Aqueducks: Review
Introduction:
Aqueducks is a unique engine building game that has players building a tableu for four rounds that will mostly get demolished at the end of each round. The challenge is the players are not only building a tableu but a literal house of cards where building next to certain cards can be a criteria in the case of flowing water or can be a element of scoring. This is done by building five districts a round (two cards leaning against each other) and converting aqueduck coins into points (gained through cards) by donating fiercer than the other players. At the end of the first three rounds players will gain new cards into their deck of various teirs. Not through purchasing but by drafting.
Game Anatomy:
Building Cards:
Each building card has several attributes to be outlined. The top of the card will contain a certain amount of ducks. The higher the ducks the higher the tier of cards. The higher tier of cards are more powerful but can also only be built on certain levels of the players city, shown by the cards on the left hand side of the card.
The resources required to play the card are also established on the left hand side of the card in a banner. These resources are not spent as the card is played but simply needed.
The water symbol shown near this banner means the card will have to be placed adjacent (not diagonally) to a card producing a water (aqueduck).
When considering adjacency in the game the best way to view this is to look at the side of the city on the left or right side and view the side as not 3D but 2D. This image from the rulebook explains adjacency the best. But essentially a card can be further back then it's adjacent card but as long as it is not covered it will count as adjacent.
Each card will have different resources that are produced, shown at the bottom of the card when they are visible from the left or right side of the city.
Each card will also have an effect which will produce more resources if adjacent to certain cards, produce an immediate way of gaining duckrats (coins), or a way to gain duckrats at the scoring stage at the end of the round. Cards will only produce the resource or resolve their effects if they are active at the time the effect is resolved.
A card is no longer active if a district is placed covering the card. The benefit of inactive cards is their resources costs do not need to be met if they are going to be placed as an inactive card.
Protection Cards:
Protection cards will keep cards in play for the rest of the rounds. For the first three rounds, districts matching the round number will be protected. If a district was placed as an inactive card during the round they can be protected and bypass the resource cost, by allowing the inactive side to be active in the next round. This strategy cannot be used for inactive cards on the wrong card level.
Player Board:
The player board will be used to track the resources gained and lost, shown on the cards throughout the game.
This is a great way to instantly look at eligible placement and to quickly access scoring conditions at the end of each round. At the top of the player board there is also a unique effect for each faction, allowing benefits like bulding a bigger city, gain a wild resource or increase hand size.
Each faction contains its own starting deck, starting resources, and stack of protection cards. The other relevant details on the player board is each board contains an appreciated player aid.
Duckrats (coins):
The duckrats will be gained throughout the game during initial placement and end of round from the building cards. They appear in numerous currencies of 1, 3, 5, 10, 20 and 50 (all expressed with Roman numerals). In the solo game these coins correlate directly into points. However, at any other player count the coins aren't points instead they are a currency used to bid (kind of) for points in the donation phase.
Pondifex Board:
The pondifex board contains a round summary and the score track. The main use for this board is donating duckrats into points. This will be explained more in the donation phase but essentially players will need to manage the cross, gem and military resources to gain the upper hand in this phase.
Setup:
- Place the duckrats in piles of their value at the centre of the board.
- Create a unique shuffled pile for the three tiers of building cards (as shown by the ducks).
- Let each player choose a faction including their cards, donation cards, resource cubes and their player board.
- Each player will select the two building cards with the solid banner on the right of the card. Creating their first district and placing a protection card underneath.
- Each players starting deck is now shuffled and each player is dealt a six card hand which is displayed face-up.
How to Play:
Aqueducks is a four era game which is played simultaneously for the majority of the game with the donation phase being the exception. These phases are broken down into build, donate, end of era, protect, downfall and draft. As shown below each round is broken into these phases, the consecutive build phases can be resolved at the same time as long as players do not have more build phases than permitted.
