Feast for Odin: House of Bricks, A 192 Point Solo (no Emigration)

Feast for Odin: House of Bricks, A 192 Point Solo (Norwegians; no Emigration; moderate Exploration; Risk and Pillaging-lite; Animal, Crafting, and Building heavy)

Due to my endgame picture, which shows a preponderance of longhouses and pigs (as well as other animals), my starting occupation card (Master Bricklayer), and artisan shed (The Hermit’s Hut, obviously named after someone who likes to hole up in their house), I dubbed this solo “House of Bricks,” after the house of the wisest of the Three Little Pigs.

I should say that a little of this is postmortem analysis, in that my memory of what I did isn’t crystal clear. Often I’m setting up this game relatively late, after lots of writing. But I would say the following is a 95% accurate interpretation of my post-round photos. I’ve been snapping pics after the end of every round in recent solos, from the feeling that I have something to share with people who A) feel stuck in a rut of going from risk spaces to upgrade spots, or B) want to refine a risk-free crafting/animal strategy to be competitive with pillaging/raiding/whaling. While I did a few risk spots (Fishing and Theft in round 5; Pillaging in round 6), by then I had activated my weapon card bonus on Orkney in order to make two of these actions more or less risk free, only feeling that I was taking a gamble in my round 6 pillaging action.

Not that I rested my game entirely on crafting and weekly market action spaces, as you can see that I do a bit of Exploration–a bit less than usual, as I’ve wanted to work on my house game–and Building, in which I unlock as many bonus squares as possible on islands and longhouses, and use these action-free engines to generate VP.

Set-Up:

Weapon cards: sword, spear, net, bow.

Harvest: Pea, Bean, Flax, Mead horn.

Starting occupation card: Master Bricklayer.

Artisan Shed: The Hermit’s Hut / Icehouse. (You can find my analysis of Artisan Sheds through this link.)

The two starting mountain strips included the long strip from Norwegians, as I wished to contribute to a survey on Board Game Geek posted by the expansion designer, Gernot Kopke, who wondered how it would impact games to play this strip first. This is a bit of a change for me, as while the Norwegians rules advise shuffling it in, so that it could come out in any round, previously in the Board Game Geek forums the designer advised to place it on the bottom of the mountain strips stack, so that it arrives in the last round, and this is the way that I usually set up solos, as well as multiplayer games. It did impact round 4 a bit, when I took the two paired ore one the 1 resource / upgrade 1 Viking action space, and used one for crafting, and one on a crucial square on Isle of Man that let me fill in most of the island, all of its income, and go on after income phase to unlock the pig bonus.

Round One:

1 Viking: Mountain Strip, 2 lumber

1 Viking: Build Artisan Shed (-1 lumber, The Hermit’s Hut)

2 Vikings: Craft Chest (-1 lumber, 4-blue, +1 hacksilver)

2 Vikings: Weekly Market (herb, +1 hacksilver, mead horn) + Play Occupation Card (Master Bricklayer, -1 Stone when Building Houses)

The chest went on my homeboard, unlocking 2 income; the herb, two mead horns, and my pea went in my hut, unlocking the herb bonus and 1 income. My feast was flax/hacksilver/bean.

Income: 3. Between income, feast, and Viking actions, I have 4 hacksilver going into round 2. My only bonus was an herb.

Things I might have done: 1) as I didn’t end up building a house until round 5, I could have played Master Bricklayer later. I chose to pass on another action–such as a risk action, like fishing–because vikings are worth more later in the game, and I definitely wanted to get this card into play. Master Bricklayer is one of the better “unbanned” starting occupation cards. I was considering fishing to fill my hut, and then taking the whaling ship + exploration board action on the fifth column instead, which is a great action saver. Overall, though, I was happy with my opener, as 3 income, 4 hacksilver going into round 2, an herb bonus, and my starting occupation card in play, is a pretty strong start.

Round 2:

Usually, I like to play animals in Norwegians, perhaps because I did so much whaling and pillaging in the base game. However, for my last half-dozen solo games, I’ve been changing it up, going heavy crafting or knarr market strategies, in order to keep my interest in the animal strategy fresh, but in this game I decided to return to animals at last. This ended up paying off extremely well, due to a lucky occupation card draw.

Harvest: Pea, Bean, Flax, Grain.

