by chally
out4blood wrote:
garygarison wrote:
Soledade wrote:
Also the priests and the cult tracks in the cult board are absolutely expendable. There's no need of that in the game.
So in your opinion, they are...superfluous?
I think the cult track is essential to the gameplay. There are mainly three sources of points in the game: incidental points during the game, network points, and cult points, both earned at the end. Incidental points are generally pretty close, unless someone messed up during the game, so the decisive factors end up being size of network and cult track. Without the cult track, blocking someone becomes an overpowered tactic, which would essentially knock someone out of contention. With the cult track, the players have two strategic options for where to focus. So the game is about maximizing your assorted opportunities relative to the other players, and less about pure network size.
If I were to consider something superfluous in the game, it would be the incidental points that score for each round, since I don't find them particularly decisive.
Great comment, but I wanted to note that I think "incidental" points during the game can also be enough to win if done exceptionally. I've won a three-player game with the smallest network and the second-most cult points.
The round-end scoring cards can produce ~30 points if things fall favorably.