Cascadia

Welcome to Replayable, where we go into depth on our favorite tabletop games that keep us coming back again and again. I'm the start player Todd, and today I'm joined by Megan and Dave for our 23rd episode. We will be enjoying the landscapes of the Pacific Northwest in Cascadia. It was designed by Randy Flynn with artwork by Beth Sobel. It was released by FlatOut Games in 2021. Are you two ready to soar with eagles or at least with hawks? Yeah, I'm wearing flannel and listening to grunge.

You're jumping ahead to one of the later questions. I'm ready to go. I'm at the trailhead. Let's let's kick this off. All right. Cascadia is a tile laying and token drafting game featuring the habitats and wildlife of the Pacific Northwest. On your turn, you choose a new habitat tile that's paired with a wildlife token. You place that tile next to the other ones in your tableau, and then you may place the wildlife token on an appropriate habitat tile or discard it.

Each animal type scores differently, and there are bonuses for having the largest habitats. Let's talk about the theme of this game. How do you feel about the conservation theme that is creating harmonious ecosystems? How does it make you feel? I'll say I mean, I think the game is a vibe. That's part of what it's one of those games that it's a relaxing play, even though there's a lot to think about.

There's a lot going on, but it is in some ways like a walk in the park or something like that, that it's an enjoyable play. In fact, Megan, you have a tile laying game that is a very like relaxing, like it's intended to be. What is that game? A Gentle Rain. Yes. So it's not quite like a Gentle Rain where it's almost meditative when you play, but it's still like a nice walk through, you know, nice hike through the state park.

Yeah, it's interesting that you brought up a Gentle Rain because I would not have made that comparison. But now that you've said it, I'm like, oh, that's interesting. I will say I was taught the game by someone who already knew it the first time I played. So I was not referring to the rulebook. So I don't know that I even knew that there was a theme regarding a harmonious ecosystem. I just thought it was this kind of Pacific Northwest forest vibe.

And so perhaps if that was someone's goal for me to just get that it was about a harmonious ecosystem without reading that in the rulebook, they maybe didn't achieve that goal. Just putting that out there. Right. I mean, you don't necessarily have to have the bears next to the salmon so they can eat them. It's not that tightly interwoven. We'll get into theme later. I have some things to say. All right. Let's talk about a throwback here to these tile laying games.

It feels like these aren't as common as maybe they once were. You mean because of the rise of polyaminos? Right. So the idea that you have atomic shapes that are being laid used to be squares. If we're going to talk about Carcassonne and a lot of the other tile laying games that came out around that time. But here we have hexagons, but still tile laying games in general kind of feel like a throwback to me. Well, like our friend Paul says, hexagons are the bestagons.

Hey, that's a great YouTube video. In tile laying games. Wait, I thought he just made that up. I didn't know that came from something else. I thought I was giving credit to where it originated. The YouTuber is CGPGrey, G-R-E-Y. And that's literally the name. And he talks about how the hexagon is the bestagon because it occurs so many times even in nature like tiny combs. Right. So is that not even gaming or is it gaming? Completely unrelated to gaming. Just literally about the six sided figure.

Mm hmm. OK. Wow. So educational, too. I've learned something. We just started and I've learned something. What are we talking about? Well, OK. So tile laying games these days are from the beginning of tile laying times. Like you said, there's squares, hexes, and now kind of the flavor of the month now is polyaminos. Or if you're Kinesia, you just do a square tile and then a year or two later do the hexagon version of that game.

I'm convinced he's designed half as many games as he gets credit for. He just redos them as hexagons. Right. First, we have Tiggers and Euphrates and then we get Yellow and Yanksy and. Yes. My city, my island. Yeah. But yeah, it's because of the rise of polyaminos, I think tile laying is still alive and well. I just think we're seeing it as polyaminos, which we saw with Princess and Florence 20 years ago. But now I feel like we're seeing a lot more like Uwe Rosenberg got into it.

Right. And then that's every third game he designs now is polyamino play. It's Tetris. Oh, yeah. He had a run of those. Absolutely. And then animals. So we've got tile laying and animals slash zoos is another popular trend and theme at the moment. Well, yeah, because moving away from colonialism and things like that, we're getting into anthropomorphized animals, actual animals. Nature themes are easy because who's going to argue with that? You know, you can't really step on anybody's toes there.

I mean, this is a very different game if it's about like what gerrymandering, where we're segregating neighborhoods or something like that. Like all of a sudden, this is a very touchy game. You know, there is a game about that, though. Cafe International, you mean? No, no, no, no. No, literally about gerrymandering. And it was like for every game sold, they were going to send one to the U.S. Capitol building. Oh, I think we should do an episode.

On Cafe International and then edit out all the inappropriate stuff and it'd be like 10 minutes. If that, yeah, I don't think I can get far enough away from that idea. No, right. We've got this building of harmonious ecosystems that may not exactly be the intuitive idea. We've got tile laying, which is alive and well in polyaminos, but we've gone back to hexes. What about the idea of the scoring in this game? I mean, most of a thing of a habitat makes sense.

If I have the longest river, if I have the biggest mountain range, I can see why there would be a bonus there. But the way the animals score and the way that interacts is completely different. Is that a challenge for you? I know it is for me, seeing how I'm going to make these different animal requirements fit together while I'm building out the map. Yeah, I'll say for me, I love the creating the habitat where everything matches up nicely. I hate having like a mismatch of two different habitats.

And so sometimes my focus is so much on that that I I won't let myself make a mismatch, even though it's going to end up scoring me more points because of the animals I can place, just because it drives me nuts to mess up the pattern. Right. I want that nice pattern. And so I think there can be a little tension there. If I were Paul, I would be mapping it out and determining what is the optimal move.

But when I'm playing as myself, which maybe I should do a little bit less of, I'm more like, hey, my board doesn't have enough mountain on it right now. I want more mountain. And that's probably a silly way to play. But it's what brings me joy. So there you go. Yeah, we've stepped on my comments for theme a couple of times now, so I might as well just put them in here. Let's just do it. Yeah. Thematically, it's kind of a mess.

There's sometimes where it works, maybe bears and pears, a run of salmon. There's sometimes where that sort of works. But like hawks don't like other hawks, but they kind of want to see them from afar. Like it starts to get a little strange, you know, sometimes elk like to be lonesome elks. And sometimes elks like to hang out in threes. So there is some kind of abstract overlay that really works as a game, but doesn't really track thematically.

And I don't really the shining example is the Sam salmon or the prairie salmon, where I could just put a salmon in the middle of this prairie. In the middle of the field, there's a salmon, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's interesting in that the patterns you're going for with the animals are largely separate from the habitats that are underneath them. Right. I think this is two different games happening at the same time.

