Fight for the Forest in Root

Root is a game where each player has their own...

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A really enjoyable read. Thank you! This sort of reminds me of Food Chain Magnate with its twists and turns. I love games with this high level of interaction and I also love games with less interaction but in which players have more control (I'm enjoying Gaia Project right now). I love both of these things but they make for very different types of game!

The woodland folk have the best story!

They are the miscellaneous animals too small and too scattered to be a force… in the beginning.

Then, as others trample over these poor oppressed creatures’ territory they start to generate Outrage and begin thinking “enough is enough” and ambush in force and/or bring forward a few powerful warriors they can muster. They are the gorilla warfare faction in the game.

Agent easy wrote: They are the gorilla warfare faction in the game.

I thought you said they were small? (Sorry, couldn't resist).

I've been flirting with Root again after those early sessions with some of the other people on F:AT( in what i think must have been the before times! wow) thanks to the app. It is good.

I need to grab that app >.>


I think my problem with the Woodland Alliance was I played too passively. I didn't want to be the first to start the war of the forest - puts a target on your back.

But really you want to start spreading your supporters whereever people are going to be. So that they give you more supporters!

I played my first game of Root last night, as the otters.

I found the concept of everyone playing by a different ruleset a bit dis-unifying, like the three of us were sitting at different tables. It's sold as a big plus for the game, but I'm not sure it came without a price.

Am I the only person that feels this way? Maybe it's a first-play thing.

It also depends on the factions involved. Vagabond has a big sense of playing a different game, Woodland alliance also has a little disconnect. A lot of the other factions have different engines but are playing a pretty similar area control battle game. It's why I'm somewhat ambivalent to the vagabond being in the base pack.

Can't say that I'd recommend playing the Riverfolk for your first game, either. They take some familiarity with the deck and other factions so you really know how to sell your cards to the other players. It also helps if you're good at selling/table talk in the first place. I'd probably stick to the Marquise, the Eyrie, and the Alliance for a three-player game with a first-timer(s). That way, it will play out more like the wargame that it is, without having to absorb the variations to the rules presented by the Vagabond, Riverfolk, Lizard Cult, etc. Root is already often a challenging first play and your reaction isn't unusual, Sag.

I seemed to get the hang of it (but yeah, some of the text instructions on cards and the like could use a rewrite) but it just didn't feel like I was competing with the birds or the cats. Granted, they were paying me plenty to use my otter soldiers (apparently otters can be soldiers . . . and can be bought) but it just felt like three people playing different solitaire games at the same table. The comradery was there, but not the "a mile in your shoes" sort of catharsis you get from other games.

You don't look at one of the other players and think "this is what I'd do" in a game like this as much as you do in more symmetric titles.

Root can be pretty cutthroat. The area I absolutely agree with you in, I like Root but don't love it like Oath which is more bareknuckled, is that it takes a pretty experienced eye to tell you who you should be beating the shit out of at any moment.

The Vagabond is a great example. It is, technically, by far the most explosive and scary power in the initial four as the game gets later. But that isn't obvious. Among super experienced players people beat the shit out of the Vagabond every time there is an opportunity early, dropping everything to do so if they're in your clearing. But that isn't obvious unless you're good and also they're good so you know they'll be able to make it explode.