hexeme | bringing people to the geeks and geeks to the people

Vital Stats

3-6 players, 120 minutes play time. Published 2008 by Tablestar Games.

Core Gameplay

As near as I can tell, WoN is an American amalgamation of several Eurotrash economic games. The concept is simple; players build structures that provide resources on a hexagonal grid. The difficulty lies in maximizing the efficiency of your industrial grids, as structures can be validly placed in only a few different ways. Also, you have to develop carefully such that you don’t flood or inflate the market with particular goods, lest your value diminish or other players seek alternatives to purchasing from you.

Thoughts, Notes & Musings

There are six people in my weekly gaming group, so we’re always on the lookout for 6+ player games. The published capacity be damned; this game supports four players and no more. The game can take exceptionally long to play — or at least seem to — and adding more players makes things go that much slower.

The construction of the game leaves a little to be desired. The cardboard pieces are fine, but the quick-reference sheets are flimsy paper and the market boards tend to warp easily. On the plus side, the instructions are very thorough and well-organized.

Thematically the game is confused. It seems like the designer had an idea for a theme, and an idea for a game, but never realized they didn’t quite match up. At no point do you feel like you run the economy of an entire country; just a piece of a larger one.

So let’s get down to brass tacks. I always like to cover the bad news before the good, am I right?

Cons

• Serial gameplay. The game can take very, very long, and you have to wait while other players take their turn before you can do anything. It’s very similar to Settlers in this regard, except, somehow, even slower.
• Player-order dependent. Not so bad, just make sure that you’re to the right of your nemesis and the left of a patsy.

Pros

• Deterministic. Entirely. There’s no randomness in the game at all, which in my book is a good thing — players win on their laurels instead of luck.
• Varied and balanced strategies. There’s so many resources in the game it’s hard to generate a killer strategy when playing with experienced players.

What Makes It Fun

Building 2/3rds of a bank, having an opponent block its completion, then moving it into his cordoned-off territory as a counter-screw-you.

Noobisms

So you don’t know how to play. Your friends probably don’t either. What are some effective, simple strategies that just might pay off?

• Flagwhoring. The game ends when you plant all of your flags on the board. If you have academies and food, you can make this happen very quickly.
• Banks. $90 per turn isn’t insignificant, although the initial investment can be pretty steep. It’ll usually take several turns to pay off the debt you acrue to build them, but if you do it properly it’s a game-winner.