Correct. And we'll get to that when we talk about games that remind us of these, because that is a theme that I think carries through strongly in Cascadia and makes me think of other games as well. Do you ever have do you ever think about not placing animals? So obviously on your turn, you're going to pick up a habitat tile and a paired wildlife token. And while you must play that tile, you don't have to play the token.

Do you ever consider not playing the animal token because you're saving that spot for a better scoring grouping of a different animal? Yes, I feel like it happens more to me toward the end game than at the beginning, just because at the end, things have narrowed down a bit. Right. I know exactly what I'm going for at the end in a way that I maybe don't at the beginning. And so there's times where, oh, I see the potential.

I can get the one last thing I need to score big points, and I'm not going to let this stupid fox get in the way of my victory. And so I think there have been times where I've chosen not to play an animal. But I think at the beginning, I don't see myself doing it. I would rather just get things on the board and give myself options for later in the game. If that's a good strategy, I'm not there yet on my learning curve. There's 100 wildlife tokens in the game, and you're going to get 20 of them.

And so, like Megan said, especially beginning in the beginning or maybe even the mid game, you're not going to do something like that. But even in the end game, I feel like if you're going for this exact animal has to go here, you're kind of shooting for an inside straight. But I don't know if the unless you've been counting, I don't know if the odds are really in your favor that that bear is going to come out. And if it does, you'd better have a nature token in order to grab that bear.

So I feel like if you're doing that, you're maybe not listening to what the game is giving you. I don't know. Like I said, maybe that is the strategy. And I'm just not there on my learning curve yet. But I feel like when you're doing that, you're fishing for a salmon. Nice. Nice. Maybe quite literally. But for something like that really might not come up when you plan that, didn't you? Yeah, I was trying to avoid it, honestly, that whole time.

But I just don't know if the odds are there late in the game unless you've been counting salmon. And I'm not certainly not playing on that level. I have an idea of the distribution, but I'm not counting the animals yet. I guess I could count it on other people's boards. Well, and if you had more than one nature token, then you could spend one to clear the board, right, and get a fresh set. So you can go looking for it.

There's no limit to the number of nature tokens you can spend on a single turn if you wanted to wipe the board multiple times. So then let's talk about those nature tokens, those pine cones. Do you have a strategy for them? I don't yet have a strategy for pine cones. I feel like I had a game where I was chasing them maybe too much, and that was a problem. And so then the next game, I swung the other way and was like, I'm just going to have my plan. Who cares about pine cones?

And then I tasted the bitter flavor of defeat. And so I think feeling strongly one way or the other didn't help me. So maybe I need to figure out a Goldilocks nature token strategy. I don't know. Teach me Yosemite, David. Well, I know I don't have the solution to it, but I think the existence of the pine cones or the nature tokens, that to me, I think shows good game design because this is a game where the luck could totally destroy you on just what's available.

So to have this element in there that's going to allow you to to mess with that. And we're seeing that in quite a few games is when a game starts to realize that it could be luck driven, it's going to give you something to mitigate that luck. And in this case, those nature tokens, I think you got to get a handful of them early. And we played the other day with John and he just mopped the floor with us or mopped the trail with us.

I don't know what the metaphor would be there. Whatever it is, you did the trail with us. Yeah. And he got a lot of pine cones early and I felt like he used a pine cone on every turn. I'm where are these coming from? But he really focused on those keystone tiles early. And I guess there has to be a balance there where, like you said, Megan, where you run into trouble, where you get too many.

Well, now your habitat is not as exciting because for every keystone tile you get, that's one less habitat. I don't know, because you either get one habitat on a tile or two habitats on a tile. And so if you take that keystone, what would you call it? One less habitat point, right? I guess at the end. Yeah. Unless you're using the expansion, which we'll get to in a bit, because then you have more keystone tiles and keystone tiles that have multiple habitats on them.

In fact, I think the thing with the keystone tile is that it only has a single animal, right? In the base game. In the base game, of course. Yeah, I think you need to have one. I mean, definitely, I like the idea of going for multiple nature tokens early while you're still trying to assemble a habitat that's going to support the animal structure and the visualization of how they're going to interact that you may have in mind.

And so early on, it's like, fine, I'm going to draw. I'm going to grab a keystone tile. I'm going to play it. And if I can capture a pine cone, then great. I think like towards the end of the game, I like having one in reserve. I don't want to have to use it. But if I get down to zero, I get nervous, right? I'm starting to look for, OK, how do I pick up on the other easy one right now?

Because it's going to happen where, like you said, when you go fishing for that salmon, I'm going to keep using that line. I'm going to go fishing for elk. Yeah, that doesn't work as well, right? So I need to be able to have a token when I need it in that moment. Yes. Is it the best to get a little of everything or like we talked about the habitats here? I don't know if you can actually compete to have the most in all five of them, right?

You have to pick and choose your battles and which ones can you realistically win. So what are your thoughts about trying to do well in a few or try to get a little of everything? So there's two different games, like we talked about happening at the same time on the table. So there's your habitat game and then there's your wildlife game. So you're talking about specifically for habitat. I don't think it's possible to get most and a majority in all of them, even in a two player game, right?

Because, you know, the math just isn't going to work out that way. But we were chatting about it earlier. You get 20 turns. So you're going to get 20 tiles. What is it? Twenty five percent? No, forty one percent of the tiles are keystone tiles in the base game. So basically you're looking at I did the math, if I could just look at it closely here. But forty one percent just have a single habitat on them. About fifty nine percent, sixty percent have two habitats on them.

So to win a corridor, it's going to take four to seven based on my games. I went back and looked over the scores and you're going to need four to seven in a corridor to win that majority. Well, you're only getting maybe 30 habitats in total when you average out what you're drawing, especially if you're trying to focus on keystone. So you can't get seven of five different habitats. So you're going to have to kind of pick your battles on those.

Nice. OK. And how much of this game do you feel is heads down versus heads up in that respect? Like, are you tracking how many tiles in a habitat the other players have? I think you do need to be. And that is tough, especially when you're playing in numbers beyond two player, because I think then you're having to weigh those decisions of, hey, I know that Todd really wants his tile. That's what's going to, you know, get him the most in this habitat.

And I know if he gets his habitat, he's going to be able to play this other animal on it. So it's going to, you know, get him these bonuses that are really great. And so I don't want to let that happen. But this tile doesn't help me a ton. It helps me in that it hurts Todd. Right. So I take it. But I take it. And then I bear the cost of that. And David's like, great. Megan just took a tile that's not great for her, but she's blocking Todd.

