There's a sort of balance game designers strive for when creating video games -- the creation of gameplay that may seem deceptively simple to the player at first, but works its way toward being more difficult as the game progresses. However, while this difficulty curve strives to make the game experience more challenging, the "perfect" game in this scenario will make the player feel compelled to continue rather than feel frustrated enough to give up. Enter Puerto Rico, a very unique RTS-style board game.
Now, when board game comes to mind, I think more of an experience that remains constant throughout. Peurto Rico has different expectations for the player, requiring new strategies as the game progresses in order to succeed. I was tickled by my first experience with the game and hope to get back to it again sometime, but here are a few highlights of the experience.
-Every Turn is Everyone's Turn
There are a series of cards that each define a single action. Each round is a series of turns where a player selects a card with an action to follow. However, when a card is selected, every player performs that action. This is a unique twist to a board game, as it ensures that everyone always has something to do. Out of the action cards, when one is selected then no other player can select that card for the rest of the round. After a round is completed, all cards return to being freely available. Also, the person to start a round rotates each turn, so every player is guaranteed to have first dibs on selecting an action each turn.
-Purpose (or the actions)
Each player has their own playing field, which is split between an area to construct buildings and an area to place fields. As far as action cards go, players will have the ability to add a new plantation of land for growing crops, build a new building, add new citizens to their city (which must be stationed at plantations in order to produce anything), produce what their fields will allow them to produce, sell their produced goods, or ship the goods by ship to another country (which doesn't give the player money, but victory points). There are also two left-over cards that are "Do Nothing," where the person who picked that card receives one coin (the only card that effects no other players).
There are multiple victory conditions to the game. First of all, there are only a certain number of victory tokens available for players to take. There's also a limited number of citizens. If either of those tokens are depleted to nothing, the game will end at the end of that round. Finally, there are only a certain number of buildings a player can place (albeit a very large number), and using all of those lots will also end the game. However, the player with the most victory points when one of those victory conditions is met will be the winner. While each building has its own rule-bending purpose to the player (as well as being another requirement for the "production" phase), each building owned also gives the player added victory points.
-Planning of Others
In the beginning of the game, you don't have to worry so much about the other players. However, the problem comes at around the half-way point, when everyone gets established with production. Say the player directly after you plays the Production phase action. There are a limited number of tokens that can be taken for production, but each player takes the maximum amount they are allowed to produce. Being the last player for dibs on the production phase, you might get slim pickings -- sometimes nothing at all.
Just as well, the Trading phase and Shipping-ish phase have their own restrictions, that can screw you over if you're the last in line. For the Trading phase, there is a maximum limit to 4 items that can be shipped, and each item added has to be different than all of the others that are already added. Worse, the shipping crate only empties when it is full of 4 items, so if it has only 3 items on it then those 3 items will carry over to the next turn. In that scenario, the next player to fill the crate with the next Trading phase will be the only player to play during that phase. Only of slight assurance is that each player is only allowed to trade a single resource during this phase.
For the Shipping phase, there are a limited number of boats, each with their own limit of items storable on them. If a boat is empty, you can place any type of resource on the boat when it comes to you. If a boat already has a resource, you can only place a matching resource on that boat. However, if you have the opportunity to dispose of all of your resources (but only of a single type), then you may do so, unlike with the Trading phase when you are limited to a single action. Same with the Trading phase, boats only lose their cargo when they become full, and then only at the end of that Shipping phase. As these resources stay stuck within the Trading and Shipping phase, this further reduced the resources available at the next Production phase being called.
Watching other players to figure out where they currently are and what they need next is an important part to succeeding in Puerto Rico. If someone before you needs the same thing you do, some strategy re-thinking might be in order for what you can do as an alternative. BUT, don't pick an action just because someone after you wants it, intent on throwing them off -- an action that doesn't benefit you is a wasted action.
All in all, there are a lot of different strategies that can be taken, but knowing to be flexible is just as important. Personally, I know that I would play the game differently my second time around now that I have more of an idea of what to expect. It's definitely something that has to be experienced on your own to fully grasp. I had been told all of the rules, but as was said, it's one of those "easy to learn, hard to master" games.
