Disclosure: Meeple Mountain received a free copy of this product in exchange for an honest, unbiased review. This review is not intended to be an endorsement.

Rumble Nation is a game that you have to be careful reviewing, because you might end up writing something that takes longer to read than to just go purchase the game and play it three times.

It’s simple. There are eleven territories, with points numbered 2-12. You want to win them so you can win the game. On your turn, you roll three dice. You sum two of those dice to determine the territory, and the third determines how many armies you put out. There are tiebreaker tokens that go to the players who place all their armies first, and tactics cards that you can use instead of rolling the dice, though each player can only use one per game. They just do the occasional maneuver.

But, the real juice is the endgame.

You start with territory 2, resolve, and then go to territory 3, territory 4, etc. The winner of each gets the points, second place gets less points, and the winner gets to “reinforce” territories where they have adjacent troops with extra troops.

That’s it.

Refined cleverness

I don’t really like El Grande that much. All the euro-heads scream for my execution whenever I say this, but I just don’t find area majority a compelling conflict mechanism, mainly because it is less cleverness and subtlety than it is a marriage of bean-counting and passive conflict.

I like Rumble Nation, mainly because it takes 15 minutes, and that short playtime gives it a frenetic pace and loads each decision with meaning. You’re at the mercy of die rolls, but each roll gives you 3 choices (less if you roll doubles or triples). My friends, you can do a lot of damage with only 3 choices per turn.

Recommended for the stodgy bean counter in your life.