review

Trade along the river

Yangtze

Trade posts and commodities

Jangtsekiang, also known as Jangtse or - as used here - Yangtze is Asia’s longest river and was an important trade route in ancient times. You are a representative of a rich merchant family in China in the era of the Quing Dynasty and invest in commodities and various settlements or sell goods.

The game board shows the river Yangtze, commodities are arranged on the river. Eight trade posts carry numbers 4 to 10 and determine the price for commodities that are on the river next to the respective trade post; there are also cases to place the 12 rulers. Commodities in play are 25 luxury goods and 36 goods of daily life.

The set up the game, you put commodity, ruler and settlement tiles into the cloth bag, from which you then draw tile after tile. Commodity tiles are placed openly on the Yangtze, until there is one tile in front of each trade post. If you draw a ruler or settlement, you put the tile back into the bag. By the way, commodities get cheaper and cheaper along the river towards shanghai, but don’t wait too long to get them, all the same!

Each player then takes a screen, a marking board and a punctured coin, which is put on case 30 of the money track and indicates the money of each player. Finally, you put down a set of special cards openly and then draw two commodities from the bag to put behind the screen, rulers and settlements go back into the bag.

Then you play in clockwise direction. The active player has two action options in his turn: Sell a bundle of commodities and buy a commodity. If nobody wants to do any of both options in a round, the game ends and a final scoring is done.

As Step 1 of your turn, you can sell one or even several bundles of commodities. A bundle is made up from tiles of the same category, either luxury or daily wares, which either show the same ware or the same color or the same symbol. Even one tile of a commodity is a bundle! The amount of money you can earn with such a bundle, depends on the number of tiles in the bundle; the prices are indicated very nicely on the screens and on the board. Tiles that you sold do not go back into the back, but are taken out of play.

Then you may buy a commodity off the river Yangtze. To do so, you take the tile and put it in front of your screen, adjust the money marker on the track and put the tile behind your screen. A new tile is drawn from the bag - if it is a commodity, you slide it, beginning at the open side of the river, forward, together with the tiles before it, until the gap is filled.

If you draw a ruler or a settlement while replenishing the river, ruler or settlement are resolved instantly before you have another try to draw a commodity tile and fill the gap.

A settlement is immediately auctioned. The active player makes the first bid or passes, then all in turn can raise or pass until only one player is left. He pays his bid and receives the settlement; if nobody wants to bid, the settlement is taken out of play. Settlements remain, visible to all, IN FRONT of the screen of their owners.

Why would I bid for a settlement? Well, at the end of the game the number of different settlements is scored as well as majorities in the various types of settlements.

A ruler is laid out next to the board to be resolved, adjacent to the next free ruler case on the board. Beginning with the active player, the directive of the tile is resolved in turn for each player. When the directive is marked with a question mark, each player may decide if he wants to resolve the directive.

Directives are: Pay tax, sell a bundle of commodities, swap a commodity tile from behind your screen with one on the Yangtze, discard a commodity tile from behind your screen, buy back a liquidity card or resolve the instruction of a previously drawn ruler.

With the directive about a liquidity card we have arrived at the special cards; each player has six of them on display and may use them once during the game. The options are: Buy two commodities in a turn, take a commodity from the Yangtze for free, sell a bundle at any time of your choice to remain solvent. Three of the cards are liquidity cards; you discard them to raise your money by 10, 15 or 20 units. Liquidity cards that you did not use, are worth 30 money units at the end of the game. However, if you do not have enough money on the track to pay taxes as directed by a ruler tile, you must use a liquidity card to pay taxes.

When the 12^th ruler tile has been drawn and resolved, the game ends with a final scoring:

- You combine all commodities behind your screen into bundles and sell them.

- Then, two to four different green or brown settlements earn you 15, 30 or 50 money units; majorities in a type of settlements, regardless of the settlement color, give you 30 money units for most and 15 for the second-most settlements.

- Then you add 30 units for unused liquidity cards to your money and win with most money.

Yangtze is a very beautiful game, a very well-working game, technically 100% okay, as are all games by Reiner Knizia, and with a very harmoniously implemented topic; the fun with the game, however, depends largely on the players. When all immerse themselves in the game and probe the tactical possibilities, it is a super family game. But if only one player does not give his full attention to the game or if people pass too often, because the one commodity that you think you must have, does not appear, then it can get monotonous quickly. All in all, al good game, a solid family game in which settlements are the deciding factor; selling and buying goods is only a means to an end.

Dagmar de Cassan

Players: 2-4

Age: 8+

Time: 60+

Designer: Reiner Knizia

Artist: atelier 198, Andreas Resch

Price: ca. 25 Euro

Publisher: Piatnik 2016

Web: www.piatnik.com

Genre: Trade, auction

Users: For families

Version: de

Rules: cz de fr hu it pl sk

In-game text:

Comments:

Very good rules

Easily accessed

High element of luck due to tile drawing

Compares to:

Trade games with auction

Other editions:

Currently none

My rating: 5

Dagmar de Cassan:

Beautiful, harmonious and very well-made - a solid family game, also suitable for beginners.

Chance (pink): 2

Tactic (turquoise): 2

Strategy (blue): 1

Creativity (dark blue): 0

Knowledge (yellow): 0

Memory (orange): 0

Communication (red): 0

Interaction (brown): 2

Dexterity (green): 0

Action (dark green): 0