Archive for the 'Spyrium' Category

Spyrium is a eurogame with an interesting worker placement game mechanic.  It is designed by the creator of Caylus and Caylus Magna Carta (the latter being one of my favourite games) so I was keen to try it out.

THE GAME
The game has a steampunk-ish setting and players are each head of an industrial conglomerate in Victorian England and spyrium is a mineral high in energy.  The player who scores the most victory points (VPs) by the end of the game wins.

Each round 9 cards are drawn from the deck and laid out in a 3×3 grid – I’ll call this ‘the grid’ from now on.  Players take turns either placing a worker or activating a worker; however, once a player starts activating their workers, they can’t return to placing workers during the current round.  As a result, you have to choose carefully when to switch from placing to activating.

The cards in the 3×3 grid are either characters (one-off benefits that all players can use), buildings (which can be bought to give special actions), and patented techniques (which can be bought to give on-going abilities plus they score VPs at the end of the game too).  When a building or technique is bought, it is removed from the grid and placed in front of its owner. Read the rest of this entry »

Spyrium caught my attention from the gameplay description.  It was only after that that I discovered it is designed by the creator of Caylus and Caylus Magna Carta (the latter being one of me favourite games).  So, this doubly interested me.

The game has steampunk-ish setting and players are each head of an industrial conglomerate an spyrium is a mineral high in energy.  The player who scores the most victory points (VPs) by the end of the game wins.

Spyrium uses a clever worker placement system where players place their workers in between buildings which are laid out in a 3×3 grid.  Players take turns either placing or activating a worker; however, once a player starts activating their workers, they can’t place any more during the current round, so you have to choose when to switch from one to the other.

Activating a worker allows the player to use one of the two cards that the worker is positioned between, so you have a choice until you use them.  The cards in the 3×3 grid are either characters (which give you one off benefits), buildings (which allow you to build your own buildings used for special effects in future turns), and patents (which give you on-going abilities plus score VPs at the end of the game too).

Using a card by activating one of your workers next to it costs money equal to the cost of the card being used plus the number of workers (of any player) that are positioned next that building.  So, placing your workers can hinder others, give you a choice of uses, and the order you use them in can make a difference too.  Workers can generate money too which is also based on how many other workers (of all players) are next to the same building. Read the rest of this entry »