wallet? Wait a second, hold on. I retract my initial no. So if you're looking at A game, that price per play. I have gotten $180 worth out of this game, five times over, and that's like just talking about playing that version on the table, not to mention the times I've played online, because I've played freaking Castles of Burgundy. And to see people's faces when you get out that beautiful box and you hand them their silver coins and you give them these. Again doesn't come with the acrylic tiles, but it, you know, I think you get your money's worth if this is a game that you enjoy. Um, I've, no doubt, like I, I don't think there's any other game that I've gotten my money's worth out of more and that costs the most. If you're going to buy it to play it once or twice, absolutely not.
Speaker 3:How much is the Raffensperger one?
Speaker 1:It's really hard to find because they don't make it anymore. I looked at. I looked at a on amazon market. I'm seeing 30 bucks, 30 euros, 20 euros uh, the on amazon the ravensburger one is like 70 dollars. She is new like new wow, but even then, like you can't, even, like you have to go through like these channels to like buy it, so like that um yeah, I think the ravensburger one is out of print.
Speaker 2:Now that awaken realms has the license, take it. Um, like I was like I was telling you before the podcast started, I got this at a game swap for five dollars and then there was an even cheaper version available and those people were probably offloading in anticipation of the big box awaken realms version. But but, um, yeah, if you can find this for a decent price, the Ravensburger version is still worth a try. I think that the barrier to entry for the awakened realms is a little steep. I think it's you got to know that you love this game If you're going to invest in, like the big box version is the uh, the awakened realms one, the $180.
Speaker 1:is that normal price or is that a sell price?
Speaker 4:That's what it just was at our local game store. I literally went there this morning with Scott and Brittany with their intentions to buy that game because I played it with them a few weeks ago, and they're like, yeah, that game is amazing, they're willing to spend $180. On the trigger. They pulled the trigger, I walked them into Petri's, I showed them the wall. I was like this is where you can get it. And they bought it. So I mean, petri's is usually selling things at retail price, so that's probably pretty accurate.
Speaker 2:And I know I know we're not speculating, but they just did a second run on Kickstarter for the big box version or game found, rather, and so Awakened Realms should that price should be coming down a little bit, but it's still pretty expensive.
Speaker 1:So we can. This is a tough one because it's like, yes, it's decently priced if you find the Ravensburger one, because it's like, like Jerry was saying, it's like $30 and you can find it easily. But the Waking Realms one, which is kind of the one we're trying to lean towards more, because it's like the more updated version, the better one, it's $180. And, like you said, clay, what you get is you know you're paying for what you're getting for. We can make the argument with Nemesis. That's like a $140 game, but you're getting all these minis, you're getting all these components for it, so it is worth it, but even then it's like, oh geez, $120.
Speaker 1:So, $180 for that one. Me personally, it's like oof when I think decently priced games. My range is from $35 to $70, $80 range. It's a good, decent price game, even if you're selling it on sale and stuff like that. But I agree with you, clay, the price you're paying for is what you're getting for the game. Obviously, if this game was a horrible game, you're paying $180. You're like you just paid all this money for it. No, this game's not even that good, but I don't know. Like I said, I'll leave it up to you guys. I'll let you make the final decision. Do you think this is a decently?
Speaker 4:yeah, I would like to say too that it's not just the fancy components in this new version like, they also stuff that thing full of like. Like we spoke about, we had that Castles of Burgundy tournament night where, because they have like this team variant in this game, so they stuff this thing full of different modules. There's like this team variant in this game, so they stuff this thing full of different modules. There's like this whole vineyard expansion. I've played a few times so I mean that thing is jam. That box is packed full of a lot of different like gameplay, experiences, like not. I believe we've been focused on the like base gameplay, but yeah, like you're getting a lot in the box besides just the sweet production. Okay, but I don't know that in good conscience I could say that it's a recently through price game yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1:All right, we'll go find a. We'll go find a break, jerry. What do you think, yes or no?
Speaker 3:decently price um, you don't do qualified guesses, do you?
Speaker 1:We got to stick to the wire ends.
