Board Game Arena

Curious to hear others' thoughts.

Personally, for me, the addition of the C and D decks ruin the game. Using just the ol' E, I, and K decks felt like a well-engineered, balanced game in which you could hone your skills. (Even with the banned cards.) I've played a few games with all these new decks and they made the game feel more slot-machine-ish. At home, I have the Z deck, and some of those cards are odd--we take out the bad one, but even the Z deck felt more balanced than C and D. Playing with the C and D decks, I've had a few times where out of all my cards there wasn't one that I wanted. Whereas with the older decks, even if you got "bad" cards, you could always still play a decent game.

But I'm sure it's "different strokes for different folks."

One of my friends likes to add all expansions to all games ... and, for me, this usually wrecks the game. There are so many games that are beautifully designed and balanced, some with simple mechanisms but excellent strategy. Then they HAVE to add expansions, and when my friend wants to play with all the expansions, I find it messes up a nice, clean game of wits. This is similar to how I feel about the C and D decks.

I'm glad we have the option to not use them

theAudsMustBeCrazy wrote: ↑07 August 2023, 03:06 Curious to hear others' thoughts.

Personally, for me, the addition of the C and D decks ruin the game. Using just the ol' E, I, and K decks felt like a well-engineered, balanced game in which you could hone your skills. (Even with the banned cards.) I've played a few games with all these new decks and they made the game feel more slot-machine-ish. At home, I have the Z deck, and some of those cards are odd--we take out the bad one, but even the Z deck felt more balanced than C and D. Playing with the C and D decks, I've had a few times where out of all my cards there wasn't one that I wanted. Whereas with the older decks, even if you got "bad" cards, you could always still play a decent game.

But I'm sure it's "different strokes for different folks."

One of my friends likes to add all expansions to all games ... and, for me, this usually wrecks the game. There are so many games that are beautifully designed and balanced, some with simple mechanisms but excellent strategy. Then they HAVE to add expansions, and when my friend wants to play with all the expansions, I find it messes up a nice, clean game of wits. This is similar to how I feel about the C and D decks.

I'm glad we have the option to not use them

It sounds like you may not have observed that the E, I, and K decks aren't available here. That's because the version of Agricola that BGA offers is the Revised Edition, first published in 2016, and not the original edition, first published in 2007—it's that earlier version that has the E, I, and K decks.

I think you're somewhat confused, and/or came to a weird spot to complain about this.

BGA has never had the EIK decks implemented, and that is for original edition Agricola. While you technically can used revised expansion decks with original Agricola, it is not particularly advised. I am not surprised if you find adding C and D decks to original Agricola to be a bit of a jarring/weird experience.

Z deck is also an original Agricola expansion deck, and as such has not been on BGA ever, nor will be.

BGA has only ever had the revised Agricola game, which came with some cards from the A and B decks in the original box. Since then many, but not all, cards from the C and D decks have been implemented.


With that said, I fairly heavily disagree with the concept that the C and D decks are full of useless cards. I will mildly agree that the Dulcinaria deck expansion box has a few too many unbalanced cards and that it was a bit shoddy, but if you're open to self selecting (which you clearly are given your Z deck comments), I'm not sure how there could be an issue as 80+% of the cards are still totally fine.

I'm personally with you that I generally prefer less expansions in games. If I already love a game, why would I want to change it up in to something different with an expansion? However card decks in Agricola fall in a different category for me, since variation in the draft and opening hands is part of the core game, and expanding those options doesn't really change things fundamentally. (Whereas I'm not a big fan of Farmers of the Moor and basically never play with it).

Regardless, as you note, BGA gives you the option to play with whatever sets you'd like (although again you're not going to be able to play EIK here)

Ranior wrote: ↑07 August 2023, 13:59 I think you're somewhat confused, and/or came to a weird spot to complain about this.

Not confused, no, although my post may have been confusing. As stated in my opening line, was just: [quote}Curious to hear others' thoughts.[/quote]

Weird spot to complain about this? Maybe. I didn't realize I was complaining; just wanted to hear others' thoughts. Everyone has their opinion, and is entitled to it; there is no wrong or right in this case. I didn't think it a weird place to strike up a conversation about a topic about a board game, as this is "Board Game Arena", in the '''forum''' (Dictionary definition of forum: "a place, meeting, or medium where ideas and views on a particular issue can be exchanged.", and it was in the Agricola "game-related forum" ... so, can't say that I agree with the judgment of "weird".

BUT, I concede that the '''weird''' judgement may have been because I ought to have started this thread on BGG instead of BGA, since the EIK and Z decks were never implemented in the BGA version. So, yeah, BGG might have been a more appropriate place to start this conversation. But I like chatting on BGA better than on BGG

The rest of your post was very enjoyable to read. It was exactly the type of discussion I was hoping to spark.

There are other games on BGA which have expansions added which I'd like to hear people's thoughts about, but I didn't want to write a post in every game-specific forum, for every game.

Seems like people LOVE expansions, overall, and I think I'm in the minority, a "purist", judging by the options I see people choose at the tables.

I used to play Agricola on Boite-a-Jeux. On that site, your deck options are as they were in the original Z-Man game (E,I,K). Personally, I prefer that mix of cards to all others I've tried, and I have 3 copies of that game at home, knowing that I may not be able to find replacement pieces. The only thing I liked about the newer editions was the wooden animeeples (but I have animals I made out of Sculpey clay, so that's moot for me).

I love your enthusiasm for the game! It's one of my all-time favorites, and I still remember the first time I ever saw it being played. In a board game gathering, I saw someone building fences on a plot of land, and that hooked me in. I've been on the hook ever since.

I bought the Consul and Dirigens decks, are they not the C and D cards we use on BGA? There are some being used in my BGA game that are not in the deck I bought.

psychwoman wrote: ↑02 December 2023, 01:57 I bought the Consul and Dirigens decks, are they not the C and D cards we use on BGA? There are some being used in my BGA game that are not in the deck I bought.

https://boardgamearena.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=27615