by Mikey Boy
It's a complex game, and I'm not surprised you're finding it a bit impenetrable on an iPad. I have several tabletop games of LH under my belt, and I find it much harder to keep track of everything on the iPad than when it's all laid out in front of me.Basically, the gist of the game is acquiring resources (including money), and turning them into more money. Or, more accurately, turning them into money plus buildings, since buildings are worth money at the end of the game. Along the way, you also have to worry about feeding your workers - the amount you need will increase as the game progresses.
Ways to get resources (including food) include:
- Taking an available offer
- Using a building that gives you resources.
- Using a building that converts basic resources to processed resources (e.g. wood to charcoal, or clay to bricks)
- Other players paying you food or money to use the buildings you've built
Other ways to get food include:
- Building ships
Ways to turn resources into money include:
- Building a building
- Building ships (although most ships are worth very little, some of the ones availably at the end of the game are worth a lot)
- Using a building that gives you money in return for something else. In particular:
(a) The Shippling Line allows you to use your ships to sell resources for money
(b) In the full-length version of the game, Special Buildings often give a big payout for specific combinations of resources
The key to the game is in deciding the best route(s) to getting that money, and doing it as efficiently as possible. Do you focus on building lots of buildings? Or do you concentrate on getting high-value goods that you'll then ship for money? Will you concentrate on getting cattle and charcoal, so that you can sell steaks at that Steakhouse for big money? And what do you do when your opponents are already using it, blocking you? Do you use those steaks to feed your workers, do you build ships to bring in regular food supplies, or will you just take loans to feed them, and plan to pay them off later with the money you're planning to make?
There are, of course, further complications, but that's about as succinct as I can make it.
Three big tips I can think of:
1) Take the time to keep checking which buildings have been built by the town and your opponents. Using buildings is absolutely key to doing well at the game, and it's not easy to see them all on the iPad.
2) Don't be too terrified of taking loans to feed your workers. This isn't Agricola - the penalties for not having enough food aren't necessarily going to lose you the game, and being able to spend actions on things other than getting food can outweigh those penalties if done right.
3) When in doubt, you can do a lot worse than gathering wood, clay and/or iron, especially if a pile has accumulated on an offer space, and then building buildings with it. It may not be the most spectacular way to get VP, but it's a perfectly good one.
Hope that helps!