March of The Ants Strategy Board Game

Can critters crawling about a meadow over four or five rounds really scratch 4X itch? 4X? Yes, Explore, Expand, Exploit, and Exterminate. A Civilization or Twilight Imperium: one that you honestly need 3-7 hours to play... when you can find that time and the people who likewise have that much time- the same time you do. This happens all the time. If only you could get the same buzz but only have to spend less than 90 minutes. Enter: March of the ants. And yes there are worm holes.Game playEveryone starts with their own nest card. This is where you keep track of ant evolutions and it doubles as the game play cheat sheet made of cardstock. Familiar small cubes make up their nest and ants. And there is the beginnings of the board in the center- the Great Tunnel. It and the tiles you lay down as you explore are on sturdy cardboard. So that's nice. The artwork isn't awful. But it isn't good.Anyway, you start out with a loan ant and some larva. The larva and incidentally the ants are used as currency to play cards the have immediate affects, evolve your ants (giving you added bonuses), or give you colony goals which give you points for conditions met at the end of each round. The larva can also become ants that can, once on the board, explore a new tile, march or rest on their laurels. Marching and exploring cost food and at the end of each round you are going to need to feed your ants. Happily...? you can use the larva to feed the ants if you don't have enough food. Hrmm... Hey, they are ants, they eat their young. That or they die, and maybe that's ok, because it's all about the collective and what you deem is the greater good.The first little while that you explore, things are safe and peaceful, but then the centipedes being to abound and if you smite their ruin in the depths of the meadow you get a point and get to eat their remains. Most tiles that you turn up will have resource collection sites on them. One ant per site. If multiple players have ants within one square, that's fine if there are sites enough for them. But add more than that and it will be contested, but not immediately.A round can go around several times and if you have nothing to do on your turn you can pass and pick up a larva for your trouble. If your turn comes around before another passes you get another bonus for resting on your laurels.Once two have passed you get to resolve contested tiles. So it is conceivable that sites could be contested during the turns, but upon further reflection, or maybe it was part of the plan all along and movement the superfluous ants moved to more fertile parts of the meadow. A little intimidation never hurt anyone.Anyway, here's the battle mechanic: number of ants, plus the number of head evolutions your nest has had, plus a revealed amount 1-5 on a card you use to add ferocity to the mix. While the winner wins, there are casualties to the amount of half the opponents count, excluding the heretofor unknown ferocity. A winner gets to keep his last ant, if it comes down to that. And you get a point for winning a battle, so that's nice. Ties go to the players whose ant is sitting on the tie-breaker collection site. Centipede fights are resolved at this time too, their strength is the sum of two cards from the top of the deck, so somewhere between 2 and 10.I hate to tell you what to do but...Don't think that isolation is the best way, or that it will be permanent. Worm holes abound providing instant access to any other wormhole in the galax... meadow. It's nice to be able to mooch of someone else exploration (saving you the food) and you can sing kum-ba-ya together. Sure you can...Don't think that exploration and harvesting the most resources will get your first place, war mongering, especially early in the game will put you in a bad way. The treasure trove of points comes from the colony goals.ThemeI feel like I'm looking at an ant farm, the tiny size of the cubes may help this. Trepidation exploring beyond the initial tiles that surround the great tunnel is real. There's danger out there. Centipedes, and other dicey places that might render points or desolation. I confess I'm a little dissappointed by how powerful the colony goal cards are relative to expanding your boarders at the expense of someone elses boarders. While I complain about the artwork, I do buy into the larva chamber. That is to say, I think the theme sticks.BalanceThere are no catch up mechanisms in place in this game, so someone can run away with it, but it’s a game where you can always claw for second place. I find a lot of satisfaction being able to claw for second place myself. The imbalance arrives by what tiles are found when exploring. A colony of an otherwise pacifist player may have to crank up the war-machine when they come across a nest of centipedes. But sections of the meadow are available to all, if there are collection sites, you want, you can go get them. But resources are so common and so few in variety: larva food or cards, you don't need to fight over them.InteractionInteraction is above average in this game because of the reactions that happen every person's turn and because your nests are interacting within the same meadow. If your ants are posturing to fight, this is bound to raise some verbal response like, ”Hey, that's mine!” or “Can't we all just get along?” or “You pupate from the wrong side of the great tunnel!”Learning CurveVery low, The manual is isn't small, but it is helpful, they only thing I had trouble with was figuring out how the colony goal cards worked. There are good how to videos online to demonstrate a few turns as this was originally crowd funded.DowntimeNill as you get to have a reactionary action for every turn a player takes in the game.What’s not to Like?The colony cards are point heavy. I've mentioned that. But if you know that going in, you don't have to be dissappointed. Ant the artwork isn't stupendous.Collateral EndorsementsMy kids repeatedly ask to play the game and they have many choices. It has never taken anyone till the end of the game to finally think they get it. Easy Peasy.

Supper fun board builder. If you like that sort of thing. It’s a cross between... “no escape”with the evolving board and the resource management of “Sythe”. With the turn based style of “terraforming Mars”. It’s an interesting premise and we have had a blast each time we play it. Would definitely recommend as an interesting add to you game library

Game was OK, rules need to be tweaked a bit and the rulebook can be difficult.

Great quality

wonderfull game It is a constant struggle to the end. how will you build? evolve your ant? spread your colony? Bread more ants?

My sons and I love this addictive strategy game. The game is very intricate and allows many different strategies.

This is a fun game for one – five players that can be played in less than 90 minutes.Each player takes the role of a colony of ants. You are trying to accumulate victory points by expanding your colony and conducting raids against other colonies.Much like the earlier game Insektoid, you also have the option of evolving your aunts to become more formidable.The catchphrase on the box is "explore, evolve, emerge victorious." This is a pretty good description of the game in a single phrase.The components are very high quality, and this game has a very high replay value.Yes, you can play it solo.I highly recommend this game

Great game that is a race for points like Carcasson but with battles and reaction moves by other other players. Reactions engage the other players while they wait for their turn.