Reviewed by Chris Kovac
THE BUILDERS: MIDDLE AGES & THE BUILDERS: ANTIGUITY (Asmodee, 2 to 4 players, ages 10 and up, 30-45 minutes; $17.99 each)
The Builders: Middle Ages and its sequel/remake The Builders: Antiquity are 30-minute worker management card games for 2-4 players produced by Asmodee and designed by Henry Frederic. The sequel Builders: Antiquity is the better of the two games in that it adds some additional decisions which makes the game more interesting that’s its predecessor and so is the basis for this review.
To set up, first shuffle all the building/machine cards together with their unbuilt construction side face up and deal five in a row out next to the remaining deck of building cards. Next, give each player one apprentice worker card and ten coins (silver worth one and golds worth five). All unused apprentice cards are then shuffled into the worker deck from which five workers are drawn and placed in a row above the dealt-out building cards. The remaining deck of worker cards is placed to the left of this row of workers. Above this row of cards is placed the decks of slaves, tools, loans and university cards. Finally create a pile of the coins to form a bank and randomly choose a starting player to start the game.
Beginning with the start player, each player in turn can perform three free actions for the list of actions below plus additional actions for five coins a piece. The actions are:
- Start construction on a building by choosing a building from one of the five building cards from the row of building cards (replace any chosen immediately from the building deck).
- Recruit a worker from the row of worker cards. Each worker provides different amounts of stone, wood, architecture and decoration resources.
- Purchase an investment card (slaves, loans, tools and university cards). Slaves cost seven coins and at the end of the game cause you to lose one point from the player’s final score. Slaves can be freed during the game which flips them to the more productive freed worker side but each slave freed costs one action. Loans give you ten coins but if not paid off with fifteen coins by the end of the game each outstanding loans causes you to loses two points from your final score. Tools can be bought for two coins and you can choose any of the four tools (each enhances a different one of the four resources by one) which can be then assigned to enhance a worker. Finally, for seven coins, you can buy any one of the four university cards to “educate” a worker enhancing one or more of the resources of a worker to which it is assigned to.
- Build a building/machine by sending a worker or slaves to work on a building. Workers cost the number of coins listed on the top right of the worker card while slaves cost nothing but are less “productive” than workers. During a turn, sending one worker to work on a building costs one action. If you send another worker to the same building during a turn it will cost two, third worker six actions and so on. Once assigned to a building, workers cannot be moved until the building is built which happens when the workers assigned to the building equal to or exceed the resource demands listed on the left-hand side of the building. When this happens, you get the reward in coins and flip the building to its built side. Victory points on the card count towards your victory point total. Built machines give you special abilities when built as well as coins and victory points. All assigned workers to this building are returned to the players hand of workers.
- Take coins from the bank (one for one action, three for two actions or six for three actions).
The game continues until one player has built seventeen or more points of buildings/machines. Each other player gets one more turn then the game ends. Players add up all points from buildings and machines, then adds one tenth of a point per coin still held. From this total, one point is deducted for each slave the player still has and two points for each unrepaid loan. The person with the highest score wins (no tie breaker).
In order to win at either version of The Builders, one has to choose the right workers to build the buildings one has chosen to build while at the same time balancing the resources each worker has and the cost to employ workers on a building. You must then choose carefully which workers are assigned to which building and the number of workers it will cost to build a building. Higher point buildings cost more resources but provide more coin and points when built.
The Builders: Antiquity is the more interesting of the two games since it adds investments options to the games, options Builder Middle Ages did not have. Balancing this mix of buildings and workers correctly along with help from investments will help you win the game. Production quality if fairly good for this game and the rules are well written with few ambiguities. This game is also fairly easy to teach and play with little downtime between turns. Overall, these are fairly light 30 to 45 minute filler games with real appeal to the family or casual gamer though it still has enough decisions to keep the more serious gamers involved. A 7.5 out of ten for me. – – – – – Chris Kovac
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