Azul: Summer Pavillion Review
I, for one, am more of someone who enjoys the larger, complex euro games. Where the depth is so profound that it gives the far end of an Olympic swimming pool a run for its money!
However… who you play certain games with can make all the difference in enjoyment, and I have a ton of fun when the family breaks out Azul. The chunky bits, the abstract puzzle of getting the correct tiles at the right time, all with a rulebook that is only about four pages long, really helps sell this game. And you don't have to take my word for it - Azul is one of the hottest-selling games in the industry. Because this game was such a hit with my family, we kept an eye out for other games like it. When we stumbled upon one of the sequels, Azul Summer Pavilion. We decided to give it a try.
If you have played the original Azul, then the rules themselves are pretty similar. Your goal is to draft sets of colored tiles so that you can cover spots on your star-pattern board to collect victory points. At the end of the game, whoever has the most points is the winner. However, in this version, the game is over at the end of the sixth round. The tile drafting in Summer Pavilion is the same as the base game, but you don't have to immediately place the tiles. Instead, once all tiles are taken, then in turn order, you spend an amount of tiles called for on the space of your board of the correct color, then place a single tile in its spot. After placing the tile, then you would score a point and another point for all other tiles connected via adjacency. Other major differences include the addition of wild tiles (a different wild color each round) and the option for each player to hold up to four tiles over until the next round.
Example: You would need to discard 3 purple tiles to place in the spot circled in red. If blue is wild this round, you could even discard 1 purple and 2 blue if you wish. Because of adjacency to other purple tiles, this player would then score 3 points.
That scoring may seem pretty basic but can really rack up some serious points by strategically placing your tiles. Another reason to place certain tiles in a pattern is that you could end up getting free tiles from the main board, depending on how you place tiles on your player's board. If you surround a circle icon, you get to claim one tile, a statue surround gets you two, and if you manage to place a 5 and 6 spot in a pattern, you can take three tiles from the main board.
At the end of the sixth round, there is also some end-game scoring where you can get bonus points if you covered all of your 1, 2, 3, or 4 spot areas on your board or even a big chunk of points if you manage to complete a full star pattern. This can be a pretty powerful alternative to trying to fill up entire circles - there are several ways to maximize VP if you pay attention.
Azul is a hit, and this game joins it in its success. While the base game can be a little more rigid and allows opportunities for strategically withholding tiles from other players - this version creates opportunities for players to mitigate the damage of such strategy by opponents via the wild tiles and the tile holdover options. If you prefer a tighter game, then this version may not be up your alley, but it is still a worthwhile game to play. We find that we prefer this one when playing with a younger audience or players that don’t enjoy hate-drafting as a strategy.
