When comparing Caverna: The Cave Farmers vs Agricola, the Slant community recommends Agricola for most people. In the question“What are the best board games?” Agricola is ranked 24th while Caverna: The Cave Farmers is ranked 58th. The most important reason people chose Agricola is:
The basic premise in Agricola is simple: players take one of their two starting people and, in turn order, use it to select an action. Once an action is selected, it can not be chosen by other players. After everyone has placed their first worker players place their second, again in turn order, followed by 3rd, 4th, and 5th, if applicable. However, the difficulty in Agricola comes from the relatively limited number of action slots available and the sheer number of things players are trying to accomplish over the 14 rounds of the game.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Very deep strategic opportunities
With all of the available action spaces and 48 unique rooms you can build in your cave, the many options for developing your strategy and trying to score points allows for a wide variety of effective strategies and encourge long term strategic planning.
Pro Basic gameplay is simple at it's core
On a players turn they take one of their dwarves and place it on an available action space to take that action, then play moves to the next player in turn order. This makes the main gameplay very simple to explain.
Pro Fantastic components
From the thick player boards and cave tiles to the over 300 chunky, wooden resources, all of Caverna's resources are top-notch.
Pro Easy to explain, but very difficult to master
The basic premise in Agricola is simple: players take one of their two starting people and, in turn order, use it to select an action. Once an action is selected, it can not be chosen by other players. After everyone has placed their first worker players place their second, again in turn order, followed by 3rd, 4th, and 5th, if applicable. However, the difficulty in Agricola comes from the relatively limited number of action slots available and the sheer number of things players are trying to accomplish over the 14 rounds of the game.
Pro Has expansions that can add more depth and variety to the game
Players can purchase the expansion, Farmers on the Moor, to add more gameplay options and strategic depth or they can purchase additional card packs to add variety to the minor improvement and occupation decks. This helps keep the game from getting stale and encourages multiple plays to try and experience everything this game has to offer.
Pro High player interaction for this type of game
The very limited number of actions available to take each round, combined with most resources only being available at 1 or 2 spots means that players are regularly interfering with eachother's plans and constantly being forced to reevaluate their strategy after an opponent blocks them. This leads to high amounts of player interaction and keep you very engaged in the game instead of focusing solely on your player board.
Cons
Con Too many actions can cause players to have analysis paralysis
Caverna features a large central board that can contain up to 27 spots to place your dwarves and take an action and with so many choices available some players might end up taking a long time to decide between them.
Con Higher player counts can lead to long games
The official play time is listed as 30 min / player, but can run even longer if you play with 5 or more players.
Con A bunch of components make the game a bit fiddly
With over 300+ wooden resources, 60+ acrylic nuggers, and 400+ cardboard pieces Caverna has a lot of pieces to manage as you play the game and as a result it can be a troublesome to manage all of those over the course of a game.
Con Can be a very punishing game for new players
Even players who love Agricola regularly joke that its name should be Misery Farm. This is because everything that you fail to do will cost you points, yet it is very difficult to do some of everything. This means that new players have a very low chance of beating someone experienced since they won't fully now what to expect as the game goes on and how to plan for it.