I really enjoy tile laying mechanics in games, or as I call them competitive puzzle building. Cacao by Phil Walker-Harding, is one of the latest games to use this style. Players will build plantations, villages, markets and temples all in an effort to grow and sell the delicious bean, responsible for a little thing called chocolate.
They both have similar size tiles, make use of meeples and have a scoring system based on the landscape that you and your opponents will build together. In Cacao there are public jungle tiles that everyone has access to and personal tiles that represent your villages. Each player owns an identical set of villages. Everyone starts with a hand of three personal tiles and on their turn they will play a tile and then draw back up.
Personal tiles must be placed orthogonally to public tiles and diagonally from other personal tiles. In this way a checker board effect is created between the two types. When an open space is created with two worker tiles it must be filled in with a jungle tile.
There is a face-up display of two jungle tiles available and the active player will choose which tile to fill the open space with. The new tile will be activated for current played and also the other player who shares a side with the new tile.
Jungle tiles have things like cacao plantations, temples, markets and mines on them. For each worker the jungle tile can be activated. So the two workers on the side of a plantation will produce two cacao beans, one worker at a market means you can sell one of those beans at the going rate for money. And money just as often is the case in real life is the ultimate goal. Activations can be done in any order, so finding profitable combinations is key to placement.
