Kohle & Kolonie

With Kohle & Kolonie, we made an honest effort: we tackled the monstrous manual, read the errata, and searched Geek as well. Somewhere along the way, though, we lost the thread and ended up playing something of our own—not necessarily what the designer had in mind.

I am not going to pretend I can confidently describe every corner of the system, because that was exactly our problem. The rules flow did not lead us clearly from “what do I do now?” to “why am I doing it?”, while the errata and FAQs felt more like essential material than mere clarification.

What did emerge on the table, however, was a very tight and heavy game, full of decisions that leave no room for casual play. Even our probably skewed version had enough tension to convince us that there is an exceptionally solid game of its kind underneath.

In the end, we liked it a lot—and the Swiss guy treated us to fondue too, so it is hard to stay mad. We will play again soon, hopefully with the proper rules this time; or at least with the new edition that manages to sort out the FAQ mess.