This is perfect. And now Megan just king made me wonderful. You know, and and so I think that's why we're talking about this game. I think if it didn't have that level of strategy to it, it might be a little too light for this podcast. And I think that it's having to do that calculus that is what makes the game popular at the moment and makes it worth talking about here. Right.

To be fair, you know, as of the recording data, this pod, it's number 44 on board game geek overall, and it's the number six rated family game. So there's definitely a lot of allure that it has, even if it is not as strategically deep as some of the other games we've discussed. Shout out to the artist Beth Sobel, who has a collection of these kind of nature themed art games. And her designs, I think are fantastic.

I think some people have complained a little bit that when you even when you match up your tiles perfectly and you get your nice habitats, it still can kind of look a little hodgepodgey. But I say all the more for the artist that she made it super functional and also, I think, very aesthetic. You know, it looks it looks very good. So I'm happy with it. I totally agree with that. I think she did Arboretum, which is also gorgeous.

Yes. And lanterns, which I almost mentioned that earlier as far as tile laying and, you know, it kind of it starts to build this kind of beautiful lantern festival tableau. We talked about the two games that overlay on top of each other. And as it is in the base game, I think the wildlife token game, the animals game is going to score you about 60 to 70 percent of your total score. And then your habitat game is 30 to 40 percent of your total score.

So you talked about what's more important, getting the land that you want or getting the animal that you want. I think in the end, the animals are the lion's share of your of your game. Is that what you were fishing for? Let's just keep using fishing. We'll keep at it. And that's exactly what I was looking for, because does that division slide based on player count? So, like in some games, you'll see more points come from one style.

And then the more players you add, it slides and tilts in a different direction. Do you think maybe that happens here because the land score you're going to get from habitats is going to be higher at a two player game because you're only competing against one other person for a majority in those land points, whereas in a four player game, perhaps animals are stronger? I think it's probably pretty negligible because for majorities, what's up for grabs?

Fifteen points for if you get all the majorities and then second place, it's got to score differently for two player. I haven't I've only played two player once. I don't remember offhand how the scoring works. But still, getting all the majorities, it's three points for a majority and there's five of them. So that's only a total of even if you got them all, that's 15 points.

So going from a two player game when you're looking to get two or three of them versus a four player game where you're hoping to get one or two of them, you're really only talking about a three to six point swing. So I don't think it's ways that much. Yeah, that's fair. OK. I think it's still all about the animals at all times. Yeah. You've convinced me. Me too.

Well, and about the distribution, too, so because it really opened my eyes when you reminded me you only get 20 turns that I hadn't sat and done that math yet. So that means it kind of sways, like we were saying, because there's the keystone tiles and then the dual habitat tiles. But the animals, you're only going to get 20 animals and there are five different ways to score animals. Therefore, the baseline number is four animals if you're going to be evenly distributed.

So I think when you're evaluating those wildlife scoring cards in the beginning of the game, you're going to want to look at what is for get me versus what is three get me. Do I want to go to five? Because if you're going to go to seven and salmon, you have to decide which animal you're only going to get zero, one or two of if you want to get seven salmon. And it's usually in those higher end ones when you're getting five, six, seven of a certain kind of animal

where your score really starts to jump. Right. But then if I leave you all the elk, you're going to run away with all the elk. And I think that's where it becomes a pretty fun dance. Right. So Megan, you mentioned taking a tile to block me. But then David's like, great, do you think there's a lot of room for spite drafting in this game? And I don't because of what David just said, where, you know, the exact limit on turns, how many tiles you're going to be getting.

And I think if you are focused so much on preventing someone else from being successful, man, the stars really have to line up for a tile to both prevent someone else and be exactly what you need. Right. So I think you are probably better off focusing on your own success. And hey, if someone groans when you take that tile and that animal, more is the better. But I think you need to focus on your own victory, because I think you're not going to be able to be as successful.

I don't think there's as much the players don't have as much power to really hurt each other, I don't think. And also be successful themselves. Right. I look at it more like if my river is up to five or six in length and David's the next nearest player at four. OK, then I'm going to stop looking at extending my river unless that's the only one out there that I can reasonably place without altering my animal compositions. So I look at it as far as that goes.

But then if David picks up another river tile and so now he's just one away, I might start thinking, maybe I want to secure that length. Even then, now I'm thinking about it. Dave, you mentioned what it really means in the course of the game. Maybe I'm OK if you catch up. It's only if it's only if you get even. And now I'm afraid that you're going to pull ahead, you know, then I might take a look at trying to extend the lead. So you saying that brought something else to mind for me, Todd.

So I appreciate what you just said. I do think I have had experiences where the available animals and tiles like did not match, you know. And so all you had were like three salmon and a hawk out there. And the tiles didn't even have any place where you could put a salmon or a hawk. And you're going around with people like taking something and being like, oh, I don't really want this, but I'm taking it.

And then you reach into that cloth bag and you just pull out another salmon and you're like, oh. And all you want is someone to spend the nature token and wipe that tableau so that you get all new. And and they don't. And they're just like, no, I took crap. You have to take crap. Let's just be in this together, taking what we don't want.

And I think sometimes that is where I've actually seen some of the like spite play, because it's like, oh, me playing the nature token helps me, but it helps everyone else to, you know. And so there's a little bit that you're weighing there as well. I would say that that definitely probably change, definitely probably sorry. That definitely probably changes over player count. So in a two player game, I might hate draft because it's zero sum in a four player game.

I'm not going to take a tile that's amazing for you if it's nothing for me. Maybe if it's a little bit for me, I'll take one for the team. Right. But and like you were getting at to Tata, you know, if you get into brinksmanship, like if you and I get into a battle over mountains, then that's great for Megan. She can run away with two or three other categories while we're exactly. Yeah. And that's the case with any three player area majority, area control majority, whatever.

That's always the case. Right. But then each tile that you have in that region is a point right in your largest one. It's got to be in your largest corridor. Yes. Yes. So if you can keep extending that corridor, even if you've you may be giving up the majority bonus somewhere else, but you're still getting a point for each additional one that you add there. This does feel like this is a game of small victories. Yeah. When it comes to the habitat. Right.

The animals, like we've been saying, it's that's a separate game. It is. And that one, you know, sure, there are small victories. This one's only three points, but you're really building up to those. Your fifth animal that's giving you five points or sixth animal that's giving you that many points or something like that. But yes, in the habitat or 12. Right. Well, and in ties, you split it right. So you're not lost if we get into a little bit of brinksmanship and we tie.

But if you get into brinksmanship and get second place, then that's a little bit of trouble. Avoid that at all costs. I agree, Dave. So that let's move on to the prompts. Weight and complexity on board game, Geek scale of one to five. No decimals, please. How would you rate the complexity of Cascadia? Megan, why don't you start? I give it a two. I'm thinking about some of the other games that have been discussed on this podcast. And I think we're saying this is certainly not a heavy game.

