Chill but stressful?

I didn’t know much about Tranquility before, but I’ve heard good things about it a few times already, so it became one of the small presents I got for Reni this Christmas. 🎁 The risk was worth it, because it turns out the game is really great indeed! 😁 It’s a no-communication co-op game of hand management and card placement. Basically you want to complete a 6x6 grid, with cards of ascending numbers from bottom-left to top-right. It’s not as easy as it sounds! 🙀

Tranquility can be played with 1-5 players, and you split up the shuffled deck accordingly. The deck consists of 80 cards, numbered 1 to 80.
On your turn you either play a card, or discard 2 cards. The rules for playing cards are quite interesting. 🧐 You can place anywhere on the 6x6 grid, where there is no card yet. If there is no adjacent card there, you can do it for free, however if you place next to another card, you have to discard as many cards as the difference between the two cards’ values. ☝️ As your hand size is 5, you are never allowed to place a card that is more than 4 higher or lower. Discarding is something you really want to avoid! A card at the end of a row is adjacent to the first card of the row above it, so every card will be adjacent to 2 cards.

You lose if someone cannot place a card or discard 2 cards on their turn. ☠️ To win, you have to finish the grid completely, and that’s not all! You also have to play a Start card, which usually throws a wrench in your plans, and finally have a Finish card after 36 islands are in play. This gives a final challenge to the game, as players’ decks are already dwindling.

The game is quite tranquil, but stressful too - I know that’s a paradox. 😅 Tranquil because you don’t really have to mentally prepare yourself “to game”, you can just sit down, shuffle the cards, then place them one at a time. It’s a simple endeavour, but fun. The stress comes from the fact that you keep having to discard cards, and the deck is running out! 😱 You are also sometimes unsure where to place cards, what your teammates have already discarded or if you even still have some of the needed values. In summary, we definitely recommend this game! 🥰