Hello there, First name / friend! It's almost summer, so what type of games should I feature next? Games that are easy to travel with or games to play with your younger kids? Today I'll be talking about a new game that gets a lot of attention, Cascadia. We just got this one through a Target sale and have played it 5 times already. |
|
Cascadia is a medium-light game that can be played with 1-4 players. In this tile placing game, you have the opportunity to create your own ecosystem, full of wildlife and various habitats. Each tile will include at least one habitat and at least one animal. Bears, elk, salmon, hawks & foxes are the animals and mountains, forests, prairies, wetlands, and rivers are the habitats. Each animal will have its own objective card, shown below. On your first game you will play with the A side. There are 4 options for each animal to provide variety. You will start with a stack of 20 habitat tiles per player, face down, plus 3. Then turn over 4 tiles and draw 4 wildlife tokens from the bag. You'll set that up as shown below. Give each player one starter habitat tile (the big one that has 3 tiles in one). Then you are ready to start! |
|
Below is my starting tile. I will then choose a habitat tile and the wildlife token that's under it. I can place the tile anywhere on my board, where an edge lines up with another. The habitats don't need to match, but you'll get bonus points at the end for connecting habitat pieces. So for my first turn, I placed the tile at the bottom so my forest and mountain tiles would line up. Then I get to place my wildlife token (hawk) on a tile that contains a hawk symbol. I had three options, but chose the one at the top since that is a keystone tile. A keystone only has one animal, includes a small picture of a pinecone, and a little triangle at the top. When you cover up a keystone tile, you take a nature token (pinecones). I will explain what those do soon. |
|
Then we place a new habitat tile and wildlife token on the board. There should always be 4 of each, lined up. Now it's the next players turn. You'll take turns until there are only 3 remaining tiles, 20 turns each. You also need to take note of overpopulation. If all 4 wildlife tokens are the same animal, they are cleared and replaced. If there's 3 of the same, it's up to the current player if they want to replace them. Now let's talk about nature tokens! Nature tokens can be spent to either 1. take any one wildlife token and any one habitat tile (not lined up) or 2. clear any number of wildlife tokens and replace them. Use these strategically! If you do not use them, you'll get 1 point for each at the end of the game. |
|
After turn 20, you'll score the game. You'll score each wildlife according to their objective cards. Then you'll score habitats. You'll look at how many continuous tiles you laid for each terrain, only counting your largest. For example, above I have 3 yellow tiles on the upper left and 5 in the center. I will only count the 5. You'll get a point for each, and bonus points if your habitat is the largest (for each type). Then you'll score your nature tokens and total it all up. Most points wins… which unfortunately was Adam by 1 this time. 🙄 So what do you think? Have you tried this one yet or would you? |
|
Instead of shopping links, I'm including previous emails just in case you missed them!
|
|
|