And I think a Greek law, I think the three of you said that that was a three. And I think if a Greek law is a three and I don't think this is a one because I think like checkers is a one, then I'd put this at a two. There's some things to think about, but I think it's an easy teach and I think it's also an easy play. I don't see us going for 20 or even 10 plays of this in a year. I don't know that there's that much meat on the bone or fish on the fish spine.

Wow. I forgot we were using fish metaphors this time. Did we really all say a Greek law was a three? You and Paul did. I said it was a four. I feel like it was a four. I don't know what I was talking about. I should listen to that podcast. I'm always a month behind in my podcast. So when I hear it, even the ones that I'm on, I'm like, wow, this is really interesting stuff. It's all new to me. It was so long ago.

But yeah, because that's weird because a Greek law feels like a four to me because it's so hard. I don't know why I was I was probably just showing off. I'll go the other way with this one. And I think it's a three. And we didn't really get into our personal experiences with, you know, where we first played the game and all of that would like we sometimes do. But when I played this game, well, because this comes in here. When I first played this game, I hated it.

Maybe I was just cranky that night. Maybe. But I know part of it was I was expecting King Domino. I was expecting a very simple like it won the Dixville Dijar. It's super popular. Like this is just going to be, you know, walking the park, you know, a little Thailand game. Right. And I'm instantly like, well, wait, I just placed a bear that totally messes up my ox. I got nobody told me, you know, it was just way harder than I expected it to be.

Now, the more I play, the better I'm getting at that. But it's also kind of some calculations or spatial relations that don't always come easy for me. So I struggle with the game a little bit. So I'm going to have to bump it up to a three. And I started to like the game when I started to accept that this game's a little bit heavier than I was expected when I was going in, because I really didn't enjoy that experience. That's fair. I also had it down as a two.

I think either one of the games, if it was just Thailand, it's a one. If it was just the animal scoring, it'd be a one. But I think the way they weave together, it makes it a two for me. But I can appreciate the initial difficulty is in visualizing the pattern you're going to go for. Right. As far as how the animal scoring interacts.

Like if I have to have a fox and it's got to be surrounded by a bunch of different animals, then suddenly I got to start planning for a woman, put my bears in this area. I'm going to put my elk over here. And these two can't match all of that. Trying to visualize it at the start of the game. The game is hard for me. But once I have that map in my mind, I'm pretty good about drawing to it and trying to build it out.

Well, I have a question for you then that I think leads into our next one is, do you approach this as you would say, dominion, where you're going to look at the tableau we've been giving, the scoring tableau, and then set your strategy at the beginning of the game? They're like, OK, I'm going to I'm going to try to focus heavy on these two animals. They seem to work together. And that's the you know, the market strategy or whatever, when you get your dominion tableau that comes out. Right.

Or are you kind of giving everything equal weight? And let's just see how the tiles start coming. You mean this works well into the next question about strategy and how we'd rate it for strategy. Yes. I definitely look at how the animals scoring cards interact. And I try to come up with what is it I'm going to try to create for that map. And then I try to do the habitats as best as I can within that context. But if anything, it's going to suffer.

It's going to be the habitats while I'm trying to build out that map. At least that's how I play. By the way, I think I have only won two player games. And in more than that, I've gotten as close as second. But I don't think I've run away with a win yet. So mine may not be the best way to play. Well, so what would you give it for strategy? Yeah, I gave it a two.

I mean, even though there's a lot of strategy up front, the ability to execute on it is really governed by the tile selection you have when your turn comes around. So I don't feel like overarching strategy is always going to prevail because there's still, as we'll get to in the next question, a good amount of luck that is going to get in your way. What did you have? Again, maybe maybe I'm thinking this game's harder than it is. I have it as a three.

And that's because I think juggling five different scoring patterns in one game, it starts to become a little bit of a heavy load to bear. Maybe that's just me. Maybe this just isn't my strong suit to be stretched in five directions and doing spatial relations. Sorry, you said heavy load to bear there. I think you meant heavy load to salmon. I think you meant bear. But I'm just wondering how he's going to work Elfkin Hawks into it next. I'm getting there. All that Fox you yet? No, I'm not ready.

All right, Megan, how about you? How would you rate strategy of Cascadia? I agreed entirely with you, Todd. I don't we need to kick David off this pod. Maybe I'm just not getting the game. Yeah, I agree with you. It's a two. You can make plans, but they're only going to take you so far. And I think, you know, at the end of the day, whenever you're blindly sticking your hand in a bag, there's only so much strategy that's there. You know, right.

Yeah, maybe I'm being swayed because the last time I played was with the expansion and there's a little bit more going on there. And I haven't played I haven't played the base game in a little while. So maybe I'm being swayed by having that expansion fresh on my mind. That's fair. So then like how much you think luck plays a factor, Megan? I said it's a four and I just have a four and I have that bag draw. I mean, essentially what I just said. Right.

And because you can be in a situation where you don't have any of those pinecones and so you're just painfully draw one, take one, draw one, take one. And that just feels like all luck there. You know? Yeah. So I'll just go ahead and say I'm in lockstep with you here as well. I also had a down as a four and that's OK. I don't think games that have a lot of luck are empirically bad, not in the slightest. You just accept that that's what's part of this game. There's a fair amount of luck.

And sometimes the person going before you is going to draw the exact token and tile that you were hoping for and put them out there and your turn is made easy. And then sometimes they don't. Most of the time they don't. Yeah. How about you, Dave? What do you have it down for luck? I'm going to just stay out in weird land for the rest of the podcast because I got three. That's right. I feel like, you know, it's like any game like this.

When I don't do well, it I'm going to say it's so luck driven, but really it gives you the nature tokens. It gives you ways to mitigate that luck. And I think in the end, I don't know if you're the tile draw is going to make your game or even break your game. I think, you know, if you'd played differently early on, maybe you could keep yourself flexible as you get in the endgame.

If you get into a place where like only two tiles are going to work for you, maybe you painted yourself into that corner. But I don't ever feel like I don't ever feel like the game destroyed me. Obviously, by the way, I think the game's harder than everybody else. I always feel like I destroyed myself, you know, when I lose the game. And at the same time, I don't feel like I've lost to anybody that I feel like, well, they just got all the lucky draws.

Usually it's the player to their right left them all the lucky draws on the table. So, all right. So then Dave theme, let's talk about it. Well, I actually think the way I covered most of what I was thinking about theme is that, you know, the art gives a great vibe. You know, it really does a good job building these corridors that you kind of get this unique, you know, almost looking down at the fortnight map where it has all these different, you know, regions you can go to.

