Akropolis: Pantheon - Coop and Solo Expansion Review
Transcript
Welcome to Allies or Enemies. I'm Jess.
And I am Shawn and today we are talking about Acropolis Pantheon and our copy was provided but the thoughts are all our own.
Acropolis Pantheon is designed by Jules Messad and it is a one to four player expansion for Acropolis that lets you play solo or cooperatively.
Acropolis Pantheon changes the game a lot because this changes the game into a co-op game and you can play this game with one to four players. There's also a solo mode that doesn't change all that much from the two to four player mode but we're mostly going to talk about the multiplayer mode and in this game what you were doing is you are building your own city and then you're also building a collective capital. Only the capital scores on your turn. You're going to have three tiles in your hand. You are going to play one of those either to your city and the point when you're playing it to your city is to finish these different challenges and when you finish those challenges you are going to get alters. You're going to put those alters on the scoring tiles or plazas that are in that capital city and only plazas with alters will score. So you have to do these tiles.
When you're putting things into the capital, you have to spend one stone but you're adding them there because you want to get points and so you've got to balance that out. Getting these alters that are going to allow you to score any points and building the capital which also is going to build stuff that's going to allow you to score points. And what you're doing is you're going to choose one of three challenges at the start of the game. That is going to have three different target scores. Either a win, a good win or an amazing win and at the end of the game you're just going to count up all your points and see where you qualify on that tile.
Yeah and it's an interesting balance because to be able to complete for example like a blue challenge, you're going to need a bunch of blue tiles in your city. But then once you're putting the altar in the shared city, that plaza's going to score. So you obviously want to make sure it gets a lot of points. So it's going to need a lot of blue tiles. So you're constantly balancing where you're sending tiles and like facing these conflicting priorities.
Yeah, and I do like that in a game where I have to play I have to play the thing that I also want to score. So I have to spend the thing that I want to score. And what often happens in this sort of two-player game is we find one of us is kind of let's say it's blue is focusing on blue in their city and the other one is more spending their blues into the capital. But that can't always happen because you may not get the tiles that you want to get. And the other thing that you've got to think about is stones. And I like how they use those in this game because in the original game, that's really used to be able to choose from a row from like a different row. So you can skip over rows. But here you that's not a part of the game. So here you're using it first of all just to spend to put out in the capital. So every single time you put one in the capital, you have to spend a stone. But then also, if if you spend five stones on any one turn, you can add another challenge to the row of challenges. Now you will always have four challenges to choose from and that is really helpful.
And then also, you obviously want to have a range of different colors. So you have more options available to you because you might end up in a situation where there isn't even a particular plaza of that color available. And you definitely uh will have to just wait until you have a plaza in before you can even score it.
Yeah, we have definitely had that before where we've got two of those three challenges for like a yellow, but we haven't found a yellow plaza. And so we're just like, "Oh, what do we do?" So it is great to be able to use those stones, but you still do need them as well to put out things. So you do have to think about that. And we definitely find ourselves doing Well, I find myself doing a lot more of those putting a tile on top of three or two or three white buildings in order to get more of those stones because they are quite valuable. But, really this game is is about that balance of do I put it in my city? Do I put it in the capital? And then also the teamwork. And I found that while on the surface this seems like a game that could use that could end up with a bit of alpha gaming where someone has got a picture of what they want that capital to be, we really haven't found that that's happened.
Yeah, we haven't found there to be an alpha gamer, but communication is definitely needed because the last thing you want to happen is unbeknownst to either of you if you're both going for the same challenge because then you're just wasting tiles in your city. And one of the things I found interesting is it did take me like a game to get used to playing so differently when building your own city because your own city doesn't score at all. It's only to complete those challenges. So, I did find myself having to like go through a game before I like fully understood that.
Yeah, yeah, cuz you just from playing it so much, I do want to put all those blues into a line and I want to separate those yellows and all that stuff. And you don't need to. You just need to follow what's on the cards. But, the other thing I learned from playing this is that we sucked to this game before because we really found when we were building like when we first played this game that shared city, we were not getting even that minimum score. So, this expansion I think has made us a lot better at this game because it's taught really the importance of building up cuz you realize that pretty quick when you're trying to hit these minimum scores.
Yeah, and for people who are really good, I like that there are the three different scenarios that you can pick from. So, if you're you're new to it and the one we've played the most is the one where there's like no additional restriction. But, there's another one that you can play where you have to like group your altars, another one where only the ones that are at least on the second level score. So, it adds increasing like challenges.
Yeah, and the one that only has the altar on the second level. So, we have tried that one and we have beaten the bottom score on that one. But, that one is tough because really you don't want an altar on the second level. That's just a waste because altars usually score the same no matter what level. And so, I think that is clever that you have to play a little different. And the one where you're grouping, too. Because while that's not quite as hard and the score does reflect that, that that score is not quite as or it's a little bit higher what you need. But, it it definitely takes a little bit more thinking, a little bit more planning, and a little bit more teamwork.
Yeah. And I also like that at two players, well, at any player count, you play with all of the tiles regardless. So, you don't have to like go through and like figure out what your player count is for this cooperative version, whether it's one player or four players or in between, you play with everything.
Yeah, and I like that, too, because we've got a like a nice big city. At two, it sometimes feels like the city's not quite as much as our individual cities aren't quite as much as I want them to be. But, here, you've got this huge capital that you've all built together. And talking about that solo mode, too, I love that they've included a solo mode now and it plays so much like the other modes, as well, that it is quite a solid solo mode and an interesting puzzle.
But, obviously, the key for this expansion is that it's for people who want to play Acropolis cooperatively or who are looking for a solo mode because that's entirely what it is. And for us, who really like cooperative games, we think it's a really strong, maybe even a slightly stronger game as a cooperative mode.
And that is it. That is Acropolis: Pantheon. And are there other expansions that turn games into co-op games or maybe even vice versa? Please let us know about those in the comments.
Thank you so much for watching and as usual, please like, subscribe, and hopefully we'll see you next time for another game.