Kanban EV: Reviewing a Week or two in the Factory
What do you get when you cross a just in time production method with a board game? Well you get an incredibly rewarding experience along with some of the best turn order manipulation mechanisms that I have yet to see in a boardgame. To say that this is my favorite Vital Lacerda game would be an understatement. This game has everything going for it from an action management game with a buttery smooth turn sequence, to thematic crystal clear fittings for the job that all the players at the table are trying to accomplish.
Ready to start a day at the factory!
In this game players take on the roles of employees at an electric car factory attempting to earn a promotion by scoring the most victory points over the course of the game. On a player's turn you move your worker meeple to a different department in the factory and then do actions there depending on how many shifts you get that turn. Players move from the Design and Logistics for car designs and car parts up to the assembly line and R&D department to push cars off the assembly line along with acquiring test cars and upgrading designs to improve car models. Can’t get to the department you need in time? For less actions you can always go to admin in order to work in one other department of your choosing. Be quick and on time with what you need and where as not only are you competing with the other players but the manager Sandra moves along departments as well evaluating those who are untrained in these areas, costing them points!
Turn order manipulation
Probably my favorite part of this game has to do with how turn order is established. There is a bit of first turn housekeeping and then department selection, but once that is established then turn order is done from the top of the board at R&D down to admin. This is true for both action order as well as who has to move their meeple first, thus either blocking someone by placing before them or even blocking them unintentionally because you have yet to get a chance to move your meeple out of the way. Sandra also moves from one department to the next in this order which you can use to your advantage and figure out where she will strike next. With this defined order of operations it really opens up a lot of options for turn order manipulation and makes the game buttery smooth with turn flow.
Ex: Blue, Orange, Purple, Yellow, then Sandra
Lets get to work
During your stay at the factory you will visit its multiple departments to spend shifts (actions) in order to gather resources and score points. What's nice about their setup is that they all tend to flow together in an intricate, easy to follow way in reverse order up the action track. Get car designs from the design department with potential bonuses to help along the way, and use your kanban cards to fill warehouse’s in the logistics department in order to acquire car parts. Past that you will see the assembly line where you can use your car parts to push cars out of the line onto the test track, as well as being rewarded for pushing out in demand cars. Finally you end up at the top of the action track, the R&D (Research and Development) department. This department goes into a bit more detail as it tends to amount to where you will end up getting a big chunk of your points during the game.
R&D, or time to develop!
Research and Development
In this department you will either claim cars from the test track or upgrade designs. First there is upgrading designs. There are six different car parts in the game and as an action if you have a design and the correct part for that design you can upgrade it, spending the car part to the specific model area for a bonus and then flipping the design over to the upgraded design scoring you some points. This also advances the part marker of the part used forward. This comes into important play later with tested designs. Claiming cars requires discarding a design of the same model you are claiming from the track and then you get bonuses from the garage you place it in. Not only will this allow you to now score end game points based on the model car taken but now your upgraded designs for this model are now slotted above your car matching the model, turning them into tested designs. Tested designs are worth points equal to how far the part marker for that part type has advanced in the game, potentially scoring you a ton of points.
The ever present Sandra and end of week scoring
In each department you will notice a training track where you can optionally spend shifts to train when you are there. Not only will these tracks score you end game points based on positioning at the end but they also unlock special department abilities and player board slots as well as allowing you to lessen the blow from Sandra. Sandra (The Pink meeple watching over everyone) is the manager of the factory that will also move to the next department down in turn order relative to the game turn order. Once on her turn she will then evaluate the department performing a special action to update the department as well as causing the lowest trained players on the training track to potentially lose some points. Because of how structured the turn order of this game works, avoiding Sandras Wrath can be a big part of it! When Sandra reaches her personal desk in Admin this will also trigger an end of week scoring where each car you own will score you points based on how many parts have been upgraded which can be quite high if you are going the car collection route.
Time for a meeting aka points
Once enough cars from the test track have been claimed this will trigger a meeting. Meetings are incredibly important as they can score you a ton of points if you time the requirements well enough. Whoever is certified in the most departments will go first and claim one of the sections of a meeting card with a speech bubble (Speech bubbles are earned during the game through multiple means in the factory). These can range from getting points from having cars of a certain model, car parts, or upgraded designs to even something like just being certified in a department. What is also cool here is that there are public meeting cards, but you start the game with three in your hand as well. During the meeting you must play at least one card and then it just becomes a scoring card for the meeting that anyone with a bubble can potentially score. After the meeting concludes you then seed the new public display with a card from your hand and draw two new replacements.
Personal qualities
On your player board you have spots for designs, car parts, speech bubbles, and garages for cars. What's neat is that over the course of the game when you get certified in departments you will unlock sections of your board which in most cases allows you to hold more things. The boards are also dual layered which is a nice touch for keeping everything neat and organized while planning out your next move. Ian O’Toole’s artwork really shines here in how clean and clear everything is and where it needs to go.
End Game
The game has an end of week scoring track and meeting track. When both of them are at 2 and one is at 3 that triggers the end of the game. Because of this timing nature the game actually has an indeterminate number of rounds leading to players needing to take tactical decisions throughout the game to get what they need at the right time. From here there is a plethora of end game scoring to do from cars to tested designs and leftover resources and then whoever has the most points is the winner!
Vital Lacerda is one of my favorite designers and makes a lot of heavy thematic euros, but in my opinion when it comes to thematic feel and smooth play I believe this is one of the best. If I had to choose an intro heavy game of his it would either be between this and The Gallerist because of how incredibly easy this is to pick up thematically for what you are trying to do strategically as well as a limited set of actions at each department which helps cut back on potential analysis paralysis on player turns. It is a bit costly in the low hundred dollar range but if you are looking for that next step into heavy gaming and like what you have read so far then you will be playing this dozens of times into your games nights.