When comparing Carcassonne vs Terraforming Mars, the Slant community recommends Carcassonne for most people. In the question“What are the best board games?” Carcassonne is ranked 3rd while Terraforming Mars is ranked 8th. The most important reason people chose Carcassonne is:
The rules are pretty basic for Carcassonne, with first time players being able to grasp its concepts quite quickly, making Carcassonne a great gateway game. Every turn the player draws one tile from the pile. They then must place the tile adjacent to a tile that has already been placed in a way that the edges match. There are four types of terrain on the tiles – roads, cities, monasteries, and grassland. After the tile is placed the player can choose to put a player figure, a.k.a. a meeple, on the tile to potentially score points. If a meeple is placed on a road, then the player will score one point for every road tile until the road ends in an intersection or a city. If the meeple is placed on a city, the player will receive two points for every city tile until the city is fully walled off. If the player chooses to place the meeple in a monastery, then they will receive one point per tile until the monastery is fully surrounded by tiles. Lastly, if the meeple is placed on grassland, then it’ll only score points at the very end of the game, giving three points for every city in the field. The player with the most points wins.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Easy to learn for beginners
The rules are pretty basic for Carcassonne, with first time players being able to grasp its concepts quite quickly, making Carcassonne a great gateway game.
Every turn the player draws one tile from the pile. They then must place the tile adjacent to a tile that has already been placed in a way that the edges match. There are four types of terrain on the tiles – roads, cities, monasteries, and grassland. After the tile is placed the player can choose to put a player figure, a.k.a. a meeple, on the tile to potentially score points.
If a meeple is placed on a road, then the player will score one point for every road tile until the road ends in an intersection or a city. If the meeple is placed on a city, the player will receive two points for every city tile until the city is fully walled off. If the player chooses to place the meeple in a monastery, then they will receive one point per tile until the monastery is fully surrounded by tiles. Lastly, if the meeple is placed on grassland, then it’ll only score points at the very end of the game, giving three points for every city in the field. The player with the most points wins.
Pro Near-endless replayability
Carcassonne will pretty much never feel dull, there are so many possibilities and variables in the game not only because of the randomness, but also because of the simplicity and the variation count.
Carcassonne is going to be a different game every time because of the tiles you and your opponents draw and where you choose to place them. There are over 70 tiles in the base set, which amounts to a lot of possible combinations.
Carcassonne has been around for a while, and this has led to the release of many expansions throughout the years. Each of these provides more tiles, rules, and other variables to the game.
Lastly, you can even introduce many variations that’ll change up the game without owning any expansions, for example, instead of drawing one tile and placing it every turn, have the players manage a hand of four tiles.
Pro Detailed with polish
The board game pieces are highly detailed and colorful, be it lush grassland, a fortified medieval castle, or a monastery in the middle of nowhere. The game is themed after southern France in the medieval ages and the actual fortified city of Carcassonne and the landscape around it. There is definitely some forethought put into the polish of this game that makes much of it intuitive and a pleasure to look at.
On a more practical note, the back of the tile with which the game starts is in a separate color, so it is easier to find when starting the game.
Pro Simple, but allows for lots of thinking if you want
The game is very accessible to beginners, but it allows for quite a bit of strategic play when you get more familiar with the concept. You can either go for long-term strategies with farms, or for quick point-grabs; you can build your own cities in peace or try to mess with your opponent whenever possible. A lot of tactics come in the form of cutthroat play – trapping other players’ meeples, stealing cities, and getting to share points.
Moreover, the last turns of the game can also influence the outcome a lot – players receive some points for unfinished creations as well.
Pro Quick to play
In a regular expansion-less game of Carcassonne it can take 30 – 45 minutes to blast through the approximately 70 tiles.
Pro Accessible
Because of the simple rules Carcassonne is very easy to get back into even after big breaks and it’s great to teach to other people. This means that the people you play with can change without any problems and you can play the game with anyone – children, your parents, your friends, or your partner.
Pro Engaging
The gameplay is dynamic, and everyone’s constantly engaged, managing their meeples and calculating which part of the board is worth fighting over. Even the kids stay engaged since the winner is usually not obvious untile the very end.
Pro Exciting feeling of progression
The constant anticipation and sense that you're working towards a goal is very pronounced. At the start of the game, you'll have limited money and resources, but as the game progresses and these resources accumulate, you can start to do more and more things each turn. Seeing your strategy slowly start to pay off as your corporation grows, and knowing you'll soon have the resources to unleash your big play helps to keep you excited for the next round.
