Nakasendo Preview - The Journey from Edo to Kyoto
Transcript
Hey there gamers and welcome back to the board game co channel and today we have a preview of Nasundo. Hey there gamers, it's Professor Mag here and welcome back to the board game co channel. Today we have a preview of Nasundo by Little Rocket Games. You can check out the link down below for everything that they have planned. This is a sponsored preview and this is a prototype copy in front of me. So all rules, components, things like that are subject to change. Now, Nakasendo is going to be a competitive tile laying game for two to four players, where you're going to be building out these different paths with discovery tiles as well that are all going to have unique ways to score, hoping to end with the most victory points at the end of the game. But players are going to be gaining these victory points in two different ways. So, you are going to be placing out these path tiles and then discovery tiles, but you're also going to be scoring both during intermediate phases as well as at the end of the game. So, you're going to be using this tile placement to score for yourself, not only for the conditions that you know are going to happen after a few certain turns, but you're also going to be planning for endgame scoring because ultimately players are building out a 4x4 grid of their paths where you're trying to have a pathway that leads you from one way to the other. Because at the end of the game, you're only going to score for the tiles that connect you with one continuous pathway with one way in and one way out. So, not only are you trying to juggle scoring in those intermediate phases, but you're trying to build out this path as well. So, with that, let's take a look at Nakasando.
Now, in front of me, the game is currently set up for two players. So, I have a player on each side over here, and this is going to be the shared main board, which is going to have a ton of information for players. So, you do have your victory point track around here, and that's where you're going to, of course, track your victory points throughout the game when you do the intermediate scoring phases, and you're going to know when those are because of these tracks here. So, this is going to represent each round, and when you move on to the next round after all players have completed their turns, you'll progress this marker here. So, this is going to show you exactly when you will hit the different points that you are going to score. And one thing to note, in a two-player game, you're going to have 10 rounds, but in a three or four player game, you will only have nine rounds. So, you can also see that there are snow symbols here. And I'll get to what that is going to mean, but it's going to relate to this event over here.
So, that's what the main board is going to look like. And for the things that players are going to be scoring, you can see that these are tokens that are going to change their order each game that you play. You're going to shuffle these up and place them out. And for these different scoring conditions, there are a bunch of tokens for these as well. So, these are the ones that were randomly drawn for this particular game. And two of them are always going to be a particular type of tile for the path tiles as well as the discovery tiles. And one of them is always going to be a particular condition. So, this one is going to relate to the snow. There is also bears in the game. Those are going to be the two types of tokens that you're working with. Uh, but that is the different things that players are going to be looking at to score during the game. But as I noted, you're also going to have endgame scoring, which is going to look very different. So once I go through what the game is going to look like, I'll go over how endame scoring is going to go, but that's going to involve your hiker mele here showing the path that you have created in a 4x4 grid, starting with the entrance and going all the way to the exit. So, taking a look at the player area over here, you're going to have your starting tile with your player color. And this is going to be the only tile in the game that you will have that has an intersecting path here. So, you are able to perhaps loop around with it, but this is the only one that you know will come out like that.
And all of the others are going to look similar to this. So, you are able to cover tiles when you play them. So you could cover this, but when you are building out your path, you're going to want to keep in mind that this is the only intersection that you have. But it does also have these two bear symbols here, which are going to be worth negative one point at the end of the game, unless you have something to negate that. So there are bells that will be able to negate that as well if you want to leave this showing. But players also have in their supply three elements. So, you're going to start the game with two path tiles as well as a discovery tile. Those are the two types of main tiles that you are working with. And when you replenish your supply, you're going to be able to replenish from the market. So, you'll always have three at the end of a player's turn because players are going to be able to play these tiles not only from your own supply or from ones that you have reserved from the market, but you're also going to be able to play tokens from other players supplies. So, even when you are playing the normal game, all players will have their tokens face up like this for you to see because you are able to play them from other players supplies. But you don't want to do that too much because they're going to gain one of these tokens if that happens, which is going to give them an extra action or two victory points at the end of the game if they're able to hold on to that. Now, in that overview, you heard me describe a lot of things such as scoring during these different points or replenishing your supply or playing
out these different tiles. So, those are all things that players are going to do. So, now I'll walk you through what the different routes are going to look like and a player's turn and the things that they're able to do so that all of this is put into order. Now, as I said, the rounds are going to be tracked here. And starting with the first player, players are going to take two actions on their turn. So you are able to perform the same action twice if you are able to do so. But you are going to have to perform two actions and that part is not a choice. So one of the things that players are going to be able to do is play either of these types of tiles into their path from their own supply. And you cannot place a discovery tile unless you have somewhere to place it as you can see in these boxes here. So you can't place these unless you have somewhere to place them. But you are going to be able to place anything from your own supply. Now, as I said, you're also able to place something from other players supplies. And when you do so, you would be giving them one of these tokens. But in order to place something from the market, you're going to have to have reserved it first. And you're only able to reserve at the end of your turn.
