Propeller Islands is a board-building game that has emerged among many at the recent Essen fair.
It has, however, 2 major features. Players will earn their tiles through a dice drafting mechanism, and certain tiles can be activated to perform their effect (usually to gain resources).
The central board of Propeller Islands represents 7 hexagons: 1 central and 6 external, each marked with a number from 1 to 6 representing the 6 possible faces of a die.
At the beginning of each round, players will roll 2 times the number of players +1 dice and place them in the corresponding spaces (maximum 3 dice of the same value; otherwise, the excess is re-rolled). Around each die value, 3 tiles are placed.
During the action phase, players must choose, one at a time, one of the available dice to take one of the 3 adjacent tiles and either place it on their island or discard it to gain 2 energy.
Each energy can be used to modify the value of a die by one step.
Instead of taking a tile, a player can use the chosen die to activate their own tiles showing the same number and on which a worker is standing. They will then lay down all these workers and perform the actions of these tiles. Most tiles will allow players to gain or exchange between the 3 resources of the game. Some others will allow activating another tile with a different number, and another allows adding a worker to a tile.
But what will all these resources be used for? They will be used to play plan cards. For plan cards, it’s quite simple. If one is played, a new one is drawn for free. Therefore, players will always have 3 plan cards in hand. It costs resources to play a plan card, but it is worth it as they all yield many victory points as well as effects that add attributes to their tiles, which will earn additional victory points, extra resources, or more flexibility by replacing the required die value with any value.
And gaining victory points during the game is very interesting because it will unlock permanent abilities such as re-rolling dice, modifying a die, activating a tile, or gaining additional resources. Each player board has its own abilities. The game thus offers starting asymmetry.
Propeller Islands is a relatively simple board-building and resource management game with a theme and interaction that are somewhat minimal. The choice of tiles to acquire or discard is very interesting as it will depend on many factors: not only what it will yield in terms of victory points or resources but also whether it will provide immediate victory points to quickly gain always interesting permanent abilities.
And that’s not all; you will also choose it based on the resources you lack to play as many of your plan cards as possible, as well as to ensure the optimization of points earned from certain tiles based on their conditions (3 points per set of 6 workers, 3 points per tile providing an immediate bonus, 4 points per certain colors of tiles, 5 points per set of 4 tiles with a different die number,…).
Propeller Islands offers a complete experience, is enjoyable to play even if it lacks a bit of originality to make it a top game. Its simplicity means that players will quickly get through it, although for a less experienced audience, it does the job. It runs smoothly and is easy to set up, making it a good entry point to more complex games, given that it features several mechanisms typical of more expert games such as asymmetrical abilities, dice drafting, managing one’s own board and tableau, resource management, contract completion, fulfilling objectives, and the cornelian choices oscillating between tactical and more strategic decisions.
