Rome wasn’t built in one play-through!
~Game Stats~
~Publisher: PSC Games
~Designer: Dávid Turczi / Nick Shaw
~Artists: Andreas Resch / Nicholas Avallone
~Players: 1-4
~Sweet Spot: 2-3
~Mechanics: City Building / Roll & Write / Resource Management / Asymmetrical Player Powers
!!!Find it on Kickstarter now!!!
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/pscgamesuk/rome-and-roll-gladiators-expansion
As we sit here surrounded by piles of roll & writes, nursing our dice addiction, the more sadistic side of us has often wondered what kind of lovechild would come from a R&W/Euro-game union. The answer: Rome & Roll, and its subsequent expansion, Gladiators! If a typical roll & write is a gaming snack, then Rome & Roll is the whole damn meal! But don’t be daunted! With sprawling player boards and strategic options for miles, you’ll find Rome & Roll the perfect mash-up of tactical crunch and streamlined ease! Prepare to win Nero’s favor as you build the perfect empire, one die at a time!
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~THOUGHTS~
Kitty: Now THIS is a real roll & write! Here… lift it… it’s got…
Brooks: Heft! That’s what it’s got! I could bludgeon an intruder with the player boards alone! And the dice…
Kitty: Yeah, these are really nice! Niiiiice hand-feel!
Brooks: Ew… Anyway, Rome & Roll is not simply a roll & write. It is a euro-game trying to smuggle itself into a lightweight gaming convention. It’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing. And then… you get into it and realize it’s a nice, friendly wolf that you totally want to introduce to your wolf-hating friends. *cough, cough, Liz*
Kitty: Exactly! Our dear Lizzy sat this one out (temporarily) because she typically doesn’t like roll & writes. But we will be forcing her to play this one and amending this review with her input.
Brooks: Yes we will. Because, honestly, Rome & Roll is that good! We were stunned after our first play-through at just how lush the strategic options were, yet how mechanically smooth it ran. We felt like we had just played Concordia or the like, relishing that feeling that mid-weight euro gives you after successfully managing your resources for the entire run, while also building an enviable empire. The only reason this can even be considered a roll and write is because instead of building tiles to place on the board, you draw, and instead of fiddly bits to keep track of your resources and such, you tick boxes.
Kitty: So true! It’s a dense game on a diet! We had to keep reminding ourselves that we were technically playing a roll & write. The game starts by slapping beautifully hefty slab-like player boards in front of you with an array of actions and scoring opportunities. Each player board contains a comprehensive action glossary, a storage area for your resources, 6 different scoring tracks integral to different actions, and a panel of advisors that act as a skill tree of sorts, providing character upgrades and bonuses. These advisors are unique to each character making them all feel thematically different from one another.
Brooks: The board is a beautiful grid of construction possibilities, tasking each player with rebuilding ancient Rome. With varying terrain types and district demarcations, outlying regions rich in resources, and a catalogue of buildings with synergistic powers, your options are satisfyingly plenty. You can fortify your army, establish settlements, create trade routes, tax, trade, and rebuild the city. While doing all of this, you’ll also be attempting to gain the favor of various gods as well as Emperor Nero. The amount of tactical pathways are so numerous, it makes Rome & Roll stand far above all other roll & writes, looking down on them in shame.
Kitty: And while all of that is packed into the compact and deceiving disguise of a roll & write, it actually is an easy game to learn and understand. That’s not to say it won’t be a challenge for regulars of the genre and newer players, but it’s an attainable step up for sure. The dice and markers are just a conduit for all of the euro-game goodness within. It’s very thinky, and delightfully crunchy, as you decide between many methods of building your economic engine as you lurch towards domination.
Brooks: The most beautiful thing about Rome & Roll is that you’re not punished for your play-style. You can be an aggressor that devotes resources to conquering the outlying territories, you can live your best merchant life amassing a fortune of points, or you can reconstruct the city creating synergistic, point-spewing neighborhoods.
Kitty: Or, you can diversify, like you did, and squash me like a bug!
Brooks: Haha… you were just a little too eager early on instead of playing the long game. Sometimes you have to sit on your plans for a while until the right time!
Kitty: To say I was slaughtered in the Colosseum is an understatement… “are you not entertained”, indeed!
Brooks: Speaking of the Colosseum, we were lucky enough to get our hands on a preview copy of the newest expansion, Gladiators! The additions it brings are incredible and varied! Public advisors that can be bribed by any player, new building blueprints, additional God’s Favour and Emperor Nero cards, and most excitingly, the Colosseum itself which you’ll train gladiators to fight and entertain in. All of this also comes with another unique character sheet with the gladiators as his specialty!
Kitty: Gladiators is a perfectly thematic addition to an already meaty and marvelous game! Something fantastic about Rome & Roll, as well as Gladiators, is that everything feels so purposeful. From the large, sturdy player boards with a beautiful icon glossary on the back, to the way in which player interaction can dictate rewards and consequences, everything has a meaningful purpose. Nothing feels tacked on or try-hard. It all works together building the perfect economic engine for reestablishing the empire.
Brooks: I love when I can finish a game and say, there’s hardly a single thing I would change.
Kitty: Except the marker on the box art and the creepy faces on some of the cards, right?
Brooks: Oh yeah… that I would change! The pro-consul card has the most comically concerned expression I’ve ever seen. But those things are certainly minor. The components are of an incredible quality, game play is so incredibly satisfying that you’ll think you just finished a full-size, table-hog of a euro game, and the rule book is master class in clarity and order.
Kitty: It certainly is! It even has designer notes that hilariously clarify things like, don’t worry… just because you’re bribing everyone with fish, that’s not all they ate… we promise… they had other food… we think…
Brooks: I’m going to try and purchase my next game with fish…
Kitty: I’m sure that will go well.
Brooks: Can I bribe you with a fish to play Rome & Roll again?
Kitty: Aw, I thought you’d never ask!
Kitty: 8/10 ~ Brooks: 9.5/10
!!!GAME PLAYLIST!!!
Rome ~ Dermot Kennedy
Fighter ~ JOSEPH
Burn ~ Phillipa Soo (Hamilton)
Hold Back the River ~ James Bay
worst behavior ~ Ariana Grande
I Write Sins Not Tragedies ~ Panic! At the Disco
Postcards from Italy ~ Beriut
Fall Into You ~ Night Terrors of 1927
Roll Up Your Sleeves ~ Meg Mac
Sanguine ~ Widowspeak
Venus ~ Lady Gaga
My Boy Builds Coffins ~ Florence + the Machine
Art of War ~ We the Kings
Four Cypresses ~ Grizzly Bear
End of the Road ~ Noga Erez
Rolling In the Deep ~ Adele
Rose of Sharon ~ Mumford & Sons
Gold Coins ~ Charli XCX
Roll Call ~ The Neighbourhood
Long Way to Go to Die ~ LP
The Fight ~ Overcoats
Roses and Gold ~ Biig Piig
Soldier On ~ The Temper Trap
Written In the Water ~ Gin Wigmore
The Last Song I’ll Write For You ~ David Cook
Long Distance Gamers 