Stamp Collection

• Designer: Michael Schacht
• Publisher: Trefl
• Players: 2-4
• Age: 8+
• Time: 45 minutes
• Played with review copy provided by Trefl

In Stamp Collection you will play the role of philatelists whose goal is to gather a collection of unique postage stamps from around the world! Each element of the collection must be placed in the stamp album in a thoughtful way to score as many points as possible.

To set up, each player takes a player board (for the appropriate player count), one gold coin, and one silver coin.  Each player board comes with one printed mount (blue square) on the board. The 88 tiles are shuffled and one is placed on each of the 8 slots on the stamp fair board.  A gold coin is put on each of the slots in between the rows of stamps.

Players take turns in clockwise order – and on a turn, they do one of two actions:

A] Take a gold coin from the Stamp Fair board

B] Buy a Tile (stamp, mount, storage slot) and put it in their album. The cost is a number of silver coins (worth 1) equal to the number of gold coins still on the Stamp Fair board. You must be able to legally place the tile somewhere in order to buy it.  You must also be able to afford it.  If you can’t you have the option of taking a loan tile, which gives you 3 coins, but you will eventually need 4 coins to pay it back.  You may only have one loan marker at a time.

• Mounts come in 6 colors, matching the colors of the stamps. The first mount of a color can be placed anywhere on your board. Further mounts of that same color must be adjacent to a mount of that same color.  Pay the cost if there is one printed on that space when you place the mount.  If you place a mount that matches the color of a stamp in storage, that stamp must be taken out of storage and immediately put in your album.
• Stamps come in 6 colors and you cannot put a stamp in your album until you have a mount of that color; they can otherwise be placed in an empty Storage space.  If you place a stamp in your album, you attract the connoisseur of the matching color. If you already have a connoisseur there, you get a box of chocolate with each successive connoisseur that arrives.  Also, if you place a stamp, check to see if you meet the criteria on any of the bonus tiles, and if so, collect those bonus tiles.
• Storage spaces can hold a stamp (but not a mount) that you buy that you aren’t ready to place yet. You can add one storage space to your board, next to the one that comes printed on it  

This continues until the end of the round is triggered – when any one of the three rows on the Stamp Fair board is empty.  Discard any unchosen tiles, then refill the board.  For the final round of the game, you’ll have to use the discarded tiles to refill the board.  At the end of the twelfth round, the scores are tallied.

1 VP per space on your album that is covered by a mount, stamp or storage slot (max 18)

1 VP per box of chocolates collected

VP per bonus tile collected

-2VP per unpaid loan

Most points wins. Ties broken in favor of the player with the most money left over.

My thoughts on the game

I’ll admit that I didn’t do that much research on the Trefl games prior to the show other than At The Office.  I was intrigued to see a Schacht game on the list of releases, as it has been a few years since I’d played one of his designs.  As it turns out, Stamp Collection is a re-skin of California, a 2006 release that I had honestly forgotten that I still owned!  As far as I can tell (and remember) – the rules seem the same, just the theme has changed from interior decorating to stamp collecting.

The market system is clever with players having to decide whether to buy a tile or to take money (which then makes all tiles cheaper for everyone else). Early in the game, players are often more likely to take money – in part to build up for later turns but also because you might not yet have a specific plan in place and you’re not really targeting any particular tile yet and you’re willing to wait until they get cheaper to take a tile or two.

The games tend to be close affairs. Most stamp albums are nearly full by the end of the game, and as a result, the bulk of the differential scoring comes from chocolate and bonus tiles.  As people realize this, what seems like an easy going game becomes fairly tense as each decision looms more and more important.  The race for bonus tiles becomes fierce, and suddenly, it becomes worthwhile to take out a loan to make sure you can get a tile that you covet.  Loans are not without risk (and cost); and as I said, as games are close, you usually want to be able to pay off the loan before the end of the game as the -2VP penalty can all the difference. As such, keeping an eye on the bonus tiles is a key strategic point, and trying to secure them is a good way to determine which tiles you want.

The components are nice, and frankly, much more attractive than the Uberplayi 2006 version.  The rules translation I have is fairly clear, though it maybe helps that I’ve played California before. I will say that the section on bonus tiles isn’t very clear in Stamp Collector, and I had to read the California rules to get an explanation for how the criteria on the bonus tiles work.

Many of the decisions seem straightforward in the game, and playing Stamp Collection reminded me of just how solid a game the original was (which is likely why I still have it in my collection).  It doesn’t try to do too many things – but then again, that is really how games were way back when… (I mean, I remember thinking that Caylus was so confusingly complex when it first came out!)   That being said, it’s not a particularly sexy title either.  Everything works, there are some tough decisions to be made in the 30-40 minute time frame, but at the same point – there is never a “wow!” move to be made.  California was a game I liked in 2006 and felt was good enough to stay in the collection; Stamp Collection is a game I still like in 2023, which still feels like a game from 2006, and I’m glad to have a more attractive version of that same game.

Ratings from the Opinionated Gamers

• I love it!
• I like it. Dale Y
• Neutral.
• Not for me…