El Grande Decennial Edition

This is a review of the original game of El Grande - the version above comes with all of the expansions (which are supposed to be excellent too, by the way!). Of course, the version above can be played without these expansions.

The theme is feudal Spain and the game board is a map of Spain, divided into regions. Players attempt to control each region by placing their Caballeros (knights) around the board. Nine rounds are played and at the end of the third, sixth and ninth rounds the board is scored.

Every turn of the game begins with a round of bidding to determine the turn order. The first player will have the first choice of a limited number of action cards but will will then have to perform the action and place their pieces on the board first. These pieces determine control of the regions and cannot be moved later in the turn, giving subsequent players a slight advantage because they can react to earlier placements. However, later players may be forced to take a less useful action card. This pretty much sets the tone for the whole game: every decision must be a compromise. There are a few other interesting mechanics in the game, such as the Castillo and the King piece, but the rules are so well explained here that you should take a look if you're serious about buying this game: http://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/6296.

Of all of the games in my collection, El Grande is probably the one I find most intriguing because nearly every piece you play not only changes your score, but also the scores of other players. Therefore, every choice you make should take into consideration the relative scores of each opponent. This makes the potential for analysis paralysis high, but somehow only in a fun way! This is certainly in my top five games of all time.