Weapon Card: + 1 spear. So I have Sword, Spear x2, Bow, Net.

3 Vikings: Buy 2 Sheep (-2 Hacksilver, -1 Bean). I drew Inspector! A super great card, especially to draw so early in the game, when I actually had hacksilver to use it! Because while Inspector is free to play, returning one viking from the game board to your home board, if you have 1 hacksilver per round, you can double its effect, returning two vikings to your pool.

4 Vikings: Weekly Market (Spice, Wool, 1 hacksilver) + Occupation card play (Inspector, detailed above, -2 Hacksilver, +2 Vikings returned to home board).

At this point, I had one hacksilver remaining, and it occured to me that if I got a lumber, I could hit the Whaling Ship + Occupation Board action space in column five.

1 Viking: 1 lumber + 1 upgrade (upgrading herb to pig, so that next time I hit the 4 Viking Weekly Market, I would get the 4-red tile as well).

1 Viking: Whaling Ship + Occupation Board (-1 lumber, -1 hacksilver). I took Isle of Man.

As you can see, I placed my spice and my wool on Isle of Man, unlocking 2 more income and the mead horn bonus. My new income was 5, but as my feast was grain/hacksilver/pea, I only had 4 hacksilver going into round 3. At this point, my bonuses were mead horn, herb. My tile collection was: 2 herbs, flax, mead horn.

Animal Breeding: one of my sheep flips.

Round 3:

Harvest: none.

Weapon cards: sword, bow, spear x2, net x2.

3 Vikings: Weekly Market (2 wool, 1 fruit basket). Occupation card: I drew Hornblower, which will work great with my then-plan to fill Isle of Man.

At this point, I wanted to hit the 3 Viking ore crafting space, and needed ore. I hate going to the Mountain Strips, but there was an ore and two hacksilver sitting there.

1 Viking: Mountain Strip (+1 ore, +2 hacksilver)

3 Vikings: Craft Ore. I usually draw my occupation card before I pick a special tile, as sometimes your plans change, and this was one of those times. I drew Farmer (it gives you an anytime action by which you can trade a cow for an 8-blue jewelry tile, an awesome VP engine for later in the game), which changed my whole game plan. Instead of filling Isle of Man, I decided to grab Orkney. So I took the large armor suit from the ore crafting space, which works great with that exploration board.

1 Viking: Explore 1 Viking island, taking Orkney.

At this point I had six hacksilver, two wool, and the armor suit, five of which I laid underneath the middle island piece, and one of which I put on Isle of Man, to unlock another income. This gave me 3 income from Isle of Man, 3 income from Orkney, and 9 income total. Six of these were used to unlock the cow bonus on Orkney, so I would get the full benefit from Farmer later on. (Not that I intended to use it until round 6, after my initial pair of cows would have a chance to breed in round 5.) I had 3 hacksilver left over going into round 4. My feast was herb, mead horn, flax. Bonuses: herb, mead horn, cow. My tiles going into round 4 were two herbs, a mead horn, and a fruit basket, not to mention my cow, my pig, and now three sheep, as my flipped sheep reproduced this round in the animal breeding phase.

Round 4:

Harvest: pea, bean, flax, grain, cabbage.

Weapon cards: sword, bow x2, spear x2, net x3.

4 Vikings: Weekly Market (+1 hacksilver, spice, wool, 4-red meat, herb) + Occupation card play. I played Hornblower (-1 sheep and -3 hacksilver, but yielding a pelt, another wool, another 4-red meat, and the horn special tile). I had three hacksilver going into this round, so after this action space I had one.

1 Viking: Craft Flax to Linen.

2 Vikings: Craft Linen and Pelt to Jacket + 2 Hacksilver.

At this point, I didn’t really know what to do, and was regretting not starting my ore bonus on my home board, so I could do the ore crafting on the fifth column. I also wanted to get pig breeding started.

1 Viking: Mountain Strip, taking the two paired ore at the end of the Norwegians mountain strip, and upgrading another herb to a pig, giving me my breeding pair.

