by murksofus
Hey,I played a 2p game of Le Havre many months ago and really enjoyed the multitude of options that was available to me to get points. The game took 2,5 hours, which was reasonable as a first play of a somewhat heavy game.
Last weekend we took it out again, this time for a 3p game. That play was a bit of a disaster. The play time (even though we knew the rules) ballooned to 3,5 hours, which we felt was far too long. We never felt we spent much time thinking or agonizing over decisions. It was mostly just refilling spaces and quickly doing an action.
My main concern, however, was that all 3 building stacks were empty by round 12 (of 18) or so. So for the last third of the game all we did was to use a building to get resources, use another building to flip those resources, then use either the shipping line/other buildings to sell goods or to buy ships. It felt very dull and mechanical and really soured our experience.
I'm wondering whether this is a common occurrence. Do the building stacks often go that early? Is it less of an issue in 2p games because there are relatively more buildings available?