Speaker 3:It's almost like I wonder what it would come out to in your calculations there. Like you go with the one version it's cheaper but not as nice, and this one you're paying for what you're getting, so maybe we still are going to reach the top shelf.
Speaker 4:Um, I think we'll reach it. This was the only. This was the only one.
Speaker 1:I was worried about yeah. So right now we have one no on the game design. So if we do this, no, I mean we just got to get the next two questions and I think we will I think.
Speaker 3:I think it may be just the amount of discussion that we've have to have. Maybe we just do this one. No, no.
Speaker 1:OK, Clay, do you think you're agreeing with this? I agree, I agree. Ok, and Travis, what do you think? Yeah, I'm going to say no, no, ok.
Speaker 2:So as much as I love my five dollar copy, I yeah. I don't know if I can. Yeah, most people.
Speaker 1:Yeah. We have I don't know if I can justify most people. Yeah, we have to think through the lens of this. We are new board gamers and intermediate board games looking at this game. Okay, so we'll move on to the next question here, which I'll ask, this one here Travis, does this game have good game, lore, or does it immerse?
Speaker 2:you into this world of Castles of Burgundy. Is this a game?
Speaker 1:that.
Speaker 4:Oh no.
Speaker 1:Is this a game where, like we, you are yeah, oh no, we're yard.
Speaker 1:So is this a game where, like the rule, like the, the story of this game is just like a paragraph on the, on the blue sheet? We're like, all right, you're, you're, uh, you're this guy and you're building this there, good luck. Or is it again, like you know, you guys probably understand, like immersion, like for me, like a good immersion game for me is like betrayal house on the hill. That's a game where you're immersing yourself into the world of who are we? What are we doing here? What's the story? What do you think?
Speaker 4:about yeah, I love, that's my, that's my top game, for sure guys, can we go back to the last question and give that a yes? I feel better about. I feel better about giving price a yes than giving a yes to an immersive storyline or lore Good lore.
Speaker 1:I mean, if you guys want to change it, we can change it. If you want, it's up to you guys, whatever you guys want to go with.
Speaker 4:No, I feel like that's massaging the… Metagaming a little bit.
Speaker 1:But where are we going with lore here? I mean, I think, it doesn't immerse you deep into the world, but it gives you a good game idea where it's like the 15th century princes of Burgundy searching to devote their efforts to the country.
Speaker 4:I didn't even know that was what it was.
Speaker 1:You're like ah, I'm just building stuff.
Speaker 4:Yeah, where is this game taking place?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like yeah, where is this game taking place? Yeah, it's like it's like on a little like a. It's like a paragraph on top of like the rule sheet. That kind of gives you like a. I mean I thought it was cool, cause, like when I was reading it I'm like okay, I can get on board with like where, where this, where this person or where this on the lore here. I mean, there's not too much to go off of.
Speaker 2:But so this is the question. This is the question that I have a little bit of beef with. I think that this question should be like if you are I don't know, I guess if we're leaning towards new gamers it's probably not the correct question but like if you are a serious board gamer, should this be on your top shelf? And I would say yes, the lore. I would say no, it does not have any lore. I you could ask 10 people what the lore of this game is and you'd probably get 10 different answers that are all wrong. Oh, the lore. The lore is you are building a duchy, a little yeah, that's it.
Speaker 3:I have no idea who I am yeah yeah, okay, I mean I guess I maybe I'll give you the opposite perspective is like I mean, there is water features, right, sometimes there's a river, like it's. It's not like, it's just made up, like, and sometimes all of your uh, your cows are going to be in one area. So, from from a design aspect, I'm a civil engineer, so when I'm thinking of the way you lay this thing out, like, yeah, I could see it sometimes, oh, this is an interesting duchy that maybe I'm going to invest in.
Speaker 1:I'm going to put my mines over here, away from my castles, yeah, which is interesting is interesting, though, jared, because, like I think, something that on on our previous episode, when we had kevin, I was that, um, his battle for the lore of this one is that the game itself doesn't have lore, but you have the opportunity to create lore in this game. So it's like you are creating the lore with your friends too as well. Like, so you're creating, like you know yeah, you don't know who you are, but it's like oh, my land is better than your land because I have this and this, and so you're now you're creating a little story with it. It can be said by every other board game. I mean you can't really do with monopoly, but I mean with.
