There’s a group of Italian super designers, including (but not limited to) Flaminia Brasini, Simone Luciani, and Virginio Gigli, who seem to work with each other on every game that they release. These designers have collaborated on many of my all time favorite games: Lorenzo il Magnifico, T’zolkin, Teotihuacan…the list could go on, but I think you’re picking up what I’m laying down.
Well, a new heavy hitter has entered the ring, and it is right on par with the other previously designed titles. Let’s just get this out the way early: I absolutely love this game. It just scratches that perfect itch for me between the mechanics of drafting, dice rolling, rondel, action point, and contract fulfillment. I’ll just say, Tiletum has it all.
Building with Dice
Tiletum, co-designed by Simone Luciani and Daniele Tascini and published by Board&Dice. This is probably my number one game released of 2022. You’ll never find out my #2 – #10 because Ryan lost in a duel of fisticuffs trying to force me to write a top 10 list for 2022, or I’m just lazy and I tell it to whomever asks. It’s definitely one of those two things (bluemeeplebob@gmail.com if you want to know).
Tiletum is on the heavier side of a playthrough coming in at a BoardGameGeek weight of 3.36 out of 5. However, I LOVE heavier games, especially games with multiple paths to victory by collecting victory points in many different ways.
Tiletum’s objective is just that, collecting the most victory points before the end of four fixed rounds. You will be rolling a set number of multi-functional dice and placing them around a rondel (according to pips) containing 6 actions. Players decide on drafting a single die per turn, and a round consists of 3 turns per player.
The dice not only represent the action you’ll be allowed to take based on the pip placement where you pull from. These dice are also multi-colored and represent the resource and amount of that resource you’ll be able to take. The different die colors represent gold, iron, wool, food, and stone. The more of a resource you decide to take, for example taking a 6 pipped die, the less action points you will receive to perform the drafted die action. The lesser valued die provide less resources but more action points.
A Heavy Trip Through Europe
You will be traveling around Europe during the golden age of the Renaissance with your merchant and your architect, which are in fact two of the six available actions. The merchant will be building houses in city stops along the map. The architect will be building pillars in preparation to build pieces of cathedrals which are placed about the map.
All of these actions are acquiring victory points for you in some way throughout the game. You will also have a chance to take and solve contracts requiring turning in a number of resources. You will be using the stone resource to build pieces of the cathedral in areas where your architect has prepared. Taking characters and placing them onto your own personal player board, which give you in game bonuses, will eventually give you more houses to place on the board.
The name of the game is variability, which after a number of lengthy plays has kept this title very fresh.
One of the other things I truly love about Tiletum is that the most of the scoring is variable from each gaming session. There are 4 interim scoring sessions in 4 variable chosen cities each game, with a variable objective for scoring. The cities requiring stone to build cathedrals each have a variably placed stone requirement with variable victory points.
The name of the game is variability, which after a number of lengthy plays has kept this title very fresh. There are a lot of ways to tackle the strategy of obtaining victory points I this game. This can sometimes, understandably, be overwhelming for some players. However, if you enjoy longer, heavier games with multiple paths to victory and lots of choices, Tiletum is a guaranteed winner.
You can purchase Tiletum at your local game store or online through the Board&Dice webstore.
Highs
- Game is built with replayability in mind
- Dice drafting and placement is very tactile
- Multiple pathways to victory
Lows
- Must be in the mood for a heavier strategy game
- So many paths to victory can cause AP in players
Complexity
Time Commitment
Replayability
