Expeditions Around the World

• Designer: Wolfgang Kramer
• Publisher: Super Meeple
• Players: 2-5
• Age: 8+
• Time: 30-45 minutes
• Played with review copy provided by Hachette USA (distributor)

Embark on an adventurous race around the world in Expeditions: Around the World! Discover extraordinary destinations, immerse yourself in new cultures, encounter exotic wildlife, and marvel at stunning landscapes!  Three expeditions depart from Northern Europe, engaging every player in each thrilling journey. With secret destinations in mind, players aim to influence expeditions, reaching as many as possible to shape courses and score victory points. Experience detailed, stunning artwork, and fascinating facts on each location card. Get ready for a tabletop journey, where every location card is a ticket to explore the world. Let the wonders of travel unfold in the palm of your hands with Expeditions!

The board depicts a world map, with 80 green circle Locations on the board. Dotted lines connect these with some intermediate spaces (red stars and blue squares).  The deck of Location cards is shuffled and each player gets a hand of cards – these are the player’s personal objectives; Players should look and make sure that all of their cards are at least 3 paths away from the starting point found in Northern Europe (these cards have a special bullseye icon on them to make it easy to notice).  If you have a card which is too close, discard it to the bottom of the deck and draw a new card. Continue doing this until all the cards are compliant.  As you are doing this, make sure that you find the locations of all of your cards on the board. The remainder of the deck becomes the Expedition deck.  The top 6 cards are dealt out to the table as common objectives.  Players choose a player color, take the 4 tokens in that color as well as three Tickets.  Starting with the first player, each player marks one of their Personal Locations on the map with a token of their color; this becomes a Key Location.  Repeat this until all players have marked 4 of their hand card Locations on the board. 

As the game starts, the 3 different expeditions will start from Northern Europe and travel around the board.  There are 3 different colors of arrows (red, blue and yellow), one for each. These expeditions do not belong to any particular player. They are independent of each other, and arrows from multiple expeditions can be on the same path.  On a player’s turn, you must advance one of the three expeditions by laying an arrow heading outward from the city at the end of its current path (the arrowheads on the arrows remind you of the direction of the path).  The path cannot double back on itself.  Once the arrow is placed, a few things can happen:

• If any player notices that the newly placed arrow has arrived at one of their Objective locations, they say so, reveal the card and lay it on the table.  If it had a Token on it, this is collected as well.  Note that you must announce this on the turn which the location was reached; if you miss it – you cannot claim it later unless another expedition arrow again reaches this location
• If a common Objective location is reached, the active player takes that card and places it on the table in front of him; a new Common objective is revealed from the deck to always have a tableau of 6 available
• If a blue square is reached, the player can place another arrow to any Expedition
• If a red star is reached, the player collects a Ticket.  Players can use up to 2 tickets per turn. They can be used to: add an additional arrow to any Expedition, to remove the last arrow of an expedition, or to draw 2 Expedition cards from the deck and then discarding any one card from their new hand.
• If the expedition forms a closed loop of paths (i.e. there is no free arrowhead), the player immediately places a new arrow from any spot which the expedition has visited to form a new trailhead.

The game continues until either: one player has revealed all the cards in their hand OR all the arrows are on the map.  At this point, players calculate their scores:

• 1 VP per completed objective
• 1 VP per token collected
• -1 VP per token left on the board
• -1 VP per objective card still in your hand

The highest total wins. Ties broken in favor of having the most Tickets remaining.

My thoughts on the game

Well this is like the fourth or fifth version of this game to make it to my table, and though it’s an old design, it is well loved and I still enjoy playing it.  I’ll admit that I haven’t really thought about playing Expedition or Wildlife Adventure in quite some time, so getting the new version was a nice reminder of how much I have enjoyed this game in the past.

There is a lot of joy in getting to replay this classic. The game limits the number of actions per turn, and you seemingly always want to do one more thing that you have the ability to do.  Additionally, you always have to be aware of what options you are leaving for the next player.  Arrows can often be immobile for a number of turns exactly three spaces away from a common objective; as no one wants to give the next player an easy point.  

That being said; sometimes you just have to suck it up and let the next guy have a common objective because there is a premium on getting your secret personal locations – once a pathway passes a space by, it is sometimes quite hard to get it to come back around.  Using the special abilities of the tickets is also a great way to make a somewhat unexpected play and snag objective cards that seemed out of reach.

One other key strategy (for me at least) is to build a closed loop, as this lets you then branch off of any point on that loop, and this is a great way to get the arrows heading in the direction that you want them to go.

Lots of other game places to be found here!

I do like the new art direction of this version; I find the map attractive with some details printed on the continents/islands of the world.   I will note that this opinion is not shared by everyone who has played the game with me.  For some, the background illustrations on the board are ery distracting and make it much harder to see the arrows.  The cards also have vivid illustrations and some interesting facts to read about the different locations.  So, this would be my fourth version of the game in the Gaming Basement, and I doubt that they all need to stay (Abenteuer Wildlife, Expedition, Terra X and this) – but, then again, I haven’t been able to let any of the other three go either because I just like this game that much. 

This game remains one that I’m always happy to play, and one of the first games to introduce me to our wonderful hobby.  An unmitigated I love it!

Thoughts from other Opinionated Gamers

Mark Jackson: While I haven’t played this new edition, any chance for this excellent and streamlined game system to be available to new folks is a net good for the universe. My German copy of Expedition is one of the treasured pieces of my collection… and it was #87 on my list of top 100 favorite games this year.

Pro tip: Watch the number of arrows left in each expedition – other players can run them out to keep you from certain sections of the board.

Larry:  I played the original Expedition a couple of times about 20 years ago.  It’s an unquestioned classic and I can see the appeal, but it didn’t particularly, uh, float my boat.  There’s a little less control than I prefer and the potential for a lot of frustration as the paths swerve away from what you’d like.  Not really my kind of game.

Ratings from the Opinionated Gamers

• I love it! Dale, Mark Jackson, Eric M.
• I like it. John P
• Neutral. Larry
• Not for me…