Discount Dive: El Grande Big Box 20th Anniversary Edition Board Game Review

If El Grande isn’t the Granddaddy of Area Majority games,...

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I had this edition and ended up trading it for the plain old edition. I preferred the cubes to the meeples, the old tower is much nicer, and we never touched any of the expansions. El Grande is fine all on its own and doesn't need a huge empty (even with the expansions in it) box to shine.

I have the Decennial and still consider it one of my best purchases. Really a great game.

Legomancer wrote: I had this edition and ended up trading it for the plain old edition. I preferred the cubes to the meeples, the old tower is much nicer, and we never touched any of the expansions. El Grande is fine all on its own and doesn't need a huge empty (even with the expansions in it) box to shine.

Discount Dive is a bit of a strange beast. It is literally what I bought at a discounted price, in this case it was the 20th Anniversary Big Box. I wouldn't have flinched at buying ANY version of El Grande at a discounted price. I have no preference for cubes to meeples but I was surprised at just how bloody well the expansions fit into the base game and how it loses none of what makes it fantastic when you do. Needed? Not Really. Wanted as an alternative? I say yes. I've read statements where players say "I'll only play it with the King/Intrigue expansion." Is that me? No. Is that something I would do to get it to the table? Absolutely.

On the same page with you on dumping a big box where you never play the expansions. I traded away my Shogun Big Box and hope to replace it with a base copy of Wallenstein or Shogun.

WadeMonnig wrote: On the same page with you on dumping a big box where you never play the expansions. I traded away my Shogun Big Box and hope to replace it with a base copy of Wallenstein or Shogun.

Hey, I finally was able to get the "normal" version of Shogun.... except the person had the first expansion and didn't want to seperate them. So, now I have an expansion to unload.

I'm sure I've told this story here, but the first Christmas that my wife and I were together, my wife bought me a copy of the then-out-of-print El Grande on the BGG Marketplace. I was home visiting my parents when it arrived, and she texted me frantically to tell me that it arrived, and it was a German copy. Fortunately this was back when Funagain still sold the English cards, so my copy is a German one with the little bridge-size English deck.

Still one of the very best games out there. I just love it.