Re: [piecepack] A post about games! (Chariots)

["Mike Schoessow" <mikeschoessow@...>]

>> I think it will only really play well with four players. It was just
>> about OK with three, but it would be terrible with two. This is
>> because the fun lies in trying to squeeze the other competitors out
>> of the inside track and trying to force them to crash. It might be
>> worth taking the central column of tiles out of the straight the next
>> time we play with three, in order to compress the interest of
>> jockeying around the corners.

>I've come to the same conclusion myself.  I will be updating the game in
>the near future to add some of the suggested special actions to the
>game.  Thanks to all who made suggestions; more are welcome.  As
>part of that update, I'll suggest that with two players each player
>races two chariots.  

One of my favorite ideas for playing 4-to 6-player games (including race games) with only two players is to have each player play two or three parts, but then have each player count only their trailing car (in the case of a race game) at the end. This scheme prevents players from building their strategy around a *favorite* car at the expense of others. In fact, it forces players to work equally hard for all of their cars. I use this with my own race game, Racepack, and have also used it with New City, where it is particularly effective. Among non-piecepack games, it works well with Acquire, Mississippi Queen, MarraCash, Elfenland, and I'm sure other games that I haven't tried it with yet.

-Mike