Well, I did in fact receive my long-awaited copy of Agricola on Tuesday.  But, despite an ill-conceived lunch-time visit home (with a 30 minute commute each way) to see if it had arrived yet, I did not get it in time to take to our regular game night at Hypermind, which bummed me out considerably.  When I got there, however, my day got a lot better when John had his copy sitting on the table next to him!  The bulk of the evening was then dedicated to learning and playing this hype-tastically cool game.


Kenny, Britt, John, and Carol try to figure out what the heck they're doing!
John hadn't had the chance to read the rules yet, so it was up to me to explain this game that I had not ever actually seen in person before.  I had, however, read the translated rules found on BGG.  But with a game where so much of the understanding comes from reading the board and cards, that wasn't really much of a help. 

For the first 30 minutes or so, I read aloud the setup section of the rules and then went over all the different actions on the board, and I think I got things pretty much straight.  The first four rounds of play were pretty rough as well, because everyone else had sorta ignored the descriptions of the actions until time came for them to actually choose one.  I had also pushed for us to play the full game, so we all had a full hand of Occupation and Minor Improvement cards (limited to the E Deck at least) to figure out on our own as well. 

By the first harvest, things really started coming together.  Personally, I had the Shepherd and Shepherd's Pipe in my hand, so my main strategy was to get lots of sheep.  I also had the Mushroom Collector, which gave me enough food in the early rounds to survive until I could get a Fireplace to cook my sheep.  Others, like Britt, were not doing as well.  Due to ther allure of having extra actions, Britt had expanded his family very early and ended up with 3 Begging cards. 


"Please kind sir... Could you spare a crust of bread?"

Things seemed to really "click" for everyone by this point, and turns 5-11 or so went very smoothly.  Kenny was swimming in food from his Baker, Bread Seller, and  multiple Ovens, but putting together the "combo" kinda distracted him from other business.  Carol was catching on, but wasn't able to start implementing any real strategy until the last few turns.  John was over there plowing and sowing fields left and right with his Hobby Farmer, Turnwrest Plow, and crazy Potato Dibber, and ended up with tons of veggies and grain.  I kept pushing my sheep strategy, focusing later on upgrading my house to stone (so I could benefit from the Half-Timbered House card I had) and expanding my family.  John did the best at procreating, though, getting all 5 of his family into play.

During the last few turns, things slowed down again as we all tried to milk the most points possible out of our little, jury-rigged farming engines.  Kenny lost a bunch of points because of leaving around 9 spaces empty on his farm board.  Surprisingly, Britt played the Mendicant occupation in one of his last few turns to cancel two of his Begging cards and salvage a decent score.  Carol fared decently for her first play as well.

When I calculated my score, I did pretty well.  I ended up with max points for sheep (of course), and had at least one of the other animals as well.  I lost one point for having a single unused space, and 2 more for not having any grain or vegetables.  My 4-space stone house and 4 family members did well for me, though, and I ended with a score of 34.  

John, however, did a great job of not taking any negative points at all.  He maxed out on both grain and veggies, had 15 points from the big family, and was very well-balanced.  The Animal Yard helped him a lot, allowing him to keep one each of two different animals, causing a net 4-point swing in his score with minimal investment.  Interestingly enough, 4 points just happened to be the span by which he beat me (the stinking dog!) to win the game (38 points total).   

Building up my "sheep" strategy!
So, what do I think of Agricola? 

After one play, I rate it a 9 out of 10.  I so totally see what everybody likes about the game.  At its core, it's a simple worker-placement game with nice engine-building and efficiency elements.  That's what the "family" game, a nice, solid game with static actions that would be enjoyable for a long time.  But then, you get to throw in a set of 332 other cards (E, K, I, and Z decks) that introduce an entirely new element of hand-management and combo-development that makes the game almost infinitely replayable.  Even in this first game, I got that same sort of feeling that I get in Race for the Galaxy, where you look at that opening hand and try to figure out which direction you need to go in the game.  

Despite the almost overwhelming complexity and fiddlyness in setup, the game itself really impressed my by its simplicity and efficiency.  Especially in our 5-player game, action spaces were tight, but it wasn't impossible to get what you needed within a few rounds.  After re-reading the rules later, I actually think that we got pretty much all the rules correct, which is a rare and precious thing with new games of any weight at all! 

There is just so much potential for cool gameplay within both the "programmed" actions and the variable player cards that I just can't stop thinking about the game we played, and I'm anxiously looking forward to my next opportunity to get all medieval on some farming!