Build:
Each era there are three build phases before the first donate phase and then two more build phases after. In the build phase each player simultaneously will create one district. This is done by choosing two cards from their hand combining them back to back (like a house of cards) making the face of the cards visible. This new district can be placed anywhere in the players city of five row long and three column wide. District cards can be placed on top of two districts below them creating a higher tier, like a house of cards. The higher tier cards are required to be placed higher shown in the top left.
When a side of the district is blocked by another district its effects and costs to play are inactive (no cost or resource produced). Any active sides of the district need the proper resources to be already in the players city and need water adjacent if required (if water is part of the cost). After placing a district players need to increase their player board to signify the resources gained.
On a build phase players can pay five coins to discard up to six cards and re-draw if they cannot or choose not to work with the cards in their hand. Once the build phase is done players will draw two more cards to replenish their hand and continue with the next build phase or other phase.
Donate:
The donate phase has players converting their earned duckrats into points using the pondifex boards. Starting with the player with the most faith (purple resource) then the player with the next highest faith. Players will donate their duckrats allowing access to one of the rows. Ranging from 10 duckrats to 200 duckrats. The player will place their piece in the left most available spot. The further left grants more points. If the player has more military (red resource) then any other player in that row they can push all of the other players down and take the coveted spot.
When donating players also have to factor in the luxury (light green resource) bonus. If a player has enough luxury in their city requested by the donation row they will gain a point bonus. For example if donating 25 duckrats the player will gain a bonus of two points if they have two luxury.
End of Era:
During this phase all of the end of era effects on active sides of districts will now occur. A lot of these end of era effects are easily resolved by looking at the resources listed on a player's board. Some end of era effects are not based on total resources but certain resources on cards adjacent to these cards.
Protect:
Based on the era players are in they will be able to protect that many districts keeping the districts in play for the rest of the game. This does not occur in era four but in era 1, 2 and 3 there will be 1, 2 and 3 districts protected. To protect a district on a higher tier the districts below have to be protected. If a side of the district was played inactive (and the resources were not met) the player can protect this district and when the district covering that card is demolished the resources will not need to be met and immediately becomes active. If the inactive card is on an illegal tier it cannot be protected. This is a strategy that can be employed in earlier era's to gain coveted resources or fortunate duckrat scoring.
Downfall:
The tableu that has been built this round will now be dismantled for each player instead of the protected cards. Every district that is dismantled will go back into the players deck to return possibly in the next era. Players will have to now look at their remaining districts and reset their resources on their player board match.
Draft:
Shown in the table below each era will have a different selection of cards dealt to each player. By selecting one and passing the cards to the right simultaneously, players will draft 6 more cards into their deck for the next era. Each player will shuffle their discard pile, deck and new cards together to form a new deck for the next era.
Final Thoughts:
- Deck building done with a draft which keeps the game from being slowed down but still allows players agency in how they want their city to develop.
- Range of factions with unique starting district, starting resources and abilities.
- Really enjoy that some parts of the city are saved and the rest is demolished at the end of every round, allows multiple ways for players to develop their city.
- Can be prone to analysis paralysis for new players and players more susceptible to AP.
- By the nature of the game the cards won't last. I wish the cards were plastic but understand the cost.
Aqueducts is an interesting mix of many elements. The game itself is firstly unique creating a house of cards display. This concept is more than a gimmick, it actually creates a unique spatial puzzle where players are trying to carefully curate their districts to create the right scoring possibilities and adjacency needed. The game is played over four rounds, where players will build five districts, bid over points using three different resources as turn order, brute force and bonus points, choose some districts to remain for the game and demolish the rest of the city, adding cards to each player's deck not through purchasing but by a draft at the end of each round. This build, then destroy and build something greater loop creates an interesting game that can be challenging to learn the logistics of at first, but once understood creates and engaging puzzle that I know for my collection it will be staying around, since I have nothing that scratches the same itch. If you enjoy engine building games that have a spatial puzzle this is definitely a unique gem to seek.
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