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The tea ceremony lies at the heart of Japanese culture, giving life the most essential and elemental concepts of hospitality, respect, and Zen philosophy. There, they believe that tea, which came from China in the 13th century, resolved the health problems of the Buddhist monks who drank it. Over the years, the tea ceremony evolved to offer the samurai a place of calm, far from the chaos of the battlefield.
In The White Castle: Matcha, you will have to deal with a new place in which to influence the court using new members of your clan. Having members of your clan in good seats within the Chashitsu (tea room) will help you achieve a greater level of influence within the court of Himeji. Also, you will have one additional action each round. Will that be enough?
The first printing includes The White Castle: Promo 4 packaged inside the expansion box. It is currently not available by itself.
To be played with the base game and the Matcha expansion.
Contains 3 Die tiles, each of which with Chasen on the back. When setting up the game, replace the 3 Die tiles that grant a Resource of your choice with these 3 new tiles.
—description from the publisher
- Introduced as part of the unboxing sequence
- Adds momentum to the pre-Spiel shopping period
- Unknown
- Unknown
- Unknown
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- unknown — Not specified in the transcript; unboxing context is the primary focus.
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- oh I'm starting to get a spider sense
- I'm super excited about one of my most anticipated games for Spiel
- look at this taosi the new Danny Garcia game
- oh it's very heavy I am excited
- probably the last games coming before Spiel
References (from this video)
- expands depth without sacrificing conciseness
- reusable art and components with elegant illustrations
- expansion could challenge storage/box fit in base box
- some production aspects (e.g., component counts) may require replacements or additional storage
- hospitality, respect, political intrigue
- Japanese-inspired court with ceremonial spaces
- expanded rounds and actions within the same castle framework
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- additional action per round — adds a fourth round-equivalent action, broadening the engine and decision space
- new board element (tea room bridge/dice spaces) — introduces a t-room extension with river spaces and new placement options
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- my favorite deve game they've ever put out
- dice worker placement game, which oh my gosh, you know, my heart's a flutter
- I like concise games for sure
- it's very concise. It's only three rounds of drafting dice and then you're placing them into different areas of the castle to gain different benefits