1 Viking: Craft Ore >9, taking the sickle. The sickle is such a great piece! It’s great for unlocking nearly any bonus.

This was an excellent round, giving me a heap of tiles to lay on my boards, and letting me start on my home board. However, I only had three hacksilver and one ore to fill in around these tiles. This meant that I could either choose between unlocking a little income on my home board, or a lot on Isle of Man, so I chose the latter, by placing the three hacksilver, the ore, the sickle, one of the wool, and the horn, unlocking 6 income there. This gave me 13 income, 4 of which I used to unlock my pig bonus (so now I was making two pigs a round!); 5 of which went on my home board, so that I could lay the jacket, the spice, and the wool, unlocking 3 income for next round, as well as a mead horn, a lumber, and an ore bonus; and three of which I used to unlock my weapon card bonus on Orkney. While I wasn’t doing a lot of risk actions yet, I didn’t need the hacksilver the following round, couldn’t unlock any other bonuses, and thought I might luck into some swords for late game pillaging/raiding. This left me one hacksilver going into round 5. My total bonuses were now: 1 lumber, 2 stone, 1 ore, two mead horns, 1 pig, 1 cow, and 1 weapon card. I now had a breeding pair of cows, but as breeding comes before bonus phase, they didn’t have a chance to breed this round. However, I now had 4 pigs and one of my sheep flipped. My feast was an herb, one 4-red meat, and a pea. My tile collection: fruit basket, herb, two mead horns, grain, bean, cabbage. At this point, I feared I was overproducing food, but wanted to keep it going, as my plan was to start getting some use out of my Master Bricklayer.

Round 5.

Harvest: none.

Weapon card: At this point, I can’t remember, and my picture was taken after the round, during which I did not only Fishing, but Theft, and spent most of my stash of cards. What I can say is that I had 9 weapon cards after my weapon card draw this round, and spent all but one of my cards, ending the round with a spear and a net (one of which was from my Orkney weapon card bonus).

At this point, I really wanted to get some use out of Master Bricklayer, plus I wanted to make some use out of my weapon cards. I also wanted to chip away the rest of the blanks from the home board. While I would want a longship next round to take Waterford or Newfoundland, I decided to go knarr/longhouse rather than longship/stone house. I don’t like stone houses that much. I see how they can be a great engine builder early in the game, making three points a round from the pelts, but in the late game, they’re a pain to fill, as they have an odd shape, making the negatives harder to cover than the ones in long houses.

The problem was that I only had one lumber and one stone, and even with Master Bricklayer, I needed another lumber. So back to the Mountain Strips again.

1 Viking: Mountain Strips (+2 lumber).

4 Vikings: Build Knarr/Longhouse (-2 lumber, -1 stone due to Master Bricklayer), play occupation card. I played Farmer. While this unlocked the anytime action, I wasn’t to use it for a little while.

3 Vikings: Craft Ore. I took the axe (the 9-square special tile). I think I drew one of the occupation cards I exchanged for a VP chip here. I don’t remember what it was. I only remember I didn’t want to play it on the Theft action space.

1 Viking: Fishing. While I wanted to have a great show on theft, I also wanted to get some use out of my long house. Plus, I had some nets, which you can’t use on Theft. I think I rolled a 2 here, and spent two nets. +2 fish, +1 oil barrel.

1 Viking: Theft. I scored the chalice (the special tile covering 10 squares).

Feast: grain, meat, mead horn.

Placing the hacksilver, the chalice, and the axe, I unlocked 5 income on my home board, which gave me a new income of 16, another of which I placed with the oil barrel to unlock my rune stone bonus on my home board; 5 of which I placed to unlock my grain bonus on Isle of Man; and, one of which I placed to unlock my pea bonus in my longhouse. This left me 9 hacksilver going into round 6. Having also placed two herbs, a pig, the two fish, and a bean in the longhouse, this added an oil barrel, a bean, and a pea bonus. My total bonuses at this point were 1 lumber, 2 stone, 1 ore, 2 mead horns, 1 rune stone, 1 grain, 1 pig, 1 cow, 1 weapon card, 1 oil barrel, one pea, and one bean. My tile collection was now up to 3 mead horns, 1 rune stone, one oil barrel, a cabbage, an herb, a grain, a pea, a bean, and a fruit basket. And look at all that stone and lumber! I could have hit the 4 viking Build action space again in round 6, if I didn’t just block myself due to the solo rules of Feast for Odin. In the stables, my sheep flipped, taking me to three sheep; I got two more pigs, but as one went in the long house, this took me to five total; and, one of my cows flipped at last, plus I got another one from Orkney, taking me to three total, one of them pregnant.

