by RogueM
Hi all - this is part 2 of my 'chopping' boards variant. As per part 1 you will be required to cut your existing player boards in pieces (or work on copies). I'll refer the reader to part 1, which explains the first step:This second part tries essentially to achieve the opposite of the first goal, i.e provide players with custom boards that are different for each player. How much different is up to you to an extend, and the approach I've taken.
As you may have realised if you have tried to chop your 'boards 1' as explained in part 1, two of the sextants actually feature some of the boards 2-3-4-5 tiles on the reverse, namely tile 'A' and tile 'X' (see other topic for nomenclature, but essentially the left most two).
What I thought could be interesting is to supplement my set of 'modular' boards with ad hoc pieces that may yield interesting boards...
The major issue is that tile 'A' features 3 river spots, and tile 'X' features 3 mines, so if you merely flip them over you'll end up significantly reducing the value of mines and the frequency of goods acquisition / player order change.
So to counter this I scavenged a few size-3 sections from boards 6-7-8-9 featuring both mine and river. There are 3 on board 7 (MRK, MRP and MRC), and there is also another MRC on board 8 that you will want to grab.
You will also want to grab the central size-1 Castle from board 6 and the central size-1 Mine from board 8.
With all of those bits you should be able to collate a set of tiles as pictured below (besides the other 4 sets of identical size-6 sections scavenged from the boards 1):
EDIT 1: I guess I should explain the philosophy a bit more here. Basically at this point each of your player set should include six size-6 identical tiles plus a central size-1 Castle. This is your 'board 1' in kit/pieces for symmetrical play talked about in part 1.
Each set should also contain a unique size-3 tile (as pictured above)
If you wish to give asymmetrical play a go on somewhat custom boards, here is what you can do:
1) arrange the size-6 tiles as you desire around the central Castle.
2) flip tile 'A' and 'X' to their other side
3) flip the central tile to the non-Castle side
4) overlay the size-3 add-on piece on top of the 3 'knowledge' spots found on the 'Y' tile
At that point you should have four different boards with an equal number of mines (2), rivers (5) and castles (5), but a slight offset in the representation of buildings, pastures and knowledge tiles compared to the official CoB boards.
... Note that I make absolutely no guarantee that these asymmetrical boards can be fun to play, but I think with enough thoughts put into coming up with adequate layouts you should be able with some 'balanced' alternatives to the official boards.
EDIT 2: and here is a suggested nomenclature if you wish to share your creations...
- the reverse of tile 'A' is named 'AZ'
- the reverse of tile 'X' is named 'XZ'
- the reverse of tile 'S' is named 'SZ'
- the add-on size-3 tile is named 'Z'
- the orientation of the 'Z' tile indicates the top of the mine
- the player set is tied to the pictures herein
So a description could be communicated as follows:
SZ1
AZbr-Cbc-BblZbl
XZtr-Ytc-Wtl
and in picture:
...hope that makes sense...
EDIT 3: in order to keep the 'colour' representation on the boards as close to the original as possible the most judicious choice for overlaying the 'Z'tile is the 'Y' tile in every player set, but there is nothing stopping you to experiment with other placements.
Happy playing!
