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I think it is universally considered that “Skip your turn” is one of the most awful feelings in Boardgames. And that is this game's Broom and Butter....with one Caveat- every time it happens to you, its because of a choice that you made.
Let me go over how a round of the game works so I can explain how it just works. The first player plays one of their Role cards and reads either the Brave or the Cowardly text/option. If the player selects Cowardly, they may immediately perform the Action. If the player selects Brave, the Action cannot be performed until all other players have played/reacted. If they don’t have that card in their hand, they just say “Next”. If they do have that card in their hand, they must place it on the table and choose to either Brave or Cowardly. If the player choose cowardly, they immediately perform the Action. If they choose Brave Action, the previous Brave player now gains nothing from this round. But the current player must again wait until all subsequent players have played. After all players have taken a turn, the player who last chose a Brave Action now performs it. They then become the new Start player and a new turn begins.
As I hope you can tell from the explanation, the Brave actions are significantly better than the Cowardly actions. So the push-your-luck aspect is always tempting you toward literally risking it all (for that turn) in order to take it. Brave will let you both move and deliver in the case of witches and Deliver and score bonus VP in regards to the druids. Brave Gatherer's will secure you multiple potions while cowardly ones will usually only get you a single one. The game is played out over seven rounds with each player selecting four action cards for each round. Round tracking is made easy because you build a deck of seven event cards and when they run out, the game is over.
This means the game is mean. And, on the other hand, this game is also mean. Which is to say that Yes, you will crush another player's turn by saying “Actually, I'm the Brave Hill Witch” with a spiteful smile when they select the Brave action. And you'll also say “Actually, I'm the Brave Hill Witch” with slight regret because every single thing you planned this turn hinges on you being about to move and drop off a potion in a hill area this turn. Of course, saying “I didn't mean to screw you over but I have to screw you over.” doesn't hold a lot of weight. Expect choruses of “This is stupid! This is great! This is STUPID!” throughout the game.
You (kind of) need to plan your entire turn, especially in the later rounds. And you can easily derail your own plans with a ill-timed Brave turn or you can be forced to do an action before you wanted to because someone else takes that action before you were “ready.” This is where having two witches that move around the board is key, you want to select something you can hopefully do with either of your pawns, even if the back-up plan is less than optimal. It's better than losing an entire action because you are not on a location that allows you to take it. So, you want to evaluate the other player's witch locations and decide if they can move to a specific location and, if they can't, then you can safely play the Mountain Druid and so you should pick that card and now for my other three cards for this round....Why is everyone staring at me ready to start the next round? Oh, Hello, Analysis Paralysis my old friend.
When you have less than the full compliment of five players, you will have Bewitched cards, which is evilly delicious. You are going to get -3 victory points just playing a Bewitched card. These cards will change every round. That can really sting but that just adds another element to card selection, since these cards suddenly become less desirable because of this and, presumably, less of a chance for other players to select it this round...which makes it a perfect time for you to select it and go with the brave action.
Looking at this from the outside, Playing Broom Service shouldn't really work at two players...but it absolutely does. The last person to take a Brave action goes first, as with any player count but in a two player game it really allows you to steer the game.
Broom Service has a Double sided board with “optional rules” for both sides of the board. Translation: It has a beginner side of the board which introduces you to the concepts and mechanisms of the game. And it is a perfectly functional version of Broom Service. The second side of the board is the “Expert/Expansion” side. That is everything that might have been considered “Overwhelming” to a family-ish board game in 2015 (like high scoring locations that are literally one way trips with no way to return to the previous play area). Or, more likely, since Broom Service is a re-implementation of Witch's Brew from 2008, they picked what best worked from it's expansions and put them into the Broom Service Base Game. Whichever it was, it truly benefits with everything feeling balanced and streamlined. After playing a few beginner games, you'll see some emergent strategies and begin to think “Ah, this is the obvious way to win.” But what is great is that when you reach that point, you'll find that the module “expansions” are balanced for that, giving alternative scoring strategies for just that case you “stumbled” upon. And the included “expansions” are super simple, they are all just Tokens you put on the board with actions that are activated when your pawns move there. You can use them on either side of the board, the expert side just includes outlined spaces for them and requires them when playing that side. Personally, I'll play it with any mixture of them but I'd definitely add in Amulets, even for your first game. This will get player's moving around the board to snag the amulets, “teaching” that a well traveled witch is a point happy witch and overcome the tendency to simply stay near the starting location and repeatedly deliver to low point locations.
The Kiki's Delivery Service vibe and the ease of play makes it great as a family-style game..well, except that whole mean thing. My wife will occasionally play a card and say “This is a Hill Witch” and then glance at everyone around the table. “Brave or Cowardly?” “I'm deciding!” She'll reply. So, optional social deduction aspect?!? Overall, it's a great game. It even won a spiel de something something the year it was released.
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