Thurn and Taxis

In Thurn & Taxis, players build post office routes across Bavaria and the regions around, collecting bonus points in various ways. The board shows a map of all the towns, with roads leading from each one to some of its neighbors. There are various colored regions around the board, most with one or two towns, and a large region with all the Bavarian towns in the center.

From a display of six city cards (or the top of the deck), you draw one or two cards each turn, add one or two to your route, and score for it if you're ready to score. The fact that you *must* add at least one city to your route each turn or lose the whole route gives the game an enjoyable planning element.

BoardGameGeek Info

Publisher: Rio Grande Games
Published in: 2006
My Rating: 7.5
BGG Rating: 6.92
BGG Rank: 557
Players: 2-4
Ages: 10+
Duration: 0:45
Complexity: 2.2583 / 5

Acquired: September 2008
Eager to Play: No
Plays: 8
Last Played: June 25, 2015
Time Spent: 6:00

Thurn and Taxis is an area control game with route building via a card drafting mechanic. No two games play the same, and there is more than one strategy that will secure enough victory points to win the game. On their turn players add at least one card to their hand representing cities on the board. They then must play one card representing a route. They may only play a card they do not have in their route, and the card must be adjacent to one of the cities on the two endpoints of their route. Players may then score their route which allows them to place houses in cities (from their route) either one in each of the regions in your route, or all of the cities in one region in your route.

Victory points are awarded for routes 5 or more cities in length, and for have houses in all cities of a given region. The first person to do this gets more points than the rest, and eventually it's not worth anything. At the end of the game any unplaced houses count against you, so the players need to balance the pace of the game and try not to let it end while they have a deficit of points.

The tension in the game comes from trying to be first to capture points, but also maintaining your route, because if you cannot add to your route you lose it. All decisions in the game are strategic but not unforgiving of mistakes.

Thurn and Taxis

Eight plays