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Games Session

This week we decided to try the brand new Rio Grande game, Goldbrau by Franz-Benno Delonge (the guy who previously designed the excellent Transamerica and Dos Rios).

Goldbrau is a business game where the idea is to earn the most money through investment in beer gardens and the breweries that supply the gardens. The game board shows a town square consisting of 38 spaces for the beer gardens to expand into. Six beer gardens surround the square and each starts by occupying one space. There are also four breweries that can supply beer to up to three gardens but each garden can have only one supplier. Each beer garden has one boss, who can determine which brewery supplies it, but players can compete to take over the role of boss. The breweries also have bosses and each business (gardens and breweries) has six shares available for purchase.

The game is played over three weeks (rounds) with each consisting of seven turns (days) followed by a payout. On each day players secretly choose one of three actions: expand a beer garden where you are currently the boss; challenge a boss or change a contract; or buy a share. Players reveal their choice simultaneously and then carry out the actions in the order described above. Those choosing beer garden expansion go first. They get to expand a garden where they are the boss by one space, including taking over a space from an adjoining beer garden if they are the boss of both gardens. Those who chose "challenge or change" go next. They can attempt to take over as the boss of a garden as long as they have one share in the garden. If the current boss does not have an absolute majority of that garden's shares in play at that time, the challenger takes over as the boss; otherwise the challenge is unsuccessful. Alternatively, they can choose to change the brewery that supplies a beer garden where they are currently the boss. (With these first two actions, if only one player chooses the action, they get to take the turn twice. If more than one chooses the option, they each just get a standard turn). The final action is to buy a share from a choice of two displayed at the beginning of the day or a blind one from the supply deck. The cost of the shares goes up the more people choose that action: 2 Thalers if just one person chose to buy shares; 5 Thalers if two chose the option; and 8 Thalers if more than two. Shares once bought can be either played immediately and a share marker is placed on the respective beer garden or brewery, or kept in hand to be played later. Each day continues in the same fashion and after 7 days, a scoring takes place. Each beer garden generates income of 4 Thalers for each space it occupies (or 8 Thalers for certain special spaces). Half of this income is paid to the brewery that supplies the beer garden and the other half is distributed equally to the garden's shareholders (with any excess going to the current boss of the garden). Once all the gardens have paid out, each brewery distributes all its income equally to its shareholders (with remaining Thalers going to its boss). Two more rounds are played in this way and the player with the most money after the third week is the winner.