Meaning that on the first turn, players are not going to be able to reserve a card from the market and then be able to play it in that turn. they'd have to wait for the next turn to play it. So, to take a look at what a turn would look like for this player over here, players are going to gain two victory points at the end of the game if the discovery tile matches the terrain type. So, this player may have noticed that this tile is over here. So, as their first action, they may choose to play place this tile here. Now, as I said, you are limited to a 4x4 grid, but you are also limited to have these always oriented this way. So, you are able to flip them 180°, but they do always have to line up in this particular way. Now, you do not have to have the paths connecting, but again, as I said, you are going to have that continuous path at the end of the game, and those are the only tiles that are going to score. But you are also able to play tiles on top of other tiles. So you may even place things that don't necessarily connect at the moment, but you might be able to connect them in the future by covering either one of the tiles to continue that path. So we are going to have this player choose to play this tile down here. And that's going to be their first action. And for their second action, they're going to play this discovery tile over here because it does match this terrain type and there aren't any others out that match this type. So, they are going to choose to
take this by giving this token over to this player. So, they're going to have an extra action when they choose to use it or if they can hold on to it, it's two victory points for them. But, this is going to be placed over here for this player. Now, finally, this is when we would be able to reserve a tile. So, we may choose to reserve one from the market up here. And we're going to take a look at this scoring. So even though the stone is in A, we know that B and C are going to be scoring first. So this green is going to be pretty good for us. So we may choose to reserve this one over here, hoping to play it next round. Now, finally, starting with this player over here, they're going to refill their supply. So they're going to again look at the market, and they may choose to want something that will match this type of terrain. So they will take this path tile over here which will refill this.
And then this player is going to be able to refill something as well where they want to deal with a bear problem. So they may choose to take this bell over here which will also refill here in the market. Now after all players have taken their turns you'll move the round tracker forward and then you will resolve the event before the next round. So you won't do it on the first turn, but every turn after that you will resolve these and they're going to show up as either snow or bears. So it's going to be these different things that are going to be placed out along your different path tiles depending on the type of turning that they are. So with the current one that players were able to see and plan around, it was the forest with snow. And the amount of snow that's going to fall is going to depend on the current round as well. So, you can see from these symbols here that in the first four rounds or three in a three or four player game, only one snow will fall on that type of terrain. So, you'll place out the snow token, but after that, it's going to start to accumulate and it will be two, three, and then finally four in the final round. So, the snow is going to build and build. Whereas, there are also going to be events that have bears. And when you place a bear, it will always be one.
So when the birds show up, at least it is one where the snow is going to start to accumulate and get worse as you're getting closer to the end of the game. Now, when the round trackers do meet these respective spots, you're also going to then score at the end of that round as well. So, as I noted, you're going to score for B and C at the end of this round. And what that's going to look like is going to be this condition here, which is going to be snow on your different path tiles. And this one is going to be for your forest. So, this is going to score you one victory point for your different tiles that are discovery as well as path tiles that meet that terrain type. Whereas, this one is going to be your snow along your different path tiles. Now, in future games when you're playing with different tokens, the different terrain types will of course reference the other terrain types that you don't see here currently. But for the one that is the conditions, sometimes it is looking for that particular thing and sometimes it's looking for things without it. So, where this one is including the snow, sometimes you would be looking for the path tiles without snow instead. Now, so far we've gone over how players are going to get victory points throughout the game for these different scoring phases because you saw the value in the different path and discovery tiles that you are placing out, but the discovery tiles actually have unique abilities as well depending on which symbol is on that discovery tile. So, that's all going to relate to endame scoring and have benefits for players. So for you to have a sense of what this is really going to look like, I'm now going to
simulate what a player board may look like at the end of the game. So you can see what that endame scoring is going to look like. Now again, endame is going to trigger at the end of the final round, whether it is nine rounds or 10 rounds for two players. And that's when players are going to go through endame scoring. So again, the only tiles that are going to score are going to be ones part of your longest path. So you're going to take your hiker here and demonstrate the path that you are going to go through. So looking here, we would be able to go through this way, across this way, up and around, all the way down, and then a straight shot all the way here to the exit. So we would be able to score all of our tiles except for this one here because that one did not connect. though where we were able to legally place this during the game and it was even worth points for us because of the terrain type when it scored during those phases.
