Play as pirates of the Caribbean

🌴 Maracaibo is our newest euro von Alex Pfister, set in the 17th Century Caribbean. We have some other beloved Pfister-titles in our collection already, but this is probably the best one yet. This statement is supported by the fact that we played the game 3 times back-to-back, even though we were planning to play some other games too😁. The game board seems a bit noisy at first and we also needed a little help from the rulebook with the iconography, but after a full game everything is crystal clear, and you just enjoy the intricate strategies and tactics of the game.🤩

Maracaibo is a rondel-game - we are sailing ⛵️ around on the same path multiple times, taking actions along the way. Round end is triggered when someone reaches the last space on the circle, this means the round length is variable. It gives an ever changing ebb-and-flow to the game: some rounds might be longer because everyone is taking smaller actions, only slightly moving along; some rounds might be shorter because someone couldn’t achieve what they wanted and are racing to the last spot so others don’t profit too much. We really love rondels,😍 they always make for very intriguing gameplay.

The card play in the game is also phenomenal. Cards are multi-use - you might discard them for the goods icons or item icons, or you might buy them to use in your tableau. Tableau-building also means you get stronger as the game goes on - you raise your income, get ongoing abilities or new usable actions. I absolutely love that in games, it makes you feel powerful and want to play again to try other strategies. Due to the multi-use nature of the cards you also have a lot of hard and crunchy decisions to make.🤔 That awesome but expensive card you have been saving might have to be thrown away to make use of another effect - you can always pivot your strategy though.👍

In typical Pfister fashion there are also a bunch of unlockable upgrades on your ship - you get to mostly decide in what order to unlock them. This lends another dose of replaybility to an already incredible game.😍🤩