Brass: Birmingham (2018)

How To Play Brass: Birmingham

Set up the Board

To set up the board, place it in the middle of all players with the day or night side facing up. If there are less than 4 players, return all cards and Merchant tiles showing a player count greater than the number of players to the box. Place the decks of Wild Location and Wild Industry cards face up in their own Card Draw Area spaces. Shuffle the rest of the cards and place them in the Card Draw Area to serve as the Draw Deck.

Next, shuffle the rest of the Merchant tiles and place 1 of them facing up on each of the Merchant spaces that match the number of players in the game as indicated near the board’s edges. Place 1 beer barrel piece on each beer barrel space next to a Merchant tile that is not blank.

One black cube will go on each space of the Coal Market, with 1 space open that has 1 pound on it. Additionally, place 1 orange cube on each space in the Iron Market area and leave both number 1 spaces empty. The leftover cubes and beer barrels will go next to the board and serve as the General Supply. Lastly, place the money next to the board in its own area that will serve as the Bank.

Player Area setup

To set up the player area, each person will take a Player Mat as well as 17 pounds from the Bank. They will then choose a colored Character tile and the corresponding colored link tiles. Stack the Industry tiles that match the color (Cotton Mills, Coal Mines, Iron Works, Manufacturers, Potteries, and Breweries) on their own slots on the Player Mat with the black side facing down.

Players place Victory Point (VP) Markers on the 0 space of the Progress Track on the board and Income Markers start on the 10 space. Each player will draw 8 cards from the designated Draw Deck as their hand. One additional card is taken from the Draw Deck and placed face down in front of each player to start their Discard Pile.

Once the game board and all player areas are set up, everyone’s Character tiles will be shuffled together and placed in random order on the Turn Order Track.

Player Actions

Each round, players take turns according to the turn order track, receiving two actions to perform any of the following actions (found in the original game):

1. Build – Pay required resources and place an industry tile.
2. Network – Add a rail / canal link, expanding your network.
3. Develop – Increase the VP value of an industry.
4. Sell – Sell your cotton, manufactured goods and pottery.
5. Loan – Take a £30 loan and reduce your income.
6. Scout – Discard three cards and take a wild location and wild industry card. (This action replaces Double Action Build in original Brass.)

The game is played over two halves: the canal era (years 1770-1830) and the rail era (years 1830-1870). To win the game, score the most VPs. VPs are counted at the end of each half for the canals, rails and established (flipped) industry tiles.

Iron, coal, and cotton are three industries that appear in both the original Brass as well as in Brass: Birmingham.

New “Sell” system in Brass: Birmingham

Birmingham features three all-new industry types:

• Brewery – Produces precious beer barrels required to sell goods.
• Manufactured goods – Function like cotton, but features eight levels. Each level of manufactured goods provides unique rewards, rather than just escalating in VPs, making it a more versatile (yet potentially more difficult) path vs cotton.
• Pottery – These behemoths of Birmingham offer huge VPs, but at a huge cost and need to plan.

Brewing has become a fundamental part of the culture in Birmingham. To flip Cotton Mills, Manufacturers, and Potteries tiles, you must now perform Sell action to sell your product through traders located around the edges of the board. Each of these traders is looking for a specific type of good in each game.

To sell cotton, pottery, or manufactured goods to these traders, you must also “grease the wheels of industry” by consuming beer. For example, a level 1 cotton mill requires one beer to flip. As an incentive to sell early, the first player to sell to a trader receives free beer.

Besides, the game now increases Coal and Iron Market size. The price of coal and iron can now go up to £8 per cube, and it’s not uncommon.

How to win the Brass: Birmingham game

The object of the game is to gain the most Victory Points by the end of the Rail Era.

The Canal Era will end after the round where all players have exhausted their hands. When this happens, Victory Points will be added up for each player’s canal and rail links on the board as well as their flipped industry tiles. Level 1 Industry tiles will all be removed from the board and returned to the box, leaving all greater Industry tiles untouched. Players also reset the Merchant Beer in preparation for the Rail Era round.

Birmingham features dynamic scoring canals/rails. Instead of each flipped industry tile giving a static 1 VP to all connected canals and rails, many industries give 0 or even 2 VPs. This provides players with the opportunity to score much higher value canals in the first era and creates interesting strategies with industry placement.

The game ends when all players have used the final cards in their hands during the Rail Era. To score the game at the end of the Rail Era, players will follow the first 2 steps performed after the Canal Era: scoring canal links, rail links, and flipped industry tiles. The player with the most Victory Points at the end of the game is the winner.

Brass: Birmingham Review

“If I can expand beyond the Iron Man analogy, everything that made Brass: Lancashire a tabletop gamer’s delight was brewed, distilled, aged—add in any other process of refinement that you please—into Brass: Birmingham, an absolute treasure with economic sparring, industrial expansion, and riveting gameplay that will make you want to keep it on the table rather than put it back in the box.”

Devon Norris, gametyrant.com

“The high rankings and myriad rewards Brass Birmingham has received are certainly well deserved. The enticing art style, deep mechanics, and tons of replay value are worth learning the game for. With experience, more and more strategies will become apparent to you, and Brass Birmingham may just become your go-to Eurogame.”

Luka Kusic, gamecows.com

“There are so many strategy options in this game. So many paths to victory! Of course, that means that Brass Birmingham is prone to analysis paralysis and it can be moderate to severe, depending on the players and their tendencies for indecisiveness.

Myself, I can take 10 minutes a turn if allowed, because there are so many factors to consider when choosing an action. Each game I have tried to hone my strategy a bit more, exploring the nuances of each potential branch in the larger decision tree. I see hours and hours and hours of challenging game play ahead of me with Brass Birmingham and I look forward to it.”

Jenni Stephens, thatswhatjennisaid.com

The content of this article is originally from Board Game Geek and dbldkr.com. For more information and a better understanding of the game, you can watch the videos below.