| Complexity | Medium |
|---|---|
| Cost | £20 |
| Duration | Medium |
| Players | 2-4 |
| Producer | Rio Grande Games (Hans Im Glück) |
| Size | Medium |
El Caballero | Boardgame |
|
|
|
Explore the New World, but keep your opponents out
This game is loosely based on El Grande, but is not an expansion etc. of El Grande.
The first thing to strike you when you open the box is that most of the box is empty, in fact you could fit the entire contents into a box a third the size. Do not be too disappointed as the game is very good nevertheless. The English version includes the original German expansion.
In many respects the play resembles El Grande. You bid to go first and the order cards determine how many caballeros get added to your court. You then spend these to try and gain a majority in the lands you discover. The tiles you place every turn which make up the discovered lands are water, land or a mixture. The most lucrative scores are made by monopolising the lands, and again second place gets some points too; but water traderoutes can also generate points.
You can kick players out by forcing their cabellero cards to border two land tiles.
The game rules are a bit hard to master initially. The game engine is a bit unusual and its easy to make rule mistakes while playing at first.
Visually, the game is very pretty, but it can occupy quite a bit of table space depending on how the players expand the game.
| Depth of Play | Good | Not great, but plenty of variety to keep you occupied |
|---|---|---|
| Ease of Play | Good | A little too abstract, you need to read the rules carefully |
| Production Quality | Very Good | Why the huge box ? Good quality card of course throughout |
| Rule Book | Very Good | A sample play would probably make it much easier to understand |
| Setup | Excellent | Very quick to setup |
| Value for Money | Good | An interesting variation on a theme |
| Overall | Good | An unusual game |