And there's the snowy area and the lakes over here and comes together really nicely. But I don't see the theme influencing the mechanisms or, you know, vice versa. It's instead you get this fox likes to be near pairs of animals for some reason. He's just a weird fox that likes, you know, one bear makes him angry, but two bears makes him happy. And then what are these points that we're actually getting that we've done this? You know, the victory points are abstracted.

It's not money or, you know, in Arc Nova, we talked about its reputation and prestige or, you know, things like that. And this they're just points because I've got an elk on the hill. I get abstracted victory points. So I don't see the theme working. This could have been anything. It could have been gerrymandering neighborhoods and it's still the same game, though I very much like the artwork in the theme. But I give it a what a two on theme. All right. Megan, what did you give it on theme?

It feels strange to say it, but I agree with David. I gave it a two. Yes. The look of the game is thematic. I love the specificity of the animals because they actually aren't. If you look at the cards, they aren't. It isn't just salmon. It's a chinook salmon and it's a red tailed hawk and it's a red fox. And I love that. And the person I've played this game the most with is John, the hiker in our group. This feels like a game you play with John. You know, it just does. And that's nice.

But just like you were saying, David, this could really these mechanics could go with any theme. I was actually just thinking of there's that Ted Allspot game Suburbia. Am I remembering that? Yeah. And this could be it's kind of similar to that where it could be, hey, I have to place my airport so far apart. And, you know, my my suburban houses all want to be together. It could be just someone actually make more sense.

Then I might say it's a three theme if it did that. Like you can't have two coffee shops on the same corner. Right. Right. Come on. What about the Starbucks that was inside of another Starbucks? I'm kidding. It's a joke. So, yeah, it does not feel you know, for me, I think a game with a somewhat similar theme, Wingspan, you know, you can feel there's some connection there. That's like a five with, you know, we talked about there's that marriage of the mechanics and the theme.

This is a nice theme, nice art, but there isn't that same synchronicity between the the mechanics and that theme. One hundred percent. I mean, I love the idea of building out the habitats and placing animals in them. And for the most part, they kind of make sense. Right. The field salmon doesn't. But there really isn't any correlation between the animals and the way that they score.

So I like the presentation of everything, but I don't feel that there's a strong connection between the game and the theme. So I also had it down as a two. All right. So favorite player count. What do you feel is the best player account for Cascadia? Megan? I enjoy this at three. I think there's something about the tension there at three. It's not too long between your turns. I think that, yeah, three is nice. I don't have more to say on it than that. That's what I like.

Yeah, I agree. One hundred percent. I think three is where it shines. I think four. There's just too long in between turns and you really can't plan ahead too much, it feels like, because the likelihood that one of the components that you're looking forward to, it could be a tile wildlife token pairing. But even if you have a nature token ready to go, something is going to get disrupted in the four player game.

So I like three. Well, I do agree with you guys on this one, although I did have a tough time kind of coming around to it because of the two different games, you know, the wildlife version of the game is definitely a three because we're kind of playing our own little puzzles. The corridors or the habitat version of the game, that part that's going on, I actually don't like that part of the game at three.

Like we were saying earlier, with any kind of majority control type games, three is tough because when two people get in a fight, the third person runs away with it. But because that's a lower percentage of your score, I'm going to settle on three because exactly like you guys were saying, four gets a little long.

It gets a little chaotic. I can't plan ahead because the tableau is not even going to be close to what it looked like, you know, at the end of my turn after three other people go and things get wiped. But, you know, shout out to two player, though, because it is a very strong two player game because then you can get into that.

What do they call it in Go like Senti and Goatee or Goat and Senti where I make a move that almost kind of forces your hand to make your move, which, you know, then I can take, you know, if there's two tiles I want, maybe I can force you to move this way. It almost has a little bit of that and it starts to become a little more of a chess match. And I do like that. So two players is fine. But three is number one.

Okay, excellent. Totally agree. So then what's your least favorite player count? Dave, you can start us off with that one. Well, like we were saying there, I'm going to go with four. I don't mind it at four player, but that lack of control over the board state and complete lack of control and the downtime between turns, I think, really starts to affect it.

Okay. Yeah, four for the same reasons. All right. I'm going to say one. And it's still a fun game. And the solo player, you know, they give you a campaign to follow and challenges to do. And it's a fun activity, but I would rather do something else and play Cascadia. For me, it's one. But I understand the reluctance at four, obviously. I think I think two and three is where it really shines. One is probably right, but there are a lot of people who love it at one. Yeah.

I was reading up on it and a ton of people really enjoy the single player. For me, I got other better single player games. Exactly. So an actual playing time, the box says boxes 30 to 45 minutes. So what they're really saying is that it's like the first person is 30 minutes and then everyone there after is adding five to it. How does that feel? Does that feel right?

I don't really have the data on it. I feel like it's closer to 60. Maybe a two player experienced game I could see coming in at 30 or the solo game, I guess. But my experience at three and four player again, because I'm apparently playing a much harder, deeper game than everybody else.

Maybe it's because I'm playing slow, but I'm 60 sounds more right because you do have to evaluate other player boards. And am I going to go fight for this and all that juggling? So I can't really see playing a three or four player game in 45 minutes.

Yeah, I'll say I felt like by the time the game ends, I'm really ready for it to end. And I think that it does feel like it runs a little longer. But I think almost every time I've played, it's either we've been teaching someone or it's been a long time between plays.

So there's been some refreshing so that I'm sure impacts the play time. Yeah, I think that the game is amongst experienced players, it could probably get down to that range. I think my two player games are in the 30 to 35 minute range. But I feel like, you know, you start adding the players and you having to reevaluate and try to maximize what you're going to be able to do with your tile selection. I think it's a little longer. I agree. I think it's in the 60 minute range expansion. So setting aside the promo cards for a moment, there's really only one major expansion to this game. And that is landmarks.

What do you guys think about landmarks? My knee jerk reaction, I guess is the same thing I say about every expansion is that it adds things without adding anything substantive. It adds five to six players, which would become my new least favorite player counts. Right? I would change my I have no interest in playing a six player Cascadia. And maybe there's two different tableaus when you do that. I don't know. I haven't looked into what the five six player game is like the more scoring cards and more tiles that you have.

And more tiles. Those are welcome. Right? The tiles have kind of corrected a little bit of you get some combinations that you didn't get very many of in the other game. But the actual landmarks itself, really, the only way I could see that being valuable is if you've just played a ton of Cascadia, your 50 to 100 games of Cascadia under your belt, and you just you're looking for something more. Really, what it does is it makes something you're already doing a little more important.

