POINT
OF VIEW
by
Al Newman
ODIN'S RAVENS (Rio
Grande Games, 2 players, 30-45 minutes; $19.95)
Odin's
Ravens is another entry is Kosmos' two player series and turns
out to be one of the best, if not the best, two player game in recent years.
The game was designed by Thorsten Gimmler and is a 30 to 45 minute race through
the skies of a constantly changing landscape.
Nine of the 40 shuffled landscape cards are placed face up on
the table, forming the journey for the player's Ravens. Each card has a
landscape pictured on the top and bottom and they can be different. The
top landscape is for one 
Raven to travel and the bottom landscape is for the
other Raven to travel. Landscapes
come in several varieties; meadows, plains, lakes, and mountains etc. The
initial nine may not show identical consecutive landscapes for either Raven, so
such cards can be turned upside down if possible or simply discarded in favor of
one that works.
The players then shuffle their individual flight decks and
draw 5 cards. The remainder form a draw deck. The flight cards
picture one of the possible landscapes and are the mechanic for the journey.
Basically, play a mountain, fly over the mountain; play a plains, cross a
plains. But there is more!
The player's Ravens are placed at the start of each
"track" and one of six "Magicway" cards is placed face up
nearby. The Magicway cards have two pictures, either two of the possible
landscapes or one landscape and Odin himself. Flight cards that match
either of the two pictures can be played to the Magicway, simply another route
to victory.
The scoring breaks down as
follows. The player who gets to the last
landscape card first scores his margin of victory in Victory Points
("VPs"). The player that plays more cards to the Magicway will
score 3 VPs at the end of the round. The winner is the first to 12 VPs or
the player with the most VPs if both have more than 12. The game usually
takes three or four rounds to complete.
The youngest player starts and first turns alternate
thereafter. On his turn, a player plays 3 cards from his hand. These
cards may be played as flight cards for the journey or may be played to the
Magicway OR may be played face down to a special deck the player may later
utilize. The player may also play as many as 3 of the cards he has
previously placed face down (in the same order as they lie), so a player may
actually be able to play as many as 6 cards on his turn.
If the player plays the right flight card, his Raven is moved
to the next landscape. If there are two or more consecutive identical
landscapes, he may move the Raven the entire distance. For example, Paul's
Raven is on a Lake and the next three landscapes are Mountains. He plays a
Mountain flight card and crosses all three Mountains, landing on the last one.
If the player does not have the correct card, he may play any pair of identical
landscapes as a wild card.
If the player plays to the Magicway, the card is left there
for the remainder of the round. If the player plays to the special
facedown deck, he may later examine what he has placed but may not change the
order of the cards unless a
special Odin card allows him to. There are a number of Odin cards, all
with actions that allow a player to "break" the rules, such as turn a
landscape card upside down or to remove a card from the track. In either
of these cases, a player may be able to "set" the track so that he has
identical landscapes to traverse. If he has the right cards in his hand,
this can be a game winning maneuver. The Odin cards all have two options,
which typically afford the player some very nice choices. One type of Odin
card even allows the placement of an Odin piece in front of the opponent's
Raven. For the opponent to cross that landscape, he will need 2 of the correct card. Note that the player could actually cross the
Odin piece with one correct card and one wild set or even two wild sets (which
would require using at least one of the face down cards, since you may only play
a maximum of three from your hand).
At the end of each player's turn, players replenish their
hand to five cards and then have the option of extending the track by one card,
drawing a new landscape card and playing it next to the former last landscape
card. There are no restrictions on cards placed in this manner and
theoretically, you could have meadow after meadow after meadow, if that's how
they came up. Obviously, a player who is behind might avail himself of
this maneuver to stave off defeat but even the Raven in the lead might use this
strategy to try and increase his margin
of victory (and VPs)!
I have played the game at least a half dozen times and am
very impressed
by the simplicity of the game and at the same time, its depth. Decisions
abound and there seems adequate room to test out various tactics and strategies.
A few tips to keep in mind:
Note the landscapes for the
Magicway. Whatever is pictured, you do NOT want in your path, so use your
Odin's cards to flip those landscapes to your opponents side. If you do,
it makes it less likely that he will be able to play that flight card to the
Magicway and gives you a better chance of capturing the 3 VPs.
If you have a pair of flight cards with no similar landscape
coming up for awhile, you might want to consider playing them to your reserve
deck. You may also want to play cards that match the Magicway to your reserve,
which you can play later to surprise your opponent. Remember, you get to
play as many as 6 cards, 3 from your hand and 3 from your reserve deck.
Don't forget you can add a card to the flight path at the end
of your turn! This may make it more difficult for your opponent to finish
or may increase your own margin of victory.
Given that each contest
presents new and different challenges, Odin's Ravens
has a classic quality and I expect it to afford enjoyment for a long time to
come. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
- - - - - - - - - - - Al Newman
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