Round 6

Harvest: Pea, Bean, Flax, Grain, Cabbage, Fruit Basket.

Weapon Cards: I’m not sure what I drew, but it wasn’t a sword, which would have been the only useful weapon card to my Viking actions this round.

I used eight of my remaining hacksilver from round 5 to buy a longship, which I now did as an anytime action.

Anytime action: buy a longship (-8 hacksilver).

3 Vikings: Exploration Board. I took Waterford. I drew an occupation card here. This might have been when I drew Homecomer, as I am beginning this round to plan for three 4 Viking actions in round 7, and know that I want to have enough occupation cards either to play or exchange for VP chips. Hence the 3 hits on the 3 Viking action space column.

3 Vikings: Build Longhouse (-1 stone due to Master Bricklayer). Normally, I wouldn’t do this, but I have been wanting to work on my house game–and, moreover, I have scads of food at this point. I drew an occupation card here, which was destined to be exchanged for a VP chip.

3 Vikings: Weekly Market (+3 Wool, +1 Fruit Basket). Another occupation card that became a VP chip.

2 Vikings: Pillaging, I placed an ore on my ship and, based on what I have in the end of the round picture, spent a stone here. But I must have had no swords. So I am guessing I rolled a 10 here, as this is when I took the other armor suit, covering ten squares.

This is when I made my first use of the Farmer occupation card. By leaving the pregnant cow in the stable, I would make two cows, one from breeding and one from bonus, but this still left me with two cows to upgrade, action free, to jewelry tiles. Which I did. Placing those jewelry tiles, plus my bonus rune stone, oil barrel, and one remaining hacksilver from the previous round, I unlocked 7 income on my home board. This gave me 18 income. After placing the armor suit and three wool on Waterford, I had to place 9 hacksilver to unlock all of this island’s bonuses. I also placed one in my feast and one on my second longhouse, along with an herb, a pig, a cabbage, two mead horns, and a flax, to unlock all of its bonuses. This gave me 7 hacksilver going into round 7. During animal breeding, I flipped a sheep, and added a cow and a pig, and after bonuses from Orkney and Isle of Man, had 3 sheep (one pregnant), 6 pigs, and 3 cows. Total bonuses: 1 lumber, 2 stone, 1 ore, 2 mead horns, 1 rune stone, 1 grain, 1 pig, 1 cow, 1 weapon card, 2 oil barrels, two peas, two beans, 1 knarr, 1 longhouse, and the 10xblue tile from Norwegians. My tile collection going into round 7: 3 fruit baskets, 3 beans, 3 peas, two oil barrels, two mead horns, one rune stone, that big Norwegians blue tile, two grain, one herb. Also, notice my longhouse community and my harbor are growing due to Waterford’s bonuses.

Round 7:

Harvest: none.

Weapon cards: irrelevant, no risk actions.

So my strategy going into this round was to get my maximum oomph out of Homecomer. Homecomer lets you return one Viking on every 4 Viking action space, which means using it in round 7 is often your best play, if you can squeeze out three 4 Viking actions. Which I did.

4 Vikings: Build Knarr + Longhouse. This fills my harbor, and gives me my fourth longhouse, as well as a 4 VP chip.

4 Vikings: Weekly Market. +1 Spice, +1 Wool, +1 Hacksilver, +1 herb, +1 4-red meat. Plus another 4 VP chip.

4 Vikings: Mountain Strips, sweeping up four hacksilver and an ore from the end of a mountain strip, and double upgrading two fruit baskets to cloaks (nine-green tiles). While this only let me take three things from a mountain strip, rather than the full four, I took the extra hacksilver and ore for puzzling and points. This is when I played Homecomer, returning 3 vikings. I hate going to the Mountain Strips so late in the game, but can’t deny that it works well with a sheep strategy to double upgrade your growing pile of fruit baskets from the 3 Viking Weekly Market. Two cloaks is 18 points, which made this an 18 point play, or 4.5 points per Viking, plus a lot more if you count the next two actions due to my occupation card play. At this point, I had 12 hacksilver, 7 from the previous round plus 5 from viking actions this round.

