by teddog
One thing all posters seem to have ignored is the effect of randomness in both games. My game group has played both games numerous times (Agricola over 300, Le Havre over 100), and the consensus is that randomness is minimal in Le Havre (yes, different buildings are used in each game, but their order is known to all at the start; special buildings are unknown, but the game mechanic makes it a choice to know them to some extent, thereby making it possible to mitigate the luck factor), whereas the expert Agricola players in my group have gotten to know the game so well that they could just deal out the 10 occupations/minor improvements to each player and show them all face up, and pretty much know who's going to win! Sound like a true board game, or just craps ("roll and see who wins"). And the draft mechanism, while helpful, can still only do so much to overcome this luck factor.Yeah, for newbies or even those like myself who only have a few dozen plays under their belt, Agricola is a fine game, that I still like (and really enjoy the solo variant!). But for a truly repeatable experience that doesn't boil down to "Dan got the Nurse Maid and the Layabout, he wins", Le Havre is much better, IMO.