Pro Theme and gameplay gel well
Pro Huge amount of strategy
Juggling your resources, money, and production against your opponent's actions as you try to satisfy the win conditions (getting the oxygen, temperature, and ocean coverage to their desired levels) can be pretty intense. Always having to think several turns ahead will definitely appeal to people who like a game that makes them strategize and prioritize. Choosing which cards to buy each round, what to spend your resources on, and how to terraform the planet without giving too much leeway to your opponents creates plenty of situations to outplay others.
Pro Loads of replayability
There are over 200 unique project cards in the game that represent all of the terraforming projects available such as introducing plant or animal life, greenhouses, new buildings, and more.
Since you'll be drawing random cards in a random order each time you play, each and every game session turns into a unique experience. Even if you've seen a card in a previous session, the conditions on the board (oxygen levels, temperature, and ocean coverage) will most likely be different than the last time you saw that particular card, meaning you'll be calculating the cost vs. benefit of playing that card in a brand new way.
Additionally, each player-controlled corporation has its own specialties. Some examples are being able to substitute certain resources for money, or perhaps having an increase in production for specific resource. Each one plays dramatically different from the others, so something as simple as choosing a new corporation on your next playthrough will change your strategies.
Pro Great balance in the game systems
The win condition states the oxygen, ocean levels, and temperature must reach a certain level. However, all three of these parameters are interconnected with one another, meaning you'll have to focus on all of them rather than just trying to brute force one.
For example, if you want to build a water production facility, you will need at least 2 ocean tiles in play. But in order for those ocean tiles to come into play, the oxygen and temp will first have to be satisfactory.
Overall, the game systems are very deep and complex, but the takeaway is that everything has a condition that needs to be met that is reliant upon all three parameters. This results in a very balanced experience where you need to pay heed to everything equally if you want to succeed.
Pro Lots of great expansions
There are several expansion packs which add new moons and planets for you to terraform. The rules and game flow is the same as the vanilla game, but they add new cards and corporations. The most interesting twist is that the board layouts are completely different for each expansion - with heat sources, oceans, etc in vastly different spots. They are an excellent addition that take the fun and excitement of the base game while giving you an all new playing field full of new possibilties.
Cons
Con Risk of accidental tile moving
If the game is not played on a flat surface or if you accidentally apply more force to the tile when you're placing it adjacent to another, then everything can shift, which can be annoying to fix.
Con May be a little light for hardcore boardgame players
The game itself is not very deep in design or play, which may be a turn off for the more hardcore of boardgame players though can be good for newcomers.
Con Small official scoreboard
The official scoreboard that comes with the base game only stacks up to 50 points, but proper games of Carcassonne go way past that mark – a game without any expansions can easily reach over 100 points. If you add expansions to the equation, then the points can stack up even past 400, but some expansions feature scoring tokens that help resolve this issue.
Con Highly random
As is typical for a game with a drawing mechanic, almost every action in the game is influenced by whatever tile is drawn and where a player has chosen to place it, so it’ll benefit him the most. The randomness is enhanced by the fact that the players only draw one tile at a time, so you must take what you get.
Con Games can feel very long and drawn out
The sheer amount of things that need to be tracked is fairly high, and continually grows in complexity as the game goes on. Keeping track of cards in play, actions, awards, milestones, map, resources, money, etc. can lead to some intense calculations. Most players will want to carefully ponder their strategy each turn, and the end result is a game that often seems like it comes to a grinding halt.
Con Not suited for large groups
Regardless of how many players you have, getting the oxygen, temperature, and ocean levels to their goal level to satisfy the win condition is the exact same. The more players you add to this equation, the longer the game will take as each person has to contemplate and think their strategy each turn. As such, this game is best played in only very small groups and doesn't lend itself well to larger parties.
Con The board is flimsy
The game board itself is very thin cardboard with no linen finish, and tends to dent easily. After enough wear and tear, the game tokens/pieces won't stay in place due to the lumps and pockets that form in the cardboard. The board must be handled carefully at all times due to its low quality or you risk damaging it.
Con Game pieces are cheap and wear down easily
The little game cubes (the tokens/pieces that represent resources) are coated with a metallic finish that chips and wears away easily. This leaves you with some rather ugly game pieces with flaking and peeling paint, especially in the corners.