Nidavellir

Designer: Serge Laget

Artist: Jean-Marie Minguez

Published: 2020
Players: 2-5
Playing Time: 45 Mins
BGG Rating: 7.6
BGG Ranking: 241

Publisher: GRRRE Games

Mechanisms: Auction, Bidding, Set Collection, Simultaneous Action Selection

Sleeves: NDV 54x80 mm

Game Description:

Nidavellir, the Dwarf Kingdom, is threatened by the dragon Fafnir. As a venerable Elvaland, you have been appointed by the King. Search through every tavern in the kingdom, hire the most skilful dwarves, recruit the most prestigious heroes, and build the best battalion you can to defeat your mortal enemy!

Quick play overview:

Players will start with the same 5 coins (2,3,4,5 and 0 = trade coin). Everybody will place 3 coins of their choice, face down on the 3 inns, with 2 coins left in their purse. Starting with the first inn, players will show their bid and the highest bidder has the first pick of the available dwarves (ties are solved with the first player tokens). When a player uses a 0 coin, they take the dwarves as normal (usually last) and then sum the 2 coins in the purse, discarding the highest one and take a new coin of the combined value (or higher if the needed coin was already taken).

There are 5 different colours of dwarves that each has a different scoring mechanism (pure points, multipliers, …). Every time a player gets a row of 5 different colors, they can take a hero card from the always available stock. These heroes will improve a color by adding points and make it easier to get another row filled up.

Do this 4 times for half time scoring (the player that is the strongest in each color will get a bonus) and then repeat 4 more times to see who has the best team to fight the big bad boss. There is no actual fighting in this game… just the hiring before the actual boss battle.

Final thoughts:

This game made the auction/bidding mechanism an enjoyable experience. You might not always win the wanted dwarf but there is no bad card that would penalize you.

Every round you will be faced with the decision if you want to bid high to get the wanted dwarves or get a better coin for next round. Sometimes the selection of available dwarves will let you know what you should do… but most of the times, you will have to look at the opponent's army and try to figure out what is their target and what are their highest coins…

FINAL SCORE:

Gameplay & How often I want to play it: 10/10

It's a fast game with lots of decisions that will give you good feelings (if you win or not). Every time you make a set of 5 colors, you will be faced with another nice decision. I want to test different strategies and the expansions.

Art & Graphic Design:

The dwarves are really well drawn and the graphic design is clean as it can be.  

Rules & Complexity:

The game is simple to teach and easy to play.

All the complexity comes from the interaction with other players.

Theme & Mechanism fit:

Bidding at the inns to recruit dwarves into your army fits this interesting theme.

Fun & Replayability:

I'm having lots of fun when I play this game. Trying to figure out the opponents is always fun. Even if you don't get the wanted dwarf, you will still get one that will be useful sooner or later.

With a limited number of coins and many different heroes, each game will feel different.