Stamp Swap
- Designer: Paul Salomon
- Publisher: Stonemaier Games
- Players: 1-5
- Age: 14+
- Time: 20-60 minutes
- Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4fjwGPb
- Played with review copy provided by publisher
Designer Paul Salomon (Honey Buzz, Genotype) brings stamp collecting to life on tabletops in Stamp Swap! Draft from a public pool of face-down and face-up tiles (along with some bonus cards), then simultaneously divide them into 2 groups. You will select one group from another player and keep the group of yours that isn’t selected. Organize your growing collection each round and score 1 of 4 goals–choose wisely, as you can’t score that goal again.
The art of stamp collecting is not just in accumulating many stamps, but in collecting high-quality stamps (including rare gold-foil stamps). This 3-round game for 1-5 players is your chance to meet other attendees, put together a beautiful and well-focused stamp collection, and show it off in a series of contests. Do well and you may walk away with the top prize at this year’s Stamp Swap!
To set up, each player takes a player mat from the box, a reference card and the 3 show tickets in their color. The game board is placed on the table, and one of each of the four types of contest cards is chosen randomly and placed on the board. The stamps are sorted by size and placed in facedown stacks. Finally the Attendee and Event decks of cards are shuffled and kept nearby.
The game is played over three rounds, each of which is split up into 3 phases 1] Collect Phase, 2] Swap Phase, 3] Show Phase.
To start each round, flip up a number of Event cards equal to the number of players. Splay them so that each covers the text of the card above it. Read aloud the text on the top card of the stack; this is the single event that occurs this round. Now, look at all the icons on the top halves visible on the cards. Get the matching things from the supply to create the pool of items to draft from this round. Note that some are face up and some are face down.
1] Collect Phase – the First Player places the First Player marker into the pool and then selects any item they want from the pool and places it in their Daily Collection area. If you choose a face-down stamp, you may look at it as you draw it, but keep it face down in your Collection area. If you draw a Specialist card, it is immediately active as long as it is in your area. The next player then chooses a thing from the pool, and this continues until all players have drafted exactly six things into their Collection area. If the First Player token has not been chosen, the player who drafted last takes the First-Player token (though it does not count as something they drafted).
2] Swap Phase – players now look at the six things in their Collection area, and they reserve one thing for themselves, putting it in the Reserve area of their mat. Now, take the remaining five things and split them into 2 piles (3-2 or 4-1), keeping facedown things facedown. Once all players have finished making piles, the player who now owns the first player token takes a turn. That player chooses a pile from an opponent and places it on their Reserve area. The player who was chosen from takes their remaining pile back into their Reserve area and then chooses a pile from an opponent. (If you have already taken a turn and someone chooses one of your piles, the first player to your right who is still in the round takes the next turn). If only one player is left, they take back both of their piles.
3] Show Phase – Players now add all their uplaced items to their player mat. Put any exhibitor and specialist cards to the right of your player mat, making sure that all cards can be seen. All the stamps are placed in their album; keeping the orientation such that the cancellation mark is always top right. You must place a stamp if possible. Then, score points per your Exhibitor cards. If you have the first player token, score 2 pts. Finally, choose one of the contest cards that does not have your ticket on it, place your ticket on it, and then score that contest given your current situation.
The round is now over. Discard the top event card and return the others to the deck. Discard any unchosen items in the pool, move the turn marker one space forward and then repeat. If this is the end of the third round, instead move into the Final Show phase (end game scoring):
- Forever Stamps – score 10/6/3 for most/2nd/3rd most
- Stamp Values – sum the values of all the stamps in your book and score that
- Specialist Cards – 2 points each
- Finale Contest Card – all players score the Finale Contest Card (no ticket required)
The player with the most points wins. Ties broken in favor of the most valuable sum of rare stamps.
