Reply: Mosaic: A Story of Civilization:: General:: Re: Game end stalls?

by Thunkd

Konwacht wrote:

I have noticed, that in our game round this awesome little civ game has one problem, that really bothers us: Actually, the game could often end after half (!) the playing time, then it only stalls because one little end game condition cannot be met. For example: The BUILD and the POPULATION empire cards show up very fast, but the TECHNOLOGY or TAX card does not, because the tech deck is huge and the card just hides and tax / tariff are not that often needed.

Your group is stuck in group think. Two things should be happening more frequently than they are. First, people should be taking tax and tariff actions. Generally those actions are going to be more effective than working, especially if you are building a lot (and feeding the coffer). So you should be hitting that empire scoring card more often. Second, people should be ending the game by depleting the Golden Ages/Civ Achievements.

Konwacht wrote:

The other condition: ALL three decks of Golden Ages, Achievements and Wonders depleted?

Nope. Any two of those three decks. You've seriously goofed the rules here.

Konwacht wrote:

What is your experience?

My experience is that the game will often end by the Golden Age/Civ Achievement decks running out. Especially once it becomes a thing that your group sees happening, they'll realize that grabbing those points quickly and shutting down the game is an effective strategy.

In my groups, the population deck is infrequently used. Occasionally one player will go heavily into it, but often players will get cities/population from the tech deck. I think maybe your group is prioritizing the map/area control aspect of the game and playing longer games, and thus relying on population to build up cities a lot. Once you switch to quicker games, and rushing the end of the game, you really don't need to do population much if at all. I've played this game 17 times now. I think I've taken the population action maybe three times? No more than 5 certainly. I don't value food much at all. I rarely develop food production, rarely work for food, mostly get my population/extra city stuff from tech decks, and if I need it to build a wonder with food, I'll usually be spending coins for it.