Yeah I know, but considering everything currently going on in politics, I had to give it that title. In today’s segment we return to Heady Hollow to play Carcassonne: The Dice Game to build walls! We enjoyed the Rowdy Root Beer and 60 Horses Scotch Ale to help us roll for those fortifying castle walls. Carcassonne as a dice game? This is a very interesting concept compared to it’s predecessor with nearly a hundred tiles and multi-colored meeples sweeping across the land. However, we still have the same end goal, to build lots of walls! This version is essentially a micro version of the same concept, except we’re using dice instead of tiles and this version can be played in 10 minutes. The idea came about for a tenth anniversary edition when many gamers backed the idea for dice rolling mechanics for the original. Follow us back into France as we continue to build cities faster than ever.
The players roll the dice in turn order. Everyone decides on the starting player and this player takes the 9 dice into their hand to begin the first round. On their turn, the players will roll then passes the dice to his or her left who continues their turn. On their first turn, if they roll one or more catapults, the player passes those dice immediately to the player on his or her left. The active player who rolls the catapult may not re-roll the catapults nor score points for his or her roll. When the active player rolls knights and city segments, they may set them aside or re-roll them as they choose.
When it comes to city building, the player rolls their dice to build as large of a city as possible. The active player scores the number of dice in his or her largest city. The rules are, the black parts are the city segments, and the black parts are played next to black parts and white parts are played next to white parts, always making sure they are properly closed in. As far as scoring is concerned, only the dice of the largest closed city are scored. If the player did not build a closed city, that player scores no points. If the player has a knight at the beginning of their turn, they double their score for that turn. The points are scored from the following criteria:
3 dice = 1 point
4 dice = 3 points
5 dice = 6 points
6 dice = 10 points
7 dice = 15 points
8 dice = 21 points
9 dice = 28 points
The game ends as soon as a player has scored 42 total points, winning the game.
The game can end much faster if the rolls are in your favor. This picture is one example of me rolling a lucky hand and all 9 dice landed on wall pieces. This earned me the highest score possible for a single turn at 28 points and the game ended a lot faster than we anticipated. To us, this game is alright. The concept of rolling dice to build cities is pretty cool. We love rolling dice! The game comes in a tin which is a draw back, but if it wasn't made as a tin, it may have been harder to form it into a small meeple, which is a cute touch. The game is very portable since it's a micro game, and it conveniently comes with a small pad of paper and pencil for keeping score. The dice are good quality. The images are nicely engraved in the dice, and they are somewhat weighted which is nice. From a conceptual standpoint, the game itself is extremely light weight and can be learned and then played in 10 to 15 minutes. It's very ideal as a filler game or even a travel game for trips. The instructions are well written and printed on a meeple shaped booklet that fits perfectly into the meeple tin. If we want to play Carcassonne we will reach for our full box versions, but this one is okay if you just want something for on the go or even collect as a fun little filler game for 2 - 5 players.
Carcassonne: The Dice Game
Overall Meeple Rating: 6/10
Game Mechanics:
1) Dice Rolling
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