The Tide, and three specialty cards. Photo: Jonathan Liu
The Basics
Rowboat is a new game from Moosetache Games for two to four players. It’s recommended for ages 13 and up, although I would think a younger kid who’s familiar with other trick-taking games might be able to pick this up. (Do younger kids still play Spades, though?) The website states that it can take anywhere from an hour to three hours, though the two-player games I’ve played were significantly shorter than that. Rowboat comes with 61 cards and a sand timer.
Rowboat looks a little more like a traditional card game at first: the cards have different, nautically-themed suits (Shells, Maps, Waves, and Oars) but the layouts are the same as what you’re used to from a poker deck. The Ace has been replaced by an Anchor; instead of the Jack, Queen and King, the high numbers are the Dolphin, Mermaid, Seeker, and Whale—so it’s basically like a poker deck with an additional card in the lineup. Bidding is similar to Spades, too: you bid on how many tricks you think you’ll take, and you get ten points per successful trick, plus one point for each trick you take over your bid which counts as a sandbag. Accumulate five sandbags and you lose 100 points. Don’t make your bid, and you lose ten times your bid, regardless of how close you came to it. First player to 200 points wins. So far, that’s all a fairly straightforward trick-taking game.
The Twist
What’s new is the Tide, Knobs, and a few specialty cards. Before the round begins, the dealer reveals the Tide: a series of cards (“ruling cards”) face-up in the center of the table, stopping when either all four suits are revealed or twelve cards have been played, whichever comes first. The Tide determines both the number of rounds in the next hand and the trump suit for each round. (For example, in the photo above, the hand will last eight rounds, and the trump suits will be: Shells, Waves, Waves, Oars, Waves, Shells, Waves, Maps.) I noticed after playing a few times that in cases where the Tide hits twelve cards and not all four suits have been revealed, you’re likely to have a lot of the remaining suits in your hand and not so many trumps, which makes bidding an interesting exercise in guesswork and probability.
On top of that, though, are the Knobs. (I’m really not sure how “knobs” fit into the whole nautical theme, but I’m not a sailor so who knows?) The Knob is the most powerful card in the round, and is the card with the same value and color as the ruling card in the Tide. So for the first round pictured above, the ruling card is the 6 of Shells (green), and the Knob is the 6 of Maps (also green). There’s also the “Off-Colored Knobs,” those cards that have the same value as the ruling card but in a different color—those are the most powerful non-trump cards in a round.
With the Tide, changing trump suits, and Knobs, it makes for some very interesting strategy over Spades. The rules say that you can leave out bidding for beginners, but for me it really adds a lot when you’re trying to figure out how best to match up the cards in your hand with the cards in the Tide.
Rowboat Specialty Cards. Image: Moosetache Games.
Each player (or team, in a four-player game) receives one of each card, which can be used only once during the entire game. The Rowboat is a super-trump, beating every other card in the game (and cannot be beaten by a second Rowboat). But it can’t be played on the last round of a hand. The Lighthouse allows you to look at your opponent’s hand for the duration of the included sand timer, which lasts roughly a minute. The Moon card can be played by the dealer before the Tide is revealed, and allows the dealer to declare the number of cards in the Tide (between four and twelve).
The Verdict
So far I’ve gotten to play a few two-player games of Rowboat and I’ve enjoyed them, and I imagine a four-player team game would be a lot of fun. That said, because my typical game nights tend to focus on big board games with lots of bits, I haven’t been able to entice as many of my regular gamers to try Rowboat. Next time I see my family, though, I think I’ll probably bring this along to see what they think. In the games I’ve played, we haven’t really used the specialty cards much, and I think the game has pretty good gameplay and strategy without them. In particular, the inclusion of the sand timer seems like something just to make the box a little bigger and doesn’t really add much value for me. (Then again, I’m a weird gamer who likes small, compact boxes.)
The one other thing that bugged me was the backwards 9—you can see it in the photo above. I was told that it was actually an intentional design decision which I won’t really get into and it’s certainly shouldn’t be the deciding factor in trying out the game, but it really messes with your brain while you’re playing, seeing that and trying to make it look right.
A video tutorial on how to play Rowboat is available on YouTube. Rowboat is available from a few game stores (with more locations coming soon), or from Amazon
Wired: The Tide and the Knobs make for a very fun and challenging variation on Spades.
Tired: I didn’t really care for the specialty cards or the sand timer.
The Giveaway
Moosetache Games is generously providing three copies of Rowboat so you can help spread the word about their debut!
You have two ways to win:
- Post a comment on this page (make sure you mention Rowboat so I know you’re not commenting about Myth: Pantheons).
- Tweet about it! You must include the hashtag #gdrowboat and a link to this review to be eligible.
Entries will be accepted until 11:59 pm (PST) on Friday, May 14, and we’ll draw three names at random to win the games.
Note: Moosetache Games provided a review copy of Rowboat.