1 Viking: Livestock Market, trading a sheep for a wool, a pelt, and a 4-red meat.

2 Vikings: Craft Ore >9, taking the helmet, and another 3 VP chip.

I turned my three remaining cows to jewelry, and placed two of them with the cloaks, the giant blue tile from Norwegians, the spice, my oil barrel and rune stone bonuses, and some of my remaining hacksilver and ore from the previous round, to finish my home board. Then I took my slew of food and filled my houses. The other jewelry, along with another oil barrel, another wool, and the pelt, went to Waterford. The helmet went to Isle of Man. The last wool went to Orkney. My income was 29, and after placing a couple on some -2 squares on Waterford and Isle of Man, I had 34 hacksilver remaining.

Ships 26

Emigrations —

Exploration boards 53

Sheds and Houses 75

Sheep and Cattle 10

Occupations 21

Silver 34

Home board —

Final income — (scored as silver, above. If you’re wondering why I didn’t score 29 points here, you’re scoring your Feast for Odin games wrong–see page 23 of the Feast for Odin rules, and Commonly Missed Rules in Feast for Odin.))

Exploration boards (negatives) -23

Sheds and houses (negatives) -4

Total 192.

Wait!!!! There’s an ore sitting with my unused loot. I could have had 193 if I tossed that on Waterford. This happens a lot to me. Don’t forget to place all your unused ore on your boards after the final round.

A Feast For Odin

Z-Man Games Feast for Odin: The Norwegians Expansion

A Feast For Odin: Mini Expansion 1

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Feast for Odin: Which Artisan Shed?

The Prologue: Which Side Do I Pick?

I’ve wanted to do an analysis of the Artisan Sheds for some time, but with one already on Board Game Geek, I was waiting until I could contribute something not only useful but original.

What’s interesting to me is that often the sides you think are good aren’t as good as their flip sides. For instance, while most glom on the Hermit’s Hut, thinking they can upgrade the herbs to pigs, for a whaling strategy, the Icehouse can be better. The Icehouse is a wonderful artisan shed, even though you have to give up a whale meat to activate it, rather than upgrade it to a nine-green, because the Icehouse is the only artisan shed to produce a green tile you can lay directly on your exploration boards and homeboards, so that together with the income, it produces a potential three points a round.

Which isn’t to say that the favorite sheds–the Armory, the Mason’s Shed, and the Lumberjack’s Hut–aren’t wonderful sheds to have. The Armory is the best one, no doubt, not for the sword, but because it lets you get started ore crafting before other players. Any free resources early on gives you a wonderful advantage in saved actions, so the Mason and the Lumberjack are also nice to have.

However, many of the other favorites aren’t quite as good in play as we envision. So many times I’ve activated the Hunter’s Lodge, thinking I will use the extra bows on theft and the extra nets on laying a snare, but my actions get tied up in other active engines, and I end with a slew of weapon cards. So the Hunter’s Lodge is perhaps not as good as you think.

Often passed over, the Beekeeper’s Hut is actually pretty awesome, in that it’s very small, easy to fill, and makes a red food every round. The Pig Sty is even better, although slightly harder to fill, in that it makes a LONG red food every round.

Because one indissoluble facet of strategizing with the artisan sheds is your choice of which of the two flip sides to play, my mode of presenting the Artisan Sheds will be a mirror of the choice offered to players: that is, I’ll cover not each Shed individually, but each two-sided board, touching on both sides grouped together, which side is generally better than the other, and, sometimes, when the reverse might be true.

Armory / Cowshed

The Armory is the best Artisan Shed, not for the sword, but because short of a successful Elk Hunt unlocking the ore bonus on your home board, it is the easiest way to get an ore bonus going early, to fuel lots of ore crafting. (Otherwise, you have to snipe ore from Mountain Strips, which costs actions, and can result in you getting blocked from something else you wanted to do that round.)

The Armory is a little troublesome to fill in round one, but doable, through hitting the Weekly Market fifth column space, and laying down your starting bean, mead horn, and pea, as well as the mead horn and the hacksilver you just got. This means your round one feast will require the income that you just started making in the Armory, but that’s ok–you just unlocked an ore a round, or six ore for the long game.

The Cowshed is one you’d usually fill in the mid-game, as you’re generally unable to make cows in round one, and unwilling to part with one until you have breeding going. If you get Orkney in round 3, you could activate the Cowshed easily in round 4 if you don’t plan on breeding your bonus cows. One Cow plus one grain and the Cowshed is done.

