Stronghold Games AuZtralia, Strategy Board Game

Auztralia is unlike any board game I've ever played, and I'm loving it! Player rounds are quick, strategic, and thematic.Each round, the player in last place on the Time track goes first--a cube is placed on the player's board, and the corresponding action takes place. Each action costs time, which moves the pawn along the Time Point Track until someone reaches space 53. On this journey, players will mine for resources, build farms for gold, build their military forces, expand their train network, and combat Lovecraftian Old Ones in a fight for survival.My first playthrough of Auztralia was a little clunky, mostly because I found the rulebook to be confusing. Rules which should be in the same section are instead scattered, while the Old Ones card-based movement is unusual. I wrote notes for easier gameplay, watched several playthrough videos on YouTube, and this really helped. Once playing, any fiddly rules are easier to remember, and I found the Euro-ish gameplay captivating.The artwork, components, and Cthulhu theming make this game one of the best wargames I've played. Replayability is high due to the random seeding of the game board during setup, and due to Old Ones Tokens remaining facedown--there is an element of surprise in not knowing where powerful Old Ones are hidden. The goal from the beginning of the Time Point Track until space 23 is focused on earning gold to purchase military units and allies, so that you'll successfully survive heavy combat to reach space 53.So far, I've mostly played alone using the two player Co-op Variant using the Co-op deck included. I'm having alot of fun playing alone, and can't wait to play with friends. If you love strategic horror themed games, Auztralia is an excellent addition to your collection!

I wish more designers were able to successfully do things like create a train / settling game that also involves defending against Lovecraftian monstrosities. But I guess that's part of what makes Martin Wallace special.I find the aesthetic very agreeable, and the different people you can recruit are all kind of interesting.The components are nice. Good map, serviceable cardboard railroad chunks, nice attractive cards with great art, and cool little thematic resource bits.I consider this a bit of an underappreciated gem.

