Roux Dat: Recent Plays of Magical Athlete, Basilica, and Relic Runners

A few of my gaming friends are teachers, which means we get in a lot of games during relatively unexpected periods of the year. Mardi Gras is one such time. Teachers here in south Louisiana generally enjoy a whole week off during that time, and it’s even better when it falls around Washington’s birthday. 

Mitchell had some free time, so in between podcasts, we got in a couple of game days together, and some really interesting games. 

At our buddy Doug’s house, we played Magical Athlete, a game that I have been dying to play since I heard Tom and Eric talk about it on the Dice Tower podcast ten years ago (or more?). They used to run live versions of this at Dice Tower Con East, and it seems liked the perfect, wacky, convention game. Would it hold up for just four players on a Saturday sandwiched between king cakes and Mardi Gras beads? 

Yep, it sure did. The goal of Magical Athlete, supposedly, is to score the most points. But the real goal, apparently, is to laugh as hard as you can. Each player picks four athletes, each with crazily different powers, and run four races with them against the other player’s choices. At its heart, it’s a dice chucker, basically a roll-and-move game. That is normally anathema to hardcore cardboarders, but in this case, it works. Why? Because you never just “roll and move”. 

Players will roll the dice, and then complications ensue. The different racers’ powers will compete against each other, or even cancel each other out, so the dice becomes a tension creator rather than an aggravation causing delay. I’m glad Doug has a copy, but to be honest, I might need a copy myself to play with my scout dad buddies and family members. I have only one play of Magical Athlete and Hot Streak, but I think I like Magical Athlete better because it’s streamlined down to exactly what is fun about these type of root-beer-and-boudin games.

Next up, Mitchell came over to play a couple of games off of our Shelves of Opportunity. He brought out Basilica, and I was excited for this one. I am a subscriber to Ignacy’s newsletters, so I had watched the development of this game. Apparently, it’s a complete re-working of an older title by the same designer. (It’s the original with an expansion built in, per the designer.) It’s a tight two-player battle, but not what I was expecting. Normally, games like this feel like tug-of-wars — think Match of the Century or Watergate, for example — but Basilica actually feels more like a euro game where you are trying to build tiny little combos and area majority dominance, and then fire off those for points. 

Each player gets three actions per turn, and the turns are simple. You can really only do three things, either: play a face up tile for it’s power (always a good choice), add to the shared tableau of tiles with one of four colors, or add one of your five workers to a tile that you just played to the tableau. Having the most workers in a blob of colors scores a ton of points, especially when you juice the blob with special powers or tiles that can add significant bonuses to the area. But controlling the areas are the key, and that’s where the turn-by-turn decisions on what tiles to use for their special powers (which takes them out of the tableau choices) are so important. This game feels very tight until the very end, and after a sluggish start, I made a game of it in the second and third rounds. Excellent little two player game that did not overstay its welcome.

Finally, we played Relic Runners, from Days of Wonder.. Back in the day, we scored the internet to find out what the latest release at GEN CON would be from Days of Wonder. Their games were perfect for my little family game nights. I remember when Relic Runners came out for sure. It looked gorgeous in the photographs, and the “Indy Jones” theming seemed like it would have been a good fit for the family. But we never picked it up, and we moved on to other games. I saw that it was available a year or so ago in the BGG VFM, so picked up a copy and I’m glad I did. 

In Relic Runners, players try to move around a jungle, laying down pathways between temples and exploring them for points and powers. The points are what you need to pile up for victory, but the powers are what might get you there, since they come in the form of adding more pathways, or breaking the game rules, or even end-game scoring. Plus, there’s another mechanic to score points — once the temples are explored, and the statutes are revealed, players can travel between two like-colored temples to get the statue and score points based on the length of the route. That part feels less thematic then the other mechanics, but it is easy to explain. 

This was actually my second play that day, after teaching SneauxBunny. So, I have two plays, and both are at two players. (Honestly, I think it would be a little better at three or four.) Mitchell and SneauxBunny beat me pretty handily, because I keep getting sidetracked by the special powers on our player boards that are triggered by moving up “tool boxes” during your turn. The actions on your player board are free actions, and I keep getting enamored with their little dopamine hits when you trigger them, but I need to work on scoring points instead. I’d like one play at a higher player count to decide whether it is a keeper. 

So that was our Mardi Gras gaming. The next school holiday will be for Easter, but in between then, I plan on getting in some good gaming at our upcoming Southern Board Game Festival March 20-22 in Lafayette, Louisiana. 

Until next time, laissez les bon temps rouler!
— BJ from Board Game Gumbo