These days I am very into board games. A game night invite made me thrilled. This time, the invite was from Dan. We looked at the invite detail. It said Dan would host this game night and dinner would be served. I tried Dan's home made cake before. It was GOOD. We highly expected his dinner cooking.We arrived with 15 min polite time. Now, I am used to 15 min polite time rule. Apparently other guests did not follow the 15 min polite time rule. All other guest had arrived. We had eight people. Excluding us, we had Dan, Adam, Ed, Wen, Memet, and Emily. Adam and Ed were new faces. They are Dan's friends. Dan provided appetizers. The appetizer was juicy and fresh looking salad on top of crispy Italian bread slice.
The entree was lasagna. Its ingredients included pork sausage, tomato sauce, egg, and plenty of cheese. The lasagna looked very manly. We each got a square of it.
After dinner, the game began. We spent some time on game picking because of the head count. We were thinking to split the group into 2. But then the fun would be eroded. We wanted to play Power Grid. But Power Grid did not allow 8 players. Settlers. No, too many people. Suddenly, Dan took a box out. On the cover, we saw CITADELS.
Apparently a few people had played Citadels before. Emily, Adam, and Dan knew the rules well. At some point, Emily disagreed with Adam. After 5 min, we got a consensus.
The rules explanation as usual took some time. People were inpatient. So we asked to cut the explanation short. We said we could pick up as we played. This strategy worked. Here is brief explanation of the rules.
Settings for 8
Pick 9 cards from the deck. 9 cards are: Assassin, Thief, Magician, King, Bishop, Merchant, Architect, Condottiere, and Queen. One person is chosen randomly to be the de-facto King for the first turn. The King turns 9 character cards face down and shuffles them. Then, picks one card and put this card in the middle of the table. No body including the King knows what this card is. Then, the de-facto King takes the 8 character cards and pick one role. He does not need to pick King if he does not want to. Then, goes clockwise, everyone picks a role. The last person has an advantage which the last person can choose between the remaining card and the one in the middle of the table. Since sometimes the remaining card is not attractive, it might be better to pick the one in the middle. Besides, no one knows what the card in the center of the table is. This rule makes the game more fun.
Then, the main body starts by exercising roles. Here is the order: Assassin, Thief, Magician, King, Bishop, Merchant, Architect, Warlord, and Queen. If no one possesses a role, then the role will be skipped. Each role has some special power and attractive characters. Some roles are more powerful since some roles can destroy other player's district or steal golds or swap the whole cards with another role.
The powers of the characters
1. Assassin
Assassin announces which other character the Assassin attempts to murder. The player who has this character says nothing, and says nothing when his character is called to take his turn. The murdered character therefore misses his entire turn.
2. Thief
Thief announces what character the Thief attempts to steal from. When the player who has this character is called upon and shows his character card, the Thief takes all of his gold pieces. The Thief may not steal from the Assassin or the character that the Assassin murdered because Assassin and the assassinated action have had happened.
3. Magician
Any time during Magician's turn the Magician may either:
- swap the Magician's entire hand of cards (not the ones on the board) with the hand of another player. This applies even if the Magician has no cards in his hand. In this case, he simply takes the other player's cards.
- Or the Magician may discard a number of cards from his hand, and take replacement cards from the top of the district deck. The discarded cards are placed under the district deck.
4. King
King receives a gold piece for each noble district (gold) in his played districts. He receives the Crown card immediately. He will now call for characters, and will be the first player to choose his character on the next turn. If no King is chosen on the next turn, the current King keeps the marker.
5. Bishop
Bishop receives a gold piece for each religious district (blue) in his played districts. The Bishop cannot be attacked by the Condottiere.
6. Merchant
Merchant receives at the beginning of his turn an extra gold piece. The Magician can therefore take three gold pieces, or a card and a gold piece. The Merchant also receives a gold piece for each trade district (green) in his played districts.
7. Architect
At the beginning of Architect's turn, the Architect takes two extra district cards from the top of the deck, without choosing them. The architect can therefore take three cards at all, or two cards and two gold piece. The Architect is also allowed to build up to three districts on his turn.
8. Warlord
Warlord receives a gold piece for each military district (red) in his played districts. At the end of Warlord's turn, the Warlord may attack a city and destroy a district of his choice. The Warlord can destroy a district of cost 1 for free, or can destroy a more expensive district by paying a cost of one less than the cost to build the district. Thus, a district which cost 2 to build will cost the Warlord 1 to destroy and so on and so forth. He can also attack his own city if it makes sense for him to do so. But, he cannot attack a city already completed by having 8 districts.
People liked me and Wen were confused about the rules at the first 10 min. We did not get the gold allocation and role selection right. We saw other players got many golds and good districts. We were losing. BUT, here is the beauty of Citadels. The beginning disadvantage does not determine the final position. This game is full of surprises. You can always see the top three players change dramatically at one round. This game was totally a Psychological game. You need to think the consequence of each remaining roles before you pick a role. You need to think how to defend your districts as well as how to steal advantage from other players. You need to think what people after your order may pick if you take this role. Besides, you need to think what other players may want in order to win so that you can pick their desired cards first to make the game more dynamic.
Citadels was amazing.