It rewards getting five a court or a five, which is something you're already kind of trying to do. It just makes it a little bit more of a race to do that. I felt that detracted from what the game is, but not not egregiously. So it's not you know, some expansions we really rail about in here really hate him. I didn't hate it. I just didn't see the need for it at I don't have 100 plays at the game. When I get to 100. Maybe I'll be begging for it.

I agree wholeheartedly with the new scoring cards for the animals. Great. You know, it new puzzles to solve or to integrate the added tiles and the combinations of habitats that they have on them. The addition of keystones on combinations of habitats is all interesting can make for a more, you know, nature token prosperous game.

So this is I don't say it's putting on an easy mode, but you can definitely get more of those on your side of the board and leverage them. So I like those things. I like that. But I also agree about the landmarks and it's adding more to the game that I don't think needs to be there. Moving on to most recognizable comparison. What's the highest ranking game that is most like this one? I'm gonna let Dave lead off with this.

This one feels obvious enough to where I was actually kind of afraid somebody might steal it or maybe not. But I'm gonna say Alhambra because as I'm laying out my tableau in front of me, I'm keeping an eye on how many of this one do you have? How many of this one do they have? Where am I falling when it comes to the majority of these?

Now in Alhambra, it's not just a straight draft. It's a little more complicated up front because you're buying them. And then in this game, it's in Cascadia, it's a little more complicated on the tail end because it's scoring differently. But for the most part, that portion of the game has a very similar feel to Alhambra. I like that. I didn't even think about that. Megan, what did you have?

I went with Kingdom Builder and I feel like this was the most obvious one and I was so scared that David was about to say that. But when I think about those endgame scoring cards and having those different objectives you're going towards and now you aren't laying out the habitats, but you're really paying attention to how you're building on those habitats. And so just yeah, something about that really feels similar to me.

Yeah, absolutely. I thought about that one too. I went with a long shot. I knew neither one of you were going to step on this one. I went with Taj Mahal because it was the first game I remember playing that I thought had two different games laying on top of each other because there's creating the longest sequence of connected temples following the roads on the board.

But then there's also collecting the most of each of the commodities that are also in the provinces. So you might say, I need this one to have a temple in this thing because I'm going to try to keep my road going. But in this one, I want to collect gems because I want to have the most of that commodity. And it's all in the same auction. So that was the first game I played that felt like there were two disparate goals that were involved in each round, essentially.

I like it. I like both of your answers a lot. And dang it, Taj Mahal is such a good game. I don't play that enough. I love that game. I know we need to get that one back to the table. Yeah. And also along those lines with what you're saying, it made me think of China, Web of Power, Iwari, all the different names for it. Yeah, because there's two games overlaid on top of each other.

Exactly. Exactly. All right. So Megan, less recognizable comparison. What's your choice here for a game outside of, say, the top 750 that reminds you the most of Cascadia? And I'm just going to keep drawing this out because your answer is like a foregone conclusion here. Let's go.

Yeah. My answer is in all caps in my notes. And we mentioned this before we even started recording. And David was like, I have no clue what this could be. But Todd knew exactly what I was going to do. And he's just figured it out now, which is a delight to see that happen on your face.

It's Mondo. Absolutely. My favorite tile placement game. I love and just like I talked about with this game in Mondo, sometimes I focus a little bit too much on building out perfect habitats where all the sides of my tiles match.

And I'm creating the patterns and the aesthetic that I want, which helps you with points in Mondo. But there are other victory conditions that you're working towards or kind of point cards you're working towards for the end of the round that sometimes I need to be focusing on those a little bit more than I do.

But yeah, Mondo just has a place in my heart. It is one of the games I've played most in my life. It's just a bizarre maybe favorite for me and someone else in our group. And so I have a lot of affection for it. And I think more people should play it. So everybody, let's start a Mondo resurgence.

All right, Dave, what did you have? Well, I actually have two answers. I don't know which one I want to put. Well, okay, my first one's a cheat. So I'm just going to throw the cheat out there because it is currently ranked 2772. And I think that's just because it hasn't been released yet.

It gets released to be up there. Wow. I'm talking about Kinesia is my island. Okay, that's where he takes my city, which are square tiles or polyamino square tiles and turns it into hexagon polyaminos. And in the same way you're scoring corridors, you're scoring groups of light colors together. And it's a quite different game in that it's a legacy game. And you know, things change, but still, it's all about, you know, the tile that you've been given and placing it in such a way where you're keeping them together.

And it really hurts you if you can put a certain one color has to be separate from the rest of its kind. So you have to put them together like that. So similar to that, and I'm only guessing of what my island is like. But it's I mean, obviously, it's just the hex version of my city. But that's my cheat answer because I haven't played the game and it's not even out yet. And it will be ranked probably in the top 750 when it comes out. Are you sure it's not out yet? No, I'm not. So maybe it is out and it's terrible or just no, it's not.

It's terrible or just nobody's played it yet. I'm positive I have a copy sitting sitting on my shelf. My island. Yes. Oh, I just assumed it wasn't out yet because it was so low ranked. Okay. All right. My real answer, though, is a game called Village Green. Yes. And it's very similar where you've got different kinds of ways to score. And you're trying to lay out this tableau in front of you and everything you do to help one thing that you're trying to do screws up the other three things that you're trying to do. And that's another one.

I find very frustrating just because I'm not good at these kinds of games. And that one that one, the difficulty is, I think, a little bit higher legitimately. So and but it is quite a fun game. It's a pure Sylvester game who's slowly becoming a favorite designer of mine. Nice. Okay. Well, I had a joke of a suggestion that I had a real one. So the joke was Mondo Sapiens, which which is an amazing game. It's even better than Mondo. And it's because it is one of the very

few games of Mondo that Megan has actually ever lost. To someone, I feel like I don't know if he even listens to the podcast. But there's a guy in our group I've lost a lot of games to. Right. Yes. To to not him. You are one of the few people who's beaten me in Mondo.

But it was Mondo Sapiens. It wasn't Mondo. Yes. Right. Yes. So that was the joke of a guess at the other one. Dave stepped on. Well done. It was Web of Power slash China slash on slash a worry for exactly that reason. So the idea that you had a chain of houses going but then you also have the influence of your emissaries and they are their own groupings outside of the houses made me think of Cascadia or Cascadia made me think of that house rules. How would you change the game?

Or are there any technicalities that you want to talk about, Dave? I actually do have a house rule for this one. And that is take see back seas are just fine. And by that I mean the game's long enough as it is. First of all, when you grab your stuff, you can take your time and we'll move on to the next player while you're figuring out where you're going to place it. But also even before it comes around to your turn, if you legitimately think you should have put it somewhere else and that's not basically the case, then you're going to have to take your time.

