Pyramid Review
Carcassonne: Abbey & Mayor
Published by Rio Grande Games
Designed by Klaus-Jürgen Wrede
Full-color boxed set with 18 tiles (12 "regular" terrain & six abbeys), 18 wooden pawns (six barns, six wagons, & six mayors, one for each player color), & rules; $14.95
playing time 30 to 45 minutes, for two to six players;zzCarcassonnexx is getting awfully busy. What was once a small, industrious little town, focus of many hours of delightful game play, has grown considerably to become a thriving home to dozens of meeples. Commerce has taken over, and they're even electing people to public office, if you can believe it. The fifth supplement is called Abbey & Mayor. The object of the game remains the accumulation of points, but like so many zzCarcassonnexx supplements before it, the face of the game changes in some ways with the new pieces.
Wagons are used to bring goods to market. Placed on cities, roads, and cloisters in the same way as a follower, the cart scores points when a board feature is finished. This piece, however, may move to any adjacent, unfinished, unoccupied feature. For example, if a cart is in a city but the completed city has a road leading out of it to nowhere, the player may shift the wagon to that pathway and await completion of the new feature. This allows fluid access to already-started projects.
Cities may elect mayors, if they grow big enough. These oversized, bow-legged meeples stand in a city like . . .
This article originally appeared in the second volume of Pyramid. See the current Pyramid website for more information.
Article publication date: January 4, 2008
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