As the Cowshed will generally only make two or three milks in a game, compared to six ore from the Armory, the Armory is the better deal. Moreover, the Armory’s swords will pile up until you build or buy a longship, giving you some great mid to late game pillaging actions. All this said, I could see someone ignoring this shed until they explore Orkney and Cork, unlock the cow and shed bonuses, and use the first shed bonus to activate the Cowshed, then fill it with the bonus cow, and a grain or a pea and a mead horn. It’s an easy eight points compared to the basic sheds, for which you have to stockpile all that useful lumber and stone in order to score the full eight points. However, why would someone wait until the mid game to activate their shed if they were lucky enough to start with the Armory? The Armory is such a useful shed–producing six ore, whether for ore crafting, chest crafting, pillaging, whaling, or simply filling those tiny spots in exploration board or your home board–that this would probably never happen, assuming a skilled player.

Mason’s Shed / Beekeper

This one isn’t so cut and dry as the previous choice. Both options here are pretty solid strategic choices. Either you unlock free red food, saving you actions during the game, or you unlock a less useful orange food and a stone, which fuels building houses, pillaging and crafting.

As there have been many games where I have never touched the 1V Craft Stone square, and many more in which I don’t build a house until round six or seven, by which point I have the stone unlocked on an exploration board and/or my home board, the Mason’s Shed isn’t the clear choice here for me.

Having red food bonuses is such an outstanding action saver in Feast for Odin that nine times out of ten I would choose Beekeeper. Moreover, Beekeeper is eight points instead of seven, only eight squares to fill instead of ten, and you only have to use one of the mead horns it makes to avoid the -2, compared to two of the six stone bonuses for the flip side. To top it all off, I have ended a half-dozen games with a half-dozen leftover bean tiles, so the Mason Shed’s bean bonus simply isn’t attractive to me at all.

There are a few starting occupation cards that would make me play Mason’s Shed, however, such as the one giving you a one stone discount on houses, so that with every stone it makes you could build a long house. That would be a sweet game of Feast for Odin.

Pig Sty / Hunting Lodge

At first glance, the Hunting Lodge looks like the clear choice. Players like to hit the risk actions, and the Hunting Lodge will let you succeed more often on those action spaces. Moreover, the Elk Hunt action space lets you grab big green tiles for your board, and the Hunting Lodge will impact that action space as well. Plus, the bow-a-round it gives you could make a difference on the Theft action space.

But look at the flip side. If you’ve read my other Feast for Odin posts, you know how easy it is to make pigs in Feast for Odin. You can make two by round two or three without going to the Buy Animal action spaces, simply by upgrading herbs you’ve acquired on weekly market action spaces. If other players let you do this (because in multiplayer, not everyone will be able to do this in the early rounds), you could get the pig sty going in round two, if you don’t care about starting pig breeding, or in round three, if you want to breed your first two pigs. If you don’t care about breeding pigs, you could grab an herb on the fifth column action space round one, upgrade it to a pig in round two while grabbing a lumber in the 1st column Mountain Strip action space, then build your shed, toss your grain in, and voila, one four-red tile every round. While you sacrificed breeding pigs, you’re breeding pure pork at the rate of one a round! Plus the income.

So the Pig Sty is a great action saver. It will make your harvests last a long time, and make it easier to fill houses. In most cases, the Pig Sty is the better of the two choices. If your play style is going to lots of hunting action spaces, you might fight me on this, but you should try playing a game with the Pig Sty and see how you feel about it then.

Lumberjack’s Hut / Barn

In this case, the obvious choice is the good one. If you’ve played even one of Uwe’s sandbox games, you know how important lumber is. If there’s one rule of thumb for playing most Uwe games, it’s “when in doubt, grab lumber.” Lumber is incredibly useful in Agricola, Caverna, and Fields of Arle, and it’s no surprise that it’s useful in Feast for Odin. In Feast for Odin, lumber fuels build ship and shed actions, hunting action spaces, and the 2V craft chest action.

As experience at Feast for Odin will teach you that most of this lumber should be obtained from action-free bonus spaces, the Lumberjack’s Hut is an awesome way of making sure you will rarely have to hit Mountain Strips for lumber after you build this shed.

