Negotiation (trading)
The best negotiation games that are trading games...- Basari/Edel, Stein & Reich
- Bohnanza
- Chinatown
- Oltremare - Merchants of Venice
- Settlers of Catan (and all the various permutations)
- Traders of Genoa, The
For comparison, the top five games from 2002:
The Apples Pickers were asked about a couple of preferences:
- They overwhelmingly preferred playing "vanilla" Settlers over any other version (both Seafarers & the Historical Boxes received votes).
- There is a very slight preference for Edel, Stein & Reich over the original Basari... the games are not identical but are very similar.
And, yes, this time around (2006) The Traders of Genoa ended up on this list... and still managed to make it into the top 6. Impressive.
Labels: Mechanisms
posted by Mark (aka pastor guy) at 10:15 AM
2 Comments:
Now this is more my speed... though I was sad to see Res Publica not get the recognition it deserves. (Granted, it's an odd game whose only US publication is woefully inadequate, but still... there's nothing quite like it out there.)
I was surprised that Chinatown continues to be recognized even though it's:
a) way OOP
b) only really works well with 4 players
OTOH, I love the game, so go figure.
Another fine list, although part of the reason may be that there's a shortage of true trading games. I mean, I picked Oltremare as one of my five finalists, despite the fact that I've only played it once (I liked it, but I'm really not sure how good a game it is). Similarly, we included Settlers and Civ, both of which are only peripherally trading games.
Chinatown, Bohnanza, and Genoa were on my list. The first is the best pure trading game there is. Most gamers seem to own it (if you like trading games, it was pretty much a must buy when it came out), so I think that explains it's popularity despite the OOP status. I also think it works fine with five players; why do you think that's a problem, Mark? Bohnanza is a classic, of course. There's probably less control than it seems to have, but it's always great fun and an excellent gateway game. Genoa might be the best of them all, but it takes a long time and can be a bit fragile. Chinatown has pretty much replaced it on our gaming table.
My other finalist was Res Publica and I agree, Mark, it's underrated. It certainly is an odd bird and fairly polarizing, but I always enjoy it. Actually, I'm just happy it got nominated.
I've only played ESR once and thought it was pretty good; I wouldn't mind playing it again or trying out Basari. Settlers isn't a personal favorite, plus I really don't think of it as a trading game, even though that's a big part of the action.
I'd say the same with more emphasis about Civ. I think for a lot of people, the trading is the highlight of each turn, so they tend to focus on it, but it's really only one part of many in Tresham's opus. I played Kuhandel for the first time recently and was pleasantly surprised at how much I liked it--usually that kind of blind bidding/bluffing game is anathema to me. And Pit is a classic, of course, but honestly, it was wearing a little thin even when I was in short pants.
My other two nominated games were ESR and--surprise!--Bean Trader. I've STILL only played it once, but that was a truly great game, so I don't care what the rest of the gaming world thinks. Besides, "Bohn Hansa" is an inspired pun.
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