Dog Park: Review
Information:
Mechanics: Time Track, Area Majority, Set Collection
Player Age: 10+Player Count: 1 - 4 PlayersTime to Play: 40 - 80 Minutes
Player Age: 10+
Introductions:
Dog Park is a game themed around the lavish lifestyle of being a dog walker. Players will play over four rounds, selecting new dogs to add to the kennel, selecting which dogs to send on walks, at what pace, and what locations to stop at during the walk and finally returning the dogs home. Players are pursuing reputation from their objective card, some dogs end-game scoring, and largely the set collection of certain breeds. Players will have to be willing to change the dogs they are walking, as well as the dogs in their kennel to fully optimise resources and achieve the majority of certain breeds.
Game Anatomy:
Dogs:
Each dog has an ability, breed type and cost on the left hand side. The cost is not needed when purchasing the dog instead this is spent every time the dog is walked.
Each dog's ability will either be used in certain phases outlined or create an end game scoring bonus.
Each dog will have a breed colour. This will be either of the seven breeds; toy, utility, terrier, gundog, hound, working, pastoral.
Park and Location Cards:
The park is the pathway players are going to take during the walking phase. This is a short path filled with resources, points and ways to do scout or swap actions. The path will split mid-way and players can choose to move up or continue straight.
Each round a new location card is revealed adding bonus actions or resources to locations for that round, or removing the benefit of the location. There are two location decks that the players can choose from the four player recommended plentiful or 2- 3 player rerouted park. At the players choice either is usable at any player count.
Resources:
There are four main resources, toys, treats, sticks and balls. These resources will be used to place dogs on the lead for the walk each round. Some dogs will also have end game scoring that will allow the player to convert certain resources into points at the end of the game.
Reputation:
Reputation is essential as a dog walker, this is the players points. However they will also be used during the game to bid on what two dogs they would like to gain to their kennel each round, if a player lands on another player during the walking phase and wants to gain the benefits of the location they will also need to spend one reputation.
Breed Experts:
Each breed in the game (represented by the dog cards colour) will have a breed expert card. These breed expert cards will randomly be dealt with determining the value of points that the player with the most of each breed type will gain at the end of the game. In the case of a tie, it will be friendly and any tied players at the end of the game will both gain points.
Objectives:
Each player will be dealt a standard and expert objective at the start of the game. They will need to select one of these objectives to be a scoring bonus. The standard is easier to achieve but awards less points, while the expert is more challenging.
Forecasts:
These don't have to be used in the game, but what they offer is a change of condition to the current round. These give new conditions that players have to factor in, normally based around certain dog breeds.
Setup:
Game Setup:
- Place the bone containers within reach of all players.
- Pick which location card deck is in use.
- Shuffle the forecast cards and deal four at the top of the park board, one for each round.
- Shuffle the breed expert cards and deal all seven starting with the top of the expert award space.
- Shuffle the dog deck, half of the dog cards can go back into the box they won't be needed this game.
- Reveal dog cards equal to the player count.
- Place the round tracker (bird) at the start of the first round and give the fort player marker (doghouse) to the first player.
Player Setup:
- Place each player's reputation marker on five on the reputation track.
How To Play:
Dog Park is played over four rounds, then a final scoring will commence. Each round is broken into recruiting dogs, selecting the dogs for the walk, walking then returning home to rest.
At the end of the game players will score each breed expert, determining which players have the majority of each breed, score each player's dogs in their kennel which score and reveal and score each player's objective.
Recruitment:
Each recruitment phase will have two rounds of bidding. These bids will work the same. Each player in turn order, select secretly how much reputation they would like to spend to recruit their chosen dog. Players may and often select the same dogs. When everyone has placed their bid all is revealed. If the dog is uncontested the player will spend their reputation and recruit that dog. If there is competition the player who bids the highest reputation will spend their reputation (ties are broken in turn order). The player(s) that didn't win in turn order will spend one reputation instead and recruit another dog. After each bid, dogs equal to the player count are revealed. This occurs even after the second bid since the dogs can be interacted with during the walk.
Selection:
Each player will select one to three dogs in their kennel that they would like to walk this round. Each resource cost on the left hand side must be paid. Some dogs will activate their abilities when selected. Each selected dog will gain a collar token, representing the amount they have been walked in the game.
Walking:
In player order, each player will walk their dog through the park any amount of spaces forward between one and four. If there is no one at this location they will gain the benefits at the location and if any are placed this round. If someone else is at the location the player can still gain the benefits they simply have to pay one reputation.
Players will continue to do this in turn order until each player reaches the end of the park gaining any bonus shown they choose (with no other walker there). The last player in the park will immediately leave the park and gain no bonus.
Home Time:
Players will now return their dogs back to the kennel. Each dog walked this round will gain the player two reputation, any dog in the kennel without a collar will lose the player one reputation.
A series of end of round effects will now occur:
- Each player gains their walker back
- The current round forecast will be flipped face-down.
- All locations bonuses are removed, a new bonus card is revealed and placed on the locations.
- The round tracker is moved up to the recruitment phase of the next round.
- If that was the fourth round end-game scoring occurs; reputation for players objective, majority for the each breed and any end game scoring on dogs in players kennels.
Final Thoughts:
- Great theme that matches gameplay.
- Player colours are very close and feel confusing when setting up the game and matching player boards.
Dog Park is an easy to learn game loop. Players are bidding on which dogs they would like to add to their kennel using their hard earned reputation (the points of the game). Then selecting which dogs to walk by paying their cost and gaining their benefits. Players have to weigh up sending numerous dogs on the walk to earn more reputation with spending the low amount of resources they have. They also have to balance sharing which dogs they walk since dogs without collars lose players points each round and keeping the dogs with interesting abilities on the lead can help generate resources or points. The actual dog walking is a very easy time track that has players moving in player order deciding which locations they wish to visit and ultimately gaining the extra bonus at the end by not being the last player on the track. The forecasts and location bonus cards sprinkle some more decisions into the mix. Ultimately the two main ways players will score are through scoring benefits that certain dogs create when gained and through collecting the majority of the highly sought after breeds. All breed types will score for the player with a majority but each breed has a different level they will score for (each game). Dog Park is a very welcoming game that has a great theme to match that. I tend to really enjoy animal theme games and personally don't feel dogs have enough of them (unlike cats). So Dog Park is a welcome edition to my collection that will be gaining many more plays as I discover how to best manipulate my kennel at the right time to hold the majority of the right dog breeds. The only down side of the game is played colours represented through the player board, tokens and lead used to bid can be a bit confusing on how similar they are.
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