My thoughts on the game
Stamp Swap brings the world of stamp collecting to the table, making us all philatelists. The main thrust of the game is the I split / you choose mechanism – which is repeated in each of the rounds here. This is combined with a bit of drafting that also adds an extra layer of intrigue to the game. More often than not, you’ll keep one of your two stacks, so as you draft, you’re trying to put together a set of things that you want while at the same time trying to find a group of things that someone else will want more (and thus choose it from you). Most rounds will provide you something you want as you are able to reserve one of your six drafted things for yourself (though never a rare stamp!). However, the art of the game is figuring out how to get the most out of what you choose from others and what is left behind for you by someone else.
The game is mid weight and plays fairly quickly. Though obviously player count has some effect on the length (more drafting, more choosing of piles with more players) – the swap meet portion happens simultaneously, so players are engaged with the game for a good proportion of the time. With my group, once everyone is familiar with the rules, I’d be surprised if this went over 30-40 minutes regardless of player count.
As I mentioned earlier, there are some interesting decisions to be made in the drafting and splitting/choosing. When you get to the Show Phase, you then have to decide where to put those stamps into your album and how to best use your Specialists and Exhibitor cards. Further, you will choose a different Contest card each round, so trying to work things so that your book scores well for one Contest now and sets up well for a different Contest later is something to plan for. And, of course, everyone knows what the Final Show scoring criteria is from the start – and it’s wise to plan ahead for that last opportunity to score points as well. I feel that the scoring rules are fairly well explained on the cards, and there are helpful clarifications in the final pages of the rulebook.
Rules are all in the book but maybe not in the best arrangement for me. An important rule that you cannot reserve a Rare stamp in the splitting phase is not included until the definitions of the stamps that comes after the endgame scoring section. Otherwise, the rulebook is good in the sense that all the rules are in there somewhere and you should not need to refer to outside sources. That being said, rather than having 4 pages of Clarifications at the end of the rules, I’d much prefer these bits to be in the mainline flow of text. Set them apart in dialogue boxes if you want, but man, it’s hard to find and remember rules when they’re not all grouped together in the book itself. Of course, the issue could be me and not the book; it’s just not laid out in a way that worked for me. Obviously, YMMV. And, if you don’t like reading rules, you can find a link to a rules video to learn that way.
The components are gorgeous. Stonemaier has a strong track record of making beautiful games, and this is no exception. The artwork on the stamps is amazing as is the overall art direction. The gold foiled rare stamps are definitely the most eye-catching feature of the game. The quality even extends to the rules… who knew you needed linen finish rulebooks? One last note – the boxes are numbered. Not sure if this is interesting or not, but I don’t know if I’ve really seen this before on a Euro game. The one downside is that it is not always apparent to see the theme of a stamp; there is no icon to help you along. There were more than a few stamps that we had to pass around and make a group decision on what theme that stamp should fit in. That’s no bueno when you’re rewarded for stamps of a particular theme. Also, when you ask about a stamp, you’re signaling interest in it which could give someone else an advantage as they’re trying to split up their drafted tiles.
Stamp Swap is a good, possibly great, game. Thematically and visually, it really checks off a lot of boxes. Add in some good decisions in a medium time frame, and it is definitely a game that should hit the table a lot. If we did this sort of thing, surely this game would earn a “stamp of approval”.
Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/4fjwGPb
Thoughts from other Opinionated Gamers
Mark Jackson (1 play): While the game is undeniably pretty to look at, some of the UI choices make the play of the game actively more difficult. More than once, we had to decide if a particular stamp fit a theme – and the size of some of the stamps made reading them across the table difficult in a game with a full complement of players.
Dan B. (1 play): I like I split/you choose in general and this game has some good things in it, but it didn’t quite work for me. Part of it is the number of extra bits added, like the events and the specialists, which I am not convinced do anything except add time. Part of it is the scoring – possibly we just had a bad mix of contests, but later in the game my choices grew fairly uninteresting as just about any lot I could take would score about the same number of points. Possibly I would like it more with fewer players (we had five) which would might make the lot-choosing more interesting.
Ratings from the Opinionated Gamers
- I love it!
- I like it. Dale Y, Steph, Craig M.
- Neutral.Joe H., John P, Mark Jackson, Dan B.
- Not for me…