Speaker 1:I think for me, I think you could build, like, your own lore with this game, because you have enough they gave you enough to like build it off where it's like my sheep are better because I fed them with this grade A fertilizer than your castles over here. You're destroying the forest on your areas, and so you're building this little story behind it. I don't know if that gives it a little bit more perspective. You think maybe that's a yes on that one, or if you think like, nah, it's still kind of a game where it's like we don't even know much about this game, it's just built.
Speaker 4:I think Uno has more lore than this game.
Speaker 1:Oh snap.
Speaker 3:That's going to be one of his shorts right there. That's going to be real.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're going to clip that for sure.
Speaker 2:Maybe the better question is like will this game as a new gamer, will this make a great game night for new gamers? Okay, and I think it's. Yes, I think people can jump into this and have a great time and learn and have a good time, and it's a little bit competitive and it's a little bit of solitaire, where you're placing things on your own to make the most of your turns. But yeah, the lore is pretty terrible, okay, okay, okay, you want to get dressed up like a prince and play some old-timey medieval music and make a game out of it, then great, have at it.
Speaker 2:But yeah, the lore itself is pretty terrible.
Speaker 3:Isn't Burgundy French?
Speaker 2:I think it's supposed to be a French fiefdom.
Speaker 3:Go buy a bunch of wine.
Speaker 2:Get a shakurdi board going. Get your big chalice and drink wine and dress up like a prince and have a good night.
Speaker 1:I mean yeah this is a tough question with lore because, like I mean, as as myself as a board gamer, I like to be immersed in board games. Um, yeah, you know a game where, like, why are we playing it? I feel like, as new board gamers, they want to get immersed into what they're playing, you know, because it's like, if it's a simple like all right, grab a dice and just roll it and that's what you're doing, that's fun. But it's like okay, it's not memorable, like I my. My intention is, when I have new board gamers at my house, I want them to leave with like a memorable night of like a game of like immersion, but also competitiveness as well. Like you know me personally, I think I can create a good game lore with this one. Um, yeah, I might be reaching for some straws for this one, but it's kind of there. But I'll leave the decision up to you guys. What do you guys think on this one?
Speaker 2:I'm going no for lore.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I can't in good conscience sit here, unfortunately.
Speaker 1:No, okay, all right, then oof.
Speaker 4:I will be a man of honor.
Speaker 3:You won't sully your good name.
Speaker 4:No.
Speaker 1:There you go.
Speaker 4:Okay, good name no there you go, okay, so it was all credibility all right, let's go with the final question here.
Speaker 1:Uh, take it away, travis. What's? What's the final question here for this one?
Speaker 2:does it have good turn pace or turn order? Can you? Does the game move along in a decent clip? Are you paying attention to what other people are doing? Are you on your phone between turns? Is it engaged enough to move quickly and keep people engaged?
Speaker 3:I think yes, another thing too is like maybe Clay doesn't necessarily do this if he's not looking at the yellow tiles, but like you can also see what people roll and then see, okay, they have this, they're probably looking for this type of tile, but I want that tile as well. Or like maybe now I need to start investing in the coins which lets you go to a different marketplace to buy different tiles. Um, I think there's. I think if you are a competitive board gamer, you are obviously going to be doing things to make yourself more competitive and, um, it's super, like I love it.
Speaker 3:Like it's like also like a race too. That I really like, um, because you get more points earlier on in the game. Or if you max out certain types of tiles, like if you place all of your own blue tiles, you get a bonus for being the first one to do that. So it's like a race. Um, that like tons of interaction. So it definitely keeps me engaged. Not saying that you can't just like throttle back, and if you're playing it live, you can be on your phone, but you're not going to beat Travis, I'll tell you that.
Speaker 4:You'll probably beat me, but that's, that's because I'm not looking at the yellow tiles and I'm not looking at other people's boards.
