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Carcassonne: River 2 Toy from Battle Quest
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Rating:  
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Customer Reviews
Worth having Posted 09 April 2008
I avoided this set for some time because our base set contains a built-in Rivers "upgrade". However, this expansion is intended to upgrade the basic Rivers tiles and it introduces some more interesting options at the start of the game.
A useful addition Posted 26 March 2008
To prevent confusion, this is Rivers II, not the original Rivers, which I shall refer to as Rivers I. The Rivers I expansion had very limited availability by itself. Now, Rivers I is generally only available if you purchase the correct version of the English starter set (it still appears to be missing from the German starter!), or manage to find one second-hand. Fortunately for those gamers who have missed out on Rivers I, Rivers II was made available.
Given the relatively low cost of this expansion it adds a distinct variation to how the game is begun. Instead of using the single starting tile, the spring is place down and, then the remaining river tiles. Personally I choose to place the river junction next to the spring, but it could be placed within the stack for placement during play.
One of the problems with Rivers I was that the first player laying a tile could take control of a potentially very large farmland. This is alleviated in Rivers II with the introduction of bridges that cross the river, splitting the farmland, although, in almost direction contravention of this, there is a river tile which has a city which spans the river, and allows the farmland to join up underneath the 'city bridge'.
On the whole, I found this to be a very worthwhile expansion and, to make up for the lack of Rivers I in my set, I bought a second Rivers II! The use of two sets means that the starting variations have multiplied. You can choose from using both of the springs separately, or just one of them. When used with the Count expansion you may choose to have the two rivers emanate from opposite ends of the City of Carcasonne.
Whether you choose to use Rivers II by itself or with the Count expansion, it will add a level of variation to the starting of a game, creating more opportunities for both fields and cities, when the game properly starts. A word of caution, if you are using the Princes and the Dragon expansion, be careful when you get to the end of the Rivers II set, because that Dragon will be arriving right next to the most recently placed tiles; and you never know when he'll decide to get some exercise.
The score for education is based on the overall effect this expansion has when applied to the whole game.
A must for Princess and Dragon fans Posted 11 March 2008
This expansion for Carcassonne is a small box of river tiles. Whilst you do not neccessarily need to have 'The River' expansion to use this set, most boxes of Carcassonne come with it these days. The river tiles are laid before the 'usual' land tiles of the main game.
There are a few tiles that are worth mentioning specifically:
The river ends with a volcanic lake. This puts the dragon on the board from the beginning of the game, rather than having wait for a volcano tile to be drawn.
A pig pen that scores a farmer an additional point for every city they supply in this field.
The river has a fork that as a second starting tile. This gives a few more options when laying river tiles and should split the fields up a little.
All in all, very good value.
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