Wayfarers of the South Tigris Review

Explore the landscape of ancient Baghdad.

Wayfarers of the South Tigris from Renegade Games and Garphill Games has players attempting to map the surrounding areas including the land, sea, and the sky. This is done by blending different elements including dice placement, worker placement, and tableau building. At the beginning of the game, players will roll their pool of dice and these can be used to complete actions. Some will require a prerequisite item such as a camel or a boat. These can be added to your scroll by purchasing upgrade tiles to fulfill the dice roll values. Players can alternatively place a worker on a card in order to get some resources or the upgraded tiles as mentioned. When a player takes a card with the worker, they gain the worker. Still following along? Good. When you add cards to your tableau, they will be added on either side depending on the type or above if it's a sky card. You can also purchase townsfolk cards to go underneath ground cards. This provides a consistent bonus anytime they're used. But wait, there's more. There's also the main board which will allow you to gain bonuses and reputation with the guilds. When someone reaches the end of the track, the endgame is triggered. Players will score their cards in the tableau as well as whoever has the most reputation. Whoever has the most points will win. There's more but that's the gist of it all.

The Good: For as many different mechanics that are floating around this game, they work seamlessly. You can have poor dice rolls and still be able to do the actions you want to do. The economy is very tight, but it's manageable. You may need to make some additional plans to get where you want to get to but as long as another player doesn't grab it, you should be able to do what you want. I loved the concept of placing townsfolk below cards to gain a persistent bonus. Watching the landscape evolve in front of you is incredibly satisfying to see. The artwork is beautiful so you'll want to gather as many cards as you can.

The Okay: The rulebook left me with some questions. Specifically, the gray landscape cards. It didn't clearly elaborate when they activated. Having played enough games I was able to interpret it and doing a little research on BGG I was able to figure it out. It's whenever the prerequisites have been met by the way.

The Not So Good: I didn't care for the reputation system. When I played, I mostly neglected it, especially in the later game. It's a good way to manipulate dice or gain a boat but once your engine has developed you can mostly avoid it. Unfortunately, there's 9 points on the line which can win or lose you the game.

Final Thoughts: Wayfarers of the South Tigris is a really great game. It's got so many different elements that shouldn't work together but they do. Nearly flawlessly. While I wasn't sold on the reputation system, everything else works perfectly. I cannot wait for the next iteration of the South Tigris series.

Thanks to Renegade Games and Garphill Games for providing me with a review copy.