Matthew BaileyIn a vague pattern of switching between a kid-orientated game and not, having showcased Warhammer yesterday, game 12 of the “Bailey Family Sorta Summer Board Game Bonanza” is “Super Farmer” played by myself and Toby(4).
Unlike most of the games, we feature here, Super Farmer is a classic drafting/engine-building game that originated in Poland during the Nazi occupation in the Second World War. (Matt keep it light I hear you say). Originally called “Hodowla zwierzątek” (“Animal husbandry”) the general concept is each player takes the role of the owner of the animal farm. The main goal is to breed, exchange and gather different animals (rabbit, sheep, pig, cow, horse and two kinds of dogs) and the winner is the person who can collect at least one of each kind (except the dogs). But be careful there are foxes around trying to snatch your rabbits and wolves which can eat all your other animals (that is why you need dogs to protect your herd
Each player starts with 1 rabbit and on their turn, you can do 2 things: first, you have a possibility to exchange your animals according to the special table (e.g for six rabbits you get one sheep, three pigs for a cow) and then you roll two special D12s with the pictures of animals on the sides. You count the number of pairs of the animals on rolled dice (together with the ones on the farm) and this is how many new animals you get, divided by two. The trick is that there are foxes and wolves that will eat all your rabbits so keeping large amounts of rabbits is a gamble. which are eating your animals.
Obviously, because of the dice rolls, there is a fair amount of luck, but there is a strategy to it. Do you stay with cheap animals that are way more likely to breed quickly (and equally might be lost) or do you go for the expensive ones first and work backwards? The addition of the dog mechanic basically acts as insurance against the fox is also worth considering. In practice, we found the wolf and the fox did not appear enough to warrant the need for the dog and both of us chose to switch out rabbit asap because you can always convert back if you need to.
This is the kind of luck-based game I would not normally enjoy but oddly I really liked this one. When I read the rules I sighed a little and then about 4 or 5 rolls in when I realised Toby(4) knew exactly what he was doing and started gaining some cow-shaped ground against my rabbit hoard it clicked.
There are some good concepts on offer here that lead into games such as Century Spice Road and Splendor.
seems fairly tricky to get hold of in the UK but this is the sort of game your FLGS might have had knocking about a few years and there are plenty of copies on eBay for around the £15 mark. There is a version on Amazon for £25 that comes with cool little plastic dogs but I must admit I think £25 is a bit steep for tokens and dice no matter how nice those plastic dogs are.
So basically you see this for cheap (we were given it as a present) it’s a good little simple game that actually could easily be played with grandparents. Plus if you have Polish family members they might even remember this game from their childhood.
