camels and villages oh my!

[reverancepavane]

Timbuktu is an interesting game. Your objective is to send your caravan across the desert to Timbuktu whilst carrying the most valuable cargoes. There are five different paths, each of which is plagued by a bandit group that steals two types of goods from two caravans. You know the nature of one bandit group, and as play continues, you'll learn the nature of two other groups. As such it's a memory game (although you could play it with paper if you wanted to wimp out). The trick is to avoid occupying a position where bandits will not steal your cargo whilst forcing your opponents into the bandit's traps. The value of each cargo in Timbuktu (there are five kinds, and your caravans will carry a semi-random four units), is equal to the number of units stolen by the bandits. Dominion is an interesting (non-collectable) card game where the objective is to build a usable deck from ten different sets of cards (there are 50 different types to choose from if you have the expansion), and then use the deck to purchase more cards and victory points. Whilst enjoyable, the game is a bit too predictable for my taste. There are definitely optimal strategies with the suggested set ups, which, if you don't follow them, means you won't win. And following these strategies is less interesting. Definitely a "Jim" game. That reminds me, I must get my copy of Knightmare Chess back sometime.