On top of the lumber a round you get from the Lumberjack’s hut, you get an extra weapon card.

Compared to the Barn, it’s just no contest–so if I activate the Barn, I get 6 points, but I have to give up a six point horse I just got on a 2V/4V Buy Animal action space? And my bonus is ORANGE food? And unlike flax, it’s an orange food without any kind of quirky usefulness, as grain doesn’t really pop up in the occupation card anytime actions like flax does. Even though the Barn is the only shed to have more than one income, the two income is not a sufficient enticement to giving up a horse to get it going.

I will no doubt never build the Barn in Feast for Odin. Even if I luck into getting Wexford (which has never happened in multiplayer, due to the usefulness of Isle of Skye).

Hermit’s Hut / Icehouse

This is a tougher choice than any so far. Not that either of these sides are as good as the Armory or the Pig Sty, but they’re pretty decent options.

Actually, both of these sheds are pretty exciting on first glance, and they would be a lot better if they weren’t so expensive to fill.

The Hermit’s Hut, for instance, gives you a bonus herb a round, which can be upgraded to pigs, and get pig breeding going in round 3 without every buying pigs. After that, it’s a free herb and pig a round, and this combo is outstanding for filling long houses. You should never have to use Vikings to get food with this artisan shed in play.

However, no doubt because Gernot Kopke saw how useful the Hermit’s Shed would be to a skilled player, eventually producing much, much more than any of the other sheds once the pig breeding was underway, the Hermit’s shed has a larger area than any of the other sheds, including the Armory. The Armory only has eleven squares to fill, while the Hermit’s Hut has thirteen squares to fill. The top two on the left don’t have to be filled to unlock the bonus and the income, though. You could unlock the Hermit’s hut income and herb bonus in round one by hitting the 5th column weekly market, and placing one herb, one mead horn, one hacksilver, and one pea or flax, left to right.

On the other hand, the Icehouse is super easy to fill, given that you produce just one whaling meat tile and a peas tile. A lucky player might be able to activate this one in round one (1V Mountain Strip, getting two lumber, 1V Buy Whaling Ship. 3V Whaling, 1V Activate Shed on 1st or fifth column), producing one oil barrel a round. This would be quite a start, by the way, in that you would have the six-green bones tile to start 2 income on your home board, giving you a total three income going into round 2. Plus you’d have an extra oil barrel for starting off whichever exploration board you’re able to get in round two.

Oil barrels are great for helping to unlock bonuses on your exploration boards, as you can slip them in anywhere. I don’t like whaling in Feast for Odin anymore, but I might consider it, given this artisan shed at the start of the game.

Most times I get dealt this artisan shed board I choose the third alternative–play Feast for Odin without an artisan shed. They’re often prohibitively expensive alternatives. If I get Cork later, I might activate one of these sheds with the shed bonus on Cork, assuming I have good food bonuses coming in.

Whaling Hut / Spinnery

This is another one I often elect not to play, unless I get dealt some good early occupation cards that consume flax, in which case I play Spinnery. I also do hit the 1V Flax to Linen spot at least once per game, sometimes twice.

To my mind, Whaling Hut is simply too expensive, considering how useful a Whaling Ship is for Exploration in the early to mid-game (Orkney and Limerick are 1V islands, remember), and also considering that I’m giving up 3 victory points (a whaling ship) to unlock 7 on my shed.

The Spinnery can also sting you, as you will always want to use the linen you make from your flax to slip in on narrow spots on your home board grid or your exploration boards. I have ended more than one game with the -4 spot still open on the Spinnery. If that doesn’t get filled, the Spinnery is only worth 4 points, and not 8, although it has saved you lots of actions with the food, perhaps fueled some crafting or filled some houses, and given you a trickle of income.

While a red food bonus early in the game is nice, because the Whaling Hut is prohibitively expensive in the early game, I rate the Spinnery higher than the Whaling Hut.

If your income is coming in strong, you can buy a spare whaling ship for only three hacksilver to finish off your Whaling Hut. I am guessing you will need those three hacksilver for something else, though, such as going toward the cost of a knarr or longship so that you can explore the better islands ready to flip in the mid to late game. Usually by the time you can fund the completed Whaling Hut, you have a fish bonus from some other occupation board, as the fish bonuses are more common on exploration boards than most bonuses.

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