One of the first games I decided upon for B&B&B when we returned this year was The Quacks Of Quedlinburg from Schmidt Spiele and designed by Wolfgang Warsch.
I had heard a lot about the game and it looked a whole bunch of fun too. It is one that had somewhat passed me by even though it made an absolutely massive splash in the board gaming world. Seems just like me to miss out on the big trend and come back to something years down the line right?
I can safely say that, much like with Bunny Kingdom, it wasn't quite the game that I thought it was and it was indeed a "whole bunch of fun".
Brewing "Helpful" Potions
In a game of The Quacks Of Quedlinburg (which we'll just call Quacks for now I think) you take on the role of charlatans who are looking to brew potions to sell to the people of Quedlinburg. However, as you don't really know what you're doing you are pushing your luck with each ingredient you add to your cauldron!
Designed as a "bag builder", Quacks has each player start with the same array of ingredients in their bag. During a round, you'll draw these tokens from your bag and place them on the swirling path that winds its way out from the middle of your cauldron.
Each token in the game has a value and so at its basic level, you'll simply place said token that far away from the last one and hopefully get a higher and higher score. Simple right? Well, this is where the push your luck element of Quacks comes into play.
Each player has a number of cherry bomb tokens in their bag and if you add too many of them into the mix, your pot will explode and you'll lose out when it comes to scoring at the end of the round.
The end of the round does however brings victory points and coins that can be spent on new ingredients. If your pot exploded then you'll have to choose one or the other whilst everyone else gets both!
New ingredients range from tokens that help you get further up that swirling track on your player board whilst others have special abilities. As with any good "builder" game, you'll be trying to optimise your collection so that when you draw, you should end up with something useful!
Quacks then plays out over nine rounds, occasionally adding new ingredients into the mix for players to choose from, and the person with the most victory points at the end of the game wins!
Randomness, The Great Leveller!
I really enjoyed Quacks and I would certainly play it again. The gameplay mechanics are simple and easy to understand and you'll get them within a second of starting your first round. Where the game shines is in that push your luck mechanic and the moments that it creates at the tabletop.
It was neat playing the game and trying to work out the odds on whether or not you should continue. You look around the table and see the tense faces of your other charlatans trying to work out if they're going to storm by you thanks to a good bout of luck.
This also means that even if someone is really good at the game and knows what to pick and when; fate can intervene and screw them over just as often as a new player. It works as a great leveller but one that isn't so random as to be annoying.
The types of ingredients that you add into your bag are great mitigators and there is often a way out of a bad situation if you've bought a good mix of ingredients and feel lucky!
Quacks also plays ridiculously quickly too. You can get through a couple of games in an evening which is very handy if you play and found yourself mercilessly losing out to bloomin' cherry bombs!
There is also a built-in catch-up mechanic in the game so even if you find yourself lagging behind you will still be able to start getting your hands on better and better ingredients. It's not so big a mechanic that it unbalances things but it means that you always feel like you're progressing.
I think that Quacks would be a great game to play at a convention or with those that you're looking to introduce to hobby board gaming for the first time. It's light, quick, easy and full of fun moments.
There is a bunch of replay value in Quacks too. The core box comes with loads of different ingredients for you to use each game and there are already two expansions that build on that core experience. The Herb Witches and The Alchemists both get good ratings on BGG and seem like a good option if you find Quacks being played a lot with your group.
Components Image Via Nitz Barron On Board Game Geek
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