During this endame scoring, it would not score for us. So once you show the path that you are going to go through, you are going to score victory points for your discovery tiles. You're going to get two points if they match the path tile that they are on. But they also have unique scoring as well, which I'll go through in just a moment. So, you're going to demonstrate that path. You will score points for your discovery tiles. You'll score for them matching the terrain type, and then you'll score two victory points for any of these tokens that were left over at the end of the game. Now, finally, players do receive negative points for the snow and bears that are out there, as well as the symbols that are on the tiles that are showing unless you are able to negate them. So, with that, let's go over the different abilities of the discovery tiles because some of them are going to be able to protect you from those negative points. Now, the juku are going to be these buildings here, and you can see that we have three of them in play.
So, you're going to gain victory points based on the total number that you have along your path. So, where we had three, we're going to be able to score eight victory points for that. But, for example, if we had five, we'd be able to score 15. So, that's how those are going to score. And then the samurai are going to score for you three victory points for each samurai on a different terrain type. So, we do have two samurai here and they are on unique terrain types that also just happen to match their path tiles. So, we would score three victory points for these samurai and again you would get the bonus for them matching as well. Now, there are the temples which are going to be very crucial for protecting you against negative points. So, the temples you'll gain two victory points for each of them. You can see that we currently have two of them out, but they're also going to be able to protect you from the bear symbols, bear tokens, and the snow tokens as well. Now, the wheel tokens are going to want to be near snow. So, you can see there is one wheel token over here, and they're going to score one victory point for each snow on its tile, as well as any that are orthogonally adjacent. So they would be scoring six points for all of the snow that is placed around here. Now, as I noted earlier, you are able to play tokens on top of other tokens. So there is the observation point here. And for this, you're going to score two victory points for each unique terrain type that
is underneath it. So it would not count itself. So where we currently have three underneath it that are unique, this one would score six victory points for us. So that's how that would score. And finally, there are the bells. And the bells are another form of protection for players where on [snorts] a spot where there is a bell or again anything that is orthogonally adjacent is going to be protected from bears. So this bell here is protecting these two tiles as well as itself. And this bell here is protecting all of these tiles. So you can see there is one bear symbol here that is not protected. and it was never covered. So that is going to be a negative victory point at the end of the game for this player. In Nakasendo, players are going to be primarily focused on the path that they are creating because that endgame scoring is going to be crucial. And when you have these different discovery tiles out, you're able to optimize them in a way that you're able to get a bunch of endgame scoring for yourself. So the tiles are really going to matter with the different directions that you're able to configure because as I showed you, you're only going to score for the tiles that are along your path. So you want to be sure that you're able to build out this path that makes sense and connects from the longest way possible from your entrance to your exit. So at the beginning of the game, you may be a bit more relaxed and choosing certain tiles perhaps because they score for the intermediate scoring for you and you're building out your different grid. that as you get more and more constricted in that 4x4 grid, you're going to start
offering up these different extra action tokens to other players because you want that thing that's in their supply. So, you're going to start wanting certain things, whether you need a certain type of curve or direction, and you're going to want to be able to be sure to snag that for yourself, or perhaps you're going to gain some extra scoring from having your discovery tiles match or a certain discovery tile that you really need, or you want to be sure someone else doesn't get it as well. So players are really going to be focused on their path, but you're going to have that intermediate scoring throughout the game to guide you as well. So that's going to give you a sense of what you are working toward that if you're not sure perhaps what type of terrain you want to go for, that's going to guide you because certain ones are going to score for you, perhaps once or twice still in the game if you're able to grab it early enough.
So this has been a preview of Nakasendo. You can check out the link down below for everything that Little Rocket Games has planned. Thank you all for watching the BorgM channel. I've been Professor Mag and I'll see you all next time.