AuZtralia is a four player game where players will work semi-cooperatively to eradicate the old ones out of Australia. Players are generally working to achieve the most victory points by extending their railway to create farms and reaching the old ones to eliminate them. The players are trying to outscore each other, but the old ones will also eventually take a turn, and if they are not eliminated, they will obtain victory points for every blighted farm and remaining old ones.The board is setup with the eastern side of the Australia. The board is seeded by special markers called Survey Tiles that show where to place old ones and player resources. Resources are gold (for buying units), iron, coal (both for building railways), and Phosphates (three victory points). There are twenty survey tiles and they are not all used. This allows the game to have variable setup. The spawning of the old ones are dictated by the survey tile and what type by the number listed on the location. The old ones range from one to three, weak to strong respectively. If any weak old ones would be placed double in a location they would both be discarded and instead be changed to a single next level old one. The old ones are placed face down. They are only flipped face up by a player attacking or a revelation card which allows the earliest numbered old one to flip.Players will create a revelation deck by randomly drawing five cards out of a ten card set for levels one through three. Each level increases the punishment players will receive which range from nothing, death of two personality cards, flipping of an old one, or even a flipping of an old one with six movement cards drawn. The old one deck will be shuffled and only used for attacks and movement. The personality deck is shuffled and five personality cards are flipped face up in a row.Players will place there port disc, starting location, on any hex near the edge of the ocean with an anchor symbol. Next they will place a disc on the time track which begins at the amount of players playing. The players will spend time to complete actions until they reach, or past, number 53 of the time track. The old ones own disc will begin on number 22 of the time track, and this disc will move every time it is last and will also end on number 53. An additional affect the old ones receive is for every odd number reached the revelation deck will be drawn to show a new event for the players to face. Also, players must be aware of where they place their port because if the old one reaches it and destroys it, the game immediately ends and scoring begins.A turn begins with the player in the lowest numbered position on the time track with ties going to the player that is highest in the stack of discs. There are ten time actions a players are able to choose from and each has a separate amount of costs of time. The first two are building railway actions which both costs one coal and iron in resources. The time cost are two and three. The build railway action for three time is the only way players can build into hills. The second actions have two spaces dedicated to mining resources for only one time each. The resources that were seeded across the board can be reached by rail and mined for one type of resource per activation. The recruit help action costs only one time and allows a player to choose from five face up personality cards. These cards give one time uses, permanent abilities, or combat abilities. The buy military unit action only costs one time, but players are only able to recruit one kind of military unit with the exception being infantry as two can be recruited. The costs for units is also paid in gold resources and range from one to five gold. Eventually players will either obtain all the resources on the board, or will not be able to reach any, and will need to do an import/export action. This action only costs one time and allows the player to take any two resources they need or sell any two resources for gold, can be a combination of both. The farm action can be taken to obtain gold for each farm placed. The farm action is only able to place one of each type of farm as a single action. This also costs the player one time for each type of farm; cattle, sheep, and corn. Fighting is an action a player will use to eliminate an old one. The time spent is equal to which units are sent to fight. Infantry, armored car, and artillery will each cost one time, no matter the amount of units a player has, and airships/armored trains are free. Each turn a player is taking one of these actions they do so by placing cube markers, and they can choose to do the same action again on the following turn by spending one gold for every cube that has already been placed. To avoid spending a great amount of gold, a player can take the last action which is the retrieve cube action. The retrieve cube action costs one time, but a player may then remove all cubes from their board.The fight action the players are able to do is how they attack the old ones. How they are able to reach an old one is dictated by their railway and units being used. The railway represents a player's units traveling by train so units like infantry and artillery can only attack in spaces next to a train track. Armored cars have a range of two, airships four, and armored cars zero as they must have an old one on a railway. When attacking with units, the lowest range is used for the attack. A player will announce which units will be sent to fight an old one, which will spend the time used. Afterwards, players will select a hex in range that has an old one. The old one's tile is flip and the battle commences. For lower level old ones, it is possible to find nothing on the other side of the tile which will just be a waste of time for the player. If it is an old one, combat is dictated by what kind of old one a player is fighting. There are six types of old ones that could possibly be faced and only certain units may do well or poorly against these old ones. An example is a zombie which shows infantry and armored cars as doing well while everything else is poor. Players will then flip over the an old ones deck to show if the player did damage to the old one, or if the old one damaged them physically or mentally. Players will continue the fight until they give up, defeat the old one, or are forced to retreat.These actions will continue to go between the players until they all pass the old one disc on the 22nd space on the time track. Players will then move the old one disc one space and if it is odd numbered they will turn over a revelation card. The other detriment to the players is if any old ones are revealed on the board they will have two old one cards flipped to see if they move, minus temples as they do not move. Old ones will always move towards the nearest farm or port, if there is a tie the players will follow the number and direction found on the card.Players will spend time and fight the old ones until they all, including the old ones disc, reach or pass the 53rd space on the time track, or a player has their port destroyed. Scoring commences with players counting farms for two points, eliminated old ones, phosphates, and any additional points from personalities. The old ones get one point for every farm blighted (attacked and destroyed), the victory point value of a faced up old one on the board, and double victory points for the value of every face down old one left on the board. Whomever has the most points is the winner.AuZtralia is an interesting and great fast-paced game about trying to use time optimally to get everything done for the most amount of victory points. Players will quickly feel the pressure of the awakening of the old ones as each players disc gets closer to passing the 22nd time track space. That dread increases as revelation cards are revealed. It is a game that requires a great amount of balance and decision making. Players will ask themselves, "is this the perfect moment to spend three time" or "are these the units that should be used in a fight" constantly because any mistake can cost them victory points or units. A player spending too much time may have them waiting three turns while the old ones are moving and attacking each of their farm areas. The tension also builds when a port is attacked and everyone is hoping that the player survives their ordeal so the game can continue on. Some individuals may be worried that the semi-cooperative nature of the game could allow someone to throw the game because they are losing, its really hard to do. An individual who wishes to do this would have to go into the game wanting to lose for that to happen. Players will usually have some genuine hope that they will win and be victories over the old ones and the other players. The game requires some careful planning, but the variable setup disallows the notion of always doing the same strategy each time. The reason being is one time an area may be rich with resources and another being filled with mid to high level old ones. If players want a cooperative game, the game does come with rules on how to be fully cooperative. The board is double sided and comes with the western side of Australia. This side makes for a smaller map with restrictive rules on resources which creates a harder game. That increasing difficulty seems to be most of the variants to the game. There is also objectives for solo mode, and two player variants. Overall the game brings out the best in player strategies, or grit, and will get players to assist one another, feel each others pain or joy of facing the old ones.

First off, I will say that in my opinion, this is one of the best games I have played. Both in terms of the game and player boards designed to subtly remind you of the rules you might have forgotten, and in terms of the innovative game mechanics themselves, I think this game is excellent. The game features random starting conditions and different variants to choose from (although for now I've only played one of the main variants), so I think it can be played many times before it feels repetitive.That said, this is not the most "casual" board game. It can take many hours to play though, and the rules may feel complicated until you start playing and get the hang of it. For this reason, I don't recommend it to the type of person who plays board games once or twice a year. If you're a board game person though, go for it!Lastly, the reason I'm giving 4/5 stars is because, in my copy at least, while everything else was in English, the player boards were half in Portuguese and half in polish. This is only a minor inconvenience since they don't say anything that isn't in the rules or in universal symbols. If it happens to you and you'd like to get english replacements, contact Stronghold games (which links to Indie Boards and Cards) or use the link offered by Amazon and create a ticket requesting the parts (they didn't list Auztralia in the drop down menu, so I specified it in the comments). In my experience, the website is glitchy but I got the parts I wanted quickly and without charge.

I definitely got the English version of the game because the box is all english, the rulebook and other bits of paper are english.But I got 2 rulebooks in mine and the player boards are polish for some reason.