The most crunchy garphill game yet?

🌄 Wayfarers of the South Tigris is the first entry in the newest trilogy from Garphill Games . I am quite fond of the Western Kingdom and North Sea trilogies, so I was intrigued when the new “South” trilogy was announced - then I got even more hyped when I heard the main mechanic will be dice allocation. I simply love the input randomness of dice worker placement games, thinking about the best ways to do things with what you were given. 😍

🧾 The game is set in 820 AD. You play as explorers who set out from Baghdad, trying to map not just the surrounding lands and seas, but also the skies and stars, and recording your journey. You also employ citizens and vie for influence in the guilds with the aim to be the most successful and earn the favor of the Caliph.

Some things will be familiar if you played the other trilogies, but there are so many cool new ideas in this one. 😊

🎲 As mentioned, dice are the main way to interact with the game. You can use them to activate actions if you have the required amount of symbols. Which leads us to the ‘caravan’.

🐫 Managing your caravan is awesome! You have a grid on your player board. Each column corresponds to a die value. As the game goes on you get some bonus tiles that you can place in the grid, making the different dice values stronger and more versatile.

🃏 Tons of Tableau-building. You add Land and Water cards to your tableau as you explore, tuck Townsfolk cards under them, add Space cards above them, tuck Inspiration cards under your Space cards - all of these give you new scoring conditions, bonuses or new dice slots. There is also a set collection element to the icons of cards you acquire.

♟️Worker placement as a side mechanic - in addition to your dice you also have meeples. When you place these and activate a spot, they go on the card adjacent to that slot. They can then be taken by whoever claims that card.

Learning the rules was a breeze (in usual Garphill fashion), however it takes some time during the game until you start to grasp what all the possibilities are. It is quite an analysis paralysis inducing game, at least in a first play, but we absolutely enjoyed playing! 😁