Hadrian's Wall - Solo Review

Flip&Write resource management with a Roman theme.

Image Source: Shem Phillips

Overview

• Official Website and on Boardgamegeek
  
• Designed by Bobby Hill and published by Garphill Games
  
• You play as a Roman general tasked with building up a milecastle of Hadrian's Wall
• Flip&Write with gameplay that rewards planning with satisfying combos
• High replay value but a bit expensive for what you get in the box (50€+)

Tl;dr: I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys resource management and planning ahead within the constraint of Flip&Write's inherent randomness.

Component Quality

• Decent wooden resources in different colors (workers and stone)
• Good quality cards that still look new after 15+ games
• The player board (2 parts) only slides together without anything keeping it there
• Can easily separate by accident
  
• The two play mats (200 sheets each) are detailed but the colors look really faded and pale
• Possible colorblind issue with worker/icon mismatch (see picture below)
  

Overall, the quality is good enough. I didn't have any issues during gameplay but there is definitely room for improvement.

The wooden meeples are easy to distinguish from each other and the box comes with more than enough for a solo player.

The player board is a bit annoying because it can separate when you tuck cards under it or nudge it by accident. However, it is fun to line up your workers and it looks nice with several tucked cards showing your scoring conditions.

Considering the premium price tag, I'm disappointed by the print quality, especially the faded colors. If you look at the rulebook or online renders, the colors are much more vibrant and defined. I really don't know why they decided to save money on the part of the game you spend 95% of your time with.

Being colorblind, it's always aggravating to see modern board games that only use color to differentiate between components. My first few games, I kept confusing the Builders and Servants because the printed icon color doesn't match with the meeple. I ended up ignoring their colors and just think of them as "the light/dark one". The printed icons themselves are easy to recognize so it wasn't a problem after a few games. Still annoying though.

Designers: please read this article about colorblind friendly design.

Faded Colors Example

Art Style

People familiar with Garphill Games' previous titles will recognize the work of artist Sam Phillips. This was my first game of theirs and I was immediately drawn in. The generals on the card backs look great and the background art on the play mats is pleasant to look at without distracting from the actual gameplay.

If you've played a lot of their games, then this art style may give you familiar comfort. It might also do the opposite and annoy or confuse you with the homogenized art over different genres and games. Art is subjective after all.

Ignoring the faded print issue, the iconography is excellent. It's simple enough to understand at a glance and I very rarely had to look something up after my first few games. Just in case, there is an icon reference on the back of the rulebook.

Image Source: Shem Phillips

Gameplay

• Plays over 6 turns with random resources each turn
• Choice of two cards to mitigate some of the randomness
• Picts attack after each turn (3 difficulty options)
• Gets progressively harder
  
• Bonus or minus depends on success of your defense
• A variety of factions, buildings, and defenses to focus on
• Many options give you resources in return, which allows you to chain actions together
  
• End of game scoring determines how well you managed your milecastle
• Solo scoring: Beat the high score
  

My usual setup

The first time I looked at the play mats, I was completely overwhelmed by the options. Thankfully, it looks much more complex than it actually is. The sheets are organized in a very logical manner and similar actions are grouped together depending on their resource requirement. The special faction buildings on the right side can be confusing so I recommend to just play a few games where you focus on one after the other. You'll quickly get the hang of it and see the countless possibilities to combine their actions.

Every turn (1 year ingame time) starts the same: You flip a card of the Fate Deck and see what starting resources you get (plus any unlocked resources from your left sheet). Then, you draw 2 cards from your own deck and pick one to use for scoring, while the other gives you additional resources and options for some of the specialist actions like Scouts, Merchants, or Gladiators. To simulate other players around you, you draw 2 more cards from another general's deck and place them to the side (faceup). These cards offer similar options as your own card, but every time you use one of them, you have to draw one more card when the Picts attack.

Now, you can spend all your resources to build up your defenses, hire wall guards or diplomats, scout the enemy, unlock resource generation, gain influence with factions, or build a variety of buildings offering you additional actions. I won't go into further detail because this isn't a rules explanation and there are quite a lot of options. Figuring out what to focus on and in what order to spend your resources is the core of the game.

Once you can't do any more actions, any leftover resources are discarded and the Picts attack! You draw as many cards from the Fate Deck as shown on your player board. Each card has an arrow that shows which part of the wall they are attacking. Each Wall Guard can block one attack card. Any gaps in your defense may be plugged by hired diplomats to prevent some of the attacks. You gain Valour for a successful defense and gain Disdain (minus VP) for each attack that gets through.

After 6 turns, it is time for scoring to see how well you've managed your milecastle. You have 4 static scoring tracks that you hopefully filled during gameplay, the 6 scoring cards you've chosen at the start of each turn, and the minus points from any leftover Disdain. So far, I haven't cracked the max score of 70+ but I've been close a few times. Those were all on normal difficulty though and I have no idea how you'd beat that on hard. Let me know if you manage to do so and please tell me how you did it.

Multiplayer Variant

Hadrian's Wall is one of those games that can be played with several people but I really wouldn't want to. There is barely any player interaction and the gameplay is almost identical to solo play. There are so many options and opportunities to plan ahead that I don't even want to imagine the amount of downtime some players will have. It's also never fun to feel rushed because everyone else is waiting for you.

Just take your time and play this one solo. There are many other multiplayer games that are better suited for a social setting.

Conclusion

Despite my minor complaints, I highly recommend Hadrian's Wall to anyone who likes Flip&Write games where you can really take your time and think about all the possible options. The ability to gain resources through your actions enables you to chain a ton of actions together. There is no greater feeling than to see it all come together and to use one worker to start a chain reaction that showers you with victory points.

The game is fairly short, 30 to 60 minutes depending on the amount of planning you do. I like to set it up on my table and usually play a couple of games spread over the day. Other times, I just play several games back to back and enjoy an evening full of Roman resource management.

Small tip at the end: don't stack the Pict attack cards per wall section. It will make shuffling a pain if they are all sorted like that. Just flip them in a line and then move the defended one up a bit to show that they're defeated. Go one section after the other (don't forget diplomats) and it'll go much faster that way.