And if you're like, oh, I should have put this over there, I'm going to be a stickler. You're like, oh, I should have put this over there. Like, obviously, that was too long ago. You can't do it. Or if tiles that have been revealed make you make that decision. No, you can't. But there's enough to think about. And if it's going to I don't want to sit and wait for you to calculate everything. Just you get a little bit of wiggle room late, you know, like before it's your next turn.

Do you have any house rules for the game? No, I don't. I have been listening to the podcast too much and hearing from David that house rules are bad. So no house rules. House rules are for cowards, I believe are his actual. For cowards. Well, I'm no coward. You've played Age of Steam with us. That's correct. You are no coward. Absolutely. And hated every second of it.

But she still played. Yep. The only one that I would want to experiment with would be experimenting with the combined styles of scoring. So like, there's the easy version of the game, which starts with one animal of each type. And then if you have two up to four, right, it has a scoring increase there. And then there's the intermediate version, which is just starts with two of an animal are the first scoring level and then three, four, five.

And then there's the, you know, quote unquote advanced or expert version, which is the one that we all think about, which is each of the animals has its own scoring pattern that you're trying to fulfill. I actually want to try to see if I could play on the advanced rules against say my wife on the intermediate rules and if our scores would be competitive or if the advanced rules just totally blow it out and make it an unfair competition.

If this game is being played at game night, then what do you want to play afterwards? What's the best double feature game that goes along with it? I think wingspan is a nice match for this because of the nature theme. I will say I have also played this as part of a game day where we just played games that started with the letter C, which actually was a super fun game day and gave us a lot of variety.

So I would love listeners to hear from you. If you have done game days or game nights based off of, hey, we're going to play all games that start with the same letter. I would love to hear how it went for you, whether you chose C or something else. I'm just tossing that out there as an idea for you. All right. I like it. I like Megan's theme game nights. We've done, I think it was the three of us. We did a night of tens. We only played games that one of us ranked a 10.

And we've done BSW theme nights games that we had played on BSW. When we did that, this is not relevant to this podcast at all. But what was the music group game? And John brought a copy of that. I was surprised. Yeah, shrill steel. Shrill steel. We actually played that in person, which was amazing. Not amazing is that it's a very fun game to play, but amazing that we were able to do it. That we actually had a copy in our combined library that we were able to play in person.

Yes. But anyways, to answer this question, it's largely, you know, even though you're keeping an eye on each other's corridors, it's largely a solitaire puzzle solving game. And usually my answer to follow up a game like this is to go with like something that's going to be highly interactive, like the king is dead or ready set bet or something where we're really getting in each other's way and things.

But I'm going to lean in on this one and I'm going to go with my less recognizable pick and say the village green because you're in that mode and this follows along and just goes a little bit deeper down that path. Yeah, absolutely. Okay. I put down another tile laying game. It's only the one game, right? There's nothing that goes really on top of it all that much. And that is dwarf romantic. And I don't even know if I'm pronouncing that correctly.

But the idea that you are drafting tiles and laying and grouping them and you're creating a cool little landscape as a result. I really like that. What feature of the game still stands out to you? What do you think has aged the best in the scant number of years this game has been out? For me, it's that two layer thing, right? The thing that I say it shared with Taj Mahal with Web of Power.

And here it's that I'm creating zones of habitats and they score one way. And then I'm also taking into account the animals I can place with them to figure out how to score in a completely different way with the animals. So I really like that. Yeah, that's my answer, too. And it's we've said it a bunch of times already on this. I'm going to play two tile laying games in the same physical space at the same time. And that's pretty ingenious.

And I think that's what makes this game really shine. Yeah. And really, I mean, when we look at the games that stand out over the years that win all of the awards and that kind of at first blush, I'm like, oh, it's just another tile laying game. But when we dig into it and realize this is something different and going back through all of the games, kind of every year, the games that stand out, it's like, wait, this is something new.

And we've hit that on this podcast a few times. We're like, did this fire any other game? And we say, no, there was no other game like this until I played this game. And that's why it's such a standout and why this is the one we play over and over. Right. So Megan, did you have a feature of the game that stood out? No, I liked your thoughts, though, when I heard you say them, I thought, oh, yeah, that is that is what makes this special.

So I'm glad you said it because it did not occur to me previously. All right. So then does any portion of the game disappoint? You know, what hasn't aged as well? Do you have an answer to that? I am curious at the idea in our discussion, we touched on the fact that it can move slowly at times.

And maybe this is something to house rule. But I also wonder if perhaps this should be something that's baked into the game, something that would keep it moving a bit faster, whether that's a timer or some other mechanic to enforce you having to do the mental math quickly or else I think you can just get bogged down in it. Yeah, I can't believe you said timer. You're not turning this game into Mondo.

I was surprised that wasn't her double feature in the game. I mean, yeah, I just love Mondo. I'll see. Dave, how about you? Did you have an aspect of the game that hasn't aged as well? No, not really. I mean, I don't like when games feel like they don't go your way. And maybe that leads into the luck portion of it. But I know where you have games are like, I just couldn't make do with what I was given. And that's just a shortcoming on my part. That's not the game's fault.

But, you know, that's just it's the kind of game where you are going to have those sessions where you just I'm looking at you and everything's coming together perfectly for you. I'm looking at this mess that I've created. Like I've got plate tectonics going on over here. And I don't know what's happening. My bears are eating my salmon. So but I think that's more of a you know, what's age the worst with me and not the game itself. But this is the kind of game where that happens. Right.

For me, it's the visualization of how the different scoring zones are going to interact. And I don't mean the habitats. I mean of the animals, the different patterns of scoring, because I start the game and I create one and it's great. But then somewhere along the way, I lose. I can lose sight of it. I'll take a tile. But then I get them and I'm looking at them and I'm thinking, why did I pick this again? Where was I going to put this?

And then it occurs to me later that, oh, I wanted to go over there. But now it's too late. Right. At that point, it's been integrated and there's no retconning to that extent. So that's the one part about the game. I don't like. But it is the game in a way. So it's not that I don't like the game. I guess I just don't like the fact that I can't keep that detail in my brain for the entire time. I think that you don't like that the complexity really is a three when you want it to be a two.

No, it's not. That's what I hear you say. It's a little there's a little more to think about than you want to think about when you're playing this game. You may be on to something there. I'm trying to defend my three weight answer. No, I like it. So has this game replaced the previous one? And you were just talking about this, Dave. You're right. This is something new.

So it's not like I had a game very similar to this, although I do say King Domino is a game that always felt like phase one of a bigger game anyways. That it wears the rest of the game, but it has such a great draft mechanism. But that's not a game that I'm going to bring into the table very often, at least not since my kids have gotten a little bit older. And then this kind of is in that same family. And I would much rather play Cascadia than King Domino.

