In Barony, players are ambitious barons trying to extend their dominion over the land! Who will succeed and become the new king?
At the beginning of the game, players create the board at random with nine tiles per player; each tile comprises three hexagons, with each hexagon being one of five landscape types: forest, plains, field, mountain, lake. Players then each place three cities on the game board, with a knight in each city. They then take turns in clockwise order, with each player taking exactly one action from the six possible actions:
Recruitment: Add two knights to a city, or three knights if the city is adjacent to a lake.
Movement: Move one or two of your knights one space each. A knight can't enter a lake (blub), a mountain with an opposing pawn, or any space with an opponent's city or stronghold or two knights of the same opposing color. If you move a second knight into a space with an opposing pawn or village, remove those tokens and take one resource from the village owner.
Construction: Remove one or more of your knights from the game board and replace each with a village or stronghold, gaining one resource token matching the landscape under the structure.
New City: Replace one of your villages with a city and earn 10 victory points (VPs).
Expedition: Remove two knights from your reserve, placing one back in the box out of play and the other on any empty space on the edge of the game board.
Noble Title: Discard at least 15 resource points, then upgrade your title: baron to viscount, then count, marquis, and finally duke.
Once any player has gained the title of duke, finish the round, then tally the VPs, with players scoring for resources still in their possession, their rank in the game, and the number of cities they built. Whoever has the most VPs wins.
- super smooth drafting
- beautiful visual appeal
- strong optimization puzzle
- can be punishing if you misplace tokens
- may skew toward perfectionism for solo players
- spatial drafting and optimization
- A playful habitat-building setting with animal needs
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Drafting and placement of wooden tokens — Draft three tokens per round to fulfill animal needs on your environment board.
- Placement synergy — Placements can synergize to satisfy multiple animal needs at once.
- worker placement — Placements can synergize to satisfy multiple animal needs at once.
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- a lovely mediumweight Euro by board and dice
- the dice has dual use
- I love the way that everything is driven here through dice
- spatial puzzle
- an instant classic
- a great example of its genre
- I instantly fell in love with it
- Kitzia at his best
- Punchy, colorful and very engaging
- top tier kitzia for me
References (from this video)
- polished feel with refined design
- great balance between short-term and long-term decisions
- not highly interactive; some players may desire more direct interaction
- puzzly tiling and pattern construction
- patterns and tiles on a board
- polished and refined
- Cascadia
- Calico
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Pattern completion and scoring — removing cubes to generate points as patterns are completed
- pattern drafting — draft wooden tokens to build interlocking patterns
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- it's really tight this Bard is and the opportunity cost of doing one thing
- there are so many different ways you can score in this game
- it's punchy
- the game end really does rush up on you
- polished, refined, gorgeous to look at
- you can just take the pieces off the board and go again
References (from this video)
- Challenging puzzle gameplay
- Easy to learn
- Rewards multiple plays
- Adaptable difficulty
- Engaging decision-making
- Some luck element
- Can be frustrating
- Limited player interaction
- Animal and Landscape Pattern Building
- Forest/Nature
- Abstract puzzle-solving
- Cascadia
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- Contract Completion — Players must complete animal card objectives multiple times
- contracts — Players must complete animal card objectives multiple times
- Pattern Building — Create patterns to match animal card requirements
- tile drafting — Players draft three tokens each turn to place on their board
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- You can make it as stressful as you want to make it
- The game is challenging you
- Making your own luck