Strada Romana

With "Strada Romana", players find themselves merchants in ancient Rome and they must manage to do the maximum business by buying and selling goods on the road between Rome and Ostia, its port 35 km away. Traffic was impressive between the two cities, even then, as it was the main source of supply for the city and its one million inhabitants. During the game, therefore, it will be necessary to maneuver the best of the trolleys on a road far too narrow for everyone to circulate while managing to trade. This gives a game both tactical and chaotic.

During the game, players will be able to freely use the 10 carts in play and move them in the traffic jams of the Via Ostiensis represented on the game board. In each round, a player can move as many carts as he wants in up to three squares. Since the three boxes are mandatory, this speeds up the traffic jam effect, which can make travel expensive. By spending gold, it is indeed possible to deviate from certain rules of movement such as movements normally prohibited. After moving a trolley, a player can take a Goods tile in the area of the cart in question and also cubes of goods if the cart has stopped on a specific square. If tile and cube are of the same color, supply and demand meet and the player in question earns gold and victory points. The goal of the game will therefore be to succeed in moving carts to his advantage, without creating a particularly favorable situation for the next player.

As a bonus, there is also a betting system. A player can secretly choose (or almost) a cart rather than make a move in order, if the so-called cart arrives at its destination, to score points. Players, in addition to trying to trade, will try to favor or delay certain trolleys, creating a lot of confusion because it will be necessary to decipher why a trip was made. In addition, other players can have information to find out which carts, bets are taken. The more this is done at the beginning of the game, the more likely a cart is to be left behind...

At the end of the game, when four carts have arrived, or when the 20 victory points have been distributed, it is time to make the accounts. Players who bet well score three points per trolley arrived. Contracts made (tile and cube) also mark. There are six types of goods and to make his total, a player multiplies the number of types of contracts he has by the number of contracts he has completed to the maximum in one color. Not clear? A player who has completed five types of contracts and four blue contracts (his maximum) scores 20 points. For every tile or cube that serves no purpose, the player loses a point. Ditto if he bet on the bad nag!