I like that answer. I actually didn't have one, but now that's mine. Yes, it replaced King Domino. How about you, Megan? I think that's a great answer. I also think for me, this has replaced Kingdom Builder. That was a game that I got to the table more frequently prior to Cascadia being something that was in the game libraries of people I knew. And now this is getting played. And I don't know that it's like a one for one.

It's getting played instead. But I can definitely tell you that Kingdom Builder isn't being played right now in Cascadia is. So it certainly seems like there's a connection there. Yeah, absolutely. So has this game since been replaced and granted, it's relatively new, right? It's only been out for three years. But if it has been replaced, what replaced it? Yeah, ironically, it's my big box version of Kingdom Builder. I'm just kidding.

You like the Uber Deluxe Empire version, right? Yeah, it's too much. It is a Kingdom in and of itself. I would rather have the old twenty five dollar box that I used to have. I don't know why I got that. It was a very big, expensive Kickstarter. Now I've got this huge box on the shelf that's kind of a burden to get down and play. And I don't know why I did that, but I've got it. It's pretty. It looks great.

And let's just play Cascadia instead. I don't have an answer for this one. It's too fresh. It's replaced. Yeah, too fresh. So the only one I even thought came close would be to say Arc Nova. That's only because they both have animals in them. And Arc Nova seems to be getting to the table more often than Cascadia for us. But I'm still playing Cascadia. So it hasn't been replaced. I mean, you can play four to five games of Cascadia or one game of Arc Nova. Right.

But you're right. When we when we want to get out the animals, it's it's Arc Nova over Cascadia. Right. So then soundtrack, what music would you want to listen to while playing this game? I don't have a great answer, so I'm just going to go first and say I want some nature sounds with running water. OK. I mean, maybe you could talk me into like some pan flute, but that's it. So I went down a similar path. OK. And this is going to be a little niche, though.

I'm going to say the soundtrack from World of Warcraft Wrath of the Lich King expansion, specifically the Totems of the Griselma track or Howling Fjord. Both of them have sound of like wind through the trees, like a cold kind of mountainy northern wind going through. And especially Totems of the Griselma that plays while you're in a zone that is like a northern forest. And yeah, both of them just really feel aligned with the vibe of this game.

So that was my choice. That makes me realize, though, Megan, now that we've got worm span with the dragons, is it only a matter of time before we have worm scadia? I mean, this could definitely be fantasy creatures, right? Sure. Yeah. As we talked about a theme, this theme could really be anything. Right. It totally could. So obviously the meme here would be, you know, throwing your hoodie, throwing your plaid.

Let's get some Pearl Jam. Let's get some Nirvana. Let's get some Tina Marie Bell going. But, you know, once we're done grunging out, I would agree. Like, give me something that is cinematic in scope. Nature sounds. Absolutely. I found an artist named Tim Janis has several albums that fits the right style of music. And he had one particular track that's called High Sierra off of his relaxation volume one album, which is an interesting title.

I guess he knew ahead of time that it was going to be one of more than one. Same idea, right? Something that is expansive in its scope. I mean, we could just go Pacific Northwest, go with, you know, the Sonics, which I love, or Seattle's beloved son, Jimi Hendrix. We could. Yes. I'm up for that. Jimi Hendrix and Cascadia. I'm in. I don't think I'd be paying attention to the game, though. That's the problem. Come on, Foxy.

You worked it in. I did. You've got like two questions left to figure out how you're going to work Alex into this. All right. Rating on a scale of one to ten now. What would you rate Cascadia? Megan? I give it a seven and I'm happy to play it. It doesn't make me feel like sick to my stomach so that I would need some Elka seltzer. Oh, my gosh. Ding, ding, ding, ding. You win. Game over. But yeah, I like this, but I don't love it.

I don't know that it's a game that I would ever be like, yeah, if you give me my choice, this is what I'm going to pick to play. But at the same time, if someone else says, hey, I'd love to play Cascadia. Yeah, sure. Happy to play it. That's kind of where a seven sits for me. Yeah, sounds good. Yeah. I think I admitted earlier how much I hated the game when I first played it. I had it actually ranked as a five, which I just cleared recently as I was going through it.

Well, it's definitely not that. That was just my first impression of the game. But I would probably put it at a seven, too. That might be like a little bit generous. Then again, I recognize how good of a game it is, so I wouldn't want to put it any lower than that. And I really, really do like the game. But I don't see anyone getting super excited to play Cascadia. It's fun while I'm playing it. And when it was over, yeah, I had a good time.

But like Megan was saying, I'm not like when we get together tonight, we're in place of Cascadia and I'm stoked we're going to be doing that. But I'm never disappointed when I play. I guess that just that cradles right in at seven. Right. Surprisingly, I also had it as a seven. And at first, when I started playing the game, it was OK. It was maybe a six. I didn't hate it. It was better than a five. But after several plays, it grew on me. And even more important, my wife enjoys playing it.

So that's definitely worth the extra point. So it's a seven. Would I prefer to play other games with our gaming group? Absolutely. But I'm very glad to have it in my collection. And it's something that my wife enjoys playing, too. It's a game that grows on you. I mean, I would bet there's a lot of people whose first impression was it's OK or maybe even didn't like it. But after a while, it's, you know, a firm seven. So is the game replayable? And how soon would you want to revisit it?

I'd say yes. Replayable. I'm good with playing this two, maybe three times a year. I'm happy to see it come out. And once I've played it for a while, I can go several months without playing it again. Yeah, I would agree with that same frequency. Definitely replayable. I'm looking forward to playing this again to play with the wife, but definitely would not suggest bringing it to game night for the four player count that we talked about before.

Yeah, I agree with the replayability. And then I think that's part of the design that works very well, is that every time you play, you're getting a different combination of scoring cards that you're going for. And the game comes out differently as the tableau builds. So I would say, yeah, I'm happy to play it and it feels like a fresh experience every time. And it doesn't feel stale when I do play it. So certainly replayable.

I think I'd like to play a little more than two or three times a year, but not once a month. OK, fair. And with that, we've each placed our 20th tile for our next episode. We'll be talking about the Venice of the North. Thank you both for being available tonight. This was a lot of fun. Thanks so much for having me. Yeah, thanks. That was fun. Thank you for listening to replayable support for our podcast comes from listeners like you.

You can find us online at replayable FM on Twitter as replayable FM and on Instagram as replayable FM. You can also join our team at Patreon dot com slash replayable. Thank you for your support. We welcome your feedback, which is the only way that we are going to get better. You can get in touch with us via email at feedback at replayable dot FM. And if you're interested in sponsoring us, then please contact us at sponsors at replayable dot FM.