Amalfi: Renaissance - A Look at the Sea Trading Board Game

Amalfi: Renaissance is a board game set in the age of sail. In this game, you are in charge of a group of ships. Your goal is to use these ships to bring back all kinds of goods from lands far away. You take these goods and use them to hire special characters. These characters give you different abilities to help you play. You can also try to get private contracts. These contracts give you special rights to trade at certain places. Another way to play is by buying great works of art. These art pieces can give you many benefits. They usually cost a lot, but they are often worth many points to help you win. You can and should build more things to help your game. You can build more ships to carry more goods. You can also build lighthouses at places where people trade often. When other players visit those places, you get a small benefit. The game is played in four rounds. After the four rounds are done, the player with the most points wins.

The main game board

Your player board

The most important part of the game is how you use your ships to get things. You only have a few ships you can use in each round. They start out at sea, which means they are ready to go. To go on a trade trip, you usually spend one ship to send others to a place that has a specific resource. At your player board, you move these ships from the sea to a spot that shows the type of resource. Now, each ship you moved gives you 2 or 3 of that resource. You can spend these resources to buy other things. When you spend the resources, those ships go back to the sea. This means they are ready to use again. You can choose to move them back even if you do not need to use their resource. But if you do this, the re

Some things can be bought with food. More importantly, you need food when you want to send out a trade trip. At the end of a round, you must have enough food to pay for keeping your fleet going. This depends on how many ships you have. If you do not have enough food, you will get a penalty.

You get points in many different ways. Things you buy, like private contracts, art, and some characters, give you points. At the end of every round, there is a special scoring condition. There are also three goal cards you can try to get. If you get a goal before anyone else, you get a bigger reward.

A character card

Places you can visit to trade

Works of art

Private contracts are special trade spots

Goals are picked when you set up the game

Special scoring happens at the end of each round

Amalfi is a complex game where you try to make resources well and spend them smartly. You need to build up your game and buy things that help you get points. Managing your resources is hard. You need to make sure you have a good supply of food. If you get a good mix of characters, their skills can help you a lot. There are many ways to score points at the end of a round, and there are many goals. This makes the game feel different each time you play.

I did not find the game very interesting. To me, it felt like just another complex game about managing resources. It is hard enough, and there are many ways to score points. One problem I have with games that have many ways to score is that they feel like a math problem. I am just figuring out the best way to make goods and turn them into points. It feels like I have done this same thing in too many other games. I am not doing anything new. One nice thing about the game is the characters. They are based on real people from history. It feels good to put together a team of characters that work well together.