Speaker 4:But you certainly should and could do that and it would make a more interactive experience. But I just like, I mean I don't even need that to enjoy this game because to me it's just a fun puzzle of trying to maximize each turn when the die are rolled. And the turns do go quick because you have two dice and you perform an action with each of them. So you know it's not like you're working through a ton of options that you have. If you have a one on the die, you can either place a tile in a one spot or take a tile from the one port, and so I mean there's workers that you can like mitigate, and I've certainly seen people get a little bit of ap about it. But I think for the most part you can kind of rattle through your turns pretty quick and a two-player game mary and I can play cast as a burgundy in like 45 minutes Because we just rip through our turns and five rounds go by pretty quick.
Speaker 1:For sure.
Speaker 2:And I think if you have a bunch of new gamers at the table and they know that, they know what they're doing on their turn, even if they're not paying attention and they're on their phones, or they're stepping away from the table to go get a drink or snacks or whatever. You come back, they have their two dice, they make those two choices and they're on to the next one, and it's pretty readily apparent what they can and cannot do on their turn, and so the turns move quickly, um, and so it keeps the game moving at a decent clip, and and you reset the rounds and then you're off to the races again. So I think the turn pace and turn order is really fast.
Speaker 3:There's no hidden objectives or anything and you're constrained by the die and there's a little bit of like hey, should I use? You can use workers to change the number on the die that you roll. Do I use a worker or do I not? That's like almost like the only you know. This is like a decision space, I guess, to decide how much do I want to invest in this move and stuff.
Speaker 1:so I don't yeah, I agree with you guys. Yeah, we're in the rules, rereading the rule sets like, yeah, it keeps you kind of engaged, you're going going, going, just two dies, do you think? Move on to the next person, do that and it just keeps going.
Speaker 1:It's not like on your turn you get to do three actions out of the list of 17 things. You can do three of those things. You're just like okay and show it's like it keeps the game going, flowing for sure, and stuff like that. Um, but that is all eight questions and um, guys, it's not, it's not, look, it's it's not no one. Two, four. We have five out of the eight questions Dang.
Speaker 4:Did we just yard sale Castles of Pervity?
Speaker 1:Unfortunately, guys, this is a yard sale game, but, like if it makes it any easier, it's like a 5.9 out of like six. Because it's like, right there, I mean like me personally. Like because I mean like me personally. Like I mean I was getting close to even getting rid of this game because I've never like played it as much. I've only played it once. But I have to talk to you guys. I'm like this is this. This needs to remain on my top shelf. Because it's been on my top shelf, I just need to play it again. I gotta reread the rules.
Speaker 3:I'll play with you guys on board game arena yeah, get your account game arena with us and you're going to like it.
Speaker 1:You're going to like it. I would be like how dare we yard sell this game? How dare this game?
Speaker 4:I know You're going to regret this. Yeah, I know Seriously.
Speaker 1:Oh man. But if we're following the rubric here and we can't give it grace because then again I have to give grace to all the other games that I yard sell We've got to earn, unfortunately. Yes, it is a yard sale game five. But honestly, though, if intermediate board gamers and I say this to all the other board games that we give at yard sales give it a try anyway. Give it a try, even if you feel like it's a game that's going to end up in a yard sale. Find someone that has it and just play with them and just see how it is, and then maybe you know you leave. Try, find that core group that has it and that's played it. Go to your local board game shop and maybe someone there has played it and give the game a whirl and I hate to keep beating the drum, but get on board game arena it's free too.
Speaker 3:You can get an account. I mean there's a paid version. But like, hit up clay, he'll play a game with you. I mean, I just signed him up to it.
Speaker 4:But I'm sure, yep, I'm uh cardboard and clay on there, so find me yeah, definitely.
Speaker 1:We can even need your guys's board game arena tags if you want. That way they can get more board game sessions there. Um, but yeah, closing off this podcast, that yes. Unfortunately it is a yard sale sorry, clay and travis for you guys's favorite game. You guys are disagreeing and I can feel the pain with that, but hey, you know what Beauty about the podcast episodes is we can have more episodes to redeem ourselves with other board games that we can top shelf as well.
