1825 - Unit 3
The 2-player 1825: does it work?
As these things go, I've been playing a fair
amount of 1825 in the past 6 months or so, and been enjoying
it.
I bought 1825 Unit 3 mainly because
a) I'm a completist and b) it helps cover the numbers well beyond 4 players (so
if you were to play with 5 players, Unit 2 plus Unit 3 would be a good choice,
where Units 1 and 2 don't quite add up right it seems to me). But Unit 3 is also
playable by two players.
18xx games are
generally not very amenable to 2 player games. Especially on the 1830 side of
the family (1830, 1856, 1870, 2038, 1835), the loot-n-dump is such an ongoing
threat that you would simply never buy an opponent's stock, which would take a
whole interesting element out of the game. But if any of the 18xx games could
support 2 players, 1825 would be it. Without the huge stock market risks, you're
free to make interesting investment
choices.
I actually ended up liking it
more than expected. The initial companies seem rather well balanced, so one
player won't be at an obvious geographical disadvantage. There are lots of
interesting choices in the middle game, with 3 minor companies and one major
company available to start in different areas of the board. This is the first
time I've played 1825 in which the minor companies really made a difference, and
I like how they work (you get to pick the par, unlike most companies which have
a fixed par, and they are capitalized incrementally - getting cash as shares are
sold - all of which makes for interesting cash-management
decisions).
I used to play 1830-style
games quite a lot in college, but rather rarely since. I'm happy that 1825 has
helped me rediscover them. I like the blend of onboard tactical decisions and
the investment decisions. I like how well-balanced all the mechanisms of the
game are when compared to the classic 18xx games - investment is important,
tactics are import, cash management is important, and you need to balance
long-term strategy against immediate needs, but all the elements seem much more
equally important than in 1830 or 1870, where so much seems to revolve around
the simple acquisition of a permanent train. And, of course, the length is far
more sensible.
It's possible that 1825
will play out more rapidly than the meatier and more wide-open 1856, but until
then, 1825 seems to have taken its slot as a favorite "heavy" euro.
Posted: Tuesday - March 08, 2005 at 08:47 PM