Larry Levy:  Gulf Games Glimpses – Before the Wind

My return to Gulf Games was just as wonderful as I had anticipated it would be.  It was great seeing old friends and the gaming was terrific.  In fact, I was able to try out enough new-to-me games that I don’t want to wait for my usual once-every-two-weeks rotation to talk about them.  So I thought I’d post some impressions of the games I played as I got them down on paper.  Hope you enjoy.

Before the Wind
Okay, let’s get the obvious stuff out of the way early.  Yes, this game’s title is poorly chosen, since it’s about loading goods onto ships, not sailing them.  Yes, the more sophomoric amongst us (present company included) are prone to alter these words to an activity associated with intestinal distress.  Yes, one of the goods to be shipped is cheese, for God’s sake!  Can’t we just ignore all this and cut to the cheese—uh, chase!  Thank you!

Before the Wind is a 2-4 player card game from Phalanx and Mayfair.  The components consist strictly of a number of decks of cards, with the exception of the highly superfluous Warehouse tiles.  These tiles display a picture of a very grungy looking empty warehouse floor, so at least they earn the distinction of being the most depressing looking game component I’ve seen in quite a while.

Players earn victory points by loading goods on board ships.  There are four kinds of goods (apples, cheese, spices, and silks) and there are cards for each of these.  There are also decks for the money, ships, and for three kinds of action cards.

The game is played in rounds and at the beginning of each round, a number of ships are revealed.  Each of these show the kinds of goods it must have to set sail, along with a number of VPs.  So, for example, one of the ship cards requires a player to deliver an apple card, two spice cards, and a silk card and the first player to do this will receive its total of 16 VPs.

The game revolves around the action cards.  The first type are for goods.  Each of these cards list a number of goods (for example, an apple and a cheese, or three silks) and the player who carries out the action gets to add those good cards to their hand.  The second type are warehouse cards.  Each of these allows a player to place a specified number of goods (2 to 4, depending on the card) from their hand into their warehouse (i.e., faceup in front of them) for a reasonably steep cost.  Evidently, the game is based in a period where the Teamsters Union is alive and well.  The third type are shipping cards.  Each allows a player to ship goods if they have cards in their warehouse which matches the requirement on the ship; this allows the player to claim the ship card.  (Players can grab more than one ship card if they have the needed goods in their warehouse.) Alternatively, a player can use a shipping card to take the amount of money listed on the card from the bank.  Each deck also contains some special cards which give the players additional one-time abilities, including some “take that” actions.

Before the Wind has some genuinely clever mechanics and the way that action cards are chosen is one of them.  On a turn, the first player reveals action cards equal to the number of players, the only restriction being that there can be no more than two cards of any one type.  He then selects one of these cards and places it in front of him.  Each subsequent player has a choice.  They can either pick one of the remaining cards.  Or they can point to one of the cards chosen earlier and put it up for auction.  Each player who hasn’t taken a card can make a bid, which doesn’t have to be higher than previous ones.  The player who originally took the card selects one of the bidding players.  He can then either accept the bid and give that player the action card or pay the bid to the player and keep the card.  In either case, both players will wind up with what they receive and are out of any further auctions.  This continues until each player has either an action to perform or has received money from another player.  This procedure has a lot of subtleties and gives the players plenty of interesting choices during the turn.

The players then take their actions in turn order and a new turn begins.  This continues until all but two ships have had their goods requirements met.  At this point, a new round begins and another clever mechanic comes into play.  You see, goods can spoil.  Everything in your hand gets flushed (so maybe those Teamster charges weren’t so exorbitant after all).  In addition, all the apples in your warehouse turn rotten, along with half of the cheese and spice goods.  So an unexpectedly early end to a round can cause you to dump some hard won items into the sea.

Play continues until one player reaches 50 or more VPs.  Finish the turn and the player with the most victory points wins.

I’ve played the game twice and the term that keeps popping into my head is “processional”.  That’s a description you used to hear during the mid-nineties from reviewers like Mike Siggins and Ken Tidwell.  It means a game where the players do the same things over and over again.  A similar complaint that you’re more likely to hear these days is “lacking a story arc”.

Before the Wind has some nice gameplay and some innovative rules.  But you’re really doing a lot of the same activities throughout the game.  This would be fine in a 45-60 minute game, but it gets a bit samey for the actual 90 minutes it takes.  Maybe the design needs another twist or an extra element.  But in both of my games, I was kind of hoping the game would end before it did.

The game is reasonably enjoyable and features some nice player interaction.  I wouldn’t turn down a chance to play.  But I do wish it would do a bit more or do what it does quicker.  Some others like it more than I do, so make of that what you will.  But ask me to play Before the Wind and I’ll probably check what other games are before me before I say yes.

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