Speaker 1:And we can talk that. But anyway, closing remarks here. Guys, we can do some plugs. We already did the plugs at the very beginning, but if you guys want to reiterate, first of all, you guys can find them on Operation Game Night. Is there anything else you guys like to plug in that I can leave on the description below for you guys. Maybe, if you want to leave your Board Game Arena accounts or if you want anything else, you guys are working on any other projects. You'd like me to give a shout out for you guys. The floor is yours, guys, whatever you guys want to plug in.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we've done a couple of reviews for different publishers, um, recently and we have a couple more on the way, so we're looking forward to that. If you have a game that you're looking to have tried, we are pretty new and we're willing to try anything, so hit us up. Uh, usually DMS on Instagram are the easiest way to reach us. Um, absolutely, add us on board game arena and request to game with us. Uh, these guys have added me to more games than I can count of games that I have never played before and don't know how to play. So if you have a favorite game, go ahead and add us and we will try it out. And if you do find Castles of Burgundy at a yard sale, do yourself a favor and buy it. If you are walking around a game swap and you find a copy for $5, go ahead and get it, because it's great. Yeah, castles of Burgundy and Operation Game Night.
Speaker 1:There, it is All right. Clay anything else, anything else you want to add in Any closing remarks for the game.
Speaker 4:No, I mean, I feel like we just botched this for Castles of Burgundy. It doesn't deserve what happened here. I might have trouble sleeping tonight, oh no.
Speaker 1:But, thanks for having us on Rick no.
Speaker 4:of course, this has been fun. This is great. It's cool to do these things.
Speaker 1:This is the beginning of future stuff, man. I want to have you guys on for sure and talk more games and get more stuff content out there for you guys and stuff like that and and collapse some more, man, because, yeah, I love having you guys. You guys were a blast. Uh, jared, you got anything? Closing remarks about this game? Anything else you want to add on?
Speaker 3:uh, no, um, jared ray was my board game arena. Um I, I, uh. I love playing board games during class, so, uh, my teacher didn't listen. I'll sneak a couple rounds of Board Game Arena in every now and then, but maybe a little shout out to the United States Air Force Academy for bringing the three of us together. If it wasn't for that sleepy town, colorado Springs, and the glorious Air Force Academy, we wouldn't be here today. There you go.
Speaker 1:Nice. Yeah, there you have it, guys, bringing board gamers together and creating a beautiful friendship and creating a good, awesome podcast Again. Once again, check out their podcast Operation Game Night on YouTube. You can find them on Instagram as well. You guys are at Operation Board Game right on Instagram.
Speaker 2:At Operation Game Night. At Operation Game Night game night on youtube. You can find them on instagram as well. You guys are at operation board game right on on instagram at operation game night. At operation game night. Any underscores? Yeah, we do have underscores between um and we are also on spotify, apple music.
Speaker 4:I heart radio we're on anywhere you get your podcast so I heard radio really yeah, everywhere, man, you can't get away from us, jared yeah, there you go, you're everywhere, and let's get all the fans no okay not yet
Speaker 2:not yet.
Speaker 1:That's later, that's later if you want to see the rest of this board game, you gotta, you gotta, um. Guys, travis, clay, jared. Thank you again so much for joining me on this podcast, my humble little podcast. Here I'm with you guys. We're I'm still small, we're still trying to grow. I love the support, I love supporting you guys. You guys have been awesome. Yeah, thank you guys so much for watching you guys. Thank you guys so much for watching and for supporting us.
Speaker 1:You can also find us. We gave you guys the plugs. Our plugs are you can find it's at Games you Must Pod. We're on all socials. We're on Facebook, instagram, tiktok X, youtube, spotify and wherever you guys can find us, we can find us at Games you Must Pod. That's Games you Must Pod. Or, if you want to send us an email for any questions or give us some more suggestions on some more top show for your art style games, we're at GamesYouMustPod at gmailcom. Very humbled, you guys are awesome. You guys are like celebs. You guys are awesome. I appreciate it, guys. And yeah, with all being said, guys, nos vemos a la próxima.
